Blanche (Plantagenet) of Lancaster (abt.1341-1368) (original) (raw)

Born about 1341 in Lancaster, Lancashire, England

Ancestors

Descendants

Died 12 Sep 1368 at about age 27in Tutbury Castle, Staffordshire, England

Profile last modified 13 Aug 2024| Created 22 Sep 2010

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Blanche (Plantagenet) of Lancaster is a member of the House of Lancaster.

Biography

(Royal Ancestry) Blanche, Duchess of Lancaster, died at Tutbury Castle, Staffordshire, 12 Sept. 1368, and was buried at St. Paul's Cathedral, London.

Blanche was born in 1345. Blanche Plantagenet ... She passed away in 1369. [1]

note - Marriage date to John of Gaunt, 1359-05-13, added at same time as Royal Ancestry source, along with changes for birth date (from 1341-03-25 to about 1341) and death date/location (from 1369-09-30, Bolingbroke Castle to 1368-09-12, Tutbury Castle, Staffordshire, England).

Death and burial of Blanche, Duchess of Lancaster

(Royal Tombs of Medieval England) Blanche was the daughter and heiress of Henry of Grosmont, Duke of Lancaster. She died on 12 September 1368 and was buried north of the choir in the cathedral church of St. Paul's in London. There are no records for her tomb, but in June 1374 Gaunt instructed the delivery 'with haste' of six cartloads of alabaster from the quarry in the ducal manor of Tutbury. The instructions were repeated the following month. He ordered alabaster for two effigies which suggests he was planning a double tomb for himself and his first wife. The accounts for Blanche's anniversary mass drawn up in December 1374 mention a 'tomb', suggesting that work by then was reasonably advanced. In 1375 records show a payment was made for work on the tomb. The monument must have been suitably advanced by 1379, when payment was made for ironwork enclosing it. In 1380 payment was made for painting inscriptions on the tomb-chest and canopy. The year before his death in 1399, Gaunt had founded a chantry for himself and his third wife, Katherine Swynford, at Lincoln, and his will endowed two further chantries for himself and his first two wives at St. Paul's (Blanche) and the church of the Annunciation of St. Mary in the Newarke, Leicester (Constance of Castile). A drawing of the St. Paul's tomb of the duke and duchess, made in 1664, records effigies of them, an arcaded tomb-chest and tomb-canopy. Gaunt was shown wearing armor and basinet, a surcoat emblazoned his arms, and hands clasped in prayer. Blanche was depicted wearing an ermine-edged mantle and reticulated headdress. The St. Paul's tombs and chantry were destroyed in the Great London Fire of 1666.

Sources

↑ First-hand information as remembered by Mitchell Watson, Thursday, December 4, 2014. Replace this citation if there is another source.

Royal Ancestry by Douglas Richardson Vol. I p. 88
Royal Ancestry 2013 D. Richardson Vol. III p. 491-500
Royal Tombs of Medieval England M. Duffy 2003 p. 158-161

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