William Greville.

About William Greville

William Greville, of Chipping Campden in Gloucestershire and a Citizen of the City of London, was a prominent wool-merchant and is the ancestor of the present Greville Earls of Warwick. The Latin inscription on his ledger stone in Chipping Campden Church, which he rebuilt at his own expense, describes him as flos mercatorum lanar(iorum) tocius (totius) Angli(a)e, "the flower of the wool-merchants of all England". This language is reminiscent of that used to describe certain prominent knights such as Edward, the Black Prince (d.1376) who was described by Froissart as la fleur de toutte chevalerie dou monde and was likely intended to suggest a degree of equivalence between mercantile and martial activities". He was amongst the richest and most influential wool merchants of his era and was the leading purchaser of wool from the Cotswold Hills.