Showing posts with label Normandy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Normandy. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 5, 2022

Gunnor

I mentioned that Emma of Normandy's mother was an interesting character. Gunnor (c.950 - c.1031) was a countess of Normandy by virtue of her marriage to Count Richard the Fearless. How they met is an interesting story—assuming it is true. Supposedly, Gunnor was living with her sister Seinfreda, who was married to a local forester. Richard heard of the beauty of the forester's wife and ordered that she be brought to his bedchamber. Seinfreda sent her unmarried sister, Gunnor, instead, saving Seinfreda's virtue and introducing Richard to the woman he would eventually marry. Besides Emma of Normandy, they had two other daughters and three sons. Gunnor was very active in the kingdom. She had the authority to certify ducal charters, she performed as regent of Normandy when Richard went on tours, and she was often used as a judge. She knew several languages, and had such a good memory that she was an important source of details for a history of the Normans written by Dudo of St. Quentin.

After Richard's death, she gave in a charter two alods to the abbey of Mont Saint-Michel for the soul of her husband. (An alod is a feudal property with no superior; that is, it did not owe a tithe to a higher lord, so any wealth of the property was the property of the owner, which was now the abbey.) The picture here is of her granting the charter.

Above, I said "the woman whom he would eventually marry." They originally lived together with Gunnor as his concubine. The Normans were fine with this, but when Richard nominated their son Robert as Archbishop of Rouen, the church would not recognize his legitimacy. Richard and Gunnor married "according to the Christian custom" in order to legitimize their children in the eyes of the church. The Norman custom of ... let's say "cohabitation" was called more danico, and I'll explain that a little more tomorrow.

Friday, April 22, 2016

Ralph Flambard, Robert, and Henry

The Battle of Tinchebray
When Ralph Flambard escaped from the Tower of London, he fled to Normandy to the court of its duke, Robert Curthose. Robert was the eldest son of William the Conqueror who failed to inherit the throne—twice. The first time was when he rebelled against his father, later seeing the throne going to the second eldest, William Rufus. The second time was when, despite an agreement with William Rufus to be his heir, Robert was on Crusade when William died, giving younger brother Henry the opportunity to take the throne.

Flambard convinced Duke Robert that he should assert his claim to the throne (despite Robert's agreement to not pursue it in exchange for 3000 marks/year). With Flambard organizing the fleet, Robert's army landed in England in July 1101. It didn't go well. Henry's army was larger, and England didn't really want another change on the throne, so the local support was all for Henry.

Within a couple weeks of landing, on 2 August, Robert and Henry agreed to the Treaty of Alton—Alton was where Henry's army met and stopped the advance of Robert's—in which Robert (again) agreed to renounce any claim to the throne of England in exchange for an annual payment. Flambard, no doubt part of the negotiating force, actually got reinstated as Bishop of Durham! But he chose to stay in Normandy for five years: Robert had thanked him for his help by granting him the see of Lisieux

In 1105, however, Henry broke the agreement. Despite the Treaty of Alton, Henry invaded Normandy and fought against his brother in the Battle of Tinchebray. Robert was captured and imprisoned (he died in 1134, in Cardiff Castle). After the battle, Flambard made his peace with Henry, returned to England, and took up responsibility for Durham again.

Back in England, Flambard continued major building projects: a cathedral, a defensive wall around Durham Castle, Norham Castle, and more. He died on 5 September 1128.

Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Sibling Rivalry

When William the Conqueror died in 1087, he decided to leave the throne of England to his second eldest, William Rufus. To his eldest, Robert Curthose, who had once rebelled against him, he left the Duchy of Normandy. (Robert hadn't even come to his father's deathbed, staying on the continent because of the bad blood between him and his family.) The youngest son, Henry, got £5000 silver (and two smaller provinces in France: Maine and the Cotentin Peninsula). William and Robert, as the two major landholders, agreed to make each other their heir.

Robert Curthose tomb in Gloucester Cathedral
That didn't last.

