In each case the jury notice with reprehension that the earls allowed proceedings in the marches which elsewhere would, as they knew, have been punished.
Both earls, with their followers, were committed to jail, and their Welsh franchises taken in hand by the king.
Upon this Edmund, the king’s brother, William de Valence, his uncle, Henry de Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, and John de Hastings, gave bail for Gloucester; and Reginald de Grey, Robert Typetoft, Robert Fitz-Walter, and Walter de Beauchamp, for Hereford; and, while thus at large, they were permitted to hold their franchises. The earls themselves, thus bailed, were permitted to become bail for their followers, and thus passed 1291.
The parties appeared again at Westminster on the morrow of Epiphany, 1292, but sentence was not finally pronounced until Thursday (17th January) after the octaves of Epiphany, when the parties again appeared before the king at Westminster.
With regard to the Earl of Gloucester, his whole franchise or royalty, totum regale, in Morganwg, was declared forfeited. But whereas he had married the king’s daughter, and had by her offspring; and whereas she had an equal share in the franchise, the earl having a life interest only, he could not forfeit more than his own rights, neither was it lawful to punish the innocent for the guilty. His forfeiture therefore was to be for life only. He was further to be imprisoned during pleasure, and to pay £100 damages to the Earl of Hereford.
The Earl of Hereford’s Welsh franchises, being held by him without limitation, were forfeited altogether, and he also was remitted to prison. But, inasmuch as his offence non est ita carcans, nor deserving of punishment so heavy as that of his brother earl, and as he had married a kinswoman of the queen, who made the marriage, so that the earl’s children and the king’s children would be of kin, his forfeiture also was limited to his life.
The obvious unfairness of the punishment seems to have been in some degree adjusted by the fines under which the earls were restored, Gloucester paying 10,000 marcs, and Hereford 1,000 marcs.
Neither earl long survived this transaction. Gloucester died in the castle of Monmouth in 1295, and Hereford in 1298, but not before he had on more than one occasion made a bold and successful, and strictly legal, opposition to his sovereign.
The retainers were let off lightly, on the plea that they had not been warned by their lords of the royal prohibition. John de Creppyng was fined fifty marcs; his securities being Richard de Creppyng, of co. York, and John Wogan, of Somerset.
Richard le Flemyng was fined £20; his securities were John le Waleys, of Somerset, and Stephen Haucumb, of Cornwall.