The subject of this book is William the Conqueror. Its object is to consider the Norman impact upon England. It seeks to show how, within the lifetime of one man, and largely through his acts, a single province of Gaul was enabled to effect the conquest of an ancient kingdom, and it attempts to analyse the character and the results of that conquest. These topics (it will be further suggested) may challenge attention not only for their intrinsic importance, but also by reason of their enduring relevance to the subsequent development of England and of western Christendom. And they are made the more interesting by being inseparably connected with one of the most spectacular biographies of history.
In one sense the theme is familiar. No medieval king of England is more famous than William the Conqueror, and no event in the whole of English history has been more discussed than the Norman conquest. To call attention to the massive tradition of scholarship1 which has been inherited by the student of Anglo-Norman history in this period, it would, indeed, be unnecessary to do more than recollect, for example, how the seventeenth-century labours of André Duchesne and Jean Pommeraye in France were matched by those of their great English contemporaries – Selden, Spelman, and Dugdale; how the eighteenth-century editions of Wilkins and Bessin still together offer material for comment; or how this topic was later enriched by Stapleton and Freeman in England; by Haskins in America; by Steenstrup in Denmark; and by Auguste Le Prévost, Henri Prentout, and Léopold Delisle in France.
Nor does this activity show any signs of abating. In England new editions are providing students of this subject with fresh opportunities, and the fine collection of early Norman charters which has just appeared at the hands of Madame Fauroux has made more accessible than ever before a wide range of indispensable material.2 Such textual studies are, moreover, being matched by new efforts at interpretation. Thus in England the origins of Anglo-Norman feudalism are being subjected to re-examination, and the ecclesiastical history of the age is being displayed with ever-increasing elaboration. At the same time, in France, a new approach to Anglo-Norman history is being successfully made by Professors M. de Bouard, Jean Yver, Lucien Musset, and their colleagues in the university of Caen. The list could, of course, be easily extended and it would include the fundamental work associated with Dom David Knowles and Sir Frank Stenton. But even the bare mention of a few selected names may indicate the continuing interest which the subject excites. It might also serve to raise a doubt whether anything new can be added to this accumulated erudition.
Nevertheless, a reconsideration of this theme may perhaps be justified if only because wide differences of opinion still appear in the work of its most distinguished exponents; and these disagreements extend even to the largest issues involved. Thus French scholars remain sharply divided on the relative importance of the Scandinavian factor in the growth of Normandy; and in respect of the development of Anglo-Norman feudalism, new theories are now being propounded in opposition to those of John Horace Round, who himself reacted so vigorously against his predecessors. Again (to quote no more instances) the appraisal of the ecclesiastical consequences to England of the Norman conquest as supplied in the work of Heinrich Böhmer or Z. N. Brooke may be contrasted with that offered by Professors Stenton and Darlington. Examples could be multiplied, but these may suffice to point the paradox. There is, of course, no finality in historical research, and the ebb and flow of criticism and correction is essential to its vitality. None the less the situation here revealed is surely remarkable. Despite the fact that the history of William the Conqueror and of the Norman conquest of England has been assiduously studied for three centuries, few periods of our history remain more the subject of controversy.
There is, moreover, another reason why a fresh examination of this theme may not be without profit. The modern student of Anglo-Norman history finds himself today in a quite extraordinary position. He is not only the heir to a great tradition of scholarship: he is also subject to the influence of an even longer tradition of propaganda. The treatment accorded to William the Conqueror and to the Norman conquest of England is, indeed, one of the curiosities of English literature, and it is surely strange how consistently over the centuries the history of this distant age should have prompted statesmen and lawyers, pamphleteers and ecclesiastics into a war of words inspired by current controversies or immediate political stress.3 Arguments concerning the Norman conquest cover almost the entire span of English prose. Thus even before the death of Queen Elizabeth I, Archbishop Matthew Parker and his associates were seeking in the Old English Church uncorrupted by the Normans a prototype of the reformed establishment they were called upon to administer; and few indeed of the contentions – political and religious – which vexed England during the seventeenth century were debated without some reference either to the Conqueror or to the Norman conquest. Here, for example, the common lawyers came into conflict not only with the supporters of the king but with the new historiography, and it may be recalled how important to the Levellers was their conception of the ‘Norman yoke’.4 In the eighteenth century the debate was vigorously continued in the constitutional sphere; and in the nineteenth it became even more highly coloured under the influence of liberal and national sentiments.
