Baldwin Fitzgilbert

Notes:

Gilbert (or Giselbert) de Brionne, Count of Eu and of Brionne (c. 1000 – c. 1040), was an influential nobleman in the Duchy of Normandy in Northern France. He was one of the early guardians of Duke William II in his minority, and a first cousin to William's father Duke Robert. Had Lord Brionne not been murdered, the senior house of de Clare would probably have been titled de Brionne. Lord Brionne was the first to be known by the cognomen Crispin because of his hair style which stood up like the branches of a pine tree.

Gilbert de Brionne was son of Geoffrey, Count of Eu (otherwise cited as 'Godfrey'), who was an illegitimate child of Richard I of Normandy. He inherited Brionne, becoming one of the most powerful landowners in Normandy. Gilbert was a generous benefactor to Bec Abbey founded by his former knight Herluin in 1031. When Robert I died in 1035, his illegitimate son William inherited his father's title and several powerful nobles, including Gilbert of Brionne, Osbern the Seneschal and Alan of Brittany, became William's guardians.

A number of Norman barons, including Ralph de Gacé, refused to accept William as their leader. In 1040 an attempt was made to kill William but the plot failed. Gilbert however was murdered while he was peaceably riding near Eschafour. It is believed two of his killers were Ralph of Wacy and Robert de Vitot. This appears to have been an act of vengeance for the wrongs inflicted upon the orphan children of Giroie by Gilbert, and it is not clear what Ralph de Gacé had to do in the business. Fearing they might meet their father's fate, Gilbert's sons Richard and Baldwin were conveyed by their friends to the court of Baldwin V, Count of Flanders. Gilbert's children would accompany Duke William on his conquest of England and his descendants would become one of the most powerful noble families in the British isles. They would rule over vast lands in modern-day Ireland, Scotland, and England and become powerful Marcher Lords.

The name of the wife of Gilbert de Brionne is not known; however, they were known to have the following children:
Sir Richard fitz Gilbert (Richard de Clare) (bef. 1035 – c. 1090), m. Rohese Giffard (1034 – aft. 1113), daughter of Walter Giffard, Lord of Longueville[9]
Baldwin FitzGilbert (d. 1090)[5]
William (died after 29 August 1060)
Adela (died August 1092), m. Neel II, Viscount of Cotentin (fr)
Emma, m. Hugh de Waft[10]
Hesilia, m. William Malet, Honour of Eye[11]
Through his eldest son, Gilbert was ancestor of the English house of de Clare, of the Barons FitzWalter, and the Earls of Gloucester and Hertford. After Gilbert's death, his uncle William I became Count of Eu whereas Brionne reverted to duke.

Gilbert and an unknown woman had the following children:
Osbern of Cailly (c. 1020 – c. 1090), m. Hildeburge of Beaudemont[b]

Gilbert married Gunnora D'aunou, , , England. Gunnora was born about 984 in , , , France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Geoffrey of Brionne (mid-10th century – 1015), also called Godfrey was Count of Eu and Brionne in the late tenth and early eleventh centuries.

He was a son of Duke Richard I of Normandy, by an unnamed wife or concubine. The county of Eu was an appanage created for Geoffrey by his half-brother Richard II of Normandy in 996 as part of Richard's policy of granting honors and titles for cadet members of his family. The citadel of Eu played a critical part of the defense of Normandy; the castle and walled town were on the river Bresle, just two miles from the English Channel. It had long been an embarkation point for England and in time of war was often one of the first places attacked.

The castle of Brionne had been held by the Dukes of Normandy as one of their own homes but Richard II also made a gift of Brionne to his half-brother Geoffrey, who held it for life passing it to his son Gilbert and was only returned to the demesne of the Duke after his murder.

Both Geoffrey and his son Gilbert are styled counts in a diploma to Lisieux given by Duke Richard II, but without territorial designations. Geoffrey died c. 1010.

