General Notes

ROBERT MARMION (b), son of Roger MARMION (c), which Roger at the time of the Lindsey Survey, circa 1115-18, held land in Lincolnshire (d), rendered an account of 176£ 13s. 4d. for relief on his father's lands, of which 60£ had been paid by Michaelmas 1130. He was granted by Henry I, circa 1129-33, free warren in Warwickshire as his father had it, especially at Tamworth. With his wife Milicent he granted the church of Polesworth and other property to the nuns there, and the vill of Buteyate to Bardney Abbey. In 1140 Geoffrey, Earl of Anjou, besieged and destroyed his castle of Fontenay. A prominent figure in the anarchy of Stephen's reign, he evicted the monks of Coventry and profaned their church.

He married Milicent, daughter of Hugh, Count of Rethel. He died in 1143 or 1144, being slain in warfare with the Earl of Chester. His widow married Richard DE CANVILLE or CAMVILLE.  [Complete Peerage VIII:505-8, XIV:467]

(b) The family of Marmion was of Norman origin, its chief property lying at Fontenay-le-Marmion in the dÈpartement of Calvados. There are few families whose origin has given rise to more erroneous speculation. Of all the myths which have encumbered this family perhaps the most glaring and persistent has been that which makes William the Conqueror confer the castle of Tamworth on Robert Marmion, the "Champion of Normandy," to hold by the service of Champion in England.

(c) THIS TEXT IS INCLUDED IN GRANDFATHER ROBERT MARMION'S NOTES.

(d) The places named include Winteringham, Willingham, Scrivelsby, and Coningsby; much of the land was held in chief, and much of it had belonged to Robert Dispensator at the time of Domesday.  The connection between Roger Marmion and Robert Dispensator is a complex problem.  As the latter had also held Tamworth (as is clear from a charter of the Empress Maud to William de Beauchamp printed in Round, 'Geoffrey de Mandeville', p. 314) and property in other counties afterwards held by the Marmion family, it has been suggested that Roger Marmion acquired the Dispensator's lands from him either by inheritance or marriage.  With a view to support the theory of inheritance, it has even been urged that the word Dispensator and the name Marmion were equivalent - an assertion in which there is no truth whatever.  The more likely theory that Roger married Robert Dispensator's daughter is shaken by the discovery of J. H. Round that to the Lincolnshire fee of the Dispensator, his brother Urse d'Abetot succeeded, suggesting the probable solution that Roger Marmion acquired his lands through Urse.  In the Worcestershire survey, circa 1108-18, and in the Leicestershire survey, circa 1124-29, a Robert Marmion and Walter de Beauchamp occur jointly as successors of Robert Dispensator.  This Robert Marmion may have been Roger's son, acquiring these lands in his father's lifetime; and it is not improbable that Roger had married a daughter of Urse.  The succession Roger, Robert, Robert is clear from a charter granted to the second Robert by King Stephen.  Roger may be the Roger Marmion who was one of Henry I's justiciars in Normandy.