Duke Liudolf Of SWABIA

Other Events:

• AFN: PZ63-T2
• _UID: 58042049F6724C34A234F442CE10FCF08339

Notes:

Source: lorenfamily.com

Other Events:

• AFN: 8HR7-TX
• Name: Otto I "Le Grand" Emperor HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE
• Name: The Great
• _UID: C8D6252E4C8A457DB344B2E807220375BB20
• Titled: Between 936 and 961
• Titled: Between 936 and 973
• ACCEDED: 8 Aug 936
• Titled: 951
• Titled: Between 961 and 973
• Titled: Between 962 and 973

Notes:

Otto I (Holy Roman Empire), called Otto the Great (912-973), Holy Roman emperor (962-973), king of Germany (936-973), the son of the German king Henry I. After subduing an uprising of nobles incited by his brother, Otto consolidated his kingdom by granting duchies to faithful relatives and followers. In 951 he marched to Italy to assist Adelaide, the widowed queen of Lombardy, against Berengar II, who had usurped the kingdom. Otto defeated Berengar and married Adelaide, thereby becoming ruler of northern Italy. When he returned to Germany, he again crushed a rebellion of nobles led by his son Liudolf and halted a Hungarian invasion in 955. In 962 he was crowned Holy Roman emperor. In 963 he deposed Pope John XII and had Leo VIII elected in his stead. Otto sought to make the church subordinate to the authority of the empire but assisted in spreading Christianity throughout his domain. He negotiated unsuccessfully with the Byzantine emperor Nicephorus II Phocas for an alliance between the Byzantine and Holy Roman empires, but was able to arrange a marriage between his son Otto II and Theophano, daughter of the Byzantine emperor Romanus II.

Relationship (J,M&L):
34th Great-grandparent

Relationship (J,M&L):
36th Great-grandparent

Titled:
Duke of Saxony

Titled:
King of Germany

ACCEDED:
Holy Roman Emperor

Titled:
King of Italy

Titled:
King of Italy

Titled:
Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire

Otto married Edith (Edgyth) Princess Of ENGLAND in 930. Edith (daughter of Edward I "The Elder" King Of ENGLAND, King Of England and Elfleda Of ETHELHELM, Queen Of England) was born about 910 in Wessex, England; died on 21 Jan 947. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events:

• AFN: 9GB3-H9
• Name: Eadgyth (Edith) Princess Of ENGLAND
• Name: Elfleda D' ANGLETERRE
• _UID: FD8194E01E5C47B6A1F73A8B048CBC4B5DB2
• Alt. Birth: Abt 903; Alt. Birth

Notes:

Source: lorenfamily.com

Alt. Birth:
Wessex, England

Other Events:

• Name: The Fowler
• Occupation: King
• _UID: C5A0362C27B84B3E9B47911287FA570A9603
• Alt. Birth: 876, Saxony, Germany; Alt. Birth
• Alt. Death: 2 Jul 936, Membleben, Saxony, Germany; Alt. Death

Notes:

Henry I (of Germany), called Henry The Fowler (876?-936), king of Germany (919-936), the first of the Saxon line of German kings. In 912 Henry succeeded his father as duke of Saxony. Following the death of Conrad I, king of Germany, in 918, Henry was chosen king by the Franconian and Saxon nobles. Bavaria, Swabia, and Lotharingia refused to acknowledge him at first, and it was not until 925 that he managed to win recognition from all the German states. In 926 Henry secured a nine-year truce from warfare with the Magyars. During that period he transformed many of the small towns of Germany into fortified cities with trained troops of mounted warriors. His military preparations were successfully tested in a war against the Wends in 929. When the Magyars invaded Th?ringen in 933, Henry repulsed them decisively. He defeated the Danes in the following year and seized territory from them. Henry was the first to create a united Germany, and, although he never received the imperial crown, he is generally recognized as one of the Holy Roman emperors. He was succeeded by his son, Otto.

Henry married Mathilda Von RINGELHEIM, Countess Of Ringelheim in 909 in Wallhausen. Mathilda (daughter of Count Dietrich Of SAXON, Hamelant Ringelheim and Reginhilde Von FRIESLAND) was born about 878 in Ringelheim, Goslar, Hannover, Germany; died on 14 May 968 in Membleben, Saxony, Germany. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events:

• Occupation: Countess
• _UID: E8076B8DA3B64A5EAE0F39140D4AE99CCEA7

Notes:

Countess of Ringelheim

Other Events:

• AFN: 9GB3-CL
• Name: The Elder
• _UID: 2F1F67A1F28949879ADEAF6B10F482D58E6C
• Titled: Between 899 and 924
• Event: 8 Jun 900
• Alt. Death: 924; Alt. Death

Notes:

Well-trained by Alfred, his son Edward 'the Elder' (reigned 899-924) was a bold soldier who defeated the Danes in Northumbria at Tettenhall in 910 and was acknowledged by the Viking kingdom of York. The kings of Strathclyde and the Scots submitted to Edward in 921. By military success and patient planning, Edward spread English influence and control. Much of this was due to his alliance with his formidable sister Aethelflaed, who was married to the ruler of Mercia and seems to have governed that kingdom after her husband's death.

