
Fulk FitzWarin ( – c. 1258), variant spellings (
Latinized ''Fulco filius Garini'', Welsh ''Syr ffwg ap Gwarin''), the third (Fulk III), was a prominent representative of a
marcher family associated especially with estates in
Shropshire
Shropshire (; abbreviated SalopAlso used officially as the name of the county from 1974–1980. The demonym for inhabitants of the county "Salopian" derives from this name.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West M ...
(on the English border with
Wales
Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...
) and at
Alveston in
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...
. In young life (c. 1200 – 1203), early in the reign of
King John (1199–1216), he won notoriety as the
outlaw
An outlaw, in its original and legal meaning, is a person declared as outside the protection of the law. In pre-modern societies, all legal protection was withdrawn from the criminal, so anyone was legally empowered to persecute or kill them. ...
ed leader of a roving force striving to recover his familial right to
Whittington Castle in Shropshire, which John had granted away to a Welsh claimant. Progressively rehabilitated, and enjoying his lordship, he endured further setbacks in 1215–1217.
Thereafter, his connections with the court of
Llywelyn ap Iorwerth
Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (, – 11 April 1240), also known as Llywelyn the Great (, ; ), was a medieval Welsh ruler. He succeeded his uncle, Dafydd ab Owain Gwynedd, as King of Gwynedd in 1195. By a combination of war and diplomacy, he dominate ...
and his usefulness to the English king placed him in the midst of a larger conflict in which he lost Whittington to Llywelyn for a year in 1223–1224, though that prince was said to have married his daughter. During the 1220s Fulk founded
Alberbury Priory in Shropshire, which became the smallest and last established of the three English houses dependent upon the
Order of Grandmont
Grandmontines were the monks of the Order of Grandmont, a religious order founded by Saint Stephen of Thiers, towards the end of the 11th century. The order was named after its motherhouse, Grandmont Abbey in the eponymous village, now part of th ...
. Always ready to defend his rights, Fulk lived to a ripe old age and was buried at Alberbury beside his two wives, leaving heirs and daughters and a plentiful posterity among whom the name of Fulk FitzWarin was continuously renewed in later centuries. His grandson was
Fulk V FitzWarin, 1st Baron FitzWarin (1251–1315).
After his death, Fulk became the subject of a popular "
ancestral romance" in French verse, ''
Fouke le Fitz Waryn'', relating his life as an outlaw and his struggle to regain his patrimony from the king.
[T. Wright (ed. and transl.), ''The History of Fulk Fitz Warine, an Outlawed Baron in the Reign of King John'', Warton Club]
(London 1855)
(Internet Archive). This survives in a prose version, and combines historical material with
legend
A legend is a genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human values, and possess certain qualities that give the ...
ary and fantastical elements which are heroic rather than strictly biographical.
[K. Bedford, 'Fouke le Fitz Waryn: Outlaw or Chivalric Hero?', in A.L. Kaufman (ed.), ''British Outlaws of Literature and History: Essays on Medieval and Early Modern Figures from Robin Hood to Twm Shon Catty'', (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2011), p. 97.]
Origins
Although the name Fitz Warin means "son of Warin", it was Fulk's grandfather,
Fulk I FitzWarin, whose father's name was Warin, or Guarine, of
Metz
Metz ( , , , then ) is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle (river), Moselle and the Seille (Moselle), Seille rivers. Metz is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Moselle (department), Moselle Departments ...
, in
Lorraine
Lorraine, also , ; ; Lorrain: ''Louréne''; Lorraine Franconian: ''Lottringe''; ; ; is a cultural and historical region in Eastern France, now located in the administrative region of Grand Est. Its name stems from the medieval kingdom of ...
.
[G.E. Cokayne, ''The Complete Peerage'', V, p. 495, note (c)] Warin (who appears in the Romance of ''Fouke le Fitz Waryn'' as "Warin de Meer") is, however, a "shadowy or
myth
Myth is a genre of folklore consisting primarily of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society. For scholars, this is very different from the vernacular usage of the term "myth" that refers to a belief that is not true. Instead, the ...
ical figure" about whom little is known.
Whatever his origin, the head of this family is generally held to have come to England during the reign of
William the Conqueror
William the Conqueror (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), sometimes called William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England (as William I), reigning from 1066 until his death. A descendant of Rollo, he was D ...
(1066–1087). Neither he nor his sons were then
tenants-in-chief
In medieval and early modern Europe, a tenant-in-chief (or vassal-in-chief) was a person who held his lands under various forms of feudal land tenure directly from the king or territorial prince to whom he did homage, as opposed to holding them ...
(i.e. important
vassal
A vassal or liege subject is a person regarded as having a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch, in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. While the subordinate party is called a vassal, the dominant party is called a suzerain ...
s or
feudal barons
A feudal baron is a vassal holding a heritable fief called a ''barony'', comprising a specific portion of land, granted by an overlord in return for allegiance and service. Following the end of European feudalism, feudal baronies have largely bee ...
): their estates were granted by later kings.
Fulk I was associated with the Peverels:
William Peverel the Younger granted him a
knight's fee
In feudal Anglo-Norman England and Ireland, a knight's fee was a unit measure of land deemed sufficient to support a knight. It would not only provide sustenance for himself, his family, and servants, but also the means to furnish himself and h ...
in
Tadlow
Tadlow is a small village and civil parish in South Cambridgeshire, South Cambridgeshire, England on the River Cam (or Rhee). It is south-west of Cambridge and north-east of Biggleswade, Bedfordshire. In 2001 the population was 181 and the ar ...
