Thomas FitzAlan

Thomas Arundel (1353 – 19 February 1414) was an English clergyman who served as Lord Chancellor and Archbishop of York during the reign of Richard II, as well as Archbishop of Canterbury in 1397 and from 1399 until his death, an outspoken opponent of the Lollards. He was instrumental in the usurpation of Richard by his cousin Henry Bolingbroke, who became Henry IV. Life Early life and career Arundel was born, probably in Etchingham, Sussex, England, a younger son of Richard Fitzalan, 3rd Earl of Arundel and Eleanor of Lancaster. His elder brothers were Richard Fitzalan, 4th Earl of Arundel, who was executed for his opposition to Richard II, and John FitzAlan, 1st Baron Arundel, who drowned at sea in an expedition to aid the Duke of Brittany. Arundel studied at Oriel College, Oxford, until papally provided as Bishop of Ely on 13 August 1373 entirely by reason of his father's status and financial leverage with the Crown during the dotage of Edward III, and happily abandoning his student days at Oxford, from which he gained little pleasure. A hugely wealthy near-sinecure, Ely seems to have captured the young bishop's genuine interest until his brother Richard's political opposition to Richard II's policies both at home and towards France grew rancorous and dragged him in. In an extremely grave crisis, teetering towards civil war during the years from 1386 through 1388, the bishop found himself, at least in formal terms, right at the front of the dangerous attempts by five leading temporal lords to purge the king's advisors and control future policy.