jats:pIn 966, by the end of the reign of its third duke, <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">R</jats:styled-content>ichard <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">I</jats:styled-content>, <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">N</jats:styled-content>ormandy had overcome the crises that had beset it in the middle of the century. Much of this success came from the coherence of its ruling group, which expressed itself partly in terms of ‘<jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">N</jats:styled-content>orman’ identity. This article uses <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">D</jats:styled-content>udo's history of the dukes and <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">R</jats:styled-content>ichard's charters to argue that ‘<jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">N</jats:styled-content>orman’ as a political identity was a deliberate creation of the court of <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">R</jats:styled-content>ichard <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">I</jats:styled-content> in the 960s, following the perceived failure of his and his father's policies of assimilation into <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">F</jats:styled-content>rankish culture.</jats:p>