General Notes

MISC:  The baronial family of BRAOSE came from orginially from Briouze, near Argetan, Normandy.  William de BRIOUSE was one of the most powerful barons in William the Conqueror's army.  He received large possessions, chiefly in Sussex, including the whole Rape of Bramber, where he built Barmber Castle, which was his seat.  In 1075 he executed the foundation charter of the Sele Abbey, Sussex, founded the Abbey of Braisose in the time of William I and made grants to St. Florent Saumer.  Gunnora, his mother, in 1082 held lands from Hugh PINCERA and Roger de CUILLI.  The date of his death is unknown, but he was succeeded bykl his son, Phililp de BRIOUSE, during the reign of William RUFUS; he increased the vast estates of his father by marriage with Beta, sister and co-heir of William, Earl of Gloucester.  He is mentioned by Orderic VItal in 1096 as supporting William RUFUS against his brother Henry, who held the strong castle of Domfront in Normandy, from which he carried on his opeations.  Philip was the ancestor of the house of Braose, barons of Bramber, Brecknock, Gower, and Totness, and of William de BRAOSE, who obtained from King Henry II a grant of the "whole kingdom of Limerick" in Ireland for the service of sixty knight's fees.

One of King Williams's most fovored companions; had numerous manors at Domesday; md. Agnes (1040, 2nd marr. for both), d. of Waldren de St Clare."Guillaume de Briouze is recorded in lists of those present at the Battle of Hastings.  He became the first Lord of the Bramber Rape by 1073 and built Bramber Castle.  William made considerable grants to the abbey of Saint Florent, Saumur to endow the foundation of Sele Priory near Bramber and a priory at Briouze.  He continued to fight alongside King William in the campaigns in Britain, Normandy, and Maine.

See remains of gatehouse at Bramber Castle.

William de Braose came into England with the Conqueror and held, at the general survey, considerable estates in the counties of Berks, Wilts, Surrey, Dorset, and Sussex. He was s. by his son, Philip de Braose. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 72, Braose, Baron Braose, of Gower]

Guillaume de Briouze is recorded in lists of those present at the Battle of Hastings.  He became the first Lord of the Bramber Rape by 1073 and built Bramber Castle.  William made considerable grants to the abbey of Saint Florent, Saumur to endow the foundation of Sele Priory near Bramber and a priory at Briouze.  He continued to fight alongside King William in the campaigns in Britain, Normandy, and Maine.

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One of the most distinguished commanders in the army of the Conqueror, based upon the broad lands he acquired in the counties of Berks, Wilts, Surrey, Dorset and Sussex.  A noble Norman, who held, in his native Duchy, the Honour of Braose near Falaise. [The Roll of Battle Abbey]

From the time of Domesday the family of Briouze were lords of the rape of Bramber, Sussex. Their place of origin is established by a series of charters for the abbey of St. Florent at Saumur, particularly by one bef 1080 in which William de Briouze gave to the church of St. Gervaise and St. Protaise at Briouze all is tithe except his demesne profit from the mills of Briouze, and also the church of St. Nicholas at his castle of Bramber. [Anglo-Norman Families, p . 20]

One of the most powerful barons in the Conqueror's army. He received large possessions, chiefly in Sussex, including the whole Rape of Bramber, where he build Bramber Castle, which was his seat. In 1075 he executed the foundation charter of Sele Abbey, Sussex, founded the abbey of Braiose in the time of William I and made grants to St-Florent Saumur. Gunnora, his mother, in 1082 held lands from Hugo Pincerna and Roger de Cuilli. The date of his death is not known, but he was succeeded by his son Philip, during the reign of William Rufus. [Falaise Rol l, p. 35]

The family of de Buceio/Boceio held Kingston Bowsey or 'by Sea', Sussex of Briouze from an early date.Randulfus Landrici de Boceio witnessed a charter of William de Briouze for St. Florent de Saumur bef 1030. Bouce is 22 kil E of Briouze, but only 9 kil. S of Ecouche (Scocetum), the church of which belonged to William de Briouze in the 11th century. [Anglo-Norman Famil ies, p. 21]

m. Agnes de St. Clare; dau. m. William of Harcourt. [GRS 3.03, Automated Archives, CD#100]

Son of Robert de Brus and Emma de Brittany; m. Agnes de St. Clare; dau. m. Anchetil de Harcourt. [Charlemagne & Others, Chart 3316b, 3354c]

