standard of Aversa afforded shelter and encouragement to the outlaws of the province, to every fugitive who had escaped from the injustice or justice of his superiors; and these foreign associates were quickly assimilated in manners and language to the Gallic colony. The first leader of the Normans was Count Rainulf; and, in the origin of society, pre-eminence of rank is the reward and the proof of superior merit. 19 a The Nor mans serve in Sicily, A.D. 1038. Since the conquest of Sicily by the Arabs, the Grecian emperors had been anxious to regain that valuable possession; but their efforts, however strenuous, had been opposed by the distance and the sea. Their costly armaments, after a gleam of success, added new pages of calamity and disgrace to the Byzantine annals: twenty thousand of their best troops were lost in a single expedition; and the victorious Moslems derided the policy of a nation which intrusted eunuchs not only with the custody of their women, but with the command of their men.20 After a reign of two hundred years, the Saracens were ruined by their divisions.2 The emir disclaimed the authority of the king of Tunis; the people rose against the emir; the cities were usurped by the chiefs; each meaner rebel was independent in his village or castle; and the weaker of two rival brothers implored the friendship of the Christians. In 19 See the 1st book of William Appulus. His words are applicable to every swarm of barbarians and freebooters: Si vicinorum quis pernitiosus ad illos Confugiebat, eum gratanter suscipiebant: Moribus et linguâ quoscumque venire videbant And elsewhere, of the native adventurers of Normandy:— Pars parat, exiguæ vel opes aderant quia nullæ: Pars, quia de magnis majora subire volebant. [p. 254.] 20 Liutprand in Legatione, p. 485. Pagi has illustrated this event from the MS. history of the deacon Leo (tom. iv. A.D. 965, No. 17-19). 21 See the Arabian Chronicle of Sicily, apud Muratori, Script. Rerum Ital. tom. i. p. 253. This account is not accurate. After the retreat of the emperor Henry the Second, the Normans, united under the command of Rainulf, had taken possession of Aversa, then a small castle in the duchy of Naples. They had been masters of it a few years when Pandulf the Fourth, prince of Capua, found means to take Naples by surprise. Sergius, master of the soldiers, and head of the republic, with the principal citizens, abandoned a city in which he could not behold, without horror, the establishment of a foreign dominion: he retired to Aversa; and when, with the assistance of the Greeks, and that of the citizens faithful to their country, he had collected money enough to satisfy the rapacity of the Norman adventurers, he advanced at their head to attack the garrison of the prince of Capua, defeated it, and re-entered Naples. It was then that he confirmed the Normans in the possession of Aversa and its territory, which he raised into a count's fief, and granted the investiture to Rainulf. Hist. des Rép. Ital. tom. i. p. 267.-G. every service of danger the Normans were prompt and useful; and Apulia, A.D. 1040-1043. Jeffrey Malaterra, who relates the Sicilian war and the conquest of Apulia (1. i. c. 7, 8, 9, 19). The same events are described by Cedrenus (tom. ii. p. 741-743, 755, 756) and Zonaras (tom. ii. p. 237, 238 [1. xvii. c. 15]); and the Greeks are so hardened to disgrace, that their narratives are impartial enough. Cedrenus specifies the ray of the Obsequium (Phrygia), and the pigs of the Thracesians (Lydia: consult Constantine de Thematibus, i. 3, 4 [tom. iii. p. 22 sqq., ed. Bonn], with Delisle's map); and afterwards names the Pisidians and Lycaonians with the fœderati. 1090 prowess of their adversaries. In the plains of Cannæ the Asiatics fled before the adventurers of France; the duke of Lombardy was made prisoner; the Apulians acquiesced in a new dominion; and the four places of Bari, Otranto, Brundusium, and Tarentum were alone saved in the shipwreck of the Grecian fortunes. From this æra we may date the establishment of the Norman power, which soon eclipsed the infant colony of Aversa. Twelve counts 24 were chosen by the popular suffrage; and age, birth, and merit were the motives of their choice. The tributes of their peculiar districts were appropriated to their use; and each count erected a fortress in the midst of his lands, and at the head of his vassals. In the centre of the province the common habitation of Melphi was reserved as the metropolis and citadel of the republic; a house and separate quarter was allotted to each of the twelve counts; and the national concerns were regulated by this military senate. The first of his peers, their president and general, was entitled Count of Apulia; and this dignity was conferred on William of the iron arm, who, in the language of the age, is styled a lion in battle, a lamb in society, and an angel in council. 