Humphrey with the Beard

Humphrey with the Beard (died before 1113) was a Norman soldier and nobleman, the earliest known ancestor of the de Bohun family, later prominent in England as Earls of Hereford and Earls of Essex. He took part in the Norman Conquest of England of 1066 although not one of the 15 or so proven Companions of William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings.^[1]

Before the Norman Conquest of England in 1066 he was seated at the manor of "Bohun" in Normandy, as is stated by his contemporary Wace in the Roman de Rou: De Bohun le Vieil Onfrei ("from Bohun the old Humphrey").^[2]

His epithet, "with the beard" (cum barba), was a distinguishing one in eleventh-century Normandy, where the custom was to shave the face and back of the head. It is first recorded in a later chronicle of Llanthony Prima, edited by William Dugdale in the Monasticon Anglicanum (VI.134):

Dominus Humfredus de Bohun, cum barba, qui prius venit cum Willielmo Conquestore in Angliam de Normannia, cognatus dicti Conquestoris. . . ("Lord Humphrey de Bohun, with the beard, who first came with William the Conqueror to England from Normandy, a relative of the said Conqueror").^[3]

At the time of the Conquest Humphrey held the manor of Bohun in western Normandy, today comprising two communes, Saint-André-de-Bohon and Saint-Georges-de-Bohon. After the Conquest he received lands in England including his seat at the manor of Tatterford in Norfolk, as recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086. The small size of his reward in England, despite his relations with William's family, may have been due to his old age.

He donated a plough and garden to the nuns of the Abbaye Saint-Amand at Rouen. The charter was witnessed by William, Duke of Normandy as Comes ("Count"), indicating that he had not yet succeeded to the throne of England and was still only Duke of Normandy. This suggests that Humphrey was advanced in age by 1066.

He later donated the church of Saint-Georges-de-Bohon to the Abbey of Marmoutier.

He married three times, as is stated in the charter of his donation of a plough and garden to the nuns of the Abbaye Saint-Amand at Rouen, but the names of his wives are unknown. He may have married a relative of William the Conqueror. He had progeny three sons and two daughters, including:

• Robert de Bohun, eldest son, who died unmarried and predeceased his father.
• Richard de Bohun, 2nd son, the progenitor, in the female line, of the Bohuns of Midhurst.
• Humphrey I de Bohun (died c.1123), youngest son, who by convention according to Planché is given the first ordinal number because by his marriage he was "the founder of the fortunes of his family".^[1]

Sources

• Graeme White, "Bohun, Humphrey (III) de (b. before 1144, d. 1181)," Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, accessed 20 December 2009.

References