The Normans: From Raiders to Kings

by Lars Brownworth

  1185-1195 Isaac II Angelus

  1195-1203 Alexius III

  1203-1204 Isaac II and Alexius IV

  Non-Dynastic

  1204 Alexius V the Bushy-eyebrowed

  Crusader (Latin) Emperors till 1261

  Double click to enlarge the map

  Double click to enlarge the map

  Double click to enlarge the map

  Double click to enlarge the map

  INTRODUCTION

  The idea for this book began with a question: How did Western Europe, which was militarily, technologically, and socially far behind its immediate neighbors in the Middle East, manage not only to catch up with them, but to rise to global dominance?

  At the start of the second millennium, a gambler certainly wouldn’t have placed their bet on the West. It was much more likely that the sophisticated and sprawling Islamic Caliphate would continue to dominate, or perhaps the cultured, resurgent Byzantine1 Empire. Europe was a battered shell, crumbling under the hammer blows of invasion and disease. And yet, it was a group of Viking descendants – the very ones who were ripping Western Europe apart at the time – that would provide the catalyst for its future greatness.

  Few events in European history are as remarkable as the sudden rise of those Normans in the latter half of the eleventh century. In the space of a single generation they carved out kingdoms from the North Sea to the North African coast, and transformed Europe. They lived in a world where the old order was passing away and the clever among them had seemingly unlimited possibilities. For the bold no ambition was too lofty, and no dream was impossible. They were among the West’s first great entrepreneurs; a powerful example that in the new world of the tenth century low birth was no bar to success.

  But who exactly were the Normans? Despite their prominence, there is an air of ambiguity to them. They settled in France and can most famously be seen on the Bayeux Tapestry, but were not strictly French. Their most famous king ruled over England so they can just as easily be called English, but they can also be seen as Norse, or even Italian. Even their legacy is conflicted. They appear in the story of Robin Hood as oppressive villains, and at the same time are regarded as the founders of the English state who established modern law and eliminated slavery.

  One of the reasons for the confusion is that the whole Norman story is not widely known. The Norman identity is dominated by William the Conqueror, the illegitimate son of an absent father, who famously landed at Pevensey Beach in 1066 and conquered the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England.

  There is another Norman conquest, however, which is in some ways even more remarkable. Six years before Duke William launched his invasion, the sons of an impoverished Norman knight headed south, creating a kingdom that extended from southern Italy to the Tunisian coast. Full of the restless ambition of their Viking ancestors, they presided over a century of commercial expansion that turned Palermo (in present day Sicily) into the cultural and economic capital of the western Mediterranean. Most importantly, they fostered the rising fortunes of the papacy at a critical period in the history of Christendom, playing a pivotal role in the formation of a European identity.

  It was an astonishing achievement for men with such humble beginnings. Tancred de Hauteville, an obscure Norman knight living in northern France, had little he could offer his twelve sons and most left to seek their fortunes in the south. They arrived as humble mercenaries, but quickly proved to be among the most inspired of medieval leaders. From William ‘Iron-Arm’ who killed the Emir of Syracuse in single combat, to Robert Guiscard who captured a pope and nearly overthrew the Byzantine Empire, the sons of Tancred combined ambition with tenacity. For three quarters of a century they carried out a systematic campaign to enlarge their territories, culminating with Count Roger who accepted the unconditional Saracen2 surrender of Sicily and adopted the dress and customs of a Byzantine emperor. By the time the youngest Hauteville brother died, his relatives sat enthroned in Palermo, Tripoli, Malta, and Antioch, and the family possessed the strongest and wealthiest kingdom in Europe.

  The Hauteville family, however, is important for more than just colorful individuals. They are also part of a larger Norman story, embodying the energy of a continent poised for rapid growth. At the start of the eleventh century, Europe was largely agrarian, politically divided, defensive, and economically undeveloped. Three non-European powers – the Byzantine Empire, the Spanish Caliphate, and the Fatimid Caliphate of Cairo - dominated the Mediterranean. England was part of the Scandinavian cultural orbit, Rome was mired in the corruption and politicking of the early papacy, and Christendom was under attack from the formidable powers of Islam.

