Re: King Edward's promise of throne to Duke William- The flemish link

[John Duguid <john.duguid@snl.co.uk>]

>    Another interesting note is that in May 1066 Tosti had  tried to attack
>England and was provided aid by a large flemish fleet of his brother-in-law,
>Baldwin V OF Flanders, who was also a  relation of WC.  This author in many
>places put holes in the Norman account of history over and over again. >There
are so many details here.  We only hear the Norman version of history.

To the victor belongs the spoils. And one of those spoils is the pen that
writes the history.

The Flemish element is interesting. The Flemish royalty was related to Norman
royalty. The Flemish supplied many soldiers and mercenaries for WC. In 1102,
widespread flooding in Flanders ended up with the result of a large quantity of
Flemings being settled in Pembrokeshire, Wales. About that time, the Norman
King of England (Henry II, I think) began re-settling the pockets of Flemings
in England (from the Conquest) into Pembrokeshire, "Little England Beyond
Wales." Thus, he rid himself of an irritant in his kingdom, and visited upon
the Welsh the rebellious Flemish nature. Little did he know that the mixture of
the Normans, Welsh, and Flemish would start the "adventures" of England in
Ireland, the consequences of which we read in the newspaper today.

One comment I read about the Normans was that they were the Saracens of
Christianity. An apt description if you ask me.

Rick [ This is the Sinclair family discussion list, sinclair@jump.net. [ To get
off or on the list, see http://www.mids.org/sinclair/list.htm<<<<<





Thanks Rick I enjoyed your article.


The Flemish element to the Norman Conquest and settlement of England and
Scotland is indeed very interesting and very under researched. May I recommend
to those interested in the subject the books by Beryl Platts, "Origins of
Heraldry" and 'The Scottish Hazard' which go into great detail on the very
significant contribution by the knighthood of Flanders and Lower Lorraine, to
the Conquest. Indeed many great families who proudly profess Norman descent may
in fact be decended from Flemish stock. I'm working from memory here and that
has been known to let me down in the past so don't ne too hard on me if I'm
wrong but families with possible Flemish origins are Montgomery (disputed),
Seton, Lindsay, Dundas, Cameron, Douglas, Erskine, Comyn, Fleming, Hamilton,
Abernethy and many more ( but not Sinclair). Incidenly many of these families
are also said to  have Templar links.

I'm possibly getting a bit off topic here so I'll drop this thread.

Yours Aye

John Duguid

[ This is the Sinclair family discussion list, sinclair@jump.net.
[ To get off or on the list, see http://www.mids.org/sinclair/list.html