• General Notes

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  Notes on Tancred de Hauteville. from Gordon Fisher     gfisher@@s hentel.net  "At Hauteville-la-Guichard, eight miles or so north- east of Coutances, the ruins of an ancient castle marked until r ecently what was once the home of Tancred, the father of the con querors of Apulia, and the grandfather of Roger II. of Naples an d Sicily.  Tancred was a knight of small patrimony, possessing a pparently a single manor.  He was born in the latter half of th e tenth century at a time when only two generations separated th e Normans, now becoming Gallicised in blood, physique, and cultu re, from their Norse ancestors who, heathens and barbarians, ha d sailed with Rollo up the Seine and shared the duchy of Normand y with him.  Many legends testify to the tremendous physical str ength and personal address of the old Tancred, the worthy founde r of a great race.  Poor as he was in possessions, he imparted c ourage, strength, and high gifts to twelve sons who grew up roun d him and found the patrimony too narrow for them.  They were th e product of two marriages:  Muriella was the mother of William , Drogo, Humfrey, Geoffrey, and Serlo; a second wife, Fredesind a or Fressenda, bore him Robert afterwards called Guiscard, Maug er, another William, Alveredus or Auvray, Tancred, Humbert, an d Roger.  Of the twelve, eight sought their fortunes in Italy .  Five proved to be conquerors of the first rank." --- Edmund C urtis, *Roger of Sicily, and the Normans in Lower Italy 1016-115 4*, NY & London (G P Putnam's Sons, The Knickerbocker Press), 19 12, p 39-40.  For the list of sons, Curtis cites "the historia n Malaterra", chap i.  "Hauteville-la-Guichard:  This characterl ess village on the Cotentin Pininsula of Normandy has so littl e to recommend it to the modern tourist that never to have hear d of it is not only forgivable but understandable. Hauteville-la -Guichard?  Even its eleventh-century inhabitants could not hav e suspected that from their backward community of farmers and ca ttle-raisers would march one of those indomitable families whos e eyes are ever on the peaks, whose only philosophy is pragmatis m, whose loyalties are loose, and whose future is unquestionabl y in the sun.  There is nothing there now but the name to sugges t any connection with that family of brawling brothers, all of w hom were known throughout Europe as far as Constantinople, and a t least a few of whom had such power as to rock the thrones of C hristendom, causing the occupants, be they kings, popes, or empe rors, to battle occasional bouts of queasiness on feeling the in security of their positions.  (P) Tancred de Hauteville, a man o f petty nobility, had to have been a crusty old goat.  If he ha d any fears of impotence they were demonstratively proven to b e misguided.  Tancred was the progenitor of a raft of swaggering , bullying, troublesome, but sometimes likeable young marauder s who this year began a veritable migration into Southern Ital y on the invitation of Rainulf, count of Aversa; and for this re ason alone is Tancred de Hauteville remembered, though there ar e probably worse reasons for immortality.  One by one he produce d his swarm of gifted, active sons with remarkable regularity .  His first wife, Muriella, bore him five stawlwart heirs.  Hi s second wife (it is hardly surprising that he had become a wido wer!), a lass by the name of Fressenda, went two better than th e first.  (P) Having satisfied himself as to his own fertility , Tancred informed his sons that the modest family resources wer e simply not adequate, taking the reasonable stand that dispersa l was the only alternative.  Thus it was that the three eldest , seeing the world as their oyster, left the Coentin and found t heir way to the gates of Norman Aversa.  The world was not thei r prize, of course; but they would do everything in their powe r to make it so." --- Richard F Cassady, *The Norman Achievement *, London (Sidgwick & Jackson) 1986, p 38,40.  NOTE:  Cassady gi ves a chart on p 39 of "The House of Hauteville" from Tancred do wn to Frederick II of Hohenstafen b 1194 d 1250, the contents o f which has been copied into this database.  "Early in the eleve nth century there were several groups of adventurers from Frenc h Normandy earning a profitable living as professional soldier s in southern Italy.  Some of them were straightforward mercenar ies' others preferred the life of robber chiefs who plundered tr ade, stole cattle, and inflicted appalling devastation to sprea d the terror of their name.  They hired themselves out as fighte rs, changing sides at will, or even fighting for both sides at o nce.  Byzantium employed some of them for the expedition of Mani aces in Sicily; sometimes, with papal encouragement, they attack ed the Greek Christians of southern Italy; and sometimes they fo und it more profitable ro raid the Papel States.   (P) Among the se warriors were half a dozen sons of a certain Tancred de Haute ville, one of whom was Robert Guiscard ..... [continued under RO BERT GUISCARD]" --- Denis Mack Smith, *A History of Sicily.  Med ieval Sicily: 800-1713*, NY (Viking Press) 1968, p 13  "In 104 0 six brothers, the sons of a petty Norman knight, Tancred de Ha uteville, seized the town of Melfi in the Apulian hills and foun ded there a principality.  The local Byzantine authorities did n ot take them seriously; but the western emperor, Henry III, eage r to control a province for which the two empires had long conte nded, and the German Pope whom he had nominated, resentful tha t the patriarch of Constantinople should rule over any Italian s ee, both gave the Normans their support.  Within twelve years th e sons of Tancred had established a mastery over the Lombard pri ncipalities.  They had driven the Byzantines into the tip of Cal abria and to the Apulian coast.  They were threatening the citie s of the west coast; and they were sending raids through Campani a northward to the neighborhood of Rome.  The Byzantine governme nt was alarmed.  The governor of Apulia, Marianus Argyrus, was s ummoned home to report and sent out again with fuller powers t o repair the situation.  Militarily, Marianus achieved nothing .  The Normans easily repulsed his small army.  Diplomatically h e was more successful; fir the Pope, the Lorrainer Leo IX, was e qually nervous.  The Norman successes were greater than he or He nry III had envisaged.  Henry was now occupied with a Hungaria n campaign; but he sent help to the Pope.  In the summer of 105 3 Leo set out southward with an army of Germans and Italians, pr oclaiming that this was a holy war.  A Byzantine contingent wa s to have joined him; but as he awaited it outside the little Ap ulian town of Civitate the Normans attacked him.  His army was r outed and he himself made prisoner.  To obtain his release he di savowed his whole policy.  (P) This was the last serious attemp t to curb the sons of Tancred. Henry III died in 1056.  His succ essor was the child Henry IV; and his regent, Agnes of Poitou, w as too busy in Germany to concern herself with the south.  The P apacy decided to be realist.  In 1059, at the council of Melfi , Pope Nicholas II recognized Robert Guiscard, 'Robert the Wease l', the eldest survivor of Tancred's sons as 'Duke of Apulia an d Calabria, by the grace of God and Saint Peter, and, by their h elp, of Sicily'.  This recognition, considered by Rome but not b y Robert to involve vassaldom to Saint Peter's heir, enabled th e Normans easily to finish off their conquest.  The maritime rep ublics soon submitted to them; and by 1060 all that was left t o the Byzantines in Italy was their capital, the coastal fortres s of Bari.  Meanwhile Robert's younger brother Roger began the s low but successful conquest of Sicily from the Arabs." --- Steve n Runciman, *A History of the Crusades*, v 1 :The First Crusad e and the Foundation of the Kingdom of Jerusalem*, London (Pengu in) 1951, p 56-57

Details of Tancred's family with Fredesendis of Normandy