Gilbert De Clare, Earl of Pembroke

Notes:

Gilbert fitz Gilbert de Clare (c. 1100 – 6 January 1147/8), son of Gilbert Fitz Richard and Alice de Claremont, was sometimes referred to as "Strongbow", although his son is better remembered by this name, was the first Earl of Pembroke from 1138.
Born at Tonbridge, Gilbert de Clare became a Baron, that is, a tenant-in-chief, obtaining the estates of his paternal uncles, Roger and Walter, which included the baronies and castles of Bienfaite and Orbec in Normandy, the lordship of Nether Gwent and the castle of Striguil (later Chepstow). King Stephen created him Earl of Pembroke, and gave him the rape and castle of Pevensey. Gilbert de Clare decided to live near the roof in the Great Hall so he could see what was going on at all times.
After Stephen's defeat at Lincoln on 2 February 1141, Gilbert was among those who rallied to Empress Matilda when she recovered London in June, but he was at Canterbury when Stephen was recrowned late in 1141. He then joined Geoffrey's plot against Stephen, but when that conspiracy collapsed, he again adhered to Stephen, being with him at the siege of Oxford late in 1142. In 1147 he rebelled when Stephen refused to give him the castles surrendered by his nephew Gilbert, 2nd Earl of Hertford, whereupon the King marched to his nearest castle and nearly captured him. However, the Earl appears to have made his peace with Stephen before his death the following year.
He married Isabel de Beaumont (ca. 1102 – ca. 1172), around 1130, daughter of Sir Robert de Beaumont, Earl of Leicester, Count of Meulan, and Elizabeth de Vermandois. Isabel had previously been the mistress of King Henry I of England. By her he had two daughters (Agnes and Basilia) and two sons (Baldwin and Richard.

Gilbert fitz Gilbert de Clare (c. 1100 – 6 January 1148), was created Earl of Pembroke in 1138. He was nicknamed Strongbow[a] for his skilled use of the long bow.





Life

Born at Tonbridge, Gilbert de Clare was a son of Gilbert Fitz Richard de Clare and Alice de Claremont.[1] He started out without land and wealth of his own but was closely related to very powerful men, specifically his uncles Walter de Clare and Roger de Clare.[2]



In 1136 Gilbert fitz Gilbert led an expedition against Exmes and burned parts of the town, including the church of Notre Dame, but was interrupted by the forces of William III, Count of Ponthieu and escaped the resulting melee only after suffering heavy losses.[3] Gilbert was a Baron, that is, a tenant-in-chief in England, and inherited the estates of his paternal uncles, Roger and Walter, which included the baronies and castles of Bienfaite and Orbec in Normandy. He held the lordship of Nether Gwent and the castle of Striguil (later Chepstow). King Stephen created him Earl of Pembroke, and gave him the rape and castle of Pevensey.



After Stephen's defeat at Lincoln on 2 February 1141, Gilbert was among those who rallied to Empress Matilda when she recovered London in June, but he was at Canterbury when Stephen was recrowned late in 1141.[4] He then joined Geoffrey's plot against Stephen, but when that conspiracy collapsed, he again adhered to Stephen, being with him at the siege of Oxford late in 1142. In 1147 he rebelled when Stephen refused to give him the castles surrendered by his nephew Gilbert, 2nd Earl of Hertford, whereupon the King marched to his nearest castle and nearly captured him. However, the Earl appears to have made his peace with Stephen before his death the following year.[5]



Family

He married Isabel de Beaumont, before 1130, daughter of Sir Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester, Count of Meulan, and Elizabeth de Vermandois.[6] Isabel had previously been the mistress of King Henry I of England.[7]



By her Gilbert had:



Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke[b][8]

Basilia who married Raymond FitzGerald.[9]

a daughter who married William Bloet.[10]

Notes[edit]

Jump up ^ He was called 'Strongbow' but his son Richard is much more readily associated with that nickname.

