445 – Feeding Frenzy

Welcome to the British History Podcast.

My name is Jamie, and this is episode 445: Feeding Frenzy.

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Matilda was dead.

And now things were coming apart at the seams.

The fact is, she appears to have been holding the House of Normandy together, though you wouldn't know that if you just relied on her eulogies left by the scribes.

Churchmen like Orderic, while writing these eulogies, emphasized the fact that she was a good woman.

And for them, that meant she was a quiet one who was focused on her faith.

And by focused on her faith, they meant a woman who gave the church fat stacks of cash on the regular.

Now, to be clear, I have no reason to think that Matilda didn't have a deep faith in her religion.

However, when we read these eulogies, we're reading a curated account of a person.

The scribes were telling us that Matilda was a very good woman.

And to do that, they were focusing on what their culture defined as a very good noblewoman.

So we're not going to read about her very real impact on the political stage when we're reading these eulogies.

We also won't read about how she regularly governed as regent, nor how much William benefited from her connections and political clout.

We won't read about how it was her effort, and specifically her influence on William, that appears to have kept this dysfunctional family together.

Matilda was likely a good medieval noblewoman, but she was also a highly skilled politician.

However, we have to look elsewhere in the record to see those powerful aspects of Matilda's life.

But once you know where to look, it's very clear that Matilda did a lot for this family.

And now she was gone.

I have no doubt that her absence was felt deeply in Rouen and Winchester.

But unfortunately, we don't have any written accounts detailing how the royal family was coping, because Matilda and the boys were knights.

And the quickest way to defeat a knight is to challenge him to a spelling bee.

And while I give them a lot of shit over this, I genuinely wish it wasn't the case.

I want to read William's sad poetry.

I want to read his Mopey Live Journal posts.

I want access to all of the things that he would have produced if he was part of our modern culture of oversharing.

But that's not how it is.

And so we just have to wonder how he and the boys were handling this loss.

Because at this point, we're in an informational black hole.

And it's actually worse than normal.

Way worse.

For example, you may remember that Robert just sort of bailed on the family when Matilda died.

Well, there's an indication in the records that another quarrel had kicked up between Robert and his father, King William.

But there's no detail about it.

Not how it it started, not why it started, not even when it started.

And while you might be inclined to say, well, I mean, these were feudal Normans, so the scribes probably didn't record those details because a quarrel between these guys was just another day at the office.

Well, I should remind you that the last time the scribes reported a so-called quarrel, there was an entire civil war within Normandy, and William was nearly killed on the battlefield.

Norman family quarrels are way more dangerous than those awkward arguments you get into with your uncle on Facebook.

Normans bicker with swords on horseback.

And speaking of quarreling, another fight had actually kicked up shortly after Matilda's death, because it turned out that, once again, there was trouble in Maine.

And thankfully, unlike what was happening in the royal family, our favorite 11th century gossip Orderic Vitalis decided to give us a ton of juicy details about this conflict.

Now, unfortunately, this is also Orderic.

And at the risk of sounding like the critics that pissed him off so much, I do need to point out that he had some problems in his account.

Specifically, he had some timeline issues.

For example, he cannot decide if this conflict with Maine lasted three years or four years.

And while that might seem minor, it's actually a really big problem because if the conflict lasted four years, then England was ruled by William the Lich King, who was commanding armies from beyond the grave.

And while that sounds awesome, I'm also pretty sure it would have been recorded somewhere.

So I'm going to assume that Orderk did what we all tend to do while living through stressful times, and he just kind of lost track of time.

I mean, remember when we couldn't leave our homes for 23 years due to the pandemic?

Man, that was a crazy time.

So yeah, perhaps Order's sources were a bit like that, and it just felt like the events were lasting longer than they actually were.

And in that case, maybe this conflict only lasted like three years or less.

But anyway, let's get to the conflict.

So what happened?

Well, you can point to a number of small political moves and stuff like that, but if you take a bigger picture view, you see the larger problem.

People had been protecting William from himself for pretty much his entire adult life.

He was surrounded by people who had been doing the thankless task of smoothing feathers and taking the temperature down, and when that didn't work, preparing armies for him.

