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- Normandy or Normandie, region and former province of France, bordering on the English Channel. In area it corresponds approximately to the modern departments of Seine-Maritime, Eure, Orne, Calvados, and Manche; its former capital was Rouen. Normandy is an agricultural region known for its dairy industry.
Under Roman domination the region formed part of Gallia Lugdunensis (Celtic Gaul). With the Frankish invasions it was made a constituent part of the kingdom of Neustria. It came to be known as Normandy about 911, when Charles III, king of France, turned it over to Rollo, the leader of a menacing band of Viking raiders. In 1066 a descendant of Rollo, William II, duke of Normandy, led an invasion of England and established himself there as William I, king of England. Normandy remained an English possession until conquered in 1204 by Philip II Augustus, king of France. During the Hundred Years' War, the region was held at various times by both French and English forces; it was finally recovered by the French in 1450. The Channel Islands, which were once a part of Normandy, remained in the possession of England.
The year 1066 was a turning point in English history. William I, the Conqueror, and his sons gave England vigorous new leadership. Norman feudalism became the basis for redistributing the land among the conquerors, giving England a new French aristocracy and a new social and political structure. England turned away from Scandinavia toward France, an orientation that was to last for 400 years.
William was a hard ruler, punishing England, especially the north, when it disputed his authority. His power and efficiency can be seen in the Domesday Survey, a census for tax purposes, and in the Salisbury Oath of allegiance, which he demanded of all tenants. He appointed Lanfranc, an Italian clergyman, as archbishop of Canterbury. He also promoted church reform, especially by the creation of separate church courts, but retained royal control.
When William died in 1087, he gave England to his second son, William II (Rufus), and Normandy to his eldest son, Robert. Henry, his third son, in due time got both-England in 1100, when William II died in a hunting accident, and Normandy in 1106 by conquest. Henry I used his feudal court and household to organize the government. The exchequer (the royal treasury) was established at this time.
Henry wanted his daughter, Matilda, to succeed him, but in 1135 his nephew, Stephen of Blois, seized the throne. The years from 1135 to 1154 were marked by civil war and strife. The royal government Henry had built fell apart, and the feudal barons asserted their independence. The church, playing one side against the other, extended its authority.
William I (c. 1027 - September 9, 1087), was King of England from 1066 to 1087. Known alternatively as William of Normandy, William the Conqueror and William the Bastard, he was the illegitimate and only son of Robert the Magnificent, Duke of Normandy, and Herleva, the daughter of a tanner. Born in Falaise, Normandy, now in France, William succeeded to the throne of England by right of conquest by winning the Battle of Hastings in 1066 in what has become known as the Norman Conquest.
No authentic portrait of William has been found. In the patriotic print he is wearing plate armour that was invented generations after his death.
William was born the grandnephew of Queen Emma, wife of King Ethelred the Unready and later of King Canute.
William succeeded to his father's Duchy of Normandy at the young age of 7 in 1035 and was known as Duke William II of Normandy. He lost three guardians to plots to usurp his place. King Henry I of France knighted him at the age of 15. By the time he turned 19 he was himself successfully dealing with threats of rebellion and invasion. With the assistance of King Henry, William finally secured control of Normandy by defeating the rebel Norman barons at Caen in the Battle of Val-ès-Dunes in 1047.
He married Matilda of Flanders, against the wishes of the pope in 1050 or 1051 at the Cathedral of Notre Dame at Eu, Normandy (now in Seine-Maritime). He was 23, she was 21. Their marriage produced four sons and six daughters (see list below).
His half-brothers Odo of Bayeux and Robert, Count of Mortain played significant roles in his life.
Upon the death of William's cousin King Edward the Confessor of England (January 1066), William claimed the throne of England, asserting that the childless Edward had named him his heir during a visit by William (probably in 1052) and that Harold Godwinson, England's foremost magnate, had reportedly pledged his support while shipwrecked in Normandy (c. 1064). Harold made this pledge while in captivity and was reportedly tricked into swearing on a saint's bones that he would give the throne to William. Even if this story is true, however, Harold made the promise under duress and so may have felt free to break it.
