Manfred - Manfred, Galfred and Rollo

Source #1 https://familysearch.org/photos/artifacts/11572402

William de Percy b. 980
Geoffrey de Percy b. 955
William de Percy b. 930
Galfred or Galfried the Dane b. 900
Galfrid assisted Rollo in conquest of Normandy.

Galfred, the son of Mandfred, was the subject in the The Hermit of Warkworth:
"Brave Galfred, who to Normandy
With vent'rous Rolla b. 860 came;
And, from his Norman castles won.
Assumed the Percy name."

Mainfred or Manfred "The Dane" b. 860

A different Rollo, Rollo Rolloson is said to be Manfried's Father b. 945 (possible but an awfully young Father at 15 yrs. old.

Rolloson's Father is said to be Rollo Thurstan Bigod b: ABT 885 in Maer, Nord-Trondelag, Norway making him a 60 yr. old Father and the Mother is said to be Gerlotte de Blois b: 936 in Tillieres, Normandy, France
Title: Comte d'Hiesmes (Not possible as she would be a 9 yr. old Mother)

Hrollager Ragvnaldsson is said to be Bigod's Father, b: ABT 854 in Maer, Nord-Trondelag, Norway, an age appropriate Father of 31 yrs. of age.

Hrollager's Father is said to be Ragnvald I 'the Wise' Eysteinsson b: ABT 830 in Maer, Nord-Trondelag, Norway

Source: Weis, Frederick Lewis, 1895-1966. Ancestral Roots of Sixty Colonists Who Came to New England Between 1623 And 1650: the Lineage of Alfred the Great, Charlemagne, Malcolm of Scotland, Robert the Strong, And Some of Their Descendants. 2d ed. Lancaster, Mass., 1951.

This would make Rollo the same age as Manfred or Mainfred, and 30 yrs. older than Galfred born abt. 900.

Galfred's Great Grandson is said to be William de Percy born 80 yrs. later, connecting with William the Conqueror said to be the 3rd Great Grandson of Rollo.

Thanks for looking at this!

"The Hermit of Warkworth" is a ballad from 1771: http://spenserians.cath.vt.edu/TextRecord.php?textsid=34815

I don't think we should regard it as a valid source; the author was probably more worried about whether he got his rhyme right than about whether he got the right sequence of ancestors. But knowing about its existence means that we can relate inconsistent trees to the source and disconnect them with confidence!

The death of Rollo (Gange-Hrólfr 'Rollo' Ragnvaldsson) around 931 is pretty firm based on Dudo's account and other sources, so if Manfred was born in 972, he was not allied with the famous Rollo who settled in Normandy.

Very good that you link to and quote the sources you're looking at!

..... and "the Hermit of Warkworth" doesn't contain any dates of birth, and doesn't claim to have listed all the generations in the line of descent, so it could easily be correct without helping us any more in building the tree ....

Hi Harald,

Thank you for responding. I did some more searching and found a better source for Galfred, Manfred and their descendants with reference to Rollo.

https://archive.org/stream/historyofhouseof01bren/historyofhouseof0...

When I compared it to Colby's reference, it dawned on me that the phrase
"The story starts in 972", which people might think Manfred was born in 972, but it doesn't say that. It say's the STORY, starts in 972.

When I followed the better source references from https://archive.org/stream/historyofhouseof01bren/historyofhouseof0... for the timeline, Manfred, Galfred and Ralph the Ganger, join forces and sail the River Loire, settling in Maen. There is a tributary river called Mayenne, that goes into the maine river Loire. The beginning of the adventure would have had to begin at St. Nazaire. Where Manfred, Galfred and Rollo originally met up would be interesting to find out. Rollo is referred to as the Norwegian Viking, and Manfred and Galfred as Dane's. The River Loire is 629 miles long, so that is quite a trip from Norway and Denmark.

Yes, that's a more readable source. He probably took his info from the poem, though.

