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Abstract
The use of illegitimate children to further political designs was not unusual among medieval kings, but the number of Henry I of England’s offspring was remarkable, even by contemporary standards. There is no indication that he chose his partners from the diverse racial groups within the Anglo-Norman realm as a political gesture and they were mostly taken from the same social grouping that provided his ‘new men’. Henry’s peripatetic lifestyle made the maintenance of multiple partnerships and families possible and there are signs of family solidarity among his children. Some amendments to, and new interpretations of, the Complete Peerage list of Henry’s children are given.
Keywords:
Notes
1 William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum, ed. R.A.B. Mynors, completed by R.M. Thomson and M. Winterbottom (Oxford, 1998–1999), I, 744 [WM]. An earlier version of this paper was presented in July 2000 at a Leeds International Medieval Conference session sponsored by the Haskins Society to commemorate the novocentenary of Henry I’s seizure of the English crown. I am grateful for the comments of participants at that session and particularly for the advice of Prof. Judith Green.
2 Orderic Vitalis, Ecclesiastical History, ed. Marjorie Chibnall, 6 vols (Oxford, 1969–1980), VI, 248 [OV].
3 W.L. Warren, Henry II (London, 1973), 119. D. Knowles, C.N.L. Brooke and V.C.M. London, The heads of religious houses. England and Wales 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1972), 208. A recent study which addressed the issue of illegitimate offspring was disappointing: Chris Given-Wilson and Alice Curteis, The royal bastards of medieval England (London, 1984), reviewed by Frank Barlow, History, 70 (1985), 283–284.
4 The Times, 8 March 1969, 10 h.
5 E. Searle, ‘Women and the legitimization of succession at the Norman Conquest’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 3 (1980), 169 for the quotation and 168 for her comments on Gunnhildr.
6 M.K. Lawson, Cnut: the Danes in England in the early eleventh century (London, 1993), 131 ff.
7 I.W. Rowlands, ‘The making of the march: aspects of the Norman settlement in Dyfed’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 3 (1980), 142–157. Gerald of Wales, Opera, ed. J.S. Brewer, J.F. Dimock and G.F. Warner (Rolls Series, 21, 1861–1891), I, 130. Annales Cambriae, ed. J. Williams ab Ithel (Rolls Series, 20, 1860), 47.
8 OV, VI, 40. Kathleen Thompson, Power and border lordship in medieval France: the county of the Perche, 1000–1226 (Woodbridge, 2002).
9 Eynsham Cartulary, I, ed. H.E. Salter (Oxford Historical Society, 1907), no. 65 for Ede, her husband and son; for Adeliza see Appendix A, Daughters, no. 13.
10 W.E. Kapelle, The Norman conquest of the north: the region and its transformation, 1000–1135 (London, 1979), 200 ff. Henry in the North, Regesta regum anglo-normannorum, 2, eds. C. Johnson and H.A. Cronne (Oxford, 1956), xxx. Robert of Torigni, ‘Interpolations’, The Gesta Normannorum Ducum of William of Jumièges, Orderic Vitalis and Robert of Torigni, ed. and trans. E.M.C. van Houts (Oxford, 1992–1995), 2, 250.
11 See Appendix A, Sons, no. 1.
12 Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon, ed. J. Stevenson (RS, 2, 1858), 2, 122. WM, Gesta, I, 761.
13 E.M.C. van Houts, ‘The origins of Herleva, mother of William the Conqueror’, English Historical Review, 101 (1986), 399–404.
14 Walter Map, De nugis curialium: courtiers’ trifles, ed. and trans. M.R. James, rev. C.N.L. Brooke and R.A.B. Mynors (Oxford, 1983), 478, 494; OV, V, 282.
15 WM, Gesta, I, 726: defuerat enim feminae, ut fertur, quod desideraretur, uel in morum modestia uel in corporis elegantia.
16 Eynsham Cartulary, no. 34 for Isabel’s subsequent career. Complete Peerage, X, appendix H, p. 102. Recueil des Actes de Henri II Roi d’Angleterre et Duc de Normandie concernant les provinces françaises et les affaires de France, eds. Léopold Delisle and E. Berger (Paris, 1906–1927), where no. DLXXVI is a royal confirmation of Isabel’s act, the original being Archives Départementales de la Seine-Maritime 56 HP1. I am grateful to Dr Daniel Power for his help in locating this act.
