Flemish Descent of the Lindsays
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Flemish Descent of the Scottish LindsaysThe following article is reprinted with permission from Ms. Teresa Bostle, President of The Clan Lindsay Society of Australia. This article was featured in the March 2002 Newsletter of the Australian Lindsay Society. Ms. Bostle used the "Lives of the Lindsays" publication and the research report released by Ms. Beryl Platts to the Lindsay Society of Scotland as her source material. The article is well written and provides a very concise and clear path of the descent of the Scottish Lindsays from their Flemish origin. If any reviewer of this article has a comment and particularly a difference of opinion, which can be documented, please send these thoughts to Ron Lindsay ******************************************Historical Feature – the Early LindsaysThe
Rt. Hon Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, K.T., P.C. recommended Beryl Platts’
research as being the more accurate account of his family’s origins. The paper
argues its theory the Lindsays originated from Flanders -
very well indeed.
For those historians who need the references and documentation, you can obtain a
copy of Mrs.
Platts’ research paper from the Clan Lindsay Society in Scotland. This
article is the story of the early Lindsays based on Beryl Platts’ work. I hope
it provides a clear picture of the origin of the Lindsays. You may need to keep
the ‘family tree’ handy -
it is a useful aid to the relationships between
the various branches of the Lindsays. Flanders
The great Charlemagne provided the northern part of Europe with its
nobility. Charlemagne’s children
married his civil and military administrators.
Those families retained some of that responsibility and power into future
generations, giving a structure to the society of those distant times. The Carolingian families were found in the comtés north of the Ile de
France, east of Normandy, and west of Germany.
The Carolingians were also found in Flanders. At this time, Flanders included territories like Brabant and
Hainaut which, though theoretically independent,
were in practice
part of the political ambience of the Flemish
counts, and for long periods under their direct control. Flemish law forbade noble men and women to marry outside their own class.
Many Carolingian families married distant cousins and the like.
This law followed the Flemish nobility wherever they were.
Its effects were especially apparent in Scotland where all the non-Celtic
aristocracy were related. The descendants of the Counts of Flanders followed two lines.
The primary line, the descendants of the Counts of Flanders, arrived in
England in the person of Matilda of Flanders (granddaughter of Count Baldwin IV of Flanders
and Ogive of Luxembourg), wife to William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy. The secondary line, the descendants of the Lords of Alost, arrived in
England when the sons of Ralph, Lord of
Alost and Gisela of Luxembourg (Ogive’s sister) accompanied William, Duke
of Normandy. The Counts of Alost
Count
Arnulf of Flanders
made a pact with Emperor Otto I, persuading Otto to retire from Ghent during the
10th century. The
defence of Ghent became the responsibility of Flanders. A new comté called Alost was formed as a buffer between Flanders and the
Lorraine border. Alost was given to
Arnulf’s nephew, Ralph (son of his
brother Ethelwulf, who had acquired his name from a Saxon mother – Elstrudis,
King Alfred’s daughter). Ralph died in 962. Under the Flemish regime every man who ruled a comté had his device,
unique to himself and his land. The
device passed with the inheritance to his heir at the moment of succession. The Counts of Alost bore sable, a
chief argent. The black and
silver tones, which these words denote, came to be understood as the colours
marking the region around Ghent. Ralph’s son, Baldwin
succeeded him as Count of Alost. Baldwin was a vassal of the Emperor, a duty
that would continue for several generations.
It was not an unusual arrangement; many Flemish counts held more than one
allegiance. The Lords of Alost were among the first six peers created when the
peerage of Flanders was formed in the middle of the 11th century.
They had a known descent by at least three lines from Charlemagne and
were regarded as the noblest of the nobilitas. The comté was held by Ralph, Lord
of Alost, between 1031 AD and 1052 AD. Ralph married Gisela, daughter of the
Count of Luxembourg (whose sister Ogive was married to Count Baldwin IV of
Flanders). Ralph’s children were
first cousins to William the Conqueror’s wife, Matilda of Flanders. Ralph and Gisela are known to have had at least four sons and several
daughters. The known sons were: ·
Baldwin I, the heir to Alost ·
Ralph II, who became
Chamberlain to the Count of Flanders ·
Gilbert, who accompanied
William the Conqueror to England and received land in 14 counties as his
Domesday reward, and ·
Ragenfridus. Baldwin
I
of Alost was likely to have accompanied William the Conqueror to England in 1066
AD. He would have brought a
substantial army of his own men, and men of Brabant. Baldwin I died in 1082 AD,
too early for Domesday rewards. Baldwin
II
of Alost (sometimes called the Fat”) was killed in Nicaea in 1097 AD while
following his leader and kinsman, Godfrey de Bouillon, on the First Crusade.
