William (Guillaume) ‘Bonne-Ame’, Archbishop of Rouen († 9 February 1110)

He was initially a canon of the cathedral of Rouen and then archdeacon of the archbishopric. In 1058 he resigned these posts in order to take part in a voyage to the Holy Land in the company of the Abbot of St Evroult. On his return from the pilgrimage he vowed to become a monk. He entered St Stephen in Caen under the abbacy of Lanfranc (c. 1060); as a novice, he was sent to Bec-Hellouin in order to provide intellectual teaching. Once back in St Stephen in Caen, he was first appointed prior, and then abbot on the departure of Lanfranc (1070). Duke William then appointed him Archbishop of Rouen (1079). He undertook significant repairs to the cathedral, its cloister and the episcopal palace. He trained his clergy, encouraged monastic life and managed to reform the morals of the clerics. William’s interventions in this respect are recalled in important councils (Lillebonne, 1080, and Rouen, 1096). He officiated at the funeral ceremony of Matilda at the ‘Abbaye aux Dames’ in Caen, in 1083, and that of William the Conqueror in Caen in 1087. He intervened in the attempts to pacify the duchy during conflict between the sons of William (synod of Rouen, 1091). In 1096, at the Council of Rouen, he ratified the decisions of the Council of Clermont in preparation for the crusade. On his death, he was buried in the chapter house that he himself had built.

Bibliography :

- François Neveux. - La Normandie des ducs aux rois, Xe-XIIe s. - Rennes : Ouest-France, 1998.
- Michel de Boüard. - Guillaume le Conquérant. - Paris : Fayard, 1984.