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Beatrice ap Rice

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Beatrice ap Rice (died 1561) was a servant of Mary I of England. She was first recorded as a laundress in 1519.[1]

Her name was sometimes written as Beatrix a Pryce, or Beatrice Aprice.[2][3] The household accounts of Lady Mary call her the "launder".[4] She and Jane Foole were ill in 1543 while the household was at Beddington,[5] and at Greenwich Palace.[6]

Mary and Philip II of Spain granted her lands at Boreham in the honour of Beaulieu alias Newhall, citing her forty years in royal service.[7] This included a holding of 30 acres known as "Bullis" or "Boles", with the "Deyhouse" and "Coggeshallfield". Beatrice was confirmed as the leaseholder on 6 November 1557, after the death of her husband.[8][9]

Beatrice ap Rice was of sufficient status to be involved in the New Year gift exchange at court, perhaps as an assistant to the "mother of the maids". The surviving 1557 gift roll records a "free gift" of a gilt salt given to "Betterys, laundrys".[10][11]

Beatrice died in December 1561, after making a will on 25 May,[12] and was buried at Boreham in Essex. The parish register recorded her burial in January, "Betteris Apryse landeris to Queen Marie".[13]

Family

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Her husband was David ap Rice, a yeoman of the chamber.[14] He died before November 1557.[15] Their children included Harry, Susan, Winifred, and probably Mary. The accounts of Lady Mary include gifts to the children.[16]

It is not known if she was a relation to Mrs Barbara Ryce, Mary's chamberer, and her husband William Ryce (died 1588), who was also a royal servant.[17] John Foxe, who wrote a description of Mary's final days, claimed to have received his information from a Mr Rice.[18]

References

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  1. ^ David Loades, Reign of Mary Tudor (Routledge, 1979), p. 12.
  2. ^ W. C. Richardson, The Report of the royal commission of 1552 (Morgantown, 1974), p. 133.
  3. ^ James Gairdner, Letters & Papers Henry VIII, vol. 10 (London, 1887), pp. 494–95 no. 1187.
  4. ^ Frederick Madden, Privy Purses Expenses of Princess Mary (London: Pickering, 1831), p. 245.
  5. ^ Melita Thomas, The King's Pearl (Amberley, 2017), p. 217.
  6. ^ Frederick Madden, Privy Purses Expenses of Princess Mary (London: Pickering, 1831), p. 207.
  7. ^ Mary Anne Everett Green, Calendar State Papers Domestic, 1663–1664 (London, 1862), pp. 570–71.
  8. ^ Calendar of Patent Rolls, 1553–1554 (London, 1937), p. 320.
  9. ^ Calendar of Patent Rolls, 1557–1558 (London, 1939), pp. 117–18.
  10. ^ Jane Lawson, 'Mary's Participation in the Ritual of the New Year's Gift Exchange', Valerie Schutte & Jessica S. Hower, Mary I in Writing: Letters, Literature, and Representation (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), pp. 180–181.
  11. ^ John Nichols, Illustrations of the manners and expences of antient times in England (London, 1797), p. 23
  12. ^ Frederick Emmison, Essex Wills: 1558–1565 (Chelmsford, 1982), p. 122.
  13. ^ Robert H. Browne, 'Boreham Registers', Essex Review, 1 (1892), p. 220.
  14. ^ Frederick Madden, Privy Purses Expenses of Princess Mary (London: Pickering, 1831), p. 207.
  15. ^ Calendar Paper Rolls, 1557–1558 (London, 1939), p. 117.
  16. ^ Melita Thomas, The King's Pearl (Amberley, 2017), p. 217.
  17. ^ Calendar of Patent Rolls, 1553–1554 (London, 1937), p. 53: HMC 7th Report: Molyneux, p. 612: John Nichols, Illustrations of the manners and expences of antient times in England (London, 1797), p. 22
  18. ^ Gonzalo Velasco Berenguer, Habsburg England: Politics and Religion in the Reign of Philip I (Brill, 2023), p. 5.
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