Geoffrey was married but the name of his wife is unknown. He was the father of:
Gilbert, Count of Eu and Brionne
Upon his death, Geoffrey was succeeded as Count of Eu and Count of Brionne by his son Gilbert.

While there is little doubt Geoffrey (Godfrey) was Count of Eu, there is an open question as to whether Geoffrey was ever "Count" of Brionne. See: Douglas, Earliest Norman Counts, EHS 61, No. 240 (1946), p.134.

The early Normans followed the Viking custom of marriage called mos danicus that they considered a legitimate form of marriage. It was the Church that considered this the same as concubinage. Legitimacy would not have been an issue at this time.

Orderic in a speech attributed to Roger, Count of Mullent to Robert II, Duke of Normandy, in asking for the castle of Brionne stated that it was Duke Richard the elder (I) who gave Brionne to his son Geoffrey (Godfrey). See Ordericus Vitalis, Ecclesiastical History, Trans. Forester, Vol. II (1854),

Count married Geoffrey Countess Brionne. Geoffrey was born in 958 in , Normandy, France; and died. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Married: Abt 952, , Basse-Normandie, France

Notes:

Richard I (28 August 932 – 20 November 996), also known as Richard the Fearless (French: Richard Sans-Peur; Old Norse: Jarl Richart), was the Count of Rouen or Jarl of Rouen from 942 to 996. Dudo of Saint-Quentin, whom Richard commissioned to write the "De moribus et actis primorum Normanniae ducum" (Latin, "On the Customs and Deeds of the First Dukes of Normandy"), called him a Dux. However, this use of the word may have been in the context of Richard's renowned leadership in war, and not as a reference to a title of nobility. Richard either introduced feudalism into Normandy or he greatly expanded it. By the end of his reign, the most important Norman landholders held their lands in feudal tenure.

Richard was born to William Longsword, princeps (chieftain or ruler) of Normandy, and Sprota. His mother was a Breton concubine captured in war and bound to William by a more danico marriage. He was also the grandson of the famous Rollo. William was told of the birth of a son after the battle with Riouf and other Viking rebels, but his existence was kept secret until a few years later when William Longsword first met his son Richard. After kissing the boy and declaring him his heir, William sent Richard to be raised in Bayeux. Richard was about ten years old when his father was killed on 17 December 942. After William was killed, Sprota became the wife of Esperleng, a wealthy miller. Rodulf of Ivry was their son and Richard's half-brother.

With the death of Richard's father in 942, King Louis IV of France installed the boy, Richard, in his father's office. Under the influence of Arnulf I, Count of Flanders, the king took him into Frankish territory and placing him in the custody of the count of Ponthieu before the king reneged and seized the lands of the Duchy of Normandy. He then split up the duchy, giving its lands in lower Normandy to Hugh the Great. Louis IV thereafter kept Richard in close confinement at Lâon, but the youth escaped from imprisonment with assistance of Osmond de Centville, Bernard de Senlis, Ivo de Bellèsme, and Bernard the Dane.

In 946, at the age of 14, Richard allied himself with the Norman and Viking leaders in France and with men sent by King Harold of Denmark. A battle was fought after which Louis IV was captured. Hostages were taken and held until King Louis recognised Richard as Duke, returning Normandy to him. Richard agreed to "commend" himself to Hugh, the Count of Paris, Hugh resolved to form a permanent alliance with Richard and promised his daughter Emma, who was just a child, as a bride; the marriage would take place in 960.

Louis, working with Arnulf, persuaded Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor to attack Richard and Hugh. The combined armies of Otto, Arnulf, and Louis were driven from the gates of Rouen, fleeing to Amiens and being decisively defeated in 947. A period of peace ensued, Louis dying in 954, 13 year old Lothair becoming king. The middle-aged Hugh appointed Richard as guardian of his 15-year-old son, Hugh Capet in 955.

