ORIGIN OF THE COUNTS OF ANJOU. 179 dignity either by Charles the Bald or by his son Lewis the Stammerer. He bore the name of Ingelgar, and he seems to be the first member of the family who can be unhesitatingly set down as historical. His grandfather, Torquatius or Tortulfus, was, according to the legend, a peasant, and seems to have sprung from that Breton race of which his descendants became the most persevering enemies. It must have been a later version of the tale which invented for him a Roman name and a Roman descent.2 The son of Torquatius, Tertullus, rose, we are told, to importance at the court of Charles, and founded the greatness of his house. Whatever may be the amount of strictly historical truth preserved in these stories, they are, in one point of view, of no small historical value. Like the kindred story of the origin of Godwine, they point to a belief, which can hardly have been ill-founded, that, in Gaul in the ninth century and in England in the eleventh, ignoble birth did not disqualify a man from rising to the highest dignities, or from founding a dynasty of Princes or even of Kings.* But when we reach Ingelgar, we seem to stand on more distinctly historical ground. He held Amboise in Touraine as an allodial possession,5 and he was, as we have seen, invested with the Countship of Anjou on the hither side of the Mayenne. But it is The "sævi prædones" are explained to be perors taken from the plough. 1 The authors of the Art de Vérifier les Dates (ii. 828), as also Sir F. Palgrave (i. 502), place the enfeoffment of Ingelgar under Charles the Bald in the year 870. But the story in the Gesta Consulum (238 et seqq.) seems to make the reigning King to be Lewis the Stammerer. Count Fulk himself (233) describes the benefactor of his ancestor as Rex Franciæ, non a genere impii Philippi, sed a prole Caroli Calvi." Fulk had excellent reasons for the epithet Destowed on Philip. See Will. Malms. iii. See vol. i. pp. 169, 219, 478. The author of the Gesta Consulum becomes eloquent on this head (p. 237); "Tempore enim Caroli Calvi complures novi atque ignobiles, bono et honesto nobilibus potiores; clari et magni effecti sunt. Quos enim appetentes gloriæ militaris conspiciebat, periculis objectare et per eos fortunam temperare non dubitabat. Erant enim illis diebus homines veteris prosapiæ multarumque imaginum, qui acta majorum suorum, non sua, ostentabant; qui quum ad aliquod grave officium mittebantur, 257 Gest. Cons. 237. "Fuit vir quidam aliquem populo monitorem sui officii de Armoricâ Galliâ, nomine Torquatius, genus cujus olim ab Armoricâ jussu Maximi Imperatoris a Britonibus expulsum est. Iste a Britonibus, proprietatem vetusti ac Romani nominis ignorantibus, corrupto vocabulo Tortulfus dictus fuit." We may be pretty sure that Tortulf, or something like it, of which his son's name Tertullus seems another and happier Latinization, was the true name. Charles made Torquatius a forester, "illius forestæ quæ Nidus-meruli nuncupatur." The writer goes on to talk about Senators and Em sumebant, quibus quum Rex aliis imperare jussisset, ipsi sibi alium imperatorem poscebant. Ideo ex illo globo paucos secum Rex Carolus habebat; novis militaria dona et hæreditates pluribus laboribus et periculis acquisitas benigne præbebat. Ex quo genere fuit iste Tertullus, a quo Andegavorum Consulum progenies sumpsit exordium." See Palgrave, i. 404, 500502; cf. ii. 11. 5 Gest. Cons. 239. "Alodium enim cognationis eorum erat Ambazium villa." plain that no detailed account of his actions, or of those of his immediate successors, was preserved. His son Fulk the Red (888) received from Charles the Simple the remaining portion of the County of Anjou, that beyond the Mayenne, and he vigorously defended his enlarged dominions against the attacks of Northmen and Bretons.2 This Romulus was appropriately succeeded (938) by a Numa, Fulk the Good, renowned for his piety, his almsdeeds, his just and peaceful government, and for being the traditional author of the proverb that an unlettered King is but a crowned ass. His son, Geoffrey Grisegonelle1 (958), renewed the warlike fame of his house; he fought with his neighbours of Britanny and Aquitaine, and he is said to have borne (978) an important share in the wars between King Lothar and the Emperor Otto the Second. After him (987) came his son Fulk, surnamed Nerra or the Black, renowned as a warrior and still more renowned as a pilgrim, and who is the first prince of his house whose name has found its way into the general history of France. He overthrew his brother-in-law Conan of Britanny in one or more pitched battles, which French, as well as Breton and Angevin, writers thought worthy of record. He was also engaged in a war with his neighbour Odo the Second, Count of Blois and Chartres, the grandson of the famous Theobald, a war which passed on as an inheritance to the next generation, and which proved the origin of the first entanglements between Normandy and Anjou. It sounds like an incursion from another hemisphere, when we read how Aldebert, Count of Perigueux, Perigueux with its cupolas and its Roman tower, far away in the heart of Aquitaine, appeared as an ally of the Angevin Count. He took Tours and gave it to Fulk (990), but the citizens were ill-disposed to their new master, and Odo re 1 Count Fulk (p. 233) says, with much good sense, Quorum quatuor Consulum virtutes et acta, quia nobis in tantum de longinquo sunt, ut etiam loca ubi corpora eorum jacent nobis incognita sunt, digne memorare non possumus." Ingelgar, in the legend (p. 239), slays the accuser of a slandered lady-in this case his own godmother and benefactress-much in the style of the ballad of Sir Aldingar or of the. story of Queen Gunhild. 