The Remarkable Tale of the Bull and the Sheep

Val Morgan

Description

Imagine a bull and a sheep harnessed together at the same yoke. What would happen? The most likely thing would be utter chaos as they struggle to separate and go off in their own directions. The plough would slice dangerously about behind them, no furrow would be straight and in the end, the weaker animal would be trampled.This is the scenario evoked by Anselm on the day he was, controversially, made Archbishop of Canterbury."You are trying to harness together at the plough under one yoke an untamed bull and an old and feeble sheep. What will come of it?"Anselm''s question is the beginning of a remarkable story.What ''came of it'', that is to say, what happened between the bull, William II, King of England; and the sheep, Archbishop Anselm, in the closing years of the 11th century, is one of the great untold sagas of the medieval period.

Informations

• Publié par: Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
• Date de parution: 30 octobre 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781528953375
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

The Remarkable Tale of the Bull and the Sheep
Val Morgan
Austin Macauley Publishers
2019-10-30
The Remarkable Tale of the Bull and the Sheep About the Author About the Book Dedication Copyright © Val Morgan (2019) Chapter One The King at Kingsholm Chapter Two A Cup of Anjou Chapter Three Easter Rising Chapter Four In Search of a Bride Chapter Five A Plucked Rose Chapter Six Enter Eadmer Chapter Seven Gunhild’s Secret Chapter Eight Heartbreak Chapter Nine Raising the Fyrd Chapter Ten The Problem of the Pallium Chapter Eleven What Was Said at Wilton? Chapter Twelve The Property Deal Chapter Thirteen The Cat Pounces
About the Author
Val Morgan is a writer and retired academic. She lives near Colchester.
About the Book
Imagine a bull and a sheep harnessed together at the same yoke. What would happen? The most likely thing would be utter chaos as they struggle to separate and go off in their own directions. The plough would slice dangerously about behind them, no furrow would be straight and in the end, the weaker animal would be trampled.
This is the scenario evoked by Anselm on the day he was, controversially, made Archbishop of Canterbury.
“You are trying to harness together at the plough under one yoke an untamed bull and an old and feeble sheep. What will come of it?”
Anselm’s question is the beginning of a remarkable story.
What ‘came of it’, that is to say, what happened between the bull, William II, King of England; and the sheep, Archbishop Anselm, in the closing years of the 11th century, is one of the great untold sagas of the medieval period.
Dedication
For Ros
Copyright Information ©
Val Morgan (2019)
The right of Val Morgan to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781528953375 (ePub e-book)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published (2019)
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
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“The plough in England is drawn by two oxen outstanding among the rest: the King and the Archbishop of Canterbury. These two, drawing the plough, rule the land, one by human justice and sovereignty, the other by divine doctrine and authority. My lords, you are trying to harness together at the plough under one yoke an untamed bull and an old and feeble sheep. What will come of it?”
—Archbishop Anselm, 1093
Chapter One

