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The Conquest of Santarém and Goswin’s Song of the Conquest of Alcácer do Sal
Achieved at the height of the Crusades, the Christian conquests of Santarém in 1147 by King Afonso I, and of Alcácer do Sal in 1217 by Portuguese forces and northern European warriors on their way by sea to Palestine, were crucial events in the creation of the independent kingdom of Portugal. The two texts presented here survive in their unique, thirteenth-century manuscript copies appended to a codex belonging to one of Europe’s most important monastic library collections accumulated in the Cistercian abbey of Alcobaça, founded c. 1153 by Bernard of Clairvaux. Accompanied by comprehensive introductions and here translated into English for the first time, these extraordinary texts are based on eyewitness testimony of the conquests. They contain much detail for the military historian, including data on operational tactics and the ideology of Christian holy war in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. Literary historians too will be delighted by the astonishing styles deployed, demonstrating considerable authorial flamboyance, flair and innovation. While they are likely written by Goswin of Bossut, the search for authorship yields an impressive array of literary friends and associates, including James of Vitry, Thomas of Cantimpré, Oliver of Paderborn and Caesarius of Heisterbach. Jonathan Wilson (PhD, Liverpool) is a Researcher in the Institute of Medieval Studies (IEM), Universidade Nova, Lisbon, and Research Fellow in the project Cistercian Horizons (IEM Nova, University of Évora, Catholic University of Portugal, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, Monastery of Alcobaça) financed by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal.
Crusade Texts in Translation Editorial Board Peter Edbury (Cardiff), Norman Housley (Leicester), Peter Jackson (Keele)
The crusading movement, which originated in the 11th century and lasted beyond the 16th, bequeathed to its future historians a legacy of sources which are unrivalled in their range and variety. These sources document in fascinating detail the motivations and viewpoints, military efforts and spiritual lives, of the participants in the crusades. They also narrate the internal histories of the states and societies which crusaders established or supported in the many regions where they fought. Some of these sources have been translated in the past but the vast majority have been available only in their original language. The goal of this series is to provide a wide-ranging corpus of texts, most of them translated for the first time, which will illuminate the history of the crusades and the crusader-states from every angle, including that of their principal adversaries, the Muslim powers of the Middle East.
Titles in the series include The Conquest of Santarém and Goswin’s Song of the Conquest of Alcácer do Sal Jonathan Wilson History of the Dukes of Normandy and the Kings of England by the Anonymous of Béthune Paul Webster Ibn Naẓīf’s World-History: Al-Tā’rīkh al-Manṣūrī David Cook Chronicles of Qalāwūn and his son al-Ashraf Khalīl David Cook Baybars’ Successors David Cook
Figure 1 Detail. Alc.415 fol. 147r. (All plates showing folios of Alc.415 appearing herein are supplied by, and used with kind permission of, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, Lisboa.)
The Conquest of Santarém and Goswin’s Song of the Conquest of Alcácer do Sal Editions and Translations of De expugnatione Scalabis and Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen Jonathan Wilson
First published 2021 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2021 Jonathan Wilson The right of Jonathan Wilson to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Wilson, Jonathan (Charles Jonathan), author. Title: The conquest of SantareŁŁm and Goswin’s song of the conquest of Alcácer do Sal : editions and translations of De expugnatione Scalabis and Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen / Jonathan Wil Other titles: 02 De expugnatione Scala Description: 1 Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2 | Includes bibliographical references and index Identifiers: LCCN 2020052309 (print) | LCCN 202005 (ebook) | ISBN 9780367753818 (hardback) | ISBN 9781003162292 (ebook) Subjects: Classification: LCC D151 .W55 2021 (print) | LCC D151 (ebook) | DDC 946.9/02—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020052309 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020052310 ISBN: 978-0-367-75381-8 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-75382-5 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-16229-2 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Apex CoVantage, LLC
for June Wilson
Contents
List of figures List of maps Acknowledgements List of abbreviations
xi xii xiii xiv
General introduction
1
PART I
De expugnatione Scalabis The road to Santarém
3 7
The Scalabis and Liturgy
24
The Scalabis and Rhetoric
43
The glory of kings
51
Previous editions and translations of De expugnatione Scalabis
59
De expugnatione Scalabis, Latin text with English translation
60
PART II
Gosuini de Expugnatione Salaciae Carmen
73
SUERIUS commissioner of the Carmen, and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’
75
In search of the author, GOSUINUS
97
Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen, Latin text with English translation
141
x
Contents
Appendix I: Inscribed text, Alc.415 fol. 146v Appendix II: Maps Bibliography Index
153 156 159 179
Figures
1 Detail. Alc.415 fol. 147r. 2 Statue (thirteenth century). Thought to be of Afonso Henriques, Museu Arqueológico do Carmo, Lisbon. 3 Detail, Alc.415 fol. 148v. 4 Tomb of Bishop Soeiro Viegas (SUERIUS) with details inset showing motifs: crusader cross, palm tree, bishop’s crosier, Cloister, Lisbon Cathedral. 5 Alc.415 fol. 150r. 6 Detail. Alc.415, fol. 146v
iv 58 72 96 140 154
Maps
1 2 3 4
Iberia at the time of the Fourth Lateran Council, 1215 Southwestern Iberia Goswin’s Southern Low Countries Battlefront, Santarém 15 March 1147
156 157 158 158
Acknowledgements
Many debts of gratitude have been incurred in the preparation of this work. Firstly, thanks are due to my former supervisors in the University of Liverpool, Damien Kempf and Harald Braun. Too much is owed to this duo to be included here. However, I will always be grateful to Damien for his incisive vision, astonishing drive and inexorable labours to keep me to the point, and to Harald for his constant cheer, wise counsel, insightful commentary and some very fine lunches. Further I am indebted to Damien Kempf especially for his support, advice and friendship in the final stages of the submission of the manuscript of this book. Meanwhile, in Lisbon, my gratitude goes to Maria João Violante Branco of the Institute of Medieval Studies, FCSH Universidade Nova, who has continually, and from a very early stage, supported my efforts; and also to José Mattoso and Luís Filipe Oliveira for their encouragement and patience in reading my various contributions over the past few years. In the broader Iberian landscape I am particularly grateful for the hospitality afforded me in recent years by Flocel Sabaté and his team at the Universitat de Lleida during their excellent annual Medieval Meetings, where it was my very good fortune to come to know Lawrence McCrank and Paul Chevedden, whose lively conversations and continued friendship have considerably enhanced some of the positions advanced herein. Special thanks are due to Roger Wright for his expert help with the principal Latin texts and for his always warm and jovial comradeship, and to Godfried Croenen for sharing with me his profound knowledge of the medieval Southern Low Countries and for his generosity in supplying documentary materials, including his own transcripts of key charters from Belgian archives. Many friends both inside and outside academia have given selflessly of their time, support and companionship, in particular Maria do Carmo Martins Luís, Joe Norris, Angela Vincenza Ballone, Alba Valenciano Mañé, Benedict Davies, Dmitri van den Bersselaar and Simon Addington. Inevitably to list the names of all those who have been important in the realisation of this project would be impossible. To those of you I have missed, please forgive your anonymity herein. My thanks go out to you nevertheless. Above all I thank my mother June Wilson for her inspiration and unflagging encouragement during this entire body of work and to whom I dedicate this book.
Abbreviations
ANTT BNP Bulário
Canivez DEL
DIN
DM
DR
DS ep ESV
Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo (National Archive of Portugal) Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal Bulário Português: Inocêncio III (1198–1216), ed. by Avelino Jesus da Costa and Maria Alegria Marques (Coimbra: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Cientifica, 1989) Statuta Capitulorum Generalium Ordinis ab anno 1116 ad anno 1786, ed. by Dom Joseph-Marie Canivez, 8 vols. (Louvain: Bureaux de la Revue, 1933–41) De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, The Conquest of Lisbon, ed. and Eng. trans. by Charles Wendell David with a foreword and bibliography by Jonathan Phillips (New York, Columbia University Press, 2001) De Itinere Navali, ed. by Charles Wendell David as ‘Narratio de Itinere Navali Peregrinorum Hierosolymam Tendentium et Silviam Capientium, A.D. 1189’, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 81, No. 5 (Dec. 31, 1939) pp,. 591–676 Caesarius of Heisterbach, Diologus Miraculorum, 2 vols., ed. by Joseph Strange (Cologne: H. Lempertz and Comp, 1851; Reprint, Ridgewood, NJ: Gregg International,1966) Documentos medievais portugueses: Documentos Regios, vol. 1: Documents dos Condes Portucalenses e de D. Afonso Henriques, AD 1095/1185, ed. by Rui de Azevedo (Lisbon: Academia Portuguesa da Historia, 1958) Documentos de D. Sancho I (1174–1211), ed. by Rui P. de Azevedo, Avelino de J. da Costa and Marcelino Pereira (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, 1979) epistola Bible, English Standard Version
Abbreviations xv KJV Mansilla
Martène et Durand MGH NIV PL
PMH
Bible, King James Version Demetrio Mansilla, ed., La Documentación Pontifica hasta Inocencio III (965–1216), Monumenta Hispaniae Vaticana, Registros I (Rome: Instituto Español de Estudios Eclesiásticos, 1965) Thesaurus Novus Anecdotorum, ed. by E. Martène and U. Durand (Paris, 1717; Facsimile Reprint, New York: Burt Franklin, 1968) Monumenta Germaniae Historica, ed. by G.H. Pertz and others (Hanover, 1826–) – Antiquitates, Diplomata, Epistolae, Leges, Scriptores, Necrologia Bible, New International Version Patrologiæ cursus completus; seu bibliotheca universalis omnium ss. patrum, doctorum, scriptorumque ecclesiasticorum. Series latina, general ed., Jacques Paul Migne, 221 vols. (Paris, 1844–64) Portugaliae Monumenta Historica a saeculo octavo post Christum usque ad quantum decimum, ed. by Alexandre Herculano and J.S. Mendes Leal, 7 vols. (Lisbon: Olisipone, 1856–1888. vol. 1: Scriptores; vol.2: Leges et consuetudines; vol.3: Diplomata et Chartae; vols. 4–7: Inquisitiones; Reprint, Lisbon: Klaus Repr, 1967)
General introduction
The two texts treated in these pages are indispensable sources for the formative years of the sovereign kingdom of Portugal. They survive in a single codex belonging to the great Cistercian monastery of Santa Maria de Alcobaça, founded in 1152–1153 by Portugal’s first king, Afonso Henriques, following an agreement compacted with St Bernard of Clairvaux. Compiled in the scriptorium of the monastery around the middle of the thirteenth century, this codex, today conventionally identified by its modern shelf-mark, ‘Alc.415’, is to be found in the Biblioteca Nacional in Lisbon where it forms part of the fundo of Alcobaça, one of Europe’s most important monastic library collections. Comprising more than 460 codices, most from the medieval period, the fundo includes works of external provenance in addition to the large number that were produced in Alcobaça, several of which richly illuminated, and many, like Alc.415, still retaining their original bindings.1 Even so, Alc.415 is for the most part unremarkable since it contains little in the way of illumination and is taken up almost entirely with works already well known, namely a selection of writings by and correspondence concerning Fulgentius of Ruspe and a complete rendering of Paulus Orosius’ Historiarum Adversum Paganos Libri VII, all of which occupies 146 out of a total of 150 folios, which is to say a full eighteen quires of a total of nineteen. As if saving the best for last, the crucial importance of Alc.415 lies in its final quire, which is found quite literally tacked on to the end of the volume in a manner suggestive of afterthought. Here, upon the four folios comprising quire XIX, is inscribed the manuscript preserving, in their unique copies, the two texts that are the subject of this volume, both of
1 Among the multiple treasures of the Alcobaça store is an early copy of the Liber Sancti Jacobi, BNP, Ms, Alc.334, (c. 1170s), and the earliest known surviving copy of Benedict of Peterborough’s Liber miraculorum beati Thome, copied in the monastery of S. Mamede de Lorvão from a now lost exemplar arguably issued from the very seat of authorship, the priory of Christ Church in Canterbury; BNP, Ms, Alc.143; Jonathan Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction: Saints, Pilgrims and Warriors in the Portuguese Reconquista’, Portuguese Studies, 30:2 (2014), 204–21, at 219–20; Anne J. Duggan, ‘Aspects of Anglo-Portuguese Relations in the Twelfth Century: Manuscripts Relics, Decretals and the Cult of St Thomas Becket at Lorvão, Alcobaça and Tomar’, in Thomas Becket: Friends, Networks, Text and Cult, ed. by idem (Aldershot: Ashgate, 20017), Ch. X, pp. 1–19.
2
General introduction
which are of immeasurable value for the early history of Portugal as an autonomous political entity. The first of these, De expugnatione Scalabis, comprises a report of the 1147 conquest of Santarém by Afonso Henriques, (unusually) presented as the king’s very own eyewitness testimony and, save for a short introductory passage, it is duly related in the first person. The second, Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen, is an idiosyncratic, versified account of the conquest of the Almohad naval-base and Atlantic port of Alcácer do Sal in 1217 by Portuguese forces allied with a fleet of passing northern European crusaders on their way to the eastern Mediterranean in the opening phase of the Fifth Crusade. Although the events described in the texts are chronologically separated by some seventy years, there are strong internal and external factors linking the narratives which ultimately suggest a common author in the person of Goswin of Bossut, a Cistercian monk who flourished as cantor of the important and powerful Abbey of Villers in Brabant during the 1230s.2 Since the case for his authorship requires the traverse of a somewhat convoluted trail involving a perusal of conditions and connexions both in thirteenth-century Portugal and in the Southern Low Countries, it will be treated in a discreet section in Part II.
Note on titles For the purposes of exposition herein, the titles used to identify the texts will be those appearing in the title to this volume which were attributed to the works by Alexandre Herculano when editing them for inclusion in the Portugaliae Monumenta Historica.3 These are the titles that have been most commonly deployed in the literature since the latter nineteenth century and it is hoped their retention here will serve the reader greater ease of cross-referencing with other secondary material. In the manuscript, the text of the De expugnatione Scalabis appears as Quomodo sit capta Sanctaren civitas a rege Alfonso comitis Henrici filio,4 whilst that of the Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen, appears as Quomodo capta fuit Alcaser a Francis.5 Although Herculano’s titles are scarcely less cumbersome, they do possess the advantage of convenient abbreviation to Scalabis and Carmen respectively.
2 Martinus Cawley, O.C.S.O., Send Me God: The Lives of Ida the Compassionate of Nivelles, Nun of La Ramée, Arnulf, Lay Brother of Villers, and Abundus, Monk of Villers (Medieval Women: Texts and Contexts; 6) (Pennsylvania: Brepols, 2006), pp. 1–26. 3 PMH, Scriptores I, De expugnatione Scalabis, pp. 93–95, Gosuini de exupgnatione Salaciae carmen, pp. 101–04. 4 BNP, Cod.Alc.415, fol. 147r. 5 Ibid., fol. 148v.
Part I
De expugnatione Scalabis
The Scalabis narrates the pivotal moment in the Portuguese Reconquista1 that was the daring nocturnal conquest of the fortress the Muslims called Shantariyn, but which the Christians called Sanctaren,2 (modern Santarém) on 15 March 1147 by King Afonso Henriques in command of a hand-picked soldiery. Described by Herculano as a sort of ‘poem in prose’,3 the Scalabis is important to historians on a number of levels, not least because it is the earliest and most detailed account of the definitive Portuguese conquest of this key Muslim fortress which protected the northern apex of the Tagus estuary, some 70 km upstream from the port city of Luxbuna, Muslim-held Lisbon. An intriguing aspect of the principal narrative, and a facet that makes it unique in all Portuguese historiography, is that it is recounted in the first person purportedly by King Afonso himself.4 Whilst this is almost certainly a device adopted by the true author who, amongst other things, might have schemed to boost the authority of his work, the text is nevertheless extraordinarily precise in its condescension to particulars, including the specification of geographical locations, the names of certain Christian and Muslim participants, and details of tactics and operational planning. The consistency with which many of the events and 1 For a definition of the term Reconquista (or ‘Reconquest’) as used herein, see Derek Lomax, The Reconquest of Spain (London: Longman, 1979), pp. 1–4. See also, Manuel González Jiménez, ‘Reconquista? Un estado de la cuestión’, in Tópicos y Realidades de la Edad Media (I), coord. by Eloy Benito Ruano (Madrid: Real Academia de la História, 2000), pp. 175–8, esp. pp. 157. Cf., more generally, José-Luis Martín, ‘Reconquista y Cruzada’, Studia Zamorensia, 3 (1996), 215–41; Julio Valdeón Baruque, La Reconquista. El Concepto de España, Unidad e Diversidad (Madrid: Espasa, 2006); Francisco Garcia Fitz, ‘La Reconquista un estado de la cuestión’, Clio & Crimen, 6 (2009), 142–215. 2 Roman name; Escalabis or Scalabis; see generally, Carlos Fabião, ‘A romanização do actual território português’, in História de Portugal, 8 vols. dir. by José Mattoso (Lisbon: Editorial Estampa, 1994), vol. 1 pp. 203–99. 3 espécie de poema em prosa, Alexandre Herculano, História de Portugal, Desde o começo da monarquia até o fim do reinado de Afonso III, ed. by José Mattoso (Lisbon: Betrand Editora, 2007), vol. 1, p. 313; Aires Augusto Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória: Celebração da Tomada de Santarém aos Mouros (AD 1147)’, in Actes del X Congrés de l’Associación Hispánica de Literatura Medieval (Alacant: Instituí Interuniversitari de Filología Valenciana, 2005), pp. 1217–32, p. 1217. 4 Cf., José Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques (Rio de Mouro: Círculo de Leitores, 2006), p. 171.
4
De expugnatione Scalabis
individuals described may be corroborated in other independent contemporary sources confers added probity, as does the presence of specialised cultural knowledge manifest in the precise citation of several Arabic words and expressions. In combination, these features lend the work a cogency which, along with a marked vitality of style, suggests the text before us has been elaborated from some currently unknown underlying source redacted by someone who was personally involved in the action or by someone who gathered testimony directly from such a participant. Since it contains no mention whatsoever of Afonso Henriques’s signal conquest of Lisbon in October of that same year of 1147, just a few months after the Santarém triumph, the weight of scholarly opinion has placed authorship of the Scalabis in the central months of that same year, fresh in the euphoria of victory.5
Date of redaction Nevertheless, the text exhibits several important indicators of a later date of redaction. In the first place it contains a feature that would be most out of place in a text produced in mid-twelfth-century Portugal. This is the passage in a speech delivered by Afonso Henriques immediately prior to the attack on Santarém in which he urges his warriors to kill the entirety of the inhabitants of the city. Taking inspiration from the Book of Joshua, the king instructs his men: But this you shall observe diligently, ‘you may spare no one on account of age or sex; may the infant hanging at the breast die and the old man full of days, the youthful woman and the decrepit hag’ [Joshua 6.21]. May your hands be comforted, the Lord is indeed with us, for [just] one of you will be able to strike down one hundred of them.6 It is an exhortation severely at odds with the reasonably well-documented Portuguese royal policy of encouraging conquered Muslim populations to remain in their homes in peace with their new Christian overlords who would proceed to benefit from their continued presence through the concomitant maintenance of infrastructure (crucial for the attraction of new settlers), through reaping the profits of their productivity (e.g., manufacturing skills, agricultural labour, established mercantile networks) and by the levying of taxes.7 Indeed, such preoccupations likely explain why the paraphernalia of the crusades, a novel type 5 Armando de Sousa Pereira, ‘A conquista de Santarém na tradição historiográfica portuguesa’, in Actas do 2° Congresso Histórico de Guimarães. Actas do Congresso . . . (Guimarães: Câmara Municipal de Guimarães – Universidade do Minho, 1996), vol. 5, pp. 297–324; Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, pp. 1226, 1231; Pierre David, ‘Au sujet du “De expugnatione Scalabis” ’, Revista Portuguesea de História, Coimbra, 6 (1995), 45–47. 6 Scalabis, pp. 63, 68. All English translations herein from other languages are my own save where otherwise indicated. 7 Jonathan Wilson, ‘Dispatches from the Western Frontier; Portugal and the Crusades’, in Entre Deus e o Rei, O mundo das ordens Militares, coord. by Isabel Cristina Ferreira Fernandes (Palmela: Município de Palmela – GESOS, 2018), pp. 209–44.
De expugnatione Scalabis 5 of holy war that had shown an early tendency towards what in modern parlance could be termed ‘total war’, that is to say the complete annihilation of the enemy, is not manifest in operation inside Portugal until 1217 in the campaign to capture Alcácer, the subject of the Carmen.8 Indeed, it is likely the famous near-contemporary account of the 1147 conquest of Lisbon known as the De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, is an attempt by those close to Afonso Henriques to filter the ideology of crusading, as they perceived it, in order to eradicate the parts they found unacceptable.9 A second indication of later authorship is the manner in which the date of the conquest of Santarém is appointed. [Santarém] was captured on the Ides of March as the day of Saturday began to dawn in the era of 1185 [1147], that year the Moors, who are called Almohads in Arabic, entered Spain destroying the city of Seville. At that time I had completed nearly thirty-seven years of age, and nineteen of my reign, a year had not yet unrolled that I had married my wife named Mafalda the daughter of Count Amadeus of whom my firstborn son Henrique was born on the third of Nones [5th] of that same month in which the city was captured.10 In the chronological placement of the event, carefully orientated within the context of other well-known ‘historical’ events, the passage retains the flavour of looking back from a distance, being concerned with a conquest that took place perhaps a generation or more in the past and certainly not just a few days or weeks before the time of writing. Rather, the passage is served to the reader as a carefully crafted preamble to the celebration of an event amplified and increasingly mythicised over the passage of time.11 At this juncture it is appropriate to note that, although there has been a strong tendency to place authorship of the Scalabis in the central months of 1147, several
8 See, inter alia, Trutz von Trotha, ‘ “The Fellows Can Just Starve”: On Wars of “Pacification” in the African Colonies of Imperial Germany and the Concept of “Total War” ’, in Anticipating Total War: The German and American Experiences, 1871–1941, ed. by Manfred F. Boemeke, Roger Chickering, and Stig Forster (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 415–36. 9 Jonathan Wilson, ‘Enigma of the De Expugnatione Lyxbonensi’, Journal of Medieval Iberian Studies, 9:1 (2017), 99–129. 10 Capta est Idus Martii illucescente die sabbati in era Ma centesima Lxxx V, quo anno Mauri qui arabice Mozamida vocantur, ingressi Yspaniam destruxerunt Yspalim civitatem, me tunc agente tricesimum ferme ac septimum etatis annum, et regni X. VIIII., anno nondum evoluto quo duxeram uxorem Mahaldam nomine comitis Amedei filiam, ex qua primogenitus est natus Henricus filius meus III Nonas eiusdem mensis quo civitas capta est; Scalabis, pp. 62, 67. 11 Cf., Abel Estefânio, ‘A data de nascimento de Afonso I’, in Medievalista [online]. dir. by José Mattoso (Lisbon: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, July 2010), No. 8, pp. 1–48, p. 29, who finds a parallel in the development of the reports of Afonso Henriques’s victory at Ourique in 1139; see Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 114–15. Reilly considered the Scalabis ‘much later in origin and literary nature [than the Annais de D. Afonso, c. 1185]’ and stated that it ‘draws on popular accounts of what clearly had become a folk epic of sorts’, although he adduced no evidence in support of his opinion; Bernard F. Reilly, The Kingdom of León-Castilla under King Alfonso VII, 1126–1157 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998), No. 20, p. 96.
6
De expugnatione Scalabis
important commentators, notably Lindley Cintra,12 Luís Krus13 and most recently Abel Estefânio,14 have preferred a later date of composition, attributing its redaction to the mid-1180s. For these authors, the production of the Scalabis would have been associated with crises in the kingdom precipitated by the military threat presented by the Almohads, conspicuously the great Caliphal campaign culminating in the siege of Santarém in 1184, and by the death of Afonso Henriques in the following year; it would also have been associated with the production shortly thereafter of the so-called Anais de Santa Cruz II,15 edited by Monica Blöcker Walter under the title Annales domni Alfonsi Portugallensium regis,16 comprising twenty-six entries covering the period 1125–84 lauding the deeds of Afonso Henriques in a moment when Portuguese spirits might have needed fortifying with rousing tales, festooned with providential even messianic rhetoric, of past royal heroic deeds. Importantly, although texts produced in Portugal in the 1180s contain elements that have been described, rather loosely, as being of a crusading nature,17 a crucial difference between these texts and the Scalabis is that they contain absolutely none of the brutal rhetoric, characteristic of so many crusading narratives of the twelfth century originating elsewhere in Christendom, approving of wholesale massacre of the Muslim Other. Thus, whilst it is entirely possible that an earlier version of the Scalabis was in circulation during the 1180s (indeed it is a text redolent of manifold composition which almost certainly passed through anterior versions before reaching the form in which it appears in Alc.415) the presence of the extraordinary exhortation to mass slaughter in the Scalabis is more apt to be explained by the likelihood of the text in its surviving form being of Cistercian provenance, redacted perhaps around the time of the Fifth Crusade, since by the first quarter of the thirteenth century the White Monks, through their increasing involvement in the crusades and in the fight against heresy, had come to adopt an extremely hard-line approach when confronting the enemies of Roman Christianity.18 12 Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344, ed. by Luís Filipe Lindley Cintra, 4 vols (Lisbon: Casa da Moeda, 1953–1990), vol. i, CCCXCII–CCCXCV, n. 214. 13 Luís Krus, ‘Historiografia. I. Época Medieval’, in Dicionário da História Religiosa de Portugal, dir. Carlos Azevedo (Rio de Mouro: Círculo de Leitores e Centro de Estudos de História Religiosa da Universidade Católica Portuguesa, 2001), vol. 4, P-V, pp. 512–23. 14 Estefânio, ‘A data de nascimento de Afonso I’. 15 Krus, ‘Historiografia’. 16 Annales D. Alfonsi Portugallensium Regis, ed. M. Blöcker-Walter, in Alfons I von Portugal. Studien zu Geschichte und Sage des Begrunders der portugiesichen Unbhangigkeiten (Zurich: Fretz und Wasmuth Verlag, 1966), pp. 151–61. See also PMH, Scriptores, I, 15, and Pierre David, Études historiques sur la Galice et le Portugal du VIe au XIIe siècle (Lisbon: Livraria Portugalia Editoria, 1947), pp. 261–90 17 On the measured inclusion of ‘crusading’ elements in Indiculum fundationis monasterio Vincentii and related texts, see Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, and idem, ‘Enigma of the De Expugnatione Lyxbonensi’. 18 Jonathan Wilson, ‘A Cistercian Point of View in the Portuguese Reconquista’, Journal of Medieval Monastic Studies, 8 (2019), 95–142.
The road to Santarém
As an aid to appreciation of the significance of the Christian conquest of Santarém, not to mention a good many references in the Scalabis, the following pages offer a brief adumbration of pertinent conditions subsisting in the Iberian FarWest at around the time of the events described. By the early 1140s, following decades of devastating Muslim raids on Coimbra, finally things were looking promising for Portuguese southerly expansion. The Almoravids, Magrebian lords of al-Andalus since the 1090s, had been from the 1120s increasingly threatened by the rise of the rival Almohad dynasty in Morocco. In attempting to defend themselves in North Africa, the Almoravids had been forced to divert military resources away from al-Andalus with the result that a power vacuum began to develop in Muslim Iberia which was keenly exploited by local potentates who began successively to seize power in their own regions. Almoravid rule on the peninsula, never universally popular among the Andalusi Muslims, was beginning to implode.1 In 1138, Emir Ali ibn Yusuf had summoned his son Tashfin ibn Ali, a talented general only recently appointed governor-general of al-Andalus, away from his capital at Cordoba, to serve the Almoravid cause in Morocco in the war on the rebel Almohads. Defeated heavily in their attempt to take Marrakech in 1130, the Almohads had spent the ensuing years rebuilding their forces and were now mobilizing in earnest. Having learned from past mistakes, they avoided an initial attack on the Almoravid capital, preferring to target strategic locations on a piecemeal basis and, importantly, wreaking havoc on Almoravid trade routes. Soon mercantile traffic was in such disarray that the all-important flow of gold from sub-Saharan Africa, source of the famous Almoravid gold dinars, was all
1 See generally, Inês Bailâo Lourinho, Terreno de Confronto entre Almorávidas e Cristãos (1093– 1147) (Doctoral Dissertation, Faculdade de Letras, Universidade de Lisboa, 2018), and I. B. Lourinho and Manuel Fialho Silva, ‘Lisboa nas vésperas da Conquista: da política à topografia’, in Da Conquista de Lisboa à conquista de Alcácer, 1147–1217, definição e dinâmicas de um território de fronteira, ed. by Isabel Cristina F. Fernandes and Maria João V. Branco (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 2019), pp. 167–89, Also, Hugh Kennedy, Muslim Spain and Portugal, a Political History of alAndalus (Harlow: Longman, 1996), pp. 154–95.
8
De expugnatione Scalabis
but severed precipitating grave consequences for the efficient payment of the Almoravid armies. With Tashfin having removed troops and resources from al-Andalus to the Magreb, the Christian princes of Hispania were swift to exploit the opportunity. Afonso Henriques began raiding deep into the Gharb achieving victory at Ourique in 1139, whilst simultaneously Alfonso VII exploited Almoravid weakness to lay siege to Oreja in the central peninsula. Almoravid miseries increased when, on the death of Emir Ali in 1143, Tashfin succeeded him, precipitating violent internal dissension (especially between the Lamtuna and Massufa tribes) on account of his mother being a Christian slave. A year later, Tashfin embarked on the disastrous siege of Tlemcen, which would prove another notorious drain on Almoravid military strength and would ultimately lead to the collapse of the empire. Again, Christian princes took their cue; Roger II of Sicily attacked Ceuta with 150 ships,2 and Alfonso VII conquered the castle of Mara (April 1144), having spent several weeks of the previous summer leading a grand fossado plundering and devastating the surrounds of Córdoba, Carmona and Seville.3 As the crisis in Berber Islam accelerated, Christian fortunes were reviving. Although the 1130s had seen war on the Portuguese-Andalusi frontier without decisive gain to either side, Afonso Henriques’s 1139 victory over the Muslims at Ourique was perhaps the first of several indicators suggesting the overall balance was shifting in his favour4. The strategic advantages brought by holding the castle of Leiria, the building of which had commenced in 1135 on the orders of Afonso Henriques to defend the old Roman road running northward up the Atlantic coast from Lisbon, were clearly of such importance for the defence of Coimbra that the locale, destroyed by the Almoravids in 1137, probably at the urging of the governor of Santarém, was not allowed to remain depopulated for long.5 Indeed it must have been resettled by 1142 when it received a charter from the king,6 and sufficiently thriving such that, in the same year, the royal tithes and the churches of Leiria could
2 Ibn Idari, ‘al-Bayan al-Mugrib’, in Nuevos Fragmentos Almorávides y Almohades, Spanish trans. Ambrosio Huici Miranda (Valencia: Textos Medievales, 1963), p. 236. Lourinho, ‘Lisboa nas vésperas’ p. 175. Cf., Charles D. Stanton, Norman Naval Operations in the Mediterranean (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2011), pp. 104–5. 3 Reilly, Alfonso VII, p. 78. 4 Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 112–18. 5 The incident is described in two sources, the Annales Domni Alfonso, ed. by Blöcker-Walter, p. 154; and the Chronica Adefonsi Imperatoris, ed. by Antonio Maya Sánchez, in Chronica hispana saeculi XII, Part I – Corpus Christianorum, Continuatio Medievalis (Turnhout: Brepols, 1990), vol. 71, p. 187. Whilst the Chronica specifies no date, the Annales indicate the year 1140; however this is likely an error, or refers to a second attack on the same location. In this disputed chronology, the interpretation of José Mattoso is preferred as the more logical. For Mattoso’s position see, idem, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 109–111. See also Herculano, História de Portugal, vol. 1, pp. 290, 293, who suggests the possibility of a second attack in 1140 and Mattoso’s commentary at XVII, pp. 743–45. 6 DR, 189, pp. 233–35.
The road to Santarém
9
valuably be assigned to the Monastery of Santa Cruz de Coimbra.7 Soon, an extensive programme was underway to rebuild the town walls and castle, probably replacing ad-hoc temporary defensive installations erected shortly after the destruction of 1137.8 Meanwhile, further to the east, Afonso Henriques saw to the building of the castles of Germanelo, Alvorge and Ansião traversing the frontier in a southwesterly line from Penela, granting a charter to Germanelo sometime between 1142 and 11449. It also appears to have been in this same period that Afonso Henriques led a first expedition in partnership with a passing fleet of Palestine-bound, Anglo-Norman crusaders to conquer Lisbon. Reported in some detail in the Annales Domni Alfonsi, this expedition appears to be that which is also referred to as having taken place ‘five years before’ in the De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, which would place the event in 1142.10 The enterprise was a failure, with the king withdrawing northward (according to the De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, to the considerable vexation of some members of the fleet) and the crusaders continuing their voyage to the East.11 Failure at Lisbon was not the only disappointment for the Christians. In 1144, Abu Zakariya of Santarém launched a devastating attack on the region of Soure. By this time, the Templars, who had been in nominal command of the castle since 1128, had finally become an active fighting force on the frontier. Mounting a reprisal attack, they were soundly defeated with many being killed or thrown into Zakariya’s dungeons in Santarém.12 However, it appears that shortly after the episode, Afonso Henriques had taken some form of retributive action for, according to the Annales Domni Alfonsi, he succeeded in reducing Santarém and other fortresses to paying him tribute in the form of parias.13 Since the parias arrangements were essentially non-aggression/protection treaties that would be observed so long as the sums were paid, it is likely it is just such an agreement between Afonso Henriques and Abu Zakariya of Santarém that is being referenced in the Scalabis in the passage recounting the sending of messengers to the town to advise, presumably the Mozarab population (under conditions of the strictest secrecy), that the ‘treaties’ would be broken three days hence, the idea being that Afonso Henriques was likely counting on their help as a ‘fifth column’.14
7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
DR, N° 182, pp. 224–25; N° 193, pp. 238–39. The Annales Domni Alfonsi records that the king began to rebuild the castle in 1144 (p. 156). DR, N° 190. Annales Domni Alfonsi, era 1178, p. 155; De exupgnatione Lyxbonensi, the Conquest of Lisbon, ed. and trans. by Charles W. David (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), pp. 100–03. The event has been discussed by Lucas Villegas-Aristizábal, ‘Revisiting the Anglo-Norman Crusaders’ Failed Attempt to Conquer Lisbon c. 1142’, Portuguese Studies, 29:1 (2013), 7–20. Vita S. Martini Sauriensis, in Hagiografia de Santa Cruz de Coimbra, ed. and trans. by Aires A. Nascimento (Lisbon: Edicões Colibri, 1998), pp. 240–41. Annales Domni Alfonsi, p. 156. Cf., Miguel Martins Gomes, De Ourique a Aljubarrota (Lisbon: Esfera dos Livros, 2011), p. 69.
