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Guy I of Ponthieu (also known in the Bayeux Tapestry as Wido) was born sometime in the mid- to late 1020s and died 13 October 1100. He succeeded his brother Enguerrand II as Count of Ponthieu.
Guy was a son of Hugh II, Count of Ponthieu, and Bertha of Aumale. [1] About 1053, he succeeded his brother Enguerrand II as Count of Ponthieu. [1] The Ponthievin alliance with Duke William of Normandy had earlier been secured by the marriage of Enguerrand to Adelaide of Normandy, Duke William's sister. [2] However, the marriage was apparently annulled due to consanguinity c.1049/50. [3] Enguerrand's and Guy's unnamed sister was married to William of Talou, son of Richard II, Duke of Normandy. [1] William of Talou had built a strong castle at Arques, and from it (in 1053) he defied his nephew the youthful Duke of Normandy. [4] As "family", the comital house of Ponthieu supported the rebellion.
Duke William put Arques under siege, and then remained mobile with another force in the countryside nearby. He was aware that Normandy was being threatened by the armies of King Henry I of France, who wanted to bring his young, former vassal to heel; and that Normandy's erstwhile allies from Ponthieu would also be coming to break the siege of Arques. Young Count Enguerrand led a Ponthievin army into the Talou to relieve Arques, and arrived first, but Duke William successfully ambushed them and Enguerrand was killed. [5] Upon learning of this serious reverse, the vacillating Henry withdrew his forces at once back across the Norman border. William of Talou was compelled to surrender Arques and was banished for life. (Alternatively, the story goes that Henry reinforced Arques, and Duke William lured part of the French army, including Enguerrand and the Ponthievins, away by a feigned flight, then turned on them and won a battle: Henry then withdrew, forcing the surrender of Arques not long after.)
With the death of his older brother (who was without male issue or heirs), Guy assumed the comital duties: this is the first mention of Guy in the historical record.
In February 1054, Henry was again ready to chastise Duke William: he reentered the duchy with a large army of his own liegemen and an Angevin army led by Geoffrey II, Count of Anjou. This combined force moved down the Seine toward Rouen, while Henry's brother Eudes "led" a second army, along with Guy and Count Rainald of Clairmont. The Franco-Ponthievin army was undisciplined, and fragmented out of control to plunder and pillage the countryside around Mortemer. They were attacked suddenly by Normans from Eu and other districts of northeastern Normandy. In the Battle of Mortemer, Guy's younger brother Waleran was mortally wounded, and Guy himself was captured. He spent two years as a prisoner in Normandy, while his uncle, Bishop Guy of Amiens, ruled Ponthieu as regent.
Evidently, from this point on, Count Guy was a vassal of Duke William of Normandy.
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In 1064, Harold Godwinson, the Earl of Wessex, was shipwrecked on the shores of Ponthieu and captured by Count Guy who took him to his castle of Beaurain on the river Canche, as the Bayeux Tapestry relates: hic apprehendit wido Haroldum et duxit em ad Belrem et ibi eum tenuit ("Here Guy seized Harold and led him to Beaurain and held him there"). Duke William demanded the release of the earl, and Count Guy delivered Harold Godwinson up after being paid a ransom for him. Harold was not released from Normandy until he too had sworn on the Holy Relics to be Duke William's vassal, and to aid him to the throne of England. (This story is pictured prominently in the Bayeux Tapestry where he is called Wido.)
In 1066, Harold accepted the crown of England upon the death of Edward the Confessor, thus precipitating the war that resulted in the Norman Conquest.
According to one interpretation of The Carmen de Hastingae Proelio , Hugh, another of Guy's brothers, was a participant in the Battle of Hastings, and had a hand in the slaying of Harold. Guy I had a son, Enguerrand, who must have died before the Carmen was composed (no later than 1068): when the Carmen refers to Hugh, Guy's brother, as "the noble heir of Ponthieu", we must assume Enguerrand's death as a fact, either at the time of the Conquest, or shortly before.
Guy married Adela. [6] They had:
Guy was portrayed by Bernard Hepton in the two-part BBC TV play Conquest (1966), part of the series Theatre 625 .
Harold Godwinson, also called Harold II, was the last crowned Anglo-Saxon English king. Harold reigned from 6 January 1066 until his death at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066, the decisive battle of the Norman Conquest. Harold's death marked the end of Anglo-Saxon rule over England. He was succeeded by William the Conqueror.
The Battle of Hastings was fought on 14 October 1066 between the Norman-French army of William, Duke of Normandy, and an English army under the Anglo-Saxon King Harold Godwinson, beginning the Norman Conquest of England. It took place approximately 7 mi (11 km) northwest of Hastings, close to the present-day town of Battle, East Sussex, and was a decisive Norman victory.