17 See Appendix A, Daughters, no. 3 for the liaison between Adelaide, consobrina of Countess Adela of Blois and one William.
18 David Crouch, The Beaumont twins: the roots and branches of power in the twelfth century (Cambridge, 1986), 25. Book of Fees, (London, 1921–1931), II, 1158 for Henry’s mistress, the sister of Walter of Gand and Hugh of Montfort-sur-Risle. OV, VI, 336 for Adelina.
19 PR 31 Henry I, ed. J. Hunter (London, 1833), 155; W. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, ed. J. Stevens (London, 1817, repr. 1846), VI, 251.
20 Pipe Roll 2–3–4 Henry II, 61, 80. Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, ed. W. Stubbs (Rolls Series, 49, 1867), I, 172. For a discussion of Herbert’s family, C.W. Hollister, ‘Origins of the English treasury’, English Historical Review, 90 (1978), 267.
21 Gerald of Wales, Opera, II, 128.
22 David Crouch, The Normans: the history of a dynasty (London, 2002), 157–165.
23 OV, II, 28. On younger sons and the life of the unmarried knight, Georges Duby, ‘Dans la France du Nord-Ouest au xiie siècle: les ‘jeunes’ dans la société aristocratique’, Annales, 19 (1964), 835–845, trans. by F.L. Cheyette as ‘In northwestern France: the ‘youth’ in twelfth-century aristocratic society’, Lordship and community in Medieval Europe: selected readings, ed. F.L. Cheyette. (Huntington, NY, 1975), 198–209.
24 On King John’s illegitimate children, W.L. Warren, King John, new ed. (New Haven, NY, 1997), 189.
25 See Appendix A, Daughters, no. 5.
26 Robert of Torigni, ‘Interpolations’, 248.
27 OV, VI, 98.
28 WM, Gesta, I, 726.
29 On the status of concubines, P. Stafford, Queen Emma and Queen Edith: queenship and women’s power in eleventh-century England (Oxford, 1997), 73–74. WM, Gesta, I, 207.
30 On prolonged bachelorhood within Henry’s own family, W.M. Aird, ‘Frustrated masculinity: the relationship between William the Conqueror and his eldest son’, in Masculinity in medieval Europe, ed. D.M. Hadley (London, 1999), 39–55, esp. 46–47.
31 See references collected in David Crouch, The reign of King Stephen 1135–1154 (Harlow, 2000), 18.
32 C.W. Hollister with T.K. Keefe, ‘The making of the Angevin empire’, Journal of British Studies, 12 (1972/1973), 5. On Abbess Matilda of Montivilliers, Chronicon Valassense, ed. F. Somménil (Rouen, 1868), 20–21. Montivilliers had been founded in the first half of the 11th century for Beatrix, the aunt of Duke Robert I, and other ducal relatives had taken the veil there: Regesta Regum Anglo-Normannorum: the acta of William I (1066–1087), ed. David Bates (Oxford, 1998), no. 212.
33 See Georges Duby, Medieval marriage: two models from twelfth-century France, trans. E. Forster (Baltimore, MD, 1978) for increasing ecclesiastical influence on marriage, coupled with a desire to restrict inheritance to a legitimate line.
34 WM, Gesta, I, 438 (Fulk), 474 (William fitz Osbern).
35 Alan Cooper, ‘‘The feet of those that bark shall be cut off’: timorous historians and the personality of Henry I’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 23 (2000), 47–67, esp. 64–65.
36 Metamorphoses, ii, 846–847.
37 Laura Wertheimer, ‘Adeliza of Louvain and Anglo-Norman queenship’, Haskins Society Journal, 7 (1995), 102–104.
38 Martin Brett, The English church under Henry I (Oxford, 1975), 75–76; Lois. L Huneycutt, ‘The idea of the perfect princess: the Life of St Margaret in the reign of Matilda II (1100–1118)’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 12 (1989), 81–97, esp. 90.