10
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With the attempt, two years earlier, on Lisbon an ample indication both of Afonso Henriques’s optimism and of his desire for pushing his southern frontier to the natural bulwark of the line of the Tagus, it can readily be appreciated that the increasing mayhem in the Muslim world was powerfully motioning him that now was the time for decisive action. The definitive capture of the towns of Santarém and Lisbon would not only substantially increase his territory and win him control of the all-important Atlantic branch of a vital riparian artery, the advance would greatly bolster the protection of the otherwise exposed lands south of Coimbra which, besides occasional hills and high ground, possessed comparatively little in the way of natural defences. It was not only turmoil in the Muslim world that was signalling Afonso Henriques it was high time he played the advantage. The complicated politics of Christian Hispania weighed in heavily. Afonso Henriques’s father, Count Henry, a supple and audacious diplomatic operator, had taken full advantage of the dynastic crisis in León-Castile following the death of Alfonso VI in 1109, to make himself de facto king of a vast territory which, by the time of his own death in 1112, included Astorga, Zamora, Salamanca, probably Ávila, and certainly a large portion of modern Spanish Extremadura, in addition to his original lands in Portucale.15 Afonso Henriques, no less ambitious and tactically conscious of his august lineage as a grandson of the Emperor of the Spains,16 was to show steadfast in his own quest for autonomy. Becoming leader of the Portuguese in 1128, Afonso Henriques spent most of the first decade of his incumbency, in addition to behaving every inch the sovereign ruler of the old condal heartlands, repeatedly attempting to assert his authority beyond the Rivers Minho and Limia in southern Galicia leading to clashes with his cousin Alfonso VII of León-Castile, legitimate successor to Alfonso VI.17 However, due to a combination of factors, not least a series of agreements with Alfonso VII that were more or less forced upon him, Afonso Henriques suspended his Galician projects in the early 1140s.18 Especially important for urging the Portuguese chieftain to concentrate his efforts on his southern frontier was a succession of manoeuvres within a triangular power play between Afonso Henriques, Alfonso VII and the Roman Curia. In October of 1143, Afonso Henriques had achieved recognition for his kingship from Alfonso VII, at a meeting in Zamora.19 However, probably because the question of Afonso Henriques’s vassalage to the King-Emperor of León-Castile
15 Stephen Lay, The Reconquest Kings of Portugal (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), p. 54; DR, vol. 1, p. 42. 16 Rather than stress his relationship to Count Henry, which would highlight his vassal status vis a vis Alfonso VII, Afonso Henriques proclaimed his relationship to Alfonso VI which emphasised his quality as an heir to the old Emperor of the Spains. See Scalabis, pp. 61, 66, and cf. Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, p. 103. 17 Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 99–104. 18 He would resume them in the 1160s only to surrender his gains to Fernando II following a botched attempt to take Badajoz in 1169; Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, p. 221. 19 Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, p. 152.
The road to Santarém
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still lingered, in December of the same year, Afonso Henriques availed himself of that ruse employed by Sancho Ramirez of Aragon (1068), Bernat II of Besalú (1077) and Berenguer Ramon II (1090), and made himself a nominal vassal of the Holy See. By thus becoming a miles Sancti Petri, and promising on behalf of himself and his successors to pay an annual census of four ounces of gold, he achieved papal recognition and protection for the territorial integrity of his polity. However, he failed in obtaining papal acceptance of his adoption of the title of king which had also been his hope.20 Rather, Pope Lucius II, in his letter issued from the Lateran on 1 May 1144 accepting the homage and the promised census, greeted Afonso Henriques only as Filio A. illustri Portugalensium Duci.21 This was almost certainly a grave let-down for the Portuguese ruler. It would appear the fact that the pope was far away in Rome had been a doubleedged sword for Afonso Henriques. On the positive side, there was the advantage brought him by paying homage to a distant lord which, beyond the annual censive payments, scarcely could ever be more than ostensible.22 However, to Afonso’s disadvantage, the canonists of the papal curia, increasingly adopting the rigours expounded in the lecture halls of Bologna, were placing growing emphasis on more precise definitions of titles, among which rex was undoubtedly one of the most important.23 In spite of Afonso Henriques’s capacity to assemble a court and to retain the loyalty of the nobles and townships of the Iberian Far-West and have himself popularly entitled Rex noster,24 the pope’s lawyers remained unconvinced of the juridical probity of his independence.25 Even so, conditions in Iberia were shifting at a breathless pace. Importantly, at the time Afonso Henriques had made his homage to the pontiff, the only evidence he could place before the Curia as evidence of his military prowess was his triumph over the Muslims at Ourique. Now, just a year or two later, with the principal powers of the Islamic West in the spiralling disarray of civil war and al-Andalus dissolved into a constellation of mutually squabbling taifas, here was a golden opportunity for him to pluck further victories from the infidel with the added great boon that all future conquests could be laid before the Holy See in
20 Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 153–54; Lay, Reconquest Kings, pp. 88–89; Reilly, Alfonso VII, p. 81. 21 For Afonso Henriques’s letter of homage, the Claves regni, see DR, No. 202, p. 250. Pope Lucius II’s letter of reply and acceptance is to be found in Epistolae et privilegia, PL clxxix: 860–61. 22 Cf., Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, p. 154. 23 K. Pennington, ‘Law, Legislative Authority, and Theories of Government, 1150–1300’, in The Cambridge History of Medieval Political Thought, c.350–1450, ed. by J. H Burns (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), pp. 424–53, esp. 430–47; also see generally Walter Ullman, The Growth of Papal Government in the Middle Ages (London: Methuen & Co., 1962), pp. 359– 81, at p. 451 et seq. 24 Vita Tellonis, in Hagiografia de Santa Cruz de Coimbra, ed. and trans. by Aires A. Nascimento, pp. 60–61; cf. Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, p. 155. 25 This was apparently so despite, or perhaps because of, the reports conveyed to the Curia by Cardinal Guido de Vico, papal legate to Hispania in 1143, who had presided at the meeting between Afonso Henriques and Alfonso VII in Zamora; cf., Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 151–53.
12
De expugnatione Scalabis
the guise of offerings on behalf of a faithful and indefatigable vassal-knight of St Peter. Indeed, scarcely had the pope’s reply been received in Portugal, perhaps in autumn 1144, when Afonso Henriques and his advisors were already anticipating a renewed petition to the Curia in the near future, this time garlanded with a so-impressive list of new acquisitions taken for Christendom from an enfeebled al-Andalus that the pope could no longer withhold the royal dignity.26 In fact, the opportunity for the grand adornment of such an appeal turned out to be more imminent than even they had imagined. Before the year was out, events from afar would set in motion a process that would shake the West at all levels of society.
Advent of the Second Crusade On Christmas Eve, in distant northeastern Mesopotamia, the Turkish warlord Imad al-Din Zengi, atabeg of Mosul and Aleppo, captured the city of Edessa, early centre of Syriac-speaking Christianity of prodigious sacred heritage and eponymous capital of the Frankish crusader-state established under Baldwin of Boulogne in 1098. By summer 1145, news of the event was spreading in Europe and, although the actual situation in the Levant scarcely merited it, the message was quickly amplified to the pitch that the entire Frankish East was about to collapse into the hands of Islam. The result was the inauguration of perhaps the largest international military campaign of the entire medieval epoch – we know it as the ‘Second Crusade’. As is well rehearsed in the literature, Pope Eugenius III officially announced the new holy war on 1 December 1145 in his bull Quantum praedecessores addressed to French king Louis VII and his barons. Nevertheless, things did not get underway effectively until Bernard of Clairvaux had been brought on board as chief preacher for the enterprise following negotiations with the pope during the first months of 1146. With the abbot now spearheading the initiative, the effective launch of the crusade took place in a field near Vézelay Abbey on 31 March, poignantly the Feast of the Resurrection, where Bernard preached to Louis VII, his assembled vassals, and a large crowd. The resultant scenes were reminiscent of the reports of Urban II’s address at Clermont in 1095.27 The Portuguese, characteristically well informed of events in other parts of the world, will almost certainly have received news of these developments by mid-1146, if not earlier. Certainly one important channel for the arrival of the news would have been the sending of envoys to Portugal by the leaders of those contingents intending to voyage along the western coasts of Europe heading for the Mediterranean via the Strait of Gibraltar, in order to petition of the Portuguese 26 Such hopes were premature, and despite Afonso Henriques impressive conquests, including Santarem and Lisbon in 1147, Rome would not recognise kingship to him until 1179; Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, pp. 260–62. 27 On these events see, inter alia, Jonathan Phillips, The Second Crusade Extending the Frontiers of Christendom (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), pp. 61–79; also, Christopher Tyerman, God’s War (London: Penguin, 2006), p. 243 et seq.
The road to Santarém
13
ruler safe passage and supplies for their vessels in his ports, the last Christian havens until the Mediterranean.28 Of course, the passage of flotillas of well-armed northern European warriors along the coasts of Portugal placed enormous potential military aid within the reach of Afonso Henriques and, given events playing out in al-Andalus, it is almost inconceivable Afonso Henriques and his advisors would not have made every effort to secure it. Importantly, northern Crusaders would most likely have to be cajoled to join an assault on Lisbon. Whilst promises of plunder available in the famously opulent towns of al-Andalus were undoubtedly an attractive prospect for some, there were many for whom the spiritual dimensions of their undertaking were supreme. With attention inevitably focussed on the Holy Land, the most sacred site in Christendom, many may have needed some considerable convincing of the spiritual value of fighting Christ’s war anywhere else.29 The perfect person to persuade them was Bernard of Clairvaux, the most influential churchman of his time and the pope’s very own advocate in the crusade. Furthermore, the abbot’s links with Portugal were, by this time, substantial indeed. Already for several years, probably since the late 1130s, Bernard had been sending out foundation parties of monks from his own abbey of Clairvaux to found affiliated communities of White Monks in the lands of Afonso Henriques, who supported each foundation with generous endowments. For the Portuguese ruler, if ever there was a time to call in a favour, this was surely it. Indeed, there is disputed evidence, in the form of a letter, the so-called ‘Letter 308’ after the Mabillon/Migne/Leclercq numbering of Bernard’s collected letters, that may or may not be genuine, purportedly sent by Bernard to Afonso Henriques. The letter suggests that the Portuguese ruler had dispatched a messenger to the abbot to request his help in recruiting support for the Lisbon enterprise either shortly before or during the abbot’s preaching tour of northern France, Flanders 28 Notable here is Odo of Deuil’s report that the leaders at Vézelay decided that the crusading forces would start out in a year’s time, which allowed for preparations to be made, including the sending of embassies to the rulers of the various lands through which the armies would travel. Thus, Odo mentions Louis VII’s sending of ambassadors to Roger II of Sicily, and to the Hungarian and German kings requesting the right to pass and for market rights. Specifically, immediately afterwards, Odo refers to those in coastal communities (maratimi) preparing ships to accompany the French king by sea (Parant naves maritimi cum rege navigio processuri); Odo of Deuil, De profectione Ludovici VII in Orientem: The Journey of Louis VII to the East, Eng. trans. by Virginia Gingerlick Berry (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1948), pp. 12–13. 29 On the conceptual problem see, William Purkis, Crusading Spirituality in the Holy Land and Iberia, c.1095-c.1187 (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2008), especially pp. 125–38; Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, pp. 210–13. Robert of Reims, writing c. 1110, encapsulated the unique appeal of Jerusalem in his eyewitness report of Urban II’s words at the Council of Clermont: ‘Our Redeemer dignified it with his arrival, adorned it with his words, consecrated it through his Passion, redeemed it by his death and glorified it with his burial’. Eng. trans. by Carol Sweetenham, Robert the Monk’s Historia Iherosolimitana, p. 81; see also, The Historia Iherosolimitana of Robert the Monk, ed. by D. Kempf and M. G. Bull (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2013), p. 6 (and ‘Introduction’ therein at xl for date of composition).
14
De expugnatione Scalabis
and the Rhineland. These areas were likely to produce substantial volumes of crusaders who would travel by sea on the westward passage.30 Regardless of the status of the letter, some communication between Afonso Henriques and Bernard seems likely and, anyway, it is a near certainty that even absent an agreement compacted with the northern fleets before they set out, Afonso Henriques was relying on their collaboration and was determined to secure it, one way or another. Moreover, if mistakes were made in 1142, firm steps would be taken that they were avoided this time. To that end, there was no time to lose before the arrival of the foreigners. First and foremost, a successful assault on Lisbon meant that Santarém had to be neutralised beforehand. Indeed, it is unknown if the attempt on Lisbon in 1142 had failed because the besieging Christian army had been attacked by contingents from this powerful garrison town, causing Afonso Henriques to withdraw forces from the siege operation to fight a rearguard action, a circumstance that may well have led to the ultimate collapse of the principal enterprise. Certainly, it is unlikely to be coincidence that, by the beginning of 1147, Afonso Henriques had begun intense preparations for the conquest of Santarém. It was a daunting target. With its principal nucleus located on the prime vantage point of a high flat-topped hill on the right bank of the Tagus, the city controlled the fluvial traffic and a key crossing point of the river, as well as watching over the principal roads to Coimbra, Mérida and Lisbon that intersected nearby.31 Of obvious and vital strategic importance since at least the Roman period, natural features and the labours of successive generations of men had combined to construct a famously impregnable redoubt. Half a century before, Al-Muwwakil, ruler of the taifa of Badajoz who had been maintaining an equivocal position between Alfonso VI and the Almoraivds, terrified the Moroccans were about to overthrow him, finally cast in his lot with Alfonso VI and, in return for the king-emperor’s protection, he surrendered to him the towns of Sintra, Lisbon and Santarém in 1093. This helped Al-Muwwakil not at all. In 1094, the Almoravids conquered Badajoz and executed both him and his son, and very shortly thereafter, they reclaimed Lisbon and Sintra for Islam. Santarém, undoubtedly due to its formidable fortifications, managed to survive in Christian hands for a few more years until, on 25 or 26 May 1111, it too fell to the Almoravid general and governor of Seville, Sir b. Abi Bakr, whilst the Christians were distracted by complicated internal affairs in León in the aftermath of the death in 1109 of Alfonso VI.32 Nevertheless, this feat had been achieved only with considerable difficulty when the Almoravid forces, after
30 Jonathan Wilson, ‘The Filthy Animal and Saint Bernard of Clairvaux; Re-assessing the Case for Letter 308 and the Conquest of Lisbon, 1147’, Al-Masaq, vol. 32, No. 3 (2020) pp. 332–52. 31 See, inter alia, Vasco Gil Mantas, ‘A rede viária de Scallabis’, in De Scallabis a Santarém, ed. by Ana Magarida Arruda, Catarina Viegas, and Maria José Almeida (Lisbon: Museu Nacional de Arqueologia/Câmara Municipal de Santarém, 2002), pp. 107–12; also A. M. Faria, ‘Colonização e municipalzação nas províncias hispano-romanas: reanálise de alguns casos polémicos’, Revista Portuguesa de Arqueologia, 2:2 (1999), 29–50, esp. pp. 43–44 and the bibliography given therein. 32 J. Mattoso, Hisória de Portugal, vol. 2, pp. 30–34.
The road to Santarém
15
repeated efforts to wear down the defenders, stormed the walls in a ‘desperate attack’ which, according to the short report made of the event by one participant in the action, only succeeded because Fortune and Allah had smiled upon them. The clear sense is that things could easily have gone the other way.33 For Afonso Henriques, there could be no prospect of laying siege to the fortress in the hope of capturing it by the usual method of starving the garrison into capitulation. Such an operation required specialised equipment and engineering know-how which, as far as is known, the Portuguese ruler did not yet possess, and almost certainly a larger army than he alone could muster in order effectively to invest the town and drive off any army of rescue that might be sent from the Muslim hinterland.34 Nor did he have the time, since siege operations could drag on for many months, as was very likely to be the case with Santarém which, in addition to its natural and man-made defences, was located within famously fertile agricultural land and therefore likely to be well provisioned with substantial food reserves stored within enabling its defenders to hold out for a very protracted period likely extending beyond the crucial time of passage of the anticipated crusader fleets. In fact, the only alternative open to the Portuguese ruler was a high-risk operation relying upon stealth, subterfuge and surprise – a method later made famous by the mercenary adventurer, often referred to as the ‘Portuguese Cid’, Geraldo Sem Pavor.35 This method required a much-reduced number of men comprising, in essence, two contingents acting in unison. Under cover of darkness or foul weather, taking advantage of a moment in which the relevant fortification was found most weakly guarded, a contingent comprising a cadre of specialists would scale the walls of the target, overpower the guards and swiftly open the main gates of the compound enabling a second much-larger force, to rise up from its hiding
33 Abu Mohammad Ádd el Medjîd ibn Abdoûn, a high Almoravid official, reported the successful capture of Santarém to Emir Abû Bakr Tashfin in a letter written from inside the city shortly after the event, in which he included the following . . . nous n’avons cessé de tenter d’extraire cette épine, de dégrossir cette souche, de nous y reprendre à plusieurs fois, de nous hâter avec (une sage) lenteur, de détruire successivement ses plus braves guerriers, de dévorer petit à petit ses plus vaillants héros . . . Nous fîmes alors une attaque désespérée à un moment où toutes les routes étaient fermées et où, grâce à la puissance divine, nul stratagème ne pouvait réussir aux assiégés, à l’heure où la Fortune souriante découvrait ses dents crochues et où, sortie des marais et des torrents, elle marchait d’un pas assuré, in Abd El-Wâhid Merrâkechi, Histoire des Almohades, French trans. by E. Fagnan (Alger: Adolphe Jourdan, 1983), pp. 139–43. 34 Matthew Bennett, ‘Military Aspects of the Conquest of Lisbon, 1147’, in The Second Crusade: Scope and Consequences, ed. by Jonathan Phillips and Martin Hoch (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001), pp. 71–89. 35 David Lopes, ‘O Cid português: Geraldo Sem Pavor (novas fontes árabes sobre os seus feitos e morte)’, Revista Portuguesa de História 1 (1941), 93–111. The most detailed treatment of Geraldo to date is by Armando Sousa Pereira, Geraldo Sem Pavor. Um guerreiro de fronteira entre cristãos e muçulmanos, c. 1162–1176 (Fronteira do Caos Editores: Porto, 2008). For a useful bibliography see António Rei, ‘Giraldo Sem Pavor, a conquista de Évora, e a origem da família Pestana’, Raízes & Memórias, 28 (2012), 119–26, note 4.
16
De expugnatione Scalabis
place and rush inside to crush the garrison and take full control.36 The Scalabis includes by far the most detailed contemporary account to have survived of this method of attack.
The conquest of Santarém The success of the stratagem relied on the gathering of the best intelligence possible, including the best routes for approaching Santarém without detection and the best time of day and most suitable location on the fortifications for the carrying out of the assault. The Scalabis informs us that this reconnaissance mission was entrusted to one Menendo (Mem) Ramires, ‘a far-sighted man and with a sharp talent’, probably a Mozarab and already familiar with the terrain, who would scout the best trails for approaching Santarém and assess the condition of the defences of the town.37 His subsequent report and offer to lead the escalade party convinced Afonso Henriques of the viability of the plan. Secrecy was of course a key element and, apart from Menendo Ramires and the prior of Santa Cruz de Coimbra, D. Teotónio, whom the king had asked to organise prayers in his monastery for the success of the enterprise, it appears the king’s plan was known to very few others, with the personnel of the army being kept ignorant of the destination of the mission even as it departed Coimbra on 10 March.38 According to the plan, the army (which was probably reduced in size, perhaps not more than a few hundred strong,39 not only because a comparatively small number of warriors was needed to achieve the purpose of the operation, but also to keep the force as small as possible in order to avoid detection in enemy territory)
36 Almohad chronicler Ibn Sahib al-Salat, writing in about 1198, described Geraldo’s tactics in his al-Mann bil-imama, ed. Abd al-Hadi al-Tazi (Beirut: Dar al-garb al-ismai, 1987); Spanish trans. by A. Huici Miranda, Al-Mann Bil-Imama (Valencia: Editorial Anumbar, 1969), the relevant passages are included by António Borges Coelho in Portugal na Espanha Arabe (Lisbon: Caminho, 2008), pp. 352–53; cf., Pereira, Geraldo Sem Pavor, p. 41; Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, pp. 65–66. 37 Almost nothing is known of this individual, save that he probably did not long survive the Santarém episode, perhaps falling victim to his own daring, as suggested by José Mattoso. In any event, he appears not to have lived long enough to leave any direct descendants since property he held in the region of Ladeia was later given to Pedro Viegas (alcaide of Lisbon, 1159–1160) at an unknown date, but before 1157. José Mattoso, Ricos-homens, infanções e cavaleiros: a nobreza medieval portuguesa nos séculos XI e XII (Lisbon: Guimarães Editores, 1985), p. 187; Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 66; Lay, Reconquest Kings, p. 93; Joaquim Veríssimo Serrão, História de Portugal, 12 vols (Lisbon: Verbo, 1989), vol. 1, p. 94. 38 Vita Theotonii, ed. and trans. by Aires A. Nascimento, Vida de São Teotónio (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 2013), pp. 79–169, at pp. 150–51, Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344, makes no mention of Menendo Ramires, but includes in the planning of the Santarém campaign D. Lourenço Viegas de Ribadouro, Gonçalo Mendes de Sousa, the alferez mor Pedro Pais de Maia and two other knights the names of which have not been recorded; Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344, vol. 4, Cap. DCCXI, p. 230; Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 67. 39 Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 68.
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would have made its way towards Santarém avoiding main thoroughfares.40 Further, the Scalabis is clear that the army travelled with its own food provisions (preparatis cibariis) obviating the need for foraging, an activity which could easily draw attention to the presence of the force.41 The tone of the Scalabis leaves little room for doubt that the army comprised almost wholly frontiersmen and commoner knights from the region of Coimbra. This is especially clear from the king’s address to his troops immediately prior to going into action, in which he reminds his warriors of the injuries inflicted by the Muslims of Santarém upon Coimbra, which are framed in terms of evils done ‘to your city and to you’, (quanta mala fecerit civitati vestre et vobis).42 There is no mention at all of contingents from the nobility, and indeed, in the king’s grand scheme for the conquest of Lisbon later that year, it would be logical for them to be absent. As Miguel Martins has observed, the nobles and their mesnadas were obliged to render military service to the king for only three months of the year, and it would make sense for the king to wish to keep these in reserve.43 Nevertheless, according to the Scalabis Fernão Peres Cativo (Fernando Pedride), at that time mordomo mor to Afonso Henriques, a most faithful courtier possibly of Galician noble extraction,44 was at least one aristocratic member of the expedition along with perhaps a few unnamed others of the king’s close circle (cum aliis de meis paucis).45 In keeping with the high-risk nature of the undertaking, it further emerges from the king’s address that the members of the troop had been carefully selected on account of their previous tried and tested combat experience in the king’s own campaigns. Also in harmony with the task at hand, the force comprised a detachment of Templars, presumably brought in for their marshal skills and discipline. This detail is not mentioned in the Scalabis, a principal concern of which appears to be to eulogise the warriors of Coimbra, but is reported in a charter issued by Afonso Henriques in April 1147 not long after the conquest of Santarém in which he donates the churches of the town to the Order of the Temple. Here, the king adds that he makes the gift in fulfilment of a vow he had made to the Order before the campaign began, if God were indeed to grant him the town.46 Yet, besides
40 Or as the Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344 reports, ‘as covertly as possible and through the most sleepy places known’. ecubertamente que pode e per os mais descaados logares que soube; Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344, IV, Cap. DCCXII, p. 231. 41 Cf., Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 67. 42 Scalabis, pp. 63, 68. 43 Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 68. 44 Ibid., pp. 72–74. 45 Scalabis, pp. 62, 67. In this respect, the Crónica Geral de Espanha 1344 may well supply the lacuna, listing the presence of Lourenço Viegas de Ribadouro, Gonçalo Mendes de Sousa and the alferes Pedro Pais de Maia among the king’s company, although the source fails to mention Fernão Peres Cativo. 46 Ego Alfonsus Dei gratia Portugalensium rex, incipiens iter meum ad illud castellum quod dicitur Sanctarem, propositum feci in corde meo et votum vovi quid si Deus sua misericordia illud michi atribueret omne ecclesiasticum darem Deo et militibus fratribus Templi Salomonis, constitutis in
18
De expugnatione Scalabis
indicating the incentivised participation of these warrior monks, the charter also allows us to glimpse Afonso Henriques’s overall planning as, in making the donation, the king anticipates a problem if, as he explicitly states, ‘it may chance to happen that God in his tenderness should give me that city which is called Lisbon’. Under this circumstance an issue would arise concerning the rights of the bishop of the newly restored see of Lisbon, under whose jurisdiction would fall the churches of Santarém. In such an eventuality, the king states, ‘this [gift] would be harmonised with the bishop at my deliberation’.47
The Southward Trek Leaving from Coimbra on the morning of Monday 10 March, the army began the 150 km trek towards Santarém, which they covered in five days, making daily stops to camp at locations along the way which, although named with particularity in the Scalabis, have failed to resonate with any toponyms known today. Nevertheless, it appears that the route taken will have passed along secondary Roman roads to the east of Leiria, in the direction of the Serra de Aire and the Serra de Minde making for Pernes, a little north of Santarém.48 On the second day of the march, having made camp at ‘Cornudelos’, the leaders sent ahead a certain Martim Mohab and ‘two others’ to announce to the ‘inhabitants’ of Santarém that the ‘truce’ would be broken three days hence. In view of the quality of secrecy that was fundamental to the success of the mission, this can only mean that Martim Mohab and his companions were sent to inform clandestinely the Mozarab leaders of Santarém that the Christian force was on its way and preparing to strike. Armed with this information, elements in the Mozarab community inside the town would accordingly have made preparations to aid the attacking Christians when the crucial time came.49 The Mozarab population of Santarém is likely to have been substantial at this time, as it was in Coimbra and Lisbon, and possibly even in the majority.50 Whilst they were perhaps likely in any event
47 48 49 50
Jherusalem pro defensione Sancti Sepulcri, quorum pars mecum erat in eodem comitatu. – DR, N° 221, p. 272. The Crónica de Portugal de 1419, mentions the participation of the Order of the Templars in the enterprise; Cróncia de Portugal de 1419, ed. by Adelino de Almeida Calado (Aveiro: Universidade de Aveiro, 1998), p. 44. Sed si forte evenerit ut in aliquo tempore michi Deus sua pietate daret illam civitatem que dicitur Ulixbona, illi concordarentur cum episcopo ad meum consilium. DR, N° 221, p. 272. Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 69; Pedro Gomes Barbosa, Conquista de Lisboa 1147 (Lisbon: Tribuna, 2004), p. 21. Cf., Martins, De Ourique a Aljubarrota, p. 69; Barbosa, Conquista de Lisboa, p. 23; Mattoso, D. Afonso Henriques, p. 172 See, inter alia, José Mattoso, ‘Os Mozarabs’ in Fragmentos de uma Composição Medieval, ed. by idem (Lisbon: Editorial Estampa, 1987), pp. 19–34; also, inter alia, Pedro Picoito, ‘A trasladação de São Vicente. Consenso e conflito na Lisboa do século XII’, Medievalista [online], 4 (2008), idem, ‘Identidade e Resistência. São Vicente e os Moçárabes de Lisboa’, Xarajîb, 7 (2009), 21–34; Isabel Rosa Dias, Culto e Memória Textual de S. Vicente em Portugal (da Idade Média ao século
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to side with their co-religionists outside the walls, the increased harshness of dhimmi life under Almoravid rule may well have been an extra source of Christian discontent within the city.51 The text informs us that the emissaries having delivered their message rejoined the column on the Wednesday as it camped at ‘Abdegas’.52 Again following the Scalabis, it was not until the end of the penultimate leg of the journey southward, when the army arrived to Pernes, about 20 km north of Santarém, at dawn on Friday having marched through the night, that Afonso Henriques finally spoke to his men revealing the purpose of their mission. Besides offering stirring words of encouragement, the king’s speech includes the important detail that a contingent of 120 warriors will be split into ten groups, each group making one ladder so that, the ten groups working in concert, the initial escalade will consist of twelve waves of ten men at a time sweeping up onto the battlements to neutralise the guards and raise the king’s own banner signalling the success of this phase of the operation. They will then break open the gates allowing the entry of the rest of the army waiting outside, thus bringing the mission to completion.
The assault Leaving all unnecessary equipment behind, the army departed Pernes at sunset for the final approach on Santarém. The details of the attack are clearly set out in the Scalabis and therefore it will suffice here to highlight only that the initial stages of the escalade did not go as planned, thanks to a misplaced ladder falling and crashing noisily onto the roof of a building backing on to the exterior of the wall. This appears to have roused the watch who discovered the Christian attack when only three warriors had managed to reach the parapet. In the ensuing confusion, a mere two of the intended ten ladders were successfully placed and only a total of twenty-five out of the 120 men intended to carry out the initial phase managed to scale the walls. Nevertheless, with the vital element of surprise working in their favour, and in the turmoil of darkness and confusion, this tiny force succeeded in opening the gates, allowing their comrades outside to enter in strength, thereby bringing the operation to a successful outcome.
XVI), rev. edn. (Lisbon: orig. Unpublished PhD Dissertation, 2011; Faro: Universidade do Algarve, 2003); Isabel Alves Moreira, ‘Nos traços dos moçárabes: para uma investigação de hagiotoponímia no espaço português’, Xarajîb, 7 (2009), 105–14. 51 Darío Fernández-Morera, The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise; Muslims, Christians, and Jews Under Islamic Rule in Medieval Spain (Wilmington: ISI Books, 2018), pp. 205–33; and cf., Tarek Ladjal, ‘The Christian Presence in North Africa under Almoravid Rule (1040–1147)’, Cogent Arts & Humanities, 4:1 (2017), 1–17. 52 It is unclear if qui (‘those’) includes Martim Mohab, or if it merely refers to the ‘two others’ which has led Barbosa to speculate that Martim Mohab may have remained in Santarém since he is not mentioned again in the text; Barbosa, Conquista de Lisboa, p. 21.
20
De expugnatione Scalabis
The fortifications References to the robustness and impregnability of the fortifications abound in both Arab and Christian sources, but details of their precise structure and configuration are scarce. In this latter respect, the brief sketch included in the Scalabis supplies the most particularised information. Although there is considerable divergence among modern researchers, and whilst ongoing archaeological projects continue to unearth new data requiring the modification of previous models, it is at least clear that when Afonso Henriques attacked the town in 1147, control of the alcáçova53 was key to gaining control of the entire conurbation of Santarém.54 The twelfth-century town was somewhat unusual in that it comprised at least four distinct and more or less separated zones, such that Santarém did not present the ‘conventional’ configuration of a single urban area enclosed by a ring of battlement walls (see Map 4, Appendix II). The alcáçova characteristically occupied the highest point of the complex, located on the top of a hill, which in the west dropped steeply to the bank of the Tagus, some 100 m below.55 Such was its aspect that, typical of contemporary observers is the comment made by the twelfth-century geographer from Granada, Ibn Ghâlib who, apparently observing Santarém from its eastern elevation, probably from a boat on the Tagus, describes ‘its tower (burj) raised up on the summit and extreme in its inaccessibility’.56 It is generally agreed that the alcáçova which included a small medina (dwellings and suq/marketplace area) was encircled by a full battlement wall, with access through a single gate. This, according to the Scalabis, is where Afonso Henriques and his army gained entry on the night of the conquest, with the scaling of the wall led by Mem Ramires taking place on the fortification some several metres to the north of the gate. Thus, the Christian warriors will have made their way up to the area identified in the Scalabis as ‘Alplan’,57 a zone separating the alcáçova from the area to the west known as Marvila occupying a plateau on the same hill but at a slightly lower level than the alcáçova. Marvila, a toponym of Arabic or Mozarabic origin not mentioned in the Scalabis,58 was defended partly by fortifications and partly by natural features such that it did not present a
53 From the Arabic al qasaba, indicating the most fortified area within a medieval Iberian castle, usually including the residence of the civil and/or ecclesiastical authorities of the town or region. 54 Jorge Custódio, ‘As fortificações de Santarém – séculos XII a XIII’, in Mil anos de fortificações na Península Ibérica e no Magreb (500–1500) – Actas do Simpósio Internacional sobre Castelos (Lisbon: Edições Colibri/Câmara Municipal de Palmela, 2002), pp. 405–21, p. 413. 55 Maria Ângela V. da Rocha Beirante, Santarém Medieval (Lisbon: FCSH, UNL, 1980), p. 23. 56 Ibn Ghâlib Muḥammad b. Ayyūb al-G̲h̲ arnāṭī. (c. 1140–1177), Farhat al-anfus, fragment ed. by L. ‘Abd al-Badî’, Revista del Instituto de Manuscritos Arabes, I:2 (1955), 272–310, at 291; António Rei, O Gharb al-Andalus al-Aqsâ na Geografia Árabe (séculos III h/IX d.C. – XI h/XVII d.C.) (Lisbon: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, 2010), p. 144. 57 Alc.415, fol. 147r. In other sources referred to variously as Alpram or Alporão. 58 Custódio, ‘As fortificações de Santarém – séculos XII a XIII’, p. 411.
