Duke Robert NORMANDY, I ¹

   Other names for Robert were "The Magnificent", "The Devil" and NORMANDY Duke.

   Ancestral File Number: 8XJ0-S0. User ID: 302555912.

   General Notes:

"The Magnificent", "The Devil", Duke of NORMANDY Reigned 1027-1035, On First Crusade.

Not Married Herleve De Falaise.

BOOKS
Barber Grandparents: 125 Kings, 143 Generations, Ted Butler Bernard and Gertrude Barber Bernard, 1978, McKinney TX, p86: "375W Robert II, `The Magnificent', Duke of Normandy, (S of 367, F of 387);died while returning from the First Crusade to the Holy Land in 1035; married Herlex of Fulbert."

Kings and Queens of Great Britain, Genealogical Chart, Anne Taute and Romilly Squire, Taute, 1990: "Robert I The Devil Duke of Normandy, ?Mar Estrid Daughter of Sveyn King of England, Mistress Herleve Daughter of Fulbert Tanner of Falaise, Mar (ii) Herluin De Centeville, Died 1035... Estrid, Daughter of Sveyn Forkbeard and Sigrid, Mar =1 Robert I Duke of Normandy, -2 Jarl Ulf."

A History of the Plantagenets, Vol I, The Conquering Family, Thomas B Costain, 1949, Doubleday & Co, p208:
"Falaise Castle was familiar to Englishmen, for it had played an important part in the story of Anglo-Normand relations. Here Robert of Normandy had brought the tanner's daughter and here the healthy child had been born to her who became William the Conqueror. Here the Norman kings had gone most frequently when they returned to the duchy...All the cells in Falaise, and there weremany of them, were sunk into the walls, as was the comparatively cheerful apartment where the tanner's daughter had lived..."

The Oxford Book of Royal Anecdotes, Elizabeth Longford, 1991, Oxford Univ Press, pxviii: "Saxons and Danes Genealogy: Robert The Magnificent, died 1035."

A History of the English Speaking People Winston S Churchill Vol I The Birth of Britain Dodd Mead & Co p143:
"In Normandy a class of knights and nobles arose who held their lands in return for military service, and sublet to inferior tenants upon the same basis...
"It was from this virile and well-organised land that the future rulers of England were to come. Between the years 1028 and 1035 the Viking instincts of Duke Robert of Normandy turned him seriously to plans of invasion. His death and his failure to leave a legitimate heir suspended the project, but only for a while.
"The figure of Emma, sister of Robert of Normandy, looms large in English history at this time..."
p153: "One morning Duke Robert of Normandy, the fourth descendant of Rollo, was riding towards his captial town, Falaise, when he saw Arlette, daughter of a tanner, washing linen in a stream. His love was instantly fired. He carried her tohis castle, and, although already married to a lady of quality, lived with her for the rest of his days. To this romantic but irregular union there was born in 1027 a son, William, afterwards famous."

The Lives of the Kings and Queens of England, Antonia Fraser, 1975, Alfred Knopf, p24: "Robert the Devil Duke of Normandy, died 1035..."

The Wall Chart of World History, Edward Hull, 1988, Studio Edition, Normandy 1027: "Duke of Normandy 1027-1035, Robert the Devil..."

The Story ofCivilization, Will Durant, Vol IV, The Age of Faith, Bk IV, The Dark Ages, Ch XIX, The Decline of the West, Sec III, France, p480: "A war of succession followed between the sons of Hugh Capet; the elder, Henry I (1031- 1060), won, but only by the help of Robert, Duke of Normandy...Robert I (1028- 1035) was not yet duke of Normandy when in 1026 his eye was caught by Harlette. She became his cherished mistress and soon presented him with a son known to his contemporaries as William theBastard, to us as William the Conquereor. Weighed down by his sins Robert in 1035 left Normandy on a penitential pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Before going he called his chief barons and prelates to him and said to them: `By my faith, I will not leave ye lordless. I have a young bastard who will grow, please God, and of whose good qualities I have great hope. Take him, I pray you, for lord. That he was not born in wedlock matters little to you; he will be none the less able in battle...or to render justice. I make him my heir, and I hold him seized, from this present, of the whole duchy of Normandy.' Robert died en route..."

Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1981, Microapaedia, Vol VIII, p610, Robert I the Magnificent: "also called Rovert the Devil, Died Jul 1035 Nicaea, now in Turkey, Duke of Normandy, the younger son of Richard II of Normandy and the father, by his mistress Arlette, of William the Conqueror of England. On the death of his father (1026/27), Robert contested the duchy with his elder brother Richard III, legally the heir, until the latter's opportune death a few years later. A strong ruler, Robert succeeded in exacting the obedience of his vassals. In 1030 he helped Baldwin IV, Count of Flanders,suppress a rebellion. On the death of Robert II the Pious, King of France (1031), a crisis arose over the succession to the French throne. The Duke gave his support to Henry I against the party favouring his younger brother; in reward for hisservices he demanded and received the Vexin Francais, a territory not far north of Paris. He died while returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem."

The New Columbia Encyclopedia, 1975, p2333, Robert I the Magnificent: Died Abt 1035, Duke of Normandy 1027-1035; father of William the Conqueror. He is often identified with the legendary Robert the Devil. He aided King Henry I of France against Henry's rebellious brother and mother, intervened in the affairs of Flanders, and wupported Edward the Confessor, then in exile at Robert's court. He also sponsored monastic reform in Normandy. After making his illegitimate son William his heir, he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and died at Nicaea."

From Alfred to Henry III 871-1272, Christopher Brooke, 1961, Norton Library History of England, p82:
"Across the English Channel, at its narrowest point, lay another great Viking state, the duchy of Normandy. A Norman princess, Emma, had successively married both Ethelred andCnut. A Norman duke, Robert I [Emma's nephew], amiably known to later tradition as Robert the Devil, had gone through a form of marriage with a sister of Cnut. Duke Robert was naturally interested in English politics, all the more because theyoung sons of Ethelred, Alred and Adward, were exiles living in his duchy. Had Robert not died on his way back from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1035, it is highly probable that he would have staged an invasion of England on these young men's behalf.
"In 1035 Duke Robert died, and his illegitimate son, William, succeeded at the age of seven..."

ANCESTRAL FILE
Ancestral File Ver 4.10 8XJ0-S0, 8Q7S-KQ.

   Marriage Information:

Robert married Herleve De FALAISE, daughter of Fulbert De FALAISE and Doda De FALAISE, about 1023. (Herleve De FALAISE was born about 1003 in Falaise, Calvados, France and died about 1050.)

   Marriage Information:

Robert also married Princess Estrid DENMARK, daughter of King Svend DENMARK, I and Queen Sigrid Skoglar-Testedotter SWEDEN. The marriage ended in divorce. (Princess Estrid DENMARK was born about 947 in , , Denmark, died on 9 May 997 and was buried in Cathedral, Roskilde, Roskilde, Denmark.)