Walter Mauclerk

Walter Mauclerk (also Gualterus Mauclerk ) († around October 28, 1248 in Oxford ) was a bishop of the English diocese of Carlisle . He was one of King Henry III's leading diplomats . and also served as treasurer .

origin

The origin of Mauclerk is uncertain. Only W , the first letter of his first name, is known of his father , so it is unlikely that he is identical to Walter Mauclerk, who was the son of a Girard Mauclerk from Rouen in Normandy . Possibly he was related to Robert Mauclerk , who lived in Nottinghamshire and who had supported the rebellion of Johann Ohneland against his brother Richard the Lionheart in the 1190s . In 1218 he is mentioned as the owner of a benefice in Southwell Minster in Nottinghamshire. In the next few years he attested to this in Nottinghamshire several documents, which suggests that he had family ties in the northern Midlands . A brother of his, whose first name has not been recorded with certainty, was prior of Reading Abbey and ran unsuccessfully as Abbot of St Albans Abbey in 1214 . Mauclerk was possibly the uncle, but certainly a relative of Ralph Barri , who was made prior of Carlisle during his tenure as bishop .

Official in the service of Johann Ohneland

Walter Mauclerk is mentioned for the first time in 1202 as a tax clerk in the service of King Johann Ohneland in Normandy. In the same year he received an office in the church of Falaise , but after the collapse of John's rule in Normandy during the Franco-English War , Mauclerk fled to England. As a civil servant, Mauclerk enjoyed the trust of the king, who appointed him to one of the sheriffs of Lincolnshire in 1204 and entrusted him with the administration of several guardianships. For his services Mauclerk was rewarded with several benefices, among others at Croxton in Lincolnshire, King's Nympton in Devon , Mylor in Cornwall , with the Vicariate of Catfield in Norfolk and with a pension from the Diocese of Exeter . As was customary at the time, Mauclerk was represented in these offices and instead remained in the service of the king. Presumably in the wake of John de Gray , the Justiciar of Ireland , Mauclerk was in Ireland in 1210 and 1212. In 1214 he is said to have taken part in the king's campaign in Poitou and in the English campaign to Flanders . In 1215 he sent a report to the king from Rome in which he reported on the activities of the king's lawyers and the lawyers of the aristocratic opposition against the king, who presented their concerns to the pope.

Bishop of Carlisle

Ascent to bishop

After the death of King Johann in 1216 and the end of the War of the Barons in 1217, Mauclerk remained in the service of the minor Heinrich III. In 1218 he was royal judge in the eastern Midlands , and in 1221 he was appointed to oversee the royal forests in England. From 1222 he was sheriff of Cumberland . Presumably strengthened by this office, he ran for bishop of Carlisle in 1223, for which he was elected by the cathedral chapter and confirmed by the king on August 22, 1223. Shortly thereafter, the king hired a lawyer to represent him before the Pope against Mauclerk, but on October 26, 1223 the king renewed his consent to the election of Mauclerk and gave him the temporalities of the diocese. On April 21, 1224 Mauclerk was consecrated bishop together with Ralph de Neville of Chichester and William Briwere of Exeter by Archbishop Stephen Langton in St Katherine's Chapel in Westminster .

Act as a bishop

As Bishop of Carlisle, Mauclerk emerged less as a clergyman and as a teacher, but more through his skillful use of money. He significantly improved the financial position of the diocese and acquired jurisdiction over Horncastle in Lincolnshire. Above all, he remained active in the service of the king as bishop. Since he was mostly in the favor of the king, the latter also granted the diocese several privileges. Mauclerk himself received from the King the estates of Melbourne in Derbyshire and Dalston in Cumberland for lifelong use. Presumably with his support, 1233 Franciscan and Dominican branches were founded in Oxford .

Diplomat and Treasurer in the service of the King

At the beginning of 1225 Mauclerk traveled to Cologne, where he married Heinrich III. with a daughter of Duke Leopold VI. of Austria and negotiated a marriage between Heinrich's sister Isabella of England and the emperor's son Heinrich . During the trip to Cologne he is said to have been shipwrecked and thus got into great hardship. The marriage negotiations were energetically supported by Archbishop Engelbert , but were rejected by the German princes at the Frankfurt Court Conference in August 1225. After a stay of several months, Mauclerk traveled back to England, the project finally failed due to the assassination of Archbishop Engelbert on November 7th, 1225. During his stay in Cologne, Mauclerk consecrated a reliquary in the Church of St. Apostles in July 1225 , of which he was the first to know Donated indulgence in Cologne.

