Walter de Gray

Coat of arms of Walter de Gray as Bishop of Worcester

Walter de Gray (also Walter Gray ; † May 1, 1255 in Fulham ) was an English prelate and statesman under the government of King John Ohneland and his son, King Henry III.

Life

Origin and education

Walter de Gray came from the Anglo-Norman family de Gray , but there is no reliable information about his exact origins and his youth. He was probably a son of John de Gray of Eaton , Norfolk . In addition, he had a connection to Rotherfield Grays in Oxfordshire , where in 1239 he bought a castle from his relative Eve de Gray for his brother Robert de Gray . He studied at Oxford University and, like his uncle John de Gray , who was Bishop of Norwich , became a clergyman.

Career under King Johann

With the approval of his uncle, Walter came to the royal court and was appointed Lord Chancellor by Johann Ohneland in 1205 , for which he had to pay £ 5000 to the king. His uncle vouched for this sum. In 1207 he acquired a benefice in Rochester , was canon in Exeter and archdeacon of Totnes . Over the next few years he acquired additional benefices, and in 1208 he was elected as a rival candidate from the Monks of Coventry for Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry . Because of Pope Innocent III. However, after the interdict imposed on England he was unable to occupy the bishopric, and after the abolition of the interdict in 1213 the papal envoy Pandulf gave the diocese to a third candidate, William of Cornhill . De Gray, however, was ordained Bishop of Worcester after the repeal of the interdict on October 5, 1214 in Canterbury as the successor to Bishop Mauger , in return he renounced the office of Lord Chancellor. After the King's recognition of the Magna Carta in June 1215, he was with Hugo von Boves , Richard de Marisco and William Gernon in the Netherlands, where he recruited mercenaries for the king because of the impending civil war .

Power struggle for the Archdiocese of York

At this time, during the height of the power struggle between the barons and the king, the Canons of York met in June 1215 to elect a successor to Archbishop Geoffrey of York, who died in 1212 . The king proposed Walter de Gray, who was rejected by the canons, all of whom had studied at Cambridge , because he had studied at Oxford. Instead, they elected Simon Langton , brother of the Archbishop of Canterbury, as their new archbishop. Both Simon and Stephen Langton were among the opponents of the king, so that this provocation against Pope Innocent III. protested, who declared Langton's election on December 13, 1215 invalid. De Gray himself traveled to Rome and was ordained by the Pope as the new Archbishop of York in 1216, reportedly paying the Pope £ 10,000 for this.

The grave of Walter de Gray in York Minster

Counselor of Heinrich III.

As Archbishop of York, de Gray was one of the confidants and most important advisers of John's son and successor Henry III, for whom he often carried out diplomatic missions. In 1227, after the death of King Louis VIII, he was in France, where he tried to find supporters for a planned campaign by the king in Normandy , Anjou , Brittany and Poitou to bring about the possessions that his father had lost wanted to win back. Together with Richard of Cornwall , the king's brother, de Gray traveled in 1237 to the Roman-German Emperor Friedrich II. During the campaign of Henry III. to France in 1242 and during the king's stay in Gascony in 1254, de Gray was regent of England. The king and also the Scottish king Alexander II visited him several times in York . The most important of these visits was in 1251, when the English and Scottish courts were spending Christmas in York and the young Scottish King Alexander III. Margaret , a daughter of Henry III, married. In 1255, de Gray took part in the parliament that led to the Second Barons' War. After the dissolution of Parliament, he retired at the invitation of the Bishop of London to his palace in Fulham , where he died three days later.

Archbishop of York

In the Archdiocese of York de Gray reformed the neglected administration and left the Archdiocese in comparatively good order and prosperity on his death. He acquired the village of St Andrewthorpe , where he built a new bishop's palace, which is why the village was soon renamed Bishopthorpe . In London he acquired 1240 York Place , which became Whitehall Palace after the fall of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey in 1529 . In Ripon he had the west facade of the monastery church built and the relics of St. Wilfrid transferred to the church. He began the construction of what is now York Minster , during his tenure the south transept was built and the north began. He was buried in the south transept.

Web links

• Walter de Gray, after Richard John King's "Handbook to the Cathedrals of England: Northern Division" (1903)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Alan Harding: England in the thirteenth century. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1993. ISBN 0-521-30274-9 , p. 236
2. ↑ The de Gray Family. Retrieved March 5, 2015 . 
3. ^ John T. Appleby: Johann "Ohneland". King of England . Riederer, Stuttgart 1965, p. 187
4. ↑ John T. Appleby: Johann "Ohneland". King of England . Riederer, Stuttgart 1965, p. 212
5. ^ Thomas Faulkner: An Historical and Topographical Account of Fulham . Ergerton, London 1813, p. 197

predecessor	Office	successor
Hubert Walter	Lord Chancellor of England 1205–1214	Richard Marsh
Mauger	Bishop of Worcester 1214-1216	New Year's Eve
Geoffrey	Archbishop of York 1216–1255	Sewal de Bovill