Guillaume Malet Seigneur de Graville, Sheriff of York

  General Notes:

~Per Weis' Ancestral Roots. . .234A:25, he was at the Battle of Hastings 1066, was sheriff of Yorkshire 1068. ¹⁶⁰

~An Analysis of the Domesday Book of the County of Norfolk, pg. 17, gives his wife's name as Hesilia, and his son as Robert. ⁷³³

~Medeival English Ancestors of Certain Americans, p. 142, William Malet married Hesilia Crispin, a great-great-granddaughter of Rollow the Dane, progenitor of the Dukes of Normandy. It is said that he held lands in Lincolnshire before 1066, possibly because his mother was English. He was one of William the Conqueror's chief lieutenants in 1066, and was allegedly charged with King Harold's body after the Battle of Hastings. He was Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1068. ⁷²¹

  Noted events in his life were:

• Background Information. ⁷³³
William de Malet was one of the Conqueror's faithful Normans. He was appointed governor of York Castle, which the Conqueror built in 1068. He died before the Domesday Survey was taken, yet his death is alluded to in the second volume when speaking of the claims of his son Robert.

~An Analysis of the Domesday Book of the County of Norfolk, pg. 17

• Background Information. ⁹⁵⁵
William of Graville in Normandy, companion of the Conqueror, is described by Guy of Amiens [Carmen de Hastingæ Prælio, 1. 587] as 'quidam partim Normannus et Anglus.' Several points of evidence seem to justify Mr. Freeman's conjecture [Norman Conquest, 1875, iii. 779] that his mother was an Englishwoman, and a sister of Godgifu or Godiva and of Thorold the sheriff. This relationship, if true, would help to account for the unsupported tradition noticed by Mr. Freeman [ib. 1877, ii. 679], that Ælfgifu, the wife of Ælfgar of Mercia, and the mother of Aldgyth, Harold's queen, was a sister of William Malet. In most readings of Guy of Amiens' poem Malet is described as 'Compater Heraldi,' a term which is unexplained except by a conjecture of Mr.Planché [The Conqueror and his Companions, ii. 95] that Malet and Harold may have been joint sponsors of Duke William's daughter, Adela, who was born in 1062, the year of Harold's visit to Normandy. But in Michel's 'Chron. Anglo-Normandes,' iii. 27, ed. 1826, a different reading of this line, viz. ' Compatit, Heraldi,' is given, which, if correct, would dispose of the difficulty. The exploits of 'Guillaume ki l'en dit Mallet' at the battle of Hastings are celebrated by Wace in his 'Roman de Rou' (11. 13472-84), and he was entrusted by William with the duty of burying the body of Harold.

After the capture of York by William in 1068, Malet received the office of sheriff, and was appointed with two other Norman captains to command the garrison of the castle of York. In the following months, with the help of the king, he repelled the attacks of the enemy, but he shared in the defeat of the Norman garrison in 1069, when a strong force of Danes and English attacked and captured the city, and he was himself carried off as a prisoner.

Subsequently it seems that he recovered his freedom and re-entered the service of William, although he lost his sheriffdom and some of his lands. It is almost certain from the references to him in the second book of 'Domesday,' that Malet died in the campaign against Hereward in 1071 (Norman Conquest, 1876, iv. 787-90, note W). Malet received large grants of land in England, chiefly in the eastern counties, and at his prinicipal lordship at Eye in Suffolk he built a castle and established a market. He is notice in 'Domesday' as having been one of the tenants in chief, and in a charter granted by William I to the church of St. Martin's-le-Grand in London he signs as 'Willielmus Malet, Princeps,' after the bishops, abbots, and earls.

By his wife Hesilia Crispin, a descendant in the fourth generation of Rollo, first duke of Normandy, Malet left two sons, Robert and Gilbert, and a daughter Beatrice. His brother Durand also settled in England, and from him the Lincolnshire branches of the family are descended.

[The whole subject of William Malet's English connections is discussed by Mr. Freeman in note PP, iii, 776 et seq. of his History of the Normand Conquest, 1875, and there are many other references to him in vols. iii. iv. and v. passim. See also, besides the authorities quoted above, William of Poitiers' Gesta Guillelmi Ducis Normannorum, in the collection of Hist. Normann. Scriptores, Paris, 1619, p. 204; Benoit de Ste. More in Michel's Chron. Anglo-Normandes, iii. 214, ed. 1336; Ordericus Vitalis's Eccles. Hist. in the Hist. Normann. Scriptores, pp. 502, 512, 513; Sir H. Ellis's Introductrion to Domesday Book, i. 252, 449, ii. 183; Dugdale's Baronage, i. 110-11; Notices of an English Branch of the Malet Family, by Arthur Malet, compiled largely from documents and family papers.]

~Dictionary of National Biography, Vol. XXXV, p. 421

• Web Reference: William Malet, Campanion of William the Conqueror, 1066.

• Web Reference: The section about Guillaume Mallet From the Conqueror & His Companions.

• Background Information. ⁹⁵⁴
After the Conquest, William Malet may have spent most of time at court as a royal official. He witnessed a royal charter of privileges for Peterbourgh in 1067, and was present at the coronation of Queen Mathilda at Westminister at Whitsun 1068, when he witnessed, as princeps, another royal charter for the collegiate church of St. Martin-le-Grand, in a position after the earls but before Arfast the Chancellor. [Regesta i. nos 8, 22]

It appears that William Malet was appointed, Feb. 1069, as Castellan at York, where William the Conqueror had erected his first castle. Soon after this appointment, Ætheling Eadgar showed up at York with a large force of fellow Northumbrians. William the Conqueror came at the request of Malet, and ravaged the city of York. William was made Sheriff of Yorkshire sometime after he was made castellan of the castle at York. At this time he also acquired extensive Yorkshire properties.

In the autumn of 1069, a force of Danes arrived at York in about 240 ships, and was joined by Ætheling Edgar and Northumbian earls, with a large army of the men from Northumbria. According to The Worcester Latin Chronicle, the occupants of the forts set fire to the adjacent houses because they feared that the Danes might use their timber to fill up the moats and reach the forts. The Chronicle says that three thousand Normans were killed, yet the lives of William Malet and his wife and two children were kept alive as hostages. They were later released.

Even after this disaster, William Malet remained a favorite of the Conqueror's.
He appears to have been appointed as Sheriff of Suffolk. William was given a huge fief in Suffolk, Norfolk and Essex. William chose the center of his fief, Eye near the Norfolk border, which had a large rural manor when he acquired it. He built a deer park there and opened a Saturday market. He also built a motte-and-bailey castle, and installed twenty-five burgesses. By doing this, he turned Eye into a small and prosperous borough. This placed William Malet in command of the internal trade of East Suffolk. He died shortly after in 1071.

~Ango-Norman Studies, XIX, p. 125-145

• Web Reference: Mallett Family History . ⁹⁵⁶ A database for Mallett, Mallet, Malet and related familys. Much of the information is based on Arthur Malet's books A Family History, Malet and Notices of an English Branch of the Malet Family.

Guillaume married Hesilia de Crispin, daughter of Gilbert Crispin castellan of Tillières in the Vexin and Gunnor ^954,955.^,956