John Mautravers

  Noted events in his life were:

• Background Information. ¹⁴¹
John Mautravers may have been the son and heir of John Mautravers who can be found in entries in the Pipe Rolls of Somerset and Wiltshire for 1158-1169. There is no proof of this connection except for the name and location. This John Mautravers is the oldest Mautravers that can connected with the later memebers of the family.

In 1172, John was fined to have sisin of his land and four knight's fees in dorset, and he held a knight's fee in Berkshire. He was married twice and had issue from broth wifes. His first wife, Alice, daughter and coheir of Roger Fitz Geoffrey, was the mother of sons Walter and John. His second wife, Alice de Bendeville was the mother of thomas and William.

~Cokayne's Complete Peerage, 2nd Edition, (Maultravers), Vol. VIII, p 578

• Family Background Information. ¹⁴¹
Cokayne's Complete Peerage says that Hugh Maltravers, who held Lytchett (afterwards distinguished as Lytchett Mautravers), Woolcombe, and other manors in Dorsetshire and Wiltshire, land at Yeovil, etc, Somersetshire; and in Gloucestershire, from William, Count of Eu; in Somersetshire he held Preston, etc, from Alfred de Ispania [Domesday], was "undoubtedly the progenitor of the Maultravers of Dorsetshire. The family connections are difficult to figure out since there are fewer records for the earlier Maultravers. They were large land owners, but they did not hold any of their land direct of the Crown.

The Hugh, Domesday tenant of 1086, held land on such a large scale, and yet transmitted to his descendanter neither a Norman surname nor an English one. It has been suggested that Maultravers was a nickname of Norman origin. Since Hugh Maultravers doesn't seem to come from a distinguished Norman family, he must have been highly rewarded from distinguished service at the time of the conquest of 1066. In all likelihood, the Hugh of the Domesday Survery had a son also named Hugh.

There are many evidences of the existence of the next generation, of a Walter and William Mautravers, who may have been sons of Hugh, son of Hugh the progenitor of the Maultravers. William, most likely the second son, was a witness to a number of charters by Henry I, both in the King's Norman campaigns and later in England. William was given a grant from Henry I of the Honor of Pontefract for fifteen years, and of the widow of Hugh de Laval, its late owner. William was killed in the North in 1135, seemingly with out issue.

The other son, Walter Mautravers left even less trace of himself in records. He appear in connections with land in Berkshire and Dorset, and his wife's inheritance in Leicestershire, and it would seem that the family continued through him. In the Somersetshire & Wiltshire Pipe Rolls of 1158-1169, Walter is followed by a John Mautravers, who must be his son and heir. This John Maultravers may be the father of the next generation of John Mautravers.

If these assumptions are correct, the line would follow:
Hugh --> Hugh --> Walter --> John followed by John, the first certain member of this line.

~Cokayne's Complete Peerage, 2nd Edition, (Maultravers), Vol. VIII, p 575-577

John married Alice Fitz Geoffrey, daughter of Roger Fitz Geoffrey and Unknown.¹⁴¹ (Alice Fitz Geoffrey was born in 1154 in Maltravers, Dorset, England and died in 1184 in Maltravers, Dorset, England.)