Guillaume of the Rocks

Guillaume of the Rocks , born in 1165 or 1170 with Longué-Binoculars in Anjou, dead on July 15th 1222, lord of Longué-Binoculars and Castle-of-Dormouse, Lord of Sanded, Seneshal of Anjou of 1199 with 1222.

Biography

Origin

Guillaume of the Rocks, of which the place of origin is dubious between the ground of the Rocks in Vendômois, the Poitou according to the new chronicle of Parcé, the Anjou according to others, had in any case his inheritance in the Maine, close to Castle-of-Dormouse. The manor of Houx, in which it made its first foundation of abbey, is in the parish of Jupille. Guillaume had as a Herbert grandfather, who could be wire of Hardouin of the Rocks, quoted as of 1040 with the cartulaire of Vendôme, and for Baudouin father: both were vassal of Castle-of-Dormouse. His/her mother, according to the chronicle of Parcé, would be Alice de Châtellerault.

With the service of Richard Heart-of-Lion

Born from 1155 with 1160, one is unaware of his childhood very. Like it makes a foundation for Henri II of England, one can believe that it served it as soon as it was in age to do it (1180).

He was initially a knight with the service of the Empire Plantagenêt and the king angevin of England, Jean without Ground.

He was certainly with the service of Richard I {{er}} of England known as Richard Heart-of-Lion , wire of Henri II, and one knows that he already skilful with the weapons and was tested in the businesses, rather advanced in the favor of the prince so that he chose it the second of the four delegates charged to negotiate peace with Philippe-Auguste, the July 8th 1193, with leaving his captivity.

Baron d' Anjou and of Maine

Guillaume married in first weddings Philippe , whose mother named Hilaire; he gave in this time to the Abbaye of Boissière two meadows to Long-Island, that Célestin Port identifies with the island of Blaison. There is not other allusion to this marriage which did not give him a heir.

Widower towards 1190, in 1201, it Marie with Margaret or Marguerite , the girl and the heiress of Robert IV of Sanded. By this marriage, it becomes one of the largest barons of Anjou and of the Maine with the strongholds of Suze, Briollay, Mayet, Louplande, Genneteil and Précigné. One can see in this alliance which got for Guillaume an enviable situation and a considerable territorial fortune, the influence of Richard Heart-of-Lion, which left then for the crusade, taking along with him, as chief of his fleet, the father of been engaged. There is in this alliance a circumstance which one did not notice and who is however interesting. When was made the union in 1189 or 1190, Marguerite was not heiress, nor even future heiress, because Geoffroy de Cornillé, his brother, lived and was to still live ten years. The Abbé Angot supposes it disabled person or incompetent, physically or morally, because separately the role which it fills in place of his father to the reception of the abbot of Évron (1190), one does not meet it in any act, if not for donations with the abbeys, and however its existence is noted like benefactor with the Perray in Écouflant until the August 8th 1200. However for a long time, either of living of his/her father before 1195, or since until the death of Geoffroy de Cornillé in 1200, Guillaume of the Rocks managed and controlled the fields of his wife. His/her Philippe sister-in-law, who had only 60 books of revenue in marriage, did not make a large breach there.

In 1197, in Briollay, field of the house of Sanded, it renewed the Douaire his woman, universally, on all its goods present and to come, acknowledging by there how much the fortune which Marguerite had brought to him, before he is seneshal, was higher than his. Well before this date, towards 1187, Guillaume of the Rocks had founded, in the family manor of Houx in Jupille, a priory of Marmoutier. It is the first of its foundations, made before its marriage, even before its first union with Philippe, because it is mention in its expressed intentions only of his parents and his brothers whom one will find never again quoted; no allusion to its wife, who will appear in all her posterior donations.

Against Jean without Ground

But at the beginning of the 13th century, Guillaume appreciates little the treachery of Jean without Ground (Jean without Ground becomes king of England the April 6th 1199, after the death of its brother, Richard I {{er}} of England known as Richard Heart-of-Lion , which it betrayed on several occasions).

To died of Richard Heart-of-Lion, G. Rocks, which previously had already been used as intermediary between Philippe-Auguste and fire king for a league against Jean without Ground, was turned deliberately against this last, sticking to the young person Arthur Ier of Brittany, wire of his/her older brother Geoffroy II of Brittany.

