Robert Burnell

Robert Burnell († October 25, 1292 in Berwick ) was an English clergyman. From 1274 until his death he was a confidante of King Edward I, his chancellor . From 1275 he was also Bishop of Bath and Wells .

origin

Robert Burnell came from a family from the Welsh Marches who named themselves after Acton Burnell in Shropshire before 1198 . He was probably a son of Roger Burnell († after 1259), a member of the gentry from Acton. Two of Burnell's brothers were killed in the battle of Menai Strait during the conquest of Wales in 1282 . Another brother, Hugh, died in 1286.

Rise in the service of the heir to the throne Lord Edward

Burnell was possibly the same age as the heir to the throne, Lord Edward, born in 1239 . Probably shortly after he had received his own household and a large property in the Welsh Marches as apanage in 1254 , Burnell entered his service. In 1257 he attested to documents from Lord Eduard, whom he accompanied to France in November 1260. In 1266 Eduard rewarded him by allowing him to create a hunting park within a royal forest. In 1269 Lord Eduard granted him the right to hold a weekly market in Acton and a fair twice a year . Burnell was apparently so popular with the heir to the throne that he proposed in 1270 that he be elected Archbishop of Canterbury . This attempt failed, however, as the Pope appointed Robert Kilwardby as archbishop instead . A little later, Lord Edward set out on his crusade to the Holy Land . Burnell had also taken a crusade vow and wanted to accompany Eduard, but in the end he remained in England as one of Edward's four representatives as a representative of the already older Robert de Walerand and together with Archbishop Walter Giffard of York, Philip Basset and Roger Mortimer . For his services he was rewarded with the office of Archdeacon of York , and in August 1272 he was able to purchase a house in Westminster that was immediately north of the Palace of Westminster . After the death of King Henry III. in November 1272 he made sure that a new Regency Council took over the government while Eduard was still abroad. He called a parliament with and accepted oaths of allegiance to the king. In addition, he received money for the government from Italian bankers and, together with the treasurer, raised a tithe from the clergy.

Development of an extensive property

After the death of his father, Burnell inherited half of the Acton estate in Shropshire. He held this as a vassal of the Corbet family of Caus Castle . The other half of Acton had belonged to his relative William Burnell , who was ostracized for two murders in 1248 and died a little later. William Burnell's fiefdom was confiscated from the Crown and given to William de Gardinis . Before 1266, Robert Burnell bought this stake. As a result, he was able to expand his property and build the manor house Acton Burnell Castle . Even as an influential official of the heir to the throne, Burnell managed to acquire further possessions in the Welsh Marches and other parts of England.

The ruins of Acton Burnell Castle built by Robert Burnell

Royal Chancellor and Bishop of Bath and Wells

Influence on legislation and the development of parliament

Immediately after his coronation in September 1274, Edward I named Burnell his chancellor , making him head of the new government. As early as October 11, 1274, less than a month after taking office, Burnell set up committees to review the observance of royal privileges and the conduct of office of the sheriffs and bailiffs in each county. In January 1275, the king managed to get Burnell elected bishop of the Diocese of Bath and Wells , but continued to be royal chancellor. In April 1275 the first general parliament of the kingdom was convened, where the king could enact a series of laws that became known as the First Statute of Westminster . These laws should allow the government to handle the increasing administrative tasks. Numerous magnates and royal officials regularly turned to Burnell with requests or administrative questions that Burnell had previously had to submit to the king or parliaments. The increasing number of these petitions made to the government led to an increasing establishment of the parliament. Burnell arranged for the Royal Chancellery to have its headquarters in London, where petitions could immediately reach the government. Finally, in 1280, the Chancellor and the other leading members of the government received an order that, due to the multitude of petitions made during parliaments, only the most urgent matters should be brought before the King and Parliament. The other submissions could then be answered or dealt with directly by the government. This made Burnell the most important member of the government after the king. He was at the king's side almost all the time, except when, as envoy, he had to carry out important missions abroad. Burnell was also partially responsible for the appointment of judges and the division of judicial districts.

