Ralph de Normanville

  Information about this person:

• Background Information. ¹¹¹⁶
The manor of Empingham was given by Roger de Mowbray to Ralph de Normanville for his services. Ralph seems to have forfeited it, for Roger later restored it to Gerold de Normanville, possibly Ralph's son, to whom it was confirmed by King Henry II [Cal. Pat. R. 1494-1509, p. 268]. Ralph and Gerold de Normanville were witnesses to the foundation of the Abbey of St. Mary, Huntingdon, by Simon, Earl of Northampton, in 1146/7 [Geneal. New Ser., 13, 15]. Gerold was living in 1164/5. By an undated charter, he granted to Geoffrey de la Mare in frank marriage with Mary, his daughter, at the door of the church of St. Peter in Stamford, lands and rent in Empingham [Blore, op. cit. 124; Pipe R. Soc. viii, 57].

Ralph, said to be son of Gerold de Normanville, paid 40s. for a writ of right in 1170 [Ibid. 16 Hen. II, p. 147; Geneal. New Ser., 13, 15] and was in possession of Empingham in 1205, when he obtained a grant of free warren there [ot. Chart. John, Rec. Com, 149]. King John by the same charter granted him the county of Rutland at farm, for which grants Ralph agreed to pay 60 marks, a destrier or war horse, and a palfrey [Pipe R. 7 John, m. 50; Rot. de Oblat. et Fin.. Rec. Com., 268]. At about the same time Ralph inherited from his uncle, Reginald de Normanville, land in Rouceby and Rokesham, co. Linc. [Curia Reg. R. iv, 299; v, 84].

In the early years of the reign of King John, Ralph de Normanville was apparently in the king's favor, and in 1213 served with Ralph de Bray as Marshal of the king's army in England [Rot. Litt. Claus., Rec. Com., i, 16]. In the same year he was appointed to make inquiry as to damage done to churches in the diocese of Lincoln, during the late disturbances in the kingdom [Ibid.]. Later he joined the rebellion against King John, and though he was pardoned [Ibid. 260], severe conditions were imposed upon him. Gerold his son, and one of his knights, William de Badlesmere, had been taken prisoner, and for their release and his own pardon, Ralph was required to pay 500 marks and 5 palfreys of 25 marks. Of this, 250 marks and 25 marks for the palfreys was to be paid before the release of his son Gerold, William de Badlesmere. Two other of Ralph's sons, Geoffrey and Thomas, were to be delivered to the king to be held as hostages until Ralph made two further payments of £100 at Easter and 100 marks at Whitsun. After payment of these sums, Ralph was further required to give the king his charter of faithful service, when one of his two sons should be released, the other being retained as a hostage for the faithful service of Ralph and his son Gerold [Rot. de Oblat. et Fin. 576.].

Ralph was constable of Stamford in 1221 [Cal. Pat. R. 1216-25, 451], and it was he, probably, who served in 1225 as a justice of the forest for the perambulation of the Forest of Rutland [Cal. Pat. R. 1216-25, p.569]. The date of his death is not known, but an incomplete entry on the Pipe Roll of 1230 suggests that his son Ralph had then succeeded him [Pipe R. Soc., New Ser., iv, 324].

The younger Ralph and Thomas his brother were pledges in 1222 for the payment of William Mauduit's relief [Excerpt, e Rot. Fin. i, 87]. Both of them forfeited their lands in Kent in 1223 [Rot. Lin. Claus., Rec. Com., i 568]. Ralph's offence, and probably that of Thomas, was that he took part in a tournament at Blythe notwithstanding the king's prohibition [Ibid. i, 545].

Ralph de Normanville seems to have died shortly after 1241, and to have been succeeded by his brother Thomas, or possibly a son of that name. Thomas de Normanville died seized of the family estate at Kenardington, co. Kent, in 1245 and was succeeded by his heir, Ralph, probably his son [Cal. Inq. Hen. III, i, 55].

Ralph de Normanville set out on a pilgrimage to Santiago in April 1259 [Cal. Pat. R. 1258-66, p. 20] and died before May following, probably on the journey. He died seized of the manor of Empingham [Cal. Inq. Hen. III, i, 421], and his widow Galiena had dower there [Cal. Pat. R. 1258-66, p. 33]. Galiena paid 300 marks for the wardship of Ralph's lands and heir and for her own marriage [Excerpt. e Rot. Fin., Rec. Com., ii, 309; Cal. Pat. R. 1258-66, p. 37], and in 1261, at the instance of her kinsman Geoffrey Rawe, a Knight Templar, she was exempted from suits of county, hundred and other courts for three years [Ibid. p. 157].

Thomas, her eldest son, was only two and a half years old at his father's death [Cal. Inq. Hen. III, i, no. 421]. He inherited the manor of Empingham, but Kenardington, co. Kent was divided between him and his brother Ralph, according to the law of gavelkind [Cal. Fine R. 1272-1307, pp. 172, 187; Cal. Inq. ii, no. 479]. Thomas died in 1282, leaving Ralph, his brother, heir to his Kent property [Ibid.], but Margaret, his daughter, a minor, seems to have been heir to his Rutland estates.

~ A History of the County of Rutland, Volume II, pp. 242-250

The pedigree I derived from the above:
Ralph de Normville, 1146/7
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Gerold de Normanville, living 1146/7- 1164/5
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Ralph, living 1170-1225, d. before 1230
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Thomas, living, 1222, 1241
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Ralph, d. May, 1259= Galiena, Living 1261
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Ralph, living 1298

Ralph married.