Geoffrey de Say Lord of Greenwich

  Noted events in his life were:

• Background Information. ¹⁴¹
Geoffrey de Say II, 2^nd but 1^st surviving son and heir by 1^st wife, was born probably about 1155. In 1180 in the account of the farm of the Vicomte of Arques he is acquitted in respect of a liability of 10s. "for the land of Geoffrey de Sai which he had with the wife of Hugh de Periers." In the same year he was amerced at the Forest Assize in respect of Hudwic' & Dodinton' (Ditton Priors, Salop); and, again in 1180, with the consent of his wife, he delivered to the prior of Wenlock his manor of Ditton Priors, which was her dower from Hugh de Periers. In 1190 Michael Belet accounted for 100 li. to have right against him of the inheritance of his wife and to have his office. In 1198 he was bailiff of Arques. In 1202 Ralph Tesson, seneschal of Normandy, was ordered to see that Geoffrey de Say the younger had a hundred librates (of the money of Anjou) of the land of Juhel de Mayenne to replace the land which he had lost through the war. In 1203 the King directed the bailiffs of Caen to give to Geoffrey de Say seisin of a manor, the name of which is obliterated, which he held de prestito of King Richard, and which was of the fee of Earl William.

In 1204 a notification issued taking the lands of Geoffrey de Say into the French King's demesne. In 1206 he appears as a pledge for Gerard de Furnival. On 15 Apr 1208 the sheriff of Kent was directed to put Geoffrey de Say the younger into possession of that moiety of the manor of Burn which Ralph Tesson held. Presumably in 1210, he was with the army in Ireland, with his brother Ingram. In 1214 Geoffrey made fine in 400 marks to have his father's lands: and in the same year the sheriffs of Kent, Herts, Bucks, Sussex, Middlesex, and Northampton had orders to give him seisin of the lands which had been his father's.

Geoffrey de Say took part with the Barons against the King and was one of the 25 appointed to enforce the observance of Magna Carta. With Richard Earl of Clare, Richard Fitz Walter, and the mayor and two or three or four citizens of London he had letters of safe conduct on 9 Nov 1215 to speak with the Bishop of Winchester and others to treat of peace between the King and the Barons. In October 1215 the King gave to Piers de Crohun all Geoffrey's lands except the manor of Greenwich. In July 1217 two of his knights had letters of safe conduct to go to London as hostages; and in 1217 his lands in Kent, Essex and Sussex were restored to him. In 1219, he went on pilgrimage to the Holy Land and in 12Z3, apparently with William Earl de Warenne, to St. James [of Compostella]. In 1221 he was allowed his scutage for the army of Bytham on the fees which he held in chief, which suggests that he was with the army. He went to France with the King in April 1230, taking with him his son William.

Geoffrey de Say married, 1^stly, Alice, widow of Hugh de Periers, and heir and possibly daughter of John de Chesney. He married, 2^ndly, Margery, sister and coheir of William Briwerre, by whom he was divorced. He died in 1230, in Poitou, shortly before 26 August, [? 19 August] and was buried at the Hospital of St. Mary, Dover, to which he had given his manor of Coldred with his body.

~Cokayne's Complete Peerage, 2nd Edition, (Say), Vol. XI, pp. 468-70, Vol. XIV, p. 571

Geoffrey next married Margaret de Briwere, daughter of William de Briwere Lord and Béatrix de Vaux. (Margaret de Briwere was born about 1200 and died after 1232.)