2-376-505 - Historica Graphica Collection/Heritage Images

Robert, Duke of Normandy, captured at the Battle of Tinchebraye, Normandy, 1106 (1864). Taken prisoner by the Breton clerk, Baudri. Robert Curthose (1054-1134) was the eldest son of William the Conqueror. In 1077 he rebelled against his father after William failed to punish Robert's brothers, William Rufus and Henry I, after they played a humiliating prank on him. When William died, he opted to name William Rufus as his heir to the English crown, leaving Robert as Duke of Normandy. Henry, meanwhile, was left the sum of £5000. In 1100 William II died after being shot by an arrow while hunting in the New Forest. Robert was away on the First Crusade and in his absence, Henry seized the crown, despite the fact that William and Robert had agreed that the latter was the rightful heir. Robert returned and pursued his claim, but was defeated by Henry at Tinchebraye, which lost him the Duchy of Normandy as well. After his capture, Robert spent the rest of his life in prison at Devizes, then Cardiff, where he died, by then in his eighties, in 1134.