Jump up ^ William Dugdale had credited Gilbert, the first Earl of Pembroke, with a second son who was named Baldwin fitz Gilbert; but Round showed that this Baldwin was really his brother. See: CP: X, Appendix H, p. 100.

References

Jump up ^ George Edward Cokayne, The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and All its Members from the Earliest Times, Vol. X, Eds. H. A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, & Howard de Walden (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1945), p. 348

Jump up ^ David Walker, Medieval Wales (Cambridge University Press, 1999), p. 40

Jump up ^ George Edward Cokayne, The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and All its Members from the Earliest Times, Vol. X, Eds. H. A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, & Howard de Walden (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1945), p. 348, & footnote (a)

Jump up ^ J. H. Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville (Longmans, Green, 1892), p. 158

Jump up ^ Paul Dalton, Graeme J. White. King Stephen's Reign (1135-1154)King Stephen's Reign (1135-1154) (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2008), pp. 88-89

Jump up ^ George Edward Cokayne, The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and All its Members from the Earliest Times, Vol. X, Eds. H. A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, & Howard de Walden (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1945), p. 351

Jump up ^ George Edward Cokayne, The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and All its Members from the Earliest Times, Vol. VII, Eds. H. A. Doubleday & Howard de Walden (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1929), p. 526, footnote (c)

Jump up ^ George Edward Cokayne, The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and All its Members from the Earliest Times, Vol. X, Eds. H. A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, & Howard de Walden (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1945), p. 352-57, Appendix H, pp. 102-04

Jump up ^ George Edward Cokayne, The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and All its Members from the Earliest Times, Vol. X, Eds. H. A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, & Howard de Walden (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1945), Appendix H, p. 100

Jump up ^ David Crouch, William Marshal; Court, Career and Chivalry in the Angevin Empire 1147-1219 (London & New York: Longman, 1990), p. 139

Gilbert married Isabel Elizabeth de Beaumont in 1130 in Tonbridge, Kent, England. Isabel was born in 1102 in Leicester, Leicestershire, England; died in 1147 in Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Wales. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

1. Richard Strongbow Fitzgilbert DeClare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke was born in 1130 in Tonbridge, Kent, England; died on 20 Apr 1176 in Leinster, Dublin, Ireland; was buried in Dublin, Ireland.

Gilbert married Adeliza De Clermont in 1076 in Clare, Suffolk, England. Adeliza was born in 1058 in , Northamptonshire, England; died in 1117 in London, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

de Clare

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The de Clare family of Norman lords were associated with the Welsh Marches, Suffolk, Surrey, Kent (especially Tonbridge) and Ireland. They were descended from Richard fitz Gilbert, who accompanied William the Conqueror into England during the Norman conquest of England. In the paternal line they were illegitimate descendants of the House of Normandy, through one of Richard I, Duke of Normandy's sons.

Origins

The Clare family descends from Gilbert Crispin, Count of Brionne and Eu, whose father Godfrey was the eldest of the illegitimate sons of Richard I, Duke of Normandy. Gilbert was one of the guardians of William II, who became Duke of Normandy as a child in 1035. When Gilbert was assassinated in 1039 or 1040, his young sons Baldwin de Meules et du Sap and Richard de Bienfaite et d'Orbec fled with their guardians to Baldwin V, Count of Flanders; they returned to Normandy when William married Baldwin's daughter in 1053, and William took them into high favour.