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completed ring of walls and, as recent archaeological operations have revealed, was largely or wholly uninhabited at the time.59 Regarding the nature and configuration of Alplan there is considerable debate,60 however, Marco Liberato, in an attempt to reconcile available documentary and archaeological data, has suggested that, at the crucial time, this area conceivably comprised some form of bulwark or barbican built by the Almoravids, probably in taipa (adobe), in order to present an extra obstacle for attackers attempting to reach the walls of the alcáçova.61 If such structures were indeed in existence in Alplan, they appear to have been glossed over in the Scalabis. Indeed, it is possible, as Liberato observes, that the author employed some licence at this point in his narrative in so far as the assault and entry he describes as effected at the walls and the gate of the alcáçova in reality took place at these postulated fortifications in Alplan which, once successfully overcome, resulted in some form of negotiated surrender of the alcáçova. On this view, the author would have compressed the action, thereby enhancing and sharpening the dramatic effect by transposing the most daring and dangerous event of the operation to the walls and gate of the alcáçova.62 Below these hilltop levels, two suburbs had grown up on the right bank of the Tagus to the north and south of the alcáçova. In the north, referred to in the Scalabis as ‘Seserigo’, was the village of Santa Iria (today known as Ribeira) which had developed around the cult of the eponymous Visigothic saint probably during the 600s. Later, under Muslim rule, the settlement was fortified on account of its importance as a riparian port in the shipping of regional agricultural produce to Lisbon and other urban centres.63 To the south was another quayside zone known
59 Archaeological investigations indicate that it was probably not until the late twelfth/early thirteenth century that urbanisation began in Marvila; Marco Liberato, ‘Novos dados sobre a paisagem urbana de Santarém medieval’, Medievalista, [online], 11 (January–June 2012), 1–23, and see pp. 11–12 on the possibility of earlier defensive walls being ‘back-filled’ with earth to create a level plateau, as appears to be indicated in the Scalabis (earth being transported for the purpose on the backs of slaves). Further with reference to the medieval topography of Santarém and its fortifications, see Custódio, ‘As fortificações de Santarém – séculos XII a XIII’. 60 See inter alia, Beirante, Santarém Medieval, pp. 31, 48, n.8; António Henrique R. Marques de Oliveira, Iria Gonçalves, and Amélia Aguiar Andrade. Atlas de cidades medievais Portuguesas, vol. I: séculos XII-XV (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos Históricos da Universidade Nova de Lisboa. 1990), pp. 65–67; Manuel Sílvio Alves Conde, ‘Madinat Shantarin. Uma Aproximacao à paisagem da Santarém Muçulmana (séculos X-XII)’, in Actas do Colóquio Santarém na Idade Média. 13 e 14 de Março 1998, Santarém (Santarém: Câmara Municipal de Santarém, 2007), pp. 347–81, pp. 352, 374; Mário Viana, Espaço e povoamento numa vila portuguesa. (Santarém 1147–1350) (Lisbon: Caleidoscópio\Centro de História da Universidade de Lisboa, 2007), esp. p. 62.; Cláudio Torres and Santiago Macias, Legado Islâmico em Portugal (Lisbon: Fundação Circulo de Leitores, 1998), pp. 106–09; Custódio, ‘As fortificações de Santarém – séculos XII a XIII’, p. 411. 61 Liberato, ‘Novos dados sobre a paisagem urbana’, p. 11. 62 Ibid., pp. 12–13. 63 Ibid., p. 17; Carlos Batata, Elisabete Barradas, and Vanessa Sousa, ‘Novos vestígios da presença islâmica em Santarém’, in Santarém e o Magreb: encontro secular (970–1578): catálogo da
22
De expugnatione Scalabis
as Alfange. Although later iconographic evidence shows the suburb with fortifications, it is unknown if they were in existence in 1147.64 According to the report in the Scalabis, Afonso Henriques’s lieutenant, Gonçalo Gonçalves and his men would have blocked the road leading from the Alplan/alcáçova area down to Seserigo, to prevent any enemy forces coming from this northern zone (perhaps the guard protecting the port and its warehouses) from reaching the fighting at the alcáçova. It may be surmised that following the capture of the Alplan/alcáçova area, or simultaneous with it, a Christian force will have descended the southern slope of the hill to take control of Alfange.65
Ramadan and the conquest of Santarém Given the poly-nuclear layout of Santarém, and given its formidable reputation as a powerful military stronghold, a key bastion of Islam’s at-this-time hotly contested far-western frontier, it does indeed appear something of a miracle that the presumably numerous Muslim troops that would have been expected to be billeted in various nearby zones outside the limited accommodational space of the alcáçova, were not immediately roused in strength as soon as the first clamours of battle rang out from the walls, shattering the silence of the small hours. The solution to this mystery may well lie in Islamic ritual. The Almohads on arriving to al-Andalus in summer of 1146 had compelled the taifas of the Gharb to send their forces to assist in the conquest of Seville. As Inês Lourinho has suggested, it appears likely that Afonso Henriques, moving quickly in order to keep abreast of the cascading action, had shrewdly used the circumstance of the holy month of Ramadan to seize the advantage at Santarém. In short, it appears the practice of the Muslim forces was to remain static for this annual period of fasting, prayer and introspection. Such had been recently demonstrated in North Africa at the siege of Oran in 1146 when, during Ramadan that year, the Almohads had remained in their positions about the city, only mounting their final assault some three days after the end of the solemn commemoration. With only a little over two weeks following the taking of Seville on, 17/18 January, to the beginning of Ramadan, which in 1147 fell between 4 February and 5 March, the troops of Santarém would not have had time to complete the march home, a distance of approximately 500 km (c. 300 miles) and thus they remained in or near Seville. The Scalabis demonstrates well Afonso Henriques’s use of spies in the activities of Mem Ramires, and we can easily postulate the king
exposição / Museu Municipal de Santarém, coord. by Carlos Amado and Luís Mata (Santarém: Câmara Municipal de Santarém, 2004), pp. 68–77, p. 72. 64 Custódio, ‘As fortificações de Santarém’, p. 414. 65 Ibid., p. 416.
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having gathered the intelligence of the bulk of the garrison of Santarém being away at Seville, along with the troops of the other western taifa states (with the likely exception of Lisbon which remained Almoravid). Thus, when Afonso Henriques attacked and conquered Santarém on 15 March, he did so before the return of its troops whilst its garrison was still greatly under its usual strength.66
66 It may also be significant that the Christians attacked in the early hours of a Saturday morning, following the Islamic contemplative period surrounding Friday prayers.
The Scalabis and liturgy
From the foregoing it can be seen that the victory at Santarém was a cause for Christian rejoicing for a good number of reasons including: the vastly increased security now brought to Coimbra and its vital bread basket of surrounding farmlands; the bringing of retribution at long last to the Muslims of a highly dangerous and troublesome fortress; the strategic importance of its capture, which now greatly improved the prospects of success for the future planned conquest of Lisbon and control of the Tagus; its prize value as a glittering trophy for Afonso Henriques to lay at the feet of a grateful pope; and the successful execution, apparently against all the odds, of a daring and risk-laden plan that snatched a mighty and impregnable redoubt from under the very noses of the enemy. On the basis of any one of the foregoing, it would be unsurprising to find the event celebrated in a contemporary literary work. Today, although we may marvel at the ingenuity of the enterprise, our empirical age naturally compels us to find purely mundane processes at work behind the Christian triumph. In twelfth/thirteenth-century Iberia, spirituality and political expediency clamoured for a more fated interpretation. Accordingly, that a fortress so powerful, impregnable and strategically vital could be seized literally overnight by the lightning action of so few is hailed unequivocally in the Scalabis as nothing less than a divine miracle. It is a motif prominent in the Vita of the saintly prior of Santa Cruz, D. Theotóno, another near-contemporary text which includes a brief account of the conquest, which attributes the success to the prayers of the good prior and his brethren, presenting ‘that single miracle of Santarém’ as the epitome of the close relationship between the prior and the king.1 Almost as explicit is the only other known twelfth-century report of the event included in a short entry in the Annales Domni Alfonsi, which emphasises the providential nature of the achievement in close association with the important detail that the town had been taken by the king with ‘a few’ of his men.2 Each of these reports, in harmony with prevailing devotional attitudes, carries more or less clear sentiments of the association between the notions of
1 illo uno miraculo de Sanctaren; Vida de São Teotónio, p. 148. 2 cum paucis suorum, Era 1185, Annales D. Alfonsi Portugallensium Regis, ed. by M. Blöcker-Walter, pp. 151–61; also, PMH, Scriptores, I, 15; Pierre David. Études, pp. 261–90. Alfredo Pimenta,
The Scalabis and liturgy
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Victory and Divine Favour so inseparably fused in the medieval psyche. This conceptual union in the Scalabis taken with the equally prominent theme of exultant Christian thanksgiving, and the provenance of the manuscript itself as the product of a Cistercian scriptorium, inevitably invites consideration of the work in a liturgical context.
Liturgical aspects Viewed from this angle several structural features of the Scalabis arise in obvious relief, not least the fact that the work proclaims an immediate liturgical association in its opening lines. The exuberant Cantemus domino fratres karissimi begins a joyful call to communal worship much in the style of the ‘Invitatory’, Psalm 94,3 around which is constructed the opening ritual prefixed to Matins,4 the first canonic Hour of the liturgical day. The Rule of Benedict which in Alcobaça, as in all Cistercian houses, was the very bedrock of life,5 specifies the Invitatory sequence be structured around the singing or chanting of Psalm 94, Venite exultemus Domino (‘Come let us praise the Lord’).6 St Benedict instructs brethren to commence with the verse Domine labia mea aperies et os meum adnuntiabit laudem tuam (‘Lord, open my lips and my mouth shall proclaim your praise’, Ps. 50, 17) which, after being said three times, is to be followed by Ps. 3, then the Invitatory Psalm (Ps. 94) with antiphon,7 followed by an Ambrosian hymn sung or chanted.8 Whilst the Venite was a fixed feature of the ritual, the antiphons were variable elements apt to be tailored to a particular occasion as part of the temporale or sanctorale. Accordingly, if it was a saint’s day that was being celebrated, the Invitatory antiphons were
3 4 5 6
7
8
Fontes Medievais da História de Portugal, Anais e Crónicas (Lisbon: Livraria Sá da Costa, 1948), vol. 1, pp. 22–47, at p. 40. Psalm 95 in the Hebrew numbering. Also known as Vigils or Nocturnes and today also referred to as the Office of Readings or the Night Office; see generally John Harper, The Forms and Orders of Western Liturgy from the Tenth to the Eighteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991), pp. 86–97. See generally Louis J. Lekai, The Cistercians, Ideals and Reality (Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1977), pp. 248–60. Rule of Benedict Abbot of Monte Cassino, 9:1, The Rule of St Benedict, in Latin and English with Notes, ed. by Timothy Fry O.S.B (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1981) [hereafter ‘RB’], p. 203. On the term invitatory or invitatorium as applied to the Venite itself, see Henri Leclercq, ‘Invitatorium’, in The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910), vol. 8, p. 685. The term has also been used more broadly in recent times to indicate any chant occurring at the opening of the Divine Office; Grove Music Online, ‘Invitatory’. Benedict uses the term ‘Vigils’ instead of ‘Matins’. The exact meaning of antiphona, translated as ‘refrain/s’ in the RB, but usually translated as ‘antiphon’, has been the subject of considerable debate. Fry prefers Adalbert de Vogüé’s interpretation that the psalms were sung or chanted by one or two cantors whilst the congregation responded with an antiphon; A. de Vogüé, ‘Le sens d’antifana’ et la longueur de l’office dans la “Regula Magistri” ’, Revue bénécitine, 71 (1962), pp. 119–24; RB pp. 401–3. RB, Ch.9, p. 203. On Abmrosianum, translated as ‘Ambrosian hymn’, see RB, p. 401.
26
De expugnatione Scalabis
often proper to the saint being celebrated as were other elements in the Office for that day, with such proper elements being most especially prominent at Matins.9 Although the opening lines of the Scalabis can hardly be said to follow the formulae set out by St Benedict, a few parallels with the Invitatory Psalm deserve our attention. Most obviously, both the Scalabis and the Venite begin by sounding a vigorous call to communal praise with an emphasis on singing, the principal sentiment being expressed in each text through an exhortatory jubilemus! – ‘Let us sing out joyfully!’, whist at the same time the Scalabis incorporates references to Psalm 150 (4–5), one of the three ‘Laudatory’ psalms that are principal elements of the service of Lauds, which in the Divine Office was the service following Matins at daybreak.10 Psalm 94
Psalm 150
Scalabis
Cantemus domino fraters (4) Laudate eum in tympano (1) Venite exultemus karissimi, ‘cantemus et choro; laudate eum Domino: jubilemus domino in tympano, in chordis et organo. (5) Deo salutari nostro. (2) et choro et jubilemus Laudate eum in cymbalis Praeoccupemus faciem in cordis et organo’ benesonantibus; laudate eum ejus in confessione et in exultationis voce. in cymbalis jubilationis. psalmis jubilemus ei. (1) Come let us praise the (4) Praise him with the timbrel Let us sing to the Lord most dear brothers, let us and dance: praise him with Lord with joy: let us sing to the Lord with the stringed instruments and joyfully sing to God our timbrel and in choir, and organs. (5) Praise him upon saviour. (2) Let us come let us sing out joyfully the loud cymbals: praise before his presence with with stringed instruments him upon the high-sounding thanksgiving; and make and organ with the voice cymbals. a joyful noise to him of gladness. with psalms.
Whist Psalm 150 is a short (6 verses) and simple exhortation to alleluia (‘praise ye the Lord’) without more, both the Scalabis and the Venite develop the jubilatory theme by following the opening exhortation with a proclamation of the occasion for the praising of God. In the Venite, the motive is a general celebration of God the creator and supreme sovereign of all-things. In the Scalabis, however, although the same theme is prominent, it is woven around a far more specific reason for joyous thanksgiving, presented along with a reference to (the also jubilatory) Psalm 46, namely the laying-low of the Muslims in the divinely orchestrated Christian conquest of Santarém.11 That the appeal in the Scalabis is expressly
9 On the variability of antiphons and other texts in the Office see, inter alia, Andrew Hughes, Medieval Manuscripts for Mass and Office (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982), pp. 50–79, esp. ‘Matins’, pp. 53–68. 10 Cf. Armando Sousa Pereira, ‘Motivos Bíblicos na Historiografia de Santa Cruz de Coimbra dos Finais do Século XII’, Lusitania Sacra, 2° série, 13–14 (2001–2002), 315–36, at 330. 11 subiciendo gentes Mahometh adorantes sub pedibus nostris, elegit nobis hereditatem speciosissimam quam dilexit; Scalabis, p. 82. Compare: Subiecit populos nobis: et gentes sub pedibus nostris. Elegit nobis hereditatem suam: speciem Iacob, quam dilexit. Psalm 46:4–5.
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27
addressed to fraters karissimi (‘most dear brothers’), could hardly be more indicative of an act of collective worship in the monastic setting or among a community of canons. Further, in common with the Venite, the proem of the Scalabis shifts abruptly from an initial call for enthusiastic vocal praise to an attitude of awed reverence. Whilst this change of mood is more pronounced in the psalm which proclaims, ‘Let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord’, the sentiment is also clearly present in the Scalabis where there is acknowledgement, in apparent echo of the Venite, that Christ is the true king (sed Christo regi vero) to whom belongs the whole earth and to whom, ‘rightly every knee is bent’ (merito cui curuatur omne genu). Thereafter, correlation is extended when, following the change of tone, each of the works, in a turn unusual in a biblical or devotional text, manifests a change of speaker. In the Venite the first seven verses are spoken by the psalmist-author but, at verse eight, the voice abruptly switches to the first-person as God himself directly addresses the people of the psalmist’s ‘generation’. In the Scalabis, the opening lines are spoken by a putative ‘cantor’ or ‘master of ceremonies’, before, as in the Venite, the text carries forward in the first-person. This time, however, it is not God speaking, but King Afonso Henriques. Indeed, the author is careful to make the distinction12 and, accordingly, the cantor calls forth ‘our King Afonso’ (rex noster Alfonse) to confess (confitere) that ‘this great wonder you do not ascribe to your merits nor powers, but to Christ the true king’ (Christo regi vero; my emphasis). Accordingly, it is in a spirit of deference that the King begins his speech with a grateful proclamation of God’s goodness and mercy in fashioning miracles on his behalf (in me pietatis et misericordie). The moderation present both in the cantor’s entreaty to the King inviting him to recount his Santarém adventure, and also in the opening lines of the King’s responding narrative, emphasises an essential message informing the entire work, that credit for the triumph is to be attributed emphatically to God rather than to the King who, whilst especially blessed, is His agent. This careful differentiation between the acts of God and man is significant, for it is in the keen acknowledgement of God as the true architect of the victory being celebrated, that we observe one of a number of features which combine in the Scalabis to indicate that its author was both familiar with contemporary crusading literature and was concerned to resonate with it. In this instance, notable is the element common to several well-known early crusade-historians including Fulcher of Chartres, Baldric of Dol, Raimond of Aguilers, Ekkehard of Aura, Robert of Reims, Hugh of St Fleury and the anonymous chronicler of Monte Cassino, of the 12 Similar close association between God and Afonso Henriques is present in the Annales Domni Alfonsi, where the King is described as acting ‘with a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm’ (manu forti et brachio extento, Era 1173), an expression frequently used in Scripture when describing the power and actions of God; see, for example, Deuteronomy 4:34, 5:15, 7:19, 9:29, 11:2, 26:8; 1 Kings 8:42, 2 Kings 17:36; Jeremiah 32:17, 32: 21; Psalm 136:12; Sousa Pereira, ‘Motivos’, p. 322.
28
De expugnatione Scalabis
unequivocal attribution of the conquest of Jerusalem in 1099, not to the human agency of the crusaders, but to God – a sentiment exemplified in the title of Guibert of Nogent’s history of the First Crusade, Dei Gesta per Francos, a ‘correction’ of the title of the anonymous earlier Gesta Francorum.13 Nevertheless, since the Venite was an exceptionally well-known psalm, being recited from memory daily by numerous communities of religious, contemporaries can hardly have failed to make the link between the King in the Scalabis and (his) God in the Venite, in that both personages begin to speak directly to their respective congregations immediately following an introductory preamble delivered by a third party. Importantly for our understanding of the Scalabis, psalms were central to the monastic life. The Rule of St Benedict stipulated that the 150 psalms of the Psalter were to be recited in the Daily Office during each term of a week, the number of psalms being distributed equally among the seven days.14 Furthermore, each monk was expected to learn all 150 psalms by heart.15 This provided a monk, canon or nun with a ready store of images and references (which was often enhanced and extended by the monastic emphasis on the training of memory through techniques of the Ars Memorativa) so that memory, in the medieval intellectual environment, was fully hypostatised as an active tool (a machina memorialis) both for the production of new works (literary, musical, liturgical) and for monastic scriptural meditation, the practice of Lectio Divina.16 This environment, populated by religious who, if they rarely condescended to putting their thoughts into writing, were nevertheless steeped in the methods of exegesis found in the literature of the Fathers, offered myriad possibilities to confectors of liturgy. In the words of Joseph Dyer, In the medieval Office the singing of psalms was far more than a musical exercise. It was ampler in its connotations than the mere adaptation of words to stereotypical melodic formulae. Years of daily encounters with the prayers of the psalmist fostered a rich contextuality of associations, a private and interior exegesis of the scriptural text in an ever-widening field of significance.17
13 Robert Levine, ‘Introduction’, in The Deeds of God Through the Franks (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1997), pp. 2–3; Sylvia Schein, Gateway to the Heavenly City: Crusader Jerusalem and the Catholic West, 1099–1187 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), pp. 21–33, esp. the references given at pp. 21–22. See also, Jonathan Riley Smith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading (London: Athlone Press, 1986), pp. 91–119, 139–52. 14 RB, esp. chaps 17–19, pp. 211–17; Lekai, The Cistercians, pp. 248–49. 15 Joseph Dyer, ‘The Singing of Psalms in the Early Medieval Office’, Speculum, 64:3 (July 1989), 535–78, 535. 16 See generally, Mary Carruthers, The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); and esp., idem, The Craft of Thought: Meditation, Rhetoric, and the Making of Images, 400–1200 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) – the notion of machina memorialis is found at p. 4. Also, Frances Yates, The Art of Memory (London: Routledge, 1966, reprinted 1999), esp. pp. 50–128. 17 Dyer, ‘The Singing of Psalms’, p. 535–36.
The Scalabis and liturgy
29
The careful inclusion of indicators, sometimes very short, often consisting of merely two or three words, sometimes a single word, were sufficient to trigger in the mind of one experiencing the liturgy, resonances with other sacred places, events and personages, instantly multiplying the meaning in time and space beyond the ritual moment of the particular Office.18 Thus, for example, the reference to Psalm 46, mentioned previously, is presented in the Scalabis, subiciendo gentes Mahometh adorantes sub pedibus nostris, elegit nobis hereditatem speciosissimam quam dilexit.19 In the psalm, the following: Congregavit populos subter nos et tribus sub pedibus nostris, Elegit nobis hereditatem nostram gloriam Iacob quam dilexit semper20 A monk reading or hearing the words of the Scalabis would apprehend the textual indicators such that hereditatem speciosissimam quam dilexit would find instant resonance in the psalm with hereditatem nostram gloriam Iacob quam delixit, knowing that gloriam Iacob (beauty/pride of Jacob) was a biblical expression for the Holy Land. In fact, in this way, the Scalabis succinctly reveals its entire theological foundation within the first few lines – God has defeated the (pagan – worshippers of Muhammad) enemies of the people to whom the congregation belong (fratres karissimi – and by extension the Portuguese) and has restored to them their (rightful) inheritance, analogous to the ‘Holy Land’ of Jacob and likewise a land beloved of God (quam delixit), a notion which results onto the ‘Portuguese’, casting them in the light of a new chosen people. This core theme is then amplified without deviation throughout the remainder of the text. Infused with a number of similarly operating indicators and allusions, the Scalabis avails itself of the multiple layers of meaning possible in devotional literature and especially in the liturgy, a medium evolved over centuries uniquely to incorporate an almost limitless variety of colour and inflection through the frequent and multiple incorporation of references to biblical passages, people and, indeed, to other feasts in the liturgical year. Scalabis as vestigial Historia? Before considering the crucial matter of the liturgical implications of the subject here being celebrated, let us first note that the narrative oration of ‘the King’,
18 Cf., M. Cecilia Gaposchkin, ‘The Liturgical Memory of July 15, 1099, between History, Memory and Eschatology’, in Remembering the Crusades and Crusading, ed. by Megan Cassidy-Welch (New York: Routledge, 2017), pp. 34–48, at pp. 35–39. 19 Scalabis, p. 60, 65, my emphasis. 20 Psalm 46:4–5, my emphasis.
30
De expugnatione Scalabis
beginning at line 31 of the manuscript immediately following the cantor’s introduction, occupies the entirety of the rest of the text, or in other words the remaining 253 lines. Pursuing links with the Daily Office, the only place we would be likely to discover a narrative text of this length within that liturgical medium would be in a type of festal Office sometimes referred to as an historia.21 A genre in existence from at least the beginning of the ninth century, early historiae were made up of a series of responsories and antiphons the texts for which were taken from books of the Bible other than the Book of Psalms (the traditional source for such items). Importantly, these textual elements in their conjuncture were so assembled as to present a coherent narrative or historia. Over time, the genre evolved whereby increasingly texts were included from non-biblical sources (sometimes versified though not necessarily rhymed) and used for the responsories and antiphons of newly written Offices, especially those for saints. It was thereafter only a short step before, still during the ninth century, saints’ Offices were composed which took their textual elements, including the lessons for Matins, from the vita of the relevant saint such that the label historia, which contemporaries attached to these compositions, reflected the prominence of the narrative ‘historical’ element. In short, historias told the story of the saint chronicling biographical elements, deeds, and holy attributes in historical time.22 The principal parts of the saint’s story were read or sung between sunset and sunrise at the Major Hours of Vespers, Matins and Lauds. Of the these services, Matins was the longest and most elaborate divided into three parts, or ‘nocturnes’, consisting of psalmody, readings, antiphons and responsories.23 It was the only
21 The term historia, the earliest appearance of which is in the writings of the Carolingian liturgist Amalarius of Metz (c.775–c.850), has occasioned some debate amongst commentators over its precise meaning since it has been confused with the modern terms ‘rhymed Office’ and ‘versified Office’, both of which describe separate subcategories of the historia genre, rather than being synonymous with it or, indeed, with each other, as some have erroneously supposed. The details of the now somewhat antiquated debate concerning the significance of the ninth-century word historia and its relation to the modern terms ‘versified Office’ and ‘rhymed Office’, the latter being a term coined in the Analecta Hymnica Medii Aevii, 1886–1922 and used loosely by scholars thereafter, need not detain us here, however, see Ritva Jonsson, Historia, Études sur la Genèse des Offices Versifiés (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1968), pp. 9–25. See also Grove Music Online, entry for ‘Versified Office’, where it is noted that during the later Middle Ages there are many instances where historia and also the more general term officium appear to signify a versified Office. The better view appears to be that both the versified Office and the rhymed Office are subcategories of the historia. As Jonsson observed, ‘tous les offices rimes sont certes des historiae, mais toutes les historiae ne sont pas des offices rimes, et le terme historia est plus ancient et plus general’. Historia, Études sur la Genèse pp. 11–12. Cf., Paul Lehmann, ‘Mittelalterchiche Buchertitel’, in Erforschung des Mittelalters, 5 vols (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1962), vol. 5, pp. 1–93 at pp. 63–69. 22 Jonsson, Historia, Études sur la Genèse des Offices Versifiés, pp. 9–25. 23 Lila Collamore, ‘Charting the Divine Office’, in The Divine Office in the Latin Middle Ages: Methodology and Source Studies, Regional Developments, Hagiography, ed. by Rebecca A. Baltzer and Margot E. Fassler (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 1–8, p. 3.
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Hour to include readings from the vita24 and, in the case of a prominent saint, it was not unusual for all of the lessons in the first two nocturnes, a total of six in the secular cursus and eight in the monastic, to be taken from it.25 Since a single lesson could be a fairly lengthy affair, perhaps 200 words or more, the combined lessons in either cursus would certainly have been capable of accommodating a good deal, if not all, of a narrative running to the length of the Scalabis.26
A liturgy for the conquest of Santarém? Yet, in the Scalabis, what is being commemorated is not the life of a saint but a military conquest. Probably at any other time in history, the addition to the liturgy of a post-biblical secular event would have been a very remarkable proposition indeed; however, in the period of the redaction of the Scalabis, there was a recent and brightly shining precedent for just such an innovation. Following the conquest of Jerusalem by First Crusaders in 1099, a truly remarkable achievement brought about in the face of seemingly insurmountable hardship and danger, the victorious crusader-settlers widely believing themselves to be not only the beneficiaries of divine intervention but also the very agents of God’s will, added a new feast to their liturgical calendar.27 Accordingly, affixed to the ides (15th) of July, the day of the Frankish victory, a commemoration appears respectively entitled Festivitas Hierusalem quando capta fuit a Christianis and Festivitas Hierusalem quando capta fuit a Franci, in two sacramentaries, both produced in the scriptorium of the church of the Holy Sepulchre around 1130, which are the earliest surviving sources containing the liturgy of Frankish Jerusalem.28 Although these manuscripts are relatively late there is good reason to
24 Cf.; Sherry L. Reames, ‘The Office for St. Cecilia’, in The Liturgy of the Medieval Church, ed. by Thomas J. Heffernan and E. Ann Matter (Kalamazoo: Michigan, 2001), pp. 245–70, at p. 246. 25 Indeed, the Sarum Office devoted all nine of its lessons to the Vita or legend, as did the Franciscan and Dominican Offices; Reames, ‘The Office for St Cecilia’, p. 260. 26 Cf., Reames, ‘The Office for St Cecilia’, p. 263. Medieval breviaries frequently included abbreviated versions of lessons or merely the incipit, since full versions tended to be otiose, especially in communities where the complete lessons would be read aloud from a larger volume. By the thirteenth century entire lectionaries were produced comprising ‘choir legends’ – abridged yet coherent narratives of the saints designed specifically to supply lessons for Matins; Reames, ‘The Office for St. Cecilia’, pp. 259–62. 27 Bernard Hamilton, The Latin Church in the Crusader States (Routledge: London, 1980), p. 14. 28 Respectively, Rome, Biblioteca Angelica, MS 477, fol. 4v., and Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France; MS lat. 12056, fol. 5v., thought to be the later, since it incorporates corrections and additions made to Angelica 477; Cecilia Gaposchkin, considers that the date of 1128–1130 for the compilation of these manuscripts to be more precise than the evidence allows, M. Cecilia Gaposchkin, ‘The Feast of the Liberation of Jerusalem in British Library Additional MS 8927 Reconsidered’, Mediaeval Studies, 77:10 (2015), 127–81, 130; Cristina Dondi, The Liturgy of the Canons Regular of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem: a Study and Catalogue of the Manuscript Sources, Biblioteca Victorina 16 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), pp. 62–63, and pp. 155–62. See also, Cara Aspesi, ‘The Cantors of the Holy Sepulchre and their Contribution to Crusade History and Frankish Identity’,
32
De expugnatione Scalabis
suppose that the new feast was instituted in the Holy Sepulchre immediately after the conquest itself and may have been celebrated as early as 1100.29 In the ensuing decades the commemoration was included, in one form or another, in the liturgical cycles of several western churches.30 Nevertheless, the trope of Christians presented as a new chosen people in the struggle against a pagan enemy for possession of a sacred and hereditary fatherland is relatively common in medieval literature and was certainly no novelty in twelfth or thirteenth-century Hispania. It is to be found more or less explicitly presented in a succession of chronicles extending at least from that of John of Biclaro (d. post 621), continuing through the works of Isidore, Julian of Toledo’s Historia Wambae (680s), the Asturian chronicles of the 880s, and later works such as the Historia Silense (c. 1109–1118) and the Chronica Adefonsi Imperatoris (c. 1150) among others.31 However, that we are justified in suspecting a link
in Medieval Cantors and their Craft: Music, Liturgy and the Shaping of History, 800–1500, ed. by Katie Ann-Marie Bugyis, A. B. Kraebel, and Margot E. Fassler (Woodbrdge: Boydell and Brewer, 2017), pp. 278–96, at p. 284. On the celebration of the ‘Liberation of Jerusalem’ in the Holy Sepulchre, see Amnon Linder, ‘The Liturgy of the Liberation of Jerusalem’, Mediaeval Studies 52 (1990), pp. 110–31; idem, ‘A New Day, New Joy: the Liberation of Jerusalem on 15 July 1099’, in L’idea di Gerusalemme nella spiritualità cristiana del medioevo: atti del Convegno internazionale in collaborazione con l’Instituto della Görres-Gesellschaft di Gerusalemme: Gerusalemme, Notre Dame of Jerusalem Center, 31 agosto – 6 settembre 1999 (Vatican City: Libreria editrice vaticana, 2003), pp. 46–64; and Jaroslav Folda, ‘Commemorating the Fall of Jerusalem: Remembering the First Crusade in Text, Liturgy, and Image’, in Remembering the Crusades: Myth, Image, and Identity, ed. by Nicholas Paul and Suzanne Yeager (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012), pp. 125–45. On liturgical celebration in the West, see M. Cecilia Gaposchkin, ‘The Echoes of Victory: Liturgical and Para-Liturgical Commemorations of the Capture of Jerusalem in the West’, Journal of Medieval History 40 (2014), 237–59, and the useful bibliography given therein; also, Simon John, ‘The “Feast of the Liberation of Jerusalem”: Remembering and Reconstructing the First Crusade in the Holy City, 1099–1187’, Journal of Medieval History, 41:4 (2015), 409–31. 29 M. Cecilia Gaposchkin, Invisible Weapons (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2017), pp. 130–64; idem, ‘The Liturgical Memory’, p. 39; idem, ‘The Echoes of Victory’, pp. 238–39, Simon John, postulates a terminus ad quem for the establishment of the feast of 1105 based on Baldric of Dol’s Historia Ierosolimitana; John, ‘The “Feast of the Liberation of Jerusalem” ’, pp. 415–16. 30 Gaposchkin, Invisible Weapons, pp. 165–91; idem, ‘The Echoes of Victory’. 31 See, inter alia, Alexander Pierre Bronisch, ‘On the use and definition of the term “Holy War”, the Visigothic and Asturian-Leonese Examples’, Journal of Religion and Violence, 3:1 (2015), 35–72, and, idem, ‘En busca de la Guerra santa. Consideraciones acerca de un concepto muy Amplio (el caso de la Peninsula Iberica, siglos VII/XI)’, in Regards Croises Sur La Guerre Sainte, Guerre, religion et idéologie dans léspace méditerranéen latin (XIe-XIIIe siècle), ed. by Daniel Baloup and Philippe Josserand (Toulouse: Université de Loulouse-Le Mirail, 2006), pp. 91–113; Luís Krus, ‘Tempos dos Godos, Tempos dos Mouros: as memórias da Reconquista’, in A Construção do Passado Medieval. Textos inéditos e publicados (Lisbon: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, 2001), pp. 93–113; Luís Filipe Oliveira, ‘Guerra e religião: As narrativas de conquista das cidades do Sul’, in Hombres de religión y guerra: Cruzada y guerra santa en la Edad Media peninsular (siglos X – XV), ed. by Carlos de Ayala Martínez and J. Santiago Palacios Ontalva (Madrid: Sílex, 2018), pp. 519–40. For the motif as applied in the Carolingian context, see, inter alia, Mayke de Jong, ‘Charlemagne’s Church’, in Charlemagne: Empire and Society, ed. by Joanna Story (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2005), pp. 103–35, at pp. 110–12.
