strong in their position that they could do little against them. So they
consulted together privily, and arranged to draw off, and pretend to
flee, till the English should pursue and scatter themselves over the
field; for they saw that if they could once get their enemies to break
their ranks, they might be attacked and discomfited much more easily. As
they had said, so they did. The Normans by little and little fled, the
English following them. As the one fell back, the other pressed after;
and when the Frenchmen retreated, the English thought and cried out that
the men of France fled and would never return.
"Thus they were deceived by the pretended flight, and great mischief
thereby befell them; for if they had not moved from their position, it
is not likely that they would have been conquered at all; but, like
fools, they broke their lines and pursued.
"The Normans were to be seen following up their stratagem, retreating
slowly so as to draw the English farther on. As they still flee, the
English pursue; they push out their lances and stretch forth their
hatchets, following the Normans as they go, rejoicing in the success of
their scheme, and scattering themselves over the plain. And the English
meantime jeered and insulted their foes with words. 'Cowards,' they
cried, 'you came hither in an evil hour, wanting our lands and seeking
to seize our property; fools that ye were to come! Normandy is too far
off, and you will not easily reach it. It is of little use to run back;
unless you can cross the sea at a leap or can drink it dry, your sons
and daughters are lost to you.'
"The Normans bore it all; but, in fact, they knew not what the English
said: their language seemed like the baying of dogs, which they could
not understand. At length they stopped and turned round, determined to
recover their ranks; and the barons might be heard crying, '_Dex Aie_!'
for a halt. Then the Normans resumed their former position, turning
their faces toward the enemy; and their men were to be seen facing round
and rushing onward to a fresh _mêlée_, the one party assaulting the
other; this man striking, another pressing onward. One hits, another
misses; one flies, another pursues; one is aiming a stroke, while
another discharges his blow. Norman strives with Englishman again, and
aims his blows afresh. One flies, another pursues swiftly: the
combatants are many, the plain wide, the battle and the _mêlée_ fierce.
On every hand they fight hard, the blows are heavy, and the struggle
becomes fierce.
"The Normans were playing their part well, when an English knight came
rushing up, having in his company a hundred men furnished with various
arms. He wielded a northern hatchet with the blade a full foot long, and
was well armed after his manner, being tall, bold, and of noble
carriage. In the front of the battle, where the Normans thronged most,
he came bounding on swifter than the stag, many Normans falling before
him and his company.
"He rushed straight upon a Norman who was armed and riding on a
war-horse, and tried with his hatchet of steel to cleave his helmet; but
the blow miscarried, and the sharp blade glanced down before the
saddle-bow, driving through the horse's neck down to the ground, so that
both horse and master fell together to the earth. I know not whether the
Englishman struck another blow; but the Normans who saw the stroke were
astonished and about to abandon the assault, when Roger de Montgomeri
came galloping up, with his lance set, and, heeding not the long-handled
axe which the Englishman wielded aloft, struck him down and left him
stretched on the ground. Then Roger cried out, 'Frenchmen, strike! the
day is ours!' And again a fierce _mêlée_ was to be seen, with many a
blow of lance and sword; the English still defending themselves, killing
the horses and cleaving the shields.
"There was a French soldier of noble mien who sat his horse gallantly.
He spied two Englishmen who were also carrying themselves boldly. They
were both men of great worth and had become companions in arms and
fought together, the one protecting the other. They bore two long and
broad bills and did great mischief to the Normans, killing both horses
and men.
"The French soldier looked at them and their bills and was sore alarmed,
for he was afraid of losing his good horse, the best that he had, and
would willingly have turned to some other quarter if it would not have
looked like cowardice. He soon, however, recovered his courage, and,
spurring his horse, gave him the bridle and galloped swiftly forward.
Fearing the two bills, he raised his shield, and struck one of the
Englishmen with his lance on the breast, so that the iron passed out at
his back. At the moment that he fell the lance broke, and the Frenchman
seized the mace that hung at his right side, and struck the other
Englishman a blow that completely fractured his skull.