In 962, Theobald I, Count of Blois, attempted a renewed invasion of Rouen, Richard's stronghold, but his troops were summarily routed by Normans under Richard's command, and forced to retreat before ever having crossed the Seine river. Lothair, the king of the West Franks, was fearful that Richard's retaliation could destabilize a large part of West Francia so he stepped in to prevent any further war between the two. In 987, Hugh Capet became King of the Franks.

For the last 30 years until his death in 996 in Fécamp, Richard concentrated on Normandy itself, and participated less in Frankish politics and its petty wars. In lieu of building up the Norman Empire by expansion, he stabilized the realm and reunited the Normans, forging the reclaimed Duchy of his father and grandfather into West Francia's most cohesive and formidable principality.

Richard used marriage to build strong alliances. His marriage to Emma of Paris connected him directly to the House of Capet. His second wife, Gunnor, from a rival Viking group in the Cotentin, formed an alliance to that group, while her sisters formed the core group that were to provide loyal followers to him and his successors.

His daughters forged valuable marriage alliances with powerful neighboring counts as well as to the king of England. Emma married firstly Æthelred the Unready and after his death in 1016, the invader, Cnut the Great. Her children included Edward the Confessor, Alfred Aetheling and with Cnut, Harthacnut, so completing a major link between the Duke of Normandy and the Crown of England that would add validity to the claim by William the Conqueror to the throne of England.

Richard also built on his relationship with the church, undertaking acts of piety, restoring their lands and ensuring the great monasteries flourished in Normandy. His further reign was marked by an extended period of peace and tranquility.

Richard's first marriage in 960 was to Emma, daughter of Hugh the Great, and Hedwige of Saxony. They were betrothed when both were very young. She died after 19 March 968, with no issue.

According to Robert of Torigni, not long after Emma's death, Duke Richard went out hunting and stopped at the house of a local forester. He became enamored with the forester's wife, Seinfreda, but she was a virtuous woman and suggested he court her unmarried sister, Gunnor, instead. Gunnor became his mistress and her family rose to prominence. Her brother, Herfast de Crepon, may have been involved in a controversial heresy trial. Gunnor was, like Richard, of Viking descent, being a Dane by blood. Richard finally married her to legitimize their children:

Richard II "the Good", Duke of Normandy[1]
Robert, Archbishop of Rouen, Count of Evreux[1]
Mauger, Count of Corbeil[1]
Robert Danus, died between 985 and 989[23]
another son[23]
Emma of Normandy, wife of two kings of England[1]
Maud of Normandy, wife of Odo II of Blois, Count of Blois, Champagne and Chartres[1]
Hawise of Normandy m. Geoffrey I, Duke of Brittany[1]

Illegitimate children
Richard was known to have had several other mistresses and had children with many of them. Known children are:

Geoffrey, Count of Eu[1][24]
William, Count of Eu (ca. 972-26 January 1057/58),[24] m. Lasceline de Turqueville (d. 26 January 1057/58).
Beatrice of Normandy, Abbess of Montivilliers d.1034 m. Ebles of Turenne[1] (d.1030 (divorced)
Possible children
Muriella, married Tancred de Hauteville[1][25][26]
Fressenda or Fredesenda (ca. 995-ca. 1057), second wife of Tancred de Hauteville.[1][26][27]
Guimara (Wimarc(a)) (b. circa 986), died Abbey of Montivilliers, Seine-Inferieure, Normandy, wife of Ansfred (Ansfroi) II "le Dane" le Goz, vicomte of Exmes and Falaise, mother of Robert FitzWimarc Papia

Richard married concubine of Richard I deNormandy. concubine was born in 937 in , Basse-Normandie, France; died in 1033 in Fecamp, Normandie, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Married: , Normandy, France

Notes:

William Longsword (French: Guillaume Longue-Épée, Latin: Willermus Longa Spata, Old Norse: Vilhjálmr Langaspjót; c. 893 – 17 December 942) was the second ruler of Normandy, from 927 until his assassination in 942.