The result has been truly astonishing. The posthumous career of William the Conqueror in controversial literature is almost as remarkable as his actual career in eleventh-century history. For generations he has remained, so to speak, a figure in contemporary politics. He has been presented in terms of Whig theory, of sectarian fervour, and of modern nationalism. He has been hailed as one of the founders of English greatness, and as the cause of one of the most lamentable of English defeats. He has been pictured as the special enemy of protestantism, and as one of the most strenuous opponents of the papacy. He has been envisaged as both the author, and also as the subverter, of the English Constitution. In France, too, the tradition, though distinct, has not been dissimilar. William of Normandy has there been saluted as a French national hero. He has also been denounced as a champion of superstition and as an enemy of the people, so that Calvinists and Revolutionaries were led savagely to desecrate his tomb, and to scatter his remains. Was he not representative of that ‘feudalism’ which has still formally to be renounced by all new members of the Legion of Honour? Few personalities in history have been more praised and blamed for acts in which they had no share.
It is, indeed, important to realize how persistent has been this polemical tradition, and to recall the lengths to which, even in comparatively recent times, it has been exploited. As an example, there might be cited the utterances of two men who on all grounds may be revered as eminent Victorians – that is to say, distinguished men in a most distinguished age. Here, for instance, is Thomas Carlyle in 1858 echoing in some sense the sentiments of John Milton, but writing in a manner wholly his own:
Without the Normans [he exclaims] what had it ever been? A gluttonous race of Jutes and Angles capable of no great combinations; lumbering about in pot-bellied equanimity; not dreaming of heroic toil and silence and endurance, such as lead to the high places of the Universe, and the golden mountain tops where dwell the spirits of the Dawn.5
The exclamation may well provoke surprise. But it could be matched (in the opposite sense) by remarks made a few years earlier by Edward Freeman in connexion with the establishment of the present School of Modern History in the university of Oxford:
We must recognize [wrote Freeman, when debating the new Examination Statute of 1850] the spirit which dictated the Petition of Right as the same which gathered all England round the banners of Godwin, and remember that the ‘good old cause’ was truly that for which Harold died on the field and Waltheof on the scaffold.6
These, it will be recalled, were notable men who were justly revered by their contemporaries as exponents of history. And the fact that they could write in such a way about an episode of eleventh-century history testifies to the strength of the controversial tradition which they inherited and which they sought to pass on to us their successors. Nor were they wholly unsuccessful in so doing. Even today it is very evident that the influence of this long polemical tradition has not wholly evaporated, and it is something against which every student of eleventh-century English history should be set on guard.
And if a special obligation is thus imposed upon a biographer of William the Conqueror to avoid such controversies as extraneous to his subject; to attempt objectivity; and to eschew anachronistic sentiments; so also should he strive to place the general problems with which he is concerned in their widest contemporary setting. Beyond doubt, the latter half of the eleventh century witnessed a turning-point in the history of western Christendom, and beyond doubt Normandy and the Normans played a dominant part in the transformations which then occurred. By the conquest of a great kingdom they effected a political regrouping of north-western Europe with lasting consequences both to France and England. They assisted the papacy to rise to a new position of political dominance, and they became closely associated with the reforming movement in the Church which the papacy came to direct. They contributed also to a radical modification of the relations between eastern and western Europe with results that still survive. The Norman conquest of England may thus in one sense be regarded as but part of a far-flung endeavour, the implications of which were to stretch even into the sphere of culture. The Normans by linking England more straitly to Latin Europe helped what may be called the Romance-speaking peoples to achieve that dominance in western culture which they exercised during the twelfth-century renaissance, so that, for example, the great monastic movements of that age, crusading sentiment and troubador song, the new universities and the learning that was fostered therein, all came from a world that was centred upon France, and which included not only the England which the Normans conquered but the Italy which the Normans helped to transform.7
This transference of power and influence was a prime factor in the making of Europe, and the Norman contribution to it, though inspired by many diverse motives, was undoubtedly considerable. But it was not inevitable, and it came from a province which some forty years before the Norman conquest of England showed but few signs of its future achievement. On the day when William the Conqueror was born it could hardly have been foreseen. When he died after a career which was in every way astonishing, its results were already assured.
