The Fall of the Grand Sarrasin / Being a Chronicle of Sir Nigel de Bessin, Knight, of Things that Happed in Guernsey Island, in the Norman Seas, in and about the Year One Thousand and Fifty-Seven

by William John Ferrar

NOTE A.

Archbishop Maugher.—"William succeeded Robert A.D. 1035. One of his most powerful opponents was his uncle Maugher, Archbishop of Rouen, who, after William was settled in his Duchy of Normandy, excommunicated him on pretence that his wife Matilda was too nearly related. William, in 1055, deposed and banished Maugher in consequence to the Isle of Guernsey.... Insular tradition has fixed his residence near Saints Bay.

"Du Moulin says: 'Maugher, thus justly deposed, was banished to the island of Guernsey, near Coutances, where, says Walsingham, he fell into a state of madness, and had a miserable end. Others affirm that during his exile he gave his mind to the black arts (sciences noires) and that he had a familiar spirit, which warned him of his death, while he was taking his recreation in a boat, on which he said to the boatman: "Let us land, for a certainty one of us two will be drownèd to-day," which happened, for as they embarked at the port of Winchant he fell into the sea and was drowned, and his body being found a few days afterwards was interred in the church of Cherbourg'" (F.B. Tupper, "History of Guernsey," p. 40).