Emperor Charlmagne, m. (3) Hildegarde of Vinzgau.
Emperor Louis I., m. Judith of Bavaria.
Charles II King of France, m. Richilde of Provence.
Judith Carolingienne, m. Baldwin I., Count of Flanders.
Baldwin II, Count of Flanders, m. Aelfthryth of Wessex.
Arnulf the elder, 897-964, Count of Flanders, m. Adele de Vermandois..

1. Boudewijn (“von Flanderen”), count of Flanders, m. Ælfthryth, dau. of Alfred “the Great”, king of the Anglo-Saxons, and Ealhswith.
1.1. Arnulf I. (“the Great”), count of Flanders (897-965), b. in Ghent, East Flanders; m. Adele of Vermandois, dau. of Héribert II, count of Vermandois, and Adèle, dau. of Robert I, King of France, and Aélis. His southern expansion led to conflict with the Normans, who were trying to secure their northern frontier, resulting in the 942 murder of William Longsword at the hands of Arnulf’s confederates.
1.1.1. Baldwin III., Count of Flanders, m. Matilda, dau. of Hermann I, duke of Saxony, and Hildegard von Westerburg.
1.1.1.1. Arnulf (961-March 30, 987), Count of Flanders, m. Rozala, dau. of Berengar II., king of Italy.
1.1.1.1.1. Baldwin (Jan. 8, 980–May 30, 1035), Count of Flanders, m. (2) Elenore, dau. of Richard II, of Normandy, half-br. Geoffrey, father of Gilbert de Brionne.

1.1.2. Hildegarde, m. Dietrich I., Count of West Frisia. (Theoderich/Dietrich, a name popular among the elite).
1.1.2.1. Hildegarde, m. Theoderick von Ghent. According to Europäische Stammtafeln, Hildegard was the dau. of Count Arnulf and his wife Adela de Vermandois and born in 934 (ES II., 5). Adela’s sister, Luitgarde de Vermandois, m. William Longsword.

(Chronology suggests that if Hildegard was the dau. of Count Arnulf, she was issue of an earlier marriage. The fact of her naming two sons Arnulf and Egbert suggests an affiliation to Count Arnulf. She may have been his niece, for instance. The Annales Egmundani name “Hildegardis comitissa” as wife of “Theodericus comes secundus ” but do not give her origin).

(1. William Longsword and his mistress, Sprota (Scand. Sprottr), described as ‘nobilissima‘ (Frodoard, 933, MGH SS III, p. 381). She was not a Breton. Eric Christiansen’s (History of the Normans, note 234, p. 199, 1998), explains that in 934 William Longsword was given Breton lands by King Ralph as a bulwark against the Vikings to the west of them. These Vikings were led by Ragnall, and Sprotta was likely allianced with William as a peace-weaving exercise, giving William an uncontested (by Ragnall) claim to the Cotentin and Avranchin. The Loire Vikings held sway in Brittany between 919 and 936. 1.1. Richard, “the Fearless”. 1.1.1. Geoffrey, Count d’Eu. 1.1.1.1. Gilbert de Brionne).

(1. Sprota, m. (2) Esperlenc. 1.1. Rodolph d’Ivri, born ca. 943. 1.1.1. Emma d’Ivri, Abbess of St Amand. 1.1.2. … d’Ivri, m. Richard de Beaufou. 1.1.2.1. … de Beaufou, b. ca. 1085, m. Erchembald, vicecomes of Rouen).

1.1.3. Luitgarde, m. Wichman von Hamaland, “burggraaf von Ghent”.
1.1.3.1. Theodric von Ghent, count in West Frisia (Ouest-Frise). Frisé, frisée. adjective: curly-haired; latin crispus, frisé, from which crispinus is a diminutive. He m. Hildegarde, dau. of Dietrich 1, Count of West Frisia, and Hildegarde, of some relation to Arnulf I. (“the Great”), count of Flanders.
1.1.3.1.1. Arnoul von Ghent, m. Liefgarde.
1.1.3.1.1.1. Adalbert von Ghent, m. Ermengarde.
1.1.3.1.1.1.1. Rolph von Ghent, m. Giselle, dau.of Gislebert of Luxemburg, who made a gift to St. Peter’s, ca. 1058, naming her three sons: “Balduuini filii ipsius Gislæ, item filiorum eius Rodulfi, Gisleberti”.
1..1.3.1.1.1.1.1. Gislebert von Ghent (Gilbert de Gand). The first record of him is that he was left conjointly in command of York with William Malet (as sheriff) and Robert FitzRichard in 1068.

