Medieval Warfare 1000-1300 075462515X, 9780754625155

Table of contents :
Acknowledgements vi
Series Preface ix
Introduction xi
1. J. O. Prestwich (1954), 'War and Finance in the Anglo-Norman State', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4, pp. 19-43. 1
2. Elisabeth van Houts (1998), 'The Anglo-Flemish Treaty of 1101', Anglo-Norman Studies, 21, pp. 169-74. 27
3. Stephen D. B. Brown (1989), 'Military Service and Monetary Reward in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries', History, 74, pp. 20-38. 33
4. Jean Richard (1952), 'An Account of the Battle of Hattin Referring to the Frankish Mercenaries in Oriental Moslem States', Speculum, 27, pp. 168-77. 53
5. Ian Pierce (1987), 'Arms, Armour and Warfare in the Eleventh Century', Anglo-Norman Studies, 10, pp. 237-57. 63
6. R. H. C. Davis (1987), 'The Warhorses of the Normans', Anglo-Norman Studies, 10, pp. 67-82. 85
7. Claude Gaier (1965), 'Analysis of Military Forces in the Principality of Liège and the Country of Looz from the Twelfth to the Fifteenth Century', Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History, 2, pp. 1-42, 42a,42b [205-61]. 101
8. R. Allen Brown (1980), 'The Battle of Hastings', Anglo-Norman Studies, 3, pp. 1-21, 197-201. 145
9. Matthew Bennett (1998), 'The Myth of the Military Supremacy of Knightly Cavalry', in M. J. Strickland (ed.), Armies, Chivalry and Warfare. Proceedings of the 1995 Harlaxton Symposium, Stamford: Paul Watkins, pp. 304-16. 171
10. Michael Prestwich (1995), 'Miles in Armis Strenuus: The Knight at War', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6, pp. 201-20. 185
11. Bernard S. Bachrach (1983), 'The Angevin Strategy of Castle Building in the Reign of Fulk Nerra, 987-1040', American Historical Review, 88, pp. 533-60. 205
12. Charles Coulson (1996), 'Cultural Realities and Reappraisals in English Castle-Study', Journal of Medieval History, 22, pp. 171-207. 233
13. Donald R. Hill (1973), 'Trebuchets', Viator, 4, pp. 99-114, 114a, 114b. 271
14. John Beeler (1963), 'Towards a Re-Evaluation of Medieval English Generalship', Journal of British Studies, 3, pp. 1-10. 289
15. John Gillingham (1984), 'Richard I and the Science of War in the Middle Ages', in J. Gillingham and J. C. Holt (eds.), War and Government in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of J. O. Prestwich, Woodbridge: Boydell, pp. 78-91. 299
16. Stephen Morillo (1990), 'Hastings: An Unusual Battle', Haskins Society Journal, 2, pp. 95-103. 313
17. Richard Benjamin (1988), 'A Forty Years War: Toulouse and the Plantagenets, 1156-96', Historical Research, 61, pp. 270-85. 323
18. Elena Lourie (1966), 'A Society Organized for War: Medieval Spain', Past and Present, 35, pp. 54-76. 339
19. Reuven Amitai-Preiss (1992), 'Ayn Jalut Revisited', Tarih, 2, pp. 119-50. 363
20. Thomas Asbridge (1997), 'The Significance and Causes of the Battle of the Field of Blood', Journal of Medieval History, 23, pp. 301-16. 395
21. A. J. Forey (1984), 'The Failure of the Siege of Damascus in 1148', Journal of Medieval History, 10, pp. 13-23. 411
22. Alan V. Murray (1992), 'The Army of Godfrey of Bouillon, 1096-1099: Structure and Dynamics of a Contingent on the First Crusade', Revue belge de philologie et d'histoire, 70, pp. 301-29. 423
23. John France (2000), 'Crusading Warfare and its Adaptation to Eastern Conditions in the Twelfth Century', Mediterranean Historical Review, 15, pp. 49-66. 453
24. Denys Pringle (1989), 'Crusader Castles: The First Generation', Fortress, 1, pp. 1-16. 471
25. Ronnie Ellenblum (1999), 'Frankish Castle-Building in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem', in S. Rozenberg (ed.), Knights of the Holy Land. The Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, Jerusalem: Israeli Museum, pp. 1-5 [142-7]. 487
26. H. E. J. Cowdrey (1977), 'The Mahdia Campaign of 1087', English Historical Review, 92, pp. 1-29. 493
27. John H. Pryor (1982), 'Transportation of Horses by Sea during the Era of the Crusades: Eighth Century to 1285 A.D.', Mariners Mirror, 68, pp. 9-30, 103-26. 523
28. John W. Nesbitt (1963), 'The Rate of March of Crusading Armies in Europe: A Study and Computation', Traditio, 19, pp. 167-81. 569
29. Malcolm Barber (1992), 'Supplying the Crusader States: The Role of the Templars', in B. Z. Kedar (ed.), The Horns of Hattin, Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, pp. 314-26. 585
30. David Nicolle (2002), 'Wounds, Military Surgery and the Reality of Crusading Warfare: the Evidence of Usamah's Memoires', Journal of Oriental and African Studies, 5, pp. 33-46. 599
31. Yvonne Friedman (2001), 'Captivity and Ransom: The Experience of Women', in S. B. Edgington and S. Lambert (eds.), Gendering the Crusades Cardiff: University of Wales Press, pp. 121-39. 613
Name Index 633

Citation preview

Medieval Warfare 1000-1300

The International Library of Essays on Military History Series Editor: Jeremy Black Titles in the Series: Modern Counter-Insurgency Jan Beckett

African Military History John Lamphear

Macedonian Warfare Richard Billows

Warfare in China to 1600 Peter Lorge

Warfare in Europe 1650-1792 Jeremy Black

World War I Michael Neiberg

Warfare in the Middle East since 1945 Ahron Bregman

The Army of Imperial Rome Michael F Pavkovic

The English Civil War Stanley Carpenter

The Army of the Roman Republic Michael F Pavkovic

Warfare in Latin America, Volumes I and II Miguel A. Centeno

Warfare in South Asia from 1500 Douglas Peers

United States Military History 1865 to the Present Day Jeffery Charlston

The American Civil War Ethan S. Rafuse

Medieval Warfare 1300-1450 Kelly De Vries Medieval Warfare 1000-1300 John France Warfare in the Dark Ages John France and Kelly DeVries Naval History 1500-1680 Jan Glete Byzantine Warfare John Haldan Warfare in Early Modern Europe 1450-1660 Paul Hammer Naval Warfare 1680-1850 Richard Harding Warfare in Europe 1919-1938 Geoffrey Jensen Warfare in Japan Harald Kleinschmidt Naval History 1850-Present Andrew Lambert

The British Army 1815-1914 Harold E. Raugh, Jr The Russian Imperial Army 1796--1917 Roger Reese Medieval Ships and Warfare Susan Rose Warfare in Europe 1792-1815 Frederick C. Schneid The Second World War Nick Smart Warfare in China Since 1600 Kenneth Swope Warfare in the USA 1784-1861 Samuel Watson The Armies of Classical Greece Everett Wheeler The Vietnam War James H. Willbanks Warfare in Europe 1815-1914 Peter H. Wilson

Medieval Warfare 1000-1300

Edited by

John France University of Wales Swansea, UK

~~ ~~o~;~~n~~~up LONDON AND NEW YORK

First published 2006 by Ashgate Publishing Published 2016 by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA Routledge is an imprint ofthe Taylor & Francis Group, an infonna buJiness

Copyright iC) John France 2006. For copyright of individual articles please refer to the AcknmYledgements.

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data MedieYal warfare 1000-1300. -(The international library of essays in military history) !.Military art and science - History - MedievaL 500-1500 2.Middle Ages- History 3.Europe- History, Milita!) !.France, John 355'.00902 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Medieval \\arfare, I 000-1300 I edited by John France. p. em.- (The international library of essays in military history) ISBN 0-7546-2515-X (all(. paper) I. Military art and science-History-MedievaL 500-1500. 2. Military history, Medieval. I. France, John. II. Series. U37.M433 2005 355'. 009'02--dc22

ISBN 9780754625155 (hbk)

2004062794

Contents Acknowledgements Series Preface Introduction

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 I0 II

12 13 14 15 16

J.O. Prestwich (1954), 'War and Finance in the Anglo-Norman State', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4, pp. 19-43. Elisabeth van Houts (1998), 'The Anglo-Flemish Treaty of 1101 ',Anglo-Norman Studies, 21, pp. 169-74. Stephen D.B. Brown (1989), 'Military Service and Monetary Reward in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries', History, 74, pp. 20-3 8. Jean Richard (1952), 'An Account of the Battle ofHattin Referring to the Frankish Mercenaries in Oriental Moslem States', Speculum, 27, pp. 168-77. Ian Pierce (1987), 'Arms, Armour and Warfare in the Eleventh Century', AngloNorman Studies, 10, pp. 237-57. R.H.C. Davis (1987), 'The Warhorses of the Normans', Anglo-Norman Studies, 10, pp. 67-82. Claude Gaier (1965), 'Analysis ofMilitary Forces in the Principality of Liege and the Country of Looz from the Twelfth to the Fifteenth Century', Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History, 2, pp. 1-42, 42a,42b [205-61]. R. Allen Brown (1980), 'The Battle of Hastings', Anglo-Norman Studies, 3, pp. 1-21, 197-201. Matthew Bennett (1998), 'The Myth of the Military Supremacy of Knightly Cavalry', in M.J. Strickland (ed.), Armies, Chivalry and Warfare. Proceedings ofthe 1995 HarlaxtonSymposium, Stamford: Paul Watkins, pp. 304-16. Michael Prestwich (1995), 'Miles in Armis Strenuus: The Knight at War', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6, pp. 201-20. BernardS. Bachrach (1983), 'The Angevin Strategy of Castle Building in the Reign of Fulk Nerra, 987-1 040', American Historical Review, 88, pp. 533--60. Charles Coulson ( 1996), 'Cultural Realities and Reappraisals in English CastleStudy', Journal of Medieval History, 22, pp. 171-207. Donald R. Hill (1973), 'Trebuchets', Viator, 4, pp. 99-114, 114a, 114b. John Beeler (1963), 'Towards a Re-Evaluation of Medieval English Generalship', Journal of British Studies, 3, pp. 1-10. John Gillingham (1984), 'Richard I and the Science of War in the Middle Ages', in J. Gillingham and J.C. Holt (eds), War and Government in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour ofJ. 0. Prestwich, Woodbridge: Boydell, pp. 78-91. Stephen Morillo (1990), 'Hastings: An Unusual Battle', Haskins Society Journal, 2,pp.95-103.

vi ix xi

27 33 53 63 85 I0I

145 171 185 205 233 271 289 299 313

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Medieval Warfare 1000--1300

17 Richard Benjamin ( 1988), 'A Forty Years War: Toulouse and the Plantagenets, 1156-96', Historical Research, 61, pp. 270-85. 18 Elena Lourie (1966), 'A Society Organized for War: Medieval Spain', Past and Present, 35, pp. 54-76. 19 Reuven Amitai-Preiss (1992), 'Ayn Hi!Ut Revisited', Tarlh, 2, pp. 119-50. 20 Thomas Asbridge (1997), 'The Significance and Causes ofthe Battle ofthe Field of Blood', Journal of Medieval History, 23, pp. 301-16. 21 A.J. Forey (1984), 'The Failure ofthe Siege of Damascus in 1148', Journal of Medieval History, 10, pp. 13-23. 22 Alan V. Murray (1992), 'The Army of Godfrey of Bouillon, 1096-1099: Structure and Dynamics of a Contingent on the First Crusade', Revue belge de philologie et d'histoire, 70, pp. 301-29. 23 John France (2000), 'Crusading Warfare and its Adaptation to Eastern Conditions in the Twelfth Century', Mediterranean Historical Review, 15, pp. 49-66. 24 Denys Pringle (1989), 'Crusader Castles: The First Generation', Fortress, 1, pp. 1-16. 25 Ronnie Ellenblum (1999), 'Frankish Castle-Building in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem', in S. Rozen berg (ed.), Knights of the Holy Land. The Crusader Kingdom ofJerusalem, Jerusalem: Israeli Museum, pp. 1-5 [142-7]. 26 H.E.J. Cowdrey (1977), 'The Mahdia Campaign of I 087', English Historical Review, 92, pp. 1-29. 27 John H. Pryor (1982), 'Transportation of Horses by Sea during the Era ofthe Crusades: Eighth Century to 1285 A.D.', Mariners Mirror, 68, pp. 9-30, 103-26. 28 John W. Nesbitt (1963), 'The Rate of March of Crusading Armies in Europe: A Study and Computation', Traditio, 19, pp. 167-81. 29 Malcolm Barber (1992), 'Supplying the Crusader States: The Role of the Templars', in B.Z. Kedar (ed.), The Horns ofHattin, Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, pp. 314-26. 30 David Nicolle (2002), 'Wounds, Military Surgery and the Reality of Crusading Warfare: the Evidence ofUsamah's Memoires', Journal of Oriental and African Studies, 5, pp. 33--46. 31 Yvonne Friedman (2001), 'Captivity and Ransom: The Experience of Women', in S.B. Edgington and S. Lambert (eds), Gendering the Crusades Cardiff: University of Wales Press, pp. 121-39. Name Index

323 339 363 395 411 423 453 471 487 493 523 569 585 599 613 633

Acknowledgements The editor and publishers wish to thank the following for permission to use copyright material. American Historical Association for the essay: Bernard S. Bachrach (1983), 'The Angevin Strategy of Castle Building in the Reign of Fulk Nerra, 987-1 040', American Historical Review, 88, pp. 533-60. Blackwell Publishing for the essay: Richard Benjamin (1988), 'A Forty Years War: Toulouse and the Plantagenets, 1156-96', Historical Research, 61, pp. 270-85. Boydell and Brewer Ltd for the essays: Elisabeth van Houts (1998), 'The Anglo-Flemish Treaty of 1101 ',Anglo-Norman Studies, 21, pp. 169-74; Ian Pierce (1987), 'Arms, Armour and Warfare in the Eleventh Century', Anglo-Norman Studies, 10, pp. 237-57; R.H.C. Davis (1987), 'The Warhorses of the Normans', Anglo-Norman Studies, 10, pp. 67-82; R. Allen Brown (1980), 'The Battle of Hastings', Anglo-Norman Studies, 3, pp. 1-21, 197201; John Gillingham (1984), 'Richard I and the Science of War in the Middle Ages', in J. Gillingham and J.C. Holt (eds), War and Government in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour ofJ.O. Prestwich, Woodbridge: Boydell, pp. 78-91. Elsevier for the essays: Charles Coulson (1996), 'Cultural Realities and Reappraisals in English Castle-Study', Journal of Medieval History, 22, pp. 171-207; Thomas Asbridge ( 1997), 'The Significance and Causes of the Battle of the Field of Blood', Journal of Medieval History, 23, pp. 301-16; A.J. Forey (1984), 'The Failure of the Siege of Damascus in 1148', Journal of Medieval History, 10, pp. 13-23. Fortressfortheessay:DenysPringle( 1989), 'CrusaderCastles: TheFirstGeneration' ,Fortress, 1, pp. 1-16. [14-25]. Yvonne Friedman for the essay: Yvonne Friedman (2001), 'Captivity and Ransom: The Experience of Women', in S.B. Edgington and S. Lambert (eds), Gendering the Crusades Cardiff: University of Wales Press, pp. 121-39. Haskins Society Journal for the essay: Stephen Morillo (1990), 'Hastings: An Unusual Battle', Haskins Society Journal, 2, pp. 95-103. Mariner's Mirror for the essay: John H. Pryor (1982), 'Transportation of Horses by Sea during the Era of the Crusades: Eighth Century to 1285 A.D.', Mariners Mirror, 68, pp. 9-30, 10326.

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Oxford University Press for the essays: Elena Lourie (1966), 'A Society Organized for War: Medieval Spain', Past and Present, 35, pp. 54-76; H.E.J. Cowdrey (1977), 'The Mahdia Campaign of 1087', English Historical Review, 92, pp. 1-29. Royal Historical Society for the essays: J.O. Prestwich (1954), 'War and Finance in the AngloNorman State', Transactions ofthe Royal Historical Society, 4, pp. 19--43; Michael Prestwich (1995), 'Miles in Armis Strenuus: The Knight at War', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6, pp. 201-20. Taylor and Francis Ltd for the essay: John France (2000), 'Crusading Warfare and its Adaptation to Eastern Conditions in the Twelfth Century', Mediterranean Historical Review, 15, pp. 49--66. http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals Traditio for the essay: John W. Nesbitt (1963), 'The Rate of March of Crusading Armies in Europe: A Study and Computation', Traditio, 19, pp. 167-81. Yad lzhak Ben-Zvi for the essay: Malcolm Barber (1992), 'Supplying the Crusader States: The Role of the Templars', in B.Z. Kedar (ed.), The Horns of Hattin, Jerusalem: Yad lzhak Ben-Zvi, pp. 314-26. University of Chicago Press for the essay: John Beeler (1963), 'Towards a Re-Evaluation of Medieval English Generalship', Journal ofBritish Studies, 3, pp. 1-10. Paul Watkins Publishers for the essay: Matthew Bennett ( 1998), 'The Myth of the Military Supremacy of Knightly Cavalry', in M.J. Strickland (ed.), Armies, Chivalry and Warfare. Proceedings of the 1995 Harlaxton Symposium, Stamford: Paul Watkins, pp. 304-16. Every effort has been made to trace all the copyright holders, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangement at the first opportunity.

Series Preface War and military matters are key aspects of the modern world and central topics in history study. This series brings together essays selected from key journals that exhibit careful analysis of military history. The volumes, each of which is edited by an expert in the field, cover crucial time periods and geographical areas including Europe, the USA, China, Japan, Latin America, and South Asia. Each volume represents the editor's selection of the most seminal recent essays on military history in their particular area of expertise, while an introduction presents an overview of the issues in that area, together with comments on the background and significance of the essays selected. This series reflects important shifts in the subject. Military history has increasingly taken a cultural turn, forcing us to consider the question of what wins wars in a new light. Historians used to emphasise the material aspects of war, specifically the quality and quantity of resources. That approach, bringing together technological proficiency and economic strength, appeared to help explain struggles for mastery within the West, as well as conflicts between the West and non-West. Now, the focus is rather on strategic culture - how tasks are set and understood - and on how resources are used. It involves exploring issues such as fighting quality, unit cohesion, morale, leadership, tactics, strategy, as well as the organisational cultural factors that affect assessment and use of resources. Instead of assuming that organisational issues were driven by how best to use, move and supply weapons, this approach considers how they are affected by social patterns and developments. Former assumptions by historians that societies are driven merely by a search for efficiency and maximisation of force as they adapt their weaponry to optimise performance in war ignored the complex process in which interest in new weapons interacted with the desire for continuity. Responses by warring parties to firearms, for example, varied, with some societies, such as those of Western Europe, proving keener to rely on firearms than others, for example in East and South Asia. This becomes easier to understand by considering the different tasks and possibilities facing armies at the time- when it is far from clear which weaponry, force structure, tactics, or operational method can be adopted most successfully- rather than thinking in terms of clear-cut military progress. Cultural factors also play a role in responses to the trial of combat. The understanding loss and suffering, at both the level of ordinary soldiers and of societies as a whole, is far more culturally conditioned than emphasis on the sameness of battle might suggest, and variations in the willingness to suffer losses influences both military success and styles of combat. Furthermore, war is not really about battle but about attempts to impose will. Success in this involves far more than victory on the battlefield; that is just a pre-condition of a more complex process. The defeated must be willing to accept the verdict of battle. This involves accommodation, if not acculturation - something that has been far from constant in different periods and places. Assimilating local religious cults, co-opting local elites, and, possibly, today, offering the various inducements summarised as globalisation, have been the most important means of achieving it over the years. Thus military history becomes an aspect of total history; and victory in war is best studied in terms of its multiple contexts. Any selection of what to include is difficult. The editors in this series have done an excellent job and it has been a great pleasure working with them. JEREMY BLACK

Series Editor University of Exeter

Introduction The academic study of medieval military history was, for a long time, conditioned by a series ofwell-established ideas. It was believed that warfare in this period was totally dominated by mounted knights. These were seen as substantial men who served kings and great magnates in return for land. They were supported by ill-disciplined and largely ineffective footsoldiers. English-speaking scholars were profoundly impressed by Sir Charles Oman's magisterial study of medieval warfare and by the conclusion embodied in the title of his seventh chapter, The Last Struggles of Infantry- Hastings and Dyrrachium. 1 According to Oman, from that time onwards, cavalry dominated warfare until the early fourteenth century, when effective infantry again came to the fore. The most important of these footsoldiers were the people of the Flemish cities who defeated the French chivalry at Courtrai in 1302 and the English bowmen who were so often victorious over the same enemy. Oman, therefore, defined the outstanding characteristic of military history in the period I 000-1300 as the dominance of the mounted knight. Not only was war in this period seen as primarily the affair of the knights, but it was also a matter of battles, as the title of Oman's seventh chapter makes clear. This was partly the influence of E. Creasy's enormously popular Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World which established an entire genre of battle-literature whose results can be seen on the shelves of libraries and bookshops to this day (Creasy, 1851 ). In turn Creasy was reflecting the supremacy in the nineteenth century of the ideas of Clausewitz who argued that the purpose of war was the destruction of the enemy's fighting forces by armed confrontation. The Clausewitzan view of the pre-eminence ofbattle influenced attitudes towards medieval generalship. Because much medieval warfare did not produce battles or even sieges, an enormous volume of medieval military activity was dismissed as uninteresting and inconclusive. It was assumed that nothing could be achieved in the absence of such great events and that those who directed it were, therefore, incapable. Moreover, academic historians in England and America were deeply concerned with constitutional and administrative history and they were happy to pigeonhole warfare as a rather pointless and ill-organized business peripheral to the main lines of historical development. They were further encouraged in this by the absence of any obvious major collection of sources, comparable to the records of the English monarchy kept at the Public Records Office in London. Researching war meant looking for small nuggets of information in a vast selection of source-material, some of it literary and all of it dispersed. Moreover, much military history was written and taught not in universities but in quite separate institutions, staff colleges, as part of the professional formation of officers. As a result military history was seen as a very separate, and perhaps rather inferior discipline. By and large, European writers, under much the same influences, tended to agree with Oman, and as a result his general view, that war in the period 1000-13 00 was totally dominated

1 C. Oman, 1884 was a prize essay expanded and republished as C. Oman, 1924.

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by cavalry, was sustained. 2 Oman's conclusions about medieval warfare were for long barely questioned. His methodology, based on analysis of battles, similarly reigned supreme. In a certain sense it can be said that Oman and his generation projected the ideas of Clausewitz upon the medieval past. This stance was unchallenged until the 1950s. The most authoritative work on warfare of that decade was written by the Belgian historian, J.F.Verbruggen who, in 1954, argued that war was a much more systematic activity than had generally been supposed (Verbruggen, 19543). But Verbruggen's general ideas had little impact because they were published in Dutch, and he was best known for his perceptive articles on the organization and tactics of medieval cavalry. This was because they were published in French, a rather more accessible language than Dutch for historians in the English-speaking world. Verbruggen's central notion that forces of knights employed considered tactics merely reinforced the existing view of a cavalry supremacy which continued until the fourteenth century, and the wider implications ofVerbruggen's ideas remained almost unknown. Another twenty years were to elapse before the central view of the importance of cavalry was challenged, but in the meantime significant work was being done which would indirectly undermine the whole thesis. It was always assumed that the knights, the key element in armies of this period, were provided with land in return for military service. In the view of many historians, such as R. Allen Brown (see Chapter 8 below) Norman knights were successful precisely because they were substantial men who could afford the best horses and the most effective armour. But this notion of the key nexus of the armoured knight serving in return for land was, in effect, and in a very radical way, challenged by J.O. Prestwich (Chapter 1). His essay sprang from the traditional English field of research into the nature of royal government. In this case Prestwich looked at Henry I's household and the complex rules drawn up to regulate its military members. From this Prestwich was able to show that under Henry I (1100-35) a distinct body of military men had come into being who served to control the king's military efforts. Some of these certainly were landowners, and others rose to that eminence, but many others seem to have been much humbler people who were, in effect, professional soldiers. They were far more than a bodyguard and formed a nucleus who took over key castles and commands in time of war, and around whom the royal army could be expanded at need. One of these, Odo Borleng, crushed the Norman barons who had rebelled against Henry I in the battle of Bourgtheroulde on March 26, 1124. He was clearly a knight, but others in the household were merely sergeants, although they had a military role. Prestwich's purpose was in no way polemical, but the implication of his research was that troops could be raised in a number of ways, and that mercenaries were prominent amongst them. Thus, Henry's armies were much more organized than historians had hitherto been prepared to believe, and the complex financial organization of his government was matched by a parallel military structure. Overall, the very modesty of this tightly constructed and beautifully researched essay, and the fact that it fitted very well into the traditional English speciality of administrative history, somewhat disguised its far-reaching implications. Others have followed where Prestwich led, and the importance of the military household of the English kings across this entire period is now widely recognized as a subject of research in itself (Prestwich, 1981; Chibnall, 1977; Crouch, 1990; Vincent, 1996; Church, 2 Delbriick, 1920--32 of which the 3'd volume of 1923 was translated by Renfroe, 1982; Lot, 1946. 3 Translated by Willard and Southern. 1977. revised edition, 1997.

Medieval Warfare 1000-1300

1999; Carpenter, 1996). 4 One of these works is reprinted here, Elisabeth van Houts' study and translation of the Treaty of Dover (Chapter 2). By the terms of this agreement of 1101 between Henry I of England and Robert II 'the Jerusalemite' of Flanders (1093-1111), the Flemish count undertook to raise 1000 mounted troops on request in return for an annual pension of £500. It is likely that the treaty repeated an earlier one of 1093 and we know that it was renewed in various forms into the reign of Henry II (1154-89). Van Rout's very useful essay makes clear the remarkable scale of military effort which could be mobilized by the Anglo-Norman kings and their successors. Since these mercenaries, with their horses and equipment, needed to be shipped to the Anglo-Norman realm within a month of the treaty being invoked it is evident that this could only be achieved by elaborate organization. Taken with J.O. Prestwich's essay it is very evident that there was a systematic form of control and command for English royal armies, and this challenged all accepted views of primitive medieval armies. At the same time the idea that the king could expand and contract his forces pointed to a greater flexibility than could ever have been achieved by relying on service from landed men. The theme of dependence of English royal armies on mercenaries was further explored and expanded in an essay by S.D.B. Brown (Chapter 3). In this, Brown points to the ubiquity of mercenaries in armies before and after the Norman conquest. He pointed out that, although the term mercenarius was pejorative and other words were preferred, notably stipendiarius, cash relationships for the purposes of war were regarded as honourable and were entered into by notable figures like Robert of Flanders and Henry I of England. Brown saw the distinction between the paid man and the endowed knights in the following terms: It might be useful to think of vassals as secure employees of a demanding but ultimately paternalistic

family firm and to cast mercenaries as external contractors, who might thrive in their prime but could rarely look forward to stability and protection in their old age.

Although Brown's article is about the Anglo-Norman world, he also shows that paid men were an obvious feature of warfare in this period in all the countries of the west. In fact western mercenaries were highly valued even outside Europe. Frankish mercenaries were a vital element in the Byzantine armies of the eleventh century (France, 1994).They were also used by Muslim potentates and this continued even into the crusader period. In his essay, J. Richard (Chapter 4) notes that in certain circumstances westerners could quite honourably enter into the service of Muslim military leaders. The Sultan of Morocco, in the years before 1147 recruited a force of Spanish knights who were so numerous that they needed their own priests and churches, and in the early thirteenth century the Seljuq Sultans oflconium valued his western knights very highly. Discussion of the make-up of armies in this period has focused on the knights who were the cavalry element in armies. It is now evident, as has been noted above, that a large proportion of them were professionals, and this seems to have become more and more marked across the period. However, these men were not sharply differentiated from tenured knights, and in fact they seem to have been drawn from members of this group who took up war as a vocation. Such men would have faced substantial costs as a consequence of their choice of profession. The nature ofthis equipment has been discussed by I. Pierce in a valuable essay which appears 4 For the household in the later thirteenth and fourteenth centuries see also Prestwich, 1996.