25 The manners of his countrymen are fairly delineated by a contemporary and national historian. 26 "The Normans," says Malaterra, "are a cunning and revengeful people; eloquence and dissimulation appear to be their hereditary qualities: they can stoop to flatter; but, unless they are curbed by "the restraint of law, they indulge the licentiousness of nature and Their princes affect the praise of popular munificence; 66 Character of the Normans. 66 passion. 66 24 Omnes conveniunt; et bis sex nobiliores, Quos genus et gravitas morum decorabat et ætas, His alii parent; comitatus nomen honoris Singula proponunt loca quæ contingere sorte Cuique duci debent, et quæque tributa locorum. [p. 255.] And after speaking of Melphi, William Appulus adds, Pro numero comitum bis sex statuere plateas, Atque domus comitum totidem fabricantur in urbe. [p. 256.] Leo Ostiensis (1. ii. c. 67) enumerates the divisions of the Apulian cities, which it is needless to repeat. 25 Gulielm. Appulus, 1. ii. c. 12, according to the reference of Giannone (Istoria Civile di Napoli, tom. ii. p. 31), which I cannot verify in the original. The Apulian praises indeed his validas vires, probitas animi, and vivida virtus; and declares that, had he lived, no poet could have equalled his merits (1. i. p. 258, 1. ii. p. 259). He was bewailed by the Normans, quippe qui tanti consilii virum (says Malaterra, 1. i. c. 12, p. 552), tam armis strenuum, tam sibi munificum, affabilem, morigeratum ulterius se habere diffidebant. 26 The gens astutissima, injuriarum ultrix . . . . adulari sciens . . . . eloquentiis inserviens, of Malaterra (1. i. c. 3, p. 550), are expressive of the popular and proverbial character of the Normans. 66 "the people observe the medium, or rather blend the extremes, of "avarice and prodigality; and in their eager thirst of wealth and "dominion, they despise whatever they possess, and hope whatever they desire. Arms and horses, the luxury of dress, the exercises "of hunting and hawking 27 are the delight of the Normans; but, "on pressing occasions, they can endure with incredible patience "the inclemency of every climate, and the toil and abstinence of a "military life." 28 The Normans of Apulia were seated on the verge of the two empires, and, according to the policy of the hour, they Oppression A.D. 1046, &c. accepted the investiture of their lands from the sovereigns of Apulia, of Germany or Constantinople. But the firmest title of these adventurers was the right of conquest: they neither loved nor trusted; they were neither trusted nor beloved; the contempt of the princes was mixed with fear, and the fear of the natives was mingled with hatred and resentment. Every object of desire, a horse, a woman, a garden, tempted and gratified the rapaciousness of the strangers,29 and the avarice of their chiefs was only coloured by the more specious names of ambition and glory. The twelve counts were sometimes joined in a league of injustice; in their domestic quarrels they disputed the spoils of the people; the virtues of William were buried in his grave; and Drogo, his brother and successor, was better qualified to lead the valour, than to restrain the violence, of his peers. Under the reign of Constantine Monomachus, the policy, rather than benevolence, of the Byzantine court attempted to relieve Italy from this adherent mischief, more grievous than a flight of barbarians ;30 and Argyrus, the son of Melo, was invested for this purpose with the most lofty titles 31 and the most ample com The hunting and hawking more properly belong to the descendants of the Norwegian sailors; though they might import from Norway and Iceland the finest casts of falcons. 