1.1.3.1.2. Heloise, second-cousin of Baldwin (Jan. 8, 980 – May 30, 1035), Count of Flanders, who m. (2) Elenore, dau. of Richard II, of Normandy, half-br. Geoffrey, father of Gilbert de Brionne. She was also the second-cousin of Elstrude, Baldwin’s sister, who m. Siegfried, Count of Guines

She m. Ansgot. ‘Au commencement du onzième siècle, Bonneville appartenait à un chevalier de race normande, nommé Ansgot, vassal de Gislebert, comte de Brionne, et allié, par sa femme Hellois, aux puissants comtes de Flandres’* (Alfred Canel, Essai historique, archéologique et statistique sur l’arrondissement de Pont-Audemer, p. 314, 1834). *Will. Gem. vi. 9. ‘Mater proximam Ducum Morinorum, quosmoderni Flandros cognominant, consanguinitatem attigit’.

Ansgot et Héloïse eurent trois autres enfants, savoir: Eudes, Roger et une fille mariée à Balderic de Servaville; ils paraissent leur avoir laissé en héritage, outre le fief de Bonneville, le Petit-Quevilly, le Pré, près de Rouen, Surcy-en-Vexin, Cernay, et un manoir à Malleville (Charpillon, Dict. Hist. vol. i., 1868). … Gilbert, comte de Brionne, donna aux religieux la pêche de Pont-Autou, les prés d’Antouel, la forêt et la terre de Malleville et le moulin de Norman. La grande charte de Guillaume le Conquérant mentionne en ces termes les donations de Gilbert de Brionne: Gislebertus comes, servitia alodiorum fratrum Herluini abbatis, aquani Rislae a vadis usque sub Ponte-Autou, quod habebat in Malavilla, molendinum Normanni. (Bibl. nat. lat. 13905. fo 115).

One of the most erroneus and repeated myths of Norman genealogy makes Gilbert Crispin I. synonomous with Gilbert, Count of Brionne. Prévost, in his commentaries on Rom. de Rou, t. ii., in MSAN, 1828-1829, gives the source of this misconception, which should not be necessary if the slightest attention is given to the unlikely event of a governor of the castle of Tillières being also the Count of Brionne.

1.1.3.1.2.1. Herlwin. Annales ordinis s. Benedicti occidentalium monachorum patriarchae, in quibus … By Jean Mabillon … Notum fit omnibus christianæ religionis cultoribus , quòd ego abbas Herluinus, filius Ansgoti; astantibus & laudantibus fratribus meis, Odone Rogerio, jubente Gilleberto comite, & Alberto & Ranulfo, consentiente Roberto comite & Roberto arcbiepiscopo, donavi Sanctæ Mariæ tertiam partem terræ de Burnevilla, & hoc quod pertinet ad illam ; & Tavilleio & Surceio , & quod pertinet ad est , & terram de Sernaio, & hoc quod pertinet ad eam, quæ Ansgotus pater meus in vita sua habuit: dorem quoque matris meæ , jubente patre meo ex integro mibi datam. Coram testibus Fulberto, Vitale, Rainaldo, et aliis multis.
1.1.3.1.3. Erchembald von Ghent, vicecomes (in this instance, sheriff) of Rouen, m. a dau. of Richard de Beaufou and a sister of Emma d’Ivri, Abbess of St. Amand (wife of Osbern the dapifer); granddau. of Sprotta and Esperlenc, thus consanguineous of the Norman ‘dukes’.

BEAUFOU
1. Richard de Beaufou, m. a sister of Emma d’Ivri (wife of Osbern the dapifer, by whom she had issue; William FitzOsbern.

Thus, he must have been of a family of the highest rank. Beaufou/Beaufai is situated in the parish of Ballon (arr. Beaumont-le-Vicomte, ca. 10 mls fr. le Mans); a fief in the posession of Herbert, Count of Maine in 1031, which later passed to the family of Cadurces (Chaworth). This might suggest the ancestry of Richard de Bello-Fago, who, if he was a younger son of Hugh II, Count of Maine, and br. of Herbert, Count of Maine (in 991), then, the social qualification is met, and, as importantly, also a political/familial one: Herbert’s wife was probably the sister of Judith de Rennes, the wife of Richard II, Duke of Normandy, son of Richard I.

Rolf d’Ivri’s son, Hugh, Archbishop of Bayeux, between 1042 and 1049), gave Celloville, that is Serlos villa (Seine-Maritime, cant. de Boos), and Sahurs (Seine-Maritime, cant. Grand-Couronne), to St Amand. (See Pierre Bauduin, ‘La première Normandie’, p. 206, 2004). His dau., Aubree, m. Albert de Cravant, having issue:

(1) Raoul, who died in the lifetime of his father, who had him buried at Ouche, gifting his tithe at Lommoi, with the permission of his lord, Raoul Mauvoison, father-in-law of William Crispin II. This gift was confirmed by Albert’s heirs, one of which was Raoul de Connelles/Cunelle.