Edward was able to establish an administration for the kingdom of England, whilst obtaining the allegiance of Danes, Scots and Britons. Edward died in 924, and he was buried in the New Minster which he had had completed at Winchester. Edward was twice married, but it is possible that his eldest son Athelstan was the son of a mistress.

Relationship (J,M&L):
37th Great-grandparent

Titled:
King of Wessex

Event:
Crowned at Kingston-upon-Thames

Alt. Death:
, Farrington, Berkshire, England

Edward married Elfleda Of ETHELHELM, Queen Of England between 901 and 902 in Wessex, England. Elfleda was born about 878 in Wessex, England; died in 920; was buried in Winchester Cathedral, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events:

• Name: Elfleda Queen Of ENGLAND
• _UID: 61CCD012AB8B4AB7A4B84C60230368835F56

Notes:

Relationship (J,M&L):
37th Great-grandparent

Other Events:

• Name: Der Erlauchte
• Occupation: Duke
• _UID: 448318B4156441B689A0316D592F6F8647DD

Notes:

Duke of Saxony

Otto married Haduwig Von Babenberg, Hedwig in 869. Haduwig was born about 855 in Saxony, Germany; died on 24 Dec 903. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events:

• _UID: 5BCB3D28EB8345488E979DB93639C8033BC4

Notes:

Married:
NOTE MARRIED

Other Events:

• _UID: ACDF6C35EBEB4992B1545F4D9A321739AA77

Dietrich married Reginhilde Von FRIESLAND in 900. Reginhilde (daughter of King Godefrid Of HAITHABU and Gisela Of LORRAINE) was born about 883 in Friesland, Niedersachsen, Germany; and died. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events:

• _UID: 3486343EABFD4C95ABE51E81D874555CE1C6

Other Events:

• AFN: GS4H-XF
• Name: The Great
• _UID: 47D5463A70E2414F93706439B2D2B66CC42B
• ACCEDED: Apr 871

Notes:

Born at Wantage, Berkshire, in 849, Alfred was the fifth son of Aethelwulf, king of the West Saxons. At their father's behest and by mutual agreement, Alfred's elder brothers succeeded to the kingship in turn, rather than endanger the kingdom by passing it to under-age children at a time when the country was threatened by worsening Viking raids from Denmark.

Since the 790s, the Vikings had been using fast mobile armies, numbering thousands of men embarked in shallow-draught longships, to raid the coasts and inland waters of England for plunder. Such raids were evolving into permanent Danish settlements; in 867, the Vikings seized York and established their own kingdom in the southern part of Northumbria. The Vikings overcame two other major Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, East Anglia and Mercia, and their kings were either tortured to death or fled. Finally, in 870 the Danes attacked the only remaining independent Anglo-Saxon kingdom, Wessex, whose forces were commanded by King Aethelred and his younger brother Alfred. At the battle of Ashdown in 871, Alfred routed the Viking army in a fiercely fought uphill assault. However, further defeats followed for Wessex and Alfred's brother died.

As king of Wessex at the age of 21, Alfred (reigned 871-99) was a strongminded but highly strung battle veteran at the head of remaining resistance to the Vikings in southern England. In early 878, the Danes led by King Guthrum seized Chippenham in Wiltshire in a lightning strike and used it as a secure base from which to devastate Wessex. Local people either surrendered or escaped (Hampshire people fled to the Isle of Wight), and the West Saxons were reduced to hit and run attacks seizing provisions when they could. With only his royal bodyguard, a small army of thegns (the king's followers) and Aethelnoth earldorman of Somerset as his ally, Alfred withdrew to the Somerset tidal marshes in which he had probably hunted as a youth. (It was during this time that Alfred, in his preoccupation with the defence of his kingdom, allegedly burned some cakes which he had been asked to look after; the incident was a legend dating from early twelfth century chroniclers.)

A resourceful fighter, Alfred reassessed his strategy and adopted the Danes' tactics by building a fortified base at Athelney in the Somerset marshes and summoning a mobile army of men from Wiltshire, Somerset and part of Hampshire to pursue guerrilla warfare against the Danes. In May 878, Alfred's army defeated the Danes at the battle of Edington. According to his contemporary biographer Bishop Asser, 'Alfred attacked the whole pagan army fighting ferociously in dense order, and by divine will eventually won the victory, made great slaughter among them, and pursued them to their fortress (Chippenham) ... After fourteen days the pagans were brought to the extreme depths of despair by hunger, cold and fear, and they sought peace'. This unexpected victory proved to be the turning point in Wessex's battle for survival.

