Several of Windsor’s appointees in the Irish admin-
istration were dismissed, but the charges directed at
Windsor himself were subsequently dropped. Modern
historians have depicted him as a victim of circum-
stance and his own excessive zeal, rather than a corrupt
official. He went on to have a highly successful career
and died at Haversham in 1386. The Anglo-Irish com-
munity continued to demand aid from England while
simultaneously resenting the intrusion of English offi-
cials, and the policy of military intervention was to
culminate in the two expeditions under King Richard II
of 1394 and 1399.
References and Further Reading
Clarke, Maude V. “William of Windsor in Ireland, 1369–1376.”
InFourteenth-Century Studies by M. V. Clarke, edited by L.
S. Sutherland and M. McKisack, 146–241. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1937. Reprint 1968.
Connolly, Philomena. “The Financing of English Expeditions
to Ireland, 1361–1376.” In England and Ireland in the Later
Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of Jocelyn Otway-Ruthven,
edited by James Lydon, 104–121. Dublin: Irish Academic
Press, 1981.
Harbison, S. “William of Windsor, the Court Party and the
Administration of Ireland.” In England and Ireland in the
Later Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of Jocelyn Otway-
Ruthven,edited by James Lydon, 53–74. Dublin: Irish Aca-
demic Press, 1981.
Lydon, James F. “William of Windsor and the Irish Parliament.”
InEnglish Historical Review80 (1965): 252–267.
See alsoChief Governors; Lordship of Ireland
WILLS AND TESTAMENTS
Testaments, in later medieval Ireland, were the sets of
instructions, left on their death by testators, for the burial
of their body and for the disposition of such of their
property as was at their free disposal, and appointing
executors to ensure that these wishes were carried out.
Testaments of this general type were a common
feature of general Western European legal practice, but
seem only to have been introduced into Ireland by the
Synod of Cashel of 1172. Testaments seem most com-
monly to have been made in writing. They could also
be made orally, provided there were witnesses to prove
what the testator had said. They were normally made
on the testator’s deathbed. Indeed, the Synod of Cashel
required them to be made in the testator’s last sickness
in the presence of his confessor and neighbors. The
executors were required to probate the testament, nor-
mally in the local bishop’s court—that is, to produce
the testament and prove it was genuine—before they
would be authorized by sealed letters of administration
to carry out the testator’s last instructions. For testators
who had property in towns, a second probate in the
town court was often required. The executors could
then proceed to pay the debts of the deceased, collect
moneys owing to him, and then distribute his or her
estate. When they had finished doing so they were
required to provide written accounts of their adminis-
tration to the bishop’s court. In general principle, lands,
houses, and other similar kinds of property could not
be left by testament and were supposed to pass by the
general rules of intestate inheritance, except in towns
where local town or city custom authorized this. Mar-
ried men, on their deaths, had at their free disposal
only one third (if they had a wife and children) or one-
half (if they had only a wife) of their money and other
goods. Under secular law married women could only
make testaments with the consent of their husbands,
and of such property as the husband assigned to them.
The term “last will” or “will” was often used as a
synonym for testament, but it was also used more
specifically from the later fourteenth century onward
for the instructions left to trustees (feoffees to uses),
who held the nominal legal title to lands, to execute
the wishes of the beneficial owner of the lands after
their death. Last wills of this kind effectively gave
landowners a power of testation over their lands and
allowed them to determine to whom they passed. Wills
did not require probate, but were often included in
testaments and probated with them. Some original tes-
taments and wills survive in collections of medieval
deeds, and others as copied into cartularies. There is also
a single surviving (and published) register of enrolled
copies of testaments and wills, plus accompanying
inventories of the possessions of the deceased testator
submitted by the executors at the time of probate, for the
diocese of Dublin for the period from1457 to 1483.
PAUL BRANDReferences and Further Reading
Berry, H. F. Register of Wills and Inventories of the Diocese of
Dublin, 1457–1483. Dublin: Royal Society of Antiquaries
of Ireland, 1898.
Connolly, Philomena. Medieval Record Sources (Maynooth
Research Guides for Irish Local History, No. 4). Dublin:
Four Courts Press, 2002.
Murphy, Margaret. “The High Cost of Dying: An Analysis of
pro animaBequests in Medieval Dublin.” In The Church
and Wealth (Studies in Church History vol. 25), edited by
W.J. Sheils and Diana Wood. Oxford: Blackwell, 1987.
See alsoBurialsWISDOM TEXTS
Literature that in a pithy, sententious style comments
on the nature of humankind and the world or that
gives aphoristic, moralizing precepts is known asWILLIAM OF WINDSOR (c. 1330–1386)