"On the other side was an Englishman who much annoyed the French,
continually assaulting them with a keen-edged hatchet. He had a helmet
made of wood, which he had fastened down to his coat and laced round his
neck, so that no blows could reach his head. The ravage he was making
was seen by a gallant Norman knight, who rode a horse that neither fire
nor water could stop in its career when its master urged it on. The
knight spurred, and his horse carried him on well till he charged the
Englishman, striking him over the helmet so that it fell down over his
eyes; and as he stretched out his hand to raise it and uncover his face,
the Norman cut off his right hand, so that his hatchet fell to the
ground. Another Norman sprang forward and eagerly seized the prize with
both his hands, but he kept it little space and paid dearly for it, for
as he stooped to pick up the hatchet an Englishman with his long-handled
axe struck him over the back, breaking all his bones, so that his
entrails and lungs gushed forth. The knight of the good horse meantime
returned without injury; but on his way he met another Englishman and
bore him down under his horse, wounding him grievously and trampling him
altogether under foot.
"And now might be heard the loud clang and cry of battle and the
clashing of lances. The English stood firm in their barricades, and
shivered the lances, beating them into pieces with their bills and
maces. The Normans drew their swords and hewed down the barricades, and
the English, in great trouble, fell back upon their standard, where were
collected the maimed and wounded.
"There were many knights of Chauz who jousted and made attacks. The
English knew not how to joust, or bear arms on horseback, but fought
with hatchets and bills. A man, when he wanted to strike with one of
their hatchets, was obliged to hold it with both his hands, and could
not at the same time, as it seems to me, both cover himself and strike
with any freedom.
"The English fell back toward the standard, which was upon a rising
ground, and the Normans followed them across the valley, attacking them
on foot and horseback. Then Hue de Mortemer, with the Sires D'Auviler,
D'Onebac, and St. Cler, rode up and charged, overthrowing many.
"Robert Fitz Erneis fixed his lance, took his shield, and, galloping
toward the standard, with his keen-edged sword struck an Englishman who
was in front, killed him, and then drawing back his sword, attacked many
others, and pushed straight for the standard, trying to beat it down;
but the English surrounded it and killed him with their bills. He was
found on the spot, when they afterward sought for him, dead and lying at
the standard's foot.
"Duke William pressed close upon the English with his lance, striving
hard to reach the standard with the great troop he led, and seeking
earnestly for Harold, on whose account the whole war was. The Normans
follow their lord, and press around him; they ply their blows upon the
English, and these defend themselves stoutly, striving hard with their
enemies, returning blow for blow.
"One of them was a man of great strength, a wrestler, who did great
mischief to the Normans with his hatchet; all feared him, for he struck
down a great many Normans. The Duke spurred on his horse, and aimed a
blow at him, but he stooped, and so escaped the stroke; then jumping on
one side, he lifted his hatchet aloft, and as the Duke bent to avoid the
blow, the Englishman boldly struck him on the head and beat in his
helmet, though without doing much injury. He was very near falling,
however; but, bearing on his stirrups, he recovered himself immediately;
and when he thought to have revenged himself upon the churl by killing
him, he had escaped, dreading the Duke's blow. He ran back in among the
English, but he was not safe even there; for the Normans, seeing him,
pursued and caught him, and having pierced him through and through with
their lances, left him dead on the ground.
"Where the throng of the battle was greatest, the men of Kent and Essex
fought wondrously well, and made the Normans again retreat, but without
doing them much injury. And when the Duke saw his men fall back and the
English triumphing over them, his spirit rose high, and he seized his
shield and his lance, which a vassal handed to him, and took his post by
his standard.
"Then those who kept close guard by him and rode where he rode, being
about a thousand armed men, came and rushed with closed ranks upon the
English, and, with the weight of their good horses, and the blows the
knights gave, broke the press of the enemy, and scattered the crowd
before them, the good Duke leading them on in front. Many pursued and
many fled; many were the Englishmen who fell around, and were trampled
under the horses, crawling upon the earth, and not able to rise. Many of
the richest and noblest men fell in the rout, but still the English
rallied in places, smote down those whom they reached, and maintained
the combat the best they could, beating down the men and killing the
horses. One Englishman watched the Duke, and plotted to kill him; he
would have struck him with his lance, but he could not, for the Duke
struck him first, and felled him to the earth.
