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1 Chapter 1 : Living in Ireland A Brief History of Ireland Even before the Norman Conquest of England, the Normans had come into contact with Wales. Edward the Confessor had set up the aforementioned Ralph as earl of Hereford and charged him with defending the Marches and warring with the Welsh. In later times this custom stopped and people began to keep the same fixed surname. The English King Intervenes: When word got back to King Henry of England that the man who he knew as the Earl of Pembroke Strongbow had established himself as King of a province in Ireland, he was furious. The way he saw it, he had given permission for his citizens to help Mac Murchada militarily, not to rival his authority as King. Henry, rather pointlessly, issued a decree forbidding Strongbow to go to Ireland, cut off the supplies from England and set out for Ireland himself with large army arriving in Waterford in October Realising that the King could and would defeat him, Strongbow intercepted Henry before he had even arrived offering apologies and begging forgiveness. Henry carefully divided the parts of Ireland for which was now overlord. He set aside Dublin which was no longer to be part of Leinster, but rather owned by the King and chartered to the city of Bristol. The next few years saw de Lacy and Strongbow devote much of their energies to containing resitance across their new liberties. They established Motte-and-Bailey castles fortified mounds with a courtyard beside them in all troublesome areas and established the feudal system of peasants working on lands owned by the lord as an investment. The picture on the left shows the remains of an Anglo-French Motte-and-Bailey castle which can be seen today in Dundonald in county Down. Dozens of examples survive across Ireland. When Strongbow died in, the liberty of Leinster passed into the hands of King Henry who granted all his rights as Lord of Ireland to his youngest son Prince John. Prince John was Lord of Ireland until he became King of England in, but in that time he showed little respect for the remaining Irish Kings. His courtiers famously tugged the beards of Irish Kings who came to see him. In the lands that had been secured by the Anglo-French, an extensive process of colonisation took place. Agricultural estates were established, and market towns established to sell the goods locally, nationally and to the rest of Europe. English, Welsh, French and Belgian settlers arrived to settle the lands of the Anglo-French Lords, while the Irish who remained were reduced to the status of serfs working on the estates. For most poor Irish this was largely academic: But things were different for the old Irish aristocracy, practically none of whom was able to retain their status and lifestyle. For more details of life under the Anglo-French, see the Everyday Life section below. Anglo-French Expansion and the Irish Reaction: The expansion of the Anglo-French colony in Ireland continued under the Lordship of Prince John in the period to the end of the s. The response of the Irish Kings was largely to submit to the more powerful invaders. However, the general populace was less enthusiastic and a whole area of folklore developed with retrospective predictions about the invasion and promises of a liberator who would come and free Ireland from the Anglo-French. The Anglo-French, in turn, had their own prophecies of the invasion and their destiny to succeed. The story of the expansion of the colony is largely made up of the actions of individual barons, with occasional input from the King. By, the Anglo-French ruled Leinster and Meath. The Lordship of Leinster was ruled by the King ever since Strongbow had died the previous year. The Liberty of Meath was ruled by Hugh de Lacy. The expansion of the colony took off that same year when John de Courcy invaded and took over Ulaid modern day Antrim and Down. The region became known as "Ulster", probably derived from the word "Ulaid" with the "-ster" appended to make it sound like the more prominent areas of Munster and Leinster. De Courcy founded the town of Carrickfergus the next year and began work on an elaborate castle there see picture on the right of Carrickfergus Castle as it looks today. This region of Ireland became known as "Ormond". Their armies took 8 years to subdue the region. Shortly afterwards, in, William de Braose was granted land in Limerick. Meanwhile, back in Ulster, de Courcy fell out of favour with King John, who gave permission to Hugh de Lacy to invade, which he duly did, becoming Earl of Ulster himself. This title he retained apart from the period when he himself fell out of favour with the King. His brother Walter de Lacy, who had inherited Meath, lost control of that lordship from to The period to saw a protracted war in western Ireland when Richard de Burgh invaded the Irish Kingdom of Connacht. Perhaps Page 1

2 surprised by how much the Irish had developed their military technology since the time of Strongbow, it was a hard war to win and while de Burgh did emerge with most of Connacht in his hands, it was not an easy victory. The conquest of Connacht was a famous event for several centuries. In this same period, another prominent family of the future - the FitzGeralds, or Geraldines - took possession of north Kerry and Waterford. In the s they gained further land in the newly conquered lands of Connacht, Kerry and Fermanagh. They built a castle at Belleek in Fermanagh but they did not truly control the area and the local Irish lost little time in asserting their authority by burning the new castle. After that, Fermanagh reverted to Irish control. By the middle of the 13th century, Hugh de Lacy of Ulster was dead and the Irish kings of Tyrone and Donegal stopped paying tribute entirely. When this caused little response from the English King, the Kings gained confidence and formed an alliance with the humiliated King of Connacht. In they launched a series of raids into Ulster, killing colonists and burning their towns. By the revolt had become more widespread, with the Irish of Munster revolting against the Anglo-French Lords there. In fact, in, the Irish defeated an English army sent to avenge atrocities committed against colonists. However, the revolt fizzled out after this as some of the key leaders were killed. It was to be a century before the Irish would have another successful revolt