(2) … de Cravant, m. Rodolf “de Connelles”,* alias Raoul d’Astin. The fortress of Dastin (d’Astin) was situated in the parish of Duranville (Durandivilla), Lisieux, the caput of the Crispin family; its castelans being the family of Astin, as vassals of the Crispins. Raoul d’Astin witnessed (ca.1050), the charter by which William Crespin I gifted land in Blangy to the abbey of Bec, a gift later ratified by his son, Gilbert Dastin, alias Gilbert de Cunelle. The family of Dastin were “seigneures de Vezins” (a mot vicinium), of canton d’Isigny, in Maine.

1.1. … m. “Vicecomes Erchembald“, b, ca. 1075-1080, who, on entering La Trinité du Mont, gave to the house his meadow in Sahurs, and all that he held by “hereditary right” in Celloville (RADN, no. 82, 1030-1035), that is, his wife’s gift from her uncle.

1.1.1. Erchembald de Faverolles, canton Thiberville, b. ca. 1015-1020. This fief had a common boundary with Bournainville. Erchembald de Faverolles was a vassal of the Crispin family (Prevost, M and N, ii, 78). Bournainville/Faverolles was held by “Guillaume Crespin le jeune”, his son, William, his son, William., his son, Goscelin (1155) . “Milon Crespin”, son of “Guillaume Crespin le jeune”, donated land in Bournainville to the Abbey of Bec. (Charpillon, D.H. i, 526). William d’ Echauffour held Giverville, canton Thiberville, his sister becoming inheritor, situate 5 niles fr. Fresne-Cauverville. (Reginald Allen Brown, Anglo-Norman Studies. p.99, 1985). William’s father, Giroe, was a vassal of Gilbert Crispin I. (Faroux/Musset, p. 558). Fresne-Cauverville (Cauverville-en-Lieuvin) was probably synonomous with Colleville. “Colleville, comm. du Fresne-Cauverville, cant . de Cormeilles, Eure”. (Nomina Germanica, Arkiv för Germansk Namnforskning, 11, 408, 1954).

1.1.2. Croco, b. ca. 1010. A sobriquet; cric/croc, hair like a lion’s mane, en flamande.

1.1.2.1. Rainald filius Croco, follower of William FitzOsbern, and sub-tenant in 6 manors held by Milo Crispin of the Hon. of Wallingford, Domes. The King holds Wilmingham in demesne, and it was held in parcenary by Ulviet. It was then as now assessed at 1 hide. Here is 1 ploughland, and 3 villeins with 2 ploughlands and half an acre of meadow. Its value was and is 20s. Rainald the son of Croc holds 1 yardland of this manor, and says that Earl Roger gave it to his father. It was worth 5s. but it is now waste. Held Wainhill in Oxfordshire under the FitzOsborns – ancestor of the Foliots.

1.1.2.1.1. Gilbert filius Rainaldus, vassal of the Crispins, b. ca. 1045, donated 80 ac., with Emma de Conde, sister of William and Gilbert Crispin II., in La Tillaye,* to Bec Abbey. *Canton Christophe-sur-Conde, Eure, which is ca. 10 mls N.E. of Thiberville.

1.1.3. Gilbert Crispin ((alias Collavilla), b. ca. 1005), m. Gunnora d’Anet (born 1009). He was a vassal of Gilbert de Brionne. Milo Crispin, his kinsman, cantor of Bec Abbey, wrote of him: ‘Because of the shape of his hair was to be known as Crispin. For in his early youth he had hair that was brush-like and stiff and sticking out, and in a manner of speaking bristling like the needles of a pine tree. This gave him the name of Crispin, from ‘crispus pinus, ‘pine hair’. Gilbert Crispin I. was also noted by Milo Crispin as being ‘of renowned origin and nobility’ (Milo Crispin, How The Holy Virgin Appeared To William Crispin The Elder And On The Origin Of The Crispin Family, ed. Migne, cols. 735-744, 1856). Duke Robert I. established Gilbert Crispin at Tillières to defend this important border castle for him. The Normans had a fondness for word-play that exploited multiple meanings of a term, or of similar-sounding words, or of different words of the same meaning, thus crispus, frisé; Gilbert of renowned Frisian origin and nobility. He was Gilbert son of Erchembald, named in a charter as Gulbertus – It is a creation of old orthographical speculation that Gulbertus stems from Gosbertus; it, rather, is a derivative of Guilbert, of which is the form Guilbertus, as trancribed in med. latin as Gisiebertus, more commonly, Gilbert.

