William of Savoy

Last updated

William
William of Savoy.jpg
Coat of arms of William of Savoy
(Matthew Paris, c. 1255)
Died1239
Viterbo
Noble family House of Savoy
Father Thomas, Count of Savoy
Mother Margaret of Geneva

William of Savoy [1] (died 1239 in Viterbo) was a bishop from the House of Savoy. He was a son of Thomas, Count of Savoy and Margaret of Geneva. He was elected bishop of Valence in 1224. He negotiated the weddings of queens, and was an advisor to Henry III of England. Between his religious roles and his family relations, his influence was noted from London to Rome.

Contents

Career in Savoy

Seal of Guillaume de Savoie Seal of Guillaume de Savoie.jpg
Seal of Guillaume de Savoie

Being at least the fourth son of a noble house, William's father Thomas sought for him positions in the church which would serve to strengthen the County of Savoy rather than diminish it. This included a request by 1220 to Henry III of England which led to William being responsible for the benefices of St Michael's on Wyre and Bingham. In 1220 he was also elected dean of the cathedral at Vienne, and in 1225 was elected bishop of Valence, replacing Gérold of Lausanne, who had just become patriarch of Jerusalem. [2]

His job as bishop included temporal authority as well as spiritual, but this was contested by Ademar de Peiteus, Count of Valentinois. With the assistance of his kinfolk, William was able to defeat the forces of Ademar and negotiated a favorable peace treaty in 1231. [3]

When their father died in 1233, William's brothers began to struggle for control of the various portions of the county. In July 1234, the brothers met at Château de Chillon, some bringing large armed forces with them. William played a key role in maintaining the integrity of the county under Amadeus IV of Savoy, with the others receiving significant portions under his authority. These portions were also designed to encourage those brothers to expand their authority outward from the county. The treaty they signed there required all the brothers to take arms against any one of them who violated the territory of another, and left William as the arbiter of any disputes. [4]

International Influence

William of Savoy lobbied to have his niece Margaret of Provence marry Louis IX of France, as this would bring prestige and influence to his family. He and his brother Thomas accompanied her to her wedding and coronation, but William was not invited to the court in Paris and sent home by Blanche of Castile with a few gifts.

William then labored to have Margaret's younger sister Eleanor marry Henry III of England. This succeeded and in 1236 he came with her to England. Henry made William the head of a council of advisors. [5] Henry exchanged letters with Pope Gregory IX about how much he needed William in England. [6] Granted the Honour of Richmond in August 1236. [7] Henry then tried to have William selected as bishop of Winchester; the chapter resisted Henry on this. [8] In 1237, William worked on behalf of his brother Thomas, Count of Flanders to convince Henry to release many Flemish merchants and restore better trade between England and Flanders. [9] That same year, William was also a signing witness to a treaty between England and Scotland. [10]

When Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor called together an army to invade Italy in 1238, Henry chose William to accompany his force of 100 knights from Gascony, so that he could lead them through his Savoy's Alpine passes. He joined the imperial army in Turin, and then went on to participate in the siege of Brescia. His prowess during this was widely noted. Philippe Mousket recorded that he led his troops on 23 August to drive off a force coming in from Piacenza to help Brescia. [11] He and his troops took 90 knights and 300 infantry prisoner, while the foe took only 5 prisoners. [12]

In 1238 William secured election as Prince-Bishop of Liège. He died next year, in Italy (said to have been poisoned [13] ).

Related Research Articles

Humbert I, better known as Humbert the White-Handed or Humbert Whitehand was the founder of the House of Savoy. Of obscure origins, his service to the German emperors Henry II and Conrad II was rewarded with the counties of Maurienne and Aosta and lands in Valais, all at the expense of local bishops and archbishops; the territory came to be known as the county of Savoy.

Thomas Ι was Count of Savoy from 1189 to 1233. He is sometimes numbered "Thomas I" to distinguish him from his son of the same name, who governed Savoy but was not count.

Amadeus IV was Count of Savoy from 1233 to 1253.

Thomas, Count of Flanders Lord (later Count) of Piedmont

Thomas II was the Lord of Piedmont from 1233 to his death, Count of Flanders jure uxoris from 1237 to 1244, and regent of the County of Savoy from 1253 to his death, while his nephew Boniface was fighting abroad. He was the son of Thomas I of Savoy and Margaret of Geneva.

Peter II, Count of Savoy European noble

Peter II, called the Little Charlemagne, held the Honour of Richmond, Yorkshire, England from April 1240 until his death and was Count of Savoy from 1263 until his death. He built the Savoy Palace in London.

