Guy de Craon

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it to an
off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a comcast.net address
are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a Breton)
and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others have assumed.
The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is uncertain: soon after
the death of Berthe's father it was confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of
Anjou. Subsequently it was held by Berthe's second husband, Robert the
Burgundian, whose son by his prior wife was married to Berthe's daughter
by her first husband. Craon was later granted to this couple,
reinstating the forfeited hereditary rights that might otherwise have
devolved to Guy if he was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of her
paternal relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a household
knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as lord of Craon.
He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father), Suhard II and
Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as Suhard II
succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in the late
1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30. There may have
been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's daughter or her
putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can provide source
references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

Not directly connected to your subject, but i just wanted to check the
id of this Robert the Burgundian; was he the son of Rainald/Renaud I of
Nevers [d1040] and Hedwiga [d1063], the daugther of Robert I and Constance
of Arles? For the grandaughter of a mere knight to marry the grandson of
a king, thats some example of upward mobility in the 11th century!

I've not seen what Keats Rowan says, but the net believes this Guy de Craon came
over witH William the Conqueror and became an important landowner in Lincolnshire
by 1086. Usually on the net his death is noted as c1121, or is this a different
man/generation? If so this is quite a significant subject as many people in the
UK and i assume USA etc claim descent from the 12th century Craon family who
founded the priory of Freston.

AIUI Berthas daughter was called Enoguena Domita and she married as you say
her stepbrother Renaud I [d1101] and their son was Maurice I [dc1119] a name
also used by the Lincolnshire family. I assume this is 1 reason to connect them,
but the net makes Guy another son of Enoguena and Renaud [although none of their
known documents mention such a son]. Maurice is a rare name I think at this time,
but recalls Maurice [d1012] son of Geoffrey I Count of Anjou by his 2nd wife
Adelais of Chalon. I couldnt find out much about this Maurice of Anjou but
a source called the Deeds of the Counts of Anjou, claims he married the daughter
of Count Aymeric of Saintes [not heard of him?] and neptem [that difficult
term again!] of Count Raymound of Poitiers [I dont think there was 1? Geni the
site i got this from thinks its Raymond Pons but thats unlikely]. But this same
source says Maurice was Count of Anjou, and Fulk Nerra was his son so can any
of this be believed? I couldnt find a contemporary document which called Maurice
count, unless he was regent for his nephew Fulk. Apparently Maurice did have
2 sons, Geoffrey who was killed in about 1039 and Otger alive in 1055.

Mike

Peter Stewart

2024-04-28 00:11:15 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it to
an off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a comcast.net
address are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a Breton)
and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others have assumed.
The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is uncertain: soon after
the death of Berthe's father it was confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of
Anjou. Subsequently it was held by Berthe's second husband, Robert the
Burgundian, whose son by his prior wife was married to Berthe's
daughter by her first husband. Craon was later granted to this couple,
reinstating the forfeited hereditary rights that might otherwise have
devolved to Guy if he was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of
her paternal relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a
household knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as
lord of Craon. He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father),
Suhard II and Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as
Suhard II succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in
the late 1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30. There
may have been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's daughter
or her putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can provide source
references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

His father was Renaud I of Nevers, his mother Advisa was most probably a
daughter of King Robert I and Constance despite a few sources calling
her Robert I's sister. Robert the Burgundian described himself as
'nepos' of Robert I's son Henri I in this charter
http://telma.irht.cnrs.fr/outils/originaux/charte1478/.

Post by miked
For the grandaughter of a mere knight to marry the grandson of
a king, thats some example of upward mobility in the 11th century!

Not that straightforward - royal descent as opposed to actual royal rank
was to some extent compromised by the fairly recent displacement of the
Carolingians by the Capetians, but in any case Robert the Burgundian was
himself described as a knight of Geoffroy III, count of Anjou, along
with others from noble families, in a charter dated 1066 ("Signum
Gaufredi comitis. Nomina militum ejus: Rodbertus Burgundionus ...",
here: https://books.google.com.au/books?id=SwpaAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA360).
Suhard was similarly called a knight of Fulk Nerra, here for instance
http://telma.irht.cnrs.fr/outils/originaux/charte3295/ - this does not
preclude his coming from a noble lineage, although his descent from
earlier lords of Craon as represented in the 19th century may be a
fabrication.

I will have to take up the rest of your post later as I have run out of
puff for the time being.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-28 03:39:21 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it to
an off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a comcast.net
address are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a Breton)
and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others have assumed.
The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is uncertain: soon after
the death of Berthe's father it was confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of
Anjou. Subsequently it was held by Berthe's second husband, Robert the
Burgundian, whose son by his prior wife was married to Berthe's
daughter by her first husband. Craon was later granted to this couple,
reinstating the forfeited hereditary rights that might otherwise have
devolved to Guy if he was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of
her paternal relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a
household knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as
lord of Craon. He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father),
Suhard II and Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as
Suhard II succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in
the late 1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30. There
may have been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's daughter
or her putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can provide source
references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

This is from *Domesday People*, p 464:

"Guy 'of Craon', in Anjou, can be confidently identified with a Breton,
younger son of Robert I de Vitré and his Angevin wife Berthe de Craon
(Morice, Preuves I, 413). The Lincolnshire Claims of Domesday Book
suggest that he was a Breton who had formerly held some of his land
under Ralph I de Gael, Earl of East Anglia (d. 1069). After 1075 and the
revolt and fall of Ralph II de Gael, Guy acquired some of the lands then
forfeited by Ralph and his supporters. His tenancy-in-chief lay
principally in Lincolnshire and was later known as the barony of
Freiston (Sanders, 47). He had married the daughter of another northern
tenant-in-chief, Hugh fitz Baldric, by the date of Domesday Book. The
Thorney Abbey Liber Vitae (BM Add. 40000, fol. 3r) shows that her name
was Isabella. The same source also shows that he had a son Lisoius, an
important name in the family of Bertha de Craon (ibid., fol. 3r; Mon.
Ang. iv, 125). Active in Lincolnshire in the early 1090s, when he
attested grants to Spalding Priory (Mon. Ang. iii, 120), he had been
succeeded by his son Alan (q.v.) by 1114. Alan's charters show that Guy
was father also of two daughters, Emma, mother of William fitz Roger de
Caen of Huntingfield, and Alice. K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, 'Le rôle des
Bretons dans la politique de la colonisation normande', MSHAB, lxxiv,
1996, 188-9; idem, 'Le problème de la suzeraheté et la lutte pour le
pouvoir: la rivalité bretonne et l'état anglo-normand 1066-1154', MSHAB,
68 (1991), 53-6; E. M. Poynton, 'The fee of Creon', Genealogist n.s. 18,
162-6, 219ff."

I can't agree with Keats-Rohan's confidence that Guy was a son of Robert
I de Vitré and Berthe de Craon - he could more plausibly have been a
cousin of Berthe having no claim to Craon in competition with that of
her daughter Enoguen Domit(ill)a, whose son Maurice was ancestor of the
later seigneurs. Enoguen's father-in-law Robert the Burgundian had been
granted Craon by 31 May 1040 - long before she married his son - as set
out in Geoffroy Martel of Anjou's foundation charter of La Trinité de
Vendôme abbey here (bottom 3 lines on p 66 & top 2 lines on p 67):
https://books.google.com.au/books?id=bkPEZtS6DgoC&pg=PA66. The marriage
of Enoguen to Robert the Burgundian's son Renaud brought Craon back to
the descendants of Suhard - allegedly the reason Enoguen was also called
'Domita' or 'Domitilla', to emphasise that she was the rightful 'domina'
- from whom it had been confiscated when granted to Robert (a
great-nephew of Agnès of Mâcon, the countess of Anjou at the time). The
use of the name Lisoius in Guy's family is hardly strong evidence that
the latter was passed over as the proper heir of Craon. Berthe's father
had a brother named Lisoius who may have been Guy's father for all we
know. The Breton link could have come about in an undetermined way apart
from his being a son of Robert de Vitré.

I will post later about Maurice of Anjou.

Peter Stewart

Maurice is a rare name I think at

Post by miked
this time,
but recalls Maurice [d1012] son of Geoffrey I Count of Anjou by his 2nd wife
Adelais of Chalon. I couldnt find out much about this Maurice of Anjou but
a source called the Deeds of the Counts of Anjou, claims he married the
daughter of Count Aymeric of Saintes [not heard of him?] and neptem
[that difficult
term again!] of Count Raymound of Poitiers [I dont think there was 1? Geni the
site i got this from thinks its Raymond Pons but thats unlikely]. But this same
source says Maurice was Count of Anjou, and Fulk Nerra was his son so can any
of this be believed? I couldnt find a contemporary document which called
Maurice count, unless he was regent for his nephew Fulk. Apparently
Maurice did have 2 sons, Geoffrey who was killed in about 1039 and Otger
alive in 1055.
Mike

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miked

2024-04-29 00:21:58 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it to
an off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a comcast.net
address are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a Breton)
and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others have assumed.
The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is uncertain: soon after
the death of Berthe's father it was confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of
Anjou. Subsequently it was held by Berthe's second husband, Robert the
Burgundian, whose son by his prior wife was married to Berthe's
daughter by her first husband. Craon was later granted to this couple,
reinstating the forfeited hereditary rights that might otherwise have
devolved to Guy if he was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of
her paternal relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a
household knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as
lord of Craon. He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father),
Suhard II and Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as
Suhard II succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in
the late 1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30. There
may have been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's daughter
or her putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can provide source
references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