Henry III. had not yet given up his claims to the French possessions his father had lost in 1204. When a regency council took over the government in France after the death of the French King Louis VIII , Mauclerk traveled to Poitou in 1227 . From there he tried in vain to recruit allies for the English king among the nobility of Brittany and Normandy. Back in England, he became Constable of Newcastle in 1228 . Around November 13, 1228 he took over the office of Treasurer of the king's exchequer .

Fall under Peter des Roches

When the longtime Justiciar Hubert de Burgh was overthrown in 1232 , Mauclerk received, through the influence of the new ruler Peter des Roches, the confirmation of the king that he could exercise his office of treasurer for life. In addition, the administration of Carlisle Castle were handed over to him. However, he was released as treasurer in January 1233, for which he had to surrender the Melbourne estate in Derbyshire and was to pay a fee of £ 1000 to keep his other possessions. He was succeeded as treasurer by Peter de Rivallis , a nephew of des Roches. Having fallen out of favor with the king in this way, Mauclerk wanted to flee into exile in August 1233. In Dover he was forcibly held back by royal officials, his estates were occupied and Rivallis handed over to administration. Thereupon Bishop Roger Niger of London excommunicated the officials on behalf of the other English bishops, whereupon Mauclerk was allowed to leave for Flanders. From there he announced an interdict over the cathedral and the city of Carlisle .

Return to the service of the king

When Peter des Roches was overthrown in April 1234, Mauclerk was restored to grace at the royal court, with much of the outstanding £ 1000 fee waived. He soon returned to a leading role on the royal council. In 1235 Mauclerk was the head of an embassy, ​​which in Flanders over a marriage of Henry III. negotiated with a daughter of Count Simon von Ponthieu . In 1236 he was again given the administration of Carlisle Castle, and for a fee of 600 marks annually he was given the administration of Westmorland and the guardianship of Robert de Vieuxpont , the heir of John de Vieuxpont , in 1238 . When the king was in France during the Saintonge War from 1242 to 1243, Mauclerk was a leading member of the reign for England. For several years he was one of the English delegations that negotiated peace with Scotland. The king rewarded his services with the transfer of financially lucrative guardianship.

Resignation as bishop and last years

Out of piety, but also because of his old age, Mauclerk renounced his episcopate on June 29, 1246 and entered the Dominican order in Oxford. Over the next several years, on behalf of Bishop Grosseteste of Lincoln, he established the Dominican Chancellors in Leicester and Godstow . In May 1248 he issued an episcopal indulgence for the relics of Westminster Abbey .

In his will he left generous foundations for the Dominicans in Oxford. He bequeathed his possessions, including his house in London and land in Salkeld near Penrith, to the Bishops of Carlisle.

Web links

• Nicholas Vincent: Mauclerk, Walter (d. 1248). 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. ↑ Fred A. Cazel, Jr: Neville, Ralph de (d. 1244). 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
2. ^ Natalie Fryde: A medieval German large entrepreneur. Terricus Teutonicus de Colonia in England, 1217-1247. Steiner, Stuttgart 1997. ISBN 3-515-06817-1 , p. 38
3. ↑ Christiane Neuhausen: The indulgences in the city of Cologne from the 13th to the 16th century . Janus, Cologne 1994. ISBN 3-922977-47-2 , p. 18
4. ↑ Nicholas Vincent: Peter des Roches. An alien in English politics, 1205 - 1238 Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2002. ISBN 0-521-52215-3 , p. 353
5. ↑ Nicholas Vincent: Peter des Roches. An alien in English politics, 1205 - 1238 . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2002. ISBN 0-521-52215-3 , p. 436

predecessor	Office	successor
Hugh of Beaulieu	Bishop of Carlisle 1223-1246	New Years Eve of Everdon
Eustace de Fauconberg	Lord High Treasurer 1228-1233	Peter de Rivallis