With the service of Arthur of Brittany

It joined the young prince with the head of Breton S, indication probable of a load which he would have filled in this duchy for king Richard. It followed it to the Mans, accepted as of June the title of seneshal of Anjou and Maine, Mayet and the Forêt of Bersay, which makes include/understand the utility of its councils and the importance of its help. In October, it ordered the troops of Arthur, princeps exercitus Arthuri , when they came in Mans to join the army of Philippe-Auguste. But it is there that after having known the destruction of Ballon, it made to the king reproaches have devastated the places of its pupil and that, seeing the bad mood of the monarch, it decided to work with the reconciliation of Arthur and its uncle, already probably prepared with the camp of Auvers-le-Hamon, close to Sablé. The bringing together took place and Guillaume reappears at once, the December 26th, with his title of seneshal in the acts of king Jean. He obtained the creation of a fair with Angers, and entered of it the intimacy of the queen-mother, Aliénor, which made then foundations with Fontevrault for the heart of Richard, his son. The king confirmed with Chinon, the June 24th 1200, the load of seneshal of Anjou, of Maine and even from Touraine, with Guillaume and this one accepted it in its Château of Suze, the September 3rd. It had of the king several missions of confidence: near the chapter of Angers for the election of Guillaume de Beaumont with the episcopal see, which does not end immediately; with the seneshal of Poitou, in 1201, to give letters of safeguard to those which wished outward journey to find it in England; November 3rd, near the garrison of Moncontour. In January 1202, of agreement with Raoul de Beaumont, it negotiated with Rome a loan in the name of the king to advance the election of the royal candidate to the head office of Angers.

Arthur, thanks to the influence of the duchess Constancy, her mother, had remained at the court of France. He refused to go to make homage to king Jean who summoned it to come there and who requested all those which had joined with him: Maurice de Craon, Juhel de Mayenne, Guy of Laval, Guillaume of the Rocks, the bishop of Mans, the Viscount of Beaumont, to give him hostages if Arthur made defection (March 29th 1202). When the Arthur young person had undertaken his conquest of the Poitou which leads to its capture with Mirebeau, Guillaume of the Rocks warned king Jean that, if it did not slacken the prince and the other prisoners, it would separate from him. It is what it did while being reconciled with Philippe-Auguste, without listening to the king of England which summoned it to return the places to him whose it had the guard (August 18th) and deprived it of sound sénéchalat (August 24th).

The enemy of Jean without Ground

Guillaume of the Rocks became one of the burning enemies of Jean without Ground after the assassination of unhappy Arthur; conspired initially with the Breton lords, then made the open war with the principal characters of Maine who had again lent oath to Philippe-Auguste: it was Maurice de Craon and Juhel de Mayenne. Jean without Ground occupied of September 1202 in April 1203 the castle of Suze, which belonged to Guillaume of the Rocks. The Easter Monday (April 7th), the seneshal disgraced tie-beam in Anjou, attacked and carried the town of Angers, took Beaufort, Saumur, Châteauneuf, and finally, on November 1st, Philippe-Auguste returned his functions of seneshal to him; the holder hastened of him to make homage to Poitiers in August of it 1204, then yielded to the queen Bérangère de Navarre, countess dowager of the Maine, widow of Richard Lion-hearted the particular seneschalsy of the city of Mans, and accepted in exchange the douaire of the princess with Castle-of-Dormouse, contract ratified by Philippe-Auguste in September 1204.

Battle Rock-with-Monks

In 1207, Guillaume of the Rocks took Parthenay on Guy de Thouars, which it made itself captive the following year, with Savari de Mauléon, seneshal of Poitou for Jean without Ground. In 1214, it brought to Louis, wire of king de France, a reinforcement of four thousand men with whom it forced the king of England to raise the seat of the Rock-with-Monk. This forwarding took place a few days before the Bataille of Bouvines to which Guillaume of the Rocks could not take share. But it was small number of the knights Norman, angevins and manceaux who were given without ulterior motive to the royal cause, with Juhel de Mayenne and the Viscount of Beaumont. Almost all the others, had said Rigord, had secretly called their on king Jean. Personally, it is named the first between the knights who carried banner under Philippe-Auguste to Anjou: Militate andegavenses: senescallus . It left for the Croisade against the Albigensians in 1218 or 1219.

Seneshal

Though he played a military part of first rank, it is especially as seneshal who he is known. Matured already by the experiment of two reigns, under Henri II and Richard, his son, it was ready, on the king nomination de France, to receive from the Arthur young person a load which required eminent qualities, that it preserved always increased under three often enemy kings, and that it hereditarily transmitted to his family. If the services which it rendered were estimable, the consideration that it withdrew some and the emoluments of the load were considerable too. Its row was of first order; superior with the maréchalat, equal to that of the counts, and often giving the step on the pars when it sat with them. Fifty books per annum on each prévôté of the three provinces, Anjou, Maine, Touraine, one the third of the exploits, the fines, of the offices, the guard of the castles, constituted the ordinary or accidental profits of its load.

