Don't know if anyone is interested in this old account of the Lacy family
(Duchess of Cleveland, _The Battle AbbeyRoll_ 1889 Vol II pp 176-181)
Adrian
Lacy: from Lasci (now called Lassy) on the road from Vire to Auvray. "The
branches of this house were so numerous that Robson furnishes above forty coats
of arms of different houses. Walter de Lacy is mentioned by Wace at the
battle of Hastings, and witnessed a charter of Walter Fitz Osborne ; and from him
descended the barons of Evias, Earls of Ulster and Lincoln, Barons of
Pontefract, and Palatines of Meath."-_The Norman People_. Four of the name are on
the Dives Roll - Ibert, Roger, Gautier, and Hugues; but the two former only
are to be found in Domesday. The Walter de Lacy who, with some others brave as
himself, "forming one troop, fell on the English offhand, fearing neither
fence nor fosse" ( Roman de Rou), had died in the previous year. His lands had
been assigned to him in the West, where he held territory - to what exact
extent is not known - under William Fitz Osbern, the first Norman Earl of
Hereford; and upon the rebellion of William's son, Earl Roger de Britolio, the whole
vast fief was conferred upon him by the Conqueror. He waged war successfully
with the Welsh, defeating three of their princes with great slaughter in
Brecon; and was killed in 1085 by a fall from a ladder while inspecting a new
church he had founded at Hereford. Roger his son, the Domesday Baron, held,
besides his Norman fief of Lasci, one hundred different manors in Shropshire,
Herefordshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire, and Berkshire; but forfeited
them by his rebellion against William Rufus, and was exiled in 1095. His
brother Hugh, on whom the King then conferred the barony, and "whose loyalty and
rectitude Ordericus contrasts with his own conduct," had already conquered for
himself the territory of Ewias in Wales, which became one of the
Baronies-Marcher, instituted to guard the frontier, and defend "these lands thus
acquired with the sword." It was a perilous honour, but it conferred a kind of
Palatine jurisdiction. With him ended the male line, for his only brother was a
churchman who became Abbot of Gloucester, and he himself died s. p., leaving
two sisters, who neither of them inherited, as his lands escheated to the
crown. One only had children, and her son Gilbert assumed the name of De Lacy.
He was "an approved soldier, a prudent man, and one of great foresight and
activity in any military undertaking," and living, as he did, "in a time when
all law and kingly authority were in abeyance, he could readily turn his sword
to good account." For some time he was at the Court of the Empress Maud,
and fought stoutly on her behalf; then, opportunely shifting his allegiance, he
went over to Stephen, and received his uncle's great barony as his reward.
He assumed the habit of a Templar some time before his death in 1163. His
son, Hugh II., accompanied Henry II. to Ireland in 117I, received the whole
province of Meath, to be held by the service of one hundred knights, and on the
King's departure, was left in charge of the country as Justiciar, and custos
of the city of Dublin. But when Prince Henry's rebellion broke out in 1173,
he was summoned in all haste to the King's aid in Normandy; and did signal
and gallant service in the war. He then returned to Ireland - though no longer
as Viceroy; and married a daughter of the King of Connaught without license,
thus incurring the dire displeasure of the King, who, in spite of his tried
and devoted loya1ty, suspected him of designing to rule Ireland independently,
and when he was murdered by one of his Irish vassals in 1185, heard of the
event "with vast delight." He left four sons, Walter, Hugh, Gilbert, and
William. Of the two last I can find no further account, but both the elder
brothers were pre-eminent among the nobles that subdued and governed Ireland. Hugh,
styled by Matthew Paris "this famous soldier," who had been the conqueror of
a great part of the country, was appointed Constable of Ireland by King
John, and obtained the Earldom of Ulster by a foul act of treachery. John de
Courcy, the Norman lord of Ulster, was then in open revolt; and De Lacy,
pretending to be his friend, invited him to his castle with a promise of protection
and safe-conduct. {1) But when he had got the unfortunate Earl into his power,
he broke his plighted word, and delivered him up to the King, receiving in
return his lands and honours. He left no son to succeed to them, and the
Earldom passed through his only daughter Maud to her husband Walter de Burgh, Lord
of Connaught.
