by Alison Weir
129. Doherty, Isabella; Knighton.
130. Knighton; E.403; Foedera.
131. E.403.
132. CPR.
133. Froissart.
134. Ibid.
135. Kingsford.
136. CCR.
137. Brown, “Death and the Human Body”; Duffy; Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers.
138. Kingsford; Johnstone, “Isabella.”
139. Haines, “Edwardus Redivivus.”
140. See, for example, Strickland.
141. E.403.
142. Shepherd.
143. Parsons.
144. Gee; Blackley, “Isabella…and the…Cult of the Dead”; Blackley, “Tomb”; E.101; Cotton MSS, Galba; Stow, London; Duffy.
145. Grey, Scalacronica.
146. Stow, London.
Notes on the Chief Sources
What follows is a brief description and evaluation of each of the main contemporary sources to which I have referred in the text and notes. They are arranged in alphabetical order. Full details of these works are given in the bibliography.
ADAM OF USK, an able lawyer from Monmouth, was educated at Oxford and later enjoyed the patronage of the powerful Mortimer family. His chronicle mainly covers the period 1377 to 1421 and is based on firsthand evidence, but it lacks a critical eye.
The ANNALES LONDONIENSES cover the period 1194 to 1330 and were written by a citizen of London who enjoyed access to the archives of the Corporation of London. These annals are particularly important for the first half of the reign of Edward II, containing as they do a number of transcribed documents.
The ANNALES PAULINI, a valuable contemporary source that covers the years 1307 to 1341 and deals primarily with events in London, was probably written by a canon of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London, who was a close associate of another canon, Adam Murimuth (see below), on whose chronicle these annals were probably partly based.
GEOFFREY LE BAKER (flourished circa 1350), the parish priest of Swynbroke (Swinbrook) in Oxfordshire, wrote a chronicle covering the years 1303 to 1356, at the behest of his patron, Sir Thomas de la More (or Moore) of Northmoor (d. after 1347), an Oxfordshire knight and MP who was a loyal servant and follower of Edward II and was present at his abdication. Besides receiving eyewitness information in a memoir from his patron, Baker also drew heavily on the earlier chronicle of Adam Murimuth (see below). Baker’s style is lively, descriptive, and frequently melodramatic, but he is not often reliable as a historian, being inclined to embroider the facts; his vivid imagination sometimes even led him to invent material. His work has a strong royalist and patriotic bias. His chronicle was begun in circa 1350 and completed in 1358. Until the late nineteenth century, when E. Maunde Thompson correctly identified its author, Baker’s chronicle was erroneously ascribed to Sir Thomas de la More.
THE BRUT CHRONICLE exists in several versions that cover the period to 1333. Most of these are translations from a French original. The most important for this work are the London Brut and the northern Brut, both written in the 1330s.
The CHRONICLE OF LANERCOST, which covers the period 1297 to 1346, was probably compiled in circa 1346 at Lanercost Priory, a Franciscan house near Hadrian’s Wall; it is partly based on a lost work that was probably written by a Franciscan monk of Carlisle. It deals mainly with northern affairs and includes an eyewitness account of the Battle of Bannockburn.
The CHRONICLE OF MEAUX was written in a Yorkshire abbey and covers the period to 1406.
The CHRONIQUES DE LONDON cover the period 1260 to 1344; written purely as annals, they are nevertheless useful as a source for events in the capital.
WILLIAM DENE, a notary public, wrote the Historia Roffensis, an important source for the deposition of Edward II. He was an eyewitness to some of the events about which he wrote.
JEAN FROISSART (circa 1335–37 to circa 1407–10), the celebrated Flemish chronicler, was born at Valenciennes in Hainault and later became a priest. He was in England from 1360 to 1366, as a page in the service of Queen Philippa of Hainault, wife of Edward III. During this period, he began his famous Chronicles. Thereafter, he traveled all over western Europe, collecting information for his great work. He was close to the English royal family and accompanied the Black Prince to Bordeaux in 1366 and the Duke of Clarence to Italy in 1368. He visited the court of Richard II in 1394–95. His Chronicles are written in French. They cover the years 1325 to 1400; the earlier period, up to 1361, is based on what he calls “the true chronicle” of another Hainaulter, Jean le Bel (see below). Froissart’s Chronicles are lively, detailed, and eminently readable, but they are romanticized, unreliable, and inconsistent in parts and often based too indiscriminately on court gossip, and should therefore be treated with caution.
The GESTA EDWARDI DE CARNARVON, written by an anonymous Canon of Bridlington between 1327 and 1340, is an important source for Edward II’s reign. It chiefly deals with events in the North.