The acts of sound sénéchalat are far from being all known. One can mention only those which relate to the public affairs, the king or the abbeys; these the most varied parts of include/understand lawsuits, sealing of acts of its court or court of the king, confirmations of legacy to the abbeys; he pronounces judgments in court of Mans, of Angers and of Tours, guard the castles of the crown, takes the protection of the Abbaye of the Seam, in the name of Philippe-Auguste (1211); draft with Guillaume de Sillé (1210); commit yourself respecting the ecclesiastical jurisdiction; once admits having unduly required taxes for the men-at-arms of the king; in 1211, Philippe-Auguste has recourse to his knowledge of the local habits in its provinces of Touraine, Anjou and Maine: it acts in the species “of the businesses of Laval”, where Emma of Laval, girl of Guy VI, has just inherited the baronnie; the seneshal gives the opinion that the king must marry this heiress, and which the son-in-law must treat with him repurchase. It in common seals acts with the bishop of Angers, pronounces on the reciprocal jurisdiction of the chapter of Mans and Guillaume of Jaille in Outillé (1213); sit with the pars of France in the disagreement between Erard de Brienne and the Bérengère queen about the counties of Champagne and Brie, with precedence of Guillaume, count de Joigny, senior of the Champagne pars, Jean, count of Beaumont-on-Oise, Robert, count d' Alençon; with same the Robert d' Alençon and the abbot of the Seam, it inquires into the sizes which the count of Maine perceived, on those that the subjects of the bishop paid, on the lawsuit of the Bérengère queen against Robert de Riboul. In August 1218, it is guarantee, always in the capacity as seneshal, for Elisabeth d' Amboise, towards Bérengère, countess of Troyes, the repurchase of the grounds of the succession of Thibault, her nephew. It has lieutenants in various centers: Hamelin de Rorte is with Ballon, and will become itself seneshal of France.

These functions were dangerous to exert for a delicate conscience. Guillaume reproached himself for having required undue sizes on his subjects, to be itself made pour by the abbot of the Seam of the taxes that this one voluntarily paid him it is true (1218). With the article of death, he recognized other similar exactions (1222); the victims complained sometimes. Lastly, its widow consulted the bishop of Mans on perceptions of comparable nature and asked him a policy. Guillaume of the Rocks was thus not an irreproachable civil servant, but it could recognize its wrongs.

The personal acts of Guillaume of the Rocks are almost as numerous as those of its official administration. One can quote those which relate to its foundations and especially its city of Sanded. He gave much to the abbeys: with Perseigne, in the name of his/her mother; in the name of its Marguerite wife, with the Trap door (Nos 8,9,10), and with Marmoutier. As of before 1187, it founded for its family the priory of Houx; before 1190, it gave to Boissière, that its Hardouin nephew will enrich later, of its assent, two meadows located with Long-Island; it confirmed with the Abbaye of All Saints' day said them Tiercé (1200); he was benefactor of the Abbaye of Bellebranche, foundation of his predecessor Robert III of Sanded; Abbey of Clermont, of which it founded the luminary; Abbey of the Trap door. In 1209, with Marguerite de Sablé, his wife, it transferred in a more favorable place, in Précigné, the Abbaye of Wood-Renou, already mentioned, and of it Perray-Neuf made, to distinguish it from the Perray-with-Nonnains the, rested by his/her father-in-law.

Creator of the fair of Agou, under Jean without Ground, it wanted to grant the same advantage, the day of the decapitation of Saint Jean-Baptiste, at his city of Sanded in 1204, at once that it had been appointed seneshal. After 1210, it had to judge a disagreement between the prior of Saint-Wolf and Guillaume the Norman one, lord of the place. The cause interested it as suzerain and dispenser of justice; it regulated in detail, according to the titles and the habit, the litigious points on the furnaces and the pond, but did not forget especially what one owed him when it raised its army, the way in which Guillaume the Norman one was held to lead the men of the prior, his rights when they were his personal defense and several other questions, the legal duel, the revenge on the insults made to the lord.

