Roger of Montgomery

Roger de Montgomery (died 1094), also known as Roger the Great, was the first Earl of Shrewsbury, and Earl of Arundel, in Sussex. His father was Roger de Montgomery, seigneur of Montgomery, a member of the House of Montgomerie, and was probably a grandnephew of the Duchess Gunnor, wife of Duke Richard I of Normandy, the great-grandfather of William the Conqueror. The elder Roger had large landholdings in central Normandy, chiefly in the valley of the River Dives, which the younger Roger inherited.

Life

Roger inherited his father’s estates in 1055. By the time of the Council of Lillebonne, which took place in about January of 1066, he was one of William the Conqueror's principal counsellors, playing a major role at the Council. He may not have fought in the initial invasion of England in 1066, instead staying behind to help govern Normandy. According to Wace's ''Roman de Rou'', however, he commanded the Norman right flank at Hastings, returning to Normandy with King William in 1067. Afterwards, he was entrusted with land in two regions critical for the defence of the Kingdom of England. At the end of 1067 or early in 1068, William gave Roger nearly all of what is now the county of West Sussex, a total of 83 manors, which at the time of the Domesday Survey (1086) was an area known as the Rape of Arundel; and about 1071 Roger was granted estates in Shropshire which amounted to some seven-eighths of the whole county; he was also made Earl of Shrewsbury, but it is uncertain that the earldom came to him at the same time as the land, and it may have been a few years later. In 1083, Roger founded Shrewsbury Abbey.

Roger was thus one of the half dozen greatest magnates in England during William the Conqueror's reign.Salzmann, 'The rape of Chichester: Introduction', A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 4: The Rape of Chichester (1953)
pp. 1-2
accessed: 8 August 2010 The Rape of Arundel was eventually split into two "rapes", one keeping the name of Arundel, the other being called the Rape of Chichester.

Besides his estates in Sussex and Shropshire, Roger had others in Surrey (four manors), Hampshire (nine manors), Wiltshire (three manors), Middlesex (eight manors), Gloucestershire (one manor), Worcestershire (two manors), Cambridgeshire (eight manors), Warwickshire (eleven manors), and Staffordshire (thirty manors).Horsfield. History of Sussex. pp. 76–77 The income from Roger's estates amounted to about £2,000 per year, and in 1086 the income of all the land in England was around £72,000. The £2,000 (equivalent to several million in 2022) was almost 3 per cent of the nation's GDP.

After William I's death in 1087, Roger joined with other rebels to overthrow the newly crowned king, William II, in the Rebellion of 1088. However, William was able to convince Roger to abandon the rebellion and to side with him. This worked out favourably for Roger, as the rebels were beaten and lost their land holdings in England. "CONQUEST & RESISTANCE England: 1066 TO 1088", britannia.com, accessed 14 September 2012

Family

Roger married Mabel de Bellême, who was heiress to a large territory straddling the border between Normandy and Maine. The medieval chronicler Orderic Vitalis paints a picture of Mabel of Bellême being a scheming and cruel woman.Orderic Vitalis. ''The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis'', Volume 2, Book 3. pp. 49–55 She was murdered by Hugh Bunel and his brothers who, possibly in December 1077, rode into her castle of Bures-sur-Dive and cut off her head as she lay in bed.Orderic Vitalis. ''The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis'', Volume 2, Book 3. Footnote pp. 54–55. Discussion on date of death of Mabel of Bellême, 1077 and 1079 being the most likely. Their motive for the murder was that Mabel had deprived them of their paternal inheritance.Allen Brown. Proceedings of the Battle Conference on Anglo-Norman studies: 1978. p.41. Roger and Mabel had 10 children:

* Robert de Bellême, Count of Alençon in 1082, he succeeded his younger brother Hugh as 3rd Earl of Shrewsbury. He married Agnes, Countess of Ponthieu and died in 1131.
* Hugh of Montgomery, 2nd Earl of Shrewsbury, died without issue 1098.
* Roger the Poitevin, Vicomte d'Hiemois, married Adelmode de la Marche.
* Philip of Montgomery.K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, ''Domesday People, Vol. I Domesday Book'' (The Boydell Press, Woodbridge, UK, 1999), p. 399
* Arnulf of Montgomery, married Lafracota, daughter of King Muirchertach Ua Briain.
* Sibyl of Montgomery, she married Robert Fitzhamon, Lord of Creully.
* Emma, abbess of Almenêches.
* Matilda (Maud) of Montgomery, she married Robert, Count of Mortain and died c. 1085. He was a half-brother of William the Conqueror.K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, ''Domesday People, Vol. I Domesday Book'' (The Boydell Press, Woodbridge, UK, 1999), p. 372
* Mabel of Montgomery, she married Hugh de Châteauneuf.
* Roger of Montgomery, died young.

Roger then married Adelaide du Puiset, by whom he had one son, Everard, who entered the Church.

After his death, Roger's estates were divided.George Edward Cokayne, ''The Complete Peerage; or, A History of the House of Lords and all its Members from the Earliest Times'', Vol XI, Ed. Geoffrey H. White (London: The St. Catherine Press, Ltd., 1949), pp. 688, 689-92 His eldest surviving son, Robert of Bellême, received the bulk of the Norman estates (as well as his mother's estates); the next son, Hugh, received the bulk of the English estates and the Earldom of Shrewsbury. After Hugh's death, the elder son Robert inherited the earldom.

References

Sources

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*J. F. A. Mason, "Roger de Montgomery and His Sons (1067–1102)", ''Transactions of the Royal Historical Society'', 5th series vol. 13 (1963) 1-28
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*Kathleen Thompson, "The Norman Aristocracy before 1066: the Example of the Montgomerys", ''Historical Research'' 60 (1987) 251-263
*''Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700'' by Frederick Lewis Weis Lines: 124-26, 185-1
Stirnet: Montgomery01
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External links

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* VIMOUTIERS Heart of the Pays d'Auge in Normandy


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{{DEFAULTSORT:Montgomery, Roger
1030s births
1094 deaths
11th-century English nobility
Anglo-Normans in Wales
11th-century Normans
11th-century French people
Earls of Shrewsbury
Clan Montgomery