Nicholas Carew (Lord Privy Seal) the Royal Household. In 1371 he was appointed Keeper of the Privy Seal, the first layman to hold the post, and remained in office until the king's death in 1377. He was one of the group of courtiers around Edward III, including William, Lord Latimer, Lord John Neville, Sir Alan Buxhull, Richard Lyons, and the king's mistress Alice Perrers, who increasingly controlled access to and decisions emerging from the king as his health failed. Influential in the royal campaign in 1376 against William Wykeham, bishop of Winchester, he was named as an executor and trustee of the king's will. After
English and British royal mistress English and British royal mistress In the English court, a royal mistress was a woman who was the lover of the King. She may have been taken either before or after his accession to the throne. Although it generally is only used of females, by extrapolation, the relation can cover any lover of the monarch whether male or female. To date no English reigning Queen is known to have had a lover. Monarchs had an incentive to take mistresses in that they generally made dynastic marriages of convenience, and there was often little love in them. Beyond the physical relationship,