Piers FitzHerbert (bef. 1184 - bef. 1235)

Ancestors

Husband of Alice (Warkworth) FitzHerbert — married about Nov 1203 (to before 1225) in Clavering, Essex, England

Descendants

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Illustrious Men Piers FitzHerbert was one of 16 Illustrious Men, counselors to King John, who were listed in the preamble to Magna Carta. Join: Magna Carta Project Discuss: magna_carta

Biography

Piers, or Peter, FitzHerbert was the son of Herbert FitzHerbert and Lucy of Hereford, daughter of Miles of Gloucester.^[1][2][3] He was of age by 1204, meaning he was born no later than 1183:^[4][3] his father died before 18 July 1204^[1] and he was found to be adult son and heir.

Lands

Through his mother Piers inherited a one-third share of the barony of Miles of Gloucester.^[3][5] He held lands in Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Warwickshire, Wiltshire and Yorkshire^[6] and Wales.^[5]

Marriages and Children

Piers Fitz Herbert married twice. His first wife (marriage settlement 28 Nov 1203)^[4][3] was Alice of Warkworth, daughter of Robert FitzRoger of Warkworth^[1][3] and his wife Margery de Chesney.^[4][7][6][8] They had three known children:

• Herbert FitzPiers^[1][4][6][9]
• Reginald or Reynold FitzPiers^{[1][4][7][9][6]}
• Lucy (FitzPiers) de Roos^{[4][10][11][12][13]}

Piers' second wife was Isabel de Ferrers, widow of Roger Mortimer and daughter of Walkelin de Ferrers.^[4][14][15] They married in or before 1225.^[4][16] when an order was made relating to a repayment to Piers and Isabel by her brother Henry.^[6][15][17] They had no known issue.^[4] She died before 29 April 1252.^[4][14][15]

Reigns of King John and Henry III

King John appointed Piers governor of Pickering Castle in Yorkshire.^[4][18] He was Sheriff of Yorkshire^[4] in 1214/5.^[19]

In 1215 Piers was one of the Illustrious Men listed as King John's counsellors in the Magna Carta.^[20][21][22] During the succeeding civil war, Giles de Braose seized one of his Welsh castles, Blaenllynfi; it passed to Giles' brother Reginald de Braose on Giles' death, and in 1217 Reginald was ordered to restore it to Piers.^[5][23]

There was also difficulty over the manor of Watlington, Oxfordshire, which King John entrusted to Piers Fitzherbert in 1216. Once peace was restored at the beginning of Henry III's reign, Henry d'Oilly claimed it, and Piers acceded to this claim "to avoid labour and expense". Despite this, Piers was officially recorded as holding the fee in 1219. The following year he and Henry d'Oilly were called to account in the royal courts for having reached an agreement which was illegal because of the terms on which Piers held Watlington, and in 1223 the agreement was declared null and void and the manor reverted to Henry III.^[24]

Before 1228 Piers founded a hospital at Lechlade, Gloucestershire, probably in the early years of Henry III's reign.^[25][26]

In 1233 two of his castles in Wales, Castell Dinas and Blaenllynfi, were sacked by Llywelyn ap Iorwerth (Llywelyn the Great) and Richard Marshal.^[27][28]

Death and Burial

Piers FitzHerbert died shortly before June 6, 1235 and was buried at Reading Abbey, Berkshire.^[4][3]

Coat of Arms

Gules, three lions rampant, or.^[29]

Research Notes

Wives

Some older sources refer to Piers' first wife as Alice FitzRoger. Her father was Robert FitzRoger and she is nowadays often known as Alice FitzRobert.

Various false ascriptions of wives have been made.

• There is no evidence that Piers FitzHerbert married Sibyl de Dinham, as listed in a family tree on Geni.^[30]
• A muddled genealogical account in Collectanea Topographica Et Genealogica (1834)^[31] names three wives:
  • Alice, daughter of Robert FitzRoger, who is the same as Piers' first wife Alice
  • Alice Broadspeare or Broadspere, daughter of Blethin Broadspere - there is no good evidence for this relationship. She has briefly been attached as a wife of Piers and is now detached. Alice Broadspeare is also given as a wife in the 1847 edition of Burke's Landed Gentry.^[32]
  • Isabella de Braose, described as widow of David ap Lewelin Prince of Wales. This is patently wrong, as Isabella married David ap-Llywelyn in 1230 and he died in 1248, well after Piers' own death. There was a thread about this in 2002 on soc.genealogy.medieval.^[33] A discussion in Notes and Queries, 1880, elaborates a bit further on the reasons why Isabella de Braose cannot have been a wife of Piers FitzHerbert.^[34]

Previously-shown Daughter Joan

Piers FitzHerbert has previously been shown on WikiTree as father of Joan (FitzPiers) de Verdun who married Nicholas de Verdun. There is no evidence for this, and she has been detached. Joan may have become attached to Piers FitzHerbert through the profile of Isabella de Braose being incorrectly attached as his wife. This blog mentions a Joan (Joanna), Sir Nicholas Verdun (and wife Clementia), and the de Braose family. There also seems to be no good evidence that Nicholas de Verdun married anyone with first name Joan.

