Hugh le Despenser

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Sir Hugh le Despenser ( Hugh le Despenser the younger ; * 1286 ; † November 24, 1326 in Hereford ) was an English courtier and politician. He was a favorite of the English King Edward II.

origin

Hugh le Despenser was a son of Hugh le Despenser the Elder and Isabella de Beauchamp , daughter of William de Beauchamp, 9th Earl of Warwick . His grandfather Hugh le Despenser, 1st Baron le Despenser , died as a rebel in the Battle of Evesham in 1265 . His parents married around 1285, his father had received his grandfather's property back in 1281 and was appointed to parliament in 1295 as 2nd Baron le Despenser .

Life

Rise to country nobleman

Hugh le Despenser portrayed as the Earl of Gloucester; he was entitled to this title because of his marriage.

On May 22, 1306 Hugh was together with the Prince of Wales to the Knights defeated. That same summer he was allowed to marry Eleanor de Clare , a granddaughter of King Edward I of England and eldest sister of Gilbert de Clare, 7th Earl of Hertford , which was likely to compensate for debts the king owed to his father. At this point Despenser was only the heir of a minor baron and had no property of his own. On May 14, 1309, the new King Edward II, his wife's uncle, gave him the Sutton estate in Norfolk , which had previously belonged to the Knights Templar , giving him an annual income of £ 200. In the following year his father gave him further estates in Cambridgeshire , Suffolk and Essex , which came from the inheritance of Hugh's grandmother Aliva Basset . In 1313 Despenser accompanied the king on a trip to France. Around this time he became the guardian of the underage William Huntingfield . Thomas Plantagenet, 2nd Earl of Lancaster, had striven for this task and the associated income , so that this decision of the king was one of the reasons for the later enmity between Lancaster and Despenser.

Promotion to magnate

When Eleanor's brother Gilbert de Clare was killed at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 , his wife, along with her two sisters, became one of the three heirs to the Clare family's rich estates . However, Gilbert's widow Maud claimed to be pregnant so the division of the inheritance was initially postponed. However, when Maud had no child, the impatient despenser, who did not believe in the pregnancy of his sister-in-law, occupied Tonbridge Castle in May 1315 , which had previously been administered by the Archbishop of Canterbury . Despenser finally had to vacate the castle in June and return it to the archbishop, but this episode already illustrates Despenser's greed and willingness to use violence.

The division of the Clare family's inheritance was delayed in 1316 by the Llywelyn Bren rebellion in the Welsh Glamorgan , which was part of the heritage. For this purpose, suitable spouses had to be found for the two younger but already widowed sisters of Despenser's wife. During this time, Despenser, along with Roger Damory and Hugh de Audley, belonged to a small group of courtiers who were highly favored by the king. Elizabeth de Clare eventually married Roger Damory, and Margaret de Clare , Piers Gaveston's widow , was married to Hugh de Audley. When the inheritance was finally divided up in November 1317, Despenser became a major magnate with an annual income from the inheritance of around £ 1,500. Glamorgan belonged to his inheritance, so that as baron of the Welsh Marches he had privileges over the English barons. He let the king extradite the rebel Llywelyn Bren, who was held in the Tower of London, and executed him in 1318 without due process. He confiscated Llywelyn Bren's property. At the same time, Despenser began to expand his property in South Wales at the expense of his other heirs. Before Hugh de Audley could formally take possession of the Wentloog reigns adjacent to Glamorgan , Despenser had assured himself of the loyalty of the feudal men there and was able to hold possession of the barony against the initial resistance of the king. The king finally confirmed Despenser as Lord of Wentloog, while Audley had to be content with smaller fiefs in England. Despenser began another dispute in South West Wales, where he had inherited Dryslwyn Castle with the reign of Cantref Mawr . There he immediately began a border dispute with John Giffard , the baron of Cantref Bychan bordering to the west .

Favorite of the king

Despenser was appointed Lord Chamberlain of the king's household by Parliament in October 1318 . As a member of the court, Hugh quickly maneuvered himself forward in the favor of Edward II, ousting Damory and de Audley from their positions. Despenser’s favor reminded contemporaries of Piers Gaveston, the king’s former favorite, who had been executed in 1312 by a noble opposition under the Earl of Lancaster. Through his office Despenser had direct access to the king, while at the same time he is said to have made it difficult for others, including Queen Isabella , to gain access. There is little evidence to support the suspicion that Despenser and the king, who was said to have had a sexual relationship with Gaveston, also had a sexual relationship. There is no doubt that there was a close and trusting relationship between the king and his favorite.