Months later, several barons decided to revolt against William Rufus in the Rebellion of 1088. Robert joined them. Verbally. He never actually traveled to England to take part in the rebellion with any troops; had he done so, the rebellion might have succeeded. As it happened, William invaded Normandy a few years later, capturing large parts of the Duchy from Robert.

They managed to reconcile, however, when they decided to team up and expand both their property holdings by taking Maine and Cotentin away from their younger brother, Henry. Henry lost the Cotentin (an important coastline on the English Channel) after a two-week siege, retaining only the smaller and now land-locked Maine.

William died in a hunting accident on 2 August 1100. At the time, Robert was returning from the 1st Crusade. He hurried back to England to claim the throne because of the agreement he had with William since 1087. Unfortunately for him, Henry was in a position to claim the throne before Robert returned.

Robert's troops landed at Portsmouth in 1101 to fight for the throne. Henry was awaiting him at Pevensey (coincidentally[?], near where their father had made his landing for the Norman Invasion of 1066), but caught up with Robert before he reached London, and defeated him. Henry convinced Robert to give up his claim to the throne for 3000 marks per year. That might have resolved their conflict—and it did, for a little while.

But then Ralph Flambard escaped from the Tower of London.

[to be continued]

Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Robert Curthose

Yesterday's post mentioned Henry becoming king of England upon the death of his brother, William Rufus. Their father was William the Conqueror. William had more than two sons, however. In fact, neither Henry nor William Rufus was his eldest son.

His eldest was Robert Curthose (c.1051 - 3 February 1134). He might have eventually succeeded his father to the throne of England, but his own actions got in the way.

Robert had some admirable qualities, as noted by William of Malmesbury in his Gesta Regum Anglorum [Deeds of the Kings of England]:
...considered as a youth of excellent courage... of tried prowess, though of small stature and projecting belly... he was neither ill-made, nor deficient in eloquence, nor was he wanting in courage or resources of the mind. [Note the "small stature" line; the nickname, "curthose" likely derived from his legs being a little shorter than usual]
But he had a temper. In 1077—still a young man—his younger brothers were bored, and dumped the contents of a chamber pot on Robert from an upper gallery. The boys got into a fight, which their father had to break up. Enraged that his father did not punish the instigators, the very next day Robert tried to capture one of his father's castles, at Rouen. He failed, and fled ultimately to Flanders, where his mother secretly sent him money to support him. His mother, Matilda, arranged a reconciliation between father and son from that lasted from 1080 until her death in 1083, after which Robert left court and traveled Europe.

On William the Conqueror's death in 1087, he left England's throne to William Rufus, and £5000 silver to Henry. To his estranged and difficult eldest son, Robert, he left Normandy—a generous gift considering the troubles between them.

Robert continued to cause trouble for his siblings, however; a story for tomorrow.

Monday, September 15, 2014

Charles the (Not) Simple

Charles the Simple
Charles III, called "the Simple" (from Latin Carolus Simplex) was a King of Francia (what we think of today as France) and Lotharingia (what we think of today as the Rhineland, western Switzerland, and the Low Countries).

He was born 17 September 879, the third son of Louis the Stammerer (son of Charles the Bald) and Adelaide of Paris. His father died before Charles was born, and Charles might have succeeded him as king, but his cousin Charles the Fat was put on the throne by the nobility. When Charles the Fat was deposed in 887—he was increasingly seen as spineless after paying off the Vikings and showing little inclination to military solutions—the nobility again skipped over Charles in favor of Odo of Paris. Eventually, however, a faction within Francia decided that Charles the Simple should be made the rightful ruler; he was crowned king in 893, but only assumed the throne once Odo died in 898.

Charles negotiated with the Vikings whom Charles the Fat had paid off. In exchange for peace, he granted them lands on the continent. Their leader, Rollo, was baptized and married Charles' daughter, Gisela. Their heirs became the Dukes of Normandy, leading eventually to William the Conqueror.

Charles himself married (for the second time) to Eadgifu, a daughter of the English King Edward the Elder. Their son was the future King Louis IV of France.