He is sometimes anachronistically dubbed "Duke of Normandy", even though the title duke (dux) did not come into common usage until the 11th century. Longsword was known at the time by the title Count of Rouen. Flodoard, always detailed about titles, consistently referred to both Rollo and his son William as principes (chieftains) of the Norse.

William Longsword was born "overseas" to the Viking Rollo (while he was still a pagan) and his Christian wife Poppa of Bayeux. Dudo of Saint-Quentin in his panegyric of the Norman dukes describes Poppa as the daughter of a Count Berengar, the dominant prince of that region. In the 11th-century Annales Rouennaises (Annals of Rouen), she is called the daughter of Guy, Count of Senlis, otherwise unknown to history. Despite the uncertainty of her parentage she was undoubtedly a member of the Frankish aristocracy. According to the Longsword's planctus, he was baptized a Christian probably at the same time as his father, which Orderic Vitalis stated was in 912, by Franco, Archbishop of Rouen.

Willliam succeeded Rollo (who would continue to live for about another 5 years) in 927 and, early in his reign, faced a rebellion from Normans who felt he had become too Gallicised and too soft. According to Orderic Vitalis, the leader was Riouf of Evreux, who was besieging William in Rouen. Sallying forth, William won a decisive battle, proving his authority to be duke. At the time of this 933 rebellion William sent his pregnant wife by custom, Sprota, to Fécamp where their son Richard was born.

In 933 William recognized Raoul as King of Western Francia, who was struggling to assert his authority in Northern France. In turn, Raoul gave him lordship over much of the lands of the Bretons including Avranches, the Cotentin Peninsula and the Channel Islands. The Bretons did not agree to these changes and resistance to the Normans was led by Alan II, Duke of Brittany, and Count Berenger of Rennes but ended shortly with great slaughter and Breton castles being razed to the ground, Alan fled to England and Beranger sought reconciliation.

In 935, William married Luitgarde, daughter of Count Herbert II of Vermandois whose dowry gave him the lands of Longueville, Coudres and Illiers l'Eveque. He also contracted a marriage between his sister Adela (Gerloc was her Norse name) and William, Count of Poitou, with the approval of Hugh the Great. In addition to supporting King Raoul, he was now a loyal ally of his father-in-law, Herbert II, both of whom his father Rollo had opposed. In January 936 King Raoul died and the 16-year-old Louis IV, who was living in exile in England, was persuaded by a promise of loyalty by William, to return and became king. The Bretons returned to recover the lands taken by the Normans, resulting in fighting in the expanded Norman lands.

The new king was not capable of controlling his Barons and after William's brother-in-law, Herluin II, Count of Montreuil, was attacked by Flanders, William went to their assistance in 939, Arnulf I, Count of Flanders retaliated by attacking Normandy. Arnulf captured the castle of Montreuil-sur-Mer expelling Herluin. Herluin and William cooperated to retake the castle. William was excommunicated for his actions in attacking and destroying several estates belonging to Arnulf.

William pledged his loyalty to King Louis IV when they met in 940 and, in return, he was confirmed in lands that had been given to his father, Rollo. In 941 a peace treaty was signed between the Bretons and Normans, brokered in Rouen by King Louis IV which limited the Norman expansion into Breton lands. The following year, on 17 December 942 at Picquigny on an island on the Somme, William was ambushed and killed by followers of Arnulf while at a peace conference to settle their differences.

William had no children with his wife Luitgarde. He fathered his son, Richard, with Sprota who was a Breton captive and his concubine. Richard, then aged 10, succeeded as Duke of Normandy upon William's death in December 942.

