Rollo of Normandy
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Rollo on the Six Dukes statue in the Falaise town square. |
Rollo (c.
860 - c.
932) was the founder and first ruler of the
Viking principality in what soon became known as
Normandy. He is also in some sources known as
Robert of Normandy.
The name
Rollo is a
Frankish-
Latin name probably taken from Scandinavian name
Hrolf.
Some ancient sources, though contestedly, identify this Rollo with
Hrolf Ganger (Hrolf the Walker;
Old Norse:
Hrólfr Rǫgnvaldsson and
Gǫngu-Hrólfr,
Norwegian:
Gange-Rolf). The nickname of that character, be it Rollo of Normandy or not, came from being so big that no horse could carry him. He has also been called "Rollo the Gangler" in some works.
Rollo was a
Viking leader of contested origin.
Dudo of St. Quentin, in his
De moribus et actis primorum Normannorum ducum, tells of a powerful Danish nobleman at loggerheads with the
king of
Denmark, who then died and left his two sons,
Gurim and Rollo, leaving Rollo to be expelled and Gurim killed.
William of Jumièges also mentions Rollo's prehistory in his
Gesta Normannorum Ducum however he states that he was from the Danish town of
Fakse.
Wace, writing some 300 years after the event in his
Roman de Rou, also mentions the two brothers (as
Rou and
Garin), as does the
Orkneyinga Saga.
Norwegian and
Icelandic sources however state that he came from
Norway, the son of
Ragnvald, Earl of Moer; sagas mention a Hrolf, son of Ragnvald jarl of Moer. The oldest source of this version is the latin
Historia Norvegiae, written in Norway at the end of the 12th century. This Hrolf fell foul of the Norwegian king,
Harald Fairhair and left Norway with a viking war-band, arriving in France via the British Isles. However, the latinization
Rollo has in no other known instance been applied to a
Hrolf, and in the texts which speak of him, numerous latinized Hrolfs are included.
The matter of Rollo's Norwegian or Danish origins was a matter of heated dispute between Norwegian and Danish historians of the 19th and early 20th century, particularly in the run-up to Normandy's 1000-year-anniversary in 1911. Today, historians still disagree on this question, but most would now agree that a certain conclusion can never be reached.
In
885, Rollo was one of the lesser leaders of the Viking fleet which
besieged Paris under
Sigfred. In
886, when Sigfred retreated in return for tribute, Rollo stayed behind and was eventually bought off and sent to harry
Burgundy.
Later, he returned to the
Seine with his followers (known as
Norse, or Northmen). He invaded the area of northern
France now known as
Normandy.
Unlike most Vikings whose intentions were to plunder Frankish lands, Rollo's true intentions were to look for lands to settle. Upon arrival in France, and after many battles with the Vikings, the French King
Charles the Simple understood that he could no longer hold back their advances, and decided as a tempory measure to give Rollo land around
Rouen under the condition that he would convert to
Christianity and defend the
Seine River from other raiding Vikings.
In the
Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte (
911) with King Charles, Rollo pledged
feudal allegiance to the king, changed his name to the Frankish version, and converted to
Christianity, probably with the
baptismal name Robert. In return, and in admission of defeat, King Charles granted Rollo the lower
Seine area (today's upper Normandy) and the titular rulership of Normandy, centred around the city of
Rouen. There exists some argument among historians as to whether Rollo was a "
duke" (
dux) or whether his position was equivalent to that of a "
count" under
Charlemagne. According to legend, when required, in conformity with general usage, to kiss the foot of King Charles, he refused to stoop to what he considered so great a degradation; yet as the
homage could not be dispensed with, he ordered one of his warriors to perform it for him. The latter, as proud as his chief, instead of stooping to the royal foot, raised it so high, that the King fell to the ground.
Rollo stayed true to his word of defending the shores of the Seine river in accordance to the
Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, but in time he and his followers had very different ideas. Rollo began to divide the land between the Epte and Risle rivers among his chieftains and settled there with a
de facto capital in Rouen. With these settlements, Rollo began to further raid other Frankish lands, now from the security of a settled homeland, rather than a mobile fleet. Eventually, however, Rollo's men intermarried with the local women, and became more settled as Frenchmen. At the time of his death, Rollo's expansion of his territory had extended as far west as the
Vire River.
Sometime around
927, Rollo passed the
fief in Normandy to his son,
William Longsword. Rollo may have lived for a few years after that, but certainly died before
933. According to the historian
Adhemar, 'As Rollo's death drew near, he went mad and had a hundred Christian prisoners beheaded in front of him in honour of the
gods whom he had worshipped, and in the end distributed a hundred pounds of gold around the churches in honour of the true god in whose name he had accepted baptism.' Even though Rollo had converted to
Christianity, some of his
pagan roots surfaced at the end.
If genealogical information from Middle Ages is true, Rollo is a direct ancestor of
William the Conqueror. Through William, he is a
direct ancestor and predecessor of the present-day British royal family, including
Elizabeth II of the
United Kingdom of
Great Britain and
Northern Ireland.
The "
Clameur de Haro" in the
Channel Islands is, supposedly, an appeal to Rollo.
|
Diagram based on the information found on Wikipedia |
*
Ålesund*
Viking Age*
Rulers of Normandy* D.C. Douglas, "Rollo of Normandy",
English Historical Review, Vol. 57 (1942), pp. 414-436
* Robert Helmerichs, [Rollo as Historical Figure]
* Rosamond McKitterick,
The Frankish Kingdom under the Carolingians, 751-987, (Longman) 1983
*
Dudonis gesta Normannorum - Dudo of St. Quentin
Gesta Normannorum latin version at Bibliotheca Augustana
*
Dudo of St. Quentin's Gesta Normannorum - An English Translation
*Gwyn Jones. Second edition: A History of the Vikings. Oxford University Press. (1984).
*William W. Fitzhugh and Elizabeth Ward. Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga. Smithsonian Institute Press. (2000)
*Eric Christiansen. The Norsemen in the Viking Age. Blackwell Publishers Ltd. (2002)
*Agnus Konstam. Historical Atlas of the Viking World. Checkmark Books. (2002)
*Holgar Arbman. Ancient People and Places: The Vikings. Thames and Husdson. (1961)
*Eric Oxenstierna. The Norsemen, New York Graphics Society Publishers, Ltd. (1965)