, Cambridgeshire, before 1148 which King
Henry II
Henry II may refer to:
Kings
* Saint Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor (972–1024), crowned King of Germany in 1002, of Italy in 1004 and Emperor in 1014
*Henry II of England (1133–89), reigned from 1154
*Henry II of Jerusalem and Cyprus (1271–1 ...
confirmed in 1154. Henry rewarded Fulk I for his support of the
Empress Matilda
Empress Matilda (10 September 1167), also known as Empress Maud, was one of the claimants to the English throne during the civil war known as the Anarchy. The daughter and heir of Henry I, king of England and ruler of Normandy, she went to ...
during the
civil war
A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same Sovereign state, state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.J ...
by conferring upon him the royal
manor of
Alveston in Gloucestershire (by 1155) and the manor of Whadborough in
Loddington, Leicestershire. His son Fulk II
held
Held may refer to:
Places
* Held Glacier
People Arts and media
* Adolph Held (1885–1969), U.S. newspaper editor, banker, labor activist
*Al Held (1928–2005), U.S. abstract expressionist painter.
*Alexander Held (born 1958), German television ...
those properties after the death of his father in 1171. In the time of
Robert Foliot, Bishop of Hereford (1174–1186), Fulk II gave land at Tadlow to
Shrewsbury Abbey
The Abbey Church of the Holy Cross (commonly known as Shrewsbury Abbey) is an ancient foundation in Shrewsbury, the county town of Shropshire, England.
The Abbey was founded in 1083 as a Benedictine monastery by the Normans, Norman Earl of Shre ...
to settle a controversy over the
patronage
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, art patronage refers to the support that princes, popes, and other wealthy and influential people ...
of the church of
Alberbury, Shropshire, in his own favour. The FitzWarin land tenure at Alberbury, held from the
Fee of Caus, was therefore presumably already in place.
At some time before 1178 Fulk II married Hawise, one of the two daughters and co-heirs of
Josce de Dinan and his wife
Sybil, widow of
Pain fitzJohn. Josce had held
Ludlow Castle
Ludlow Castle is a ruined medieval fortification in the Ludlow, town of the same name in the English county of Shropshire, standing on a promontory overlooking the River Teme. The castle was probably founded by Walter de Lacy (died 1085), Wal ...
in the Welsh Marches for the Empress Matilda during the civil war, but it was not expedient for Henry II to confirm Ludlow to Josce, and in place thereof, he granted to him the large manorial estate of
Lambourn in Berkshire, with its appurtenances, amounting to a considerable value. Josce died by 1167, and Lambourn became the inheritance, in two parts, of his daughters Hawise and Sybil (who married Hugo de Plugenet).
Fulk II and Hawise de Dinan were the parents of Fulk FitzWarin III.
;How John and Fulk came to blows
The ''FitzWaryn Romance'' tells that Fulk II and Hawise lived in proximity to the king, and had sons Fulk, William, Philip, John and Alan (who appear as real historical persons in contemporary records). It further states that young Fulk was bred with the four sons of King Henry, who all loved him except for
Prince John (born 1166): ''Fouke le jeouene fust norry ou les iiij. fitz Henré le roy, et mout amé de tous, estre de Johan...'' The story goes that Fulk and John quarrelled over a game of chess: John struck Fulk over the head with the chessboard, whereat Fulk's foot made a connection with the prince's abdomen, and John fell back, banging his head against the wall. John went off to tell his father, who had him beaten for complaining.
This merry episode reflects a truth, for John was brought up under the tutelage of
Ranulf de Glanvill (who became King Henry's
Chief Justiciar in 1180), as were Ranulf's nephews
Hubert Walter
Hubert Walter ( – 13 July 1205) was an influential royal adviser in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries in the positions of Chief Justiciar of England, Archbishop of Canterbury, and Lord Chancellor. As chancellor, Walter be ...
and
Theobald Walter, with whom (and with Ranulf's grandson
Robert de Auberville), Fulk III later became closely connected by marriage. The
milieu
The social environment, social context, sociocultural context or milieu refers to the immediate physical and social setting in which people live or in which something happens or develops. It includes the culture that the individual was educated ...
s of the English royal court and the princely courts of Wales are never far distant from Fulk's story.
Career
The lordship of Whittington
Fulk II encountered many problems in receiving his
capital
Capital and its variations may refer to:
Common uses
* Capital city, a municipality of primary status
** Capital region, a metropolitan region containing the capital
** List of national capitals
* Capital letter, an upper-case letter
Econom ...
patrimony and other claimed lands. Among the latter was
Whittington Castle, a site north-east of
Oswestry
Oswestry ( ; ) is a market town, civil parish and historic railway town in Shropshire, England, close to the England–Wales border, Welsh border. It is at the junction of the A5 road (Great Britain), A5, A483 road, A483 and A495 road, A495 ro ...
which had been fortified by William Peverel the younger in 1138 in support of Empress Matilda.
[Meisel, ''Barons of the Welsh Frontier'', p. 35] Fulk I, it is supposed, had held this from the
Honour of Peverel. The Castle stands on the English (eastern) side of
Offa's Dyke
Offa's Dyke () is a large linear Earthworks (Archaeology), earthwork that roughly follows the England–Wales border, border between England and Wales. The structure is named after Offa of Mercia, Offa, the Anglo-Saxons, Anglo-Saxon king of Mer ...
, the ancient boundary between England and
Wales
Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...
. During the late 1140s the lordship of
Whittington, as with Oswestry and Overton, was ceded from English authority and became a Welsh
marcher lord
A marcher lord () was a noble appointed by the king of England to guard the border (known as the Welsh Marches) between England and Wales.
A marcher lord was the English equivalent of a margrave (in the Holy Roman Empire) or a marquis (in Fra ...
ship within the
Kingdom of Powys
The Kingdom of Powys (; ) was a Welsh successor state, petty kingdom and principality that emerged during the Middle Ages following the end of Roman rule in Britain. It very roughly covered the northern two-thirds of the modern county of Pow ...
