Some corrections and additions to the Complete Peerage: Volume 11: Saint Amand

SAINT AMAND

Volume 11, page 298:
He [Amauri de St. Amand (d. 1310)] m. Mary (----) ...

J. C. Parsons [The Court and Household of Eleanor of Castile in 1290 (Toronto, 1977), pp. 50-52] suggested that Mary was a daughter of John de Pécqigny, vidame of Amiens (d. 1304). The marriage took place at Leeds Castle on 21 August 1289 [ibid, p. 52, citing P.R.O. E 101/352/13, m. 2].

The basis of the identification is that Mary is one of a group of four "damsels" of the chamber who appear frequently throughout Queen Eleanor's wardrobe account book for 1289-90 and in one entry are described as kinswomen of the queen. Mary is usually described named as St Amand, but twice appears as domicella de Pynkeny, suggesting that she was a member of the Pécqigny family who were the queen's distant cousins (through their descent from an aunt of her maternal grandmother). Parsons also notes that Mary, who arrived at court on 10 August 1289, was apparently accompanied by John de Pécqigny, who did not leave until February 1289/90 [citing P.R.O. E 101/352/21, m. 1]. (He also notes that the marriage of Marie de Pécqigny to the "seigneur de St.-Amand" is stated by F. Darsy, Pécqigny et ses Seigneurs, Vidames d'Amiens (Abbeville, 1860), pp. 753-755.)

[Item last updated 13 July 2004.]

Volume 11, page 300:
AMAURI DE ST. AMAND ... m. Eleanor (---),(c) and d. 11 Sep. 1381.
Note c:
Said in his inq. p.m. (Wilts) to have been one of the daughters and heirs of the Earl of "Herford."

There is no evidence for a wife of Amauri named Eleanor. Amauri married, before 3 November 1329, Joan, one of the daughters of Maud, the daughter of Sir Philip Burnell, probably by her second husband, Sir John de Haudlo (d.1346). Joan was living in 1340.

Both the name given in volume 11, Eleanor, and the description of her as a daughter and coheir of the earl of Hereford, appear to be based on a misreading of the inquisitions taken after Amauri's death. No wife of Amauri is mentioned in these inquisitions, but those for Gloucester and Wiltshire mention manors held by Amauri of the earl of Buckingham, as of the right of the earl's wife Eleanor (described as as daughter and one of the heirs of the earl of Hereford in the Wiltshire inquisition) [Cal. Inq. p. m., vol.15, nos 581-586]. (For Eleanor, daughter and coheir of Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford etc., and wife of Thomas of Woodstock, earl of Buckingham, see Complete Peerage, vol.5, pp.719-728.)

On 3 November 1329 an agreement was made between John de Haudlo, knight, lord of Boarstall, and John de St Amand, knight, lord of Woodhay, to settle lands of John de Haudlo on Richard, his son, and his wife Isabella, and lands of John de St Amand on Amauri, his son, and his wife Joan [H. E. Salter, ed., The Boarstall Cartulary (1930), no 602].

In 1340 John de Haudlo conveyed several manors and advowsons on Geoffrey de Scardeburgh and Thomas Asselote - John was to hold these for his life, and after his death they were to pass to his son Nicholas and his heirs [Essex Feet of Fines, vol.3, p.56]. An endorsement records that Amauri de St Amand and Joan his wife, Walter the son of John de Norwich and Margaret his wife, and Elizabeth the daughter of John de Haudlo put in their claim. Most of these manors had in 1331 been settled by John de Haudlo and Maud his wife on themselves and their male heirs, with successive remainders to Joan, Elizabeth and Margaret, daughters of Maud, for their lives, and to John son of John Lovel (Maud's son by her previous marriage) and his male heirs [Essex Feet of Fines, vol.3, p.21; licence was given for this settlement 10 February 1330/1 (Calendar of Patent Rolls 1330-34, p.75)]. Clearly these three daughters are the same women who put in their claim in 1340.

From the evidence above, it is clear that Amauri's wife Joan was one of the daughters of Maud Burnell. It is not quite so clear whether Joan was the daughter of Maud's first husband, John, Lord Lovel, or her second, Sir John de Haudlo. John Lovel had a daughter Joan, said to be aged 2, or 2 and more, in October 1314 [Complete Peerage, vol. 8, p. 217, note m]. John de Haudlo also had a daughter Joan, mentioned in a fine of 1326 [Essex Feet of Fines, vol.2, p.225]; she may not have been Maud's daughter, as he had previously been married to Joan, the daughter and heir of Sir John FitzNiel [Complete Peerage, vol. 6, p. 400].

But the agreement of 1329 suggests that Joan is likely to have been the daughter of John de Haudlo, and the chronology gives some support to this likelihood - Amauri was born in or around early 1314 [Complete Peerage, vol. 11, p. 299], and a daughter of Maud's second marriage would be somewhat younger than this, rather than somewhat older.

[Douglas Richardson pointed out the feet of fines establishing the identity of Joan's mother in January 2002. Rosie Bevan supplied the 1329 agreement in September 2003.
Item last updated 2 October 2003.]