"Loud was now the clamor and great the slaughter; many a soul then
quitted the body it inhabited. The living marched over the heaps of
dead, and each side was weary of striking. He charged on who could, and
he who could no longer strike still pushed forward. The strong struggled
with the strong; some failed, others triumphed; the cowards fell back,
the brave pressed on; and sad was his fate who fell in the midst, for he
had little chance of rising again; and many in truth fell who never rose
at all, being crushed under the throng.
"And now the Normans had pressed on so far that at last they had reached
the standard. There Harold had remained, defending himself to the
utmost; but he was sorely wounded in his eye by the arrow, and suffered
grievous pain from the blow. An armed man came in the throng of the
battle, and struck him on the ventail of his helmet, and beat him to the
ground; and as he sought to recover himself a knight beat him down
again, striking him on the thick of his thigh, down to the bone.
"Gurth saw the English falling around, and that there was no remedy. He
saw his race hastening to ruin, and despaired of any aid; he would have
fled, but could not, for the throng continually increased. And the Duke
pushed on till he reached him, and struck him with great force. Whether
he died of that blow I know not, but it was said that he fell under it
and rose no more.
"The standard was beaten down, the golden standard was taken, and Harold
and the rest of his friends were slain; but there was so much eagerness,
and throng of so many around, seeking to kill him, that I know not who
it was that slew him.
"The English were in great trouble at having lost their King and at the
Duke's having conquered and beat down the standard; but they still
fought on, and defended themselves long, and in fact till the day drew
to a close. Then it clearly appeared to all that the standard was lost,
and the news had spread throughout the army that Harold, for certain,
was dead; and all saw that there was no longer any hope, so they left
the field, and those fled who could.
"William fought well; many an assault did he lead, many a blow did he
give, and many receive, and many fell dead under his hand. Two horses
were killed under him, and he took a third when necessary, so that he
fell not to the ground and lost not a drop of blood. But whatever anyone
did, and whoever lived or died, this is certain that William conquered
and that many of the English fled from the field, and many died on the
spot. Then he returned thanks to God, and in his pride ordered his
standard to be brought and set up on high, where the English standard
had stood; and that was the signal of his having conquered, and beaten
down the standard. And he ordered his tent to be raised on the spot
among the dead, and had his meat brought thither, and his supper
prepared there.
"Then he took off his armor; and the barons and knights, pages and
squires came, when he had unstrung his shield; and they took the helmet
from his head and the hauberk from his back, and saw the heavy blows
upon his shield and how his helmet was dinted in. And all greatly
wondered and said: 'Such a baron (_ber_) never bestrode war-horse nor
dealt such blows nor did such feats of arms; neither has there been on
earth such a knight since Rollant and Oliver.'
"Thus they lauded and extolled him greatly and rejoiced in what they
saw, but grieving also for their friends who were slain in the battle.
And the Duke stood meanwhile among them, of noble stature and mien, and
rendered thanks to the King of Glory, through whom he had the victory,
and thanked the knights around him, mourning also frequently for the
dead. And he ate and drank among the dead, and made his bed that night
upon the field.
"The morrow was Sunday; and those who had slept upon the field of
battle, keeping watch around and suffering great fatigue, bestirred
themselves at break of day and sought out and buried such of the bodies
of their dead friends as they might find. The noble ladies of the land
also came, some to seek their husbands, and others their fathers, sons,
or brothers. They bore the bodies to their villages and interred them at
the churches; and the clerks and priests of the country were ready, and
at the request of their friends took the bodies that were found, and
prepared graves and lay them therein.
"King Harold was carried and buried at Varham; but I know not who it was
that bore him thither, neither do I know who buried him. Many remained
on the field, and many had fled in the night."