Despenser War: Exile and Return

The tensions that existed between the king and the nobility under Edward II in England were exacerbated by Despenser’s favoritism, the shameful failure of the 1319 campaign against Scotland and, most recently, by Despenser’s expansion efforts in the Welsh Marches. When Despenser wanted to buy the Gower rule from the indebted Baron William de Braose in 1320 , resistance came from the other Marcher Lords under the leadership of John Mowbray , Braose's son-in-law, who feared for his inheritance. The alliance of the Marcher Lords against Despenser included, among others, Humphrey de Bohun, 4th Earl of Hereford , Roger Mortimer of Wigmore , Maurice de Berkeley and Hugh de Audley. In October 1320, Mowbray occupied Gower. The king intervened, forcing Mowbray to place Gower under the king's administration by the end of the year. The Marcher Lords feared not only the efforts of Despenser, but also for their privileges in the Welsh Marches. In the so-called Despenser War , the united army of the Marcher Lords conquered and plundered Despenser's possessions in South Wales in May 1321. The Earl of Lancaster joined the rebellion. In August 1321 the rebels marched with their army to London. In parliament, they made serious accusations against Despenser and his father: impairment of royal power, prevention of access to the king without their presence, installation of corrupt officials and embezzlement of the Knights Templar's property. The younger despenser was accused of the wrongful murder of the rebel Llywelyn Bren. The Earl of Pembroke , one of the moderate barons, advised the king to give in to the demands of the rebels, and on August 14 the king approved the despensers' exile from England in Parliament. The rebels, however, were pardoned by Parliament on August 20 for their war crimes.

While his father went to Gascogne , which belongs to England , Despenser worked as a pirate. Presumably through the mediation of the king, the Cinque Ports made ships available to him. In the English Channel he attacked a Genoese merchant ship, murdered the crew and looted the cargo. He then attacked Southampton. The king secretly contacted him and prepared a retaliatory strike against the rebellious barons. He managed to split the rebellious barons and defeat them one after the other. A meeting of the English bishops convened at short notice by Walter Reynolds , the Archbishop of Canterbury, at the king's behest , to which only five of 17 bishops appeared, declared the exile of the Despensers to be unlawful, so that the king lifted the exile on December 8th. After the king had regained control of the Welsh Marches by the end of January 1322, the Despensers joined him on March 2 in Lichfield . On March 16, the army of the remaining rebels was decisively defeated in the battle of Boroughbridge . The Earl of Hereford fell while Lancaster and numerous other rebels were captured and executed.

Tyranny of Edward II and the Despensers

After the nobility opposition was crushed, Despenser's power and wealth reached their peak. His father had been promoted to Earl of Winchester , with him he ruled the royal court and ruled almost unlimited over his estates. The younger despenser created a network of followers who also served as royal officials, which gave him tremendous influence over the government. His opponents and victims had little opportunity to object to his decisions, since the royal officials were also his followers. This procedure was particularly evident in the confiscation and subsequent administration of the possessions of the members of the aristocratic opposition. Through royal favor, law-breaking, and violence, Despenser expanded his estate to the point where his final annual income was over £ 7,000. Alice de Lacy , the widow of Lancaster, was forced to give him land, and even Marie de Saint-Pol , the widow of the loyal Earl of Pembroke, suffered from the harassment of Despenser's attempt to acquire her husband's estates in South Wales. Elizabeth de Clare, the widow of Roger Damory, had to exchange her rich barony of Usk for the plundered Gower in 1322 . Then in 1324 Despenser brought the previous owner of Gower, William de Braose , to reclaim Gower. After Elizabeth had to hand over the barony to him, Braose passed it on to Despenser's father, who then handed it back to his son. Despenser also acquired Striguil , Abergavenny , Cilgerran and Pembroke , so that he owned South Wales from the Wye to the Teifi .

He used his wealth for the expansion of Caerphilly Castle and the decoration of Tewkesbury Abbey . Tewkesbury Abbey has preserved stained glass that was completed under his widow and son. They show despenser between Robert Fitzhamon and Gilbert de Clare, 4th Earl of Hertford , two of his predecessors as Lord of Gloucestershire . Further pictures in the choir arch show him in paradise.

The execution of Hugh le Despenser the Younger, from a manuscript by Jean Froissart .

