“Willelmus [VII., _alias_ Guy-Geoffrey] Pictavensium comes consulatum Sanctonicum suum esse volebat et vi præoccupatum tenebat [having presumably seized it on Martel’s death], quia patrui sui [for _patrui_ read _fratris_--William the Fat--or _patris_, William the Great] fuerat. Martellus [Barbatus] eumdem consulatum reclamabat, quia avi sui [Fulconis Nerræ] fuerat, cujus hæredes [_i.e._ G. Martellus] absque liberis mortui essent; et ideo ad hæredes sororis avi sui [read _avunculi sui_--Martel’s sister, the Bearded one’s mother] debere reverti affirmabat.” Read in this way, the story is quite reasonable and intelligible, and the rest of the _Gesta’s_ account might stand almost intact, except the capture of the duke, which of course is dragged in from the earlier war. The confusion between the Williams of Aquitaine is easily accounted for, and so is that between the Geoffreys of Anjou, especially as all the Geoffreys after Martel occasionally took to themselves his cognomen. NOTE D. THE DESCENDANTS OF HERBERT WAKE-DOG. Not the least puzzling matter connected with the Cenomannian wars is the genealogy of the sovereign house of Maine. The succession of the counts themselves--Hugh I. (or David), Herbert I. (Wake-dog), Hugh II., Herbert II.--is plain enough, as also that each was the son of his predecessor. But the filiation of the women of the family--Margaret, Gersendis, Paula and Biota--is far from being equally clear. 1. As to Margaret, there is no real doubt. Orderic does once (Duchesne, _Hist. Norm. Scriptt._, p. 683) call her a daughter of Herbert [II.]; but his own statements in two other places (_ib._ pp. 487 and 532), as well as Will. Poitiers (_ib._ p. 190), shew that this is a mere slip. Margaret was clearly a daughter of Hugh II. and sister of Herbert II. 2. As to Biota. Orderic (as above, p. 487) calls her “Hugonis Cenomannensium comitis filiam”; in Will. Poitiers (_ib._ p. 189) she is “_soror_ Hugonis”; and Mr. Freeman (_Norm. Conq._, 3d ed., vol. iii. p. 200, and note T, p. 676) adopts the latter version. Biota, then, was a daughter of Herbert Wake-dog and sister of Hugh II. But were Gersendis and Paula her sisters or her nieces? 3. The fullest and most distinct statement of the Cenomannian pedigree is that of Orderic in Duchesne, _Hist. Norm. Scriptt._, p. 532: “Hugo filius Herberti ... Bertam ... in conjugium accepit; quæ filium nomine Herbertum et tres filias ei peperit. Una earum data est Azsoni Marchiso Liguriæ. Alia nomine Margarita Rodberto filio Guillelmi Ducis Neustriæ desponsata est ... Tertia vero Joanni domino castri quod Flecchia dicitur nupsit.”