Anne Say

Anne Say (born c. 1453 – died between 1484 and 1494) was an English baroness through her marriage to Sir Henry Wentworth in c. 1470 until her death. She was the daughter of Sir John Say (1441–1483) and his wife Elizabeth Cheney, Lady Say. She was the maternal grandmother of Jane Seymour, the third wife of King Henry VIII of England, and a great-grandmother of Edward VI.

Anne Say
Coat of arms of Say
Born	c. 1453 Borough of Broxbourne
Died	1484-1494 Nettlestead, Kent
Buried	Newsham Abbey
Noble family	Say (by birth) Wentworth (by marriage)
Spouse(s)	Sir Henry Wentworth
Issue	Sir Richard Wentworth Edward Wentworth Elizabeth Wentworth Margery Wentworth Dorothy Wentworth Jane Wentworth
Father	Sir John Say
Mother	Elizabeth Cheney, Lady Say

Early life and family

Anne Say was born c. 1453 to Sir John Say and Elizabeth Cheney, Lady Say, the daughter of Sir Lawrence Cheney and his wife, Elizabeth Cockayne daughter of John Cokayne (died 1429) and Ida de Grey. Ida was a daughter of Welsh Marcher Lord Reginald Grey, 2nd Baron Grey de Ruthyn and Eleanor Le Strange of Blackmere. Through her mother, Ida was a direct descendant of Welsh Prince Gruffydd II ap Madog, Lord of Dinas Bran. Anne's father represented Hertfordshire in several Parliaments from 1453 to 1478 and was chosen to serve as speaker from 1463 to 1465 and again 1467 to 1468. From 1455 to 1478, he held the post of under-Treasurer of the Exchequer and from 1476 that of Keeper of the Great Wardrobe. Through her mother's first marriage to Sir Frederick Tilney, of Ashwellthorpe, Norfolk, and Boston, Lincolnshire, Anne was the half sister to Elizabeth Tilney. Both sisters would be the grandmothers to three of King Henry VIII's wives, Elizabeth being the grandmother to Anne Boleyn and her cousin, Katherine Howard, and Anne being the grandmother to Jane Seymour.

Anne had six other siblings. They were:

• Sir William Say (1452–1529), of Baas (in Broxbourne), Bedwell (in Essendon), Bennington, Little Berkhampstead, and Sawbridgeworth, Hertfordshire, Lawford, Essex, Market Overton, Rutland, etc., Burgess (M.P.) for Plympton, Knight of the Shire for Hertfordshire, Sheriff of Somerset and Dorset, 1478–9, Sheriff of Essex and Hertfordshire, 1482–3, Justice of the Peace for Hertfordshire, 1486–1506, and, in right of his 1st wife, of East Lydford, Radstock, Spaxton, Wellesleigh, and Wheathill, Somerset, and, in right of his 2nd wife, of Wormingford Hall (in Wormingford), Essex, Great Munden, Hertfordshire, etc. He married (1st) before 18 November 1472 (date of letters of attorney) Genevieve Hill, daughter/heiress of John Hill, of Spaxton, Somerset. She was still alive in 1478. He married (2nd) shortly after 18 April 1480 Elizabeth Fray, widow of Sir Thomas Waldegrave, by whom he had two daughters, Mary Say and Elizabeth Say. Mary, the eldest daughter married Henry Bourchier, 2nd Earl of Essex and 6th Baron Bourchier, by whom she had one daughter, Anne Bourchier, 7th Baroness Bourchier.
• Thomas Say, of Liston Hall, Essex.
• [Master] Leonard Say, clerk, Rector of Spaxton, Somerset. See Testamenta Eboracensia, 4 (Surtees Soc. 53) (1869): 86–88 (will of Leonard Say, clerk).
• Mary Say, married Sir Philip Calthorpe, Knt., by whom she had issue.
• Margaret Say, married Thomas Sampson, Esq.
• Katherine Say, married Thomas Bassingbourne. Thomas and Katherine Bassingbourne lived chiefly, if not entirely, at Woodhall, where he died about 1500, leaving his widow with one son, who married Audrey Cotton. In March 1457/8, John Bassingbourne, Esquire, being desirous of marrying his son Thomas to one of John Say's daughters, conveyed Hoddesdonbury to the Say trustees, giving to John Say the wardship and marriage of the said Thomas, the manor to be settled on Thomas and the Say lady whom he might marry. Thomas Bassingbourne married Katherine, daughter of John Say, and in 1493 sold to Sir William Say for £600 the estate described as "his manor of Hoddesdonbury and other lands in Hoddesdon, Mochell Brokesbourne, Litill Brokesbourne, Brekynden, Wormeley, and Amwell, of the yearly value of £24. The manors of Astwyk and Wodehall to be settled on the said Kateryn." Thomas died before June 1506, and all Hoddesdon and Broxbourne, save the Broxbornebury Estate and the Duchy property, were possessed by Sir William Say. Katherine retired to Woodhall with her son John, who married Audrey Cotton and had two daughters, one of whom married Sir Nicholas Hare, Master of the Rolls, and the other married Thomas Gawdy, Serjeant-at-law, representative of the Gawdy family of Norfolk.