against the English. After the revolts had died down, the vacant Earldom of Ulster was granted to Walter de Burgh, who was also Lord of Connacht. When the Geraldines agreed to cede Sligo to de Burgh in it confirmed de Burgh as ruler of all of Connacht and all of Ulster, second only to the King of England in power. The territory of Thomond was granted to Thomas de Clare in, the man who would eventually give his name to the modern county there. In the south, the two prominent families that were emerging were the Geraldines of Desmond modern Cork and Limerick and the Butlers of Ormond modern Tipperary. The former territory of Leinster was by this stage divided into a multitude of smaller Lordships as families divided their land between heirs. Meath was divided into two - the two halves being called Trim and Meath. The map of Ireland around is shown by the map below. The map makes a strong distinction between Irish and Anglo-French Norman lands. However, it would be a mistake to believe that these regions were anything like modern frontiers, with border guards peering warily across no-mans land. In practice, the borders were blurred, with a lot of everyday movement of trade and persons to-and-fro. Anglo-French and Irish lords routinely signed agreements with each other against common foes. In later centuries, this interchange was to become so pronounced that it would be legislated against. As with almost everywhere else in Europe, the Anglo-French followed the Feudal system of government. This differed from the Irish method of government in fundamental ways. Under feudalism, the King owned all land. He granted this land to Lords in return for annual tribute in the form of money, soldiers or goods. Some Lords paid their tribute by becoming a Knight, an armed nobleman, to ride with the King into battle. The Lords, in turn, granted parcels of their lordships to Peasants ordinary people in return for money, a soldier at time of war or some goods. Many lords set up market towns in their lordships to encourage trade and to convert goods into money. The Irish system, by contrast, saw no overall ownership of land, but rather each individual Lord had absolute ownership of their land. The Anglo-French introduced feudalism to Ireland, but the administration of government evolved with the expansion of the colony, and thus different parts were ruled in different ways. In Anglo-French society, rich landless men recruited armies and conquered land for their King, in the hope that the King would reward them by making them a Lord of some land somewhere, often the same land they conquered. This was the only way they could make themselves in the world and this was the motivation for much of the expansion of the colony in Ireland. It was a form of capitalist expansionism - privatised warfare. The status of Ireland was clarified in, when the Pope gave permission to King John of England to make Ireland into a Kingdom and to declare himself as King of it. In, a decree was issued that made all laws passed in England valid in Ireland also, thus uniting the two legal systems. The country itself was divided into a series of administrative units that had different degrees of autonomy. The liberties exercised a lot of self government, being governed by a seneschal chief officer who operated the courts and treasury. Most liberties appeared towards the start of the Anglo-French period when there was not much financial stake in the colony. As the colony grew, the King increasingly created counties in preference because he could collect taxes there. Key liberties in included Meath, Trim, Kildare and Ulster. The counties also known as shires operated like liberties except that they were under Royal control. The King Page 2

3 appointed a Shire Rief origin of the word sheriff to manage the county, its treasury and its court. The map above shows the liberties and counties that existed in The chartered territories were lands not under Anglo-French control, but rather under Irish Kings and Lords. These men and the King of England signed a charter that let them keep their lands as long as they submitted to the Anglo-French and collect taxes. Connacht was a chartered territory until it was invaded. Changes in the Church: Throughout the medieval period, and indeed until the twentieth century, the church was of pivotal importance in Irish society and culture. With the church now divided across lands ruled by native Irish Lords and lands ruled by Anglo-French lords, it became difficult to administer the whole. Keen to assert control over the church as well as the land, the King of England repeatedly attempted to ensure that all dioceses in their lands should have Anglo-French bishops. A law passed in banning Irishmen from the post was abandoned after the Pope expressed his outrage at such discrimination. The reform of the Irish church in the century before the Anglo-French came helped usher in the new monastic houses that were springing up across Europe. The Cistercians founded 33 monasteries across Ireland between and and also established a large number in Britain. They were very different from the preceding Irish monasteries, and reached the height of their success in the s, before declining after this time due to financial difficulties and general stagnation. Augustinian and Benedictine orders founded a large number of monasteries of their own. Page 3

4 Chapter 2 : The First Crusade part II: The arrival of the Main Crusaders About History On arrival the Normans like the country and invade it themselves. Nineteen year old, William The Bastard wins his first major engagement at the battle of Val Es Dunes on the Norman / Frankish border. The Normans By the end of the year, the old king was gone and the fate of the country was changed for ever. History of the Normans Continuing the on-going history of the British Isles, this site looks at the effects and changes brought in by the Norman invasion. For hundreds of years to come, it would be embroiled in wars in Europe and the Holy Lands. Civil unrest would be rife and the once proud traditions of the Saxons would be ground under the stone of a network of castles that covered the country. However, there is much more to the new rule than this gloomy picture paints! The Normans brought a whole new society which made the country what it is today. Norman Life The Normans had an interesting mix of cultures. Historically, they were a combination