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as Chapter 5. This was expensive equipment, but as Pierce points out, swords were very fine weapons and the chain-mail provided excellent protection. One of the key elements of the knight's equipment was the horse and this is the subject of an essay by R.H.C. Davis (Chapter 6). As Davis shows, the warhorse of the eleventh century was not a very big animal, though it was substantial. To produce such animals an elaborate and expensive network of stud farms had to be created, and the young horses had then to be trained to withstand the conditions of battle. 5 In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries armour became more elaborate and heavier as the upper classes invested in self-protection, and the warhorse accordingly became heavier and stronger, and more costly. But the knight needed more than one horse. To save his precious warhorse he would use another for daily transport, and probably at least one other to carry his baggage. In Burgundy in the eleventh century a warhorse cost between 20 and 50 sous, about five times the price of an ox, while the shirt of steel rings, the hauberk cost about 100 sous, the price of a good peasant farm or manse. The wages paid to mercenaries were not so high as to suggest that they were intended to finance equipment on this scale. The general conclusion is, therefore, that professionals were younger sons of the knightly and noble classes who chose to make their way by war. Knights in England were a very variegated group, ranging from the very wealthy to the very poor, while northern European sources mention 'poor knights' (milites plebei) and the Spanish ones which distinguish between caballeros hidalgos and caballeros villanos (Harvey, 1970). Since at various times we hear of knights being paid wages, or even coming to serve without pay in the hope of booty and ransoms only, we should see the professional soldiers as being drawn from the upper classes and the knights who formed a reservoir of military talent and provided capital equipment for their sons. But knights were not the only people on the battlefield. In 1066 the Anglo-Saxon anny, an anny which fought entirely on foot, fought tenaciously to the bitter end against the Normans and almost held them off. In 1119 at BnSmule, Henry l's archers cut down a disordered French cavalry charge and at Bourgetheroulde in 1124, archers and dismounted knights were victorious over cavalry. In 1176 it was the citizens of Milan, fighting as infantry, who defeated the anny of the Emperor Frederick I ( 1152-90), while at the end of the period Edward I of England (1272-1307) raised huge numbers of foot for his wars in Wales and Scotland. The importance of foot in the armies of this period argues against the structure and chronology of military history as established by Oman. Now that it is recognized that infantry were always important across the whole period 1000-1300, the notion that foot suddenly improved and became important in the early fourteenth century has become untenable. In a very crude way we should note that the Flemish citizens who triumphed at Courtrai in 1302 were children of the thirteenth century! This is the importance of C. Gaier's essay (Chapter 7) printed here. This very distinguished Belgian historian discusses the nature of the forces raised in two important principalities of the Low Countries across the whole medieval period, and the most striking point he makes is that strong infantry were a constant. In fact common sense would suggest that foot soldiers were important in this period because they were very numerous in every major western army. Henry II of England was a highly successful general, partly because of his skilful use of mercenary foot. Despite increasing evidence of the importance

5 Davis later developed and elaborated his ideas in Davis, 1989. See also Hyland, 1994.

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of infantry, historians tended to see the knight as the single most important factor in warfare until comparatively recently. In his study of the battle of Hastings of l 066, R. Allen Brown (Chapter 8), while conceding that William used many infantry and that the Anglo-Saxons fought well, firmly asserted that it was the knights who won it. Nor, in a sense, was he wrong, but there was much more to it, and in particular William's preparations for the battle suggest that he intended his heavy foot, under a barrage of arrows, to break the enemy line. Brown believed that the Norman cavalry used shock tactics, couching their lances under their arms and charging en masse into the enemy line, relying on shock to break it. But there is considerable evidence, some of it in the Bayeux Tapestry on which Brown relied heavily, to show that couching was only one way of using the lance. Further, mass cavalry charges were very rare in the eleventh and twelfth centuries and it is likely that even at Hastings small groups of Normans attacked the AngloSaxon line, jabbing and even throwing javelins, and this seems to have been the pattern of cavalry usage in battles in the twelfth century. In fact, as Morillo has suggested, we have too long emphasized the knight as a 'weapons system' when in actuality he was an all-purpose warrior, quite prepared to fight on foot when conditions warranted it (Morillo, 1999). On August 22, 1138 the northern barons of England confronted a Scottish army of invasion at the battle of the Standard. When the initial Scots attacks were repulsed, Henry, son of the Scottish king, launched a cavalry attack: But his mounted knights could by no means continue long against knights in armour who fought on foot, close together in an immovable formation. 6

In fact M. Bennett (Chapter 9) challenges the traditional view of the supremacy of cavalry in a very clear and sharply-written essay which stresses the limitations of the man on horseback. Weather and topography often told against him, and this was particularly the case in wild areas like Wales. This essay has carried considerable weight with more recent writers. Cavalry, because of their mobility, continued to have the initiative in field-warfare, but they were not always the decisive factor in war, especially as they were of limited use in sieges and they did not always decide the result in pitched battle. 7 But the value of the knight, mounted and armoured, was very great. However, knighthood changed its nature, and this is the tenor of the essay by M. Prestwich (Chapter 10). At the start of our period the cavalry was made up of knights, but by the end of the twelfth century they were only an element within it. By about the turn of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries knighthood increasingly became a rank of the minor nobility, and cavalry forces are spoken of as consisting of knights and others, notably sergeants. The difference between them was social rather than military, though wealthier men could better afford the latest equipment. By the early fourteenth century the term 'man-atarms' was being used to describe the hardened professionals who now formed the bulk ofthe cavalry in armies. This professionalization probably explains why cavalry was so much more effective in battle in the thirteenth century. It should be noted that this new kind of cavalry appeared and accompanied the increasingly effective infantry of the later thirteenth century, amongst whom professionals were also a substantial element. 6 Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, in Greenway, 1996. 7 See notably France, 1999.

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So, gradually, historians have become aware of alternatives to the traditional view of war, and in particular they have evolved a different chronology. Horse and foot were always important elements in armies, and there was no moment when one became more important than the other. Both had always contained some professionals and both became more professionalized by 1300. However, command was retained in the hands of the traditional landowning military class because for them it was the ultimate justification of their role in society and an area, therefore, in which they claimed a monopoly. Harried by educated royal administrators who were displacing them in government and the councils of kings and rivalled by new urban elites, they clung to military leadership. One expression of this was their insistent building of castles which symbolized their status and particular calling. Few aspects of medieval warfare have been written about as much as castles. It had long been appreciated that the castle was essentially a fortified house, but the weight of opinion tended to emphasize their passive strength in war. B.S. Bachrach (Chapter 11), analyses the way in which Fulk Nerra, count of Anjou, used castles to create his important principality on the lower Loire. Bachrach established by careful research how Fulk built his castles to defend rights and lands he owned and to extend them into new areas. In this view castles were used strategically, both in defence and attack, to create a new political entity. The castle projected the power of its owner, for from it horsemen could ride out and dominate the countryside. This is why so many ofFulk's castles were about 30 miles apart. Bachrach shows that the building of a castle was never a simple defensive act because it was always also a challenge to the enemies of its builder. His work is extraordinarily important because it reveals to us how feudal lordships were created and how castles actually worked. Fulk's castles are amongst the earliest known to have been built in stone, for the generality of fortifications until well into the twelfth century were made of earth and timber. 8 But the most innovative work in recent years has been that of C. Coulson (Chapter 12), and the essay printed here has commanded enormous attention and given rise to a whole new way of looking at these great buildings. It has always been appreciated that castles were more than mere bunkers, but Coulson pointed out that many had features, like great windows, which made them positively unsuited to be strongpoints. Castles, he suggested, were as important for their non-military roles and he has originated a trend to look at them in this way, and even to consider the landscapes in which they are set. 9 But it is interesting that Coulson's evidence is largely limited to England, where there were long periods of peace, and most historians would argue that while the castle had many functions, it always had a military structure. Castello del Monte in Southern Italy is a superb pleasure palace built by the Emperor Frederick II (121750), but it also has a certain strength. It is always worth remembering that many medieval castles stood against attack by canon in the English Civil War of the seventeenth century. In fact, the existence of castles had a powerful influence on war. Infantry and engineers were always needed if they were to be besieged because it was necessary to resort to mining and special machinery if they were to be taken. One particularly important range of machines were catapults. D.R. Hill (Chapter 13), has shown that there were basically two types, the 'Traction-Trebuchet' operated by manpower and the 'Counterweight-Trebuchet' which was much more sophisticated and depended on a heavy counterweight for its driving force. 8 See also, for example, Bachrach, 1979. 9 Of particular interest is Liddiard, 2000.

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The 'Traction-Trebuchet' seems to have been known in the west since the very start of our period, but it was derived from China and was primarily an anti-personnel weapon. The more advanced counterweight type seems to be a Muslim or western development and was effective against all but the strongest stone walls. These were spectacular weapons and on occasion very effective, but for the most part siege was a contest of wills in which psychological factors were as important as machinery. But the very existence of these castles had a profound effect on medieval warfare. All these changes in the way medieval warfare was perceived have been very important. We now have a new chronology and a much more nuanced sense of how armies were made up and why castles were such a major factor. But the key development was an understanding of how warfare was conducted in the light of all these changes. The first sense of change came with an essay in 1963 by J. Beeler (Chapter 14), a distinguished American historian of medieval warfare. He was the first to challenge the notion that: European warfare in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries shews (sic) a somewhat bewildering variety of practice behind which lies no constructive idea (Thompson, 1929)Y'

Interestingly, Beeler drew on ideas developed by those studying the 'Hundred Years War', quoting with approval from Hewitt's account of one of the great expeditions of the Black Prince: Medieval warfare is not solely nor even largely battles and sieges. For weeks and even months at a time it is military pressure exerted by the destruction of life, property and the means by which life is maintained (Hewitt,1958). 11

In a curious way, the history of medieval warfare has been written backwards because the 'Hundred Years War' has always attracted a very great deal of attention. This was perhaps because it was seen as a war between nations, England and France, for both of whom the course of events had special interest and presented matters of pride. The French got a good result while the English achieved a series of victories, one of which, Agincourt, was enshrined in national myth by Shakespeare. In addition, there were ample records compared with earlier periods. For whatever reason, Hewitt here laid his finger upon the essence of medieval warfare. Medieval armies were expensive constructions with uncertain structures of command and relatively poor discipline. Open battle was (and is) extremely chancy and the victor could be robbed of the fruits of victory if the defeated took refuge in castles and fortified cities and continued to defy him. In these circumstances 'military pressure', in effect economic warfare which destroyed the countryside and its infrastructure, was a rational choice. Moreover, it solved another problem. Armies could only carry supplies at the cost of compromising mobility. So ravaging sapped the enemy and provided food for the attacker's troops. This was the central general principle of war laid down by the lateRoman writer, Vegetius, whose treatise on war was very popular throughout the Middle Ages:

I 0 Quoted in Beeler, 1964. II Quoted by Beeler, 1964.

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It is preferable to subdue an enemy by famine, raids and terror, than in battle where fortune tends to

have more influence than bravery. 12

It was this style of war which so puzzled Thompson and other writers by its 'bewildering variety of practice' and often seemed so insignificant because it lacked the focus of a battle or siege. The middle ages were characterized by Vegetian warfare, which was an economic style of war appropriate for a relatively poor society whose armies were transient entities which campaigned only for short seasons. Of course there were wars of annihilation, on the Clausewitzan model, but they were very rare. It is greatly to Beeler's credit that he perceived that this reality of medieval warfare was not confined to the period after 1300. However, these ideas could not be developed in what was a very short essay. It was the contribution of J. Gillingham to work out the essence of medieval warfare in the light of these ideas and the other developments noted here. In his series of essays, the most important, a study of Richard the Lionheart as a soldier, is reproduced here (Chapter I 5). In these works Gillingham demonstrated the Vegetian nature of warfare, quoting William of Poitiers' comments on his hero, William the Conqueror: He sowed terror in the land by his frequent and lengthy invasions; he devastated vineyards, fields and estates; he seized neighbouring strongpoints and where advisable put garrisons in them; in short he incessantly inflicted innumerable calamities upon the land (Gillingham, 1986).

By studying important military leaders of the period, Gillingham provided a clear and sharp analysis of the military conditions of the age. He argued that medieval warfare was a much more organized activity than had commonly been accepted. Even more importantly he recognized very explicitly how rare battle was and how important were campaigns hitherto dismissed as inconclusive. The staple of war in his writings is the raid which was aimed simultaneously at feeding an attacking army, depriving its enemy of food and attacking his resources. This was a form of war well suited to a Europe studded with castles, and it clearly corresponded to the kind of war envisaged by Vegetius whose popularity in the Middle Ages as a writer on war is widely recognized. None of these ideas were entirely new, and they had been anticipated by Beeler, but the clarity and comprehensiveness of the synthesis was remarkable. Gillingham's influence shows inS. Morillo's account of Hastings (Chapter 16). He describes the famous encounter as an 'unusual battle', and, of course, the respect in which it is unusual is that it was a battle at all. His analysis, in contrast to Brown's which we have already noted, stresses the technological equality of both sides, and suggests that this in part explains why the battle lasted as long as it did, and stresses the quality of leadership in shaping the course of events. Hastings is a battle from which historians have frequently drawn very wide-ranging conclusions about the nature of contemporary warfare, largely because the sources for it are so good. Perhaps Morillo's greatest contribution is to stress that it was an individual event and to caution against erecting theories on the basis of such a particularity. Historians have lavished attention on Hastings and a few other major military campaigns, but neglected others. One such is the protracted war between the counts of Toulouse and the rulers of Catalonia which became subsumed into the much better-known conflict between 12 Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus, in Milner 1993.

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the Capetians and Plantagents. This was rescued from obscurity in an essay by R. Benjamin (Chapter 17), who died tragically young. J. Gillingham is to be thanked for having ensured that this fine piece of writing saw the light of day. The wars against the Muslims in Spain, the Reconquista have always attracted attention, though detailed discussion in the English language on military matters there has not been common. But a distinguished exception is the essay by E. Lourie (Chapter 18). This analyses the effects of sustained warfare on Spanish society, and argues that its consequence was a deeply militarized society. Perhaps now one might suggest that the differences between Spain and other parts of Catholic Christendom was one of degree rather than kind. However, this article has been enormously influential, and others have developed the ideas within it. 13 From time to time Europeans confronted external enemies with very different styles of war. In Spain, Muslim and Christian methods of war tended to converge somewhat. Traditionally the Muslims had relied on light cavalry which could be easily raised in the open spaces of the Middle East and these conditions were replicated on the Spanish plateau, but the need to combat the heavy cavalry of the Christians led to the use of more heavily armed and mounted warriors. For their part the Spanish Christians used light cavalry. Both sides had infantry, essential when much of the fighting focused on sieges. On the fringes of Christendom, in Wales, Scotland or the Baltic frontier, western soldiers encountered guerrilla resistance which capitalized on knowledge of local geography and topography, and they were forced to adapt to this. But the greatest challenge to Europe in this period came from the Mongols. These peoples of Central Asia depended on light cavalry, but under Ghengis Khan (1206-27) they formed into a great political unity. The major fighting unit of a Mongol army was the tiimen, consisting of 10,000 mounted men, subdivided into elements of 1000, 100 and 10. Iron discipline reinforced the natural habits of cooperative hunting and herding; this was the secret of their military success. The Khans incorporated conquered peoples into this structure, notably the Turks who were often a major element in their cavalry, and Chinese and others who provided infantry and engineers. Mongol cavalry were poorly armed and mounted on ponies, but each soldier had a string of animals, so that they could move quickly across the steppe, or sustain concentrated combat over long periods by changing mounts. Individually, Mongol horsemen were inferior to almost all their enemies in the settled lands. To compensate, Mongol generals tried to marshal superior numbers whose discipline enabled them to operate in a concerted manner and to accept heavy casualties. In preparing campaigns they employed careful reconnaissance. They invaded Europe in 1241 and on April9 destroyed a German-Polish army at Leignitz and two days later wiped out the Hungarians at Mohi. It was a remarkable achievement, but their armies immediately withdrew from the west and, for various reasons they never returned. Europeans were never able to defeat the Mongols. In the mid-thirteenth century the Asian Turks, the Mamluks, seized power in Egypt, and they were able to develop a regular army with an outstanding cavalry arm which drove the Mongols from the Middle East, as R. Amitai-Preiss has shown (Chapter 19) in an essay which is highly enlightening on both the Mongol and Mamluk armies. 14

13 See especially Powers, 1988. 14 There is also a very valuable article on the same subject with much the same scope by Smith, 1984.

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The study of crusading warfare has been dominated by R. Smail's book, Crusading Warfare, first published in 1956 when its clear and accurate analysis was a revelation. In many ways, Smail anticipated recent developments in the history of warfare in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The concept of campaigns without battle, the need to impose your will on the enemy, even the role of professionals, are all discussed in his book. It commands respect even now, almost half a century after its publication, and inspired a continuation by his pupil C. Marshal which covers the thirteenth century (Smail, 1992; Marshal, 1992). In recent years historians have been able to fill in gaps and to develop Smail's work considerably, with treatments of particular periods, events and aspects of war, though they have rarely attacked the main body of his thinking. A good example of a careful piece of writing which expands upon an episode discussed by Smail is provided by T. Asbridge (Chapter 20). His discussion of the battle of the 'Field of Blood' is a model of its kind and sets the battle into the context of Antiochene expansionism and the Muslim response to it. A very major episode in crusader history is the failed siege of Damascus at the end of the Second Crusade in 1148. This had always been condemned as a foolish adventure, doomed from its very conception. However, A. Forey (Chapter 21), showed that it was a defensible undertaking and stripped away some of the myths surrounding it. As a result of his work there has been a good deal of research on this episode oflate, and we now have a more balanced view of the siege and the events which led up to it. 15 A very fine example of a new area of investigation is represented here in an essay by A.V. Murray (Chapter 22). The personnel of armies has always been a difficult subject because our records are so limited. However, Murray has used his knowledge of noble lineages and the crusader sources to show how Godfrey's support rested on his family and those who had been his close associates in Lorraine. This article points the way to a methodology for studying the make-up of medieval armies. Smail had a fine general knowledge of medieval warfare, but he never discussed the relationship between it and crusading warfare as a topic in itself. His general view was clearly that the crusaders fought in very much the same way as in the west, but with some adaptations. However, this was never really given any precision, and although the subject has emerged at various times, it was not until an essay by J. France in 2000 (Chapter 23), that the matter was thoroughly explored. France compared the conditions and style of war in east and west and argued that the crusaders made very substantial changes to the style of war which they brought with them from Europe. They adopted an aggressive style of war with a readiness to engage in battle which was generally avoided in Europe. They developed the mass charge of the heavy cavalry which, again, was not known in the west, and employed a disciplined body of infantry which worked with the cavalry, and, of course, the small but highly disciplined regular armies of the Religious Military Orders. In addition, they made use of light cavalry, the Turcopoles, who seem to have been very numerous in their armies. 16 Such conclusions are controversial, but for the moment this remains the only attempt to provide an overview of field warfare in west and east. Of course, there is a vast literature on crusader castles. These highly visible monuments of the western adventure in the Levant have attracted much scholarship and some very notable

15 Notably by Hoch. 1996. 16 For a detailed study of the Turcopoles see Harari, 1997.

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books have been devoted to them. 17 The chief difficulty has been that certain very spectacular castles have attracted disproportionate attention, most notably Crac des Chevaliers and Marqab in modern Syria. It has taken much time and research to establish a firm chronology of these structures. What has become clear is that in the early stages of the Latin settlement in the Holy Lands, castles were generally very simple affairs, most of which were designed to act as seigneural centres rather than as serious obstacles to enemy invasion. Of course, they could obstruct a Muslim army, but not for long. The great difference between them and the castles of Europe in the early twelfth century was that they were built of stone, but this was because timber was scarce in the Middle East and cut stone was available from the numerous ancient ruined cities of the area. At Saffuriyah near Nazareth, for example, two great Roman sarcophagi are built into the corners of the main tower. A frequent pattern of the castles of these early years was a simple stone enclosure with a gate and towers, set around a two-story donjon. One of the major investigators of these and other structures of the Frankish east is D. Pringle whose essay (Chapter 24), provides an excellent view of this early stage of development and of the relatively rudimentary nature of the structures. However, crusader castles developed considerably. Byblos is a simple enclosure castle, but built on a mighty scale. A number of nineteenth-century cannonballs embedded in the western wall of the donjon are testimony to its sheer strength. As the crusaders became more and more hard-pressed by their Muslim enemies, they developed a new style of fortification, the true concentric castle. Many castles are in principle concentric in that they present an outer and inner defence; the enclosure castle has an outer wall and an inner tower. However, at Belvoir, studied by R. Ellenblum (Chapter 25), a whole series of architectural features were brought together in a remarkable fortification. There was a very deep and wide ditch, partially stone-lined: the walls and projecting towers were massive and on their backs were covered galleries provided with loops: these served as storage areas and cover shooting galleries. Every angle of approach was covered with arrow-slits. Above all, the inner castle, which precisely replicates the outer one, is higher and so can provide support against an attack on any section of the outer wall. Belvoir is a remarkable achievement and anticipates by over a century the great concentric castles raised by Edward I of England (1272-1307) in North Wales. This concentric pattern would be employed in the great castles the crusaders constructed in the thirteenth century, when they were standing on the defensive. There has been much debate about whether the crusaders got their ideas from the Muslims or the Byzantines or worked in a western European tradition, and this controversy has certainly not been settled. However, there is no doubt that the Islamic world had its own tradition of fortification. The most important of these tended to be citadels, designed by the alien Turkish ruling class of the Middle East to overawe the native population, and they relied on massive structure rather than successive lines of defence. However, research on Muslim military architecture is developing fast and this picture may change. 18 It is a curious fact that, although the crusader states were entirely dependent upon the dominance of the Mediterranean achieved by the Italian city-states in the early twelfth century, there is no study of sea-power in the crusades. H.E.J. Cowdrey (Chapter 26), provides a very clear analysis of Genoa in action in the western Mediterranean at the start of the period. 17 The best introduction to the subject is Kennedy, 1994. 18 For an introduction to Muslim fortifications see Kennedy, 1994, Chapter 8.

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In 1087 a Genoese naval expedition seized the isle of Pantelleria and went on to capture Mahdia in Tunisia. The powers of the Mediterranean were addicted to this kind of raiding, and the Genoese had strong reasons for reacting to North African attacks on their commerce, but the growing idea that war against Muslims was especially virtuous gave this particular expedition an aura of holy war. J. Pryor has written a major general study of sea-power in the Mediterranean, but his essay here (Chapter 27), discusses horse-transportation by sea (Pryor, 1987). This illustrates the western domination of the eastern Mediterranean which was established shortly after the success of the First Crusade. At the same time this was a pioneering essay about supplying and supporting the crusader states, and was, therefore, a contribution to the study of medieval military logistics which has now become a field of study in its own right. Fleets were frequently used to move and supply armies in the Middle Ages, because water transport was a very cheap way of moving men and heavy goods. Movement across land was very difficult for large masses of men and equipment, as the important essay by J.W. Nesbitt (Chapter 28), shows. Twenty kilometres per day was a very good rate of march and this could not usually be sustained over a long period. Although Nesbitt's figures relate to the crusades, they have a much wider general importance and are relevant to other armies. Nesbitt and Pryor have produced two very important articles which explore medieval military logistics. M. Barber, a specialist in the history of the Order of the Temple, shows in Chapter 29 how the Templars mobilized their resources in the west to support their fighting in the east. The victims of medieval warfare, notably the civil population and the wounded, have been neglected perhaps even more than logistics. Two recent essays printed here seek to address this situation. D. Nicolle (Chapter 30), has explored the evidence provided by Usamah, an important Muslim writer of the twelfth century who was a warrior and fought the Franks. Usamah was very interested in medical practice and Nicolle has here analysed the sufferings of soldiers and the way they were treated, both by the Franks and the Muslims. The sufferings of civilian populations are frequently mentioned but rarely explored by those who write about military history. The interest in women's history has prompted some investigation of this topic. Ransom was a commonplace of medieval warfare because soldiers saw it as a means of making money, but the role of women in the crusades and warfare in general has been much neglected. Y. Friedman's essay (Chapter 31 ), is therefore exploring new territory and casts interesting light upon the sufferings of the civilian population. The study of medieval military history is evolving very rapidly indeed. The establishment of a learned periodical, The Journal of Medieval Military History is testimony to the vibrancy of academic research in this field. The essays in this volume chart a remarkable process of change and development in the way we have seen developments in the period 1000-1300, but, of course, other periods have seen a similar growth. There is no doubt that this will continue and flourish as new scholars come into the field.

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Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus (1993), Epitome of Military Science, ed. N.P. Milner, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, p. 108. Renfroe, W.J. Jnr (1982), History ofthe Art of War within the Framework ofPolitical History, vol 111 The Middle Ages, translated from original, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. Smail, R.C. (1992), Crusading Warfare, ed. C. Marshal, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Smith, J.M. (1984), 'Ayn Jalut: Mamluk Success or Mongol Failure?', Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 44. Thompson, A.H. (1929), Cambridge Medieval History Volume Vi, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 793. Verbruggen, J.F. (1954), De Krijkunst in West-Europa in de Middeleeuwen, Brussels: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen. Vincent, N. ( 1996), Peter de Roches: an Alien in English Politics 1205-39, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Willard, S. and Southern R. ( 1977), Art of Warfare in Western Europe in the Middle Ages, translated from original, Oxford: North Holland, revised 1997, Woodbridge: Boydell.

[1] WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE By

J, 0. Prestwich, M.A.

READ 14 FEBRUARY 1953

'MONEY', wrote

Richard FitzNcal in the preface to the Dialogue of the Exchequer, 'appears necessary not only . in time of war but also in peace. In war it is poured out in fortifying castles, in soldiers' wages and in numerous other ways, depending on the nature of the persons paid, for the preservation of the kingdom.' 1 In time of peace, the Treasurer added, money was spent on charitable purposes; but it is clear from even the limited evidence of the Pipe Rolls of Henry II that expenditure on defence greatly exceeded that on charity. This statement on the relations between war and .finance made about I 179 raises the general problem which I wish to consider in this paper. Was Richard FitzNeal merely justifying himself and his book with a well-worn commonplace, appropriate for inclusion in a preface? Or was he calling attention to a change in the character of war and its demands upon revenue, a change which both reflected and conditioned a major transformation of society and government under Henry II and his sons? Few historians are now prepared to commit themselves to clear, confident generalizations about this period; but it still appears to be the orthodox view that such a major transformation was taking place in these reigns. Indeed, it is precisely because the transition is so obvious to historians that they .find generalization so difficult. Dr. A. L. Poole, writing of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, has told us that 'already in this period a society based on tenures and services is beginning to pass into a society based on money, rents and taxes'; that 'the feudal levy had ceased to be an effective fighting force . . . It was superseded by an army chiefly composed of men paid to .fight'; and that 'in the Pipe Roll 1

Dialogus de Scaccario, ed. C. Johnson, p.

2.

Medieval Warfare 1000-1300

2

20

TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY

of u62 we have the earliest mention of milites solidarii'. 1 Moreover, the records of the reigns of Richard and John reveal the startling magnitude of the financial effort made in their wars, and allow us to trace in great detail the expenditure on paid troops, castles, foodstuffs, materials, weapons, ships and allies. The wages of soldiers, sailors and workmen absorbed a high proportion of this expenditure, though the payment of Richard's ransom and the subsidies to John's allies imposed a great additional strain. We can also follow in this period the ambitious attempts to organize a war economy: tl1e direct taxation of incomes, price controls, import and export licences, the regulation and close supervision of certain industries, requisitioning, control of currency and credit and an expansion of borrowing, the organization of a national customs system, regulations against trading with the enemy and even the use of the black-list technique. It is only against this background of war finance that it is possible to under~ stand the administrative expedients and the complicated interplay of ideas, interests and personalities which make up the political history of these years. If we now look back to the first century following the Conquest, we find ourselves, it seems, in a very different and a much simpler world. Mr. Jolliffe, for example, when in an illuminating discussion of Magna Carta he turned back to this earlier period, observed that 'the military habit of the Normans and the comparative modesty of the war.s of the first century after the Conquest enabled the monarchy to survive without putting any intolerable strain upon the generosity of its vassals'.S1 The demands of these modest wars were largely met by the system of knightservice and castle-guard, supplemented at need by the fyrd or militia. Round long ago taught us of the introduction of knightservice by the Conqueror. Vinogradoff spoke of the postConquest period as one in which 'society settled down on the basis of land tenure, and natural economy superseded for a time the "cash" system which had ruled the relations between the government of Canute or Edward the Confessor and its hired soldiers'.3 Sir Frank Stenton, although warning us that the influ-

of

1 Ohligations Society in the XII and XIII centuries, pp. J-4, 52· 1 J. Jolliffe, '~agna Carta', Schweir.er Beitriige :cur aUgemeinen

E. A.

Geschiclzte, x (r9p), 95· 3

English Society in the Eleventh Century, pp.

