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posticon Re: Robert of Mortain


" I imprisoned not a bishop but a tyrant and if he goes free without doubt he will disturb the whole kingdom and bring thousands to destruction"
William the Conqueror regarding Odo of Bayeux

Anne
You find Odo interesting.Why? I ask because I find him interesting too in the sense of "know your enemy".Perhaps someone will start a wee debate on him.Steve and Rob, why do you telescope your reasons for the divisions around around the deathbed?
For goodness sake, following the revolt of 1075 in Angleland, the leading conspirator Ralph de Gael escaped to his native Brittany. The Conqueror tracked him to his lair at Dol and suffered defeat at the subsequent siege.
There followed another reversal in Maine resulting in that wily fox, King Philippe brokering a deal between the Conqueror and Fulk Le Rechin.In 1077, Philippe exploited Simon de Crepis monastical vocation to annex the Vexin.In the following settlement, tellingly,Courtheuse was put in charge of Maine at Philippe's behest.
I agree that a house divided among itself risks a fall.Aye for sure! Cnut the Holy and Philippe waited for the Norman divisions to mature until they believed it right to strike.Philippe waited ten years before invading Normandy from his base at Mantes. The Conqueror levelled Mantes to prevent Philippe returning for a renewed assault(compare and contrast here with E.Anglia in 1085)
On the other hand,Philippe's army was in full flight and the Conqueror was only one hundred and fifty kilometres from Paris.So why the divisions around his deathbed?
Both attempts at counter-revolution in 1085 and 1087 were defeated, not least by the Conqueror's actions.
My view is that both were pyrrhic victories.I'm no saying he was wrong.The opposite is the case.What I am saying is they exacerbated the pre-existing divisions over policy that ultimately led to counter-revolution in Angleland 1088-89.
Robert of Mortain's initial indecision about who to support: the Red or Courtheuse was reflective of a deeper division among the Norman leaders and their social base in the ranks of the most combative,revolutionary knights.
It's one of the ironies of History at work here that exactly at the moment of upswing, the revolution was running out of steam.

Sammy (personal capacity)
Jun/19/2004, 4:05 pm Link to this post Send Email to thewilliam theredforum2002   Send PM to thewilliam theredforum2002
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


150 kilometres should read 48 kilometres.

Sammy
Jun/19/2004, 4:33 pm Link to this post Send Email to thewilliam theredforum2002   Send PM to thewilliam theredforum2002
 
lagarvelho Profile
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Re: Robert of Mortain


Sammy:

You keep making quotes, of which I have never heard elsewhere. So, first of all, what are your *sources* for these quotes? Again, be specific, so I can check them out.

And why do I find Odo interesting? Well, because he both supported William(at least to begin with), and also "supported" his own interests, or tried to, and he tried to do it as a kind of "brains" operation. I find that very intriguing, at least on a "personal" level.
Anne G
Jun/20/2004, 4:16 am Link to this post Send Email to lagarvelho   Send PM to lagarvelho
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


Anne: Are you stating that you have your own personal Odo? If so, the detail would be interesting to know.

Sammy: Two key events link the politico-military operations of 1085-6 and 1087.

The first is the Domesday Book which was not simply an accounting exercise but a state planning policy engendered by the huge problems produced by the arrival of the Conqueror's massive,international army which as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles records as " a large force of mounted men and foot-soldiers than had ever come into this country".
Their dispersal across his vassals' lands caused an upheaval in terms of the economic dislocation caused to accommodate and sustain them.Hefty taxes were imposed to alleviate the immediate financial burden.Domesday was a product of war-mobilisation.

The second event is for me far more important.The Oath of Salisbury in the summer of 1086,was a mass gathering of vassals and freemen of differing stripes called by the Conqueror to coincide with Lammas(Ist August)which was a medieval harvest festival involving the consecration of bread produced by new wheat.The name is derived from "loaf-mass".And as you must know,it is still celebrated in Scotland as a quarter day.
This vast mass-meeting was without precedent in previous English history and surpassed feudal practice in that the Conqueror sought by an oath of allegiance,mass endorsement of his rule and implicitly of his policy to defeat the enemy,and not simply relying on his own automatic authority as king by homage (joining of hands,the previous Anglo-Saxon practice was "bowing")
This event was about boosting morale to a new level to meet the primary threat from Philippe,the Frankish King.The Conqueror knew that political and spiritual elevation was just as important,if not more so, as economic imposition among the decisive levels of popular leadership and its translation into elevating military morale.