The Bayeux Tapestry is an embroidered cloth nearly 70 metres long and 50 centimetres tall that depicts the events leading up to the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, led by William, Duke of Normandy challenging Harold II, King of England, and culminating in the Battle of Hastings. It is thought to date to the 11th century, within a few years of the battle. Now widely accepted to have been made in England, perhaps as a gift for William, it tells the story from the point of view of the conquering Normans and for centuries has been preserved in Normandy.
Ponthieu was one of six feudal counties that eventually merged to become part of the Province of Picardy, in northern France. Its chief town is Abbeville.
Geoffrey II, called Martel, son of Fulk the Black, was Count of Anjou from 1040 to 1060 and Count of Vendôme from 1032 to 1056. He fought battles against William VII, Duke of Aquitaine, Theobald III, Count of Blois, and William, Duke of Normandy. During his twenty-year reign Geoffrey II faced the ambitions of the Bishop of Le Mans, Gervais de Château-du-Loir, but was able to maintain his authority over the County of Maine. Martel founded the Abbey aux Dames in Saintonge and also -in collaboration with his wife Agnes- founded the Abbaye de la Trinité at Vendôme. The first mention of Geoffrey II in the Gesta Normannorum Ducum reads: "Geoffrey, count of the Angevins, nicknamed Martel, a treacherous man in every respect, frequently inflicted assaults and intolerable pressure on his neighbors."
Adelaide of Normandy was the ruling Countess of Aumale in her own right in 1069–1087. She was the sister of William the Conqueror.
The Carmen de Hastingae Proelio is a 20th-century name for the Carmen Widonis, the earliest history of the Norman invasion of England from September to December 1066, in Latin. It is attributed to Guy, Bishop of Amiens, a noble of Ponthieu and monastically-trained bishop and administrator close to the French court, who eventually served as a chaplain for Matilda of Flanders, William the Conqueror's queen. Bishop Guy was an uncle to Guy I, Count of Ponthieu, who figures rather prominently in the Bayeux Tapestry as the vassal of Duke William of Normandy who captured Harold Godwinson, later to become King Harold II of England, in 1064.
Guy was the bishop of Amiens in the north-east of France and a Latin poet. He composed the Carmen de Hastingae Proelio, a celebration of the Norman victory at the Battle of Hastings in 1066.
Enguerrand II was the son of Hugh II count of Ponthieu. He assumed the county upon the death of his father on November 20, 1052.
William of Talou, Count of Talou (Arques) was a powerful member of the Norman ducal family who exerted his influence during the early reign of William the Conqueror Duke of Normandy.
Hugh II of Ponthieu was count of Ponthieu and lord of Abbeville, the son of Enguerrand I of Ponthieu. Evidently, Hugh II was the half-brother of Guy, who became the bishop of Amiens; Fulk, who became the abbot of Forest l'Abbaye; and Robert. However, it is possible that both Robert and Hugh II were the sons of Enguerrand's first wife, and Guy and Fulk the sons of a later wife that Enguerrand I married when he was in his forties.
Enguerrand I was the son of Hugh I of Ponthieu and Gisela, daughter of Hugh Capet.
Hugh I of Ponthieu, who died circa 1000, was also known as Hugo Miles.
Arnold II is a Count of Boulogne identified by Morton and Muntz as the one slain in battle by Count Enguerrand I of Ponthieu. Frank Barlow prefers to retain the traditional identification of the slain count as Baldwin I of Boulogne. However, he admits that the identification is "uncertain." In any case, the widow (Adelvie?) of Baldwin / Arnold then married Count Enguerrand I.
The County of Ponthieu, centered on the mouth of the Somme, became a member of the Norman group of vassal states when Count Guy submitted to William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy after the battle of Mortemer. It eventually formed part of the dowry of Eleanor of Castile and passed to the English crown. Much fought-over in the Hundred Years' War, it eventually passed to the French royal domain, and the title Count of Ponthieu became a courtesy title for the royal family.
Beaurainville is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-de-France region in northern France.
The Battle of Mortemer was a defeat for Henry I of France when he led an army against his vassal, William the Bastard, Duke of Normandy in 1054. William was eventually to become known as William the Conqueror after his successful invasion and conquest of England.
Mauger was born around 1019 near Dieppe. He was the younger son of Richard II, Duke of Normandy, and his second wife, Papia of Envermeu.
The Bayeux Tapestry tituli are Medieval Latin captions that are embroidered on the Bayeux Tapestry and describe scenes portrayed on the tapestry. These depict events leading up to the Norman conquest of England concerning William, Duke of Normandy, and Harold, Earl of Wessex, later King of England, and culminating in the Battle of Hastings.
Walter Gautier Giffard, Lord of Longueville, Normandy, was a Norman baron, a Tenant-in-chief in England, a Christian knight who fought against the Saracens in Spain during the Reconquista and was one of the 15 or so known companions of William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066.