Albert of Aix noted that Baldwin was “carried away by his ardour and
the wish to reach the walls, had his head pierced by an arrow and died in
combat” during the assault on Nicaea. Baldwin
III
of Alost died in 1127 AD from the effects of a head wound received during the
struggles for the Flemish comital succession.
He left no legitimate male heirs, and the heritage, which should have
passed to his daughter, Beatrice, was
annexed by the family’s black sheep, Ivan,
who succeeded him as Lord of Alost. The seizure of Beatrice’s patrimony caused a feud between other members
of the family and their senior branch, the Counts of Guines, which was to last
for many years and lead to Ivan’s murder.
Ivan’s only son, Thierry
(sometimes called Dirk), who married the daughter of the Count of Hainaut,
brought some sort of natural retribution to the situation by dying in 1166 AD
without heirs. The county, its revenues and its titles were withdrawn into the treasury
of the Counts of Flanders. However,
the arms of the comté, a black shield with a silver chief (a broad band running
along the top) were taken by a cadet branch of the house who had been castellans
of Ghent and Advocates of the abbey church of St. Peter at Ghent since the 9th
century. The Norman Conquest
Ralf
de Limesi was
born in Alost about 1040 AD. He had a small Norman manor in Limesi, on the north
side of the Seine valley. He was
the Chamberlain, to the Flemish Court. Ralph de Limesi left a son, Alan,
in Warwickshire and heirs of unknown name in Limesi. Ralph de Limesi (or Ralph de Ghent or Ralph de Lindsay) came to England
with William the Conqueror in 1066 AD. He
received Domesday estates in Somerset, Devonshire, Hertfordshire,
Northamptonshire, Warwickshire (his most important holdings), Nottinghamshire,
Essex, Norfolk and Bedingfield, Suffolk as tenant in chief. Ralph’s coat of arms was gules,
an eagle displayed or. Ralph de Limesi and his wife, Hawisa, founded Hertford Priory and they
were generous benefactors to the Priory thereafter. Ralph died in mid-1090’s in the monastery of St Albans. Alan de Limesi built
a church dedicated to St Andrew at Collyweston in Northamptonshire. Aleonora de Limesi, Ralph’s great-granddaughter and heiress
married Sir David de Lindsay of Crawford a distant relation.
Her sister, Basilia de Limesi,
married the Flemish knight, Sir Hugh de Odingsels. Gilbert de Ghent (de Lindsay), son of Ralph, Lord of Alost, married Alice de Montfort sur Risle, a
distant relative. Amaury de Valenciennes, Count of Valenciennes, was in conflict with the
Count of Flanders during the first decade of the 11th century. Amaury
de Valenciennes fled to France where he became the first Amaury de Montfort.
Valenciennes was seized by Flanders during the conflict.
This effectively removed the comté from Hainaut control and was a source
of contention for some time. Hainaut’s Countess Richelde married Baldwin of Mons (afterwards Baldwin
VI of Flanders) a few years before the Norman Conquest of England.
This ended the contention about Valenciennes between Hainaut and
Flanders. The marriage of Gilbert
(cousin to the Count of Flanders) and Alice (descendant of Amaury de Montfort)
also had a healing diplomatic significance. Knights such as Ralph de Limesi had probably received their lands from
the Montforts at the time of Gilbert and Alice’s marriage as part of the
general reconciliation. Hainaut had
ruled Alost itself before the Flemish seizure of Valenciennes. Gilbert de Ghent accompanied William, Duke of Normandy, on his expedition
to England. Gilbert took an active
part in the subjugation of England: the city of York was placed under his
command in 1068 AD, together with William Malet. In 1069 AD, an invading force captured the city, killed the
Norman garrison and only spared Gilbert and William for their ransom. Gilbert de Ghent brought the Alost colours (sable, a chief argent) to England in 1066 AD, and he may have had
them carried in front of his own troops there.
The family devices were an important part of their Flemish culture and
provided a strong sense of identity in a new country. An adaptation of the Alost coat-of-arms was used in the great priory at
Bridlington, Yorkshire: per pale, sable
and argent with the unusual addition of three Bs for Bridlington. He received 172 English manors; most of them in Lincolnshire (Gilbert was
the first Earl of Lincoln) and Nottinghamshire, through the shires of York,
Derby, Huntingdon, Leicester and Cambridge also provided extensive estates. Gilbert and Alice made their chief home at Folkingham, near Grantham.
Their children include (there were others, unnamed by chroniclers): ·
Gilbert II ·
Hugh ·
Walter I ·
Robert I ·
Ralph III ·
Henry ·
Emma ·
Agnes Gilbert died in 1095 AD. There
are many more stories about Gilbert’s activities after the Conquest.