"Guy 'of Craon', in Anjou, can be confidently identified with a Breton,
younger son of Robert I de Vitré and his Angevin wife Berthe de Craon
(Morice, Preuves I, 413). The Lincolnshire Claims of Domesday Book
suggest that he was a Breton who had formerly held some of his land
under Ralph I de Gael, Earl of East Anglia (d. 1069). After 1075 and the
revolt and fall of Ralph II de Gael, Guy acquired some of the lands then
forfeited by Ralph and his supporters. His tenancy-in-chief lay
principally in Lincolnshire and was later known as the barony of
Freiston (Sanders, 47). He had married the daughter of another northern
tenant-in-chief, Hugh fitz Baldric, by the date of Domesday Book. The
Thorney Abbey Liber Vitae (BM Add. 40000, fol. 3r) shows that her name
was Isabella. The same source also shows that he had a son Lisoius, an
important name in the family of Bertha de Craon (ibid., fol. 3r; Mon.
Ang. iv, 125). Active in Lincolnshire in the early 1090s, when he
attested grants to Spalding Priory (Mon. Ang. iii, 120), he had been
succeeded by his son Alan (q.v.) by 1114. Alan's charters show that Guy
was father also of two daughters, Emma, mother of William fitz Roger de
Caen of Huntingfield, and Alice. K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, 'Le rôle des
Bretons dans la politique de la colonisation normande', MSHAB, lxxiv,
1996, 188-9; idem, 'Le problème de la suzeraheté et la lutte pour le
pouvoir: la rivalité bretonne et l'état anglo-normand 1066-1154', MSHAB,
68 (1991), 53-6; E. M. Poynton, 'The fee of Creon', Genealogist n.s. 18,
162-6, 219ff."
I can't agree with Keats-Rohan's confidence that Guy was a son of Robert
I de Vitré and Berthe de Craon - he could more plausibly have been a
cousin of Berthe having no claim to Craon in competition with that of
her daughter Enoguen Domit(ill)a, whose son Maurice was ancestor of the
later seigneurs. Enoguen's father-in-law Robert the Burgundian had been
granted Craon by 31 May 1040 - long before she married his son - as set
out in Geoffroy Martel of Anjou's foundation charter of La Trinité de
https://books.google.com.au/books?id=bkPEZtS6DgoC&pg=PA66. The marriage
of Enoguen to Robert the Burgundian's son Renaud brought Craon back to
the descendants of Suhard - allegedly the reason Enoguen was also called
'Domita' or 'Domitilla', to emphasise that she was the rightful 'domina'
- from whom it had been confiscated when granted to Robert (a
great-nephew of Agnès of Mâcon, the countess of Anjou at the time). The
use of the name Lisoius in Guy's family is hardly strong evidence that
the latter was passed over as the proper heir of Craon. Berthe's father
had a brother named Lisoius who may have been Guy's father for all we
know. The Breton link could have come about in an undetermined way apart
from his being a son of Robert de Vitré.
I will post later about Maurice of Anjou.
Peter Stewart

Thanks for this.

I just read on gbooks a few pages of Robert the Burgundian and the Counts of Anjou [2000]
by W scott Jessee, who interprets the sources somewhat differently. I dont know if he
missed this 1040 doc, as he quotes from the Vendome cartulary quite regulary but he [p40-2]
suggests the confiscation happened only at some point between june 1040 and 1052. He suggests
that a quarrel had arisen earlier between the count and the baron over the church of St.Clement
which St.Aubin at Angers claimed had been given to them by Suhard I. The count then gave it to
Trinity Vendome.
https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Robert_the_Burgundian_and_the_Counts_of/9dKP7rbgwfQC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=robert+vitre&pg=PA65&printsec=frontcover

Jessee links this quarrel to a much later story that the sons of Suhard I had changed
allegiance to Conan II of Rennes and a report that in 1048 the people of Craon welcomed
Conan. He suggests thats why Geoffrey Martel placed Craon in the hands of Robert the
Burgundian as the family of Suhard was unreliable. If Bertha was already married
to Robert de Vitre, that could suggest a marriage alliance between the family and
the Bretons so one can see why the count acted so.

What I havnt found yet is the evidence that Robert the Burgundian married Bertha de Craon
or even the name of the wife of Robert de Vitre. After the death of Conan II the 2 Roberts
seem to have made their peace as Robert de Vitre is present at Craon in August 1067 for a
doc of Rainald de Craon [Jessee p73], but according to Jessee no wives or relationship are
mentioned. Jessee mentions a doc of Trinity Vendome I, 217, which confirms that Rainalds wife
Enoguena was the daughter of Robert de Vitre by an unnamed daughter of Warin heir to the
lordship of Craon. What is the evidence that Robert the Burgundian married Bertha and where
is she named?

I assume that Robert de Vitre came from Vitre on the borders of Brittany not so far
from Craon, and if he was a breton, that would explain Enoguenas name, which i hadnt
ever seen before. The net names his parents as Tristan de Vitre and Enoguen. The Breton
element in the 'Norman conquest' must have been quite substantial. I believe the 1st earls
of Richmond were descended from Conan I of Brittany and there must have been many other
lesser knights like Guy de Craon who made good after the conquest. So if the Suhard family
did defect from the count of Anjou, then that would tie in with Guy de Craon being linked
to Ralph II de Gael [d1100] a leading supporter of Conan II, and like Ralph joining the
Norman invasion in 1066.

So it seems that as a landless younger son Robert the Burgundian took service with a great
lord and acquired his own lordship, something he had in common with Guy de Craon. But not just
Craon, it seems Roberts first wife [Avise Blanche d1057] was heiress to Chateau de Sable,
which in turn passed to his younger son Robert II [d1111]. So i'm a bit surprised hes just
called a miles in 1066 when he already held 2 lordships from the Count of Anjou. In that
period he seems a pretty major player in the region throwing his support first behind Fulk
against Geoffrey the Bearded, and so on.

Mike

Peter Stewart

2024-04-29 03:04:07 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it to
an off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a comcast.net
address are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a
Breton) and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others
have assumed. The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is
uncertain: soon after the death of Berthe's father it was
confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of Anjou. Subsequently it was held by
Berthe's second husband, Robert the Burgundian, whose son by his
prior wife was married to Berthe's daughter by her first husband.
Craon was later granted to this couple, reinstating the forfeited
hereditary rights that might otherwise have devolved to Guy if he
was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of her paternal
relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a household
knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as lord of
Craon. He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father), Suhard
II and Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as
Suhard II succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death
in the late 1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30.
There may have been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's
daughter or her putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can
provide source references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

"Guy 'of Craon', in Anjou, can be confidently identified with a
Breton, younger son of Robert I de Vitré and his Angevin wife Berthe
de Craon (Morice, Preuves I, 413). The Lincolnshire Claims of Domesday
Book suggest that he was a Breton who had formerly held some of his
land under Ralph I de Gael, Earl of East Anglia (d. 1069). After 1075
and the revolt and fall of Ralph II de Gael, Guy acquired some of the
lands then forfeited by Ralph and his supporters. His tenancy-in-chief
lay principally in Lincolnshire and was later known as the barony of
Freiston (Sanders, 47). He had married the daughter of another
northern tenant-in-chief, Hugh fitz Baldric, by the date of Domesday
Book. The Thorney Abbey Liber Vitae (BM Add. 40000, fol. 3r) shows
that her name was Isabella. The same source also shows that he had a
son Lisoius, an important name in the family of Bertha de Craon
(ibid., fol. 3r; Mon. Ang. iv, 125). Active in Lincolnshire in the
early 1090s, when he attested grants to Spalding Priory (Mon. Ang.
iii, 120), he had been succeeded by his son Alan (q.v.) by 1114.
Alan's charters show that Guy was father also of two daughters, Emma,
mother of William fitz Roger de Caen of Huntingfield, and Alice.
K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, 'Le rôle des Bretons dans la politique de la
colonisation normande', MSHAB, lxxiv, 1996, 188-9; idem, 'Le problème
de la suzeraheté et la lutte pour le pouvoir: la rivalité bretonne et
l'état anglo-normand 1066-1154', MSHAB, 68 (1991), 53-6; E. M.
Poynton, 'The fee of Creon', Genealogist n.s. 18, 162-6, 219ff."
I can't agree with Keats-Rohan's confidence that Guy was a son of
Robert I de Vitré and Berthe de Craon - he could more plausibly have
been a cousin of Berthe having no claim to Craon in competition with
that of her daughter Enoguen Domit(ill)a, whose son Maurice was
ancestor of the later seigneurs. Enoguen's father-in-law Robert the
Burgundian had been granted Craon by 31 May 1040 - long before she
married his son - as set out in Geoffroy Martel of Anjou's foundation
charter of La Trinité de Vendôme abbey here (bottom 3 lines on p 66 &
https://books.google.com.au/books?id=bkPEZtS6DgoC&pg=PA66. The
marriage of Enoguen to Robert the Burgundian's son Renaud brought
Craon back to the descendants of Suhard - allegedly the reason Enoguen
was also called 'Domita' or 'Domitilla', to emphasise that she was the
rightful 'domina' - from whom it had been confiscated when granted to
Robert (a great-nephew of Agnès of Mâcon, the countess of Anjou at the
time). The use of the name Lisoius in Guy's family is hardly strong
evidence that the latter was passed over as the proper heir of Craon.
Berthe's father had a brother named Lisoius who may have been Guy's
father for all we know. The Breton link could have come about in an
undetermined way apart from his being a son of Robert de Vitré.
I will post later about Maurice of Anjou.
Peter Stewart

The horrible "new Google Books" shows me a blank page, so I assume that
others may find the same. Jessee wrote (p. 40): "All that is known is
that between 21 June 1040 and 26 March 1053 Geoffrey Martel confiscated
the honor dominicum of Craon and held it in his own hands", citing just
this charter dated 26 March 1053 from the cartulary of La Trinité de
Vendôme
https://archive.org/details/cartulairedelabb01abba/page/176/mode/1up. It
says, in the perfect tense "Cum vero honorem Credonis in manu mea
dominicum habui ... antequam honorem illum Roberto Burgundioni, fideli
meo, donavissem" (literally: "When indeed I had the lordship of Craon in
my hands ... before I granted that honour to my faithful Robert the
Burgundian"). This only establishes that the grant of Craon to Robert
happened before 26 March 1053, not how long before. Jessee's inadequate
citation may have overlooked the charter dated 31 May 1040 noted
upthread. Its authenticity had been questioned because Geoffrey called
himself "count of the Angevins" whereas his father did not die until 21
June 1040 - but Fulk Nerra was returning from his last pilgrimage to
Jerusalem in May of that year and died at Metz without reaching Anjou:
his son Geoffrey (who had already been titled count in Vendôme from ca
1029) was evidently acting as count in Anjou as Maurice is supposed to
have done during earlier absences of Fulk Nerra.

