Chapter 270: On the Great Normandy Family

Since William was determined to establish the Norman kingdom, it would not have worked without the support of many of his nobles.

So the next day, William invited a group of his cronies and nobles to the Duke's Palace, and the attendees included Count Adolf, Count Hubert, Steward Osborne, Count Richard, Count Rodrigo, Count Andrew, Viscount Faller, Viscount Ferdinand, Baron Jeanne, and many other nobles, who were arranged on both sides of the hall according to their status and affinity with William.

William did not use this ornate hall too much, most of the time it was used for major meetings, celebrations and ceremonies, and William generally preferred to use the conference hall to hold meetings to discuss political affairs.

Although William did not use it very often, he still attached great importance to the hall, spending as much as 6,000 pounds of silver per year on decoration and maintenance, just as the Duke's Palace has some extraordinarily rich decorations and huge frescoes painted behind the throne of the Duke of Normandy today.

The main body of the mural is the family of the House of Normandy, which begins with William's ancestor, the Duke of Rollo, and continues to the second Duke of Normandy, William the Longsword, Duke of Brittany, and then to the third Duke of Richard.

Among the first three generations of Normandy dukes, the Normandy family Ding Buwang has been passed down in a single line, but these three have all made great contributions to the prosperity of the Normandy family.

The first is William's ancestor, Duke Rollo, Rollo or Gaange Rolf (Old Norsevian: Hrolfr; France: Rollon; 846 AD - 930 AD), the Vikings became the first ruler of Normandy in France.

He is sometimes referred to as the Duke of Normandy. His Scandinavian name, Rolf, was extended to Gaange Rolf because he became too heavy as an adult to carry a horse, so he had to walk ("gaa" in older Danish Norwegian).

Rollo became a prominent figure among the Norsemen, who gained a permanent foothold in the Frankish lands of the Seine.

Charles III of the Carolingian family, king of West Fasic, ceded them at the mouth of the Seine and in what is now the city of Rouen in exchange for Robo's agreement to end his invasion and provide protection for the Franks against future Viking attacks.

In the Charter of 918, Rollo was first recorded as the leader of the Viking settlers, who continued to rule Normandy until 928.

His son William 'Longsword' inherited the fiefdom of his father, the Duke of Normandy, so Rollo's descendants and his followers were called Normans.

William 'Longsword', Duke of Normandy, built on his ancestor Duke Rollo to conquer the western part of the county of รˆvres and the entire county of Mortan, nearly tripling the size of the Duchy of Normandy.

At the same time, the 'longsword' Duke William also served as the Duke of Brittany, and at that time, the prestige of the Normandy family was not much worse than that of William at this time.

The position of the Duke of Normandy passed to the third deputy, Richard I (28 August 932 โ€“ 20 September 996), a greater Duke than William the Longsword, also known as "the fearless" and "fearless".

Duke Richard I ruled Normandy for 24 years from 942 to 996, during which his most significant achievement was the introduction and expansion of feudalism into Normandy, and at the end of his reign, the most important Norman landowners took possession of their lands under feudal rule, making the Normans truly masters of the land.

Richard commissioned St. Quentin to write "De Maurbas", which detailed the customs and deeds of the first dukes of Normandy, so that the Normans could truly become an independent people, with their own cultural customs and traditions.

This is a great thing in ancient and modern times, both at home and abroad, and the three generations of Richard I can be called great.

The third-generation Duke Richard I of the 'Fearless' had a similar experience to William.

In 942, Richard's father died, and King Louis IV of France, under the influence of Arnulf I, Duke of Flanders, brought him into Frankish territory and placed him under the tutelage of the Count of Pontic.

Then the king reneged on his promise and seized the lands of the Duchy of Normandy. He then divided the ducal territory in half and gave it to Hugo, Count of Paris, of the Capetian family.

King Louis IV later imprisoned Richard in Laton, but the young man escaped from prison with the help of his father's friend Osmond and others.

In 946, when he was 14 years old, Richard joined forces with the leaders of the Norman and Viking Vikings under King Harold of France and Denmark, and they formed an alliance to defeat King Louis IV of West Francia and capture him.

Richard held Louis IV hostage until King Louis recognized Richard as a duke and returned Normandy to him.

As a condition of reconciliation between the two parties, Richard agreed to "recommend" himself and Hugo, Count of Paris. Capet forms a permanent alliance and promises his daughter Emma that she will be the bride of Richard, Duke of Normandy.

However, King Louis IV of France was not resigned to defeat, and the following year in 947, he joined forces with Arnulf I, Duke of Flanders, and they persuaded Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, to attack Richard and Hugo, Count of Paris. Cape.

The combined army of Otto, Arnulf and Louis IV, under the command of Duke Richard, was driven out of the gates of Rouen and fled to Amiens, where they were definitively defeated in 947.

During a period of peace, Louis IV died in 954 and Lothair became king at the age of 13.

The middle-aged Count of Paris, Hugo. Capet appointed Richard in 955 as the name of his 15-year-old son, Hugo. Capet's guardian.

In 962, Thibaud I, count of Bourges, Blois and Chartres, tried to invade Rouen again, Richard's stronghold, but his army was quickly routed by the Normans on Richard's orders and forced to retreat before crossing the Seine.

King Lothair of France feared that Richard's revenge could destabilize much of the Kingdom of France, so he intervened to prevent further war between the two countries.

Eventually, thanks to the help of Richard, Duke of Normandy, his nephew Hugo. Capet became King of France in 987 AD, and William and Henry I were also related.

For 30 years before his death, Richard had been preoccupied with Normandy itself, and less involved in French politics and trivial wars.

In order to thoroughly consolidate the expansion of Normandy, he stabilized the Kingdom of France, unified the Normans, and transformed the Duchy of Normandy, which his father and grandfather had left to him, into the most cohesive and powerful Duchy in France.

Throughout the life of Duke Richard, he was worthy of the title of 'fearless', an example that William admired and emulated.