Simon III Chauve de , Count d'Evereux MONTFORT

                   On Leicester, Earldom of [Burke's Peerage, p. 1671]:

The 4th [Beaumont] Earl, who was also the fourth named Robert,accompanied Richard I on the Third Crusade but accomplished a smoothtransfer of loyalty to John on the latter's succession in 1199.  On hisdeath without issue in 1204 the elder of his two sisters and coheirs,Amice, began calling herself Countess of Leicester.  Her first husbandwas Simon de Montfort (roughly halfway between Paris and Chartres) andRochefort, and her son by him, another Simon de Montfort, was beingregarded as Earl of Leicester by the years 1205 or 1206, shortly afterthe death of his maternal uncle [Robert de Beaumont], the 4th Earl ofwhatever creation had occurred in or about 1102.  The new de MontfortEarl led the victorious crusade against the Albigensian heretics inSouthern France and carved out for himself a substantial territory in theToulouse-Carcassonne area, hanging, burning and in once case entombingdown a well his opponents as he went and arrogating to himself the titlesof the more important heretics, such as Duke of Narbonne, Marquis ofProvence, Count of Toulouse and Vicomte of Albi.  He was killed in 1218while besieging Toulouse, hit by a well-aimed stone launched from amangonel within the city.

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The first of this family that settled in England was Simon de Montfort,surnamed the Bald, great grandson of Almaric, an illegitimate son ofRobert,* King of France. Which Simon having m. Amicia, one of the twosisters and co-heirs of Robert de Bellemont, or Beaumont, surnamedFitz-Parnel, 4th and last Earl of Leicester of that family, obtained agrant of the Earldom of Leicester from King John, with a confirmation ofthe Stewardship of England, which he acquired by the possession of thehonour of Hinkley, a portion of the immense fortune of his wife. Butnotwithstanding these marks of royal favour, the earl, within a briefperiod, revolted from the King of England to the King of France, forwhich act of treason the Earldom of Leicester was transferred to Ranulph,Earl of Chester, the honours of Hinkley seized upon by the crown, and deMontfort himself banished the realm. Soon after this (1209), we find himunder the title of Earl of Montfort, general of the crusade against theAlbigenses, and in nine years subsequently a leader in the besieging armsof Lewis, King of France, before the walls of Toulouse where he was slainby a slinger from the battlements. His lordship had two sons by theco-heiress of Beaumont, namely, Almaric and Simon.

*Thus, Robert, King of France.
Almaric, who had the town of Montfort by gift of his royal father andthence assumed that surname.
Simon de Montfort.
Almaric, Earl of Monfort, father of Simon, [the subject of this sketch].

[Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages,Burke's Peerage Ltd, London, England, 1883, p. 376, Montfort, Earls ofLeicester]

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note: it was Simon's father (also Simon) who married Amicia de Bellemontas his 2nd wife and mother of this Simon.
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Simon de Montfort, b. 1165?--d. June 25, 1218, Toulouse, Fr., Frenchleader of the Albigensian Crusade declared by Pope Innocent III againstthe Cathari, an unorthodox religious group in southern France.

In 1190 Montfort married Alice de Montmorency (died 1221). During theFourth Crusade (1202-04) he participated in the siege of Zara and laterfought in Syria. Beginning in 1209 he led the fight against the Cathari(better known as Albigenses after the town of Albi) in a crusade thatquickly became a war of conquest by the northern French against thenobility of the south. Having conquered Béziers and Carcassonne, he waschosen to govern those lands. When most of the crusaders departed afterthe 40-day term they had promised to serve, he was left with largeterritories still to conquer. After he had won the important Battle ofMuret in 1213, the lands of Raymond VI, count of Toulouse, were adjudgedto Montfort by the fourth Lateran Council (1215) because of Raymond'sfailure to root out heretics. He now styled himself count of Toulouse,viscount of Béziers and Carcassonne, and duke of Narbonne, but Raymonddid not accept defeat. He occupied Toulouse in September 1217. Montfortwas killed while besieging the city. His son Amaury (died 1241) soonabandoned the crusade and ceded the Montfort lands in southern France toKing Louis VIII. [Encyclopædia Britannica CD '97]