The Normans: From Raiders to Kings

by Lars Brownworth

  Gregory had been restored, but he was now so universally hated that he had to accompany Guiscard’s army when it withdrew. He found a new home in Salerno, where he set up his court in exile, and concentrated on his reform of the Church. He died the following year and was buried, as was fitting, in a Norman tomb. He was defiant until the end, but his last words were bitter: “I have loved righteousness and hated iniquity, therefore I die in exile”.

  Robert Guiscard, meanwhile, was finally free to concentrate on Byzantium. The war had not gone well without him. His son, Bohemond, was a superb knight and a good general, but he lacked his father’s ability to inspire. Despite demolishing three successive armies that the emperor had sent against him, the mood in the Norman camp was increasingly defeatist. It had been nearly four years since they had sailed from Italy, and yet they were no closer to taking Constantinople than on the day they had arrived. Most of them were exhausted and homesick, beginning to feel as if this long campaign would never end. Bohemond managed to hold them together for a few more months, but at the end of the campaigning season he committed the cardinal sin of underestimating his opponent. As he was crossing a river in northern Greece, Alexius lured him into attacking a decoy force while the main imperial army plundered the Norman baggage. After an afternoon spent chasing shadows, Bohemond returned to his camp to find that four years worth of spoils had vanished. For the weary army it was the last straw. The moment Bohemond’s back was turned the men surrendered en masse to Alexius.

  It was a severe setback, but Guiscard was nothing if not persistent. Although he was now seventy, he had lost none of his vigor and he immediately gathered another army. He spent the winter in Corfu, but typhoid fever struck the camp killing thousands. When it finally abated, he gave orders to sail to the Byzantine island of Cephalonia as the first step of the campaign. In the middle of the crossing, however, Guiscard himself was struck by the fever and was barely strong enough to stand when he arrived. He died on July 17, 1085, having never lost a major battle.

  The body was taken back to Italy, but just off the coast of Otranto the corpse washed overboard in a storm and was badly damaged. The sailors managed to recover it, but the decision was made to remove the heart and entrails and bury them in a small chapel while the rest was embalmed and completed the journey to the Hauteville mausoleum in Venosa, Italy. There it was interred in the Abbey of the Holy Trinity in a magnificent tomb.

  He had lived an extraordinary life, and his accomplishments had earned him a spot as one of the greatest military adventurers. With a mixture of vision, political skill, and force of personality he had taken a small barony and turned it into one of the great powers of Europe. Along the way he had evicted the Byzantines from Italy, the Muslims from Sicily, saved the reformed papacy, and held two emperors at bay. An anonymous stone worker put it best in an inscription above his tomb: “Here lies Guiscard, Terror of the World…”

  Chapter 11

  Bohemond I

  Guiscard’s death left the vexing question of who would inherit his possessions unanswered. The trouble was that although his two marriages had produced at least ten children, his most able son wasn’t a legitimate one.

  The boy had been born sometime before 1058, and was given the Christian name of ‘Marc’. A few nights before the birth, Guiscard had been regaled at a banquet with the story of a legendary giant named Buamundas Gigas, and when he saw the large size of the baby he nicknamed him ‘Bohemond,’ unwittingly inventing one of the more popular names of the Middle Ages.

  Almost nothing is known of Bohemond’s early years, although he evidently had some schooling since he could read and write Latin along with a smattering of Greek and possibly Arabic. When he was still young, perhaps only four, Guiscard abandoned his mother for political reasons. Although Bohemond was now both illegitimate and disinherited, there didn’t seem to be too many hard feelings as he was raised by his step-mother and given an important post in Guiscard’s army as soon as he was old enough. Perhaps this was because, regardless of the temporary needs of realpolitik, there was no doubting who his father was. Bohemond looked every inch a Hauteville. With the broad shoulders, thick chest, and blond hair of his Viking ancestors, he was enormously tall, with an easy air of command. Even the restless and reckless streaks of his father were there. As one of his contemporaries put it “He is always seeking the impossible”.