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between the Scalabis and the Jerusalem Feast, or at least the memorialisation of the First Crusade and almost certainly the crusading movement defined more broadly, is signalled by an indicator that unquestionably locates the Santarém episode firmly within the ambit of the 1099 conquest of Jerusalem. This is an unmistakable reference to a letter of Pope Paschal II (r. 1099–1118) dated 28 April 1100, in which the pontiff had congratulated the crusaders in the East praising their conquest of the Holy City, declaring Renovat enim Dominus antiqua miracula (the Lord has certainly renewed his miracles of old).32 However, in the Scalabis we read the brazen announcement that, in Afonso Henriques’s conquest of Santarém, [Deus] . . . novis mirabilibus non renovt, sed supergreditur antiqua mirabilia ([God] . . . does not renew the miracles of old but surpasses them).33 Accordingly, we are given to understand that the conquest of Santarém is an even greater achievement than the conquest of Jerusalem. This somewhat startling intention on the part of the author is confirmed when we return to the words of Paschal’s letter and note the inclusion of a quotation from Deuteronomy which immediately follows completing the sentence. Here is the line in full with the scriptural extract underlined: ‘The Lord has certainly renewed his miracles of old so that one [defeated] a thousand, two ten thousand’.34 The notion is of course that God increases the individual powers of the Christian soldiery such that one discharges the functions of many and, thereby, a small force with God on their side achieves victory however vastly outnumbered by the enemy. Indeed, the army of crusaders, by the time it reached Jerusalem, was diminutive when compared with the forces ranged against them which, besides the garrison and population of the city itself, included in the wider vicinity the various armies of the Turks and the forces of Fatimid Egypt. Yet, even after running the gauntlet of the almost inconceivably difficult crossing of Anatolia under more or less constant Seljuk attack and, thereafter, successfully withstanding the forces of Kerbogha and the tribulations of Antioch, the Franks had triumphed,
32 Paschalis II, Epistolae et privilegia, ed. by Migne, col. 42C; Epistulae et chartae, ed. by Hagenmeyer, no. 22; Miriam Rita Tessera, ‘The Use of the Bible in Twelfth-Century Papal Letters to Outremer’ in The Uses of the Bible in Crusader Sources, ed. by Elizabeth Lapina and Nicholas Morton (Brill: Leiden, 2017), pp. 179–205, at pp. 179–90. The clear resonance of Paschal’s letter with the Scalabis permits the highlighting of a poem composed in the mid-twelfth century for the Jerusalem Feast in the Bendictine Abbey of Solignac, Limoges, which, like the Scalabis, makes use of Psalm 95:1 in its opening; ‘Nomen a Solemnibus trahit Solemniacum’, Carmina Burana, ed. by A. Hilka and Otto Schumann (Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universitatsbuchandlung, 1930), No. 52, pp. 104–5. See G. Spreckelmeyer, Das Kereuzzugslied des lateinishchen Mittelalters, Munich 1974 (Münsterche Mittelalter-Schriften), 21, pp. 184–94; Schein, Gateway to the Heavenly City, p. 21. For liturgical links between Limoges and Braga, see, inter alia, Joaquim Felix de Carvalho, ‘A Liturgia em Braga’, Didaskalia, xxxvii:2 (2007), 139–84. 33 My emphasis; Lisbon, BNP, Cod.Alc.415, fol. 47r. 34 Renovit nimirum dominus antiqua miracula, ut in uno mille et in duobus dena milia. In the Vulgate the relevant passage is: quomodo persequatur unus mille et duo fugent decem milia nonne ideo (Deuteronomy 32: 30).
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despite their dwindling numbers.35 For Paschal and his contemporaries, not least the First Crusaders themselves, the victory in 1099 was certainly the work of God. Nevertheless, the Scalabis trumpets the news that Afonso Henriques has succeeded in capturing ‘the best defended of all the cities of Spain’ with only a force of ‘twenty-five or a few more’.36 This, it proclaims, exceeds even the prodigious military triumphs of great biblical heroes such as no less a figure than the ‘father of a multitude of nations’ himself, Abraham,37 and the ‘mighty man of valour’, Gideon38 who each, with God’s help, secured astounding victories against overwhelming odds, the former having some 318 men and the latter 300 – considerably less than the army of the crusaders but many times more that of Afonso Henriques.39 Indeed, the opening of the King’s speech anticipates the scale of the marvel since neither the collapse of the walls of Jericho (from the sound of the horns and shouts of Joshua’s army),40 nor the stopping of the sun in answer to Joshua’s prayer (enabling the Israelites to decisively destroy the army of the five kings attacking Gibeon)41 are comparable to the miracles fashioned by God for Afonso Henriques. Thus, Afonso Henriques, like King David of the Old Testament, is especially divinely favoured. However, even the renown of David, who is frequently presented in Scripture and early literature as a model for good kingship and forerunner to Christ himself, does not withstand the magnitude of the events now being recounted.42 Indeed, Afonso Henriques is a leader of greater merit, for
35 Casualty rates for First Crusaders over the period of the expedition were notoriously high. Estimates of the death rate vary; Jean Flori calculates Christian deaths at 66%, idem, Pierre L’Ermite et la Première Croisade (Paris: Fayard, 1999), p. 453; John France arrives at a figure of 75%, idem Victory in the East: A Military History of the First Crusade (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 142; Jonathan Riley Smith puts the rate of mortality among the knightly class at around 35%, idem, ‘Casualties and Knights on the First Crusade’, Crusades 1 (2002), 13–28, at 17–18; Peter Frankopan suggests the Frankish army by the time it reached Jerusalem had suffered losses of 66%, idem, The First Crusade: The Call from the East (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press, 2016), pp. 173–74. 36 Scalabis, pp. 60, 65. 37 Genesis 17: 5 (ESV). 38 Judges 6: 12 (ESV). 39 Gideon in particular is associated with victories of small forces over overwhelmingly numerous armies. The coincidence of ‘300’ has led him to be associated with the heroic defence of the Thermopylae pass against the Persians in 480 bc led by Spartan king Leonidas; Daniel L. SmithChristopher, ‘Gideon at Thermopylae: Mapping War in Biblical Narratives’, in Writing and Reading War: Rhetoric, Gender, and Ethics in Biblical and Modern Contexts, ed. by Brad E. Kelle and Frank Ritchel Ames (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2008), pp. 197–212; cf., Kelly J. Murphy, Rewriting Masculinity, Gideon, Men and Might (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019). 40 Joshua 6: 1–20. 41 Ibid., 10: 12–13. 42 For example, I Kings: 15:11, II Kings, 18:3, 22:2. One of the names used for Charlemagne in his court was ‘David’; see, inter alia, Mary Garrison, ‘The Franks as the New Israel? Education for an Identity from Pippin to Charlemagne’, in The Uses of the Past in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Hen Yitzhak and Matthew Innes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 114–61, at pp. 123–24; Laura Fábián, ‘The Biblical King Solomon in Representations of Western European Medieval Royalty’, in The Routledge History of Monarchy, ed. by Elena Woodacre, Lucinda H.S.
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we are informed a little further on that, whereas Joab and other military leaders (before the Battle of Ephraim’s Wood) had dissuaded David from involving himself in the fighting since his royal person was too valuable to be put at risk, Afonso Henriques, when prevailed upon in like manner by his warriors, insists not only on participating in the fighting, but also on personally leading the operation.43
nova bella in diebus nostris To this providential scheme is added a further layer of meaning through the early expedient, effected during the proem, of establishing the action within the context of ‘new wars in our days’ (nova bella in diebus nostris) which are ‘divinely chosen’ (dominus elegit),44 a reference to the broader conflict in which Christendom confronted Islam not only in Spain, but across the Mediterranean. Indeed, as Paul Chevedden has notably highlighted, both Urban II and various contemporary chroniclers in the Islamic world, shared a common view of their times. From Damascus in 1105, Ali ibn Tahir al-Sulami saw the Frankish invasion of the Levant and the conquest of Jerusalem as part of an expansive Christian offensive operating on three principal fronts, Sicily, Hispania and Syria,45 a perception similarly present in the work of Ibn al-Athir, and the Syriac and Arabic chronicles of Bar Hebraeus.46 Likewise, Urban II comprehended the religious clash as a Mediterranean-wide phenomenon giving rise to the same three main theatres of war in a continuum
43 44
45
46
Dean, Chris Jones, Russell E. Martin, and Eva Rohr Zita (London: Routledge, 2019), pp. 54–69, at p. 56. Cf., M. Cecilia Gaposchkin, The Making of Saint Louis, Kingship, Sanctity, and Crusade in the Later Middle Ages (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008). Scalabis, pp. 63–64, 68–69; II Samuel 18: 2–3; Sousa Pereira, ‘Motivos’, p. 324. Scalabis, pp. 60, 65; cf., ‘Song of Deborah and Barak’, Judges 5:8, nova bella elegit Dominus. Note also the reference (Scalabis, ibid) to the same Song (Audite reges auribus percipite) ‘give ear’ etc. – (cf., Judges 5:3, audite reges percipite auribus). The Song is a triumphal hymn celebrating God’s victory over the Canaanites through the actions of Deborah and Barak which were laden with risk, as were the actions of Afonso Henriques and his warriors at Santarém. Paul Chevedden, ‘The Islamic Interpretation of the Crusade: A New (Old) Paradigm for Understanding the Crusades’, Der Islam: Journal of the History and Culture of the Middle East, 83:1 (2006), 90–136, at 94, 135; Ali ibn Tahir al-Sulami, Kitab al-jihad, in Emmanuel Sivan, ‘La genèse de la contre-croisade: un traité damasquin de dévut de XIIe siècle’, Journal asiatique 254 (1966), p. 207 (Arabic text, 206–14; French trans., 214–22). Izz al-Din Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn Muhammad Ibn al-Athir, al-Kamil fil-tarikh (Beirut: Dār Ṣādir, 1965); Abu al-Faraj Gregorius Bar Hebraeus, The Chronography of Gregory Abu’l Faraj: English Translation, trans. Ernest A. Wallis Budge (London: Oxford University Press, H. Milford, 1932), p. 234; Chevedden, ‘The Islamic Interpretation’, pp. 100–02; Herman Teule, ‘The Crusaders in Barhebraeus’ Syriac and Arabic Chronicles’, in East and West in the Crusader States: Context, Contacts, Confrontations: Acta of the Congress held at Hernen Castle in May 1993, ed. by Krijnie Ciggaar, Adelbert Davids, and Herman Teule (Leuven: Peeters, 1996), pp. 39–49; Matti Moosa, ‘The Crusades: An Eastern Perspective, with Emphasis on Syriac Sources’, Muslim World, xciii (2003), 249–89; Chevedden, ‘The Islamic Interpretation’, pp. 94–102.
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which had begun in earnest in 1060 with the Norman invasion of Sicily.47 Importantly, in both Muslim and Christian sources the campaign in Sicily is perceived as inaugurating an entirely new age.48 In the Islamic world, these changing times precipitated great anxiety and calls for jihad to resist the surge of Christian militarism which threatened it.49 For the Christians, it was a new age of hope bringing opportunities for the driving back of the Muslim deluge that had, since the mid-seventh century, successively inundated and subjugated so much of formerly Christian territory. Now, at last, there was the possibility of restoring Christendom to the unity it had enjoyed prior to the Islamic expansion. Importantly, Urban II had observed the events unfolding in the Mediterranean and read into them proof of the words of the prophet Daniel, ‘And God changes times and seasons, deposes kings and sets up kings’,50 to which he refers explicitly in three of his surviving letters and which encapsulate his ‘theology of history’.51 Thus, in the transference of rule (translatio regni) from Muslim to Christian, and the consequent expansion of the ecclesiam Dei, in Sicily, in Spain (with landmark Christian conquests including Toledo in 1085 and Huesca in 1096), and in the East, Urban II saw clear signs that God was indeed changing the times: the era of Islamic predominance was being brought to an end and a new era of Christian reconquest and restoration was beginning. In May 1098, with the Sicilian conquest completed (in 1091), Urban wrote to Bishop Peter of Huesca, conquered two years earlier by Peter of Aragon. In terms markedly resonant with the Scalabis, the pope reflected on the recent success against the ‘the Moors in Europe’, that is, in the western Mediterranean, and on the recent victories at Nicaea and Dorylaeum in 1097 in the East. Best of all, after many years, God has, in our time (nostris temporibus) alleviated the suffering of the Christian people and has deigned to exalt the faith. In our days (nostris diebus), He has conquered the Turks in Asia and the Moors in Europe with Christian forces and he has restored once famous cities to the practice of His religion by even more immanent divine grace. Among these, He has released the cathedral city of Huesca from the tyranny of the Saracens by the vigorous effort of our beloved son King Peter of Aragon and has reestablished His Catholic Church.52 47 Paul Chevedden, ‘Pope Urban II and the ideology of the crusades’, in Crusader World, ed. by Adrian Boas (New York: Routledge, 2015), pp. 7–53, idem, ‘A Crusade from the First; The Norman Conquest of Islamic Sicily, 1060–1091’, Al-Masāq, 22:2 (2010), 191–225. 48 Chevedden, ‘Crusade from the First’, p. 201, idem, ‘The Islamic view and the Christian view of the Crusades: A new synthesis’, History, 93 (April 2008), 181–200. 49 Chevedden, ‘Crusade from the First’, p. 201. 50 Daniel 20: 20–21. 51 Et ipse mutat tempora et aetates transfert regna; cf., Chevedden, ‘Pope Urban II and the Ideology’, p. 14, and see therein note 14 for the quotation and comprehensive bibliography. See also Tessera, ‘The Use of the Bible’, p. 182. 52 [Dominus] . . . post multa annorum curricula nostris potissimum temporibus christiani populi pressuras releuare fidem exaltare dignatus est. Nostris siquidem diebus in Asia Turcos in Europa
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All of these events were united in Urban’s understanding by their common objective; the grand Christian project to reconquer the Mediterranean from Islam.53 Further, it was exactly this same shared objective that made these wars ‘new’ (nova bella), compared with the preceding period of desultory Christian/Muslim hostilities prior to 1060, the period prior to the ‘crusades’ broadly defined.54 In 1099, Urban wrote to Bishop Pons of Barbastro and contemplated the state of the Mediterranean world, proclaiming, ‘In our time (nostris temporibus) the Church has been enlarged, the domination of the Muslims has been reduced, the ancient honour of episcopal sees has been, by the gift of God, restored (restauratur)’.55 With the phrase dominus elegit nova bella in diebus nostris, the author of the Scalabis unequivocally presents the conquest of Santarém within this broad scheme which, although not begun at the initiative of popes – the campaign in Sicily had sprung from the ambitions of Norman adventurers – became a movement which the popes quickly came to support and develop.56 Notably, Urban II had perceived these ‘crusades’ as being carried out by the Christian people ‘led by princes chosen by God’ – for it was not the papacy that instigated and orchestrated crusades, but the secular leaders of Christendom.57 Nevertheless, the new era had not been decreed by man, but by God who, as Daniel had said, ‘changes
53
54 55
56
57
Mauros christianorum uiribus debellauit et urbes quondam famosas religionis sue cultui gratia propensiore restituit, inter quas Oscam quoque pontificalis cathedre urbem sarracenorum tirannide liberatam karissimi filii nostri Petri Aragonensis regis instantia katholice Ecclesie sue reformauit (11 May 1098) in Antonio Durán Gudiol, La Iglesia de Aragón durante los reinados de Sancho Ramírez y Pedro I (1062? – 1104) (Rome: Iglesia Nacional Española, 1962), No. 20, p. 193; Alfons Becker, Papst Urban II (1088–1099), 3 vols (Stuttgart: Hiersemann and Hanover: Hahn, 1964–2012), vol. 1, 228, vol. 2, 334, 348–49, 351, 383, 400; idem, ‘Urbain II, pape de la croisade’, Y. Bellanger and D. Quéruel, eds., Les Champenois et la croisade [Actes des 4es journées rémoises, 27–28 nov. 1987] (Paris: Aux amateurs de livres, 1989), pp. 9–17 at pp. 15–16; idem, ‘Urbain II et l’Orient’, in Il Concilio di Bari del 1098 (Atti del Convegno storico internazionale e celebrazioni del IX Centenario del concilio), ed. by S. Palese et G. Locatelli (Bari, Edipuglia, 1999), pp. 123–44, at p. 136. Eng. trans. by Paul Chevedden. Chevedden, ‘Crusade Creationism’, p. 34 and see also his comment at p. 40, ‘As Riley-Smith observes, “Urban regarded the new crusade to the East as part of a wider movement of Christian liberation and did not distinguish it from the Spanish Reconquest”. Even a distinction, such as the one that Riley-Smith draws between a “crusade” and a “reconquest,” would have made little sense to Urban’. Cf., Chevedden, ‘Crusade Creationism’, p. 34. [Q]uod nostris temporibus ecclesia propagatur, Sarracenorum dominatio diminuitur, antiquus episcopalium sedium honor prestante Domino restauratur; Paul Fridolin Kehr, Papsturkunden in Spanien. Vorarbeiten Zur Hispania Pontificia (Berlin: Weidmannsche Buchhandlung, 1926), No. 31, p. 298; Riley-Smith, The First Crusade, p. 18; Becker, Urban II, vol. 2, p. 351, vol. 3, p. 600. Duke Robert Guiscard and his brother Count Roger d’Hauteville saw no conflict between their intentions and God’s, thus the war in Sicily became a ‘God-directed activity’; Chevedden, ‘Crusade from the First’, p. 208. As this practice of holy war developed, the Church, which obviously (ex oficio) shared its objectives, stepped in to support it in various theatres so that ‘a loose nexus of institutional structures and arrangements evolved, which over time crystallised into a standard panoply of institutional components’ often used to identify ‘crusading’; idem, ‘Crusade Creationism’, p. 45. Becker, Urban II, vol. 2, 354; Chevedden, ‘Crusade Creationism’, pp. 19, 32.
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times and seasons, he sets up kings and deposes them’.58 Accordingly, in the Scalabis, Afonso Henriques’s Santarém campaign is presented as being undertaken expressly under his own initiative, but accordingly and integrally within God’s overarching plan as augured by God’s benevolence towards the Portuguese ruler and his people. Additionally, as indicated at least once in the Scalabis,59 by the 1140s the Iberian Far-West, was manifestly in the throes of a changing of era, precisely in harmony with that presaged in Daniel as theorised by Urban II. The conquest of Santarém took place when the Almoravids were weakened (irretrievably, as it would turn out) by internal upheaval and civil war, just as the Sicilian emirate had been riven with internal conflict in the eleventh century, laying it open to Norman conquest, and likewise the Islamic Levant had been split between Suni Turks and Shia Egypt (under the Fatimids), in the period preceding the Frankish conquest of Jerusalem. Further, postulating a thirteenth-century date for the composition of the Scalabis as it survives to us, a similar changing era would have been apparent to contemporaries in Iberia following the Christians’ decisive defeat of the Almohads at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212, a victory which, characteristically, was swiftly attributed to divine intervention.60 Emphasising the hand of providence behind this toppling of the old order, the Scalabis presents harbingers wondrously signalled in the skies in two quasimeteorological events. On the final leg of their trek to Santarém, Afonso Henriques and his warriors witness ‘a miracle which very much raised our spirits’ in the form of a ‘great star, burning like a torch’ which sails across the night sky and falls into the sea ‘greatly illuminating the surface of the earth’ as it does so. This, the Christians immediately interpret as an omen of their future success. By contrast, the Muslims of Santarém had seen at midday, on the ‘day that the truce was ended’ (i.e., some three days earlier), ‘a dreadful portent’ which to them resembled a flaming serpent moving across the sky, whereupon their ‘wise men’ prophesied that ‘Santarém would have a new king’, a notable echoing of Daniel 20:20–21. If, in the use of miraculum for the Christians and prodigium for the Muslims we can note the author’s caution when dealing with Muslim prophesy,61 we can at the
58 Daniel 2:20. (NIV). 59 Allusion to the war within Berber Islam is conveyed in the mention of the Almohad conquest of Almoravid Seville (quo anno Mauri qui arabice Mozamida vocantur, ingress Yspaniam destruxerunt Yspalim civitatem); Scalabis, pp. 62, 67. 60 See, inter alia, letter of Alfonso VIII to Pope Innocent III reporting the victory, PL ccxvi: 703–704; Joseph F. O’Callaghan, Reconquest and Crusade in Medieval Spain (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003), p. 72. 61 Cf., Sousa Pereira, ‘A Conquista de Santarém’, p. 316; also John France, ‘An Unknown Account of the Capture of Jerusalem’, The English Historical Review, 87:345 (October 1972), 771–83, at 779, 781.
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same time recognise the deployment of a technique of ‘mirroring’, also present in the works of First Crusade chroniclers including Robert the Monk, Guibert of Nogent and Baldric of Dol, whereby the inevitability of the success of the Christian offensive is recognised as an act of providence by the Muslims themselves.62 As might be expected, the choice of phenomena is also laden with symbolic meaning. The star is an image appearing throughout the Bible, frequently connected with Christ – thus, for example, it is a star that guides the Maji to Bethlehem;63 Christ is described as the ‘Morning Star’,64 and especially here, since we are told it greatly illuminated the surface of the earth, the star is redolent of Christ as the ‘light of the world’.65 The star is also a symbol of righteous leadership.66 Meanwhile the serpent is perhaps the most powerful Christian symbol of evil featuring in numerous Biblical passages from beginning to end; for example in Genesis, where it instigates the original sin of Eve in the Garden of Eden,67 and in Revelation where the snake (or dragon) is defeated and cast out of Heaven by Michael and his army of angels – ‘that ancient serpent called the devil or Satan, who leads the whole world astray’.68 That the Christians experience their providential sign whilst travelling through the hours of darkness, but contrastingly,
62 This is a theme that has been developed by Carol Sweetenham who cites the example, included by Robert the Monk in his Historia Iherosolimitana, of the speech made by Kerbogha’s mother before the battle of Antioch where she advises her son that those who pitch themselves against God and his warriors (in this case the Franks) will surely perish: ‘the God of the Christians . . . is the All-Powerful God of all gods. If you fight the Christians, you will be fighting him and his angels. But it is the act of a lunatic to take on the All-Powerful, tantamount to self-destruction’, Robert the Monk’s History of the First Crusade, Historia Iherosolimitana, trans. by Carol Sweetenham (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), pp. 154–55 (quotation at p. 154); idem, Robert the Monk’s use of the Bible in the Historia Iherosolimitana, pp. 142–43; also see Carol Sweetenham, ‘Crusaders in a Hall of Mirrors: The Portrayal of Saracens in Robert the Monk’s Historia Iherosolimitana’, in Languages of Love and Hate: Conflict, Communication and Identity in the Medieval Mediterranean, ed. by Sarah Lambert and Helen Nicholson (Turnhout: Brepols, 2012), pp. 49–63. 63 Matthew 2:1–11. 64 e.g., Revelation 22:16, and cf., Numbers 24:17. 65 John 8:12; Matthew 5:14–16. 66 Daniel 12:3. 67 Genesis 3:1–20. 68 Revelation 12:7–9 (NIV). For a comprehensive survey of evidence relating to the various symbolic functions of the serpent in Christian and other cultures, see James H. Charlesworth, The Good and Evil Serpent: How a Universal Symbol Became Christianized (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010). On the often negative use of serpent imagery in Second Temple Judaism and the wider Mediterranean world and in particular the use of the serpent invective in the Gospel of Matthew, see Michael P. Knowles, ‘Serpents Scribes and Pharisees’, Journal of Biblical Literature, 133:1 (Spring 2014), 165–78 and esp. p. 171 on the association of burning serpents and sages (‘wise men’). Some English translations of Isaiah 14:29 and 30:6 refer to a ‘fiery flying serpent’, see for example KJV: ‘Rejoice not thou, whole Palestine, because the rod of him that smote thee is broken: for out of the serpent’s root shall come forth a cockatrice, and his fruit shall be a fiery flying serpent.’ (KJV, Isaiah 14:29).
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the Muslims experience theirs at noon, is doubtless intended to invoke numerous Biblical references to night and day.69 Of course, as presaged in the heavenly messages, Santarém duly falls to the Christians and thus the Portuguese are brought into their divinely chosen (elegit nobis) ‘inheritance’ – a land presented in the text as being of exceptional fertility and beauty. Indeed, a full eleven lines in the manuscript are given up to praising the qualities of the Santarém region.70 It is a ‘paradise of God’,71 a ‘garden of delights’72 and, importantly in a climate notorious for long arid summers, it is well watered such that it looks ‘like Segor had appeared to those arriving from Egypt’.73 Among these predominantly Biblical epithets, is the careful placement of an outstanding exception – a highly charged and specific phrase powerfully reprising the recurring theme of the changing era (transferatio regni). This is, of course, the comparison of Santarém with ‘Apulia’ which inevitably and immediately transports us to the Christian Islamic confrontations in the central Mediterranean where, by the mid-twelfth century the ever ambitious Roger II presiding over his splendid new kingdom of Sicily, one of the wonders of the medieval world for its wealth and high culture,74 was seeking to extend his power and influence in the Maghreb. More particularly, however, this is simultaneously (and perhaps preferentially) a reference to earlier Norman campaigns in the Italian peninsular south during the late eleventh century, those responsible for bringing the Christian kingdom of Sicily into being. This relatively recent and ongoing Norman colonisation meant that the bounties of the balmy regions south of Rome were well known in the wider world and were especially associated with ‘Apulia’, which, in the sources, is sometimes a toponym used rather loosely to designate Southern Italy in general.75 In 69 See for example, among numerous possibilities, Psalm 91:5–6 (‘you will not fear the terror of night . . . nor the plague that destroys at midday’. NIV). 70 Alc.415, fol. 147r-147v; Scalabis, pp. 61–62, 66–67. 71 Revelation 2:7. 72 There are numerous Biblical references to gardens, however, also of note is the title of Herrade de Landsberg’s late twelfth century encyclopaedic work, Hortus deliciarum. Further, Robert the Monk’s report of Urban II’s description of Jerusalem at the Council of Clermont includes. . . terra pre ceteris fructifera, quasi alter paradisus deliciarum . . . in Historia Iherosolimitana, ed. by Bull and Kempf, at lib. I, p. 6. 73 Scalabis, pp. 62, 67. The reference to Segor, recalls Abraham and Lot’s journey from Egypt and Lot’s choice of the fertile plain of Jordan for his dwelling place, as described in Genesis 13:1–11. 74 Cf., Joseph R. Strayer and Dana C. Munro, The Middle Ages 395–1500 (New York: AppletonCentury-Crofts, 1959), p. 180. 75 The regions of Apulia and Calabria were united into a single county (later a duchy) from 1042 until it was subsumed into the kingdom of Roger II in 1130. In the mid-twelfth century the riches of ‘Apulia’ were known to Henry of Huntingdon who, in his Historia Anglorum, (c. 1123–1154) recounts a speech supposedly delivered by a bishop to the Anglo-Norman forces prior to the Battle of the Standard in 1138 in which he said the following of the Normans: ‘No one resists you with
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any event, the chroniclers are unambiguous – Norman pilgrims and adventurers, on discovering they had arrived in a land of opportunity, from about 1000, began sending word back to their homelands in a drive to recruit reinforcements, enticing their countrymen with glowing descriptions of the wealth of the Italian domains that awaited them. Thus, Amatus of Monte Cassino reports that Normans at home were entreated to come to ‘the land which flowed with milk and honey and so many good things’.76 Likewise, William of Apulia, in his epic poem Gesta Roberti Wiscardi describes how the Norman leader Rainulf, after fortifying the newly built city of Aversa, itself located ‘in a most suitable spot, rich and fertile, lacking neither crops nor fruits, meadows nor woods – [t]here was nowhere in this world more pleasant’, sent messengers back to Normandy to recruit reinforcements: These envoys recounted how delightful and fertile Apulia was, promising wealth to the poor, and to the rich that their wealth would be still further enhanced. Hearing this, both poor and rich flocked there, the poor man that he might relive his poverty through plunder, the rich seeking to become richer still.77 To contemporaries, the parallels would have been crystal clear between southern Italy, a land offering valuable and tangible rewards for those willing to lend a hand in its conquest – either from the schismatic Greeks or from the Muslims occupying Sicily – and similar opportunities for adventurers through the conquest of Muslim lands in the Iberian Far-West. If not mentioned explicitly, it is no less a facet of the Scalabis perfectly in tune with a royal policy designed to attract reinforcements to the Portuguese frontier where shortage of manpower
impunity, brave France has tried and taken shelter, fierce England lay captive; rich Apulia flourished anew during your rule; renowned Jerusalem and noble Antioch both submitted themselves to you’; see, Henrici archidiaconi huntendunensis, Historia Anglorum (London: Longman, 1879), p. 262; Eng. trans. by John Le Patourel, The Norman Empire (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976), p. 353. 76 See G. A. Loud, ‘Coinage; Wealth and Plunder in the Age of Robert Guiscard’, The English Historical Review, 114:458 (September 1999), 815–43, at 816, and his footnote 3. 77 G. A. Loud, Translation of William of Apulia’s Deeds of Robert Guiscard (accessed 27 July 2020), p. 7. See similar examples, ‘They talked of the fertility of Apulia and of the cowardice of those who lived there [i.e. the Byzantines]’ at p. 4, and the description of Salerno which replaced Melfi as the capital of the Norman Duchy of Apulia and Calabria: ‘There is not a city in Italy more delightful than this one, filled with fruit, trees and wine, and with abundant water. It lacks neither apples nor nuts, nor fine palaces, nor indeed beautiful women and honourable men. Part of it is sited in the plain and part in the mountain, and whatever one could wish for is furnished by land and sea. At the same time, [Robert] acquired Amalfi, a wealthy city seemingly filled with people. None is richer in silver, gold and textiles from all sorts of different places’, at p. 40. It is also interesting that William opens his Book I with a reference to Daniel 2:21.
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was a continuing problem, as it was in the rest of coeval Christian Iberia. Further, foreign warriors who acquired a more lasting taste for the Hispanic lifestyle were encouraged to establish homesteads in the kingdom, settling as loyal subjects under the Portuguese crown which rewarded them accordingly for their services.78
78 See, inter alia, Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, and idem, ‘Dispatches from the Western Frontier’.
The Scalabis and Rhetoric
The King’s speech Finally, to conclude this perusal of textual highlights, a few brief observations on the use of Rhetoric in the Scalabis can scarcely be avoided since it is expressly mentioned. Heralded in the manuscript by the rubric in red ink, ab hinc rex,1 the oration of the King is carefully organised in response to the cantor’s explicit entreaty that he recount the episode according to exordium, ordinem et exitum. Although not conforming precisely to the Ciceronian model, which famously divided a speech into six parts, the appeal to the ancient preceptive tradition of the oratory craft is clear.2 Indeed, in their advice to future speakers or writers, all three of the new rhetorical genres that were to emerge during the broad period contemplated for the production of the Scalabis, the ars dictaminis from the 1080s, the ars poetriae from the 1170s, and the ars praedecandi from about 1200, emphasise the crucial importance of planning. Perhaps most fundamental of all Cicero’s parts, due to its capacity to encapsulate most other prescriptive formulae, was the concept of ‘arrangement’ (dispositio) prescribed in his De Inventione, a work enjoying notably wide circulation in the High Middle Ages, which concerned the distribution of elements (arguments discovered in the inventio) in the proper order (dispositio est rerum in ordinem distributio).3 It is unlikely to be mere chance that the author of the Scalabis, in limiting himself to only three parts, does not omit the crucial ordo,4 to which he affords a literal centrality.5
1 BNP, Alc.415, fol. 147r. 2 Ernst Robert Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, trans. from German by Willard R. Transk (New York: Pantheon Books, 1953), p. 64. On the various routes of transmission of the rhetorical paideia from the ancient world see inter alia, James J. Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages, A History of Rhetorical Theory from Saint Augustine to the Renaissance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974), pp. 74–75; Matthew Kempshall, Rhetoric and the Writing of History, 400–1500 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2011). 3 Cicero, De Inventione, 1:9, in Cicero, De Inventione, De Optimo Genere, Topica, trans. by H. M. Hubbell (London: Heinemann, 1949), pp. 18–19. 4 ordo, ordinis (hence ordinem in the accusative). 5 Cf., Whilhelm Wuellner, ‘Arrangement’, in Handbook of Classical Rhetoric in the Hellenistic Period, 330 B.C.-A.D. 400, ed. by Stanley E. Porter (Leiden: Brill, 1997), pp. 51–87, esp. 69. Due
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Of course, there can be little doubt that the Scalabis is a carefully planned work and, although Gabriel Spiegel has commented, ‘the medieval historian honoured rhetorical rules of composition more in the breach than in practice’ on account of his ‘literary limitations’ (i.e., his inadequate grasp of rhetorical principle) the impression here is rather of a skilled composer crafting his work much in the pioneering spirit engendered by Hrabanus Maurus in his De institutione clericorum (produced in 819),6 or later by Alberic of Monte Cassino (c. 1030 – c. 1094–1099) in his enterprising works on the ars dictamini,7 selecting and including in a pragmatic way only those elements that suit his purposes, not fearing to step outside norms perhaps as much in his use of the principles of Rhetoric as in his use of Biblical and other references.8 Exordium Certainly the King’s oration can be shown to adhere to the arrangement indicated in the proem and, accordingly the exordium (which in the Ciceronian model is the place for the exposition of the subject and purpose of the speech, and where the speaker should also establish his credibility and gain the sympathy of his audience) is very clearly assembled to achieve more or less exactly those ends. Thus, we learn that: the King is the beneficiary of extraordinary divine favour for which he is duly beholden; Santarém, the ‘best defended city’ has been captured by a very small force; the capture has been affected previously but only through starvation at the hands of the King’s grandfather, the mighty ‘Emperor of the Spains’ Alfonso VI (implying a lengthy blockade by a large and powerful army); Santarem is awesomely fortified by man and nature, presenting serious difficulties to those who should try to take it by siege. Encomium Urbis Notable also in the exordium is the description of Santarem judiciously rendered according to topoi for the laudation of cities, including fortifications, aesthetic
to variations between different antique schools the number of parts or sections of an oration were not universally agreed upon; cf., Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, p. 71. 6 Hrabanus Maurus, De institutione clericorum, ed. and trans. Detlev Zimpel, 2 vols. Fontes Christiani, 61 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2006). 7 Alberico de Montecassino, Dictamini radii (or Flores rhetorici) ed. by Don Mauro Inguanez and H. M. Willard, in Miscellanea Cassinese 14 (Monte Cassino, 1938); idem, Breviarium de dictamine, ed. Filippo Bognini, Edizione Nazionale dei Testi Mediolatini 21, Serie 1/12 (Florence: SISMEL, Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2008). 8 Cf., Gabriel Spiegel, ‘Political Utility in Medieval Historiography: A Sketch’, History and Theory, 14:3 (October 1975), 314–25, at 318. On the influence of Hrabanus Maurus and Alberic of Monte Cassino in the foreshadowing of the application of Rhetorical principles in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, see, inter alia, James Murphy, ‘Introduction’, in Three Medieval Rhetorical Arts, ed. by idem (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), pp. xiii–xiv; idem, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages, pp. 43–88; idem, ‘Western Rhetoric in the Middle Ages’, in Latin Rhetoric and Education in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, ed. by idem (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), vol. I, p. 9.