of viking settlers who had married into the local Frankish cultures and as a result their society was a conglomerate of the two. As befits their descendancy from the vikings, the Normans were a warlike culture and prized mounted soldiers. The Norman cavalry were to form the basis for medieval Knights and what we now look at as "Chivalry" stems from the Norman codes of conduct on the battlefield. The Normans were more than just mobile killing machines although they excelled at this, and with their invasion of England they brought in some fantasic examples of architecture and style. As they were devout folowers of the medieval Christian church, the best examples of Norman style can be found in the churches and chapels that still exist all over the country Norman Warfare The Normans brought with them a wholly new form of warfare. The Saxons and, before them, the Celts had largely depended on armies of "brave warriors" who would band together to fight the enemy. Often battles were resolved through one on one fights between clan heroes. Very similar to classical era Greeks. The Normans had a warfare style that evolved from their Norse roots and was heavily influenced by the European wars of the 9th and 10th centuries AD and the Frankish kings like Charlemagne. This resulted in the Norman armies being very organised and disciplined. The mainstay of the army was the heavy foot soldier, although the nobles and leaders were always mounted on powerful horses. During the middle-medieval period the status symbol of horses became firmly rooted and even today people think of owning a horse as being something the "rich" do In addition to the new forms of combat, the Normans brought with them a brand new way of defending territory. The Saxons were from a culture of mobile raiders and as such tended to not rely on heavy defensive structures as we think of them today. Most Saxon strongholds were hill forts similar to the ones the Celts used, or where they had taken over an old Roman fortification the Saxons would shore up the walls and reuse it. In the mainstream of Saxon culture, it was wrong to attack the settlements where people lived raids, however, were common place and battles were always fought in open ground. This changed with the arrival of the Normans. They brought with them the massive stone structures we still see today. Norman castles were a stamp of authority as much as a defensive structure and the conquerors spent little time building hundreds of them accross the country Search the Norman History Site If you cant find what you are looking for here, you can search either this site or the whole internet - just enter your search terms and press "Google Search". Sorry There is currently a fault with the search for this site. We hope to have it back online soon. A common misconception today is that the Normans were "French. The name "Normans" comes from the term "Norsemen" and was applied to the vikings who sailed from Scandinavia, raided the Frankish kingdom and eventually settled. During the 8th and 9th centuries, it was very common for vikings to raid then settle in new lands, and from the Frankish point of view, it must have been easier to give them the land Etrusia - Norman Links. Page 4

5 Chapter 3 : BBC - History - British History in depth: Inside Domesday The first Normans landed on May 1st at Bannow near Wexford led by Robert Fitz Stephen and Maurice de Prendergast, the second wave a year later at Bagibun near Wexford led by Raymond le theinnatdunvilla.com erected a fort at Bagibun and awaited the arrival of Strongbow on the 23rd of August of the same year. Westminster Hall, Westminster London, the oldest building in Parliament with the most stunning hammerbeam roof Norman Timeline Browse, search. These two earls were defeated and killed at the Battle of Fulford just outside York. King Harold has to turn more troops towards this northern invasion. He gathers troops as he marches miles in 4 days. On Oct 1st barely recovered from their gruelling march and battle Harold hears William has landed in Sussex. He turns the troops around and marches to London. The king together with his brothers, Leofwine and Gyrth are killed, Harold alledgedly with an arrow through his eye. He begins building wooden fortifications as he goes. He divides up land between his French lords and empowers them to subdue the British. Construction of Chepstow Castle is begun. This would have been a wooden building. It was built on the high ground above the town using the step slope down to the river Leen as a defence. They held out at Exeter until William broke the defences. William had to take heavy casualties in the confrontation. Sandwich was an important port on the south coast. He lays waste to the land, using fire to detroy property and land leading to widespread famine. In the same year, the Normans begin their push into Wales, securing their advance with a sequence of motte and bailey castles. In this treaty Malcolm paid homage to William. It is possible that William the Conqueror was planning to attack King Malcolm to prevent him protecting Edgar the Aetheling and to stop him advancing into the north of England. Roger Fitz Osbern joined an unsuccessful uprising against the king and lost. The castle then passed to the crown. He met Rhys ap Tewdwr, the ruler of the area and allowed him to remain in control of the region for a yearly sum of money. Early returns were submitted by, it was the most complete document of its type and time and remains a legally valid British document, surveying propery ownership throughout England, for the purpose of determining the extent of crown holdings, levying taxes, and holding an account for the settling of disputes. Landholders gather to swear fealty to William at Salisbury. The oath is now known as the Oath of Salisbury. His disputes with his eldest son, Robert, who succeeded to the Duchy of Normandy clouded his final years. His third son was to receive wealth as opposed to lands and title. He was married to Mathilda of Flanders and had 9 children by her. He had to move fast to secure the crown of England, to which he had not been specifically named as heir. Robert sent troops to support the rising, but they were driven back by bad weather. William II showed deft political skill and overcame both this and a later Northumbrian rebellion. On reflection he helped maintain the balance between Church and the Monarch. He campaigns as far south as Durham, causing great devastation. King William II musters his troops, causing Malcolm to withdraw. She was married to Malcolm III and had a very significant influence again on both secular and church matters. She was also later canonised as St Margaret. Page 5