1.1-2.

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3

WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

21

ence of money on feudal relationships has often been underestimated, has emphasized that throughout this period 'the feudal army remained the ultimate defence of the land', and that for over sixty years after the Conquest the monarchy therefore 'depended in the last resort on the loyalty of individual barons and the knights of their honours'. 1 Professor Painter was even more categorical when he wmte of the Conqueror that 'even if there had been sufficient resources to maintain an adequate hired army, the fact that \Villiam and his men were deep! y steeped in feudal tradition would have made the adoption of such a military system out of the question'. 2 Vinogradoff's use of the phrase 'natural economy' in explaining the system of unpaid service and restricted warfare suggests that it may now be difficult to gain the support of economic historians for this part of the argument. But the difficulty appears to be verbal rather than substantial. Professor Postan, if I understand his chronology correctly, suspects that there was an economic slump at the time of the Conquest and holds that the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries were a period 'in which landlords happened to prefer fixed yield to fluctuating profits from rent and cultivation' and explains this in terms of'the general economic and political insecurity of the age, which made it difficult for landlords to control production in their outlying estates, to exact labour services and to move large quantities of agricultural produce across the country'. 3 Indeed, the interpretation of the evidence for military organization and the interpretation of the evidence for economic trends support each other in an unusually reassuring way. The first century of English feudalism when military needs were largely met by unpaid service coincides with a period when the volume of production and exchange was low. The succeeding period when a bureaucratic state was able to finance a war effort vastly greater in scale and different in kind coincides with the rapid economic expansion of the thirteenth century, defined as beginning in about n8o. Thus Richard FitzNeal's remark about the pouring out of money in war, rnade just 1

The First Century of English Feudalism, zo66--zz66, pp. 50, n. r, 214,

I9I• 2 Studies

in the History of the English Feudal Barony, p.

20.

3M. M. Postan, 'The Rise of a Money Economy', Economic History Review, xiv (1944), 133, 129.

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THANSACTIONS OF THE HOYAL HISTOH.ICAL SOCIETY

when England was passing into this new phase of development, shows that he had a sharp and even prophetic eye. Nevertheless, it is worth while re-examining the evidence on war and finance in the Anglo-Norman period. One reason is that Richard FitzNeal himself intended his remark as a commonplace, made familiar and respectable by long practice. Writing of the period immediately following the Conquest, he says that coined money for the wages and rewards of knights was derived from pleas of the kingdom, from voluntary payments for privileges and from the urban communities; and he adds that this payment of troops persisted under the Conqueror's sons. 1 But it would be unwise to make much of this, for the Treasurer could make rnistakcs, and we have been warned that he is 'a very unsafe authority for anything that had happened more than a generation before his own time'. 2 Next there are the qualifications and silences of the scholars whom I have already quoted. Round was concerned with the introduction of knight-service, not with its enforcement; and he was only able to find three instances of the summoning of the feudal host. 3 Sir Frank Stenton similarly noticed the paucity of evidence for the actual performance of knight-service.4 Both these scholars drew attention to the early evidence for the commutation of knight-service and castle-guard. And Vinogradoff pointed out that mercenaries were employed after the Norman Conquest, though he considered that the social importance of this expedient was not great. 5 Another reason for re-examining the evidence is that, as Mr. McFarlane has pointed out, the origin of the practice of substituting paid for unpaid service remains untraced in detail; and indeed he left open the question whether even military service was ever wholly or mainly a matter of tenure. 8 Moreover, the orthodox account of the military organization of the AngloNorman state presents anyone seeking to understand the political history of the period with serious difficulties. If the field armies and garrisons were largely composed of tenants-in~chief and their knights performing their due service, then indeed the monarchy must have depended on the loyalty of these men. But Dialogus, p. 40. 2 V. H. Galbraith, Studies in the Public Records, p. 48. 4 Op. cit., pp. 168, 177· 6 Op. cit., p. IS· Feudal England, p. 305. 8 K. B. McFarlane, 'Bastard Feudalism', Bulletin of the Institute of Hi.rtorical Research, XX (1945), 162. 1

3

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300 WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

5

23

it is very difficult to find sufficiently strong grounds for this assumption in the accounts of the chroniclers. Nor is it easy to explain the outbreak and course of civil war in the reign of Stephen. Above all, it is peculiarly difficult to fit in what we know of financial policy and institutions under Rufus and Henry I. Perhaps the monkish writers grossly exaggerated the financial exactions of Rufus; and in any case money had to be found for granting the mortgage on Normandy and for the building of Westminster Hall. But for Henry I there is the solid and impressive evidence of the Pipe Roll of I I 30. Stubbs's calculation that the total sum accounted for in this year was £66,593, while in II 56 it was little over £22,000 and in II89 only £48,781, cannot be taken as giving an accurate and complete account of the revenues of Henry I, Henry II and Richard I, but it at least indicates the formidable severity of Henry I's financial demands. 1 It is not easy to explain that severity on what has recently been called 'the feudal assumption that the Crown was an Anglo-Norman estate burdened with nothing but the Household expenses, the outlay of the great feasts, and an occasional foray into the Welsh border or Maine'. 2 For Henry I appears to have regulated and restricted the expenses of his household, and is even reported to have dropped the three great annual feasts held by the Conqueror and Rufus. 3 And if the troops for these occasional forays were largely provided by unpaid knight-service, only pointless avarice can have driven Henry to levy the great sums accounted for in II30. Constitutional historians have unravelled the introduction and development of knight-service and thrown much light on the origins and structure of the Exchequer; but they have not shown how the working of these two institutions can be intelligibly related to each other in the Anglo-Norman period. Yet to those who lived and wrote in this period these difficulties did not exist. William of Malmesbury commented on the Conqueror's avarice and added: 'But it will easily be excused, because it is impossible to rule a new kingdom without a great deal of Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi (R. S.), ii, pp. xciv, xcix. Jolliffe, op. cit., p. 95· Gesta Regam (R. S.), ii. 335, 483,487. Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium (cd. M. R. James), p. 219, refers to Henry's written regulations, and these survive in the Constitutio Domus Regis of c. I I 36 (ed. C. Johnson in Dialogus de Scaccario). 1 2 3

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300

6

TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTOlUCAL SOCIETY

money.' The Conqueror, he continued, 'for fear of his enemies, cheated his territories of money in order that with it he might either delay or even repel their attacks ... and this shameful evil still endures and daily increases, vills and churches being subjected to payments'. 1 How then did the Conqueror spend this money? Largely, it seems, on paying and rewarding his troops. It was the Conqueror's generosity which attracted so many foreign knights to the cross-Channel enterprise.! A little later, probably in 1067, the Conqueror rebuked William FitzOsbern for wasting treasure by excessive expenditure on knights. 3 And in 1068 he called together his mercenary knights, solidarios milites, paid them liberally and allowed them to return across the Channel." But they were required again for the winter campaign of 1069-70. William spent Christmas at York, completed the harrying of the north in January, and then crossed the Peak country to put down the Welsh and the men of Cheshire, Staffordshire and Derbyshire. During this arduous march the troops drawn from Anjou, Brittany and Maine sought to be released; but William held his forces together, and when he reached Salisbury he was able to reward his knights libcra1ly. 5 This was probably late in March, for William went on to spend Easter, which fell on 4 April, at Winchester. From what source were the knights rewarded? It can hardly be a coincidence that in mid-February the Conqueror had, according to the Worcester chronicler, ordered a search of all the monasteries of England and had transferred to his own treasury the money which the wealthier Englishmen had deposited in the monasteries. Indeed, the plan had been suggested by William FitzOsbern, notoriously solicitous for the financial interests of the knights. 6 It is interesting to notice that the Easter council of 1070 which the Conqueror attended was presided over by Bishop Ermenfrid; for this same Ermenfrid held a Norman council later in the year Gesta Regam, ii. 335-6. William of Poiticrs, Gesta Willelmi (eel. J. A. Giles), p. 146. 3 William of Malmesbury, op. cit., ii. 314. 4 Ordericus Vitalis, llistoria Ecclesia.uica (ed. Le Prevost), ii. 187. 5 Ibid., ii. 196-9. 6 Florence of Worcester (ed. Thorpe), ii. 4-5. For other evidence of the seizure of treasure in the monasteries sec Armales de IJ7intonia in Annale.r Monastici (R. S.), ii. 29 1 and llistoria Monasterii de Abingdon (R. S.), i. 486, 493-4· 1

2

Medieval Wmfare 1000-1300 WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

which ordered the restitution of goods pillaged from churches. Moreover, the penitential code drawn up in this council for all ranks of the army which had achieved the conquest makes it plain that that army was not regarded as being purely feudal in composition. It distinguishes between those whom William had armed on his own orders, those armed not on his orders, those who owed him service as a matter of duty and those who fought for hire. 1 But the Conquest was the result of an exceptional military effort, achieved, it may be thought, by forces raised and financed in exceptional ways. During the first difficult and dangerous years tenants-in-chief found it necessary to keep their knights together and to pay them; but as conditions became more settled and secure these stipendiary knights were dispersed and quartered out on lands which they held in the familiar way. We have accounts of this process at Abingdon and Ely, for example.9 And we know from a letter ofLanfranc that Ralph Guader's followers in the rebellion of 1075 were composed partly of Bretons who held lands in England, partly of landless men who served for pay. 3 The Conqueror's own son, Robert Curthose, complained that he was being treated as just such a landless knight when he told his father: 'I do not want to be always your mercenary. Sometime I want to have something of my own, so that I may give proper pay to my followers.'' And when the Conqueror put down the subsequent rebellion of Robert and his followers, he confiscated their lands and, with characteristic economy, applied the rents to the pay of the mercenaries he had employed in the campaign. 5 Again it was the exceptional emergency of threatened invasion in 1085 which led William to bring over from France the mercenary force which so impressed contemporaries by its size.6 It is also hard to deny the exceptional character of the 1 Wilkins, Concilia, i. 366. Sir Frank Stcnton called attention to the interest of this document in Anglo-Saxon England, pp. 653-4· 2 Historia Monasterii de Abingdon, ii. 3; Liher Elien.ris, cd. D. J. Stewart, P· 275· 3 Epistola XXXV (Migne, Patrologia Latina, cl. 534): 'Qui vero Rodulpho traditori, et sociis suis sine terra pro solidis servierunt.' 4 Ordericus Vitalis, ii. 378. 5 Ibid., ii. 297. 6 Florence of Worcester, ii. 18; William of Malmesbury, op. cit., ii. 32o; Historia Monasterii de Abingdon, ii. u. Cf. Stenton, First Century of English. Feudalism, pp. 149-5 o; 'In a great emergency the knight-service due to the king from his tenants in chief was obviously unequal to the defence of the land.'

7

Medieval Warfare 1000-1300

8

2.6

TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY

Domesday descriptio and the Salisbury assembly of 1086, whatever may have been the purpose of the one and the exact composition of the other. 1 During the twenty years which followed Hastings there were exceptional reasons why the Conqueror and his tenants-in-chief should employ paid knights and exceptional proceeds from loot and extortion to finance such practices. It is therefore necessary to review the evidence for the succeeding twenty years, from the making of the Domesday survey to the battle of Tinchebrai. William of Malmesbury has a revealing account of Rufus's measures. At the very outset of his reign, fearing disorders, he had assembled knights, denying them nothing and promising more for the future. And so because he had energetically emptied his father's treasuries and limited revenues were left, his substance fell short; but he continued to be extravagant, for this had become second nature to him. He was a man who did not know how to beat down the price of anything or to get proper value in his dealings. Sellers sold to him at their own prices and knights fixed their own rate of pay.2 There was then a sellers' market for, mercenaries in England. Meanwhile Duke Robert was engaged in similar negotiations to raise troops in Normandy. When his own treasures were exhausted, he raised more by selling territory to Henry.8 The 1 In recent discussions of the purpose of the Domesday Inquest the significance of descriptio, the contemporary and official term for the undertaking, has not been emphasized. In Gregory of Tours and in official documents of the Merovingian and Carolingian periods descriptio is used as the term for assessment and enrolment for public taxation. Cf. Gregory of Tours, Histoira Francorum, vi. 28: 'post congregatos de iniquis dcscriptionibus thesauros', echoed by Robert of Hereford at the end of his note on the Domesday descriptio: 'Et vexata est terra multis dadibus ex congrcgatione regalis pecuniae procedentibus.' For other evidence see Thesaurus Linguae Latinae, v. 665, and Dopsch, Economic and Social Foundations of European Civilir_ation, pp. 292, 377· Descriptio was also used to refer to the collection of taxes. Ct: the charter of Adela, countess of Chartres, of no9 cited by Ducange, s.v. 'descriptio': 'Descriptionem pecuniae, quae consuetudinaric tallia nominatur ... fieri pracccperam.' Ralph of Diceto has an interesting account of the descriptio generalis carried out by the regii exactores of Louis VII of France in order to supply his army in I 173 (Opera Historica, R. S., i. ,372). 2 Op. cit., ii. 368. 8 /bid., ii. 468; Ordericus Vitalis, iii. 266-7.

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300 WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

9

27

financial power to raise paid troops was not even a monopoly of princes. In the autumn of 1090 the leading citizen of H.ouen, Conan, arranged to hand over the city to Rufus and, we are told by Orderic Vitalis, employed his own great wealth to raise a considerable body of troops for use against Duke Robcrt. 1 But it was Rufus's war expenditure which astonished and dismayed the chroniclers. In 1094 he is described as raising mercenaries on all sides in Normandy and showering gold, silver and lands on those whom he detached from Robert. 2 In 1095 he sent his brother Henry into Normandy with ample funds; and in the campaigns of 1097 and 1098 he spent lavishly on troops drawn from France, Burgundy, Brittany and Flanders, and on subsidies to Robert of Belleme. 9 Suger, a practical statesman with his own experience of the problems and methods of war finance, described Rufus in striking terms as 'that wealthy man, a pourer out of English treasures and a wonderful merchant and paymaster of knights (mirabilisque militum mercator et solidator)'.' It is revealing that just as William of Malmesbury used the words commercium and mercimonium, so Suger applied the term mercator to Rufus. For war was a trade and troops, castles and allies its merchandise. The cost of war and policy was not limited to the payment of troops. 10,ooo marks had to be raised when Robert pawned Normandy in 1096. Much, too, went on the construction and repair of castles; for, as Rufus reminded Helie de Ia Fleche, masons and stone-cutters were anxious for monetary gain.. 5 There was, too, a 1ively traffic in ransoms. Orderic explains Rufus's relative lack of success in the campaigns of 1097-8 by the fact that the French were stimulated by their handsome gains from ransoms.6 According to Suger, the balance of payments on this account was wholly in favour of the French; for Rufus's knights when captured were so anxious for their wages that they speedily ransomed themselves, while the impecunious French captives suffered long imprisonment and were released only on condition Ordericus Vitalis, iii. 352· Florence of Worcester, ii. 34· s Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum (R. S.), p. 218; Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 40, 45· 4 Suger, Vie de Louis VIle Gros, ed. H. Waquet, p. 8. 5 Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 38. 6 Ibid., iv. 21-4: 'quorum redempt.ionibus opimis egentes Franci ad dimicandum animati sunt'. 1

2

10

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY

of doing homage to Rufus and swearing to fight against their own kingdom and king. 1 Rufus's only mourners may have been the troops whom he had paid so well and the loose women, uncharitably linked with the mercenaries by the chroniclers. 2 But the mercenaries were not thrown into unemployment on Rufus's death, and there are indications that they were acquiring a recognized professional pride and standing. In the rebellion of 1102, Robert of Belleme handed over the castle and town of Bridgnorth to three of his captains, placing under them 8o mercenary knights. Henry I besieged llridgnorth, detached the rebels' W clsh allies by bribes and promises, and then threatened that unless the garrison surrendered within three days, he would hang every man whom he took. The three captains and the burgesses agreed to surrender and, when the mercenaries refused to collaborate, cooped them up in a comer of the castle and admitted the royal forces. 'Then', says Orderic, the king, because the mercenaries had kept faith with their prince, as was proper, decreed that they should depart freely with their arms and horses. When the mercenaries came out through the crowds of besieging forces, they publicly lamented and bewailed the fact tl1at they had been tricked by the fraud of the burgesses and captains; and before the whole army they laid bare the trickery of their associates, lest what had happened to them should bring other mercenaries into discredit. 3 There are other examples which suggest that at this time the mercenaries' standard of loyalty to their paymasters compared favourably with that of vassals to their lords:" Valuable evidence of the value attached to mercenaries and of the numbers required is afforded in the remarkable Treaty of Dover of 10 March 1103. By this treaty Count Robert of Flanders agreed to make r,ooo knights available to Henry in England against invasion or rebellion, to produce I,ooo knights in Normandy or 500 knights 1 Suger, op. cit., p. w: 'Anglie captos ad reclempcionem celerem militaris stipendii accelcravit anxietas.' 2 Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 90. Cf. William of Malmesbury, op. cit., ii. 379· 3 Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 173-5· 4 E.g. the conduct of the captains of the garrison at Le Mans after the death of Rufus (Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 99-102).

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300

WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

in Maine. 1 In return, Count Robert was to receive an annual pension of £5oo. It is significant that at a time when the total servitium debitum of England did not produce more than 5,000 knights, Henry should have been arranging for the service of I ,ooo knights from one external source alone. For the value of the servitium debitum was reduced not merely by the practical difficulties of mobilizing it for a campaign of any duration in the field and not merely by the rebellion of individual barons. It was reduced above all by the political concern of many barons who did follow the king with the consequences to themselves of a decisive royal victory. 2 That baronial leaders understood the ease with which cash could be converted into military power is illustrated by an incident which occurred on 2 August I wo. On that day, directly after the death of Rufus, Henry rode hard for Winchester, conveniently close, and demanded the keys of the treasury. He was there confronted by another member of the hunting party, William of Breteuil, who had spurred on his horse even faster, and who put forward the claims of Duke Robert to the succession. s Who was William of Breteuil? Not, as historians have sometimes supposed, the treasutcr 4 : he was the son of William FitzOsbern and brother of Roger, earl of Hereford, who had rebelled in xo75. William of Breteuil had joined Robert of Belleme and Robert Mowbray in the ineffectual demonstration of Robert Curthose against the Conqueror, had fought for Duke Robert in 1088 and had ransomed himself on three occasions for a total sum of £7,000. 5 1 The best text of this treaty is that printed by F. Vercauteren, Actes des comtes deFlandre, zo:n--·zZ28, no. 30. Although this is the first such treaty of which the text survives, William of Malmesbury suggests that similar arrangements had been made by the Conqueror and renewed by Rufus. Sec the discussion by Bruce D. Lyon in English Historical Review, lxvi (195 r), 178-9. 2 For attempts of baronial followers of the king to mitigate the consequences of a royal victory, or even to prevent such a victory, see Ordericus Vitalis, iii. 274-8 (roSS) and iv. 174 (1 102); Gesta Stephani in Chronicles of the reign of Stephen, etc. (H.. S.), iii. 27-8 (1136), 42 (n38); John of Hexham, Historia, in Symeon of Durham (R. S.), ii. 291 (IIJ8); Henry of Huntingdon, op. cit., p. 287 (1153). 3 Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 87-8. 4 H. \V. C. Davis, England under the Normans and Angevins (roth ed.), p. u8, described William of Breteuil as the treasurer, and was followe by A. L. Poole, .Prom Domesday Book to Magna Carta, p. II5· :; Ordericus Vitalis, ii. 380, iii. 296, 336, 348, 4 r 3·

TRANS,

5TH

S.--.YOT ..

4-C

11

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300

12

TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY 30 William of Breteuil's intervention of 2 August was the act not of an official concerned for the due observance of legal formalities but of a baron who understood that the treasure at Winchester could be converted into military force for the mastery of England and the recovery of Normandy. In the battle ofTinchebrai which allowed Henry to recover control of Normandy, the role of the hired contingents from Brittany and Maine was decisive. 1 The heavy and sustained war expenditure of these years between the Domesday survey and Tinchcbrai was met in part by developments in judicial and financial organization and in part by irregular exactions which set up mounting political strains. Mr. Southern has shown that the apparently undiscriminating abuse heaped on Flambard by the chroniclers expresses not merely their resentment of the spoliation of the church but also their recognition of specific administrative developments and a general plan. 2 On one point William of Malmesbury has not received full justice. His comment on Flambard that, as translated by Stubbs, 'whenever a royal edict went forth taxing England at a certain sum, it was his custom to double it' reads like a loose generalization which cannot stand critical examination.3 But William of Malmesbury's own language makes it probable that he was referring to the geld and not to all forms of taxation; and in 1096 the rate of geld was indeed double the normal rate. Moreover, if the knight-service of the abbey of Ely was raised from forty to eighty knights at this period there would be further ground for the charge of doubling:1 And perhaps too much has been made of the fact that the word scaccarium does not appear in English records before the reign of Henry I. Rufus's writ of 1095 ordering the famous Worcester relief contains the clause sicut per barones meos dispostti," and it seems probable that this refers to the central board soon to be addressed as barones mei de scaccario.6 But despite the substantial continuity of men and methods in the reigns of Rufus and Henry I, temporary concessions had to be

Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 229-30; Henry of Huntingdon, op. cit., p. 235· R. W. Southern, 'Ranulf Flambard and early Anglo-Norman administration', Trans. R. Hist. S., 4th ser., xvi. 3 /hid., p. 97· 4 Liher Elien.ris, ed. D. J. Stewart, p. 276. 5 J. H. Round, Feudal England, p. 309. 6 E.g. in the writ of Henry I cited by R. L. Poole, The Exchequer of the Twelfth Century, p. 39, n. 4· A. L Poole (op. cit., p. 4I6) has called attention to an earlier mention of the b~trons of the exchequer in I I IO. 1 2

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31 made in I roo. Flam bard went to the Tower and lucrative practices were renounced in the coronation charter. How then did Henry I finance the campaigns of the next few years? There are no records to answer this question; but it is interesting that Robert of Meulan advised Henry at this juncture to live on capital and promises, and to promise even London or York if neccssary.1 For it was after making similar concessions that Richard I lived temporarily on capital and is reported to have said that he would sell London itself if he could find a purchaser.2 After Tinchebrai it was both possible and expedient to reduce the scale of war expenditure. William ofMalmesbury said justly of Henry that 'he preferred to fight with policy rather than with the sword: he triumphed, if he could, without spilling blood; if he could not, he spilt as little as possib1e'. 3 So successful was this policy that whereas Rufus was mourned by the knights to whom he had given full employment and high wages, Henry's peace was hated by the knights of England, reduced thereby to a slender diet.4 Much of Henry's policy consisted in the skilful use of the orthodox techniques of diplomacy. In addition he employed the weapon of economic pressure. William of Malmesbury explains that Hem~y's relations with Murchcrtach) the High King of Ireland, were normally good, but that on one occasion Murchertach took an independent and insolent line. 'But soon', the historian went on, 'he was brought to reason by the embargo declared on shipping and trade. For what would Ireland be worth if goods were not shipped to it from England?' 5 Fortunately there is a scrap of record evidence to support this statement, for the Pipe Roll of 1130 shows that the burgesses of Gloucester rated Henry's influence in Ireland sufficiently highly to justify their offering him thirty marks for the recovery of money stolen from them in Ireland. 6 And when the pretender to the English throne was invested in 1127 with the county of Flanders, already importing wool from England, the embargo on trade drove the citizens of Bruges to rise against their count. 7 Another ingenious WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 1 12. Richard of Devizes in Chronicles of the reign of Stephen, etc., iii. 388. 3 William of Malmesbury, op. cit., ii. 488. 4 Ibid., ii. 540. 5 Ihid., ii. 484-5. 6 Pipe Roll31 Henry I, p. 77· 7 Galbert of Brugcs, llistoire du meurtre de Charles le Bon, cd. Pirenne, P· Ip. 1 2

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measure was the planting of a Flemish settlement in Pembrokeshire shortly after the Tinchebrai campaign, for Henry thereby freed himself of a potential source of disorder in England and provided himself with a method of restraining the Welsh less dangerous than that of a marcher lordship. 1 By these methods defence expenditure was reduced but not abolished. The general comments of chroniclers show that, in their view, Henry continued to employ mercenary troops as a regular practice. William of Malmesbury tells us that Henry had been familiar from his youth with the readiness of the Bretons to serve for foreign pay, and that he, 'well aware of these characteristics, spent much on the Bretons whenever he needed mercenary knights, borrowing the faith of that faithless people with his coins'. 2 Robert of Torigni, a well-placed observer, emphasizes that even in the relative tranquillity of his last ten years Henry's wealth allowed him to defend his frontiers with large forces of knights whom he paid well and rewarded Iiberally. 3 Henry remembered these mercenaries on his deathbed, ordering Robert, earl of Gloucester, to pay them their wages and rewards from the treasury at Falaise, recently replenished from England.' The use of mercenaries was indeed a commonplace to the writers of this generation. Orderic Vitalis described the monks who gained promotion as abbots by currying favour with lay authorities as stipendiarii non monachi5; and Lawrence of Durham, explaining in the preface to one of his poems that the poet, like other men, required incentives, wrote of the farmer spurred on by the prospect of harvest, the pedlar by the motive of gain and the soldier by thinking of his wages. 6 1 William of Malmesbury, op. cit., ii. 477: 'ut ct regnum defaeccrct, et hostium brutam tcmeritatem retunderct'. 2 Ibid., ii. 478. 3 Gesta Normannorum Ducum, ed. J. Marx, p. 296. 'Ordericus Vitalis, v. 50. Robert of Torigni (Chronicles of the reign of Stephen, etc., iv. 129) adds the information that Earl Robert removed the bulk of this treasure, recently brought over from England. 6 Ordericus Vitalis, ii. 225, where this phrase occurs in an elaborate comparison beginning 'Sicut Tironibus suae a principibus erogabantur stipendia militiae, sic quibusdam coronatis pro famulatu suo dabantur a laicis episcopatus et abbatiae .. .' 8 Lawrence of Durham (Surtees Society, vol.lxx), p. 62. Cf. the provision for 'conducticii uel solidarii uero uel stipcndiarii' in Leges Henrici Primi (Liebermann, Die Geset:r_e der Angelsachsen1 i. 554).