Post by miked
Jessee links this quarrel to a much later story that the sons of Suhard
I had changed allegiance to Conan II of Rennes and a report that in 1048
the people of Craon welcomed Conan. He suggests thats why Geoffrey
Martel placed Craon in the hands of Robert the
Burgundian as the family of Suhard was unreliable. If Bertha was already married
to Robert de Vitre, that could suggest a marriage alliance between the family and
the Bretons so one can see why the count acted so.
What I havnt found yet is the evidence that Robert the Burgundian
married Bertha de Craon or even the name of the wife of Robert de
Vitre. After the death of Conan II the 2 Roberts seem to have made
their peace as Robert de Vitre is present at Craon in August 1067 for a
doc of Rainald de Craon [Jessee p73], but according to Jessee no wives
or relationship are mentioned. Jessee mentions a doc of Trinity Vendome
I, 217, which confirms that Rainalds wife Enoguena was the daughter of
Robert de Vitre by an unnamed daughter of Warin heir to the lordship of
Craon. What is the evidence that Robert the Burgundian married Bertha
and where is she named?

The first mention of Robert's wife Bertha is in a charter dated 13 March
1079 here:
https://archive.org/details/cartulairedelabb01abba/page/429/mode/1up
("praesente Rotberto Burgundione et Bertha uxore sua ... anno a passione
Domini MLXXVIIII, indictione I, III idus martii"). The correct indiction
for March 1079 was II, leading to the editor's uncertainty - but wrong
indictions are very commonly stated.

Post by miked
I assume that Robert de Vitre came from Vitre on the borders of Brittany not so far
from Craon, and if he was a breton, that would explain Enoguenas name, which i hadnt
ever seen before. The net names his parents as Tristan de Vitre and
Enoguen. The Breton element in the 'Norman conquest' must have been
quite substantial. I believe the 1st earls of Richmond were descended
from Conan I of Brittany and there must have been many other lesser
knights like Guy de Craon who made good after the conquest. So if the
Suhard family
did defect from the count of Anjou, then that would tie in with Guy de
Craon being linked to Ralph II de Gael [d1100] a leading supporter of
Conan II, and like Ralph joining the
Norman invasion in 1066.
So it seems that as a landless younger son Robert the Burgundian took
service with a great lord and acquired his own lordship, something he
had in common with Guy de Craon. But not just Craon, it seems Roberts
first wife [Avise Blanche d1057] was heiress to Chateau de Sable,
which in turn passed to his younger son Robert II [d1111]. So i'm a bit
surprised hes just called a miles in 1066 when he already held 2
lordships from the Count of Anjou. In that period he seems a pretty
major player in the region throwing his support first behind Fulk
against Geoffrey the Bearded, and so on.

Calling him "miles" may indicate only that he was in the entourage of
the count at the time rather than acting as a territorial lord. The same
may apply to Suhard when he was called "miles" to the count, although in
his case there is no record of his having a lordship beforehand and if
Craon had been an ancestral holding in his family it is less likely that
a subsequent count would have confiscated and regranted it within a
short time after his death.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-29 07:17:54 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it
to an off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a
comcast.net address are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a
Breton) and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others
have assumed. The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is
uncertain: soon after the death of Berthe's father it was
confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of Anjou. Subsequently it was held
by Berthe's second husband, Robert the Burgundian, whose son by his
prior wife was married to Berthe's daughter by her first husband.
Craon was later granted to this couple, reinstating the forfeited
hereditary rights that might otherwise have devolved to Guy if he
was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of her paternal
relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a household
knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as lord of
Craon. He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father), Suhard
II and Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as
Suhard II succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death
in the late 1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30.
There may have been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's
daughter or her putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can
provide source references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

"Guy 'of Craon', in Anjou, can be confidently identified with a
Breton, younger son of Robert I de Vitré and his Angevin wife Berthe
de Craon (Morice, Preuves I, 413). The Lincolnshire Claims of
Domesday Book suggest that he was a Breton who had formerly held some
of his land under Ralph I de Gael, Earl of East Anglia (d. 1069).
After 1075 and the revolt and fall of Ralph II de Gael, Guy acquired
some of the lands then forfeited by Ralph and his supporters. His
tenancy-in-chief lay principally in Lincolnshire and was later known
as the barony of Freiston (Sanders, 47). He had married the daughter
of another northern tenant-in-chief, Hugh fitz Baldric, by the date
of Domesday Book. The Thorney Abbey Liber Vitae (BM Add. 40000, fol.
3r) shows that her name was Isabella. The same source also shows that
he had a son Lisoius, an important name in the family of Bertha de
Craon (ibid., fol. 3r; Mon. Ang. iv, 125). Active in Lincolnshire in
the early 1090s, when he attested grants to Spalding Priory (Mon.
Ang. iii, 120), he had been succeeded by his son Alan (q.v.) by 1114.
Alan's charters show that Guy was father also of two daughters, Emma,
mother of William fitz Roger de Caen of Huntingfield, and Alice.
K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, 'Le rôle des Bretons dans la politique de la
colonisation normande', MSHAB, lxxiv, 1996, 188-9; idem, 'Le problème
de la suzeraheté et la lutte pour le pouvoir: la rivalité bretonne et
l'état anglo-normand 1066-1154', MSHAB, 68 (1991), 53-6; E. M.
Poynton, 'The fee of Creon', Genealogist n.s. 18, 162-6, 219ff."
I can't agree with Keats-Rohan's confidence that Guy was a son of
Robert I de Vitré and Berthe de Craon - he could more plausibly have
been a cousin of Berthe having no claim to Craon in competition with
that of her daughter Enoguen Domit(ill)a, whose son Maurice was
ancestor of the later seigneurs. Enoguen's father-in-law Robert the
Burgundian had been granted Craon by 31 May 1040 - long before she
married his son - as set out in Geoffroy Martel of Anjou's foundation
charter of La Trinité de Vendôme abbey here (bottom 3 lines on p 66 &
https://books.google.com.au/books?id=bkPEZtS6DgoC&pg=PA66. The
marriage of Enoguen to Robert the Burgundian's son Renaud brought
Craon back to the descendants of Suhard - allegedly the reason
Enoguen was also called 'Domita' or 'Domitilla', to emphasise that
she was the rightful 'domina' - from whom it had been confiscated
when granted to Robert (a great-nephew of Agnès of Mâcon, the
countess of Anjou at the time). The use of the name Lisoius in Guy's
family is hardly strong evidence that the latter was passed over as
the proper heir of Craon. Berthe's father had a brother named Lisoius
who may have been Guy's father for all we know. The Breton link could
have come about in an undetermined way apart from his being a son of
Robert de Vitré.
I will post later about Maurice of Anjou.
Peter Stewart

The horrible "new Google Books" shows me a blank page, so I assume that
others may find the same. Jessee wrote (p. 40): "All that is known is
that between 21 June 1040 and 26 March 1053 Geoffrey Martel confiscated
the honor dominicum of Craon and held it in his own hands", citing just
this charter dated 26 March 1053 from the cartulary of La Trinité de
Vendôme
https://archive.org/details/cartulairedelabb01abba/page/176/mode/1up. It
says, in the perfect tense "Cum vero honorem Credonis in manu mea
dominicum habui ... antequam honorem illum Roberto Burgundioni, fideli
meo, donavissem" (literally: "When indeed I had the lordship of Craon in
my hands ... before I granted that honour to my faithful Robert the
Burgundian"). This only establishes that the grant of Craon to Robert
happened before 26 March 1053, not how long before. Jessee's inadequate
citation may have overlooked the charter dated 31 May 1040 noted
upthread. Its authenticity had been questioned because Geoffrey called
himself "count of the Angevins" whereas his father did not die until 21
June 1040 - but Fulk Nerra was returning from his last pilgrimage to
his son Geoffrey (who had already been titled count in Vendôme from ca
1029) was evidently acting as count in Anjou as Maurice is supposed to
have done during earlier absences of Fulk Nerra.

There is conflicting evidence for the timing of Craon's confiscation
from Bertha's uncle Suhard II in another charter of Geoffrey Martel,
that Jessee could have used to support his date range from 21 June 1040.

This is a charter for Saint-Nicolas d'Angers witnessed by Suhard of
Craon, recorded in a confirmation by King Philippe I dated 11 October
1106 reciting the text which explicitly states that it was issued after
the death of Fulk Nerra ("ego Gaufridus, Andegavensium comes ...
defuncto ipso patre meo Fulcone ... Testes: [7 others]; Suardus de
Credonio; [13 others]", here:
https://archive.org/details/recueildesactedd00fran/page/394/mode/1up),
i.e. this was after 21 June 1040, by when Craon was already in the hands
of Robert the Burgundian according to Geoffrey's foundation charter for
La Trinité de Vendôme dated 31 May 1040.