  Bohemond got his chance for adventure in 1081 when Guiscard decided to invade the Byzantine Empire. The twenty-seven-year-old was sent with an advance guard and instructed to lay waste to the Dalmatian33 countryside, capture the port city of Valona to use as a bridgehead, and besiege the island of Corfu. The only serious resistance he faced was at Corfu, where the defenders openly mocked his small force, but when they saw Guiscard’s main fleet on the horizon, the garrison fled in terror.

  From there, however, the campaign had unraveled. Guiscard’s plan – so we are told - was to put Bohemond on the throne of Constantinople, and carve out a larger empire of his own to the east, but he was outwitted by the Byzantine emperor Alexius. Thanks to a large amount of Byzantine gold, Guiscard’s Italian lands revolted, forcing him to return. Bohemond was ordered to secure Greece and Macedonia, but was warned not to risk a battle with the emperor.

  Bohemond had courage, but he was faced with an opponent who was far more experienced and wily. When Bohemond entered northern Greece and began to systematically reduce some Byzantine fortresses, Alexius suddenly appeared. As the two armies prepared themselves for a battle, the emperor sent light chariots bristling with spears into the Norman line. It would have crippled the main section of the army, but Bohemond had been warned and was expecting the ruse. As the chariots approached, gaps in the line opened up and they passed harmlessly through. The Normans then charged the Byzantines and easily routed the half-trained recruits.

  Alexius regrouped in the Balkan city of Ohrid,34 and a few months later he tried again. This time he had his men scatter nails across the center of the field the night before the battle, hoping to cripple the Norman cavalry as they charged. Again Bohemond was warned, and in the morning he held his center back and ordered his wings to collapse on the Byzantine army. They broke almost immediately and this time Bohemond pursued Alexius into the Balkan Mountains, capturing Ohrid, the emperor’s previous city of refuge.

  Although Bohemond had been successful at every turn, that winter was a demoralizing one. There was little food and less money to be had, and the Norman troops hadn’t been paid for several months. Some began to question exactly what they were doing in a strange and inhospitable land. Constantinople, which had seemed so close a year ago, now seemed increasingly distant. That spring, Alexius attacked for the third time. The Normans were occupying the ancient Greek city of Larissa – birthplace of Achilles – when the imperial standards appeared and began to advance. Bohemond immediately charged, chasing the fleeing Byzantines for several miles. Alexius, however, wasn’t with them; he was leading the main army into the Norman camp, capturing two years’ worth of spoils.

  Thinking he had won another victory, Bohemond was relaxing by a river, eating grapes and lampooning yet another example of Byzantine cowardice when the message reached him that his camp was under attack. He raced back with his cavalry, but was too late. He managed to repulse an overeager Byzantine charge, but was forced to retreat and collect his scattered men, abandoning all the territory he had conquered that year to Alexius.

  The emperor sensed that the tide was turning in his favor, and he opened up secret negotiations with Bohemond’s officers. He cleverly suggested that they demand their full pay, knowing that with the recent loss of supplies, Bohemond had no way of paying it. He further offered lucrative posts in the imperial army (which he backed up with substantial gifts), or safe passage home if their honor prevented them from accepting.

  Some of Bohemond’s officers undoubtedly stayed loyal, but enough of them demanded their pay that he was forced to return to Italy to raise the money. The moment he was
gone, whatever morale remained collapsed and with one exception, his officers defected to Alexius. Bohemond received word of their treachery as he was boarding his ship in the Dalmatian seaport. The war was lost. Not by any glorious defeat, but by a thousand cuts. Perhaps not wanting to face his father until tempers had a time to cool, Bohemond wintered on the Dalmatian coast, waiting until the spring to return to Italy.

  Fortunately for Bohemond, Guiscard was not particularly upset. He had had his own hands full putting down the Italian revolt, but he had settled it in such a ruthless fashion that it would take more gold than Alexius had to stir up trouble again. Now the emperor would have his undivided attention. That October of 1084 Guiscard and his four adult sons sailed again. They were intercepted by the Venetian navy, which scattered them, but when the fastest ships left prematurely to inform Venice of the great victory, the Normans rallied and managed to defeat them.