Walter de Lacy, as the eldest brother, inherited the three great fiefs in
Eng1and, Ireland, and Normandy, but lost the latter when the Duchy was ceded to
France. He was confederated with his father-in-law De Braose in his
rebellion; and he and Hugh together arrayed Meath, Ulster, and Munster against King
John. But in 1210 the King came over in person to Ireland, and carried on a
successful campaign against the rebels, which ended in the banishment and
outlawry of De Braose and both the De Lacys. The two brothers, in humble disguise,
found shelter in the Abbey of St. Taurin at Evreux, where they lived for
some time as servants before the Abbot discovered who they were. He then
interceded for them with the King; and in token of their gratitude, they founded in
after years Foure Abbey in Ireland as a cell to St. Taurin. Walter obtained
the restoration of his estates only by payment of an exorbitant fine; and
seems to have remained ever after on fair terms with the King. When Hugh and the
men of Meath rose in rebellion against Henry III., he was sent over to subdue
his own brother and his own vassals. He died, blind and infirm from old age,
in 1241 ; having survived his only son and an infant grandson; and his
granddaughters Maud and Margery were his heirs. Maud was first married to Peter de
Geneva, a low-born Provensal favourite of Henry III., and then to Geoffrey
de Genevill or Joinville. Margery was the wife of John de Verdon.
The other Domesday baron, Ilbert de Lacy, was an even greater land-owner
than his brother or kinsman Roger. His fief comprised the whole district of
Blackburnshire in the county of Lancaster, with nearly one hundred and fifty
manors in Yorkshire, ten in Nottingham, and four in Lincolnshire. He was seated
in the West Riding; and there, near the town then called Kirkby, he built
the famous Castle of Pontefract (so named from a broken bridge over the Aire)
which was the great stronghold of South Yorkshire, commanding the passes of
the river as effectually as a former Roman station had done. Within this new
fortress he founded a collegiate chapel dedicated to St. Clement; and he
likewise laid the foundation of Nostell Abbey, which was completed and endowed by
his successor. He left two sons; Robert, and Hugh. Robert, also called de
Pontefract, took part with Robert Curthose against Henry I., and "was forced to
buy his peace at a dear rate." Yet after this he obtained from the King a
grant of Bowland, (2) that had been Roger de Poitou's, with other lands in
Yorkshire; and next, by a sudden transition of fortune left unexplained by
Dugdale, he and his son Ilbert were expelled the realm. He was never allowed to
return, and must have died in exile; but Ilbert obtained from Stephen the
restoration of his barony, and "calling to mind the misery of his banishment by King
Henry I., approved himself the more cordial to King Stephen." He was one of
the chief commanders at the Battle of the Standard, and a powerful magnate in
the Northern counties. Henry his brother succeeded him; and Henry's son
Robert proved the last of his race.(3) He did not live to complete the great
castle he began to build at Clitheroe, but d. s. p. in 1193, and was buried
in Kirkstall Abbey.
The great Lacy inheritance then definitively passed away from the Lacy
blood. It was arbitrarily appropriated by the half sister of the last heir,
Albreda de Lisours, who was his mother's daughter by her second husband, Eudo de
Lisours. This was an outrageous assumption, for she had not even the shadow of
a claim, and could only make some pretence of a grant or deed of gift
obtained from Henry de Lacy by her mother before he died. But she was the wife of a
powerful and ambitious noble, Richard Fitz Eustace, Baron of Halton and
Constable of Chester, whose will might not be gainsaid; and her son John took the
name and place of De Lacy, and transmitted the united baronies of Pontefract
and Halton to four generations of his descendants. His grandson and
namesake, John, Constable of Chester, was one of the twenty-five great barons
appointed to enforce the observance of Magna Charta, with the custody of the
counties of York and Nottingham; and married Margaret de Quincy, through whom he
obtained the Earldom of Lincoln, that had belonged to her uncle, Ralph de
Meschines, Earl of Chester. Henry, the last Earl, was a man of great ability,
eminent both as a soldier and statesman. He attended Edward I. in his wars, and
stood high in his esteem, was sent by him to treat with the French King, and
appointed his Chief Commissioner for reforming the administration of justice in
the realm. There had been great complaints made in parliament of the
venality of the judges; and the Earl swept away four -the Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas among them - that were convicted of receiving bribes. After the
conquest of Wales, the King, who "much studied the fortifying of that country,
especially North Wales and the Marches, for that respect gave him the land of
Denbigh; whereupon he began the town of Denbigh, walling it, and making a Castle
there, in Front whereof was his Statue in long Robes: And every Sunday
(antiently) Prayers were made in Saint Hillaries Chapel there for Lacy and
Percy." This castle, however, was never finished: for his only son was drowned in a
deep well belonging to the so-called Red Tower, and the Earl lost all heart
in the work. His wife was the sole heiress of William de Longespee, who
brought him her grandfather's Earldom of Salisbury. They were long married without
children; but at length she brought forth this long expected and early lost
heir, and one other child, Alice, who succeeded as Countess of Lincoln and
Salisbury.
