Alain II (Brittany)

Alain II Schiefbart (Latin: Alanus Barbatorta , Breton: Alan Varvek , French: Alain Barbe-Torte ; † 952 ) was a duke of the Bretons in the 10th century.

He was a son of Count Mathedoi von Poher and his mother was a daughter of the Breton prince Alain I the Great († 907). He and his father had to flee to the British island in 919 before the invasion of Brittany by the Loire Normans , where he became a friend of the Anglo-Saxon king Æthelstan , who was also his godfather. Around the year 931, Alain took advantage of the death of Rollo to lead an uprising against the Norman rule in Brittany together with Count Judicaël Berengar von Rennes . However, this was knocked down by Wilhelm Langschwert , whereupon Alain had to flee again to England. In 933, King Rudolf granted the Normans the coast of Breton, which probably meant the Cotentin and Avranchin , which had been in Breton possession since the days of King Solomon (867). With the military support of King Æthelstan, Alain returned to Brittany in 937 and this time successfully and permanently expelled the Normans from Nantes . In the following years he continued the fight against the Normans and won a decisive victory in the Battle of Trans-la-Forêt on August 1, 939 , whereupon the Normans threat to Brittany subsided.

From then on, Alain Schiefbart held the position of the first prince of the Bretons as a dux with the capital Nantes, although this was contested by the Counts of Rennes . He is therefore considered to be the actual founder of the high medieval Breton duchy, which, however, was not much consolidated due to a strongly feudalized social order. Through his marriages he had also opened the country to the influence of the neighboring Frankish Counts of Anjou and Blois, who determined the fate of the country until the 12th century.

Alain II was married to Roscille, a daughter of Count Fulko I the Red of Anjou . Their son was Drogo , who was later murdered. In his second marriage he was married to a daughter of Vice Count Theobald the old man from Blois , with whom he had no children. However, with Hoël I. and Guérech he still had two illegitimate sons.

After his death in 952 Alain II was buried in the church of Saint-Donatien and Saint-Rogatien in Nantes.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ René Merlet (ed.): La chronique de Nantes (570 environ - 1049) (= Collection de textes pour servir à l'étude et à l'enseignement de l'histoire. 19, ZDB -ID 978323-4 ). Picard, Paris 1896, pp. 80-83, § XXVII .
2. ↑ Dudo of Saint-Quentin , Gesta Normanorum fol. 35r – 36v (# 17) ( Memento of the original from October 20, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
3. ↑ Flodoard of Reims : Annales. Published by Georg Heinrich Pertz . In: Monumenta Germaniae Historica . 5: Scriptores in folio. Vol. 3, 1839, ISSN  0343-2157 , pp. 363–407, here p. 381 ( Memento of the original from May 21, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . 
4. ↑ René Merlet (ed.): La chronique de Nantes (570 environ - 1049) (= Collection de textes pour servir à l'étude et à l'enseignement de l'histoire. 19, ZDB -ID 978323-4 ). Picard, Paris 1896, pp. 87-90, § XXIX .
5. ↑ René Merlet (ed.): La chronique de Nantes (570 environ - 1049) (= Collection de textes pour servir à l'étude et à l'enseignement de l'histoire. 19, ZDB -ID 978323-4 ). Picard, Paris 1896, p. 91, § XXIX ; Flodoard of Reims: Annales. Published by Georg Heinrich Pertz. In: Monumenta Germaniae Historica. 5: Scriptores in folio. Vol. 3, 1839, ISSN  0343-2157 , pp. 363–407, here p. 385 ( memento of the original from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . 
6. ↑ René Merlet (ed.): La chronique de Nantes (570 environ - 1049) (= Collection de textes pour servir à l'étude et à l'enseignement de l'histoire. 19, ZDB -ID 978323-4 ). Picard, Paris 1896, p. 105, § XXXVI .

literature

• John Le Patourel: Feudal empires. Norman and Plantagenet (= History Series. Vol. 18). Hambledon Press, London 1984, ISBN 0-907628-22-2 , pp. 240-241.

predecessor	Office	successor
Norman occupation	Duke of Brittany 937–952	Drogo