CLARE, Avice

  Research Notes:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Clare-59
---

Biography
European Aristocracy
Avice Clare was a member of the aristocracy in England.

Peter Stewart has remarked:[1]

She was mentioned without name in the pipe roll for 1130, Rotul Scacc Henr I 82 (expanded here): Et idem Ricardus [Basset] reddit compotum de .xxxv. marcis argenti pro terra matris Nicholai vicecomitis de Statford. According to Eyton (1880) 16 'This is probably but the residuary account of a somewhat antique Fine', but he gave no evidence for this; in any case, the mention of her may mean only that the land in question had passed to Nicholas on his mother's death and does not necessarily imply that the lady herself was still living. There is no contemporary evidence for the name or family of Robert's wife. She was called 'Avice de Clare' in a verse history kept at Stone priory in 1537, Monast Angl vi/I 230\endash 231 Cartae ad prioratum de Stone, in agro Staffordiensi, spectantes no 2, 'The Copie of the Table that was hanging in the Priorie of Stone, at the time of the Suppression of the same':

'In the time of the Conquest was the lord of Stafford
Baron Robert, which here was chief lord ...
And when that he had builded this place,
Then he dyed as God's will was,
In the entry of the cloyster he was buried sekerly,
And Avice de Clare his wife lyeth him by.'

This goes on to describe the burial place of Robert's namesake grandson and the latter's wife, also Avice, both of whom we know from better evidence to have been actually buried at Stone
[...]
since we know from better evidence that Robert the Domesday lord of Stafford was almost certainly buried at Evesham, where he had become a monk in his last illness [...], and that his grandson Robert was buried at Stone with a wife name Avice, it seems likely that the two had become confused by the mid-15th century or later, whenever this doggerel was composed (after October 1438, if it is even genuine to that period), and then doubled up by the versifier. Whether or noteither Robert's wife belonged to the Clare family is unknown, and it is worthless to speculate about possible connections on such a flimsy basis.

Charles Cawley, writes on the MEDLANDS website:[2]

A table (obviously of late composition because of the language), hanging in Stone priory at the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, names "Avice de Clare" as the wife of Robert and records their burial at Stone. It is far from certain that this information is accurate. No person of that name has yet been identified, and the name "Clare" only appears to have been used by the descendants of Robert de Brionne from the early 12th century

Sources

? Peter Stewart, http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bobwolfe/gentxt/Origin_and_early_generations_of_the_Tosny_family.pdf
? Charles Cawley, https://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/ENGLISH%20NOBILITY%20MEDIEVAL2.htm#RobertStafforddied1088B

Avice married Robert DE TOENI of Stafford on an unknown date. (Robert DE TOENI of Stafford was born in 1036 in Tosny, Louviers, Eure, Normandy and died about 4 Aug 1088 in Belvoir, Leicesterhsire, England.)