Agnes of Essex

Agnes of Essex, countess of Oxford (c. 1151 – c. 1212) was the daughter of Henry of Essex and his second wife. She was betrothed at age three to Geoffrey de Vere, brother of the first earl of Oxford. Raised by the Veres from the age of three, she later rejected the match with Geoffrey and by 1163 had married his brother Aubrey de Vere III, the earl (died 1194), as his third wife.

After her father's disgrace and forfeiture of lands and offices in that year, the earl sought to have his marriage annulled. Agnes fought the action. On May 9, 1166, she appealed her case from the court of the bishop of London to the pope (the archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket, being in exile at the time). While the case was pending in Rome, the earl kept Agnes confined in one of his three castles, for which the bishop of London Gilbert Foliot reprimanded Aubrey. Pope Alexander III ruled in her favor, thus establishing the right and requirement of consent "by females" in betrothal and the sacrament of marriage. The couple may have co-operated in the founding of a Benedictine nunnery near their castle at Hedingham, Essex. Having survived her husband, Countess Agnes paid the crown for the right to remain unmarried in 1198 and died sometime in or after 1212. She was buried in the Vere mausoleum, Colne Priory, Essex.

Many have followed the mistake of antiquarians in believing the third wife of earl Aubrey to have been named Lucia. A woman of this name was prioress at Castle Hedingham Priory. On Lucia's death, a mortuary or roll was carried to many religious houses in the region requesting prayers, and in the preface of that document Lucia is called the foundress of the priory. As the countess presumably cooperated with her husband in the founding of the house, the erroneous assumption was made that the prioress was in fact the earl's widow.

Children

Agnes bore her husband four sons and a daughter, including two future earls of Oxford: Aubrey IV and Robert I. Her daughter Alice married 1) Ernulf de Kemesech, 2) John, constable of Chester.

References

*RaGena DeAragon. "The Child-Bride, the Earl, and the Pope: The Marital Fortunes of Agnes of Essex" in "Henry I and the Anglo-Norman World", 2007 Boydell & Brewer.