William (Aubigny) d'Aubigny (1109 - abt. 1176)

Born 1109 in St Sauver, Manche, Normandy, France

Ancestors

Husband of Adeliza (Brabant) of Louvain — married before 1139 in Arundel, Sussex, England

Descendants

Died about 12 Oct 1176 at about age 67 in Waverley Abbey, Surrey, England

Biography

Vitals

William d'Aubigny, 1st Earl of Lincoln and 1st Earl of Arundel (d.12 Oct 1176)

1st Earl of Arundel (or Sussex or Chichester), Chief Butler of England, Privy Councillor to King Henry I

Alias: William d'Albini, William de Albini and William de Albini II^[1]

son of William d'Aubigny "Pincerna" of Old Buckenham Castle in Norfolk & Maud Bigod dau. of Roger Bigod, 1st Earl of Norfolk.^[1]

Bio

WILLIAM (D'AUBIGNY), EARL OF SUSSEX, son and heir 1176/7 confirmed but Castle and Honour of Arundel retained by the Crown ... Richard I restored them to him 27 June 1190 when (according to the admission of I433] he became EARL OF ARUNDEL.

styled Earl of Arundel before possession of the Castle and Honour, namely, on 18 Sep 1189, and on 26 Nov of the same year he witnessed King Richard's Charter as "Will. Earl of Arundel." He received also at the same time, the third penny of the pleas of Sussex in the precise words of the grant made to his father. In 1191 he was made Custos of Windsor Castle, and in 1194 one of the Receivers of the money raised for the King's ransom.

William d' AUBIGNY, 1st Earl Arundel^[2][3]

"Stronghand"^[2]

b. ABT 1104 St. Sauveur, Manche, Normandy^[2]

m. widow Queen Adeliza in 1138 and became Lord of Arundel in her right.^[4]

Occupation: Crusader^[2]

Death: 12 OCT 1176 Abbey, Waverly, Surrey; Age 75-76^[5]

Title: 1st Earl of Arundel, Lord of Stackhorn, Earl of Lincoln

Early Life

son of William d'Aubigny Pincerna (Master Butler of Royal household) of Buckenham Castle and Maud Bigod, dau of Roger Bigot.^[6]

Mother: Maud widow of Roger (DE CLARE), EARL OF HERTFORD (d.1173) dau and heir James DE ST. HILAIRE Du HARCOUET, by Aveline.

d.24 Dec 1193. buried Wymondham Priory.^[7]

(Royal Ancestry) William d'Aubeney, 1st Earl of Arundel (or Sussex or Chichester), died at Waverly Abbey, Surrey 4 (or 12) October 1176, and was buried at Wymondham Priory, Norfolk.

Family

m. Adeliza

son. William d'Aubigny, 2nd Earl of Arundel

grandparents of William d'Aubigny, 3rd Earl of Arundel.

William with the strong hand

a tall tale related by Dugdale...

"The Queen of France, ... caused a tournament to be proclaimed throughout her dominions, promising to reward ... and concluding that if the person ... could act his part better than the others in those military exercises, she might marry him ...

William de Albini, ... excelled all others, overcoming many, and wounding one mortally with his lance ... observed by the queen, she ... invited him to a costly banquet, and afterwards bestowing certain jewels upon him, offered him marriage.

But ... he refused her...

Discontented ... she consulted with her maids how she might take away his life; and ... enticed him into a garden, where there was a secret cave, and in it a fierce lion...

She told him of its fierceness, he answered ... it was a womanish and not a manly quality to be afraid thereof. But having ... the advantage of a folding door, thrust him in ...

He rolled his mantle about his arm and, putting his hand into the mouth of the beast, pulled out his tongue by the root; ...

Done, he followed the queen to her palace and gave it to one of her maids to present her. Returning thereupon to England, with the fame of this glorious exploit, he was forthwith advanced to the Earldom of Arundel, and for his arms the lion given him."

He subsequently obtained the hand of the Queen Adeliza, relict of King Henry I, and daughter of Godfrey, Duke of Lorraine, which Adeliza had the castle of Arundel in dowry from the deceased monarch, and thus her new lord became its feudal earl.