But things had changed.

Matilda was dead, and Fitz Osborne was dead.

And Odo, well, he was in prison, and Robert was probably in rebellion.

And King Philip these days openly hated him, and the Count of Flanders also hated him.

And Pope Gregory, right now, was up to his eyeballs in papal crises.

Things had gotten very bad in the world, and most of the people or organizations that William could rely on were either sick of his nonsense these days or were dead.

And a good indicator of just how bad William's situation had become can be found in the record of Christmas of 1083.

On this year, Count Fulk of Anjou hosted a Christmas party at his estate.

And in attendance were several powerful nobles from Burgundy and Maine, men like Robert the Burgundian and Geoffrey de Mayenne.

And while I love a good Christmas party, what we're seeing here isn't that.

This is a gathering of nobles who were either openly hostile to William or who were politically aligned with figures who were openly hostile to William.

We're also at the same time seeing a generational turn.

William was no longer the young upstart, nor were his companions, you know, what was left of them.

Making matters worse, Count Fulk of Anjou was in many ways a younger version of William and one of the aging conqueror's main rivals.

So this party was not great news for the House of Normandy.

And remember, these were medieval nobles, which meant that their holidays were less like the Hallmark channel and much more, well, medieval.

So it's very likely there wasn't much partying at this Christmas party.

And it was more of a preliminary marshalling of forces.

You know, the preparations for a campaign.

And if William caught word of this Christmas party, either hearing what they were planning or just worrying that they were getting together and might plan something, the anxiety in Rouen and the concerns about his numerous numerous enemies would have been quite high.

I mean, what exactly were they up to over there?

And that brings us to one particular French noble.

And of course, his name was Hubert, because there were only like six names in all of France.

And this Hubert was the Vicomte of Maine.

And that meant he had a lot of power in the region that William was still trying to exert control over.

And critically, Hubert held land sitting between William and the influential city of Le Mans in Maine.

Even worse for William, Hubert had been one of the bastards' main rivals back in the 1060s and early 1070s.

So he was already someone that William was probably not too trusting of.

And then right in the middle of all of this mess, while shady Angevin Christmas parties were going on, Orderk reports that following the death of Matilda, Vicant Hubert just up and rebelled.

And he wasn't rebelling for freedom from William, nor justice, nor any sort of independence.

No, Orderk tells us that Hubert rebelled because William had offended him.

Specifically, he says that Hubert, quote, gave umbrage to the king at first on some trivial occasions, end quote.

Basically, William did something rude and Hubert overreacted, which, you know, checks out.

And then, rather than calming down, we're told Hubert proceeded to get more and more upset and heaped on a bunch of other complaints on top of it, which also checks out.

These were, after all, 11th century feudal nobles.

And we're told that Hubert was so mad at William that he took his soldiers and his resources out of his castles at Beaumont and Frenaille and plonked them down in his castle castle at Saint-Suzanne.

So now it wasn't just a castle, it was a base camp for his campaign.

And this wasn't just Hubert and some soldiers.

The guy also brought his wife and all his other followers with him to that castle.

And probably for good reason, because here's Orderic:

quote, the fortress in which he took refuge stands on a high rock above the river Euv, on the borders of Maine and Anjou, end quote.

So strategically and tactically, Saint-Suzanne was a beast.

And once Hubert flew his flag of rebellion, other people in Maine began to take up his cause.

Why?

Well, probably because they weren't all that thrilled with Norman domination.

But Orderic's take on the cause is too good to skip.

So here's what he has to say about the people of Maine: quote, a people of naturally unsettled temper and ever ready to disturb the peace of others and disquiet themselves by their love of change, flew in arms against the king and occasioned great expenditure and damage on their own state as well as many others.

End quote.

Which, I think you'll agree, has a very they hate us for our freedoms vibe.

But it's quite clear that as far as Orderic was concerned, this rebellion had nothing to do with William or the Normans, and the people of Maine were just unstable and chaotic.

And so, once Hubert and his army were entrenched in their castle, you know, hating stability, they decided to launch attacks upon the Normans.

And they didn't have to go to the border of Normandy to do it.