Here, then, is a problem which invites solution. How had the Norman power which was to be so notably exhibited under William the Conqueror been attained? How had the special characteristics of Normandy at that time been acquired? And what were the factors of Norman policy which was then brought to its culmination? These questions, it would seem, lie across the threshold of our subject. But even to pose them indicates an important conclusion. It is that the long debate on the consequences to England of the Norman conquest can no longer be profitably sustained unless a fresh attempt be made to appraise, for its own sake, the social and political character of the Normandy which confronted England in 1066. This conviction is at all events implicit in the chapters which here follow, and it has determined their sequence. If the Norman achievement at its zenith cannot be dissociated from the career of the greatest of the Norman dukes, it is certainly not to be explained solely by reference to a single personality. To discriminate, in this sense, among the causes – general and personal – of the Norman impact upon England, and of the highly individual results it entailed is, in fact, a primary object of the present study, and one which is largely responsible for the pattern of this book.
William was the outstanding member of an exceptional dynasty, and he ruled over an exceptional province of Gaul. What he accomplished was thus in large measure due to his inheritance.8 But the circumstances of his birth and of his accession were also exceptional,9 and before he could be assured of his heritage he was forced into a hazardous struggle which tested his courage, and annealed his character.10 On the outcome of that struggle, which involved not only Normandy but a large part of northern France, the subsequent strength of ducal Normandy was largely to depend, and only after its successful conclusion could William complete the consolidation of the duchy on which his power was henceforth to be based. In that work, too, he was dependent upon social and political movements which had begun before his accession. The Norman military successes in the eleventh century were directly dependent on the rise in the province of a new secular aristocracy,11 and the quality of the influence which Normandy was to exercise during the life of William the Conqueror was conditioned by the ecclesiastical revival which at the same time transformed the Church in the province of Rouen.12 It was William's achievement not only to foster and co-ordinate these movements but also to dominate them. Only thus is to be explained the success of his rule over Normandy, and the subsequent expansion of Norman influence overseas.13
The same considerations apply also to William's later career. He was placed in a position of crucial importance at a critical moment in the political development of western Europe, but he was capable of turning that situation to his own advantage, and to the profit of the Norman duchy. The Scandinavian impact on Europe in the tenth and eleventh centuries had already bound together the fates of Normandy and England, and posed for the future the fundamental question whether, for the remainder of the Middle Ages, England should be linked to Latin Europe rather than to the Scandinavian lands. That problem, complicated by so many personal and political factors, dominated Anglo-Norman relations until the climax of 1066, and to its solution William undoubtedly made his own individual contribution.14 Prepared and made possible by previous history, the conquest of England owed its accomplishment, and many of its major consequences, to his initiative, and the Anglo-Norman kingdom was established through him.15Its continued existence was, however, long in doubt and its defence, conducted through years of hazard, displayed to the full the energy and capacity of its ruler. That defence (as will here be suggested) was a unified endeavour involving a continuous series of interconnected operations on both sides of the Channel, and it was the essential prerequisite for the fulfilment of William's constructive work.16