William married Sprota deBreton in 932 in , Normandy, France. Sprota was born on 28 Aug 911 in , Vermandois, France; died on 12 Dec 940 in , Vermandois, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Rollo or Gaange Rolf (Old Norse: Hrólfr; French: Rollon; c. 860 – c. 930 AD) was a Viking who became the first ruler of Normandy, a region in northern France. He is sometimes called the first Duke of Normandy. His son and grandson, William Longsword and Richard I, used the titles "count" (Latin comes or consul) and "prince" (princeps). His great-grandson Richard II was the first to officially use the title of Duke of Normandy. His Scandinavian name Rolf was extended to Gaange Rolf because he became too heavy as an adult for a horse to carry; therefore he had to walk (ganga in older Dano-Norwegian). Rollo emerged as the outstanding personality among the Norsemen who had secured a permanent foothold on Frankish soil in the valley of the lower Seine. Charles the Simple, the king of West Francia, ceded them lands between the mouth of the Seine and what is now Rouen in exchange for Rollo agreeing to end his brigandage, and provide the Franks with protection against future Viking raids.

Rollo is first recorded as the leader of these Viking settlers in a charter of 918, and he continued to reign over the region of Normandy until at least 928. He was succeeded by his son William Longsword in the Duchy of Normandy that he had founded. The offspring of Rollo and his followers became known as the Normans. After the Norman conquest of England and their conquest of southern Italy and Sicily over the following two centuries, their descendants came to rule Norman England (the House of Normandy), the Kingdom of Sicily (the Kings of Sicily) as well as the Principality of Antioch from the 10th to 12th century.

The name Rollo is generally presumed to be a latinisation of the Old Norse name Hrólfr – a theory that is supported by the rendition of Hrólfr as Roluo in the Gesta Danorum. It is also sometimes suggested that Rollo may be a Latinised version of another Norse name, Hrollaugr.

Rollo is generally identified with one Viking in particular – a man of high social status mentioned in Icelandic sagas, which refer to him by the Old Norse name Göngu-Hrólfr, meaning "Hrólfr the Walker" (also widely known by an Old Danish variant, Ganger-Hrolf). The byname "Walker" is usually understood to suggest that Rollo was so physically imposing that he could not be carried by a horse and was obliged to travel on foot. Norman and other French sources do not use the name Hrólfr, and the identification of Rollo with Göngu-Hrólfr is based upon similarities between circumstances and actions ascribed to both figures.

The 10th-century Norman historian Dudo records that Rollo took the baptismal name Robert. A variant spelling, Rou, is used in the 12th-century Norman French verse chronicle Roman de Rou, which was compiled by Wace and commissioned by King Henry II of England, a descendant of Rollo.

Rollo was born in the mid 9th century; his place of birth is unknown. The earliest well-attested historical event associated with Rollo is his leadership of Vikings who besieged Paris in 885–886.

Medieval sources contradict each other regarding whether Rollo's family was Norwegian or Danish in origin. In part, this disparity may result from the indifferent and interchangeable usage in Europe, at the time, of terms such as "Vikings", "Northmen", "Swedes", "Danes", "Norwegians" and so on (in the Medieval Latin texts Dani vel Nortmanni means "Danes or Northmen").

A biography of Rollo, written by the cleric Dudo of Saint-Quentin in the late 10th century, claimed that Rollo was from Denmark. One of Rollo's great-grandsons and a contemporary of Dudo was known as Robert the Dane. However, Dudo's Historia Normannorum (or Libri III de moribus et actis primorum Normanniae ducum) was commissioned by Rollo's grandson, Richard I of Normandy and – while Dudo likely had access to family members and/or other people with a living memory of Rollo – this fact must be weighed against the text's potential biases, as an official biography. According to Dudo, an unnamed king of Denmark was antagonistic to Rollo's family, including his father – an unnamed Danish nobleman – and Rollo's brother Gurim. Following the death of their father, Gurim was killed and Rollo was forced to leave Denmark. Dudo appears to have been the main source for William of Jumièges (after 1066) and Orderic Vitalis (early 12th century), although both include additional details.

A Norwegian background for Rollo was first explicitly claimed by Goffredo Malaterra (Geoffrey Malaterra), an 11th-century Benedictine monk and historian, who wrote: "Rollo sailed boldly from Norway with his fleet to the Christian coast." Likewise, the 12th-century English historian William of Malmesbury stated that Rollo was "born of noble lineage among the Norwegians".

