Statue

This video shows a close-up of Rollon’s statue and the plaque there.  The plaque says it was donated by the city of Eu in Normandy.  When Rollon was given what became Normandy by the French king, there were already people living there; and there was a lot of fighting among them.  The Vikings were barbarians and were quite brutal.  These other people were mostly Franks, descendants of Charlemagne’s empire.  Rollon was killed at the siege of the castle of Eu.  After being conquered by the Normans, Eu was taken over by the Normans.  From that time on the people of Eu would have been Norman.  So the people who donated the statue at Alesund were descendants of the Normans, not the original  Franks.  This same situation occurred at Bayeux where the count, Berenger, a Frank, was killed and his castle destroyed.  After this event Bayeux was Norman.  After a generation or so the various tribes in the area married with each other and became more or less one.  The mother of Rollon’s children was Poppa, the kidnapped daughter of  the Count of Bayeux, Berenger; and the mother of William Longsword’s children was a Breton captive, probably Frankish, named Sporta.  William was the son of Rollon.  Apparently the next generation was more respectable because Richard I, William’s son, had a more  standard marriage.  He was married to Gunnor, the daughter of Harold Bluetooth, the King of Denmark.  The castle at Eu is no longer there, but archaeologists may have found some remains.

http://youtu.be/9kJz4IBJpD8