Chapter IV: Sketch of the History of Normandy During the Tenth Century.188 (3)

William Longsword left one son, Richard, surnamed the Fearless, born of a Breton mother Sprota, who stood, as we have seen, to Duke William in that doubtful position in which she might, in different mouths, be called an honourable matron, a concubine, or a harlot.[307] Her son had been taught both the languages of his country, and he was equally at home in Romance Rouen and in Scandinavian Bayeux.[308] Whether his birth were strictly legitimate or not was a matter of very little moment either in [Sidenote: His doubtful legitimacy little thought of.] Norman or in Frankish eyes. If a man was of princely birth and showed a spirit worthy of his forefathers, few cared to pry over minutely into the legal or canonical condition of his mother. The young Richard had been already, without any difficulty, acknowledged by the Norman and Breton chiefs as his father’s future successor in the duchy,[309] [Sidenote: He is invested with the Duchy by Lewis.] and he now found as little difficulty in obtaining a formal investiture of the fief from his lord King Lewis.[310] In England his minority, for he was only about ten years old, would have been a far greater hindrance to his succession than his doubtful birth. But even in England, within the same century, minors reigned when no better qualified member of the kingly house was forthcoming, and young [Sidenote: Reign of Richard. 943–996.] Richard was the only male descendant of Rolf. The long reign of Richard, reaching over more than fifty years, is one of the most important in the history of Normandy and of France, and it is in his time that we hear of the first direct collision between Normandy and England. And the early part of Richard’s reign is perhaps more crowded with picturesque incidents than any other portion of time [Sidenote: Romantic interest of his early life.] of equal length. The early life of the orphan child, his dangers, his captivity, his escape, his bitter enemies and his faithful friends, the mighty powers which strove for the possession of his person or for influence over his counsels—the tale has all the interest of a complicated romance. Many of the details are doubtless due to the invention of Norman legend-makers; but there is enough in the soberer French and German writers to show that the main outline of the story is trustworthy. But for the purpose of the present sketch, I must set forth the romantic tale of Richard’s childhood only in a greatly abridged shape, and content myself with pointing out those parts of the story which are of political importance.[311]

The year in which William Longsword was murdered was an important year in many ways for the whole of Gaul. It marks in some sort the beginning of a new [Sidenote: Events of the year 943;] epoch. Besides the death of William and the important events which followed upon it, this year was marked by a birth and a death which had no small influence on the [Sidenote: death of Herbert of Vermandois; birth of Hugh Capet.] course of affairs. Herbert of Vermandois, the regicide, the tyrant as he is called, died this year, and died, according to some accounts, in a mysterious and horrible fashion.[312] His dominions were divided among his sons, except some portions which passed into the hands of Hugh of Paris. The royal power thus lost one of its most formidable enemies, while another enemy yet more formidable was still further strengthened. And this year, for the first time, Hugh had a son to be the heir of his greatness. His English wife Eadhild had died childless; but her successor, Hugh’s third wife, Hadwisa, daughter of King Henry and sister of King Otto and Queen Gerberga, now bore him a son, Hugh surnamed Capet, the future King. [Sidenote: Effect of Hugh’s birth on Hugh the Great’s policy.] One can hardly doubt that the birth of his son had an effect on Hugh the Great’s policy. He would not be a King himself, but he would put no hindrance in the way of his son being a King. From this time onwards the contrast between the two dynasties, between the old and the new, between the Frank and the Frenchman, between Laon and Paris, becomes even more sharply marked than before.

[Sidenote: Constant influence of Germany in Western affairs.]

From this time onwards also we must remark another tendency which was doubtless closely connected with the one just mentioned, and of which we have already seen the beginning. I mean the continued and constantly strengthening influence of Germany, the Eastern Kingdom, in the affairs of the West. The Council of Attigny, with the two Kings of the Franks sitting and acting as colleagues, was but the first of a long series of assemblies of the like kind. It is to Otto that all parties in the Western Kingdom appeal as their natural mediator; the King appeals to him as his natural protector. If the Eastern King receives no formal homage as over-lord, still he is clearly looked on both by Lewis and by Hugh as something more than a mere neighbour and brother. Towards Lewis Otto appears as the senior colleague in a common office; in the language of the elder days of the Empire, the Saxon acts as the Augustus, while the Frank is only the Cæsar.[313] While Otto is absent on distant expeditions, his vice-gerent in Lotharingia, Duke Conrad[314] or Archbishop Bruno, is competent to [Sidenote: From 942 [Attigny] to 973 [death of Otto].] act in his name as moderator of the Western realm. This kind of relation between the two kingdoms lasted during the whole remainder of the reign of Otto the Great, that is, during the rest of the reign of Lewis and during the minority and early reign of his son Lothar. The changed state of things in the days of the two cousins, Otto the Second and Lothar, was undoubtedly one determining cause of the fall of the dynasty of Laon. But there was another determining cause of its fall with which we have more immediately to do. Under Rolf Normandy had stuck faithfully to the King; under William it had fluctuated backwards and [Sidenote: Normandy under Richard attached to France.] forwards between King and Duke. Under Richard, Normandy, becoming every day more French and more feudal, became, both in its policy and through actual feudal ties, permanently attached to the Duke and therefore commonly hostile to the King.

[Sidenote: Events following the death of William. 943.]

