| History |
Aoife was born about 1145, the daughter of Diarmaid Macmurchada, king of Leinster, and his wife Mor (O\'Toole).
On the 29 August 1170, following the Norman invasion of Ireland that her father had requested, Aoife married Richard FitzGilbert de Clare, 2nd earl of Pembroke, better known as \'Strongbow\', the leader of the Norman invasion force, in Reginald\'s Tower in Waterford. Her husband was the son of Gilbert de Clare, earl of Pembroke, and Isabel de Beaumont. Aoife had been promised to him by her father, who had visited England to ask for an invasion army. He was not allowed to give his daughter away, as under Early Irish Law Aoife had the choice of whom she married, though she had to agree to an arranged marriage.
Under Anglo-Norman law, this gave Strongbowe succession rights to the kingdom of Leinster. Under Irish Brehon law, the marriage gave her a life interest only, after which any land would normally revert to male cousins; but Brehon law also recognised a transfer of \'swordland\' following a conquest.
Aoife and Richard had two sons and a daughter Isabel, but only Isabel, her father\'s immensely wealthy heiress, would have progeny, marrying the great knight and statesman William Marshal, who became earl of Pembroke in her right.
Aoife died about 1188. [1] |
Ellie Wood Keith Genealogy
Abt 1145 - Abt 1188 (~ 43 years)
, d. 1 May, 1171, Ireland