The Earl of Lancaster invited select guests to his house in Nottingham in order to fete and entertain a convert to the English king's cause. Amongst his guests were several notables - Queen Isabella, the Duc de Lorraine, the Earl of Desmond, the Countess of Norfolk, and the Archbishops of Canterbury and York.

Marriages were made, royal ones too, for the Countess of Norfolk was married to the Duc de Lorraine, the youngest sister of Lancaster married the Earl of Desmond, and two of Baron Tavistock's children were wed, all that same year. That autumn, Margaret de Bruce managed an escape back to Scotland, giving rise to rumours of English traitors aiding the Scottish raiders.

The concerns of the nobles that the French war was to the detriment of border defences were put to the king by his cousin, Lancaster, and such heed did he pay that the Siege of Château-Gaillard, where the King of Scots and his wife, Joan of England, were captured. David now languishes in the Tower; Queen Joan enjoys the company of her mother and sister-in-law at court.

The year was not without its losses - but five days after the gathering at Lancaster's home, the Archbishop of York died and by the end of 1341 the Archbishop of Canterbury found himself greatly out of favour. Having forced his king to submit to the demands of Parliament limiting the funds for his war in France, he found his political power over and his position of Lord Chancellor of England lost.

Portraiture