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Birth:          ABT 1023 Graville St. Honorine, Normandy
Death:          ABT 1071 Yorkshire, England

Notes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Malet_(companion_of_William_the_Conqueror)
William Malet (died 1071) held senior positions within the Norman forces that occupied 
England from 1066. Malet was one of only a few "Companions of William the 
Conqueror" proven to have been present at the Battle of Hastings. The contemporary 
chronicler William of Poitiers recorded Malet's presence at Hastings.

According to apocryphal accounts, Malet was related to both William of Normandy and 
King Harold of England. Some accounts claim that Malet took charge of Harold's body 
following the Norman victory at Hastings. However, there is no evidence confirming 
such claims.

Malet held substantial property in Normandy – chiefly in the Pays de Caux, with a 
castle at Graville-Ste-Honorine (now a suburb of Le Havre). After 1066, he held many 
properties in England as well, most of them in Yorkshire and East Anglia.
Biography[edit]

Early life[edit]

According to apocryphal accounts, Malet's mother was English, and he was the 
brother of Aelgifu, who married Ælfgar, Earl of Mercia (the son of Lady Godiva).

If the above account is correct, Malet was the uncle of Ealdgyth (also known as 
Edith, a daughter of Aelgifu and Ælfgar), who became the second wife of King Harold 
II of England.

Battle of Hastings[edit]

Divided loyalties or not, there is strong evidence that Malet fought on the Norman side 
at Hastings.

William of Poitiers wrote:
His [King Harold's] corpse was brought into the Duke's camp and William gave it for 
burial to William, surnamed Malet, and not to Harold's mother, who offered for the 
body of her beloved son its weight in gold.[1]
Therefore Malet was present in the duke's camp, immediately after the battle. This 
should however suffice to deem him one of the very few proven participants in the 
battle.

High Sheriff[edit]

Malet's activities during the first few years of the Norman conquest of England are not 
known. But after the Danish stronghold York was captured in 1068, he was appointed 
the first High Sheriff of Yorkshire and was one of the commanders of the garrisons in 
the new castles built in the city of York. His efforts at defending the shire from Danish 
raids were, in the end, a terrible failure, for the next year the city was burned and the 
garrison slaughtered. Malet, his wife, and two of their children were held as hostages, 
and finally released when the Danes were driven off.

Malet was relieved of his duties in the north, but seems to not have lost the king's 
favour, for he soon was appointed High Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk, and given the 
great honour of Eye, with lands in Suffolk and several other shires. It was in fact the 
largest lordship in East Anglia. He built a motte and bailey castle at Eye, and started a 
market there.

In Histories and the Media[edit]

The Domesday Book also mentions a Durand Malet, who held land in Lincolnshire[2] 
and possibly some neighbouring shires. This may be William Malet's brother, but this is 
not certain.

On screen, Malet has been portrayed by Peter Halliday in the two-part BBC TV play 
Conquest (1966), part of the series Theatre 625, and by Gawn Grainger in the TV 
drama Blood Royal: William the Conqueror (1990).

Family[edit]

He had married Hesilia (Helise or Elisee) Crispin de Brionne, a great great 
granddaughter[dubious – discuss] of Rollo, 1st Duke of Normandy. He was succeeded 
by his son Robert as Lord of Eye and Sheriff of Suffolk. His other son Gilbert founded 
the Malets of Shepton Mallet.

Death[edit]

He died around 1071, probably during the rebellion of Hereward the Wake.
http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=jweber&id=I07178
William Malet, of Granville, Normandy; also held lands in Lincs before 1066 (possibly 
by virtue of his mother's putative status of Englishwoman); granted the feudal Barony 
of Eye, Suffolk, following the Conquest, in which he was one of William I's chief 
lieutenants, being allegedly given the task by William of burying Harold's body after 
Hastings; Sheriff of Yorks 1068; married Hesilia Crispin (living 1086), gggdau of Rollo 
The Dane, Duke of Normandy, and died c1071. [Burke's Peerage]

---------------------------------------------------

William, according to some, was grandson of Lady Godiva & brother of Harold 
Godwyn's wife, while not necessarily entirely true, probably there was some 
relationship. I have William's mother as a daughter of Godiva's husband Leofric Earl of 
Mercia, by an earlier wife or mistress. There is conjecture that William's father one of 
the men who accompanied Emma of Normandy to England in 1002 for her marriage 
with Aethelred.