  It was too late in the season for much more campaigning, so the Normans wintered on Corfu. While they were confined, Bohemond came down with a fever and obtained permission from his father to return to Italy to convalesce. In his absence Guiscard caught the fever as well, and after lingering a few months he died.

  Bohemond was the natural choice to succeed him. Not only was he battle-seasoned, commanding, and ambitious, but the only serious rival, his half-brother Roger Borsa35 was just thirteen years old, and was already displaying the nervous incompetence that would be the hallmark of his later years. But fatefully, Roger Borsa – or more correctly his mother – was present at Guiscard’s deathbed while Bohemond was away in Italy. She convinced the assembled Normans that her son – a legitimate heir – was the only choice to inherit Guiscard’s lands and titles. Surprisingly, she found a powerful ally for this argument in Bohemond’s uncle, Roger of Sicily. Whoever was chosen would technically be his senior colleague, and he naturally wanted someone he could manipulate. Bohemond, still recovering in Italy was dispossessed of his inheritance for a second time.

  Roger Borsa and his mother had pulled off a clever coup, but if they thought the matter was settled, they didn’t know Bohemond very well. He was furious, and as soon as his uncle was safely back in Sicily, he started a rebellion. Roger Borsa tried to buy off his half-brother with the best part of southern Apulia, but that only encouraged Bohemond to try for more land. Bohemond crossed the border into Calabria and convinced the most powerful of his brother’s vassals there to switch loyalty. The revolt gradually spread throughout Calabria until Roger Borsa desperately called for his uncle’s help. The elder Roger responded to maintain the status quo, and forced Bohemond to agree to a truce, essentially allowing him to keep what he had conquered. This uneasy peace lasted for three years until Roger Borsa fell seriously ill with a fever. Assuming that his half-brother was dead, Bohemond moved quickly to seize his property, claiming to be acting to ‘protect the interests of his nephews’.

  Once again, their uncle Roger had to cross over from Sicily and restrain Bohemond from capturing any more of his half-brother’s lands. This basic pattern continued for the next several years, with Bohemond attempting to chip away at Borsa’s territory without being serious enough to draw in his uncle too frequently.

  The slow-burning civil war that resulted mostly benefited Roger of Sicily. Each time he intervened, he obtained more concessions from his weak nephew. Family relations all around were understandably strained.

  In the summer of 1096, the city of Amalfi rebelled against Borsa and a frustrated Bohemond was summoned by their uncle Roger to join them as a sign of family solidarity against the rebels. After nine years of a fruitless civil war, it was clear to a depressed Bohemond that his uncle would never allow him to have any significant power. Just as he was resigning himself to this fate, however, a new opportunity presented itself. The year before, Pope Urban II had put out a great call for a ‘crusade’ to free the Holy Land, and eager knights had begun to trickle into southern Italy in search of a sea passage. At first they had been mostly Italian, and Bohemond had ignored them as a fad, but as he sat before the walls of Amalfi larger groups of French knights began to appear, and he realized the international scope of the movement.

  He would never be more than an upstart in Italy, forever held down by his uncle, but now his father’s old dream beckoned to the east. If he couldn’t claim a title here in the west he could carve out a kingdom for himself in the Levant, and the crusade would provide the perfect cover. All that was left was for him to announce his intentions, which he did with considerable panache. In the middle of the siege he called a great assembly where he dramatically swore to liberate Jerusalem and called all good Christians to join him. He then took off his rich, scarlet cloak and ripped it up to make crosses for his vassals and those who were quickest to kneel. The bulk of those present eagerly joined in, providing him with an army suitable to his rank, while depriving the two Rogers of theirs at the same time. His annoyed kinsman had no choice but to abandon the siege.

  The Crusades are usually thought of as single armies, or single waves of armies, launching themselves in a certain year. However, they were more like continuous movements; not armies so much as armed men moving in ebbs and flows to the East. There was no single route they chose to travel, and no single recognized leader, just a vague agreement of the leading princes to gather at Constantinople.