Robert the Burgundian does not occur in the confirmation text, but the
designation given in it to Suhard implies that he still held Craon at
the time while his place in an exalted company of witnesses shows that
he was not yet in discredit with the count. So it appears that Olivier
Guillot's confidence in the charter of 31 May 1040, or at least in its
dating, was not entirely warranted.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-29 09:50:49 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
The horrible "new Google Books" shows me a blank page, so I assume
that others may find the same. Jessee wrote (p. 40): "All that is
known is that between 21 June 1040 and 26 March 1053 Geoffrey Martel
confiscated the honor dominicum of Craon and held it in his own
hands", citing just this charter dated 26 March 1053 from the
cartulary of La Trinité de Vendôme
https://archive.org/details/cartulairedelabb01abba/page/176/mode/1up.
It says, in the perfect tense "Cum vero honorem Credonis in manu mea
dominicum habui ... antequam honorem illum Roberto Burgundioni, fideli
meo, donavissem" (literally: "When indeed I had the lordship of Craon
in my hands ... before I granted that honour to my faithful Robert the
Burgundian"). This only establishes that the grant of Craon to Robert
happened before 26 March 1053, not how long before. Jessee's
inadequate citation may have overlooked the charter dated 31 May 1040
noted upthread. Its authenticity had been questioned because Geoffrey
called himself "count of the Angevins" whereas his father did not die
until 21 June 1040 - but Fulk Nerra was returning from his last
pilgrimage to Jerusalem in May of that year and died at Metz without
reaching Anjou: his son Geoffrey (who had already been titled count in
Vendôme from ca 1029) was evidently acting as count in Anjou as
Maurice is supposed to have done during earlier absences of Fulk Nerra.

There is conflicting evidence for the timing of Craon's confiscation
from Bertha's uncle Suhard II in another charter of Geoffrey Martel,
that Jessee could have used to support his date range from 21 June 1040.
This is a charter for Saint-Nicolas d'Angers witnessed by Suhard of
Craon, recorded in a confirmation by King Philippe I dated 11 October
1106 reciting the text which explicitly states that it was issued after
the death of Fulk Nerra ("ego Gaufridus, Andegavensium comes ...
defuncto ipso patre meo Fulcone ... Testes: [7 others]; Suardus de
https://archive.org/details/recueildesactedd00fran/page/394/mode/1up),
i.e. this was after 21 June 1040, by when Craon was already in the hands
of Robert the Burgundian according to Geoffrey's foundation charter for
La Trinité de Vendôme dated 31 May 1040.
Robert the Burgundian does not occur in the confirmation text, but the
designation given in it to Suhard implies that he still held Craon at
the time while his place in an exalted company of witnesses shows that
he was not yet in discredit with the count. So it appears that Olivier
Guillot's confidence in the charter of 31 May 1040, or at least in its
dating, was not entirely warranted.

Guillot ascribed the foundation pancarte for La Trinité de Vendôme to 31
May in 1040 because this was the date of the abbey's dedication before
Fulco Nerra's death on 21 June according to the annals of Vendôme
("Dedicatio Sancte Trinitatis monasterii Vindocinensis facta est II
kalendas junii et hoc ipso anno obiit Fulco comes, XI kalendas julii",
here:
https://archive.org/details/recueildannales00halpgoog/page/n136/mode/1up).

A forgery of the 12th century explicitly dates the foundation charter on
31 May, but the document accepted as authentic by Guillot does not set
down the precise date - it says that it was in the year 1040, indiction
8 in the 9th regnal year of Henri I, that it was written on the day of
the dedication and confirmed by all the bishops and abbots present on
the occasion ("Actum est hoc anno ab incarnatione domini nostri Jesu
Christi millesimo quadragesimo, indictione octava [sic, incorrectly VII
according to Guillot], regnante Henrico rege anno nono ... Scriptum
Vindocino, ipso die dedicationis ecclesiæ Sanctæ-Trinitatis, et ab
omnibus episcopis atque abbatibus, qui interfuerunt, confirmatum", here:
https://archive.org/details/cartulairedelabb01abba/page/69/mode/1up).

Indiction 8 corresponds to 1 September 1139-31 August 1040, and the 9th
year of Henri I to the year starting on 21 July 1039. Given that Suhard
evidently still held Craon after the death of Fulco Nerra on 21 June
1040, the confiscation may possibly have taken place between the time
his death in Metz became known in Anjou and 20 July 1040 when Henri I's
9th year ended, but it was more plausibly later. The statement in the
pancarte that it was written on the day of the dedication may refer to a
lost original, containing the missing subscriptions, which was
interpolated subsequently with further details such as the grant of
Craon to Robert. The omission of any respects paid to the deceased Fulco
Nerra suggests that most of the text was probably written shortly before
he died, with some of his son's subsequent dispositions for the new
abbey and the information about granting Craon to Robert added later.

Peter Stewart

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miked

2024-04-29 22:33:00 UTC

There is conflicting evidence for the timing of Craon's confiscation
from Bertha's uncle Suhard II in another charter of Geoffrey Martel,
that Jessee could have used to support his date range from 21 June 1040.
This is a charter for Saint-Nicolas d'Angers witnessed by Suhard of
Craon, recorded in a confirmation by King Philippe I dated 11 October
1106 reciting the text which explicitly states that it was issued after
the death of Fulk Nerra ("ego Gaufridus, Andegavensium comes ...
defuncto ipso patre meo Fulcone ... Testes: [7 others]; Suardus de
https://archive.org/details/recueildesactedd00fran/page/394/mode/1up),
i.e. this was after 21 June 1040, by when Craon was already in the hands
of Robert the Burgundian according to Geoffrey's foundation charter for
La Trinité de Vendôme dated 31 May 1040.
Robert the Burgundian does not occur in the confirmation text, but the
designation given in it to Suhard implies that he still held Craon at
the time while his place in an exalted company of witnesses shows that
he was not yet in discredit with the count. So it appears that Olivier
Guillot's confidence in the charter of 31 May 1040, or at least in its
dating, was not entirely warranted.

Guillot ascribed the foundation pancarte for La Trinité de Vendôme to 31
May in 1040 because this was the date of the abbey's dedication before
Fulco Nerra's death on 21 June according to the annals of Vendôme
("Dedicatio Sancte Trinitatis monasterii Vindocinensis facta est II
kalendas junii et hoc ipso anno obiit Fulco comes, XI kalendas julii",
https://archive.org/details/recueildannales00halpgoog/page/n136/mode/1up).
A forgery of the 12th century explicitly dates the foundation charter on
31 May, but the document accepted as authentic by Guillot does not set
down the precise date - it says that it was in the year 1040, indiction
8 in the 9th regnal year of Henri I, that it was written on the day of
the dedication and confirmed by all the bishops and abbots present on
the occasion ("Actum est hoc anno ab incarnatione domini nostri Jesu
Christi millesimo quadragesimo, indictione octava [sic, incorrectly VII
according to Guillot], regnante Henrico rege anno nono ... Scriptum
Vindocino, ipso die dedicationis ecclesiæ Sanctæ-Trinitatis, et ab
https://archive.org/details/cartulairedelabb01abba/page/69/mode/1up).
Indiction 8 corresponds to 1 September 1139-31 August 1040, and the 9th
year of Henri I to the year starting on 21 July 1039. Given that Suhard
evidently still held Craon after the death of Fulco Nerra on 21 June
1040, the confiscation may possibly have taken place between the time
his death in Metz became known in Anjou and 20 July 1040 when Henri I's
9th year ended, but it was more plausibly later. The statement in the
pancarte that it was written on the day of the dedication may refer to a
lost original, containing the missing subscriptions, which was
interpolated subsequently with further details such as the grant of
Craon to Robert. The omission of any respects paid to the deceased Fulco
Nerra suggests that most of the text was probably written shortly before
he died, with some of his son's subsequent dispositions for the new
abbey and the information about granting Craon to Robert added later.
Peter Stewart

I didnt realise it was a later copy so probably better leave it in the
1040-52 timeframe I guess is ok. I'm more used to seeing charters dated by
kings regnal years than AD, so seeing it as 1040 seemed like a gift.

Going back to the original subject is it out of the question that Guy de Craon
could be actually a son of Robert the Burgundian by his first wife? I notice
that he had a both a brother and an uncle called called Guy.

I also noticed that Robert the Burgundian was related to the counts of
Vendome as his uncle Bodo of Nevers [dc1023] had married Adele of Anjou,
the daughter of Fulk the Black by his first wife Elizabeth of Vendome.
This was the wife that Fulk had burnt at the stake for adultery. I'm
surprised that neither her brother or father seem to have reacted to
this. But my point is that the counts of Anjou already had a relationship
with the Nevers family before Robert the Burgundian appeared on the scene.

I could only find about Robert de Vitres family on Medieval Lands.
The evidence that Warins daughter was called Bertha seems mistaken. The charter
of Trinity Vendome I,217 dated 1070, doesnt name her, so she must have died
before then. Robert de Vitre appears with his wife Bertha and his 2 sons
Andrew and Robert in another doc dated 1064/76, the ref is only given as
"Broussillon (1895), Tome I, 35, p. 46, extract only, citing Morice, I, 424,
and Lobineau 207. "
I assume that refers to de Broussillon, La maison de Laval (Paris) 1895 vol 1.

