page_title: Richard de Belmeis I
section_title: Family
hierarchical_section_title: Richard de Belmeis I / Family
caption_attribution_description: English: Tympanum over entrance on south side of the church. Lilleshall Abbey, Lilleshall, near Telford, Shropshire.
context_page_description: Richard de Belmeis I was a medieval cleric, administrator, judge and politician. Beginning as a minor landowner and steward in Shropshire, he became Henry I's chief agent in the Welsh Marches and in 1108 Bishop of London. He founded St Osyth's Priory in Essex and was succeeded by a considerable dynasty of clerical politicians and landowners.
context_section_description: Richard became the originator of both ecclesiastical and secular dynasties. He had at least two sons, Walter and William. Walter was a canon of London, holding the prebend of Newington,  and William was Archdeacon of London.
  However, his nephews, heirs who could be legally acknowledged, were recipients of much greater benefits. The sons of two sisters, Ralph de Langford and William de Mareni, both pursued distinguished careers in the Diocese of London and in turn became Dean of St Paul's. Sons of his brother Robert received still more. Philip became his secular heir in the Midlands, receiving the substantial and lucrative estates at Tong and Donington. Philip's younger brother, Richard de Belmeis II received a royal grant of his prebends of St Alkmund's church, Shrewsbury, and the pair were able to found and endow another great Augustinian house: Lilleshall Abbey in Shropshire. However, both Philip's sons died young, after successively inheriting the estates, which then passed through their sister Adelicia and her husband, Alan de la Zouche, to the Barons Zouche. Richard later became Bishop of London. Richard Ruffus, their brother, apparently sharing his uncle's complexion, was archdeacon of Essex in the diocese of London, and had two sons who were canons of St Paul's. Another brother, Robert seems to have been the ancestor of the later Belmeis landowning dynasty. His son, William, was a canon of St Paul's and prebendary of St Pancras, but it is unclear whether he or a brother was Robert's temporal heir.
caption: Tympanum over the south processional entrance to Lilleshall Abbey. Richard de Belmeis's nephews were able to endow the abbey from their large inheritance.
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