Gurney Genealogy Library Updated 29 May 2026 by Allen Gurney

Sir Matthew de Gournay (fl. c. 1180–1220)

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Knight; acquired Harpley manor through a marriage arranged by Hameline Plantagenet, Earl Warren.

Born
c. 1180, Norfolk. Son of William de Gournay I (G30). 1
Died
c. 1220 or later. Last attested living 1217, when he paid 20 marks to the Crown for a writ of attaint concerning his Swathings tenement. 2
Occupation / Status
Knight ("Sir Matthew de Gournay, Knt."). Lord of Runhall, Swathings in Hardingham, and — through marriage — Gurney's manor in Harpley, Norfolk. Held under the senior Lords of Gournay. 3
Buried
Unknown. No record. 2
Marriage(s)
Rose de Burnham — daughter and heir of Reginald Fitz-Philip / de Burnham; given in marriage to Matthew by her kinsman Hameline Plantagenet, Earl Warren, c. 1183. The Burnhams were said to be a younger branch of the house of Warren. Through Rose, Matthew acquired Gurney's manor in Harpley and other estates. Rose's last documented appearance: Norfolk fines of 27 Henry III (c. 1243). 4

Highlights

  • Harpley enters the family through a royal marriage-gift. Hameline Plantagenet, Earl Warren — an illegitimate half-brother of Henry II of England — personally arranged Matthew's marriage to Rose de Burnham c. 1183, bringing the Harpley manor into the Gournay family. It would remain the family's primary Norfolk seat for nearly 200 years. The act of a senior magnate arranging a marriage for a minor tenant was a routine piece of feudal patronage, but for the Gournay family it was transformative. 5
  • Connected (again) to the Warren family. Rose de Burnham was given in marriage by Hameline Earl Warren precisely because the Burnhams were "said to be a younger branch of the house of Warren." This means Matthew's wife was a kinswoman of Edith de Warenne — his own ancestress, five generations back. The Gournay family's Warren connection, first established when Gerard de Gournay (G32) married Edith de Warenne c. 1090, was effectively renewed. 6
  • Charitable acts documented in primary sources. Matthew gave the tithes of Hardingham to the church there — an act recorded in the British Library Harleian Manuscripts (Harl. MSS. 970). 7
  • Corroborated by a different antiquarian tradition — and a century before Daniel Gurney. James Anderson's Genealogical History of the House of Yvery (1742) — published 106 years before Daniel Gurney's Record — names the same Norfolk Gournay sequence Matthew → William → John in the same order. Anderson's dating slips (he places this group "in the Time of Henry the First," likely a copy-error for Henry III), but the independent name sequence corroborates the pedigree from a source Daniel Gurney did not himself rely on. 11
  • Living 1217 -- survived to see the loss of Normandy and beyond. Matthew was active in the period when King John lost Normandy to Philip Augustus (1204). The Montigny-sur-Andelle Norman holding that his grandfather William I had held in parage presumably passed out of the family's hands at this point, as most Anglo-Norman lords who remained in England forfeited their Norman estates. He outlived King John (d. 1216) and is still found paying the Crown 20 marks for a writ of attaint concerning his Swathings tenement in 2 Henry III (1217). 8

Children

Name Dates Mother Notes
William de Gournay II fl. c. 1210–1250; living 1234 and 1243 Rose de Burnham G28 in direct line. Lord of Harpley; by wife Katherine, father of Sir John de Gournay I. 9
Matilda fl. c. 1210s–1240s Rose de Burnham Named in Daniel Gurney's pedigree. Further details unknown. 10
Katherine Norfolk fines, 27 Hen. III (c. 1243) Rose de Burnham Named in Norfolk fines. Further details unknown. 10
Thomas fl. c. 1210s Rose de Burnham Named in a Norfolk fine. Further details unknown. 10
Matthew de Gournay (younger) Held lands in Dunston 1251 (Norfolk fine, 41 Hen. III) Rose de Burnham Held lands in Dunston, Norfolk, 1251. Married Hawise. 10

Narrative

Sir Matthew de Gournay is the ancestor who turned the junior Norfolk branch from a minor knightly family with modest manors into the settled gentry of Harpley — a position they would hold for nearly two centuries. The engine of that transformation was a single marriage arranged by one of the most powerful men in England.

Hameline Plantagenet, illegitimate half-brother of Henry II, had inherited the earldom of Surrey through his marriage to the de Warenne heiress. He was one of the great magnates of the realm, a man whose good will opened doors and whose displeasure closed them. Around 1183, he gave in marriage to Matthew de Gournay his kinswoman Rose, daughter and heir of Reginald de Burnham — described as a younger branch of the Warren house. With Rose came her inheritance: Gurney’s manor in Harpley, and other estates. Matthew and Rose also held the manor of Swathings in Hardingham, and Matthew gave the tithes of that parish’s church to the church itself — an act recorded in the Harleian Manuscripts at the British Library, giving us an independent primary-source confirmation of his name and his Hardingham holding.

