Mediæval Military Architecture in England, Volume 1 (of 2)Clark, George Thomas
History
Mediæval Military Architecture in England, Volume 1 (of 2)
Clark, George Thomas
Architecture -- England; Architecture, Medieval; Military architecture
King Henry held Arundel till his death, when it passed in settlement to
his widow, Adeliza, daughter of Godfrey of Louvaine, Duke of Brabant.
The Queen Dowager married William d’Albini, a Norfolk noble, known
to chroniclers as “William with the strong hand,” the royal dapifer.
They received the Empress Maud at Arundel on her landing in 1139, with
her brother, the Earl of Gloucester, and in consequence had to stand
an attack from Stephen, to whom, it is said, Adeliza pleaded with
success the duties of hospitality, and Maud was allowed to retire to
Bristol. D’Albini, however, was, on the whole, a supporter of Stephen,
though with great judgment. He advised the accord between Stephen and
Henry in 1153, and signed the compact as “Earl of Chichester.” Henry,
on his accession, acknowledged the service by a grant of the earldom
of Arundel in fee with the third penny of the county of Sussex. Earl
William died in 1176. By Adeliza, who died in 1151, he left a son,
also William, the first of four generations of D’Albinis, and of five
persons who held the earldom of Arundel, or, as they called it, of
Sussex. They were buried at Wymondham, their own foundation. Earl Hugh,
the eighth from the Conquest, died childless in 1243. Isabel, his
sister, carried on the succession, and married John Fitz-Alan, whose
son, on his uncle’s death, succeeded.
This John, head of the great house of Fitz-Alan, Lords of Clun and
Oswaldestre, became the ninth earl, and died 1240. He was the first of
fourteen earls of the name who held the castle for twelve generations.
Of these, the elder line died out in the person of Thomas, fifteenth
earl, who died childless in 1415; but the succession was continued by
his cousin, Henry Fitz-Alan Lord Maltravers, who died 1580, leaving an
heiress, Mary, who married Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk. The later
Fitz-Alans lived much at Arundel, with which place they became closely
identified.
Duchess Mary died 1557, and her husband in 1572. Their son, Philip,
became twenty-second earl, since when there have been in all ten
generations of Howards who have held the title of Arundel, the
present Duke of Norfolk being the thirty-fifth Norman earl, and the
thirty-second by descent from Queen Adeliza and William d’Albini.
The castle of Arundel has not played any very important part in English
history. Its most famous event is the siege of 1643, when it was
besieged by Sir William Waller, who first attacked and took the town,
then defended by walls, and finally battered the castle from the tower
of the church, where he posted his guns. The siege lasted from the
20th December, 1643, to the 6th of January following, when the place
surrendered, and with it the celebrated Chillingworth, who died shortly
after. The domestic buildings were then ruined, and seem so to have
remained until the last century.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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