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Alan Kirketon: a clerical royal councillor in Normandy during the English occupation in the fifteenth century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2011

C. T. Allmand
C. T. Allmand
Affiliation:
Assistant Lecturer in History, University College of North Wales, Bangor
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Extract

The search for royal councillors was one of the major difficulties which Henry V had to face once he had achieved the conquest of Normandy. Many local royal officials, having taken the oath of loyalty to the king, were confirmed in their posts; others were brought over from England—a system which proved satisfactory at first. But the finding of personnel for the higher offices presented Henry with a serious problem. Since he was unwilling to trust the native French at so early a stage he could, and did, begin by seeking the counsel of his fellow-countrymen. But this method could not continue indefinitely, since it did not correspond with the intentions lying behind the conquest, planned to be lasting and permanent. However, the alliance with Charles VI, cemented in 1420 by the Treaty of Troyes, meant that the English could now call upon a number of Frenchmen, many of Burgundian origin or sympathy, to serve in the royal council. It was soon realised, too, that the university of Paris was an admirable seed-ground for future royal councillors, especially lawyers, of whom there was need. By the end of Henry V's reign, a number of these graduates were already employed by the English: under the regency of the duke of Bedford they soon achieved a numerical superiority in the royal council in France. From now on, the English dominions were to be ruled by men of these two groups.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 15 , Issue 1 , April 1964 , pp. 33 - 39
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1964

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References

page 33 note 1 Rowe, B. J. H. Miss, ‘The Grand Conseil under the Duke of Bedford, 1422–1435’, Oxford Essays in Medieval History presented to H. E. Salter, Oxford 1934, 210 fGoogle Scholar.

page 33 note 2 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G.2125, fol. 18.

page 34 note 1 P.R.O., E. 101/187/15/14, 26.

page 34 note 2 Vatican Archives, Reg. Lat. 330, fol. 5V; Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers relating to Great Britain and Ireland, (C.P.L.), ed. Twemlow, J. A., viii, 532Google Scholar.

page 34 note 3 Rowe, op. cit., 210–11. The will of John Estcourt, who died late in 1427, is printed in The Register of Henry Chichele, ed. Jacob, E. F., Oxford 1937, ii, 372–4Google Scholar. It was primarily as dean of the regent's chapel that Estcourt spent much of his later life in France.

page 34 note 4 Emden, A. B., A Biographical Dictionary of Members of the University of Oxford from A.D. 11766 to 1500, Oxford 1958, ii, 1055–6Google Scholar. I gratefully acknowledge Dr. Emden's help in the preparation of this article.

page 34 note 5 P.R.O., C.64/10, m.40; Reports of the Deputy Keeper of the Public Records, (D.K.R.), xli, 724.

page 34 note 6 P.R.O., C.64/15, m.24; D.K.R., xlii, 398. Other king's clerks who served in Normandy during the occupation were Edmund Lacy, Thomas Rodebourne, John Prentys, and William Colles.

page 34 note 7 Arch. Seine-Maritime, Échiquier records, 1423, fol. 1; Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, Y. 84, fols. 88v, 89.

page 34 note 8 B.M. Add. Ch. 1016. He is incorrectly described as archdeacon of Meaux in the catalogue.

page 34 note 9 Bibliothèque Nationale (B.N.), MS. Fr. 4485, p. 127; C. de Beaurepaire, De l' administration de la Normandie sous la domination anglaise aux années 1424, 1425, 1439, Caen 1859, 25, 26.

page 34 note 10 Beaurepaire, op. cit., 14.

page 35 note 1 B.M. Add. Ch. 317.

page 35 note 2 Arch. Seine-Maritime, Échiquier records, 1424, fol. 1; Beaurepaire, loc. cit.

page 35 note 3 He is not mentioned as such in Jean Blanchard's MS. list of masters of requests (B.N. MS. Fr. 32514, pp. 118–34).

page 35 note 4 Stein, H., Le Palais de Justice et la Sainte Chapelle de Paris, Paris 1912, 132, n.4Google Scholar. Canonries at the Sainte Chapelle were often given to men occupying high public, ecclesiastical or administrative positions. Since the canons were supposed to reside, it is possible that Kirketon may have been given this post to provide him with lodgings in Paris.

page 35 note 5 Vatican Archives, Reg. Lat. 269, fol. 272v; C.P.L. vii, 505–6. Both he and Bedford were in England at the time of the appointment.

page 35 note 6 Vatican Archives, Reg. Lat. 272, fol. 274; C.P.L., vii, 527. Kirketon succeeded John Estcourt as dean, and John Rickinghall as confessor, probably holding both offices himself. Later on, while preserving his office of dean, Kirketon surrendered that of confessor to Peter Irford, who held it at Bedford's death. Irford, who studied theology at Paris, was also appointed to a canonry at the Sainte Chapelle by the regent (B.N. MS. Lat. 5494, pp. 59, 80, 128, 146, 166; Stein, loc. cit.).