Great disturbances in Normandy followed on the unlooked-for death of William Longsword. A new invasion [Sidenote: New Danish settlement under Sihtric.] or settlement direct from the North seems to have happened nearly at the same time as the Duke’s murder; it may even possibly have happened with the Duke’s consent.[315] At any rate the heathen King Sihtric now [Sidenote: The Danes joined by the heathen party in Normandy.] sailed up the Seine with a fleet, and he was at once welcomed by the Danish and heathen party in the country. Large numbers of the Normans, under a chief named Thurmod, fell away from Christianity, and it appears that [Sidenote: Apostasy of young Richard.] the young Duke himself was persuaded or constrained to join in their heathen worship.[316] In such a state of things [Sidenote: The Christian party in Normandy seek French help.] we can neither wonder at nor blame the Christian party in Normandy if they drew as close as they could to their Christian neighbours, even at some risk to the independence of the duchy. To become subjects either of the King of Laon or of the Duke of Paris was better than to be eaten up by heathen wikings. Nor are we entitled to be unduly hard on either King or Duke for trying to make the most of such an opportunity for recovering [Sidenote: Position of Lewis and Hugh] the ground which they had lost. The Land of the Normans had been given up to Rolf by the joint act of [Sidenote: towards Normandy.] its immediate ruler, the father of the present Duke, and of its over-lord, the father of the present King. The grant had been made on the express condition that the Normans should become members of a Christian and Frankish commonwealth. If heathen invasions were to begin again, and to be powerfully helped by men settled on Gaulish soil, the Norman duchy was serving an object exactly opposite to that for which it was founded. In such a case both Duke and King might well feel themselves justified in getting rid of the nuisance altogether. Feudal ideas also were fast developing, and King Lewis may have already begun to entertain some dim notion that wardship over the fief of a minor vassal was a right [Sidenote: The Christians commend themselves, some to Hugh, some to Lewis.] which of necessity belonged to the lord. In any case, neither Hugh nor Lewis was unwilling to extend his dominions, and at first a large party in the duchy seemed ready to welcome either of them. The Christian Normans were divided between the rival attractions of the King and the Duke. The Duke, nearer and more powerful, could give the most effectual aid at the moment; the King, more distant, would be less dangerous as a permanent protector, and the kingly title still commanded a feeling of deep, if vague and unreasoning, veneration. Some of the Norman chiefs therefore commended themselves to King Lewis and others to Duke Hugh. This choice of different protectors seems to mark a difference of feeling among the Normans themselves;[317] but the relations of King and Duke were just now unusually friendly, and no immediate dissension seems to have arisen between them on this account. It was in this same year, though later than these Norman transactions, that Hugh not only acted as godfather to a daughter of the King, but was confirmed by his new spiritual brother in the possession of the duchies of France [Sidenote: Lewis and Hugh both enter Normandy.] and Burgundy.[318] Hugh entered Normandy; he fought several battles with the heathens and apostates, and was willingly received at Evreux, where the citizens were of [Sidenote: Lewis defeats the heathens and occupies Rouen.] the Christian party.[319] Meanwhile the King marched to Rouen, he gathered what forces he could, seemingly both from among his own subjects and from among the Christian Normans; he fought a battle, he utterly defeated the heathens, he killed Thurmod with his own hand, he recovered the young Duke, and left Herlwin of Montreuil as his representative at Rouen.[320] On a later visit to Rouen, he received the cession of Evreux from Hugh.[321] Herlwin now waged war against Arnulf with some success, for he slew Balzo, the actual murderer of William, and sent his hands as a trophy to the Norman capital.[322] But in the course of the year Hugh contrived to reconcile Arnulf to the King,[323] and the King reconciled Arnulf and Herlwin.

Such is the account given by the French writers; the Normans fill up the story with many further details.[324] [Sidenote: Norman version.] They leave out—thereby throwing the greatest doubt upon the trustworthiness of their own story—all about the homage of Richard and the other Normans, all about Sihtric and Thurmod and the deliverance of Normandy by Lewis himself. Lewis, according to them, came of his own accord to Rouen after the death of William, and was received with joy, as he was supposed to have come in order to plan an expedition against the common enemy Arnulf.[325] Still from this point it is just possible to patch the two narratives together, though I confess that I receive every detail which comes clothed in the rhetoric of Dudo with very great suspicion. Lewis then, according to this account, remains at Rouen, and a suspicion gets afloat that he is keeping the young Duke a prisoner, and that he means to seize on Normandy for himself. A popular insurrection follows, which is only quelled by the King producing Richard in public and solemnly investing him [Sidenote: Richard’s detention at Laon.] with the duchy.[326] After this, strange to say, the Norman regents, Bernard the Dane, Oslac, and Rudolf surnamed Torta, are won over by the craft of Lewis to allow him to take Richard to Laon and bring him up with his own children. The King is then persuaded by the bribes of Arnulf to treat Richard as a prisoner, and even to threaten [Sidenote: Richard’s escape.] him with a cruel mutilation.[327] By a clever stratagem of his faithful guardian Osmund, the same by which Lewis himself had been rescued in his childhood from Herbert of Vermandois,[328] Richard is saved from captivity, and carried to the safe-keeping of his great-uncle, Bernard of Senlis. A mass of perfidious and unintelligible diplomacy now follows in the Norman accounts, of which, if it ever happened at all, we get only the results in the French version. The French writers know nothing of the captivity of [Sidenote: Norman invasion of Britanny. 944.] young Richard, and they connect the invasion of Normandy which undoubtedly took place in the next year with certain transactions in Britanny. The Breton princes, Berengar and Alan, were at variance between themselves, a state of things which gave opportunity for a desolating invasion of the Normans, seemingly the heathen or apostate [Sidenote: Lewis invades Normandy in concert with Hugh. 944.] Normans.[329] Lewis now invaded Normandy in concert with Hugh. The Duke had already made peace with the Normans,[330] but he was seduced by the offer of all Normandy beyond the Seine,[331] or at any rate of the district of Bayeux.[332] Lewis accordingly, with Arnulf and Herlwin, and several Bishops of France and Burgundy, entered Normandy and occupied Rouen. We again find a division of parties in the country, some receiving the King and others withstanding him.[333] Hugh meanwhile occupied Bayeux, but Lewis required his confederate to surrender the city to him. The Duke obeyed, but he at once began again to plot against [Sidenote: Dissension between Lewis and Hugh.] his sovereign.[334] He now stirred up several smaller enemies against Lewis, such as Bernard of Senlis, Theobald, Count of Tours, Blois, and Chartres—of whom we shall hear again—the Vermandois princes, and Hugh, his own Archbishop [Sidenote: War at Rheims and elsewhere. 945.] of Rheims. Lewis meanwhile felt himself so safe in Normandy that he employed Norman troops against these various enemies;[335] and when he had made a truce with Hugh and had raised the siege of Rheims, he returned to Rouen, almost as if he intended to make that city his capital and his permanent residence.[336]