39 OV, V, 282.
40 Calendar of documents preserved in France, ed. J.H. Round (London, 1899), no. 539. Henry’s benefaction is made for the welfare of his filiorum et filiarum.
41 See Appendix A, Sons, no. 2.
42 Gerald of Wales, Opera, II, 128.
43 For the funeral, WM, Gesta, I, 513.
44 For Adeliza, the otherwise untraceable wife of Baldwin de Redvers, Charters of the Redvers family and the earldom of Devon 1090–1217, ed. Robert Bearman (Devon and Cornwall Record Society, new series, vol. 37, 1994), 24–25. In Kathleen Thompson, ‘Dowry and inheritance patterns: some examples from the descendants of Henry I’, Medieval Prosopography, 17/2 (1996), 60, I suggested that Adeliza might have been an unrecognised daughter of Henry I, but this is unlikely in the light of her son’s marriage to the daughter of Earl Reginald of Cornwall, which would then have been a marriage between cousins. Prof. Judith Green (personal communication) suggests a former partner of the king.
45 OV, VI, 278. WM, Gesta, I, 761.
46 Marjorie Chibnall, The empress Matilda: queen consort, queen mother and lady of the English (Oxford, 1991), 186.
47 Crouch, Stephen, 115. See also Appendix A, Sons, no. 3.
48 Appendix A, Daughters, no. 16. For Helias, OV, VI, 92, 162–164.
49 See Appendix A, Daughters, no. 15.
50 For details, see Appendix A, Daughters, nos. 1 and 2.
51 Hollister and Keefe, ‘The making of the Angevin empire’, 6.
52 OV, IV, 182; VI, 294.
53 OV, IV, 98.
54 Thompson, Power and border lordship, 76–77.
55 For Eustachia, see Appendix A, Daughters, no. 4. For Ermengarde’s marriage, Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, I, 347.
56 Judith Everard, Brittany and the Angevins: province and empire 1158–1203 (Cambridge, 2000), 29–31 characterises this view as ‘anti-English and misogynistic’ and suggests that Conan had clear political motives.
57 Heads of religious houses, 219; Curia Regis Rolls (London, 1949), X, 137–138; Chibnall, Empress Matilda, 165–166.
58 Reading Abbey cartularies, vol. I, ed. Brian Kemp (Camden Society, Fourth series xxxi, 1986), no. 370: pro salute…totius progeniei nobilissimi regi Henrici.
59 Book of Fees, II, 1158.
60 For John’s reputation, J. Bradbury, ‘Philip Augustus and King John: personality and history’, in: King John: new interpretations, ed. Stephen Church (Woodbridge, 1999), 352. For John’s children and their political usefulness, Warren, King John, 189.
61 David Crouch, ‘Robert of Gloucester’s mother and sexual politics in Norman Oxfordshire’, Historical Research, 72 (1999), 323–333.
62 WM, Gesta, I, 799.
63 OV, VI, 174, Regesta, II, nos. 1019, 1069.
64 CDF, no. 124.
65 S.E. Gleason, An ecclesiastical barony of the middle ages: the bishopric of Bayeux, 1066–1204 (Cambridge, MA, 1936), 25.
66 Monasticon, II, 70.
67 OV, IV, 120.
68 Donald Nicholl, Thurstan, archbishop of York (1114–1140) (York, 1964), 3–4.
69 OV, IV, 120, note 1. C.W. David, Robert Curthose (Cambridge, MA, 1920), 48–49.
70 Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum: the history of the English people, ed. and trans. Diana Greenway (Oxford, 1996), 594.
71 William Dugdale, Baronage, I, 610–611. OV, VI, 510. For examples of attestations, Charters of the Redvers family, 184, 187–188; Cartulary of Launceston Priory (Lambeth Palace MS. 719): a calendar, ed. P.L. Hull (Devon and Cornwall Record Society, new series, vol. 30, 1987), nos. 11, 27, 493, 538. For Dunstanville lands, Calendar of Charter Rolls (London, 1903–1927), II, 152–153.
