Otho de Windsor

  General Notes:

~Burke's A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry, Part 1, p. 483, Otho descended from the Florentine House of Gherardini. ⁷⁴⁰

  Information about this person:

• Background Information. ⁷³⁹
Otho was a rich and powerful lord in the time of King Alfred, and had descended from the dukes of Tuscany, whom from Florence or Norway passed to Heturia in Normandy, and thence to England, where, and in Wales, they fourished until Richard Strongbow, earl of Pembroke, their kinsman, engaged them to partake in his expedition to Ireland in which Maurice Fitz Gerald embarked and was one of the conquerors of the kingdom. Sir William Dugdale tells us that Otho was a baron of England in the 16 King Edward the Confessor and was father of Walter Fitz Otho.

~Rev. William Betham's The Baronetage of England, 1801 Edition, Vol. I, pg. 59

• Background Information. ⁷⁴¹
Otho was in England before the Norman conquest about 16 Edward the Confessor. He appears as a powerful Baron in England, possessing 35 lordships. Of these lordships one was in Somerset, two were in Berkshire, three in Surrey, three in Bucks, three in Dorsetshire, four in middlesex, nine in Wiltshire and ten in Southampton.

The origin of Otho has been referred as an stock, and his race connect with England by removal first from Italy to Normandy, and afterwards from Normandy accross the Channel. From Otho good fortune during King Edward the Confessor's time, he most likely was one of the Continental cavaliers who reared Edward during his exile, and who came to England upon Edward's return.

Edward favored this group of Nomans and this brought about jealousy among the native Saxons. There was an insurrection under the leaders of Earl Godwin, father of Harold, the last Saxon King of England. This was only made worse after the Noman invasion when Otho's son, Walter Fitz Otho was treated as a fellow country man by the Normans after their subjugation of England. The native Saxons lost their land and were denied positions of power, yet Walter Fitz Otho was allow to keep possession of all his father's land and named the Castellan of Windsor.

~History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, pg. 116-117

• Background Information. ⁹⁹¹
The fitz Geralds, or Geraldines, are descended from "Dominus Otho," or Other, who in 1057 (16 Edward the Confessor] was an honorary Baron of England [Dugdale]. He is said to have been one of the family of Gherardini of Florence*, and passed into Normandy, and later into England [Gherardini Papers, MS.]. He was so powerful at that period, that it is probable that he was one of the foreigners who came to England with King Edward, and whom he favored so much as to excite the jealousy of the native nobles [Hume's England]. It is also remarkable that Othols son, Walter, was treated as a fellow countryman by the Normans after the Conquest.

~ The Earls of Kildare, pp. 1-2

*The Gherardini were one of the Baronial families before Florence became a Republic. Their possessions were chiefly in the Val d'Elsa. Among the families of that name in Tuscany and Lombardy was the Marchese Gherardi. The Gammurini trace their descent:
Rainerio, A.D. 910
Rambuto, A.D. 950
Rainerio, A.D. 1020 { Otho may have been the son of Gherardo.

Otho married Beatrix.¹⁴¹