The earl was one of those who solicited the Empress Maud to come to England, and received her and her brother, Robert, Earl of Gloucester, at the port of Arundel, in August, 1139, and three years after (1142), in the report made of King Stephen's taking William de Mandevil at St. Albans, it stated --

"that before he could be laid hold on, he underwent a sharp skirmish with the king's party, wherein the Earl of Arundel, though a stout and expert soldier, was unhorsed in the midst of the water by Walkeline de Oxeai, and almost drowned."

In 1150, his lordship wrote himself Earl of Chichester, but we find him styled again Earl of Arundel, upon a very memorable occasion -- namely, the reconciliation of Henry Duke of Normandy (afterwards Henry II) and King Stephen at the siege of Wallingford Castle in 1152. "It was scarce possible," says Rapin, "for the armies to part without fighting.

Accordingly the two leaders were preparing for battle ... when, by the prudent advice of the Earl of Arundel, who was on the king's side, they were prevented from coming to blows."

A truce and peace followed this interference of the earl's, which led to the subsequent accession of Henry after Stephen's decease, in whose favour the Earl ... not only obtained for himself and his heirs the castle and honour of Arundel, but a confirmation of the Earldom of Sussex, of which county he was really earl, by a grant of the Tertium Denarium of the pleas of that shire.

In 1164, we find the Earl of Arundel deputed with Gilbert Foliot, bishop of London, to remonstrate with Lewis, King of France, upon affording an asylum to Thomas à Becket within his dominion, and on the failure of that mission, despatched with the archbishop of York, the bishops of Winchester, London, Chichester, and Exeter, -- Wido Rufus, Richard de Invecestre, John de Oxford (priests) -- Hugh de Gundevile, Bernard de St. Valery, and Henry Fitzgerald, to lay the whole affair of Becket at the foot of the pontifical throne.

Upon levying aid for the marriage of the king's daughter, 12th of Henry II [1165-66], the knights' fees of the honour of Arundel were certified to be ninety-seven, and those in Norfolk belonging to the earl, forty-two.

In 1173, we find the Earl of Arundel commanding, in conjunction with William, Earl of Essex, the king's army in Normandy, and compelling the French monarch to abandon Verneuil after a long siege, and in the next year, with Richard de Lucy, justice of England, defeating Robert Earl of Leicester, then in rebellion at St. Edmundsbury.

This potent nobleman, after founding and endowing several religious houses, departed this life at Waverley, in Surrey, on the 3 October, 1176, and was buried in the abbey of Wymondham.

His lordship left by Adeliza, four sons and three daughters. The eldest, Alice, m. John, Earl of Ewe. The eldest son, William de Albini, 2nd earl, had a grant from the crow, 23rd Henry II [1177-8] of the Earldom of Sussex, and in the 1st of Richard I [1189-90], confirmation from that prince of the castle and honour of Arundel, as also of the Tertium Denarium of the county of Sussex. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, pp. 2-3, Albini, Earls of Arundel]

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1} Wikipedia: William d'Aubigny, 1st Earl of Arundel
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3} Acrossthepond.ged on 21 February 2011
3. ↑ 104-B.ged 12 Sept 2010.
4. ↑ WIkipedia
5. ↑ breesefam.ged (09 May 2011).
6. ↑ Wikisource has text of 1885-1900 Dictionary of Nat'l Bio article about William de Albini (Pincerna).
7. ↑ Complete Peerage I:235-6 (transcribed by Dave Utzinger). Ancestry.com Jim Weber. (Link via Wayback Machine at Archive.org, capture date 03 Oct 2014.)

• Royal Ancestry 2013 Vol. II p. 250-252
• Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700 by Frederick Lewis Weis, Lines 1-22, 18A-22, 139-26,194-25, 149-26.
• Remfry, P.M., Buckenham Castles, 1066 to 1649 (ISBN 1-899376-28-3)
• The Phillips, Weber, Kirk, & Staggs families of the Pacific Northwest, by Jim Weber, Rootsweb.com
• Rubincam, Milton. The House of Brabant, Ancestry of Philippa of Hainault, Wife of Edward III, The American Genealogist (1949) Vol. 25, Page 226