Deeds of Arms

A Collection of Accounts
of Formal Deeds of Arms of the Fourteenth Century

edited by Steven Muhlberger
stevem@nipissingu.ca

Excerpt from Chronica Johannis de Reading et Anonymi Cantuariensis 1346-1367, ed. James Tait (Manchester, 1914), pp. 131-2.

Translation by Steven Muhlberger.  Translation copyright 2001.

Deeds of Arms Index -- Historical Materials on Knighthood and Chivalry -- KCT Library


Anno gratiae MoCCCoLIXo, Innocentii papae vij, regni regis Edwardi tertii, Angliae xxxiij et Franciae xxj, quartodecimo kalendas Junii dominus Johannes, comes de Richmond', filius regis Angliae, dominam Blanchiam, filiam domini Henrici ducis Lancastriae, dicti Johannis [consanguineam], cum dispensationee domini papae apud Redingum duxit in uxorem honorabiliter valde; etenim, itinerando a dicta villa usque Londonias, ipse cum militibus suis omnibus sibi occurrere volentibus et in campis et villis hastiludia tenebat.  Praeconizantur medio tempore fieri et hastiludia Londoniis tribus diebus Rogationum, viz., majorem dictae civitatis cum xxiiij aldermannis contra omnes; nomine quorum dominus rex Angliae occulte tamen, cum quattour filiis suis, scilicet dominis Edwardo, Leonello, Johanne et Edmundo, aliisque nobilibus xix, campum tenebat cum honore.


In the year of Grace 1359, in the seventh year of Pope Innocent, and during the reign of King Edward III (his twenty-third year in England, and his twenty-first in France), on June eighteenth, at Reading, Lord John [of Gaunt], Earl of Richmond, son of the king of England, took in honorable matrimony Lady Blanche, the daughter of Lord Henry, Duke of Lancaster, a close relative of John, after a dispensation had been received from the pope; and after travelling from that city to London, John and his knights jousted against all comers and held hastiludes both in the field and in the towns.   During this time it was proclaimed that there would be held at London during the three Rogation days hastiludes in which the mayor of the city and twenty-four aldermen would taken on all comers; instead, disguised and in their name the king of England and four of his sons, that is Edward, Lionel, John and Edmund, with nineteen other nobles, held the field with honor.