Henry de Lacy, 3rd Earl of Lincoln

Seal of Henry de Lacy

Henry de Lacy, 3rd Earl of Lincoln (by other counting also 5th Earl of Lincoln ; * around December 19, 1249 , † February 5, 1311 in Holborn , London ) was an English magnate , diplomat and general .

Origin and youth

Henry was a son of Edmund de Lacy, 2nd Earl of Lincoln and Adelasia (Alice), the eldest daughter of Manfred III, Margrave of Saluzzo . His father died in 1258 and the estates were administered by his mother.

Confidante of King Edward I.

In 1269, the young Henry got involved in a dispute with John John de Warenne, 6th Earl of Surrey over a property , which was only settled through the intervention of the king. On October 5, 1272, he was manager of Knaresborough Castle and on October 13, 1272, he was on the occasion of the marriage of Edmund of Cornwall for Knight Bachelor beaten. He was therefore of legal age and was able to dispose of his father's inherited lands. He was soon serving the king in a variety of ways. He quickly became one of the most trustworthy, loyal and reliable followers and friends of King Edward I. In the campaign against Wales from 1276 to 1277 , he participated with about 100 knights and conquered Bauseley in Montgomeryshire . In January 1278 he traveled to Brabant to negotiate the engagement of Margaret, a daughter of the king, to John , the son and heir of Duke John I of Brabant . In March 1278 he was part of King Alexander III's escort . of Scotland during his visit to England. Together with the bishops Roger of Worcester and Thomas de Cantilupe of Hereford as well as Edmund of Cornwall he was appointed the king's representative on April 27, 1279 during the king's journey to France, until the king returned on June 19. In 1282 and 1283 he took part in the renewed campaign against Wales , for which he received Denbighshire in North Wales as a reward . To secure his new property, he began to rebuild Denbigh Castle . From 1286 to 1289 Lacy accompanied the king on his visit to Gascony , while in 1287 he investigated the allegations of bad administration against the former Seneschal Jean I. de Grailly . After the king's return to England, Lacy became a member of a commission in October 1289 that dealt with complaints about royal officials. The complaints were directed against over 1,000 officials, including the Chief Justice of the King's Bench, Ralph de Hengham . In June 1290, Lacy negotiated with the Council of Regency of Scotland. His negotiations led to the Birgham Agreement, which was signed on July 18, 1290 between England and Scotland. As a candidate for King Edward I, he was part of the committee that examined the claims of the aspirants to the Scottish throne from 1291 onwards . In 1292 he vouched for Gilbert de Clare, 6th Earl of Hertford in his dispute with Humphrey de Bohun, 3rd Earl of Hereford over their possessions in the Welsh Marches. In the spring of 1294 he accompanied Edmund Crouchback , the king's brother, to France, where he was supposed to negotiate an armistice to end the war between England and France . The negotiations failed, however, and in the summer of 1294 Lacy was supposed to leave for Gascony with English troops. Before he could embark in Portsmouth , the news of the Welsh uprising reached him , whereupon he moved with troops to put down the uprising to North Wales. While advancing to the relief of Denbigh Castle in November, he was attacked and routed there by his own Welsh subjects. He stayed in Wales until the spring of 1295, when the rebellion was finally suppressed.

The ruins of Denbigh Castle in North Wales, built by Henry de Lacy

King's Lieutenant of Aquitaine

On December 3, 1295, the king appointed him King's Lieutenant for Aquitaine , which he held until the spring of 1298. On January 14, 1296, he set out with Edmund Crouchback and a strong infantry force from Plymouth to south-west France. On the way they plundered Saint Mathieu near Brest in Brittany and then reached Bourg and Blaye on the Gironde . Without success they marched against the French occupied Bordeaux . An attack on Saint-Macaire also failed when Count Robert von Artois appalled the besieged city. After the death of Edmund Crouchback on June 5, 1296, the army elected Henry de Lacy as his successor and his post as lieutenant was confirmed. Before Bourg he could defeat Robert von Artois. He then besieged Dax for seven weeks in July and August , but then had to retreat to Bayonne . In January 1297, citizens of Bellegarde, besieged by French troops, asked him for help. Lacy advanced to relief, but was ambushed by Robert von Artois, in which John de St John was captured and the English suffered heavy losses. Lacy had to retire to Bayonne again. In the summer he made a successful raid on Toulouse , from which he returned to Bayonne in late September. He stayed in Bayonne until after Christmas, before returning to England at Easter 1298. He was succeeded as King's Lieutenant by Guy Ferre .

Participation in the Scottish War of Independence

On May 15, 1298, the king commissioned him to negotiate the engagement of the heir apparent Eduard to Isabella of France , which should end the war between England and France. Together with other barons, he swore before Humphrey de Bohun, 3rd Earl of Hereford and Roger Bigod, 5th Earl of Norfolk , that King Edward I would keep the Magna Carta and other treaties upon his return from the Scottish campaign . He himself took part in the campaign to Scotland and the Battle of Falkirk in 1298 , in which William Wallace was defeated. As a reward he received Renfrew and other estates from James Stewart , the High Steward of Scotland . In July 1299 the king called Lacy to the council in York , and on September 12, 1299 he attended the marriage of the king to Margaret of France in Canterbury . In the summer of 1300 he again took part in a campaign to Scotland, where Caerlaverock Castle was besieged in July . In November 1300 he was sent on a diplomatic mission to Rome with Hugh le Despenser to explain English policy towards Scotland to the Pope.