SIR THOMAS GREY OF HETON (d. 1369) was a Northumbrian knight of some standing who, while being held in an Edinburgh prison in 1355, wrote the Scalacronica, a dramatic yet competent account of mainly northern history during the reigns of Edward I, Edward II, and Edward III. His father had served at Bannockburn in 1314. Grey based much of his chronicle on works by Geoffrey of Monmouth, the Venerable Bede, and Ranulph Higden, as well as the Historia Aurea of John, Vicar of Tynemouth (see under Walter of Guisborough, below). His manuscript, now in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, is dedicated to Edward III. Of all contemporary chroniclers, Grey is perhaps the most sympathetic toward Edward II.
RANULPH HIGDEN (d. 1364), a Benedictine monk at Saint Werburgh’s Abbey, Chester, from 1299, wrote his celebrated Polychronicon in circa 1347. This work, intended as an exhaustive universal history up to the year 1342, is vividly written but disjointed and repetitive. It nevertheless gained great popularity and was translated into English in 1387 by John Trevisa (see below). A later continuation, to 1381, was added by John of Malvern, a monk of Worcester.
JEAN LE BEL was a native of Hainault, a canon at Saint Lambert of Liège, and the favored confessor and adviser of his patron, Sir John of Hainault, Queen Isabella’s champion. He was present during Edward III’s Scottish campaign of 1327. His chronicle is a blend of history, chivalry, and romance, but while it is less colorful than Froissart’s, it is more reliable.
HENRY KNIGHTON (or Cnitthon) (d. 1396) was an Augustinian canon at the abbey of Saint Mary of the Meadows, Leicester. His chronicle, which covers the period from the tenth century to 1395, is more valuable for the reign of Richard II than for the earlier part of the fourteenth century. It has a strong Lancastrian bias and deals in some detail with the life of Thomas of Lancaster. Knighton drew heavily on Higden and Walter of Guisborough for source material.
ADAM MURIMUTH (1275?–1347), whose family came from Fifield, Oxfordshire, was educated at Oxford and became a canon of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London, and held several other church offices. He was employed on several diplomatic missions to the papal Curia (1312–17, 1319, and 1323) and was also a royal councillor and a friend of Archbishop Reynolds and Henry Eastry, Prior of Canterbury, as well as being on good terms with Bishops Burghersh and Orleton. His kinsman Richard Murimuth was a royal clerk in 1328–29. In 1327, Adam Murimuth was one of a deputation sent by the Chapter of Exeter Cathedral to Edward III. Murimuth’s chronicle, which covers the period 1303 to 1347, and must have been written after 1325, is of immense value, as it is based on what he himself had witnessed during his career. It deals not only with the general history of the period but also with the fate of Edward II, events in London, and ecclesiastical affairs.
WILLIAM RISHANGER (circa 1250–1312?), a Benedictine monk of Saint Albans, wrote a continuation of the Saint Albans chronicles, covering the period 1259 to 1307. He may also have been the author of the chronicle ascribed to John Trokelowe and Henry Blaneford (see below). Rishanger’s work is useful, if mediocre in quality.
ROBERT OF READING (d. 1325), a monk at We
stminster Abbey, wrote his Flores Historiarum, one of the most important sources for Edward II’s reign, in circa 1327. Intended as a continuation of the Great Chronicle of Matthew Paris, it covers the years 1307 to 1325. (The earlier portion, from 1265 to 1306, was probably the work of John Bever of London [d. 1311], a monk of Westminster, who was commissioned by Margaret of France to write a eulogy on the death of Edward I.) Robert’s is a thorough and detailed account, and of great value to the historian, despite his bombastic style, his strong Lancastrian bias, and his determination to demonstrate that Edward II was unfit to rule and that his deposition was justified.
JOHN TREVISA (circa 1340–42 to 1402), a Fellow of Exeter and Queen’s Colleges, Oxford, became Vicar of Berkeley, Gloucestershire, and chaplain to the Berkeley family. His vigorous translation of Ranulph Higden’s Polychronicon, to which he added a short continuation, was completed in 1387.
The chronicle ascribed to JOHN TROKELOWE and HENRY BLANEFORD, both monks of Saint Albans, which covers the years 1307 to 1323, may have been written by William Rishanger (see above); this is a continuation of the Saint Albans chronicles and, despite its poor chronology, is one of the chief authorities for Edward II’s reign. It must have been written after 1330, since it refers to the execution of Roger Mortimer.
