heraldryofyorkmi01custuoft

326 THE HERALDRY OF YORK MINSTER.
made extra-parochial by charter from Edward I., dated 2Qth April, 1286,
and the zenith of his prosperity
afterwards confirmed in 1452 by Henry VI. ;
was reached when, in 25th Edward I. he had summons to Parliament as
one of the barons of the realm. He died in 8th year
His wife was Nicholaa, daughter of Sir Stephen Walens.
of Edward II.
His eldest son, Walter, by whom he was succeeded, was also distinguished
in the Scotch wars. In 3 4th of Edward I. he went with him to
Scotland, and in the 8th of Edward II. was with those who assembled at
Newcastle to resist the incursions of the Scotch. On his father's death he
was summoned to Parliament, but he died sine prole,
and the privilege of
the baronage was never continued to any others of the family. He was
not happy in his marriage, for Alianora his wife, daughter of Sir Thomas
Furnival, was charged with intriguing with Peter de Mauley (4th), as I have
already mentioned on page 106 ; and, being convicted by a commission issued
by the archbishop in 1313, was enjoined to do penance. His arms, as I
have already stated, were in the Mauley window. He had two brothers :
Sir Henry, whose son married one of the family of Fitzhugh; and Sir
Robert, who was a benefactor to the abbey of Fountains, and in 1322 was
one of those who, with Henry de Scargill and others, " harried Parlington,
his house down about
" turned out Hugh le Despencer, le pere, and pulled
"his ears."* He was knighted by King Edward III. when on service in
France.
There is little further to be said of general interest concerning
individual members of the Vavasours. They continued to maintain their
position amongst the county families, and intermarried with several of
them, while cadet branches of their own house took root in various places,
and were, or are, represented
still
by the Vavasours of Copmanthorpe,
Dennaby, Acaster, Spaldington, Willitoft, Belwood, Kippax, Skarrington,
and also in Devonshire and Ireland. Wise in their generation, they seem
to have evaded the burning questions of the day, and devoted themselves
to careers of unobtrusive usefulness amongst their own people. John Vavasour,
in the sixteenth century, married Julian, daughter of John Aske, of
Aughton, but they were never drawn into the "Pilgrimage of Grace" or the
"Rising of the north," or any combinations disloyal to the Crown. Indeed,
Thomas Vavasour was an officer in the navy during the time of Queen
fleet when
Elizabeth, and commanded the "Foresight" in that gallant
"At Flores, in the Azores, Sir Richard Grenville lay." Mistress Anne
Vavasour, maid of honour to Queen Elizabeth and of whom Sir John
Stanhope, writing to Lord Talbot, 1590, says " Our new :
mayd, Mrs. Vava-
" sour, flourishethe like the lilly and the rose" was a daughter of Henry
Vavasour of Copmanthorpe. Her strange infatuation, however, for old
* Wheater's History of Shit burn.