6 Chapter 4 : Normans - Wikipedia The Normans arrive in Sicily. Monte Gargano, just east of Foggia, is the starting point for the Normans' adventure in Sicily. In about 40 Norman pilgrims met Melus, a noble Lombard from Bari who had been driven into exile by the Byzantines. Wednesday, 24 October The Normans in Italy: The Imperial Dream At the end of his life, his ambitions, more and more grandiose, lay in the direction of the Eastern Empire. During the investiture quarrels, the Pope, in serious conflict with Emperor Henry IV, who himself had been excommunicated, could not manage without Norman support. His alliance, both matrimonially and politically, was sought after, as much by the German Emperor as the Byzantine emperor. Taking advantage of a period of political anarchy and troubles in Byzantium, which had lasted since, Guiscard, ostensibly seeking to restore Michael VII, who had been overthrown in favour of Nicephorous Botanoiates in, and with his daughter confined to a convent, decided to attack Byzantium. To guarantee Apulia against attack from the new rulers of Byzantium, Robert wanted the territories on the Adriatic coast of the Balkan Peninsula, and he began to build a large navy. Crisis within the Byzantine Empire in the late s enabled Robert Guiscard to undertake an audacious enterprise against a weakened state. In he, assisted by his son Bohemond crossed the Adriatic Sea with a considerable navy and invaded mainland Greece. The first campaign in saw a series of victories on the Dalmatian coast and in Macedonia. The Norman leaders benefited from papal support for their success at Durazzo in whereas at Hastings in they had the papal banner: Initially, he had some success but a combination of Norman revolts in Apulia and Alexius Comnenus becoming emperor in compelled him to return to Italy to reassert his authority in April Having defeated the Norman rebels in Apulia, Robert marched on Rome and freed the pope. Returning, in autumn, the second campaign advanced favourably. Physically attractive, endowed with an acute and unscrupulous intelligence, a brilliant strategist and competent statesman, Robert had begun to organise a state composed of diverse ethnic groups: Latin and Germanic in Lombard territories and Greek in the Byzantine domains. The new political structure was built on a monarchical-feudal framework characteristic of the time. However, Robert controlled it by using his ducal power to create a powerful and prosperous state. The other base on which he built was Roman Catholicism, the religion of the conquerors and most of the conquered, which he used to reconcile the subjected peoples. An extremely religious man, Robert was distrustful of the Greek clergy because of their ties with Byzantium. On the other hand, his generosity toward the Latin Church was considerable. He endowed it with territories and clerical immunities in order to tie it firmly to the feudal system. Splendid cathedrals and Benedictine abbeys were built in the hope that they would consolidate and diffuse Latin language and culture among the heterogeneous people and tie them into a new, unified state. Robert was kept from realising this political vision only by his death. Page 6

7 Chapter 5 : The Norman Invasion of Ireland Chapter 9. THE DEFENCE OF THE ANGLO-NORMAN KINGDOM March November In the summer of, as William moved in triumph from Rouen to Fà camp, from the Dives to Jumià ges, he was not only, as few of his predecessors had been, effectively master of Normandy, but he was also the consecrated and acknowledged king of the English. See Article History Alternative Titles: He eventually extended Norman rule over Naples, Calabria, and Sicily and laid the foundations of the kingdom of Sicily. Arrival in Apulia Robert was born into a family of knights. These regions attracted hordes of fortune-seeking Norman immigrants, who were to transform the political role of both regions in the following decades. In Campania, the Lombards of Capua were launching wars against the Byzantine dukes of Naples in order to gain possession of that important seaport. In he had been succeeded by his brother Drogo. When Robert joined his brothers, they sent him to Calabria to attack Byzantine territory. He began his campaign by pillaging the countryside and ransoming its people. In, at the head of the combined forces of Normans from Apulia and Campania, he defeated the haphazardly led forces of the Byzantines, the Lombards, and the papacy at Civitate. After becoming the recognized leader of the Apulian Normans, Robert resumed his campaign in Calabria. In his progression from gang leader to commander of mercenary troops to conqueror, Robert emerged as a shrewd and perspicacious political figure. Until that time the papacy had been hostile toward the Normans, considering them to be an anarchist force that upset the political structure in southern Italyâ a structure based on a balance of power between the Byzantines and the Lombards of northern Italy. The schism that took place between the Greek and Latin churches in temporarily worsened the relations between the Byzantine emperors and the papacy, and eventually the papacy realized that Norman conquests over the Byzantines could work to its advantage. This expedition into Sicily got under way in, as soon as the conquest of Calabria was completed. Robert entrusted the command of the expedition to his brother Roger, but on particularly difficult occasionsâ e. Expansion of the duchy Robert continued to expand the small county left by Humphrey into a duchy, extending from the Adriatic to the Tyrrhenian sea. The capture of Bari in April resulted in the end of Byzantine rule in southern Italy. Robert turned next to the neighbouring territories of Salerno, controlled by the Lombards. Hostilities broke out between the two rulers, however, and Gisulf naively tried to bring about a Byzantine counteroffensive against Robert. The struggle came to a head when Gisulf, determined to display his power, advanced toward the prosperous city of Amalfi. Robert was now at the height of his power. The harshness with which Robert chose to deal with these rebels was intended to