Resistance, fall and death

Due to the king's failures in the conflicts in Gascony and Scotland, discontent over Despenser’s arbitrary rule grew. The so-called war of Saint-Sardos in Gascony from 1323 to 1325 was ultimately rather insignificant, but it had incalculable consequences for King Edward II and the Despensers. The king was unable or unwilling to leave his kingdom in order to make a peace to end the conflict, so in March 1325 he sent his queen Isabella, sister of the French king Charles IV , to France as a mediator. The queen was able to negotiate a peace, for which the king was to pay homage to the French king as liege lord for Gascony. The king still did not want to travel to France, but allowed his son and heir to the throne, Edward , to pay homage to King Charles IV in his place. After the homage, however, neither the queen nor the heir to the throne returned to England. In January 1326 the Queen wrote to John Stratford , Bishop of Winchester, that she would not return to England until the Despensers were removed from court. Despenser must have sensed the opposition to his rule, because he turned to the Pope because he felt threatened by black magic. In May 1326 two papal legates arrived in England, who brought two letters from the Pope to Despenser. In the first letter Despenser was asked to support the reconciliation of the king and queen, while in the second he was asked generally to maintain better relations. Basically, the letters were an invitation to Despenser to withdraw from the court. The king then had the legates arrested. After interviewing them at Dover Castle , they left England again.

The king and despenser were now preparing to defend their rule. The Earl of Norfolk , a half-brother of the king, was entrusted with the guarding of the east coast, but went over to the side of the queen when the queen and her lover, Roger Mortimer of Wigmore, who had escaped from captivity, joined a small army of mercenaries in September 1326 landed in England . It now became apparent that Despenser’s rule was not based on loyalty when his followers defected to the queen’s side. The rule of the king and despenser collapsed. On October 2nd, they left London and fled west. They reached Wales, where some Welsh lords like Gruffydd Llwyd had so effectively assisted them in the Despenser War. They were in Cardiff on October 26th when Queen's forces occupied Bristol and captured Despenser's father. Despenser and the King fled to Caerphilly Castle , where they left Despenser's young son Hugh under the protection of the strong garrison. They fled further west via Margam and Neath Abbey before they were captured on November 16 with their small entourage at Llantrisant by Henry of Lancaster and the Welshman Rhys ap Howel. Despenser was brought to Hereford . After trying unsuccessfully to starve himself to death in custody, he was sentenced to death as a traitor, crowned with nettles and executed on November 24th by hanging, disembowelling and quartering .

Grave of Hugh le Despenser at Tewkesbury Abbey

funeral

According to the medieval chronicles, Despenser's head was placed on London Bridge , and the four parts of his body are said to have been sent to Bristol, Dover , York and Newcastle . Only in December 1330 did his widow receive from King Edward III. permission to collect his remains and bury them at Tewkesbury Abbey, allegedly only given the skull, a femur and some vertebrae.

In 2008, Mary Lewis of the University of Reading discovered a grave with an incomplete skeleton in the ruins of Hulton Abbey in Staffordshire, UK . She believes the incomplete skeleton found in it came from Hugh le Despenser. The bones show traces of processing with a sharp blade. The skull and the very bones that are said to have been buried in Tewkesbury Abbey are missing from the skeleton found. The radiocarbon dating yielded an age of the bones from the period 1050 to 1385; and the deceased was at least 34 years old.

progeny

Despenser had several children with his wife, Eleanor de Clare, including:

literature

  • Natalie Fryde: The tyranny and fall of Edward II, 1321-1326 . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2003, ISBN 0-521-54806-3 .
  • Nigel Saul: The Despensers and the downfall of Edward II. In: English Historical Review. (1984), pp. 1-33.
  • Noel Denholm-Young: Vita Edwardi Secundi; monachi cuiusdam Malmesberiensis . Nelson, London 1957. (Clarendon Press, Oxford 2005, ISBN 0-19-927594-7 )

Web links

Commons : Hugh Despenser the Younger  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ William Arthur Shaw: The Knights of England. Volume 1, Sherratt and Hughes, London 1906, p. 111.
  2. ^ Michael Altschul: A baronial family in medieval England. The Clares . The Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore 1965, p. 166.
  3. ^ Diane M. Williams: Gower. A Guide to ancient and historic monuments on the Gower peninsula . Cadw, Cardiff 1998, ISBN 1-85760-073-8 , p. 17.
  4. ^ Michael Altschul: A baronial family in medieval England. The Clares . The Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore 1965, p. 174.
  5. ^ JS Hamilton: Despenser, Hugh, the younger, first Lord Despenser (d. 1326). 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
  6. ^ Eduard II .: grave of a lover discovered. on: queer.de
  7. ↑ Headless Sir Hugh. In: Epoc . Spectrum, Heidelberg 2008,3, 9th ISSN  1865-5718
personal data
SURNAME Hugh le Despenser
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sir Hugh le Despenser; Hugh the younger despenser
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English politician and courtier
DATE OF BIRTH 1286
DATE OF DEATH November 24, 1326
Place of death Hereford