In 1209, the shortly after the Rise, Friday May 8th, with Turns, instead of Boutigny, G. Rocks bases, partly on the income of Sanded, for him and his wife, its daughters and their husbands, the Cistercian abbey of Bonlieu. The same year, by two acts dated one from Loroux, the other of Suze, it recognizes that the abbot of the Seam owes him the size only of his good will and requests his baillifs not to exert against him any constraint. In April, he wants to supplement his foundation of Houx by the gift of a mill, the foundation of a fair of the Saint-Pierre with Jupille and the abandonment of a vine. The monks of Marmoutier had granted to him, his wife, and to the middle-class man of Sanded the fraternity of the abbey, in recognition of the eagerness put by them at the payment of said priory.

Family

Guillaume of the Rocks had not had children of his first wife Philippe , girl of Hilaire . Of Marguerite de Sablé , it had:

Robert , which took again the traditional name of the elder ones, city in several charters of Marmoutier in 1202 and 1204, but which died about this time without alliance;
Jeanne , married as of 1214 with Amaury Ier de Craon, which was seneshal of Anjou, Touraine and Maine, and died in 1226, father of Maurice IV of Craon, Jeanne and Isabelle;
Clemence , of the name of his/her large mother Clemence de Mayenne; she married:
1. ''' Thibault ''', count de Blois and of Clermont, widower of Mahaut d' Alençon, died without children in 1218;
2. Geoffroi VI , Viscount of Châteaudun (1220); the husbands lived in 1245; they had: a) Jeanne, countess of Montfort-l' Amaury; b) Clemence, viscountess de Châteaudun, ram of Montdoubleau.

In spite of what the investigation of the 14th century reports into the division of the girls of the barons d' Anjou, Touraine and Maine, knowledge that the elder one had all the noble baronnies or grounds, and the young people only one revenue, Guillaume, which had lost the single heir apparent to its immense fortune, made a division ratified by Philippe-Auguste. Jeanne, the elder one, in addition to the hereditary seneschalsy, had the castle of Sanded, Briollay, the Châteauneuf-on-Sarthe, Précigné, Brion; Clemence, girl junior, accepted Castle-of-Dormouse, Mayet, Suze, Loupelande, the forests and other dependences, reserve made on the two batches of the douaire of Marguerite, widow of the seneshal. This one had found that its fortune was enough considerable to equip two families.

Died

Guillaume of the Rocks died in 1222, the July 15th, day of his birthday, and was buried in the chorus of the abbey church of Bonlieu, last pious foundation of the seneshal. Its tomb statue was lying between the effigy of his two wives, or, following Pesche, of his/her two daughters. This tomb disappeared only with the French revolution. The day of the burial, of many knights who assisted to with it, following Amaury de Craon and of Geoffroy, Viscount of Châteaudun, sons-in-law of late, made in the circumstance of the gifts to the abbey for their friend.

As for Marguerite de Sablé, she survived her husband long enough, continuing her charitable works. The last known act of its share is the Vidimus, June 1238, of a charter of Robert de Sablé, given in 1201, in favor of the abbey of Étival. Bertrand de Broussillon, being pressed on a certificate of the Abbey of Marmoutier noting the restitution by the abbey of the titles and documents which had been entrusted to him by “ the feue lady ” and which is dated December 1st 1246, affirms that Marguerite died during this year. The proof is not rigorous. The deposit can be claimed several years after the death of Marguerite. She had her burial in the Abbaye of Perray-with-Nonnains the, in Écouflant, which owed him its conservation, but its heart was carried in the abbey of Bonlieu, close to the tomb of her husband.

Sigillography

The sigillography of Guillaume of the Rocks was studied thoroughly by Hucher, perhaps but new types should not be supposed with each time one sees some alternatives in the drawings. A tapering band is quite close to a vivrée band. The laurée head or the bandaged head of the incidental clause which is used as counter-seal does not state surely that one interpretation of the draftsman or engraver. All in all, the seals of the seneshal have one ecu with the vivrée or tapered band charged with a lambel to five hanging and, forward, Sigillum Guillelmi de Rupibus . The legend with Willelmi supposes a second type. The counter-seal is always with the head bandaged, incidental clause on ancient stone, crimped in a money or iron circle. The seneshal was always useful himself about it. The seal stamps published by Hucher, which is 15th century and artistic, is a whim of an unknown author of which one is not explained the use

The seal of Marguerite de Sablé is oval with figure of the lady holding of the right hand a bird; the legend carries: + SIGILLUM MARGUARITE DOMINATES OF SABLUEI. The round contresceau carries in the center one ecu triangular charged with a circumvented eagle, with around the French legend + DESSOU LESCU MY FATHER SUNT SEMI SECRE. We have there the ecu of Robert IV, like the legend says it, and which one does not know an other specimen.

Random links: