Katherine Swynford, Duchess of Lancaster (also spelled Synford), née (de) Roet (also spelled (de) Rouet, (de) Roët, or (de) Roelt) (probably 25 November 1350 – 10 May 1403), was the daughter of Sir Payne (or Paen/Pain/Paon) (de) Roet (also spelled (de) Rouet, (de) Roët or (de) Roelt), originally a Flemish herald from County of Hainaut, later knighted.Katherine became the third wife of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and their descendants were the Beaufort family, which played a major role in the Wars of the Roses. Henry VII, who became King of England in 1485, derived his claim to the throne from his mother Lady Margaret Beaufort, who was a great-granddaughter of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford.Contents [show] [edit] FamilyThe children of Paganus Ruet (argued by modern-day genealogist Lindsay Brook and followed by author Weir[2] as "probably christened as Gilles") included Katherine, her sister Philippa, a son, Walter, and the eldest sister, Isabel (also called Elizabeth) de Roet (Canoness of the convent of St. Waudru's, Mons, c. 1366). Katherine is generally held to have been his youngest child. Weir[2] argues, based upon her review of limited fragmentary evidence, that Philippa was the junior and that both were children of a second marriage.Paon de Ruet is found early, in a legal document, in the form Paganus de Rodio — referring to Rodium, the mediaeval Latin form corresponding to the Roeulx, or Le Rœulx, the name of a town of 3000 inhabitants, 8 miles north-east of Mons, on the highway leading from Mons to Nivelle. Paon de Ruet may have been impelled to seek his fortune in England by the recital of the exploits of Fastre de Ruet, who accompanied John of Beaumont in 1326, when, with three hundred followers, he went to assist the English against the Scots. Fastre was the younger brother of the last lord of Roeulx descended from the Counts of Hainault. He and his brother Eustace fell into pecuniary straits, and were obliged to alienate their landed possessions. Fastre died in 1331, and was buried in the abbey church of Roeulx, while his brother Eustace survived till 1336. Paon was, like Fastre, a younger brother — possibly of a collateral line.As the king was in the North, a number of the Flemings returned home without proceeding further than London, but Paon de Ruet was one of those who remained in England in the retinue of Philippa of Hainaut, accompanying the young queen in her departure from Valenciennes to join her youthful husband Edward III in England at the close of 1327. His name does not appear in the list of knights who accompanied the queen from Hainault, however, described by Froissart to be among additional knights referred to as 'pluissier jone esquier'. Speght (1598)[3] prefixed to his history a genealogical tree which began: 'Paganus de Rouet Hannoniensis, aliter dictus Guien Rex Armorum' describing de Ruet as Guienne King of Arms. Upon the coronation of Henry the Fifth (1413), Sir William Bruges held the same title in the fifth year of the King's reign (Edmondson 1. 104) and the same monarch was accompanied to France before Agincourt by a herald bearing that name (Wylie, Reign of Henry the Fifth 1. 493).In 1347, Ruet was sent to the siege of Calais, and was one of two knights deputed by Queen Philippa to conduct out of town the citizens whom she had saved.[Froissart, 5.215 : "Et au matin elle fist donner a casqun sys nobles [say, $150], et Ies fist conduire hors de l'oost par messire Sanse d'Aubrecicourt et messire Paon de Ruet, si avent que il vorrent, et que il fu avis as deus chevaliers que il estoient hors dou peril, et au departir il les commanderent a Dieu, et retournerent li chevalier en l'oost."] He had returned to the lands of Hainault, probably by 1349, and Katherine was born the following year.[edit] LifeKatherine's birth date in 1350 is assumed to be 25 November, as that is the feast day of her patron, St. Catherine of Alexandria. The family returned to England in 1351, and it is likely that Katherine stayed there during her father's continued travels.Katherine married in St Clement Danes Church, Strand, London in abt. 1366 to "Hugh" Ottes Swynford, a knight from the manor of Kettlethorpe in Lincolnshire, son of Thomas Swynford and Nicole Druel. Katherine was known to have borne the following children by him: Thomas (21 September 1368 – 1432), Blanche (born 1 May 1367), and possibly Margaret Swynford (born c. 1369), who was a nun nominated at the prestigious Barking Abbey by command of Richard II.Katherine