Diplomat and administrator of the king

In March 1301 Lacy was commissioned to accompany Edward the Prince of Wales on his summer campaign to Scotland and was in Galloway, Scotland in September and October . For the next two years he negotiated a peace treaty with France until the Treaty of Paris was signed on May 20, 1303 . In June 1303 he traveled to Aquitaine with Otton de Grandson and Count Amadeus of Savoy , in order to take possession of the land again for King Edward I after the peace with France. He reorganized the English administration there and did not return to England until the end of 1304 or the beginning of 1305. On September 16, 1305 he was commissioned by the Parliament in Westminster to look after Scotland, to do this he should take care of requests and petitions from Gascony. On October 15, he traveled with Otton de Grandson and Walter Langton as envoy to Pope Clement V to obtain the suspension of Archbishop Robert Winchelsey . He returned to London on February 16, 1306 and was received in public by the Mayor . He then accompanied the Prince of Wales as a consultant to Scotland. In January 1307 he was appointed to head Parliament in Carlisle. In the summer of 1307 he accompanied King Edward I on his last advance to Scotland and was with him when he died on July 7th in Burgh by Sands .

Leader of the aristocratic opposition against King Edward II.

Lacy was now the oldest of the English earls and thus had great influence on the young King Edward II. He accompanied the king to Scotland in 1307 and, with six other earls, witnessed the elevation of Piers Gaveston to Earl of Cornwall. He soon criticized the king and his favorite Gaveston, and in January 1308 he became the leader of the aristocratic opposition. Although he wore the sword of state at the coronation of Edward II on February 25, he had already sealed the so-called Boulogne Agreement in January . However, when the king continued to disregard the magnates' reform proposals, Lacy was the leader of the barons who threatened the king during parliament in April 1308 that they would distinguish between loyalty to the king and loyalty to the person of the king. In doing so, the barons forced King Gaveston into exile, and Lacy was once again one of the king's closest advisers. He stayed at the royal court, even when Gaveston soon returned from his exile and mocked him with the nickname Boele-Crevée as a bloated stomach.

Gaveston's insults and his favoritism by the king led Lacy, along with his son-in-law Lancaster and other barons, to demand reform of the royal household and government. The leadership of this aristocratic opposition, the Lords Ordainer , however, passed to the younger Lancaster. Before the king left for York in October 1310, however, Lacy was reconciled with the king. He spent Christmas in Kingston , Dorset, returned to London and died at his home in Holborn. He was buried on February 28, 1311 in the Lady Chapel of St Paul's Cathedral . After his death, the conflict between the king and the noble opposition under Lancaster intensified.

Family and offspring

Lacy was married twice. His first marriage was as a child in Salisbury in 1257 with Margaret Longespée, 4th Countess of Salisbury . His bride was a daughter and partial heir of the recently deceased William Longespée , a son of William Longespée of Salisbury . He had several children with her, including:

• Edmund († 1308)
• John
• Alice (1281-1348)

1. ⚭ Thomas of Lancaster, 2nd Earl of Lancaster ;
2. ⚭ Ebulo Lestrange, 1st Baron Strange ;
3. ⚭ Hugh de Freyne

His eldest son Edmund drowned in an accident in the well at Denbigh Castle, and his second son John was fatally injured in a fall at Pontefract Castle . After his wife Margaret died in 1309, Lacy married on June 16, 1310 the young Joan Martin , a daughter of William Martin, 1st Baron Martin and Eleanor Fitzpiers. The marriage remained childless. Since his two sons had died before him, Lacy, under pressure from King Edward II, made his son-in-law Lancaster, a cousin of the king, his main heir. Lancaster inherited large estates across England, particularly in Lincolnshire , Yorkshire , Derbyshire and Denbighshire in North Wales.

Lacy's widow, Joan, married Nicholas Audley, 2nd Baron Audley of Heleigh, without royal permission, before June 6, 1313 . She died before October 27, 1322.

The Lincoln's Inn coat of arms includes the coat of arms of Henry de Lacy

Others

Lacy was one of the richest magnates in England. The annual income from his extensive estates was estimated at 10,000 marks . Although his holdings were widely scattered and spread across several counties, their administration was considered exemplary economic and practical. Lacy himself was considered to be educated and cultured. He is said to have commissioned a short version of the breeding chronicle . Allegedly, his property in London was the namesake for the nearby Lincoln's Inn .

Web links

• JS Hamilton: Lacy, Henry de, fifth earl of Lincoln (1249-1311). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861411-X , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of 2004

Individual evidence

1. ^ William Arthur Shaw: The Knights of England. Volume 2, Sherratt and Hughes, London 1906, p. 5.
2. ^ British Listed Buildings: Denbigh Castle. Retrieved June 18, 2015 . 
3. ↑ Lincoln's Inn: History of the Inn. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on September 14, 2015 ; Retrieved June 19, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  

predecessor	Office	successor
Edmund de Lacy	Earl of Lincoln 1258-1311	Alice de Lacy