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33 On one of Henry's later campaigns we have information which, though fragmentary, is of particular interest when assembled. In the autumn of I 123 a powerful group of Norman barons, headed by Waleran ofMeulan andAmauryde Montfort, planned rebellion in the interests of William Clito. The threat was the more formidable since it was backed by the resources of Fulk of Anjou and Louis of France. Against the rebels Henry, always nervous of treachery, employed mercenaries, drawn largely from Brittany: indeed, in this campaign he is said to have feared the treachery of his own men more than external attacks. 1 Henry's siege of Pontaudcmer alone consumed six or seven weeks, though when it fell his Breton mercenaries ·were richly rewarded by the abundant loot. 2 On 25 March II24 a group of the rebel leaders, including Waleran, rashly confident in themselves as the flower of the knighthood of Normandy and F ranee, were captured by a superior force of Henry's mercenaries. 3 After this, resistance in Normandy quickly collapsed. In the summer of I 124 Henry planned a decisive stroke against Louis of F ranee by persuading the emperor Henry V, his son-in-law and ally, to march on Rheims. Nothing more was achieved than a useful diversion of the French forces away from the Norman border, for the imperial army was too weak to risk moving beyond Metz. Henry I gave his son-in-law the characteristic advice to levy a tax. 4 He had already been applying that remedy in England. Because of the Norman rebellion heavy exactions were laid upon the people in England. 5 Two factors made these exactions the heavier to bear: a bad harvest, resulting in a famine, and a debasement of the currency which pushed prices still higher.6 Against this background of unusual distress and heavy taxation it becomes possible to understand why the Anglo-Saxon chronicle singled out for particular mention the visitation of Ralph Bassett and his hanging of 'so many thieves as never were before' in Leicestershirc 1n November I 124. It also becomes possible to understand a little more clearly Henry's action in ordering the savage punishment of the English WAH AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NORMAN STATE

Symeon of Durham, ii. 274· · 2 16id. Ordericus Vitalis, iv. 456--8. 4 Otto of F reising, Chronicon, vii. 1 6. 5 Symeon of Durham, ii. 274-5. 6 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a. II24; Symeon of Durham, ii. 2.75· 1 3

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Medieval Waifare 1000-1300 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY 34 moneyers, carried out under Roger of Salisbury at Christmas I 124. The English writers describe this as simply a punishment of the moneyers who had issued coins below the proper standard of fineness. 1 But Robert ofTorigni gives a more detailed account. During the Norman rebellion the English moneyers issued coins of which scarcely a third was silver, the rest being tin. When Henry's knights in Normandy received their wages in this currency and discovered that they could buy nothing with it, they complained to the king; and it was for this reason that Henry issued his savage orders to Roger of Sa1isbury. 2 The passage has several points of interest. It supplies further evidence that the continental campaigns were financed with English treasure; it demonstrates the pressure which the mercenaries could bring to bear on the king; and it illustrates the familiar technique of currency debasement in war finance. It is possibly significant that it was in I 108, shortly after the Tinchebrai campaign, that Henry found it necessary to take action against the clipping of the currency.3 But a closer parallel is supplied by the substantial exports of tin to La Rochelle in I 195, for Lady Stenton has suggested that this too was used to adulterate the coinage in which Richard's troops were paid.4 And there is the further parallel between Henry I's recoinage of 1125 and that carried out by John in 1205. 5 But despite the temporary economic distress in England in 1123 and II24, the English economy which supported the exactions of Henry I was neither primitive in its organization nor running at a low level of production and exchanges during the first four decades of the twelfth century. Vinogradoff's point about the connexion between the existence of 'natural economy' and a system of unpaid military service is a valid one; but no such economy existed in England at this period. Nor is it easy to find evidence for the view that conditions made it difficult for landlords to exact labour services and to move quantities of produce

1 Symeon of Durham, ii. 28r. 2 Gesta Normannorum Ducum, p. 297· 3 Florence of Worcester, ii. 57· 4 Introduction to Chancellor's Roll 8 Richard I (Pipe Roll Society, N. S.,

vii), p. xix, where it is pointed out that some of Richard's continental pennies contained only three parts silver to nine of alloy. 5 See summary of the evidence in introduction to Pipe Ro!l7 John (Pipe Roll Society, N. S., vii) pp. xxvii-xxxii.

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35

across the country. At Abingdon under Abbot F arid us, at Battle under Abbot Ralph, at Hereford under Bishop Geoffrey, at Lincoln under Robert llloet, at Durham under Flambard and at Winchester under Henry of Blois there is evidence of enterprising management, the resumption of demesne lands, investment in improvements and a rapidly increasing revenue which supported the costs of greatly increased establishments of monks and canons, of lavish building programmes and of a higher and more civilized standard of living. 1 Nor does the evidence suggest that the longdistance transport of bulk produce by road or water was impossible or infrequent. Perhaps the references in the Anglo-Norman law-books to the special protection of roads and waterways prove little about the actual conditions. 2 It is more noteworthy that the timber for Abbot Faricius's building operations at Abingdon was brought from Wales by six wagons, each drawn by twelve oxen, the round trip taking six or seven weeks 3; that a great bell cast in London for Durham was transported by road on a vehicle drawn by twenty-two oxen4; and that in rur Henry I cleared and deepened the Fossdyke, the canal linking Lincoln with Torksey, thus making possible the passage of shipping from the Wash to the Humber by inland waterways. 5 There are frequent and revealing comments in William of Malmesbury's Gesta Pontijicwn on regional specialization in agriculture and on the organization and volume of trade. He describes the fertile orchards of the Vale of Gloucester and the volume of shipping handled by Bristol6 ; he stresses the predominantly pastoral economy of Cheshire and its dependence on trade with Ireland'; and he dwells on the importance of London as a centre of international trade and as a food market. 8 Moreover, the 1 For Abbot Faricius, see Historia Monasterii de Abingdon, ii. 44-1.59, 286-90; for Abbot Ralph, Chronicon Monasterii de Bello, pp. 51-9; for Bishop Geoffrey, William of Malmesbury, Gesta Pontificum (It S.), p. 304; for Robert Bloet, Henry of Huntingdon, Epistola de Contemptu Mundi (Appendix B to Historia Anglorum, R. S.), and Gerald of Wales, Vita S. Remigii in Opera (R. S.), vii. 31-2; for Flambard, Lawrence of Durham, op. cit., p. 22.; for Henry of Blois, Lena Voss, Heinrich von Blois (Historische Studien, Heft 210). 2 See references given by F. M. Stenton, 'The Road System of Medieval England', Economic History Review, vii (1936). 3/listoria Monasterii de Abingdon, ii. I 50. s Ibid., ii. 26o. 'Symeon of Durham, ii. 356-7. s Ibid., p. r4o. 7 Ibid., p. 308. 6 Gesta PontijicZJm, pp. 29t-2.

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nature of the economy of this period is reflected in some of Henry I's measures and decrees. If Edward I's abolition of the right of wreck is evidence that the activity of trade and commerce 'was becoming increasingly difficult to reconcile with the formal feudal structure',1 it is relevant to remember that Henry I also issued an edict abolishing the right of ·wreck and giving the goods of a wrecked ship to any survivors.2 If the Assize of Measures of n96 is connected with the growth of English industry, and especially of the cloth industry, 3 it should be remembered that Henry I also punished the use of false measures and prescribed a standard width of cloth. 4 Just as the literary evidence shows that tnere was no rigid feudal tradition which made the use of paid troops unthinkable, so the evidence on economic organization and resources shows that these did not make it necessary to confine military effort within the narrow limits of the servitium debitum and the fyrd. The whole history of the development of Anglo-Norman administration is intelligible only in terms of the scale and the pressing needs of war finance: the expenditure on the wages of troops, the construction and repair of castles, the pensions to allies, the bribes which eased the course of campaigns and diplomacy, and the upkeep of the bureaucracy itself. Richard FitzNeal's statement on the financial cost of war was indeed a platitude and a commonplace. But though platitudes are by definition dull and commonplaces unoriginal, it is only by recovering the commonplaces of a past age that the historian can hope to understand the working of its institutions and the subtleties ofits politics. The truth and force of Richard FitzNeal's more precise statement that the wars of the Anglo-Norman period were financed from the placita and conventiones and from the urban communities is amply borne out by the entries in the Pipe Roll of I 130. For various fines and agreements the bishop of Ely was charged over £1,500; Robert fitz Walter £I,ooo for an agreement with the king; Aubrey de Vere nearly £6oo; William de Pont de l'Arche I,ooo marks for the office and daughter of Robert Mauduit; the Jews of London were fined £2,ooo; and the chanT. F. T. Plucknett, Legislation of Edward I, pp. 136-7. Ckronicon Monasterii de Bello, p. 66. E. M. Carus-Wilson, 'The English Cloth Industry in the late Twelfth and early Thirteenth Centuries', lJconomic History ReYiew, xiv (1944), 43-4· 4 William of Malmesbnry, Gesta Regum, ii. 487. 1

2 3

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37

cellor bought his office for £3,oo6 IJs. 4d. 1 The magnitude of these sums can be measured by the fact that a Danegeld for the whole country was producing only about £3,500. In the past sheriffs had been running up considerable arrears of debt on the farms of their counties. In I 130 a former sheriff of Wiltshire accounted for the considerable sum of £1,023 os. 2d. under this heading. 2 But Richard Bassett and Aubrey de Vere, who held eleven counties in custody for the year I I29-30, had not only to pay their farms in full but also to pay in a surcharge of 1,000 marks on these counties, and of this sum 6oo marks went straight into the Norman war-chest. 3 It is not surprising that in this same year, II3o, Henry had had dreams on the score of his exactions, dreams vividly illustrated in drawings by John of W orccster, who took his information from Henry's personal physician.' But more than bad dreams were needed to relax the weight and alter the methods of war :finance: it needed, we know, the feudal reaction which followed the death of Henry, the weakness and folly of Stephen, fire ydiota, expressed in his reckless concessions, the disputed succession and the long civil war in which, according to Richard FitzNeal, the vital expertise of the Exchequer itself was· almost entirely wiped out. Yet the acceptance of these explanations of the civil war under Stephen depends more on the frequency with which they have been repeated than on any compeiling evidence to enforce them. There would have been nothing unprecedented in a disputed succession; but the disputed successions of Rufus and Henry I had not resulted in prolonged ci vii war. And on this occasion it would be more accurate to hold that the civil war caused the disputed succession than that the disputed succession caused the civil war. For, as Henry of \Vinchester pointed out in II4I, the empress had not disputed the succession effectively at the outset. 5 If Stephen made wide formal concessions in his second charter, so too had Henry I; and Stephen was careful to make t11c reservation salva regia et justa dignitate mea. 6 If we accuse Stephen of weakly basing his claim to the throne on 1 Pipe Roll3z Henry I, pp. 44, 90, 53, 37, 149, 140.

16. a Ibid., p. 63. T!te Chronicle of john of Tf7orcester, cd. Weaver, pp. 32-3 and frontispiece. 5 William of Malmesbury, Historia Novella (R. S.), ii. 575· Cf. Historia Pomificalis, ed. R. L. Poole, Appendix VI. 6 Stubbs, Select Charters, 9th ed., p. 144· 2

4

Ibid., p.

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election-Dei gratia assensu cleri et populus1-we must bring the same charge against Henry I, who described himself in 1 100 as nutu Dei, a clero et a populo Angliae electus. 2 That a reaction followed the death ofHenry I is certain. Even one of Henry's porters put himself at the head of a band of mercenary knights and pillaged the neighbourhood of Winchester. 3 Many of the porter's betters had more substantial grievances and greater opportunities to assert their interests. There was Richard FitzGilbert, who had been in the hands of the Jews in IIJo, and who now demanded great favours from Stephen'; Ranulf of Chester, heavily indebted to the crown in IIJO and also in the hands of the Jewso; and all those anxious to recover lands from the church, castles from the crown and honours from Henry's grantees. Fmther, there were the claims and menaces of the Welsh, the Scots and the men of Anjou, all now enjoying exceptionally able and determined leadership. . What is not clear is that from the outset Stephen showed weakness in yielding to these demands and folly in failing to deal with these menaces. He did not strip himself of power by keeping his general promises on Danegeld, disafforestation and the freedom of ecclesiastical elections. 6 He refused the demands of Richard FitzGilbert and Baldwin de Redvers. 7 He understood the vital importance of control of the castles and compelled the surrender of those of Norwich, Bampton, Exeter, Bedford and Bamborough.8 Nor can Stephen be fairly accused of ignoring the dangers on the borders of Scotland, Wales and Normandy. In February 1136 he led a very large army north and obtained from King David the surrender ofWark, Alnwick, Norham and Newcastle.9 In November of that year he refused the demand of the Jolliffe, The Constitutional History of Medieval England, p. 203. Stubbs, Select Charters, p. uo. 3 Gesta Stephani, p. 6. 'Pipe Roll 31 Henry.!, p. 53; Gesta Stephani, p. u. 5 Pipe Roll3z Henry I, pp. no, I49· 6 Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, p. 258. Stephen's promise to abolish Danegeld is not elsewhere recorded. For Stephen's breach of his promises on the forest, see Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville, p. 378. 7 Gesta Stephani, p. 12; Richard of Hexham, llistoria, in Chronicles of the reign of Stephen, etc., iii. q6-7. 8 Henry of Huntingdon, p. 259; Gesta Stephani, pp. 19--32; John of Hexham, HiJ·roria, in Symeon of Durham, ii. 2.91. 9 Richard of Hexham, p. 146. Cf. Henry of Huntingdon, pp. 258-9. l

2

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39 Scots that Northumberland be granted to Henry of Scotland.1 In February IIJ8 he led a counter-attack against the Scots2 ; and later in the year his despatch of a contingent of knights contributed materially to the decision of the northerners to fight the battle of the Standard. 8 Stephen's decision to leave the W clsh marches to their fate was only taken after he had seen the marcher lords frittering away the troops and money which he had sent to them in considerable quantities. 4 Moreover, in March II 37 Stephen landed in Normandy and made vigorous attempts to destroy the forces of Geoffrey of Anjou. 5 Henry of Huntingdon, no partisan of Stephen, said of the king during this stay in Normandy, that 'he completed brilliantly everything that he began' 6; and it is necessary to set this judgement, even if too favourable, against the same writer's later and more often quoted comment that it was the king's habit to begin many things vigorously and then to pursue them slothfully.' Why then was Stephen able to act so firmly during the first two years of his reign? And why did his position weaken during the following eighteen months until in June IIJ9 he sanctioned the arrest of Roger of Salisbury and the other members of his family? F cir that action meant the abandonment of the personalities, the policies and the political interests on which the strength of the monarchy had so long rested. No simple answers can be given to these questions. 8 But contemporaries noticed and emphasized one factor which does much to explain both Stephen's early firmness and later weakness: finance. When William of Malmesbury had to explain why his patron, Robert of Gloucester, did homage to Stephen in April I I 36, he pointed out that Stephen had acquired the great reserve of treasure built up by Henry I and had accordingly been able to recruit a large force of mercenaries drawn largely from Flanders and Brittany.9 Henry of WAR AND FINANCE IN THE ANGLO-NOUMAN STATE

2 /bid.,p. ISS· Richard of Hexham, p. I p. /hid., p. r6x; John of Hexham, p. 292. 4 Gesta Stephani, pp. II-14· 5 Ordericus Vitalis, v. 8r-9r. & Henry of Huntingdon, p. 26o: 'omnia quae incepit luculente perfecit'. 7 /hid., p. 283: 'mos regius erat, quod multa strenue inciperct, ct scgniter exsequeretur', referring to Stephen's conduct in I I )I. s For a recent discussion of the problem, see Isabel Mcgaw, 'The Ecclesiastical Policy of Stephen', Essays in British and Irish History in honour of ]. E. Todd, ed. Cronne, Moody and Quinn. 9 Historia Novella, p. 540. 1

3

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Huntingdon gave precisely the same explanation for the fact that Geoffrey of Anjou concluded a truce with Stephen in II37 1,; and from Orderic we learn that Geoffrey was then his wife's mercenary.1 The strength of Robert and of Geoffrey was closely related to the size of Henry I's treasures in Normandy; the strength of Stephen to the much greater treasure left in England.3 Other sources stress Stephen's military strength at this time. Richard of Hexham tells us that at the beginning of his reign Stephen 'collected very large bands of mercenary knights with which to carry out his policy in Normandy and England'. 4 The Gesta Stephani refers to his mobilization of a powerful force of knights who flocked to his support even before he seized the treasure at Winchcster. 5 ·And Henry of Huntingdon described the army which Stephen led north in February IIJ6 as the largest within memory. 6 William of Ypres, Stephen's Flemish captain, had entered his service at least as early as II37·7 For the first two years of his reign Stephen was therefore able to follow the same policy as had his predecessor and to use the same instruments in politics, administration and war. But not even Henry I's treasure, supplemented by ordinary sources of revenue and by the windfall treasure of the archbishop of Canterbury, seized on his death in I 136,8 could long support expenditure at the rate involved by tl1e campaigns of the first three years of Stephen's reign. According to the Gesta Stephani, the siege of Exeter alone cost £IO,ooo.9 Apart from the sums transmitted to the Welsh marches and the direct cost of the campaigns against rebels, the Scots and Geoffrey of Anjou, Stephen had other expenses. The Easter court of I I 36 was notable for its splendour and extravagance. 10 In II37 Stephen bought off the

Henry of Huntingdon, p. 260. Ordericus Vitalis, v. 81-2: 'stipendiarius conjugi suac factus'. 3 For Robert of Gloucester's share of Henry I's treasure at Falaise, see Ordericus Vitalis, v. ;o, and Robert of Torigni, p. 129; for the Empress Matilda's share, see Gesta Steph.an.i, p. 30. 11 Gesta Stepkani, p. 6. CHistoria, p. 145· e Historia Anglnrum, pp. 258--9. 7 Ordericus Vitalis, v. 82-4; Hiszoria Novella, p. 543· 8 Gesta Stephani, P· 7· 11 lbid., p. 25. Cf. Henry of Huntingdon, p. 259: 'obsedit urbem Excestre •.. ibique diu morando, machinas multas construendo, multum thesauri sui absumpsit'. 10 Henry of Huntingdon, p. 259· 1

ll

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23 41

claims of his brother Theobald for 2,ooo marks and purchased the truce with Geoffrey of Anjou for an annual payment of 2,ooo marks, the first instalment being paid at once. 1 Just as Stephen's possession of financial reserves helps to explain the nature of his actions during the first three years of his reign, so the running down and exhaustion of those reserves helps to explain both the mounting confidence of his opponents and the ability of a coalition of mercenaries and magnates to force the hand of the king in June I I 39· William of Newburgh tells us that in IIJ8 and II39 the exhaustion of Henry I's treasures meant that Stephen could do less and had to act more gently, and that the evils then began. 2 Three other independent and contemporary sources emphasize Stephen's financial exhaustion and its consequences. William of Malmesbury says that in II39 Stephen was making good his expenses by robbing others, and ascribes his attack on the church to the counsellors who persuaded the king that he need never lack money while the monasteries were full of treasure. 3 He adds that in I 140 Stephen ordered the currency to be lightened because Henry's treasure was exhausted and he could not meet the expenditure on so many knights. 4 The Gcsta Stephani similarly attributes Stephen's attack on the church to 'evil counsellors ... and financial necessity, wbich admits no law or reason'. 5 And Henry of Huntingdon connects the evils of r 140 with the fact that the great royal treasure had disappeared. 6 The statement in the Gest{J. that Stephen's action against the bishops was instigated 1 2 3

t

Robert ofTorigni, p. 12.4.

Historia Rerum Anglicarum, in (7tronicles ofthe reign ofStephen, etc., i. 33· His coria Novella, pp. 547, 543· /hid., p. 562.. This statement by a writer ordinarily careful on questions

of coinage has sometimes been dismissed on the ground that: it alleges debasement by Stephen, whereas the surviving coins are of a fine standard (Howlett in Chronicles of the reign of Stephen, etc., iii, pp. xxviii, lii; Corbett in Camhridge Medieval History, v. 553). But William ofMalmesbury clearly refers to a reduction in the weight of the coins: 'pondus dcnariorum . . . alleviari'. There is, however, more evidence to support this charge against the coins issued by the Empress Matilda than against those of Stephen. See G. C. Brooke, Catalogue ofEnglish Coins in the British Museum: The Norman Kings, i, pp. lxxv, cxix. 6 Gesta Stephani, pp. 18, 50. Cf. p. 74 for the depleted state of the treasury at Winchester after the battle of Lincoln. 6 Historia Anglorum, p. 2.fq: 'ingens thesauri copia jam deperierat'.

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by evil advisers may perhaps be dismissed as the attempt of an apologist to exculpate the king. But William of Malmesbury, an Angevin partisan, also went out of his way to absolve Stephen and fix the responsibility on his advisers. 1 Contemporaries were then agreed in holding that financial need placed Stephen at the mercy of the dissident magnates and unpaid mercenary captains. What these men wanted is plain: crown lands, recognition of hereditary claims, control of castles and boroughs, freedom from the forest laws, patronage for their followers and spoliation of the church. And at the Council of Oxford in which the arrest of the bishops was ordered, a sweeping programme of despoiling the church in. the interest of king and barons was formally adopted. 2 It is impossible to explain the complicated events of these years solely in terms of finance. Nevertheless, the history of the first five years of Stephen's reign lends point to Richard FitzNeal's remark that it is the abundance or want of money which raises or depresses the power of princes. 8 That remark, like so much else in the Treasurer's preface, was a commonplace; and it is only worth while calling attention to the validity of these commonplaces on war and finance in the Anglo-Norman state because the nature of our evidence and of much of the work upon that evidence make it easy to miss their significance. The incidents of tenure by knight-service have left deep and enduring traces upon the records of English history, for those incidents were of permanent importance to the holders of land and to the crown. The shifting expedients of war finance-contracts for contingents of paid troops, pensions to allies, expenditure on fortifications and materials and manipulations of the currency-have left but few and faint traces in the records for the Anglo-Norman period, partly because they were shifting expedients and there was therefore the less need to preserve any written record of them. For that reason, the detailed history of the war finance of this period cannot be written. But it does .not therefore fo1low that these expedients were insignificant at the time or that we must set the Historia Navella, p. 543· Chronicle of John of Worcester, p. 55: 'statutum est ut omnia per Angliam oppida, castella, munitiones quaeque in quibns secularia soient exerceri negotia, regis et baronum suorum iuri cedant'. 3 Dialogus de Scaccario, p. 1. 1 2

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43 political and social history of this period in a rigid framework of feudalism. We do not know how far those who owed knightservice performed it in person. Certainly the chroniclers and historians who are the primary sources for the political history of this period tell us of the presence of barons in sieges and campaigns; but they also tell us much about the paid service of mercenary troops, of other forms of war expenditure and of the relations between finance and policy. Moreover, they never use the term feudalism, that convenient but dangerous anachronism. 'Where would political history be', asked one great scholar, 'if it were not for the chronicles?' That was said by Tout. 1 It is difficult to argue that Orderic Vitalis and William of Malmesbury did not understand the society in which they lived; and fortunately just enough scraps of record evidence have survived to show that what they and other writers of the early twelfth century said on the general subject of war and finance deserves to be taken seriously. 1

Collected Papers ofT. F. Tout, iii. 18.

25

[2] THE ANGLO-FLEMISH TREATY OF 1101 translated by Elisabeth van Houts The Treaty between King Henry I of England (11 00-35) and Count Robert II of Flanders (1 093-1111) was concluded at Dover on 10 March 1101 and renewed several times during the twelfth century. The 1101 treaty may well go back to one arranged between King William I of England (1066-87) and Count Baldwin V of Flanders (1035-67) which is mentioned by William ofMalmesbury. 1 The 1101 treaty stipulates that the count of Flanders will on request provide annually 1000 soldiers to the king of England for fighting in England, Normandy or Maine in return for a yearly retainer of £500. The document is particularly interesting because it shows not only the relationship between the king of England and the count of Flanders, but also both men's relationship with the king of France. He was overlord of the count of Flanders and the duke of Normandy, but not, of course, of the king of England. In 1101 King Henry was king of England but his brother Duke Robert Curthose was duke of Normandy. From 1106 onwards, after Duke Robert's defeat at Tinchebrai, matters became complicated when, as in 1066, the king of England was the same person as the duke of Normandy. The following translation is based on the edition by Pierre Chaplais, but I have restored the division of the text into paragraphs as shown in the edition by F. Vercauteren.2 The numbered paragraphs, even though articifical and not shown in the original document, facilitate discussion of the text. The present translation of the Latin into modern English is a first attempt to make the treaty more widely available, especially for non-Latinists. 3 To print it as an appendix to Renee Nip's article will help to focus the readers' attention on the treaty's important contents. It will also, hopefully, stimulate debate on the precise meaning of some of the more obscure passages. 4 Agreement between Henry, king of the English, and Robert, count of Flanders, concluded and written down at Dover on 10 March [ 110 1] in the presence of the following barons of the king: Gerard archbishop of York, Robert bishop of Lincoln, Robert bishop of Chester, William Giffard the chancellor, Robert count of Meulan, Robert fitzHamo, Eudo the steward, Raimo the steward and William d' Aubigni the butler;5

1 William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum, ed. R.A.B. Mynors, R.M. Thomson and M. Winterbottom, Oxford 1998, Book V, c. 403 (i, 728-9). 2 Diplomatic Documents Preserved in the Public Record Office, ed. P. Chaplais, i (1101-1272), London 1964, no. 1, pp. 1-4, and Actes des comtes de Flandre, 1071-1128, ed. F. Vercauteren, Brussels 1938, no. 30, pp. 88-95; Regesta, ii, no. 515, p. 7. For a partial facsimile, see Facsimiles of English Royal Writs to A.D. 1100 Presented to Vivian Hunter Galbraith, ed. T.A.M. Bishop and P. Chaplais, Oxford 1957, plate XXVII b. For the scribe, see ibid., p. xix. 3 My aim to stick as closely as possible to the Latin has occasionally resulted in inelegant English prose. 4 I am most grateful to Renee Nip and Stephen Church, whose comments on an earlier draft have been invaluable. I alone, however, bear responsibility for the end product. 5 Gerard, archbishop of York (1100--1108); Robert Bloet, bishop of Lincoln (1094-1123); Robert de Limesey, bishop of Lichfield, Chester and Coventry (1086-1117); William Giffard, the chancellor, nominated bishop of Winchester 1100, consecrated 1107, dead 1129; Robert, count ofMeulan (d.\118); Robert

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and on behalf of Count Robert: Rainer his chaplain, Robert of Bethune, Adelard fitzCono, Baldwin of Co hem and Fromold of Lille. 6 1. Robert, count of Flanders, pledged to King Henry with faith and an oath his life and the limbs that pertain to his body and the taking of his person that the king would have his [Robert's] life to his cost and that Robert will help him to hold and defend the kingdom of England against all men who are alive and can die, subject to the fealty [owed to] Philip king of the French.7 So that, should King Philip wish to invade the kingdom of England against King Henry, Count Robert, if possible, shall persuade King Philip to stay put and request him in whatever way possible with advice and requests through faith and without ill intention or giving money that he should stay at home. But should King Philip come to England and bring the aforesaid count with him, Count Robert shall bring with him the minimum number of men so as not to prejudice his obligation [i.e. his fief] towards the king of France. 2. And within 40 days of Count Robert having been summoned by the king [of England] by a messenger or letters, the count shall have 1000 mounted soldiers (equites) in his harbours, ready to cross to England in support of King Henry as quickly as possible. And the king shall find them ships and send them to either Gravelines or Wissant. And he shall send as many ships as are necessary for the soldiers in such a way that each of them shall have three horses with him [i.e. 3000 horses]; provided that if the king does not send enough ships in one go, the remaining soldiers of the thousand shall wait at the harbour from the day the ships depart with the soldiers up to one whole month unless they themselves cross within that month. And Count Robert shall bear the cost of the shipping for all his own men and in particular for Count Eustace ofBoulogne's men and all his other men, for whom he shall pay for the duration of the stay [in the harbour], and for the crossing to and fro. 8 3. And after the soldiers have arrived in England they shall pledge faith to King Henry or to his envoys if so required, to this effect: that as long as they are on expedition in England they shall be at the king's disposal, that they shall not act so that he loses either land or men, but that they shall help him in faith to hold and defend the kingdom of England against all men. 4. And should any other people (gens) come to England against the king when Count Robert has been summoned on the king's behalf within the aforementioned period and for his cause, the count himself shall come with the 1000 soldiers; unless he stays at home on account of a demonstrable illness of his body, of the loss of his land, of a military summons from Philip, king of the French or of a summons issued by the emperor of the Romans throughout his lands; if Count Robert himself is there

fitzHamo (d. after 1130); Eudo the Steward (d.1120); Haimo the Steward (in or shortly before 1130); William d' Aubigni the Butler (d.1139). 6 All references are to E. Warlop, The Flemish Nobility before 1300, 2 parts in 4 vols, Kortrijk 1975; thus II, 21/3 refers to part II (in vols 3 or 4), family no. 21, member no. 3. Robert III 'Calvus', lord of Bethune and perhaps also of Choques, peer of Flanders (d.l100x110S (Warlop, II, 21/3)); Alard or Adelard II, son of Cono, lord of Eine-Oudenburg, advocate of the abbey of St Amand, comital butler and peer of Flanders (d.l118xl119) (Warlop, II, 64/3); Baldwin of Co hem (Warlop, I, 96) and Fromold of Lille are not otherwise known. 7 King Philip of France (1060-1108). 8 Count Eustace III ofBoulogne (c.l088-1125).