became attached to the household of John of Gaunt as governess to his daughters Philippa of Lancaster and Elizabeth of Lancaster. The ailing duchess Blanche had Katherine's daughter Blanche (her namesake) placed within her own daughters' chambers and afforded the same luxuries as her daughters; additionally, John of Gaunt stood as godfather to the child. Katherine's sister, Philippa, attached to Queen Philippa's household, married the poet Geoffrey Chaucer, whose poem The Book of the Duchess commemorated Blanche's death by plague in 1369. Speght (1598)[3] said of Philippa's marriage: 'He [Chaucer] matched in marriage with a Knight's daughter of Henault, called Paon de Ruet, king of Armes, as by this draught appeareth, taken out of the office of the Heraldes.' M Speght's authority Stow (1592)[4] recorded: 'He [Chaucer] had to wife the daughter of Paine Roete alias Gwine [ed. 1631, Guian] king at armes, by whom he had issue Tho. Chaucer.'Sometime after Blanche's 1369 death, but before the Duke's second marriage, Katherine and John of Gaunt consummated a romantic affair which would entail four children being born out of wedlock to the couple, and would endure as a lifelong relationship. Two years after the death of the Duke's second wife, Infanta Constance of Castile, Katherine and John of Gaunt married on 13 January 1396 in Lincoln Cathedral. Records of their marriage kept in the Tower and elsewhere list: 'John of Ghaunt, Duke of Lancaster, married Katharine daughter of Guyon King of Armes in the time of K. Edward the 3, and Geffrey Chaucer her sister'. John and Katherine's four children had been given the surname "Beaufort" and were legitimized as adults by their parents' marriage with approval by King Richard and the Pope. Although legitimized, the Beauforts were barred from inheriting the throne by a clause in the legitimation act inserted by their half-brother, Henry IV, although modern scholarship has disputed the authority of a monarch to alter an existing parliamentary statute. This was later revoked by the monarch Edward VI, placing Katherine's descendants back within the legitimate line of inheritance; in fact, the Tudor dynasty, including Edward, were direct descendants of John and Katherine's eldest child, John Beaufort.
Katherine De Roet
Katherine Swynford, Duchess of Lancaster (also spelled Synford), née (de) Roet (also spelled (de) Rouet, (de) Roët, or (de) Roelt) (probably 25 November 1350 – 10 May 1403), was the daughter of Sir Payne (or Paen/Pain/Paon) (de) Roet (also spelled (de) Rouet, (de) Roët or (de) Roelt), originally a Flemish herald from County of Hainaut, later knighted.Katherine became the third wife of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and their descendants were the Beaufort family, which played a major role in the Wars of the Roses. Henry VII, who became King of England in 1485, derived his claim to the throne from his mother Lady Margaret Beaufort, who was a great-granddaughter of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford.Contents [show] [edit] FamilyThe children of Paganus Ruet (argued by modern-day genealogist Lindsay Brook and followed by author Weir[2] as "probably christened as Gilles") included Katherine, her sister Philippa, a son, Walter, and the eldest sister, Isabel (also called Elizabeth) de Roet (Canoness of the convent of St. Waudru's, Mons, c. 1366). Katherine is generally held to have been his youngest child. Weir[2] argues, based upon her review of limited fragmentary evidence, that Philippa was the junior and that both were children of a second marriage.Paon de Ruet is found early, in a legal document, in the form Paganus de Rodio — referring to Rodium, the mediaeval Latin form corresponding to the Roeulx, or Le Rœulx, the name of a town of 3000 inhabitants, 8 miles north-east of Mons, on the highway leading from Mons to Nivelle. Paon de Ruet may have been impelled to seek his fortune in England by the recital of the exploits of Fastre de Ruet, who accompanied John of Beaumont in 1326, when, with three hundred followers, he went to assist the English against the Scots. Fastre was the younger brother of the last lord of Roeulx descended from the Counts of Hainault. He and his brother Eustace fell into pecuniary straits, and were obliged to alienate their landed possessions. Fastre died in 1331, and was buried in the abbey church of Roeulx, while his brother Eustace survived till 1336. Paon was, like Fastre, a younger brother — possibly of a collateral line.As the king was in the North, a number of