Grant to Queens' College of the Manor of Fowlmere 1477
Grant to Queens' College of the Manor of Fowlmere 1477
This beautiful original document with five seals is part of the Queens' Archive collection. It is the grant of the Manor of Fowlmere by Richard Plantagenet (later Richard III) to Queens' in 1477.
The early history of Queens' is deeply entwined in the rivalries of the Wars of the Roses between the families of York and Lancaster. The Manor of Fowlmere had belonged to Elizabeth, Countess of Oxford whose husband, a Lancastrian, had been executed in 1462. The land was part of the huge benefactions that Richard III bestowed upon the College all of which were lost when Richard was defeated at the Battle of Bosworth Field in August 1485.