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Earl of Winchester

title in the Peerage of England

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJan 9, 2026
Entity authorityQ1277430 ↗
Source-derived summary

Earl of Winchester was a title that was created three times in the Peerage of England during the Middle Ages. The first was Saer de Quincy, who received the earldom in 1207/8 after his wife inherited half of the lands of the Beaumont earls of Leicester. This creation became extinct in 1265 upon the death without male heirs of Saer's son Roger de Quincy. In 1322 King Edward II created the elder Hugh le Despenser earl of Winchester. This creation lapsed after Despenser's execution in 1326.

During his exile in 1470–71 Edward IV had been the guest of a Flemish nobleman, Lewis de Bruges. After Edward's return to the throne, Lewis was rewarded with the earldom of Winchester. His son, the second Earl, returned it to the crown in 1500.

Earls of Winchester, 1st Creation (1207)

Saer de Quincy, 1st Earl of Winchester (died 1219)

Roger de Quincy, 2nd Earl of Winchester (died 1264)

Earls of Winchester, 2nd Creation (1322)

Hugh le Despenser, 1st Earl of Winchester (died 1326)

Earls of Winchester, 3rd Creation (1472)

Lewis de Bruges, 1st Earl of Winchester (1427–1492)

John de Bruges, 2nd Earl of Winchester (1458–1512), renounced peerage 1500.

See also

Marquess of Winchester

References

Chisholm, Hugh, ed.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Earl of Winchester” as title in the Peerage of England. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Earl, Winchester and title.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1207, 1265, 1322, 1326—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Earl, Winchester and title providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Earl of Winchester”, the useful work is to connect “title in the Peerage of England” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1277430. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1207, 1265, 1322 and 1326.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Earl of Winchester” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.