The VITA EDWARDI SECUNDI, an anonymous life of Edward II, formerly incorrectly ascribed to a monk of Malmesbury, is one of the chief independent sources for the reign and for the life and character of the King. Its author was well informed, shrewd, keenly observant, and not overcritical of his subject, even though it is clear that he was a supporter of the baronial opposition. His work stops abruptly in November 1325. Since he refers to Bishop Stapledon as being still alive, it must have been written before September 1326 and therefore does not anticipate the invasion of Isabella and Mortimer. The author, who was almost certainly not a monk, was highly educated, well versed in civil law, and of mature years. He has been tentatively identified by Denholm-Young with John Walwayn, a Herefordshire lawyer and clerk to the Earl of Hereford. Walwayn retired in January 1324 and was dead by July 1326.
THOMAS WALSINGHAM (d. 1422?), an Oxford scholar who became a Benedictine monk at Saint Albans, was a prolific writer who revived the tradition of chronicle writing at that abbey. He began the first of his six chronicles before 1388; these included a continuation of Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora from 1259 to 1422 and a chronicle of England and Normandy from 911 to 1419. Walsingham was a competent and authoritative writer, but he was more competent at collating material than he was at historical analysis and also overfond of occupying the high moral ground. For the early fourteenth century, he drew heavily on Murimuth, Trokelowe, and others.
WALTER OF GUISBOROUGH (or de Gisburn), or WALTER OF HEMINGBURGH (sometimes incorrectly given as Hemingford) (d. after 1313 or possibly after 1338), was an Austin canon at Guisborough (Gisburn) Priory, Yorkshire, who wrote an excellent, largely reliable, and perceptive chronicle of events from 1066 to 1312, drawing extensively on contemporary sources for the period commencing in 1290 and transcribing important documents. It has been suggested that a continuation covering the years 1327 to 1346 (which cannot all have been written by Walter) is loosely based on a work known as the Historia Aurea, which was written by John, Vicar of Tynemouth, around 1346.
Select Bibliography
PRIMARY SOURCES
Acta Imperii Angliaze et Franciae (ed. F. Kern, Tubingen, 1911).
Additional MSS, British Library.
Anglo-Scottish Relations, 1174–1328: Some Selected Documents (ed. E. L. G. Stones, London, 1965).
Annales Londonienses (ed. W. Stubbs, in Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II, 2 vols., Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1882–83).
Annales Monastici (5 vols., ed. H. R. Luard, Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1864–69).
Annales Paulini (ed. W. Stubbs, in Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II, 2 vols., Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1882–83).
The Anominalle Chronicle, 1307–1344, from Brotherton Collection MS 29 (ed. W. R. Childs and J. Taylor, Yorkshire Archaeological Society Record Series 147, Leeds, 1991).
The Anominalle Chronicle, 1331–1388 (ed. V. H. Galbraith, Manchester, 1927).
Antient Kalendars and Inventories of the Treasury of His Majesty’s Exchequer (3 vols., ed. F. Palgrave, London, 1836).
The Antiquarian Repertory (1779; 4 vols., ed. F. Grose, 1807–9).
The Apocalypse of Queen Isabella (c. 1280–1300; MS Fr. 13096, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris).
Archaeologia (102 vols., ed. H. Nicholas et al., Society of Antiquaries of London, 1773–1969).
Archives Municipales d’Agen (Chartres) (ed. G. Tholin and A. Magen, Villaneuve-sur-Long, 1876).
Archives Nationales, MSS, Paris.
Archives Tallandier, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.
l’Arsenal de Paris MSS.
Ashmole MSS, Bodleian Library, Oxford.
Baker, Geoffrey le. Chronicon Galfridi le Baker de Swynebroke (ed. E. Maunde Thompson, Oxford, 1889).
Barbour, John. The Bruce (3 vols., ed. Walter Skeat, Early English Text Society, 1870–77; ed. W. M. Mackenzie, London, 1909).
The Berkeley Manuscripts: The Lives of the Berkeleys (3 vols., compiled by their steward, Sir John Smyth of Nibley, in the 17th century; ed. J. MacLean, Gloucester, 1883–85).
The Beverley Chapter Act Book, 1286–1347 (ed. A. Leach, Surtees Society, 1898).
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, Collections Brienne and Moreau.
Bodleian MSS, Bodleian Library, Oxford.
The Brut Chronicle, or The Chronicles of England (ed. F. W. D. Brie, Early English Text Society, Original Series, CXXXI, London, 1906, 1908).
Burney MSS, British Library.
Bury, Richard de. Philobiblon (ed. E. C. Thomas, London, 1960).