William's claim to be considered as a man of original genius must rest ultimately upon his rule of the conjoint realm which he created and defended. In 1066 he achieved royalty with all the sanctified authority which this implied.17 By thus acquiring a special status in the secular and ecclesiastical world of the eleventh century, he found himself possessed of new opportunities and resources. He used them to the full, and in a manner that was characteristically his own. He established in England the new aristocracy he brought from overseas, and through its agency he modified the structure of England's society by the application of new principles of social organization which were in turn to react upon the province from which he came.18 Yet, both in Normandy and in England he was faithful to tradition, and in England, especially, it became a cardinal feature of his administration to respect, and to utilize, the customs of the kingdom he had conquered.19 Similarly, William brought to England the influence of the ecclesiastical revival which had taken place in Normandy under his rule, and the Church in England whose organization was thereby remodelled was brought into a new relationship with the movement of reform which in the time of Hildebrand was beginning to pervade the politics of Europe. Nevertheless, William's ecclesiastical policy as a consecrated king of England remained highly individual, and the position he came to occupy in the European Church was scarcely less notable than that which he filled in the European secular order.20Nor was there any abatement of his activities as age advanced. The last twenty months of his reign were to involve a final crisis in the defence of his realm, and also the production of the greatest written memorial to his administration. His work did not cease until his tragic death and still more terrible funeral.21
His life possessed an heroic quality and men soon found little difficulty in applying to him phrases comparable with those used in lauding the fabled Charlemagne in the ‘Song of Roland’.22 In view of this, and still more because of the later controversies of which he was the object, it is not easy to make a sober estimate of what he accomplished. Certainly this could only be achieved, if at all, by a direct study of the contemporary evidence such as here has been attempted. It deserves note, therefore, that, considering the remote period from which it derives, such evidence is surprisingly plentiful. A bare recital of a few selected items may of itself suffice to display its abundance. It is not merely that the great king left in Domesday Book his own magnificent record of the kingdom he had conquered, or that the Bayeux Tapestry supplied shortly after the event a unique pictorial representation of the central episode of his career. The whole period is illustrated in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and is completely covered in one of its recensions, whilst writers in England of the next generation, such as William of Malmesbury, Simeon of Durham, Eadmer, and the so-called ‘Florence of Worcester’, give full prominence to the events of these years. Again, a fascinating early life of Edward the Confessor, together with the lives and letters of Archbishop Lanfranc, may by themselves suffice to indicate how fully the historical narrative of this age can be supplemented by the biographies and the correspondence it produced. Equally copious are the charters. Nearly three hundred instruments issued by William the Conqueror as king between 1066 and 1087 have been calendared, and to these can be added a considerable number of private deeds, most of which have been reproduced in print from original or cartulary texts.
The extended scope of the evidence deriving from England is fairly well known, but the fact that the Norman sources of Anglo-Norman history in this period are likewise abundant is less generally appreciated on this side of the Channel. The Norman annals23are, it is true, less full than their Anglo-Saxon counterparts, but as has recently been demonstrated, they present features of unusual interest,24 whilst the Acta of the archbishops of Rouen25 are not only interesting in themselves, but are representative of a fairly large class of material. In William of Jumièges, whose account continues until 1070–1071, we have a contemporary Norman chronicler of good standing,26 and his work is given colour by the treatise on the Conqueror composed about the same time by William of Poitiers. It is, moreover, particularly fortunate that the production of both these writers, whose work stands in close but at present undefined relation to each other, should in the next generation have fallen under the notice of an author of some genius. The interpolations made by Ordericus Vitalis to the seventh book of the chronicle of William of Jumièges are of particular value,27 and most, if not all, of the lost portion of the work of William of Poitiers is embodied in Qrderic's own great Historia Ecclesiastica, which must be judged the most valuable single narrative source of Anglo-Norman history in this period.