[Sidenote: Lewis at Rouen.]

Lewis had first appeared in Normandy as a deliverer. But according to the Norman writers, he now changed into a conqueror, and began to dream of exercising the extremest rights of conquest. The lands and the [Sidenote: His growing unpopularity and probable designs on Normandy.] women of Normandy were to be distributed among his followers; above all, the estates of the aged Bernard and his beautiful young wife were to be given to an impudent knight who asked for them.[337] It is worth noticing that, both in this case and in the former one, the evil deeds attributed to Lewis are all in intention; in the earlier tale he was going to make Richard a prisoner, he was going to mutilate him; so he is now going to give Bernard’s wife to his follower; but it does not appear that he actually did any one of these things. Still we can well believe that the Normans were tired of Lewis’s prolonged sojourn at Rouen. Foreign dominion in any shape would soon become hateful to the Norman nation, and all creeds and parties would gladly unite in an effort to get rid of it. That Lewis fully intended to keep Normandy can hardly be doubted. That great duchy, with its seven bishoprics, its flourishing capital, its fields and towns and harbours all springing into new life after their recovery from Scandinavian havoc, must indeed have been a tempting prize to the King of Laon and Compiègne. If he could not hold both Rouen and Laon, he might be well pleased to make the exchange, and to transfer the seat of his kingship to the banks of the Seine. How far any part of the Norman people was really prepared for such a transfer, how far Lewis was deceived by the false representations of men who only pretended to wish for it, it is impossible to determine. But we can well believe that all Normandy was soon united in hostility to the foreign King. And either by invitation or by accident, a most powerful and faithful ally was ready at hand to help the Normans in [Sidenote: Harold King of the Danes, [935–985.]] their struggle for independence. Denmark, like Sweden and Norway, had, in this age, out of an union of small principalities, become a single powerful kingdom. Gorm [Sidenote: son of Gorm, [840–935?]] the Old, the founder of the Danish monarchy, had died after a reign said to have been of extraordinary length,[338] and had passed on his dominion to his son Harold, surnamed _Blaatand_, Blue-tooth or Black-tooth. Harold was [Sidenote: 974.] still a heathen; in later times he became a compulsory convert to Christianity; but when he had once embraced [Sidenote: 985.] the faith, he clave stedfastly to it, and lost his crown and life in defence of his new creed.[339] And if we can at all trust the account of Harold’s conduct in Norman affairs, as given by the Norman writers, it is easy to see that, in his case at least, the seed of the Gospel was sown in the [Sidenote: Harold’s disinterested conduct in Normandy. 945.] fruitful field of an honest and good heart.[340] The heathen wiking, utterly unlike most of his tribe, set an example of straightforward, honest, and unselfish dealing, which shines all the brighter from its contrast with the endless aggressions and backslidings of the selfish and faithless princes of Gaul. Whatever brought Harold into Normandy, he acted there as a disinterested friend of the [Sidenote: He occupies the Côtentin,] Norman Duke and his subjects. He first appeared in the Côtentin, which was most probably already occupied by recent settlers from the North,[341] and he made his head-quarters [Sidenote: and Bayeux.] at Cherbourg—the borough of Cæsar.[342] He was next received at Bayeux,[343] and now all Normandy rose in the cause of the deliverer. That Harold defeated Lewis in [Sidenote: Battle by the Dive.] a battle on the banks of the Dive is allowed on both sides; that the battle was preceded by a conference is allowed on both sides. But the French writers represent the battle as a treacherous attack made by the Danes on a prince who had come in all confidence to a peaceful meeting.[344] The Normans, on the other hand, say that the fight was brought about by the imprudence or insolence of Herlwin of Montreuil.[345] He who had caused, however innocently, the death of William, he who had ruled in Rouen as the deputy of Lewis, now appeared prominently among the royal troops, and stirred up the wrath of Danes and Normans by his presence. This certainly seems a very lame story, and we may well believe that Harold, however faithful to his allies, might see no crime in practising a little of the usual Danish treachery towards an enemy. But the result of the battle is certain; the armies met, on or near ground to be afterwards made immortal by one of the chiefest exploits of the great William;[346] and, as a [Sidenote: Lewis defeated and taken prisoner.] fitting forerunner of the day of Varaville, the King’s army was defeated and Lewis taken prisoner.[347] The Normans add that Harold and Lewis met, man to man and King to King, and that the Dane led away the Frank as the prize of his own personal prowess. Lewis however escaped; he was accompanied, perhaps betrayed, by a Norman in whom he trusted, and, on reaching Rouen, he was imprisoned by [Sidenote: Harold settles the affairs of the Duchy and returns to Denmark.] other Normans in whom he trusted also. The Danish King, if we can trust a tale of such unparalleled generosity, had now done his work. He passed through the land, confirming the authority of the young Duke, and [Sidenote: The renewal of “Rolf’s law.”] restoring the laws of Rolf.[348] This last phrase is one which meets us constantly in our own history. After the Norman Conquest, the demand for the laws of King Eadward is familiar to every one, and in earlier times we read of demands for the laws of Eadgar or of Cnut, or whoever was the last King who was looked back to with any love.[349] What is really meant in all such cases is not so much any actual enactments as good administration instead of bad, often native administration instead of foreign. The renewal of Rolf’s law meant the wiping out of all traces of the dominion of the King of Laon. Harold then sailed away to his own islands; twenty years afterwards, unless the one story is a repetition of the other, he was equally able and willing to come again on the same errand.[350]