Norman soldiers were stationed throughout Maine as an occupying force, or, as Orderic phrases it, quote, guarding the country of Maine, end quote, which was very thoughtful of them.

And as Hubert and his men were attacking their

guards, it became quickly apparent that they were very, very good at this.

We're told that they made regular incursions into Norman-controlled territory, and the boldness of their tactics really started to freak out the Norman garrisons.

And before long, they were begging the king to come to their aid.

Now, As you no doubt have gathered, I really don't buy the idea that this was just a group of chaotic, apolitical people launching a blind rebellion due to their love of change.

I don't even believe that the rebellion was inspired by a trivial insult.

I mean, we're not even told what the supposed insult was.

And I think that's because it didn't really matter.

I suspect that Hubert's claim of hurt feelings over an insult was just pretext.

I think Hubert was looking to kick off a broader war with William, because that was the plan all along.

Remember Count Fulk's Christmas celebration?

And how there were nobles from Maine, Burgundy, and elsewhere in attendance?

Well, funny story.

When Hubert rebelled, guess who started showing up to his castle at Saint-Suzanne?

Quote, knights from Aquitaine, Burgundy, and other provinces of France, end quote.

What an odd coincidence.

And the speed at which this whole thing goes off the rails is breathtaking.

Matilda died in early November of 1083.

Folk's Christmas celebration was about two months later.

And by early January of 1084, we're talking like weeks after that Christmas party, we have evidence in the charters that suggest that William's army was on the move, likely to defend against this rebellion.

And this was a big army.

Orderick tells us that William mustered his troops from Normandy and then added to them any people from Maine who remained loyal to him.

On top of that, when we look at the charters from this period, which were likely drawn up during the army's advance, we see the presence of major military figures, including William's half-brother, Robert of Mortain, as well as his sons, William Rufus and Robert Curthose.

And you did hear that right.

It appears that the king's firstborn son had rejoined court, at least for a bit.

And that makes sense when you you think about it.

After all, Robert did want to inherit one day, and if his dad lost some territory in one of these squabbles, that wouldn't do Robert any good.

But ultimately, when we look at these records, we get the impression that this conflict broke out very quickly, and William responded soon thereafter.

I mean, even if the charters are a coincidence and the fighting didn't start until the campaigning season, this thing still happened pretty fast.

And so, at least by spring, and probably by January of 1084, William was in the field ready to deal with Hubert.

So the fight was on.

Now, under normal circumstances, when facing off with an enemy boarded up inside a castle and launching attacks from within, you would expect William to surround Saint-Suzanne with siege castles and keep Robert's forces contained inside.

Once the castle was surrounded, then we'd expect him to either bring the structure down or just starve Hubert out.

We've seen William do this many times in the past.

And we've even seen him do this when his enemy was using essentially nature as his castle, as was the case with Harroward and the rebels of Ely.

And because something like that takes a long time, after the castle was surrounded, you'd expect him to go and ravage any nearby communities that were linked to that enemy.

It's a 1-2 punch that worked very well for William.

And there were, in fact, nearby communities that fit the bill, like Sable and Cron.

But William didn't do any of that.

Instead, he just established an earthwork encampment to the north of San-Suzanne, which was called Le Compe de Bougie.

I'm not kidding, by the way.

And from now on, that's what I'm calling glamping.

But once established at Le Compe de Bougie, which literally translates to the Bougie camp, William made no efforts to establish further encampments or siege castles to the south of Saint-Suzanne, which is what he would have needed if he wanted to cut Hubert off.

He didn't even attack Sabla or Cron.

Instead, the Norman force at the Bougie camp just stayed to the north of Hubert and tried to hamper his efforts to penetrate further into Norman-controlled territory.

Orderic even tells us specifically that William had no intent to use his bougie camp to directly assault Saint-Suzanne, which obviously raises the question of why.

Well, Orderic doesn't tell us, but it seems quite likely that William realized that this conflict was resting on a knife's edge and that Count Fulk and his friends would love an excuse to get involved.

Historian David Bates argues that William, by taking a defensive posture here rather than going on an all-out offensive, and also by not moving south and thus closer to Fulk and his friends, may have been trying to keep this fight strictly between him and Hubert.