Unfortunately, we do not have the space to include them in this article. - Ed
Gilbert de Ghent II was
not well known. He may
have been a victim of ill health or he may have spent most of his time in
Flanders, helping to hold the comté of Alost for his family during the First
Crusade and the troubled years, which followed the death in that campaign of his
cousin, Baldwin II. He left no
heirs. Hugh de Ghent,
Gilbert’s second son, inherited the Norman lands of Montfort-sur-Risle from
his mother. He became Hugh IV of
Montfort-sur-Risle. Hugh married Adeline
de Beaumont. Walter
de Ghent (or de Lindsay), Gilbert de Ghent’s third son, was
married twice. His first wife is
virtually unknown; his second wife was Maud of Brittany.
Walter accompanied David, Earl of Huntingdon, brother of Alexander I, to
Scotland to claim his throne. Walter
de Lindsay settled at Tweedside, from Earlston to Caddonlea. Walter de Lindsay had two sons by his first wife: ·
Walter II ·
William Walter de Lindsay was a witness to the very important Inquisitio into the
See of Glasgow, around 1116 AD. Other
witnesses include Matilda the Countess, Count David’s nephew, William, Osbert
de Arden (a Warwickshire man who lived near Ralph de Limesi) and Alan de Percy,
husband of Emma de Ghent (Walter’s sister). Count David (future king of Scotland) signed a charter in 1120 AD,
founding the Abbey of Selkirk. The
signature of Galterio de Lyndeseia (Walter de Lindsay) also appears on the
Charter – the first to be found in Scotland of the great name of Lindsay. Walter de Ghent inherited the Lincolnshire estates late in life and
somewhat unexpectedly. Walter
married Maud of Brittany around 1120 AD. They
had three sons: ·
Gilbert III– a minor when his
father died ·
Robert ·
Geoffrey Walter and Maud lived at Bridlington, Yorkshire. During the civil war (1135 AD to 1152 AD) Walter supported Stephen, whose
wife, Matilda, Countess of Boulogne, was his kinswoman (Gilbert de Ghent’s
great-aunt, Adele, married the father of Count Eustace I of Boulogne).
Walter participated in the Battle of the Standard.
He supported the very
moving appeal made by Robert de Bruce to David, King of Scotland, “not to bring war between men who were kinsmen and
comrades”. Bruce had a son on the
opposing (Scottish) side, and so did Walter de Ghent – for Walter de Lindsay
II was by now established with his family at Ercildon. Walter de Ghent died 1139 AD. The Scottish estates passed to Walter de Lindsay II, who was by then
married to a kinswoman of the Scottish Queen. The children of Walter de Ghent’s marriage to Maud of Brittany enjoyed
the English estates without conflict of allegiance. The possession of the Lincolnshire parishes of Fordington and
Ulseby by Sir William Lindsay of Lamberton at the start of the 13th
century shows that at least some of the Ghent heritage passed to the Lindsays of
Molesworth, who were also the Lindsays of Ercildon. England
Gilbert
de Ghent III,
Lord of Lindsay, Earl of Lincoln (son of Walter de Ghent and Maud of Brittany),
was born in 1120 AD and died in 1156 AD. He
married Rohese de Clare. His
daughter, Alice de Ghent, married Simon de Senlis III, a grandson of Queen Maud
of Scotland, and a distant relative. Gilbert
de Ghent VI, of Folkingham (no longer calling himself Earl of Lincoln) died without male heirs in
1297 AD. Gilbert married Lora de
Baliol, a kinswoman of King John Baliol. Ralph
de Ghent
III (son of Gilbert de Ghent and
Alice de Montfort sur Risle) married Ethelreda, the granddaughter of Gospatrick,
Earl of Northumberland. It is not
known if Ralph had any immediate heirs; descendants of the great Gospatrick all
took Saxon or Scandinavian names. William
de Lindsay of Scotland eventually claimed the estates. Ragenfridus de Lindsay
(youngest son of Ralf, Lord of Alost and Gisela of Luxembourg) appears to have
accompanied Gilbert to England. He
may also have been known as Angodus de Lindsay.
Angodus de Lindsay may have left sons, but they would have been called by
the name of his chief manor, which is unknown to us. Scotland
Henry
de Ghent was
also known as Henry Erskine in Scotland. He
took the Alost arms, reversed, to Scotland: argent,
a pale sable. Henry Erskine’s
device came closest to the original Alost pattern out of those families that
took the colours to Scotland. Walter
de Lindsay II
married the sister of Walter L’Engleis (Walter the English), a granddaughter
of Seier de Seton and thus a cousin to the Queen. Molesworth manor in
Huntingdonshire probably came to Walter II as part of his wife’s dowry.
