Percy
A noble north of England family

Their founder, William de Percy (c.1030-1096), arrived with William the Conqueror, and received lands in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Hampshire and Essex. Richard (c.1170-1244) was one of the barons who extorted Magna Carta. Henry (c.1272-1315) aided Edward I in subduing Scotland and was Governor of Galloway. He also received a grant of Robert Bruce's forfeited earldom of Carrick and the wardenship of Bamburgh and Scarborough Castles from Edward II. In 1309 he purchased the barony of Alnwick, the chief seat of the family ever since. His grandson fought at Cr�cy; his great-grandson, Henry (1342-1408), 4th Lord Percy of Alnwick, in 1377 was made marshal of England and Earl of Northumberland. The latter's son, Henry Percy, was the famous 'Harry Hotspur' whom James, 2nd Earl of Douglas and Mar defeated at Otterburn (1388), and who fell fighting against Henry IV at Shrewsbury, where his uncle, Sir Thomas, Earl of Worcester, was captured and soon after executed. His father, who had helped Henry of Lancaster to the throne, was dissatisfied with the king's gratitude, and with his sons plotted the insurrection. He joined Archbishop Scrope's plot, and fell at Bramham Moor (1408), when his honours were forfeited, but they were restored (1414) to his grandson, who became High Constable of England. The title and estates were passed to a brother of Richard Warwick, the Kingmaker, but in 1469 Henry, son of the 3rd earl (d.1461), was restored by Edward IV. The 6th earl (once the lover of Anne Boleyn) died childless in 1537, and as his brother, Sir Thomas Percy, had been attainted and executed for his share in the Pilgrimage of Grace, the title of Duke of Northumberland was conferred by Edward VI upon John Dudley, Earl of Warwick, who in turn was attainted and executed under Mary I in 1553. In 1557 Mary granted the earldom to Thomas Percy (1528-72), son of the attainted Sir Thomas. A devoted Catholic, he took part in the Rising of the North, and was beheaded at York. His brother Henry, 8th earl, became involved in Francis Throckmorton's conspiracy in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots, and was committed to the Tower, where he was found dead in bed (1585). His son, 9th earl, was imprisoned for 15 years in the Tower, and fined �30,000 on a baseless suspicion of being privy to the Gunpowder Plot. His son, 10th earl, was a Parliamentarian. On the death of his son (1670), 11th earl, the male line of the family became extinct. Charles II created his third bastard by the Duchess of Cleveland, Earl, and afterwards Duke, of Northumberland, but he died childless in 1716. The 11th earl's daughter, Baroness Percy, married Charles Seymour, 6th Duke of Somerset; their son was created Baron Warkworth and Earl of Northumberland in 1749, with remainder to his son-in-law, Sir Hugh Smithson (1715-86), who assumed the name of Percy, and in 1766 was created Duke of Northumberland.

Bibliography: Bertram Wyatt-Brown, The Literary Percys: Family History, Gender, and the Southern Imagination (1994)