William de Braose's first wife was Agnes, dau. of Waldron de St. Clare. Then he m. the widow of Anchetill de Harcourt, Eva de Boissey, who already had seven children. Travelled with William the Conqueror as he subdued England and dealt with some serious disputes on the continent.
   William de Braose features in the Domesday survey as an established tenant in chief.
   William was with the Conqueror when he died at the priory of Saint Gervais, outside Rouen, in 1087.
   He was from Briouze in Normandy, near Falaise where the Conqueror was born. King William distributed manors across the country to his companions but he chose his best warriors from the Norman nobility to defend the coast of Sussex. Trade and travel between Sussex and Normandy was a lifeline for the new conquerors.
   Sussex was divided into six rapes. The king created a lordship for each rape, possessing all its manors, and the lord built or strengthened a major castle and a port. Trade with Normandy soon flourished, free from interference by English rebels or invaders such as the French or the Danes.
   William de Braose became lord of the rape of Bramber and held over 200 manors elsewhere. He began building Bramber Castle, near Steyning, in about 1071 to dominate the fertile Adur River valley and its estuary. At first the castle would have been a ditch and a wooden enclosure with high defensive mound inside. Stone castles were only started after local resistance wa s under firm control.
   The rape also needed inland defences so William de Braose entrusted his stepson, Robert de Harcourt with Knepp near Shipley, where a castle mound and some flint ruins can still be seen. Shipley church has survived with many Norman features intact.
   The river Adur was wider and deeper than it is today. It had a thriving port at Steyning named after an important Saxon church, Saint Cuthman's. The father of England's royal line, King Aethelwulf, was originally buried there in 858. In 1043 Edward the Confessor granted Saint Cuthman's church, with Steyning, Ashurst and Warminghurst manors, to the Benedictine abbey of Fecamp in Normandy. The monks had given him refuge during his exile in Normandy, then as king of England Edward rewarded their hospitality.
   King Harold's father severed the link between Sint Cuthman's and Fecamp in his efforts to check the Norman influence on English affairs. William the Conqueror cited this outrage as one of the reasons for his invasion and Fecamp Abbey lent its powerful moral support. The Norman attack and William's claim to the throne won the pope's blessing. Benedictines welcomed the Conqueror at Hastings in anticipation of lavish future endowment.
   William de Braose built a large bridge over the river at Bramber and established his own port there. His castle then exacted tolls from the ships using Saint Cuthman's port. The imposing "caput" of his barony began to sprawl across the Saxon landscape and local rights and customs became subordinate to his will.
   In 1085 the king belatedly restored Saint Cuthman's to the monks of Fecamp, with the income from its three manors including Steyning. A rival force had entered William de Braose's domains and threatened his baronial supremacy. Naturally he opposed it but the abbey was more th an equal to the fight.
   In an aggressive claim for burial fees, the monks challenged Bramber's right\ to bury its parishioners in the churchyard at Saint Nicholas. This was William de Braose's new church which served the castle. In 1086 the king called his sons and all his barons and bishops to court to settle the dispute, which took a full day. The abbey of Fecamp swayed the court in its favour and William de Braose had to organize the unpleasant exhumation of bodies.
   Fecamp's victory meant that Bramber's dead were all moved to the churchyard at Saint Cuthman's. William de Braose also lost the right to charge tolls at his bridge and the port of Bramber failed to thrive. Fecamp fought him and won over a rabbit warren, a park, gardens, a causeway and a channel to fill his moat. The monks celebrated their reinstated income by ostentatiously rebuilding Saint Cuthman's church. They rededicated it to Saint Andrew and transported Saint Cuthman's relics to Fecamp abbey.
    The was the first of several legal battles. The dispute was exacerbated by Sele priory in Upper beeding. William de Braose's attempt to form a college of secular canons at Saint Nicholas' church in 1073 failed when they were found to be leading dissolute lives. After 1080, however, he made improved arrangements for prayers to redeem his sins and for the souls of his family. Obviously the monks at Steyning would never be trusted to do the job. So Willia m founded Sele priory and his valuable patronage went to rival Benedictines from the Saint Florent abbey of Saumur in Anjou.
   The Sele priory at Upper Beeding was sited over the river from Steyning, where Saint Peter's church remains. William handed Saint Nicholas' at Bramber, Saint Botolph's, Saint Nicholas' in Old Shoreham and other churches with the rape to the monks of Saint Florent, providing a generous income to maintain Sele priory. He also endowed Saint Florent with gifts from his Norman domains. In 1093 William coerced his unwilling son Philip to confirm these gifts at the dedication of the church at Briouze to Saints Gervais and Protais. It was a dramatic scene, in which they jointly placed a dagger on the altar to make an oath in the presence of the bishop and clergy about to celebrate mass. ["Barons de Braose" <http://freespace.virgin.net /doug.thompson/BraoseWeb/stage.htm]

Bramber was part of the parish of Steyning and responsibility for religious affairs of that town had been given by Edward the Confessor to the Abbey of Fecamp in France together with certain lands in the neighbourhood. Those rights and lands the monks of Fecamp stubbornly maintained when, after the Conquest, William de Braose was given the lordship of the "Rape of Bramber," stretching far beyond the confines of his home parish.
   By way of breaking their monopoly, de Braose established a small college of Benedictines just outside his castle at Bramber and attached it, with some endowments, to the important Benedictine house of St. Florent at Saumer in Anjou. For that college, the little cruciform Church of St. Nicholas was built. [The Church of St. Nicholas in the parish of Beeding and Bramber with Botolphs flyer]

When first built, the Church of St. Nicholas was the Chapel of the Castle of William de Braose who, as a foremost Baron of William the Conqueror, was given the Lordship of the Rape of Bramber, one of the main sections into which Susssex was divided. It extended some 10 miles along the coast and inland to include the present Crawley. [St. Nicholas's Church, Bramber, Sussex flyer]

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