page 35 note 7 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2125, fol. 70; de Beaurepaire, C., ‘Fondations pieuses du duc de Bedford à Rouen’, Bibliothèque de l'École des Chartes, xxxiv (1873), 345–6Google Scholar.

page 36 note 1 Archives Nationales (A.N.), M. 70, fol. 22; Wickersheimer, E., Commentaires de la Faculty de Médecine de l'Université de Paris, 1395–1516, Paris 1915, 141Google Scholar.

page 36 note 2 Fournier, M., La Faculté de Décret de l'Université de Paris au XV Sièle, Paris 1895, i, 296Google Scholar.

page 36 note 3 Fournier, op. cit., i, 316; Denifle, H. and Châtelain, E., Chartularium Universitatis Parisiensis, 1394–1452, Paris 1897, iv, 476, No. 2309, n.2Google Scholar.

page 36 note 4 A.N., Xla a 4795, fol. 283; Journal de Clément de Fauquembergue, greffier du Parlement de Paris, 1417–1435, ed. Tuetey, A., Société de l'histoire de France, Paris 1909, ii, 280Google Scholar; Journal d'un Bourgeois de Paris, 1405–1449, ed. Tuetey, A., Société de l'histoire de Paris, Paris 1881, 227, n.2Google Scholar.

page 36 note 5 Vatican Archives, Reg. Suppl. 233, fol. 183.

page 37 note 1 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2132. There is no local evidence that Kirketon was a canon of Rouen before this date, in spite of the evidence recorded in C.P.L., vii, 280.

page 37 note 2 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2132.

page 37 note 3 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2126, fol. 158v; G. 2132.

page 37 note 4 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2132. Tiphaine had received benefices in Normandy from Henry V, who had also appointed him to Totnes: A.N., Xla 4794, fol. 33; F. C. Hingeston-Randolph, The Register of Edmund Lacy, Bishop of Exeter 1420–1455, London/Exeter 1909, i, 47, 156. He was physician to queen Katherine, who presented him to the deanery of the collegiate church of Holyhead in 1423: The Register of Henry Chichele, i, 211.

page 37 note 5 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 3573; The Register of Henry Chichele, ii, 585.

page 37 note 6 Fournier, op. cit., i, 366, 380, 381, 386.

page 37 note 7 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2127, fol. 41v: ‘… ob reverenciam venerabilis et circumspecti magistri Alani Kyrketon, decretorum doctoris …’.

page 37 note 8 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2133. He was styled ‘trescher et bien ame’ in a letter addressed to him by Henry VI, probably about May 1436. There had been a suggestion of his resigning his Evreux offices at this time, but it is unlikely that this step was taken, as Kirketon was styled archdeacon of Neubourg in March 1443. See P.R.O., E. 28/38, last document, which is wrongly ascribed to the early years of Henry VI. It is clearly connected with another in E. 28/57.

page 38 note 1 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2128, fols. 46, 52, 124, 141, 149, 154; G. 2129, fols. 6v, 7, 27. 30.

page 38 note 2 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2128, fol. 52; G. 2133; Beaurepaire, Fondations pieuses, 370, n.2.

page 38 note 3 B.N., MS. Fr. 26064/3419, 3545, 3583: Pièces Originales, 1610/37267/2–4.

page 38 note 4 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2129, fol. 7: ‘… judices seu amicabiles compositores de omnibus discordiis inter eos motis …’.

page 38 note 5 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2129, fol. 30; G. 1893; Floquet, A., Histoire du Privilige de Saint Romain, Rouen 1833, i, 166Google Scholar.

page 38 note 6 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2129, fol. 35: ‘… ad avisandum modum providendi electionem futuri decani …’.

page 38 note 7 Anquetil, E., Présentations et collations de bénéfices du diocèse de Bayeux, 1436–1445, Bayeux 1904, 27Google Scholar.

page 38 note 8 Collection Lenoir, 27, pp. 37, 119, 225–6 (a microfilm of this collection, which is privately owned, may be consulted at the Archives Nationales in Paris); Beaurepaire, Fondations pieuses, 378.

page 38 note 9 Arch. Seine-Maritime, G. 2130, fols. 159, 160.

page 38 note 10 Coll. Lenoir, 27, p. 193.

page 39 note 1 Tout, T. F., Chapters in the Administrative History of Mediaeval England, Manchester 1928, iv, 188Google Scholar.

page 39 note 2 ‘… ibidem in eodem Obsequio in Comitiva ejus Avunculi Regis moraturus’: Foedera, ed. 1710, x, 551.

page 39 note 3 A.N., Xla 4795, fol. 83v.