The initial opposition to Charles was not due to the nickname. Although we translate Carolus Simplex as "Charles the Simple," the adjective has become...umm..."simplified" over time. When attached to Charles, it did not mean he was unintelligent; rather, that he was straightforward and direct, acting without subterfuge or guile.

But this quality did not endear him to everyone. Not everyone appreciated giving territory to the Vikings, or some of his other decisions. Odo's brother Robert became the fiscal point for revolt in 922, and Charles had to flee. Returning with a Norman army, he was defeated on 15 June 923, captured and imprisoned, where he died on 7 October 929. Eadgifu fled to England when the revolt took place, but her son Louis would return to become king of France in 936.

Thursday, March 20, 2014

Æthelred the Unready

From a 14th century manuscript
Since Æthelred keeps getting mentioned here (most notably the past two days, due to the contested inheritance of the English throne between him and his half-brother, Edward the Martyr), I thought maybe we should mention a little more about him—or at least explain his not-very-flattering nickname.

When his father, King Edgar, died Æthelred was only about 10 years old. His half-brother, Edward, was a few years older. Edward was illegitimate, whereas Æthelred was the legitimate son of Edgar's last wife, Ælfthryth. Ælfthryth and others fought to have Æthelred succeed Edgar, but others fought for the older Edward, who wound up ruling for three years.

It is highly unlikely that the then-13-year-old Æthelred had anything to do with Edward's death on 18 March 978. Æthelred was crowned a month later.

One of the chief problems faced by Æthelred was attacks by the Danes. About a year after Æthelred became king, small groups of Danes began making raids on the English coast; these happened for a couple years. Then, after a six-year span of peace, a Danish incursion caused a battle between them and the nobles of Devon. England was able at this time to successfully defend itself, but there was an interesting side-effect of these raids, and that was the connection to Normandy.

Upon occasion, the Danes would leave England and cross the Channel to Normandy to give themselves time to rest and recuperate. The Normans ("North Men"), being of Scandinavian extraction originally, "took the side" of the Danes and started viewing England as a rival. Relations between England and Normandy started becoming hostile, so much so that Pope John XV decided to step in and broker a peace treaty between the two nations, in 991. A couple generations later, relations between England and Normandy would change radically, in 1066.

991 also saw the Battle of Maldon, in which the Danes did terrible damage to parts of England and the English nobility. After Maldon,  Æthelred decided that England should pay the Danes to stay away. This started a dangerous precedent: paying off one group of Danes was no guarantee that another (or the same group) wouldn't come back and attack your shores in 997, 998, 999, 1000, and again in 1001. There were more payments, but they were followed by more invasions.

This is a runestone in Sweden,
set up to commemorate a man
who received Danegeld three
times
due to raids in England.
Were the payments a good idea? This idea of Danegeld ["Dane gold"] wasn't new: even King Alfred the Great had seen fit to use money to ensure peace. It was a way to get a marauder to go away and leave lives and crops and property intact. Still, it marred Æthelred's reputation, and may have led to his nickname.

"Unready" suggests to modern readers that he was not prepared for the problems that beset his reign. His Anglo-Saxon name and nickname were Æthelred Unræd, which we translate today as "Æthelred the Unready." The ræd element means "counsel" or "advice." The name Æthelred Unræd would be a pun meaning "Noble advice, no advice." The "blame" (if that is what we should assign due to his nickname) may be imputed to his councilors, who gave him bad advice. It is the modern English understanding of the word "Unready" that makes us condemn him personally for not being prepared for what befell England while he was on the throne.

Friday, November 2, 2012

And Then There's Maud

Matilda of Flanders (c.1031-1083), also called Maud, was the wife of William II of Normandy (later William the Conqueror). Their legendary and odd "courtship" was described here. The odd thing is that, after the supposed abuse he heaped on her when she first refused his hand, she later defied her father, Count Baldwin of Flanders, and refused to marry anyone else.