When the great King lay on his death-bed at Burgh-upon-Sands, this Earl was
one of the chosen friends and comrades to whom he made his last appeal,
desiring them "to be good to his son, and not to permit Piers de Gaveston to
return to England." Edward II. left him in charge of the realm during his
absence in Scotland in 1307. But he was unable to stem the rising tide of abuses
and misgovernment that his dead master had foreseen; and as he felt his own
death drawing near in 1312, he called his son-in-Iaw, the Earl of Lancaster, to
his bed-side, and reminding him "how highly God had honoured him, and
inriched him above others, told him, ‘That he was obliged to love and honour God
above all things. Seest thou (quoth he) the Church of England heretofore
honourable and free, enslaved by Romish oppressions, and the King's unjust
exactions! Seest thou the Common People impoverished by Tributes and Taxes, and from
the condition of Freemen reduced to a servitude! Seest thou the Nobility,
formerly venerable through Christendom, vilified by Aliens in their own Native
Country! I therefore charge thee by the name of Christ, to stand up like a Man:
for the Honour of God, and his Church, and Redemption of thy Countrey;
associating thyself to that valiant, noble, and prudent Person, Guy, Earl of
Warwick, when it shall be most proper to discourse of the Publick Affairs of the
Kingdom; who is so judicious in Counsel, and mature in Judgment. Fear not thy
Opposers, who shall contest against thee in thy truth. And if thou pursuest
this my Advice, thou shalt gain eternal honour.'â€
Lacy Family
Moderator: MOD_nyhetsgrupper
-
Douglas Richardson royala
Re: Lacy Family
Dear Adrian ~
Thank you for sharing this information. Much appreciated.
Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah
Website: http://www.royalancestry.net
ADRIANCHANNING@aol.com wrote:
Thank you for sharing this information. Much appreciated.
Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah
Website: http://www.royalancestry.net
ADRIANCHANNING@aol.com wrote:
Don't know if anyone is interested in this old account of the Lacy family
(Duchess of Cleveland, _The Battle AbbeyRoll_ 1889 Vol II pp 176-181)
Adrian
Lacy: from Lasci (now called Lassy) on the road from Vire to Auvray. "The
branches of this house were so numerous that Robson furnishes above forty coats
of arms of different houses. Walter de Lacy is mentioned by Wace at the
battle of Hastings, and witnessed a charter of Walter Fitz Osborne ; and from him
descended the barons of Evias, Earls of Ulster and Lincoln, Barons of
Pontefract, and Palatines of Meath."-_The Norman People_. Four of the name are on
the Dives Roll - Ibert, Roger, Gautier, and Hugues; but the two former only
are to be found in Domesday. The Walter de Lacy who, with some others brave as
himself, "forming one troop, fell on the English offhand, fearing neither
fence nor fosse" ( Roman de Rou), had died in the previous year. His lands had
been assigned to him in the West, where he held territory - to what exact
extent is not known - under William Fitz Osbern, the first Norman Earl of
Hereford; and upon the rebellion of William's son, Earl Roger de Britolio, the whole
vast fief was conferred upon him by the Conqueror. He waged war successfully
with the Welsh, defeating three of their princes with great slaughter in
Brecon; and was killed in 1085 by a fall from a ladder while inspecting a new
church he had founded at Hereford. Roger his son, the Domesday Baron, held,
besides his Norman fief of Lasci, one hundred different manors in Shropshire,
Herefordshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire, and Berkshire; but forfeited
them by his rebellion against William Rufus, and was exiled in 1095. His
brother Hugh, on whom the King then conferred the barony, and "whose loyalty and
rectitude Ordericus contrasts with his own conduct," had already conquered for
himself the territory of Ewias in Wales, which became one of the
Baronies-Marcher, instituted to guard the frontier, and defend "these lands thus
acquired with the sword." It was a perilous honour, but it conferred a kind of
Palatine jurisdiction. With him ended the male line, for his only brother was a
churchman who became Abbot of Gloucester, and he himself died s. p., leaving
two sisters, who neither of them inherited, as his lands escheated to the
crown. One only had children, and her son Gilbert assumed the name of De Lacy.