transform a heterogeneous population into a strong state. When, in, the conflict between church and state over the right to control ecclesiastical personnel and property had become more intense, Robert chose to reconcile himself with Gregory VII, entering into the Concordat of Ceprano, which confirmed the commitments of the earlier Council of Melfi. Even the Byzantine court drew closer to him and went as far as trying to establish a familial relationship with Robert. The opposition party, however, deposed Michael and confined Helen in a monastery. To guarantee Apulia against attack from the new rulers of Byzantium, Robert wanted the territories on the Adriatic coast of the Balkan Peninsula, and he began to build a large navy. Now his goal was even more ambitious: In Robert landed in Epirus with a well-trained army and immediately succeeded in defeating the Byzantines and their Venetian allies. Following this success, he returned to his campaign on the Adriatic coast. He died during the siege of Cephalonia on July 17, Achievements Physically attractive, endowed with an acute and unscrupulous intelligence, a brilliant strategist and competent statesman, Robert had begun to organize a state composed of diverse ethnic and civil groups: Latin and Germanic in Lombard territories and Greek in Byzantine domains. The new political structure was built on a monarchial-feudal framework characteristic of the time, but it was controlled by the energetic and uncompromising Robert, who tried to use his ducal power to create a powerful and prosperous state. The other base on which he built was Latin Christianity, the religion of the conquerors and most of the conquered, which he used to reconcile the subjected peoples. An extremely religious man, Robert was distrustful of the Greek clergy because of their ties with Byzantium. On the other hand, his generosity toward the Latin church was bountiful. He endowed it with territories and clerical immunities in Page 7

8 order to tie it firmly to himself. Splendid cathedrals and Benedictine abbeys were built in the hope that they would consolidate and diffuse Latin language and culture among the heterogeneous people and tie them into a new, unified state. Page 8

9 Chapter 6 : Looking at History: The Normans in Italy: The Imperial Dream Robert Guiscard (c July ) was a Norman adventurer remembered for the conquest of southern Italy and theinnatdunvilla.com was born into the Hauteville family in Normandy, went on to become Count of Apulia and Calabria (), and then Duke of Apulia and Calabria and Duke of Sicily (), and briefly Prince of Benevento () before returning the title to the Pope. The plan was for the various armies to make their way to Constantinople, where they would combine their forces with the Byzantines for the march east. Among the greater lords was Godfrey of Bouillon, a member of the family of the counts of Boulogne. Godfrey was a second son, yet one with substantial resources. Henry IV had made him Duke of Lower Lorraine in, and he had worked hard to consolidate and expand his other holdings. Once he took the cross, however, his efforts were transformed from consolidation to liquidation. To raise the sums necessary to transport himself, his brother Baldwin of Boulogne, and a sizable retinue of knights to the East, Godfrey sold off a number of properties and settled many ongoing disputes to his disadvantage. Although he made considerable financial sacrifice, Godfrey clearly planned to come home after the crusade. He did not relinquish his claim to Lower Lorraine, nor to a nucleus of other rights and properties with which he could rebuild power upon his return. He traveled to Constantinople via Hungary. His troops made their way in an orderly manner to Constantinople, where they arrived on December 23, Hugh of Vermandois, the brother of the king of France, left Europe at the same time but took a more direct route and a much smaller force. For Emperor Alexius, the crusade presented both a challenge and an opportunity. On the one hand, he was pleased that his request for aid had met with such success. Thousands of Christian soldiers were now mobilized to fight the enemies of Byzantium. On the other hand, these Western barbarians were not altogether trustworthy. He was understandably concerned that the empire not exchange a Muslim enemy for a Christian one. When Hugh arrived, his men camped in the suburbs, while he was invited to the marvelously rich imperial palace in the city. Hugh was impressed but not distracted. Like other crusade leaders, he was curious about the role the emperor planned to play in the expedition. Before he transported foreign armies across the Bosporus, though, Alexius felt only justified in asking them to show their good faith. He politely requested that Hugh swear an oath that any lands the crusade should capture that had previously belonged to the empire should immediately be returned to the emperor. He also asked for an oath of loyalty to himself while the crusade remained in his domains. Since the crusaders had never planned to go beyond the far-flung borders of the old Roman Empire, this oath would effectively give all conquests to Alexius. Hugh stalled, not certain what other magnates had planned and not wanting to go out on a limb himself. In the meantime, the emperor kept him in sumptuous luxury in the city but refused to allow him to return to his troops. He declined the invitation, but the emperor was not so easily put off. When Godfrey remained aloof, the emperor cut off provisions to his army. In retaliation, the crusaders pillaged the suburbs, forcing Alexius to reopen the markets. For three months, the army stubbornly waited, all the while demanding to be taken to Asia. Exasperated, Godfrey finally ordered his troops to attack Constantinople itself. In January, the crusaders assaulted the mammoth Theodosian land walls near the imperial palace of Blachernae. In retaliation, the emperor ordered a sortie of imperial soldiers to attack the crusaders. After his forces were roughly pushed back from the walls, Godfrey at last decided to come to terms. On January 20, he took an oath to Alexius and he and his men were promptly transported across the Bosporus. Bohemond was the son of the Norman leader Robert Guiscard. Before his death in, Guiscard had left his lands east of the Adriatic Sea to Bohemond, and those to the west in southern Italy to his younger son, Roger. In, that seemed a fair division, given that Robert and Bohemond had captured Durazzo and were in the process of the conquest of Greece. But by an allied force of Byzantines and Venetians had erased most of the Norman gains just before Robert Guiscard himself died of plague. Bohemond was left with practically nothing. Since then, he had managed to cobble together a lordship for himself in southern Italy, but it was not impressive. More than any other crusading leader, Bohemond was ambitious for personal gain. He had once believed that he would rule in Thessalonica or perhaps even Constantinople. Although his hopes had been dashed, he still looked to the east as an opportunity Page 9

