Nicholas de Balscote

Nicholas de Balscote (died 1320) was an English-born official and judge in fourteenth-century Ireland. He attainedhighjudicialoffice, but his career wasdamagedby a quarrel with King Edward II.

He was born at Balscote in Oxfordshire, and probably belonged tothe same family as Alexander de Balscot, who was to holdhigh office in Ireland two generations later. He is first heard of as an official of the Exchequer of Ireland in 1303, and was subsequently appointed Archdeacon of Glendalough. In 1313 he was one of the attorneys appointed by John Wogan, the outgoing Justiciar of Ireland, to manage his legal affairs. He spent a considerable sum on the upkeep of the King's mills in Dublin between 1311 and 1314.He became Chancellor of the Exchequer of Ireland in 1310, and Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer in 1313. In 1317 he was spoken of as a possible Lord Chancellor of Ireland but was not appointed. He became custodian of the Archdiocese of Dublin in the same year.

Downfall

In 1318 he claimed the right to be appointedto the office of Chancellor of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin; although the details of the case are obscure, his claim for some reason gave great offence to the King. He was removed from office as Chief Baron in 1319 and died the following year.

He left his property in Dublin to John de Balscote and his brother Ralph. Presumably they were his nephews or cousins: he had appointed them as his attorneysthe previous year. The property was taken into the Crown's hands, but after John and Ralph petitioned the Court of Chancery (Ireland) for redress, they received a lease of it. John was a clerk in the Royal service: he becameChief Chamberlain of the Exchequer of Ireland in 1331, and was still in office in 1344, when he had been joined in the Royal service by yet another Balscote relative, John de Balscote junior. The elder John held the living of Callan, County Kilkenny, and was still alive in 1356. Ralph was also a clerk, but little else is known of him. Alexander de Balscot, also called Alexander Petit (died 1400) was probably another relative of Nicholas; as Lord Chancellor of Ireland and Bishop of Meath, he dominated Irish politics in the last years of the fourteenth century.