Humphrey with the beard

Humphrey de Bohun, with the beard ( French Onfroi de Bohon , Latin Hunfredus de Bohun, cum barba , † after 1092) was a Norman nobleman and military man and is the head ancestor of the Bohun family , who later became Earls of Hereford and Earls of Essex became known.

His nickname “with the beard” was a distinguishing feature in 11th century Normandy, as it was then fashionable to shave the face and back of the head.

origin

Planché reports that the Bohun family got their name from the Bohon region in what is now the arrondissement of Saint-Lô in the Cotentin in Normandy , where "the communes of Saint-André-de-Bohon and Saint-Georges-de-Bohon " are still located. However, there is no trace of the family in Norman sources, apart from a donation made by Humphrey with the beard to the Abbey of Saint-Amand in Rouen . Their rare appearance in the surviving records suggests that Humphrey was of lower nobility and had little political influence in the duchy.

Humphrey with the beard is not mentioned as a companion of William the Conqueror , nor as a participant in the Battle of Hastings , i.e. not with William of Poitiers or Ordericus Vitalis, and also not on the Bayeux Tapestry . He can be identified in Wace's Roman de Rou , a story of the Dukes of Normandy commissioned by King Henry II of England around 1160 . The value of the Roman de Rou as a historical source has long been controversial and was only processed by Elisabeth van Houts in 1997.

A much more recent manuscript relating to the descendants of the founders of Lanthony Abbey in Gloucestershire , however, reports that "Dominus Hunfredus de Bohun, cum barba", who accompanied William the conqueror to England, was the king's cognatus . It is not known whether this document exaggerated relations with the ducal family in order to strengthen the reputation of the abbey's founders, but "cognatus" will in any case include relationships that were created either by birth or by marriage. Whatever the truth of their position in Normandy, the Bohun family's fortunes began on a small scale in England, as Humphrey with the beard is only listed in the Domesday Book of 1086 as the owner of Tatterford , Norfolk , which inferred suggests that the family relationship with the king was not close enough to be considered by the monarch.

family

Humphrey was married three times, his third marriage before going to England; the names of the wives are as little known as from which marriage the children come:

• Robert de Bohun, the eldest son, died unmarried before his father
• Richard de Méry, the second son, in the female line the progenitor of the Bohun of Midhurst .
• Ingelram (Ingulf), † after 1093, monk in Marmoutier
• two daughters, nuns in the Abbey of Saint-Léger de Préaux
• Adela de Bohun, † after 1130, possibly identical to Adelisa (de Bohun) ∞ Main (d'Aubigné, Seigneur de Saint-Aubin-d'Aubigné ) - presumably ancestors of the Albino Brito family
• Humphrey de Bohun secundus , † probably 1128/29, the youngest son, who according to Planché was given the serial number "I.", because he was "the founder of the family's wealth" due to his marriage; he married Matilda de Salisbury, daughter of Edward of Salisbury , High Sheriff of Wiltshire

literature

• Melville M. Bigelow , The Bohun Wills , in: American Historical Review, 1.3 (1896), pp. 414/15
• William Dugdale , Monasticon Anglicanum VI, Lanthony Abbey, Gloucestershire, II, Fundatorum progenies , p. 134
• Elisabeth MC van Houts , Wace as Historian and Genealogist , in: KSB Keats-Rohan (Ed.): Family Trees and the Roots of Politics, The Prosopography of Britain and France from the Tenth to the Twelfth Century , Woodbridge, 1997.
• James Planché , The conqueror and his companions , Volume II, Tinsley Brothers, 1874, pp. 63-66
• Graeme White, Bohun, Humphrey (III) de (b. Before 1144, d. 1181) , in: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , Oxford University Press, 2004

Web link

• Charles Cawley, Medieval Lands, Earls of Hereford 1200–1373 (Bohun) ( online )

Remarks

1. ↑ Dugdale
2. ↑ [1]
3. ↑ Planché