.
In 1165 Henry II granted the castle of Whittington to Roger de Powys, a Welsh leader, and in about 1173 gave him funds for its repair. Fulk II successfully claimed for the restitution of Whittington, a judgement mentioned in the
Pipe Roll
The Pipe rolls, sometimes called the Great rollsBrown ''Governance'' pp. 54–56 or the Great Rolls of the Pipe, are a collection of financial records maintained by the English Exchequer, or HM Treasury, Treasury, and its successors, as well a ...
for 1195 when he owed a Fine of 40 marks to have
seisin Seisin (or seizin) is a legal concept that denotes the right to legal possession of a thing, usually a fiefdom, fee, or an estate in land. It is similar, but legally separate from the idea of ownership.
The term is traditionally used in the context ...
: but he never paid this, and was dead by 1197. It, therefore, remained in Welsh hands.
Fulk III then renewed his father's claim,
[Painter, ''The Reign of King John'', p. 52] and in 1197 offered
relief
Relief is a sculpture, sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces remain attached to a solid background of the same material. The term ''wikt:relief, relief'' is from the Latin verb , to raise (). To create a sculpture in relief is to give ...
of £100 for it as his inheritance. However, on 11 April 1200
King John granted it to Meurig (Maurice), son of Roger of Powis, who had offered half that sum. Again, after Maurice's death in August 1200, King John granted it to Maurice's son Werennoc.
Rebellion and outlawry
Whether John's refusal to honour Fulk's hereditary claim to Whittington was personal or political, it was this which by April 1201 drove Fulk openly into armed defiance of the king. He was accompanied by approximately fifty-two followers including his brothers William, Phillip and John, by his cousins, and by the family's many tenants and allies in the Marches.
Although it is an important element in the Romance of ''Fouke'', the uprising is not described in detail by more formal chroniclers.
It was sufficiently troublesome, however, that when in the spring of 1201 King John crossed into
Normandy
Normandy (; or ) is a geographical and cultural region in northwestern Europe, roughly coextensive with the historical Duchy of Normandy.
Normandy comprises Normandy (administrative region), mainland Normandy (a part of France) and insular N ...
and
Poitou
Poitou ( , , ; ; Poitevin: ''Poetou'') was a province of west-central France whose capital city was Poitiers. Both Poitou and Poitiers are named after the Pictones Gallic tribe.
Geography
The main historical cities are Poitiers (historical ...
to suppress a revolt by the
Lusignans, he assigned 100 knights to
Hubert de Burgh with instructions for him to put down the activities of Fulk and his band, and those of a renegade in
Devon
Devon ( ; historically also known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west ...
. The ''Annales Cestrienses'' tell that in 1202 Fulk was obliged to make his escape by sea, and, having got away with a few of his followers, took refuge in
Stanley Abbey near
Chippenham
Chippenham is a market town in north-west Wiltshire, England. It lies north-east of Bath, Somerset, Bath, west of London and is near the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The town was established on a crossing of the River Avon, ...
, Wiltshire. There he was besieged by the king's forces, after which Archbishop
Hubert Walter
Hubert Walter ( – 13 July 1205) was an influential royal adviser in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries in the positions of Chief Justiciar of England, Archbishop of Canterbury, and Lord Chancellor. As chancellor, Walter be ...
with a number of the clergy got him away and kept him for some time in his court. Then Fulk set off quietly with many armed men to join the king of France.
Pardons were granted during that year for Eustace de Kivilly and Gilbert de Duure, for having been associated with him. Fulk himself seems to have had difficulty coming to terms with the king, for in 1203 there are three separate safe-conducts for him and his company to attend and leave the royal presence. In November 1203 he was pardoned together with over thirty of his followers. In October 1204, by a fine of 200 marks, Fulk at last received "right and inheritance" in Whittington. The castle thereafter descended in the
FitzWarin family, all subsequent holders being named Fulk, until the death of Fulk (XI), the 7th Baron FitzWarin, in 1420.
The first marriage
By 1207 Fulk III married
Maud (Matilda), daughter and heir of Robert le Vavasour, and widow of
Theobald Walter, 1st Chief Butler of Ireland, who died late in 1205 in Ireland.
[W. Farrer and C.T. Clay, ''Early Yorkshire Charters'', XI: The Percy Fee (Cambridge University Press, 1963 edition)]
p. 130
(Google). Theobald (of
Warrington
Warrington () is an industrial town in the Borough of Warrington, borough of the same name in Cheshire, England. The town sits on the banks of the River Mersey and was Historic counties of England, historically part of Lancashire. It is east o ...
), who was granted his Irish office in 1185 in service to Prince John's Lordship of Ireland, assisted his brother Hubert Walter in receiving the surrender of John's supporters in
Lancaster in 1194. John, after his accession to the throne in 1199, in 1200 deprived Theobald of his lands and offices and did not restore them to him until 1202. His children included the
second Theobald.
Maud's dower included one-third of the lands Theobald had held from the king in Ireland, as well as of those in Norfolk and Lancashire: which were released immediately, but a dower from Theobald's lands in
Amounderness
The Amounderness Hundred ( ) is one of the six subdivisions of the historic county of Lancashire in North West England, but the name is older than the system of hundreds first recorded in the 13th century and might best be described as the na ...
was in the king's hand in 1215. For the huge fine of 1,200 marks levied upon Fulk for this marriage he secured pledges from his brother William and from Maud's father, a tenant of the
feudal barony
A feudal baron is a vassal holding a heritable fief called a ''barony'', comprising a specific portion of land, granted by an overlord in return for allegiance and service. Following the end of European feudalism, feudal baronies have largely bee ...
of
Skipton
Skipton (also known as Skipton-in-Craven) is a market town and civil parish in North Yorkshire, England. Historically in the East Division of Staincliffe Wapentake in the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is on the River Aire and the Leeds ...
in Yorkshire.