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[in Flanders] at the time, the aforesaid summons on this account are not to be found without ill intention.9 5. And should any earl of England or other men of his land deceive the king so that the king shall lose the earldom or its income, Count Robert shall come with 1000 soldiers to England in support of the king unless he has to remain [in Flanders] by any of the four lawful excuses. And if the count for such reason has to stay [in Flanders] he shall send 1000 soldiers to England in support of the king as we have said. 6. And if by the king' s summons he shall bring more than 1000 soldiers the surplus will be deducted from next time's summons. If he sends less than 1000 soldiers, by 20 or 40 up to 100, he will not on that account have defaulted on his agreement with the king. But after he shall have been summoned by the king, he shall make up the missing numbers within forty days. 7. And men who come to the king shall pass freely and safely over land and through the harbours of Count Robert, whoever they are and from whereever they come. Nor will they be denied ships if they wish to rent them, except in the land of Count Eustace. And the count shall not deny permission to men of the land of Count Robert who wish to enter the service of the king of the English; and if they come they shall on no account lose land or a fief or any agreement which they have with him. 8. And if Count Robert or his men come to help the king, as long as they are in England, they will be at the king's expense and the king will make good any losses suffered in England as is his custom concerning his household troops (familia). And as long as the contract lasts they shall be faithful to the king and at the end of the contract the king shall allow them to return and find them ships and the count shall return the ships safely with men and money. 9. And the king's enemies who fight against him on sea or on land shall not have the count's trust nor receive any place of refuge in his land which Count Robert can defend against them or take away from them, unless in the land of Count Eustace. And if any man of Count Robert offends King Henry or his men and refuses to make restitution to King Henry or his men on count Robert's behalf, he shall not have the faith of the count or his men, unless with the agreement of the king, except for Count Eustace. 10. And if King Henry wishes to have Count Robert's support in Normandy or Maine and if he summons him there the count will go there with 1000 soldiers and shall help him in faith as a friend and from whom he holds a fief; and he [the king] shall not send him [the count] back from where he comes unless the king of France judges that Count Robert should not help his friend, the king of England, who holds a fief from him [the king of France], and whether Count Robert is right shall be judged by his peers. And Count Robert shall not evade this summons; and the summoners shall not be ill treated or harmed by Count Robert nor by men against whom he cannot defend them. 11. That should King Henry wish to take Count Robert as his ally with him in Normandy and summon him by letters or messengers, the count shall come to him with 1000 soldiers who for the first 8 days in Normandy shall live at Count Robert's expense. And should the king wish to retain them longer, they shall stay 8 more days with the king at his expense for these 8 days and he shall restore the loss of these 8 days to them as is his custom with regard to his household troops (familia). 9 The German emperor was overlord for the eastern, or 'imperial', part of Flanders. The meaning of the last part of the sentence is obscure.

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12. And should during that time King Philip invade Normandy against King Henry, Count Robert shall come to King Philip with 20 soldiers so that the other [980] soldiers shall remain with King Henry in his service and fealty. 13. The same Count Robert shall come to King Henry in Normandy as has been prescribed unless he is forced to stay [in Flanders] on account of severe illness of body or loss of his land or an expedition of the king of France or an expedition of the emperor of the Romans, as set out above. And if for this reason he has to stay, he will send, as we have set out, 1000 soldiers into Normandy in the king's service. 14. And should the king wish to have him with him in Maine, he shall come with 500 soldiers once a year and they shall join his household troops [familia] for one whole month in Maine; should the king wish to keep him longer he shall do so at the king's expense and with reimbursement of losses as is his custom with regard to his royal household troops [familia]. And the king shall do this from the moment they enter Normandy until they go to Maine. 15. That should Count Robert by summons of King Henry lead or send more than 1000 soldiers in Normandy or more than 500 in Maine, any men more than 1000 in Normandy or 500 in Maine shall be deducted from the count's next service; whichever of the two services, in Normandy or Maine, Count Robert performs to King Henry once a year will exclude the other service in the same year unless he performs it out of friendship. 16. And should Count Robert still be on an expedition when he is summoned, he shall have respite of three full weeks from the moment he returns, and he shall have the same respite if the summons arrives within 8 days after his return from an expedition. And should he be ill, he shall have respite from sending soldiers for up to 15 days. 17. And to confirm these agreements Count Robert gives King Henry the following guarantors: Robert of Bethune for 100 marks of silver 10 Baldric of Cohem for 100 marks of silver" Robert, castellan of Bruges for 100 marks 12 Froolf of Bergen for 100 marks 13 Amalric the constable for 100 marks 14 Adelard fitzCono for 100 marks 15 Roger, castellan of Lille for 100 marks16 Ostoven of Therouanne for 100 marks 17 Baldwin, castellan of Saint-Omer for 100 marks 18 Hugh d' Aubigni for 100 marks 19 10 See above, note 6. II See above, note 6. 12 He may also have been castellan of Veume. He died in 1109 (Warlop, II, 40/5). 13 Froolf, castellan of Bergues, probably was a brother of Walter I, the later castellan of St Orner (Warlop II, 20/7; 192/6). 14 Amaury II, lord ofNinove, the count's constable; he died in 1118x1119 (Warlop, II, 155/4). 15 See above, note 6. 16 Roger II, castellan of Lille; he died in 1130 (Warlop, II, 130/4). 17 Ostoven of Therouanne was also the count's butler; he died in 1112 (Warlop, II, 205/5). 18 Baldwin's presence in this treaty is the last known reference to him (Warlop, II, 192/5). 19 Hugh III Havet, lord of Aubigni-en-Artois, peer of Flanders, died in 1113 (Warlop, II, 15/5).

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Gerard, castellan of Cassel for 100 marks 20 Tamard, castellan of Boubourg for 100 marks 21 And of these twelve guarantors, six are to lead the aforesaid soldiers in the service of the lord King Henry if Count Robert shall default on account of the aforesaid lawful excuses. And should six of the guarantors not be able to do the leading, at least two of them will lead the soldiers and four of the barons will come instead of the count, for four of those who are leading are of equal value to the service of the king. And the aforesaid twelve guarantors are guarantors on this condition: should Count Robert deviate from the aforesaid agreement, and they cannot within 120 days reconcile the king, then each of the aforesaid guarantors shall give the king 100 marks of silver and they will do this within 120 days. And should they not do this they place themselves in King Henry's captivity for the aforesaid marks of silver. And the king cannot exact more from them than what has been agreed. And they place themselves into captivity in the Tower of London or another place where the king can hold them free at his mercy as has been agreed. And should any of the guarantors die or leave the count's fealty or his land, the count shall replace him with someone of equal value at the summons of the king. And if, when the guarantors shall have sent the aforesaid money to the king, it shall be taken in England from them, whom the king could bind, and they shall be quit. And should they lose the money at sea they shall have respite of 40 days to replace it. 18. The king assured Count Robert with his life and the limbs that pertain to his body and with the capture of his person lest the count should have it at his cost; and that he shall not be indebted to him for his whole land if he loses it, except for the land of Count Eustace, as long as Count Robert shall have observed the agreement with the king. And on account of the aforesaid agreement and the aforesaid service King Henry shall give Count Robert each year £500 of English money in fief (Iibras anglorum denariorum infeodo): £100 on the feast ofSt John the Baptist [24 June], £200 on the feast ofMichaelmas [29 September] and £200 at Christmas [25 December]. And if the aforesaid sums are not paid by the agreed time, they shall be paid fully within a year. The year in this agreement starts on 20 March. 19. And to confirm the agreement King Henry gives to Count Robert the following guarantors: Robert fitz Ramo for 200 marks of silver22 Stephen, count of Brittany for 100 marks of silver23 Gilbert fitzRichard for 100 marks 24 Roger of Non ant for 100 marks25 Hugh ofMaminot for 100 marks 26 Manasses Arsic for 100 marks27

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

Gerard, castellan of Cassel, died after 1128 (Warlop, 11, 45/5). Theinard, castellan ofBourbourg, died in 1127 (Warlop, 11, 3111). See above, note 5. Stephen, count of Brittany and earl of Richmond, died c.1136. Gilbert fitz Richard of Clare, died in 1117. Roger of Nonant replaced Judhael of Totnes at Totnes in c.1 088. Lord of West Greenwich. Occurs also in Regesta, ii, nos 639 (1103), 944 and 950 (1110).

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Raimo the steward for 100 marks 28 William of Courcy for 100 marks 29 Milo Crispin for 100 marks30 Arnulf of Montgomery for 100 marks3 1 Hugh of Beauchamp for 100 marks 32 And they are guarantors under such condition towards the count as the guarantors of the count are towards the king. And the guarantors of both the king and the count confirm that they shall not avoid the summons and that the summoners will be at no risk from them or from others whom they [the guarantors] can prevent from harming them [the summoners].

28 See above, note 5. 29 William of Courcy was one of Henry I's stewards; he died after 1110. 30 Married the heiress of Wallingford and died in 1107. 31 Son of Roger of Montgomery and Mabel of Belleme; brother-in-law of Robert fitz Haimo, died after llOI. 32 Landholder in Bedfordshire and sheriff in Buckinghamshire (Regesta, ii, nos 497, 659); died after 1101.

[3]

Military Service and Monetary Reward in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries*

Stephen D.B. Brown

F

ew today would be inclined to think of the armies fielded in the eleventh and twelfth centuries as classically feudal, in the sense that all taking part therein did so in recognition of lands they held. The professional warrior in receipt of a monetary return for his service is now taken to have been a crucial component of the forces of the Anglo Norman and Angevin monarchs. 1 Despite this the mercenary can scarcely be said to have achieved respectability in the eyes of the historian. Comtemporaries are thought to have been uneasy about relationships underpinned solely by cash. 2 The many complaints of ecclesiastical chroniclers about the misbehaviour of such troops has led to the claim that 'they had no feudal ties to constrain them and were unbound by normal social obligations'. 3 Even when the integration of the mercenary into the prevailing social system is recognised, there appears to be something grudging in the acceptance: 4 The knights of the royal and baronial familiae normally thought of the great men who paid their wages as their lords. Even the stipendiarii seem to have regarded the kings and barons for whom they fought more as suzerains than as paymasters ... Notions of lordship and personal subordination so dominated the thinking of the age that many monetary relationships were incorporated in one way or another into the feudal structure or were expressed in a feudal context. 1 For narratives of mercenary actions see: H. Geraud 'Les routiers au douzieme sii:cle' Bib!. de !'Ecole des Charles (1841-2)iii, 125-147; 'Mercadier: les routiers au treizieme sii:cle' Ibid. pp. 417-43; Boussard, J. 'Les mercenaires au XIIe sii:cle' Ibid. (1945-6), cvi, 189-224; J.O. Prestwich 'War and finance in the Anglo Norman state' Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 5th series (1953), iv, 19-43. J. Schlight Monarchs and Mercenaries (Bridgeport 1968). 2 R. W. Southern The Making of the Middle Ages (London 1953) p.116: 'the position ... of the hired labourer was still an uneasy one'. 3 Schlight op. cit. p. 47. 4 C.W. Hollister The Military Organisation of Norman England (Oxford 1965) pp. 189-90.

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In truth, any unease felt upon this subject-is of our own creation, rooted in the fact that in current usage the adjective 'mercenary' is employed above all to condemn. A glance at the Vulgate, which must have shaped the minds of those who composed the chronicles of the period, will cleanse the term of such value-laden trappings. The key text·is John 10.12-14 where Christ tells of the good shepherd, prepared to make any sacrifice for his flock, and contrasts him with the mercennarius who would abandon it on the approach of a threatening wolf.5 Certainly this reveals a lack of commitment but it is a perfectly reasonable one as the flock does not belong to the hired hand. This fact i,nevitably sets a limit to the risks he is prepared to take to protect it. In less extreme circumstances it was accepted that the hireling could perform satisfactorily and give all the external appearance of a diligent shepherd. John- of Salisbury for one was prepared to concede him his reward: 'even though they are mercenaries I shall not act so as to deprive them of their wages'. 6 This shows that John had absorbed the lesson of the term's appearances elsewhere in scripture, where no critical taint is present and the hireling's reward for his toil is guaranteed. The life of the hireling might be said to be a hard and ever uncertain one but a tolerable living could be obtained from a wage. 7 It was only in the church, with the spectre of Simon Magus to avoid, that Christ's words on the shepherd were taken in isolation so as to make the term a wholly negative one. s The actual word mercennarius was rarely used with the sense of" its modern equivalent - waged warriors were described as stipendiarii or solidarii. Nonetheless the latter terms arose through a similar processderivation from the reward proferred - and can be shown to have carried the same trappings as the biblical term. The Vulgate had linked military activity with the taking of stipendia and later writers had no hesitation in using this word as an equivalent of mercedem. 9 Thus Orderic Vital is talked of William II distributing benefices to curial clerics 'as if stipends to

For instances of the citation of this passage see: John of Salisbury; C.C.J. Webbed. Joannis Saresberiensis PolicratictJS (Oxford 1909) [hereafter PolicratictJS] pp. 780-2; Gratian Decretum Part II Causa 23. Q.4 c.12 (in Patrologia Latina Vol. 187); M. Chibnall ed. The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vita/is (6 vols. Oxford 1969-80) [hereafter Orderic Vita/is], iii, 292. 6 Policraticus p. 782d. 5

Lev. 25.6; Lev. 25.40; Lev. 19.13: Job 7.1-3; Is. 16.14; Is. 21.16; The Prodigal son realised that his father's hired men enjoyed far better treatment than his recent experiences had brought him: Luke 15.17. Of course their status was not the highest, which explains why Orderic Vitalis has Robert Curthose rejecting the role of mercennarius, without means of his own, under the financial tutelage of his father: Orderic Vitalis III p. 98. M. Chibnall 'Feudal Society in Orderic Vitalis' Proceedings of the Battle Conference (1978) i, 43 links this passage to the tale of the Prodigal son. 8 Even there Arnulf of Lisieux could talk sympathetically of 'mercennarios sacerdotes' placed by monks in churches, the presentation of which they had acquired, and then left in poverty by their patrons' greed. F. Barlow ed. The Leuers of Arnulf of Lisieux (Camden Soc. 1939) no. 89. 9 I Mace. 3.8; I Mace 14.32; I Cor. 9.7.; Luke 3.14. 7

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mercenaries'. 10 John of Salisbury normally talked in terms of milites fuelled by stipendia but on one occasion referred to mercennarios milites .11 The crucial thing to recognise is that no embarassment was expressed over the taking of a wage. This was founded on John the Baptist's advice to a group of legionaries to be content with their stipendia. 12 Modern writers have been misled by concentrating upon the fact that an individual received money for his service, a sharp division being made between the feudal vassal who served because of his fee and the mercenary who did so only because he was offered cash. 13 Yet the question of reward cannot foreclose that of motivation. Galbert of Bruges was alarmed at William count of Flanders' support for the duke of Lorraine at the siege of Aalst in 1128 as he wished to emphasise the freedom of Flanders from the dominion of the duke 'he was, in this matter, the duke's knight: above all else he was there not by reason of the county (of Flanders) but for the health and honour of the duke, just like any other mercenary'Y Denying any suggestion of a feudal obligation, Galbert nonetheless portrayed count William as moved by honourable and personal concerns -which makes it striking that he is at the same time said to have acted 'just like any mercenary'. Similarly, Orderic Vitalis referred to the distribution by Baldwin I king of Jerusalem of his wife's dowry to 'stipendiaries who laboriously struggle against the pagans for the name of Christ'. 15 The money they received was certainly not seen as explaining their actions. John of Salisbury's Policraticus envisaged a secular system under which a class of knights would be supported by publically appointed revenues. 16 This amalgam of biblical teaching and the writings of the classical military theorist Vegetius Ruffus was not peculiar to John's magpie mind for it can also be seen in the letters of his contemporary Peter of Blois and the canonist compilations· of Ivo of Chartres and GratianY While not underestimating the importance of the reward in practical terms- 'should you remove such support the knight will deny you obedience and faith'-

Orderic Vita/is V, 202,: 'quasi stipendia mercennariis'. W.J. Millor, S.J. & H.E. Butler eds. rev. C.N.L. Brooke The Letters of John of Salisbury Vol. I (Oxford 1955) no.96. 12 Luke 3.14. The condemnation of Brabancon, Spanish and other mercenary bands at the Lateran Council in 1179 cited their habits of plunder and sacrilege, not their hiring out their arms: text of decree preserved in Roger of Howden Chronica Rogeri de Hovedene ed. W. Stubbs (4 vols. Rolls Series 1868-71) II, 78. 13 e.g. Schlight op. cit. p.18; Hollister op. cit. p. 167. 14 H. Pirenne ed. Histoire du meutre de Charles le Bon (Paris 1891) [hereafter Galbert of "Bruges] p. 174: 'ducis enim miles in hoc fuerat, nee ibidem pro comitatu primo, sed pro salute et honore ducis, velut alius quistibet solidarius'. The question of service and dependence is also tackled with reference to the king of France: pp. 152·3. 15 Orderic Vita/is, VI, 432. 16 Policratus pp. 60ld·602c. See J. Flori 'La chevalerie selon Jean de Salisbury' Revue d'Hiscoire Ecclesiastique (1982), cxxvii, 35-77. 17 Peter of Blois Ep_ 94 (Pat. Lat. Vol. 207); Ivo of Chartres Decretum (Patrologia Latina Vol. 207) X c.llO, c.125;-Gratian Decretum Il.23. Q.l. c.4-5. J. A. Wiseman 'l:Epitorna rei militaris de Vegece et sa fortUne au Moyen Age', Moyen Age (1979), xxxiv, 13-32 provides a general guide to knowledge of Vegetius. 10

11

22

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to John of Salisbury the regular payment was a privilege which followed, and did not provoke, the adoption of the military role. 18 In 1205 King John commanded that, were England to be invaded, holders of knights fees were to field a certain number of warriors provided with sufficient ready money to sustain them in royal service. 19 This reflects normal feudal theory with the fee standing both as the occasion of and the means of enabling military activity. In the same letter John reminded all the inhabitants of the island of their defensive obligations in times of emergency and assured them that none need be prevented by personal poverty from meeting these as he would ensure that they were adequately sustained. Had an invasion occurred and been successfully repulsed the Pipe Roll for the year would most likely have contained multiple references to expenditure in Liberationibus servientum, a phrase whose appearance is normally taken to reveal the use of mercenaries. 2o Yet in this case it is clear that the basic motivating force would have been loyalty to the crown, not the preferring of a reward. 21 Money was a resource which facilitated serviCe; proof of its provision does not answer the question why _tb.e service was sought or forthcoming. Probably the most important text in obscuring the fact that stipendta could play a utilitarian rather than constitutional role in relationships has been the passage in Eadmer's Vita Anselmi which draws upon the image of a lord's court and those who formed it. It is tempting to take this as encapsulating the familia whose military importance is now unchallenged. 22 Anselm is said to have enumerated three distinct ties between followers and lord: 'for the lands which they hold of him'; 'for wages'; 'to recover an inheritance' 23 Before this is taken as an accurate guide the intention behind the metaphor must be recalled. It was evidently structured so as to facilitate its exposition in spiritual terms to the saint's audience of monks whose zealous adherence to their vocation he was determined to encourage. Thus landholding vassals were said to be akin to angels in their 18 John of Salisbury Policraticus p. 617d: 'si enim subtrahas alimenta, tibi miles obsequium negabit aut fidem'. 19 T.D. Hardy ed. Rotuli litterarum patentium in Turri Londinensi asservati (London 1835) [hereafter Rot. Pat. J p. 55. 20 Schlight op. cit. pp. 55-6; J. Beeler The composition of Anglo-Norman armies' Speculum (1965) xi, 406-7; EM. Powicke The Loss of Normandy (Manchester 1%1) p. 218,223 stands out against this trend although this is perhaps because he treats only the corporate bands of routiers as true mercenaries, which is too restrictve an approach (pp. 228-32). 21 It was to this obligation that Robert count of Meulan can be seen to refer in Orderic Vitalis' account of his attack on those who backed Robert duke of Normandy in his invasion of England in 1101 to wrest the crown from Henry I. He condemned those who 'militare servitium quod ultro pro defensione regni exhibere debet regi suo venale facit' (Orderic Vita lis V. p. 316). Hollister op. cit. ch. 8 and Addendum, champions the proposition that fyrd service survived into Norman from Anglo Saxon times. 21 R.W. Southern ed. The Life of Sc. Anselm (Oxford 1972) pp. 94-7. The fundamental discussions of the world of the familia, to which this piece seeks to be no more than a supplement, are J.O. Prestwich 'The military household of the Norman Kings' English Historical Review (1981), xcvi, 1-35 and M. Chibnall 'Mercenaries and the familia regis under Henry I' History (1977), lxii, 15-23. 23 From The Life: 'pro terris quas de se tenent'; 'pro stipendiis'; 'pro recuperanda haereditate '.

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security and devotion. Those seeking a lost inheritance were equated with monks seeking to win through to paradise. This left those drawing cash to stand for the vast bulk of the earthly population. They were said to follow their earthly lord (and, by implication, God) only while they received an immediate profit. Were that to cease, or to be deemed insufficient, their inconstancy would immediately be apparent. This is to assume that the reward constituted the tie. Against Anselm can be cited the words of Odo Borleng in Orderic Vitalis' description of the battle of Bourgetheroulde of 1124, a key instance of the military familia of Henry I in action. Odo is portrayed haranguing his fellows and referring without shame to the daily rewards they received from the king: 'to my mind we will justly lose both wages and praise, nor will we any longer deserve to feed upon the King's bread' if they failed to rescue a captured baron. 24 The fear of losing stipend and daily sustenance is not to be read in terms of an anxiety about unemployment. Borleng does not imagine that his tie to Henry would be broken were these to be withdrawn for he talks of the embarrassment he and his fellows would feel in Henry's presence in the future if they failed to come up to scratch in the battle. They expected to remain with him; the w.ages were but a symbol of the king's good grace. < The equation of wages with venal motivation is clearly wrong- at least if it is so posited as to exclude fee holders from this category. 25 Walter Map tells how William of Tan carville won his way back into favour at Henry ll's court by appearing boldly before the king and citing his record of loyal attachment. He referred not only to his deeds, such as his governorship of Poitou, but the no-cost character thereof: 'both my men and myself have always served my lord at our own expense'. 26 A moment's reflection shows how absurd this would be if it were intended as an attack on fund service. The fief ofTancarville was after all theoretically still Henry II's and was but out on loan during good behaviour to the chamberlain's family. Moreover William can scarcely have had a principled objection to money as the surviving Norman account rolls reveal a standing charge on the revenues of 24 Orderic Vita/is VI pp. 348-50: 'stipendia cum laude nostra merito perdemus, nee pane regia vesci ulterius me iudice debemus'. Chibnall p. xxv n. 1. suggests that Odo might be identified with Odo serviens meus in C. Johnson, H.A. Cronne ed. Regesta Regum AngloNormarmorum Vol. II (Oxford 1956) no. 1956, which would then show that he held lands in Bray. Odo is rather too common a name to allow any confidence in this. Anyhow, even were he enfeoffed it is clear that neither he nor the rest of his fellows (who surely were not) regarded this as a central factor. 25 H.E.J. Cowdrey 'Bishop Ermenfrid of Sion and the Penitential Ordinance following the battle of Hastings' Journal of Ecclesiastical History (1%9) lxx, 241 n.l quite properly insists that the exclusion of those 'tantum premia adducti' who had fought at Hastings from the specially reduced penances enforced by the legate Ermenfrid of Sion was intended to focus on the inner state of those who claimed simply to have been there as loyal vassals rather than referring bluntly to any mercenaries present. The latter approach is chosen by Hollister op. cit. p. 167. That canonist thought was sufficiently sophisticated to look behind the surface in such cases is shown by Ivo of Chartres' insistence that those who slew others in a public war to look to their hearts and demanded whether they had acted 'propter avaritiam ... atque propter favorem dominorum suorum temporalium': Decretum X c. 152. 26 M.R. James, R.A.B. Mynors, C.N.L. Brooke eds. De nugis curialium (Oxford 1983) p. 93: 'semper autem ego meique domino meo propriis militavimus stipendiis'. 24

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Lillebonne being paid to the chamberlain of Tancarville in the shape of sixty pounds per annum de feodo. 27 Unfortunately for any wage-earner the fact that his reward was fed to him in regular and piecemeal fashion has cast a shadow over his reputation avoided by those whose landed resources were in truth permanent salaries. That there was nothing special about the assigning of land in particular to support service is clear from the fact that the provision of a sum of money under a fief rente could create a bond which was classically feudal. The evident uneasiness of a legist such as Bracton over the question of whether homage could be taken for a promised annual sum does not vitiate this point for to Bracton's mind homage was not primarily a means of expressing the bonding of man and lord but a technique employed to convey landholdings permanently. 2~ In actual fact the duration of a fief rente was potentially just as long term: that given to Robert count of Dreux in 1200 was explicitly stated to be hereditary and was accompanied on the Charter Roll by an instruction to the baillifs of the Caen exchequer which established a precedent for subsequent payments. 29 It must have been the desire to avoid a situation in which the king regularly renewed the gift, thus constantly emphasising its beneficial nature, which provoked Bracton to insist that fief rentes be established as a standing charge on a particular piece of land. John too took pains to make plain that the gift of a fief rente was not intended to create a relationship always subject to his caprice. In 1202 he justified his threat to resume the fiefs of those Flemish knights who did not heed his summons by publically writing to the bailiffs of the count of Flanders to stress that the Flemings were being treated by the same rules that applied to any other vassals. 30 If the count of Dreux is described as John's mercenary simply because he received money and not lands then the term loses any analytical value.3 1 Vernacular literature confirms that contemporaries did not regard cash as a tainted commodity. The Anglo Norman equivalent of stipendiarius was soldeier, something proved beyond all doubt by an early thirteenth century translation of Magna Carta. 32 Yet while the rebels of 1215 portrayed mercenaries solely as an evil to be driven from the kingdom, composers of verse were happy to tag their heroes thus. Rather than highlighting an aberrant social phenomenon, to them the term simply drew attention to an aspect of the quest for enrichment and sustenance which involved all of aristocratic society. It could bear a wide spectrum of use within a single n T. Stapleton ed. Magni Rotuli Scaccarii Normanniae (2 Vols. London 1840-4) [hereafter Rot. Scacc.] i, 68 (the 1180 account); Rot. Scacc. 157 (1195 account). 28 S.E. Thorne ed. De legibus et consuetudinibus regni Angliae (4 Vols., Cambridge Mass. 1968-77) [hereafter Bracton] ii, 231. 29 T.D. Hardy ed. Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati (London 1837) [hereafter Rot. Chart.] p. 58. 30 Rot. Pal. p. I lb. 31 Schlight op. cit. pp. 19-20 would describe him thus. B.Lyon From Fief to Indenture (Cambridge, Mass. 1957) provides an unashamed and convincing feudal reading of the fief rente. 32 See clause 51 of the text in J.C. Holt 'A vernacular French text of Magna Carta' in Magna Carta and Medieval Government (1985); its date is discussed at pp. 245-6.

