The Age of Chivalry (5 page)

It was the Franks who gave the
Nordmanni
their first opportunity by ceding them lands around the mouth of the Seine in
c
.911. From this base they extended their grip westward to “Normandy,” which soon became one of the most tightly controlled feudal
states in Europe. Conversion to Christianity and adoption of cavalry warfare did not remove the piratical restlessness that formed part of the Normans' Scandinavian inheritance. The Norman readiness to learn, adapt and assimilate gave them a swift command over conquered territories. Their evolution of the motte-and-bailey castle, a mound surrounded by a ditched enclosure, invariably marked the Normans' implacable territorial penetration. Their championing of religious orthodoxy was typically authoritarian, but their support for Benedictine monasticism, especially the foundations at Bec and Caen, turned Normandy into a pioneering center of 11th-century scholarship.

A
BOVE
A detail of the Bayeux Tapestry depicting Harold, king of England, being hit in the eye by an arrow at the Battle of Hastings in 1066
.

Norman interest in England dated back to 1002, when Ethelred II married Emma, the daughter of Normandy's Duke Richard. But contemporary Scandinavia had a longer tradition of pursuing ambitions in England. Alfred the Great, king of Wessex, had contained the Danish Viking raiders and then consolidated his authority as ruler right across the English south and west. A century later, however, the Danes resumed their offensive, and the Danish King Cnut became king of England after Ethelred's death in 1016. English, Norman and Scandinavian positioning ensued. Cnut's marriage to the widowed Emma solidified his power base, but their son Harthacnut died after a brief reign. Ethelred and Emma's son Edward had spent long years in exile after joining his maternal relatives in Normandy. His accession to the English throne in 1042 restored the line of Anglo-Saxon kings, albeit with a Norman slant, and Edward “the Confessor” proved a good patron to the many Norman clergy, soldiers and officials who traveled with him from the duchy to the English court. This clique aroused the antagonism of Earl Godwine, England's preeminent aristocrat, who forced the king to dismiss his Norman advisers in 1053. When Edward died without issue at the beginning of 1066 the English aristocracy chose the earl's son and successor Harold Godwinson as king, and he was duly crowned.

The Scandinavian dimension to English kingship had one final card to play: Harthacnut was supposed to have promised Magnus I of Norway that if either died without issue the other would rule as king in both countries. Harald III Hardrada, king of Norway, therefore pursued a claim to the throne, and Harold of England's estranged brother Tostig Godwinson, the earl of Northumbria, supported him. Harold's army gained a great victory over the invading Norwegian army at the Battle of Stamford Bridge near York on September 25, 1066, in the course of which Tostig and Harald Hardrada were killed. Having marched south from Yorkshire to Sussex, the English army was already exhausted when it fought the battle that was joined at Hastings on October 14 and which ended in Harold's defeat and death. The English aristocracy immediately chose Edgar Atheling to succeed Harold, so William still had to fight his way to the Crown. He failed to take London at his first attempt from the east, after which he advanced on the capital from the northwest before eventually receiving the submission of the English aristocracy at Berkhamsted.

A
BOVE
Ethelred II, the king dubbed “unraed” or “bad advice” by contemporaries, is shown holding a sword in the
Chronicle of Abingdon (c.
1220)
.

The coronation of William as England's new king took place at Westminster Abbey on December 25, 1066. It was the prelude to a series of campaigns of subjugation. In 1067 rebels in Kent attacked Dover Castle and a revolt spread in West Mercia. In 1068 William had to negotiate the surrender of Exeter, and there were further revolts both in Mercia
and in Northumbria. Harold's sons were meanwhile raiding the West Country from their new bases in Ireland, and in 1069 a rebellion spread in Northumbria after the massacre of several hundred Norman soldiers garrisoned at Durham. William defeated the northern rebels in battle near York before pursuing the remnants into the city, many of whose inhabitants were then massacred. The arrival of a large Danish fleet off England's eastern coast in the late summer of 1069 inspired widespread English dissidence, and an allied Northumbrian-Danish army defeated the Norman garrison at York before establishing control over Northumbria. William stopped the Danish penetration into Lincolnshire, and after retaking York he bought off the Danes, who agreed to leave England by the spring of 1070. William's army then waged a relentless campaign of devastation across Northumbria in the winter of 1069–70 resulting in a death toll of around 150,000. The following spring saw the Conqueror established in Chester, from where he crushed remaining areas of Mercian resistance. Eastern England saw further resistance, since the Danes initially reneged on their assurances to leave. However, a further payment finally secured their departure. Deprived of Danish support the rebels—led by Hereward (“the Wake”) in the Isle of Ely—were crushed in 1071.