Such is a Norman account of the battle of Hastings, which does full
justice to the valor of the Saxons as well as to the skill and bravery
of the victors. It is indeed evident that the loss of the battle by the
English was owing to the wound which Harold received in the afternoon,
and which must have incapacitated him from effective command. When we
remember that he had himself just won the battle of Stamford Bridge over
Harald Hardrada by the manoeuvre of a feigned flight, it is impossible
to suppose that he could be deceived by the same stratagem on the part
of the Normans at Hastings. But his men, when deprived of his control,
would very naturally be led by their inconsiderate ardor into the
pursuit that proved so fatal to them. All the narratives of the battle,
however much they vary as to the precise time and manner of Harold's
fall, eulogize the generalship and the personal prowess which he
displayed until the fatal arrow struck him. The skill with which he had
posted his army was proved both by the slaughter which it cost the
Normans to force the position, and also by the desperate rally which
some of the Saxons made after the battle in the forest in the rear, in
which they cut off a large number of the pursuing Normans. This
circumstance is particularly mentioned by William of Poictiers, the
Conqueror's own chaplain. Indeed, if Harold or either of his brothers
had survived, the remains of the English army might have formed again in
the wood, and could at least have effected an orderly retreat and
prolonged the war. But both Gurth and Leofwine, and all the bravest
thanes of Southern England, lay dead on Senlac, around their fallen King
and the fallen standard of their country. The exact number that perished
on the Saxons' side is unknown; but we read that, on the side of the
victors, out of sixty thousand men who had been engaged, no less than a
fourth perished; so well had the English billmen "plyed the ghastly
blow," and so sternly had the Saxon battle-axe cloven Norman's casque
and mail. The old historian Daniel justly as well as forcibly remarks:
"Thus was tried, by the great assize of God's judgment in battle, the
right of power between the English and Norman nations; a battle the most
memorable of all others, and, however miserably lost, yet most nobly
fought on the part of England."
Many a pathetic legend was told in after years respecting the discovery
and the burial of the corpse of our last Saxon King. The main
circumstances, though they seem to vary, are perhaps reconcilable. Two
of the monks of Waltham Abbey, which Harold had founded a little time
before his election to the throne, had accompanied him to the battle. On
the morning after the slaughter they begged and gained permission of the
Conqueror to search for the body of their benefactor. The Norman
soldiery and camp followers had stripped and gashed the slain, and the
two monks vainly strove to recognize from among the mutilated and gory
heaps around them the features of their former King. They sent for
Harold's mistress, Edith, surnamed "the Fair," and "the Swan-necked," to
aid them. The eye of love proved keener than the eye of gratitude, and
the Saxon lady even in that Aceldama knew her Harold.
The King's mother now sought the victorious Norman, and begged the dead
body of her son. But William at first answered, in his wrath and the
hardness of his heart, that a man who had been false to his word and his
religion should have no other sepulchre than the sand of the shore. He
added, with a sneer: "Harold mounted guard on the coast while he was
alive; he may continue his guard now he is dead." The taunt was an
unintentional eulogy; and a grave washed by the spray of the Sussex
waves would have been the noblest burial-place for the martyr of Saxon
freedom. But Harold's mother was urgent in her lamentations and her
prayers; the Conqueror relented: like Achilles, he gave up the dead body
of his fallen foe to a parent's supplications, and the remains of King
Harold were deposited with regal honors in Waltham Abbey.
On Christmas Day in the same year William the Conqueror was crowned, at
London, King of England.
TRIUMPHS OF HILDEBRAND
"THE TURNING-POINT OF THE MIDDLE AGES:"
HENRY IV BEGS FOR MERCY AT CANOSSA
A.D. 1073-1085
ARTHUR R. PENNINGTON
ARTAUD DE MONTOR
(If during the pontificate of Innocent III [1198-1216] the papal power
attained its greatest height, yet under one of his predecessors the
chair of St. Peter became a throne of almost absolute supremacy. This
mighty pontiff, Gregory VII, whose real name, Hildebrand, indicates his
German descent, was born--the son of a carpenter--in Tuscany, about
1020. He became a monk of the Benedictine order, and was educated at the
abbey of Cluny in France. In 1044 he went to Rome, called by a papal
election, and there saw abuses which from that moment he fixed his mind
upon striving to abolish. In 1048 he was again in Rome and soon rose to
the rank of cardinal.
