Geoffrey (Mandeville) de Mandeville (abt. 1186 - 1216)

Born about 1186 in Saffron Walden, Essex, England

Ancestors

Died 23 Feb 1216 at about age 30 in London, England

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Magna Carta Surety Baron Geoffrey V de Mandeville was one of the twenty-five medieval barons who were surety for Magna Carta in 1215. Join: Magna Carta Project Discuss: magna_carta

Biography

Birth and Parentage

Geoffrey de Mandeville was the son of Geoffrey FitzPiers/FitzPeter and his first wife Beatrice de Say.^[1][2] His birth year is not known.

First Marriage

Geoffrey's first wife was Maud/Matilda FitzRobert,^[1] daughter of Magna Carta Surety Baron Robert FitzWalter.^[1][2][3] Geoffrey remarried in January 1213/4,^[1][2] so she died before then. They had no surviving children.^[1]

Inheritance

On 3 November 1213 he was ordered to hand over the Tower of London to the Archdeacon of Huntingdon,^[1] so he was presumably of full age then. The next day he paid homage to King John for his inheritance, following the death of his father the previous month, thereby becoming Earl of Essex.^[1][2] His inheritance included the Barony of Pleshy, Essex^[4]

Second Marriage

In January 1213/4 (1214 in modern reckoning), Geoffrey married Isabel, Countess of Gloucester, who had previously been married to King John.^[5] This appears to have been a forced marriage^[1][6] and his wife would have been significantly older than him. He was persuaded to pay the vast sum of 20000 marks for the privilege.^[1] This marriage made him Earl of Gloucester,^[1][2] and brought him the Honour of Glamorgan^[1] and the Barony of Gloucester.^[6] He had no children by his second marriage.^[1][5]

Rebellion

In 1215 Geoffrey joined the Barons who forced King John to agree to the Magna Carta,^[1] of which Geoffrey was one of the Sureties.^[7] In December 1215 he, along with other rebel Barons, was excommunicated. His lands were confiscated.^[1][2]

Death

Geoffrey died without issue on 23 February 1215/6 (1216 in modern reckoning) after being mortally wounded in a tournament in London. He was buried at Trinity Priory within Aldgate.^[1][5] The lands he held through his wife reverted to King John.^[6] His own lands and the title of Earl of Essex passed to his brother William, though he did not gain possession until he had returned to allegiance to the Crown in 1217.^[1][2]

Research Notes

Magna Carta 800th Anniversary Biography

For the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta in 2015, Professor Nigel Saul wrote a set of biographies of the Surety Barons. He and the Magna Carta 800th Anniversary Committee generously gave permission for them to be reproduced on WikiTree. They can be viewed here.

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15} G E Cokayne. The Complete Peerage, new edition, Vol. V, St Catherine Press, 1926, pp. 126-130, ESSEX V
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6} Charles Cawley. "Medieval Lands", entry for Geoffrey de Mandeville d. 1216, accessed 4 April 2020
3. ↑ Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, entry for 'Robert FitzWalter (magnate and rebel)', print and online 2004, revised online 2011, available online via some libraries
4. ↑ I J Sanders. English Baronies. A Study of their Origin and Descent 1086-1327, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1960, p. 71
5. ↑ ^{5.0 5.1 5.2} Douglas Richardson. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham, 2nd edition (Salt Lake City: the author, 2011), Vol. II, p. 304-5, FITZWALTER 1.i, Google Books
6. ↑ ^{6.0 6.1 6.2} I J Sanders, English Baronies, p. 6
7. ↑ Douglas Richardson. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham, 2nd edition (Salt Lake City: the author, 2011), Vol. I, p. ix

• Cokayne, G E. The Complete Peerage, new edition, Vol. V, St Catherine Press, 1926, pp. 126-130, ESSEX V
• Cawley, Charles. "Medieval Lands": A prosopography of medieval European noble and royal families © by Charles Cawley, hosted by Foundation for Medieval Genealogy (FMG). See also WikiTree's source page for MedLands. Entry for Geoffrey de Mandeville d. 1216
• Richardson, Douglas. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham. 2nd edition. Salt Lake City: the author, 2011. See also WikiTree's source page for "Magna Carta Ancestry". Vol. II, p. 304-5, FITZWALTER 1.i, Google Books
• Wikipedia: Geoffrey FitzGeoffrey de Mandeville, 2nd Earl of Essex

Acknowledgements

Magna Carta Project

As a surety baron, Geoffrey (Mandeville) de Mandeville's profile is managed by the Magna Carta Project, even though he is one of the eight barons with no traced ongoing line of descendants. ~ Noland-165 03:27, 30 January 2018 (EST)

Profile revised by Michael Cayley 4 April 2020.