Joan Tudor - Joan Tudur: Can We Decide Whether Or Not To Keep Her On Geni

Started by Anne Brannen on Sunday, July 23, 2017
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7/23/2017 at 1:35 PM

There are a couple of other discussions that mention Joan Tudor, connected to this profile, and I'm starting another.

I've gotten to the tree in Bartrum where she SHOULD be showing up, and she isn't.

Here is the page:

http://cadair.aber.ac.uk/dspace/bitstream/handle/2160/5264/BLEDDYN%...

I know Bartrum's notes aren't exceedingly easy to follow, but if you go the the section called "B" and follow it down, you see that Ieuan of Whitchurch (he is called Yevan by the English) marries Margred Kemeys; they have a child William of Whitchurch, Privy Councillor to Henry VII, and he is married to Margred verch Thomas.

Well, that's the problem. She's also the mother of William's children.

And she is NOT Joan Tudor.

I know it would be great for all the descendants of the Cromwells to also be descended from Jasper Tudor, the supposed Joan's father, but she is not showing up here, in the Welsh Genealogies. They often don't include the English, but she is a Welshwoman, and should be in here. At the very least, she shouldn't be named Margred verch Thomas.

I followed up all the links I could, and I went looking myself, and I find LOTS of assertions as to her existence, and I find NO references. So far, all the references have turned out to go nowhere.

Here's a nice little bit, too -- you see that pretty picture of her? it's very pretty indeed. It's actually a Titian, of an unknown young woman: https://www.wikiart.org/en/titian/portrait-of-a-young-woman

no evidence that it is Joan Tudor.

So!

What exactly is the evidence that this woman existed AT ALL?

And if she DID exist, what is the evidence that she married William ap Yevan and bore his children?

In other words, what evidence is there that the Giant Reference Of Welsh Genealogy is wrong?

Because believe me, if there were really a link to the Tudors he would have known.

Private User
7/23/2017 at 1:58 PM

If there is no evidence then i would delete her we do not need a fake tree????

7/23/2017 at 2:15 PM

The Titian, by the way, is from 1515; Joan was long dead. If she existed. I suppose if she didn't she wasn't dead, having not been alive.

7/23/2017 at 2:28 PM

I am merely following my family tree through my own DNA. And you are correct, she should be there.
Hence new leaves being discovered that was once lost, all options must be examined before a final determination is actually finalized.
If there are unrecorded descendants, that are dna connected to her, and/or a immediate family member, which I have been, then logic would dictate that not all records to be exact. Humans do make mistakes, none of us are perfect, no matter how meticulous we may or may not be. I am not disputing your knowledge, nor anyone else's, just merely questioning if all possible other information, has been examined to exhaustion, with an open mind, and nothing more to it than that.
I am merely following the dna trail of my test results, and nothing more. DNA can not be controlled by human errors, as it always migrates back to it's own. And much to people's dismay ... obviously.

Private User
7/23/2017 at 2:57 PM

Anne,
I wonder where this info came from...

"Joan was an Illegitimate daughter of Jasper Tudor and Mevanvy Verch Daffydd.
She married William ap Yevan, the son of Yevan ap William and Margaret Kemoys.
Joan was the mother of Morgan ap William (or Williams) (born Lanishen, Glamorganshire, Wales, 1479), later married at Putney Church, Norwell, Nottinghamshire, in 1499 to Katherine Cromwell, born Putney, London, c. 1483, an older sister of statesman Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex. Joan and William were fourth-generation ancestors to Oliver Cromwell.
It is believed that Joan died young giving birth to her sons John and Morgan."

Is this just something someone made up?
Just Curious,
ben

7/23/2017 at 3:02 PM

We need to be very cautious about making excessive claims for DNA.

In a best case, DNA can be used to show there is some kind of relationship but it cannot say what the relationship is.

For Joan, we don't even have that much:

- She's too far back. There can be no autosomal evidence.

- She's a woman. There can be no yDNA evidence.

- That leaves just mtDNA evidence, but since there are no proven descents from her that we could use to triangulate and prove her maternal line, any such evidence shouldn't be treated as highly suspect. Further, any such evidence would have to be tied firmly to primary sources that show her identity.

We've been over Joan before. She needs to be labelled as {fictititious}, disconnected from the Cromwells, and retained as a fake daughter of Jasper so we don't keep covering the same territory.

7/23/2017 at 3:26 PM

Private User -- that is exactly what I am asking.

this info shows up all over the web, and apparently in some historical fiction -- but even when references are given, if I trace them down, Joan isn't there.

