General Notes

Aubigny (Brito), of Belvoir.

Saint-Aubin d'Aubigne: Ille-et-Vilaine.

For this identification see J. H. Round in Hist. MSS. Comm., Duke of Rutland, vol. iv, p. 107.

An offshoot of the parent stock was represented by William de Albigneio, who was a benefactor of the abbey of Viewville in Britanny c. 1200 and the father of Philip d'Aubigny, bailiff of the Channel Islands temp. Henry III.  This family frequently occurs in the dioceses of Dol and Rennes.  An account is given in The Complet Peerage, surname Daubeney, new edition, vol iv, pp. 93 et seq.  [Origins of Some Anglo-Norman Families]

Note: The above d'Aubigny/Albini/Daubeney family is from Britanny (Bretagne) and is not directly related to the other family known by the exact same surnames, from Saint-Martin d'Aubigny in Normandy

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William, who assumed, from what reason is unascertained, the surname of Albini, and was known as "William de Albini, Brito," in contradistinction to another great Baron, "William de Albini, Pincerna," from whom the Earls of Arundel descended. William de Albini, Brito, Lord of Belvoir, in the Chapter House of St. Albans, confirmed all the grants of his father and mother to the Church of Our Lady at Belvoir, desiring that he might be admitted in the fraternity as those his parents had been. This feudal lord acquired great renown at the celebrated battle of Tinchebray, in Normandy, where, commanding the horse, he charged the enemy with so much spirit that he determine at once the fate of the day. of the exploit, Matthew Paris says, "In this encounter chiefly deserveth honour the most heroic William de Albini, the Briton, who, with his sword, broke through the enemy, and terminated the battle." He subsequently adhered to the Empress Maud and had his castle of Belvoir, with all his other lands, seized by King Stephen and transferred to Ranulph, Earl of Chester. He m. Maud, dau. of Simon de St. Liz, 1st Earl of Huntingdon, widow of Robert, son of Richard de Tunbridge, and ding about the year 1155, left two sons, viz., William, surnamed Meschines, and Ralph. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, England, 1883, p. 160, Daubeney, Barons Daubeney, Earl of Bridgewater]