'ZZmisc03'Index links to: Lead / Letter
Families covered: Late Earls of Mercia, Taillebois of Kendal [These families are still being researched.]

                               
There are many different offerings for the ancestry of Aelfgar, Earl of Mercia, whose daughters, confirmed and alleged, appear in many ancestries. The following pulls together the position as we see it but is not completely secure. We find that many online genealogical databases show dates that are simply not acceptable and this, along with a failure to identify sources, weakens faith in them.
Leofric
1. Edulph
  m. Elfwine (dau of Ethelred, Ealderman of Mercia)
  A. Leofwine, Earl of Mercia
  m. Alwara (dau of Athelstan Mannesson)
  Uncertain on the order of their sons. Commoners shows Norman, Edwin, Leofric then Godwin.
i. Leofric, Earl of Mercia (d 31.08.1057)
  m. Godgifu, 'Lady Godiva' (d 1067, sister of Thorold, Sheriff of Lincoln)
  a. Aelfgar (Algar), Earl of Mercia (d 1059)
  m. Aelfgifu
  Some web sites indicate that Aelgifu was daughter of Ethelred 'the Unready', King of England. That is unlikely mainly because that is not mentioned in any of the 'reliable' sources (the Aelgifu/Elgivawho was King Ethelred's daughter is reported as having married only once, to Uchtred, Earl of Bernicia) whilst the dates indicate that Princess Aelgifu was a generation earlier than Aelfgar (Uchtred died in 1016).
  (1) Edwin
(2) Mocar
  (3) Ealdgyth (d after 1070) HJY
  m1. Gruffydd, Prince of Deheubarth (d 1063) HJY
  m2. (c1064) Harold II, King of England (b c1022, d Battle 14.10.1066)
  Many web sites report the widely-held view that another daughter of Earl Aelfgar was Lucy who married (1) Ivo Taillebois (2) Roger FitzGerold (3) Ranulph de Meschines, 1st Earl of Chester. Whilst it appears that the matter is by no means clear, we show her as daughter of Thorold (Turold) of Bucknell, Sheriff of Lincolnshire, by a daughter of William de Malet.
  Collins (1741, vol 3, Temple, Viscount Cobham) reports the following brothers of Earl Algar.
  b. Montgomery
  c. William de Temple (a 1066)
  ii. Edwin of Mercia (d 1039)
  a. Ealdgyth EGHJRSWY
  m1. Edmund II 'Ironside', King of England (d 1016) EGHJRSWY
  m2. (?) Outred or Uchtred of Atiscross HJY
  The widow of Edmund Ironside has also been named Ethelfreda and shown as married to Goronwy ap Tudurap Cadell ap Einion ap Owain, King of South Wales.
iii. Norman (d Assandun 1016)
  iv. Godwin
  a. Wolfric, lord of Leek, Aldithley, Balterley, Croxton, etc. (a 1066)
  Commoners identifies Wolfric's wife as a daughter of WilliamPoncius, Count of Arques & Thoulouse, son of Richard II, Duke of Normandy, and sister of Richard FitzPontzwho married the heiress of Clifford Castle and was progenitor of the De Clifford family. The relationship reported between William, son of Duke Richard II, and Richard FitzPontz appears to be incorrect which makes us believe that this identification is spurious.
N.B. As reported here, there is confusion between the generations with some of this family.
(1) Gamel de Tettesworth, Staffordshire (a 1086)
  (A) Adam de Aldithley
  (2) Waltheus, lord of Etchells, Bredbury & Brinnington (Cheshire)
  Commoners identifies Walthens (sic, we presume this should read Waltheus) as "the patriarch of many Cheshire families".
  (A) son
  (B) Lidulph de Croxton
  (C) Margery
  m. Gilbert Venables, baron of Kinderton
  (3) Ranulphus (Ralph) had issue : we show him here
  (4) Orme de Davenport
  b.+ other issue - Godfric (d Hastings), Egelric (Bishop of Durham), Egelwyn (d 1072, Bishop of Durham)
  iv. Ermenhild
  Commoners identifies Ermenhild as "the mother of Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester". Provisionally, we do not.