the Flemings returned home without proceeding further than London, but Paon de Ruet was one of those who remained in England in the retinue of Philippa of Hainaut, accompanying the young queen in her departure from Valenciennes to join her youthful husband Edward III in England at the close of 1327. His name does not appear in the list of knights who accompanied the queen from Hainault, however, described by Froissart to be among additional knights referred to as 'pluissier jone esquier'. Speght (1598)[3] prefixed to his history a genealogical tree which began: 'Paganus de Rouet Hannoniensis, aliter dictus Guien Rex Armorum' describing de Ruet as Guienne King of Arms. Upon the coronation of Henry the Fifth (1413), Sir William Bruges held the same title in the fifth year of the King's reign (Edmondson 1. 104) and the same monarch was accompanied to France before Agincourt by a herald bearing that name (Wylie, Reign of Henry the Fifth 1. 493).In 1347, Ruet was sent to the siege of Calais, and was one of two knights deputed by Queen Philippa to conduct out of town the citizens whom she had saved.[Froissart, 5.215 : "Et au matin elle fist donner a casqun sys nobles [say, $150], et Ies fist conduire hors de l'oost par messire Sanse d'Aubrecicourt et messire Paon de Ruet, si avent que il vorrent, et que il fu avis as deus chevaliers que il estoient hors dou peril, et au departir il les commanderent a Dieu, et retournerent li chevalier en l'oost."] He had returned to the lands of Hainault, probably by 1349, and Katherine was born the following year.[edit] LifeKatherine's birth date in 1350 is assumed to be 25 November, as that is the feast day of her patron, St. Catherine of Alexandria. The family returned to England in 1351, and it is likely that Katherine stayed there during her father's continued travels.Katherine married in St Clement Danes Church, Strand, London in abt. 1366 to "Hugh" Ottes Swynford, a knight from the manor of Kettlethorpe in Lincolnshire, son of Thomas Swynford and Nicole Druel. Katherine was known to have borne the following children by him: Thomas (21 September 1368 – 1432), Blanche (born 1 May 1367), and possibly Margaret Swynford (born c. 1369), who was a nun nominated at the prestigious Barking Abbey by command of Richard II.Katherine became attached to the household of John of Gaunt as governess to his daughters Philippa of Lancaster and Elizabeth of Lancaster. The ailing duchess Blanche had Katherine's daughter Blanche (her namesake) placed within her own daughters' chambers and afforded the same luxuries as her daughters; additionally, John of Gaunt stood as godfather to the child. Katherine's sister, Philippa, attached to Queen Philippa's household, married the poet Geoffrey Chaucer, whose poem The Book of the Duchess commemorated Blanche's death by plague in 1369. Speght (1598)[3] said of Philippa's marriage: 'He [Chaucer] matched in marriage with a Knight's daughter of Henault, called Paon de Ruet, king of Armes, as by this draught appeareth, taken out of the office of the Heraldes.' M Speght's authority Stow (1592)[4] recorded: 'He [Chaucer] had to wife the daughter of Paine Roete alias Gwine [ed. 1631, Guian] king at armes, by whom he had issue Tho. Chaucer.'Sometime after Blanche's 1369 death, but before the Duke's second marriage, Katherine and John of Gaunt consummated a romantic affair which would entail four children being born out of wedlock to the couple, and would endure as a lifelong relationship. Two years after the death of the Duke's second wife, Infanta Constance of Castile, Katherine and John of Gaunt married on 13 January 1396 in Lincoln Cathedral. Records of their marriage kept in the Tower and elsewhere list: 'John of Ghaunt, Duke of Lancaster, married Katharine daughter of Guyon King of Armes in the time of K. Edward the 3, and Geffrey Chaucer her sister'. John and Katherine's four children had been given the surname "Beaufort" and were legitimized as adults by their parents' marriage with approval by King Richard and the Pope. Although legitimized, the Beauforts were barred from inheriting the throne by a clause in the legitimation act inserted by their half-brother, Henry IV, although modern scholarship has disputed the authority of a monarch to alter an existing parliamentary statute. This was later revoked by the monarch Edward VI, placing Katherine's descendants back within the legitimate line of inheritance; in fact, the Tudor dynasty, including Edward, were direct descendants of John and Katherine's eldest child, John Beaufort.