Basically, William was refusing to take the bait.

And as for why he wasn't directly assaulting Hubert's castle, well, Orderig tells us that it was pretty much impregnable thanks to its position on the rocks, and also because it was surrounded by a dense thicket of vineyards.

And strategically, not attacking is probably the right call here.

I mean, if his entire force was torn to shreds, that probably would please Fulk to no end.

So it looks like William decided to opt for a strategy of containment.

But even though he was just keeping this conflict between him and Hubert, the fact was, this was a very expensive conflict.

Keeping an army of that size in the field meant that there were far fewer hands tending the fields back home.

Furthermore, all those soldiers needed to be fed and cared for.

And then there was also the matter of payment.

Soldiers, especially higher-ranked ones, would be expecting some sort of reward at the end of this.

Also, as we know all too well by now, keeping this many knights all together was certain to create all manner of problems if you didn't keep them entertained.

I mean, even when knights were entertained, they still managed to do things like kick off wars by peeing on each other.

So at the very least, you probably want to set up rudimentary tournaments or other sorts of war games to keep the knights happy and distracted.

And that also would cost money.

Basically, William was bleeding cash here.

But no worries, he always had his ATM on hand.

And right on cue, the chronicle tells us that in 1084, as he was waging this war, William imposed, quote, a great and heavy tax, end quote.

John of Worcester tells us that William demanded, quote, six shillings from every hide of land throughout England, end quote.

He was hitting the English with a big blanket tax.

Now, it should be noted that we have no indication that William came to England in 1084.

So chances are this tax was imposed upon the English via messenger rather than directly by the king.

So he didn't leave the battlefield to personally issue an adjustment to your 1040 EZ.

But regardless of whether or not the king did it personally, the English suddenly found themselves having to tighten their belts once again to fund one of William's endless problems on the continent.

And speaking of problems on the continent, down in Rome, Pope Gregory was still having problems of his own.

And I'm going to try and keep this brief.

So King Henry of Germany was still pissed at Greg, and he had all of that money from the Byzantine Emperor for the express purpose of kicking the bejesus out of the Pope, as well as his Norman friend Robert Guiscard.

And so lately, Henry had been trying to bring his army over the mountains to Rome, you know, so he could get the job done.

Now, unfortunately for Henry, between him and Rome lay Countess Matilda of Tuscany.

And Countess Matilda was an incredible military medieval leader, and also an ally of Pope Gregory.

There's actually way too much to get into with her, but there are two things of note regarding Matilda of Tuscany that you should know.

One, she was obviously solid marriage material, and Robert Curtos had noticed this.

Stick a pin in that one.

And second, she and her armies had been almost single-handedly keeping Henry out of Rome.

So eventually, Henry was forced to try a different route, a non-Matilda of Tuscany route.

And only then was he finally able to reach the city.

Rome surrendered, and the Pope locked himself inside the mausoleum of Hadrian.

And it was from here that Gregory and Henry began to argue over terms.

Henry wanted the Pope to crown him emperor, and the Pope wanted Henry to drop dead.

Henry spiced up the offer and said that he would betray his ally, anti-Pope Clement, and hand him over to Gregory if only the Pope would just crown him emperor.

But the Pope was still pretty happy with his initial offer of drop dead.

Now there was some more wrangling that went on here, but that's basically the gist of it.

And while all that was going on, a council of bishops was convened at the Pope's request, and guess what happened?

Yep, they excommunicated Henry again.

And apparently, this was the final goddamn straw for Henry.

So he entered Rome again, and in March of 1084, he established Anti-Pope Clement III as new Pope Clement III.

And then Clement, Clement, now promoted, immediately crowned Henry as emperor.

And while all of this was going on, Gregory was reaching out to his allies for help.

And shortly after Clement and Henry gave each other promotions, that old Norman adventurer, Robert Giscard, appeared along with his merry band of bastards.

And there were a lot of them because new Emperor Henry was forced to run from the city.

Now, unfortunately, the people of Rome Rome had enough of Gregory's chaos by this point, and inviting a shady Norman adventurer and his shady Norman army into the city was the last nail in the coffin of Gregory's public opinion numbers.