A later charter of his son Andrew in 1110 refers to St.Croix de Vitre being founded
by Robert de Vitre with the consent of his mother Inoguena, and wife Bertha and their
sons Andrew and Robert. According to ML

"Broussillon argues convincingly that Berthe, mother of Robert´s two sons André and
Robert, could not have been --- de Craon, otherwise Craon would not have been inherited
by Robert´s daughter, which inheritance was unchallenged by the Vitré family"
[de Broussillon, Laval, I, 276-77; refs in ML are a bit difficult to follow]

It seems from this that Bertha was the 2nd wife of Robert de Vitre and not the
daughter of Warin and mother of Enoguena, wife of Renaud son of Robert the
Burgundian. This Bertha outlived her husband who seems to have died by 1090,
as she was alive in another doc of St.Aubin only dated to 1093/1106. Warins
daughter remains unnamed it seems.

Robert the Burgundian also had a 2nd wife called Bertha but she seems to have
been a completly different person. In 1077 according to Jessee p122, Robert
made gifts for his late brother Henry and his wife Advise de Sable, then in
1079 appears with a new wife Bertha. As Robert de Vitre and his wife Bertha
were both still married at that date, the 2nd wife of Robert the Burgundian
cannot be the same person.

Mike

Peter Stewart

2024-04-30 06:55:45 UTC

Post by miked
Going back to the original subject is it out of the question that Guy de Craon
could be actually a son of Robert the Burgundian by his first wife? I notice
that he had a both a brother and an uncle called called Guy.

The name Guy was very common and widespread in the 11th century, and any
hypothesis from onomastics would have to take into account that Guy of
Craon's known sons were named Alan and Lisoius, which do not occur in
the family of Robert the Burgundian. According to Scott Jessee Robert
married his first wife by ca 1052 and that Robert is 'nearly always
referred to as "Burgundio" or "Allobros," "the Burgundian" or "the
Allobrogian." These represent ethnic terms that by the eleventh century
simply referred to anyone from the region of Burgundy. For Robert,
Burgundio became virtually a family name, being applied first to his
grandfather Landric count of Nevers, then to his uncle Bodo, then to
Robert himself, and finally to his children and grandchildren born
within Anjou.' I don't know of any source applying either of these
epithets to Guy of Craon, who seems to have had a Breton connection
rather than a Burgundian one. Also younger sons of lords holding such
extensive territories as Robert obtained in Anjou were not very likely
to be left to seek their fortunes in England rather than being
established locally to support their kindred.

Post by miked
I also noticed that Robert the Burgundian was related to the counts of
Vendome as his uncle Bodo of Nevers [dc1023] had married Adele of Anjou,
the daughter of Fulk the Black by his first wife Elizabeth of Vendome.
This was the wife that Fulk had burnt at the stake for adultery. I'm
surprised that neither her brother or father seem to have reacted to
this. But my point is that the counts of Anjou already had a relationship
with the Nevers family before Robert the Burgundian appeared on the scene.

Once Elizabeth was dead her father and brother had to be concerned for
her only child, her daughter Adela, who then became heiress to Vendôme -
she remained in Fulk Nerra's custody - and in any case their potential
allies may have thought Elizabeth deserved her fate after she had seized
the citadel of Angers in defiance of her rampaging husband and/or had no
wish to tangle with such a formidable savage as Fulk anyway.

Post by miked
I could only find about Robert de Vitres family on Medieval Lands.
The evidence that Warins daughter was called Bertha seems mistaken. The charter
of Trinity Vendome I,217 dated 1070, doesnt name her, so she must have died
before then. Robert de Vitre appears with his wife Bertha and his 2 sons
Andrew and Robert in another doc dated 1064/76, the ref is only given as
"Broussillon (1895), Tome I, 35, p. 46, extract only, citing Morice, I,
424, and Lobineau 207. "
I assume that refers to de Broussillon, La maison de Laval (Paris) 1895 vol 1.

Post by miked
A later charter of his son Andrew in 1110 refers to St.Croix de Vitre being founded
by Robert de Vitre with the consent of his mother Inoguena, and wife Bertha and their
sons Andrew and Robert. According to ML
"Broussillon argues convincingly that Berthe, mother of Robert´s two
sons André and Robert, could not have been --- de Craon, otherwise Craon
would not have been inherited by Robert´s daughter, which inheritance
was unchallenged by the Vitré family" [de Broussillon, Laval, I, 276-77;
refs in ML are a bit difficult to follow]
It seems from this that Bertha was the 2nd wife of Robert de Vitre and not the
daughter of Warin and mother of Enoguena, wife of Renaud son of Robert the
Burgundian. This Bertha outlived her husband who seems to have died by 1090,
as she was alive in another doc of St.Aubin only dated to 1093/1106. Warins
daughter remains unnamed it seems.
Robert the Burgundian also had a 2nd wife called Bertha but she seems to have
been a completly different person. In 1077 according to Jessee p122, Robert
made gifts for his late brother Henry and his wife Advise de Sable, then in
1079 appears with a new wife Bertha. As Robert de Vitre and his wife Bertha
were both still married at that date, the 2nd wife of Robert the Burgundian
cannot be the same person.

As for the name of Robert de Vitré's wife, there is no reason to suppose
he had more than one in the first place, who as his widow later became
the second wife of Robert the Burgundian - the charter referenced above
calls her Bertha: "ego Robertus de Vitriaco ... consensu et auctoritate
matris meae Innoguent et uxoris meae Bertae et filiorum meorum Andreae
et Roberti" (I Robert de Vitré ... with the consent and authority of my
mother Enoguen and of my wife Bertha and of my sons André and Robert).
When Robert de Vitré died is not certain but it was probably ca
1077/before 1079. Broussillon's idea that a daughter (Enoguen in this
case) could never receive such a considerable fief as Craon when she had
a living brother is simply wrong - the circumstances were exceptional,
but the outcome was not by any means unthinkable. His idea that Robert I
de Vitré was still living until ca 1090 is not backed by any solid
evidence that I have seen.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-30 07:33:13 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
As for the name of Robert de Vitré's wife, there is no reason to suppose
he had more than one in the first place, who as his widow later became
the second wife of Robert the Burgundian - the charter referenced above
calls her Bertha: "ego Robertus de Vitriaco ... consensu et auctoritate
matris meae Innoguent et uxoris meae Bertae et filiorum meorum Andreae
et Roberti" (I Robert de Vitré ... with the consent and authority of my
mother Enoguen and of my wife Bertha and of my sons André and Robert).
When Robert de Vitré died is not certain but it was probably ca
1077/before 1079. Broussillon's idea that a daughter (Enoguen in this
case) could never receive such a considerable fief as Craon when she had
a living brother is simply wrong - the circumstances were exceptional,
but the outcome was not by any means unthinkable. His idea that Robert I
de Vitré was still living until ca 1090 is not backed by any solid
evidence that I have seen.

I should add that Robert I de Vitré's second son, Robert, named in the
document quoted above (the foundation charter of Sainte-Croix priory at
Vitré, undated but written 1064/76) may have died before rights to Craon
were given to his sister, Robert the Burgundian's daughter-in-law Enoguen.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-30 12:43:25 UTC

I have been asked off-list to explain the problem I have with
Broussillon's idea that Robert I of Vitré lived until ca 1090.
Broussillon relied on two sources that he misdated.

The first of these, which apparently he failed to read through
carefully, is the record of an adjudication by Jean II, archbishop of
Dol ca 1082-ca 1088 of a dispute between the abbeys of Saint-Serge
d'Angers and Saint-Jouin over possession of the chapel at Bréal within
Robert's territory. But the mention of Robert in this relates his
earlier concession along with his son André and several of the Laval
family (headed by Jean, who died as a monk at Marmoutier in 1070) of a
donation of the chapel to Saint-Serge, not as a living man at the time.
The archbishop's decision was witnessed by Robert's son André as
seigneur of Vitré - "Cum Sanctus Sergius capellam de Braello tempore
trium abbatum absque calumnia tenuisset per donum Rainerii de Tasleia et
filiorum ejus Rainaldi et Merilli et per concessionem Johannis de Valle
et Haimonis fratris ejus et Guidonis filii Haimonis et Rotberti
Vitreacensi et Andreae filii ejus ... Testes: Johannes archiepiscopus
... [5 others] Andreas de Vitreo." Broussillon noted the witnesses as
Geoffroy de Mayenne and his namesake son, but these were witnesses only
to a subsequent transaction ("Nec multo post tempore ...") recorded
after the list of witnesses to the archbishop's adjudication including
André as above.

The second alleged proof of Robert's survival through the 1080s is a
notice by the monks of Marmoutier about the capture of his tenant at
Marcillé by the men of Count Eudes, and this man's subsequent ransom by
one of the monks which the tenant repaid with the consent of Robert and
his mother Enoguen. Broussillon wrongly dated this to ca 1090 because he
arbitrarily identified the Count Eudes in question as the son born ca
1070 of Hoël of Cornouaille and Alan III of Brittany's daughter Hawise,
assuming him to have been at least 20 years old. This is mistaken: for
starters, Robert first occurs as lord of Vitré in 1037 so his mother is
unlikely to have been still alive ca 1090. But in any case the incident
described took place ca 1058 in the course of strife between Conan II of
Brittany (a maternal uncle of Eudes of Cornouaille) and his own paternal
uncle Count Eudes (of Penthièvre), younger brother of Alan III of
Brittany. This Eudes was imprisoned by Conan at the time and his men
were making trouble in order to get him released.

Peter Stewart

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miked

2024-04-30 22:17:13 UTC

Robert the

Post by miked
Burgundian. This Bertha outlived her husband who seems to have died by 1090,
as she was alive in another doc of St.Aubin only dated to 1093/1106.

Warins

Post by miked
daughter remains unnamed it seems.
Robert the Burgundian also had a 2nd wife called Bertha but she seems to have
been a completly different person. In 1077 according to Jessee p122,

Robert

Post by miked
made gifts for his late brother Henry and his wife Advise de Sable,

then in

Post by miked
1079 appears with a new wife Bertha. As Robert de Vitre and his wife

Bertha

Post by miked
were both still married at that date, the 2nd wife of Robert the

Burgundian

Post by miked
cannot be the same person.