Wherever they went, Norman knights wanted two things: land and titles. Those who were prominent in the English campaign were of higher birth than their compatriots who went to southern Italy, and their surnames often reflected the family fiefdoms they already held in Normandy. In an unusual move, William claimed personal possession of all English land, and this meant he could dispose of it as he saw fit. The territories of English nobles who had fought and died with Harold were redistributed among William's supporters. The pattern of confiscations explains the persistence of major anti-Norman revolts that led in turn to even more confiscations during 1067–71. Where a landholder died without issue, William and his barons claimed the right to choose the heir, who tended to be Norman, while widows and daughters who inherited property were often made to marry Norman husbands. William distributed his land-grants so that an individual's holdings were spread throughout the country. A noble who revolted would therefore find it difficult to defend all his territories simultaneously, and the system encouraged group solidarity by bringing the nobility into contact with each other rather than retreating into a regional power base. The loyalty of this élite group meant that William could rule England from Normandy by implementing the practice known as government “by writ,” and this was the system followed by his Norman successors on the throne. After 1072 the king returned to Normandy since his duchy faced serious external threats, and he visited England on just four further occasions.

THE NORMANS IN ENGLAND

1042
Edward (“the Confessor”) is crowned king of England on returning from his exile in Normandy.

1066
Following the launch of an invasion force led by Duke William of Normandy, Harold II (Harold Godwinson), last Anglo-Saxon king of England, is killed in battle at Hastings on October 14. William is crowned king in Westminster Abbey on December 25.

1085
King William orders the nationwide compilation of English land holdings which becomes known as the Domesday Book.

1089
Death of Archbishop Lanfranc of Canterbury, whose revenues are then seized for Crown use by William II (William Rufus).

1100
Henry I succeeds to the English throne and issues the Charter of Liberties which confirms the nobility in its traditional freedoms.

1105
Resumption of the armed struggle between Henry I and his brother Robert, duke of Normandy.

1107
The Concordat of London: the papacy concedes substantial control over the Church in England to the English Crown.

1135
Anarchy follows the death of Henry I.

The Domesday Book, a compilation of land holdings ordered in 1085 by William, records that by this date the native English owned just five percent of their country's territory, and hardly any of them retained public office. The shires or shares were Anglo-Saxon administrative units, and they were run by the shire reeve, or sheriff, who was accountable to the highly effective central bureaucracy with its sophisticated archival system. Henry I established the treasury. Located in Westminster, it became the heart of government, although the institution evolved out of the central accounting office which the Anglo-Saxon monarchy had run in Winchester. Having seized the governmental structure, the Normans bent it to their own will by staffing it with their own people. A few Englishmen were appointed sheriffs, but after 1075 Normans monopolized the earldoms. There was a similar purge among the senior clergy: by 1096 there was not a single English bishop, and very few abbots were English. Loyal churchmen were crucial to England's Norman government and this form of episcopal rule represented an English application of William's methods in Normandy where, personally presiding over synods, he had secured a Church administration notably pliant and free of corruption.

KINGS OF ENGLAND 1016–1154

CNUT THE GREAT

(
c
.985–1035)

r. 1016–35

HAROLD I

[“Harold Harefoot”]

(
c
.1015–40)

r. 1035/37–40

HARTHACNUT

(1020–42)

r. 1040–42

EDWARD THE CONFESSOR

(
c
.1003–66)

r. 1042–66

HAROLD II

[Harold Godwinson]

(
c
.1022–66)

r. 1066

WILLIAM I

[“the Conqueror”]

(
c
.1027–87)

r. 1066–87

WILLIAM II

[William Rufus]

(1056–1100)

r. 1087–1100

HENRY I

(1068/9–1135)

r. 1100–35

STEPHEN

(1096–1154)

r. 1135–54

The Conqueror's decision to divide his inheritance between Robert, who became Normandy's duke, and William Rufus, who became England's William II in 1087, also divided opinion among the Anglo-Norman nobility. Those who also held lands in Normandy thought that there should be just one ruler for both areas to counter the risk of divided loyalties, especially since the two brothers were notoriously quarrelsome. The rebellion mounted by some of them against Rufus in 1088 aimed at placing Robert on the English throne. This was swiftly suppressed, however, and in 1091 the king invaded Normandy, forcing his brother to yield some of his lands. The two were subsequently reconciled, and when the duke needed money to go on crusade in 1096 he pledged the dukedom to his brother in exchange for a sum of 10,000 marks. This huge sum amounted to about a quarter of the entire annual revenue raised by the English Crown and was paid by William's imposition of a special tax. William then ruled as regent in Normandy during Robert's absence which lasted until September 1100, a month after the king's death.

William Rufus's relations with the Church were turbulent. The king quarreled violently with Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, whose revenues were seized when he died in 1089 and appropriated for Crown use. Lanfranc's successor Anselm maintained his opposition, and on going into exile in 1097 he appealed to the pope for support. But Urban II was involved in a major dispute with the German emperor Henry IV and
could ill afford to make another enemy. He therefore endorsed the status quo in England. William made a statement recognizing the pope's authority, and in return he was allowed to keep the revenues of the archbishopric of Canterbury since Anselm remained in exile.