Name Robert Count | Predecessor Agnes de Baudemont Died December 28, 1218 | |
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Reign 1184 – 28 December 1218 Reign 24 July 1204 – 28 December 1218 Spouse Mahaut de Bourgogne (m. 1178–1181), Mahaut of Burgundy (m. 1178), Yolande de Coucy Children Robert III, Count of Dreux, Peter I, Duke of Brittany Parents Robert I, Agnes de Baudemont, Robert I, Count of Dreux Grandchildren Yolande of Dreux, Duchess of Burgundy Grandparents Louis VI of France, Adelaide of Maurienne | ||
Robert II of Dreux (1154 – 28 December 1218), Count of Dreux and Braine, was the eldest surviving son of Robert I, Count of Dreux, and Agnes de Baudemont, countess of Braine, and a grandson of King Louis VI of France.
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He participated in the Third Crusade, at the Siege of Acre and the Battle of Arsuf. He took part in the war in Normandy against the Angevin Kings between 1193 and 1204. Count Robert had seized the castle of Nonancourt from Richard I of England while he was imprisoned in Germany in late 1193. The count also participated in the Albigensian Crusade in 1210. In 1214 he fought alongside King Philip Augustus at the Battle of Bouvines.
Marriages and Children
His first marriage with Mahaut of Burgundy (1150–1192) in 1178 ended with separation in 1181 and produced no children. The excuse for the annulment was consanguinity. Mahaut and Robert were both great-great grandchildren of William I, Count of Burgundy and his wife Etiennete and they were both Capetian descendants of Robert II of France.
His second marriage to Yolande de Coucy (1164–1222) produced several children:
And according to Father Richard Augustine Hay a priest that lived with the Sinclair family and whose stepfather was a Sinclair in his book The Genealogie of the Saintclaires of Rosslyn he and Yolande had a daughter named Eleanor who married Robert de Saint Clair Sur Epte and that they were the most likely ancestors of the Sinclair family and he is supported by a member of the Sinclair family Roland William St Clair in his book Saint-Clairs of the Isles.
Tomb
Count Robert's tomb bore the following inscription, in Medieval Latin hexameters with internal rhyme:
Stirpe satus rēgum, pius et custōdia lēgum,Brannę Rōbertus comes hīc requiescit opertus,Et jacet Agnētis situs ad vestīgia mātris.Of which the translation is: "Born from the race of kings, and a devoted guardian of the laws, Robert, Count of Braine, here rests covered, and lies buried by the remains of his mother Agnes."
It is also dated Anno Gracię M. CC. XVIII. die innocentum, that is, "In the Year of Grace 1218, on the Feast of the Holy Innocents."