The scholarly guess is that this has indeed all been invented -- as OFTEN happens in genealogy -- in order to give the Cromwells a lineage back to the Tudors.

That sort of thing isn't unusual.

The core of the issue here is that the Biggest Gun of All in Welsh Genealogies -- Bartrum -- gives William ap Yevan's wife as Margred verch Thomas, not Joan Tudor.

Which means that she does not show up in the genealogies close to her time.

Which means she got made up later.

(Sometimes people like to speculate that illegitimate people have been left out of the tree for reasons of decorum; I can't speak to the rest of the medieval and early modern tree, but I can say with certainty that "illegitimacy" was not an issue in the Welsh genealogies.)

7/23/2017 at 6:18 PM

Illegitimacy wasn't really an issue in medieval and early modern England. Illegitimate children were often recorded in wills and left money, sometimes land. The only thing was they could not be their father's heir or heiresses unless they were legitimised.

Jasper Tudor does not mention any children in his will.

The following family members are mentioned.

Katherine, sometime Queen of England, my mother
Edmund late Earl of Richmond my brother
my Lady my wife

see
https://books.google.com.au/books?id=XOgKAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA430
and additional notes
http://www.susanhigginbotham.com/blog/posts/jasper-tudors-will/

7/23/2017 at 7:05 PM

This blog post is an interesting read.

Guest Post by Debra Bayani: The Supposed Daughters of an Earl
http://www.susanhigginbotham.com/blog/posts/guest-post-by-debra-bay...

7/23/2017 at 7:28 PM

At the very least I think both daughters need to be disconnected from Jasper Tudor and Joan disconnected from her husband. I suggest keep Joan's profile and label her fictitious and just link her and Helen in the overview/about section of Jasper Tudor's profile.

7/23/2017 at 7:51 PM

This is a problem of positioning. We always struggle with that when it comes to popular fakes in the medieval tree.

If we cut them loose from Jasper they'll be added back eventually. Even if we lock relationships, there is a good chance a curator who isn't familiar with the area will merge without ever noticing the potential problem.

A better strategy I think is to keep them connected to their supposed father, label them {fictitious}, and disconnect from their supposed husbands.

The highest priority should be to make sure there are no descents from them.

7/23/2017 at 8:46 PM

Curators above all should be checking notes and sources before merging. Being a curator is not a licence to behave recklessly. Joan is clearly a fake and should be disconnected from all real people. Helen is more of a problem. If were keep Helen attached to Jasper people are always going to believe she is a proven daughter when she is not. Better to disconnect and add a note and link her profile and try and educate people there is no documented proof.

7/23/2017 at 9:05 PM

With Nest verch Cadell, about whom I recently caused another ruckus, I labeled her Fictitious, put info in the About section and curators notes, detached her from the tree, and for both Merfyn Frych and Rhodri Mawr, put in curators notes as to the fact she should not be reattached, and info in the About section with links to info and Nest's profile, AND locked everything down, so that only curators can add her back in, and there are plenty of warnings as to why that is not ok.

Anyone looking for that person specifically will find her in a search, and the profile itself will,take them to various renditions of the controversy.

I think that would work here.

I haven't come to the page in Bartrum upon which Jasper Tudor appears, but I will go look for it.

If indeed he had any children at all with Myfanwy they will be there.

What I know right now is that this is not the wife of William ap Yevan.

Before I cut her off the tree, I'll check Jasper.

7/23/2017 at 9:10 PM

Probably would have been better as a curator discussion since it overturns the existing agreement about how to handle questions like this.

7/23/2017 at 9:19 PM

Oh I thought that was what we had agreed on!

I can put things back as they were for Nest, then.

But Charlene Newport -- I just found a reference to the Bartrum tree Jasper shows up in ( the server is down and I can't see the page itself at the moment)

According to the Welsh Genealogies, Jasper had one child with Myfanwy, that being Helen (though when I see the page I expect to find that her name is Elen)

So there is indeed solid evidence for her.

Joan is not there.

7/23/2017 at 9:22 PM

The Bayani essay does not mention Bartrum. But it's clear that Ellen/Helen is not in Jaspers will.

Ooh I want that server back up, so I can see if Bartrum shows her as married to a Gardiner.

7/23/2017 at 10:13 PM

solid evidence?

Peter Bartrum's Welsh Genealogies is a secondary source. I know you place a lot trust in him but that doesn't mean he is a 100% accurate.

However, I'm happy to leave Helen/Elen attached.

Joan is fake and should not be attached to real people.

After thinking about it a bit more it wouldn't bother me if she was deleted.