[Sidenote: Lewis kept in prison by Hugh. 945–6.]

King Lewis was thus a prisoner, as his father had been before him. After a certain amount of the usual treacherous diplomacy,[351] he was transferred from the hands of the Normans to those of their ally the Duke of the French. His wrongs called forth the wrath of his kinsmen in other lands. Queen Gerberga sought help alike from her own Old-Saxon brother and from her husband’s West-Saxon uncle. Æthelstan the Glorious was no more, but he had handed on his sceptre to a [Sidenote: Intervention of Eadmund. 946.] worthy successor in Eadmund the Magnificent. An English embassy haughtily demanded the release of the King, and received from Hugh as haughty a refusal. The Duke of the French would do nothing for fear of the threats of the English.[352] How Eadmund would have followed up this beginning it is hard to say; but the next year saw him cut off by the assassin’s dagger, and his successor Eadred had enough to do in the renewed and final struggle [Sidenote: Intervention of Otto. 945.] with the Northumbrian Danes. The application to Otto was more effectual. The King of the East-Franks at once determined to invade the Western Kingdom the next year.[353] He refused a personal conference with Hugh, and the conference which he allowed him to have with Conrad of Lotharingia was fruitless.[354] At last, when the German army was actually assembling, Hugh found it necessary to [Sidenote: Lewis obtains his liberty in exchange for the] come to terms with his royal prisoner.[355] Hugh’s terms were simple—freedom in exchange for Laon. After a while, Lewis brought himself to surrender his single [Sidenote: cession of Laon. 946] stronghold, his own royal city, which was still held for him by his faithful and stout-hearted Queen. The Duke of the French took possession of the city of the rock, and the King of the West-Franks was reduced to be little more than King of Compiègne. Most likely he hoped, through German and English help, soon to be again King, not only of Laon, but of Paris and Rouen as well. And as far as forms and words and outward homage went, his authority was presently restored over the whole kingdom. [Sidenote: Lewis’s kingship renewed.] Duke Hugh did not scruple to deprive his sovereign of liberty and dominion; but he would never be a King [Sidenote: Hugh and the other Princes do homage. 946.] himself, and he would always have a King over him. The royal dignity—held, it would seem, to have fallen into abeyance through the King’s imprisonment—was solemnly renewed, and Hugh the Great once more became the faithful liegeman and homager of the King whom he had just before held in bonds.[356] The other princes of the kingdom followed his example; but, if the Norman writers are to [Sidenote: The absolute independence of Normandy asserted by the Norman writers.] be believed, there was one marked exception. On the banks of the Epte, where the founder of the Norman state had first done homage, the Duke of the Normans was formally set free from all superiority on the part of the Frankish King.[357] Richard still bore no higher title than that of Duke; but he was a King, as far as complete authority within his own land, and absolute independence of all authority beyond its borders, could make him a King. The prince who was thus acknowledged as perfectly independent was presently persuaded, like other [Sidenote: Richard’s Commendation to Hugh.] allodial owners, to seek a lord, and Richard Duke of the Normans forthwith commended himself and his dominions to his neighbour and benefactor Hugh Duke of the French.[358] Now the absolute independence of Normandy, the renunciation of all homage and all superiority on the part of the crown, is an assertion for which we need some better authority than the declamation of Dudo. In his pages indeed Richard appears as a King, holding the Norman monarchy in fee of no earthly power. But in those pages he also appears as one who far more than forestalled the work of his descendant, as one who held all Gaul and all Britain, with seemingly Germany and Denmark to boot, as dependencies of his Norman monarchy.[359] By the accuracy of the one description we may perhaps judge of the accuracy of the other.

[Sidenote: Practical character of the commendation of Richard to Hugh.]

But the commendation of Normandy to the Duchy of France rests on much better authority. Norman vanity was less inclined to dwell on it than on the alleged independence of Normandy on the kingdom, but it is incomparably the better ascertained fact of the two. In the days of Richard we get our first glimpses of documentary evidence for Norman history in the form of charters, and in an extant charter Richard distinctly speaks of the Duke of the French as his lord.[360] And it is clear that homage to the Duke carried with it a much more practical relation than homage to the King. Throughout this whole period we find Normandy constantly acting as a subsidiary ally of France. Hugh is followed in his campaigns by Norman troops, seemingly as a matter of course.[361]

[Sidenote: Double alliance, between Normandy and France and between the
Eastern and Western Kings.]