Marriage and issue

On about February 25 1470, Anne married Sir Henry Wentworth, KB, of Nettlestead, Suffolk. He was the only son and heir of the courtier Sir Philip Wentworth (d. 18 May 1464) of Nettlestead, Suffolk, beheaded after the Battle of Hexham, and Mary Clifford, daughter of John Clifford, 7th Baron de Clifford, by Lady Elizabeth Percy, the daughter of Henry Percy. The couple had six children:

Anne's granddaughter, Jane Seymour.

• Sir Richard Wentworth (about 1480 – 17 October 1528), Baron le Despencer and Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk (from 1509 – 1510 and 1516 – 1517), who married Anne Tyrrell (d. 11 November 1529), the daughter of Sir James Tyrrell, by whom he had three sons, Thomas Wentworth, 1st Baron Wentworth, Richard and Philip, and five daughters, Anne, Elizabeth, Margery, Dorothy and Thomasine. He was knighted at the coronation of Henry VIII.
• Edward Wentworth.
• Elizabeth Wentworth (died after 22 September 1545), who married firstly, Sir Roger Darcy (d. 30 September 1508) of Danbury, Essex. She was appointed to wait on Katherine of Aragon in October 1501. She was the mother of Thomas Darcy, 1st Baron Darcy of Chiche (1506 – 28 June 1558). She married secondly, as his second wife, Sir Thomas Wyndham (d. 1522) of Felbrigg, Norfolk, Vice-Admiral and councillor to Henry VIII, by whom she was the mother of Sir Thomas Wyndham. She married thirdly, as his third wife, John Bourchier, 1st Earl of Bath.
• Margery Wentworth (c. 1478 – c. October 1550), who married, before 1500, Sir John Seymour, by whom she was the mother of Jane Seymour, third wife of Henry VIII and mother of Edward VI.
• Jane Wentworth.
• Dorothy Wentworth, who married, as his second wife, Sir Robert Broughton.

Death and burial

Anne's exact year of death remains a mystery. She was last mentioned in 1484, and her husband Henry Wentworth married his second wife Elizabeth Neville (died September 1517) on October 22, 1494. Therefore it is evident that she had died between 1484 and 1494. She is believed to be buried at Newsham Abbey, Lincolnshire, England, where her husband would later join her in c. 1499.

Royal relatives and descendants

Elizabeth Cheney

Elizabeth Tilney

Anne Say

Lord Edmund Howard

Elizabeth Howard

Margery Wentworth

Katherine Howard

Anne Boleyn

Henry VIII

Jane Seymour

Elizabeth I

Edward VI

Ancestry

Ancestors of Anne Say
8. Sir John de Say 4. Sir John Say (b. 1445) 9. Elizabeth le Boteler 2. Sir John Say 5. Maud 1. Anne Say 12. Sir William Cheney 6. Sir Lawrence Cheney 13. Katherine Pabenham 3. Elizabeth Cheney 14. Sir John Cockayne 7. Elizabeth Cockayne 15. Ida de Grey

References

Works cited

• Alsop, J.D. (October 2009) [2004]. "Wyndham, Thomas (d. 1554), naval officer and navigator". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/30146. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• Beer, Barrett L. (2004). "Jane (née Jane Seymour) (1508/9–1537), queen of England, third consort of Henry VIII". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/14647. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• Cokayne, George Edward (1912). The Complete Peerage edited by the Honourable Vicary Gibbs. Vol. II. London: St. Catherine Press.
• Cokayne, George Edward (1916). The Complete Peerage edited by Vicary Gibbs. Vol. IV. London: St. Catherine Press. p. 78.
• Kirby, J.L. (2008). "Say (Fynys), Sir John (d. 1478), administrator and speaker of the House of Commons". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/24764. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• Richardson, Douglas (2004). Everingham, Kimball G. (ed.). Plantagenet Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families. Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing Company, Inc.
• Richardson, Douglas (2011). Everingham, Kimball G. (ed.). Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families. Vol. III (2nd ed.). Salt Lake City. pp. 237–8. ISBN 978-1449966393.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Richardson, Douglas (2011). Everingham, Kimball G. (ed.). Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families. Vol. IV (2nd ed.). Salt Lake City. p. 289. ISBN 978-1460992708.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
• Taylor, Ida Ashworth (1822). Lady Jane Grey and Her Times. London: Sherwood, Neely and Jones. Retrieved 14 March 2011.