The pope objected, because they were too closely related. Determining the exact relationship has been difficult for modern scholars, however:
It has thus been suggested that both William and Matilda were cousins in the fifth degree, being both directly descended from Rolf the Viking. ... Finally, it has been suggested (perhaps with greater probability) that the prohibition was based on the fact that after the death of Baldwin V's mother, Ogiva, his father, Baldwin IV, had married a daughter of Duke Richard II of Normandy. All these theories have difficulties to overcome, and the matter may well therefore be left in some suspense. —William the Conqueror, David C. Douglas (1964)
We know that she was a direct descendant of Alfred the Great, and also was a descendant of Charlemagne, but those connections should not have sparked the pope's concern. Whatever his objections, they were overcome eventually with the help of Lanfranc (see the link above).

Matilda proved to be an admirable consort. She outfitted a ship, the Mora, with her own funds to join his fleet for the Conquest of England. She also had skills as an administrator: William left the Duchy of Normandy in her hands when he headed to England in 1066 to defeat Harold. In fact, although she did spend time with her husband in England—notably when she accompanied him during his Harrying of the North campaign—except for giving birth to their fourth child, Henry, in Yorkshire while on that campaign, all of their other children were born in Normandy.

One thing she likely did not do is work on the Bayeaux Tapestry. As picturesque as the image is of her and her ladies in waiting working away as seamstresses and embroiderers, it is now believed that the tapestry (actually a banner) was arranged by Bishop Odo of Bayeaux (William's half-brother) and created by Kentish artists.

So far as we know, once she captured William's heart she never let it go again. There are no records of William having any children outside of his marriage, or of taking a mistress. They had nine children, all of whom lived to adulthood. Two of them became kings: William II, called Rufus, who ruled England after the Conqueror, and Henry who ruled after William as Henry I.

Her illness and death, with William at her side, was devastating for her husband. William survived her by four years, but he was changed. True, in 1085 he called for the Domesday Book, but his interest in ruling England was waning, and he returned to Normandy for good in 1086. There are also reports that he became more cruel. When he died, he was buried in Caen, near but not with his wife. While he was buried at Abbaye aux Hommes (Abbey of Men), at which Lanfranc had once been abbot, Matilda was interred down the road at the Abbaye aux Dames (Abbey of Women), which had been founded by William and Matilda in 1062. She is buried under a slab of black marble.

Matilda of Flanders died 929 years ago today. The illustration is a statue of her in Paris

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Who Will Rule?

In 1051, when King Edward the Confessor was inviting more friendly Normans to join him in England, Duke William of Normandy visited. According to records made after 1066 but before William's death in 1087, William reported that Edward (who was celibate and would have no heirs of his own) told William that William would be his heir to the throne of England.

In 1064 (two years before Edward the Confessor's death), Harold Godwinson (the most powerful lord in England after the king; his sister was married to Edward) was shipwrecked off the coast of Normandy and held captive by Count Guy of Ponthieu.* Duke William of Normandy told Guy to release him; this was done, and Harold was returned to England, but only after swearing on holy relics that he would recognize William as his king in the future. (This is according to reports written long after the fact by William's chroniclers.)

When Edward died in 1066, Harold claimed that Edward had made a deathbed pronouncement, naming Harold his heir.

There was also a third claimant to the throne, although the least convincing. King Harald Hardrada of Norway and Denmark believed that he was the proper heir, because Danes had conquered England so many times in the past. A tenuous claim, but strengthened by the fact that he was supported by Tostig, the brother of Harold Godwinson! (Ahh, the days when sibling rivalry had higher stakes!)

The problem with all these claims?

In primarily Anglo-Saxon England, the next king was chosen by the witenagemot, the meeting of wise men. Kings might name a successor, but the Witan was needed to approve a ruler.

So who pressed their claim?

All of them.

I'll tell you the unhappy (for Harold) result tomorrow.

*Note: This is about the only reason why anyone studying history cares about Guy of Ponthieu. Feel free to forget the name.

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Edward the Confessor

Edward's life was a series of contrasts.

Son of an English king (Ethelred The Unready), he nevertheless spent much of his life in Normandy, making Norman French friends.