72 Robert of Torigni, ‘Interpolations’, II, 250; Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, I, 172. The classic study remains, E.W. Eyton, The antiquities of Shropshire (London, 1854–1860), VII, 146 ff.
73 For the lawsuits, Curia Regis Rolls, IV, 186; VI, 176–177, 287, 296. For Alice and Walter Corbet, Redvers, 188; Curia Regis Rolls, IV, 186.
74 Eyton, Antiquities, VII, 145, 156.
75 Book of Fees, II, 1275: Item dicunt quod villa de Alencestr’ fuit francum burgum domini Henrici avi domini regis qui nunc est e idem rex dedit illud burgum Roberto Corbet pro servicio suo.
76 For Dunstanville connections with the Montgommerys, CDF, nos. 135, 1238. For Adeliza’s benefaction, Regesta, II, no. 1069 and the connection of Tewkesbury with the fitz Hamons and Sibyl of Montgommery, OV, III, 228.
77 Pipe Roll 31 Henry I, 22.
78 For the Corbets, DB, 255b and I.J. Sanders, English baronies: a study of their origins and descent 1086–1327 (Oxford, 1960), 29.
79 English Episcopal Acta, vii: Hereford, ed. Julia Barrow, nos. 23, 24. See also on Robert Corbet, Eyton, Antiquities, VII, 144–145.
80 William of Malmesbury, Historia Novella: the contemporary history, ed. Edmund King, trans. K.R. Potter (Oxford, 1998), 74.
81 Pipe Roll 13 Henry II 1166–1167, 66.
82 Judith Green, ‘Family matters: family and the formation of the empress’s party in south-west England’, in: Family trees and the roots of politics: the prosopography of Britain and France from the tenth to the twelfth century, ed. Katharine. Keats-Rohan (Woodbridge, 1997), 147–164, esp. note 63.
83 Book of Fees, II, 1158; OV, VI, 18. Henry used the church of the former Gand manor to endow Reading, Reading cartularies, I, no. 494.
84 L.C. Loyd, Origins of some Anglo-Norman families, 104–106. For William de Tracy, the benefactor of Troarn, Regesta, I, ed. Bates, no. 281/II, p. 850. For Henry in the Cotentin, OV, IV, 120.
85 Roger of Howden, Chronica, ed. W. Stubbs (Rolls series, 51, 1868–1871), II, 134–135.
86 Redvers, 187 for a charter of Earl Reginald in which he describes himself as the king’s son and which is attested by Herbert fitz Herbert and William fratre meo.
87 Early Scottish Charters Prior to AD 1153, ed. A. Lawrie (Glasgow, 1905), nos. XXXVI, XLIX. Acts of Malcolm IV King of Scots 1153–1165, together with Scottish Royal Acts prior to 1153 not included in Sir Archibald Lawrie’s Early Scottish Charters, ed. G.W.S. Barrow (Edinburgh, 1960), 36.
88 Brett, English church under Henry I, 175, but this possibility is discounted by the editor of Bishop Alexander’s acts, English episcopal acta, I: Lincoln 1067–1185, ed. D.M. Smith (Oxford, 1980), 40: ‘it might be expected that a royal bastard would have had a greater precedence in the witness list.’
89 Saint-Denis de Nogent-le-Rotrou, ed. Charles Métais (Vannes, 1894), no. LXI for Matilda as daughter of the king; nos. XI, LXXIV, LXXXVIII and Cartulaire de l’abbaye de la Sainte-Trinité de Tiron, ed. Lucien Merlet (Chartres, 1883), no. CVI for the continuing importance of the dowager countess. BL Cotton Vespasian MS F xv, f. 171v for the benefaction.
90 OV, II, 352, VI, 180. André Chédeville and N.-Y. Tonnerre, La Bretagne féodale XIe-XIIIe siècle (Rennes, 1987), 69. In 1118 Conan’s mother was given the title of countess and took precedence over ‘the count’s wife’, Matilda, François Comte, L’Abbaye Toussaint d’Angers des origines à 1330: étude historique et cartulaire (Angers, 1985), no. 61.