7/24/2017 at 6:37 AM

I don't think Bartrum is 100% accurate; indeed, a great deal of the time, especially in the earlier branches of the trees, he doesn't manage to make the chronology make sense; Darrell Wolcott has been wrassling that.

But in the field of Welsh genealogy, he's considered the gold standard. So he is always to be taken seriously, even when disagreeing.

He's not a primary source; he provides a compilation of primary sources. He's the only person to have corralled all the Welsh genealogies and caused them to make some sort of sense. I find that where the Welsh intermarry with the English, he becomes highly inaccurate -- that being a hallmark of the Welsh genealogies themselves. Much like the English, dealing with the Welsh. Fair is fair.

That being said, the server is up!

Here is the Owain Tudur page:

http://cadair.aber.ac.uk/dspace/bitstream/handle/2160/4801/MARCHUDD...

Bartrum gives only Helen as a daughter of Jasper, and doesn't name her mother (the squiggly line means that she is illegitimate). So, no Myfanwy verch Dafydd. I now wonder where THAT piece of information came from.

But the index, which is highly difficult to use (the university is still in the process of digitizing these trees, and the search function is coming later) isn't coughing up either Jasper or Helen -- they are born just too late. thus, I can't say what manuscripts, if any, this information is coming from. Maybe from Betham's 1795 tables.

And no Joan.

However!

Ellen Tudor is not a later invention -- she shows up in Thomas Tonge's vistation of 1530 (he was then one of the officers of the College of Arms), here in a version printed in 1863 by the College of Arms:

https://archive.org/stream/heraldicvisitat00britgoog/heraldicvisita...

7/24/2017 at 10:56 AM

I realize I am speaking out of anger, but with the very strong implications of being accused of a liar, and/or an illegitimate birth, which I do take highly insulting, and from where I sit, is no better then my stepfather, and that is so NOT a compliment .. trust me. My stepfather had many issues, and had primarily targeted me as his release to his issues, and my family, that is why it is not a compliment. However, no one shall taint my mother in this manner, she was proper when it came to wedding my father (despite her young age of 16), and then birthing the 3 of us, plus, she didn't walk away from her responsibilities, like our father did. Some 300 miles from family, and with no transportation. None of you held her hand when she died in 1997, but 2 out of 3 of her children did, and I was 1 out of the 2. YOU didn't, nor did attend her wake, nor her funeral, nor sent flowers to her. Again, 2 of 3 of her children did, again, I was 1 of those 2 children. I apologize for stating this strongly, but anyone would .. when it came to their mother. Especially when a mother died the way mine did, slowly from within, cancer is ugly and nasty, once it hit her brain, she was done. there was no more Chemo, nor anything else that could be done. Only a person who was there can tell you the last moments of her life, and of how she called for Buster during her delirium, (her childhood family dog), that the morphine drip given to her had caused, to help with the pain, nor for that last shot. As you can tell, it was very upsetting for me, and I did not handle it well, and still don't to this very day. So please, and I am asking nicely, when it comes to my mother, tread lightly. She is, or was anyways, the only family I have ever known outside of my siblings. The truth always comes to the light, I firmly believe in this, as did my mother. This also could have been said privately, but I tire of the false accusations of my lineage. I shall always honor and protect, and defend, my mother until the day I take my last breathe, and called home to be with her. Just as the Lord gave us the commandment to do, Honor thy parents, and this is 1 less sin for me that I have to answer for, thank you very much. :)) Now back to my researching the information you have displayed here.

7/24/2017 at 11:06 AM

Carolyn, we are talking about a woman born nearly 600 years ago in a culture that treated illegitimacy very differently than our culture. The records clearly show that Ellen was illegitimate, and if her sister Joan was real she was also illegitimate. Welsh law and custom allowed illegitimate children to inherit. English law did not.

Illegitimate children often married into good families, those families were proud of the connection, and the relationship was acknowledged on both sides.

Jasper must have acknowledged and provided for his daughter (or daughters). Otherwise there would be no record of them.

Private User
7/25/2017 at 6:28 AM

Thomas Tonge, Clarenceux King of Arms is actually on the Geni Tree - I put him there myself, when researching the Whites of Hutton. In 1530 he was Norroy King of Arms.

Regarding "legitimacy", this is why I tend to prefer the term "extramarital" as being more precisely descriptive of the situation (child(ren) yes, parents married to each other, no) as well as less emotionally loaded.