Thankyou for going into this and other points in such detail and also
the details about the mysterious Count Maurice.

In your op you said that

'Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as Suhard II
succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in the late
1040s'

Did you mean Suhard II had died in the late 1040s or Warin? When is Suhard II last
mentioned? Thanks

Mike

Peter Stewart

2024-05-01 00:10:44 UTC

The name Guy was very common and widespread in the 11th century, and
any hypothesis from onomastics would have to take into account that
Guy of Craon's known sons were named Alan and Lisoius, which do not
occur in the family of Robert the Burgundian. According to Scott
Jessee Robert married his first wife by ca 1052 and that Robert is
'nearly always referred to as "Burgundio" or "Allobros," "the
Burgundian" or "the Allobrogian." These represent ethnic terms that by
the eleventh century simply referred to anyone from the region of
Burgundy. For Robert, Burgundio became virtually a family name, being
applied first to his grandfather Landric count of Nevers, then to his
uncle Bodo, then to Robert himself, and finally to his children and
grandchildren born within Anjou.' I don't know of any source applying
either of these epithets to Guy of Craon, who seems to have had a
Breton connection rather than a Burgundian one. Also younger sons of
lords holding such extensive territories as Robert obtained in Anjou
were not very likely to be left to seek their fortunes in England
rather than being established locally to support their kindred.

Post by miked
I also noticed that Robert the Burgundian was related to the counts of
Vendome as his uncle Bodo of Nevers [dc1023] had married Adele of Anjou,
the daughter of Fulk the Black by his first wife Elizabeth of Vendome.
This was the wife that Fulk had burnt at the stake for adultery. I'm
surprised that neither her brother or father seem to have reacted to
this. But my point is that the counts of Anjou already had a
relationship
with the Nevers family before Robert the Burgundian appeared on the scene.

Once Elizabeth was dead her father and brother had to be concerned for
her only child, her daughter Adela, who then became heiress to Vendôme
- she remained in Fulk Nerra's custody - and in any case their
potential allies may have thought Elizabeth deserved her fate after
she had seized the citadel of Angers in defiance of her rampaging
husband and/or had no wish to tangle with such a formidable savage as
Fulk anyway.

Post by miked
I could only find about Robert de Vitres family on Medieval Lands.
The evidence that Warins daughter was called Bertha seems mistaken. The charter
of Trinity Vendome I,217 dated 1070, doesnt name her, so she must have died
before then. Robert de Vitre appears with his wife Bertha and his 2 sons
Andrew and Robert in another doc dated 1064/76, the ref is only given as
"Broussillon (1895), Tome I, 35, p. 46, extract only, citing Morice,
I, 424, and Lobineau 207. "
I assume that refers to de Broussillon, La maison de Laval (Paris) 1895 vol 1.

Information taken from Medieval Lands is often worse than none at all.
The Trinité de Vendôme charter no. 217 dated 3 March 1070 does not
imply that Renaud of Craon's mother-in-law was dead at the time, and
there was no reason to name her in it. The charter confirms the
abbey's possession of the church of Saint-Clément at Craon in return
for payments from the monks to Renaud himself and his wife - the
genealogically relevant text is as follows: "ego Rainaldus, filius
Roberti Burgundionis, et uxor mea Eunoguena, filia Roberti de Vitreio,
nata de ipsius legali conjuge, filia videlicet Warini, naturalis
hæredis et domini Credonensis honoris .... Quapropter donaverunt michi
monachi jam facto naturali hæredi, per susceptionem meæ conjugis,
quinquaginta denariorum libras, et uxori meæ septem' (I Renaud, son of
Robert the Burgundian, and my wife Enoguen, daughter of Robert de
Vitré, born to his lawful wife, the daughter of Warin the natural heir
and lord of the honour of Craon ... Wherefore the monks have given me,
now become the natural heir by right of my wife, 50 pounds of denarii
and 7 to my wife).
Remember that this was a result of fixing back to hereditary order for
the future after Craon had been diverted from it by confiscation and
regranting. Robert the Burgundian was still living and had ceded Craon
to his son on the latter's marriage to Warin's granddaughter. Enoguen
had an elder brother, André, who was to inherit Vitré from their
father, and their mother had evidently ceded her rights in Craon to
her daughter in order to settle the matter with Robert the Burgundian.
Enoguen's mother can't have been dead in 1070 since she later married
Robert the Burgundian.
> A later charter of his son Andrew in 1110 refers to St.Croix de Vitre
> being founded
> by Robert de Vitre with the consent of his mother Inoguena, and wife
> Bertha and their
> sons Andrew and Robert. According to ML
> "Broussillon argues convincingly that Berthe, mother of Robert´s two
> sons André and Robert, could not have been --- de Craon, otherwise
Craon
> would not have been inherited by Robert´s daughter, which inheritance
> was unchallenged by the Vitré family" [de Broussillon, Laval, I,
276-77;
> refs in ML are a bit difficult to follow]
>
> It seems from this that Bertha was the 2nd wife of Robert de Vitre and
> not the
> daughter of Warin and mother of Enoguena, wife of Renaud son of
Robert the
> Burgundian. This Bertha outlived her husband who seems to have died by
> 1090,
> as she was alive in another doc of St.Aubin only dated to
1093/1106. Warins
> daughter remains unnamed it seems.
>
> Robert the Burgundian also had a 2nd wife called Bertha but she
seems to
> have
> been a completly different person. In 1077 according to Jessee
p122, Robert
> made gifts for his late brother Henry and his wife Advise de Sable,
then in
> 1079 appears with a new wife Bertha. As Robert de Vitre and his
wife Bertha
> were both still married at that date, the 2nd wife of Robert the
Burgundian
> cannot be the same person.
As for the name of Robert de Vitré's wife, there is no reason to
suppose he had more than one in the first place, who as his widow
later became the second wife of Robert the Burgundian - the charter
referenced above calls her Bertha: "ego Robertus de Vitriaco ...
consensu et auctoritate matris meae Innoguent et uxoris meae Bertae et
filiorum meorum Andreae et Roberti" (I Robert de Vitré ... with the
consent and authority of my mother Enoguen and of my wife Bertha and
of my sons André and Robert). When Robert de Vitré died is not certain
but it was probably ca 1077/before 1079. Broussillon's idea that a
daughter (Enoguen in this case) could never receive such a
considerable fief as Craon when she had a living brother is simply
wrong - the circumstances were exceptional, but the outcome was not by
any means unthinkable. His idea that Robert I de Vitré was still
living until ca 1090 is not backed by any solid evidence that I have
seen.
Peter Stewart

Thankyou for going into this and other points in such detail and also
the details about the mysterious Count Maurice.
In your op you said that
'Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as Suhard II succeeded him
but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in the late 1040s'
Did you mean Suhard II had died in the late 1040s or Warin? When is Suhard II last
mentioned? Thanks

I meant (or should have meant) that Suhard II disappeared in (or rather
by) the late 1040s, after the death of Warin.

The hereditary dynamics in this family are as mysterious as the
chronology - partly why I think Suhard I was perhaps not himself the
heir to Craon but more probably granted it as a household knight of the
count, as Robert the Burgundian was later. (As to your suggestion about
upward social mobility Scott Jessee wrote: "After 21 June 1040 but
before 1 April 1045, Robert appeared as second of four witnesses to an
act of the count. The low rank of the witnesses, two of whom were merely
comital officials of Angers, suggests that Robert was simply one of the
count's military household. As such, Robert served as a miles under the
eyes of his count. He could expect superior service and loyalty to be
rewarded. The highest reward, most eagerly sought, was to be established
on lands under comital control. Robert must have greatly impressed his
new lord with his military ability, judgment, and loyalty, for this is
precisely what happened. Geoffrey gave him command of the important
marcher castrum of Craon sometime before 26 march 1053.")

Since Bertha was Warin's daughter and Suhard II evidently his younger
brother, the latter's succession to Craon after Warin's death may have
been as Berthe's guardian or possibly usurper.

The placement of Lisoius (whom I think the best candidate for father of
Guy the original subject of this thread) is also unknown, but since his
father's name was Suhard he appears to have been another brother of
Warin and Suhard II and in that case evidently younger than them or else
bypassed in succession if he too had outlived their father.

As well as Bertha's father, Suhard I had another son named Warin who was
illegitimate.

Bertha was given a bogus and absurdly grand maternal ancestry in the
19th century, with Warin's wife said to be "Anne de Créquy, fille de
Beaudouin I et de Marguerite de Louvain". The imaginary mother of the
fictitious "Anne" was supposed to have been a daughter of Henri I, count
of Louvain. He at least was a real personage, but none of his three
recorded daughters was named Margaret and none of them is known to have
married anyone much less a lord in Anjou.