The Scalabis and Rhetoric 45 beauty, fertility of lands and health of local waters or rivers, all of which, along with several other items, are prescribed in a branch of classical rhetoric variously termed laudes urbium, encomium urbis or laus civis.9 An example of Eulogy, one of the most important divisions of the antique art of Epideixis, the encomium urbis passed into the Middle Ages as a distinct genre in both poetry and prose.10 The earliest medieval examples occur in Italy in the eighth century where a Lombard in about 738, or shortly afterwards, produced a rhythmical poem in praise of Milan,11 the practice spreading in the Carolingian world thereafter, and becoming especially present in England by the twelfth century with the appearance of ornamented and encomiastic descriptions of London, Scarborough, Exeter, Oxford and Chester.12 In Iberia, the topoi for describing places received from earlier Hellenistic tradition were applied to Hispania by authors such as Pliny and Solinus whose works were imbibed by Isidore of Seville. His highly influential De Laude Spaniae (or laus Spaniae), the proem to his History of the Goths, is packed with key ingredients including describing Spain as ‘the most beautiful’, having an ‘abundance of everything fruitful’, being rich in olive trees and vines, with shores ‘full of fish’, where crops are grown (‘fruits of the fields’) in a well-irrigated land (‘fertile with overflowing rivers’), and possessing gold-bearing rivers (‘tawny with gold-flowing torrents’).13 Each of these elements mutatis mutandi along with the topos (very relevant in this case) of the strength of fortifications, occupy their due place in the Scalabis. Within this schema we further note the deployment of
9 Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, pp. 155–58; J. K. Hyde, ‘Medieval Descriptions of Cities’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 48 (1965–1966), 308–40; John Scattergood, ‘Misrepresenting the City: Genre, Intertextuality and FitzStephen’s Description of London (c. 1173)’, in Reading the Past, Essays on Medieval and Renaissance Literature, ed. by idem (Dublin: Four Court Press, 1996), pp. 15–36; Paolo Zanna, ‘Descriptiones urbium’ and Elegy in Latin and Vernaculars, in the early Middle Ages’, Studi Medievali, 3rd series (1991), 523–96; Helen Fulton, ‘The Encomium Urbis in Medieval Welsh Poetry’, Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium, 2006/2007, 26:27 (2006/2007), 54–72. 10 Greek rhetoricians had formulated principles of Epideixis, an elevated style of demonstrative oratory delivered at public ceremonial events in the classical world, which included stipulations for the encomium Urbis; however, in the Medieval world these were known only in an attenuated form through late-Roman handbooks on Rhetoric; Hyde, ‘Medieval Descriptions of Cities’, p. 310; Curtius European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, p. 157. 11 Poetae Latini Minores, ed. by E. Duemmler, MGH, Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini (Berlin: Weidmann, 1881), vol. 1, pp. 24–26; Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, p. 157; Scattergood, ‘Misrepresenting the City’, p. 23, Zana, ‘Descriptiones urbium’, p. 524. With reference to the same, Hyde observes, ‘Italian history being, up to the nineteenth century, mainly local history, descriptions and surveys of cities and their territories were an important constituent of Italian historical literature’, Hyde, ‘Medieval Descriptions of Cities’, p. 309. 12 Scattergood, ‘Misrepresenting the City’, p. 24. 13 English translations are by Kenneth Baxter Wolf, ‘Isidore of Seville, History of the Kings of the Goths’, in Conquerors and Chroniclers of Early Medieval Spain, trans. with notes and introduction by Kenneth Baxter Wolf (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1999), pp. 67–68. On the gold-bearing Tagus, see Isidori Hispalensis episcopi etymologiarum sive originum libri XX, ed. by Wallace Martin Lindsay, 2 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, c. 1911 – reprint, 1988), vol. 2 Lib. XIV. iv, §29 and also the list of references given by Guilermo Galán Vioque, Martial, Book VII. A Commentary, Eng. trans. by J. J. Zotowski (Leiden: Brill, 2002), p. 476.
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the ‘lost for words’ or ‘inexpressibility’ topos,14 as the King implores, ‘How therefore could I describe the beauty? What will I say about fertility?’ Like William FitzStephen in his (lengthy) acclaim of London written between 1173 and 1175 prefaced to his Vita Sancti Thomae,15 the author of the Scalabis (more shortly) purposes through praise to establish the prestige of Santarém by writing in a readily recognisable genre the origins of which lie very conspicuously in the ancient world.16 In this way nudging his audience to make the classical association, he places Santarém in the same roll call of worthiness as other cities that have been the subject of encomia – an illustrious register which includes Rome, Troy, Athens, extending into the antique past in a long line rooted in the heroic age of Homer.17 Ordinem The second movement of the oration, the ordo, the beginning of which is proclaimed in the exclamatory ‘Let’s come to the matter being in hand, and explain how [Santarém] was captured’, sets out the facts in their proper order, according to the Ciceronian despositio. Accordingly, we learn: the date of the event; of the danger presented to Coimbra by the Muslims of Santarém; that the King has made previous attempts to capture the city but these have ended in failure; that those who might ordinarily be expected to participate in an expedition to capture the city avoided doing so by alleging illness; that treaties were in place with the Muslims which further complicated matters; that serious consideration, therefore, was necessary in order to devise a strategy whereby the conquest of the fortress could be carried out; of the reconnaissance undertaken and of the journey to the place of the action. The King’s speech of encouragement to his warriors outlines the method by which the fortress is to be overcome. Here the objection is raised by the warriors
14 In antique epideixis the orator ‘finds no words’ sufficient to praise the thing/person celebrated, Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, pp. 159–62; Zanna, ‘Descriptiones urbium’, p. 525. 15 ‘Descriptio nobilissimae civitas Lundoniae’, in Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, ed. by J. C. Robertson, Rolls Series 67 (London: HMSO, 1877, Kraus Reprint 1965), vol. III, pp. 2–13. See also, Elenchus Fontium Historiae Urbanae, vol. II, Part 2, ed. by Susan Reynolds, Wietse de Boer, and Gearoid Mac Niocaill (Leiden: Brill, 1988), No. 48, pp. 76–83. For an English translation, see Leo T. Gourde, An Annotated Translation of the Life of St Thomas Becket by William FitzStephen (Masters Dissertation, Loyola University Chicago, 1943), pp. 2–18. 16 Scattergood, ‘Misrepresenting the City’, p. 26. 17 See generally Theodore Chalon Burgess, ‘Epideictic Literature’, Studies in Classical Philology III (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1902), pp. 89–242; Jeffrey Stephen Ruth, The City Encomium in Medieval and Humanist Spain (Doctoral Dissertation, City University of New York, 2002), pp. 49–121. An encomiastic description of Atlantis is included by Plato in Critias; Timaeus and Critias, Eng. trans with introductions and notes by A. E Taylor (London: Routledge, 2013) Critias, t. 115, a-c, p. 117.
The Scalabis and Rhetoric 47 to the King’s participation in the action. Aires Nascimento has suggested that if this may take the place of the classical refutatio, then a corresponding confirmatio is presented in the appearance of the signs in the sky, a shooting star for the Christians, a serpent for the Muslims.18 Exitus The exitus, here clearly denoting the outcome or conclusion, presents the King in the moment of victory, sinking to his knees in the threshold of the successfully opened gates of Santarém gratefully worshipping God for the victory now granted (perhaps an echo of the First Crusaders immediately in their moment of victory, leaving the fighting and going to the Holy Sepulchre to sing the Office of the Resurrection). Importantly this short section includes an instance of praeteritio, the rhetorical device of the announcement of an intention to leave certain things unsaid.19 In his moment of thankfulness, it ‘belongs not’ to the narrator/King (non est meum) to enumerate the numerous combats that have led to this triumphal climax, but to those who have taken part in them (qui interfuerunt). Thus, it is an achievement of a whole community and, by implication, God has specially favoured both it and its king.20
Eloquence of kingship Altogether, the King’s oration is an accomplished piece of complicated literature deploying a range of intricate classical paraphernalia. Indeed, it is important they not be missed, which is why they are sign-posted in the proem, edissere nobis geste rei prodigiose exordium, ordinem et exitum – here comes some fancy rhetorical footwork – see how many moves you can spot! However, it is unlikely this impressive display of learning is intended merely as a showcase for a talented author. In fact, it is entirely apposite and highly desirable that the King be shown to speak well. The twelfth and early thirteenth centuries saw the crystallisation of a list of qualities sought for, even necessary, in a virtuous and legitimate ruler. These elements were later compiled into the didactic canon of the mirror for princes genre especially popular from the fourteenth century, and, along another
18 Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, p. 1222. The proposition is perhaps a little maladroit. Cicero, for example, in his formulation anticipating a peroratio (conclusion with a summing up), placed confirmatio before refutatio, setting out detailed rules for each; De Inventione, respectively at I, 34–77 (pp. 68–123) and I, 78–96 (pp. 122–45). 19 Also variously termed apophasis, parasiopesis, paralipsis. Cf., Aires Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, p. 1222. On Praeteritio, see, Heinrich Lausberg and David E. Orton, Handbook of Literary Rhetoric: A Foundation for Literary Study (Leiden: Brill, 2002), p. 393, para 882 and p. 394, para 885 for examples including from Cicero, Vergil, Quintillian and Martianus Capella. The Rhetorica ad Herennium treats of paralipsis at IV. xxvi. 37; Ad C. Herennium, De Ratione Dicendi, Eng. trans. by Harry Caplan (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1954), p. 321. 20 Cf., Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, p. 1223.
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track, were also developed and expanded in manuals of statesmanship from John of Salisbury’s Policraticus (c. 1159) to the writings of the Renaissance humanists, Petrarch, Machiavelli and beyond. In Iberia, the essential skills of kingship informing the ethos of the twelfthcentury that had existed as an evolving inventory, if not properly inchoate, in disparate form, scattered throughout numerous ecclesiastical writings drawing on a range of classical and early Christian works, Plato, Plutarch, Augustine, PseudoCyprian and, importantly, a corpus of antique military manuals, were brought together between 1252 and 1284 and distilled into the Siete Partidas. This mammoth assemblage of ‘laws’ compiled under Alfonso X of Castile (el Sabio) presents a complete codified system for the administration of the Church and the government of the kingdom. Of particular interest here is the contents of the ‘Secunda Partida’ which was handsomely summed up by Robert I. Burns as being concerned with ‘three allied foundations of the earthly kingdom: governance and the role of a king, defence and the art of war, and higher education as a central resource and sacral binding of governance’.21 It is a thematic union foreshadowed in the Scalabis. In this respect, the eloquence of the King can be seen as serving at least two functions. Firstly, and more broadly, the King’s oration, which forms some 90% of the entire work, in its fine technical execution shows him a competent and educated ruler. Here, a principal part of the underlying message is that a ruler should be learned and that his knowledge should benefit his people and contribute to the common good. This is treated especially in the ‘Secunda Partida’ at V, xvi, which stipulates a king should be ‘eager to learn’ so that he can be wise like David and Solomon – ‘[kings] should learn the sciences and should not forget them, for by means of them they would have to judge and protect their people’.22 Importantly, this is likely an echo of the teaching contained in Vegetius’s Late Roman Epitoma rei militaris (also known as De re militari) where it is prescribed that a ruler’s learning should be unmatched and ‘benefit all of his subjects’.23 Produced between 383 and 450, the Epitoma was to become the principal authority on military affairs throughout the Middle Ages, a period in which it enjoyed a circulation so prolific that, as Christopher Allmand has remarked, Vegetius came to be almost synonymous with war’,24 and, whilst its influence is clearly manifest throughout 21 Robert I. Burns, ‘Introduction’, in Las Siete Partidas, trans. by Samuel Parsons Scott, ed. by Robert I. Burns, 5 vols (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001), vol. 2, Medieval Government: The World of Kings and Warriors, p. ix. 22 Las Seite Partidas, vol. 2, p. 294. 23 Vegetius: Epitome of Military Science, Eng. trans. with notes and introduction by N. P. Milner (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1996), p. 1. 24 Well over 200 Latin manuscript copies are known to have survived and the work was from the thirteenth century translated into various vernaculars. See M. D. Reeve, ‘The Transmission of Vegetius’, Epitoma rei Militaris’, Aevum, 74 (2000), 243–354; Charles R. Shrader, ‘A Handlist of Extant Manuscripts Containing the De re militari of Flavius Vegetius Renatus’, Scriptorium 33 (1979), 280–305. Shrader’s list of 324 manuscripts that were produced between 600 and 1600 has now been updated and extended by Christopher Allmand who provides a complete list of
The Scalabis and Rhetoric 49 the ‘Secunda Partida’, as we shall see later it may very well have also shaped elements in the Scalabis.25 Secondly, in a somewhat narrower respect but perhaps no less important, the eloquence of the King is a quintessential part of his military effectiveness, which in the epoch of the Scalabis, extended laterally to become a vital element in a sovereign’s claim to legitimate rulership. The antique military manuals held oratory skill in high esteem, emphasising its practical application in the inspiration of troops in the minutes before a battle is joined, and in rousing spirits when warriors have become downhearted or despairing.26 In harmony with the King’s ‘speech within a speech’ of the Scalabis, Vegetius had well understood the importance of keeping up morale among troops and had emphasised the crucial duty of every commander effectively to address his warriors before combat – a hands-on measure to boost a warrior’s confidence in his essential ability to go forth and vanquish.27 Ultimately the sources accessible to the author of the Scalabis are unknown to us, and whilst it is entirely possible the Epitoma, or extracts from it (assembled in florilegia, specula or other compendia), were available to him, Vegetius, although the most popular authority, was by no means the only author to treat of such matters.28 Nevertheless, several distinct nuggets of military wisdom
25 26 27 28
extant manuscripts (Latin, Vernacular and Excerpts) in his The De Re Militari of Vegetius, the Reception, Transmission and Legacy of a Roman Text in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 355–66. The quotation is at p. 7. On the date of production, see N. P. Milner’s, ‘Introduction’, in Vegetius: Epitome of Military Science pp. xxxvii–xli. For a useful overview see Maria João Branco, ‘Vegetius’, in Os Grandes Mestres da Estratégia, Estudos sobre o Poder da Guerra e da Paz, ed. by Ana Paula Garcês and Guilherme D’Oliveira Martins (Coimbra: Almedina, 2009), pp. 156–88. Vegetius is mentioned by name in the work, at XXI, ii, where he is described as ‘a wise man’ (sabio), Siete Partidas, vol. 2, p. 418. Frequently the work refers to ‘ancients’ of whom Vegetius is undoubtedly one; Allmand, The De Re Militari of Vegetius, The Reception, p. 96. John R. E. Bliese, ‘Rhetoric Goes to War: The Doctrine of Ancient and Medieval Military Manuals’, Rhertoric Society Quarterly, 24 (Summer–Autumn, 1994, 1995), 105–30, 111. Allmand, The De Re Militari of Vegetius, the Reception, p. 258; Bliese, ‘Rhetoric Goes to War’, pp. 110–11. Alfonso V of León (994–1028) is known to have possessed a copy of the Epitoma in the early eleventh century; Max Manitus, Handschriften antiker Autoren in mittelalterlichen Bibliothekskatalogen (Leipzig: Harrassowitz 1935), p. 204; Allmand, The De Militari of Vegetius: The Reception, p. 67. It has been suggested that Vegetius’s Epitoma has survived in many monastic collections due to its being copied as a potentially valuable aid to the exegesis of Old Testament war books including, Joshua, Kings and Maccabees; Gregory Hays, ‘Review of The De Militari of Vegetius: The Reception etc.’, Speculum, 87:4 (October 2012), pp. 1156–57. Cf., Allmand, The De Militari of Vegetius: The Reception, p. 64. For examples of other military manuals available in the medieval period, see Christopher Allmand, ‘A Roman Text on War. The Strategemata of Frontinus in the Middle Ages’, in Soldiers, Nobles and Gentlemen. Essays in Honour of Maurice Keen, ed. by P. Coss and C. Tyerman (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2009), 153–68. For Byzantine examples see, inter alia, Constantine Porphyrogenitus: Three Treatises on Imperial military Expeditions, ed. by and trans. by J. F. Haldon, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae, 28, Series Vindobonensis (Vienna: Osterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1990); E. McGreer, Sowing the Dragon’s
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are included in the Scalabis which are substantially redolent of his work – and which, in any event, denote elements (whatever their source) that very obviously resided in the warrior zeitgeist of twelfth/early thirteenth-century Christian Iberia, many of which would later be collated in the Siete Partidas. Among these we note the use of spies and intelligence gathering, the importance of secrecy, travelling undetected through enemy lands, keeping the troops in ignorance of the final destination,29 and the nurture of warrior morale through the delivery of appropriate and timely orations.30 This latter element, in addition to generally rousing warriors to victorious battle, also included stirring in them motives for anger (the King reminds his men of the years of devastation brought to their city of Coimbra and its region)31 and – an item included by Vegetius only obliquely, but most explicitly by the author of the Scalabis and in the ‘Secunda Partida’– lying to them where good might result.32
29
30
31 32
Teeth: Byzantine Warfare in the 10th Century, Dumbarton Oaks Studies 33 (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1996); and, more generally, Catherine Holmes, ‘Byzantine Political Culture and Compilation Literature in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries, Some Preliminary Inquiries’, Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 64 (2010), 55–80. ‘find out everything from intelligent men . . . and those who know the localities . . . be careful to preserve secrecy concerning the places and routes by which the army is to proceed . . . the safest policy on expeditions is deemed to be keeping people ignorant of what one is going to do . . . a safe march is that which the enemy least expect to be made’, Epitoma, III, 6, pp. 73–74. Cf., Siete Partidas, vol. 2, XXI, vi, p. 420, XXII, i, p. 433, XXVI, xi. pp. 480–81. ‘An army gains courage and fighting spirit from advice and encouragement from their general, especially if they are given such an account of the coming battle as leads them to believe they will win a victory’, Epitome, III, xii, p. 92. Also ‘When the men despair, their courage is raised by an address from the general, and if he appears fearless himself, their spirits are raised’, III ix, p. 85, and ‘appropriate exhortations’ at III xxv, p. 115. Cf., Siete Partidas, vol. 2, XXI, vii, p. 420–21, XXI, xxii, p. 429–30, XXIII, xxii, p. 453, ‘also say anything by which the soldiers’ minds may be provoked to hatred of their adversaries by arousing anger and indignation’, Epitoma, III, xii, p. 92. Vegetius admonishes, ‘Never lead forth a soldier to a general engagement except when you see that he expects victory’, Epitoma, III, xxvi, p. 117. In the Scalabis, the King confesses the untruth he told to his warriors before the engagement that elements of the watch in Santarém had been suborned. Compare the advice of the Siete Partidas, ‘avoid falsehood, except under such circumstances where a lie may be productive of some great advantage . . . evil be avoided, or good produced’, vol. 2, XXI, xxii, p. 430.
The glory of kings
In the present state of knowledge, if there is discernible in the Scalabis the fossilised impression of a feast for the conquest of Santarém, the question of its existence in any full-bodied form, plump with antiphons, responsories, music and all of the other accoutrements of a genuine historia, remains a dim and murky affair. Next there is the mystery of its ever being celebrated – anywhere, anytime, by anyone. It is therefore perhaps fitting to bring this introduction to a close with some short comments noting a handful of clues and connections which future research may one day be able to elucidate, for, as the proverb says – ‘It is the glory of God to conceal a matter; to search out a matter is the glory of kings’.1
Santa Cruz In Santa Cruz, long considered to have been the source of the Scalabis, or at least the testimony upon which it was based, there was certainly personal and detailed knowledge of the Jerusalem Feast as celebrated in the Holy Sepulchre. Two of the principal founders of Santa Cruz, the priests Teotónio, first prior of the house whom we have already encountered, and his erstwhile tutor, Telo (c. 1076–1136), formerly archdeacon of the cathedral of Coimbra, each had made pilgrimages to Jerusalem in the early years following the 1099 conquest. Telo, some year’s Teotónio’s senior, was the first of the two to travel to the Holy Land in the entourage of Bishop Mauritius of Coimbra during 1104–1108, fresh in the wake of the Frankish victory.2 From Telo’s Vita we learn that, during
1 Proverbs 25:2 (NIV). 2 E. Austin, O’Malley, F. S. C., Tello and Theotonio, the Twelfth Century Founders of the Monastery of Santa Cruz in Coimbra (Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 1954), pp. 39–40. The English pilgrim Seawulf, writes of his adventures in the Holy Land in the period 1102–1103 immediately before the arrival of Telo and Mauritius; The Pilgrimage of Seawulf, Eng. trans. by William Robert Bernard Brownlow (New York: AMS Press, 1971). Telo is described as ‘the first Portuguese to see the Holy Land’ by Carl Erdmann, A Idea de Cruzada em Portugal (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, 1940), p. 7. On Santa Cruz and its founders see also António Cruz, Santa Cruz de Coimbra na cultura portuguesa da Idade Media (Porto: Biblioteca Púbica Municipal, 1964); and Saul António Gomes, In Limine Conscriptionis (Coimbra: Palimage Editores, 2007).
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his travels in Palestine and in Constantinople, the archdeacon made a study of the practices of the several religious orders he encountered.3 Here then is fertile territory for the import of liturgical innovation; however, in this respect, beyond general observations concerning Telo’s being impressed by the obedience, dedication and humility manifest in various communities, the fastidiousness with which superiors provided for their care, and the strong bonds of caritas that united the different orders, his Vita is disappointingly lacking in detail. However, the recorded adventures of Teotónio (1082–1162), canon and prior of the cathedral chapter of Viseu before assuming the leadership of Santa Cruz, show a little more promise for informing more directly some of the circumstances conditioning the production of the Scalabis. According to his Vita he had made two pilgrimages to Jerusalem, the first of which, during 1112–1119, would have been coincident with a most important phase in the life of the Holy Sepulchre.4 In 1114, the secular canons, originally installed in the patriarchal church by Godfrey of Bouillon in August of 1099,5 were reorganised under the Augustinian Rule, an important step bringing the functioning of the Holy Sepulchre into conformity with Reform ideals. In this process, the liturgy would have been reworked and collated to facilitate the communal performance of the Daily Office.6 Importantly, among the various influences detectible in the liturgy as it emerged at that time, Christina Dondi has identified a certain ‘Chartres component’ in the Jerusalem Feast.7 This she attributes to the recruitment of a new member to the canonical body of the Holy Sepulchre, the chronicler Fulcher of Chartres, who joined the community in the very year of its reorganisation.8 Among other things, Fulcher’s position as chaplain to Baldwin I and his intimate links with the ecclesiastical hierarchy of Jerusalem are strong indications of his likely influence in the confection of the liturgy, including the Jerusalem Feast.9 Importantly, passages from the Historia Hierosolymitana, his great chronicle of the First Crusade and its aftermath up to the mid-1120s,10 were used for the Matins Lessons and in the lessons of the Mass for the Jerusalem Feast, specifically, Fulcher’s description of the city of
3 O’ Malley, Tello and Theotonio, p. 40; Vita Tellonis/Vida de D. Telo, in Hagiografia de Santa Cruz de Coimbra, ed. and trans. by Aires A. Nascimento (Lisbon: Edicões Colibri, 1998), pp. 54–137 at pp. 56–59. See also Aires A. Nascimento, ‘Santa Cruz de Coimbra: as motivações de uma fundação regular’, in Actas do 2° congresso histórico de Guimarães (Guimarães: Edição da Câmara Municipal de Guimarães e da Universidade do Minho, 1996), vol. IV, pp. 119–27. 4 O’Malley, p. 24; Vita Theotonii, pp. 96–99. 5 Malcolm Barber, The Crusader States (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), p. 21; Hamilton, The Latin Church in the Crusader States, pp. 12–14. 6 Sebastian Ernesto Salvadó, The Liturgy of the Holy Sepulchre and the Templar Rite (Doctoral Dissertation, Stanford University, 2011), pp. 23–24. 7 Dondi, The Liturgy of the Canons Regular, p. 59. 8 Ibid., pp. 59–60; Verona Epp, Fulcher von Chartres (Dusseldorf: Droste, 1990), p. 27; Epp postulates he occupied the position of thesaurarius. 9 Linder, ‘The Liturgy of the Liberation’, p. 111. 10 The work is known in two versions, the first taking events up to 1124, the second up to 1127.
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the Jerusalem, and his narrative of the 1099 siege.11 The chronicle went into circulation even before Fulcher had completed it and it was read and copied probably from as early as 1106.12 This being so, it is highly likely it was in liturgical use in the Holy Sepulchre by the time of the pilgrimages of Telo and Teotónio. In the case of Teotónio who, if his Vita is reliable, was present in the Holy Sepulchre at or near the time the canons adopted the Augustinian Rule, and who (like Telo) was famously possessed of a good education, we may suppose he associated with equally lettered contemporaries in the Holy Sepulchre, perhaps those especially involved in the revision of the liturgy, such as Arnulf of Chocques, ‘one of the most influential characters in the shaping of the ecclesiastical structure of the Latin East during the nearly two decades after the establishment of the kingdom of Jerusalem’,13 the cantor Ansellus, formerly of Notre-Dame in Paris,14 and even Fulcher himself. Certainly, in the liturgical use of passages from Fulcher’s Historia, here was ample precedent for the use of secular material as readings in Matins, the service from which the text of the Scalabis appears to derive. By the time of Teotónio’s second pilgrimage to Jerusalem, during the period 1126–1130, the Jerusalem Feast was firmly established. His Vita recounts that he spent ‘many days’ in the company of the canons of the Holy Sepulchre whom he so impressed with his piety that they invited him to join their community so that he might help them in their care of the shrine.15 Teotónio accepted their offer but requested he be allowed first to return to Portugal to set his affairs in order and to dispose of his property there. On his homecoming, he was persuaded to fulfil his religious calling by remaining in Portugal and joining Telo and others in the foundation, in 1131–1132, of Santa Cruz,16 established purposely, following the Holy Sepulchre, in the Augustinian model, and which would swiftly become the spiritual powerhouse of the early Portuguese monarchy. Sadly, here the trail goes cold. Although Teotónio’s decision not to return to Jerusalem changed the course of Portuguese ecclesiastical (and probably political) history,17 there is no record of any celebration at all in Coimbra of the conquest of Jerusalem nor, for that matter, of Santarém. This should not surprise us. Whilst maintenance of outward signs of association with the Holy Sepulchre were doubtless of great importance to the canons of Santa Cruz,18 wholesale copying of its liturgy would have made little sense to them. Well they would have understood
11 Linder, ‘The Liturgy of the Liberation’, pp. 123, 128. 12 Ibid., p. 123. R. Ryan, ‘Introduction’, in A History of the Expedition, trans. by Frances R. Ryan, introduction by Harold S. Fink (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1969), pp. 21–22. 13 See Dondi, The Liturgy of the Canons Regular, pp. 49–57, quotation is at p. 49. 14 Aspesi, ‘The Cantors of the Holy Sepulchre’, pp. 278–96; Dondi, The Liturgy of the Canons Regular, pp. 57–58. 15 Vida de São Teotónio, ed. Nascimento, pp. 118–19. 16 Ibid. 17 Wilson, ‘Dispatches from the Western Frontier’, pp. 22–23. 18 Mattoso, Ricos Homens, pp. 199–200.
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that the liturgy confected for the seat of the Patriarch of Jerusalem was intended to be specific to that uniquely hallowed place.19
Alcobaça Since the unique manuscript of the Scalabis is found in a codex in the monastery of Alcobaça we can at least expect it served some utility in that institution; however, from among the numerous manuscripts surviving from its library, no liturgical calendar that has so far come to light lists any feast specifically for the conquest of Santarém. Nevertheless, there is good evidence that the text was used in some way in connection with commemorations for the foundation of the house. Present on folio 146v., the final page of Orosius’s Historia, following the colophon, and occupying the entirety of the remaining space on the page, a text has been added in a fifteenth-century hand (transcribed herein at Appendix I). Given its content, and noting that the Scalabis begins immediately at the top of the lefthand column of 147r. (i.e., immediately following on) it is clear the addition has been made to serve as an introduction or prologue. It recounts the old foundation myth of the monastery of Alcobaça, a supernatural episode supposedly taking place shortly prior to Afonso Henriques’s conquest of Santarém. Although the legend itself appears to have crystallised probably towards the end of the thirteenth century,20 the earliest manuscript testimonials do not appear until the fifteenth century. Besides the text in Alc.415, which may be the earliest to survive,21 there are three more also from the fifteenth century which recount the legend in slightly differing versions. One, contained in the so called IVª Crónica Breve de Santa Cruz de Coimbra,22 is so closely related to the Alc.415 version that Lindley Cintra had erroneously concluded the latter to be a mere copy of the former.23 Meanwhile, another rendition is to be found in the Crónica de Portugal de 1419,24 and a fourth is contained in an extract copied in 1484 by Abbot Pedro
19 Salvadó, The Liturgy of the Holy Sepulcrhe, pp. 8, 142, 163, 188–91 and passim. 20 See note 23, below. 21 João Soalheiro, ‘ “Traditio Fundationis”: O mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça e a interpretação do passado cisterciense do Reino de Portugal em tempos medievais’, in De Cister a Portugal: O tempo e o(s) modo(s). Livro do XI Encontro Cultural de S. Cristóvão de Lafões, ed. Maria Alegria Fernandes Marques and Luís Carlos Amaral (São Cristóvão de Lafões: Associação dos Amigos do Mosteiro de São Cristóvão de Lafões, 2016), pp. 33–124, pp. 250–52. 22 Crónicas Breves e Memórias Avulsas de S. Cruz de Coimbra, ed. by Fernando Venâncio Peixoto da Fonseca (Lisbon: CLPIC, 2000), pp. 65–74, at p. 70. 23 Cintra, Cronica Geral de Espanha de 1344, vol. 1 p. CCCLXXIII. If the text underlying the IVª Cronica Breve and the inscribed text in Alc.415, are derivative of a text originating in the late thirteenth century as advocated by Filipe Alves Moreira, or indeed at the beginning of the fourteenth century as others have argued, then the legend must have crystallised sometime between the copying of the Scalabis in the mid-thirteenth century and the beginning of the fourteenth century. See Filipe Alves Moreira, A Crónica de Portugal de 1419: Fontes, Estratégias e Posteridade (Porto: Faculdade de Letras do Porto, 2010) and cf., Cocheril, Etudes, p. 312. 24 Cróncia de Portugal de 1419, pp. 38–39.
