Robert de Beaumont, 2nd Earl of Leicester
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Robert de Beaumont, 2nd Earl of Leicester | |
---|---|
Chief Richard de Luci | |
Lord High Steward | |
In office 1154–1168 | |
Monarch | Henry II |
Succeeded by | The 3rd Earl of Leicester |
Personal details | |
Born | 1104 |
Died | 5 April 1168 Elizabeth de Vermandois |
Robert de Beaumont, 2nd Earl of Leicester (1104 – 5 April 1168) was Justiciar of England 1155–1168.[1]
The surname "de Beaumont" was given to him by genealogists. The only known contemporary surname applied to him is "Robert son of Count Robert". Henry Knighton, a fourteenth-century chronicler, calls him Robert "Le Bossu" (meaning "Robert the Hunchback" in French). The manuscript Genelogies of the Erles of Lecestre and Chester[1] states that he was "surnamed Boissu", and mentions him by the names Robert Boissu, Robert Beamond and Robert Beaumonde.
Early life and education
Robert was an
The two brothers, Robert and Waleran, were adopted into the royal household shortly after their father's death in June 1118 (upon which Robert inherited his father's second title of Earl of Leicester).
Both twins were literate, and Abingdon Abbey later claimed to have been Robert's school, but though this is possible, its account is not entirely trustworthy. An early treatise on astronomy (the "Leicester Iudicia") carries a dedication "to Earl Robert of Leicester, that man of affairs and profound learning, most accomplished in matters of law" who can only be this Robert.[4][5] On his death he left his own psalter to the abbey he founded at Leicester, which was still in its library in the late fifteenth century. The existence of this indicates that like many noblemen of his day, Robert followed the canonical hours in his chapel.
Career at the Norman court
In 1120 Robert was declared of age and inherited most of his father's lands in England, while his twin brother took the French lands. However, in 1121 royal favor brought to Robert the great Norman Honors of Breteuil and Pacy-sur-Eure, through his marriage to Amice de Gael, daughter of a Breton noble whom the king had imposed upon the Honor after the forfeiture of the Breteuil family in 1119.[3] Robert spent a good deal of his time and resources over the next decade integrating the troublesome and independent barons of Breteuil into the greater complex of his estates. He did not join in his brother's great Norman rebellion against King Henry I in 1123–24. He appears fitfully at Henry I's royal court (despite his brother's imprisonment) until 1129, but thereafter the twins were frequently there together.
Robert held lands throughout England. During the 1120s and 1130s, he tried to rationalize his estates in Leicestershire. Leicestershire estates of the
In 1135, the twins were present at King Henry's deathbed.
Civil war in England
The outbreak of
The
Earl Robert's principal activity between 1141 and 1149 was his private war with
Earl Robert and Henry Plantagenet
The arrival in England of Duke Henry, son of the Empress Matilda, in January 1153 was a great opportunity for Earl Robert. He was probably in negotiation with Henry in that spring, and reached an agreement under which he defected to him by May 1153, when the duke restored his Norman estates to the earl. The duke celebrated his Pentecost court at Leicester in June 1153, and he and the earl were constantly in company until the peace settlement between the duke and the king at Winchester in November 1153. Earl Robert crossed with the duke to Normandy in January 1154 and resumed his Norman castles and honours. As part of the settlement, his claim to be chief steward of England and Normandy was recognised by Henry.
Earl Robert began his career as
He died on 5 April 1168,
Church patronage
Robert founded and patronised many religious establishments. He founded
About the year 1150, Robert le Bossu, Earl of Leicester, gave to one Solomon, a clerk, an acre of land at Brackley on which to build a house of hospitality for the poor, together with a free chapel and graveyard.[17]
Family and children
Robert married after 1120 Amice de Gael,[18] daughter of Raoul II de Gael, himself a son of Ralph de Gael, Earl of East Anglia and Emma Fitz Osborn Both families had lost their English inheritances through rebellion in 1075. They had four children:
- Hawise de Beaumont, who married William Fitz Robert, 2nd Earl of Gloucesterand had descendants.
- Robert de Beaumont, 3rd Earl of Leicester who married Petronilla de Grandmesnil and had descendants.
- Isabel, who married Simon de St. Liz, Earl of Huntingdon and had descendants.
- Margaret, who married Ralph IV de Toeni and had descendants through their daughter, Ida de Tosny.
Literary references
He is a major character in The Holy Thief and a minor character in Brother Cadfael's Penance, of the Brother Cadfael series by Ellis Peters. He is also a major character in Cecelia Holland's novel The Earl.
References
- ^ Round, J. Horace (1885). . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 04. pp. 66–67.