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work. In the Roman de Rou Wace employed it at one point to distinguish drawers of cash and possessors of land ('I have a great host, drawn from amongst mercenaries and from my fee') and at another so as to include those whose desire was to enter the latter class ('from many lands have I mercenaries, some for land, some for cash'). 33 The common factor behind those bearing this description was their mobility. This could be enforced: Beroul's Tristan contemplated departing 'into other lands to be a mercenary and seek his reward' for the same reason as Marie de France's Eliduc, both having incurred the wrath of their lords. 34 In Waldefthe young Gudlac stated 'without land I am but a mercenary, having nothing beyond my arms and my horse'. 35 This declaration was echoed by his brother Guiac, whose words also make clear that any objections voiced with regard to individuals in such a situation came not from society but the warriors themselves.- At some stage in his life a knight could well tire of being constantly at another's beck and call: 'it is an ill and wearisome thing to serve another day after day'. 36 Guiac's bitter words, though, are part of an attack on the world around him, where he claimed money overcame all baseness whereas poverty obscured all valour. This realistic irruption into the world of romance stands in contrast to the ethos which prevails throughout the verse biography of William Marshal, a fundamental document for the study of the knightly career structure. Even in the second decade of the thirteenth century the earl Marshal is shown to be inclined to think that a landless start in life would work to the profit of one of his sons, who would thereby have all the more incentive and opportunity to prove his worthY Scepticism regarding certain of the attitudes portrayed in this poem is in order. The scene in which those nobles who had remained partisans of Henry II during the rebellion of his sons in 1189 contemplate the accession of Richard and declare that if the new king retains his enmity towards them they will simply leave his lands and seek a lord elsewhere surely cannot be accepted in literal terms. Very few would quit landed estates with quite such abandon. 38 Nonetheless, it is the romantic ideal which is of importance, for that is where evidence of social approbation or condemnation must be sought, and it is clear that the mobile state was rarely seen as an unfortunate one. Guy of Warwick deliberately preserved

A.J. Holden ed. Roman de Rou (Paris 1970-3) III. 11. 7622-3; III. 11.8677-8: 'mais jo ai grant chevalerie I de soldeiers e de mon fieu'; 'de mainte terre out soldeiers I eels por terre, eels por deniers'. Both refer to William I's expedition of 1066. 34 A. Ewart ed. The Romance of Tristan by Beroul (2 Vols. Oxford 1939) [hereafter Tristan) 11. 2177-8: 'en autre terres I soudoier et soudees querre'. A. Ewart ed. Marie de France: Lais (Oxford 1965) 'Eiidue' 11. 29-144. 35 A.J. Holden ed. Le Roman de Waldef (Cologny-Geneva 1984) [hereafter Waldej) 11. 13169-70: 'Sanz terre sui un soldeer I N'ai fors mes annes e mun destrier'. 36 Waldef 11. 74861-2: 'Mult est grant mal e grant ennui I D'atendre tuz jurs a altri'. 37 P. Meyer ed. Histoire de Guillaume /e Marechal (3 Vols. Paris 1891-1901) [hereafter Guillaume le Marechal] 11. 18139-148. 38 !bid. 11. 9245-90. 33

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his footloose status by turning down all offers of land. 39 Moreover, no opposition was erected between feudal vassals and these unenfeoffed warriors in moral terms. Soldeier is frequently found equated with bon chevaler. 40 Thus in Beroul's Tristan king Arthur assured Iseult that he would attend and support her clearing of her name as son demoine soudoier. 41 To the complaint that this reflects but chivalric inflation of the term it may be replied that such a process could never have occurred had the hired warrior ever been seen as a base individual. The flamboyant Bertran de Born had no objection in principle to mercenaries, citing as one of the attributes of an ideal lord the ability to make gifts to casual visitors to his court at the same time as furnishing wages to hired troops and jongleurs. 42 The only time he employed soudadier as an abusive term per se was in attacking the king of Aragon, but in doing so he was thinking of the fact of service, not of reward. Bertran's world was very much divided up into the leaders and the led and it was Alfonso II's slipping into the latter category that left him unfit to be a king. 43 As focusing on the reward itself leads nowhere, it is better to look to the context within which it was provided. When Henry fitz Empress made his abortive trip to England in 1147 during Stephen's reign the Gesta Stephani states that he was accompanied by a group of knights 'drawn by a reward not yet furnished but promised for the future'. As the Gesta elsewhere uses stips in terms of wages it at first appears that these individuals followed the young man on the basis of delayed payment of such. 44 It would however be more plausible to place this band in the same category as many of those who accompanied duke William in his great invasion venture in 1066 and over the stormy years thereafter. Orderic Vitalis, at a stage in his narrative J9 A. Ewart ed. Guide Warewic (Paris 1933) 11. 1512-19, 1613-18, 2857-72, 7137-40. Such impractical displays lend credence to the thesis that these tales were composed for and to celebrate aristocratic youth in their 'wild oats' phase of life: G. Duby, 'Youth in aristocratic society' in The Chivalrous Society trans!. by C. Postan (1977) pp. 112-122; J. Flori 'Qu'est-ce qu'un bacheler' Romania (1975) xcvi, 310-12. Yet it must be recalled that it would have been the staid enfeoffed lords who had the resources to commission and patronise the poets. Social realism does not enter the question for the avoidance of landholding was a narrative imperative if the song of adventure was to be kept rolling along. To this end poets were quite prepared to have their heroes avoid what contemporaries would have chosen as the prudent course. Thus Bevis of Hampton is prepared to quit his paternal lands, having regained them after many a trial, when the choice is between doing so or surrendering for punishment his beloved horse after it had slain his prince: A. Stimming. ed. Der anglonormannische Boeve de Hauntone (Halle 1899; Bibliotheca Normannica 7) 11. 2551-2621. 40 Marie de France 'Eliduc' 11. 339-40; Guide Warewic 11. 9378-80, 11. 12589-90; Waldefl. 1313; M.K. Pope ed. The Romance of Horn (London 1955, 1964) [hereafter Hom]l. 2148. 41 Tristan I. 3541. 42 G. Gouiran ed. L:Amour et w Gue"e: J.:Oeuvre de Betran de Born (Provence 1985) [hereafter Bertran de Born] No. 30, verse five. Thus No. 32, verse one, he could celebrate Richardi's extravagant hiring of massive numbers of mercenaries. 43 Betran de Born No. 30. An emphasis in the use of this term on the service supplied by the individual can even be seen in the Latin, for Orderic Vitalis refers to Geoffrey count of Anjou attempting to realise his wife's claim to the duchy of Normandy in 1135 in very similar fashion, leading an invasion as 'stipendiarius conuigi suae'. Orderic Vita/is VI p. 482. 44 K.R. Potter, R.H.C. Davis eds Gesta Stephani (Oxford 1976) p. 204: 'nondum ad tempus stipe data, sed in futuro promissa conductos'; p. 16 for stips as salary.

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when he is likely to have been drawing upon a now lost text of William of Poitiers, tells how William I led his troops north to suppress a rising in 1069 only to encounter resistance ftom the ranks when he proposed to rush off across the Pennines in the early months of the following year to engage in a campaign in the west. The protestors are described as men of Anjou, Maine and Brittany, indicating that there is no reason to think of them as vassals from pre-1066. 45 The king's response was to assure them that their labours would ultimately be rewarded. 46 Those who did fail him were disciplined by being kept under arms for an extra forty days after he had dismissed their fellows. This would have been a self- defeating gesture had William felt bound to furnish them with a daily wage or if they had felt free to depart on his failure to do so. What would have kept these individuals in William's service was the hope of future rewards and if in the interim they received cash it would only have been to allow their survival and provide short term incentives to fuel their service. Anselm was evidently wrong in thinking that only those who hoped to regain lost ancestral holdings would stand by a lord when the going was rough. 47 ln 1150 Simon of Beaugency presented Holy Trinity Vendome with a gift in commemoration 'of a certain knight who used to serve him in the hope of reward' who had died in the house's infirmary. 48 As the knight was said to have served in hope it is clear this cannot be explained as the satisfaction of a business transaction, the gift being made in lieu of back wages. Care which extends beyond the grave bespeaks a real lordship tie, not a financial pact of employment. This point holds for many of the best known mercenaries of the time. That Mercadier drew wages from Richard I up to the day that he received a barony in Perigord has been deemed sufficient to place him in that category whereas it is of far less importance than how he regarded the bond between himself and Richard. In a charter which looked back over his life he described his past career as that of a loyal servant who had subordinated his own will to the voluntas of Richard. 49 This suggests the kind of self-effacement that the ceremony of homage was intended to convey, the subordination of the vassal's whole being to the direction of the lord. A parallel from the literary world can be seen when Horn, a dispossessed English prince, ended up in exile in Normandy with a band of noble English youth 'all to serve me and do my bidding'. When the time came for them to be knighted they insisted that he gird on their swords: 'for we are Orderic Vita/is II p. 234-6. And in such terms as to suggest that they were as yet unenfeoffed: 'nee ad honores posse pertingere nisi per labores'. This is sufficient for Hollister to lump these within his general category of mercenaries: op. cit. p. 178. 47 Chibnall op. cit. pp. 22-3 counters Anselm's rigid division by pointing out 'there was an element of hope in the service of all'. That is perhaps to go too far in denying that any performed cold cash- for-service calculations. 48 C. Metais ed. Cartulaire de l'Abbaye Cardinale de Ia Trinite de Vendome (4 Vols. Paris 1893-7) ll, 364: 'pro quadam milite qui sibi sub spe donativorum servicbat'. For donativa as monetary reward see the description of the bishop of Hereford's kinsman Roger Foliot, who served Brian fitz Count 'ad donativurn' during the civil war under Stephen: A. Morey, C.N.L. Brooke eds. The Letters and Charters of Gilbert Folio/ (Cambridge 1967) Nos. 29, 30. 49 Charter printed in Geraud 'Mercadier' p. 444. 45 46

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his and he is our advocate'. 50 If this is to be explained, with a glance at Anselm, by saying that they hoped to hold their parents' lands of Hom when he regained his kingdom, then the fact still has to be faced that their attitude seems identical to that claimed for Mercadier, who lacked any such ancestral claim. In-each case the key question to be posed is whether the individual providing military service saw his fate, not just the provision of his nextmeal, as bound ~p with the lord he followed. It has still to be conceded that a lord's familia would not have been composed only of Odo Borlengs, all looking to the long term. John of Salisbury adverted to knights who were taken on by a lord only in the moment of his necessity and dismissed immediately thereafter - 'should fortune hold the enemy back lords will dismiss mercenary knights from their halls; should the threat return they will be anxiously recalled'. 51 The lord's hall was of course the natural arena of his familia but those treated in this way could never have any illusion as to their employer's care for them. The prevalence of short term contracting is indicated by a treaty which was drawn up between Frederick I and Louis VII in 1171 which aimed to outlaw the use of mercenaries in their lands- 'unless by chance any baron has retained one by his side in perpetuity before this treaty'. 52 To remove an individual from the outlawed category it was necessary to take him on permanently. Yet, save in the special case of marriage and settlement, no means was specified by which this could be done for the verb retenere was used again later in the treaty when referring to those breaking its provisions and continuing to use mercenaries. The absence of a vocabulary capable of distinguishing the two cases suggests that the social technique employed to retain someone for life could not with ease be distinguished from that of casual employment. 53 This reinforces the point that it was the intention which lay behind the association of the two parties, not the form in which it was cast, which was crucial. The way in which wages were paid might be thought to prove the finite link between many troops and their employer. References to sums of Horn I. 291: 'Trestut pur mei servir, de faire mes talanz'; L 1446: 'Kar nus sumes li soen: il est nostre avoez'. 51 John of Salisbury Letter No. 96: 'iubent ab aula duces mercennarios milites, si hostem fortuna subduxerit; eodem imminente, avidius revocantur'. Robert of Curson, a Paris theologian of Philip II's time, asked whether the church's condemnation of Brabancons applied in all ca~es. This he approached by wondering whether it would be licit to advise a prince to hire them 'in urgenti articulo sicut alios stipendarios milites', thereby revealing an assumption that mercenaries were normally taken on for finite periods: J. W. Baldwin Masters, Princes and Merchants (Princeton NJ 1970) I, 221; II, 158 n. 104. 52 H. Appelt ed. Monumenta Germamiae Historica: Diploma/a Regum et Imperium Germaniae t.X part 3 (Hamburg 1985) No. 575: 'nisi forte aliquis baronum aliquem secum ante instam conventionem in perpetuum retinuerit'. 53 What followed that retention could, though, settle the matter, for the granting out of a fief would certainly have signalled a permanent bond. The prevailing linguistic ambiguity is confirmed by specialised studies of terminology e.g. of miles by P. Van Luyn 'Les milites dans le France du Xle siecle' Moyen Age (1971), xxvi, 32-3. Much the same emerges from a study of chevalier by J. Flori 'La notion de chevalerie dans les chansons de geste de Xlle siecle' Ibid. (1975), xxx, 223-5, 241-4; p. 436 shows a notion of professional service common to all under that label. Both authors insist upon the elasticity of sense with which contemporaries wielded key words.

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money being paid to knights and serjeants de pluribus terminibus in the accounts of the Norman exchequer might be combined with the statement of the Dialogue of the Exchequer that the clerk of the constabulary was charged with knowing the terminos of the king's stipendiaries, those residing within and without castles, so as to reveal contracts for fixed periods of service. 54 More often than not, though, financial accounts prove frustrating as the most common reference therein, to a daily rate, does not suffice for this purpose because such a rate is not necessarily incompatible with the indefinite service. The Pipe Rolls do nonetheless preserve the occasional illuminating gem. When Henry II organised an expedition to Ireland in 1171 he furnished one Godlambus from East Anglia with 19s.4d. to accompany him in his service. Godlambus' failure to turn up left him obliged to return these monies at the next accounting session, yet as no additional fine or punishment is mentioned it seems that he had been under no obligation save that created by the sum. That may be an assumption, but it is one based soundly on the propensity of the Angevin kings to exact penalties for default whenever possible. 55 It should be kept in mind that those drawing up official documents had in general nothing to gain by emphasising the short term nature of any ties to which they might refer. One curious case did reach the Patent Rolls in 1203 in the shape of compact struck between king John and one of his sappers, Ivo, which brought to a close a period of friction with the understanding that Ivo would return to John's service until a two or three year truce was struck with Philip II, upon which he would be free to go. This definite forecast of the severance of their relationship indicates that in the interim Ivo could not have seen himself as bound to John for the long term. 56 It is therefore all the more striking that his service over that period was envisaged in the same terms of 'faithful service' as would have been applied to any military tenant of the king. Fortunately the Anglo Norman poem Waldef provides a pointer as to why this was so. There is a climatic trial scene in this tale when Okenard, former count of Narborough, faces Fergus king of London on the charge of having released Waldef, to whom he had stood as vassal in the past, who had been placed in his custody. Despite the fact that Waldef had driven Okenard from his lands, since when he had served Fergus for some seven years, the fugitive still recognised Waldef as his lord. Freeing him therefore took priority over his undertakings to Fergus. Yet Okenard refused to flee with the man he released. 'I have no desire to prove false to my pledge, even if the result is my death. I gave it to Fergus and ought loyally to serve him until the end of Rot. Scacc. II, 485, I, 136; C. Johnson, EE.L. Carter, D.E. Greenway eds. Dialogus de Scaccario (Oxford 1983) [hereafter Dialogus] p. 20. Powicke op. cit. p. 223 plumps for fixed

54

renewable periods. ss Pipe Rol/18 Henry II (Pipe Roll Society Vol. XVIII 1894) p. 31: I assume this is military service from its being recorded in the scutage accounts. Any reclaiming of liberationes certainly tends to be in connection with military matters. They were taken from certain Norman servientes who ought to have served in 1195 but did not: Rot. Scacc. I p. 145 (curiously Powicke op. cit. 218 assumes in this case that a service obligation did exist prior to the furnishing of wages). 56 Rot. Pat. p. 3lb. Powicke op. cit. p. 226 discusses this case. 30

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the term he set me. Till then I must stay with him in this land ... I do of course realise that I shall never see the end of that time.' 57 In the words of another character, Okenard stood to king Fergus as 'a foreign mercenary who has served you for your purse'. 58 Here then can be seen both a fixed service term, knowledge of which would prevent the true intimacy of the personal follower, combined with the observation of certain rules of honourable behaviour. 59 Lest this be dismissed as a poet's fancy, the actual technique used to establish such finite relations has fortunately been preserved in a compact struck in 1101 between Henry I and the count of Flanders. 60 Although primarily concerned with the obligations of the count as vassal of the English king, a precocious example of a fief. rente, the treaty provides information as to the status of a thousand Flemish knights whom the count was to ensure were despatched to Henry if the need arose. This should not be mistaken as a servitium debitum of the king familiar from England from the inquest of 1166, to satisfy which the count would merely mobilise his own vassals. 61 One clause stipulates that the count was not to prevent anyone dwelling in his territory from taking up service with the English king and this.stresson non-interference rather than actual provision should be read into all the terms of the treaty. Had the count led a thousand knights to England as his vassals he would certainly have been in a peculiar position when the time came for them to be fed and rewarded, for the treaty would have him stand aside to allow Henry I's officials to get on with

Waldefll. 10467-74: Jo ne voil pas rna foi mentir, Ne pur vivere ne pur murir.l Kar a Fergus l'ai afie, Servier Je doie en lealte; I Desqu'al terme que il m'a mis I Od Ji serrai en cest pais. I De verite mult bien Je sai I Que ja le terme ne verrai; The Londoner who successfully defends Okenard does so on the basis that he had committed no felony for he was never a fully feudal vassal of Fergus: 'Ne vostres humme unc ne devint I Terre n'onur de vus ne tine' (Waldef II. 10735-6). This should not be taken to imply that it was only by holding land that Okenard could have obtained this state. The absence of holdings is cited as negative evidence, indicating the absence of the one thing which would have marked Okenard as a vassal beyond all doubt. 58 Wa/defll. 10737-8: 'estranges soldeers I Servi vus a pur vos derniers'. 59 Two lais of Marie fe France signal a similar honourable impermanence. When Eliduc joins with the king of Exeter ('en soudees remaneir') he stipulates in advance that he \\ill stay with him for but a year. In the event this is interrupted by a call for aid from his natural lord the king of Brittany. Despite his preserving this prior attachment Eliduc always scrupulously acts the part of loyal vassal towards Exeter: Marie de France 'Eiiduc' 11. 110, 267-9, 450-2, 524-50, 550-70. Guigemar saw nothing absurd in offering to become another's liege man for a maximum period of three years: ·Guigemar' II. 841-45. 00 P. Chaplais ed. Diplomatic Documents Vol. I (London 1964) Nos. 1, 2. 61 F.L. Ganshof 'Note sur le Premier Traite Anglo-Flamand de Douvres' Revue du Nard (1958) xi, 245-57, although noting some of the peculiarities of the treaty, persists in this view.

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the job.62 An oath was stipulated for the Flemish knights to take to the king but this did not arise from the same concerns that led Henry II to seek to assure himself of the fidelity of rear-tenants in 1166.63 In the normal world of fee-based lordship a lord could be held responsible for the doings of his men, as Anselm discovered on furnishing William II with substandard knights and many a magnate on being excommunicated for the sacriligious activities of his men preying on a local church. 64 Yet Henry I did not look to the count of Flanders to restrain these knights, it being said instead that were any of them to commit an offence he would have no refuge with the count. The Flemish warriors were therefore perceived as standing at much the same distance from the count as from the English king. This can only be explained by saying that the role of the count was to serve as a conduit, channelling troops to Henry I rather than bringing them as attendants upon himself. That the count could not have expected to satisfy the treaty from amongst his own vassals is confirmed by Henry II's revision of the arrangement in 1163, for he supplemented it with a distribution of fief rentes to a number of Flemish barons, each with a servitium debitum attached. 65 Henry II would scarcely have done so had he already expected to receive their aid under the main treaty. Nor, given this previous pledging by his chief feudal vassals, could the count have looked to them and their men to satisfy his own obligation. In short, had any Flemish knights ended up in England under the original arrangement they would have been there as stipendiarii of Henry I and not as men of the count. An illuminating parallel can be drawn with the Flemish forces who aided the rebels against Henry II in England in 1173-4. Although Ralph of Diceto talked of the count of Flanders, a prominent figure in the anti-Henrician coalition, despatching a select force of knights across the channel, in all other references the Flemings appear as mercenaries pure and simple. While Jordan Fantosme had Philip of Flanders agree to a request from William king of Scotland for aid his narrative makes clear at whose expense and command those knights who came served. Their professional conscience has them urge an assault on Prudhoe castle upon king William 'Thus spake The practice followed when a king issued prests to his vasssals, money advances to help them maintain themselves while in service, shows what would have been a normal feudal arrangement. Although a lord's knights might collect monies from a royal agent they were explicitly identified as doing so as men of their lord: e.g. the three knights of Maurice de Gant in the record of sums dispensed by king John in April-May 1213 (p. 93 in Praestita Rol/14-18 John ed. J.C. Holt, Pipe Roll Society 1964, New Series Vol. 38). Normally magnates such as Wiliam Marshal and Hugh de Neville took collection of lump sums which they themselves would disperse amongst their knights (op. cit. p. 97). The practice of issuing prests threatened to sweep away all superficial distinction between the waged and the feudal follower. Though in theory they had to be repaid - and some of the advances made during the Poitevin expedition of 1214 were accounted for (e.g. pp. 42-3, 121 in P.M. Barnes ed. Pipe Roll 16 John, Pipe Roll Society 1959, New Series VoL 35)- it seems that the crown was less than diligent in seeking such returns. 63 See the archbishop of York's return of 1166 in H. Hall ed. Red Book of the Exchequer (Rolls Series 1896) p. 412. 64 M. Rule ed. Historia Novorum (Rolls Series 1884) p. 78. Stephen's England produced frequent cases of the latter problem e.g. Gesta Stephani pp. 158-60 on Miles of Gloucester. 65 Chaplais, Diplomatic Documents No. 3, 4.

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the Flemings: "We shall overrun it, lest the wages you give us seem ill-spent"!'. 66 As the Flanders treaty reveals a direct connection between employer and. mercenaries it is especially valuable in revealing a form of contracting that may well have been typical of a vast number of unrecorded arrangements. Although no terms of remuneration are detailed, things being discussed in terms of sustenance rather than reward, it must be significant that they are guaranteed safe conduct 'with their cash' at the end of their service. Most importantly, although their service in England was not limited to any particular period, the arrangements specified in advance for their departure make it clear that there could have been no illusion as to the prospect of an indefinite association. For all the Flemings were envisaged as operating within the familia they could not have shared the mentality of an Odo Borleng. The parallel with John of Salisbury's image of the knights temporarily allowed into the cosy world of the hall is exact. Thus the oath that was taken from them- not to harm Henry or his men, and to operate to his advantage within the kingdom- indicates the sort of undertaking which it was deemed reasonable to extract from temporary armed support. The Flanders pact therefore allows confidence in accepting such passing associations of oaths of fealty and stipendiary service as certain narrative sources provide. William of Malmesbury depicted the Angles brought to Britain after the departure of the Roman legions being given a base and emolumenta militae after 'faith had been pledged and accepted'. Similarly, when talking of Henry I's propensity for drawing upon stipendiarios milites from Brittany he referred to his extracting fidem from an otherwise perfidious nation by means of his wages. Orderic Vitalis' depiction of the hired troops of Robert of Belleme putting up as defiant a front as circumstances allowed at the castle of Bridgnorth in support of their rebellious employer in 1102 has them earn praise for 'preserving their faith to their lord'. 67 The Flanders document even suggests that the obligations of these short term mercenaries differed little from the explicit undertakings of vassals bound to their lords by homage. The obligation to follow the employer's instructions and not to harm any of his earthly interests more or less exhausts the stipulations of the oath of fealty which accompanied homage,

W. Stubbs ed. Opera Historica (2 Vols. Rolls Series 1876), I, 385: R.C. Johnston ed. Jordan Fantosme's Chronicle (Oxford 1981) II. 603-4: 'Co dient li Flameng: Nus l'agraventerums! I U

66

mar nus durrez soldeies ne livreisuns'. Note that the five hundred Flemings called in by the bishop of Durham were eventually dismissed 'datis prius illis liberationibus suis et donis quadraginta dierum': Roger of Howden Chronica II p. 63. 67 W. Stubbs ed. De Gestis regumA.nglorum /ibri quinque (2 Vols. Rolls Series 1887-9) I, 9; II, 478; Orderic Vitalis VI p. 28: 'fidem principle suo servare'.

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certainly as it is known from the record of Galbert of Bruges, the customary guide on this matter. 68 This equivalence in terms of social technique is what permitted society to come to terms with the mercenary and makes a mockery of crude distinctions which draw on an ideal definition of feudalism. 69 Yet it would be quite wrong to dismiss the problem of distinguishing between groups of followers by claiming that, in contemporary legal terms, it received no recognition. While the concrete obligations of a vassal may be susceptible to specification, to rely on these alone to convey an impression of the state of vassalage would be to touch upon the matter at no more than a superficial level. Thus, as commentators now lump together magnates, devoted personal followers and waged troops as members of the familia of Henry I, it is necessary to make clear in what way the mercenary was a distinctive creature. Possession of another's service did not exhaust the question of the quality of that service. The emotional temperature, not legal technicalities, of the tie was the crucial factor. Knowledge of the ability of the mercenary to wander off would always have oppressed the lord. During his last revolt in 1183 Henry II's eldest son is said to have been driven to desperation while pinned down in Limoges through fear that his mercenaries would desert him for his father 'through desire for a greater return'.7° In this case to have done so would have been illicit, it being inconceivable that a bargain would have been struck with a mercenary which left him free to join the opposition on the tendering of a better price. It must have been such behaviour that led Bertran de Born to condemn the Basques. He said they earned their wages by fraud, failing to provide loyal service in return, which made them no better than whores. 71 Camp-hopping could, though, be beyond reproach- it all depended on the expectations previously built up between the two sides. The Song of Galbert ofBruges p. 89. What the vassals of count William did swear in 1128 which Henry 1 did not insist upon from the Flemish knights was to observe and preserve their homage. Nowhere is this notion fleshed out so as to show in what manner this went beyond the undertakings of fealty; perhaps the crucial factor was that homage was seen by both parties as symbolising a commitment for life. Thus a distinction may have to be drawn between the actions of individuals at any moment, in terms of which mercenaries and vassals were much akin, and their behaviour across many years. Otherwise, the similarity of their position holds true even after taking into account Fulbert of Chartres' exposition of the duties of fidelity: EC. Behrends The Leuers and Poems of Fulbert of Chartres {Oxford 1976) No. 51, pp. 90-3. This explains the absence of a special vocabulary to cover mercenaries and their employers. t!l Prestwich 'Military household' is an attack on such hamfistedness but, as with Chibnall 'Mercenaries' (esp. pp. 22-3), his more sophisticated approach threatens to tumble all into a morass of confusion, making all familia members personal followers on the same level. S. Harvey 'The knights and the knighfs fee in England' Past and Present (1970), xlix, 29-30 does much the same in her levelling of the enfeoffed knight to the standing of the stipendiary. 70 Geoffrey of Vigeois in Recueil des Historiens de Gaules et de la France (new ed. under L. Delisle), ed. M-J-J. Brial (Paris 1879) xviii, 216: 'cupiditate pretii'. 71 Bertran de Born No. 36, verse four. John of Salisbury, who was quite prepared to see knights draw wages, had equally harsh words for prostitutes on the grounds of their shiftlessness rather than the financial nature of the corporeal commerce in which they engaged: 'Omnis enim res quae in commercium venit ab uno transit ad alium, et ditiorem et avidiorem comitatur emptorem' (Policraticus II. 240).

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Dermot tells how Maurice de Prendergast did so as a participant in the Norman adventure in Ireland, turning from king Diannait to join his opponent the king of Ossory in 1169. As it is stated he drew rewards in cash from Ossory it is fair to assume he did the same from Diannait of Leinster, and in both cases he was obviously free to quit his employer whenever he tired of serving them. Gerald of Wales reveals a similar instance in his Expugnatio in recording that in 1173 Strongbow's familia threatened to quit their lord and throw their lot in with the Irish when their stipendia ran out. Neither account is critical, indeed Maurice plays the role of a chivalrous hero in the Song, which suggests an acceptance of the fact that the allegiance of the waged military workforce in Ireland was flexible indeed. It is the lack of any residual attachment that marks out the fixed term contractor, and that must reflect the fact that little amicable momentum was built up during the period of service when lord and mercenary were bound to each other. The Dialogue of the Exchequer reveals the same lack of commitment from the lord's side in explaining the workings and purpose of scutage. A sum was levied on each knight's fee 'whence wages are furnished for knights - for the King prefers placing mercenaries, rather than his own men, before the perils of war'. 72 Mercenaries were expendable, vassals were not. That was the price they paid for their mobility. 73 One passage might be cited against this depiction of a depersonalised mercenary nexus. William of Newburgh's outraged account of the capture of Richard I in December 1192 when returning from the Crusade through Germany points out that the duke of Austria had drawn upon Richard's resources while in the Holy Land: 'he had been his stipendiary while in the army of the Lord'. 74 However, it is not to be taken from this that Newburgh was of the opinion that one who had drawn a wage ought always to have cherished his former paymaster. The duke of Austria is subjected to criticism in terms of his personality, not for the breach of a social rule. By G.H. Orpen ed. The Song of Dermot and the Earl (Oxford 1892) II. 1056-1101; 1294-1307; A.B. Scott, F.X. Martin eds. Expugnatio Hibemica (Dublin 1978) p. 135; Dia/ogus p. 52: 'unde militibus stipendia vel donativa succedant. Mauult enim princeps stipendiaries quam domesticos bellicis opponere casibus'. 73 According to Roger of Howden Phillip II withdrew a compaoy of Brabancons he had posted in Chateauroux to Berry in 1189 'promittens eis bene stipendia sua'. Once there he plundered them, stripping them of arms, horses and cash (Roger of Howden, Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi Benedicti Abbatis ed. W. Stubbs, 2 Vols. Rolls Series 1867 II p. 49). What is striking is Howden's low key handling of this episode: such perfidy would have been trumpeted to the skies had Philip acted thus towards his barons. Philip may have had the Lateran Council's excommunication of Brabancons in 1179 to justify his deeds but under its terms he too would have been guilty for previously employing them, and as Roger recorded without embarrassment the frequent use of Brabancons by his own kings he would scarcely have allowed that ruling to guide his depiction of events. His account is too barren to reveal whether Philip's contract with the mercenaries was formally closed by a settling of accounts before he turned on them yet even on that most favourable reading of events the stark fact emerges that contemporaries were prepared to accept that mercenaries might be seen as fair game by those they had formerly served. 74 Historia rerum Ang/icarum in R. Howlett ed. Chronicles of the reigns of Stephen, Henry 11 and Richard I Vols. I & II (4 Vols., Rolls Series 1884-5) p. 360: 'stipendarius eius in exercitu Domini fuerat'.