This book was published in 1902, I haven't been able to find any bio of the author.

He's also very skeptical of the claim: "But no trustworthy evidence can be set forth of Danish
Mainfred's existence, or even of the source from which the
race of Perci sprang. Sir Francis Palgrave points out that
none of the Norman invaders thought of claiming descent
from Scandinavian Jarls and Vikings until long after the
Conquest. The very name of Duke Rollo's father was
apparently unknown ; ^ for this progenitor of many kings is
described in the chronicles as ^^ senex quidavi in partibiis
Daciae!' Normandy, in the tenth and eleventh centuries,
had probably a population as heterogeneous as that of
ancient Italy, or as that of modern England.^ The race of
Perci may well have been Celts or P'ranks, rather than
Danes ; indeed the tradition that their forebears held the
fief of Perci before the coming of Duke Rollo would seem
to bear out such a supposition. "

You'll find a link on Rollo's Geni profile to the chronicle of Dudo, which was written just a few hundred years after Rollo's time. Certain details have probably gotten mangled already, though!

I haven't searched Dudo's chronicle for mention of Manfred. Danes and Norwegians were a mixed bunch in those days, with Danish kings often trying to claim rule over Norway, and ranged far afield - there were Norwegians serving in the emperor's guard in Constantinople, and SIgurd Jorsalfar sailed all the way from Norway to Jerusalem, marauding randomly along the way.

History is fun!

They certainly liked to travel, lol. I too had not really found any other references to Manfred and Galfred's Ancestors. Because I couldn't find any, I decided to research the name instead. Galfred and Manfred are Danish names, but are referred to as Old Norse, especially Galfred. It's the only reference I could find. The Norse cover a pretty big territory.

This Map https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norsemen#/media/File:Viking_Expansion... shows by color and centuries, the areas the Norse were occupying. In centuries 800-900 there lived in Norway, Sweden and Denmark. The green on the map shows areas of Viking raids, and fits with Rollo's excursion to France.

The only Danes mentioned to go raiding around this time were Germanic Tribe Danes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danes_(Germanic_tribe) , who raided in 786, 793, 865, and 867. They were worse than the Vikings. Manfred originates from the ancient Germanic name Meginfrid. The time period that Rollo and Manfred meet up is about the time that Halfdan and Ivar capture Northumbria in 867.

In 842 Norse Warriors sailed up the Loire River. In 845 Ragnar brought 120 Danish Viking Ship up the Seine River in France.

In 885 and 886 Earl Sigfred/Siegfriedand Sinric (Danish Vikings help Rollo take Paris. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Paris_(885%E2%80%9386)

Rollo conducted raids BETWEEN the Loire and Seine Rivers

It seems likely that Manfred, Galfred and Rollo met sometime around the Siege of Paris. Manfred and Galfred may have been part of the Danish Vikings under control of Sigfred as the names, area and time fit. (p.588)

Timeline for Danish and Norwegian Viking raids in France, source:

https://books.google.com/books?id=OIzreCGlHxIC&pg=PT600&lpg...

Harold, thank you for the reference to Dudo, I am going to study that. I reread the references in the Dictionary of wars and remember my Uncle telling me a story about our Pierce Ancestors being Danish Pirates who fought King Alfred. For a long time I couldn't find a reference to it and thought he was just kidding, but he wasn't at all. In my family my Grandparents passed down the stories of our Ancestors for centuries. They knew a lot of the Pierce history before the advent of the digital age. I'm going to ask him to tell me the story again because their were some interesting details about what they did to King Alfred.

The Dictionary of Wars (George C. Kohn) says

Viking Raids in France Later (896-911 C.E.)
Among the Vikings leaving England empty handed (see Viking Raids against King Alfred ) in 896 were Danes under Gonge- Hrolf, better known as Rollo (860-931??). Son of the second Earl of Orkney, and thus a Norwegian, Rollo did not return home but conducted raids on France between the Seine and Loire Rivers.