He was "an approved soldier, a prudent man, and one of great foresight and
activity in any military undertaking," and living, as he did, "in a time when
all law and kingly authority were in abeyance, he could readily turn his sword
to good account." For some time he was at the Court of the Empress Maud,
and fought stoutly on her behalf; then, opportunely shifting his allegiance, he
went over to Stephen, and received his uncle's great barony as his reward.
He assumed the habit of a Templar some time before his death in 1163. His
son, Hugh II., accompanied Henry II. to Ireland in 117I, received the whole
province of Meath, to be held by the service of one hundred knights, and on the
King's departure, was left in charge of the country as Justiciar, and custos
of the city of Dublin. But when Prince Henry's rebellion broke out in 1173,
he was summoned in all haste to the King's aid in Normandy; and did signal
and gallant service in the war. He then returned to Ireland - though no longer
as Viceroy; and married a daughter of the King of Connaught without license,
thus incurring the dire displeasure of the King, who, in spite of his tried
and devoted loya1ty, suspected him of designing to rule Ireland independently,
and when he was murdered by one of his Irish vassals in 1185, heard of the
event "with vast delight." He left four sons, Walter, Hugh, Gilbert, and
William. Of the two last I can find no further account, but both the elder
brothers were pre-eminent among the nobles that subdued and governed Ireland. Hugh,
styled by Matthew Paris "this famous soldier," who had been the conqueror of
a great part of the country, was appointed Constable of Ireland by King
John, and obtained the Earldom of Ulster by a foul act of treachery. John de
Courcy, the Norman lord of Ulster, was then in open revolt; and De Lacy,
pretending to be his friend, invited him to his castle with a promise of protection
and safe-conduct. {1) But when he had got the unfortunate Earl into his power,
he broke his plighted word, and delivered him up to the King, receiving in
return his lands and honours. He left no son to succeed to them, and the
Earldom passed through his only daughter Maud to her husband Walter de Burgh, Lord
of Connaught.
Walter de Lacy, as the eldest brother, inherited the three great fiefs in
Eng1and, Ireland, and Normandy, but lost the latter when the Duchy was ceded to
France. He was confederated with his father-in-law De Braose in his
rebellion; and he and Hugh together arrayed Meath, Ulster, and Munster against King
John. But in 1210 the King came over in person to Ireland, and carried on a
successful campaign against the rebels, which ended in the banishment and
outlawry of De Braose and both the De Lacys. The two brothers, in humble disguise,
found shelter in the Abbey of St. Taurin at Evreux, where they lived for
some time as servants before the Abbot discovered who they were. He then
interceded for them with the King; and in token of their gratitude, they founded in
after years Foure Abbey in Ireland as a cell to St. Taurin. Walter obtained
the restoration of his estates only by payment of an exorbitant fine; and
seems to have remained ever after on fair terms with the King. When Hugh and the
men of Meath rose in rebellion against Henry III., he was sent over to subdue
his own brother and his own vassals. He died, blind and infirm from old age,
in 1241 ; having survived his only son and an infant grandson; and his
granddaughters Maud and Margery were his heirs. Maud was first married to Peter de
Geneva, a low-born Provensal favourite of Henry III., and then to Geoffrey
de Genevill or Joinville. Margery was the wife of John de Verdon.