The King at Kingsholm
No-one could ignore the atmosphere. In the palace, hangers-on and place-seekers drifted about in aimless groups. Courtiers and ministers gathered to exchange mistrustful whispers. Servants tip-toed about, mute and fearful. What was going to happen if the king died? Even in the best-governed kingdom with a legitimate heir to succeed, the imminent death of the sovereign was a perilous moment. But this sovereign had no heir and no-one could say that England in 1093 was well-governed. In fact many called the king’s illness an affliction of God, a punishment for the ills of his reign and his battles with the church. He was being called to account. He should have been a better king.
King William Rufus, son of the Conqueror, a man of biting humour and furious energy, had spent the six years of his reign in rancorous relations with the church. His propensity to joke about sacred things, to mock pompous prelates and exploit ecclesiastical treasuries had led to bitter wrangles with the clergy. Now, laid low on a bed of sickness, he was surrounded by priests to whom he was giving unaccustomed ear. His old subversive appetite for levity had left him. There were no more bons mots or cruel jokes for his attendants, no disarming bluff raillerie for his ministers or companions. The old provocation about how he was thinking of converting to Judaism, so often trotted out to ruffle clerics in the act of reprimanding him, had died on his lips. Those lips, now dry and cracked, had begun to pray: “Christ Jesus, have pity on the dying…” Dared they believe what seemed to be apparent, that the reign of William Rufus was about to end?
The king had fallen ill at the beginning of March while he was at Alveston, north of Bristol, a royal manor that had once belonged to King Harold. It was whispered among superstitious folk that it was no coincidence that the king was stricken in this place. In revenge for the terrible slaughter at Hastings and the subsequent massacres of the people, King Harold’s tormented spirit had risen from his blood-soaked ancestral lands to strike down the son of his old enemy. Yet, though struck, William was not stopped at Alveston. He had insisted on going on to Gloucester, from where he intended to plan how he would prevent the incursions of the malcontent Malcolm, King of Scotland. But the twenty-five mile ride to his palace at Kingsholm drained him utterly. A burning fever had ensued and, on Wednesday 2 nd March, he took to his bed feeling so wretched that he sent messengers up to St Peter’s Abbey in Gloucester asking Abbot Serlo to speed to his side with all the medical and spiritual aid that such a renowned place of learning might afford.
Far away from the court, at the obscure East Anglian Priory of St Sepulchre’s, Aefled heard the news when she rode over to the priory from her home nearby at Castle St Mary’s in answer to a summons.
‘Come quickly,’ the Prioress had written, ‘there are people I want you to meet.’
Lady Agnes had been prioress at St Sepulchre’s for the last thirteen years and was godmother to all Aefled’s children. Two of those children, Robert and William, twelve and ten years old, had left to travel north with their father, Robert, who intended to place the boys in the service of his overlord, Count Alan Rufus of Richmond. Immediately on her arrival, Aefled was told of the perilous state of the king.
‘He has certainly fasted this Lent,’ said Agnes, ‘I dare say it’s the first time he has ever done so. They say he cannot eat, cannot keep anything down. He rails against everyone, not even sparing God.’
She paused a moment before asking abruptly: ‘Have you heard from your husband?’
‘Not for many weeks.’
‘Is he with the king?’
‘I don’t know. It’s more likely that Robert will stay with Count Alan Rufus until the outcome is clear. If the king dies, there will be war.’
‘Count Alan is a powerful man. He has ambitions.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I sometimes wonder if you are wise to choose Count Alan’s household for the training of your sons.’
Every conversation with Lady Agnes left Aefled feeling inadequate, embarrassed at her own unworldliness. It seemed a strange irony that a cloistered woman, living in a remote provincial convent, should enjoy more knowledge of current affairs than herself, whose own husband was moving among the highest nobles of the land. But then Agnes was not someone who conformed to expectations, being youthful, handsome and without a religious vocation. Where her information came from was a mystery, but she appeared confident of her sources which had often proved reliable. This made her, as well as a charming and amusing friend, a necessary person to know.
‘Count Alan has ambitions,’ she went on, ‘but where they might lead him, no one can tell. We must wait. We must hope for a happy outcome, whatever that might be.’
Hoping and praying for their own versions of a ‘happy outcome’ was the preoccupation of the ruling class, at that moment assembled in great numbers at Kingsholm. Throughout the palace, courtiers were doing deals or jostling for position as everybody tried to keep one step ahead of developments. They had, at the very least, to prepare for the death of a king. William Rufus was generally reckoned an eccentric king, a flawed king, certainly an unpopular one. Never destined for a throne, it had come to him as the result of family feuding and sheer luck. But, once in his grasp, he had known how to occupy it.
The third son of the Conqueror, born into the middle ranks of the aristocracy and still a landless knight bachelor when his father had died in 1087, William was an unlikely successor to the kingdom his father had conquered. But neither his eldest brother, Robert, nor his second brother, Richard, nor his youngest brother, Henry, had been favoured by fortune or the regard of their father. Richard had been killed in a hunting accident many years ago; Henry had been set to study and at one time seemed likely to be destined for the church, while Robert, being short and inclined to overweight, had suffered from his father’s mockery for years. “Short legs”, “Fat legs”, “Gambaron”, these contemptuous names had perpetually dogged him through his youth, finally settling down into the insulting nickname “Curthose” by which he was widely known. Contempt and mockery, compounded with unfair treatment and preference for his brothers, eventually drove him to rebellion. Although later reconciled, father and eldest son were never again on mutually trustful terms. So William had inherited the throne of England while Robert Curthose got only the duchy of Normandy, for which he had to do fealty to the French king. And the two realms which the Conqueror had unified, were split apart.
Among the Norman aristocracy, there was much discontent about this division. It seemed to them preferable that England and Normandy should continue to be governed as a single administration, as it had been in the Conqueror’s time. Noblemen and castellans enjoying vast estates in both realms did not want to be beholden to two overlords,