10 for power and wealth. For the Byzantines, Bohemond seemed to present the most dire threat. Because Bohemond was a crusader, Alexius was obliged to make smooth his trip from Durazzo to Constantinople, a journey that Bohemond had fought his way across a little more than a decade earlier. The Byzantine citizens along the via Egnatia, the old Roman road that led to the eastern capital, could not help but look on the hated Normans with suspicion and dread. Bohemond, however, had his eyes on greater things. He carefully monitored his men, making certain that they were on their best behavior. He wanted to make clear to the emperor that his crusading army was no threat at all to the Byzantine Empire. One by one, he was able to negotiate with each of them in isolation. As one leader agreed to take the oath, it made it more difficult for the next leader to refuse. Bohemond was not opposed to taking the oath in any event. It seems likely that the Norman prince suggested that Alexius appoint him commander in chief of the imperial forces in Asia, something that would have given Bohemond effective control over the entire enterprise. But Alexius was not willing to go that far in this friendly reconciliation. Instead, he replied cordially and in a noncommittal fashion, and Bohemond took the oath. His troops were then taken across the Bosporus to join the other crusaders assembling in Asia Minor. This fifty-five-year-old warrior had spent most of his life extending his power over thirteen counties in southern Franceâ almost the entire region. His wealth, lands, and armies were greater than those of most kings, including the king of France. Moved by the preaching of the crusade, Raymond decided to finish his life in the service of God. He divested himself of all of his properties, giving them to his son, and with his wife prepared for the departure east. Raymond was among the first nobles to take the cross; indeed, he was probably informed of the crusade by Urban II before the Council of Clermont. To signify this, Urban appointed Adhemar, bishop of Le Puy, as papal legate to the crusade and instructed him to accompany the army of Raymond. It was a great army, far larger than any other single lord could muster. Raymond left in October, but he had a difficult journey through the Veneto and Dalmatia before arriving in Durazzo. For the remainder of his journey, he was given a Byzantine escort, whose mission it was to protect the local population from his army. There was more than one skirmish between the escorts and crusaders, and some pillaging did occur. At last, Raymond arrived at Constantinople on April 21, Raymond and the Emperor, crossing the Bosporus By now, Raymond had heard of the progress of the other crusading lords and was aware of the oath that they had sworn to the emperor. Raymond was not like the other crusade leaders. More mature and powerful, the count of Toulouse would not so easily be manipulated by this cunning emperor. When asked to take the oath, Raymond responded that he had come to serve God; he would not take another as his lord. The other crusading magnates across the Bosporus urged Raymond to relent so that they could get under way. Raymond clearly saw himself as the leader of the Latin i. He did not want to be forced to accept Bohemond as commander in chief if Alexius decided to appoint him as such. Instead, Raymond proposed that if the emperor himself would take the cross and command the crusade, then he would gladly take his oath. Alexius replied that nothing would make him happier, but that he could not leave Constantinople at present. In the end, a compromise was reached. Raymond swore to respect the property and person of the emperor, a lukewarm oath not uncommon in southern France. With that, Raymond and his forces were transported across the Bosporus. Page 10

11 Chapter 7 : Robert Guiscard - Wikipedia The Normans took some policy decisions that would meet with the approval of modern economists: at a time of radical uncertainty, they ramped up infrastructure spending. Print this page Background to invasion The devastating wars of the British nations, which had seen Edward I invade Wales and then Scotland in the 13th century, left Ireland largely unaffected. Irish gold contributed to his campaigns in Wales, 3, Irish men invaded Scotland with him, and while Irish grain fed his war machine, Edward never visited the island himself; indeed no English king did so between John and Richard II. Significantly, and for the first time, the grant of Ireland to Edward: Anglo-Norman lords had settled in Ireland in the 12th century and never left. Its landscape now featured Norman castles and abbeys, just like the British mainland. With the king of England so distracted at home, it came as no surprise that many English lords equally stayed away from their Irish estates, allowing the gradual reassertion of influence by the native Irish princes and kings. It was into the middle of this vacuum that Robert the Bruce dispatched his ambitious brother, Edward, in For all the devastating completeness of the Scots victory at Bannockburn in, Robert I, King of Scotland, knew that it was only a battle that he had won there, certainly not the whole war. Bruce and the Scottish nation also knew there was always the possibility that before long another great army of English knights and Welsh archers would come lumbering up over the Tweed. Ireland shall never be separated from the crown of England All his instincts - strategically sharp as always - told Bruce he needed to hit the English while they were still on the floor, and hit them where it hurt. The war was taken over the border into Northumbria, now subjected to raids of unsparing ferocity. For over 20 years the Scots held the