The high regard in which Fulk was then held is shown by the names of his sureties, which included the Peverels,
Alan Basset
Alan Basset (died 1232 or 1233) was an English baron.
Basset was a younger son of Adeliza and Thomas Basset of Headington, Oxfordshire. In favour with both Richard I and with John, he received from the former the lordships of Woking and Ma ...
,
William de Braose (died 1230), a de Lacy,
William Longespée, 3rd Earl of Salisbury
William Longespée, 3rd Earl of Salisbury (In or before 11677 March 1226) ("Long Sword", Latinised to ''de Longa Spatha'') was an Anglo-Norman nobleman, primarily remembered for his command of the English forces at the Battle of Damme and for ...
and
Henry de Bohun, 1st Earl of Hereford
Henry de Bohun, 1st Earl of Hereford (1176 – 1 June 1220) of Pleshey Castle in Essex, was an Anglo-Normans, Anglo-Norman Nobility, nobleman who became Hereditary Constable of England from 1199.
Origins
Henry was the son and heir of Hum ...
. In 1210 he accompanied the king to Ireland, and was at
Dublin
Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...
and
Carrickfergus
Carrickfergus ( , meaning " Fergus' rock") is a large town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It sits on the north shore of Belfast Lough, from Belfast. The town had a population of 28,141 at the 2021 census. It is County Antrim's oldest t ...
. In 1213 the king granted timbers from Leicester Forest to Fulk for his dwelling at the Vavasour
hereditament of
Narborough, Leicestershire, and for the construction of a chamber there.
On 9 February 1214, when King John again set sail for
Poitou
Poitou ( , , ; ; Poitevin: ''Poetou'') was a province of west-central France whose capital city was Poitiers. Both Poitou and Poitiers are named after the Pictones Gallic tribe.
Geography
The main historical cities are Poitiers (historical ...
, Fulk was among the barons who accompanied him. He is believed to have been a vassal of
Geoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of Gloucester at that time. In September of that year Fulk,
Walter de Lacy and many others were with King John at
Parthenay, to witness John's 5-year peace treaty with King
Philip Augustus of France. Over the months immediately following he is found among the malcontent barons who, between their meetings at
Bury St Edmunds
Bury St Edmunds (), commonly referred to locally as ''Bury,'' is a cathedral as well as market town and civil parish in the West Suffolk District, West Suffolk district, in the county of Suffolk, England.OS Explorer map 211: Bury St. Edmunds an ...
in November and at the
New Temple in January, sought to bring John to a realization of their grievances. By December 1215 Fulk's name appears in the list of English barons excommunicated by
Pope Innocent III
Pope Innocent III (; born Lotario dei Conti di Segni; 22 February 1161 – 16 July 1216) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 8 January 1198 until his death on 16 July 1216.
Pope Innocent was one of the most power ...
's
bull
A bull is an intact (i.e., not Castration, castrated) adult male of the species ''Bos taurus'' (cattle). More muscular and aggressive than the females of the same species (i.e. cows proper), bulls have long been an important symbol cattle in r ...
, for his part in their opposition to the king.
Further confrontations
In 1215 Fulk was one of many giving great trouble to the
Sheriff of Shropshire. Before the accession of the infant king
Henry III (John's son) in 1216, Fulk's manor of Alveston had already been seized by the crown: in the following year (1217) all of his other lands in Gloucestershire were likewise seized. By 1218, however, Fulk had made peace and his lands were ordered to be restored to him by the king's regents: his market at his manor of Narborough was withdrawn from him as being "a manifest enemy" of the king's in 1217, but was regranted in 1218, and the Amounderness dower was also restored. In the latter year the king also granted a fair for his manor of
Lambourn in Berkshire, the inheritance from Josce de Dinant. Fulk's mother Hawise died at about this time.
By 1220 Fulk had regained some favour with the young King Henry III and had been allowed to rebuild and fortify Whittington, and to hold a weekly market and annual two-day fair there. In 1223 Whittington Castle fell to
Llywelyn the Great
Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (, – 11 April 1240), also known as Llywelyn the Great (, ; ), was a medieval Welsh ruler. He succeeded his uncle, Dafydd ab Owain Gwynedd, as King of Gwynedd in 1195. By a combination of war and diplomacy, he dominate ...
, Prince of Wales, but was recovered and restored to him, as
Kinnerley was restored to Fulk's kinsman Baldwin de Hodenet. However his disputes with Llywelyn continued and more of Fulk's lands fell into the king's hands. During the 1220s Fulk hoped to marry his son Fulk to Anghared, daughter of prince
Madog ap Griffin, a union which Llywelyn sought to prevent. By 1228 a truce seems to have been reached between Fulk, Thomas Corbet and Llywelyn, following the intervention of the king.
[I.J. Sanders, 'Fitz Warin lords of Whittington and Alderbury (Salop) and Alveston (Gloucs.)', ''Y Bywgraffiadur Cymreig '' (1959)]
(Welsh Dictionary of National Biography online)
Throughout these years Fulk's relations with the king were changeable and seemed to be directly dependent on the state of affairs in Wales. As a marcher lord Fulk's role as a protector of the English border against the Welsh was vital to the English King. He arbitrated several border disputes on behalf of the king and although there were more personal disagreements, there were no more rebellions on the part of Fulk III.
