Abstract
In Anglo-Norman society, the landed aristocracy channelled a disproportionate amount of influence to the great rural landholders, who possessed extensive military, economic, and political power. As a result, it is important to study relations between the new immigrant nobles and surviving English nobles and rising families of native descent. To what degree did English aristocrats assimilate and absorb Norman ones? To what extent were native aristocrats responsible for the survival and triumph of English identity? This chapter focuses on patrilineal native lineages that survived the Norman conquest or rose into the aristocracy afterwards. As is well known, the Normans destroyed most of the old aristocracy, but the potential influence of even a greatly weakened native aristocracy on ethnic relations may be seen by a comparison with medieval Wales, a society that never experienced the level of assimilation found in England after the conquest. There were many reasons for the difference, but some important ones are to be found at the aristocratic level.