The Oath followed the murder of Cnut the Holy in Odense on 10th July.(It is important to remember that Cnut and Olaf fought in 1069 and 1066 respectively and both were guiding their kingdoms down the Carolingian road established earlier in Continental Europe).
The Oath was specifically targeted at Philippe.Within a year of The Oath,Philippe occupied the Vexin and invaded Normandy.
The Oath was instrumental in ensuring the maintenance of the Conqueror's revolutionary cause at the critical juncture of 1086-7 and was the primary source of ultimate victory in the Vexin.

Concerning the death-bed events.The crucial moment was when the Conqueror,despite suffering from the worst kind of wound there is (gut wound)summoned up the strength,as recorded by a Monk of Caen,the other source to Ordericus Vitalis,to hand his crown,sword and sceptre to the Red and ordered him to leave.And so it was that the continuity of The Norman Revolution in Normandy-Angleland was maintained.
Since the thread is about (in the first place) Robert of Montain,my view is that he was in the camp of counter-revolution at the death-bed.How else can it be when he motivated that Courtheuse should rule Normandy(Philippe's policy too) and Odo should be released?

Drogo,Chairperson (personal capacity)
Jun/21/2004, 3:08 pm Link to this post Send Email to thewilliam theredforum2002   Send PM to thewilliam theredforum2002
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


Drogo:

You haven't given any sources for most of your assertions. Please give me a list of these sources. I know what Domesday was, but I'm not sure you're reading it correctly. Or what you are reading it for. And do you get the rest of your assertions from ASC? As I say, please listyour sources and be specific! Otherwise, I think your assertions lack credibilty.
Anne G
Jun/21/2004, 3:34 pm Link to this post Send Email to lagarvelho   Send PM to lagarvelho
 
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Drogo,Sammy,
Brilliant postings!but the key factor is the relationship of forces prevailing a)after the Conqueror's tragic accident in Mantes and b)at his deathbed.
48 kilometres from the fortress of King Philippe with an army whose revolutionary fervour must have been at its height.It must have felt like Varaville once again.Then the Conqueror is down and everything goes into reverse gear emoticon .It reminds us of that posting earlier on the Board concerning who would replace the Conqueror after The Broken Tower?We reread those informative exchanges recently and our money is still on William Warenne.Which makes us wonder where was he at the time of the advance into the Vexin? We've scoured the dozens of books we've got on all things Norman and cannot find a trace of him! Assuming he was "prominent" at the time.The collective consensus must have been that preserving the Conqueror was number one priority.Correct too,if you see him as the central driving force of the Norman Revolution.But then you have the negative side.Did the fact that it was an accident appear as a kind of "Deus vult" factor boost the counter-revolutionary elements to the peak they achieved at the Conqueror's deathbed? Although we would agree with Drogo's assessment that when the crown sword and sceptre were handed over to the Red the continuity of the revolution was maintained. You have to weigh that with the fact that getting the crown of Angleland was inferior to getting what Curthose got:Normandy.For the Conqueror Angleland was always second to Normandy.He spent the vast majority of his reign 1066-87 in Normandy in general and Rouen/Caen in particular.Normandy was the home of the revolution.Normandy was also a province of the Frankish Kingdom and if as the events of 1087 in the Vexin would confirm,in relation to their internal dynamics,the Conqueror was finally resolved to defend the Norman Revolution by exporting it.Angleland was secondary bordering on irrelevant.The Vexin events,especially how he dealt with Mantes clearly demonstrate that the Conqueror was intent on settling accounts with the Frankish King permanently.
Instead,what Philippe loses on the battlefield he gains at the deathbed:a strategic retreat of the Norman Revolution. Curthose gets Normandy thanks to a majority of the Norman leadership forcing the dying Conqueror to submit to their demand.From our perspective Odo is a secondary or even tertiary factor and the events of 1088-89 in Normandy-Angleland amply support that thesis.Those events of 1087 resulted in a delay of 9 years before the Red could reunite Normandy-Angleland under total revolutionary control along the lines of 1058 and 1066-87 and prepare the ground for its historic export in 1099.