Calendar of Chancery Rolls (Various), 1277–1326 (HMSO, London, 1912).
Calendar of Chancery Warrants, 1244–1326 (HMSO, London, 1927).
Calendar of the Charter Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office, 1222–1516 (6 vols., HMSO, London, 1903–27).
Calendar of the Close Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office: Edward I, Edward II, and Edward III (24 vols., HMSO, London, 1892–1927).
Calendar of Documents Relating to Scotland Preserved in Her Majesty’s Public Record Office, London (4 vols., ed. J. Bain, Edinburgh, 1881–88).
Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers Relating to Great Britain and Ireland (8 vols., ed. W. H. Bliss and W. W. Blom, HMSO, London, 1893–1904).
Calendar of the Fine Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office: Edward I, Edward II and Edward III, 1327–1347 (5 vols., HMSO, London, 1912–29).
Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem and Other Analogous Documents Preserved in the Public Record Office: Edward I, Edward II and Edward III (13 vols., HMSO, London, 1906–52).
Calendar of Letterbooks Preserved among the Archives of the Corporation of the City of London, 1275–1498 (11 vols., ed. R. R. Sharpe, London, 1899–1912).
Calendar of Memoranda Rolls, Michaelmas 1326–Michaelmas 1327 (HMSO, London, 1968).
Calendar of the Patent Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office: Edward I, Edward II and Edward III (27 vols., HMSO, London, 1894–1916).
Calendar of Plea and Memoranda Rolls of the City of London, 1323–1412, Preserved among the Archives of the Corporation of London at the Guildhall (6 vols., ed. A. H. Thomas and P. E. Jones, Cambridge, 1926–61).
Calendar of Various Chancery Rolls: Supplementary Close Rolls, Welsh Rolls, Scutage Rolls, Preserved in the Public Record Office, 1277–1326 (HMSO, London, 1912).
Capgrave, John. The Chronicle of England (ed. F. C. Hingeston, Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1858).
Cappellani, William. Willelmi Cappellani in Brederode postea Monachi et Procuratoris Egmundensis Chronicon (ed. C. Pijnacker Hondyk, Historisch Genootschap, 3rd Series, XX, Amsterdam, 1904).
Cartulaire de Notre Dame de Boulogne (ed. D. Hagnière, Paris, 1844).
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Chancery Miscellanea (C.47), Public Record Office.
Chancery: Parliament and Council Proceedings (C.49), Public Record Office.
Chancery Records: Warrants for the Great Seal (C.81), Public Record Office.
Charter Rolls (C.53), Public Record Office.
Chartularies of St. Mary’s Abbey, Dublin: With the Register of Its House at Dunbrody and Annals of Ireland (2 vols., ed. John T. Gilbert, Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1884).
Chartulary of Winchester Cathedral (ed. A. W. Goodman, Winchester, 1927).
“Chronicarum Comitum Flandria” (ed. Joseph-Jean De Smet, in Corpus Chronicorum Flandriae, 4 vols., Brussels, 1837–65).
The Chronicle of Bury St. Edmunds, 1212–1301 (ed. and trans. Antonia Gransden, Nelson’s Mediaeval Texts, London, 1964).
“A Chronicle of the Civil Wars of Edward II,” also known as the Cleopatra Chronicle (ed. G. L. Haskins, Speculum, XIV, 1939).
Chronicle of the Grey Friars of London (ed. J. Nichols, Camden Society, 1852).
The Chronicle of Lanercost, 1272–1346 (2 vols., ed. J. Stevenson, Bannatyne Club, Edinburgh, 1839; ed. and trans. Sir Herbert R. Maxwell, Maitland Club, Glasgow, 1913).
Chronicle of London, 1089–1483 (ed. H. Nicholas, Society of Antiquaries of London, 1827).
Chronicle of Meaux: Chronica Monasterii de Melsa, a Fundatione usque ad Annum 1396, Auctore Thoma de Burton, Abbate. Accedit Continuato as Annum 1406 a Monacho Quodam ipsius Domus (3 vols., ed. E. A. Bond, Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1866–68).
Chronicles Illustrative of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II (2 vols. [Vol. I: Annales Londonienses; Annales Paulini; Vol. II: Commendiato lamentablis in transita magni regis Edwardi; Gesta Edwardi de Carnarvon auctore canonico Bridlingtoniensi; Monachi cujusdam Malmesberiensis; Vita et mors Edwardi II conscripta a Thoma de la Moore], ed. W. Stubbs, Rolls Series, HMSO, London, 1882–83).
The Chronicles of London (ed. and trans. E. Goldsmid, Edinburgh, 1885).