WILLIAM’S FIRST VISIT TO ENGLAND.
A.D. 1051–1052.
WHILE William was strengthening himself in Normandy, Norman influence in
England had risen to its full height. The king was surrounded by foreign
favourites. The only foreign earl was his nephew Ralph of Mentes, the
son of his sister Godgifu. But three chief bishoprics were held by
Normans, Robert of Canterbury, William of London, and Ulf of Dorchester.
William bears a good character, and won the esteem of Englishmen; but the
unlearned Ulf is emphatically said to have done “nought bishoplike.”
Smaller preferments in Church and State, estates in all parts of the
kingdom, were lavishly granted to strangers. They built castles, and
otherwise gave offence to English feeling. Archbishop Robert, above all,
was ever plotting against Godwine, Earl of the West-Saxons, the head of
the national party. At last, in the autumn of 1051, the national
indignation burst forth. The immediate occasion was a visit paid to the
King by Count Eustace of Boulogne, who had just married the widowed
Countess Godgifu. The violent dealings of his followers towards the
burghers of Dover led to resistance on their part, and to a long series
of marches and negotiations, which ended in the banishment of Godwine and
his son, and the parting of his daughter Edith, the King’s wife, from her
husband. From October 1051 to September 1052, the Normans had their own
way in England. And during that time King Edward received a visitor of
greater fame than his brother-in-law from Boulogne in the person of his
cousin from Rouen.
Of his visit we only read that “William Earl came from beyond sea with
mickle company of Frenchmen, and the king him received, and as many of
his comrades as to him seemed good, and let him go again.” Another
account adds that William received great gifts from the King. But
William himself in several documents speaks of Edward as his lord; he
must therefore at some time have done to Edward an act of homage, and
there is no time but this at which we can conceive such an act being
done. Now for what was the homage paid? Homage was often paid on very
trifling occasions, and strange conflicts of allegiance often followed.
No such conflict was likely to arise if the Duke of the Normans, already
the man of the King of the French for his duchy, became the man of the
King of the English on any other ground. Betwixt England and France
there was as yet no enmity or rivalry. England and France became enemies
afterwards because the King of the English and the Duke of the Normans
were one person. And this visit, this homage, was the first step towards
making the King of the English and the Duke of the Normans the same
person. The claim William had to the English crown rested mainly on an
alleged promise of the succession made by Edward. This claim is not
likely to have been a mere shameless falsehood. That Edward did make
some promise to William—as that Harold, at a later stage, did take some
oath to William—seems fully proved by the fact that, while such Norman
statements as could be denied were emphatically denied by the English
writers, on these two points the most patriotic Englishmen, the strongest
partisans of Harold, keep a marked silence. We may be sure therefore
that some promise was made; for that promise a time must be found, and no
time seems possible except this time of William’s visit to Edward. The
date rests on no direct authority, but it answers every requirement.
Those who spoke of the promise as being made earlier, when William and
Edward were boys together in Normandy, forgot that Edward was many years
older than William. The only possible moment earlier than the visit was
when Edward was elected king in 1042. Before that time he could hardly
have thought of disposing of a kingdom which was not his, and at that
time he might have looked forward to leaving sons to succeed him. Still
less could the promise have been made later than the visit. From 1053 to
the end of his life Edward was under English influences, which led him
first to send for his nephew Edward from Hungary as his successor, and in
the end to make a recommendation in favour of Harold. But in 1051–52
Edward, whether under a vow or not, may well have given up the hope of
children; he was surrounded by Norman influences; and, for the only time
in the last twenty-four years of their joint lives, he and William met
face to face. The only difficulty is one to which no contemporary writer
makes any reference. If Edward wished to dispose of his crown in favour
of one of his French-speaking kinsmen, he had a nearer kinsman of whom he
might more naturally have thought. His own nephew Ralph was living in
England and holding an English earldom. He had the advantage over both
William and his own older brother Walter of Mantes, in not being a
reigning prince elsewhere. We can only say that there is evidence that
Edward did think of William, that there is no evidence that he ever
thought of Ralph. And, except the tie of nearer kindred, everything
would suggest William rather than Ralph. The personal comparison is
almost grotesque; and Edward’s early associations and the strongest
influences around him, were not vaguely French but specially Norman.
Archbishop Robert would plead for his own native sovereign only. In
short, we may be as nearly sure as we can be of any fact for which there
is no direct authority, that Edward’s promise to William was made at the
time of William’s visit to England, and that William’s homage to Edward
was done in the character of a destined successor to the English crown.