For many years Hildebrand was the real director of papal policy, and
long before his election as pope, in 1073, he worked to accomplish the
reforms that distinguish his pontificate, which continued till his
death, in 1085.
As a part of the Holy Roman Empire, Italy held a dual relation to the
emperor and the pope. Between the Roman pontiffs and the secular heads
of the Empire the struggle for supremacy had been long and often bitter.
At the time of Hildebrand's active appearance the papacy was in a state
of degradation which demoralized the Church itself.
Long before his elevation to the papal chair Hildebrand's efforts had
met with much success, and the power of the holy see was gradually
increased. Independently of the Emperor, whose will had hitherto
governed the papal elections, in 1058--chiefly through the influence of
Hildebrand--Pope Nicholas II was chosen by a new method, and from that
time the choice of popes has been made by the sacred college of
cardinals.
Hildebrand reluctantly accepted the office of pope; but having entered
upon the task which he knew to be so formidable, he pursued it with such
energy, courage, and success as to make his pontificate one of the most
memorable in the annals of the Church. Of his greatest contests within
the ecclesiastical jurisdiction--over the celibacy of the clergy and
simony--as well as of those with the Imperial power represented by Henry
IV--the "War of Investitures"--the following account will be found to
present the essential features with a clearness and comprehensiveness
which are seldom seen in the relation of matter so complex and in a
narrative so concise. The differing viewpoints are also instructive, as
presented by Pennington of the Church of England, and Artaud, the
standard Roman Catholic authority.)
ARTHUR R. PENNINGTON
The time had come when Hildebrand was to receive the reward of the
important services which he had rendered to the holy see. He had been
the ruling spirit under five popes--Leo, Victor, Stephen, Nicholas, and
Alexander--four of whom were indebted to him for their election. But now
he must himself be raised to the papal throne.
The clergy were assembled in the Lateran Church to celebrate the
obsequies of Alexander. Hildebrand, as archdeacon, was performing the
service. Suddenly, in the midst of the requiem for the departed, a shout
was heard which seemed to come as if by inspiration from the assembled
multitude: "Hildebrand is Pope! St. Peter chooses the archdeacon
Hildebrand!"
From the funeral procession Hildebrand flew to the pulpit, and with
impassioned gestures seemed to be imploring silence. The storm, however,
did not cease till one of the cardinals, in the name of the sacred
college, declared that they had unanimously elected him whom the people
had chosen. Arrayed in scarlet robes, crowned with the papal tiara,
Gregory VII ascended the chair of St. Peter.
The Pope very soon made known the course which he should pursue. He
issued a prohibition against the marriage of the clergy, and in a
council at Rome abolished the right of investiture.[27] He was
determined to redress the wrongs of society. He had seen oppression
laying waste the fairest provinces of Europe, he had seen many princes,
goaded on by the revengeful passions of their nature, flinging wide
their standard to the winds, and dipping their hands in the blood of
those who, if Christianity be not a fable, were their very brothers. A
magnificent vision rose up before him. He would rule the world by
religion; he would be the caesar of the spiritual monarchy. He and a
council of prelates, annually assembled at Rome, would constitute a
tribunal from whose judgment there should be no appeal, empowered to
hold the supreme mediation in matters relating to the interests of the
body politic, to settle contested successions to kingdoms; and to compel
men to cease from their dissensions.
[Footnote 27: That is, the right of the civil power to grant church
offices at will, and to invest ecclesiastics with symbols of their
offices and receive their oaths of fealty.]
The civil power was to pledge itself to be prompt in the execution of
their decrees against those who despised their authority. But if the
decisions of those judges were to carry weight, they must be men of
unblemished integrity. The purity of their ermine must be altogether
unsullied. The sale of the highest spiritual offices by the prince, who
had deprived the clergy and people of their right to elect them, which
had stained the hands of the Church and undermined its power, must be
altogether forbidden. Elections must be free. The custom of investiture
by sovereigns with the ring and crozier, which had rendered the
hierarchy and clergy the creatures of their will, must be forbidden.