Page 214 - Lanzarotto Malocello from Italy to the Canary Islands

214 from Italy to the Canary Islands

portato a conoscenza da M.° Gallien de Bethemcourt Consigliere del Re
nella sua corte del Parlamento di Rouen” [Le Canarien, history of the first
discovery and conquest of the Canary Islands by Sir Jean de Bethemcourt,
.. chamberlain of King Charles VI in 1402. Written at the same time by
F. Pierre Boutier and the priest Jean Le Terrier, servants of the aforemen-
tioned Lord and made known by Sir Gallien de Bethemcourt, Advisor to
the King in his court at the Parliament of Rouen]. Following this publica-
tion, Lanzarotto’s descendants had a booklet published in 1632 that fea-
tured their own “Discourse”, which unfortunately went lost, which chal-
lenged the claims of the previous text, recalling how - based on documents
in their possession (including a 1453 genealogical inventory given to the
de Coutances) - that their ancestor Lancelot Maloisel had discovered the
island and lived there for twenty years. He apparently had been told of it by
a group of sailors of Cherbourg who, while trading on the Spanish coast,
had ended up in the Canarian archipelago due to a blizzard. According to
de la Roncière, this “Discourse” was recovered by the French humanist
Abbot J. De Grentemesnie Paulmyer while researching in the chanceries
of the bishops of Bayeux, Caen, and Lisieux.
As mentioned earlier, in the 14 century a branch of the Malocello fam-
th
ily had taken up service with the King of France as captains of warships.
See the website www.maloisel.ifrance.com, where the alleged current de-
scendants of that branch rebuilt their family tree.
Summarizing what is on the website, we can say that the Malocellos –
Maloisels were Viking warriors who settled in Normandy (which means
“land of men from the North”) and identified their clan by painting on their
shields an “oluck fagel” - which is Scandinavian/Norse for mean, ugly,
dangerous bird - with the purpose of frightening or at least warding off
enemies. The Latin translation of it is therefore “Malus aucellus”.
In 1016, these Viking warriors fought the Saracens and the Byzantines
in southern Italy, thus helping in the founding of the Norman County of
Aversa in 1030.
Subsequently, this warrior tribe moved north to Liguria, became Geno-
ese, and Italianized their last name to Malocello, which reconnects us to
the previously told family history.
Additionally, the aforementioned website claims the family symbol
is the little owl (Athene noctua), whereas the Norse oluck fagel (Malus
aucellus in Latin) refers to the eagle-owl (Bubo bubo); these two birds
both belong to the Strigidae family, the difference being that eagle-owls