2 Gest. Cons. 235 (so 244). "Integrum comitatum, qui prius bipertitus erat, recepit." The Breton story (Chron. Briocense, ap. Morice, Memoires pour servir de Preuves a l'Histoire de Bretagne, pp. 29, 30) makes him-" vir maledictus et diabolicus "-marry the widow of the Breton prince Alan, and procure the death of her THE EARLY COUNTS. 181 covered it after a short time. Later in his reign (1016), Fulk defeated Odo in a great battle at Pontlevois in Touraine, and afterwards gained or recovered Saumur. We have already met with him in the character of a mediator between contending candidates for the Crown of France,1 and he appears also in the less honourable light of an assassin, who removed a courtier of King Robert who stood in the way of the plans of his own termagant niece Queen Constance.2 We hear also heavy complaints of him as a violator of ecclesiastical rule, by setting up the usurped authority of the See of Rome against the rights of the independent Metropolitans of Gaul. But he is perhaps best known for his two pilgrimages (1028, 1035) to the Holy Sepulchre, for the ready ingenuity which he displayed on his first journey, and for the extreme of penitential humiliation by which he edified all men on the second.4 Less happy in his private than in his public career, he was troubled in his last years by a rebellion of his son; was charged, truly or falsely, with the murder of one wife, and with driving another from him by ill-treatment. A reign of unusual length made him, during a few years, a contemporary of the Great William, and at last (1040) he left his dominions to a son under whom Normans and Angevins met for the first time in open warfare. 5 he This son, Geoffrey by name, rejoiced in the surname of Martel, which he bestowed upon himself to express the heavy blows which, like the victor of Tours, he dealt around upon all his enemies." He 1 See vol. i. p. 314. 2 According to R. Glaber (iii. 2), he sent assassins, who murdered Hugh, the courtier in question, before the King's eyes. The murder is done, according to good English precedent, at a hunting-party, which perhaps makes the story a little suspicious. See vol. i. p. 220. 3 Fulk founded a monastery near Loches -"in honore ac memoriâ illarum coelestium virtutum quas Cherubin et Seraphin sublimiores sacra testatur auctoritas," (R. Glaber, ii. 4, copied in the Gesta Consulum, 251)—and applied to Hugh, Archbishop of Tours, to consecrate the church. The Primate refused, unless Fulk restored some alienated possessions of his see. Fulk then went to Rome with well-stored moneybags, by the help of which he persuaded Pope John-which of all the Johns contemporary with Fulk we are not toldto send a Cardinal to consecrate it. The Bishops of Gaul were horrified at this invasion of their rights, and divine vengeance showed itself by the church being blown down on the night following its consecration. Rudolf takes this opportunity to set forth his theory of the Papal authority, which is well worth studying, and which breathes in its fulness the spirit of the later Gallican liberties. The Bishop of Rome is the first of Bishops, but he may not interfere with the diocesan jurisdiction of any of his brethren. * On Fulk's pilgrimage see Fulc. Rech. p. 233; Gest. Consul. 252; Will. Malms. iii. 235. The Chronicler of Saint Maxentius makes him die, "ut dicitur," on pilgrimage in 1032. 5 See at length Will. Malms. u. s. 6 See Art de Vérifier les Dates, ii. 838. Fulk, p. 233. "Propter quæ omnia bella, et propter magnanimitatem quam ibi exercebat, merito Martellus nominatus est, quasi suos conterens hostes." William of Malmesbury (iii. 231) calls him "Gaufredus cognomento Martellus, quod ipse sibi usurpaverat, quia videbatur sibi felicitate quâdam omnes obsistentes contundere." began his distinctive career in his father's lifetime. A dispute for the possession of the county of Saintonge led to a war between him and William the Sixth or the Fat, Duke of Aquitaine and Count of Poitou.1 Geoffrey was successful; he took the Aquitanian prince prisoner (April 22, 1033), and kept him in close bondage, till his wife Eustacia ransomed him at a heavy price. According to one version, the ransom consisted only of gold and silver, the spoil or contribution of the monasteries of his Duchy. Others however assert that it was nothing short of the cession of Bourdeaux and other cities, and an engagement to pay tribute for the rest of his dominions. Three days after this hard bought deliverance, William died. Immediately afterwards, or, according to some accounts, in the course of the year before, Geoffrey married Agnes, the step-mother of his victim, the widow of William's father, William the Fifth or the Great. The marriage was, on some ground or other, branded as incestuous, and it was this imprisonment