Philippa, 5th Countess of Ulster

Philippa of Clarence (16 August 1355 – 5 January 1382) was the suo jure Countess of Ulster.

Biography

She was born at Eltham Palace in Kent on 16 August 1355, the only child of Lionel of Antwerp, 1st Duke of Clarence, and Elizabeth de Burgh, 4th Countess of Ulster.^[1] Her father was the third son, but second son to survive infancy, of King Edward III of England and Philippa of Hainault.^[2]

Philippa married Edmund Mortimer, 3rd Earl of March at the age of twelve in 1368 in the Queen's Chapel at Reading Abbey,^[3] forging an alliance that would have far-reaching consequences in English history. During her own lifetime, Philippa was the heir presumptive to her first cousin Richard II; she would have been displaced in the succession by any legitimate children of the king. Richard remained childless, so after her death, her position as first in line for the throne passed to her son, Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March. He was killed at the Battle of Kells in Ireland in 1398, making his six-year-old son, Edmund Mortimer, 5th Earl of March, Richard's heir presumptive.

However, the throne was usurped by Richard and Philippa's first cousin, Henry of Bolingbroke, son of John of Gaunt, an event that later precipitated the Wars of the Roses. As a result of Philippa's seniority in the line of succession to the throne of the Kingdom of England and her marriage into the powerful Mortimer family, her descendants eventually succeeded to the throne as the House of York under Edward IV.

Philippa died on 5 January 1382 in Cork, Ireland, and was buried at Wigmore Abbey, Herefordshire.

Marriage and issue

Ancestry

Notes

References

• Davies, R.R. (2004). "Mortimer, Roger (VII), fourth earl of March and sixth earl of Ulster (1374–1398)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/19356.  (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• Ormrod, W. M. (January 2008) [2004]. "Lionel, duke of Clarence (1338–1368)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/16750.  (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• Richardson, Douglas (2011). Everingham, Kimball G., ed. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families III (2nd ed.). Salt Lake City. ISBN 144996639X. 

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