Although so pious that he was called "The Confessor," when he became king in 1042 he ruthlessly deprived his mother of all her estates because he felt she had neglected him as a child.

Although he married Edith in 1045, he had taken a vow of celibacy that meant he would produce no heir. (What Edith thought of this is unknown.)

Although his father-in-law was Godwin of Wessex, one of his most powerful retainers, he and Godwin were frequently at odds. When Edward asked Godwin to punish some of his subjects who had hassled the king's Norman friends, Godwin refused and raised an army to fight Edward. Unfortunately for Godwin, none of the other great lords wanted to join him, so Godwin found himself losing and had to choose exile for himself.

Although Edward should have learned his lesson regarding Norman vs. Anglo-Saxon friction, Edward increased the number of Norman councilors. The Anglo-Saxon population disliked this so much that they supported Godwin when an invasion by his two sons, Harold and Tostig, took place in 1052. Godwin was allowed to return. Godwin forced Edward to send the Normans away.

Although he had unhappy dealings with Godwin's family, when Godwin died in 1053, Edward named Godwin's son Harold the heir of Edward.

Although he named Harold his heir, William of Normandy claimed that Edward had named William his heir in 1051. When Edward died in 1066, the stage was set for conflict.

Monday, May 28, 2012

Lanfranc, Part 1 (of 2)

Scholar and Teacher, Priest and Politician

There are two reasons why I want to mention Lanfranc today. One is because today is the 923rd anniversary of his death.* The second is because I want to discuss his most famous pupil in the future, and this is nice background for that.

Lanfranc (c.1005-1089) was born in Italy, educated in the liberal arts, and moved to France to teach, finally deciding to join the abbey at Bec in Normandy in 1042. In 1045 the abbot persuaded him to open a school in the abbey. His reputation drew students from France, Flanders, Germany and Italy.

His understanding and teaching of religious doctrine produced powerful thinkers who rose high in ecclesiastical ranks. Lanfranc himself ultimately became Archbishop of Canterbury, but not before a strange political somersault.

Duke William of Normandy, also called William the Bastard (and later William the Conqueror) wished to marry Matilda of Flanders. Two items stood in his way (three, if you want to believe the legend): his bastardy (he was the son of his father's mistress), and the fact that they were too closely related to satisfy custom and law. (The third thing is that Matilda supposedly refused to marry a bastard; and I guess there's a fourth thing, if you want to assume that she didn't like the fact that he was so angry with her that he angrily dragged her off her horse by her braids and threw her to the ground.) Lanfranc publicly opposed the marriage as inappropriate. Duke William (of Normandy, and Bec Abbey is in Normandy, remember) sent Lanfranc into exile; on the point of departure, however, he was forgiven and took on the task of persuading the pope to consent to the marriage! (I would love to tell you that he was the man for the job because the pope had been a student of Lanfranc's, but Pope Alexander II, who had been a student of Lanfranc's, didn't become pope until 1061.) Lanfranc's arguments succeeded, however, William and Matilda got married, William later decided to conquer England, and the rest is (English) history.

So when an Archbishop of Canterbury was needed years later, Lanfranc was rewarded for helping out William. His first job was to straighten out Thomas of Bayeaux, the Archbishop of York, who thought that York was empowered to operate independently of Canterbury's authority. Lanfranc was having none of that, and figured Thomas owed him one, since Lanfranc had given him passing grades years ago. Thomas, however, did not give in to his former teacher, so Lanfranc turned to Pope Alexander II who was now on the throne of Peter and agreed to allow Lanfranc to get it settled by a council of the English church, which met at Winchester. Lanfranc got the primacy he wanted, agreed to by the king and queen with their "X"s on the document. Before Alexander II could ratify the ruling on the Canterbury-York dispute, however, he died and was replaced by Gregory VII, who wasn't inclined to rubber-stamp England's rulings. The argument stretched out for years.

Lanfranc was a powerful help to the king, among other things foiling a conspiracy against the king and helping to ensure the succession of the next king. But what history cares about is his contributions to theological doctrine, of which more soon.

*To be honest, that date is disputed; some say it was May 24.