initiative in northern England, terrorising the population and carrying off their goods. And then in May, Bruce did something much, much, bolder. His brother, Edward, landed a formidable Scottish army, at least 5, strong, near Carrickfergus in the north-east of Ireland. In effect, this opened a second front in the war against the English empire. The Scots would come, he said, not as invaders but as liberators, for: The Anglo-Normans arrive in Ireland, on. How, and when, had their liberty been taken from the Irish? The aggressive, expansionist English - under the king most famous for gobbling up duchies and kingdoms - take a look out west, see something they fancy, push their horses onto ships, bludgeon their way into the land they want with blood and fire, and force themselves on the peaceful natives as conquerors. Then they sit there for the next years, daring the conquered people to do something about it. Awful the deed done in Ireland today Just as in Scotland a century later, the trouble with the English began with a civil war among the natives. And awful were its consequences. Now what happens when you ask the Godfather for a favour? He expects something, some day, in return. And, as the Song of Dermot made clear, from the beginning that something was: To you I come to make my plaint, good sire In the presence of the barons of your empire. Your liege-man I shall become henceforth all the days of my life, On condition you be my helper so that I do not lose at all You I shall acknowledge as sire and lord Then the King promised him, the powerful king of England That willingly would he help him as soon as he should be able. In, the Pope had asked Henry to invade Ireland to clean up what was reported to be a corrupt and lax Christianity. So he gave Diarmait permission to recruit help from among his barons. This is when the trouble became big trouble. For Diarmait promptly went shopping for mercenaries among the nastiest and greediest possible bunch of knights. These were the Anglo-Normans who, around the s, seemed to be on the losing end of the war against the Welsh princes of Gwynedd. They had lost castles, land and peasants. They were in an ugly mood and they were looking for somewhere to recoup their losses. Come west young knights. Ireland will be a piece of cake. But the pastures are green. So what are you waiting for? Within a year Diarmait had his throne back in Dublin. In fact, from the beginning, Diarmait had known this. He not only expected but wanted the likes of Strongbow to stick around, lest his old enemies get ideas of booting him out again. And Diarmait even went to the trouble of marrying his daughter to Strongbow to make sure that the alliance had staying power. The Irish kings did homage to Henry as they would to any High King At which point Henry II suddenly sat up and took notice of what was going on in the west. What he had inadvertently created was a monster: So in the winter of, Henry crossed the Irish Sea himself, coming with an Page 11

12 army big enough to give the likes of Strongbow serious second thoughts. It was then, in the wattle palace of Dublin, that he took the homage of all the six Irish kings, including Ruadrai Ua Conchobair. And though everything that happened afterwards in the sad history of England and Ireland wants to say this was the moment when Ireland lost her freedom, no one at the time saw it that way at all. The Irish kings did homage to Henry as they would to any High King, building the ritual hall through which they entered as his men, promising him one of every ten of their cattle hides in tribute. And they saw him not as imperial conqueror at all, but as their protector against the Strongbows and the Anglo-Norman barons. Top The Anglo-Norman colony is established in Ireland. With Henry in France, fighting off his children, his wife and the King of France, the Anglo-Norman barons had absolutely no intention of making his Irish settlement, with its careful attention to the claims of native Irish rulers, work. What they wanted was a colony; the nice, obedient, feudal territory they had lost over in Wales, transplanted to Ulster and the east coast. It was a true colony, a completely imported world: But it was enough to do the job of dominating the countryside against Irish attacks. In due course came the much more formidable stone buildings, such as Carrickfergus Castle, which entrenched their power in Ulster beyond any possibility of eviction. And from these power-bases, something utterly new was created in Ireland: Within two or three generations, northern and eastern Ireland had been totally transformed, from a country living off herding and horses, and ruled by clans, to a place of manors. The land taken - and taken is the word - by the Anglo-Normans, was divided up in the usual way and given to their knights, as reward for military service. But somehow - and does this sound familiar everyone? Almost from the beginning they knew this, since one of the Anglo-Normans, Maurice fitzgerald, rather pathetically complained that no one would help his kind: But the native Irish kings and much of their way of life had managed to hold on in the centre and west of the country - taking advantage of the chaos of English politics in the middle of the 12th century. So there was reason for the Bruces to hope that their clarion call to revolt would be heard loud and clear, and that oppressed Ireland would rush to their banner to evict the imperial conquerors, much as they had done in Scotland. Together the Gaelic brothers would rid Caledonia and Hibernia of the English scourge. This is not what happened. And perhaps it served them right. For all their ringing national rhetoric, some of it undoubtedly sincere, Robert and Edward Bruce were transparently using Ireland to force the English to divert resources away from Scotland to this second front, and to make them accept their claim to the crown in Scotland. So much for the Gaelic brotherhood of nations! For it proceeded with the usual indiscriminate slaughters and burnings - without making any nice distinctions between Gaelic friends and English foes. Perhaps things might have been different had not the years of the Scottish campaigns also been those of the worst famine in medieval history; so that there was nothing for the Scots soldiers to eat unless they took from the Irish. And even then they were reduced to such desperate straits, that it was said by