---------------------------------------------------

According to Crispin and Macary, "William (Guillaume) Malet de Graville stands out as 
one of the most imposing figures at the Conquest. There can be no doubt about his 
presence there, which is subscribed to by William of Poitiers, Guy of Amiens, Orderic 
Vital, and all the historians of this epoch. So much has been placed on record 
concerning him that just a few facts of his life will be recited here. He was probably 
descended from Gerard, a Scandinavian prince and companion of Duke Rollo, which 
gave the name of the fief of Gerardville or Graville, near Havre. Robert, the eldest 
son, occurs in a document of about 990 in Normandy. On his mother's side William 
Malet was of Anglo-Saxon origin, for she was probably the daughter of Leofric, Earl of 
Mercia, and Godwa or Godgifu, the supposed sister of Thorold the Sheriff in the time 
of Edward the Confessor, and therefore the aunt of Edwin and Morcar, Earls of 
Northumberland. He was nearly killed in the battle of Hastings but was rescued by the 
sire de Montfort and William of Vieuxpont, and was appointed by William the 
Conqueror to take charge of the body of Harold, a statement that has been disputed. 
The consensus of opinion favors it, and it is most logical if William Malet's mother was 
as stated the sister of Algar II., 7th Earl of Mercia, who was the father of Alditha, wife 
of Harold. He accompanied King William at the reduction of Nottingham and York in 
1068, for which he was rewarded with the shreivalty of land in that county. Gilbert de 
Gand and Robert Fitz Richard were also commanders in this expedition. The following 
year he was besieged in the castle of York by Edgar, the Saxon prince, and was only 
saved from surrender by the timely arrival of the Conqueror. In the same year he was 
attacked by the Danes, who captured the city of York with great slaughter and took 
William Malet, his wife and children, prisoners, but their lives were spared, as was that 
of Gilbert de Gand, for the sake of their ransoms. There is evidence that he was slain 
in this year, but it is uncertain and the date of his death is unknown. An entry in 
Domesday that "William Malet was seized of this place (Cidestan, Co. Suffolk), where 
he proceeded on the King's service where he died," would indicate that his death 
occurred during the compilation of that book. He was witness to a charter of King 
William to the church of St. Martin-le-Grand, in London, and is there styled "princeps," 
which title, however, was honorary and not hereditary, having ceased with his death."

------------------------------------------

William Malet, or Guillaume, as he may have been called, "Sire de Graville", came 
from Graville Sainte Honorine between Le Havre and Harfleur, in what is today the 
French province of Normandy. He is said to have had a Norman father and a Saxon 
(read English) mother, and had some sort of association with King Harold of England 
before the conquest. William, through his Saxon mother, may actually have been 
related to King Harold, and also to the well known Lady Godiva. It is also possible that 
William and Harold were both God fathers of Duke William of Normandy's daughter, 
Abela.

The Malet Castle at Graville Sainte Honorine had an important strategic location, at 
the mouth of the Seine. It has now fallen into the sea, though some remnants of it may 
still be visible. A large section of wall with large iron rings attached was still there just 
over 100 years ago. The Abbey church, in which some of the Malets are buried, is 
now in the town of Le Havre. Though William Malet had connections to both sides in 
the conflict to come, his main allegiance was to Duke William of Normandy.

William fought with distinction at Hastings, as the following Excerpt from Wace's 
"Roman de Rou" attests:



William whom they call Mallet,
Boldly throws himself among them;
With his flashing sword
Against the English he makes furious onset;
But his shield they clove,
And his horse beneath him killed,
And himself they would have slain,
When came the Sire de Montfort
And Lord William de Vez-Pont
With the great force which they had,
Him they bravely rescued.
There many of their men they lost;
Mallet they remounted on the field
On a fresh war-horse.