  Within a generation of the arrival of the Normans, much of Europe was transformed from a collection of feuding states to a culturally united and politically strong region. In place of a patchwork of French fiefdoms, they created an Anglo-Norman empire, stretching from Scotland to the Pyrenees. In Italy they found Lombard, Byzantine, and Saracen princes controlling a confused array of provinces, and replaced them with a single Norman kingdom. The Byzantine Empire was driven out of Italy, the Saracens were expelled from Sicily, and a revived papacy began the Western offensive against Islam that would spawn both the Reconquista and the Crusades.

  Norman power also coincided with several more fundamental shifts. From the eleventh century to the twelfth, the population of Europe nearly doubled. With a larger workforce came a greater specialization of labor, the founding of guilds, and technological innovations like the windmill and stern-mounted rudder. The growth of cities and towns encouraged the formation of communes and the first medieval experiments with democracy. Trading organizations like the Hanseatic League brought the West into contact with the Byzantine and Islamic worlds and partially reintroduced Europe to Greek learning and advances in medicine and science. The new Gothic form of architecture began to spread from France to the rest of the continent, and with it came a reform movement fostered in Norman monasteries that resulted in a revival of learning broad enough to be called the Renaissance of the twelfth century. Vernacular literature emerged, Latin poetry and Roman law were revived and the first European universities were founded. Lastly, the stability that the Normans gave to the Italian peninsula allowed the reforming pope, Gregory VII, to spread his idea of a universal Christian society far beyond Italy – and with it the concept of a united Europe.

  In each of these movements, a Hauteville played a catalyst role, sparking events that would begin the European rise to dominance on the world stage. Yet for all their accomplishments, the southern Normans remain largely unknown, eclipsed by their famous northern compatriots. Knowledge of the Normans for far too many seems to begin and end with the Battle of Hastings, while the Hauteville’s central role in the growth of Europe is largely unexplored.

  This is somewhat surprising, because the brothers are the most prominent example of the Norman genius of adaptability that transformed Europe. They had the instinctive ability to recognize which local traditions were superior to their own and to combine the various cultural and legal elements into a cohesive whole. Perhaps because they were a cobbled together people themselves, they displayed this pragmatic streak in every place they inhabited.

  The first Normans were Scandinavian Vikings hopelessly outnumbered amid a French population, and they quickly learned how to govern a people without alienating them. In Sicily, the Hautevilles perfected this skill. They took over the existing structure of the Muslim and Byzantine administration intact, combined it with French efficiency and gave Sicily a prosperity it hadn’t seen since the days of imperial Rome. The former mercenaries transitioned into southern kings, exchanging war for trade and mercantile activity. At the time of the First Crusade, when Christendom was internally divided and at war with Islam, Roger de Hauteville protected the Sicilian Kingdom with an army composed of Saracen infantry, Greek generals and Norman cavalry. His example provided a template for the Hauteville governance of Sicily, and the great cathedrals of Cefalù and Monr
eale, with their fusion of Norman, Islamic and Byzantine architecture, are still a testament to the success of his efforts.

  This story needs to be restored to its proper place in the history of European development. Unlike the Norman Conquest of England, the Hautevilles did not have the backing and resources of a dukedom. Their progress was slow – the conquest of Sicily alone took over thirty years of sporadic fighting – and the obstacles they had to overcome were daunting. Yet in the end their determination paid off, and their success proved enduring. They were a blend of ambition, greed and daring that was often repellent but never dull. In the most unlikely of places – the center of the Mediterranean – they created a bridge between the East and West, Christian and Muslim, ruling with an effectiveness that was unparalleled in the Middle Ages and has rarely been equaled since. They played a crucial role in explaining how the West emerged from the chaos of the early Middle Ages to a place of global prominence, and took the first steps in creating the modern world. This is their story.