A double alliance was thus formed, between Normandy and France on the one hand, between the Eastern and Western Kings on the other. And the alliance of Normandy and France sealed the fate of the Carolingian kingship. That kingship lasted forty years longer, but its doom was sealed when Richard commended himself to Hugh. It did not fall when its fortunes seemed lowest. At that moment it had still a powerful protector in the Eastern King. Nor did its utter extinction suit the peculiar policy of the powerful vassal, who, as far as internal politics were concerned, held its destiny in his hands. But even the German protectorate could hardly have much longer sustained the German throne of Laon against the growing power of the new French nationality. When that protectorate was forfeited, as we shall soon see it, there was no longer any hope for the last traces of [Sidenote: The alliance between Normandy and France determines the fall of the Carolingian dynasty. 945–987.] Teutonic sway in the West. Again, had Normandy remained isolated and Teutonic, things might have taken a different course. Had Rouen been hostile or even doubtful, Paris might not have triumphed over Laon. Charles the Simple had been able to raise up a powerful Norman division against the rival King, which staved off his fate for a while. So, had Richard been other than Hugh Capet’s faithful vassal and loving brother, a similar Norman diversion might, for a while at least, have preserved the crown to the house of Charles. But Normandy was now the firm ally of France, and that alliance of Rouen and Paris fixed the extinction, slow, it might be, but sure, of the royalty of Laon. It was a question of time. All depended on the policy of the successive Dukes of the French. And we shall presently have to study the policy of Hugh Capet, widely different from that of his father, but quite as remarkable in its own way.

This double alliance was not slow in bearing fruit. The [Sidenote: War of the two Kings against the two Dukes. 946.] threats of Otto, unlike the threats of Eadmund, were carried into action. Lewis had indeed been set free; but he was set free on terms which his royal colleague and brother must have felt to be dishonouring to himself as well as to his ally. A war shortly followed, in which the two Kings appear as the common enemies of the two Dukes. But it is a war about which it is very difficult [Sidenote: Comparison of the French, German, and Norman accounts.] to get at the exact truth. In the part which relates to Normandy the French writers are, evidently of set purpose, meagre beyond expression. Our chief German authority, though he enlarges on one or two trifling points,[362] is, on the point which most immediately concerns us, hardly fuller than his Western fellows. The Norman legend, on the other hand, overwhelms us with details, half of which we instinctively suspect to be mythical. There is no doubt that the issue of the campaign in a military point of view was inglorious, to say the least, for the two Kings of the Franks. This was quite reason enough for the French and German writers to slur over the subject, and for the Normans to pick it out as a [Sidenote: Objects of Lewis and Otto; supposed intrigues of Arnulf.] subject for special rhetoric and exaggeration. In their story Arnulf, as usual, appears as the villain of the piece. He stirs up the whole strife; his scheme is for Lewis to yield to Otto all claims on Lotharingia, and to receive Normandy instead, as soon as the duchy should be conquered for him by the arms of the German King.[363] But the French and German writers know nothing of these machinations of Arnulf, and in their eyes, or at least in their writings, Normandy never assumes any such primary importance. The interference of Otto, in connexion with what went before and what followed, is intelligible enough, and it hardly needs the introduction of Arnulf to explain it. Yet it is likely enough that the scheme said to have been suggested by the wily Fleming really did form an element in the reckonings of the two Kings. It was most important to settle the endless Lotharingian question, which had formed a subject of discord between [Sidenote: 944.] them even in the very year of Lewis’s occupation of [Sidenote: Probable designs of Lewis on Normandy.] Rouen.[364] And after Lewis’s defeat and imprisonment, we may be sure that the conquest or humiliation of Normandy [Sidenote: March of Otto; meeting of the three Kings, Otto, Lewis, and Conrad.] was an object very dear to his heart. At all events, with whatever objects, the King of the East-Franks[365] entered the Western Kingdom, and was joyfully welcomed by its King, who joined him with all his forces. A third King joined the muster, Conrad of Burgundy,[366] who followed in the wake of Otto. Of the four Carolingian kingdoms three were thus united against the upstart powers of Paris and Rouen. And among them the German King, not yet Emperor in formal rank, takes a distinct and recognized Imperial precedence. Burgundy and the Western Kingdom do not indeed seem to owe him any formal homage; but their sovereigns were far more truly his vassals, in any practical sense of the word, than the Dukes against whom they were marching were vassals of the King of [Sidenote: The three Kings fail before Laon, but] Compiègne. The three Kings began by an attempt to extend the despoiled monarch’s possessions by the recovery of his lost fortress of Laon.[367] This attempt failed; but they [Sidenote: take Rheims. 946.] took Rheims, whence they drove out Hugh, the Duke’s Archbishop, and brought back Artald, the faithful servant [Sidenote: They ravage France and Normandy, but fail to take either Paris or Rouen.] of King Lewis.[368] They then entered France; they ravaged the whole land, but they shrank from or failed in an attack on Paris.[369] They then harried Normandy, but they failed in an attempt on Rouen.[370] Thus much is certain; the confederate Kings were driven back from the Norman capital. The picturesque, but probably to a great extent legendary, details form a brilliant picture, for which I must refer to the Norman writers and their English interpreter.[371]

[Sidenote: Effects of the German intervention.]