William then came to England a mere duke and went back to Normandy a king
expectant. But the value of his hopes, to the value of the promise made
to him, are quite another matter. Most likely they were rated on both
sides far above their real value. King and duke may both have believed
that they were making a settlement which the English nation was bound to
respect. If so, Edward at least was undeceived within a few months.
* * * * *
The notion of a king disposing of his crown by his own act belongs to the
same range of ideas as the law of strict hereditary succession. It
implies that kingship is a possession and not an office. Neither the
heathen nor the Christian English had ever admitted that doctrine; but it
was fast growing on the continent. Our forefathers had always combined
respect for the kingly house with some measure of choice among the
members of that house. Edward himself was not the lawful heir according
to the notions of a modern lawyer; for he was chosen while the son of his
elder brother was living. Every English king held his crown by the gift
of the great assembly of the nation, though the choice of the nation was
usually limited to the descendants of former kings, and though the
full-grown son of the late king was seldom opposed. Christianity had
strengthened the election principle. The king lost his old sanctity as
the son of Woden; he gained a new sanctity as the Lord’s anointed. But
kingship thereby became more distinctly an office, a great post, like a
bishopric, to which its holder had to be lawfully chosen and admitted by
solemn rites. But of that office he could be lawfully deprived, nor
could he hand it on to a successor either according to his own will or
according to any strict law of succession. The wishes of the late king,
like the wishes of the late bishop, went for something with the electors.
But that was all. All that Edward could really do for his kinsmen was to
promise to make, when the time came, a recommendation to the Witan in his
favour. The Witan might then deal as they thought good with a
recommendation so unusual as to choose to the kingship of England a man
who was neither a native nor a conqueror of England nor the descendant of
any English king.
When the time came, Edward did make a recommendation to the Witan, but it
was not in favour of William. The English influences under which he was
brought during his last fourteen years taught him better what the law of
England was and what was the duty of an English king. But at the time of
William’s visit Edward may well have believed that he could by his own
act settle his crown on his Norman kinsman as his undoubted successor in
case he died without a son. And it may be that Edward was bound by a vow
not to leave a son. And if Edward so thought, William naturally thought
so yet more; he would sincerely believe himself to be the lawful heir of
the crown of England, the sole lawful successor, except in one
contingency which was perhaps impossible and certainly unlikely.
The memorials of these times, so full on some points, are meagre on
others. Of those writers who mention the bequest or promise none mention
it at any time when it is supposed to have happened; they mention it at
some later time when it began to be of practical importance. No English
writer speaks of William’s claim till the time when he was about
practically to assert it; no Norman writer speaks of it till he tells the
tale of Harold’s visit and oath to William. We therefore cannot say how
far the promise was known either in England or on the continent. But it
could not be kept altogether hid, even if either party wished it to be
hid. English statesmen must have known of it, and must have guided their
policy accordingly, whether it was generally known in the country or not.
William’s position, both in his own duchy and among neighbouring princes,
would be greatly improved if he could be looked upon as a future king.
As heir to the crown of England, he may have more earnestly wooed the
descendant of former wearers of the crown; and Matilda and her father may
have looked more favourably on a suitor to whom the crown of England was
promised. On the other hand, the existence of such a foreign claimant
made it more needful than ever for Englishmen to be ready with an English
successor, in the royal house or out of it, the moment the reigning king
should pass away.
* * * * *
It was only for a short time that William could have had any reasonable
hope of a peaceful succession. The time of Norman influence in England
was short. The revolution of September 1052 brought Godwine back, and
placed the rule of England again in English hands. Many Normans were
banished, above all Archbishop Robert and Bishop Ulf. The death of
Godwine the next year placed the chief power in the hands of his son
Harold. This change undoubtedly made Edward more disposed to the
national cause. Of Godwine, the man to whom he owed his crown, he was
clearly in awe; to Godwine’s sons he was personally attached. We know
not how Edward was led to look on his promise to William as void. That
he was so led is quite plain. He sent for his nephew the Ætheling Edward
from Hungary, clearly as his intended successor. When the Ætheling died
in 1057, leaving a son under age, men seem to have gradually come to look
to Harold as the probable successor. He clearly held a special position
above that of an ordinary earl; but there is no need to suppose any
formal act in his favour till the time of the King’s death, January 5,
1066. On his deathbed Edward did all that he legally could do on behalf
of Harold by recommending him to the Witan for election as the next king.
That he then either made a new or renewed an old nomination in favour of
William is a fable which is set aside by the witness of the contemporary
English writers. William’s claim rested wholly on that earlier
nomination which could hardly have been made at any other time than his
visit to England.
* * * * *
We have now to follow William back to Normandy, for the remaining years
of his purely ducal reign. The expectant king had doubtless thoughts and
hopes which he had not had before. But we can guess at them only: they
are not recorded.