  Prologue: The Viking Age

  Nostra conservando corpora et cutodita, de gente fera Normannica nos libera, quae nostra vastat, Deus, regna

  (Preserve us and ours, O God, from the savage race of Northmen which lays waste our realms)

  – Antiphony of St Vaast or St Medard (ca 870)

  In the year 793 the monks of Lindisfarne priory were interrupted from their evening meditations by an astonishing sight. Fiery dragons appeared in the night sky, wheeling menacingly above the island monastery before vanishing into the darkness. Sheets of lightning followed, spreading out in vast arcs above the priory roof, outlining the building with an unearthly flame. A few weeks later the dragons returned, but this time they were carved into the prows of ships. When they beached, wild men carrying strange rune-covered swords came swarming out, overtaking the monks before they could flee to safety. Neither the old nor the infirm were spared as the cloister was ravaged. Gold and silver plate was seized, precious vestments were torn from their hangings, and even the ossuaries were smashed open in search of valuables. When there was nothing left to plunder, the invaders loaded everything into their ships and departed as quickly as they had come, leaving behind the corpses scattered – as a cleric later wrote – like so much dung in the streets.

  It was only a taste of the storm to come. For the better part of the next two centuries the Viking onslaught broke on northern Europe, ripping apart kingdoms and leaving coastal cities almost deserted. The brutal assault was made worse by the thoroughly alien nature of these Norse warriors from Scandinavia. Unlike the majority of people in Western Europe they weren’t Christianized; they recognized no church sanctuary and showed no mercy. Worshiping their terrible berserker3 god Odin, the one-eyed, raven deity that inspired divine madness, these hulking warriors didn’t seem to feel pain and would attack with teeth and nails when their weapons were gone. Clothed in the skins of wolves or bears, they appeared like some bestial scourge from the frozen north.

  These cunning warriors were no mere brutes though, and were capable of remarkable sophistication. Thanks to a clever Viking innovation in shipbuilding that eliminated the need for a keel, they could sail up even the shallowest rivers, and it was this mobility that made them truly lethal. Even inland cities, long thought to be safe from seafaring raids, were now in range.

  There seemed to be no limit to their wanderlust. Sailing to the west, Norse adventurers colonized Iceland, Greenland, and eventually, as is now generally recognized, the New World. In Ireland they founded the city of Dublin, in Muslim Spain4 they seized the city of Seville, and in Africa they raided the Moroccan coast. Cruising up the coast of Italy they sacked the largest city they could find, and returned to Scandinavia boasting that they had conquered Rome. The fact that it was actually Luna, center of the Italian marble trade, was beside the point. No city was safe.

  The Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England was among the first to be buffeted by the storm. Viking raiders overran York, captured London, and butchered at least two English kings5 as a sacrifice to Odin. Other Vikings sailed east, and found their way to the Black Sea, where they were daring enough to try an attack on mighty Constantinople. Called the ‘Rus’ by the Byzantines, these Vikings carved out settlements among the Slavic populations of northeastern Europe, and gave their name to the land of Russia.

  A major target of Viking activity was what today is northern France. The Norsemen were interested in loot, and there was no more tempting target than the Frankish Empire.

  By the year 800, it looked as if the great western dream of restarting the Roman Empire had become a reality. The Frankish king, Charlemagne, had hammered together the lands of France, Germany, Switzerland, and northern Italy into a single state, and the pope had crowned him emperor of this new Roman Empire.6 Trade flourished, learning was revived, and wealth poured into Frankish treasuries. Charlemagne built a magnificent palace at his capital of Aachen, dazzled his subjects with a court that seemed to drip with gold, and even toyed with the idea of marrying the Byzantine Empress in a bid to unite the lands of the old Roman Empire. At his death in 814 it looked as if the Mediterranean-spanning Pax Romana would dawn again under Frankish leadership.

