M is for... Maynarde, Richard

Richard Maynarde was a petty criminal who in 1638 was employed as manservant to the powerful Lady Peinforte. She was a murderous sorceress who had tangled with the Doctor - fighting for possession of a sentient metal called Validium which originated as a weapon on Gallifrey. A quantity had fallen to Earth and had been found by her. She had fashioned it into a statue of herself in the guise of Nemesis - Goddess of Retribution. The Doctor had managed to seize it back from her and launched it into space - but in a decaying orbit. Every 25 years it passed close to Earth and its influence caused major social and political upheavals, but it was due to return to the location from whence it had been launched in November 1988. This was close to Lady Peinforte's Windsor home.

Maynarde assisted her in creating a magical potion which, coupled with a segment of Nemesis - the statue's arrow - would allow them both to travel in time. The final ingredient of this brew had been human blood - and Peinforte had murdered the aged mathematician who had helped plot the time and place of the statue's return.

Despite his own low level villainy, Maynarde disliked his involvement with his mistress - finding her powers frightening. Seeing his own tomb may have helped him decide to leave her employ at the earliest opportunity, and he ended up siding with the Doctor and Ace after his trip to 1988, where he was menaced by Cybermen and a Nazi war criminal and his mercenaries who also sought control over Nemesis.

After they had been defeated, and Lady Peinforte had been killed by the statue, the Doctor and Ace returned him to his own time in the TARDIS.

Played by: Gerard Murphy. Appearances: Silver Nemesis (1988).

• Maynarde's tomb gives his dates as 1607 - 1657.
• Murphy, who appeared in the pilot episode of Father Ted, had a regular role as Detective Inspector Bracken in the ITV crime drama McCallum, which starred John Hannah as a police pathologist.
• At one point Maynarde promises to repay a loan to someone called Briggs. This was a reference to writer Ian Briggs (Dragonfire, The Curse of Fenric).