Peter Stewart

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miked

2024-05-01 21:20:11 UTC

Post by miked
In your op you said that
'Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as Suhard II succeeded him
but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in the late 1040s'
Did you mean Suhard II had died in the late 1040s or Warin? When is Suhard II last
mentioned? Thanks

I meant (or should have meant) that Suhard II disappeared in (or rather
by) the late 1040s, after the death of Warin.
The hereditary dynamics in this family are as mysterious as the
chronology - partly why I think Suhard I was perhaps not himself the
heir to Craon but more probably granted it as a household knight of the
count, as Robert the Burgundian was later. (As to your suggestion about
upward social mobility Scott Jessee wrote: "After 21 June 1040 but
before 1 April 1045, Robert appeared as second of four witnesses to an
act of the count. The low rank of the witnesses, two of whom were merely
comital officials of Angers, suggests that Robert was simply one of the
count's military household. As such, Robert served as a miles under the
eyes of his count. He could expect superior service and loyalty to be
rewarded. The highest reward, most eagerly sought, was to be established
on lands under comital control. Robert must have greatly impressed his
new lord with his military ability, judgment, and loyalty, for this is
precisely what happened. Geoffrey gave him command of the important
marcher castrum of Craon sometime before 26 march 1053.")
Since Bertha was Warin's daughter and Suhard II evidently his younger
brother, the latter's succession to Craon after Warin's death may have
been as Berthe's guardian or possibly usurper.
The placement of Lisoius (whom I think the best candidate for father of
Guy the original subject of this thread) is also unknown, but since his
father's name was Suhard he appears to have been another brother of
Warin and Suhard II and in that case evidently younger than them or else
bypassed in succession if he too had outlived their father.
As well as Bertha's father, Suhard I had another son named Warin who was
illegitimate.
Bertha was given a bogus and absurdly grand maternal ancestry in the
19th century, with Warin's wife said to be "Anne de Créquy, fille de
Beaudouin I et de Marguerite de Louvain". The imaginary mother of the
fictitious "Anne" was supposed to have been a daughter of Henri I, count
of Louvain. He at least was a real personage, but none of his three
recorded daughters was named Margaret and none of them is known to have
married anyone much less a lord in Anjou.
Peter Stewart

One last thing, Guy de Craon, Bertha and Robert the Burgundian all have
something else in common, they just fade out of the story; Guy is last
heard in the 1090s, as is Bertha, and then Robert decides to go on
the 1st crusade but doesnt actually get round to doing so until March
1098 and then he too fades out of the picture. At least i think thats
what i read in 1 of Jessees articles, but i cant find the ref. But on
the net he is sometimes listed as dying in Kreuznach [nr mainz?] or
in Palestine. I think Jesse says he went with a nephew from
Chateau Gontier and i cant remember if a wife is mentioned, but
elsewhere on the net it has him dying in Palestine 1098.

Mike

miked

2024-05-01 23:13:28 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I meant (or should have meant) that Suhard II disappeared in (or rather
by) the late 1040s, after the death of Warin.
The hereditary dynamics in this family are as mysterious as the
chronology - partly why I think Suhard I was perhaps not himself the
heir to Craon but more probably granted it as a household knight of the
count, as Robert the Burgundian was later.

yes but on the net someone has created an entire line of antecedants for
Suhard I going back to Lambert of Nantes d836!

Suhard I- Lisois d1007 - Andrew of Craon [m Agnes dau of Fulk II] -
Lisois Juvenus d916 - Lisois Vetulus d907 - Lambert d836 which I list here
only so that no one is taken in by it.

Post by Peter Stewart
Since Bertha was Warin's daughter and Suhard II evidently his younger
brother, the latter's succession to Craon after Warin's death may have
been as Berthe's guardian or possibly usurper.

couldnt an uncle take precedance if the heir to the previous lord was female?
was primogeniture gender neutral?

Post by Peter Stewart
The placement of Lisoius (whom I think the best candidate for father of
Guy the original subject of this thread) is also unknown, but since his
father's name was Suhard he appears to have been another brother of
Warin and Suhard II and in that case evidently younger than them or else
bypassed in succession if he too had outlived their father.

i spose Lisoius could have died before Suhard or Warin; I had only ever come
across this name Lisoius once before, I think one of the heretics of Orleans,
and I believe this is a first for SGM too, but when I searched the net, I find
it was a very common name in 11-12th century France, despite this association.
Other websites have it as Lisois, Liso, Lisoir; like the name Fulk, it seems
too short to be a proper name, like somethings been left off, say Lisohard or
Lisofred.

I notice from a net ref that Craon is in
Europaische Stammtafeln, by Wilhelm Karl, Prinz zu Isenburg, Vol. III, Tafel 719.
But i dont access to it ATM to check what its version is like.

Mike

Peter Stewart

2024-05-02 01:14:09 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I meant (or should have meant) that Suhard II disappeared in (or
rather by) the late 1040s, after the death of Warin.
The hereditary dynamics in this family are as mysterious as the
chronology - partly why I think Suhard I was perhaps not himself the
heir to Craon but more probably granted it as a household knight of
the count, as Robert the Burgundian was later.

yes but on the net someone has created an entire line of antecedants for
Suhard I going back to Lambert of Nantes d836!
Suhard I- Lisois d1007 - Andrew of Craon [m Agnes dau of Fulk II] -
Lisois Juvenus d916 - Lisois Vetulus d907 - Lambert d836 which I list
here only so that no one is taken in by it.

couldnt an uncle take precedance if the heir to the previous lord was female?
was primogeniture gender neutral?

A lord's offspring took precedence over his siblings. Bertha was
probably not yet married when her father Warin died, so that her uncle
Suhard II may have acted as seigneur in her stead rather than assuming
the lordship as if in his own right. This would help to account for the
restoration of hereditary order through the marriage of her daughter to
Robert the Burgundian's son Renaud, since Bertha herself can hardly have
shared in whatever blame attached to her father and/or uncle.

Post by Peter Stewart
The placement of Lisoius (whom I think the best candidate for father
of Guy the original subject of this thread) is also unknown, but since
his father's name was Suhard he appears to have been another brother
of Warin and Suhard II and in that case evidently younger than them or
else bypassed in succession if he too had outlived their father.

i spose Lisoius could have died before Suhard or Warin; I had only ever
come across this name Lisoius once before, I think one of the heretics
of Orleans, and I believe this is a first for SGM too, but when I
searched the net, I find it was a very common name in 11-12th century
France, despite this association. Other websites have it as Lisois,
Liso, Lisoir; like the name Fulk, it seems too short to be a proper
name, like somethings been left off, say Lisohard or
Lisofred.
I notice from a net ref that Craon is in Europaische Stammtafeln, by
Wilhelm Karl, Prinz zu Isenburg, Vol. III, Tafel 719.
But i dont access to it ATM to check what its version is like.

This is in Detlev Schwennicke's edition, neue Folge III/4 (1989). The
table starts from Suhard I, giving him four sons (in order: Lisoir ca
1032, Guérin I living in 1053 [almost certainly too late] as father of
Berthe, Suhard-le-jeune living 1037/41 [oddly, since he succeeded
Warin], and Guérin-le-bâtard occurring in 1054). None of the sources
listed for the table has any proofs to counter information given in this
thread.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-05-02 00:46:03 UTC

Post by miked
In your op you said that
'Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as Suhard II succeeded
him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in the late 1040s'
Did you mean Suhard II had died in the late 1040s or Warin? When is Suhard II last
mentioned? Thanks

I meant (or should have meant) that Suhard II disappeared in (or
rather by) the late 1040s, after the death of Warin.
The hereditary dynamics in this family are as mysterious as the
chronology - partly why I think Suhard I was perhaps not himself the
heir to Craon but more probably granted it as a household knight of
the count, as Robert the Burgundian was later. (As to your suggestion
about upward social mobility Scott Jessee wrote: "After 21 June 1040
but before 1 April 1045, Robert appeared as second of four witnesses
to an act of the count. The low rank of the witnesses, two of whom
were merely comital officials of Angers, suggests that Robert was
simply one of the count's military household. As such, Robert served
as a miles under the eyes of his count. He could expect superior
service and loyalty to be rewarded. The highest reward, most eagerly
sought, was to be established on lands under comital control. Robert
must have greatly impressed his new lord with his military ability,
judgment, and loyalty, for this is precisely what happened. Geoffrey
gave him command of the important marcher castrum of Craon sometime
before 26 march 1053.")
Since Bertha was Warin's daughter and Suhard II evidently his younger
brother, the latter's succession to Craon after Warin's death may have
been as Berthe's guardian or possibly usurper.
The placement of Lisoius (whom I think the best candidate for father
of Guy the original subject of this thread) is also unknown, but since
his father's name was Suhard he appears to have been another brother
of Warin and Suhard II and in that case evidently younger than them or
else bypassed in succession if he too had outlived their father.
As well as Bertha's father, Suhard I had another son named Warin who
was illegitimate.
Bertha was given a bogus and absurdly grand maternal ancestry in the
19th century, with Warin's wife said to be "Anne de Créquy, fille de
Beaudouin I et de Marguerite de Louvain". The imaginary mother of the
fictitious "Anne" was supposed to have been a daughter of Henri I,
count of Louvain. He at least was a real personage, but none of his
three recorded daughters was named Margaret and none of them is known
to have married anyone much less a lord in Anjou.
Peter Stewart

We have no record that Robert ever reached Palestine, or where he may
have passed through after the last record of him when was at Marmoutier
abbey near Tours early in 1098. Olivier Guillot placed his departure
from there by Easter, that fell on 28 March in 1098.

According to a charter of the priest at Azé, dated at Saint-Nicolas
d'Angers on 23 February 1097 (i.e. 1098 new style) he left in that year
for Jerusalem with Renaud of Château-Gontier ("Donum ab utrisque
partibus factum est in capitulo Sancti Nicholai, anno ab Incarnatione
Domini millesimo nonagesimo septimo ..., anno quo Rotbertus Burgundus et
Rainaldus de Castrogunterii Hierusolimam petierunt").

