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William I's Relations with Cluny

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2011

Frank Barlow
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Extract

Those who have written about William the Conqueror and the English Church have usually implied that in the beginning it was the king's wish to reform his conquest with the help of a Cluniac mission, and that it was the refusal of Hugh of Semur, abbot of Cluny (1049–1109), to supply a contingent of monks which forced William to look elsewhere for helpers.1 This diplomatic failure therefore determined the effect of the Norman Conquest on the English Church. It led to Lanfranc, and so Anselm. Indeed, the consequences could be regarded as so vast as to be incalculable. There has, however, been a good deal of erroneous reference and general uncertainty on this matter; and diere are, indeed, some grounds for thinking that the king's approaches to Cluny occurred in the second half of his reign. A re-examination of all the evidence is required.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , April 1981 , pp. 131 - 141
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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References

1 The events discussed here, although frequently mentioned by English historians, have not been closely investigated. They are usually assigned in a vague way to the period 1066–70. Stephens, W. R., The English Church from the Norman Conquest to the Accession of Edward I, London 1901, 254Google Scholar, put the king's unsuccessful petition for six monks before William of Warenne's successful request. Knowles, David, The Monastic Order in England, Cambridge 1940, 107Google Scholar, contented himself with, ‘Fora moment [at the very beginning of his reign] he [William] had thoughts of giving Cluny a leading part in the new life, and applied to the abbot, St Hugh, for a dozen of his best men. Hugh declined to furnish them; it was not part of Cluny's policy.’ Whereupon William summoned Lanfranc from Caen [1070]. Cf. also p. 151, where the foundation of Lewes is described. All that David Douglas says in William the Conqueror, London 1964, 326Google ScholarPubMed, is that William, apparently just after 1066, ‘is known to have taken ecclesiastical advice in this matter [the reform of the English Church] from prelates of high repute, such as Hugh, abbot of Cluny, and John, abbot of Fécamp’. Cowdrey, H. E. J., The Cluniacs and the Gregorian Reform, Oxford 1970, 190Google Scholar, states, ‘Soon after the Conquest he applied to Abbot Hugh for (six) monks …’ and in his ‘Memorials to Abbot Hugh of Cluny’, Studi Gregoriani, XI (1978), 14Google Scholar, re-edits Hugh's letter to the king and dates it, ‘1066, or soon after’.

2 ‘Alia miraculorum quorundam S. Hugonis abbatis relatio MS collectore monacho quodam, ut videtur, Cluniacensi’, ed. Martin Marrier and Andre du Chesne, Bibliotheca Cluniactnsis, Paris 1614, reprinted Macon 1915, cols. 453–4. An extract from this work, including the two English episodes, is printed by D. van Papenbroeck as ‘Ex collectione Anonymi in pracnotata Bibliotheca’ in Ada Sanctorum, April ill, 29 April, Antwerp 1675, cols. 660F-661B. The extract is reprinted in P. L., clix. 923–4.

3 Ed. L’Huillier, A. in his Vie de Saint Hughes abbé de Cluny 1024–1109, Solesmes 1888, 588Google Scholar. Newly edited by Cowdrey, ‘Memorials of Abbot Hugh’, 64–5, where the episode is not put into context nor assigned a date.

4 Recueil des chartei de iabbaye de Cluny, by A. Bernard and A. Bruel, iv, Paris 1888, no. 3561, p. 689. Monasticon Anglicanum, ed. W. Dugdale, J. Caley, H. Ellis, B. Bandinel, v, London 1825, 13a. Sir Charles Clay, in Early Yorkshire Charters, viii: The Honour of Warenne, ed. C. T. Clay (Yorks Arch. Soc. Record ser., extra ser. vi, 1949), 59–62, showed that this charter was forged after 1201.

5 Cf. Schieffer, T., ‘Notice sur les vies de saint Hughes abbé de Cluny’, Le Moyen Age, 3rd ser. vii (1936), 81Google Scholar. I hope to publish my own views on another occasion.