When the battle was over, Duke William entrusted William Malet to attend to the burial 
of the dead English king. The body was buried under a heap of stones on top of a cliff 
at Hastings overlooking the shore that Harold had so bravely defended. William 
placed a stone on the grave with the epitaph:


"By command of the Duke, you rest here a King, O Harold, that you may be guardian 
still of the shore and sea".
This burial of Harold was only temporary and the body was later re-buried at Harold's 
Abbey at Waltham.

William and his brother Durand held lands in Lincolnshire, England, during the reign of 
Edward the Confessor, and through the reign of Harold right up to the conquest, in 
addition to those in Normandy. These Lincolnshire holdings, all in the Danelaw, 
probably came from William and Durand's mother. After the conquest William's English 
holdings were greatly increased, again, principally in the Danelaw, as English lands 
were taken from their Saxon owners and handed over to Norman Barons. It is likely 
that Duke William conferred these estates on William, partly because of his loyalty and 
skill in battle, but also because of his prior connections with his Danish "cousins" 
there. Perhaps the Duke felt that William was the best man to bring these proud, 
warlike and independent settlers under the control of their new King.

William was dead at the time of the Domesday survey in 1086, but the holdings at that 
time of his son Robert, and of his wife, give a good indication of the extent of his 
estates. He held large parts of what are today Suffolk and Norfolk, with smaller 
amounts of land in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire. Eye, in Suffolk appears to have been 
William's stronghold. Here he built a Motte and Bailey castle, after the Norman 
fashion. Nothing remains of the Norman fortifications, but the outline of the baileys 
and "Castle Mound", are still evident. There is even a slight indication of where the 
Market, founded by William Malet under Royal License would have been held.

William married Hesilia Crispin, by whom he had two sons, Robert and Gilbert, and one 
daughter, Beatrice. Robert and possibly Gilbert, along with their uncle Durand, 
accompanied their father at the battle of Hastings. The arms shown at the top of the 
page, likely carried by the Malets at Hastings, were used by many generations of the 
Malet family, both in England and in France, and can be seen on the Bayeux tapestry.

William was made Sheriff of York and granted considerable lands in Yorkshire 
following the building of the first Norman castle there (the mound now supports 
'Clifford's Tower') in 1068. He and his fellow captains, Robert Fitz-Richard and William 
of Ghent, with 500 picked knights had to fight off a local revolt, headed by Edgar the 
Atheling; this in or shortly after January 1069. Robert Fitz-Richard and many of his 
men were killed and it was only by the timely arrival of King William that the City was 
saved. The natives remained restless and had another, token go, as soon as King 
William left but were quickly put down. The troops were strengthened and another 
castle built on the other side of the river from the original but, notwithstanding, in 
September 1069, William, his wife and two of his children were captured by a 
combined force of Danes and English under Sweyn of Denmark supported by Earls 
Waltheof and Gospatric and the Northumbrians, when York fell to them after a terrible 
fight. This led to King William ordering the burning and killing of everything in the 
north and Domesday, even 16 years later, records most of northern England as still 
being waste and uninhabited.

William, his wife and two children must have been released some time later and 
William retained most of his lands apart from those in Yorkshire, which will have come 
with the office of Sheriff, which had been taken from him. At some point the King 
awarded William the appellation of "Princep", and in the Chart granted by the King to 
the church of St. Martin le Grand, his signature appears as "Wilielmus Malet Princep". 
In the context of the times, Princep would likely have been interpreted as "leader, or 
chief". William is believed to have died fighting "Hereward the Wake" in the Fens 
near Ely Cathedral, which lies between South Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and 
Norfolk (and in the middle of the Malet holdings), in 1071. The Domesday book 
records that "...He went into the marsh", and that "...he went on the King's service, 
where he died".

William is generally accepted to be the progenitor of many of the various branches of 
the Malet family (those that can trace their lines back that far), both in England and in 
France. The descendants of Durand continued to hold lands in Lincolnshire, and are 
recorded in Irby on Humber up to the 16th century.