A chronicler named Benoît (probably Benoît de Sainte-More) wrote in the mid-12th-century Chronique des ducs de Normandie that Rollo had been born in a town named "Fasge". This has since been variously interpreted as referring to Faxe, in Sjælland (Denmark), Fauske, in Hålogaland (Norway), or perhaps a more obscure settlement that has since been abandoned or renamed. Benoît also repeated the claim that Rollo had been persecuted by a local ruler and had fled from there to "Scanza island", by which Benoît probably means Scania (Swedish Skåne). While Faxe was physically much closer to Scania, the mountainous scenery of "Fasge", described by Benoît, would seem to be more like Fauske. Benoît says elsewhere in the Chronique des ducs de Normandie that Rollo is Danish.

The claim that Rollo was the brother of a King of Norway, Harald Finehair, was made by an anonymous 12th-century Welsh author, in The Life of Gruffudd ap Cynan.

Rollo was first explicitly identified with Hrólf the Walker (Norse Göngu-Hrólfr; Danish Ganger-Hrólf) by the 13th-century Icelandic sagas, Heimskringla and Orkneyinga Saga. Hrólf the Walker was so named because he "was so big that no horse could carry him". The Icelandic sources claim that Hrólfr was born in Trondhjem (now known as Trondheim) in western Norway, in the late 9th century and that his parents were the Norwegian jarl Rognvald Eysteinsson ("Rognvald the Wise") and a noblewoman from Møre named Hildr Hrólfsdóttir. However, these claims were made three centuries after the history commissioned by Rollo's own grandson.

There may be circumstantial evidence for kinship between Rollo and his historical contemporary, Ketill Flatnose, King of the Isles – a Norse realm centred on the Western Isles of Scotland. If, as Richer suggested, Rollo's father was also named Ketill and as Dudo suggested, Rollo had a brother named Gurim, such names are onomastic evidence for a family connection: Icelandic sources name Ketill Flatnose's father as Björn Grímsson, and "Grim" – the implied name of Ketill Flatnose's paternal grandfather – was likely cognate with Gurim. In addition, both Irish and Icelandic sources suggest that Rollo, as a young man, visited or lived in Scotland, where he had a daughter named Cadlinar (Kaðlín; Kathleen). Ketill Flatnose's ancestors were said to have come from Møre – Rollo's ancestral home in the Icelandic sources. Ketill was a common name in Norse societies, as were names like Gurim and Grim.

Dudo tells us that Rollo seized Rouen in 876. He is supported by the contemporary chronicler Flodoard, who records that Robert of the Breton March waged a campaign against the Vikings, who nearly levelled Rouen and other settlements; eventually, he conceded "certain coastal provinces" to them.

According to Dudo, Rollo struck up a friendship in England with a king that Dudo calls Alstem. This has puzzled many historians, but recently the puzzle has been resolved by recognition that this refers to Guthrum, the Danish leader whom Alfred the Great baptised with the baptismal name Athelstan, and then recognised as king of the East Angles in 880.

Dudo records that when Rollo took Bayeux by force, he carried off with him the beautiful Popa or Poppa, a daughter of Berenger, Count of Rennes, took her in marriage and with her had their son and Rollo's heir, William Longsword. There are few contemporary mentions of Rollo. The earliest record is from 918, in a charter of Charles III to an abbey, which referred to an earlier grant to "the Normans of the Seine", namely "Rollo and his associates" for "the protection of the kingdom." Dudo retrospectively stated that this pact took place in 911 at Saint-Clair-sur-Epte. In return for formal recognition of the lands he possessed, Rollo agreed to be baptised and assist the king in the defence of the realm. Rollo took the baptismal name Robert, as it was custom to take the name of godfather. The seal of agreement was to be marriage between Rollo and Gisla, daughter of Charles. Dudo claims that Gisla was a legitimate daughter of Charles. Since Charles first married in 907, that would mean that Gisla was at most 5 years old at the time of the treaty of 911 which offered her in marriage. It has therefore been speculated that she could have been an illegitimate daughter. However a diplomatic child betrothal need not be doubted.