CT,Bill H (both in personal capacity)
Jun/23/2004, 8:58 pm Link to this post Send Email to thewilliam theredforum2002   Send PM to thewilliam theredforum2002
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


It would I feel understate the matter to assert that there was "bad blood" between the Conqueror and Philippe.
There is a chilling exchange recorded by William of Malmesbury where Philippe having compared the dying Conqueror to a pregnant woman about to give birth receives the response: ' when I go to mass after the birth, I will offer him a hundred thousand candles'.
I would agree a 'final conflict' between the protagonists was probably inevitable given the necessity for the Conqueror's revolution to spread to survive and so prevent disintegration and from Philippe's perspective the desire to eliminate that phemomenon due to its incompatibility with his own rule and to avenge the humiliating defeat of his father,Henri,by the Conqueror in 1058.
Anne,your request for continual information on sources,worthy and necessary though it may be in moderate measure,risks,in my view, turning contributions into a bibliophile's paradise rather than topics for the lively discussion Board we currently have.
One must I feel assume a certain 'latitude' when one assesses a contribution to the discussion.One needs to be aware that being widely read on the subject,as all are on this Board does not mean all knowledge consumed is the same and that it behoves all who contribute to read a wider ever wider range of books in order that discussions are enriched with new perspectives and possibilities.
The quote you selected for scrutiny from Sammy's contribution about the Conqueror's description of odious Odo is well-known to me.It is from Ordericus Vitalis and also appears in a book I recommended you read during an earlier discussion here on The Bayeux Tapestry,Andrew Bridgeford's "1066 The Hidden History of The Bayeux Tapestry".
There is information expressed on the Board with which I am unfamiliar.My solution is to seek out the information for myself because I have accumulated the resources to do so.That is my commitment.One does not want to be spoon-fed or force-fed.One wants the space to feed oneself.

Lydia Giles,First Secretary (personl capacity)
Jun/25/2004, 10:05 pm Link to this post Send Email to thewilliam theredforum2002   Send PM to thewilliam theredforum2002
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


Lydia:

I'm presently waiting for the Bridgeford book, but from what I've heard of it(via another medieval e-list), I'm not sure it's what you think it might be. Still, it's worth a look. Anything I can get on th is period is.

However, and here we come to the point of your contention that listing sources would be a "bibliophile's list", it's usualfor people to back up their assertions with refs, especially if asked. I belong to several scholarly and semi-scholarly lists(not all of which are concerned with "Anglo-Norman" things), and if I ask for refs to something, I usually get them. What strikes me as odd about this "William the Red" forum is, that all of you are making assertions, none of which seem to be backed up or verified *anywhere* I've read(and that includes things like Domesday, FYI). But although I've asked on several occasions for refs for these particular conclusions, until now, I've really not gotten any answers. Just more assertions and "canned" biographies of people you seem to consider to be the "heroes" of this "revolution". There are a lot of interesting things about the Anglo Norman period, which deserve discussion, comment, debate. But unless you can provide proper evidence for these assertions, what you claim to believe isn't one of them.
Anne G
Jun/26/2004, 12:16 am Link to this post Send Email to lagarvelho   Send PM to lagarvelho
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


Anne,you seem to me to have an obsession with "references".This is not a classroom neither is it a court it is a chatboard.When anybody expresses a point of view backed up with facts,and all the contributions The William the Red Forum 2002 make do precisely that,it is all that is sufficient and necessary.As far as I'm concerned if someone disagrees with what I say it is up to that somebody to state why and counterpose their facts to mine.That is what is called informed discussion/debate.It is not up to me to tell that person where I got my facts from unless I choose to do so.
There is such a thing as intellectual laziness.Your "reference mania" smacks of it and at the very least is open to encouraging it which is why I have no intention whatsoever of disclosing my sources of knowledge to you or anybody else since anyone who visits a half-decent bookstore web or non -web can find all the key books with a modicum of common sense.I disagree also with your apparently negative attitude to biographies.There is nothing wrong with reading biographies produced by reputable historians.Indeed, they are a vital source of facts and knowledge to enable opinion-formation.And they are also replete with factual references for those hooked on them.

Rob (personal capacity)
Jun/28/2004, 7:08 pm Link to this post Send Email to thewilliam theredforum2002   Send PM to thewilliam theredforum2002
 
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Re: Robert of Mortain


Rob:

No, I don't so much have an "obsession with references" as I'm wondering on what basis you come to your coclusions. You must have come to them by reading certain things. What were they? And why are you so reluctant to share the sources. If you really want me or anybody else to "counterpose" and debate, it seems to me you had better have something we can both check and agree or disagree about. Otherwise it just looks like you have some theory and not much evidence to back it up with. And believe me when I say I've met a lot of people in cyberspace who have lots of ideas, but not much to back them up with.
Anne G
Jun/28/2004, 9:24 pm Link to this post Send Email to lagarvelho   Send PM to lagarvelho
 


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