Henry de Motlowe (died

1361 Year 1361 ( MCCCLXI) was a common year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events January–December * March 17 – An-Nasir Hasan, Mamluk Sultan of Egypt, is killed by one of his own m ...

) was an English-born judge who briefly held office as

Lord Chief Justice of Ireland The Court of King's Bench (or Court of Queen's Bench during the reign of a Queen) was one of the senior courts of common law in Ireland. It was a mirror of the Court of King's Bench in England. The Lord Chief Justice was the most senior judge ...

.Ball, F. Elrington ''The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921'' London John Murray 1926 Vol.1 p. 79 He was born in Cheshire, to a family from

Nether Alderley Nether Alderley is a village and civil parish in Cheshire, England, on the A34 a mile and a half south of Alderley Edge. The civil parish includes the hamlets of Monk's Heath and Soss Moss. At Monk's Heath crossroads, the A34 crosses the A537 ...

. His surname suggests that there was also a family link with the village of

Mobberley Mobberley is a village in Cheshire, England, between Wilmslow and Knutsford, which in 2001 had a population of 2,546, increasing to 3,050 at the 2011 Census. Mobberley railway station is on the Manchester to Chester line. Manchester Airport lie ...

, five miles from Alderley, which was called Motburlege in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...

. He owned lands at

Church Lawton Church Lawton is a village and located in the unitary authority of Cheshire East and the ceremonial county of Cheshire in England. Its location is such that its eastern boundary forms part of the county boundary between Cheshire and Staffords ...

, (then known as Bog-Lawton): in 1338 one Ralph de Lawton gave a

quitclaim Generally, a quitclaim is a formal renunciation of a legal claim against some other person, or of a right to land. A person who quitclaims renounces or relinquishes a claim to some legal right, or transfers a legal interest in land. Originally a c ...

(i.e. a formal renunciation of his own claim) for all lands which were held in Church Lawton by Henry and his

heirs Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Officia ...

. He was already a senior official of the English Crown by 1346, when he appears on a commission in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

to investigate the forgery of the

Royal seal A seal is a device for making an impression in wax, clay, paper, or some other medium, including an embossment on paper, and is also the impression thus made. The original purpose was to authenticate a document, or to prevent interference with ...

. In the same year he was appointed Lord Chief Justice of Ireland but seems to have spent no more than a few months in that office, since he was replaced in the same year by John de Rednesse, and he is shortly afterwards heard of as a member of a Commission of

Oyer and Terminer In English law, oyer and terminer (; a partial translation of the Anglo-French ''oyer et terminer'', which literally means "to hear and to determine") was one of the commissions by which a judge of assize sat. Apart from its Law French name, the ...

Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southern end of the Pennine range of hills and part of the National Forest. It borders Greater Manchester to the nor ...

. In 1357 he was made a judge of the

Court of Common Pleas A court of common pleas is a common kind of court structure found in various common law jurisdictions. The form originated with the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster, which was created to permit individuals to press civil grievances against one ...

, and in the same year he sat on another royal commission, to investigate an alleged

affray In many legal jurisdictions related to English common law, affray is a public order offence consisting of the fighting of one or more persons in a public place to the terror (in french: à l'effroi) of ordinary people. Depending on their act ...

between Simon Warde, a servant of John Gynwell,

Bishop of Lincoln The Bishop of Lincoln is the ordinary (diocesan bishop) of the Church of England Diocese of Lincoln in the Province of Canterbury. The present diocese covers the county of Lincolnshire and the unitary authority areas of North Lincolnshire and ...

and certain members of the Order of

Hospitallers The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic Church, Catholic Military ord ...

, on whom Warde had been attempting to serve a summons to appear in a lawsuit. Ironically the future Prior of the Hospitallers, Richard de Wirkeley, who together with the then Prior, John Paveley, allegedly instigated the affray, had also been Lord Chief Justice of Ireland: the commission included yet another Irish Chief Justice, William de Notton.''Calendar of Patent Rolls of Edward III May 9, 1357'' Motlowe died in 1361.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Motlowe, Henry de 1361 deaths Year of birth unknown 14th-century English judges People from Cheshire Lords chief justice of Ireland