Philip I was the count of Savoy from 1268 to 1285. Before this, he was the bishop of Valence (1241–1267), dean of Vienne, Isère (1241–1267) and archbishop of Lyon (1245–1267).

Amadeus V, Count of Savoy

Amadeus V, surnamed the Great for his wisdom and success as a ruler, was the Count of Savoy from 1285 to 1323. He established Chambéry as his seat. He was the son of Thomas II of Savoy and Beatrice Fieschi.

Eleanor of Provence 13th-century French noblewoman and Queen of England

Eleanor of Provence was a French noblewoman who became Queen consort of England as the wife of King Henry III from 1236 until his death in 1272. She served as regent of England during the absence of her spouse in 1253.

County of Savoy State of the Holy Roman Empire

The County of Savoy was a State of the Holy Roman Empire which emerged, along with the free communes of Switzerland, from the collapse of the Burgundian Kingdom in the 11th century. It was the cradle of the future Savoyard state.

Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence

Ramon Berenguer IV was a member of the House of Barcelona who ruled as count of Provence and Forcalquier. He was the first count of Provence to live in the county in more than one hundred years. During the minority of a previous count, the regency was exercised by Ramon Berenguer IV de Barcelona, who is sometimes counted among the counts of Provence. It follows that the count Ramon Berenguer IV de Provence is often named Ramon Berenguer V de Provence.

Richard Marshal, 3rd Earl of Pembroke

Richard Marshal, 3rd Earl of Pembroke, was the son of William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke and brother of William Marshal, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, whom he succeeded to the Earldom of Pembroke and Lord Marshal of England upon his brother's death on 6 April 1231.

Beatrice of Savoy Countess of Provence

Beatrice of Savoy was the daughter of Thomas I of Savoy and Margaret of Geneva. She was Countess consort of Provence by her marriage to Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence.

Events from the 1230s in England.

Rudolf of Geneva

Rudolf or Rudolph was the Count of Geneva from 1252 until his death in 1265. He was the eldest son of William II, and was described by a Renaissance historian as “the more quarrelsome son of a quarrelsome father.” He was a constant warrior, and his most frequent foes were of the House of Savoy.

Louis I was the Baron of Vaud. At the time of his birth he was a younger son of the House of Savoy, but through a series of deaths and his own effective military service, he succeeded in creating a semi-independent principality in the pays de Vaud by 1286. He travelled widely in the highest circles of European nobility, obtained the right to mint coins from the Holy Roman Emperor, and convoked the first public assembly in the Piedmont to include members of the non-noble classes. When he died, his barony was inherited by his son.

William II was the Count of Geneva, originally a usurper, from 1225 until his death. He fought a long series of wars with the House of Savoy and lost control of all of his county outside of the traditional Genevois and saw his influence over the city of Geneva proper and the Bishop of Geneva severely reduced.

Adémar II de Poitiers, known in Old Occitan as Ademar or Aimeric de Peiteus, was the count of Valentinois and de facto ruler of Diois from 1188 or 1189 until 1230. He was the son of Count Guillaume and grandson of Count Adémar I. He married Philippa, daughter of Guillaume-Jourdain, the lord of Fay, and Météline de Clérieu. The Finnish scholar Aimo Sakari hypothesised that Philippa of Fay was the famous trobairitz known as the Comtessa de Dia, and that the friend (amic) mentioned by the Comtessa in her poems was the troubadour Raimbaut de Vaqueiras. Around 1195–96, Adémar himself participated in a three-way torneyamen with Raimbaut de Vaqueiras and Perdigon.

Aymon de Briançon was a Burgundian nobleman and Carthusian monk who served as the archbishop of Tarentaise from around 1175 until his death. From 1186, he was a prince of the Holy Roman Empire. He took part in the Third Crusade in 1189.

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Guillaume de Savoie, Guglielmo.
  2. ↑ Claverie 2013, pp. 409–10.
  3. ↑ Cox 1974, pp. 35–39.
  4. ↑ Cox 1974, pp. 40–43.
  5. ↑ Powicke 1947, p. 153.
  6. ↑ Cox 1974, p. 50.
  7. ↑ CPR Henry III Vol 3 1232-1247. 156.
  8. ↑ Powicke 1962, p. 74.
  9. ↑ Cox 1974, pp. 58–60.
  10. ↑ Stones, ed. (1964). Anglo-Scottish Relations 1174-1328 London pp. 19–26.
  11. ↑ Cox 1974, pp. 62–68.
  12. ↑ Chronicon Placentinum Paris (1856), pp. 174–175
  13. ↑ , in French
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.