Ansfried the Elder, Count in Lotharingia


Ansfried, was a Lotharingian count in the 10th century, who held 15 counties in Lotharingia, a "middle kingdom" of the Franks, which was in this period contested for by the larger eastern and western kingdoms surrounding it. He is sometimes referred to as "the elder" in order to distinguish him from his nephew, Bishop Ansfried of Utrecht, who was also a powerful count until he became a bishop.
Thietmar, describing Ansfried's nephew of the same name, said that he had two paternal uncles, Ansfried and Robert, Bishop of Trier. This implies that Ansfried the elder is brother to Bishop Robert, who was himself described as a relative to the Ottonians, the royal family at the time. It was Thietmar who described Ansfried the elder, the uncle, as a count of 15 counties, and says it was he who sent his nephew to Bruno the great for his education, after he had already spent time with his other uncle.
If Ansfried was the same as the advocatus of the Abbey of Gembloux in the 950s, as is often thought, then he is described as a blood-relative of Wicfrid, the founder of that Abbey. And if he was the rebel who held Chevremont in 939 after the Battle of Andernach, then he was also described as a nephew of the leader who fell at that battle, Duke Gilbert of Lotharingia.

Records

Records of him have often been proposed though many of them are argument by at least some historians to be someone else, such as his nephew.
Not yet described as a count, a first mention might be in 928, in a grant made by Gilbert, Duke of Lotharingia, involving the church of Saint Servatius in Maastricht. Jongbloed suggested this was Ansfried the elder partly because another junior witness is named Arnold, and the names Arnold and Ansfried appear in later records together.
In 939 a count named Ansfried is described by Widukind of Corvey as one of the leaders of the Lotharingian people. Later, an Ansfried and an Arnold held the fortification of :fr:Château de Chèvremont|Chevremont near Liège after the Lotharingians lost the Battle of Andernach in 939, until they were talked down and captured. Widukind wrote that Ansfried was partly convinced by an offer of alliance and marriage with the only daughter of Count Immo, with whom he was negotiating. After Ansfried and Arnold were catured, Widukind reports that Immo advised that Ansfried, being as "hard as iron", would need the harshest torments to question him.
In 950, a count Ansfried "fidelis noster" was mentioned by Louis "d'Outremer", king of West Francia, which had control of Lotharingia at the time. Louis had married Gerberga, also present, the former wife of his ally Duke Gilbert of Lotharingia after his death at Andernach. Because this count was a vassal of the western king, there are doubts about whether it could be Ansfried, whose homeland of Lotharingia was by this time back under control of the eastern kingdom. However, Jongbloed argues that during this period the western kingdom was a defeated "quasi protectorate", and so being a double vassal would be possible.
Soon after, in a charter of 7 Oct 950, Kessel on the left bank of the Maas between Roermond and Venlo is described as being "in pago Masalant in comitatu Ruodolfi", and "cuidam vassallo nostro Ansfrid" is the beneficiary of rights there.
According to some historians such as Aarts, he is mentioned by Sigebert of Gembloux as the advocate of the newly founded Gembloux Abbey in the 950s, the reign of Bishop Balderic II in Liège. Historians who believe this argue that the younger Ansfried would have been too young. Van Winter on the other hand has argued that this record is incorrectly dated, and that these events in Gembloux must have been in the 980s when young Ansfried returned from Italy. There is therefore a similar debate about whether the elder Ansfried is also the son named Ansfried who observed in a transaction described by Sigebert, who served as a witness to a transaction between a noble named Lambert and the founder of Abbey, acting on its behalf, Wicbert. However, this Ansfried is often suggested to be the younger nephew, and there is also debate about whether this Ansfried was in any case son of Lambert or of Wicbert. Nevertheless, all of these people are likely to be related to each other and presumably to share descent from Wicbert's grandparents Gisla and Rothing.
When Otto I returned from Italy in early 965, historians such as Aarts think that the Ansfrid who appears in a high position in a list from Liège must be him, and not his nephew who was still young, and who may indeed still have been in Italy.
Later in the 960s are two records of a Count Ansfried with a county in or near the Dutch river delta area, one in Varik in Teisterbant, and one in Toxandria. There is also one more charter which connects an Ansfried to the wife of his late Duke Gilbert, in 968, when he was involved in a charter concerning her allodial rights in the area of Meerssen in the Maasland.
In July 985, one of the Ansfrieds, comes illustris vir, was granted the County of Huy, near Liège.

Notable non-consensus speculations

There are two very notable proposals which have created a lasting consensus, but which are widespread in secondary literature.
1. Vanderkindere, proposed that Ansfried was in fact the same person as Ehrenfrid, son of Ricfrid, and that an otherwise unattested sister of this Ehrenfried married the above-mentioned Lambert, the so-called Count of Louvain. The elder Ansfried, in this explanation, would actually be Bishop Ansfried's maternal uncle, normally avunculus in Latin. This is no longer widely accepted.
2. Jongbloed, proposed that Ansfried the elder married a daughter of Count Immo, based mainly on the story of Widukind mentioned above. He furthermore proposed that this Ansfried was, like his nephew with the same name, a founder of the Abbey of Thorn, though the two have later, according to him, become confused.

Primary sources