91 OV, VI, 40, 44. Eustace was probably the product of a liaison between William of Breteuil and Henry I’s cousin, Adelaide, Ivo, Epistola 8, Recueil des historiens de France, XV, 70. Dr Lo Prete identifies the Adelaide of Ivo’s letter with Adeliza, wife of Ralph of Tosny and granddaughter of the Conqueror’s sister, Adelaide: Kimberly Lo Prete, ‘Adela of Blois and Ivo of Chartres: piety, politics and the peace in the diocese of Chartres’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 14 (1991), 135, n. 18. However, she is more likely to have been Adeliza’s aunt, the daughter of Adelaide and the Count of Ponthieu, since the liaison must have taken place in the 1080s to have produced a son, Eustace, who was an adult by the opening years of the 12th century. Alternatively she may have been a daughter of Adelaide of Normandy and her second husband, Lambert of Lens, since the name Eustace was part of Lambert’s family naming stock.
92 OV, VI, 278. Bibliothèque Nationale, ms. lat. 5480, p. 278. Grand cartulaire de Fontevraud, ed. J.-M. Bienvenu avec la collaboration de Robert Favreau et Georges Pon, tom. 1 (Poitiers, 2000), nos. 473, 223.
93 Nogent-le-Rotrou, no. XL. OV, II, 122; VI, 176 ff. Thompson, Power and border lordship, 38 ff.
94 See Daughters, no. 15 subsequently. OV, VI, 176 for Henry’s precautions against Châteauneuf-en-Thymerais.
95 Kathleen Thompson, ‘The formation of the county of Perche: the rise and fall of the house of Gouet’, 313, n. 62.
96 Cartulaires de l’abbaye de Molesme, ed. Jacques Laurent (Paris, 1907), no. 663. For the Nogent acts, Nogent-le-Rotrou, nos. VIII and XII.
97 OV, VI, 444; Evêché de Sées, Livre rouge du chapitre de Sées, fo. 78. Thompson, ‘Dowry and inheritance patterns’, 49 and the references given there.
98 Obituaires de la Province de Sens, tome II, ed. A. Molinier and A. Longnon (Paris, 1906), 241. Recueil des actes de Louis VI roi de France 1108–1137, ed. J. Dufour (Paris, 1992–1994), II, 479 note l.
99 Early Scottish Charters, nos. LXXIV, CCIX.
100 Judith Green, ‘David I and Henry I’, Scottish Historical Review, 75 (1996), 9, 14.
101 Chibnall, Empress Matilda, 186.
102 Pipe Roll 31 Henry I, 22. Robert of Torigni, ‘Interpolations’, II, 249.
103 Kathleen Cooke, ‘Donors and daughters: Shaftesbury Abbey’s benefactors, endowments and nuns c. 1087–1130’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 12 (1989), 32.
104 Redvers, 187–188. Earl Reginald’s charter to Rohese is witnessed by his brothers, Herbert fitz Herbert and William.
105 C.W. Hollister, ‘Anglo-Norman war and diplomacy’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 6 (1983), 81, fn. 66 a; W.E. Wightman, The Lacy family in England and Normandy 1066–1194 (Oxford, 1966), 66–67.
106 Eynsham Cartulary, I, no. 64.
107 G.W.S. Barrow, Robert Bruce and the community of the realm of Scotland (London, 1965), 36, n. 2.
108 R.D. Oram, ‘A family business? Colonisation and settlement in twelfth- and thirteenth-century Galloway’, Scottish Historical Review, 72 (1993), 115–116.
109 S. Anselmi Cantuariensis archiepiscopi opera omnia, ed. F.S. Schmitt (1946–1951), V, 369–370; C.W. Hollister, ‘The greater Domesday tenants-in-chief’ in: Domesday studies: papers read at the Novocentenary Conference of the Royal Historical Society and the Institute of British Geographers, Winchester, 1986, ed. J.C. Holt (Woodbridge, 1987), 236, n. 82.
110 Ivo of Chartres, Epistola cclxi, RHF, XV, 167.
111 OV, VI, 332.
112 Regesta, II, no. 1923; Frank Barlow, Thomas Becket (London, 1986), 236.
113 OV, VI, 78–82, 90–92
114 OV, VI, 38.