Molesworth remained in the possession of the Lindsays of Ercildon (Earlston)
thereafter. Walter de Lindsay II brought to Scotland as his coat of arms: gules,
an eagle displayed or. The
symbol, an eagle displayed, was the symbol of the Holy Roman Emperor.
The colours, the gules and or of Boulogne,
reversed conveyed a compliment to Scotland’s Queen Maud, Walter’s cousin.
Queen Maud was the great-niece of Count Eustace II of Boulogne and a
granddaughter of Count Lambert of Lens. The unchanged Alost arms were not available to him as Walter de Ghent was
a third son and Gilbert de Ghent a second son. The Eagle reflected
Water’s Charlemagnic descent – something else he shared with the Scottish
Queen. The Eagle was a badge of honour for the lords of the Imperial Marches.
The eventual spread of the symbol far beyond the homelands of Alost meant
the Eagle lost its personal significance. There was also the difficulty of a divided loyalty, where a
continental army following a similar symbol might not be an ally of Scotland.
The Eagle symbol was eventually abandoned. About 1159 AD Walter de Lindsay II granted the church of Earlstown in
Lauderdale to the Abbey of Kelso – for the soul of Walter the English, his
brother-in-law. Walter the English
was the English-born son of Walter the Fleming, of Wahull, (Bedfordshire) and
Seton (East Lothian). He too was a
grandson of Count Lambert of Lens; he was also nephew and protector of the
Countess Judith, and cousin and guardian of her daughter, Scotland’s Queen
Maud. Around
1159 AD, William de
Lindsay of
Ercildun (Earlston) made a gift of a church to Chicksands Priory, Bedfordshire,
for the health of his father and for the souls of his mother and his kinsman,
Walter the English. William
de Lindsay had three known children: ·
Sir Walter Lindsay of Lamberton ·
Sir David Lindsay of Crawford ·
Sir William Lindsay of Luffness Sir David
Lindsay of Crawford married Aleonora de Limesi, great-granddaughter and heiress of Ralph de
Limesi about 1200 AD. In 1202 AD, Sir Walter de Lindsay
III of Lamberton made a gift of two churches (Fordington and Ulseby) to the
English Abbey of Croyland in Lincolnshire (where Queen Maud’s father was
buried). Hugh, Earl of Chester, had
held Fordington at Domesday. Through
his descendants it became part of the earldom of Lincoln.
Ulseby was one of the Domesday manors of Gilbert de Ghent. Sir
Walter Lindsay III of Lamberton
had
two known children: ·
William
Lindsay of Lamberton, who married
Ada, sister of King John Baliol, in 1266 AD. ·
Christiana
Lindsay, who married Ingleram de
Coucy (a distant cousin), son of Count Arnold III of Guines, in 1280 AD.
Henry IV, King of France, is an heir of this line. The great-grandson of William Lindsay of Luffness,
Sir Alexander Lindsay,
made a change to the family arms around 1297 AD.
On a seal of his, bearing that date and attached to a document giving a
surety for Robert de Bruce, the eagle
displayed had been displaced by a fess
chequey, argent and azure – an adaptation of the Stewart device, and the
present-day arms of Crawford. The chequered device came down to both the houses of Lindsay and Stewart
from the mighty house of Vermandois. The
Vermandois were descended from Charlemagne’s second son, Pepin, King of Italy.
The first Lindsay connection to the house of Vermandois was through the
Lords of Alost. However, there were
other more recent connections: ·
Count Hugh IV de Montfort sur
Risle’s marriage to Adeline de Beaumont, daughter of Isabel de Vermandois; ·
the marriage, about 1154 AD, of
Gundrada de Warenne (daughter of Elizabeth de Vermandois by her second husband)
to William de Lancaster; ·
the great-great-granddaughter
of William de Lancaster, Alice, married William de Lindsay; The Vermandois fess chequey,
its tinctures different but pattern unmistakable, would come to speak as loudly
as anything could in those non-literate days of kinship with the Stewarts. Sir Alexander’s son, David, Lord
of Crawford, made another change. He
kept the eagle as a single supporter
and quartered the fess chequey with
the arms of his wife’s father, Sir Alexander de Abernethy.
Those arms were or, a lion rampant gules, debruised by a ribbon sable.
The Abernethy bearing was the exact replica of one borne in the 12th
century by the Flemish noble house of Zottegem, which was one of the lordships
of Alost – indicating a further relationship. In spite of the change on the shield, the Lindsay family’s crest would remain the head and wings of a swan – that most evocative of the symbols of Boulogne. You are visitor # |