After the conquest of England Richard received huge estates including Clare and Tonbridge, the estate whose name was normally coupled with his. According to Richard Mortimer, he was "the founder of the English, Welsh, and Irish baronial family which historians usually call ‘of Clare’." [1]

Historical sources are vague and sometimes contradictory about when the name de Clare came into common usage, but Richard fitz Gilbert (of Tonbridge) is once referred to as Richard of Clare in the Suffolk return of the Domesday Survey.[2] Baldwin de Meules was left in charge of Exeter on its submission (1068) and made sheriff of Devonshire. Large estates in Devonshire and Somersetshire are entered to him in Domesday as "Baldwin of Exeter" or "Baldwin the Sheriff". [3]

On his death, Richard's English estates passed to his son Gilbert Fitz Richard (died 1114/7). Gilbert's eldest son Richard (died ca. 1136) was the ancestor of the earls of Hertford and Gloucester. Gilbert's younger son Gilbert, establishing himself in Wales, acquired the earldom of Pembroke or of Striguil. The elder line obtained (probably from King Stephen)[4] the earldom of Hertford, and were thenceforth known as earls of Hertford or of Clare.

John Horace Round suggested that it was probably because[Gilbert] and the Clares had no interests in Hertfordshire that they were loosely and usually styled the earls of (de) Clare.[3]

In the Dictionary of National Biography he stated that investigation showed that the claim that they were "styled earls of Clare" before they were earls of Hertford was not true; they were alternately called Hertford or of Clare.[5] On the other hand, Frank Barlow places Gilbert de Clare as Earl of Hertford in the group of barons given earldoms between 1138 and 1142, and states that they all had "substantial local interests".[6] Ralph Henry Carless Davis states that Gilbert was a witness as Earl of Hertford at Christmas 1141, and it is generally believed that he had been Earl since 1138; but that there is no prospect of clarifying the matter because of the others of the same name. He notes also that "In a military capacity earls figure largely in the capacity of defenders of their counties in the chronicles of Stephen's reign." He therefore argues against the title as a personal dignity at that period.[7] The general scholarly view is now that the title earl of Clare was self-assumed.

In 1217–20 Gilbert de Clare, earl of Hertford or Clare (died 1230), inherited the estates of William Fitz Robert, 2nd Earl of Gloucester (died 1183), including the earldom and honour of Gloucester and the lordship of Glamorgan. Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (died 1176), known as Strongbow, had no sons and with his death this line came to an end, his many Irish and Welsh possessions passing to his daughter Isabel, who married William Marshal, (c. 1146 – 14 May 1219) who then became known as William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke.[5]

Bibliography

J. C. Ward, "Fashions in monastic endowment: the foundations of the Clare family, 1066–1314", Journal of Ecclesiastical History, vol. 32 (1981), p. 427-451

J. C. Ward, "Royal service and reward: the Clare family and the crown, 1066–1154", Anglo-Norman Studies, vol. 11 (1988), p. 261-278.

Michael Altschul, A Baronial Family in Medieval England: The Clares, 1217-1314, The Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1965. See online summary.

References

^ Richard Mortimer, Clare, Richard de [Richard fitz Gilbert] (1030x35–1087x90), magnate, in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online by subscription.

^ Suffolk return of the Domesday Survey (c. 1086) (ed. A. Rumble, Suffolk, 2 vols (Chichester, 1986), 67 ~ 1^ a b Chisholm 1911.

^ John Horace Round, 1911 Britannica article Clare (Family), http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Clare_%28Family%29.^ a b Round 1887.

^ Frank Barlow, The Feudal Kingdom of England, 1042-1261 (4th edition 1988), p. 213.

^ R. H. C. Davis, King Stephen (1977), p. 136, and p. 129.

^ The Archaeological Journal, Article 51, pg 43- published under the direction of The Council of The Royal Archaeological Insutute of Great Britain and Ireland, available at Google books online at http://books.google.com/books?id=yZg8AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA48

Attibution

Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Clare (family)". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Round, John Horace (1887). "Clare, de". In Leslie Stephen. Dictionary of National Biography 10. London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 375–376.

External links

• de Clare Family History

Richard married Rohese de Longueville Giffard in 1054 in France, Lot-et-Garonne, Aquitaine, France. Rohese was born on 13 Apr 1034 in Longueville, Lot-et-Garonne, Aquitaine, France; died in 1117 in Warwick Parrish, Berkshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]