Nor is there any lack of documentary material deriving from the duchy at this time. The records of the Norman church councils are both copious and informative. Norman private charters of the eleventh century are also fairly numerous, and in addition to those still awaiting investigation in the Archives of Eure and Seine-Maritime many of them are in print, though, being scattered through many volumes of varying date and accuracy, they are difficult of access. Again, many of the charters issued by William himself after 1066 are likewise of Norman origin. But it is the pre-Conquest ducal texts that are here particularly noteworthy. There is a widespread impression in England that such instruments are rare. On the contrary, they are very numerous. It deserves considerable emphasis that not less than one hundred and thirty charters, issued or subscribed by William as duke of Normandy between 1035 and 1066, are extant and in print28 – a number which approximates fairly closely to that of all the genuine surviving charters and writs issued by Edward the Confessor during the whole of his reign for the whole of England. If less is known of pre-Conquest Normandy than of pre-Conquest England it is assuredly not because of lack of testimony. Perhaps the evidence has been somewhat neglected by English scholars. At all events this essential material remains the least worked source of Anglo-Norman history in this age.
The biographer of William the Conqueror has in short no reason to complain of lack of evidence. The difficulty lies in its assessment. It is by no means easy, for example, to elucidate the interrelation between the various narrative sources; the interpretation of Domesday Book is notoriously difficult; and there are few harder tasks than to criticize eleventh-century charters in respect of their form, their dating, and their authenticity. A further problem is posed by the special character of the subject, and the uneven spread of the testimony. Legend gathered very quickly about William the Conqueror, and much that is frequently related of him is fabulous. Much more, though probably true, derives from evidence that is very scanty. There is here, therefore, a special necessity to recall the salutary caution of Mabillon that the duty of the historian is not only to proclaim certainties as certain and falsehoods as false, but also uncertainties as dubious. For this reason a modern study of the Conqueror must include much criticism of evidence relating to points of detail.29 But the investigation can none the less be justified by the wider issues that were involved. For these in truth were fundamental, and the consequences of what then occurred are still alive among us today. Seldom can a decisive and constructive epoch in history be examined more directly through the contemplation of a particular series of events – and in one man's life.
1 Most of the older works are cited in C. Gross, Sources and Literature of English History (ed. 1915), and in E. Frère, Manuel de bibliographe normand (1858, 1860) – a wholly admirable work. Cf. also Douglas, Norman Conquest and British Historians (1937), and the select bibliography given below on pp. 427–447.
2 Recueil des Actes des Ducs de Normandie (Mémoires de la Société des Antiquaires de Normandie, vol. XXXVI, 1961). Cited hereafter as R.A.D.N.
3 Douglas, op. cit.; also English Scholars, chaps. III and VI.
4 J. A. Pococke, Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law (1957); C. Hill, Democracy and the Labour Movement (1959).
5 Frederick the Great, vol. I, p. 415; quoted by W. Stubbs, Constitutional History (ed. 1891), vol. I, p. 236. Cf. J. Milton, History of Britain (ed. 1695), pp. 356, 357.
6 Life and Letters (ed. W. R. W. Stephens), vol. I, p. 125.
7 Cf. R. W. Southern, Making of the Middle Ages, especially pp. 15–57.
8 Chap. 1.
9 Chap. 2.
10 Chap. 3.
11 Chap. 4.
12 Chap. 5.
13 Chap. 6
14 Chap. 7.
15 Chap. 8.
16 Chap. 9.
17 Chap. 10.
18 Chap. 11.
19 Chap. 12.
20 Chap. 13.
21 Chap. 14.
22 Cf. the phrases in AS. Chron., s.a. 1087, with those used in the Chanson de Roland (vv. 371–374 and vv. 2331, 2332). Cf. Douglas, French Studies, vol. XIV (1960), pp. 99–114.
23 Mon. Germ. Hist. Scriptores, vol. XXVI, pp. 489–495.
24 J. Laporte, Annales de Jumièges (1954), pp. 7–23.
25 Rec. Hist. Franc., vol. XI, pp. 70 et sqq. Cf. E. Vacandard, Rev. catholique de Normandie, vol. III, p. 123.
26 Separated from its later additions in the edition of J. Marx (1914). Cited hereafter as ‘Will. Jum.’.
27 L. Delisle, Bibliothèque de l' Êcole de Chartes, vol. LXXI (1910).
28 R.A.D.N., pp. 242–449.
29 For this reason a somewhat full citation of the original testimony has been given in the footnotes to the pages which follow.