The discomfiture of three Kings, the repulse of the great Otto himself, could not fail to become a favourite subject of Norman boasting. But it is by no means clear that the German intervention was altogether fruitless. We have seen the fortunes of Lewis at their [Sidenote: Lewis’s fortunes begin to improve. 947.] lowest ebb. We now see them very distinctly begin to rise, while those of Hugh the Great suffer a temporary depression. The Duke failed in several expeditions, while the King went on gaining both in territorial dominion [Sidenote: Friendship of Lewis and Otto.] and in the opinion of men.[372] The close connexion between the two Frankish Kings continued, and both Lewis and his Queen shared the hospitality of their [Sidenote: 947, 949.] brother, and took a part in the paschal splendours of [Sidenote: Series of Synods.] Aachen.[373] Not the least striking feature of this period is the series of synods, synods of bishops from both the Frankish kingdoms, but to which the Eastern realm [Sidenote: Meeting by the Cher. 947.] naturally contributed by far the greater share. The first of the series, held on the banks of the Cher, was held along with a secular conference, and with armies at no [Sidenote: Synods of Verdun, (947); Mouzon, and Engelheim, (948).] great distance.[374] The later meetings, at Verdun,[375] at Mouzon,[376] and the last and most solemn, held at Engelheim[377] under the presidency of a papal legate, seem to have been essentially ecclesiastical assemblies. But the Kings were [Sidenote: Action of the Kings.] present, acting as royal colleagues, the Eastern King keeping his distinct superiority.[378] Otto may well have dreamed of himself as a new Constantine presiding in a new [Sidenote: Controversy about the see of Rheims; its political importance.] Nicene Council. The strictly ecclesiastical object of these assemblies was to decide the controversy between the rival Archbishops who disputed, and alternately occupied, the metropolitan see of Rheims. But such a point could not be dealt with as a mere matter of canon law. The real question was not whether Hugh or Artald was the more regularly elected Primate, but whether the great city of Rheims should be held by a prince devoted to the Duke or by a prince devoted to the King. The affairs of the Western Kingdom were fully discussed in an assembly of prelates, most of whom were subjects of the Eastern King. Lewis set forth the whole story of his wrongs before his brother King and the bishops, and prayed both of them to use their several arms, temporal and spiritual, against [Sidenote: Final Synod of Trier; Hugh the Great excommunicated. 948.] his enemy. The result was, not only that Rheims was restored to the royalist Archbishop, but that, after due notice, the Duke of the French was solemnly excommunicated in a final synod at Trier,[379] which, oddly enough, consisted mainly of Western bishops. Hugh however cared little for the excommunication; the war continued, and various places were attacked with varying success on both sides. The Normans appeared as the allies of Hugh;[380] Otto, engaged in distant affairs, entrusted the support of [Sidenote: Laon recovered by Lewis. 949.] Lewis to Conrad of Lotharingia.[381] By a stratagem of Rudolf, the father of the historian, Laon was recovered to the King, except the tower, which still held out for [Sidenote: Hugh excommunicated by Pope Agapetus. 949.] Hugh.[382] At last an excommunication pronounced by Pope Agapetus in person[383] seems to have made some impression on the stubborn mind of the Duke. Through the mediation [Sidenote: Hugh does homage again. 950.] of Otto, peace was made once more; Hugh again did homage in the fullest terms,[384] and restored to the King the tower of Laon, which he still held. After this, though smaller wars and bickerings still went on in Lotharingia, [Sidenote: His last revolt and submission. 953.] Vermandois, and elsewhere, there was for four years only one revolt of Hugh, and that one after which the great Duke found it expedient to beg for peace through the intercession of Queen Gerberga.[385] During all this time [Sidenote: Lewis’s progress in Aquitaine and in Burgundy. 951.] the power of Lewis was steadily growing. Whether by force or persuasion, he gained over to his side the princes of Aquitaine, who no doubt welcomed the King as a convenient rival to their nearer neighbour the Duke.[386] Lewis even passed the boundaries of his own kingdom; he visited Besançon, and received the homage of at least one prince of the royal Burgundy, Charles-Constantine of Vienne.[387] All things seemed prospering for the Carolingian King, [Sidenote: His death. 954.] when his strange and unexpected death cut short the hopes of his house.[388] After all his long and chequered career, he was only thirty-three years of age.

[Sidenote: Reign of Lothar. 954–986.]

The long reign of Lothar, the son and successor of Lewis, answers to only a part of the much longer reign of [Sidenote: The old generation of princes dies off.] Richard the Fearless. In the course of a few years most of the principalities of Gaul changed masters. Long before the reign of Lothar was over, almost before he had personally entered on his government, Richard, so lately a child, the youngest of princes, became the eldest ruler within his own world. King Lewis was dead already; [Sidenote: Hugh the Great. 956.] [Sidenote: Arnulf born 873, died 965.] Hugh the Great died two years later; Arnulf of Flanders, at an almost incredible old age, died nine years later still.[389] [Sidenote: Otto the Great. 973.] Otto, King and Emperor, outlived all these princes, but [Sidenote: Otto the Second. 983.] Richard outlived both him and his son. Richard succeeded to his duchy in the time of Eadmund of England; he outlived Eadmund, Eadred, Eadwig, and Eadgar, and lived far on into the reign of Æthelred. In France he beheld and furthered the extinction of the Carolingian dynasty, and he died in the same year as the first King of [Sidenote: 996.] the permanent Parisian line. But this long period is, if we contrast it with that which went before it, comparatively barren of events bearing on the history of the Norman duchy. Richard wrought great changes within his own dominions, and he had many enemies to contend against without; still the greater part of his reign was no longer one incessant struggle, like the reign of his [Sidenote: 954–962.] father and his own early days. For some years wars and disputes went on almost as vigorously as before; but for [Sidenote: Comparative quiet of the later years of Richard. 962–996.] many years before his death Richard seems to have enjoyed a time of comparative peace, which he devoted to the consolidation of his power within his own states, and in a great degree to the erection and enrichment of ecclesiastical foundations.

