General Notes

REFN: 1545AN
REFN: P1545
The Conqueror and His Companions
by J.R. Planché, Somerset Herald . London: Tinsley Brothers, 1874.
Here is a personage who, under the more popu lar name of Hugh Lupus, is
perhaps almost as well known as the Conqueror hims elf.
Wace in his "Roman De Rou," speaks only of his father Richard:
"D'Avranc in i fu Richarz."
But it is generally contended that Richard was not in the ba ttle, and
that it was Hugh, his son, who accompanied William to Hastings. The
authors of "Les Recherches sur le Domesday," to whom we are so deeply
inDe bted for information on these points, hesitate to endorse the opinion
of Mons . le Prévost upon these grounds, -- that Richard was living as
late as 1082, when he appears as a witness to a charter of Roger de
Montgomeri, in favour o f St. Stephen's at Caen, to which also his son,
Earl Hugh, is a subscriber. T heir observations only point, however, to
the probability of Richard, who in 1066 was Seigneur or Vicomte of
Avranches, having been in the Norman army of invasion, as he survived the
event some sixteen years; at the same time they deny that there is any
proof that his son Hugh was in the battle, and assert, without stating on
what authority, that Hugh only joined the Conqueror in En gland after the
victory at Senlac, when he rendered the new King most importa nt services
by his valour and ability in the establishment of William on the throne,
and contributed greatly towards the reduction of the Welsh to obedien ce.
That there is authority for their assertion appears from the cartulary of
the Abbey of Whitby, quoted by Dugdale in his "Monasticon," (Mon. Ang.
vol . i, p. 72) where we read distinctly that Hugh Earl of Chester and
William De Percy came into England with William the Conqueror in 1067:
"Anno Domini mil lesimo sexagesimo septimo," and that the King gave Whitby
to Hugo, which Hugo afterwards gave to William De Percy, the founder of
the abbey there.
We hav e here, therefore, a parallel case to that of Roger De Montgomeri
(ViDe vol i , p. 181), and must similarly treat it as an open question.
The descent of Ric hard, surnamed Goz, Le Gotz, or Le Gois, from Ansfrid
the Dane, the first who bore that surname, has been more or less
correctly recorded, but in "Les Rec herches" it will be found critically
examined and carried up to Rongwald, or Raungwaldar, Earl of Maere and
the Orcades in the days of Harold Harfager, or the Fair-haired; which
said Rongwald was the father of Hrolf, or Rollo, the first Duke of
Normandy. Rongwald, like the majority of his countrymen and kin smen, had
several children by a favourite slave, whom he had married "more Da nico,"
and Hrolf Turstain, th.e son of one of them, having followed his uncle
Rollo into Normandy, managed to secure the hand of Gerlotte De Blois,
daug hter of Thibaut Count of Blois and Chartres, which seems to have been
the fou ndation of this branch of the great Norse family in Normandy, and
the stock f rom which descended the Lords of Briquebec, of Bec-Crispin, of
Montfort-sur-R isle, and others who figure as companions of the Conqueror.
The third son of G erlotte was Ansfrid the Dane, the first Vicomte of the
Hiemois, and father of Ansfrid the second, surnamed Goz, above mentioned,
whose son Turstain (Thurs tan, or Toustain) Goz was the great favouritc of
Robert Duke of Normandy, the father of the Conqueror, and accompanied him
to the Holy Land, and was intru sted to bring back the relics the Duke had
obtained from the Patriarch of Jer usalem to present to the Abbey of
Cerisi, which he had founded. Revolting aga inst the young Duke William in
1041 (ViDe vol. i, p. 21), Turstain was exiled , and his lands confiscated
and given by the Duke to his mother, Herleve, wif e of Herluin de
Conteville.
Richard Goz, Vicomte d'Avranches, or more proper ly of the Avranchin, was
one of the sons of the aforesaid Turstain, by his wi fe Judith de
Montanolier, and appears not only