"The Great Heathen Army of 865-878 occurred when Rollo would have been just 5 yrs. of age.

According to https://books.google.com/books?id=5mZUAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA305&lpg...

written in very old English, says that it was about the year 911 that Roll and Geoffrey (Galfred) were together. Most likely when Geoffrey was baptized in 912 in Artois, the family name was changed to Percy.

It wasn't yet "a family name". Percy, in Normandy, was presumably Geoffrey's main land-holding after the conquest of Normandy, so he became "Geoffrey de Percy", and the family kept the name (and probably the lands, until 1204) after they came to England at the Conquest.

I don't want to be sceptical, but I doubt whether your family did pass down stories about your ancestors for centuries. There was a craze in America around the turn of the 19th/20th centuries for books about genealogy, often assuming that people with some given family name were all descended from some noble family or other. I would guess that your grandparents (or great-grandparents) had read some such book. Most people (see Wikipedia) think that Pierce simply derives from Piers (=Peter), like Dickinson derives from Dickon's (a Northern variant of Dick) son.

Oral history does sometimes mean that something genuine gets passed down for a surprisingly long time, but usually it is so cluttered with legend that it becomes astonishing when the truth can be proved.

Mark

You are absolutely right Mark. I wanted to be absolutely sure so I called my Uncle up and asked him, was the story from a book or was it passed down? The stories of Captain Michael Pierce were passed down but the Danish pirate stories were passed down from books. (My Grandparents loved to read, especially my Grandfather, and they never threw a book away. Instead mountains of books began to live in the house occupying a good amount of space.. Some of those books may be out of print now.

As told to me by my Uncle. The danish pirates used to go across the north sea to rape & pillage, & take women back with them, some to become wives, and others as slaves.

York England was one of their favorite stops to plunder, for about 100 yrs., but one year, they had taken so much, some of their longships sank. The two last longships were stuck on a sandbank loaded down with their plunder, unable to move. so they decided to settle in York, England & set up a trading post with the booty they captured.

Alfred sent a messenger under a flag of truce, told the vikings he outnumbered them 10-1.. The Vikings said "nothing we like better than a good fight". Then Alfred said he would kill all including women and children unless the Vikings swore allegiance to them. The vikings had two longships set on sand banks at high tide and could not leave. They accepted Alfred's offer and decided it would be better to swear allegiance then risk losing their Women and Children. My uncle told me that the Danish Viking raided parts of Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Ireland.They were notorious for taking Women from those countries with them as part of the booty, and in time the bloodlines of the Women they took became intermingled with the Vikings.

The Percies descended from those Danish Vikings, but this does not mean they were always Danish. As much as they traveled around Ireland, Scotland, Denmark Norway, Iceland, The Faroe Islands and other places, and mating with the Women from the Countries they pillaged, they were probably a little bit of everything.

Geoffrey de Percy was baptized in 912 at Artois. Rollo was baptized as Robert in 911. This is when both of their names were changed. Robert used to be Rollo, and Geoffrey used to be Galfred (an ancient Norse name from the Danish Germanic Tribe. This all occurred after the skirmish with Alfred, In 911, Charles the Simple made the "Treaty of Saint Clair su Epte with Rollo.

The descendants of Rollo and Geoffrey traveled in the same circles, lived in the same area, and fought in the same battles. They both were Vikings, Rollo from Norway, and Galfred and Mainfred from Denmark.They both belonged to the same group called North men or Norse Men, no matter which Country they came from.

The book that states that Rollo and Mainfred and Galfred were together in 911 can be found here:

Source: The Peerage of England; Containing a Genealogical and Historical Account of All the Peers of that Kingdom Etc. Fourth Edition, Carefully Corrected, and Continued to the Present Time, Volume 5 H. Woodfall, 1768 (P.305) https://books.google.com/books?id=5mZUAAAAcAAJ&dq=Hugh+Capet+an...