6 These are the traditional dates: see Gallia Christiana, 11 (1720), 150Google Scholar; and Warmund was certainly archbishop by 21 March 1077. Pope Gregory VII stated more than once that he personally had ordained Warmund as abbot, i.e. after April 1073, Register, iv. 16, vi. 27–8 (ed. Caspar, M.G.H. Ep. Sel. 11. i. 320, 439–40). As there is no reference to Warmund, or indeed to any abbot of Déols, in a papal letter dated 15 Nov. 1074, concerning a dispute between Déols and St Sulpice, near Bourges, it is possible that Warmund became abbotpost 1074. He also continued to hold the abbey, despite strong local opposition, in plurality, for the pope was denouncing the intruding abbot in March 1079, ibid. For Warmund's legation to William, reference is usually made to Huyghebaert, D. N., ‘Un legat de Gregoire VII en France: Warmond de Vienne’, Revue d’Histoire Ecclesiastique, xl (1944–1945), 188–90Google Scholar, who is not at his best on this episode. He relies on L’Huillier, Vie de Saint Hughes, 334, who mistakenly refers to the Life of St Hugh by Raynald of Vezelay instead of to Anonymous 11. It is not in Raynald.

7 A common phrase based on Gal. iv. 14. Cf. Lanfranc to William 1 in 1075: ‘I would be as glad to see you as God's angel’, The Letters of Lanfranc Archbishop of Canterbury, ed. And trans. H. Clover and M. Gibson (Oxford Medieval Texts, 1979), no. 34, p. 124.

8 Anon. 11, col. 453, ‘ut cognoscerent (satrapae) quanti habendus esset Hugo sanctus praesens, qui tanti habitus a tanto fuisset absens’. Cf. Giles, ed. L’Huillier, Vie de Saint Hughes, 588, ed. Cowdrey, ‘Memorials of Abbot Hugh’, p. 65, ‘Presenti vero (viro,L’Huillier) domno abbati tantum honorum et munerum contulit, ut nullum in vita tanti habuisse credatur.’

9 Anon. 11, loc. cit., ‘antequam eius colloquio frui potuisset’; Giles, loc. cit., ‘illi nondum viso’.

10 For the texts, see below, p. 138, n. 22. In October 1071 Pope Alexander 11 in a letter to the king referred to ‘(regnum) quod vobis tradidit (deus)’: The Letters of Lanfranc, no. 7, p. 60, line 20, cf. lines 13–15. It was an expression which, although especially appropriate in the early years after the Conquest, was always valid.

11 Moreover, the opening words of B in Anon, n, ‘Rex Anglorum vir magnificus et in armis strenuus’, are almost the same as Giles's exordium to Adi), ‘Rex Anglorum Wilelmus, vir magnificus, regni debellator’. Also Anon. 11 begins A(i) with, ‘Ille Willelmus Anglorum princeps’, which is better suited to a second episode than to the first. Later (col. 459) he inserted a poem at the wrong place.

12 See above n. 4.

13 The Heads of Religious Houses, England and Wales, 940–1216, ed. D. Knowles, C. N. L. Brooke and Vera London, Cambridge 197s, 119.

14 Printed Clay, Early Yorkshire Charters, vin, 54–5. They are on the same piece of parchment. Clay dates them c. 1078 x 8s; but as 1078 is only the first occurrence of Maurice as royal chancellor, the terminus a quo could be earlie

15 L’Huillier, Vie de Saint Hughes, 338, dates the meeting Rouen 1078. H. Diener, ‘Das Verhältnis Clunys zu dem Bischöfen’, in Tellenbach, G., Neue Forschungen über Cluny und die Cluniacenser, Freiburg 1959, 315Google Scholar, dates Hugh's letter to William 1078, and ‘Das Itinerar des Abtes Hugo von Cluny’, ibid. no. 93, dates the meeting c. 1076–80.