The assembly of England's leading notables known as the Witenagemot approved Harold Godwinson's coronation which took place on January 5, 1066 making him King Harold II of England. In order to pursue his own claim, William obtained the Pope's support for his cause. He assembled an invasion fleet of around 600 ships and an army of 7000 men. He landed at Pevensey in Sussex on September 28, 1066 and assembled a prefabricated wooden castle near Hastings as a base. This was a direct provocation to Harold Godwinson as this area of Sussex was Harold's own personal estate, and William began immediately to lay waste to the land. It may have prompted Harold to respond immediately and in haste rather than await reinforcements in London.
King Harold Godwinson was in the north of England and had just defeated another rival, King Hardrada of Norway. He marched an army of similar size to William's 250 miles in 9 days to challenge him at the crucial battle of Senla, which later became known as the Battle of Hastings. This took place on October 14, 1066. According to some accounts, perhaps based on an interpretation of the Bayeux Tapestry commemorating the Norman victory, Harold was killed by an arrow through the eye, and the Anglo Saxon forces fled giving William victory.
This was the defining moment of what is now known as the Norman Conquest. The remaining Saxon noblemen surrendered to William at Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire and he was acclaimed King of England there. William was then crowned on December 25, 1066 in Westminster Abbey.
Although the south of England submitted quickly to Norman rule, resistance continued, especially in the North for six more years until 1072. Harold's sons attempted an invasion of the south-west peninsula. Risings occurred in the Welsh Marches and at Stafford. Most seriously William faced separate attempts at invasion by the Danes and the Scots. William's defeat of these led to what became known as the harrowing of the North in which Northumbria was laid waste to deny his enemies its resources. The last serious resistance came with the Revolt of the Earls in 1075.
William initiated many major changes. In 1085, in order to ascertain the extent of his dominion, William commissioned the compilation of the Domesday Book, a survey of England's productive capacity similar to a modern census. He also ordered the building of a number of castles, among them the Tower of London. His conquest also led to Norman French replacing English as the language of the ruling classes, for nearly 300 years.
William is said to have deported large numbers of the old landed classes into slavery through Bristol. Many of the latter ending up in Umayyad Spain and Moorish lands, converting and taking high positions in the state.
He died aged 60 at the Convent of St Gervais, near Rouen, France, on September 9, 1087 from abdominal injuries received from his saddle pommel when he fell off a horse at the Siege of Mantes. He was buried in the St. Peter's Church in Caen, Normandy. In a most unregal postmortem, William's corpulent body would not fit in the stone sarcophagus, and burst after some unsuccessful prodding by the assembled bishops, filling the chapel with a foul smell and dispersing the mourners. [1] (http://historyhouse.com/in_history/william/)
William was succeeded in 1087 as King of England by his younger son William Rufus and as Duke of Normandy by his elder son Robert Curthose. This led to the Rebellion of 1088. His youngest son Henry also became King of England later, after William II died without a child to succeed him.
Some doubt exists over how many daughters there were. This list includes some entries which are obscure.
1. Robert Curthose (c. 1054-1134), Duke of Normandy, married Sybil of Conversano, daughter of Geoffrey of Conversano
2. Adeliza (or Alice) (c. 1055-?), reportedly betrothed to Harold II of England (Her existence is in some doubt.)
3. Cecilia (or Cecily) (c. 1056-1126), Abbess of Holy Trinity, Caen
4. William Rufus (1056-1100), King of England
5. Richard (1057-c. 1081), killed by a stag in New Forest
6. Adela (c. 1062-1138), married Stephen, Count of Blois
7. Agatha (c. 1064-c. 1080), betrothed to (1) Harold of Wessex, (2) Alfonso VI of Castile
8. Constance (c. 1066-1090), married Alan IV Fergent, Duke of Brittany; poisoned, possibly by her own servants
9. Matilda (very obscure, her existence is in some doubt)
10. Henry Beauclerc (1068-1135), King of England, married (1) Matilda (or Edith) of Scotland, daughter of Malcolm III, King of Scotland, (2) Adeliza of Louvain
7th Duke of Normandy. Death locality also given as S-Infr, France.
Royal Ancestors of Some LDS Families by Michel L. Call, Chart 302 - # 6.