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acting as he did the duke exhibited churlish ingratitude (tanti beneficii immemor). Richard had not dispersed funds in the Holy Land to create a temporary lordship and draw others to his service but simply to allow them to susfain themselves; 'that they remain in the army of the Lord. 75 It is therefore necessary to find some criteria other than the drawing of a wage to allow a distinction to be drawn betwen true personal followers and mere temporary adherents. Perhaps the status of core familia members may be divined from the fact that Henry I was accustomed not only to sustaining his but also replaced any losses they suffered in following him.76 This hearkens back to a time when the provision of arms was a sign of lordship, a system seen in operation in Anglo Saxon times through the practice of returning a heriot of weapons and armour to a lord on the death of his thegn. 77 Such an arrangement suggests the notion that the thegn had possessed arms only as an extension of his lord's will. When looking at the frequent references to liberationes in the Norman accounts it is striking how rarely entries are made which could be interpreted as revealing a recognition on the part of the king that he ought to replace an individual's equipment.78 This must have been because the wage rates of pure professionals assumed that they arrived fully equipped to serve recollecting Magna Carta's insistence on the expulsion of the mercenaries imported by John 'being such as come with horses and arms' - and that the correction of any subsequent dropping of standards through in-service losses would have been their responsibility. Probing the attitude which prevailed towards weapons, or at least that which Henry II's Assize of Arms of 1181 set out to foster, proves illuminating. This imposed an obligation upon those of specific means to hold a certain package of arms, suggesting that things had drifted far from the notion that the provision of such was a lord's duty; but Henry still insisted on ultimate control for the oath which all arms holders were to make referred only in part to their personal fidelity to the king. Much more striking is the pledging of the weapons themselves to his service, showing that they were regarded as held in trust. 79 • William of Newburgh p. 383: 'ut in exercitu Domini persisterent'. Chaplais, Diplomatic Documents Nos. 1, 2: 'perdita reddenda sicut mos est reddere familie sue'. Note that this was granted to the Flemish mercenaries as a special concession. P. Guilhiermoz Essai sur l'origine de La Noblesse en France au Moyen Age (Paris 1902) pp. 284-5 tackles the notion of 'restor' without realising that any overt reference to it is likely to have been an exceptional gesture. He is nonetheless surely right to insist that this was originally a right due to the vassal per se. n N.P. Brooks 'Arms, Status and Warfare in Late Saxon England' in D. Hilled. Ethelred the Unready (1979) pp. 92-3. 78 An instance may be the horses furnished in 1198 to the sappers Hugh de Larbaleste and Sencio de Montreal: Rot. Scacc. II p. 314. Actual arms purchases are equally rare, usually referring to the stocking of castles with expendables such as quarrels, e.g. Rot. Scacc. I p. 155 - which suggests that Powicke op. cit. (p. 225) was too quick to see John furnishing crossbows to his mercenaries from but a few entries. 79 W. Stubbs Select charters and other illustrations of English constitutional history (9th ed. rev. H.W.C. Davis, Oxford 1913) p. 299: 'qui venerintcum equis et armis'; Assize of Arms ch. 4 in ibid pp. 183-4. This is abundantly clear in ch. 7 forbidding Jews to dispose of arms which fell into their hands, showing that the weapons themselves were seen as being in the king's service. 75

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If the physical tools of combat of the vassal were seen as somehow the possession of the one to be served, absolute ownership of arms may be the hallmark of the true mercenary. The Dialogue of the Exchequer assumed that the military service of fee-holders was to be provided at their own expense and was pledged to the crown, with the result that it could not be avoided in one form or another. In quite a separate category was the figure of the 'strenuous' knight, one who enjoyed the privilege that his military equipment would not be distrained for his debts. 80 As the Dialogue deals above all with debts to the king, in which case distraint would place this equipment directly under royal control, this is not a reflection of the concern expressed in the Assize of Arms to ensure that all arms in the land would be open to utilisation by the crown. The aim here was to ensure that the individual himself would be fit for service: 'so that when need arises he can be employed on the business of the King and the realm, fully equipped with arms and horses'. 81 This was not a matter of feudal service: the privilege was lost on refusal to serve only if the king's summons was such 'that he is not to serve at his own cost, but the King's'. 82 This is a clear instance of a warrior who fought for cash and as such received special treatment. By contrast, holders of knights fees could have their chattels seized without thought as to their ability to satisfy any sudden demand for the military service or scutage due from their tenements. Presumably military tenants of the king were regarded as subject to effective liquidation to allow the king direct access to the resources which they held. These resources, land or arms, were seen as pledged and ultimately pertaining to the king; the seemingly harsh treatment of fee holders by the Dialogue was rooted in an approach which took for granted the complete fusion of man and lord. The strenuous knight has all the appearance of one whose military capacity was his own. Rather than being a felony, a refusal on his part to take the king's shilling on any occasion would have revealed that he was not constantly open to tender: his arms would not thereby have ceased to be his own but the motivation behind kid-gloves treatment from treasury officials would have disappeared. The mercenary knight can therefore be shown not to have been particularly cherished. His value was perceived in strictly utilitarian terms. It might be useful to think of vassals as secure employees of a demanding but ultimately paternalistic family firm and to cast mercenaries as external contractors, who might thrive in their prime but could rarely look forward to stability and protection in their old age. Commentators on the mercenary would be well advised to adopt the magmatic approach and avoid the temptation of a moralistic stance. The ~ocial system would have been greatly flawed had it not provided a niche Dialogus p. 111: ·qui, meritis exigentibus, debeat inter strenuos compurari'. Dialogus p. Ill: 'ut, cum oportuerit, ad regis et regni negotia armis et equis instructus possit assumi'. Contra Harvey op. cit. p. 34 this should not be confused as a knight-friendly rulino along the lines of Henry I's coronation charter concessions (Stubbs Selecr charters p. 119).0 The coronation deed applied only to knights who defended their lands through service, in other words who were enfeoffed, and although they were to equip themselves they came to do the royal negotia and were not taken. Theirs was a compulsory duty. 82 Diulogus p. 111: ·ramen ut non propriis sed regis stipendiis militet'. 80

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for as functional a figure as the hired warrior and it is clear that it did not fail in this matter: The prevailing notion and techniques of lordship were certainly sufficiently flexible to encompass him: individuals could be asked to observe the conventions of vassalage without transforming their personal status to match. It is apparent that the mercenary retained certain distinctive qualities, rooted primarily in his avoidance of permanent ties. Cash, being a portable commodity, would certainly have facilitated such behaviour. Nonetheless it must be insisted that the process of sifting out the merely mercenary cannot be done on the basis of economic ties alone. The proper characterisation of any particular individual can only follow an attempt to comprehend his self-perception and penetrate his attitudes towards those he followed on the field. It is quite wrong to argue that an individual's role and outlook were determined by the mere fact that he drew on his lord's purse rather than occupied some of his lands. *I wish to thank J.C. Holt for guidance on the Anglo-Norman and Angevin world and Patrick Wormald for an essential introduction to the warrior aristocracy and their songs of prowess and good lordship.

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[4] AN ACCOUNT OF THE BATTLE OF HATTIN REFERRING TO THE FRANKISH MERCENARIES IN ORIENTAL MOSLEM STATES BY JEAN RICHARD THE BATTLE OF HATTIN ACCORDING TO MS REG. LAT. 598

THE battle of Hattin, which brought about the fall of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem (1187), has called forth contradictory statements. Many of these are without historical value, and Mr Marshall Baldwin had to undertake a very careful criticism of them to be able to retrace the exact development of the operations.1 The discovery of an account of Hattin, in a manuscript (Reg. lat. 598) of the Vatican library, has led us to reconsider some points of this criticism. Among other writings is a story of the world (above all of Italy) from the Creation to the conquest of Sicily by Charles d'Anjou (1266). 2 Two passages stand out because of their fullness: the chapters Persecutio Salaardini and Jerusalem a Turcis obsessa capitur (fol. 85r-86v) reproduced in an appendix to this paper (see pp. 112-114). The account of these events closely resembles that which Robert d'Auxerre inserted in his chronicle :3 the two texts certainly derive from a common source. Robert's account, copied around 1210, is more complete and less faulty tha"u that of Ms 598, copied fiity years later. Did the Italian chronicler of 1266 copy this account from the text inserted in Robert's chronicle, or did he use independently the same source? The text of Ms 598 is cut short by the sentence 'Eadem anno Philippa regi Francie nascitur filius nomine Ludovicus' which occurs also in Robert's story. 4 But the rest of our chronicle appears to be independent of Rob'ert's; the excessive lengthening of the passage devoted to the events of 1187 among generally brief notations is more easily understood if the author used an isolated text than if he had came across it in a complete chronicle. If it is an independent text, we can thus isolate the source common to the two chronicles. But the relation transcribed in Ms 598 has undoubtedly been mutilated (Robert has kept, for instance, a passage referring to the siege of Ascalon, lacking in this manuscript). In any case, the text of Ms 598 corresponds closely to that which, in Robert's chronicle, appears to derive from an original source. Robert recalls the troubles following the death in 1186 of Baldwin V and the first clashes with the Moslems (all these events are lacking in Ms 598 and are perhaps additions by Robert). Then the two texts 5 relate Galilee's invasion by 1

Marshall W. Baldwin, Raymond III of Tripolis and the fall of Jerusalem (Princeton, 1936), pp.

96 ff.

2 Reg. lat. 598, fol. 77 r to 96 r. We have to thank Miss Edith Brayer, who undertook the collation of this manuscript. 3 M.G.H., ss, XXVI, ~47-'25~. 4 Less developed in Robert, p. UO. 5 This account omits any reference to the part played by the Master of the Temple who caused the decision to be taken to march on Tiberias, to which Count Raymond ill was opposed.

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Saladin, the siege of Tiberias, the reunion of the Frankish army, and the fight between the Franks and Saladin at 'fontes quosdam' 6 (3 July 1187); this account describes the Franks as obliged to camp where no water was available on the eve of this day. Agreeing with another source, it states that the army did not camp at Hattin during the night,7 contrary to the reports of Ernoul and the Estoire d'Eracles. On 4 July King Guy de Lusignan called a council. A knight named John, who 'having long served in Turkish armies' was well acquainted with their tactics, was called upon to give his opinion. He advised the king to direct his army's charge against the center of the opposing army, where stood Saladin: if they succeeded in routing this section, the battle was won. But Count Raymond of Tripolis counselled that they should make first of all for the hill of Hattin, where the Frankish army could entrench itself in an impregnable position, whence it might deliver assaults with greater strength. But the Franks were overwhelmed by the heat and by the hostile darts which rained down, dazzled by the blazing sun. 8 Moreover, they were attacked before they were able to set up their tents. 9 Hemmed in on their hillock, they charged the Moslems again. Raymond succeeded in piercing the enemy ranks; our text considers that as a flight, a sure proof of his treason -the improbability of which Mr Baldwin has demonstrated. The rest of the army, after long struggle and terrible losses, was obliged to surrender. 10 Count Raymond and his men fled to Safed castle, according to this account. It is indeed probable that the exhausted knights, unable to strain their horses further, did not gallop straightway to Tyre. Safed was less than ten miles from Hattin, and could provide a halting-place.U As for the Moslems, they also evacuated the corpse-strewn battlefield and retired to the bridge of Tiberias, where Saladin regrouped his army, divided up the spoils, and beheaded captive Templars, Hospitallers and Prince Renaud de Chatillon. 12 6 Doubtless Robert's version ('ad fontes quosdam IV miliariis citra Tyberiadem') is better than the version preserved in Ms 598 ('ad IV fontes miliariis citra Tyberiadem'). 7 They may have camped at Lubieh (Epistola . .. Archumbaldo, in M.G.H., SS, XVII, 508). We refer back to the map drawn up by Mr Baldwin and to his excellent account of the battle. 8 Then the desertions took place which would have informed Saladin of the desperate plight of the Christian army and persuaded him to attack (Epistola . •. Archumbaldo). 9 There is some confusion in the Ms 598 and in Robert's text: the Franks, according to them, were surprised by the Moslem, and at the same time encamped, when the fight began. Such a surprise would have taken place rather at the moment when they began to encamp on the hill. According to the Epistola, the Franks, setting off from Lubieh, met strong resistance a league ahead, and thus Count Raymond had advised taking up position on the hill 'qui est quasi castellum.' But they would scarcely have had time to set up three tents. - Mr Baldwin has followed at this state (pp. 116-124) the account of the Estoire d' Eracles, combining it with the information of the Epistola; but it appears improbable that the army encamped in the battlefield, and much more likely that it made for the hill, in order to set up camp and gain breathing-space. 10 Our account maintains that King Guy bore the Holy Cross when he was captured. It seems inaccurate. 11 The other accounts referring to the escape of Raymond to Safed (Guillaume de Nangis; Marino Sanudo) proceed from Robert d'Auxerre. 12 This bridge of Tiberias is mentioned, in connection with the entrance of Saladin into Galilee, by Arnold of Lubeck.

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Having reported the fall of Acre and the generosity of Saladin, who offered to allow the Frank citizens to live in the city under his rule, the text of Ms 598 differs from Robert's. Robert recounts the arrival at Tyre of Conrad de Montferrat; then he relates how Count Raymond, prevented by Conrad from delivering Tyre to the Moslems, died when he was ready to hand over Tripolis to Saladin. 13 Ms 598 tells only of Raymond's death and his alleged conversion to the Moslem faith. The account of the siege of Ascalon, reported by Robert, is certainly a part of the original narrative (Ms 598 alludes to it by four words). Also lacking in Ms 598 is the information that Turcomans, in the same year 1187, raided the country of Antioch, looted Laodicea, repulsed the princeps Raimundus (Raymond, son of Prince Bohemond), and laid waste the country before being overtaken and relieved of their spoils. 14 After Raymond's death, Ms 598 relates only the journey of the Archbishop of Tyre to Western Europe, and the birth of the future French king, Louis VIII. Then it recounts the siege of Jerusalem by Saladin. More abreviated in the Vatican chronicle than in Robert's, this account appears to be very accurate. The attack began against the western sector of the wall, but the resistance compelled Saladin to transfer his attack to the north. The citizens, threatened by the collapse of their walls, decided to surrender: a ransom was agreed upon. On Saturday, 2 October 1187, the enemies entered the city. Our text recounts many sacrileges in the churches; it tells also how Syrian Christians bought back the Holy Sepulchre and relates the respect shown by the Moslems to the Templum Damini (Dome of the Rock). Only native Christians were allowed to remain in the city. Ms 598 ends its narrative at this point; Robert begins an account of the Third Crusade which he combines with other contemporary events. The text preserved in Ms 598 and also, with additions from different sources, in the chronicle of Robert d'Auxerre, gives, then, an account of Hattin which agrees in many points with that given by the Epistola . .. Archumbaldo, which is, according to Mr Baldwin, one of the best accounts of this battle. Our text, however, is quite independent of the Epistola and several details it recountsvery probable details- do not appear in another source. We know, from Oriental historians reproducing the testimony of Saladin's son, present at the battle, that the Franks directed two attacks against the spot where the sultan was standing: his life was imperiled. 16 According to this account, the maneuver had been suggested before the fight began. Count Raymond imposed the decision to secure 13 This narrative is quite erroneous: there is confusion between the part played by Tyre by Renaud de Sidon (according to Eracles, he received Saladin's banner in order to hoist it on the walls and Conrad had this banner hurled into the moat) and the role attributed here to Raymond. Perhaps Robert adds this story from another source to the narrative we are studying (the interest shown in Conrad leads us to believe that the other source was made up after the Third Crusade). 14 It appears to be at last partially inaccurate: Laodicea was not taken by the Moslems until 1188. Possibly, however, Turcomans took advantage of the Frankish weakness (Robert. p. !l51). Mr Cahen does not mention these events in La Syrie du Nord al'bpoque dea Croisades (Paris, 1940), p. 4!l9. 15 R. Grousset, Histoire des Croisades ... (Paris, 1984), u, 795-796.

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an entrenchment first (it was the strategy of the Frankish barons, who acted similarly in previous campaigns); nothing, however, suggests that he rejected the whole plan proposed by the 'knight John,' a plan that nearly assured the victory to the Franks. The account of the siege seems to be that of an eyewitness: he includes some remarks, such as mention of hermits who built their huts on the city wall, that appear to be based on first-hand knowledge. 16 This text, considered apart from the probable additions of Robert, refers only to events which took place between July and October 1187. Is it not an account written shortly after the fall of Jerusalem, perhaps by a clerk who (like the author of the account formerly assigned to Ralph of Coggeshall) had witnessed the siege and had received precise information (with some confusions) about Hattin? Many letters were circulated after ll87 to inform Christians about this disaster and to incite them to take up the Cross. Perhaps this account is such a document. FRANKISH MERCENARIES IN MOSLEM STATES

This account of Hattin leads us to consider the neglected problem of the Frankish mercenaries in the East. From the tenth century onwards were always such professional soldiers in Western armies. 17 During the eleventh century soldiers of fortune could be found selling their services to Byzantine emperors: Norman chiefs like Crespin, Roussel de Bailleul or Herve Francopoulos played important roles in Byzantine campaigns (their revolts even imperiled the Greek empire). 18 After the First Crusade, Franks continued to serve under Byzantine standards; in llfll, they are even found in the army of King David of Georgia. 19 Their numbers increase in the time of Manuel Comnenos, and Conrad de Montferrat served Isaac IT Angelos untilll87. 20 The foundation of a Latin empire at Constantinople, opposed to the Greek empire of Nicea, did not deter Latins from serving in the Greek armies. Emperor Henry, unable to pay his soldiers, saw them enlist in the troops of Theodoros Lascaris; and the excommunication of these mercenaries by Pope Innocent Ill 16 In the more complete story preserved in Robert's account (p. 252), further details appear to be based on first-hand knowledge: the fall of the cross dominating the Dome of the Rock (cf. R. Grousset, op. cit., p. 820); Saladin lets the very poor depart without payment of ransom; he allows the sick in the hospitals to remain and he feeds them at his own expense; the citizens depart towards Alexandria, Antioch, or Sicily.... 17 J. Boussard, 'Henri II Plantagenet et l'armee de metier,' Bibliotheque de l'&cole des Chartes, CVl (1945-46), 189-224. Bibliography: A. Maricq, 'Un "comte de Brabant" et des "Braban!;ons" dans deux textes byzantins,' Academic Royale de Belgique - Bulletin de la Classe des Lettres, 1948, pp.

468-469.

18 G. Schlumberger, 'Deux chefs normands du XI• siide ••. ,' RefJU6 Historique, 1881, p. 297. See also, for instance, Dl:ilger, Regesten der Kaiser des ostramischen Reicks (1184), and L. Brehier, Les Institutions de l'empire byzantin, in Le Monde byzantin, II (Paris, 1949), 869-870,887-898. 19 According to Walter the Chancellor (cf. Cahen, La Syrie du Nord, p. 298, n. 28) and Matthew of Edessa (trans. Dulaurier, pp. 804-805), who point to the presence of 100 Franks alongside 5,000 Alans and 15,000 Qiptchaq Turks with the Georgians . . 2°Ch. Diehl, R. Guilland, L. ee R. A. Brown, The Battle of Hastinxs and the Nor111a11 Conquest, Pitkin Pictorials 1982, 12. ' Members of the Battle Conference in Caen will remember observing this fact during the mounted demonstration conducted by the Director and myself 1° For mail coifs portrayed without helmets, sec BT pls. 47, 57. 11 BT pls. 21, 27-8, 40, 46, 54-7; Paris, BN MS Lat 6 fo 145r. 4

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from Monte Cassino. As to an explanation, it may be a separate layer of mail fastened with leather strapping to give additional protection to an extremely vulnerable area, in short, a refinement only to be enjoyed by the more affluent. 12 The lower legs of the knights on the Tapestry appear, in general, to be unprotected, being simply bound in criss-cross bindings. Two leading figures, however, Duke William and Eustace of Boulogne 13 wear mail chausses, a feature which does not appear on any of the English. Occasionally undersleeves of mail are represented on the Tapestry, probably covering the forearms only and sewn to an under-garment. 14 No hauberks from the eleventh to thirteenth centuries are known to have survived. In 1947, however, my father George Peirce of Battle and others came across, during road improvements, what he later described to me as a knight buried face downwards in a simple grave. This occurred in the town of Battle, a matter of some forty yards from the position of the high altar of the abbey church. He was wearing a mail shirt, but due to rapid deterioration even a photographic record of the find proved impossible. A few rings of mail were recovered but these have now sadly been lost. No mention of weapons accompanying the find was made. At present, the hauberk which dates closest to our period is that long associated with St Wenceslaus and preserved in the treasury of Prague Cathedral. 15 All the rings are of iron and all are riveted. From my own inspection of photographs, it appears to be of a similar pattern to those portrayed on the Tapestry and indeed all other sources, although the sleeves appear to be almost full-length, a feature which became popular again at the end of the eleventh century. The skirt is split at the back only, a characteristic which would still allow mounting to be possible. The neck is in a highly tattered state, making any logical statement as to its original form impossible. A slit runs down the centre of the chest, which would have been drawn together with laces. Claude Blair is of the opinion that this important artefact could indeed date from before the royal saint's death in 929 AD. 16 Two very fine early mail shirts reside in the Royal Armouries at the Tower of London. Both bear many similarities to those in evidence in eleventhcentury sources. The first and earliest is that of Rudolph IV, Duke of Austria, and is mid-fourteenth-century. The other is the Westwale shirt which dates from c. 1400. 17 Mail has two significant advantages in its role as a type of armour. Firstly, it gives a certain degree of protection against most weapons, while its highly 12 Harold appears to be the only Englishman bearing this fcaure, which occurs immediately after the Brittany campaign, BT pl. 27. 13 BT pl. 68. Only eight figures on the Tapestry wear mail chausscs. William on five occasions pls. 26, 55, 56, 59 and 68, Eustace once pl. 68, and two unknown figures, pls. 53 and 60. 14 See BT pl. 68, Odo, William and Eustace. 15 For a photograph of this hauberk, see I. G. Peirce, 'The Knight, his Arms and Armour in the eleventh and twelfth Centuries'. The!deals and Practice of Medieval Knighthood: Papers from the First and Second Strawberry Hill Conferences, cd. C. Harper-Bill and Ruth Harvey, 1986, 157. 16 Claude Blair, Europea11 Armour, London 1958, 24. 17 I am most grateful to Mr Peter Hammond of the Royal Armouries for giving me the details of both shirts.

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flexible properties allow the wearer the maximum of mobility. William of Poitiers relates in his remarkably detailed account of the Battle of Hastings that the English weapons, surely a reference to the fearful two-handed battleaxe, easily penetrated both the shields and the armour of the Normans. 18 Indeed, the lower border on the Tapestry, during the battle sequences, bears witness to the vulnerability of mail-clad warriors; apart from numerous headless dead, many lie with their armour pierced by arrow or spear. Illustrations in the Maciejowski Bible of c. 1250, which abounds in highly detailed battle scenes, give the distinct impression that mail afforded little protection against a well-delivered sword slash. 19 The protection which mail offers depends upon the force of a blow being distributed over a large area. Thus the blow is significantly absorbed by the mail. Consequently, there is a higher probability of the mail being severed by a blow to the arm, where fewer rings resist the full force of the sword arm, than by a slash to the chest, where more rings absorb the impact and where any injury might well be limited to extensive bruising. Needless to say, a powerfully delivered sword thrust or well-directed lance thrust or arrow would, in all certainty, result in penetration of the mail. Taking into consideration these statements, it was essential that the warrior, whether knight or foot-soldier, should wear some kind of reinforced, padded undergarment beneath the hauberk to assist in the absorption process of any direct hit. It would bring real joy to my heart to be able to dispel, for all time, the notion that hauberks were excessively heavy. If this were the case, how could a fighting man effectively conduct himself in battle with the weight of his armour impairing that effectiveness? William of Poitiers relates how Duke William in person, while conducting a reconnaissance of the area around Hastings, returned on foot, because of the difficulty of the path, carrying or wearing not only hts own hauberk, but shouldering that of William Fitz Osbern as well. It is also worthy of note that in 1983, Allen Brown and I were able to wear hauberks and all other necessary knightly equipment, in temperatures of 80°F, for over five hours, three of them in the saddle, with little or no discomfort. 20 From information on hauberks from a variety of sources, I would assess the weight of an eleventh- or twelfth-century model to be approximately 25lb (11.4kg). By way of a comparison, the splendid Rudolph IV hauberk mentioned earlier weighs 23lb 6oz (10.6kg) and the Westwale shirt exactly 23lb (10.45kg). To the fighting fit, powerfully-built warrior, whether mounted or on foot, weights of this magnitude presented few problems. In reality, the mass of the garment becomes evenly distributed about the shoulders and arms, and one unable to compensate for the weight of his armour faced a bleak future. Nowhere are the helmets of the period more finely portrayed than on the Bayeux Tapestry and considering the seamstresses' medium, i.e. wool upon

18 19

20

R. Allen Brown, The Norman Conquest, 33. New York, Pierpont Morgan Library MS 638. The final one-and-a-half hours was spent in the Chequers.

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linen, they survive with an elegance and detail superior to all other sources. 21 The majority of the better-armed English and Normans shown upon the Tapestry wear conical hdmets. All other sources of the period verify the universitality of this type of helmet worn over the mail coif. Most sources depict these helmets with a metal bar extending down over the nose, called the nasel, and occasionally some kind of extension hangs from the back. 22 The latter feature is best portrayed on the Tapestry where a wagon, laden with a barrel, lances and five helmets is dragged down to the awaiting ships. The rear extension of all five helmets appear to be unusually substantial and rigid and may therefore represent some kind of neck-guard. The majority of the helmets on the Tapestry appear to be formed of shapedplates, riveted to a framework of metal bands. Essentially the framework consisted of a circular headband, rising vertically from which metal strips met at the apex. Curved plates, roughly triangular in shape, were then inserted inside and riveted to the main framework, thus forming a conical dome. The nasel could then be either an integral part of the framework or attached separately. This simple but robust construction was by no means new, having been in use since the late-Roman period. It remained popular in a modified form until the fourteenth century. I am unaware of any surviving example from the period under discussion. A few contemporary manuscript illustrations indicate the existence of some helmets which show no evidence of a framework, but consist simply of curved plates riveted vertically to each other. Two examples of this construction have survived, one now in the Metropolitan Museum of New York, the other to be viewed in the Medieval Gallery of the Royal Armouries at the Tower of London (p. 242). The latter is in remarkable condition and survives as one of the most important military artefacts of the period, for here we have the helmet not of a follower but that of a leader. It consists of four roughly triangular curved plates, each of which overlap and are riveted vertically to one another, thus forming a conical dome. Each plate is overlaid with copper gilt and the rivets are capped with silver. There is some evidence that at one time it may have carried a neck-guard. It is of Polish or Russian origin and dates from c. 900 -c. 1100. Accurate determination of its construction is possible due to the fine condition of the specimen, while the richness of its finish indicates its owner was not solely concerned with effective protection, but also with his appearance in battle. Many eleventh- and twelfth-century sources, including the Tapestry, show helmets which give the distinct impression of being made in one piece. 23 It is most fortunate that two superlative examples of this construction have survived. Displayed in the cathedral treasury of Prague is a helmet said to be that of St Wenceslaus (d. 929 AD). The skull has been skilfully forged from a single piece of iron but damage has caused it to lose its summit. The brow 21 In particular see the helmet worn by William at Dinan BT pl. 26. Also pls. 53, 54, 55 and Odo and Eustace on pl. 68. See also The Bayeux Tapestry, ed. F. M. Stenton, 2nd edn., London 1965, fig. 31, the chasse of St Maurice. 22 A large number of twelfth-century seals show some kind of extensiOn at the rear of the helmet. In most cases they appear to be ribbon-like and in all probability, were the tied ends of laces, used to fix the helmet firmly to the coif. 23 Paris, BN MS Lat 1390 (eleventh-century); see also Goliath in the Clteaux Bible (seen. 8).