Young Lothar was chosen King without opposition by the princes of France, Aquitaine, and ducal Burgundy. Duke Hugh espoused his cause; so did Archbishop Bruno, who now ruled Lotharingia in the name of his brother King Otto.[390] But Hugh soon contrived to employ the boy whom he recognized as his sovereign as the tool of [Sidenote: Hugh embroils Lothar with the Aquitanian princes, but is defeated before Poitiers. 955.] his own crafty policy. As has been already said, the princes of Southern Gaul were the natural allies of the King against the Duke who was so dangerous a neighbour to both. The most powerful, at least the most prominent, among these princes, William of Poitiers, the brother-in-law of William of Normandy,[391] seems to have been on the whole a faithful vassal of Lewis,[392] and he had certainly given no recent cause of offence. But Hugh procured from Lothar a grant of the duchy of Aquitaine, in addition to those of France and Burgundy,[393] and it was doubtless in order to enforce this claim that he involved the King in a war with the Aquitanian princes. But Hugh was utterly baffled before Poitiers,[394] and, soon after this defeat, his busy and faithless life, hitherto in general so [Sidenote: Death of Hugh the Great.] successful, came to an end.[395] The duchy of France, like the kingdom and the duchy of Normandy, now passed to [Sidenote: Hugh Capet succeeds under the guardianship of Richard. 956.] a minor. Hugh, surnamed Capet, the future King, succeeded his father at the age of thirteen years. On account of his youth, he was left by his father’s will under the guardianship of the Duke of the Normans.[396] Besides the close political connexion between the two princes, Richard [Sidenote: Richard marries Hugh’s sister Emma. 960.] was betrothed to Emma, daughter of the elder and sister of the younger Hugh, whom some years later he married.[397] Whether Richard ever did homage to Lothar is not clear;[398] but Hugh, on his accession to manhood, did homage to [Sidenote: The sons of Hugh do homage to Lothar, and Richard does homage to Hugh. 960.] the King, and was invested with the duchy of France and county of Poitiers, Burgundy being assigned to his younger brother Otto.[399] The death of Otto however, before many years had passed, caused Burgundy also to revert to Hugh.[400] Richard also renewed the commendation which he had made to the elder Hugh, and became the loyal vassal of his brother-in-law.[401] Arnulf, the old enemy, was now in his last days;[402] so the functions of devil or villain are now transferred in the Norman tale to Theobald, Count [Sidenote: Enmity of Theobald of Chartres towards Richard.] of Tours, Chartres, and Blois. This prince, who, like Arnulf, reached an unusual age, was the son of an elder Theobald, who is said to have bought the county of Chartres of the famous wiking Hasting.[403] The second Theobald had married Liudgardis, the widow of William Longsword and step-mother of Richard; he was a vassal of the Duke of the French,[404] and, in that character, he had acted for Hugh the Great as the gaoler of King Lewis.[405] But he seems to have by no means adopted his lord’s policy towards the Normans; on the contrary he appears as the instigator of Gerberga and Lothar to every sort of hostility against Richard.[406] The French accounts, which commonly speak of Theobald with a certain tone of contempt,[407] tell us just enough to show that there is some [Sidenote: Theobald gains Evreux. 962.] ground of truth in all this. Theobald’s chief object seems to have been the acquisition of Evreux, which at one time he actually gained by the help of Lothar.[408] Before this, if [Sidenote: Supposed plot of Lothar, Bruno, and Theobald against Richard. 960.] we may trust the Norman tale, Theobald and the King had formed with Bruno, Archbishop and Duke, a treacherous plot to beguile Richard to a conference at Amiens, and there to put him to death or imprison him.[409] I confess that this sounds to me very like a Norman perversion of a fact which is much better authenticated. King Lothar had summoned to Soissons a general assembly of the chief men of his realm, an event so common in England and Germany and so rare in the Western Kingdom. Whether the Duke [Sidenote: Richard attempts to disperse the Assembly at Soissons. 961.] of the Normans was summoned or not does not appear; but he came with an armed force and attempted to disperse the assembly, but was beaten off by the King’s troops.[410] In the next year we find Theobald at war with Richard [Sidenote: Theobald defeated by Richard. 962.] and defeated by him. Being also on ill terms with his own lord Duke Hugh, he took shelter with Gerberga and [Sidenote: Norman version; defeat of Lothar; second intervention of Harold.] Lothar, and was kindly received by them.[411] In the Norman version this grows into a long and striking story.[412] Just as in the tale of Lewis and Harold Blaatand, a conference between Lothar and Richard developes into a battle in which Lothar, like his father, is of course utterly defeated. Yet even while thus victorious, Richard is neither satisfied nor confident. He sends again to King Harold in Denmark; Harold at once comes at his call, but he has no opportunity of renewing his old exploits. For his enemies are thoroughly afraid of him. Count Theobald at once makes peace, and restores Evreux. King Lothar begs for peace also, and craves that the terrible Danes may be sent away. But it is not so easy to send them away as to bring them in. However Duke Richard does his best; he goes in person and preaches an eloquent sermon to the pagans, exhorting them to embrace Christianity and to settle quietly in the country. This a portion of them are induced to do, while the stiffnecked heathens are persuaded to sail southwards and to ravage infidel Spain instead of Catholic Gaul. After this a peace [Sidenote: Peace between Lothar and Richard.] is made between Lothar and Richard,[413] which seems not to have been again broken.