A tree uploaded to Rootsweb by Jim Weber and no longer accessible (as at 20 February 2024) shows a Joan FitzPiers as daughter of Piers FitzHerbert and wife of Nicholas de Verdun but gives no sources.^[35]

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4} G E Cokayne. Complete Peerage, new edition, Vol. V, St Catherine Press, 1926, p. 465, FITZREYNOLD 1, footnote d
2. ↑ Douglas Richardson. Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 5 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham (Salt Lake City: the author, 2013), Vol II, p. 620, FITZ HERBERT 3
3. ↑ ^{3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5} Frederick Lewis Weis (continued by Walter Lee Sheppard Jr). Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America before 1700, 8th edition, Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004, pp. 215-6 (line 237-5, 6 & 7)
4. ↑ ^{4.00 4.01 4.02 4.03 4.04 4.05 4.06 4.07 4.08 4.09 4.10 4.11 4.12} Douglas Richardson, Royal Ancestry, Vol II, pp 621-622
5. ↑ ^{5.0 5.1 5.2} I J Sanders. English Baronies. A Study of their Origin and Descent 1086-1327, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1960, pp. 8-9
6. ↑ ^{6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4} Cawley. Entry for Piers FitzHerbert in Medieval Lands database
7. ↑ ^{7.0 7.1} 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. 250, BONVILLE-4. See also WikiTree's source page for ‘’Magna Carta Ancestry.’’
8. ↑ Frederick Lewis Weis, Ancestral Roots, p. 227 (line 246D-28)
9. ↑ ^{9.0 9.1} Frederick Lewis Weis, Ancestral Roots, p. 251 (line 261-32)
10. ↑ Douglas Richardson, Royal Ancestry, Vol IV, p 489, ROOS 6, Google Books
11. ↑ Douglas Richardson, Magna Carta Ancestry, Vol. III, pp. 445-446, ROOS2
12. ↑ Frederick Lewis Weis, Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America before 1700, p. 96 (line 89-28)
13. ↑ Frederick Lewis Weis, Frederick Lewis, additions by Walter Lee Sheppard Jr. The Magna Charta Sureties, 1215, 5th Edition, Genealogical Publishing Company, 1999, p. 77 (line 59A-4) and p. 152 (line 116-2)
14. ↑ ^{14.0 14.1} G E Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol. IX, St Catherine Press, 1936, p. 273
15. ↑ ^{15.0 15.1 15.2} Cawley. Entry for Isabel Ferrers in Medieval Lands database.
16. ↑ Frederick Lewis Weis, Ancestral Roots, p. 254 (line 262-29)
17. ↑ Fine Roll C 60/22, 9 HENRY III (1224–1225): 53 & 154 Henry III Fine Rolls Project
18. ↑ Wikipedia: Peter FitzHerbert
19. ↑ Wikipedia: High Sheriff of Yorkshire
20. ↑ Preface to the Magna Carta (The Magna Carta Project website), accessed 7 October 2019
21. ↑ Magna Carta translation, accessed 7 October 2019
22. ↑ Douglas Richardson, Magna Carta Ancestry, p. 8
23. ↑ Samuel Lewis. 'Cargiwch - Ceirchiog', in A Topographical Dictionary of Wales, London, 1849, pp. 228-238, British History Online, accessed 11 October 2019
24. ↑ 'Parishes: Watlington', in A History of the County of Oxford (Victoria County History: Oxfordshire), Volume 8, Lewknor and Pyrton Hundreds, ed. Mary D Lobel, London, 1964, pp. 210-252, British History Online, accessed 11 October 2019
25. ↑ 'Leach - Lechlade', in A Topographical Dictionary of England, ed. Samuel Lewis, London, 1848, pp. 42-46, British History Online , accessed 11 October 2019
26. ↑ 'Lechlade', in A History of the County of Gloucester (Victoria County History: Gloucestershire), Volume 7, ed. N. M. Herbert, Oxford, 1981)=, pp. 106-121, British History Online, accessed 11 October 2019
27. ↑ Wikipedia: Castell Dinas
28. ↑ Wikipedia: Blaenllynfi Castle
29. ↑ John Woody Papworth. An Alphabetical Dictionary of Coats of Arms Belonging to Families in Great Britain and Ireland: Forming an Extensive Ordinary of British Armorials : Upon an Entirely New Plan .... Vol. I, T Richards, 1874, p. 167, Google Books
30. ↑ Geni, Piers FitzHerbert
31. ↑ Collectanea Topographica Et Genealogica, Vol. I, John Bowyer Nichols and Son, London, 1834, p. 220, Internet Archive
32. ↑ John Burke, Bernard Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland, Volume 1, Edition 2. Publisher H. Colburn, 1847. Original from Pennsylvania State University. Digitized Apr 1, 2009
33. ↑ soc.genealogy.medieval, 'Piers Fitz Herbert's third wife', post dated 12 May 2002 and subsequent comments in the thread
34. ↑ Notes and Queries, sixth series, volume second, July-December 1880, p. 313, Internet Archive
35. ↑ 'The Phillips, Weber, Kirk, & Staggs families of the Pacific Northwest', https://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=jweber&id=I09009

• 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 Piers FitzHerbert of Blaenllyfni (-1 Jul 1235, bur Reading).
  • Entry for Isabel Ferrers.
• Richardson, Douglas. Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 5 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham. Salt Lake City: the author, 2013. See also WikiTree's source page for ‘’Royal Ancestry’’.
• Weis, Frederick Lewis (continued by Walter Lee Sheppard Jr). Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America before 1700, 8th edition, Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004:
  • p. 96 (line 89-28)
  • p. 215 (line 237-6)
  • p. 247 (line 246D-28)
  • p. 251 (line 261-32)
  • p. 254 (line 262-29)
• Cokayne, G E. Complete Peerage, new edition, Vol. V, St Catherine Press, 1926, p. 465
• Wikipedia: Peter FitzHerbert