The other Domesday baron, Ilbert de Lacy, was an even greater land-owner
than his brother or kinsman Roger. His fief comprised the whole district of
Blackburnshire in the county of Lancaster, with nearly one hundred and fifty
manors in Yorkshire, ten in Nottingham, and four in Lincolnshire. He was seated
in the West Riding; and there, near the town then called Kirkby, he built
the famous Castle of Pontefract (so named from a broken bridge over the Aire)
which was the great stronghold of South Yorkshire, commanding the passes of
the river as effectually as a former Roman station had done. Within this new
fortress he founded a collegiate chapel dedicated to St. Clement; and he
likewise laid the foundation of Nostell Abbey, which was completed and endowed by
his successor. He left two sons; Robert, and Hugh. Robert, also called de
Pontefract, took part with Robert Curthose against Henry I., and "was forced to
buy his peace at a dear rate." Yet after this he obtained from the King a
grant of Bowland, (2) that had been Roger de Poitou's, with other lands in
Yorkshire; and next, by a sudden transition of fortune left unexplained by
Dugdale, he and his son Ilbert were expelled the realm. He was never allowed to
return, and must have died in exile; but Ilbert obtained from Stephen the
restoration of his barony, and "calling to mind the misery of his banishment by King
Henry I., approved himself the more cordial to King Stephen." He was one of
the chief commanders at the Battle of the Standard, and a powerful magnate in
the Northern counties. Henry his brother succeeded him; and Henry's son
Robert proved the last of his race.(3) He did not live to complete the great
castle he began to build at Clitheroe, but d. s. p. in 1193, and was buried
in Kirkstall Abbey.
The great Lacy inheritance then definitively passed away from the Lacy
blood. It was arbitrarily appropriated by the half sister of the last heir,
Albreda de Lisours, who was his mother's daughter by her second husband, Eudo de
Lisours. This was an outrageous assumption, for she had not even the shadow of
a claim, and could only make some pretence of a grant or deed of gift
obtained from Henry de Lacy by her mother before he died. But she was the wife of a
powerful and ambitious noble, Richard Fitz Eustace, Baron of Halton and
Constable of Chester, whose will might not be gainsaid; and her son John took the
name and place of De Lacy, and transmitted the united baronies of Pontefract
and Halton to four generations of his descendants. His grandson and
namesake, John, Constable of Chester, was one of the twenty-five great barons
appointed to enforce the observance of Magna Charta, with the custody of the
counties of York and Nottingham; and married Margaret de Quincy, through whom he
obtained the Earldom of Lincoln, that had belonged to her uncle, Ralph de
Meschines, Earl of Chester. Henry, the last Earl, was a man of great ability,
eminent both as a soldier and statesman. He attended Edward I. in his wars, and
stood high in his esteem, was sent by him to treat with the French King, and
appointed his Chief Commissioner for reforming the administration of justice in
the realm. There had been great complaints made in parliament of the
venality of the judges; and the Earl swept away four -the Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas among them - that were convicted of receiving bribes. After the
conquest of Wales, the King, who "much studied the fortifying of that country,
especially North Wales and the Marches, for that respect gave him the land of
Denbigh; whereupon he began the town of Denbigh, walling it, and making a Castle
there, in Front whereof was his Statue in long Robes: And every Sunday
(antiently) Prayers were made in Saint Hillaries Chapel there for Lacy and
Percy." This castle, however, was never finished: for his only son was drowned in a
deep well belonging to the so-called Red Tower, and the Earl lost all heart
in the work. His wife was the sole heiress of William de Longespee, who
brought him her grandfather's Earldom of Salisbury. They were long married without
children; but at length she brought forth this long expected and early lost
heir, and one other child, Alice, who succeeded as Countess of Lincoln and
Salisbury.
When the great King lay on his death-bed at Burgh-upon-Sands, this Earl was
one of the chosen friends and comrades to whom he made his last appeal,
desiring them "to be good to his son, and not to permit Piers de Gaveston to
return to England." Edward II. left him in charge of the realm during his
absence in Scotland in 1307. But he was unable to stem the rising tide of abuses
and misgovernment that his dead master had foreseen; and as he felt his own
death drawing near in 1312, he called his son-in-Iaw, the Earl of Lancaster, to
his bed-side, and reminding him "how highly God had honoured him, and
inriched him above others, told him, 'That he was obliged to love and honour God
above all things. Seest thou (quoth he) the Church of England heretofore
honourable and free, enslaved by Romish oppressions, and the King's unjust
exactions! Seest thou the Common People impoverished by Tributes and Taxes, and from
the condition of Freemen reduced to a servitude! Seest thou the Nobility,
formerly venerable through Christendom, vilified by Aliens in their own Native
Country! I therefore charge thee by the name of Christ, to stand up like a Man:
for the Honour of God, and his Church, and Redemption of thy Countrey;
associating thyself to that valiant, noble, and prudent Person, Guy, Earl of
Warwick, when it shall be most proper to discourse of the Publick Affairs of the
Kingdom; who is so judicious in Counsel, and mature in Judgment. Fear not thy
Opposers, who shall contest against thee in thy truth. And if thou pursuest
this my Advice, thou shalt gain eternal honour.'" (4) - Dugdale.