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Serrano of Santa Maria de Piedra in Aragon, during his official visit to Alcobaça in that year, from a now lost work he found in the abbey library and which has recently been the subject of a study by João Soalheiro.25 According to this legend, one Pedro, described as ‘brother’ to King Afonso Henriques, is instrumental in facilitating the miraculous participation of St Bernard in the conquest of Santarém by encouraging Afonso Henriques to vow to found a monastery for Bernard’s Order on a vast estate in (what is today known as) Portuguese Estremadura, if the saint will intercede with the Almighty to grant the Portuguese king victory in his coming attack on the formidable and strategic Muslim fortress. In France, the king’s vow is immediately and miraculously revealed to Bernard who, obligingly, mediates the divine intervention necessary to bring about of the Christian triumph. Sure enough, the victory is achieved, and Afonso Henriques fulfils his promise by founding Alcobaça as a Cistercian monastery under the auspices of Bernard and Clairvaux. It is hard to overstate the significance of the victory at Santarém as a critical achievement in the process of formation of the autonomous kingdom of Portugal. Not only did it neutralise a dangerous powerbase of enemy activity from where had been launched numerous and notorious attacks on the Christian north, especially on Coimbra and its surrounds, but it also brought a vast swathe of new territory under Portuguese control. Only seven months later, largely predicated upon the capture of Santarém and achieved with the crucial help of northern European crusaders, the conquest of Lisbon gathered even more territory for the Portuguese crown, consolidating the advances of the spring and driving the frontier down to the eminently defendable natural barrier of the Tagus. These accomplishments within a few short years certainly did lead to the establishment of the monastery of Alcobaça, founded from Clairvaux in 1152–1153 under Bernard, pursuant to an agreement compacted with Afonso Henriques.26 In this, the Portuguese king had moved swiftly to exploit his links with the Burgundian abbot, whose monks had been establishing communities in his domains with his support probably from the late 1130s. Whatever his professions to piety, the king was a realist. If he were to retain his conquests, he needed to harness renowned Cistercian expertise in land-taming and cultivation and bring it to bear on his newly won terrains in Portuguese Extremadura to attract settlers and consolidate his achievement.27 On this basis it is of course conceivable that the Scalabis had been used for readings in circumstances to do with celebrations of the origins of the house, possibly read out in the Refectory during mealtimes, or used for readings at appropriate times in the liturgical cycle. Certainly codex Alc.415 is likely to be a legendarium or choir book as indicated by its large dimensions which allow for an increased
25 Soalheiro, ‘Traditio fundationis’, pp. 119–22, and see pp. 78–81 for a useful table comparing the relevant passages in IVª Crónica Breve, Alc.415, and the text copied by Pedro Serrano. 26 DR, No. 243, pp. 297–98. 27 Cf., Artur Gusmão, A Real Abadia de Alcobaça (Lisbon: Editora Ulisseia, 1948), pp. 25–26.
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size of lettering for ease of reading in situations of reduced light, for example the candlelight of the office of Matins celebrated in the small hours, perhaps around 2:00 a.m., well before dawn.
Santarém As for the possible celebration of a Feast in the city of Santarém itself, the seventeenth-century historian Jorge Cardoso (1606–1669), in an intriguing passage in his vast, encyclopedic (and unfinished) Agiologia Lusitano, mentions the existence of an annual celebration in Santarém commemorating the 1147 Christian victory. Having proclaimed St Michael the Archangel the patron saint of Santarém and, indeed the guardian angel of the entire kingdom, Cardoso relates that the inhabitants of Santarém built a chapel to the saint in that same year of 1147 to commemorate the conquest of the city. Thereafter, every year, the town council (senado) went in formal procession, to mark the anniversary of the conquest, to the chapel of St Michael which, according to Cardoso, was so old (by the 1600s) it threatened ruin. Once arrived at the chapel, Mass was sung and a sermon was preached proclaiming to the faithful the reason for the religious festival (solemnidade). The practice was still being observed at the time of Cardoso’s writing.28 It also appears that by this time the commemoration was taking place on 8 May, the day of St Michael the Archangel, which Cardoso mistakenly asserted was also the date of the conquest and not 15 March in spite of the fact that the latter date had already been shown very likely to be correct by the Alcobacensian historian Fr. António Brandão (1584–1637) in Monarchia Lusitana.29 Placing antiquated debates over the date of the conquest of Santarém aside along with speculation as to whether and why a 15 March commemoration might have been moved to 8 May, it is important here to note that that the feast in Jerusalem marking the First Crusaders’ conquest of the city involved a solemn procession, details of which have been distilled from the manuscript sources by, among others, Joshua Prawer who described the proceedings as follows: Led by the patriarch very early in the morning, this [procession] passed from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to the Templum Domini, the Mosque of Omar. Here a halt was made and prayers recited in the southern entrance in that part of the Temple esplanade which faces the Mosque of al-Aqsa. From here, the procession wound its way across the esplanade to the burial place beyond the walls of those who fell in the conquest. Crossing the street of Josaphat it then proceeded to the northern part of the city walls. Here, not
28 Jorge Cardoso, Agiologio Lusitano dos Sanctos e Varoens Illustres em Virtude do Reino de Portugal e suas Conquistas (Lisbon: Officina Craesbeekiana, 1652–1744), vol. 3, pp. 126–27. 29 António Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana, 4th edn. (Lisbon: Casa da Moeda, facsimile repr. 1974), Part 3, Chapters XXII and XXIII, esp. fols. 165v–166r. For a discussion of the now obsolete debate over the correct date of the conquest see Sousa Pereira, ‘A Conquista de Santarém’, p. 303.
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far from its north-eastern angle, a cross marked the spot where the knights of Godefroy [de Bouillon] first penetrated the city. At this place a sermon was pronounced by the patriarch to the assembled clergy and populace, and thanks-giving prayers commemorated the establishment of the crusaders in the Holy Land.30 It may be pushing the bounds of reasonable speculation, but the cross marking the spot of Godfroy’s entry into the city may hold some clue as to the origins and purpose of the mysterious stone statue, resembling an ancient piece of building masonry, today to be found in the Museu Arqueológico do Convento de Carmo in Lisbon. Retrieved from the alcácova of Santarém, it is considered most likely to be a rudimentary figurine of Afonso Henriques fashioned in about the midthirteenth century.31 Coarse in its execution, chipped here and there, and displaying what look like the signs of weathering from long exposure to the elements, the king’s likeness is adorned with the symbols of royal power, wearing a crown, sword held high in one hand whilst the other holds a cross. Did this statue once mark a station of the procession, perhaps the station at that point in the fortifications of Santarém where Afonso Henriques’s men first made entry into the city on 15 March 1147?
30 Joshua Prawer, The Latin kingdom of Jerusalem (London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1972), pp. 176–77; also quoted by Folda, ‘Commemorating the Fall of Jerusalem’, p. 126. See also, John, ‘The “Feast of the Liberation of Jerusalem” ’, pp. 423–30. 31 Little is known about the piece beyond the fact it was brought from Santarém to the Museum in 1866; Museu Arqueológico do Carmo, Roteiro da Exposição Permanente, coord. by José Morais Arnaud and Carla Varela Fernandes (Lisbon: Associação dos Arqueólogos Portugueses/Museu Arqueológico do Carmo, 2002), pp. 81–82.
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Figure 2 Statue (thirteenth century). Thought to be of Afonso Henriques, Museu Arqueológico do Carmo, Lisbon. (photograph, the author)
Previous editions and translations of De expugnatione Scalabis
There exist three previous editions of the text of the De Expugnatione Scalabis, one produced by Fr. António Brandão in 1632 in Part III of his Monarquia Lusitana,1 one by Alexandre Herculano in Portugalia Monumenta Historica, Scriptores2 and, the most recent, produced in 2005 by Aires A. Nascimento.3 The only modern language translations of De Expugnatione Scalabis have been into Portuguese. Of these, four are complete: one produced in 1602 in Crónica de Cister by Fr. Bernardo de Brito;4 another by Albino de Faria in Crónica de D. Afonso Henriques;5 one by an anonymous translator published by José H. Barata in his Fastos de Santarém;6 and that by Aires Nascimento accompanying his edition referred to previously.7 In addition, fragments appear translated in Monarquia Lusitana;8 in História de Santarém Edificada by Inácio da Piedade e Vasconcelos;9 and a lengthy passage by Alfredo Pimenta substantially based on the translation of Albino Faria (mentioned previoisly) in his Fontes Medievais da História de Portugal,10 The present publication presents the first complete rendering of the text in English.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana, Part 3, Escritura XX, fols. 289v–291r. PMH, vol. 1, Scriptores, pp. 93–95 Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, pp. 1224–28. Fr. Bernardo de Brito, Primeyra parte da Chronica de Cister; onde se contam as cousas principais desta religiam com muytas antiguidades, assi do Reyno de Portugal como de outros muytos da christandade; composta por Frey Bernardo de Brito (Lisbon: Pedro Crasbeek, 1602), liv. III, cap. 18. António Brandão, Crónca de D. Afonso Henriques, ed. by Artur de Megalhães Basto (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1945), p. 341, et seq., and also included in Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana, Parte 3, Excritura XX, pp. 165–69. José Henriques Barata, Fastos de Santarém, I, De expugnatione Scalabis, II, O cerco de 1184 (Coimbra: Coimbra Editora, 1947), p. 19 et seq. Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, pp. 1228–32. Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana, Part 3, liv. 10, cap. 22, fols. 161r–163r. Inácio da Piedade e Vasconcelos História de Santarém Edificada, 2 vols (Lisbon: Ocidental, 1740), vol. I, cap. 4. Pimenta, Fontes Medievais da História de Portugal, pp. 93–106.
De expugnatione Scalabis, Latin text with English translation
Quomodo sit capta Sanctaren civitas a Rege Alfonso Comitis Henrici filio Cantemus domino fratres karissimi, ‘cantemus domino in tympano, et choro, et jubilemus in cordis et organo’.1 exultationis voce. Magnificatus est enim gloriose subiciendo gentes Mahometh adorantes sub pedibus nostris, elegit nobis ‘hereditatem speciosissimam quam dilexit’.2 Et vos qui propria voluntate obtulistis animas vestras periculoso discrimini benedicite Deo summo regi, qui pedibus nudis innitentes hastis et clipeis accincti gladiis et scalas ligneas3 portantes humeris viriliter per montis crepidinem properastis ad murum. Ad laudem Christi ‘convocate omnem populum plaudite manibus’,4 ‘bene psallite ei in vociferatione’5 ac dicite ‘Audite reges auribus percipite’,6 principes universe terre, quoniam7 dominus elegit nova bella in diebus nostris, non in trecentis decem et viii vernaculis, ut quondam Abraham,8 qui quinque reges devicit, vel Gedeon9 qui in trecentis aquam manibus lambentibus Sisaram principem milicie Iabin prostravit,10 sed in xx. v aut parum supra, rex noster, immo deus per regem nostrum, omnium ispanie civitatum munitissimam cepit Sanctaren. Eleva ergo et tu, o rex noster Alfonse, eleva in iubilo vocem, et confitere quia non tuis meritis ascribis vel viribus hoc magnum prodigium, sed Christo regi vero, cuius est omnis terra, et merito cui curuatur omne genu,11 qui est in secula benedictus deus, et edissere nobis geste rei prodigiose exordium, ordinem et exitum.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Cf., Psalm 150:4. Psalm 46:5. Ms: lineas. Psalm 46:2. Psalm 32:3. Judges 5:1. Herculano read quam, Nascimento read quoniam. Genesis 14:1. Judges 7:1. Judges 4. Cf., Ephesians 3:14.
Latin text with English translation 61
Ab hinc Rex12 Testor deum celi, oculis cuius nuda et aperta sunt onmia, quia nec murus Iericho subrutos13 nec solis stationem prece Iosue ad Gabaon14 in comparationem huius in me pietatis et misericordie facti pro miraculis duco, sed nomen Christi magnifico cuius profunde sunt cogitationes et magnifica opera, et pro se suaque pietate pia in novissimis temporibus novis mirabilibus non renovat, sed supergreditur antiqua mirabilia. Omnes enim qui audierint ducent pro re incredibili Sanctaren civitatem munitissimam omni multitudine hominum omnique genere machinarum inexpugnabilem a tam paucissimis viris invasam. Siquidem avus meus Alfonsus Yspanie imperator non potuit eam debellare nisi famis deditione. Morabitarum etiam rex Cyrus similiter, sed necdum Abzechri, qui ferme per xxxª et IIII annos eiusdem tenuit regimen: erexerat muros, antemurale15 et turres a parte occidentali, que vocatur Alplan, eo quod ad comparationem precipicii tocius circuitus16 planum videbatur, quia antiquus repleverat terra usque ad summum in promontorii modum captiuorum humeris asportata: a parte vero orientali adeo locus ruit in preceps ut lingua arabica vocetur Alhafa, id est,17 timor, quia inde precipitabantur qui capitalem subierant sententiam, ut fractis cervicibus, ex toto corpore ad ripam usque proruerent Tagi aureas, ut ferunt, arenas habentis. A parte vero australi propter precipicium quod fit ex natura terre quasi hyantis et in abyssum euntis, vocatur Alhanse, id est,18 coluber, eo quod nullo possit adiri modo nisi per anfractus et quosdam meandros. Ex parte vero aquilonis muniuit eam ipsa montis natura petrosa, et aspera, et velut inter nubes porrigens ipsam civitatem; in sua summitate planam, non magnam ne ad tenendum sit difficilis, nec modicam ne feretur a paucis. Quomodo igitur huius speciositatem describere queam, cum nec hominum satietur visus19 cernentium ad oreintalem plagam plana et omni generi frugum fertilissima arva ferme per C.m LX stadia? Ad occidentalem et austrum deficit onmino acies oculorum; ad aquilonem versus, montuosa vinearum et olearum sunt loca. Quid de fertilitate20 dicam, cum nec sit inferior21 Apulia sed superhabundet vel 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21
Rubric appears in red ink in manuscript, fol. 147r. Joshua 6:1–27. Joshua 10:1. Isaiah 26:1. For circuitus, see Julius Caesar, ‘Eius minitionis que ab Romanis instituebatur circuitus XI milia passum tenebat’; C. Luli Caesaris Commentarii Rerum in Gallia Gestarum VII, para 69, liber VII, cf. Suzanne M. Adema, Speech and thought in Latin War Narratives; The Words of Warriors (Leiden: Brill, 2017), p. 173. Nascimento emends to quia antiquus [saltus], which, on the reading here advanced, is not warranted. On the ‘back-filling’ of the old walls, see Liberato ‘Novos dados sobre a paisagem urbana’, pp. 11–12 Herculano read idem; I follow Nascimento’s emendation, id est. Idem – id est. Herculano read nisus, I follow Nascimento’s reading/emendation, visus. Herculano read fertelitate, (or perhaps a misprint); Nascimento correctly read fertilitate. The manuscript is clear. The word inferior inserted in the manuscript written above apulia, fol.147v.
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piscium multitudine vel salubritate aque? Est quidem dei paradisus, id est deliciarum [h]ortus, ut quondam Egyptus venientibus Segor.22 Sed ad rem gestam veniamus, et qualiter capta sit aperiamus. Capta est Idus Martii illucescente die sabbati in era Ma centesima Lxxx V, quo anno Mauri qui arabice Mozamida vocantur, ingressi Yspaniam destruxerunt Yspalim civitatem, me tunc agente tricesimum ferme ac septimum etatis annum, et regni X. VIIII., anno nondum evoluto quo duxeram uxorem Mahaldam nomine comitis Amedei23 filiam, ex qua primogenitus est natus Henricus filius meus III Nonas eiusdem mensis quo civitas capta est hoc ordine. Fuit hec civitas, quia fortissima et fecundissima, semper bellicosa insidians Colimbrie et meum regnum pene pessumdans ex multo tempore. Quam non poteram debellare, quia, ut predixi, erat inexpugnabilis nec depredare propter impedimentum aque. Cum enim tetenderam insidias ex parte dextera fluuii, confugiebant ad sinistram vel e converso cum peccoribus et iumentis. Preterea planicies ipsa est paludibus plena et insulis et ob hoc nemini previa nisi navibus temporibus congruis. Cogitavi itaque mecum sepissime si quo modo eam invaderem vel vi vel aliqua deceptione. Sed quibus profitebar infirmitatis pretendebant excusationem mortis perculsi timore. Tandem pactita cum eis pace, Menendum Ramiridem mei consilii conscium premisi totius scrutatorem negocii, qua semita vel parte muri securius possemus nocte ingredi. Qui prout erat vir providus et acri ingenio et ad omnia audenda que mihi placere cognoverat auidus, prospectans omnia solito diligentius, animavit me secreto se iturum in prima fronte,24 promittendo se25 erecturum meum vexillum supra murum serasque portarum confracturum. Quod et fecit sicut rei geste eventus probavit, quia omnia sibi videbantur facilia omnique periculo secura. Itaque satuto die, preparatis cibariis cum Colimbrianis et Fernando Petride, cum aliis de meis paucis, egressi Colymbria feria II, castra metati sumus in Alfafhar et hec fuit nostra mansio prima. Sequenti die mansimus in Chornudelos, unde misimus Martinum Mohab et alios duos qui renuntiarent habitatoribus Sanctaren solutam fore pacem usque in tercium diem. Qui, iussa perficientes, venerunt ad nos feria IIII in Abdegas. Inde proficientes castra metati sumus in Alvardos, mansimusque ibi26 totam quintam feriam usque ad noctem. Indeque promoventes nocte illa ambulavimus usque Ebrahaz in summitate Peernez feria VI illucescente.27 Tunc existimans fore idoneum omnibus meum aperire desiderium, convocavi ad me omnes a minimo usque ad maximum et hoc ordine sum eos adlocutus.
22 Genesis 13:1. 23 Herculano read correctly Amedeu, Nacimento emends to Amedei. 24 Herculano read fonte, (perhaps a misprint). Nascimento read correctly fronte. The manuscript is clear. 25 Herculano read promittento et. I follow Nascimento’s reading/emendation, promittendo es. 26 Herculano read correctly ubique; Nascimento makes the warranted emendment to ibi. 27 illuscescente is clear in the manuscript. Herculano read erroneously illuscente. I follow Nascimento’s emendment, illucescente.
Latin text with English translation 63 Oratio regis ad milites28 “Nostis, comilitoines mei, nostis, et bene nostis, quia et mecum et sine me multos labores sustinuistis ex hac urbe in cuius confinio estis. Nostis quanta mala fecerit civitati vestre et vobis omnique meo regno, qualiter sit in laqueum et ‘in stuporem dentium’29 muiltis temporibus. Et nunc si convocarem omne robur totius mei exercitus ferret30 auxilium unusquisque pro viribus, sed nolui. Vos solos elegi quos assidue in meis angustiis expertos habui et vobis meum comitto consilium, de quibus bene certus sum pro me dolere dolorem meum. Credite mihi, milites mei, quoniam videtur adeo perfacile et oportunum quod vobiscum inire paro, quod pre gaudio animi mei, et mora venturi diei, crescunt mihi dies medii quos vellem transire subito. Sed et cum vos video magis hoc obtare quam ego, et ipsam in faciendo oportunitatem attendo, quasi iam sim in civitatis medio, sic exulto. Sed hoc est quod prius facere debemus. Eligantur centum XX e numero vestro, qui decem fabricent scalas divisi per duodenos, ut com unusquisque ascenderit per suam, non sit unus sed decem supra civitatis murum, et ita facilis erit ascensus et ascendentium multiplicabitur numerus; quo cum fuerit perventum, meum ergite vexillum prius ut et a nobis ad robur et ab eis forte excitatis ad detrimentum possit conspici eminus. Postea portarum confringite seras, ut impetus simul intro entium perturbet inhermes et somnolentos. Cuiusmodi erit difficultas interficiendi, dicite mihi pro amore dei, nudos et male sopitos? Sed hoc erit quod observabitis attentius, ‘nulli etati vel sexui parcatis; moriatur infans ad ubera pendens et senex plenus dierum, adolescentula et anus’31 decrepita. Confortentur vestre manus, dominus est enim nobiscum, nam unus e vobis poterit ex eis percutere c[entum]. Hodie, sicut credo, fit pro nobis communis oratio et canonicis Sancte Crucis, quibus predixi hoc nostrum negotium, et in quibus confido, et cetero clero simul cum omni populo. Praeterea quidam de vigiliis sunt nos recepturi. Parcat mihi deus huius crimen mendacii, quia ideo scienter sum mentitus, ut eorum animi consolidarentur fortius. Pugnate ergo pro filiis vestris ac nepotibus. Ego enim ipse ero unus e vobis et primus, nec est qui a vestro me possit seiungi consortio vel in morte vel in vita ullo modo”. Huc usque me audierunt auribus arrectis, ut videbatur mihi, et ad audenda que precabar pacato animo. Sed cum de mei periculo cum eis fieret sermo, obstupuerunt nec se coibere potuerunt, ut quondam Ioab et ceteri principes milicie David, dicentes: ‘non ibis nobiscum; si enim fugerimus, non magnopere ad eos pertinebit de nobis, sive media pars vel omnes ceciderimus non satis erit ulla cura, quia tu unus computaris pro decem milibus’;32 nec infitietur familia nostra sempiterno elogio ut filii proditorum si te permiserimus commisceri tam aperto periculo. Ad
28 29 30 31 32
Advertisement inserted between columns in manuscript, fol. 147v. Amos, 4:6: ergo dedi vobis stuporem dentium in cunctis urbibus vestris; cf., Nscimento, p. 1226. Herculano’s reading ferrent is clear in the manuscript. I follow Nascimento’s emendment, ferret. Joshua 6:21. II Samuel 18:3.
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quos ego benignissime iuxta karitativam eorum rationem respondi hec pauca: “Velit dues, oro, ut si in hoc anno excessurus sum vita, nisi civitas sit capta, non egrediar ab hac pugna”. Qui cum me obstinato viderent animo pronum ad subeunda discrimina, paraverunt omnia que negotio erant necessaria. Et dismissis ibidem sarcinis properavimus ad urbem ascensis equis, iam subeunte nocte. Vidimusque miraculum quod maxime nostros erexit animos. Siquidem, quedam stella magna ardens ut facula, discurrens per celi plana a parte dextera, prolapsa est in mare, maxime illuminans superficiem terre, diximusque continuo: “tradidit dominus civitatem in manibus nostris”.33 Similiter et ipsis eo die quo pax est soluta [h]orrendum apparuit prodigium, portendens eorum in tercia nocte futurum excidium; namque viderunt media die quasi quendam colubrum ferri per celi medium comis ignitum a cauda usque ad caput et prophetaverunt inter eos sapientes novum regem habere Sanctaren. Cum iam ergo non longe essemus ad urbe pedites, et velut cursarii preparati omnes, tenuimus semitam inter montem Iraz et fontem qui propter amaras aquas arabice appellatur Athumarmal, per mediam vallem, preeunte Menendo Ramiride in prima fronte, qui transitus et exitus noverat bene, et ego in posteriori parte. Hinc libet attendere quam mirabilis clarescat deus in suis operibus. Qui ne videretur aliquid nostro fieri arbitrio, mutavit consulta, tamen in melius, sua propria virtute. Quo enim loco nullam formidabamus fore custodiam, ibi enim videbatur facilis ascensus, erant due mutuo sese ad vigilandum [h]ortantes. Unde quievimus parum in [h]erba tritici quiescentes, donec consopirentur sompno a domino uterque. Statimque promovens Menendus ascendit cum suis per Alchudiam et figuli domum viriliter ad murum, tetenditque scalam in summitate haste, que no potuit herere sursum, sed repens usque deorsum dedit magnum sonitum. Condoluit itaque Menendus ne vigilie excitarentur strepitu et incuruatus parumper super se fecit ascendere iuvenem nomine Mogueyme. Qui erectus sursum ascendit ilico supra murum et innectens scalam propugnaculis,34 ascendit alius cum vexillo regis, erexitque illud. Interim ascendit Menendus, deinde ceteri, prout poterant melius. Sed cum tres tantum adhuc essent supra, excitantur subito male dormientes vigilie, respicientesque vexillum iuxta mirantesque clamaverunt rauca voce: “Man hu?”,35 id est, “quid estis?” cumque cognovissent frustra christianos fore, clamaverunt voce sublimi et confusa: “Annachara”, id est, “Christianorum insidie!” Post terciam itaque vigilarum vocem, exlamat Menendus invitans ad auxilium sanctum Iacobum Yspanie patronum et regem Alfonsum. Conclamavi et ego
33 Joshua 6:16. 34 Copyist error here in manuscript, fol. 148v; the following repeated words appear struck through: ascendit ilico supra murum et innectens scalam propubnaculis. 35 Here, Nascimento draws attention to Exodus 16:15.
Latin text with English translation 65 clamore magno: “Sancte Iacobe, et beatissima Maria Virgo, succurrite. Hic est rex Alfonsus, cedite eos,36 nec sit unus que evadat gladium”. Tanta deinde secuta est confusio vocum utrarumque partium ut nulla possit notari discretio. Aio ergo meis: “Feramus auxilium sociis, teneamus dexteram, si potuerimus ascendere per Alplan et Gundisalvus Gundisalvi cum suis sinistram ut preocupet callem, que venit de Seserigo, ne porte aditus ab illis preocupetur nosque frustrati pereant nostri qui intus sunt ad obprobrium nostrum”. Quod et factum est, non nostra, sed voluntate domini sola. Qui enim proposueramus per scalas conscendere murum, ingressi sumus per portam civitatis multo securius et qui decem fabricaveramus due sole erecte compleverunt totum officium, per quas ascenderunt, ut aiunt, qui interfuerunt ad xx.v tantum. Laudetur ergo deus in suis operibus. Tunc hii qui erant intus ad portam concurrentes citius nitebantur frangere valvas lapidibus, sed malleus ferreus de foris porrectus confregit seras et vectes fortius et ita cum magno gaudio et meis intus sum receptus. In medio ergo porte fixis genibus que oraverim vel ex quanta profunditate animi scit deus, nec nunc refferam, quia exciderunt iam a memoria. Quas congressiones vel impetus fecerint, dicant amodo qui interfuerunt, quia non est meum. Itaque ista sufficiant pro magnitudine gaudii cordis mei et leticie.
How the city Santarém was captured by King Afonso son of Count Henry Let us sing to the Lord most dear brothers, let us sing to the Lord with the timbral and in choir, and let us sing out joyfully with stringed instruments and organ with the voice of gladness. He is extolled indeed full of glory by casting beneath our feet the peoples worshiping Muhammad, He chose for us the most splendid inheritance that He loved. And you who of your own volition offered your souls to perilous danger, praise God the supreme king, who with bare feet, relying on shields and spears, with girded swords, and carrying wooden ladders on your shoulders, bravely sped up the slope of the mountain towards the wall. To the praise of Christ ‘call all the people clap your hands’, ‘sing well the psalms to Him in loud voice’ and say: ‘Hear, O ye kings, give ear’, leaders of the whole earth, for the Lord has chosen new wars in our time, not with three hundred and eighteen servants like Abraham in times past who conquered five kings, or Gideon who with three hundred, lapping water out of their hands, laid low Sisera leader of the Jabin army, but with twenty five or a few more, our king, or more correctly God through our king, captured Santarém the best defended of all the cities of Spain. Raise therefore and you too, O our King Afonso, raise your voice in praise, and confess that this great
36 Cf., Diologus Miraculorum, at Ch.XXI, where Caesarius of Heisterbach places the words Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius, (‘Kill them [all]. God indeed knows who are his’) in the mouth of papal legate, Arnaud Amaury when ordering the massacre of the inhabitants of Béziers in August 1209.
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wonder you do not ascribe to your merits nor powers, but to Christ the true king, whose is all the earth, and to whom rightly every knee is bent, who is blessed God in the world, and tell to us the proceeding of this marvellous event, of the beginning, of the unfolding and of the end. From here, the King [speaks] I bear witness before God of Heaven, to whose eyes all things are laid bare and revealed, because neither the undermined walls of Jericho nor the stopping of the sun through the prayer of Joshua at Gibeon I consider compare in goodness and in mercy to the miracles fashioned for me, but the name of Christ I praise whose plans and magnificent works are boundless, and through Him and His tender goodness, in the most recent times He does not renew the ancient miracles, but surpasses them. All, indeed, who will listen will regard it an incredible thing that invincible Santarém, the best defended city with all host of men and all variety of machines, was taken by so extremely few men. Accordingly, my grandfather Alfonso Emperor of Spain could not vanquish it except through capitulation from starvation. This event happened under Cyrus king of the Almoravids,37 but not yet [had it happened to] Abazechri,38 who for almost thirty-four years held that same rule: he had built walls, a breastwork and towers on the west side, which is named Alplan, that at which in comparison with the whole precipice the circuit seemed to be flat because earth, carried on the shoulders of captives, had filled up the old course of battlement walls up to the top[s] [of them] in the manner of a promontory: but on the east side the place drops away so precipitously that it is called in the Arabic language Alhafa, that is to say, ‘the fear’, because from here were cast down those who had been placed under capital sentence, so that with broken necks, the whole corpse would tumble down to the banks of the river Tagus, which has, so they say, gold-bearing sands. At the south side, because of the drop which is created by the nature of the land, which is as if gaping and going into an abyss, it is called Alhanse, that is to say ‘the serpent’, a place which in no way can be approached except through certain tortuous curving and winding pathways. On the north side the rough and rocky nature of the mountain itself fortified it, and [it is] as if it is extending the city up into the clouds. On its summit, [the city] is flat [and] not so large that it is difficult to hold, nor is it so small that it can be taken by a small force. How therefore could I describe the beauty of this, when no viewing of men can be sated, seeing to the east level terrain and all variety of produce and the most 37 Likely a reference to the celebrated Almoravid general Sir Ibn Abi Bakr (d. 1113) a notable participant in the Battlle of Sagrajas (Zalaqa) in 1086 and Governor of al-Andalus from 1091; see inter alia, Kennedy, Muslim Spain and Portugal, p. 176, Bernard F. Reilly, The Kingdom of LeónCastilla Under King Alfonso VI, 1065–1109 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988), p. 236, Mattoso, Hisória de Portugal, vol. 2, pp. 30–34; Annales Domni Alfonsi, Era, 1131, and cf., Era, 1147 – Rex Cyrus cepit Santarem septimo cal. Junii. 38 Abu Zakariya, Almoravid governor of Santarém.