-----------------------------------------

NORMAN SHERIFFS
By 1066, when William the Conqueror seized power, he replaced all of the existing 
sheriffs with his own loyal comrades in arms. When William conveyed the offices of 
sheriff to his Normans, he also bestowed to them the title "Vicomte," which added 
nobility to their positions. He allowed Vicomte sheriffs to build castles, a powerful 
symbol of privilege and a far greater honor than had ever been granted to prior 
Anglo-Saxon sheriffs. The castles were a sign of aggressive force. This fortification 
symbolism helped identify William as the incomparable authority in the newly 
conquered land.

The most famous William the Conqueror sheriff was a man named William Malet, a 
ferocious warrior. During the Battle of Hasting his horse was killed from under him. 
Mounting a fresh horse, he continued leading the charge, killing the enemy along the 
way, to a Norman victory. William continued to use Malet to crush insurgent forces 
within his reign.. . . As a reward, William named Malet the sheriff of Yorkshire.

King William sought aggressive types for the office of sheriff whose ambitions were 
consistent with his. Those willing to squeeze the peasants to their maximum were the 
best qualified in William's eyes. He instituted the practice of selling the office to the 
highest bidder. This brought forth evil men willing to pay exorbitant prices for the 
office and then willing to do whatever it took to recoup their investment. . . No one 
spoke out for the peasantry because their only representative to the king was the very 
sheriffs embezzling them. The most notorious was Picot, Sheriff of Cambridgeshire. . . . 
Monks describe him as:

a hungry lion, a prowling wolf, a crafty fox, a filthy swine, a dog without shame, who 
stuffed his belly like an insatiable beast as though the whole country were a single 
corpse.

If events reduced production within the shires and thereby reduced the prosperity of 
King William, the sheriff was then forced to press the peasants even more to make up 
for the deficiency. In 1083, William levied the highest tax assessment of his reign to 
make up for the previous year's famine and low production. . . . To enhance their 
income, sheriffs commonly pillaged Church properties. . . .

The only coin in circulation in twelfth century England was the silver penny. It was the 
responsibility of the sheriff to police the silver content in the coinage. If the sheriff 
failed to see that the tender did not meet quality assurance in the amount of silver 
content versus the alloy percentage, he was held personally liable for the shortage. 
Because this burden was placed on the sheriffs in the area that effected them the 
most, their pocketbooks. . . .Enforcement of the matter was particularly unkind under 
the reign of King Henry II to punish offenders that circulated "bastard" coins. The first 
offense routinely resulted in the severing of a hand or castration. . . .

The coming of King John in 1199 brought about one of the most stirring periods in the 
history of the medieval sheriff. . . . As King John waged war against the Welsh, the 
French, and the Irish, he placed the emphasis upon the sheriffs to finance his wars. . . 
. Because of the sheriff's authority and ability to raise funds, the 13th century saw the 
sheriff as the most powerful administrative force in medieval England. . . .

King John personally knew every one of the 100 or so sheriffs that he appointed 
between 1199 and 1216. Some were his intimate friends and most trusted advisors. In 
contrast to the prior practice of King Richard, he appointed only two members of the 
Church to the post. He instead chose to select intense, secular men, with strong 
military backgrounds. . . . His deliberate selection of men of harsh demeanor . . . was 
considered by people of his time as a substantive answer for the difficult issues of the 
day . . . tough men for tough times. . .

Parents
MALET ----- (ABT 1003 - )
____ ----- (daughter of Leofric) (ABT 1005 - )

Siblings
MALET William (ABT 1023 - ABT 1071)

Marriage To CRISPIN Heselia (ABT 1025 - )
    m. ABT 1041 St. Honore, Burgundy

Notes

Parents
DE BRIONNE Gilbert ("Crispin") (ABT  980 - ABT 1040)
D'EU Constance (ABT 1009 - )

Children by CRISPIN Heselia ABT 1025 - 
MALET Beatrix (ABT 1045 - )
MALET Alvarissa (ABT 1048 - )
MALET Gilbert (1057 - 1105)

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