Bernard II (Billung) OF SAXONY (995-1059)

Individual Events and Attributes

Marriage

Individual Note

Bernard II (c. 995 – 29 June 1059) was the Duke of Saxony (1011–1059), the third of the Billung dynasty, a son of Bernard I and Hildegard. He had the rights of a count in Frisia.

Bernard expanded the powers of the duke in Saxony and is regarded as the greatest of the Billungers. He was originally a supporter of Emperor Henry II and he accompanied him into Poland and negotiated the treaty of Bautzen of 1018. In 1019–1020, he revolted and gained the recognition of the tribal laws of Saxony, something his father had just failed to do. He returned then to war with the Slavs (Obodrites and Lutici) and drew them into his sphere of power and influence through their leader, Godescalc (Gottschalk).

He supported Conrad II in 1024 and his son Henry III, though he began to fear the latter for his closeness to the Archbishop Adalbert of Bremen, an inveterate enemy of the dukes of Saxony. Though he was a critical ally of the Danes, so fundamental to Henry's wars in the Low Countries, Bernard was on the brink of rebellion until the death of Adalbert. The remainder of his reign, however, was quiet.

In 1045, he erected the Alsterburg in Hamburg. He died in 1059 and was succeeded without incident by his son Ordulf. He is buried in the Church of Saint Michael in Lüneburg.

Bernard II, Duke of Saxony married to Eilika of Schweinfurt, daughter of Henry of Schweinfurt. They had:

Gertrude of Saxony (c. 1030 – August 4, 1113), married: Floris I, Count of Holland, married (secondly): Robert I, Count of Flanders

Ordulf, Duke of Saxony (c. 1020 – March 28, 1072), married: Ulfhilde or Wulfhilde of Norway (c. 1023 – May 24, 1070), daughter of Saint & King Olaf II (St.Olaf) of Norway & Astrid of Sweden

Hermann

Ida of Saxony, married: Albert III, Count of Namur.

SOURCES:

The Royal Ancestry Bible Royal ancestors of 300 American Families By Michel L. Call ISBN 1-933194-22-7 (chart 1557)

Per Frederick Lewis Weis' Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came To America Before 1700 (7th ed.), Gertrude is not a daughter of Elica von Schweinfurt, but of an unnamed 2nd wife.²

Sources