It is impossible to say exactly how much of truth lurks [Sidenote: Comparison of the French and Norman accounts.] in all this. The French writers help us to little more than the fact that there was some measure of hostility between Lothar and Richard. Richard tries to disperse Lothar’s solemn parliament; Lothar kindly entertains Richard’s vanquished enemy. Where there was as much mutual ill-will as this, it is likely that there was much more. And while we must always allow for the inventions and exaggerations of the Norman writers, we must also allow for the evident unwillingness of the French writers to say one word more about the Normans than they could help. But the whole Norman story is strange and unlikely, and many of the events sound most temptingly like repetitions of earlier events. We seem to be reading the tale of Lewis and Harold over again with but slight changes. Yet the dates come within the life, perhaps within the memory, of our one original informant on the Norman side.[414] I leave the more minute examination and final decision of the matter to those with whom Norman history is a primary object. It is enough for my purpose that the few certain facts fall in with the more elaborate picture in the legend, so far as to bring out the same general view of Richard’s position as the firm ally of France and as the enemy of the Carolingian crown.

[Sidenote: Later years of Lothar. 962–986.]

During the latter part of the reign of Lothar things took a different turn. Hugh Capet now began personally to take the lead in affairs, and his peculiar policy impressed itself on the period. We have already seen what the [Sidenote: Policy of Hugh Capet different from that of his father.] policy of the elder Hugh was; he would reduce the King to the least possible amount of power and of territory, but he would himself never be more than Duke. Hugh Capet followed a different policy. He was ready to be a King as soon as he could become one quietly and with a decent pretext; but he would not hazard the prize by [Sidenote: General peace between the Kingdom and the Duchy of France.] clutching at it too soon. The relations between King and Duke during the last twenty years of Lothar were very unlike the relations which had existed between the father of Lothar and the father of Hugh. There was very little of open enmity, and when there was any, the wily Duke contrived that it should be the King who was outwardly in the wrong. For a long time Duke Hugh acted as the vassal and friend of King Lothar, and the friendship of Duke Hugh of course carried with it the friendship of Duke Richard. On the whole this was a time of peace, a thing hitherto so unusual, between Duke and King, so much so that the duchy actually underwent a German invasion in the royal cause. For it was now that the relations between the two kingdoms of the Franks again became of paramount importance. It was now that the folly of Lothar forfeited the German protectorate for himself and his kingdom.

[Sidenote: Change in the relations between the two Frankish kingdoms on
the death of Otto the Great. 973.]

On the death of Otto the Great the relations between the Eastern and the Western Kingdoms were wholly changed.[415] Otto the uncle had been a protector; Otto the cousin was a rival. This breach of the old friendly relations with the Eastern Kingdom was undoubtedly one main cause of the fall of the Carolingian house in the Western Kingdom. The royalty of Laon was an outpost of the Teutonic interest in the West, which could hardly maintain itself without the support of the Teutonic powers to the east of it. Lothar, with a high spirit, had none of his father’s prudence. The old disputes about Lotharingia [Sidenote: War between Otto and Lothar.] began again;[416] war broke out, a war which, on Lothar’s side, had the approval of Duke Hugh and the other princes, an approval so cordially expressed as to suggest the suspicion [Sidenote: Lothar’s raid on Aachen and Otto’s invasion of France. 978.] that it was given only as a snare.[417] At any rate Lothar went on a wild and sudden raid against Aachen, which could win for him no lasting gain, but which gave him the opportunity of occupying the city of his great forefather, and of turning the eagle on his palace the wrong way.[418] But the insulted Emperor retaliated by a far more terrible invasion of the Western Kingdom, in which not only the royal domains, but those of the Duke were occupied and ravaged, and Paris itself was threatened.[419] This campaign of Otto the Second, like that of his greater father, [Sidenote: Peace between Otto and Lothar. 980.] was not exactly rich in military glory, but it was politically successful. Lothar, without consulting Hugh, sought for peace,[420] and gave up his claims on Lotharingia.[421] Hugh, who had hitherto stuck so faithfully by the King, was alarmed at his sudden and secret reconciliation with the [Sidenote: Alliance between Otto and Hugh; reconciliation of Lothar and Hugh.] Emperor. He held a council of his own vassals, and, by their advice, he determined to win over Otto to himself, which he succeeded in doing, though greatly against the will of the King.[422] Hugh and Lothar were however at last [Sidenote: Lewis son of Lothar elected King; his marriage and divorce. 981.] reconciled again.[423] Lewis the son of Lothar was, with the consent of Hugh and the other princes, associated in the kingdom with his father.[424] A ludicrous and unsuccessful attempt was then made to establish him at once as King in Aquitaine by marrying him to a princess of that country.[425] The notion was in itself a return to a rational policy with regard to Southern Gaul, if it had only been set about in a wiser [Sidenote: Death of Otto the Second. 983.] way. On the death of Otto the Second, Lothar, notwithstanding his former cession of his rights over Lotharingia, [Sidenote: Lothar’s further attempts on Lotharingia. 986.] took advantage of the minority of Otto the Third and the consequent anarchy in Germany again to assert his claims. He was pressing them with some success by force of arms, when his career was cut short by an early death.[426]

During all this time the narrative of our French authority tells us absolutely nothing about Normandy. Yet we may well believe that Richard took the first place in the assembly of Hugh’s vassals, and that Norman troops duly accompanied those of France in every expedition. The policy of Hugh, we may be sure, was always the policy of Richard. [Sidenote: Richard’s mediation in Flanders. 965.] The only thing about him which even his garrulous panegyrist has to tell us is that, after the death of the old Arnulf, when his grandson and successor the younger Arnulf refused his homage to the King, Richard stepped in as mediator. Lothar invaded Flanders, but Richard pacified King and Marquess; Arnulf rendered the homage, and his dominions were restored to him.[427]

[Sidenote: The accession of the Parisian or Capetian dynasty.]