Sir Thomas de Rokeby, Lord Justice of Ireland

Also Sheriff of Yorkshire.

Note:

The relationships shown above (and to the side of) Thomas de Rokeby who married a daughter of Sir John Hotham are unproven, and do not appear in the Visitations. Visitations pedigrees relating to this period are likeways often unproved (and sometimes fictional rather than merely speculative. All the figures shown can be proven to have existed, are obviously of the same family, and were alive at times which makes it possible for them to have been father and son (although, obviously, any one of the "fathers" could have died childless and have been succeeded by the son of an unrecorded younger brother).

The Victoria County History of Yorkshire records that "The first mention found of the family of Rokeby is in 1201, when King John confirmed to Henry son of Hervey lands near the Lune Valley which Robert de Rokeby and his wife Agnes gave him". It says that they left Rokeby for Mortham (evidently temporarily) and built a new house in Mortham because their Rokeby house was burnt by the Scots in the time of Edward II. It records a Henry de Rokeby holding a carucate of land in Mortham in 1270 (but he cannot have been the head of the family - a carucate of land is too small - and may not even have been part of the family; the possibility exists that he was a peasant from their lands in Rokesby who was granted lands in their other fee of Mortham). These records are insufficient to produce even a speculative genealogy, since it seems obvious that at least one generation is missing. It does show that the Rokebys were holding land in Rokeby (and probably Mortham) as earlier than 1200.

MD