Dear Wanda

The Vikings did not just plunder (or trade); they conquered. York was under Norse Kings for at least a hundred years. Alfred never got near there; it was something of a miracle that Wessex survived the Great Army's attacks. The country we now call Russia takes its name from the Vikings, who started Kiev in the Ukraine; "Rus" means someone with blonde hair, which is how the Slavs (from which we derive the word "slave") called the Vikings.

Mark

Dear Mark, Alfred sent his Messenger to Wessex. He knew the Vikings would be in his territory soon. To Conquer is to take control, to plunder is to take possession of goods. They did both, but the two words have different meanings and actions.

There is no way to know if the Vikings with the trapped long boats did not barter. If other Vikings came to the area, and they needed parts to fix their boat or weapons or other things, they would not go to war with them since they were allies. Bartering would be a logical solution. Who knows what sank in the other boats? They could always go conquer, plunder, pillage or take more hostages while stuck there, but it would not be logical to do so without weapons and a get away plan. They did not deem other ships worthy enough to steal. It would take time to build another viking ship big enough to go back home It would also take skilled labor, the right tree's, the right time of year, and the right tools to do it. All conquering and plundering aside, their problem was logistics and their solution was logic. They may have been barbarians, but they were intelligent barbarians.

I say that the vikings did a lot, not everything sanctioned thou, but if someone had enough ships and man he could by himself decide to plunder, thus giving a lots of youths a chance of getting a fresh start on their own. If they were a part of a rulers act towards an enemy, they were paid each and one in silver and gold, and if someone was killed, they could bring his wage to his family. Usually they would only have to bring the people into fear once or twice, then they just sent a couple of collectors to pick up the tribute once a year, a lot more civil, but still just the same methods used by gangs even today in every bigger city. On their plus side, yes, they did played a big part into changing the western world into what is is today, for better or worse.

As for the meaning of "Rus", in its ground the meaning of the word describes a pendant movement, therefore adopted into different words that reflect this, like row, yes, row row row your boat, gently down the stream, ha ha, yes, so simple, in the english language, the word "run" belongs here too, along with "rush", and likely, ruse, in our language we have our words like, rusa,(sprint fast) rucka, (move) rycka, (wrest), and likely röra, (touch, move, stir etc).

But the word rus, goes back to the men who row their boat on the rivers, streams, and must have been called that by others, in such high degree that they aadopted it by themselves, and so we see how the people in Finland even called Sweden for Ruotsi, and here the word Rus have gone in a full circle back to the scandinavian folk that resided along the coast and rivers all around the Baltic sea, not to be confused as a homogeneous people, rather seen as a people with a common way of living, moving, trading etc, and so finding them spread out all the way alongside with the mayor rivers in both east and west.

They think they may have a sample of Rollo's DNA or his sons....November data?

Most of the Viking sagas are about Vikings killing other Vikings - the raiding against non-Vikings was just part of the background, not worth writing sagas about .....

When was the last time you watched a movie where all the characters just go to work for the day? No one made sagas about pillaging because it was mundane and boring :)
Remember sagas are not history they are entertainment/propaganda.

In a few hundred years folks will earnestly trace their lineage back to Captain Jack Sparrow

Weeeell. When Henry II of England introduced circuit judges whole villages ran away because virtually everyone in them was accused of murder. The truth is that life was extremely violent unless there was some form of centralised "justice"; although this might be tempered by the fear of incurring a blood feud. The further you were from royal authority, or on the borders of conflicting royal authorities (look at Norse Greenland, which frightened even the Danes, or the Anglo-Scottish borders) the more violent the society. Look at the History of Parliament bios for around 1400. You have "civilised" people in the south of England, and "rich" people in the north who leave their named swords and lovingly described beds in their wills.