BEAUFOU cont.
1.2. …, m. Hugh de Montfort-sur-Risle, who by a second wife, was the father of Adeline de Montfort-sur-Risle, who m. William of Breteuil, eldest son of William FitzOsbern.
1.2.1. Alice de Montfort-sur-Risle (by … de Beaufou), m. Gilbert de Gand, overlord of Robert de Armentieres (Crispin).
1.3. Robert de Beaufou (the missing generation).
1.3.1. Robert de Beaufou, ‘sire de Belfou’, named by Wace as a companion of William Crispin at Hastings.

(1. Rolph d’Ivri. 1.1. Emma d’Ivri, m. Osborn the dapifer. Cart. St. Amand: “We donate from the area of Rothornagensi our mill in Rauleni villa, and our fields in Chevilly. In addition we give our cultivated land, which is near the valley Erchembald and the mountain called Cochetel”. Erchembald’s son Gislebert Crispin attempted to defend Osborn during the successful attempt to kill him in 1040. Gislebert made a gift to St. Amand to honour Osmund’s memory).

1.1.1. William FitzOsbern.
1.1.2. … de Crepon, m. Osmund de Centville.
1.1.2.1. Foulques d’Anet, from the vil of Anet, south of Ivry. He was not Foulques d’Aunou. There was a close and ongoing association between the Crispins and the d’Anets. The latin ‘ Aneio’, was wrongly translated as d’Aunou. The Norman Exchequer accounts give Simon d’Aneio as being synonomous with Simon d’Aneto, descendant of Foulques d’Anet.
1.1.2.1.1. Gunnora d’Anet, m. Gilbert Crispin I. “Nous ignorons à quel titre Gislebert Crespin etait appele à ratifier cette donation; mais nous supposons que ce pouvait être à raison de quelque alliance avec la famille d’Ivri, dont le souvenir est perdu” (‘Ordericus Vitalis’, ed. le Prevost et. al., p. 398, 1840). Gilbert Crispin’s mother was a descendant of Raoul d’ Ivri.
1.1.2.1.1.1. Gilbert Crispin, held the fortress of Damville as a vassal of Gilbert de Brionne’s son, Richard FitzGilbert (de Clare).
1.1.2.1.1.1.1. Gilbert Crispin, m. Hersende de Brezolles, and became enfeoffed in Armentières-sur-Avre.

1.1.2.1.1.1. Robert Crispin (de Armentières-sur-Avre), held under his kinsman, Gislebert von Ghent, in 1086.
1.1.1.1.1.1.1. William de Whatton, m. … de Newmarch. A son, taking the name of Newmarch, which family held the fief of Womersley, was the ancester of the family of Wormley, this being a derivative of Womersley.
1.1.1.2. William Crispin. The ancestor of the families of Stanhope and Hamilton, on which subject Nick Wormley is invited to comment.
1.1.1.2.1. Milo Crispin, overlord of Rainald filius Croco, his second cousin.
1.1.1.3. Robert Crispin.
1.1.1.4. Hesilia (Helewise/Heloise) Crispin, m. William Malet; he receiving Conteville by dower.

copyright m stanhope 2021

NICK WORMLEY’S COMMENTS

Many thanks to Michael for asking me to contribute some notes on the Y-DNA evidence linking these families. I am pleased to do so, but firstly I would just like to say I was very interested in his research finding that the Stanhope ancestor and probable Hamilton ancestor William de Coleville, is likely to have taken his toponym ‘surname’ from an 11th century spelling of the village nowadays called Fresne-Cauverville, between Lisieux and Brionne in Normandy. This feels a better fit with the contention that early English de Colevilles were descendants of the Norman Crispin family than previous ideas that they might have been tenants at a different village called Colevile elsewhere in the Duchy.

Cauverville (medieval spelling Calvilla) was right in the heart of the Crispins’ own territory and very likely their property. I feel that this helps to strengthen Michael’s proposal of a shared Crispin-Coleville ancestry for both the Hamiltons and Stanhopes – and, if he is right about Erchembald being their slightly earlier ancestor, maybe even a mutual descent from King Alfred the Great and several other crowned heads of 10th Century Europe.

Anybody interested can read more about the suggestion of Coleville being Cauverville at: Anglo-Norman Studies VII – Google Books. See pages 97 t0 102. Note Coleville on the map.

