Ranulf d' Glanville

  General Notes:

Ranulf d' Glanville was the Sheriff of Yorkshire, Warwickshire and Leicestershire from 1163 to 1170 and Sheriff of Lancashire in 1173. In 1174, when he was Sheriff of Westmorland, he was one of the English leaders at the Battle of Alnwick, and it was to him that the king of Scotland, William the Lion, surrendered. In 1175 he was reappointed Sheriff of Yorkshire, in 1176 he became justice of the king's court and a justice itinerant in the northern circuit, and in 1180 Chief Justiciar of England.

It was with his assistance that Henry II completed his famous judicial reforms, though many had been carried out before he came into office. He became the king's right-hand man, and during Henry's frequent absences was in effect regent of England. In 1176 he was also made custodian of Queen Eleanor, who was confined to her quarters in Winchester castle.

After the death of Henry in 1189, Glanvill was removed from his office by Richard I on 17 September 1189 and imprisoned until he had paid a ransom, according to one authority, of £15,000. Shortly after obtaining his freedom he took the cross, and he died at the siege of Acre in 1190.

Ranulf had married Bertha de Valognes;they had several daughters. He founded two abbeys, both in Suffolk. Butley, for Black Canons, was founded in 1171 and Leiston, for White Canons, in 1183. He also built a leper hospital at Somerton, in Norfolk.

Ranulf married Bertha De Valognes, daughter of Theobald De Valognes and Helewise Unknown, in 1150 in Parham, Suffolk. (Bertha De Valognes was born in 1132 in Parham, Suffolk.)