Conquest of Wales and relations with France

In November 1276 Burnell took part in the council meeting in Westminster, at which the Welsh prince Llywelyn ap Gruffydd was condemned as a rebel and peace criminal, after which the king could take military action against the prince . In the late summer and autumn of 1276 Burnell was in Chester or Shrewsbury , where he made sure that merchants were promised safe conduct when they supplied the English army during the campaign in Wales. On August 13, he celebrated mass in front of the king and numerous nobles when the king laid the foundation stone for Vale Royal Abbey in Cheshire . After the king was able to impose the humiliating Treaty of Aberconwy on the Welsh prince in November 1276 , Burnell accompanied Llywelyn to Westminster, where he had to pay homage formally to the king . Burnell must have been involved in the creation of a judicial committee whose judge, headed by Walter of Hopton of Shropshire, was to judge lawsuits in Wales and the Welsh Marches. This committee clearly violated the previous customs in Wales and in the Welsh Marches and led to the Welsh rebellion of 1282, which in turn led to the final conquest of Wales by the king. In March 1278, however, the king was able to report to Burnell and Otton de Grandson , another of his confidants, that Lord Llywelyn would completely submit to his judgment. At that time Burnell and Grandson were in Paris, from where they traveled on to Gascony , which belongs to England . There they were supposed to investigate the administration of Luke de Tany , the royal seneschal . Their investigations revealed that the allegations against Tany were exaggerated. The negotiations between Burnell and Grandson in France led to the Treaty of Amiens , through which Edward I received the Agenais back and to whose conclusion Burnell traveled again to France with the king in the spring of 1279.

After the renewed Welsh uprising in March 1282, Burnell himself traveled to Wales in August 1282, from where he led the administration of the empire from Rhuddlan and later from Conwy and Caernarfon . The parliament, begun in Shrewsbury in October 1283, was completed in Burnell's manor, Acton Burnell, where the Statute of Acton Burnell was adopted. On March 19, 1284 Burnell sealed the Statute of Rhuddlan , which governed the administration of conquered Wales. Edward I allowed Burnell to fortify his Acton Burnell estate in 1284, as it was easily accessible from North Wales and therefore a possible target for raids from Wales. In addition, King Burnell also gave several oak wood from the royal forests, which he was allowed to use to expand Acton Burnell Castle. As early as 1283 he had also received venison in order to be able to entertain the king and his children on their visit to Acton.

Share in financing the reign of Edward I.

The Statute of Acton Burnell was the first of the two laws of Edward I, which the king passed to secure the financial transactions of merchants. Burnell himself was affected by this law, because he was often involved in payments, some of which exceeded the stately sum of 500 marks . It is not always possible to make a clear distinction between payments that he made on the job as Chancellor and private payments. Burnell, for example, borrowed money for the king from Italian merchants in Lucca , and he himself lent the king more than 3,000 marks between 1282 and 1285. For his own benefit and that of his brother Hugh Burnell, he traded debts from Christian creditors who had given them to Jews and who had repacked them. Burnell thus acquired the funds to acquire the barony of Holdgate Castle in Shropshire, houses in Bristol , lands on the Isle of Ely and the Sheen estate in Surrey . He later sold Sheen to Otton de Grandson.

Burnell as bishop

Although Burnell was morally highly controversial because of his accumulation of benefices and because of his almost open relationship with his mistress Juliana, with whom he had several children, Edward I tried again in 1278 to have him elected Archbishop of Canterbury. After this attempt had also failed, the king had him elected bishop of the rich diocese of Winchester in 1280 . Both times, however, Pope Nicholas III canceled . the elections after investigating Burnell's morals. John Pecham , Archbishop of Canterbury appointed by the Pope to replace Burnell in 1278, asked the papal curia to deny that Pecham had provided information that was unfavorable to Burnell. Pecham was certain, however, that Burnell threatened merchants with church fines if they failed to pay their debts to the Crown.

On the other hand, Burnell tried to conscientiously carry out his duties as Bishop of Bath and Wells despite the strain of his office as Chancellor. He took care of the construction of Wells Cathedral , acquired beneficiary rights for the monasteries in his diocese and worked with other prelates for the benefit of the state and the Church. At the beginning of each Lent, Burnell left the royal court, gave the great seal to the royal wardrobe for safekeeping, and returned to his diocese. He also received royal privileges for his office as bishop. The king allowed him to encircle Wells Cathedral Liberty with a crenellated wall. As Chancellor, Burnell sent officials to heavily indebted abbeys to clean up their finances. Otton de Grandson and other magnates allowed him to grant benefices over which they had patronage rights while they were away from England , and Archbishop Pecham made him his vicar general when he tried in 1282 to try to find a place in Aber between King Edward I and Prince Llywelyn in northern Wales to convey. During Parliament on Easter 1285, the King left Burnell to receive complaints from the clergy against the government. Burnell apparently proposed the later procedure to the King after the Chancellor or the Chief Justice had been empowered to refer clearly ecclesiastical questions to an ecclesiastical court without first having to be referred to Parliament.