  The lack of an overall commander meant almost certain bickering and disorganization, but Bohemond correctly saw it also as a golden opportunity. Of all the princes, he was by far the most experienced and ambitious. If a general commander was needed, and it almost certainly would be, he was the natural candidate. Always with an eye to the future, he was careful to act the part of dignified statesman.

  While the forces led by other princes behaved with reckless abandon, pillaging their way across Byzantine territory and frequently skirmishing with their imperial escorts, Bohemond was an example of order and decorum. Everything had been carefully prepared beforehand. Together with his nephew Tancred36 and a small but very well-trained army, Bohemond set sail from the Italian town of Bari and landed his men at various points on the Dalmatian coast in order not to overwhelm local food supplies. He had taken the precaution of forbidding looting on pain of death so as to prevent the ill-will that usually accompanied a march through foreign territory.

  The route he chose was a difficult one – twelve hundred meters above sea level through mountain passes in the early winter – but his planning was such that he made it without incident into western Macedonia by Christmas. From there he traveled along the Via Egnatia, the same road on which a decade before he had marched with his father in their failed bid to conquer Constantinople. This time, of course, he was on his best behavior, scrupulously maintaining cordial relations with the imperial guard which was sent to keep tabs on his progress.

  At Epirus he sent a messenger to Constantinople, asking for an audience with emperor Alexius. He wasn’t the first crusader to reach the imperial city, and he was anxious to see what the other western leaders had agreed to. Most of all, he wanted to make sure that none of his rivals had received special treatment from the emperor.

  Westerner knights tended to assume that the Byzantines were soft and weak, but Bohemond knew better than any how powerful the empire still was. It was by far the most significant Christian state in the Near East, and without its support, no permanent success could be achieved. Friendship would also have other benefits. A special recognition from Alexius would put him in control of all crusader dealings with the empire; he would be the pivotal figure of the grand Christian alliance, and the de facto leader of the crusade.

  The treatment he received when he reached Constantinople was encouraging. After a stay of only a single night37 in the monastery of Saints Cosmas and Damian he was given a special escort to the imperial palace, an honor accorded to no other westerner. There he was showered with gifts and impressive-sounding (although empty) titles, and admitted into the emperor’s presence.

  Once there, standin
g before the immense imperial throne, complete with golden lions that would stand up and roar at the touch of a lever, he was asked to take an oath of fealty to Alexius and to promise to return any land he conquered to the empire. He gave it without a moment’s hesitation, and in return asked to be named Grand Domestic of the East – the commander-in-chief of all imperial forces in Asia.

  Bohemond had played his part to perfection, but the emperor Alexius was too perceptive to be taken in by him. Outwardly he gave every sign of embracing Bohemond, but he didn’t trust him an inch, and he had no intention of increasing his already dangerous power. He had hoped to pawn off Bohemond with expensive gifts, and was now slightly embarrassed that he had asked so boldly for a title. So he stalled for time, saying that the time wasn’t right to name him Grand Domestic, while vaguely hinting that he could earn it with a show of energy and loyalty.

  That was the best Bohemond could get, so with a few parting pleasantries and a promise by the emperor to send troops and food with him, Bohemond withdrew and rejoined his army. They were ferried across the Bosphorus and marched to Nicaea where the main Crusader army was already besieging the city. Thanks to his timely arrival and the much-needed supplies, Bohemond saw an immediate surge in his popularity. This was increased when he defeated a Turkish relieving army, triumphantly binding the Muslim captives with the very ropes they had brought to tie up the Crusaders.

  Bohemond’s run of good luck continued with the fall of Nicaea. Relations with Byzantium plummeted when the Turks decided to surrender to the Byzantine contingent who slipped into the city at night and refused to let the Crusaders enter to engage in the traditional three days of pillaging. Under the circumstances, his failure to get Alexius’ endorsement, was now if anything a badge of honor.