Matthew’s children were numerous and all survive in the documentary record to some degree. His son William II (G28) became Lord of Harpley in the next generation. A second Matthew held lands in Dunston. Katherine and Matilda appear in Norfolk fines. Thomas appears in another fine. The picture is of a productive minor gentry family, well integrated into the administrative records of late 12th- and early 13th-century Norfolk.

Matthew lived to see King John lose Normandy to Philip Augustus in 1204 — the event that severed the Gournay family’s remaining Norman tie (the Montigny-sur-Andelle parage tenure his grandfather William I had held). After 1204, the junior Norfolk branch was an English family in every practical sense, their Norman heritage preserved only in their name.

Citations

  1. Daniel Gurney, The Record of the House of Gournay, Part I (1848), p. 278: "The son of William was Matthew de Gournay, as appears by a plea between the said Matthew and Gilbert de Runhall, given in Appendix LIII." Pedigree p. 286: "Sir MATTHEW DE GOURNAY, Knight, Lord of Runhall and Swathings, in Hardingham, held under the Lords of Gournay, also in right of his wife of Harpley Gournays; living 1206." ↩
  2. Last attested 2 Henry III (1217): Daniel Gurney, Record of the House of Gournay, Supplement (1858), Note 109, p. 780, correcting the earlier Record, Part I, "did not long survive 1206" estimate, citing the Fine Roll 2 Henry III, Norfolk: "Mattheus de Gurney dat Domino Regi XX. pro habendo brevi de attingendo, &c., &c., in comitatu Norfolcie de tenemento in Swathing in comitatu Norfolcie." Norfolk fines of 27 Hen. III (c. 1243) name his daughter Katherine, suggesting Matthew was by then deceased. ↩
  3. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), p. 286: "Sir MATTHEW DE GOURNAY, Knight." Estates as above. ↩
  4. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), pp. 278–279 and pedigree p. 286: "ROSE, dau. and heir of Reginald Fitz-Philip, or de Burnham, given in marriage by her kinsman Earl Warren, about 1183." The Norman Pipe Roll of 1184 references Rose in connection with her family. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), p. 310: charter from Philip de Burnham and his son William (British Library Harleian MSS. 970). Rose living 1206 (Norfolk fines). Katherine named in Norfolk fines of 27 Hen. III. ↩
  5. Daniel Gurney, Record (1848), pp. 278–279: "To this Matthew de Gournay Hameline Earl Warren gave in marriage Rose, daughter and heir of Reginald de Burnham, his kinsman, about the year 1183 ... by this marriage Matthew de Gournay acquired Gurney's manor in Harpley and other estates." Independently corroborated by Blomefield, Norfolk vol. viii (Harpley): "Rose, who was given in marriage by Hameline Plantagenet Earl Warren ... to Matthew de Gurney, who was lord in her right, about the 30th of Henry II." Hameline Plantagenet's dates and Plantagenet kinship per English Wikipedia, "Hamelin de Warenne, Earl of Surrey": c. 1130 – 7 May 1202; illegitimate son of Count Geoffrey of Anjou; elder half-brother of King Henry II; married Isabel de Warenne, 4th Countess of Surrey, April 1164. Source IDs: dg-rec-pt1, blomefield-norfolk, wikipedia-en-hamelin-de-warenne. ↩
  6. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), p. 278: "The family of de Burnham were said to be a younger branch of the house of Warren." The original Gerard–Edith de Warenne marriage c. 1090: Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), p. 27. ↩
  7. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), p. 279: "He gave the tithes of Hardingham to the church there, as appears by Harl. MSS. 970." British Library Harleian Manuscripts 970 (Vitis Calthorpiana). ↩
  8. Loss of Normandy, 1204: Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), Introduction, p. ii. Matthew last attested 2 Henry III (1217) per Daniel Gurney, Supplement (1858), Note 109, p. 780. ↩
  9. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), pedigree p. 286: "Sir WILLIAM DE GOURNAY, Knt. II. Lord of Harpley, &c.; liv. 1234 & 1243." ↩
  10. Daniel Gurney, Record, Part I (1848), pedigree p. 286: Matilda, Katherine (Norfolk fines, 27 Hen. III), Thomas (Norfolk fine), and Matthew the younger (Dunston, 1251; Norfolk fine, 41 Hen. III; married Hawise). ↩
  11. James Anderson, Genealogical History of the House of Yvery, vol. II (London: Edward Symon, 1742), p. 478, names the Norfolk Gournays in the sequence Matthew → William → John, with the John identified as "of Hingham." Anderson's date placement ("the Time of Henry the First") is too early — John (G27) is documented at the battle of Lewes in 1264 and the Crusade of 1270 — and is most plausibly a slip for Henry III, since Anderson's preceding narrative concerned events of the early thirteenth century. Anderson explicitly hedges on the link to the senior Norman line ("doubtless of the same Stock"). The same name sequence appearing 106 years before Daniel Gurney's Record, in an independent antiquarian compilation, is a useful corroboration that the junior-Norfolk Matthew–William–John sequence pre-dates Daniel Gurney's pedigree work. Source ID: anderson-yvery-1742. ↩