Mark

The Great Heathen Army is not noted in history for infighting with each other. The Danish, Swedish and Norwegian Vikings collaborated on a unified front who they were going to attack, why, and what rewards they would share with each other.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Heathen_Army

Based on what? The history of the GHA is recorded by the English survivors, I am sure the vikings presented a very united front to the English... it's called a shield-wall.

http://66.media.tumblr.com/46c3a9b20067b6cf21c373c9d272eaba/tumblr_...

The GHA may or may not have been wonderfully cohensive but the Irish Annals are full of vikings betraying, attacking and killing each other.

Yep, the GHA was a notable example of a large band of Vikings joining together.

At roughly the same time (~872, +/- 10 or so years), the Battle of Hafrsfjord (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hafrsfjord) marked the unification of Norway into one kingdom (if you're willing to overlook the parts that weren't unified yet, like the northern half, and maybe the Oslo area - historians differ).

There is very little love lost between competing Viking groups. They were all led by warlords essentially and even feuded within families...they aligned when it suited them and the disengagement was likely to be bloody more often then not. I am sure to peasants and English lords there was a global assembly of Norsemen.

I have always wondered what those 3 Ravens on the Pierce Coat of Arms meant. No other coat of arms has 3 Ravens. The furthest back in time I could trace the Percy's of Northumberland was to the Count's of Caux who also used a Raven on their coat of arms, although it is just one. Before Manfred and Galfred changed their name to Percy, and Rollo to Robert they were part of the "Great Heathen Army" Invasion.

In the movie "Vikings", Ragnar Lodbrok is using some kind of piece of glass to navigate his way to England and France. It's a good story but probably fiction. If you go back in time to Iceland, you will find the story of Floki using 3 Ravens to find his way to Iceland from the Faroe Islands. Floki is also a character in the Vikings series and is the shipbuilder.

Because the time frame fits for the attack and invasion, I wonder if they used Ravens to find their way across the English Channel. The symbolic use of the 3 Ravens in the coat of arms may have been lost in antiquity and forgotten, or may be a clue to a secret viking navigation method. It could be coincidence, but coats of arms were always created to represent something symbolic for the family who possessed them.

Thoughts on this anyone? Thank you.

Sources:

Floki's 3 Ravens https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Settlement_of_Iceland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrafna-Fl%C3%B3ki_Vilger%C3%B0arson
https://books.google.com/books?

id=bzAiAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false (p. 7,8)

"Thoughts on this anyone?"

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/db/Del_av_hj...

The Vikings used lodestones (natural magnets) and stars to navigate, among other means. When navigating by stars, it is relatively easy to keep a straight east-west course (just keep the North Star at the same height above the horizon). It's much harder to know how far east-west you are - which may explain how they discovered Newfoundland but not places further south.

Navigating the English Channel is pretty trivial - you can see your way across on a good day. To the Vikings, who routinely sailed between Norway, Shetland and Iceland, it was a pond.

Ulf, it is a carving of Odin. It appeals to me on an artistic level but what are you getting at in this conversation?

Wanda, has it not occurred to you that the story of Floki is a rip-off of Noah and his pigeons? In reality sails used ... Terns or Cororants, I can't remember which, perhaps it was seagulls... to find islands, when you spot a sea bird in the late afternoon then follow them when they fly back to their nests at sunset.

Harald, in the pacific ancient mariners apparently followed the Bioluminescence of reef organisms that drifted down current from islands. Basically sail along until you find some Bioluminescence then follow it upstream to an island. Voila, sorry no link.

Alex Moes wrote
" It appeals to me on an artistic level but what are you getting at in this conversation?"

Wanda Marie Pierce wrote
"I have always wondered what those 3 Ravens on the Pierce Coat of Arms meant. No other coat of arms has 3 Ravens." followed by " "Thoughts on this anyone?"

I continue to answer
Odin had two ravens, they were named "thought" and "memory", we can simplify the meaning of the ravens names into the significance of given their owner the ability to predict actions and know what will happen or be needed in the future, thus a very important ability as holding an ability of foresight that arise over the common man.

