Margaret de Bohun, Countess of Devon

Margaret de Bohun
Countess of Devon
Margaret de Bohun , detail of her effigy (heavily restored) situated next to that of her husband on a chest tomb in Exeter Cathedral
Spouse(s)	Hugh Courtenay, 10th Earl of Devon
Issue Sir Hugh Courtenay, KG Thomas Courtenay Sir Edward Courtenay Robert Courtenay William Courtenay, Archbishop of Canterbury Sir Philip Courtenay Sir Peter Courtenay, KG Humphrey Courtenay Margaret Courtenay Elizabeth Courtenay Katherine Courtenay Anne Courtenay Joan Courtenay
Noble family	Bohun
Father	Humphrey de Bohun, 4th Earl of Hereford
Mother	Elizabeth of Rhuddlan
Born	3 April 1311 Caldecote, Northampton
Died	16 December 1391(1391-12-16) (aged 80)
Buried	Exeter Cathedral

Margaret de Bohun, Countess of Devon (3 April 1311 – 16 December 1391), was the granddaughter of King Edward I and Eleanor of Castile, and the wife of Hugh Courtenay, 10th Earl of Devon (1303-1377). Her thirteen children included an Archbishop of Canterbury and six knights, of whom two were founder knights of the Order of the Garter. Unlike most women of her day, she received a classical education and was a lifelong scholar and collector of books.

Lady Margaret de Bohun was born on 3 April 1311 at Caldecote, Northamptonshire, the third daughter and seventh child of Humphrey de Bohun, 4th Earl of Hereford, Lord Constable of England by his wife Elizabeth of Rhuddlan, the youngest daughter of King Edward I and Eleanor of Castile. Her paternal grandparents were Humphrey de Bohun, 3rd Earl of Hereford and Maud de Fiennes. She was named after her maternal step-grandmother, Margaret of France, the second queen consort of Edward I.

Margaret was left an orphan shortly before her eleventh birthday. On 16 March 1322 at the Battle of Boroughbridge, her father was slain in an ambush by the Welsh. Her mother had died six years previously in childbirth.

Together with her siblings she received a classical education under a Sicilian Greek, Master Diogenes. As a result, Margaret became a lifelong scholar and avid book collector.

On 11 August 1325, at the age of fourteen, Lady Margaret married Hugh de Courtenay, the future 10th Earl of Devon, to whom she had been betrothed since 27 September 1314. Her dowry included the manor of Powderham near Exeter. The marriage agreement was formally made on 28 February 1315, when she was not quite four years old. The first Earl of Devon promised that upon the marriage he would enfeoff his son and Margaret jointly with 400 marks worth of land, assessed at its true value, and in a suitable place.