He could not have committed this great charge to abler hands. Alice de
Lacy's husband, Thomas Plantagenet, Earl of Lancaster, the elder son of Edmund
Crouchback, a younger brother of Edward I., was the most powerful baron of the
time; and held the several Earldoms of Lancaster, Leicester, Derby, Lincoln
and Salisbury: - the two latter brought to him by his wife. He accepted and
loyally fulfilled the duty imposed upon him, and placed himself at the head of
the barons who revolted against the rule of Edward II.'s worthless favourites.
The tragic sequel is well known. He was utterly defeated at Boroughbridge,
and not choosing to yield to mortal man, knelt in the chapel, and turning to
the crucifix, said, "Good Lord, I render myself to thee, and put myself at
thy mercy." He was sentenced to death without even the form of a trial, asking,
"'Shall I die without answer?' A certain Gascoyne took him away, and put a
pill'd broken Hood on his Head, and set him on a lean white Jade, without a
Bridle, and thus he was led away to die, crying, 'King of Heaven have mercy on
me, for the King of Earth nous ad guerthi.'"
His widow was twice again married, but never had children. (5)
The Lacys took as their badge the _lacet_, or Lacy knot; a rebus on their
name.
"No less than one hundred parishes in the We1sh marches bear the suffix
Lacy" (Taylor); as, Stanton-Lacy in Shropshire; Holme-Lacy and Mansel-Lacy in
Worcestershire, &c.
(1) Banks gives a rather different account. "Lacy, Lord Justice of Ireland,
offered a large reward to anyone who should bring in this Earl John
(denounced as a traitor) dead or alive; but this proving ineffectual, he prevailed, by
great promises, on some of the Earl's retainers to betray their master to
him. Accordingly, on Good Friday, 1203, when the Earl, for penance, was walking
barefoot and unarmed five times round the churchyard of Down Patrick, he was
attacked unawares, and having nothing to defend him but the pole of a cross,
he was overpowered and forced to yield; but not until he had killed thirteen
of Lacy's men with his own hand."
(2) A relic of the ancient supremacy of the Lacys in Lancashire - the
"dog-gauge" - is still preserved at Bowsholme, "the depository of Forest lore, on
the Yorkshire side of the boundary. They held the forests in the Clitheroe
fee, Bowland and Blackburnshire; and the tenants of the Forest of Bowland
engaged 'to suffer the deere to go unmolested into their several grounds;' they are
also fined,, 'if anie without licens keep any dogg bigger than will go
through a stirupe, to hunt the deere.' Herds of wild deer continued to range
.the forest of Bowland till the year 1805, when the last vistige of feudal
superiority in the domains of the Lacies was destroyed." - Baines' Lancashire. The
dog-gauge is a large round stirrup.
(3) "The true line of Lacy terminated with the above Robert, and the
Constables of Chester and the Earls of Lincoln, who assumed the name, inherited the
lands and honours, but not a drop of the Lacy blood, as it would be inferred
from the politc peerages in which the reader would naturally look for
information." - Planehe.
(4) This great Earl died in the new mansion house - then called "Inne "-
that he had built in the suburbs of London, on some ground formerly occupied by
the Dominicans. Lincoln's Inn Fields, now tenanted by a colony of astute
lawyers, was then partly a coney-garth, harbouring, in addition to the "feeble
folk," several kinds of game; and partly a garden, to which they must have been
nibbling and vexatious neighbours. There were no flowers but roses: the
vegetables grown were beans, garlic, onions, and leeks; and, after supplying the
Earl's table, enough apples, pears, nuts, and cherries remained for sale to
yield an annual income of £9 2s. 6d. (about £135 of our currency).
(5) She was the Countess of Lancaster who was carried off by the
hunch-backed knight, Richard de St. Martin (see Vol. Ill.).