Birds have often been a part in older traditions all around the ancient world in both larger religious rites as in common folks superstition, birds also played an important role when it comes to be given certain supernatural abilities, as an example in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augury

Wanda Marie Pierce wrote
"In the movie "Vikings", Ragnar Lodbrok is using some kind of piece of glass to navigate his way to England and France. It's a good story but probably fiction."

Could be fiction, though it's possible.
http://rspa.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/early/2011/10/28/rsp...

Alex, Flok couldn't be a ripoff of Noah and the Pigeons as he discovered Iceland with the three ravens. That happened before the viking invasion of France etc. What I am getting at is the symbology.

From the book "Birds of Omen"; http://www.vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/Birds%20of%20Omen.pdf

"The raven was held sacred by the vikings. When setting out on marauding expeditions, the raven was with many ceremonies let loose, and where he led the Norsemen followed, believing that their bird of omen would lead to some scene of triumph." (This implies that this was a regular practice and not a one time thing).

Most of the Vikings used the Raven symbol on the mast of their ship, their banner or other places.

In the "Birds of Omen", Floki named the three Ravens after three Norse Gods: Odin, Thor and Balder. Balder was the Raven that found Iceland. The Norse God Balder is is often interpreted as the god of love, peace, forgiveness, justice, light or purity, (Wikipedia).which is similar to heraldic color white or silver on a coat of arms.

The Pierce coat of arms is a simple white or silver field with 3 ravens. Two ravens are together, but the third raven is by it's self. A black band in the middle is referred to as sable. Possibly this might represent the black banner flown on viking ships with the raven.

When the Vikings marauded or conquered, they always predetermined their success by a "black banner with a raven" on it. So long as the banner with the raven fluttered, they were successful. It was important that the Raven was flying.

Because it was no longer in vogue to be a viking, I think that coat of arms is a symbolic reference to the ancient history of Floki's ravens and the three Norse Gods.

Because no black banner is waving in the wind, the ravens are depicted as flying on the coat of arms. Because the Norsemen/Northmen were baptized and had their names changed in their new home country, it would not be acceptable for them to continue to believe in or practice worship to Norse Gods. I think that is what the symbology means on the coat of arms, a reference to their past, their success, how they conquered and from where they came. It does not necessarily mean that Mainfred, Galfred and or Rollo were related to Floki, but that the story of their beginnings might be right in plain site all this time, through the use of symbols on a coat of arms that has been passed down for centuries.

Harald, you are correct with the lodestone use. The estimated time period of invention is around 1213 but they say it's possible the Vikings were using it during the pagan era 800-1000 AD.

Ulf, there was one more Raven named Balder for a Norse God.

Alex, you are right, the Bioluminescence theory is interesting but difficult to source.

It was the Sunstone found in Iceland that helped the Vikings with navigating in foggy weather. http://www.earldeblonville.com/books/pdfs/3_The_Viking_lodestone_co...

The Ravens must have been used prior to Sunstone. At least it provides some kind of timeline. No doubt these Vikings were Sea Kings as they say with expert navigational tools. Thanks for sharing that information guys, it was very helpful.

I found the sunstone reference - http://forskerfabrikken.blogspot.se/2011/03/vikingfysikk.html (in Norwegian) - the vikings may have navigated using polarizing crystals. These occur naturally, and give you a way to pinpoint where the Sun is even when it's cloudy. Source: New Scientist, 5. februar, p 9, 2011 - this is also mentioned in the earldeblonville link above.

Here's the Wikipedia link on Floki, mentioning the ravens:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrafna-Fl%C3%B3ki_Vilger%C3%B0arson

He was following in the tracks of two VIking expeditions that had visited Iceland by accident.
The main source of this tale is the "Landnamabok" - the book of Iceland's settlement.