Eustace fitz John construction of fortifications at Tickhill and Knaresborough in Yorkshire are also recorded in this pipe roll. This and evidence of royal writs show that Eustace and Walter Espec had justiciar responsibility for the counties of Cumberland, Northumberland, Durham, and Yorkshire, a role that involved hearing pleas and conveying instructions from central government. The death of Henry I on 1 December 1135 led to the accession of Stephen de Blois, to whom Eustace submitted. Stephen's seizure of the throne was contested by Henry I's daughter, the Empress Matilda, who had been Henry's designated heir. The "Gesta Stephani" claimed that certain "very
Henry I, Margrave of the Saxon Ostmark Henry I, Margrave of the Saxon Ostmark Henry I ( – 1103), called the Elder (), a member of the House of Wettin, was Count of Eilenburg as well as Margrave of the Saxon Eastern March (March of Lusatia) from 1081 and Margrave of Meissen from 1089 until his death. Henry was the son of the Wettin margrave Dedi I of Lusatia and his second wife Adela of Louvain, a granddaughter of Count Lambert I of Louvian and widow of Margrave Otto I of Meissen. His father ruled the Lusatian march since 1046; he was one of the nobles which