Richard de Belmeis I

Beginning as a minor landowner and steward in Shropshire, he became Henry I's chief agent in the Welsh Marches and in 1108 was appointed Bishop of London.

[2] It is made up of two very common French toponym elements, meaning “attractive estate”: there is a village called Aubermesnil-Beaumais elsewhere in Normandy.

He is thought to be the Richard whom the Domesday enquiry found holding the very small manor of Meadowley, due west of Bridgnorth in Shropshire.

[10][11] Godebold at this time was much wealthier than Richard and held a large number of properties that had been intended as prebends of the collegiate church of St Alkmund in Shrewsbury.

[15] Probably at Christmas, Henry ordered Richard to help secure some land for the Abbey of Saint-Remi,[13][16] which had a daughter house at Lapley Priory in Staffordshire and estates in Shropshire.

On occasion he convened and presided over ecclesiastical synods:[23] Even after he became Bishop of London, he had no obvious authority for doing this, as Shropshire fell within the Diocese of Lichfield.

His decisions at assemblies at Wistanstow in 1110 and Castle Holdgate in 1115[24] greatly increased the powers and privileges of Wenlock Priory by recognising it as the mother church of an extensive parish[25] and made it an important force in the region.

[27] The date is known from Eadmer, the contemporary historian and biographer of Anselm, who places Richard's election at Pentecost:[28] 24 May in that year, according to the Julian Calendar, in which Easter was on 5 April.

The king's confirmation affirms that he is granted “the see of London with the lands and men pertaining to it, and the castle of Stortford.”[29] Shortly afterwards, Henry restored to the canons of St Paul's a range of judicial powers and privileges they had enjoyed in the reign of Edward the Confessor.

Eadmer does not give a date as such but says that Anselm carried out these ordinations during jejunio quarti mensis - the “fast of the fourth months,” i.e. the Ember Days, which were the Wednesday, Friday and Saturday following Pentecost.

Citing Richard as an example, Poole comments: “Piety in matters of religion was seldom the primary qualification in the election of bishops; the continued to be normally men of affairs, administrators, chosen for their experience in conducting the king's business.” What followed made clear that Richard was essentially a royal nominee, not really known, much less congenial, to Anselm and the supporters of Gregorian Reform.

Once the required formalities had been carried out, Richard pronounced himself satisfied and the consecration went ahead, with Thomas subsequently receiving a pallium from the Papal legate.

Richard was still determined to pursue his campaign against Thomas, and raised the issue of who should say mass before the king at the Christmas court of 1109,[3] which was held in London.

Richard celebrated the mass but the argument was pursued with renewed vigour, actually at the king's dinner table, until Henry sent both bishops home and remitted the issue to the future archbishop of Canterbury.

[2] He was a witness to the king's writ recognising the establishment of the Diocese of Ely: this had been discussed for some time and adopted as policy by Anselm,[37] but papal approval arrived only in 1109.

Hervey le Breton, displaced from Bangor by the resurgence of the Kingdom of Gwynedd, was translated to the new see,[38] which was created by the partition of the Diocese of Lincoln.

William de Corbeil or Curboil had been for some years the Prior of St Osyth's Priory, an Augustinian house founded by Richard at the village of Chich in Essex.

The rebuilding of St Paul's was a much bigger project he inherited with the see of London from Maurice, his predecessor, as the previous building had been destroyed by fire.

However, William of Malmesbury believed that Maurice had committed the diocese to a scheme that was too ambitious and that Richard was damaged not only in wealth but in mental health by the enormity of the task, ultimately despairing of the burden.

Probably in 1114 the king notified Hugh de Bocland that Richard was henceforth to receive the tithe of venison from Essex that had previously been a royal prerogative.

[46] Rather later was a grant to Richard and his cathedral of “the whole of the great fish caught on their land, except the tongue, which he reserves for himself.”[47] Apparently this referred to porpoises.

Richard was able to use this groundswell to send his forces and their allies across Central Wales, driving Owain and Cadwgan back into Ceredigion, then further into exile in Ireland.

Richard partitioned the fugitives' land among his allies and in 1110 Iorwerth was released from seven years' captivity to create a new centre of power and authority.

[53] However, Owain continued his depredations from further west and Madog returned to corner and kill Iorwerth, driving him at spear-point into his blazing home.

On his deathbed, Richard confessed that he had lied about his tenure of a manor, previously testifying that he held it in fee, when in reality he had it under a lease.

Although Richard directed that the estate be restored to the abbey, its status was contested by his successors for decades: by Philip de Belmeis in 1127, although he quickly defaulted;[57] a few decades later by his younger son, Ranulph, who ultimately recognised the abbey's rights in return for acceptance into its fraternity;[58] in 1212 by Roger de la Zouche, who continued his suit for years unsuccessfully.

Hic jacet Richardus Beauveis, cognomine Rufus, London : Episcopus, vir probus et grandaevus, per totam vitam laboriosus, fundator noster religiosus, et qui multa bona nobis et ministris ecclesiae suae Sancti Pauli contulit.

[4] Here lies Richard Beauveis, surnamed Ruddy, Bishop of London, an upright and very old man, industrious throughout his life, our pious founder, who bestowed numerous good things on us and on the ministers of his church, St Paul's.

[57] Philip's younger brother, Richard de Belmeis II received a royal grant of his prebends of St Alkmund's church, Shrewsbury, and the pair were able to found and endow another great Augustinian house: Lilleshall Abbey in Shropshire.

[1] Richard Ruffus, their brother, apparently sharing his uncle's complexion, was archdeacon of Essex in the diocese of London,[5] and had two sons who were canons of St Paul's.