Alan II of Brittany
Duke of Brittany (c. 900–952)
Alan II (c. 900–952), nicknamed Wrybeard or Twistedbeard, Alan Varvek in Breton, was Count of Vannes, Poher and Nantes, and Duke of Brittany from 938 to his death. He was the grandson of King Alan the Great by Alan's daughter and her husband Mathuedoï I, Count of Poher.
He expelled the Vikings/Norsemen from Brittany after an occupation that lasted from 907 to about 939.
The Vikings
Refuge in Britain
Alan had to take refuge, along with his father Mathuedoi I, with King Æthelstan of England because the Norsemen had invaded Armorica. The Chronicle of Nantes reports:
Alan became ruler of Brittany at the end of a 33-year interregnum after the death of his maternal grandfather, Duke Alan the Great.
Return to Brittany
Alan landed at Dol in 936, at the invitation of a monk, Jean de Landévennec, and with the aid of Æthelstan. By 937 Alan was master of most of Brittany, having forced the Norsemen back to the Loire.
In 938, Alan was elected Brittonum dux. On 1 August 939, with the aid of Judicael (Berengar), count of Rennes, and Hugh I, Count of Maine, his victory was made complete by defeating the Norse at the Battle of Trans-la-Forêt.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Alan II of Brittany” as duke of Brittany (c. 900–952). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as duke of Brittany (c. 900–952). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q725368. VIAF identifies the subject as 206893345. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Alan II of Brittany” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.