16 On 24 April he authorised Hugh of Die and the abbot to hear the case against Bishop Rainer of Orleans, Register, v. 20 (ed. Caspar, 383); but the case of Archbishop Evenus of Dol, also committed to them, and to the hearing of which the king of England was to be invited to send a legate, was remitted to the Council of Lyons (1080), Register, v. 22, 23, vii. 12 (ed. Caspar, 385–8, 475).

17 L’Huillier, Vie de Saint Hughes, 338.

18 Vita B. Simonis, P.L., clvi, 1216ff.; mission to France, cols. 1219ff.; mission to Robert Guiscard (ante June 1080) and his subsequent death (30 Sept), cols. 1220–2. Queen Matilda paid for his tomb at Rome. For the translation at Compiègne, see Prou, M., Recueil des octet de Philippe I, roi de France, Paris 1908, no. 126Google Scholar, and David, C. W., Robert Cwrthose, Cambridge, Mass. 1920, 29 nGoogle Scholar.

19 Regesta Region Anglo-Normannorum, ed. Davis, H. W. C., Oxford 1913, i. no. 123Google Scholar.

20 Register, vii. 25–7 (ed. Caspar, 505–8).

21 Simon's biographer writes of the count of Burgundy and Macon; but it was Guy of Macon who abandoned the world in 1078 and left his county to his kinsman William i, count of Burgundy, who died in 1087. For Hugh and Guy at Cluny, see Anonymous 11,Bibl. Clun., cols. 459–60, where Guy is correctly styled. For the pope's rebuke to Abbot Hugh over Duke Hugh, Register, vi. 17 (ed. Caspar, 423)

22 Paraphrase of William's letter: ‘cum praefatae regionis potiri coepisset, eiusque coronam regni bello optinuisset, volens digne episcopatus et abbatias terrae illius ordinare’ (Bibl. Clun. col. 453); Hugh's reply: ‘qui vultis gentem vobis a Deo traditam ad salutem suam ordinare’ (col. 454); charter: ‘et (? recte ut) eos omnes faceret episcopos et abbates in terra haereditatis suae quam ei dederat deus’ (Bernard and Bruel, iv. 695; Monasticon, p. 13a).

23 Monasticon, p. 12 a.

24 Monasticon, iii, London 1821, 240a.

25 Consuetudines Becomes, ed. M. P. Dickson, in Corpus consuetudinum monasticarum, ed. K. Hallinger, iv, Sieburg 1967, pp. xxixff.

26 Cf. Orderic Vitalis, Historia Ecclesiastica, ed. M. Chibnall, iv, Oxford 1973, 320.

27 Dickson, op. cit., pp. xxixff. Hallinger, K., ‘Cluny's Bräuche zur Zeit Hugos des Grossen’, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte, Kan. Abt. xlv 1959, 99–140Google Scholar. Evidence is accumulating which suggests that the date of Lanfranc's customary for Canterbury, at least in its transmitted form, is later than D. Knowles, Corpus consuetudinum monasticarum, iii. p. xvi, proposed—1074/5–77. Gibson, M., Lanfranc of Bec, Oxford 1978, 240–1Google Scholar, would date it 1079–89.

28 Bibl. Clun. col. 454E.

29 Ibid. col. 1640.

30 Cucherat, M. F., Cluny au onzieme siècle, 2nd ed.,? Paris 1873, 136Google Scholar. D. Lohrmann, ‘Pierre le Vénerable et Henri ler, roi d’Angleterre’, in Pierre Abélard, Pierre le Vénérable: les entrants philosophiques, littéraires et artistiquei en Occident au milieu du Xlle siecle. Abbaye de Cluny, 2 au 9 juillet 1972 [Coll. internationaux du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, no. 546], Paris 1975, 195, also makes Henry i's daughter, the Empress Matilda, a candidate.

31 Epp. iii, 2, ed. G. Constable, Cambridge, Mass. 1967, i. 228 (no. 89). Henry i's relations with Cluny are investigated by Lohrmann, op. cit.