Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Aumale

AUMALE, formerly ALBEMARLE, from the" Latin Alba Maria, a town of France, in the department of Seine Inf^rieure, on the banks of the Bresle, 35 miles N.E. of Rouen. Grain and hemp are cultivated in the neighbour hood ; cloth is manufactured ; and the town has a trade in wool and cattle. Population, 2229. Aumale was erected by William the Conqueror into a countship, which was afterwards held in succession by the houses of Castile, Dammartin, Harcourt, and Lorraine; and in 1547 it was raised to the rank of a dukedom in favour of Francis of Lorraine. It afterwards passed to the house of Savoy, from whom it was purchased in 1675 by Louis XIV., who conferred it as an apanage on one of his natural sons. In 1769 it came into possession of the house of Orleans. The earl of Albemarle, in the British peerage, derives his title from Aumale.