Latin text with English translation 67 fertile plains extending for about 160 stadia? To the west and south, the sight of the eyes altogether grows weak; to the north, hills where there are rows of vines and olive trees. What will I say about fertility, when it is no less than that of Apulia, whether in abundance of fish or in the health of its waters? It is certainly a paradise of God, that is to say a garden of delights, even as was, at one time, Egypt for those arriving from Segor. Let us come to the matter being in hand and explain how it was captured. It was captured on the Ides of March as the day of Saturday began to dawn in the era of 1185 [1147], that year the Moors, who are called Almohads in Arabic, entered Spain destroying the city of Seville. At that time I had completed nearly thirtyseven years of age, and nineteen of my reign, a year had not yet unrolled that I had married my wife named Mafalda, the daughter of Count Amadeus, of whom my firstborn son Henrique was born on the third of Nones [5th] of that same month in which the city was captured in following order: This city, which was the mightiest and the most fertile, was always warlike raiding Coimbra and, for a long time, almost destroying my kingdom. I had been unable to conquer it because, as I said earlier, it was impregnable, nor could I exhaust it by stopping their water supply. For, every time I tried to make attacks on the right side of the river, they took refuge on the left side, or vice versa, with their herds and their pack-animals. In addition, the plain itself is full with marshes and islands and, on account of this, no one goes forward except by means of boats at suitable times. Consequently, I thought to myself very frequently by what method I might take possession of it either by force or by ruse. But those to whom I disclosed [my plans], being overpowered by the fear of death, alleged the excuse of sickness. At length, having arranged truce agreements with [the Saracens], I sent ahead Menendo Ramirez, who was aware of my intention[s], to investigate the whole business; by which pathway or part of the wall we could most securely make entry by night. He, being as he was, a farsighted man and with a sharp talent, eager to dare to perform all that he had come to learn was to my pleasure, having inspected everything in his diligent manner, encouraged me that he would go stealthily in the forefront, promising that he would erect my banner on top of the walls and then break [open] the city gates. And he did, just as the outcome of the affair undertaken showed, because everything to him seemed easy, and free from all peril. Accordingly, the day being appointed, provisions having been prepared, with some from Coimbra and with Fernando Pedro, and with a few others of mine, leaving from Coimbra on the Monday, we pitched camp at Alfafhar and this was our first base. The next day we camped at Corudelos, from where we sent Martin Mohab and two others who would announce to the inhabitants of Santarém that the truce would be broken within three days. Those, the orders having been carried out, came [back] to us on Wednesday at Abdegas. Progressing from there we pitched our camp at Alvardos, and we stayed there all of Thursday until night. And from there taking advantage of the night we marched as far as Ebrahaz on mount Peernez [arriving] on Friday as dawn was breaking. Thereupon, considering it would be fitting to appraise everyone with my desire, I called to myself all from the small to the great and in this manner and in this order, I spoke to them:
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The speech of the King to the soldiers “You know, my comrades, you know, and well you know, that with me and without me, you sustained many hardships from this city in whose environs you are. You know how much evil this city has caused to your city and to you and to all of my kingdom, just as if it might be in a snare and ‘in dullness of teeth’ for many seasons. And now if I called together all of the strongest elements of my entire army, each and every one would bring help according to his strength, but I do not want this. I have chosen only you who have been consistently well proved in my campaigns, and to you I entrust my plan, whom I am duly certain feel for me my anguish. Believe me, my soldiers, because it appears very easy and advantageous, that which I prepare to undertake with you, that in view of the gladness of my soul, and the delay of the coming day, for me the days seem drawn-out [so that] I wish they would pass quickly. Moreover, when I see that you desire this more than I, awaiting the opportunity of bringing this to pass, it is as if I am already in the midst of the city, and so I rejoice. But this is what we must do first. One hundred and twenty from your number will be chosen divided into groups of twelve who will make ten ladders, so that when one man ascends his, there will not be one but ten on top of the wall of the city, and in this way the escalade will be easy and the numbers climbing will be multiplied. Once this has happened, raise my standard so that it may be visible from a distance to us in the main taskforce, and [also] to those who perchance to be awaking to their defeat. Then you break the bolts of the doors so that a charge inside [made] simultaneously by the rest [of the army] will throw those who are unarmed and drowsy into confusion. How difficult will it be, tell me for the love of God, to kill people who are still not dressed and half asleep? But this you shall observe diligently, ‘you may spare no one on account of age or sex; may the infant hanging at the breast die and the old man full of days, the youthful woman and the decrepit hag’. May your hands be comforted, the Lord is indeed with us, for [just] one of you will be able to strike down one hundred of them. Today, as I believe, communal prayer is offered for us, not only by the canons of Santa Cruz to whom I disclosed in advance this our business, in whom I trust, but also by the other clergy likewise with all the people. Furthermore, some of the members of the watch are about to receive us. (May God show consideration to me for this crime of falsehood, because the reason I was consciously lying was so that their spirits might be stiffened with courage.) Fight therefore for your children and grandchildren. I indeed in person will be one of you and the foremost, nor is there anyone who can separate me from your company either in death or in life in any way”. Up to this point they listened to me with eager ears, as it seemed to me, and with their spirits ready to do the daring deed I was asking of them. But at the point in the speech concerning the danger to which I might be subject in their company, they were astounded, nor could they hold themselves back, as at one time Joab and the other leaders of the soldiers of David, saying: “You will not go with us
Latin text with English translation 69 for, if we flee, by no means will there be very much concern for us, or if half or all of us are about to be slain, it will not amount to any anxiety, for thou alone art accounted for ten thousand; neither will our families deny the everlasting indictment as the sons of traitors, if we will have allowed you to join in such open peril”. To whom I most courteously as a consequence of their charitable reasoning responded in these few words; “God willing, I pray, that [even] if I am to lose my life in this [moment], may I not come out of this battle unless the city is captured!” When they saw me resolute with spirit bowed towards assisting in the decisive moment, they prepared all the things that were needed for the task. And the baggage being left behind in that very place, we hurried towards the city on horseback, the night now coming to assist [us]. And we saw a miracle which very much raised our spirits. Indeed, a certain great star, burning like a torch, running through the plains of the heavens from the right side, glided into the sea, greatly illuminating the surface of the earth, and we said at once, “The Lord has delivered the city into our hands”. Similarly and the very day that the truce was ended, a dreadful portent appeared foretelling their future destruction on the third night; for they saw at midday, as-though-it-were some kind of serpent being carried through the heavens with its mane all in flames from the tip of its tail to its head and it was prophesied among their wisemen, that Santarém would have a new king. Well, as soon as we were not far from the city by foot and as the runners were all of them prepared, we kept to the path between Mount Iraz and the spring, which on account of its brackish waters is called Athumarmal in the Arabic fashion, through the midst of the valley, Menendo Ramirez going on before in the forefront, who knew the passageway and its egress well, and I in the hindmost section. Henceforth it is worth to heed how marvellous is God manifest in his works. So that nothing should seem to be achieved through our own will, He changed the plans for the better, through His own goodness. Namely, at a point where we had not been fearing there would be a watch, indeed there seemed to be an easy approach by way of that place, there were two [watchmen] mutually encouraging each other to stay awake. Whence we kept quiet remaining among the wheat grass until, by the Lord, both would be rendered insensible through sleep. And, [once the watchmen were asleep], immediately Menendo went up with his men, by means of Alchudia and the house of a potter, boldly towards the wall and extended a ladder on the top of a spear, which could not be affixed above, but suddenly [falling] all the way downwards it made a loud crash. Consequently, Menendo suffered anguish lest the watch be summoned by the din and he quickly bent over and made a young man named Mogueyme climb up on top of him. This one, being raised up, immediately climbed up on high over the wall and fastening the ladder to the ramparts another climbed up with the king’s banner and erected it. Meanwhile Menendo climbed up, thenceforth the others as best they could. But when there were still only three on top [of the wall], the watch being aroused suddenly, much behaving as if [still] sleeping and gazing at the banner hard by and being bewildered, they called out in hoarse voice “Man hu?” that is “Who are you?” and when they realised that they had been deceived and the Christians were
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coming against them, they shouted with raised and confused voice, “Annachara!” that is “Christian attack!” Accordingly, after the third cry of the watch, Menendo called out invoking the aid of Saint James the defender of Spain and King Afonso. I shouted aloud and with the powerful war-cry “Saint James and the most blessed Virgin Mary come to [our] aid. This is King Afonso, kill them, nor may there be a single one that may escape the sword!” Then, so great was the following confusion of voices of either side, that no distinction could be discerned. Therefore, I said to my men, “Let us bring help to our comrades, let us keep to the right side, if we can go up through Alplan and Gonzalo Gonzalez with his men can occupy the pathway on the left which comes from Seserigo so that the entrance to the gate is not blocked by [the enemy] and we are prevented thereby, our men inside shall not perish to our shame”. And this was done, not by our will but by the will of God alone. Those of us who had planned to climb the wall by ladders went in through the gates of the city in much more safety, and of the ten [ladders] that we had constructed only two ended up being erected in the entire enterprise, by means of which, those who were present say, only twenty five went up. Therefore, may God be praised in his works. Then those who were inside came charging to the city gates speedily struggling to break the double doors with stones, but an iron hammer produced from outside shattered the bolts and mightily broke the bars and so with great gladness I and my men were received inside. Being transfixed on my knees in the middle of the city gates I worshipped, even how much from the depth of my soul God knows, nor may I report it now because it escapes the memory. What battles or attacks we have undertaken may you declare henceforth anyone taking part, because it belongs not to me. And so, may these things suffice for the greatness of joy in my heart, and of rejoicing.
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Figure 3 Detail, Alc.415 fol. 148v. (photograph, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal)
Part II
Gosuini de Expugnatione Salaciae Carmen In the wake of the Muslim surrender of Alcácer do Sal1 to Christian forces on 18 October 1217 following a three-month siege, a certain Gosuinus produced a versified account of the episode in regular elegiac couplets. His Carmen, which occupies 230 lines in the manuscript and begins immediately following the Scalabis on fol. 148v halfway down column 2, is the most detailed and full account to have survived for the definitive taking of Alcácer by a combined force comprising northern European crusaders navigating the western sea-passage to the Fifth Crusade in the East and a Portuguese terrestrial army supported by the military orders. Occurring only five years after the landmark Christian victory over the Almohads at Las Navas de Tolosa in the southern Meseta, the fall of Alcácer do Sal opened the route by which the Portuguese Reconquista would roll southwards during the following three decades to absorb the regions comprising today’s southern Portugal, namely the Alentejo and the Algarve. Written in a classical epic form, the Carmen accordingly begins with an authorial invocation of divine aid (duly Christianised) for the execution of the literary task ahead, before embarking on the action with a description of the tempestuous voyage, in terms conspicuously recalling Virgil’s Aeneid, of a fleet of crusaders from northern seas that calls at the port of Lisbon. Here, the ‘pilgrims’ are beseeched by the bishop of the city, with eloquent appeals to Christian duty and the promise of plunder, to join a Portuguese assault on the fearful and troublesome Saracen fortress of Alcácer. A part of the fleet (in fact the Frisian contingent) declines to participate; however, the remainder acquiesces to the prelate’s entreaties and, save for a short coda, the entirety of the rest of the text relates the events of the ensuing campaign. The work belies its genesis in a boldly displayed acrostic, the elements of which are highlighted in the manuscript by the large coloured capitals at the beginning of each stanza. Accordingly, following an explicit direction given in the text, the reader takes the first letter of each of the fifteen stanzas and discovers thereby
1 Known to the Muslims as Mâdinat Al-Quasr; Rei, O Gharb al-Andalus al-Aqsâ, p. 130.
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two names; SUERIUS and GOSUINUS. As is clear in the text, the first of these denotes the dedicatee of the work, the second indicates its author.2 SUERIUS, who is certainly the honorand and probably the commissioner of the Carmen, can be identified as Soeiro Viegas, bishop of Lisbon at the time of the conquest of Alcácer, and perhaps the principal architect of the campaign. Soeiro’s likely reasons for procuring the work will be explored later. GOSUINUS, the author, was apparently an eyewitness to the events he describes and is likely Goswin of Bossut (fl. 1231–1238) cantor of the important Cistercian monastery of Villers (diocese of Liège) in Brabant, known author of at least three Vitae and several other works both poetical and musical. The case for his authorship of the Carmen will be set out in some detail a little further on in this introduction.
The Carmen in coeval historiography In the context of coeval historiographical production, the Carmen represents chronologically the last narrative in a trio of accounts, all free-standing (in that none forms part of any larger chronicle) recounting the three best-documented incidents of involvement of northern European seaborne crusaders in the Portuguese Reconquista. Two of these texts have already been the subject of significant studies, the most notable in English being those by Charles Wendell David of the De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, concerning the 1147 conquest of Lisbon,3 and the Naratio de Itinere Navali, concerning the 1189 conquest of Silves.4 The present work purposes to go some way towards completing this ‘trilogy’ through the presentation (arguably long overdue) of an edition of the Carmen with English translation and a short historical analysis enabling, inter alia, comparisons to be more readily drawn between the three episodes.
2 On the use of the acrostic in medieval Latin verse, see Dag Norberg, An Introduction to the Study of Medieval Latin Versification, trans. by Grant C. Roti and Jaqueline de La Chapelle Skubly, with introduction by Jan Ziolkowski (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2004), pp. 48–57. 3 Charles Wendell David, with foreword by Jonathan Phillips, De expugnatione Lyxbonensi, The Conquest of Lisbon (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001). See also, A Conquista de Lisboa aos Mouros Relato de um Cruzado, trans. by Aires Augusto Nascimento (Lisbon: Vega, 2001). 4 Charles Wendell David, ‘Narratio de Itinere Navali Peregrinorum Hierosolymam Tendentium et Silviam Capientium, A. D. 1189’. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 81:5 (1939), 591–676 (hereafter ‘DIN’). See also, Dana Cushing, De Itinere Navali (Fallon, NV: Antimony Media, 2013).
SUERIUS commissioner of the Carmen, and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’
Soeiro Viegas, bishop of Lisbon from 1211 until his death in 1233,1 was one of the principal architects and leaders of the 1217 Christian campaign to capture Alcácer do Sal in what Carl Erdmann described as the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’.2 Indeed, the first evidence of a crusade being preached domestically to Portuguese warriors is to be found in a letter sent by Soeiro and various other dignitaries to Pope Honorius III in the days immediately following the capitulation of the town. As outlined in Part I when postulating the likely date of production of the Scalabis, the economic interests of Christian frontier settlements and of the Portuguese crown appear to have delayed the progress of crusading ideology in the Iberian Far-West. In contrast to other areas of the peninsula, crusading rhetoric is not detectible in Portuguese sources until the latter twelfth century (1180s), whereas the first indication we have of ‘crusading’ being adopted as official royal policy occurs only in 1197 when an exasperated Sancho I dispatched a petition to Pope Celestine III requesting crusading indulgences, ironically, against a Christian foe, Alfonso IX of León.3 By this time, the wars on the Portuguese frontier had become increasingly ‘professionalised’ under the influence of the military orders which, along with the growing presence in the landscape of powerful allies such as the Cistercians, did much to promulgate the crusading spirit in the kingdom.
1 DS, N° 205, p. 312; Jonathan Wilson and Maria João Branco, ‘Soeiro Viegas (1211–1233)’, in Bispos e Arcebispos de Lisboa, dir. by João Luís Inglês Fontes (Lisbon: Livros Horizonte, 2018), pp. 151–65. 2 Erdmann, A Idea de Cruzada em Portugal, pp. 44–45. The assertions of Joseph F. O’Callaghan in Reconquest and Crusade at pp. 182–83, that Portuguese kings Afonso Henriques and Sancho I took the cross, are without foundation and should be rejected. If such an extraordinary thing had occurred, it is virtually certain to have been reported. Instead, all contemporary documentation, foreign and Portuguese, is silent on the matter; cf., inter alia, Phillips, pp. 246–7, and p. 324 note 25; Purkis, Crusading Spirituality, p. 171. 3 Papsturkunden in Portugal, ed. by Carl Erdmann, Abhandlungen der Gessellshcaft der wissenschaften zu Göttingen. Philologish-historische klasse (Berlin: Neue folge 20/3, 1927), No. 154 pp. 376–77; Peter W. Edbury, ‘Celestine III, the Crusade and the Latin East’, in Pope Celestine III, ed. by John Doran and Damien J. Smith (Farnham: Ashgate, 2008), pp. 129–43, at p. 135; it is to be noted, however, that Alfonso IX was in alliance with the Almohads at the time; Maria João Branco, D. Sancho I, O Filho do Fundador (Rio de Mouro: Círculo de Leitores, 2006), pp. 152–54.
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Even-so, since Alfonso IX sued for peace resolving the immediate crisis, still it would take the passage of another two decades before Portugal decisively entered the crusading fold.4 In piloting the kingdom into this new arena, the activities of Soeiro Viegas of Lisbon appear to have been, highly instrumental and perhaps even critical. Concerning Soeiro’s antecedents, we know nothing. The patronymic Viegas reveals little since, like his Christian name, it was relatively common. Indeed, Soeiro’s life prior to his ecclesiastical career is utterly obscure, a feature he shares with at least three of his peers, bishops Pedro Soares of Coimbra (1192–1232), Fernando Raimundes of Viseu (1213–1214) and Soeiro of Évora (1209–1229), all of whom only ever appear in the documentation in their capacity as clerics. All, Soeiro included, had been appointed dean of their dioceses before rising to the episcopal seat.5 The first document associating Soeiro with the Lisbon episcopacy is dated January 1211 where he appears as bishop elect in a charter of donation made by Sancho I to the abbot of the Cistercian monastery of Moreruela in the Leonese district of Zamora.6 It was not until the following year that he would appear confirmed as bishop for the first time. He would be the fourth bishop of Lisbon following the restoration of the See in 1147 and, since he was preceded by Bishop Soeiro Anes (1186–1211), Soeiro Viegas is occasionally referred to as Soeiro II.7 Although his predecessors, Gilbert (1147–1162), Álvaro (1164–1184) and Soeiro Anes, defended the see of Lisbon against claims made against it by institutions including the military orders of the Temple and Santiago, and the monasteries of St Vicente de Fora and Santa Cruz de Coimbra, there is no evidence any of them clashed with the king or with the royal agenda.8 In the first few years of his appointment, Soeiro heartily continued this tradition of harmonious royal relations, however, from about mid-1218, the bishop found himself increasingly 4 Branco, D. Sancho I, pp. 154–55. 5 Maria João Branco, O conceito de soberania régia e a sua relação com a praxis política de Sancho I e Afonso II, Doctoral Dissertation (policopiada) (Lisbon: Universidade Aberta, 1999), p. 552 and see Appendix III, p. 120; DS, 30; Bulário, N°s 20, 26,27,28, 29, 30,31; ANTT, Mitra de Lisboa, L° 18, doc. 6; Rodrigo da Cunha, História Eclesiástica da Igreja de Lisboa Vida E Acçoens De Sevs Prelados, E Varoes Eminentes Em Santidade, Que Nella Florecerao. . . (Lisbon: Manoel Da Sylva, 1642), p. 101. Soeiro Viegas appears for the first time incontrovertibly attested as dean of the Chapter of the Lisbon diocese in 1198. Although, in his will of 1188, Sancho I bequeathed a mule to one Dean Soeiro of Lisbon, a token of esteem, it is uncertain if this was Soeiro Viegas the future bishop; Maria João Branco, ‘Reis, Bispos e Cabidos: a diocese de Lisboa durante o primero século da sua restauração’, Lusitana Sacra, 2ª série, 10 (1998), pp. 55–94, esp., p. 69. During this period, the office of dean might have served as an ‘antechamber’ post to the office of bishop; Hermínia Vasconcelos Vilar, As Dimensões de um Poder; A Diocese de Évora na Idade Média (Lisbon: Editorial Estampa, 1999), p. 42. 6 Suerius Vlixbonsnsis electus, DS, N°. 205, p. 312; Cunha, Historia Ecclesiastica da Igreja de Lisboa, p. 110 (Cunha erroneously dates the document to January 1210). 7 Confusingly Bishop Soeiro of Évora, contemporary of Soeiro Viegas is also referred to as Soeiro II. 8 Branco, ‘Reis, Bispos e Cabidos’, pp. 55–94, esp., pp. 63–70.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 77 dragged into controversy and conflict as royal policy dramatically changed direction in an attempt to curtail, often violently, what the king and his advisors considered were the excessive accumulated powers and privileges of the Portuguese Church. Certainly Soeiro had previously commanded remarkably high royal esteem as can be seen from the 1214 will of Queen Urraca whereby he was appointed one of her three executors, the others being Archbishop D. Estêvão Soares of Braga and the treasurer of Braga.9 Not only was the sum of money entrusted to Soeiro’s management greater than that entrusted to the churchmen of Braga, but the Queen further bequeathed to him 300 morabitinos, for his own personal use. In these early years, besides his ecclesiastical duties, Bishop Soeiro’s most visible activity was as a member of a select group of royal jurists. For part of 1211 and all of 1212, he was in Rome serving as an advocate of King Afonso II conducting crucial litigation against the King’s sisters in disputes over the provisions of the will of their late father, King D. Sancho I (d. March 1211). This he did in the company of distinguished colleagues, Vicente Hispano, the renowned canonist, the at-that-time archdeacon of Lisbon but destined to become chancellor to Sancho II and later Bishop of Guarda,10 Master Silvestre Godinho, another canonist and future Archbishop of Braga, and the civilist, Master Lanfranco of Milan.11 Whilst in Rome, Soeiro was consecrated bishop by Innocent III12 and was partly responsible for the timely re-issue of the bull Manifestis Probatum, on 16 April 1212, in which the Pope confirmed Afonso II’s kingship.13 Soeiro’s exertions on the King’s behalf were gratefully recognised in a charter of 17 April 1217 in which Afonso II took the Bishop and his diocese under royal protection and, at the same time, commemorated Soeiro’s services both in Rome and in the kingdom in his securing of Innocent III’s favourable decision 9 Ibid., p. 71; ANTT, Mosteiro de Alcobaça, Maço 15, N°. 336; Vilar, D. Afonso II, Um Rei Sem Tempo (Lisbon: Circulo de Leitores, 2005), p. 63, note 2, a copy of the will is included in António Caetano de Sousa, Provas da História genealógica da casa real portuguesa, 6 vols (Lisbon: Officina Sylviana da Academia Real, 1739; Reprint, Coimbra: Atlântida, 1946–1954), vol. 1, at pp. 47–49. 10 Cunha, Historia Ecclesiastica . . . Lisboa, p. 110; Maria Teresa Nobre Veloso, D. Afonso II, Relações de Portugal com a Santa Sé durante o seu reinado (Coimbra: Archivo da Universidade de Coimbra, 2000), p. 128; Bulário, N°. 179, p. 328, Noverit serenitas of 24 April 1212; and see António Dominuges de Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre e Mestre Vicente, juristas da contenda entre D. Afonso II e suas irmãs (Braga: Editorial Franciscana, 1963), p. 58 note 125. 11 Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre, p. 26, note 64, Letter of Innocent III of 23 July 1212; ANTT, Gaveta 16, Março 2, N°. 15, fl.2v. 12 Cunha, Historia Ecclesiastica . . . Lisboa, p. 110. 13 Bulário, N°. 176, p. 325. Branco, referring to the letter Noverit Serenitas of Innocent III addressed to Afonso II of 24 April 1212 requesting the king pay the census in arrears owed to the Holy See, notes the following passage: – Noverit serenitas tua . . . legium tuum per venerabilem fratrem nostrum [Suerium] episcopum et dilectum filium magistrum Vincentium arch[idiaconum] Vlixbonenses tibi . . . concedere celsitudinem regiam; Bulário, N°.179, p. 328; Branco, O conceito de soberania régia, p. 552.
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regarding the Infantas’ proprietary claims to the strategic castles of Alenquer and Montemór-o-Velho.14 Although we have no indication of the trajectory by which Soeiro achieved appointment as a royal advocate, the clear inference is that he had received considerable schooling in Law. Indeed, his legal skills appear to have been long recognised in Rome. During the year 1198, Soeiro then dean of Lisbon, was appointed judge-delegate by Innocent III no less than seven times in disputes between the Bishop of Coimbra and the monastery of Santa Cruz of the same city.15 Later, as bishop, although many details are lacking, remarkable is the ostensible deftness with which he conducted a series of legal disputes in which he opposed a number of formidable adversaries including, apart from conflicts with his own insubordinate yet highly influential and well-connected dean Vicente Hispano, some of the most powerful institutions of his time including the Bishop of Coimbra, the Order of the Temple, the monastery of St Vicente de Fora, two kings of Portugal and, on at least one occasion, the pope himself. Soeiro would return to Rome to attend the Fourth Lateran Council in November 1215 and remained at the Papal Curia throughout the following year probably in order to secure foreign reinforcements for a military campaign on the Portuguese-Andalusi frontier and also to assist his learned-friends, Vicente Hispano, Silvestre Godinho and Lanfranco in the procurement of the papal bull of 7 April whereby the disputes between Afonso II and his sisters Teresa and Sancha, which had by then dragged on for five years, were in large part resolved.16 The legal settlement was short lived, however. Innocent III’s unexpected death only three months later in July revived the Infantas’ pretensions and D. Teresa immediately petitioned his successor, Honorius III, for apostolic protection for herself, her daughters and her property.17 This sudden turn of events was doubtless another reason for Soeiro’s prolongation of his Roman sojourn throughout the remainder of 1216 as, once more, he stepped into the legal arena to defend his sovereign. It appears that from about this time, the conflict and controversy that were to be the near-continuous companions to Soeiro’s tenure began to make themselves felt nearer to home. The earliest evidence of this is the previously mentioned letter of royal protection granted to Soeiro and his diocese in April of 1217. Since the document did not expand on the circumstances that had led to its production, it is not known from whom or from what the prelate was under threat. Nevertheless, although the remainder of the surviving documentation reveals little that is explicit, we can be tolerably certain that, whilst his relations with Afonso II might have been healthy enough in 1217, the same was not true of his dealings with other parties holding interests in his diocese.18 14 ANTT, Gaveta 1 Mç. 3, N°. 14; Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre, p. 62, note 134; cf. Branco, ‘Reis, Bispos e Cabidos’, p. 71. 15 Branco, O conceito de soberania. . . Appendix, ‘Elenco dos Juízes Delegados, Dioceses Portugueses e Hispânicas’, p. 160; Bulário, N°s 20, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31. 16 Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre, note 79. 17 Ibid., note 80. 18 Cf., Branco, ‘Reis, Bispos e Cabidos’, pp. 71–72.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 79 In the first place, Soeiro may have needed royal protection from the supporters of Bishop Pedro Soares of Coimbra who was in dispute with Soeiro over the boundaries of properties belonging to Bishop Pedro located within the diocese of Lisbon.19 More ominous, perhaps, was a dispute between Soeiro and the Templars, the details of which remain unknown, resulting in the Bishop of Lisbon pronouncing a sentence of excommunication over the entire Order in Iberia.20 In addition to these discords, Innocent III (d. 1116) had apparently conducted an investigation into alleged irregularities in Soeiro’s conduct. In a letter addressed by Innocent’s successor, Honorius III, to Soeiro on 6 September of 1217, the Bishop of Lisbon was assured that the ‘inquiries obtained’ (inquisitiones obtentos) against him, ‘by the wickedness of your rivals’ (per emulorum tuorum malitiam) were now revoked by papal decree such that they could no longer in any way damage his reputation nor otherwise cause him harm. It is more than a little gnawing that Soeiro’s wicked rivals are not identified, nor is the substance of their procured ‘inquiries’ disclosed.21
Soeiro and innocent III Nevertheless, although details are scarce, it is clear the early years of Soeiro’s episcopate were far from tranquil. Victim of hostility and opposition from individuals and institutions both inside and outside his diocese, it can readily be imagined that the bishop might have been on-the-look-out for an opportunity to secure a personal triumph that would enhance his standing at home and abroad, perhaps not least in Rome. The perfect vehicle for his ‘public-relations-boost’ lay just about 100 km south of Lisbon in the form of the Muslim-held town of Alcácer, a rich and thriving port, flanked by precious salt-yielding marshes in the upper reaches of the River Sado estuary. As the head of one of Portugal’s southernmost dioceses, with his seat Lisbon and its territories frequently ravaged by Saracen raids launched from Alcácer by land and by sea,22 Soeiro was certainly one of the individuals with the most justification for stepping up to the plate in order personally to spearhead a grand enterprise to capture the fortress. With Alcácer the key roadblock to be overcome before Portuguese southern progress against Iberian Islam could continue effectively, the enterprise held enormous potential for the expansion of the kingdom. Success in the venture would not only represent a dramatic reinvigoration of the Portuguese campaigns against al-Andalus, more or less in abeyance for almost a generation, but also it would greatly bolster the royal legitimacy of Afonso II who, in conspicuous contrast to his father and grandfather, lacked military accolades. Soeiro himself meanwhile, as principal architect of the project, might have hoped to emerge from the triumph
19 20 21 22
Bulário, N°. 215, p. 378. Branco, ‘Reis, Bispos e Cabidos’, p. 71; Bulário, N°. 223, p. 437. Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre, p. 78, note 160; and cf., Branco, ‘Reis, Bispos e Cabidos’, p. 72. Such raids enabled Governor of Alcácer, Abd Allah Ibn Wazir, to send 100 Christian captives to the Almohad Caliph in Morocco each year as tribute: Carmen, lines, 69–70.
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adorned with the garlands of champion of the Portuguese and defender of Christendom, favourite of both King and Pope. In addition, he could expect to add to his diocesan lands Alcácer, its port, and its famously fertile region. Sure enough, whilst the documentation is frequently obscure, terse or even silent, there is sufficient corroborating evidence to show Soeiro’s hand in a substantial and ambitious campaign of forward-planning probably beginning as early as 1213 aimed at gathering the military forces necessary to conquer the town. The reign of Sancho I (1185–1211) had coincided with the zenith of Almohad power. Following the devastating Caliphal campaigns of the 1190s, during which the Portuguese kingdom had been ravaged almost to extinction, Sancho made no further efforts to pursue the war on the Saracens. In 1212 however, only a year after Sancho’s death, Iberian Christian fortunes revived dramatically when Alfonso VIII of Castile, commanding a coalition force, defeated the massed Almohad Imperial army at Las Navas de Tolosa near the Despeñaperros gorge in the highlands about 130 km northeast of Cordoba. The epoch of the great Berber peninsular expeditions was brought abruptly to an end as the Caliphate, reeling from the defeat, plunged into fratricidal conflict and decay.23 Greatly buoyed by the Spanish victory, Innocent III had, in the following spring, promulgated his greatest crusading bull Quia Maior (19–29 April 1213) calling for a new expedition to recover the Holy Land. At the same time, he had also announced the Fourth Lateran Council to be held two years hence in November 1215, the lengthy period of notice designed to ensure the maximum attendance of clerics from all parts of Christendom at what is, still-today, one of the most famous ecumenical councils in the history of the Church. When, at this unprecedented international assembly of leading churchmen, the question of the new crusade came to be discussed, Bishop Soeiro, in attendance along with the other Hispanic prelates,24 did not hesitate to seize the moment. Being no doubt mindful of the conquest of Lisbon in 1147 in which Afonso Henriques had successfully enlisted the aid of contingents of northern European maritime crusaders voyaging down the west coasts of Europe to Palestine and the Second Crusade,25 and also of Sancho I’s 1189 conquest of ‘impregnable’ Silves after engaging similar seaborne forces during the Third Crusade,26 Soeiro requested of Innocent III authorisation for the retention of foreign pilgrim-warriors passing through Portuguese ports for service on the PortugueseAndalusi frontier.27
23 Kennedy, Muslim Spain and Portugal, p. 56. Ambrosio Huici Miranda, Historia Politica del Imperio Almohade, 2 vols (Tetuán: Editora Marroqui, 1956), vol. 2, p. 425 et seq. 24 See generally, A. P. Figueiredo, Portugueses nos concílios geraes isto he, relaçaõ dos embaixadores prelados e doutores portugueses que tem assistido nos concilios geraes desde os primeiros lateranenses até o novissimo tridentino (Lisbon: Oficina de António Gomes, 1787). 25 DEL. 26 DIN. 27 De Itinere Frisonum, ed. by Reinhold Röhricht in Quinti Belli Sacri Scriptores Minores (Geneva: Illustrandis Orientis Latini Monumentis, 1879), pp. 57–70, p. 63.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 81 Innocent flatly refused. Unquestionably acutely aware of the diversion of the Fourth Crusade, the Pope was determined this time to take every precaution that all efforts would be concentrated on the Holy Land. Jerusalem, that most sacred city, location of Christ’s Passion and Resurrection, was more than ever the Pope’s unshakeable focus since in his view, as he pointedly remarked in his retort to Bishop Soeiro, ‘he who teaches the freedom of the Church from enslavement must start from the head’.28 Indeed, already in 1213, the Pope had suspended crusading indulgences for Iberia and the Midi, save for those warriors indigenous to those regions.29
Tactics of attraction Whilst the papal rebuff appears to have left Soiero undaunted, the good bishop had a further problem to overcome if his scheme was to have any chance of success. Although crusader fleets sailing to the East via the Strait of Gibraltar might well have been forced, in any event, to stop at Lisbon to take on supplies – indeed throughout Soeiro’s tenure the city was the last Christian port before the Mediterranean – it was by no means a foregone conclusion that their personnel could be persuaded to stay and fight, as disagreements among crusaders reported at Lisbon and Alcácer demonstrate.30 Indeed, an important conceptual obstacle appears to have existed for large numbers of crusaders when faced with the prospect of campaigning in Iberia. In essence, the difficulty seems to have arisen from the preaching of Urban II during 1095–1096 and the early memorialisation of the success of the First Crusade in the first decades of the twelfth century, the combined result of which had powerfully imbued the imagination of many would-be warriors for Christ with the urgent desire to arrive to the physical city of Jerusalem and the Holy Land, and with literal notions of the imitatio Christi, a crucial aspect of which was the idea of taking up Christ’s cross in the very land ‘where His feet have stood’.31 In spite of official efforts from the time of the Second Crusade to expand the theatre of crusading to other regions including Iberia, for many crusaders, the true Christian fight could only be fought in Palestine. 28 de vindicta ecclesie docens inchoandum a capite; De itinere Frisonum, p. 63; and see Jaime Ferreiro Alemparte, Arribadas de Normandos y Cruzados a las Costas de la Península Ibérica (Madrid: Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales, 1999), pp. 166–67. 29 The bull, Quia Maior, April 1213; PL ccxvi: 817–822. The bull was not sent to the Iberian Christian kingdoms, nor to the Latin Empire of Constantinople; James M. Powell, Anatomy of a Crusade (Philadelphia: University of Philadelphia Press, 1986), p. 17. With reference to the indulgences previously available for warriors in Iberia and the Midi, the bull announced, ‘these were conceded to them in circumstances which have entirely passed and for that particular cause which has already for the most part disappeared for, so far, affairs in both places have gone well, by the grace of God, so that the immediate use of force is not needed’; trans, Louise and Jonathan Riley-Smith, The Crusades, Idea and Reality, 1095–1274 (London: Edward Arnold, 1981), p. 122. 30 DEL pp. 101–11; Nascimento, ‘Poema de Conquista’, p. 634; De Itinere Frisonum, pp. 62–63. 31 Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’; cf., Purkis, Crusading Spirituality, especially pp. 125–38.
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It was in the face of this powerful partiality for campaigning in the Holy Land that stratagems appear to have been adopted to infuse the Portuguese kingdom, and in particular Lisbon, with extra sanctity as a crucial device in convincing doubters of the divine value of the war on Islam in the Iberian West. Especially following the conquest of Lisbon in 1147, there is evidence that individuals and parties, not always readily identifiable but certainly more or less connected to the Portuguese royal court, operated a deliberate and identifiable policy in order to attract more passing Jerusalem-bound crusaders to the fight on their frontier with Islam.32 This strategy was put into practice, in large part, through the promulgation of relevant saintly cults, not only those with traditions already established in the region, such as Sts Maxima, Verissimus and Julia,33 but also through the promotion of new or newly imported saints. Of the latter variety, the fourth-century Christian martyr St Vincent of Zaragoza, was the prime example, being installed as patron saint of Lisbon following the translation of his remains to the city in 1173 from the cape that bears his name at Iberia’s extreme southwestern corner.34 Meanwhile new saints were presented and promoted in order to appeal to specific audiences in the parts of Europe renowned as areas prodigious in the production of previous crusader help on the Portuguese frontier. Most famously, one Henry of Bonn, a Rhinelander, was proclaimed a great hero and martyr of the 1147 conquest of Lisbon in the anonymous Indiculum Fundationis Monasterii Beati Vincentii Vlixbone, a text produced in Portugal in 1188, amid the furore of the announcement of the Third Crusade.35 According to the Indiculum, from his tomb in the city a miraculous Jerusalem palm tree had sprouted whose leaves possessed the power to heal the sick.36 With the wondrous palm one of several divine indicators of Henry of Bonn’s status in the afterlife, an unmistakable, indeed crucial, purpose of the Indiculum is to proclaim that Christian warriors killed in battle on the Portuguese frontier will wear a martyr’s crown in heaven. There is also evidence for the astonishingly early establishment in Portugal of the cult of the English St Thomas of Canterbury (Thomas Becket, ca.1119–1170), indeed very shortly after his canonisation in 1173, intended to appeal to Anglo-Norman crusaders, an important presence in both the Lisbon and Silves operations.37 These tactics of attraction – projects designed to create a cultural and ideological environment propitious to the realisation of Portuguese/maritime-crusader joint-ventures – were continued by Soeiro of Lisbon and indeed appear to have reached something of a crescendo
32 Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’. 33 See for example DEL, pp. 110–11, also, Wilson, Enigma of the De Expugnatione Lyxbonensi, p. 121. 34 Picoito, ‘A Trasladação de S. Vicente’. 35 Aires A. Nascimento, ed. and trans., ‘Indiculum fundationis Monasterii Beati Vicentii Vlixbone’, in A Conquista de Lisboa aos Mouros, ed. by Aires A. Nascimento (Lisbon: Vega, 2001), pp. 178–81. 36 Ibid., p. 193; cf., Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, p. 211. 37 Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, pp. 218–21.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 83 under his stewardship in the 3–4 years immediately preceding the 1217 campaign to capture Alcácer do Sal. It can scarcely be doubted that at the centre of Soeiro’s gambit was the superlative opportunity for garnering support presented by the Fourth Lateran Council. In this respect we note a version of the account of the translation of St Vincent’s remains to Lisbon that was in circulation, at around the time of the Council, in Flanders, an important crusader-producing area. Produced in the monastery of Saint-Ghislain in Hainaut, the so-called Relatio de Translatione Sancti Vincentii Martyris,38 conventionally dated to the early thirteenth century, relates a version of the story in large-part from the oral testimony, according to the prologue, of a certain Fernando of the Cathedral of Lisbon who is described as ‘a venerable man both through divine religion and lineage’.39 All evidence suggests that this can be none other than Fernando Peres, cantor of Lisbon, and member of Soeiro’s staff at the Lateran Council.40 Notable in this version of the translation story is the prominent participation of Princess Teresa, daughter of Afonso Henriques, in the adornment of St Vincent’s new tomb in Lisbon with silver and gold and precious stones which contrasts sharply with the texts comprising the Portuguese tradition of the translation which attribute the decoration of the shrine to Afonso Henriques alone with no mention of the princess. Teresa had, in 1184, married Philip of Alsace, Count of Flanders and, following Philip’s death at the siege of Acre in 1191, she had chosen to remain in Flanders, somewhat revered as the ‘old countess’.41 Conspicuously, there is no mention in the Relatio of the other Portuguese royal personage with prominent Flemish connections of more recent memory, Prince Fernando, brother of Afonso II, who had, by marriage in 1212, become Count of Flanders. We can suspect that this silence is owed to his essentially disastrous rule which saw war between Flanders and France, his defeat at the Battle of Bouvines and his subsequent imprisonment by Philip Augustus in 1214, all of which might have somewhat tarnished Portuguese reputation in the region. However, if Fernando’s memory was best left uncelebrated, appeal to the memory of his aunt, a long-time resident of Flanders, was apparently still worthwhile. And, if her Christianity might have been in doubt, owed perhaps to a certain prejudice on the part of northerners towards the Iberian Christian kingdoms, possibly on
38 Brussels: Biblioteca Real da Bélgica, MS Códice II. 981, fols. 100v–104r. 39 Dias, Culto e Memória Textual de S. Vicente em Portugal, Appendix IV, pp. 207–20, reproduction of Latin text with Portuguese translation. 40 On Fernando Peres, see Maria José Azevedo Santos, Vida e Morte de um Mosteiro Cisterciense (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 1998), pp. 55–63. 41 Countess Teresa of Flanders (1151–1218) also known as Matilda of Flanders: see, inter alia Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, pp. 215–16; Luis Gonzaga de Azevedo, História de Portugal, 6 vols (Lisbon: Bíblion, 1940–42), vol. 5, pp. 122–26; Lay, Reconquest Kings, pp. 213–14.