Private User
7/25/2017 at 6:58 AM
7/25/2017 at 7:11 AM

You are correct on all accounts, I am aware you were speaking of the ancestor within my tree, and how relationships were accepted at that time. Different customs and laws would demand different inner structural societies, per the different cultures and eras. I am also semi knowledged, not a pro, in the vast difference of what society deems now as acceptable, compared to what was acceptable during different eras, no matter how barbaric we may find them, as a normal for them. I find it exhilarating to discover more and more.
I also stated in the very beginning, (it was not directed at you Sir), the statement was out of anger, due to myself being purely frustrated over the mention of illegitimate. However, I do not believe I stated the reasons properly for the frustrations, and I probably should have. With that being said, I do apologize if I have lead you to misunderstand my statement, and it's intentions.

7/25/2017 at 4:24 PM

One would think british royal family or any royal family would have preserved a family tree so there would be never a second guess on who is related to who..??

7/25/2017 at 4:48 PM

This is not the royal family. Helen was the daughter, by a mistress, of a man who was the son of a minor Welsh nobleman and the widow of Henry V.

Private User
7/25/2017 at 5:02 PM

'Illegitimate' is a word which really simply means Human Nature, it has existed for all eternity and will always exist ..past, present and future. Every link to any ones tree is as important as the next, its what connects us all as One.

7/25/2017 at 6:20 PM

I didnt know jasper tudor was a minor welsh nobleman. Son of Sir Owen Tudor 4th in descent from welsh royalty

7/25/2017 at 6:22 PM

Sir Owen Tudor (Welsh: Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudur,[nb 1] c. 1400 – 2 February 1461) was a Welsh courtier and the second husband of Catherine of Valois (1401–1437), Henry V's widow. He was the grandfather of Henry VII, founder of the Tudor dynasty. Owen was a descendant of a prominent family from Penmynydd on the Isle of Anglesey, which traces its lineage back to Ednyfed Fychan (d. 1246), a Welsh official and seneschal to the Kingdom of Gwynedd. Tudor's grandfather, Tudur ap Goronwy, married Margaret, daughter of Thomas ap Llywelyn ab Owain of Cardiganshire, the last male of the princely house of Deheubarth. Margaret's elder sister married Gruffudd Fychan of Glyndyfrdwy, whose son was Owain Glyndŵr. Owen's father, Maredudd ap Tudur, and his uncles were prominent in Owain Glyndŵr's revolt against English rule, the Glyndŵr Rising.[1]

7/25/2017 at 6:30 PM

I didnt know jasper tudor was a minor welsh nobleman. Son of Sir Owen Tudor 4th in descent from welsh royalty.

JASPER TUDOR, second son of Owen Tudor and Queen Catherine, sirnamed of Hatfield, the place of his nativity. He was by King Henry VI, his half-brother, created first, Earl of Pembroke, and to have place in parliament next after his brother Edmund. But King Edward IV attaining the crown, this Jasper was attainted, and William, Lord Herbert, created Earl of Pembroke in his room, his patent expressing, that he had that honour for expelling Jasper the rebel.

But fortune revolving, by the recovery of the crown to king Henry VI, this Jasper was restored to the earldom of Pembroke, anno 1470; but being taken prisoner at Barnet-field soon after, he lost his earldom a second time, which being surrendered by the second William Herbert to king Edward IV, that king gave it to his son prince Edward, who enjoyed it during life.

King Richard III held also this earldom till the time of his death, at Bosworth-field, when Henry VII attaining the crown, he not only restored this Jasper, his uncle, to the earldom of Pembroke, but likewise advanced him to the dignity of Duke of Bedford, in the 1st of his reign. He was also, by the same king, constituted high steward at the coronation of his queen, Elizabeth. The next year he made him lieutenant of Ireland for one year, and in the 5th of his reign, granted him the office of earl marshal, and to the heirs male of his body.

His wife was Catherine, daughter of Richard Widvile, or Woodville, Earl Rivers, widow of Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham; but he died without issue by her, 11 Hen. VII, and was buried in the abbey of Keynsham, where he had founded a chantry for four priests, to sing mass for his father, Catherine his mother, and Edmund his elder brother.

He had a natural daughter, named Helen, who was married to William Gardiner, esq. of London, by whom she had issue, Stephen Gardiner, lord Prior of Tinmouth, and afterwards lord bishop of Winchester, whose fame in the bloody annals of persecution, during the reign of Queen Mary, may be well remembered.

7/25/2017 at 6:49 PM

He is indeed descended from Ednyfed Fychan, but 1) there's about 200 years in between them and 3) Ednyfed Fychan was an official for royalty, not royalty. It is true that you will find sources that say he was descended from royalty. You will also find sources that say he was a commoner. Neither are true.

He was from a prominent Welsh family, part of the Welsh nobility but not the highest part of it.

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