28 We may compare this portrait with that of William of Malmesbury (de Gestis Anglorum, I. iii. p. 101, 102), who appreciates, like a philosophic historian, the vices and virtues of the Saxons and Normans. England was assuredly a gainer by the conquest. 29 The biographer of St. Leo IX. pours his holy venom on the Normans. Videns indisciplinatam et alienam gentem Normannorum, crudeli et inauditâ rabie et plusquam Paganâ impietate adversus ecclesias Dei insurgere, passim Christianos trucidare, &c. (Wibert, c. 6). The honest Apulian (1. ii. p. 259) says calmly of their accuser, Veris commiscens fallacia. 30 The policy of the Greeks, revolt of Maniaces, &c., must be collected from Cedrenus (tom. ii. p. 757, 758 [p. 548, sq., ed. Bonn]), William Appulus (1. i. p. 257, 258, l. ii. p. 259), and the two Chronicles of Bari, by Lupus Protospata (Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. v. p. 42, 43, 44), and an anonymous writer (Antiquitat. Italiæ medii Ævi, tom. i. p. 31-35). This last is a fragment of some value. 31 Argyrus received, says the anonymous Chronicle of Bari, imperial letters, Faderatûs et Patriciatûs, et Catapani et Vestatûs. In his Annals Muratori (tom. viii. p. 426) very properly reads, or interprets, Sevestatus, the title of Sebastos or Augustus. But in his Antiquities he was taught by Ducange to make it a palatine office, master of the wardrobe. League of the pope and the two empires, A.D. 1049-1054. mission. The memory of his father might recommend him to the Normans, and he had already engaged their voluntary service to quell the revolt of Maniaces, and to avenge their own and the public injury. It was the design of Constantine to transplant this warlike colony from the Italian provinces to the Persian war, and the son of Melo distributed among the chiefs the gold and manufactures of Greece as the first-fruits of the Imperial bounty. But his arts were baffled by the sense and spirit of the conquerors of Apulia: his gifts, or at least his proposals, were rejected, and they unanimously refused to relinquish their possessions and their hopes for the distant prospect of Asiatic fortune. After the means of persuasion had failed, Argyrus resolved to compel or to destroy: the Latin powers were solicited against the common enemy, and an offensive alliance was formed of the pope and the two emperors of the East and West. The throne of St. Peter was occupied by Leo the Ninth, a simple saint,32 of a temper most apt to deceive himself and the world, and whose venerable character would consecrate with the name of piety the measures least compatible with the practice of religion. His humanity was affected by the complaints, perhaps the calumnies, of an injured people; the impious Normans had interrupted the payment of tithes, and the temporal sword might be lawfully unsheathed against the sacrilegious robbers who were deaf to the censures of the church. As a German of noble birth and royal kindred, Leo had free access to the court and confidence of the emperor Henry the Third, and in search of arms and allies his ardent zeal transported him from Apulia to Saxony, from the Elbe to the Tiber. During these hostile preparations, Argyrus indulged himself in the use of secret and guilty weapons: a crowd of Normans became the victims of public or private revenge, and the valiant Drogo was murdered in a church. But his spirit survived in his brother Humphrey, the third count of Apulia. The assassins were chastised, and the son of Melo, overthrown and wounded, was driven from the field to hide his shame behind the walls of Bari, and to await the tardy succour of his allies. A.D. 1051. But the power of Constantine was distracted by a Turkish war, the mind of Henry was feeble and irresolute, and the pope, instead of repassing the Alps with a German army, was accompanied only by a guard of seven hundred Swabians and some volunteers of Lorraine. In his long progress Expedition of Pope Leo IX. against the Normans, A.D. 1053. 32 A Life of St. Leo IX., deeply tinged with the passions and prejudices of the age, has been composed by Wibert, printed at Paris, 1615, in octavo, and the Collections of the Bollandists, of Mabillon, and of Muratori. private history of that pope is diligently treated by M. de St. Marc. p. 140-210, and p. 25-95, second column.) since inserted in The public and (Abrégé, tom. ii. |