Despenser family

The Despensers were an English noble family. Hugh Despenser the Younger, a favourite of Edward II, gained the lordship of Glamorgan through his marriage to Eleanor de Clare, a co-heiress of the Clare earls of Gloucester, and he and his father dominated the government until both were executed in 1326. The family kept Glamorgan until the early 15th century, when it passed to the Beauchamps.