He said in a charter that he was going in the second expeditionary
force, that is to bolster the crusaders already at Antioch. He made
several donations to Marmoutier before leaving, with the consent of his
wife Bertha (including property that would pass to the abbey only after
her death) and his eldest son Renaud of Craon - he had to send a letter
back to his younger son Robert of Sablé seeking his approval. He had
evidently ceded both lordships and expected to die on crusade, although
he must have been in his 70s by then and perhaps more useful as a
strategist than in battle. Dying in Jerusalem, if he could achieve his
goal, was highly desirable. Bertha lived into the 12th century, until ca
1106/08.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-05-02 00:52:08 UTC

Post by miked
In your op you said that
'Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as Suhard II succeeded
him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in the late 1040s'
Did you mean Suhard II had died in the late 1040s or Warin? When is Suhard II last
mentioned? Thanks

I meant (or should have meant) that Suhard II disappeared in (or
rather by) the late 1040s, after the death of Warin.
The hereditary dynamics in this family are as mysterious as the
chronology - partly why I think Suhard I was perhaps not himself the
heir to Craon but more probably granted it as a household knight of
the count, as Robert the Burgundian was later. (As to your suggestion
about upward social mobility Scott Jessee wrote: "After 21 June 1040
but before 1 April 1045, Robert appeared as second of four witnesses
to an act of the count. The low rank of the witnesses, two of whom
were merely comital officials of Angers, suggests that Robert was
simply one of the count's military household. As such, Robert served
as a miles under the eyes of his count. He could expect superior
service and loyalty to be rewarded. The highest reward, most eagerly
sought, was to be established on lands under comital control. Robert
must have greatly impressed his new lord with his military ability,
judgment, and loyalty, for this is precisely what happened. Geoffrey
gave him command of the important marcher castrum of Craon sometime
before 26 march 1053.")
Since Bertha was Warin's daughter and Suhard II evidently his younger
brother, the latter's succession to Craon after Warin's death may
have been as Berthe's guardian or possibly usurper.
The placement of Lisoius (whom I think the best candidate for father
of Guy the original subject of this thread) is also unknown, but
since his father's name was Suhard he appears to have been another
brother of Warin and Suhard II and in that case evidently younger
than them or else bypassed in succession if he too had outlived their
father.
As well as Bertha's father, Suhard I had another son named Warin who
was illegitimate.
Bertha was given a bogus and absurdly grand maternal ancestry in the
19th century, with Warin's wife said to be "Anne de Créquy, fille de
Beaudouin I et de Marguerite de Louvain". The imaginary mother of the
fictitious "Anne" was supposed to have been a daughter of Henri I,
count of Louvain. He at least was a real personage, but none of his
three recorded daughters was named Margaret and none of them is known
to have married anyone much less a lord in Anjou.
Peter Stewart

I forgot to add: we know that he left in 1098 (new style) rather than in
1097 because a donation he made to Marmoutier was dated in the 14th year
of Abbot Bernard, who was consecrated after Easter in 1084.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-29 01:39:07 UTC

Post by Peter Stewart
I am posting this to the newsgroup because my attempts to send it to
an off-list correspondent have failed (my emails to a comcast.net
address are returned as undeliverable).
Guy of Craon was perhaps a younger son of Robert I of Vitré (a Breton)
and Berthe of Craon, as Katharine Keats-Rohan and others have assumed.
The history of Craon in the mid-11th century is uncertain: soon after
the death of Berthe's father it was confiscated by Geoffrey Martel of
Anjou. Subsequently it was held by Berthe's second husband, Robert the
Burgundian, whose son by his prior wife was married to Berthe's
daughter by her first husband. Craon was later granted to this couple,
reinstating the forfeited hereditary rights that might otherwise have
devolved to Guy if he was indeed a son of Berthe. Little is known of
her paternal relatives - her grandfather Suhard I was evidently a
household knight of Fulk Nerra of Anjou by whom he was elevated as
lord of Craon. He had at least three sons, Warin (Berthe's father),
Suhard II and Lisoius. Berthe was not the direct heiress of Warin, as
Suhard II succeeded him but disappeared shortly after Warin's death in
the late 1040s, with Lisoius never heard of again after 1028/30. There
may have been other agnates with better claims than Berthe's daughter
or her putative son Guy, who settled in England. I can provide source
references for this outline if needed.
Peter Stewart

Not directly connected to your subject, but i just wanted to check the
id of this Robert the Burgundian; was he the son of Rainald/Renaud I of
Nevers [d1040] and Hedwiga [d1063], the daugther of Robert I and Constance
of Arles? For the grandaughter of a mere knight to marry the grandson of
a king, thats some example of upward mobility in the 11th century!
I've not seen what Keats Rowan says, but the net believes this Guy de
Craon came over witH William the Conqueror and became an important
landowner in Lincolnshire
by 1086. Usually on the net his death is noted as c1121, or is this a different
man/generation? If so this is quite a significant subject as many people
in the UK and i assume USA etc claim descent from the 12th century Craon
family who
founded the priory of Freston.
AIUI Berthas daughter was called Enoguena Domita and she married as you
say her stepbrother Renaud I [d1101] and their son was Maurice I
[dc1119] a name
also used by the Lincolnshire family. I assume this is 1 reason to connect them,
but the net makes Guy another son of Enoguena and Renaud [although none of their
known documents mention such a son]. Maurice is a rare name I think at this time,
but recalls Maurice [d1012] son of Geoffrey I Count of Anjou by his 2nd wife
Adelais of Chalon. I couldnt find out much about this Maurice of Anjou but
a source called the Deeds of the Counts of Anjou, claims he married the
daughter of Count Aymeric of Saintes [not heard of him?] and neptem
[that difficult
term again!] of Count Raymound of Poitiers [I dont think there was 1? Geni the
site i got this from thinks its Raymond Pons but thats unlikely]. But this same
source says Maurice was Count of Anjou, and Fulk Nerra was his son so can any
of this be believed? I couldnt find a contemporary document which called
Maurice count, unless he was regent for his nephew Fulk. Apparently
Maurice did have 2 sons, Geoffrey who was killed in about 1039 and Otger
alive in 1055.

The dating of Maurice's death to 1012 is problematic - I don't know of
evidence for this, and Bernard Bachrach asserted (also without providing
evidence) that he was still active in 1031, see *Fulk Nerra, the
Neo-Roman Consul* (1993) p. 210: "In 1031 Maurice was alive and well and
a participant in Angevin affairs." There may perhaps be a document
naming Maurice dated in the reign of Henri I (i.e. from 20 July 1031) or
this may be one of many suppositions on non-critical points that
Bachrach presented as facts.

Maurice had a son named Geoffrey who was killed at Langeais by the son
of its seigneur at an uncertain time that may be about 1039. His killer
surrendered two mills as reparation to his blood kinsman ("cognatus" -
in this case agnatic first cousin) Geoffrey Martel. There are two
notices of this in the cartulary of La Trinité de Vendôme: the first of
these misnames him Maurice instead of Geoffrey and is a later record
dated 1039 that Oliver Guillot considered a forgery on less than
fully-convincing grounds, and the second misspelling his correct name is
undated but fixes the transaction before 15 August 1052. Bachrach
implauibly suggested that Maurice had two sons, one legitimate and the
other not, both killed at the same time. In any event, Maurice was
apparently deceased beforehand, since the reparation was paid to his
nephew Geoffrey Martel rather than to him. As for the purported second
son named Otger, I don't know of any basis for his existence.

The paternity of Maurice has been questioned. He first occurs in an
Angevin source in the foundation charter of Notre-Dame de Loches that is
undated but written shortly after the construction was authorised by
King Lothair IV within the range 979/85. This is a charter of Geoffrey
Grisegonelle, subscribed by him and his sons Fulk Nerra and Maurice
without specifying their relationship but all three named in order
before the archbishop of Tours. Maurice must have been an infant or
child of no more than 5 years old at the time, since his mother was
still married to her prior husband Lambert of Chalon until February 978
(most probably - miswritten impossibly as 988 in the only proximate source).

The first occurrence of Maurice is in an undated charter of his elder
maternal half-brother Hugo, count of Chalon, issued ca 988. In this he
is called "my brother Maurice", subscribing as "Count Maurice" after
reference to Hugo's father Lambert that the editor has unhelpfully
turned into the father of both by supplying "our" instead of "my" father
(ego Hugo comes, quam mater mea Adelaydis, et frater meus Mauricius et
tam pro absolutione pii patris [nostri] Lantberti ... S. Hugonis
comitis. S. Mauricii comitis, frater ejus. S. Adeleydis, mater eorum,
comitisse, here: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k1112446/f54).

The comital title for Maurice is not consistently accorded in Hugo's
charters. Bachrach supposed that Maurice's paternal uncle Guy of Anjou,
bishop of Le Puy, somehow wrangled a joint-countship of Chalon for the
maternal half-brothers that did not stick for very long, but this is
highly uncertain. It has been surmised by many historians since the 18th
century that Maurice acted as count in Anjou during the absence/s of his
paternal half-brother Fulk Nerra on pilgrimage/s to Jerusalem, but this
too is not definite. However, he was clearly a son of Geoffrey
Grisegonelle of Anjou, since between 24 October 996 & 12 June 1005 the
(half-)brothers Fulk and Maurice disputed rights to property inherited
by Renaud, bishop of Angers, that he had donated to his cathedral,
claiming that this had been previously surrendered by his father to
theirs, Geoffroy, in order to secure his future nomination to the
bishopric (ego Rainaldus, Andecavorum episcopus, quod Fulco comes
Mauriciusque, frater ejus, calumniam mihi intulerunt de hereditate mea,
quam post tumulationem patris mei solidam et quietam tenueram, quin
etiam sanctae Dei genitrici Mariae et sancto Mauricio martiri et sancto
Maurilio confessori pro remedio animae patris mei et matris necnon meae
devoto corde concesseram, dicentes patrem meum Rainaldum eam dedisse
patri eorum Goffrido in conventiis episcopatum adipiscendi, here:
https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k91429w/f124). Along with calling
Geoffrey Martel the blood kinsman of Maurice's son (as noted above) this
leaves little room to doubt Maurice's paternity.

Peter Stewart

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Peter Stewart

2024-04-29 01:47:28 UTC