Geoffrey De Meschines

Ranulf married Maud D' Avranches about 1069 in , Normandy, France. Maud was born about 1054 in Avranches, Normandy, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

The Battle of Val-ès-Dunes was fought in 1047 by the combined forces of William, Duke of Normandy and King Henry I of France against the forces of several rebel Norman barons, led by Gui of Burgundy (Gui of Brionne), the son of Reginald I, Count of Burgundy. As a result of winning the battle, William (later William the Conqueror) was able to retain his title and maintain control over the western half of his duchy.

Ranulf, killed in battle Val-es-Dunes 1047, son of Anschitil. Guillaume II Duke of Normandy donated "nostras insulas Serc et Aurrene, propter medietatem Grenere" to the abbey of Mont-Saint-Michel, supported by "Rannulfo filio Anschitilli", by charter dated to 1042. Vicomte du Bessin (Bayeux). Guillaume de Poitou records that "Randulfum Baiocensium vicecomitem" supported "Guido filius Burgundionum comitis" in his rebellion, dated to 1047. "…Rannulfi filii Ascelini" witnessed the charter dated to [1047 or before] under which Guillaume II Duke of Normandy confirmed the donation by "Adelelmi…Beatricis uxor eius…Rotberti filius eius" to the abbey of Mont-Saint-Michel. Orderic Vitalis records that "Ranulfum Bajocensem ac Haymonem Dentatum et Nigellum de Constantino" rebelled against Guillaume II Duke of Normandy at the battle "apud Vallesdunas".

m ALIX de Normandie, illegitimate daughter of Richard III Duke of Normandy & his mistress. Robert of Torigny names "Nicolaum…duas filias Papiam…uxorem Walterii de Sancto Walerico et Aeliz uxorem Ranulfi vicecomitis de Baiocis" as the children of "Ricardo secundo duce Normannum filio primi Ricardi". Vicomte Ranulf & his wife had one child.

Uncertain date of death. Above states he died in the battle Val-es-Dunes 10 Aug 1047. But his children are shown being born after that.

Ranulf married Alix De Normandy, , , France. Alix (daughter of Richard III De Normandie and Mrs. Richard-Iii, Concubine Of Normandie) was born about 1021 in , Normandy, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Richard + Mrs. Richard-Iii, Concubine Of Normandie. Mrs. was born about 1000 in , Normandy, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Richard II (died 28 August 1026), called the Good (French: Le Bon), was the eldest son and heir of Richard I the Fearless and Gunnor. He was a Norman nobleman of the House of Normandy. He was the paternal grandfather of William the Conqueror. Richard succeeded his father as Duke of Normandy in 996. During his minority, the first five years of his reign (suggesting he was born between 980 and 990), his regent was Count Rodulf of Ivry, his uncle, who wielded the power and put down a peasant insurrection at the beginning of Richard's reign.

Richard had deep religious interests and found he had much in common with Robert II of France, who he helped militarily against the duchy of Burgundy. He forged a marriage alliance with Brittany by marrying his sister Hawise to Geoffrey I, Duke of Brittany and by his own marriage to Geoffrey's sister, Judith of Brittany.

In 1000–1001, Richard repelled an English attack on the Cotentin Peninsula that was led by Ethelred II of England. Ethelred had given orders that Richard be captured, bound and brought to England. But the English had not been prepared for the rapid response of the Norman cavalry and were defeated at the Battle of Val-de-Saire.

Richard attempted to improve relations with England through his sister Emma of Normandy's marriage to King Ethelred. This marriage was significant in that it later gave his grandson, William the Conqueror, the basis of his claim to the throne of England. The improved relations proved to be beneficial to Ethelred when in 1013 Sweyn Forkbeard invaded England. Emma with her two sons Edward and Alfred fled to Normandy followed shortly thereafter by her husband king Ethelred. Soon after the death of Ethelred, Cnut, King of England forced Emma to marry him while Richard was forced to recognize the new regime as his sister was again Queen. Richard had contacts with Scandinavian Vikings throughout his reign. He employed Viking mercenaries and concluded a treaty with Sweyn Forkbeard who was en route to England.

Richard II commissioned his clerk and confessor, Dudo of Saint-Quentin, to portray his ducal ancestors as morally upright Christian leaders who built Normandy despite the treachery of their overlords and neighboring principalities. It was clearly a work of propaganda designed to legitimize the Norman settlement, and while it contains numerous historically unreliable legends, as respects the reigns of his father and grandfather, Richard I and William I it is basically reliable.

In 1025 and 1026 Richard confirmed gifts of his great-grandfather Rollo to Saint-Ouen at Rouen. His other numerous grants to monastic houses tends to indicate the areas over which Richard had ducal control, namely Caen, the Éverecin, the Cotentin, the Pays de Caux and Rouen.

Richard II died 28 Aug 1026. his eldest son, Richard becoming the new duke.

He married first, around 1000, Judith (982–1017), daughter of Conan I of Brittany, with whom he had the following children:

Richard (c. 997/1001), duke of Normandy[1]
Robert (1000), duke of Normandy[1]
Alice of Normandy (c. 1003/5), married Renaud I, Count of Burgundy[1]
William (c. 1007/9), monk at Fécamp, d. 1025, buried at Fécamp Abbey[1][15]
Eleanor (c. 1011/3), married to Baldwin IV, Count of Flanders
Matilda (c. 1013/5), nun at Fecamp, d. 1033. She died young and unmarried.[16]
Second he married Poppa of Envermeu, and they had the following children:

Mauger (c. 1019), Archbishop of Rouen
William (c. 1020/5), count of Arques

Richard married Judith De Bretagne about 1000 in , Normandy, France. Judith was born in 982 in , , Bretagne, France; died on 16 Jun 1017 in , Normandy, France. [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 Gunnora Harldsdottir Duchess Normandy De Crepon in 962 in Fecamp, Normandie, France. Gunnora was born in 936 in , Normandy, France; died in 1033 in Fecamp, Normandie, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]