Alberbury Priory

Between 1221 and 1226 Fulk began to build his priory at
Alberbury on a moated site at a bend in the
river Severn
The River Severn (, ), at long, is the longest river in Great Britain. It is also the river with the most voluminous flow of water by far in all of England and Wales, with an average flow rate of at Apperley, Gloucestershire. It rises in t ...
on the border of England and Wales. He first intended it as a house of
Augustinian canons following the
Arrouasian rule, and invited Alan, the Abbot of
Lilleshall, to establish the convent. However his endowments were found insufficient, and Alan's successor Abbot William renounced any interest in the project. Fulk, therefore, turned instead to the
Grandmontine Order, following the example of
Walter de Lacy's house founded at
Craswall Priory in
Herefordshire
Herefordshire ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England, bordered by Shropshire to the north, Worcestershire to the east, Gloucestershire to the south-east, and the Welsh ...
c. 1220–1225, but placing Alberbury under the immediate authority of Grandmont Abbey in
Limousin
Limousin (; ) is a former administrative region of southwest-central France. Named after the old province of Limousin, the administrative region was founded in 1960. It comprised three departments: Corrèze, Creuse, and Haute-Vienne. On 1 Jan ...
. Having been intended for the Augustinians, the buildings lacked the special features of a Grandmontine plan. In addition to the priory site with its lands and rights in Alberbury with Pecknall, a fishery in the Severn, and the right to construct mills, Fulk's endowments to the priory included his manor of Whadborough at Loddington in eastern Leicestershire. These were confirmed by King Henry III's charter of 1232. The
Castle in Alberbury, of which a ruin remains, is also attributed to Fulk III as representing the seat of his manor here.
Estates and suits
;Narborough, Leicestershire
In 1226 Maud the wife of Fulk FitzWarin died, which was no doubt a stimulus to the completion of the priory, where she was buried.
[Emma Cavell, 'The Burial of Noblewomen in Thirteenth-Century Shropshire,' in B. Weiler, J. Burton, P. Schofield and K. Stöber (eds), ''Thirteenth Century England'' XI (The Boydell Press, Woodbridge 2007), p. 174 & note 2.] In that year
Theobald Walter the younger (son of Maud's first marriage) unsuccessfully challenged William Pantolf and Hawise his wife (Fulk's daughter) for title to the manor of
Narborough in Leicestershire, a Vavasour hereditament.
Fulke's market at Narborough had received the king's re-confirmation in 1220, but a suit of 1276 shows that the manor had been given by Maud to her daughter Hawise, who by her marriage to Pantolf became Lady of the barony of
Wem
Wem may refer to:
* HMS ''Wem'' (1919), a WWI Royal Navy minesweeper
* Weem, a village in Perthshire, Scotland
* Wem, a small town in Shropshire, England
* Wem (musician), hip hop musician
WEM may stand for:
* County Westmeath
County Westmeat ...
, as the ''FitzWarin Romance'' reminds us. Theobald simultaneously challenged Fulk for the manor of
Edlington
Edlington is a town and civil parish in the City of Doncaster, South Yorkshire, England, lying to the south west of Doncaster and Warmsworth. It has a population of 8,276. The original parish town of Edlington is now known as ''Old Edlington ...
in Yorkshire, another part of the same inheritance. After Pantolf died in 1233, and Fulk paid 600 marks for custody of his heirs and lands, Hawise remarried to Hubert Husse, taking Narborough as her ''
maritagium'' with her, and in 1235 Hubert obtained a renewal of the market, which had by then lapsed.
;Lambourn and Wantage, Berkshire
In 1227 the fair at
Lambourn was re-granted. Before 1224
William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke had by his charter enfeoffed Fulk III in the nearby manor of
Wantage
Wantage () is a historic market town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Vale of White Horse, Oxfordshire, England. Although within the boundaries of the Historic counties of England, historic county of Berkshire, it has been a ...
, Berkshire and in the
Hundred
100 or one hundred (Roman numerals, Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 (number), 99 and preceding 101 (number), 101.
In mathematics
100 is the square of 10 (number), 10 (in scientific notation it is written as 102). The standar ...
of Wantage and ''Gamenefeud'': for although the king's attorney later challenged the FitzWarin right to the Hundreds, they remained in their hands. The king claimed Wantage manor against him as ''terra Flandrensium''—the land of Robert de Béthune—in 1236–37, but Fulk's possession of it was warranted by
Gilbert Marshal, and he defended his possession again in 1241 against Robert de Béthune in his own person.
In due course, Fulk by charter granted his entire manor of Lambourn to his daughter Mabil and to the heirs of her body, and acknowledged the fact before the Court of King's Bench in 1249. A
seal-matrix of Fulk FitzWarin (
equestrian) found at
Little Bedwyn, Wiltshire, about five miles south of Lambourn, corresponds to a seal-impression on a charter in the
Harleian collection
The Harleian Library, Harley Collection, Harleian Collection and other variants () is one of the main "closed" collections (namely, historic collections to which new material is no longer added) of the British Library in London, formerly the libra ...
which is dated probably early in the reign of Henry III, and therefore likely to represent Fulk III: another FitzWarin charter with armorial seal, dated 1258, grants land and rent at Wantage.
The second marriage
Mabil was the daughter of Fulk's second wife, Clarice de Auberville, who (as the
Fine rolls record) was certainly living in 1250. The marriage features in the Romance narrative (which calls her "une molt gentile dame") and is said to have occurred "a good while" after the death of Maud. The legend tells that after their marriage Fulk was struck blind for the last seven years of his life, and that he outlived Clarice by one year. It has been accepted (or asserted) that Clarice was the daughter (rather than the widow) of Sir
Robert de Auberville, of
Iden
Integrated Digital Enhanced Network (iDEN) is a mobile telecommunications technology, developed by Motorola, which provides its users the benefits of a Trunked radio system, trunked radio and a mobile phone, cellular telephone. It was called ...
and Iham (Higham, in
Icklesham), near
Winchelsea
Winchelsea () is a town in the county of East Sussex, England, located between the High Weald and the Romney Marsh, approximately south west of Rye and north east of Hastings. The current town, which was founded in 1288, replaced an earli ...