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The splendid Polish/Russian helmet, now on view at the Royal Armouries

band around the base of the skull and the elaborate nasel extension, both of iron, given the appearance of being made in one piece and are riveted to the skull. They carry decoration, in the form of interlaced patterns inlaid with silver. The nasel bears a stylised representation of Christ on the cross, his outstretched arms overflowing on to the browband. This style of decoration may be dated to the first third of the tenth century. 24 The other specimen, forged as it is from a single piece of iron, is a masterpiece of the craft of the smith. It could easily date from the tenth to the twelfth centuries and is on view in the Imperial Armoury at Vienna. The My thanks to Jennie Hooper for her time and expertise. For 'Images of War in Early Medieval Manuscripts', see her paper in ante vii, 1985.

24

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nasel is an integral part of the skull and holes around the base of the skull indicate that originally it bore a browband to stiffen the structure or some kind of lining - or perhaps both. It bears no decoration, but has great beauty in its simplicity. The conical shape of these helmets was not developed for the ease of manufacture, but more as a protection factor for the wearer. The basic shape allowed most downward and horizontal blows to be deftly deflected away from the head and upper body, while the nasel protected not only the nose but a major part of the upper face. The Norman knight carried a kite-shaped shield which protected much of

A dismounted knight ftom the first third of the twelfih century. Note the split skirt of the hauberk. (The Cfteaux Bible)

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his front and left side, including almost all of the left leg. 25 This had developed into the standard form of shield for the mounted warrior, for unlike the circular shield it fitted neatly into the space between the rider and his mount without actually touching the animal. It was also widely used by infantry and indeed the Tapestry shows the so-called English shield-wall to be entirely composed of kite-shaped shields. 26 Later a groug of lightly-armed English defending a hillock also bear shields of this form, 2 and towards the end of the battle five other well-armed English, including Harold himself. zs No shields of this type are known to have survived. In all probability, they were constructed of wood and covered in leather with a reinforcing strip of metal round the rim. They also carried a central dome-shaped boss. The shield was curved about its major axis, thus wrapping around the body of the warrior and maximising protection. It was supported by an arrangement of straps of which many variations existed. 29 It also carried a wide leather strap by means of which it could be suspended from the shoulder and, in the case of the knight, free the left hand for the reins. 30 Many of the shields bore various forms of decoration, no doubt for embellishment and as an aid to identification in battle. 31 The English also used circular shields, probably of a similar basic construction to the kite-shaped shields. These were of the traditional Germanic form and had long been the standard shield of infantry. To hold his shield, the warrior first passed his hand through a leather strap before grasping a central bar, his clenched fist, snuggly fitting into the hollow of the boss. By efficient movement of his shield arm he could ward off blows from above, side and to front. The Tapestry conveniently shows a fine example of the manner in which a foot soldier used his shield in conjunction with the sword. 32 The main offensive weapon of the knight, apart from the sword, was the lance, made from ash or applewood, both materials possessing great flexibility and toughness. No complete lances have survived but in general they appear to be between nine and eleven feet in length. In action, the first assault was usually delivered with the lance but occasionally tactical considerations dictated otherwise. For example, William ofPoitiers relates that at Hastings, after the failure of the attack delivered by the Norman archers, the knights, 'spurning to fight at long range, challenged the event with their swords,' not wishing to use their lances at the early stages of the battle. 33 Most knights on the Tapestry use their lances in the ancient over-arm or under-arm modes, both methods particularly effective against infantry. 34 For fine examples of kite-shaped shields (apart from the Bayeux Tapestry) see, I. G. Peirce, 'The Knight, his Arms and his Armour in the eleventh and twelfth centuries', 161. 26 BT pls. 62-3. 27 BT pl. 67. 28 BT pls. 70--1. 29 BT pl. 22. 30 See BT pl. 22. See also the figure of Goliath in the Bible of Citeaux (n. 8). 31 For the elaborate examples see BT pls. 9, 13-14, 16, 26 and the Temple Pyx (Glasgow, Burrell Collection Regd. No.5 and 6/139). 32 BT pl. 64, extreme right. 33 Brown, The Norman Conquest, 33. 34 BT pl. 62. 25

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Others hold their lances couched, that is tucked firmly under the right arm and grasped tightli, thus focussing the combined momentum of horse and rider at the point. 5 With this in mind, it is possible to visualize the devastating effect of the charge, executed by a contingent of well-trained, highly disciplined knights, and to better understand the sentiments of Anna Comnena, who declared the charging Frankish knights capable of piercing the walls of Babylon. 36 The Tapestry, in fact records a moment of transition, for the charge with the lance couched was a relatively new development and it is most surprising to see it employed at Hastings, against infantry, particularly as history proved the technique to be ideally suited for unhorsing mounted opponents. Furthermore Professor D.J. A. Ross, in a paper entitled 'Breaking the Lance', draws attention to a scene on the Tapestry, just prior to the battle, where three Normans, with couched lances, have them placed diagonally across the neck of their horses. 37 This nearside to nearside method of attack was not to become a common practice of warfare until the late twelfth century, and again it is remarkable to see it at this early date. The lance-heads were generally leaf-shaped and of a variety of lengths. 38 Some carry cross-pieces probably indicating the manner used to fix them to the wooden shaft but also to prevent the hazards of over penetration. The saddles were of a deep design, thus affording the rider a firm, stable seat and consequently lessening the danger of unhorsing. 3 \l In addition the long stirrups allowed the rider literally to stand up in them and take advantage of a firm base to deliver an effective sword slash or lance thrust. Many of the lances on the Tapestry bear gonfanons, surely the personal insignia, the badge of membership, of those groups of knights, or conrois, who trained and fought together as a unit. 40 A large number of manuscript illustrations from the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries also show groups of mounted warriors with one or more of their number bearing gonfanons. 41 Spears, not to be confused with the lances, were used by the Nor man and the English infantry for stabbing and thrusting, as well as throwing. 42 The great two-handed battle axe was the weapon par excellence of the Anglo-Scandinavian housecarls, and many of these fearful weapons are beautifully portrayed upon the Tapestry. 43 They consisted of a wooden shaft of some four feet in length. The head bore a curved and keenly honed cutting edge. Wace, writing in the twelfth century, related how at the Battle of Hastings a nameless English axeman brought down a rider and his horse with a single blow, and we have already heard the comment of William of Poitiers regarding the effectiveness of this weapon. 44 '5 3" 37

3" 39 40 41 42 43 44

For the couched lance sec BT pls. 55, 65, 68. The Alexiad of Amw Co111nena, ed. and trans. E. R. A. Sewter, Harmondsworth 1969, 416. BT pl. 55. Two of the lances bear gonfanons. The British /VIuseum have a fine selection of contemporary lance heads. BT pls. 64, 69 and particularly 70. BT pls. 55, 57, 59, 60, 61. 62. New York, Pierpont Morgan Library MS 736, fo. 7v. Sec in particular BT pls. 62, 63, 67, 70, 71. BT pls. 63, 64, 65, 66, 70, 72. Wacc, Roman de Rtm, cd. H. Andresen, Hcilbronn 1877-9, ii 358-9.

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Three Norman kr1ights showing the 'nearside to nearside' method of attack. Bayeux Tapestry (pl. 55) One hazard which faced the axeman emanates from the outcome of a deflected blow or even complete miss of his target, when the energy stored in the axe and man might be sufficient to cause him to rotate into a vulnerable position. Allen Brown also points out another area of weakness, in that the axeman wishing to deliver a two-handed blow left himself dangerously unguarded as he raised the axe. 45 With these practicalities in mind, it is reasonable to assume that axemen fought in combat groups, each being supported by swordsmen and javelineers who could step in and protect him when at his most vulnerable. Many axeheads have survived and most of the best are river finds. An excellent example may be seen at the British Museum. Found in the Thames, in London, it remains in a remarkable state of preservation. Another fine example may be seen in the Royal Armouries at the Tower of London (p. 247). 46 Some years ago an axehead was dredged from the Thames at Twickenham and offered to me for my collection. It was in almost pristine condition and I have not fully recovered from not buying it. The mud of the Thames had covered it for almost a thousand years, but in so doing had preserved it in its original form. Smaller throwing axes are also in evidence on the Tapestry and one such axehead was found on the field of Hastings some ten years ago. The Royal 45 46

Brown, The Normam and the Norman Conquest, New York 1968, 167, n. 129. This superb specimen, ref. no. AL.116/581, is on loan from the British Museum.

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300

A fine axehead which could date from the eleventh century (Royal Armouries)

The head of a throwing axe or 'Francisca' similar to one found on the field of Hastings (Royal Armouries)

73

74

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Armouries have a splendid example (p. 247), possibly of Frankish origin. 47 The archers were the artillery of an army and their major role involved softening up the enemy. Apart from the Tapestry, where twenty-nine archers arc portrayed, illustrations are rare in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, although after c. 1150 they are common in sculpture. There are six archers on the central narrative of the Tapestry who are more carefully depicted and rather better dressed than the twenty-three others in the lower border. Only one English archer is in evidence and he wears a simple tunic, no helmet, and docs not carry a quiver. 4R Four Norman archers are placed together in a group. 49 One of these wears a coat of mail and a fine helmet, which is surely not a mistake on the part of the designer and, if not an allusion to the growing status of the archer, then at the very least an indirect reference to his growing importance in warfare. 50 Of the other three, two appear to wear garments of cloth, while the third has quilted breeches probably of leather, and therefore very much poor man's armour. The sixth bowman on the main strip is the lone mounted archer, who is participating in the pursuit of the defeated English in the very last scene. 51 He does wear spurs and has both hands on the bow, indicating he is no ordinary archer who, fuelled by the fever of victory, has mounted a stray horse and given pursuit. All the bows on the Tapestry appear to be ordinary wooden bows, that is formed from a single wooden stave. There is no way of knowing from which wood they were constructed, although it is worth noting that the Viking-age bow from Hedeby is of yew and Gerald of Wales has the Welsh making their bows of dwarf elm. 52 Indeed, ash, holly and hazel all possess qualities suitable for bow staves. All contemporary sources reveal that these weapons were drawn to the chest only, indicating they possessed a limited range, unlike the successful longbow of later centuries, which was longer and was drawn to the ear. Very little information is available regarding the arrows except that they were tipped with iron and flighted with feathers. They were stored in simple leather quivers, hung from the shoulder or worn at the waist. One scene on the Tapestry, however, shows archers in the lower border, between whom are free-standing quivers, possibly indicating the presence of a new supply of arrows brought up from the rear. 53 There is some evidence of the crossbow being used at Hastings and it is impossible to envisage William not taking advantage of such a devastating weapon, were it available. 47 Ref. no. A11/310. Commonly known as a 'Francisca' this excellent specimen dates from the sixth century. 4" BT pl. 63. Jim Bradbury who has written the latest and the best volume on the medieval archer states: 'The sole English bowman is presented as a small figure overshadowed by the mail-clad warriors. In eleventh-century artistic convention this docs not signify a diminutive individual, but one of insignificant rank.' The Medieval Archer, Woodbridge 1985, 34. 40 B T detail from pl. 61 . 50 The cost of a hauberk was immense and to sec an archer wearing one in addition to a helmet is highly significant. 51 BT pl. 73. 52 Gerald of Wales, The Joumey tlmm; 87-8, 288.

351

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mercantile community, it was specifically the status of caballeros that was given to the merchants who settled in the most important of all, Seville. 51 However, the extraordinary leap forward in the thirteenth century, when both Castile and Aragon greatly increased their area, the initially far greater size of Castile and her policy of expelling large numbers of the Moslem cultivators, meant that, even with the vast jurisdictional areas allotted to the cities, her kings could not hope to organize and settle the new conquest on their own. 52 The result was the grant of huge lordships, often in free gift or with immunities, though carrying the duty of military service, 53 and the consequent foundation of the great aristocratic houses of Spain with their underpopulated and under-exploited latifundia which exist to this day. Just as small men got grants directly from the king of holdings in full ownership or on lenient tenancy-rates, oil conditim:i that they maintained residence, so the lay magnates, churches and great military orders received vast grants on condition that they undertook colonization. The military orders had appeared in Spain in the twelfth century. They were not especially active as colonizers but their military role was immediately apparent. 54 So apparent, indeed, that Alfonso I of Aragon, the conqueror of Zaragoza, dying childless shortly after his defeat in battle against the Moslems, bequeathed his kingdom to the three orders of St. John of}erusalem, the Temple and 51 Pescador in CHE., xxxiii-iv (1961), p. 186. R. Carande, "Sevilla, Fortaleza y Mercado", AHDE., ii (1925), pp. 276 n. 82, 286-7. N. Tenorio, "Las Milicias de Sevilla" Rev. Arch. Bib. Mus., xvii (1907), p. 225. 52 Castile's territory grew by nearly so%, her population by barely 1o%; Aragon grew in area by 40% and in population by 30%. S. Sobreques, "La Epoca del Patriciado Urbano" in Historia de Espana y America, ed. J. Vicens Vives (Barcelona, 1961), ii, pp. 10, II-2, 46, 47· For the encouragement of early marriage and large families by Alfonso X see Las Siete Partidas, Pt. ii, tit. xx, !eyes i-iii. 53 H. Grassotti, "Apostillas a 'el Prestimonio' de Valdeavellano", CHE., xxix-xxx (1959), pp. 183 n. 52, pp. 210-2. Idem, "Pro bono et Fideli Servitio", CHE., xxxiii-iv (1961), p. 46. J. M. Font y Rius, "La Comarca ·de Tortosa a Raiz de la Reconquista Cristiana (1148)", CHE., xix (1953), p. 115. 64 Elliott, op. cit., pp. 14-15. Vicens Vives, Historia Economica de Espana (Barcelona, 1959), pp. 148-50, 151, 152. Sobreques, loc. cit., pp. 12-21, 44· On the relative importance of the various orders in the different Spanish kingdoms see D. Lomax, La Orden de Santiago II70-I275 (Madrid, 1965), pp. 49-50. For the colonizing activity of the order of Santiago see ibid., pp. 119-28; idem, "El arzobispo D. Rodrigo de Rada y la Orden de Santiago", Hispania, xviii (1958), pp. 3-37. The military role of the Hospitallers is deprecated by S. A. Garcia Llaraguete, El Gran Priorado de la Orden de SanJuan deJersualen, Siglos XII-XIII (Pamplona, 1957), i, pp. 39-41. But see J. Goii.i Gaztambide's review in Hispam·a Sacra, ix (1956), pp. 461-4; M. Ledesma, "Notas sobre la Actividad Militar de los Hospitalarios", Principe de Viana, xcix-v (1964), pp. 51-6.

352

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the Holy Sepulchre. Not even the beneficiaries expected this extraordinary will to be implemented and contented themselves with very lucrative compensation for its non-fulfilment. The Aragonese nobles, having to rush through a solution in face of the far from tentative designs of the king of Leon-Castile, seized on Alfonso's only brother, Ramiro, monk and bishop-elect, secularized him, married him, waited for him to father a child, betrothed her, for it was a daughter, to the adult count of Barcelona and returned him to his monastery, all in the space of three years. 65 But popular and powerful though the Templars and Hospitallers were, their thunder was stolen by the native Spanish orders. Indeed the most important of these, Calatrava, was founded as a result of the Templars falling down on the job. They announced that Calatrava could not be held against the Almohades and handed it back to the king. Two Cistercian monks from a monastery on the NavarraCastilian frontier led a group of their fellow-religious to this now isolated and exposed fort and so, although Citeaux was far from pleased, founded a new military order. The peculiar form of this foundation, whereby monks became soldiers, is of more than transitory interest. For it underlines the strong resemblance borne by a11 the Spanish orders to the Moslem ribat. The ribats were fortified monasteries which from the eighth century arose along the frontiers of the Moslem empire to protect them and also to act as headquarters for marauding raids into enemy, infidel territory. Both attack and defence were considered part of the duty of Jihad or holy war. These ribats were unlike monasteries in so far as entry into them did not necessarily represent a permanent vocation. One needed merely to do a stint of days or months or years there to pile up treasure in heaven. In between the bouts of military activity, the inmates engaged in ascetic religious exercises. Women were not admitted. But, as a Hadit quoted by Averroes made clear, a man who lived on.the frontier was not thereby a murabit; only one who left his home to go to a place of danger. It was necessary to have a horse, and one achieved extra merit by buying one's own; but a horse would be supplied if one came without. The foundation was supported by endowments, alms and booty. The ribats were also different from 66 F. Balaguer, "La Chronica Adefonsi Imperatoris y la Elevacion de Ramiro II al trono Aragom!s", EEMCA., vi (1956), pp. 7-40. A. Ubieto Arteta, "Navarra-Arag6n y Ia Idea Imperial de Alfonso VII de Castilla", ibid., pp. 4182. P. E. Schramm, "Ramon Berenguer IV" in Els Primers Comtes-Reis (Biografies Catalanes, iv, Barcelona, 1960), pp. 9-18.

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353 NUMBER

35

the military orders in the type of person who staffed them. The permanent nucleus tended to be mystics, scholars and theologians, in this way approximating more to the civilian monasteries of the west. The great age for these military monastic foundations in Spain was the eleventh and twelfth centuries, just prior to the foundation of the Spanish military orders. The influence of the ribat on these orders is apparent in the fact that except, and then only initially, for Santiago, the Orders of Spain, Calatrava, Alcantara, Montes a and Avis, were never Hospitaller foundations, unlike either the Temple or Hospital. From the first they were intended to engage in holy war, on the frontier and in the most exposed and dangerous areas. At least in the early centuries they fulfilled these obligations. Thus when Old Calatrava fell into the hinterland with the progress of the Reconquest, the Order moved its headquarters to New Calatrava, further south, and again on the frontier. 56 The military purpose of the ribats was not the only military influence of the Moslems on the Christians in Spain. The very tactics for which the warrior-monks of the_ ribats were famous were characteristic of Moslem tactics in general and were copied by the Christians. This was the organized raid: the cabalgada and its variant the algara; an analogue of the latter, the rebato, proclaimed its derivation explicidy. 57 Moslem tactics were not only copied by the Christians, so much so that the Reconquest can even be represented as essentially long centuries of marauding raids; the regulations covering the organization, command and discipline of the cabalgada •• J. Oliver Asin, "Origen Arabe de 'Rebato', 'Arrobda' y sus Hom6nimos. Contribuci6n al Estudio de la Historia Medieval de la Tactica Militar y de su Lexico Peninsular", Bolerin de la Real Academia Espanola, xv (1928), pp. 347, 496-542; on the organization of the ribat see ibid., pp. 358 ff.; the quotation from Averroes is on p. 362 n. 5; for the influence of the ribat on the Spanish military orders see pp. 540-2. For a tentative denial of this influence see Lomax, La Orden de Santiago, p. 3; J. O'Callaghan, "The Affiliation of the Order of Calatrava to the Order of Citeaux", Analecta Sacri Ordinis Cisterciensis, xv (1959), pp. 176-8. See also F. Gutton, L'Ordre de Calatrave (Paris, 1955). On Alcantara see O'Callaghan, "The Foundation of the Order of Alcantara II76-r2r8", Catholic Hist. Rev., xlvii (1961), pp. 471-86. On the order ofEvoraAvis see Lomax, "Algunos Estatutos Primitives de la Orden de Calatrava", Hispania, xxi (1961), pp. 487 ff. A. Javierre Mur, "La Orden de Calatrava en Portugal", Bol. de la R. Acad. de Hist., cxxx (1952), pp. 324-36. On Calatrava la Nueva see O'Callaghan, "Sobre los Origines de Calatrava la Nueva", Hispania, xciii (1963), pp. 495 ff. For an unflattering description of Calatrava la Vieja see L. Torres Balbas, "Ciudades Yermas de la Espaiia Musulmana" Bol. de la R. Acad. de Hist., cxli (1957), pp. 28, 79-II4. 67 Both cabalgadas and algaras are described in Las Siete Partidas, Pt. ii, tit. xxiii, leyes xxviii, xx:ix; Palomeque, Zoe. cit., pp. 222-3. On the general Fuero de las Cabalgadas see Pescador in CHE., xxx:iii-iv (1961), pp. 169-72. On rebato see Oliver Asin, loc. cit., pp. 372 ff.

354

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300 A SOCIETY ORGANIZED FOR WAR: MEDIEVAL SPAIN

69

also received detailed attention in the statutes of the frontier towns. For these towns were expected to fight not only when formally mobilized for large-scale campaigns led by the king but to undertake annual raids on their own initiative. As a result, elaborate rules were drawn up for recruitment, discipline, indemnification for losses and wounds received, intelligence and counter-intelligence when on the march and above all - the subject of the most meticulous regulations - the division of the spoils. 58 For apart from stock-raising, these towns in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries lived chiefly from booty in the form of cattle, slaves, moveables and even food-stuffs. However, though the Christians went in for this kind of warfare, the Infante Juan Manuel in his discussion of comparative tactics written during the first half of the fourteenth century recognized that the Moslems were much better at it, partly if not chiefly because of their superior powers of endurance. 59 . The equipment and above all the riding technique which the rapid manoeuvre of a marauding band demanded was also copied from the Moslems. This was the so-called style ala jinete which was especially characterized by short stirrups, a fairly low saddle and a palate-bit which enabled the horse to turn far more quickly than by pulling at the sides of its mouth. Both Moslems and Christians remarked on the fact that the high cantle of the saddle used by the heavily armed knight riding a la brida or with long stirrups made the latter better able .to withstand a powerful lance-thrust in close battle. 60 The Christians, and Juan Manuel among them, usually prided themselves on their greater skill in pitched battle but a Hispano-Moslem writer of the late eleventh· century shows that their adversaries knew how to arrange their battle formation for such occasions in a manner normally thought characteristic of western warfare only after the turn of the . fourteenth century. 58 For independent annual raids see Chronica Adefonsi Imperatoris, ed. Sanchez Belda, paras. 72, n5. Las Siete Partidas, Pt. ii, tit. xxii-xxx is an elaborate discussion on indemnities, rewards, booty, tactics, terminology, morale, etc., amounting to a treatise on war. For municipal laws on these topics see Palomeque, Zoe. cit., pp. 205-351; Pescador in CHE., xxxv-vi (1962), pp. 177-88. 59 J. M. Castro y Calvo, El Arte de Gobernar ellas Obras de D. Juan Manuel (Barcelona, 1945), pp. 194, 196-7. 80 On riding techniques see Oliver Asin, Zoe. cit., pp. 383-7; L. Mercier, "Les Ecoles Espagnoles Dites de la Brida et de la Gineta", Revue de Cava/erie, vii (1927), pp. 301-15; R. B. Cunninghame Graham, The Horses of the Conquest (London, 1930), pp. 8-9, 10-1.. Imitation could take place in the other direction especially among long-established Andalusian Moslems, but the repeated influx of Berbers from North Mrica se~ms to have overcome and reversed this tendency: see Levi-Proven9al, L'Espagne Musulmane au Xe Siecle, pp. 145-6.

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300

70

PAST AND PRESENT

355 NUMBER

35

The tactics we use [says Abii Bakr at-Turtiisi] and which seem the most efficacious against our enemy are these. The infantry with their antelope shields, lances and iron-tipped javelins are placed, kneeling, in ranks. Their lances rest obliquely on their shoulders, the shaft touching the ground behind them, the point directed towards the enemy. Each one kneels on his left knee with his shield in the air. Behind the infantry are the picked archers who, with their arrows, can pierce coats of mail. Behind the archers are the cavalry. When the Christians charge, the infantry remains in position, kneeling as before. As soon as the enemy comes into range, the archers let loose a hail of arrows, while the infantry throw their javelins and receive the charge on the points of their lances. Then infantry and archers open their ranks to right and left and through the gaps they create, the cavalry rushes the enemy and inflicts upon him what Allah wills. 61

It has been suggested that the Spanish Christians paid little attention to the hierarchy of command, and it may be true that they could here have learned something from the Moslems. For according to some Moslem writers a strict chain of command, from commanderin..:chief to section leader, existed not only in the Praetorian guard of mercenaries surrounding the Caliph, but also within the territorialized militia, the holders of ikta and the landowners of the early years of the Conquest. It is likely, however, that much of this meticulous Moslem hierarchy existed only in theory, 62 and in any case the Christian battle formations advocated by Alfonso X and the experienced Juan Manuel, who has indeed been accused of neglecting the question of command, must have meant that very strict discipline was maintained and hence that some sort of hierarchy of command existed. For example, Alfonso X in his great law code the Siete Partidas advocated the cone whenever the numerical advantage lay with an enemy drawn up in extended ranks one behind the other. The cone, designed to break up the enemy lines, should be formed with three horse at the head, then six, then twelve, then twenty-four, etc., or by doubling from one if numbers were very small. If the enemy was numerically weaker then it was preferable to form ranks oneself in order to use the cavalry to best advantage and to envelop the opposing side. Alfonso, however, did more than discuss tactics; he also gave attention to the quality of command and to the selection and appointment of officers, incidentally revealing the survival of military 61 Ibid., pp. 146-7. His description may be held valid for the tactics of a century earlier still: see idem, Histoire de L'Espagne Musulmane, iii, p. roo. •• For charges of inattention to the hierarchy of command see Palomeque, loc. cit., p. 2I4; D. L. Isola, "Las Instituciones en las Obras de D. Juan Manuel", CHE., xxi-ii (I954), p. II4. For the Moslem chain of command see LeviProven Mongolian, bayatur = hero) al-mughul. 46 On this question, see the remarks of Morgan, Mongols, p. 57.

Medieval Waifare 1000-1300 'A YN JALUT REVISITED-AMITAI-PREISS

373

129

the battle of I:Iim~, there were 6,000 Mongol troops, 47 i.e., that at the most there were 6,000 dhurriyya. If this is more than were present at cAyn Jalfit, and it was estimated that the size of the Mongol army (without Syrian auxiliaries) was in the neighborhood of 10,000-12,000 troops, it would follow that much of Ketbuqa's army was not composed of top-notch Mongol cavalrymen, . but rather either of less elite nomadic troops (of unknown origin) or sedentary allies. The mainstay of both the Mamluk and Mongol armies were disciplined masses of mounted archers who originated in the Eurasian steppe. There were, however, differences between the two forces. The Mamluks had been plucked out of the nomadic environment at a young age, brought as slaves to Egypt and Syria, converted to Islam, and inducted into the armies of various rulers or senior officers, where they underwent long-term military training.48 The Mongols, on the other hand, maintained a nomadic lifestyle. 49 Smith has recently suggested that in general, the Mamluks were better equipped and trained and had larger horses than their Mongol counterparts. 50 This may well be true, although it must be remembered that the political disorders in Egypt and Syria over the previous decade would not have been propitious for the orderly building of armed forces in either country.

A Note on a Source The following reconstruction is based on Arabic sources from the Mamluk Sultanate and pro-Mongol sources which were written in Persian, Syriac, and Armenian. It is difficult to establish an acceptable and realistic account of the battle because none of the sources gives the complete picture and they often contradict each other; at the same time some events are unclear or completely unreported. In general, source criticism will be dealt with in the discussion of the battle below. At this stage I will limit myself to a 47 AI-Yiinini, I :434-435; 2:89-90; also found in Ibn al-Dawadari, 8:68; Mufa