John of Gaunt

John of Gaunt Prince of England 1340 and Katherine De Rouet

Titles

Knight of the Garter
Earl of Richmond 1342
Earl of Lancaster 1361
Earl of Derby 1362
Earl of Leicester 1362
Earl of Lincoln 1362
Duke of Lancaster 1362
Duke of Aquitaine

John is sometimes given the title "King of Castile and Leon" a reference to his marriage to Constance of Castile.

Because John's romance with Katherine Swynford has been such a distinctive part of his biography, it is easy to overlook the devotion he apparently felt for his first wife, Blanche. After her death, he established a number of chantries to say masses for her soul, and funded an expensive yearly memorial service. John's great biographer, Sidney Armitage-Smith reports that there is no evidence that John was even unfaithful to Blanche.

In 1377, King Edward changed the status of John's county of Lancaster, making him the Earl Palatinate, as John's late father-in-law, Genry of Grosmont had been. This had significant implications for the county as a revenue unit, and formed the basis on which John's son Henry IV sectioned off the Duchy of Lancaster to keep its fortune separate from that of the crown. Over the years, the set of transactions has had enormous financial implications for the holder of the duchy (its revenues, for instance, funded much of the Lancastrian war effort in the Wars of the Roses). The duchy's bondsmen were in technical thrall long after serfdom was abolished in England, and Elizabeth I manumitted a great number of them.

John's third wife, Katherine Swynford, had been his mistress for many years. After they were married, their four grown children were legitimized by Richard II as the Beaufort family.

Among John's lesser-known achievements: some historians credit him with intruducing morris dancers to England from Spain.

According to some sources, John died at Leicester Castle.

Joh is depicted in a stained-glass window in the chapel of All Soul's College, University of Oxford. The window apparently shows him late in life, because his hair and beard are almost white.

In his lifetime, nobody called him John of Gaunt after his very early childhood, the name only became popular 200 years later after Shakespeare used it in Richard II.