, Sussex. Sir Robert, of an influential Norman family seated at
Westenhanger, Kent, was a grandson of
Ranulf de Glanvill's, and on the death of his father William de Auberville, c. 1195, had become a ward of
Hubert Walter
Hubert Walter ( – 13 July 1205) was an influential royal adviser in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries in the positions of Chief Justiciar of England, Archbishop of Canterbury, and Lord Chancellor. As chancellor, Walter be ...
's. He was a Constable of
Hastings Castle, and Keeper of the Coast in 1228–1229. Robert's wife Clarice was daughter of Robert and granddaughter of Samson de
Gestling, benefactors of
Robertsbridge Abbey. Robert de Auberville is supposed to have died c. 1230.
In 1230 Fulk commenced a suit against Philip de Burwardsley (i.e. of
Broseley
Broseley () is a market town in Shropshire, England, with a population of 4,929 at the 2011 Census and an estimate of 5,022 in 2019. The River Severn flows to its north and east. The first iron bridge in the world was built in 1779 across the ...
, Shropshire), apparently a FitzWarin cousin, concerning lands in Shropshire and Staffordshire which had been disputed between their grandfathers, and which did not come to a full Assize until after 1233.
Service
Fulk attended the king's court in Westminster in October 1229: he received a writ of protection during absence upon foreign service in April 1230, and was required to supply one knight for foreign service in aid of the "
Earl of Bretaigne" in May 1234. In July 1236 he was appointed one of the Arbitrators (for North Wales) of the truce between King Henry and Llywelyn, as William FitzWarin was among those for South Wales. In March 1238 he was among the powerful men summoned by the king to Oxford, to deliberate upon Llywelyn's action in causing his son
Dafydd to receive homage from the magnates of
Gwynedd
Gwynedd () is a county in the north-west of Wales. It borders Anglesey across the Menai Strait to the north, Conwy, Denbighshire, and Powys to the east, Ceredigion over the Dyfi estuary to the south, and the Irish Sea to the west. The ci ...
and Powys. The Romance narrative tells that, after the death of
Joan, Lady of Snowdon in 1237 (who was buried at
Beaumaris
Beaumaris (; ) is a town and community (Wales), community on the Anglesey, Isle of Anglesey in Wales, of which it is the former county town. It is located at the eastern entrance to the Menai Strait, the tidal waterway separating Anglesey fro ...
),
Llywelyn ap Iorwerth
Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (, – 11 April 1240), also known as Llywelyn the Great (, ; ), was a medieval Welsh ruler. He succeeded his uncle, Dafydd ab Owain Gwynedd, as King of Gwynedd in 1195. By a combination of war and diplomacy, he dominate ...
took Eva, daughter of Fulk, as his last wife (with which the ''Annales Cestrienses'' concur
[Christie (ed.), ''Annales Cestrienses'',]
pp. 60–61, s.a. 1239
(Internet Archive).): and, after Llywelyn's death in 1240, she remarried to William de Blancmouster (de Whitchurch).
In June 1245, faced by the rapacity of the
Papal nuncio
An apostolic nuncio (; also known as a papal nuncio or simply as a nuncio) is an ecclesiastical diplomat, serving as an envoy or a permanent diplomatic representative of the Holy See to a state or to an international organization. A nuncio is a ...
Martin (resulting in a prohibition of
tournaments
A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses:
# One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentr ...
), an assembly of nobles at
Dunstable
Dunstable ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Bedfordshire, England, east of the Chiltern Hills, north of London. There are several steep chalk escarpments, most noticeable when approaching Dunstable from the north. Dunstable is the fou ...
and Linton deputed Fulk to proceed to London to order Martin out of the kingdom. As
Matthew Paris
Matthew Paris, also known as Matthew of Paris (; 1200 – 1259), was an English people, English Benedictine monk, English historians in the Middle Ages, chronicler, artist in illuminated manuscripts, and cartographer who was based at St A ...
relates their interview, Fulk told him to leave England immediately, but Martin questioned his authority to demand it. Fulk told him to be off within three days if he did not wish to be utterly brought down, and withdrew in anger, heaping threats upon threats with a terrible oath against him. Martin hurried off to the king, who told him that he had brought the kingdom to the brink of revolt: being asked for safe conduct the king answered, "May the Devil take you to hell." A week later Fulk witnessed a charter of the king's at Windsor.
Last controversies
Although Fulk seems certainly to have lived after 1250, in this late period it is increasingly difficult to distinguish him from his two sons named Fulk, among the various references to Fulk "senior" and "junior". At a Shropshire Assize of January 1256, Fulk "junior" (possibly the younger son called Fulk Glas) was claiming that
Thomas Corbet had disseised him of his free tenement of Alberbury. At an earlier hearing, he had become enraged when Corbet referred to his father as "Proditor" (Traitor), and had renounced any homage he had made to Corbet, vowing never to hold land of him again. The court found for FitzWarin, but Corbet later brought an appeal.
