Geoffrey III, Count of Perche
Geoffrey III was the Count of Perche from 1191 until his death.
He was the son of Rotrou IV, Count of Perche, and Matilda, daughter of Theobald II, Count of Champagne, and Matilda of Carinthia.
He accompanied his father to the Third Crusade and participated in the Siege of Acre, where his father was killed. Back from the Holy Land, he sold more land to the abbeys in order to replenish his finances depleted by his participation in the crusade. He then fought Richard the Lionheart under the banner of the Philip II of France and in 1194, he managed to recover the commune of Bonsmoulins that his father had yielded to Henry II.
When Richard sent an army to regain control of Normandy, Geoffroy, as a French army commander, helped defeat him. John Lackland, the brother and successor of Richard, was forced to renounce England's claim to Normandy in 1204.
In 1202, Geoffrey and his brother Stephen decided to take part in the Fourth Crusade, but he died at Soissons during Lent before he could set out. At Chartres Cathedral, an anniversary mass was said for his soul on 5 April, presumably the date of his death.
Geoffrey's first wife was named Matilda of which nothing is known. His second wife was Matilda of Saxony, daughter of Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, and Matilda, eldest daughter of Henry II, King of England, and Eleanor of Aquitaine. They married in 1189 in Rouen, and King Richard the Lionheart, uncle of the bride, granted them land in the counties of Suffolk, Essex and Kent previously owned by Henry of Essex. Geoffrey and his second wife Matilda had two children:
Geoffrey was succeeded as Count of Perche by his son Thomas upon his death.