of William and this marriage with Agnes which, we are told, gave rise in some way to Geoffrey's rebellion (1033) against his father and to the discord between Fulk and his second wife Hildegardis the mother of Geoffrey. The imprisonment of William of Aquitaine evidently made a deep impression upon men's minds at the time; but it was the standing war with the house of Chartres which brought Anjou into direct collision with Normandy, and thereby, at a somewhat later time, into connexion with England. The last energies of Odo were mainly directed to objects remote from Anjou, and even from Chartres and Blois. He was one of the party which opposed the succession of King Henry, and in so doing he must have crossed the policy of Henry's great champion Duke Robert. In a war with the King which followed Odo was unsuccessful,2 but his mind was now set upon greater things. Already Count of Champagne, he aimed at restoring the great frontier state between the Eastern and the Western Franks, at reigning as King of Burgundy, of Lotharingia, perhaps of Italy. After meeting for a while with some measure of success, he was at last defeated and slain by Duke Gozelo (1037), the father of Godfrey of whom we have already heard,3 in a battle near Bar in the Upper Lotharingia. His great schemes died with him. His sons were only Counts and not Kings, and their father's dominions were divided between them. But the sons of both brothers obtained settlements in England, and a grandson of one of them figures largely in English history. Stephen reigned in Champagne; his son Odo married a sister of the Con 4 Another account makes the name derived from the trade of Geoffrey's foster-father, a blacksmith, something like Donald of the Hammer in Scottish story. On the whole story see Appendix Y. 2 See the Chronicle in Duchesne, Rer. Franc. Scriptt. iv. 97. 3 See above, p. 63.. See Appendix X. REIGN OF GEOFFREY MARTEL. 183 queror, and was one of the objects of his brother-in-law's bounty in England.1 Theobald inherited Blois and Chartres. His son Stephen married William's daughter Adela, and thereby became father of a King of the English. But at present we have to deal with Count Theobald as a vassal of France at variance with his over-lord, as a neighbour of Anjou inheriting the hereditary enmity of his forefathers. Touraine, part of which was already possessed by Geoffrey,2 and, above all, the metropolitan city of Tours, were ever the great objects of Angevin ambition. It was a stroke of policy on the part of Henry, when he formally deprived the rebel Theobald of that famous city, and bestowed it by a royal grant on the Count of Anjou. Geoffrey was not slow to press a claim at once fresh and most plausible. He advanced on the city to assert his rights by force. Saint Martin, we are specially told, favoured the enterprise. The brothers resisted in vain. Stephen was put to flight; Theobald was taken prisoner, and was compelled, like William of Aquitaine, to obtain his freedom by the surrender of the city.5 Both French and Angevin writers agree in describing Geoffrey as taking possession of Tours with the full consent of King Henry. Yet in the first glimpse of Angevin affairs given us by our Norman authorities, the relations between the King of the French and the Count of Anjou are set forth in an exactly opposite light. Geoffrey is engaged in a rebellious war against Henry, and the Duke of the Normans simply comes to discharge his feudal duty to his lord, and to return the obligation incurred by the King's prompt and effectual help at Val-ès-dunes. These two accounts are in no way inconsistent; in the space of four years the relations between the King and so dangerous a vassal as Geoffrey may very well have 1 See Appendix U. 2 Fulk (p. 233) describes the cession made by Theobald to Geoffrey, and adds, "Pars autem alia Turonici pagi sibi contigerat possessione paternâ." We have seen that the Counts of Anjou held Amboise and Loches. 66 3 This grant is distinctly asserted, not only by Fulk (u. s. "Ex voluntate Regis Henrici accepit donum Turonicæ civitatis ab ipso Rege"), but also by R. Glaber (v. 2), followed by Gesta Cons. 256; Contigit ut.. Rex, ablato ab iisdem dominio Turonicæ urbis, daret illud Gozfredo cognomento Tuditi, filio scilicet Fulconis jam dicti Andegavorum comitis." The Norman writers of course know nothing of all this, and make Geoffrey an unprovoked aggressor. * R. Glaber (v. 2) describes Geoffrey's victory and the captivity of Theobald, and adds, "Nulli dubium est, beato Martino auxiliante, qui illum pie invocaverat, suorum inimicorum victorem exstitisse." 5 On the captivity of Theobald, see Fulk, p. 233; Gesta Cons. (largely after R. Glaber), 256; Chronn. Andd. a. 1044, ap. Labbe, i. 276, 287; Will. Pict. 86; Will. Gem. vii. 18; Will. Malms. iii. 231. R. Glaber is also followed by Hugo Flav. (Labbe, i. 186; Pertz, viii. 403). 6 Will. Pict. 82. "Vicissitudinem post hæc ipse Regi fide studiosissimâ reddidit, rogatus ab eo auxilium contra quosdam inimicissimos ei atque potentissimos ad officiendum." This writer is very confused in his chronology of the war, placing the details about Domfront and Alençon at a long distance from this passage, which seems to record the beginning of hostilities. |