Renewed service as diplomat and administrator in France

During the Parliament of 1285, the second Statute of Westminster was enacted, which detailed specifications of the duties and powers of the officials of the royal chancellery. In 1286 Burnell traveled again with the king to Gascony. Burnell spoke for the English king at the French royal court and explained his view of the development of Franco-English relations since the Treaty of Paris of 1259 . In Gascony he was a member of a tribunal that judged Jean I. de Grailly , the former Seneschal of Gascony. It was not until August 1289, just days before the king, that Burnell returned to England. There he was immediately entrusted with investigations into royal officials who were accused of having abused their offices and committed other misconduct while the king was away.

Role in the Scottish succession dispute

Soon after his return from France in 1289, Burnell was increasingly involved in the settlement of the still open succession of the Scottish King Alexander III, who died in 1286 . involved. In November 1289, he oversaw an exchange of letters between the Guardians of Scotland and King Erik II of Norway , and appointed envoys to negotiate the claims of Erik's daughter Margaret , the Scottish heir to the throne. On behalf of the English king he prepared the crossing from Margaret to Scotland. In February 1290, however, he secretly planned how the English king would proceed in Scotland. Eduard I's plans to marry off his eldest son Eduard to Princess Margarete, however, became irrelevant with her death in autumn 1290. When Edward's wife Queen Eleanor died in November 1290 , Burnell became an even closer confidante of the king. The king named him one of his seven executors , and in May 1291 Burnell baptized Gilbert de Clare , a grandson of the king. At the beginning of June he was in Norham on the Scottish border. Although the king himself was also present, Burnell made a promise from each of the contenders for the Scottish throne that he would recognize English sovereignty over Scotland in the event of his succession.

Before the fall of 1292 Burnell was back with the king on the Scottish border, where both John Balliol and Robert Bruce claimed the Scottish crown. He died in Berwick . William of Hambleton , Archdeacon of York and longtime attorney for Burnell, presented the great seal to Walter Langton , the Keeper of the Wardrobe , who as an official in the service of Burnell was also a close confidante of the king. Hambleton then brought Burnell's body to Wells , where he was buried in the cathedral.

Family and inheritance

Burnell had used his high office to support his family as well. In June 1283 he had acquired the right to administer the lands of the minor Richard FitzAlan from the abbot of Vale Royal Abbey , which enabled him not only to hold the Honor of Whitchurch , but also the Honor of Arundel, including Arundel Castle , by the age of majority in 1287 . This had enabled him to marry his nephew Philip Burnell to Matilda, a sister of the young Richard FitzAlan. Apparently Burnell also had several illegitimate children to care for. His long-time mistress Juliana claimed that she bore him five sons, and rumor has it that he had several daughters. Burnell married his daughter Amabilla to Andrew Hengham, a relative of Lord Chief Justice Ralph de Hengham . In 1275 he reached that William of Greystook , a nobleman from Cumberland , wanted to marry his son to Joan Burnell. Nonetheless, fifteen years later, Joan Burnell married Ralph of Grendon from Warwickshire . A William Burnell became dean of Wells Cathedral and was one of the executors of Robert Burnell.

Burnell left behind 82 goods on his death, most of which he had acquired during his service for Edward I. This extensive land holdings were spread over 19 English counties, with the main 21 estates in Shropshire. 13 other goods were in the south of London. His heir was his nephew Philip Burnell, who died in 1294. Philip's son Edward was promoted to baron, but died childless in 1315, with which the title expired.

Web links

• Alan Harding: Burnell, Robert (d.1292). 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. ^ Michael Prestwich: Edward I. University of California, Berkeley 1988, ISBN 0-520-06266-3 , p. 233
2. ↑ Michael Prestwich: Tany, Sir Luke de (d. 1282). 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
3. ^ Thomas Allen: A history of the county of Surrey: comprising every object of topographical, geological, or historical interest. Holdsworth & Ball, London 1831, p. 382
4. ^ AJ Cosgrove: The Elections to the Bishopric of Winchester, 1280-2. In: Studies of Church History 3 (1966), p. 172
5. ^ Michael Prestwich: Edward I. University of California Press, Berkeley 1988. ISBN 0-520-06266-3 , p. 234

predecessor	Office	successor
Walter of Merton	Lord Chancellor of England 1274–1292	John Langton
William Button I.	Bishop of Bath and Wells 1275–1292	William March