  Unfortunately for the Franks, none of Charlemagne’s successors ever quite measured up to him, a fact made painfully obvious by the nicknames their depressed subjects gave them. Charlemagne’s first son got the best of the lot as Louis the Pious, but it went downhill from there. After Louis came Charles the Bald, Louis the Stammerer, Charles the Fat, Louis the Blind, and so on.

  Guided by these feeble rulers after the death of Charlemagne and hopelessly divided, the Frankish lands were both wealthy and weak, a lethal combination which quickly attracted the attention of the predatory Vikings. By the end of the century the attacks had become so frequent that many coastal towns had to be abandoned, and even Paris was briefly occupied. The helpless Frankish kings, unable to match Viking speed, resorted to a disastrous policy of bribing the invaders to leave, but this only bankrupted the treasury and convinced the Vikings that the Franks were indeed weak. In 880 the ultimate humiliation occurred when Charlemagne’s old capital of Aachen fell to the invaders, and its citizens were forced to watch as Viking horses were stabled in the magnificent palace chapel. The Frankish king responded to the crisis (as he did to most others) by sending a massive payment of gold and silver, and the now fabulously wealthy Vikings lumbered off, struggling to carry all their loot.

  This victory marked a subtle change in Viking tactics. By now their thoughts had turned from plunder to settlement, and the northern seacoast looked particularly inviting. There was little to fear from the Frankish military; Vikings could besiege even major cities with virtual impunity. The difficulty lay in choosing an appropriate spot at which to settle. The Norse were men of the sea – they were often called ‘sea wolves’ by their victims – so any permanent location had to have easy access to water. Paris and Aachen may have been rich targets, but they were too far from the coast to make suitable bases. Ironically, it was a Viking defeat, not a victory, which provided the perfect location.

  Chapter 1

  The Northman’s Duchy

  The entry for the year 885 in the French Annals of St Vaast begins with the chilling phrase: “The rage of the Northmen was let loose upon the land”. It was an all too accurate assessment. As soon as the winter snows had melted, a frenetic series of Viking raids hit the French coast and continued with a ferocity not seen for half a century. This particular year was especially demoralizing because the Frankish population had believed that they had gained the upper hand against the raiders. Four years earlier, the Franks had met the Norse in a rare pitched battle and slaughtered some eight thousand of them. For several years the threat of attack had receded, but then in 885 the Norse launched a full-scale invasion.

  Viking attacks were usually carried out with limited numbers. They were experts in hit and run tactics, and small bands ensured maximum flexibility. That November, however, to the horror o
f the island city, more than thirty thousand7 Viking warriors descended on Paris.

  From the start, their organization was fluid. According to legend, a Parisian emissary sent to negotiate terms was unable to find anyone in charge. When he asked to see a chieftain he was told by the amused Norse that, ‘we are all chieftains’. There was a technical leader – traditionally he is known as Sigfred – but not one the Franks would have recognized as ‘King’. It was less of an army than a collection of war bands loosely united by a common desire for plunder.

  The Vikings launched an attack hoping to catch the French off guard, but several days of intense fighting failed to break through the Parisian defenses. The resulting siege, which lasted for a year, was ultimately unsuccessful, but it gave Europe its first glimpse of the man whose descendants would dominate both ends of the continent, and whose distant relative still sits on the English throne. Known to posterity as Rollo (the Latin version of the Norse Hrolf), he was a minor leader, probably of Norwegian8 extraction. According to legend he was of such enormous size that the poor Viking horses couldn’t accommodate him,9 and this earned him the nickname Rollo the Walker (Hrolf Granger), since he had to go everywhere on foot.

  Like all the Vikings, Rollo had been drawn to the siege by the very real prospect of making a fortune. Forty years before, the legendary Norse warrior Ragnar Lodbrok had sacked Paris with fewer men, returning home with nearly six thousand pounds of silver and gold courtesy of the terrified French king. All of those present had undoubtedly been brought up on stories about Ragnar’s exploits, and there may even have been a veteran or two among the gathered warriors. This was their chance to duplicate his exploits.