- ^ J.H. Round, D.N.B., citing Ordericus Vitalis, Ecclesiastical History, Book XI, chapter 6: see T. Forrester (ed. and transl.), The Ecclesiastical History of England and Normandy by Ordericus Vitalis, 4 vols (Henry G. Bohn, London 1854-1856), III, p. 348 (Hathi Trust). The name "Isabella" corresponds to "Elizabeth".
- ^ a b J.H. Round, D.N.B., citing Ordericus Vitalis, Book XII Chapter 33: see Forrester (1854-1856), IV, pp. 58-60 (Hathi Trust).
- ^ This work was a reworking of Raymond of Marseilles's Liber Iudiciorum of c. 1140: British Library, MS Royal 12 E XXV (bl.uk); see also D. Juste, "London, British Library, Royal 12.E.XXV", and Oxford, Bodleian Library, Digby 57 in 'Ptolemaeus Arabus et Latinus, PAL project, dirig. Prof. Dr. D.N. Hasse, Würzburg' (ptolemaeus.badw.de).
- ^ C. Burnett, 'Towards the identity of a Toledan translator', in (G. Beaujouan), Comprendre et maîtriser la nature au Moyen Age: Mélanges d'Histoire des Sciences Offerts à Guy Beaujouan, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Sect IV: Sciences historiques et philologiques, V: Hautes Etudes Médiévales et Modernes, 73 (Librairie Droz S.A., Geneva/Librairie Champion, Paris 1994), at p. 431 (Google).
- ^ J.H. Round, D.N.B., citing Ordericus Vitalis, Book XIII chapter 19: see Forrester (1854-1856), IV, at p. 150 (Hathi Trust).
- ^ J.H. Round, D.N.B., citing Ordericus Vitalis, Book XIII chapter 40: see Forrester (1854-1856), IV, pp. 209-11 (Hathi Trust).
- ^ a b c Powicke Handbook of British Chronology p. 69
- ^ 'Abbey of St Mary de Pre, or de Pratis, near Leicester', in W. Dugdale, ed. J. Caley, H. Ellis and B. Bandinel, Monasticon Anglicanum: A History of the Abbeys and other Monasteries (etc.), New Edition (James Bohn, London 1846), Vol. VI Part 1, pp. 462-68 (Google).
- ^ 'House of Cistercian monks: The abbey of Garendon', in W.G. Hoskins and R.A. McKinley (eds), A History of the County of Leicestershire, II (VCH, London 1954), pp. 5-7 (British History Online, accessed 7 September 2022).
- ^ 'Houses of Benedictine nuns: Priory of Nuneaton', in W. Page (ed.), A History of the County of Warwick, II (VCH, London 1908), pp. 66-70 (British History Online, accessed 7 September 2022).
- ^ 'Luffield Priory in Northamptonshire', in Dugdale, ed. Caley et al., Monasticon Anglicanum (James Bohn, London 1846), Vol. IV, pp. 345-54 (Google).
- ^ 'Colleges: St Mary de Castro', in W.G. Hoskins and R.A. McKinley (eds), A History of the County of Leicestershire, II (VCH, London 1954), pp. 45-46 (British History Online, accessed 7 September 2022).
- ^ 'Alien houses: The priory of Wareham', in W. Page (ed.), A History of the County of Dorset, II (VCH, London 1908), pp. 121-22 (British History Online, accessed 7 September 2022).
- ^ 'XIII. Prieuré de Notre-Dame du Désert', in Histoire des Baux-de-Breteuil et Fondation du prieuré du Nôtre-Dame du Désert, pdf, pp. 19-24 (bibnum.enc.sorbonne.fr).
- ^ 'House of Knights Hospitallers: Preceptory of Dalby and Heather', in W.G. Hoskins and R.A. McKinley (eds), A History of the County of Leicestershire, II (VCH, London 1954), pp. 32-33 (British History Online, accessed 7 September 2022).
- ^ 'Hospitals: St James & St John, Brackley', in R.M. Serjeantson and W.R.D. Adkins (eds), A History of the County of Northampton, II (VCH, London 1906), pp. 151-53 (British History Online, accessed 7 September 2022).
- ^ King, Edmund, ed. (2001). The Anarchy of King Stephen's Reign. Oxford University Press. p. 98.
Sources
- D. Crouch, The Beaumont Twins: the Roots and Branches of Power in the Twelfth Century (Cambridge 1986).
- D. Crouch, The Reign of King Stephen, 1135-1154 (London 2000).
- E. King, "Mountsorrel and its region in King Stephen's Reign", Huntington Library Quarterly, 44 (1980), 1–10.
- J. Storey, J. Bourne and R. Buckley (eds), Leicester Abbey (Leicester 2006).
- Powicke, F. Mauriceand E. B. Fryde, Handbook of British Chronology 2nd edition (Royal Historical Society, London 1961).
- British Library MS Royal 12.E.XXV.
- U Penn Ms. Codex 1070: "Genelogies Of The Erles Of Lecestre And Chester"