After pledging his fealty to Charles III as part of the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, Rollo divided the lands between the rivers Epte and Risle among his chieftains, and settled with a de facto capital in Rouen.

When Rollo had been given Rouen and its hinterland in return for his alliance with the Franks, it was agreed upon that it was both in his and his Frankish allies’ interest to extend his authority over Viking settlers. This would appear to be the motive for later concessions to the Vikings of the Seine, which are mentioned in other records of the time. When King Charles the Simple abdicated the throne to Rudolph of France, Rollo felt that his pledge and oaths to the kings of France null and void, and began raiding in the west to expand his territory, putting pressure on other rulers to propose another compromise. The need for an agreement was particularly urgent when Robert the Strong, successor of Charles the Simple, was killed by the Viking army of Brittany in 924. Rudolph is recorded as sponsoring a new agreement by which a group of Northmen were conceded the provinces of the Bessin and Maine. These Northmen were presumed to be Rollo and his associates, moving their authority westward from the Seine valley. It is still unclear as to whether Rollo was being given lordship over the Vikings already settled in the region in order to domesticate and restrain them, or was given lordship over the Franks around Bayeux in order to protect them from other Viking leaders settled in eastern Brittany and the Cotentin peninsula.

Rollo died sometime between a final mention of him by Flodoard in 928, and 933, the year in which a third grant of land, usually identified as being the Cotentin and Avranchin areas, was made to his son and successor William.

Rollo's son and heir, William Longsword, and grandchild, Richard the Fearless, forged the Duchy of Normandy into West Francia's most cohesive and formidable principality. The descendants of Rollo and his men assimilated with their maternal Frankish-Catholic culture and became known as the Normans, lending their name to the region of Normandy.

Rollo is the great-great-great-grandfather of William the Conqueror, or William I of England. Through William, he is one of the ancestors of the present-day British royal family, as well as an ancestor of all current European monarchs and a great many claimants to abolished European thrones.

One daughter of Rollo, Gerloc (also known as Adele), who married William III, Duke of Aquitaine, was mentioned by Dudo. According to William of Jumièges, writing in the latter half of the 11th century, Gerloc's mother was named Poppa.

According to the medieval Irish text An Banshenchas and Icelandic sources, another daughter, Cadlinar (Kaðlín; Kathleen) was born in Scotland (probably to a Scots mother) and married an Irish prince named Beollán mac Ciarmaic, later King of South Brega (Lagore). A daughter of Cadlinar and Beollán named Nithbeorg was abducted by an Icelandic Viking named Helgi Ottarsson, and became the mother of the poet Einarr Helgason and grandmother of Guðrún Ósvífrsdóttir (protagonist of the Laxdœla saga).

A genetic investigation into the remains of Rollo's grandson, Richard the Fearless, and his great-grandson, Richard the Good, was announced in 2011 with the intention of discerning the origins of the historic Viking leader. On 29 February 2016 Norwegian researchers opened Richard the Good's tomb and found his lower jaw with eight teeth in it.[46] Unfortunately, the skeletal remains in both graves turned out to significantly predate Rollo and therefore are not related to him.

After Rollo's death, his male-line descendants continued to rule Normandy until 1204, when it was lost by John Lackland to the French King Philip Augustus. Rollo's dynasty was able to survive through a combination of ruthless military actions and infighting among the Frankish aristocracy, which left them severely weakened and unable to combat the Rouen Vikings' growing determination to stay put.

Rollo married Poppa De Valois in 891 in Castle St Cler, Normandy, France. Poppa was born in 872 in Evreux, Rouen, Seine-Maritime, France; died in 930 in , Normandy, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]