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The English Nobility in the Late Middle Ages

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Four themes dominated the life of the medieval nobleman: warfare, politics, land, and family. All these made up English political society, not just for the great dukes and earls but also for the lesser peers and the gentry who formed the power base in the counties. The author thoroughly examines the English social structure, discussing what contemporaries meant when they talked of the nobility and analyzing in detail the territorial and familial policies of the great landholders. For instance, although William the Conqueror did not, as a matter of policy, dispossess the Anglo-Saxon nobility, that is, in fact, what had happened by the time of Domesday Book, twenty years later. By 1086, there were, at the top of society, about 170 great tenants-in-chief, men who held their land directly from the king, and enough of it to be described as barons. All but two of these men were Norman (or Breton, or Fleming). Among them, these 170 controlled about half the land of England. Another seventeen percent of the land was retained by William as his own demesne, and another quarter of the land was granted to the Church. The remaining eight percent was divided among all the other lesser tenants-in-chief and the minor royal officials. But even so, there were immense differences at the top, with Robert, count of Mortain (the king's brother), controlling a hundred times as much territory and income as, say, Robert of Aumale. In fact, about one-quarter of England was in the hands of ten men: Robert of Mortain, Odo of Bayeux (the king's other brother), William FitzOsbern, Roger de Montgomery, William de Warenne, Hugh d'Avranches, Eustace of Boulogne, Richard de Clare, Geoffrey of Coutances, and Geoffrey de Mandeville.

Given-Wilson also probes the surprising fact that no really great noble dynasts emerged in England during the 12th century -- a family that might compare in wealth and status with the great peers of France or the dukes and margraves of Germany. (It was mostly a combination of geographical dispersion of landholdings and much greater social fluidity than that of the 14th century.) The author is also careful to provide examples of his points from a large number of noble families of interest to the genealogist. The historical maps detailing the manor holdings of the Nevils, Berkeleys, Clares, Montagues, Beauchamps, Percys, Cliffords, Fitzalans, Mowbrays, and Beauforts are enlightening and the notes and bibliography are very extensive.