EDWARD III. 1827 - 1377

ACTS AND DOCUMENTS
In 1328 the treaty of Northampton recognized the full independence of Scotland, and English enterprises against Scotland henceforward are pure aggression, not as before attempts to strain to the utmost certain undefined rights. See Rymer's Foedera, II, p, ii. 734, 741. Record edition
In 1341, by an act 14 Edward III c. 7, sheriffs were to be appointed annually. Printed in the Statutes.
In 1342, by an act 15 Edward III. c. 2, peers of the realm were to be tried for offences only before their peers in parliament An act springing out of the attack by the king upon his minister Stratford the archbishop. Printed in the Statutes.
In 1349 the first statute of labourers was passed, 23 Edward III. c.1, amplified later, regulating the wages of labourers, and compelling them to work for the wages formerly accustomed to be paid, and confining them to their own counties. This was passed owing to the great Pestilence, the Black Death, which had reduced the number of labourers by perhaps one half, and naturally raised the rate of wages. It was, of course, inoperative, and the cause of intense dissatisfaction among the lower classes. Printed in the Statutes.
In 1351 the statute of Provisors was passed, 25 Edward III, c. 6, to hinder papal appointments to English benefices. The first so-called statute of Praemunire was a royal ordinance of 1353, supplementing this by punishing with outlawry and forfeiture all who sued in foreign, i.e., papal, courts for matters cognisable in the king's courts. These acts defined and strengthened the ancient royal supremacy over persons and cases ecclesiastical, Printed in the Statutes.
In 1352 the statute of Treasons 25 Edward III., s. 5, c. 2, limited treason to well-defined acts against the person and authority of the king, and the persons of his queen and eldest son. Printed in the Statutes.
In 1360, by 34 Edward m, c. 1, Justices of the Peace had their powers confirmed and defined. Their sessions gradually supplanted the old police jurisdiction of the Courts of the Hundreds. Printed in the Statutes.
In 1360 the treaty of Bretigni put a temporary end to the French war, ceding to Edward the full sovereignty of Gascony, Guienne, Agenois, Santoigne, Angouleme, Perigord, Limousin, Bigorre, Rovergue, Gaure, Caoursin, Poictou, Calais, and Ponthieu, in return for a renunciation of his claim to the French crown. Britanny and Flanders were to be free from the suzerainty of either sovereign. The non-fulfilment of this treaty gave a handle to the claims of Henry V. against France, as the lawful representative of Edward III. in the throne of England, though not his heir by blood. Printed in Rymer's Foedera, vi. 178.
In 1366 the statute of Kilkenny in Ireland passed in a Parliament held under Lionel Duke of Clarence, attempted to suppress the native Irish laws and custom; and to prevent the Hibernizing of the English colonists. Printed in Davis, Irish Statutes, 202.
In 1376 the Good Parliament gave the first example of an attack by impeachment upon the royal ministers, the attack being countenanced by the Black Prince and the Mortimers, heirs to Lionel Duke of Clarence, and directed against the partisans of the Duke of Lancaster. Sir Peter de la Mare, spokesman (prolocutor) of the House of Commons on this occasion, is commonly called the first Speaker, but the title does not seem to have been used till 1377. The Proceedings are printed in the Rolls of Parliament, ii. 323, &c.
The whole reign of Edward III. is distinguished by copious acts of social commercial, and sumptuary legislation, and it forms one of the greatest eras of our earlier commercial history.

BARONAGE UNDER EDW&RD III.
The character of the baronage in Edward's reign was largely modified by the marriages of the royal family to heiresses in England. The great earldom of Lancaster had already been created in the royal family, and endowed with the confiscated estates of De Montfort and Ferrers. ( See after the reign of Henry III ) The second Earl of Lancaster had married the heiress of the Lacys, and the heiress of Lancaster daughter of the first duke who as Earl of Derby had defended Guienne in 1345, was married to John of Gaunt, the king's son. The son of this marriage, Henry of Bolingbroke, married one of the co-heiresses of the De Bohuns, of Hereford, Essex,; and Northampton.
The earldom of Kent had beef created for Edmund, third son of Edward I., whose heiress Joanna married first Sir Thomas Holland, who was created Earl of Kent; secondly Edward the Black Prince. Lionel, second surviving son of Edward III., married the heiress of the De Burghs, earls of Ulster, who was also one of the co-heiresses of the De Clares of Gloucester and Hertford. The daughter of Lionel was married to the head of the house of Mortimer, whose ultimate heiress married the son of the Duke of York, Edward's fourth son who reached manhood. Thomas, youngest son of Edward III ., married a co-heiress of the De Bohuns. His daughter married the head of the Staffords.
Thomas, the second son of Edward L, had been created Earl of Norfolk, and his heiress was the mother of Thomas Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham and first Duke of Norfolk.
The throne was thus surrounded by a powerful baronage, related to the crown and wielding great local influence, whose dissensions helped to produce the civil wars of Richard II.
and the Lancastrian reigns.

OFFICIALS

Archbishops. - Simon Mepeham, 1327 - 1333; John Stratford, translated from Winchester, 1333-1348; Thomas Bredwardine, 1349 ; Simon Islip 1349 - 1366 ; of Simon Langham , translated. from Ely 1366 - 1369 , resigned ;William Whittlesey ,translated from Worcester , 1369 - 1375 ; Simon of Sudbury , translated from London ,1375.

Chancellors - John de Hotham, Bishop of E1y January to March 1327 ;Henry de Burgersh, Bishop of Lincoln, 1327 - 30; John Stratford, Bishop of Winchester, afterwards Archbishop, 1330 - 1834; Richard de Bury, Bishop of Durham, 1334 - 1335; John Stratford, Archbishop, 1335 - 1337; Robert Stratford, brother to the preceding, 1337 - 1338; John Wentworth, Bishop of London, 1338, No Chancellor appointed for nearly two years. The Great Seal in commission. John Stratford, Archbishop, 1340; Robert Stratford, Bishop of Chichester, July to December, 1340; Sir Robert Bourchier, the first lady Chancellor, 1340 - 1341 ; Sir Robert Parnyng, 1341 - 1343; Robert do Sadyngton, 1343 - 1345; John Ufford, 1345 - 1349; John de Thorseby, Bishop of St. David's, 1349 - 1356; William de Edington, Bishop of Winchester, 1356 - 1363; Simon Langham, Bishop of Ely, afterwards Archbishop, 1363 - 67; William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, 1367 - 1371; Sir Robert de Thorpe, 1371 - 1372; Sir John Knyvet, 1372 - 1377; Adam de Houghton, Bishop of St. David's, 1377.