Ancestry and Progentry of Captain James Blount - Immigrant, by Robert F. Pfafman, p E-28.
the first Norman King of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087. The descendant of Viking raiders, he had been Duke of Normandy since 1035 under the style William II. After a long struggle to establish his power, by 1060 his hold on Normandy was secure, and he launched the Norman conquest of England in 1066. The rest of his life was marked by struggles to consolidate his hold over England and his continental lands and by difficulties with his eldest son.
William was the son of the unmarried Robert I, Duke of Normandy, by Robert's mistress Herleva. His illegitimate status and his youth caused some difficulties for him after he succeeded his father, as did the anarchy that plagued the first years of his rule. During his childhood and adolescence, members of the Norman aristocracy battled each other, both for control of the child duke and for their own ends. In 1047 William was able to quash a rebellion and begin to establish his authority over the duchy, a process that was not complete until about 1060. His marriage in the 1050s to Matilda of Flanders provided him with a powerful ally in the neighbouring county of Flanders. By the time of his marriage, William was able to arrange the appointments of his supporters as bishops and abbots in the Norman church. His consolidation of power allowed him to expand his horizons, and by 1062 William was able to secure control of the neighbouring county of Maine.
In the 1050s and early 1060s William became a contender for the throne of England, then held by his childless first cousin once removed Edward the Confessor. There were other potential claimants, including the powerful English earl Harold Godwinson, who was named the next king by Edward on the latter's deathbed in January 1066. William argued that Edward had previously promised the throne to him, and that Harold had sworn to support William's claim. William built a large fleet and invaded England in September 1066, decisively defeating and killing Harold at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066. After further military efforts William was crowned king on Christmas Day 1066, in London. He made arrangements for the governance of England in early 1067 before returning to Normandy. Several unsuccessful rebellions followed, but by 1075 William's hold on England was mostly secure, allowing him to spend the majority of the rest of his reign on the continent.
William's final years were marked by difficulties in his continental domains, troubles with his eldest son, and threatened invasions of England by the Danes. In 1086 William ordered the compilation of the Domesday Book, a survey listing all the landholders in England along with their holdings. William died in September 1087 while leading a campaign in northern France, and was buried in Caen. His reign in England was marked by the construction of castles, the settling of a new Norman nobility on the land, and change in the composition of the English clergy. He did not try to integrate his various domains into one empire, but instead continued to administer each part separately. William's lands were divided after his death: Normandy went to his eldest son, Robert, and his second surviving son, William, received England.
SURNAME: Also shown as England
GIVEN NAMES: Also shown as William "The Conqueror" King Of
SUFFIX: Also shown as [Duke/Normandy]
BIRTH: Also shown as Born Château de Falaise in Falaise, Normandy, France.
BIRTH: Also shown as Born 14 Oct 1024
DEATH: Also shown as Died Priory of Saint Gervase, Rouen, Normandy.
DEATH: Also shown as Died 09 Sep 1087
BURIAL: Also shown as Buried Saint-Etienne de Caen, Normandy.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_the_Conqueror [read more]
7th Duke of Normandy, King of England (25 Dec 1066-1087)
William was the illegitimate son of Robert, Duke of Normandy. He won the English throne by defeating Harold II at Hastings in 1066 and was crowned at Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day of the same year. Throughout his reign he retained the Dukedom of Normandy. Despite many uprisings, he ferociously defeated Anglo-Saxon resistance but Hereward the Wake defied him in the Fens around Ely until 1071. Castles were built at strategic points, including Warwick and Windsor, first of earthbanks and wooden keeps and later of massive stonework. For some 25 years the Normans lived as conquerors in an occupied land but they began to intermarry with the resident population and slowly adapted and adopted some of the Anglo-Saxon culture. William ordered the Domesday Book to be drawn up to record details of land holders and the value of every estate and surprisingly this took only a year to compile. The feudal system, with Normans as Barons was instituted and regular meetings of a Great Council of advisors was set up, with venues at Gloucester, Westminster and Winchester. Llanfranc was made Archbishop of Canterbury and building started on seven new cathedrals. William also set in hand the building of the Tower of London. William, who was 5ft 10ins, married Matilda of Flanders who was only 4ft 2ins. He died of injuries, received while fighting in France, on Thursday 9th September 1087.
(Research):Alternate Birth; 14 Oct 1024.
GIVEN NAMES: Also shown as William
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1028 - 1087 (58 years)