Kto poślubił Engelram, Chamberlain of France'ego?

Engelram (also, Enguerand, Enguerrand, Engilram, Ingelram, Latin Engilramnus, Ingelramnus) (ca. 810 - 877) was Chamberlain to Charles the Bald through sometime after 871. He also held the title of count from 853, but it is unclear what his domain was. Nothing is known about his ancestry.

Engleram was Chamberlain, Master of the Doorkeepers and Administrator of the fisc under Charles. He held this post from 842 until 871 or 872 when he was replaced by Boso of Provence. He was identified as a leading figure of Charles’ network of loyal counts, including Nibelung II, Count of the Vexin, and Aleran, Count of Troyes, that assisted in the management of the kingdom.

Engelram is indicated as being count somewhere in the third missicatum in the Capitulary of Servais of November 853 which included “the counties of Engelram.” Nelson identifies Engelram as a count “whose county lay in the northeast of the realm, near that of Charles’s son-in-law, Count Baldwin.” Grierson has assessed that the pagi (districts) of Mélantois, Caribant, Pevèle, and Ostrevant were those of Engelram referred to in the capitulary. Claims that Engelram was the count of Flanders are clearly false (as is the assertion that he was the grandfather of Baldwin I). Engelram was lay abbot of St. Peter's Abbey in Ghent, which could also have been the source of his title.

When Charles made a pact with his half-brother Louis the German in 864, he was named, along with Hincmar of Reims, as a guarantor on the behalf of the king. He was Charles's representative at the Synod of Meaux in June 845. In 868, he was sent with gifts to King Salomon of Brittany, and he acted as a guarantor again in 870, as reported in the capitulary of a meeting of Charles and Louis on 6 March 870.

Richilde of Provence, Charles’ second wife, was hostile towards Engelram and she had him replaced as chamberlain by her brother Boso of Provence. A disgraced Engelram persuaded Louis to invade Lorraine following the death of Emperor Louis II the Younger, reaching the palace of Attigny on 25 December 875, before retreating back to Mayence.

Engelram married Friderada, a Liudolfing, and had one daughter, name unknown, who married Ricwin, Count of Verdun. She was the mother of Ricwin's successor, Otto, who also served as Duke of Lorraine. Ricwin ordered the beheading of his wife for her unchastity.

Friderada was a ninth-century noblewoman about whom very little is known. She was probably related to Liudolf, Duke of Saxony. Friderada married at least three times and was the grandmother of Otto, Duke of Lorraine.

Her first husband was Engelram, Chamberlain to Charles the Bald (d. 877). That union produced a daughter, whose name is not known. This daughter married Ricwin, Count of Verdun, as his first wife. Their only child was Otto, Count of Verdun and Duke of Lorraine.

Widowed, Friederada married Bernarius, Count of Charpeigne, about whom nothing further is known. Bernarius was murdered in 883 by Hugh, Duke of Alsace, son of Lothair II, King of Lotharingia, and his concubine Waldrada, and Friderada married her husband's murderer. No children are recorded.

Friderada's grandson Otto, Duke of Lorraine, is identified as the son of a Count Ricwin and a Liudolfing, and a relative of Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor. Chronologically, Friderada could possibly have been a daughter or granddaughter of Liudolf, but no concrete evidence of this exists.

Friderada had two husbands between Engelram and Hugh: Bernarius, and Wipert of Nantes, son of Lambert III of Nantes and Rotrude of Italy, daughter of Lothair I, Holy Roman Emperor. Wipert had one son, also named Wipert (880-900), but it is not clear that Friderada was the mother. Both Bernarius and Wipert were reportedly executed in 883 by Hugh in order to marry the widow, so it is unlikely that they were both Friderada’s husband. Note that Hugh and Wipert were first cousins.

An alternative narrative is provided by Jackman. In this analysis, Bernarius was married to a sister of Wipert. Wipert was the guardian of Hugh, and married to Friderada. Bernarius and Wipert were allies of Hugh, but turned against him once his aspirations towards royal succession surfaced, and so Hugh murdered them both and married the widow Friderada.