 

 

The following connections are shown here for the moment (at least) whilst Ivo Taillebois is investigated further. His ancestry appears to be one of the most inconsistently reported on the Internet. Not helped by the confusion over the identity of his wife Lucy, as mentioned just above, he is variously described as:
(1) brother (possibly illegitimate) of a Count of Anjou. This is probablythe most common description (which is supported by BE1883 in its article on the Lancaster family). Where the Count is named, most sources give his name as Fulk - normally (as in BE1883) without specifying which Fulk but sometimes specifying one whose dates are obviously incompatible. The only Fulks (indeed the only Counts of Anjou) whose dates would reasonably work for Ivo appear to be Fulk III 'the Black'(c956-1040), but only if he was illegitimate, and possibly (given the uncertainty on Ivo's dates) Fulk IV 'le Rechin'(1043-1109). An interesting variation to this theme is that he was not a son but a grandson of a Count of Anjou, being grandson of Fulk III 'the Black' through his daughter Adele, by Bodon (Eudes) de Nevers.
(2) an illegitimate son of Richard II, Duke of Normandy.
(3) son of an unidentified Richard FitzGerold. Some of the sources that report this give Ivo a family name of FitzRichard de Roumare. This is questionable because it appears to assume a connection with Roger FitzGerold of Roumare even though that Roger was of the same generation as Ivo (as shown by the fact that Roger married Ivo's widow, Lucy - see above) and so any descent from a Gerold of Roumare would be very unlikely to be through an intervening generation (Richard).
(4) "nephew of the Conqueror".
(5) a son (possibly illegitimate) of either Gilbert (Gislebert), Count of Brienne(1000-1040) or Gilbert Crispin de Bec, who are frequently confused with each other. The former would make Ivo a second cousin of the Conqueror. The latter seems unlikely because Ivo's wife Lucy appears to have been Gilbert Crispin's great-granddaughter as Gilbert's daughter Hesilia married William (or Robert) Malet, apparently the father of Lucy's uncle Robert of Eye (see note under Lucy on 'Malet1') as well as possibly father of Lucy's mother (Beatrice?).
Confirmation of the identity of Ivo's children is still being sought. Some web sites show him as having a daughter Lucy but this appears not to be true (see comment on 'Malet1'). At least one web site states that he died without issue and that his title and estates went to a brother called Gerard. However, the general consensus is that he did have surviving children who themselves had children. One of the uncertainties concerning his children is that, whilst many sites report him as father of Eldred (ancestor of the family of Lancaster) and some show him as father of Aelfred (ancestor of the family of Radcliffe), very few show both at the same time.
Ivo (de) Taillebois, Sheriff of Lincoln, lord of Kendal (b c1020, d c1094)§T§
Ivo was progenitor of many families. However, not only is there uncertainty as to his ancestry, as reported just above, but it is by no means clear that his marriages have been fully confirmed. http://users.ox.ac.uk/~prosop/prosopon/issue2-2.pdf (which was kindly brought to our attention by a contributor, TG, 07.01.05) identifies only Beatrix as offspring of the marriage to Lucy and draws attention to the fact that Lucy's inheritance passed to her sons by her second & third marriages and not to any son by her (first) marriage to Ivo.
m1. Gundred
1. Aelfred de Tailbois 'the Englishman' (b c1045) GHJSY
  Some sources suggest that Aelfred was the same person as Eldred of Workington, lord of Kendal.
2. Matilda Taillebois possibly dau of Ivo, if so then probably of this marriage GHJSY
  m. Hugh de Beauchamp (a 1066) GHJSY
m2. Lucy (dau of either Algar, Earl of Mercia, or Thorold, Sheriff of Lincoln)
3. Beatrix de Taillebois Y
  m1. Ethelred
  Some sources suggest that Ethelred was the same person as Eldred of Workington, lord of Kendal.
  m2. Ribald of Middleham Y

Main source(s) (uploaded 23.10.03) : various web sites with support/input for upper section from Commoners (vol 4, Stansfeld of Burley Wood, p757)
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