one chronicler that the Scots soldiers dug up freshly made graves to eat the corpses. It was the usual story: There the inhabitants tore down churches to use the stones to reinforce their walls. So they evidently were far from seeing the Scots as liberators. The city was never taken. Then at an immense and bloody battle between opposed Irish camps in the west, where 10, men were said to have lost their lives, the pro-scots side came off worst. In Edward Bruce was himself was killed in battle at Fochart, and by the end of the year the Scots were gone. Top Declarations of national identity - the legacy of the invasions. The Anglo-Norman colony stopped expanding out from Ulster and Leinster. And just as in Scotland, the idea of the unstoppable English Empire of the Plantagenets had had the shine knocked off its myth of invincibility. In this you hear a language - eloquent, fierce, righteously belligerent - and you hear a voice which, for better or worse, would shout, roar and lament, down through the centuries. Three years later - a case perhaps of the Irish teaching the Scots rather than the other way about - something remarkably like it was spelled out at Arbroath, once again in a letter to the Pope. And so the wars of Britain had once again spilled into Ireland, with bloody consequences. It was Richard II who turned Ireland into his personal crusade, only this time it was to cost the English king his throne - and his life. His best-selling books include: From he was art critic and cultural essayist for The New Yorker magazine. Page 12

13 Chapter 8 : England before the Norman Conquest Arrival of the Normans in Italy, The duke returned in to restore them, occupying Corfu and Kephalonia before his death from a fever on 15 July Print this page The culmination of the Conquest The Domesday survey and Domesday Book have generally been seen as the culmination of the Norman Conquest, and show the results of a great investigation, commissioned by William the Conqueror, of the lands over which he now ruled. He had it surveyed by teams of commissioners, who toured the country taking statements and hearing land pleas, before compiling all the information they had amassed into Domesday Book. This view is based upon the seminal analysis of Domesday Book conducted by VH Galbraith in, and breaks down into the following phases: England was divided into seven great circuits, within which tenants-in-chief supplied details of their lands. Sessions of the shire court were held under the jurisdiction of the Commissioners for each circuit. These checked, shire hundred by shire hundred, the claims being made by taking sworn testimonies from the jurors of the courts. In areas of special difficulty, an early draft was made: This draft was scheduled to be presented to King William at the Great Convocation of Salisbury, at Old Sarum, on 1 August, at which all the magnates of the land would swear allegiance to him. However, it was not ready in time, and a copy of Little Domesday is believed to have been used instead. After this, the King had much thought and very deep discussion with his council about this country - how it was occupied or with what sort of people. Then he sent his men all over England into every shire and had them find out how many hundred hides there were in the shire, or what land and cattle the King himself had in the country, or what dues he ought to have in twelve months from the shire. Also he had a record made of how much land his archbishops had, and his bishops and his abbots and his earls - and though I relate it at too great length - what or how much everybody had who was occupying land in England, in land or in cattle, and how much money it was worth. So very narrowly did he have it investigated that there was no single virgate of land, nor indeed it is a shame to relate but it seemed no shame to him to do one ox nor one cow nor one pig which there was left out, and not put down in his record; and all those records were brought to him afterwards Then he travelled about so as to come to Salisbury at Lammas; and there his councillors came to him, and all the people occupying land who were of any account over England, no matter whose vassals they might be; and they all submitted to him and became his vassals and swore oaths of allegiance to him, that they would be loyal to him against all other men. That hindsight knows that William died in, and that the compilation of the Domesday Book was therefore the culminating act of his reign. The sheer scale of it is huge: Moreover, it was not just one exercise. These were Geld surveys, to do with the payment of Danegeld - tax. Once again, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle has the answer, in the preceding paragraph of its entry: In this year people said and declared for a fact that Cnut king of Denmark, son of King Swegn, was setting out in this direction and meant to conquer this country When William, King of England, found out about this, he went to England with a larger force of mounted men and infantry from France and Brittany than had ever come to this country, so that people wondered how this country could maintain all that army. And the King had all the army dispersed all over the country among his vassals, and they provisioned the army each in proportion to his land. Cnut the Holy was the son of Swegn Estrithson. He had threatened England in earlier years, when he supported Hereward at Ely and raided York in Now, with his father dead and his elder brother installed on the throne of Denmark, he was seriously looking towards England as a forum for his dynastic ambitions. Yet it was also more than that. In essence, there were two Domesday surveys: The Domesday Book put that assessment on a firm basis, so that everybody knew what was owed by them and what was due to them. It was necessary in the wake of the Norman Conquest, because nobody was actually quite sure who owned what in the new Norman kingdom. It tells us all kinds of things, most importantly: Who owned the land before Who owned the land at the time of Domesday in How it changed hands. What that land was worth, and what manors it was associated with. How many peasants called bordars and villani tended that land. It was a form of local government, and this is what William depended on. He formed an alliance with the freemen of the shire to run the country, based upon their autonomous local governance, through the Page 13