So, realizing he very well might find himself torn apart by an angry mob, Gregory also fled the city.

He first took refuge in Monte Cassino, and then later at Salerno.

And the reason why I'm still calling Gregory Gregory and not Hildebrand Hildebrand is because he never gave up his papal name nor title.

Even when he was in exile, he still insisted he was Pope Gregory VII.

And that meant there were still two men who were claiming to be the real Pope.

And I've got news for you.

Even after Gregory dies, there will still be two men claiming to be the real Pope, because his faction flat refused to accept Clement.

And so they elected their own Pope instead.

And when that one died, they selected another.

And then when that one died, they selected yet another.

This faction never accepted new Pope Clement, even after he was outliving a surprising number of other popes.

And actually, even after Pope Clement III died, he still wouldn't be accepted.

About a century later, when Paolo Scolari was elected pope and he said he wanted to be known as Pope Clement, he became the second Pope Clement III.

Because as far as the church was concerned, that first Pope Clement III wasn't a real pope.

He was at best anti-Pope Clement, or really, just Wibbert.

So that's what's going on in Rome.

I guess they just really love chaos and change.

Meanwhile, back at the Bougie camp, William was no longer commanding the army.

Instead, Alan Rufus was in charge.

Now, over the last few years, Rufus had become fantastically wealthy.

In fact, when the doomsday book is recorded, about a year from now, we'll see that he is one of the richest and most powerful men in England, lagging behind only the king's half-brother, Robert of Mortain, and the king himself.

And in William's court, that kind of wealth was the result of being very high in the king's personal esteem.

So we can be sure that William wasn't just leaving some rando in charge of this siege.

He was leaving this campaign in the hands of one of his most trusted commanders.

But setting aside the interpersonal element here, Alan was also a wise choice on his own merits.

The fact was that Hubert's possessions were quite close to Brittany, which meant that Alan, as a Breton noble, had a direct stake in this.

And beyond that, Alan, by being not William, was probably able to handle regional matters and diplomatic efforts involving figures outside of Normandy far better than the bastard could.

So leaving him in charge makes a lot of sense.

But as for why he was in charge, well, it turns out, the king was needed elsewhere.

Now, Orderic doesn't tell us why the king was needed, but he does tell us that it was urgent.

And when we look at other records, well, I don't think he was wrong.

This was urgent.

Do you remember Swain Ethreson?

You know, the king of Denmark and extended family member of the Godwinsons, who launched a few failed invasions.

Well, he died back in 1076, and his firstborn son, Harold, took the throne.

But then Harold died four years later without any children.

And so the throne went to Swain's secondborn son, Canute, who became King Canute IV of Denmark in 1080.

And along with the kingdom, Canute also inherited his dad's ambitions to become king of England.

And chances are, word of Canute's ambition had been circulating for several years by now.

But a goal without a plan is just a wish.

So no problem there.

Well,

actually,

something of a big problem.

because Canute was actually a planner.

And he was making plans to make good on his wish.

The thing is that Knut's dad, Swain, had relied far too much on gaining local support for his dream invasion.

That's why his invasion forces were actually kind of small.

First, he tried to invade with a fleet of 300 ships, and then on the second attempt, it was just 200 ships.

And while they might have been able to pull that off with local support, they squandered it and actually betrayed their Northumbrian allies.

And betrayals like that have knock-on effects.

And as such, there was just no way that Canute, as his father's son, was going to be able to gather much local support for his planned invasion.

And that's assuming that he'd even be able to find someone living up there, which he probably wouldn't.

So yeah, there's no way he'd be able to rely on English support.

He'd have to find others who were interested in joining his venture.

Others who really wanted to stick it to William.

And Count Robert of Flanders was perfect for this.

This This guy absolutely fing hated William.

And now that his sister, Matilda, was dead, there was very little that was holding him back anymore.

And he had ships.

And so, Canute IV was hard at work in Denmark, assembling a fleet of over 1,000 ships.

And over in Flanders, Count Robert was hard at work.

gathering his own fleet of 600 ships.

It was time for a little chaos and change.

All aboard the Bruce Cruise.

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