Realising that he could not drive the Danes out of the rest of England, Alfred concluded peace with them in the treaty of Wedmore. King Guthrum was converted to Christianity with Alfred as godfather and many of the Danes returned to East Anglia where they settled as farmers. In 886, Alfred negotiated a partition treaty with the Danes, in which a frontier was demarcated along the Roman Watling Street and northern and eastern England came under the jurisdiction of the Danes - an area known as 'Danelaw'. Alfred therefore gained control of areas of West Mercia and Kent which had been beyond the boundaries of Wessex. To consolidate alliances against the Danes, Alfred married one of his daughters, Aethelflaed, to the ealdorman of Mercia -Alfred himself had married Eahlswith, a Mercian noblewoman - and another daughter, Aelfthryth, to the count of Flanders, a strong naval power at a time when the Vikings were settling in eastern England.

The Danish threat remained, and Alfred reorganised the Wessex defences in recognition that efficient defence and economic prosperity were interdependent. First, he organised his army (the thegns, and the existing militia known as the fyrd) on a rota basis, so he could raise a 'rapid reaction force' to deal with raiders whilst still enabling his thegns and peasants to tend their farms.

Second, Alfred started a building programme of well-defended settlements across southern England. These were fortified market places ('borough' comes from the Old English burh, meaning fortress); by deliberate royal planning, settlers received plots and in return manned the defences in times of war. (Such plots in London under Alfred's rule in the 880s shaped the streetplan which still exists today between Cheapside and the Thames.) This obligation required careful recording in what became known as 'the Burghal Hidage', which gave details of the building and manning of Wessex and Mercian burhs according to their size, the length of their ramparts and the number of men needed to garrison them. Centred round Alfred's royal palace in Winchester, this network of burhs with strongpoints on the main river routes was such that no part of Wessex was more than 20 miles from the refuge of one of these settlements. Together with a navy of new fast ships built on Alfred's orders, southern England now had a defence in depth against Danish raiders.

Alfred's concept of kingship extended beyond the administration of the tribal kingdom of Wessex into a broader context. A religiously devout and pragmatic man who learnt Latin in his late thirties, he recognised that the general deterioration in learning and religion caused by the Vikings' destruction of monasteries (the centres of the rudimentary education network) had serious implications for rulership. For example, the poor standards in Latin had led to a decline in the use of the charter as an instrument of royal government to disseminate the king's instructions and legislation. In one of his prefaces, Alfred wrote 'so general was its [Latin] decay in England that there were very few on this side of the Humber who could understand their rituals in English or translate a letter from Latin into English ... so few that I cannot remember a single one south of the Thames when I came to the throne.'

To improve literacy, Alfred arranged, and took part in, the translation (by scholars from Mercia) from Latin into Anglo-Saxon of a handful of books he thought it 'most needful for men to know, and to bring it to pass ... if we have the peace, that all the youth now in England ... may be devoted to learning'. These books covered history, philosophy and Gregory the Great's 'Pastoral Care' (a handbook for bishops), and copies of these books were sent to all the bishops of the kingdom. Alfred was patron of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (which was copied and supplemented up to 1154), a patriotic history of the English from the Wessex viewpoint designed to inspire its readers and celebrate Alfred and his monarchy.

Like other West Saxon kings, Alfred established a legal code; he assembled the laws of Offa and other predecessors, and of the kingdoms of Mercia and Kent, adding his own administrative regulations to form a definitive body of Anglo-Saxon law. 'I ... collected these together and ordered to be written many of them which our forefathers observed, those which I liked; and many of those which I did not like I rejected with the advice of my councillors ... For I dared not presume to set in writing at all many of my own, because it was unknown to me what would please those who should come after us ... Then I ... showed those to all my councillors, and they then said that they were all pleased to observe them' (Laws of Alfred, c.885-99).

By the 890s, Alfred's charters and coinage (which he had also reformed, extending its minting to the burhs he had founded) referred to him as 'king of the English', and Welsh kings sought alliances with him. Alfred died in 899, aged 50, and was buried in Winchester, the burial place of the West Saxon royal family.

By stopping the Viking advance and consolidating his territorial gains, Alfred had started the process by which his successors eventually extended their power over the other Anglo-Saxon kings; the ultimate unification of Anglo-Saxon England was to be led by Wessex. It is for his valiant defence of his kingdom against a stronger enemy, for securing peace with the Vikings and for his farsighted reforms in the reconstruction of Wessex and beyond, that Alfred - alone of all the English kings and queens - is known as 'the Great'.

Relationship (J,M&L):
38th Great-grandparent

ACCEDED:
Reigned Apr 871 To 26 Oct 899

Alfred married Ealhswith Queen Of ENGLAND, Queen Of England in 868. Ealhswith (daughter of Ethelred "Mucil" Eald Of The GAINAI and Eadburh FADBURN) was born about 852 in Mercia, England; died on 5 Dec 905. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events:

• AFN: 8HS0-4G
• _UID: 9256021555474002973D23B14B55078AB65F

Notes:

Queen of England

Relationship (J,M&L):
38th Great-grandparent

Notes:

Married:
NOTE MARRIED