Otto-William, Count of Burgundy

Otto-William (French: Otte-Guillaume; German: Otto Wilhelm; 955/62 – 21 September 1026 AD) was count of Mâcon, Nevers, and Burgundy.

Otto-William
Bornc.  958
Died(1026-09-21)21 September 1026
Noble familyIvrea
Spouse(s)Ermentrude of Roucy
Adelaide
Issue
FatherAdalbert of Ivrea
MotherGerberga of Mâcon

Life

Otto-William of Mâcon was born in 958 during the joint reign of his grandfather, King Berengar II of Italy, and his father, King Adalbert. His mother was Gerberga of Mâcon.[1] His mother gave him what would later be the Free County of Burgundy around Dole in 982. Otto also inherited the duchy of Burgundy on the other side of the Saône in 1002 from his stepfather Odo Henry the Great.[2] The duchy then corresponded to the diocese of Besançon in the Holy Roman Empire. By 990 Otto-William was the Count of Nevers.[2] He was also Count of Mâcon in France.[1]

While the son of a king, he did not himself seek a royal wife.[3] In c. 975–80, he married Ermentrude of Roucy, whose maternal grandmother, Gerberga of Saxony, was a sister of Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, and by this marriage alliance created a web of consanguinity between later kings of France, Germany, Burgundy and the Carolingians.[3] Even his children's spouses, although from great families, came from widespread and scattered parts of France.[3]

The Duchy of Burgundy was annexed to the crown of France by King Robert II in 1004. Determined to be sovereign ruler of his own lands, Otto revolted against the Emperor Henry II in 1016. This was after Rudolph III of Burgundy, the last king of Arles, had done homage to Henry at Strasbourg, making him his guard and heir. On Otto's death, the Free County fell under the suzerainty of the German emperors. Otto-William died on 21 September 1026 at the age of 64.[4]

Marriage and issue
Otto-William's first wife Ermentrude

His first wife was Ermentrude, daughter of Renaud of Roucy.[1] They had two sons and three daughters:

Otto remarried late in life to a wife named Adelaide. Some scholars have identified her with the four-times widowed Adelaide-Blanche of Anjou,[6][7] but the identity is not directly attested[8] and has been disputed by some studying the question.[9]

See also
  • Dukes of Burgundy family tree

References
  1. Detlev Schwennicke, Europäische Stammtafeln: Stammtafeln zur Geschichte der Europäischen Staaten, Neue Folge, Band II (Marburg, Germany: Verlag von J. A. Stargardt, 1984), Tafel 59
  2. W. Scott Jessee, Robert the Burgundian and the Counts of Anjou, Ca. 1025-1098 (USA: The Catholic University of America Press. 2000), p. 15
  3. Constance Brittain Bouchard, Those of My Blood: Creating Noble Families in Medieval Francia (Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001), p. 50
  4. David Douglas, 'Some Problems of Early Norman Chronology', The English Historical Review, Vol. 65, No. 256, (July 1950), p. 298
  5. Constance Brittain Bourchard, Sword, Miter, and Cloister: Nobility and the Church in Burgundy, 980-1188, (Cornell University Press, 1987), 33.
  6. Constance B. Bouchard, 'The Origins of the French Nobility: A Reassessment', The American Historical Review, Vol. 86, No. 3 (Jun., 1981), pp. 515-16.
  7. Detlev Schwennicke, Europäische Stammtafeln: Stammtafeln zur Geschichte der Europäischen Staaten, Neue Folge, Band III Teilband 1 (Marburg, Germany: Verlag von J. A. Stargardt, 1984), Tafel 116
  8. Thierry Stasser, "Adélaïde d'Anjou, sa famille, ses unions, sa descendance - Etat de las question", Le Moyen Age 103 (1997): 9-52
  9. Christian Settipani, La Noblesse du Midi Carolingien (Prosopographia et Genealogica 5, 2004), p. 313, note 2
Otto-William, Count of Burgundy
 Died: 21 September 1026
Preceded by
Odo Henry		 Duke of Burgundy
1002–1004		 Succeeded by
Robert the Pious
New title Count of Burgundy
982–1026		 Succeeded by
Reginald I

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