"The richest man in Britain's history is not a steel magnate, trader or football club owner, but a soldier. Alan Rufus, a French immigrant, who came over to Britain to help his uncle William the Conqueror in 1066, amassed a fortune worth an estimated 81.3 billion pounds in today's money. It dwarfs Chelsea football club owner Roman Abramovich's 10.8 billion pounds, and steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal's 19.3 billion and is nearly three times the wealth of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.The list is published in a book called "The Richest of the Rich" by Philip Beresford, compiler of the annual Rich List for the Sunday Times, and William Rubinstein, professor of history at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth. Published by Harriman House, it excludes monarchs, whose wealth is difficult to calculate."