The
Hundred Rolls {{Short description, 13th-century census of England and Wales
The Hundred Rolls are a census of England and parts of what is now Wales taken in the late thirteenth century. Often considered an attempt to produce a second Domesday Book, they are na ...
for 1255 show that Fulk FitzWarin was then holding two
hides geldable in Alberbury of the fee of Caus (of which Thomas Corbet of
Caus Castle was lord), and that the Grandmontensian brothers there held two
virgate
The virgate, yardland, or yard of land ( was an English unit of land. Primarily a measure of tax assessment rather than area, the virgate was usually (but not always) reckoned as hide and notionally (but seldom exactly) equal to 30 acr ...
s by the gift of Fulk FitzWarin ''senior'' (i.e. Fulk III in 1232), and of the fee of Caus. The services owing by Fulk FitzWarin for a knight's fee held from Corbet at Alberbury had been set forth in a concord of 1248, the Fine for which was recorded in the
Great Roll of the Pipe for 1250 and remained unpaid in 1252.
In 1245 the king had appointed Fulk FitzWarin, John le Strange and Henry de Audley to settle a land dispute between Gruffydd ap Madog, whose land had been seized by
Dafydd ap Llywelyn
Dafydd ap Llywelyn (c. March 1212 – 25 February 1246) was List of rulers of Gwynedd, King of Gwynedd from 1240 to 1246.
Birth and descent
Though birth years of 1208, 1206, and 1215 have been put forward for Dafydd, it has recently been p ...
during the king's last war, and which had been seized back from Dafydd and was now claimed by
Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn
Gruffudd ap Gwenwynwyn (died c. 1286) was a Welsh people, Welsh king who was lord of the part of Kingdom of Powys, Powys known as Powys Wenwynwyn; he sided with King Edward I of England in the latter's Conquest of Wales by Edward I, conquest of W ...
(whose mother was Margaret Corbet, and whose wife
Hawise was daughter of
John le Strange of
Knockin Castle). On the occasion of Thomas Corbet's outrageous remark, the court had been meeting by royal precept to settle contentions between Corbet and Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn. In time, Gruffydd's daughter Margaret became the wife of
Fulk V FitzWarin, son of Fulk IV.
Death and burial
Historians cannot exactly state when FitzWarin died but 1258 is given as the latest probable date. Most likely, he handed some of his affairs over to his son Fulk IV during his lifetime. According to the Romance narrative, his second wife Clarice died before him. She was buried at Alberbury Priory, and he died a year later and was laid to rest beside both of his wives in the monastery church, part of which was incorporated into later buildings at the site.
Family

Fulk III FitzWarin married, first, c. 1207,
Maud (Matilda) le Vavasour, daughter of Robert le Vavasour and widow of Theobald Walter. Maud died in 1226 and was buried at Alberbury Priory (''alias'' New Abbey, Alberbury) in Shropshire.
Their offspring included:
* Fulk IV FitzWarin (d. 1264).
[Meisel, ''Barons of the Welsh Frontier'', p. 37] He received the manor of Edlington, Yorkshire, as part of his inheritance. He married Constance de Tosny, and was the father of
Fulk V FitzWarin, 1st Baron FitzWarin.
* Hawise FitzWarin, married (first) William Pantulf, a
marcher lord
A marcher lord () was a noble appointed by the king of England to guard the border (known as the Welsh Marches) between England and Wales.
A marcher lord was the English equivalent of a margrave (in the Holy Roman Empire) or a marquis (in Fra ...
(who died in 1233), and (secondly) Hubert Huse.
She received the manor of Narborough.
* Joan FitzWarin,
married Sir Henry de Penebrugge, of
Pembridge Castle, Herefordshire.
* Eleanor FitzWarin, married William de Rivers (de Ripariis) of
Great Shefford in the Lambourn valley, Berkshire, son of Richard de Rivers of
East Mersea (Essex).
* Eve FitzWarin,
married William de Blanchminister. It was claimed in the Romance narrative and in the ''Annales Cestrienses'' that she first married
Llywelyn ap Iorwerth
Llywelyn ab Iorwerth (, – 11 April 1240), also known as Llywelyn the Great (, ; ), was a medieval Welsh ruler. He succeeded his uncle, Dafydd ab Owain Gwynedd, as King of Gwynedd in 1195. By a combination of war and diplomacy, he dominate ...
.
[
* Fulk Glas] (sometimes attributed to his father's second marriage)
Fulk's second marriage, to Clarice de Auberville, is described in the Romance narrative. Clarice is taken to have been the daughter and heiress of Robert de Auberville of Iden
Integrated Digital Enhanced Network (iDEN) is a mobile telecommunications technology, developed by Motorola, which provides its users the benefits of a Trunked radio system, trunked radio and a mobile phone, cellular telephone. It was called ...
and Iham (Higham, in Icklesham), Sussex, and his wife Clarice de Gestling. Fulk's daughter by this marriage was:
* Mabel FitzWarin (d. 1297), who married (first) William de Crevequer (no issue) and (secondly) John Tregoz, Lord Tregoz (died before 6 September 1300). By the second marriage she had two daughters and co-heirs, Clarice and Sybil Tregoz. She received the manor of Lambourn.
Sir William Dugdale
Sir William Dugdale (12 September 1605 – 10 February 1686) was an English antiquary and herald. As a scholar he was influential in the development of medieval history as an academic subject.
Life
Dugdale was born at Shustoke, near Colesh ...
, in his ''Baronage'', accepted as factual the identification of Clarice as the second wife of Fulk III and, despite occasional doubts, later accounts of the family have followed this precedent.
Romance
During the later 13th century, when the actual events of Fulk's life were still in living memory or common report, a romance known as '' Fouke le Fitz Waryn'', probably first in French verse, was written about him. This survives in an early 14th-century French prose version, in a single manuscript in the Royal manuscripts, British Library, which is thought to follow the lost verse quite closely. The 16th-century antiquary John Leland saw and briefly described the French verse version, and made an extended abstract from a Middle English
Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman Conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English pe ...
verse version called ''The Nobile Actes of the Guarines'', the original of which is also lost. Various contemporary references show that the tale was widely-known in the later Middle Ages.[K. Bedford, 'Fouke le Fitz Waryn: Outlaw or Chivalric Hero?', in A.L. Kaufman (ed.), ''British Outlaws of Literature and History: Essays on Medieval and Early Modern Figures from Robin Hood to Twm Shon Catty'' (McFarland & Co., Jefferson, NC 2011), pp. 99–99.]