DNA testing does appear to support Michael’s hypothetical historical case that the noble British Hamilton and Stanhope families, and the Wormley family that can be traced to medieval Yorkshire, all shared a male ancestor roughly around a thousand years ago. Comparing Y-DNA test results of modern descendants of these families shows that their scientific DNA numbers are exceptionally similar in ways that are very unlikely to be coincidental.

It isn’t possible to discern exact historical dates from this analysis in the same way as radio-carbon dating, because similarities and differences between DNA test results are the consequence of small, random natural mutations that have happened within family lineages over long spans of time. It is a tiny form of evolution. However, although they happen randomly, such mutations always occur within definable time band limits, so it seems a reasonable time span estimate to think these families probably branched apart from their original ancestral family in or around Norman times – approximately during the 900s to 1100s. This, in itself, does not prove that Michael’s theoretical pedigree construction is accurate, but it is perfectly compatible with it, and currently there are no known alternative versions of historical events in competition that might differently explain these families’ very close Y-DNA matches with each other.

There are two methods of Y-DNA testing, both of which suggest modern families’ generalised ancestries, and roughly at what stage and in which order their ancestors were once brothers or close cousins. The simple, basic method is to compare minor mutational differences between testees’ STR numbers – the fewer the number of mutation steps between them the more recently they are likely to have shared a common ancestor, and vice versa.

The so-called Group B Hamiltons, who are known to have had direct medieval ancestors living at Cadzow in central Scotland, almost all share a unique combination of STR marker numbers – 22 at marker DYS390 , 7-9 at DYS459, 18-21 at YCAII, and 12 at DYS640.

Wormley and another family surnamed Deatherage are the only other DNA testees presently known who also have this unique combination of marker numbers, but are not descended from the Group B Hamilton ancestor in Scotland around the 13th or 14th century. These two families branched off from a mutual shared ancestor maybe about three or four centuries before the early Hamiltons started their descendant lineages at Cadzow, in Lanarkshire. This is proved by the second form of Y-DNA testing, which is more detailed and records a testees’ SNP codes. It reveals that all of the Group B Hamiltons share three extra unique SNPs that Wormley and Deatherage lack, but otherwise their many thousands of SNP numbers are identical. That indicates these three SNPs developed after the pre-Hamilton and Wormley lines separated, but before today’s Hamilton families were derived from their Scottish initiator. Once again, there is no possibility that this could be a coincidence and it is fully compatible with Michael’s hypothesis.

A Y-DNA testee who is known to be directly descended from the earliest members of the noble Stanhope family has almost identical STR marker numbers to these Hamilton and Wormley families, but not quite, which is a little puzzling. This gentleman has the 22 and 7-9,which are exceptionally rare occurring together. The mathematical chances of anybody in the world having both of these numbers at those particular markers must be extremely minute. This strongly suggests that all of these families are closely related to each other in historical terms. However, the Stanhope testee had the numbers 19-21 at DYS459 instead of the others’ 18-21.

The large majority of people in the I haplogroups have 19-21. Presumably a random mutation must have occurred from 19 to 18 among very early ancestors of the Hamiltons, Wormleys and Deatherages, but we cannot know exactly when. If Michael’s deduction is correct that Stanhope and Hamilton both descended from a shared ancestor named de Colevile in Norman England, but Wormley branched off maybe a generation or two earlier than that from their predecessor family named Crispin, then all of these families can be expected to have had 18-21 at that time and fairly certainly still today.

There seems to be an anomaly here between these results, but the question is: which of the STR marker numbers is the anomalous one?

Taking into consideration the extraordinary unique closeness of them all sharing the first two defining numbers, combined with the strength of Michael’s historical and association evidence, my guess is that a reversion mutation has probably happened at some time during the past 1,000 years within the Stanhope lineage and that family has returned to the much-more-common marker numbers 19-21. Such a mutation is only likely to happen very rarely, but it is possible, as is shown by the fact that two similar mutations have occurred among the 118 Hamilton Group B men whose results are recorded by the testing company Family Tree DNA. Instead of 18-21, one Hamilton has 18-19 and another has 18-20, so a Stanhope reversion to 19-21 is not out of the question.
Unluckily, we do not have an SNP test result for the Stanhopes, which would provide more clear-cut scientific detail and solve this uncertainty. Hopefully, one day we might have, as this could provide a definitive answer.

Nevertheless, within the scientific limitations of the DNA comparisons currently available to us, I would say that DNA strongly appears to support the suggestion that we are all directly descended from the Crispin family of the early 11th century. If the test similarities that we can see were simply coincidence, I would be truly astonished!