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Subject: [SAYCE] Sir Gregory SAIS, d.1390
Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2007 15:01:18 +0100

Sir Gregory SAIS, d.1390

The arms of Sir Gregory Sais, stated as az. ten plates 4, 3, 2, 1, on a chief or a demi-lion issuant gu., appear as the arms of Says of Kilpeck in the Visitation of Hereford, 1634. (An account of this has been published by the Harleian Society.) A prominent SAISE family owned land in Kilpeck, some of them were buried in Kilpeck Church (two tombstones in the floor), although they may have lived at Withington Farm miles away near Hereford. They seem to have 'inherited' lands in Kilpeck and Howton, by marriage to Elizabeth Delahay in 1534, and sold them in 1712.

Sir Gregory SAIS is therefore worthy of attention as a possible progenitor of the SAISE / SAYCE families to be found in Herefordshire and Shropshire. Sir Gregory was a soldier and a member of the circle of distinguished knights around the Black Prince. He was a native of Flintshire and probably a son of Cynrig Sais ab Ithel Fychan. Sources of information about him are a paper by A.D. Carr, ‘A Welsh knight in the Hundred Years War: Sir Gregory Sais’, in the Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion (1977), pp40–53, and an entry by A.D. Carr in the (new) Dictionary of National Biography. These give a good account of his career but little of genealogical interest. He married a Poitevin heiress Ragonde Béchet, her third marriage; she had a daughter by one of the earlier marriages. Sir Gregory and Ragonde had no children, and Ragonde on her death left no heirs. In “A Welsh Knight in the Hundred Years War: Sir Gregory Sais”, A.D. Carr writes “in 1390 he (Sir Gr!
egory) died, leaving lands in thirteen Flintshire townships* …. he had conveyed them to Robert de Merston, chaplain, and Henry Salusbury, and they conveyed them in turn to Ragonde and Cadwgan Sais. The purpose of these transactions was presumably to protect Ragonde’s interests ….” And presumably those of Cadwgan Sais as well. Sir Gregory’s sister Nest had married Harri Salusbury so the question outstanding is who was Cadwgan Sais?

The speculation is that Cadwgan Sais was the son of an earlier (unknown) marriage of Sir Gregory’s. I have asked about him elsewhere on the internet but so far without response.

In 1386 it is recorded that Sir Gregory had land at "Axton" in Flintshire; the Delahays were of "Arxton" (see note (3) in the Harleian publication of the Says of Kilpeck entry in the Visitation of Hereford, 1634). Is this the same place, and is there a line of inheritance from the SAISs via the Delahays 'back' to SAISEs? Doubtful, because there seems to have been a place called "Arxton" in Herefordshire – I don’t know exactly where.

Ithel Fychan, d.1348?, is supposedly the progenitor of the prominent MOSTYN family of North Wales. It would be interesting if a match was found between the Y-chromosome DNA tests of any MOSTYNs and SAYCEs! This might be the only way of establishing a connection, and is worth looking for. I have not yet found any MOSTYNs or SAYCEs in the Y-DNA published databases.

I run a Y-DNA Testing Project for the NEW surname (we have some successes), and would be willing to run one for the SAYCE surname.

Bob New
'owner' of the list
co-ordinator of the Surname NEW Y-DNA Testing Project


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