References
Further reading
* Benecke, I., ''Der gute Outlaw: Studien zu einem literarischen Typus im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert'' Studien zur Englischen Philologie, Neue Folge, Vol. XVII (Max Niemeyer Verlag, Tübingen 1973).
* Burgess, G.S., ''Two Medieval Outlaws: Eustace the Monk and Fouke Fitz Waryn'' (D.S. Brewer, Woodbridge 2009)).
* Burton, J., P. Schofield and M. Lieberman, ''The English and the Welsh in "Fouke le Fitz Waryn"'' (Boydell Press, Woodbridge 2009).
* Cavell, E., 'Fouke le Fitz Waryn: Literary Space for Real Women?', ''Parergon'', Vol. 27, no. 2 (Project Muse, 2010), pp. 89–109.
* Cox, E., 'Women of the Fitz Waryn Family in "Fouke Le FitzWaryn",' in H.T. Düzgün (ed.), ''Texts and Territories: Historicized Fiction and Fictionalised History in Medieval England and Beyond'' (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne 2018)
pp. 39–55
(Google).
* Dolmans, E., 'Locating the Border: Britain and the Welsh Marches in ''Fouke le Fitz Waryn'',' in L. Ashe, W. Scase and D. Lawton (eds)
(Boydell and Brewer, 2016), pp. 109–134.
* Francis, E., 'The background to Fulk Fitz Warin', ''Studies in Medieval French Presented to Alfred Ewart'' (Oxford 1961).
* Hanna, R., 'The Matter of Fulk: Romance and History in the Marches', ''The Journal of English and Germanic Philology'', Vol. 110, no. 3 (University of Illinois Press, July 2011), pp. 337–58.
* Harlan-Haughey, S., ''The Ecology of the English Outlaw in Medieval Literature : from Fen to Greenwood'' (Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, London/New York 2016)
* Jones, T., 'Geoffrey of Monmouth, "Fouke le Fitz Waryn," and National Mythology', ''Studies in Philology'', Vol. 91, no. 3 (1994), pp. 233–249.
* Jordan, L., ''Das Volksbuch von Fulko Fitz Warin'' (Dt. Verlag-Actienges, Leipzig 1906).
* Kemp-Welch, A. (translator), L. Brandin (ed.), ''The History of Fulk Fitz-Warine'' (Alexander Moring Ltd., De La More Press, London 1904).
* Lecco, M., ''Il Romanzo di Folco Fitz Waryn (Fouke Fitz Waryn)'' (Edizioni dell'Orso, Alessandria 2012).
* Legge, M. ''Anglo-Norman Literature and its Background'' (Oxford 1963).
* Lévy, R., ''Fouke Fitz Warin, lexique supplémentaire'' (University of Iowa, 1933).
* Pensom, R., 'Inside and outside: fact and fiction in "Fouke le Fitz Waryn",' ''Medium Ævum'', Vol. 63, no. 1 (1994), pp. 53–60.
* Phillips, H., ''Bandit Territories: British Outlaw Traditions'' (University of Wales Press, Cardiff 2008).
* Price, G., '"Le Gué Gymele" in "Fouke Fitz Warin"', ''The Modern Language Review'', Vol. 56, no. 2 (1961), pp. 220–222.
* Rock, C.A., 'Fouke le Fitz Waryn and King John: Rebellion and Reconciliation,' in A.L. Kaufman (ed.)
''British Outlaws of Literature and History: Essays on Medieval and Early Modern Figures from Robin Hood to Twm Shon Catty''
(McFarland & Co., Jefferson, NC 2011).
* Stephenson, D., 'Fouke le Fitz Waryn and Llywelyn ap Gruffydd's Claim to Whittington', ''Transactions of the Shropshire Archaeological and Historical Society'', LXXVII (2002), pp. 26–31.
* Williams, A.J., 'Manipulating the Past for the Sake of the Future: Optimistic Perspectives in the Outlaw Romance "Fouke le Fitz Waryn"', ''New Zealand Journal of French Studies'', Vol. 28, no. 1 (2007), pp. 19–31.
* Williams, A., 'Stories within stories: writing history in "Fouke le Fitz Waryn"', ''Medium Ævum'', Vol. 81, no. 1 (2012), pp. 70–87.
* Wogan-Browne, J., T.S. Fenster and D.W. Russell, ''Vernacular Literary Theory from the French of Medieval England : Texts and Translations, c.1120-c.1450'' (D.S. Brewer, Woodbridge (UK)/Rochester (NY) 2016).
* Wright, T., ''The History of Ludlow and its Neighbourhood: forming a popular sketch of the History of the Welsh Border'' (R. Jones, Ludlow 1852)
pp. 63–83
(Google).
* Zink, M., 'Le rêve avéré. La mort de Cahus et la langueur d'Arthur, du Perlesvaus à Fouke le Fitz Waryn', ''Littératures'', Vol. 9, no. 1 (1984), pp. 31–38.
;Fiction
* Elizabeth Chadwick, ''The Outlaw Knight'' (Sourcebooks); formerly published as ''Lords of the White Castle'' (Little, Brown, 2000).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fulk Fitzwarin
1160s births
1258 deaths
12th-century English nobility
13th-century English nobility
English heroic legends
FitzWarin, Fulk
English rebels
Medieval legends
FitzWarin, Fulk
Anglo-Normans
Robin Hood
Marcher lords
Norman warriors
People from Alveston