WIGMORE CASTLE, HEREFORDSHIRE. 13 



the wardship of Llewelyn, younger son of Grufyctd ab Madoc, lord 

 of Powys, to whom the lordships of Chirk and Nantheudwy be- 

 longed, having been entrusted to this baron,* his ward suddenly 

 disappeared in the night, and Mortimer obtained a grant of the 

 lands. On the 16th of July, fifteenth of Edward I., 1287, he was 

 directed to raise four hundred foot-soldiers to march against Rhys 

 ab Maredydd, a South Wales chieftain : and on the 14th of No- 

 vember, was enjoined to reside on his demesnes until the rebellion 

 of that individual was quelled Three years after, Mortimer was 

 commanded to answer relative to jurisdiction in the barony of Ha- 

 verford West, and in 1292 he accordingly appeared. He held cer- 

 tain lands of the Earl of Hereford. The year after, he was in the 

 expedition into France, when he was appointed governor of Burgh 

 sur mer, anciently called Mont-Auban, in that kingdom. He was 

 summoned, on the 14th of June, 1294, to be at Portsmouth on the 

 1st of the ensuing Sej)tember, there to join the expedition into 

 France; and he received letters of protection that year, in conse- 

 quence of being in the king's service in Gascony ; and, for the same 

 cause, he and his tenants were exempted from the payment of any 

 part of the tenth then granted to the crown. He was again in 

 Gascony to the 26th of September, 1297. and, in 1298, commanded 

 to be at Carlisle at Easter, with horse and arms, in the record of 

 which he is styled a baron. In the same year he was a commis- 

 sioner of array in Landecho, Moghelan, and La Pole.t In the 

 twenty-seventh of Edward I. he was summoned to Parliament, and 

 in 1299 was again ordered to be at Carlisle, to serve against the 

 Scots. The heraldic poem informs us that he was at the siege of 

 Caerlaverock, in June, 1300. 



Epnis Rogier de Mortimer And then Roger do Mortimer 



Ki desa mer et de la mer Who, on both sides the sea, 



A porte quel part ke ait ale Has borne, wherever he went, 



L'eseu barree au chief pale A shield barry with a chief paly, 



E les cornieres gironnees And its corners gyronny, 



De or et de azur enlumines Emblazoned with gold and blue, 



O le escucheon vuidie de ermine With the escutcheon voided of ermine. 



Ovec les autres se achemine He proceeded with the others, 



* See Yorke's Royal Tribes of Wales for a full account of this affair, p. 

 62, 63. The Earl of Warren, to whom Llewelyn's brother was pJaced in 

 wardship, by king Edward, equally made away with that youth, and shared 

 his possessions with the king. Tradition says, they were both drowned, at 

 night-time, in the Dee. 



f Query — Llandeilo, Machynllaeth, and Welsh Pool ? 



