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Archiver > GEN-MEDIEVAL > 2005-08 > 1124637564


From: "Todd A. Farmerie" < >
Subject: Re: Edward The Elder to Robert The Pious
Date: Sun, 21 Aug 2005 09:19:24 -0600
References: <430828B1.90006@bom.gov.au> <9mWNe.6124$FA3.569@news-server.bigpond.net.au>
In-Reply-To: <9mWNe.6124$FA3.569@news-server.bigpond.net.au>


Peter Stewart wrote:
> "Guy Vincent" < > wrote in message
> news: ...
>
>>Jim Weber's site shows Edward the Elder and Aelflaed having a
>>daughter, Emliane Aelgiva who married Ebles Count of Poitou,
>>they in turn having a son, Guillaume III Duke of Aquitaine.
>>Other sites show a similar path with the daughter of Edward the
>>Elder being called Elgiva. However, I can find nothing to support
>>this using the consanguinous kin entries on the PASE database
>>nor does Leo's site follow this line. Does anyone know if this
>>line is correct?
>
>
> The origin of Emiliana is unknown, and the link to Edward the Elder was an
> error of the 16th/17th century historian Jean Besly, who confused the wives
> of Ebles and his son & misinterpreted William of Malmesbury to reach this
> particular false conclusion.

Let me just add that while William of Malmesbury's account is the most
complete, it appears to be flawed in some aspects.

AElgiva, daughter of Eadweard, is given by AEthelweard the Chronicler as
having been sent to Germany with her sister Eadgyth, one (Eadgyth was
selected) to be bride of the futute Emperor Otto I. The other, AElgiva,
was married to a man "cuipiam regi iuxta Iupitereos montes" - a certain
king near the Jupiter Mountains (Alps). William gives a similar
account, but mistakenly reverses the names - AElgiva marries Otto,
Eadgyth a 'duke' near the Alps.

Likewise, he gives a daughter Eadgifu, married to Louis, Prince of
Aquitaine, a descendant of Charlemagne (Ludouico Aquitanorum principi de
genre Karoli Magni). No such Louis is known at this time. This
princess is only known from Malmesbury, and this entry in the Malmesbury
account is problematic. It would involve Eadgifu, a supposed child of
Eadweard's third marriage, being named for her mother, which was
extremely uncommon (see other thread) among the Anglo-Saxons. It would
also have involved the giving of the same name to two daughters, for
which I know of no other examples (although we know a lot less
daughters' names, and there are a couple of documented cases for two
brothers having the same name). I have come to suspect that authentic
and garbled versions a single daughter came down to William of
Malmesbury separately, and that he did not recognize them as the same
and hence recorded them as separate daughters. Thus Eadgifu, daughter
of Eadweard and his second wife, who was married to Charles the Simple
of France and mother of Louis IV 'prince' of Aquitaine, was the the root
of this Eadgifu wife of Prince Louis.

Both of these daughters have served as targets for numerous genealogical
hypotheses. In the case of the first, a broad range of men from Alsace
to Bohemia have been tapped as the king near the Jupiter Mountains. In
the second, there being no Louis of Aquitaine at the time, pretty much
anyone named Louis or from Aquitaine has been dubbed. I have not seen
Besly, but this theory appears to combine the two, giving the wife of
Ebles, whose son would hold Aquitaine, the name of the bride of the duke
near the Alps.

taf


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