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account of their large minorities of Jews and Muslims, here was her Christian orthodoxy affirmed in the Relatio through her active participation in the translation of St Vincent.42 There is also evidence that the legend of Henry of Bonn might have undergone some adjustment at the hands of Soeiro and his envoys, perhaps aimed at overcoming a certain Frisian reluctance to join campaigns in Iberia, news of which had perchance reached the ears of the Bishop of Lisbon at the Lateran Council. Certainly one important contemporary Frisian source, the De Itinere Frisonum, relates that Henry was originally called Popteto Uluinga before adopting the name Henry on his conversion to Christianity. This piece of information, when taken in conjunction with a later mid-fourteenth-century chronicle of Frisian deeds, the Gesta Frisiorum, informing us that this same Popteto was from Wirdum in the northeastern Netherlands, is perhaps at least suggestive of a tradition (possibly oral) in circulation during the period immediately preceding the Alcácer campaign, that Henry/Popteto (the brave protagonist in the 1147 conquest of Lisbon cruelly slain in the process) was not a Rhinelander after all and had nothing to do with Bonn but was a specifically Frisian martyr! In addition, there appears to have been significant further emphasis on Henry’s miraculous palm tree. In this context, it is important to remember that crusaders visiting Jerusalem often brought a palm branch back home with them as proof they had completed their pilgrimage and fulfilled their vow, from where we get the name ‘palmers’ often used to describe returning crusaders.43 In the particular case of Henry’s palm tree, this potent symbol of the pilgrimage to Jerusalem was likely to have been a key device in attempts to bring into play the idea of the Iter per Hispaniam, or ‘route [to the Holy Land] through Spain’, famously enunciated by Archbishop Diego Gelmirez of Compostela at a council held in the city in 1124: Just as the soldiers of Christ and faithful sons of the holy Church opened up the way to Jerusalem with much blood, so let us prove ourselves to be soldiers of Christ and, having vanquished his most wicked enemies, the 42 Indicative of the northern suspicions over the orthodoxy of the Iberian Christian kingdoms is William the Breton’s anecdote concerning Countess Teresa included in his account of the Battle of Bouvines; ‘It has become common knowledge that the old Countess [Teresa] of Flanders, aunt of Count Fernando of Spain . . . had wished to know the outcome of the battle. She cast her fortune according to the custom of the Spaniards who readily use this art and received . . . truthful answers . . . but with a double meaning in accordance with the Devil’s habit of always deceiving in the end those who serve him’; William the Breton, ‘Gesta Philippi Augusti’, Oeuvres de Rigord et de Guillaume le Breton: historiens de Philippe-Auguste, ed. by H. F. Delaborde, 2 vols (Paris: Societe de l’histoire de France, 1883–1885), vol. 1, p. 202, pp. 295–96; Georges Duby, The Legend of Bouvines: War, Religion and Culture in the Middle Ages, translated by Catherine Tihanyi (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990); cf., Lay, Reconquest Kings, pp. 213–14. 43 James A. Brundage, Medieval Canon Law and the Crusader (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969), pp. 124–25.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 85 Saracens, let us also, with the help of His grace, open up a way to that same sepulchre of the Lord through the region of Spain, which is shorter and much less laborious.44 Clearly, by device of this unequivocally stated purpose of ‘way-opening’, virtually any action against the Muslims of al-Andalus could conceivably be brought within the Jerusalem pilgrimage element of a crusader’s quest. The Iter per Hispaniam had been famously espoused by Alfonso I ‘the Battler’ of Aragon-Navarre who was much enamoured of the Jerusalem-centric notion of crusading. Having conquered Saragossa in 1118, within a few years he had managed to extend his territory well south of the Ebro. In order to protect his new conquests and, probably taking the Order of the Temple as his inspiration, the Battler established two military confraternities, that of Belchite and that of Monreal. Either expressly in their Rules or specified in the wording of indulgences granted to them, each had the stated purpose of opening ‘the road to Jerusalem from this region [of Spain]’.45 Significantly, the emblem of the militia of Belchite appears to have been a palm tree as we learn in a passage of the Historia Ecclesiastica of Orderic Vitalis where they are described as the Fratres de Palmis or ‘Brothers of the Palm’.46 Pivotal here is William Purkis’s explanation of the probable significance of the palm tree for the brothers of Belchite who, both in the light of their mandate and of the iconographical role of the palm tree within the contemporary popular schematic of the Jerusalem pilgrimage, understood the palm tree precisely as an emblem of their mission to carve a path through Spain to the Holy City.47 Against this background it is difficult not to see a similar use of palm tree imagery in the Indiculum and in the cult of Henry of Bonn – the palm tree of Lisbon, miraculously grown up from a branch carried there by a pilgrim returning from Jerusalem, was presented as proof of the sacred fusion of the principles of martyrdom in Iberia and the Jerusalem Pilgrimage. In this crucial context, the powerful and readily understood motif of the miraculous palm tree would have been presented in order to assuage the doubts of those many crusaders passing the shores of western Iberia who were
44 E. Falque Rey, ed., Historia Compostellana in Corpus Christianorum, Continuatio Mediaevalis (Turnhout: Brepols, 1988), vol. LXX, pp. 379–80; His words have caused some consternation since it is difficult to see how the passage through Spain (and then presumably across North Africa and up through Egypt) could be ‘shorter’ and ‘less laborious’ than the land passage through eastern Europe and Constantinople; see Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, pp. 211–12. 45 Patrick J. O’Banion, ‘What has Iberia to do with Jerusalem? Crusade and the Spanish Route to the Holy Land in the Twelfth Century’, Journal of Medieval History, 34:4 (2008), 383–95, at 388–89. See also p. 392; the 1172 charter of union of a group of friars from Ávila with the Order of Santiago also appears to include the Iter per Hispaniam principle; the document is reproduced in José Luís Martın, Los orıgenes de la Orden Militar de Santiago (1170–1195) (Barcelona: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1974), pp. 226–8. 46 The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis, vol. vi, trans. by Marjorie Chibnall (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), p. 400. 47 Purkis, Crusading Spirituality, p. 135.
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less interested in plundering al-Andalus and more interested in securing their eternal salvation through the completion of their crusading vow. In other words, it was an effort to overcome the popular conceptual problem which prevented many crusaders from committing to fight anywhere except Palestine. Indeed, according to the De Itinere Frisonum the famous palm tree was still to be seen growing tall from Henry’s tomb in 1217.48 This is most curious, since according to the author of the Indiculum, by the time he was writing in 1188 the miracle palm had already completely disappeared, having been removed to another location or destroyed because so many pilgrims took pieces of it for the cure of their ailments. Yet, miraculously enough, nearly twenty years later, it was suddenly back for all to see in the immediate prelude to the Alcácer campaign. Certainly, the timely reappearance of the tree would have fitted very neatly into the plans of one as resourceful as Soeiro as he prepared his diocesan capital to welcome his northern visitors.49 In fact, the anonymous author of the De Itinere Frisonum, who as a member of the Frisian fleet wrote from personal experience, had been left in no doubt, following his visit to Lisbon, as to the heavenly status of Popteto/Henry: To the east, outside the city, is found the venerable monastery where presently is seen the lofty palm tree which grows from the tomb of the martyrof-Christ, Popteto Uluinga, a chief of the Christian soldiery who, having changed his name to that of Henry, ended his life in Christ in this same place seventy years ago, along with his squire; and who, now canonized by divine revelation, enjoys temporal and eternal glory.50
The conquest of Alcácer do Sal At length, on 29 May 1217, a fleet of nearly 300 ships carrying crusaders principally from the Rhineland and Frisia set sail from the port of Vlaardingen in the Southern Netherlands.51 With Count George of Wied in overall command and
48 De Itinere Frisonum, pp. 59–70. Further evidence for the likely prevalence of the association of the palm tree with the Jerusalem pilgrimage in Lisbon during the period resides in the existence until 1755 in the city (in the parish of Madalena) of the Hospital dos Palmeiros (‘Hospital of the Palmers’) where a memorial plaque over the door, now lost, is recorded to have proclaimed that the hospital had been established from an earlier foundation for pobres palmeyros e peregrinos e resgatados (‘poor palmers and pilgrims and freed hostages’) some time before 1292. The original hospital is thought to have been founded by foreign crusaders in the vicinity of Almada (Cacilhas) in the twelfth century; Mário Barroca, Epigrafia Medieval Portuguesa, 3 vols (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2000), vol. 2 book 1, N°. 420, pp. 1078–80. See also José Augusto Oliveira, ‘Vigiar o Tejo, vigiar o mar: a definição dos concelhos de Almada e Sesimbra’, in Da Conquista de Lisboa à Conquista de Alcácer, 1147–1217, Definição e Dinâmicas de um Território de Fronteira, coord. by Isabel Cristina F. Fernandes and Maria João V. Branco (Lisbon: Edições Colibri, 2019), pp. 285–316, at note 19. I am most grateful to Maria João Branco for this reference. 49 Cf., Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’, p. 217. 50 De Itinere Frisonum, pp. 59–70. 51 Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum, in Quinti Belli Sacri etc. ed. by R. Röhricht (1879), p. 29.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 87 Count William of Orange in charge of the rearguard,52 the fleet arrived to Lisbon on 10 July where it was met by Soeiro along with his namesake and fellow prelate, Bishop Soeiro of Évora (1205–1229), and the regional commanders of the Templars, Hospitallers and the Order of Santiago.53 Having preached a sermon to the northerners in Lisbon port, Soeiro was unable ultimately to convince the warriors of the Frisian brigade to join his proposed enterprise to capture the fortress of Alcácer. Apparently cowed by Innocent III’s refusal of Soeiro’s petition at the Lateran Council, the Frisians loaded up with provisions for the next stage of their journey and continued the voyage eastward. This did not prevent them, however, from making brief stops further along the Iberian coast to make opportunistic attacks on Faro, Rota, Cadiz and Ibiza which not only wrought substantial destruction in these places, but also won the Frisians considerable booty. Having followed a course northward up the Iberian east coast and then along the coast of southern France, the Frisians spent the winter of 1217/1218 at Civitavecchia in Italy.54 Happily for Soeiro, Counts William and George, along with the majority of the fleet (over two thirds), enthusiastically embraced the Alcácer endeavour. Indeed, although the documents are threadbare, there is sufficient circumstantial evidence to suppose they had anticipated an action fought on the Iberian frontier, although to what extent this was in fact due to Soeiro’s recruiting efforts and propaganda campaign during the preceding years is a matter of conjecture.55 Nevertheless, the (1) departure of the fleet from the Netherlands at the end of May, sufficiently late in the sailing season to anticipate the possibility of wintering in southern Europe, and (2) the known delay of the principal leaders of the Fifth Crusade who were not expected to arrive in the Holy Land until the following year,56 coupled with (3) efforts in Portugal resulting in the timely assembly of the army, perhaps 20,000 strong, and (4) a campaign undertaken throughout the dioceses of Portugal to preach the cross inside the kingdom in preparation for ‘the First Portuguese Crusade’, as Erdmann described it,57 almost certainly in expectation of the arrival of the northern fleet, form a conjuncture of elements suggesting a detailed programme of forward planning at an international level in which there is ample reason to suspect Soeiro of Lisbon played a leading role.58 At the end of July, the crusader fleet left Lisbon port and sailed up the Sado heading for Alcácer. Meanwhile, the Portuguese army marched southward to rendezvous with the fleet outside the walls of the fortress. The siege began on 30 July and continued for five weeks, involving the usual methods of assault by
52 53 54 55 56 57
Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum, p. 30; cf., Lay, Reconquest Kings, p. 221 Carmen, line 57; Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum, p. 30; De Itinere Frisonum, p. 62. De Itinere Frisonum, pp. 63–67; Alemparte, Arribadas, pp. 98–103. Carmen, line 34, terra vivenda; cf., Pereira, Os Cavaleiros de Santiago, p. 35. Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum, p. 31. Monumenta Henricina, dir. by A. Dias Dinis, vol. 1 (Coimbra: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do Quinto Centenário da Morte do Infante D. Henrique, 1960), N°. 25, p. 47; Erdmann, A Idea de Cruzada em Portugal. 58 On the assembly of the army see Vilar, Afonso II, p. 137.
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towers, catapults and mines. However, on 8 September a large Andalusi army of rescue arrived under the command of the governors of Seville, Jaén, Badajoz and Jerez. To the Christian besiegers, the force appeared to be overwhelming, with the author of the Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum estimating that it numbered as many as 100,000. Despite the arrival of an extra 32 Christian ships,59 the besiegers, still substantially outnumbered and fearfully bemoaning their shortage of horses, swiftly dug a ditch around their position and prepared for imminent attack. Fortunately for them, reinforcements arrived, apparently somewhat unexpectedly according to the reports, in the form of a numerous army comprising the forces of several barons of Portugal and León, a large contingent of Templars led by Pedro Alvarez, Master of the Order of the Temple in Spain, and a division of Hospitallers. Battle was joined between the two armies on 11 September at a site about 10 km from Alcácer along the banks of the River Sítimos, near the modern village of Santa Catarina de Sítimos.60 With the Knights of Santiago playing a prominent role under their commander, Martim Barregão, who ‘though small in body had the heart of a lion’, the result was a decisive Christian victory.61 The defenders in Alcácer surrendered on 18 October, making the Christian triumph complete. With almost all of the defenders taken into captivity, the spoils were divided among the Christian warriors and the fortress was handed into the safe keeping of the Order of Santiago.62 With the tide having turned so conclusively in favour of the Christians, the Iberian leaders of the campaign – Bishops Soeiro of Lisbon and Soeiro of Évora, Pedro Álvarez de Alvito Master of the Templars, the prior of the Hospitallers in Portugal and Martim Barregão Commander of Palmela of the Order of Santiago – immediately attempted to persuade Honorius III to declare a full international Portuguese crusade. To this end they wrote to the Pope to request the following: • •
that Honorius issue an order (mandatum) that the foreign crusaders remain in Portugal for another year in order to ‘extirpate the perfidy of the pagans from all Spain’; that ‘the foreigners, as well as our crusaders (crucesignati) and those who will take the sign of the cross in the future will have the same indulgence that they would have had if they had presented themselves in person for the relief of the Holy Land’;
59 Carmen, line 118. 60 Pereira, Os Cavaleiros de Santiago em Alcácer do Sal, p. 33. 61 Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum, p. 32; Eng. trans. Crusade and Christendom, Annotated Documents in Translation from Innocent III to the Fall of Acre, 1187–1291, ed. by Jessalynn Bird, Edward Peters and James M. Powell (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013), p. 156. 62 Vilar, Afonso II, p. 144; ANTT, Reg. Afonso II, fols. 81v–82. Also, see generally, Kurt Villads Jensen, A Cruzada nas Fronteiras do Mundo (Lisbon: Chiado Editora, 2014), pp. 597–602.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 89 •
that monies levied in Iberia pursuant to the Vicesima, the tax approved at the Fourth Lateran Council and promulgated in the bull ad Liberandum (1215)63 of a twentieth part of ecclesiastical income to be donated for a period of three years ‘for the aid of the Holy Land’, should now be applied exclusively for the fight against the Andalusi Saracens.64
Simultaneous with this clear petition for the declaration of an international Iberian crusade, Count William of Orange also wrote to the Pope, setting out his view that southern Iberia now lay open for definitive Christian conquest and requesting instructions as to whether he was indeed now to lead his men in the continuation of their voyage to the East or rather to keep his forces in Iberia in order to complete the expulsion of the Saracens from the peninsula.
The Pope’s Proviso and Goswin’s Carmen Here, it is important to note that in the bull, Quia Maior, Innocent III had expressly included a proviso creating the possibility of the lifting of the previously mentioned ban on crusade indulgences for foreigners fighting in Spain (and in the Midi), if the situation pertaining at the time of the publication of the bull was to change such as to require reassessment. Specifically, the Pope would ‘take care to act in any immediate necessity’.65 The question was, of course, could the Pope be persuaded that victory at Alcácer constituted such a necessity? Strong indication that a major campaign was not only anticipated in Portugal but that its chances for success were considered promising is to be found in the letter of Honorius III of 11 January 1218, addressed to the Archbishop of Braga, in which the Pope responds to the request of the Archbishop for the resolution of the question concerning to which diocese the city of Silves, the famously rich capital of the Almohad province of al-Faghar (modern Algarve), should belong in the event of its capture. Honorius appointed three judges delegate from Tui to investigate the matter.66 It was probably at the time of this concerted drive to persuade the Pope to exercise the Quia Maior proviso that Soeiro commissioned Goswin to produce the Carmen. Importantly, the Carmen contains much to suggest that God had so blessed the Alcácer campaign, and by implication the broader war on Islam in
63 Ad liberandum is to be found in Conciliorum Oecumenicorum Decreta, ed. by Joseph Alberigo et al (Bologna: Instituto per le scienze religiose, 1973), pp. 267–71. 64 Monumenta Henricina, No. 25, pp. 45–48. 65 et si forte requireret, nos ingruenti necessitate prospicere curaremus, PL ccxvi: 820, and see Powell, Anatomy of a Crusade, pp. 21 and 31 note 18; Eng. trans., Bird et al., Crusade and Christendom, p. 110. An alternative translation is provided by Louise and Jonathan Riley Smith, ‘If perchance it were needed, we would take care to give our attention to any serious situation that arises’, Crusades, Idea and Reality, p. 122. 66 Mansilla, N°. 130.
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western Iberia, such as to place it on a par with ‘official’ crusading ventures and particularly that anticipated in Quia Maior, which latter-day commentators would dub the ‘Fifth Crusade’. Viewed as a tool of persuasion designed to encourage the Pope to review the status of the war in Iberia under the terms of Quia Maior, several aspects of the Carmen assume considerable importance including the overwhelmingly providential tone of the work, with turns of fate ascribed to divine influence and, importantly, the occurrence of miracles with strong resonance in contemporary ‘crusading’ literature. Particularly significant is the appearance of a miraculous cross in the sky almost identical to that reported in Oliver of Paderborn’s letter to the Counts of Namur during his preaching of the Fifth Crusade67 and the appearance of a heavenly army in the sky strongly reminiscent of that reported at the siege of Antioch during the First Crusade.68 Notably, the letter sent to Honorius by the Portuguese clergy and the other leaders had also reported these ‘formalising’ miracles, together with a third, that of the timely arrival of the Templar and Hospitaller forces along with those of the barons of Portugal and León.69 With the Carmen and the letter thus proclaiming the appropriate sanctity of the Alcácer campaign; with the Muslim military in disarray; with the Portuguese army already assembled (with a powerful crusader force complete with a numerous
67 Oliver of Paderborn, Die Schriften des Kölner Domscholasters, ed. H. Hoogeweg (Tübingen: Litterarischer Verein, 1894), pp. 285–86; trans. Riley-Smith, Crusades, Idea and Reality, pp. 135–36. Oliver reports the same miracles in his Historia Damiatina, ed. by Hoogeweg, op cit. pp. 161–282; also ed. by Röhricht, Quinta Belli Sacri Scriptores Minores, pp. 73–115, Eng. trans, by John J Gavigan, in Christian Society and the Crusades 1198–1229, ed. by Edward Peters (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1991), pp. 49–139. The miracles in Frisia are also reported by Roger of Wendover in Flores Historiarum, ed. by Henry Gay Hewlett, Rogeri de Wendover Liber qui dicitur Flores historiarum etc.’. 3 vols. Rolls Series 84 (London: H. M. Stationary Office, 1886–89); Eng. trans, by J. A. Giles, Flowers of History, 2 vols (London: Bohn, 1849), pp. 388– 89. Roger of Wendover also includes a brief account of the conquest of Alcácer [ad 1217]. See also J. J: Moolenbroek, ‘Signs in the Heavens in Groningen and Friesland in 1214: Oliver of Cologne and Crusading Propaganda’, Journal of Medieval History, 16 (1987), pp. 251–72. 68 Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum, ed. and trans. R. Hill (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962), Liber IX; Peter Tudebode, Historia de Hierosolymitano Itinere, ed. by J. and L. Hill (Paris: Geuthner, 1977), pp. 93–96; Orderic Vitalis, The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis, Liber, IX. 69 Sed Omnipotens, cui proprium est superbis resistere, eorum mirabiliter frangens superbiam, dignatus est exercitui suo subvenire, tribus miraculis prehostensis. Primum fuit quod, cum nos de regno Portugalie essemus, eadem hora, paucissimi, in nocte precendenti, bellum ex improviso recepimus magnum exercitum templariis et de hospitalariis et de magnatibus regorum Portugalen et Legionen. Secundum fuit quod in aere apparuit vexillum crucis gloriosum exercitui invictorie signum. Tertium fuit quod in ipso belli conflictu visa est utrique parti divinitus candidatorum turba, quod etiam testati sunt ipsi qui fuerunt ibidem captuvi sarraceni, interrogantes ubi essent milites candidati, qui super eos compluebant tela et eorum oculos excecabant, propter quos etiam terga repente verterunt in fugam, ita quod, densissima durante strage, per x et amplius miliaria ibique duobus regibus interfectis, de Geen videlicet et de Croduba, de cunctis nisi fuge presidio aliquis non evasit; Monumenta Henricina, N°. 25, pp. 45–48.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 91 fleet in situ); with the road now open for the conquest of the Andalusi south; with the capital Silves seemingly within reach – here was an unparalleled opportunity to drive the Muslims from Western Iberia once and for all. Surely now the Pope would reinstate the crusade indulgence for the non-Iberian combatants.70
Soeiro for papal legate? Further, if as was the hope an International Portuguese crusade was to be declared, it would need a papal legate to lead it. That Soeiro might have sought such appointment for himself is suggested in the Carmen’s unabashed celebration of the bishop’s pivotal role in the Alcácer triumph – it is he that ‘stirred the pilgrims’ to undertake the campaign, he also supported them during the operation with his own resources, property and personnel. Yet he remains the ‘one man’ who, when victory was achieved, went ‘unrewarded and won nothing thereupon’. Here, however, the tone of the Carmen is conciliatory and, importantly, the author entreats the Bishop to be patient with those who have wronged him in order that in due course God may reward him with ‘the highest’. Typically ambiguous in its wording and construction, it is unclear if this passage contains a suggestion that soon it will be time for God, or rather the Pope as God’s chief representative on earth, to bestow due recompense upon the Bishop through awarding him a leading role in some great future endeavour. Some support for this reading perhaps resides in a curious couplet occurring near the beginning of the Carmen that appears to be a dedication to the Bishop of Lisbon but which at the same time may also be read as a plea to the Pope. Due to the peculiarities of Latin construction, especially in versification, it is just possible to interpret both the identities of the Pope and Soeiro, who as bishop was ex officio the Pope’s representative, as fused in the metaphor of the ‘boat of the rock of Peter’: And I entreat that you, for whom our songs labour, favour it To whom the boat of the rock of Peter is given to be guided71
70 Cf., Lucas Villegas-Aristizábal, ‘Was the Portuguese Led Military Campaign against Alcácer do Sal in the Autumn of 1217 Part of the Fifth Crusade? Al-Masaq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean (2019), vol. 31, 1, pp. 50–67. For a consideration of the Carmen from a modern military perspective see Carlos Afonso, ‘Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen: analysing a source through a strategy theoretical corpus’, Revista de Ciências Militares, 2018 May VI (1), pp. 41–62. 71 Ac tu, queso, fave cui carmina nostra laborant, / Cui petre Petri cimba regenda datur; Carmen, lines 15–16. In a letter to the Cistercian General Chapter of 1198, Innocent III described himself as ‘the helmsman in the barque of Peter, where on storm-tossed seas the Apostle stretches out his right hand to save those in danger.’ Cf., Brenda M. Bolton, ‘For the See of Simon Peter: The Cistercians at Innocent III’s Nearest Frontier’ in Monastic Studies I, ed. by J. Loades (Bangor: Headstart History, 1990), pp. 146–57; reprinted in, idem, Innocent III: Studies on Papal Authority and Pastoral Care (Aldershot, Variorum, 1995), at p. 146. See also Bernard of Clairvaux: De Consideratione ad Eugenium Papam, ed. by Jean Leclercq and H. M. Rochais, Sancti Bernardi Opera (Rome, 1963), vol. 3, pp. 379–493. Trans. by J. Anderson and E. T. Kennan, Five books on consideration: advice to a pope (Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1976), Book I Chapter viii. Bernard, discussing
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As official leader of the postulated crusade, indeed the Pope’s alter ego in the enterprise, Soeiro would be in an excellent position to take control of a great deal of territory in the Andalusi south, including the much-prized city of Silves. All this, Soeiro might have supposed, was eminently achievable now that all the ingredients for success appeared to be assembled. With the Muslims still punchdrunk from defeat, all he needed was for the northerners and their ships to remain in Portugal for a while longer and the necessary authority to command them to action. At the same time, it is far from certain that Soeiro, ambitious as he was, ever seriously aspired to the legatine dignity. He was undoubtedly well aware that, in spite of his brave efforts at Alcácer, the Archbishop of Braga, as the highestranking churchman in the kingdom, might have been a more fitting candidate for the office.72 Even so, by aiming high, at the very least the Bishop of Lisbon might have hoped, with good reason, to secure for himself a place among the chief commanders of the crusade, with all the attendant advantages he might have believed such a role would bring him. Alas, for Soeiro, the Pope was not persuaded to restore the crusade indulgence for foreign warriors in Iberia and he ordered the commanders of the fleet to continue the voyage to the Holy Land at the earliest opportunity.
Alcácer: the immediate aftermath If the rewards of the Alcácer enterprise were scant for Soeiro, the opposite was true for Afonso II. Beyond the immediate advantages of the augmentation of his kingdom and the elimination of a dangerous Saracen fortress, important wider benefits began accruing to the king almost as soon as letters reporting the victory arrived to Rome. The first came in with the New Year, and it was of considerable significance. On 4 January the bull Licet Venerabilis was published delivering the pontifical decision on the old question of the Primacy of the Spains.73 This was the culmination of the latest phase of a dispute the arbitration of which had been repeatedly postponed by Innocent III.74 Although the Primacy of the Spains had been confirmed Peter swimming to the shore of the sea of Tiberius to greet the risen Christ (John, 21: 1–7), writes, ‘It was surely a sign of the unique pontificate of Peter, intended to show that while the others had charge, each of his own ship, he was entrusted not with one ship, but the government of the whole world. For the sea is the world, and ships are churches. . . . So then while each of the other bishops has his own ship, you are in command of the greatest, the Universal Church throughout the world, the sum of all the other churches put together’; Five books on consideration, pp. 55–56. 72 Nevertheless, it is conceivable Soeiro could have been appointed legatus ad causam, or legatus missus with powers limited to overseeing the prosecution of the postulated crusade; see generally Kriston R. Rennie, The Foundations of Medieval Papal Legation (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), p. 65 et seq. 73 Mansilla, vol. 2, N°. 118, p. 93. 74 Veloso, D. Afonso II, Relações, p. 141. On the general background of the dispute see Carl Erdmann, Das Papsttum und Portugal im ersten Jahrhundert der portugiesischen Geschichte (Berlin:
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 93 to Toledo by a papal bull in March 1210, Braga had characteristically refused to respect the order and, almost certainly, Estêvão Soares had taken up the question personally with the Pope at the first opportunity following his succession to the archiepiscopacy during his visit to Rome to receive the pallium in 1213. The details of the dispute have been well rehearsed in the literature and it will suffice here to highlight only the outcome. Following the vigorous efforts of Estêvão of Braga, the Pope disposed of the question in his bull Licet Venerabilis whereby he imposed silence upon it.75 With the subject closed to further debate, both archbishops retained the title and prerogatives of primate and, importantly, the Church of Braga was, for all practical purposes, liberated from subjugation to the Church of Toledo. Although the decision pertained to ecclesiastical governance, the moratorium had obvious ramifications at the political level, enhancing and strengthening the Portuguese kingdom vis-à-vis her Christian neighbouring states and bolstering the hitherto often beleaguered position of Afonso II. But Licet Venerabilis was only the first of a series of bulls issued in a whirl of activity by the papal chancery in early January, apparently at the first opportunity following the intensive Christmas liturgical program in Rome. All of them displayed a strong preference for the autonomy of Portugal, both ecclesiastically and politically. Next, and still before replying to the letters sent by the victors of Alcácer, as early as 8 January 1218, Honorius III ordered the execution and enforcement of judgments that had been obtained under his predecessor, Innocent III, against Afonso’s sisters.76 These were splendid results, of course, but the icing on the cake would come on 11 January when the pontiff reissued to Afonso the Manifestis Probatum.77 This was a clangourous endorsement of Afonso’s kingship which may well have rung loud in the ears of his detractors at home and fulminated in Leon, Castile and wider Christendom.78 Although the Manifestis Probatum had been previously reissued to Afonso in 1212, the reference to military accolades relating to victories over the enemies of the Christians, here a key ingredient of royal legitimacy so prominent in the earlier version first issued in
75 76 77 78
Abhandlungen der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1928); trans. by J. A. da Providência Costa as O Papado e Portugal no Primeiro Século da História Portuguesa (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, 1935); D. R. Mansilla, ‘Disputas diocesanas entre Toledo, Braga y Compostela en los siglos XII al XV’, Anthologica annua, N°.3 (1955), 89–143; P. Feige, ‘La primacía de Toledo y la liberdad de las demás metropolis de España. El ejemplo de Braga’, in La introducción de Cister en España y Portugal (Burgos: La Olmeda, 1991), pp. 61–132. The decision was communicated to the Archbishop of Braga in the bull Cum venarabilis frater, issued from the Lateran on 19 January 2018; Rodrigo da Cunha, Tractatus de primatu Bracharensis ecclesiae in universa Hispania (Bracharae: Ex officina J. Roderici, 1632), pp. 113–14. Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre, note 82. Monumenta Henricina, vol. 1, N°. 27, pp. 50–51. On the political and legal uses of Manifestis Probatum see Maria João Branco, ‘Os Homens do Rei e a Manifestis Probatum: percurso de uma bula pelos caminhos da luta pela legitimidade do rei e do reino nos séculos XII-XIII’, in Poder Espiritual/Poder Temporal; as Relações Igreja-Estado no Tempo da Monarquia (1179–1909) coord. by Maria de Fátima Reis (Lisbon: Academia Portuguesa da História, 2009), pp. 127–71.
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1179 to his grandfather Afonso Henriques and reissued to his father Sancho I in 1190, had been carefully amended to reflect Afonso’s notable lack of achievements on the battlefield. Now, the text of the 1218 bull appeared fully restored to its original form. It was a powerful and welcome assertion both of Afonso’s regal status and of the autonomous sovereignty of his kingdom.79 With a landmark victory to his credit and unprecedented bounties flowing from Rome to his king as a direct consequence, Soeiro might have expected that Afonso II would at least grant to him and his diocese the government of Alcácer along with the lush region of which the conquered town was the capital. Once again, Soeiro was to be disappointed. In January 1218, Afonso II issued documentary confirmation of the transference of the government of Alcácer and its lands to the Order of Santiago under its master Martim Barregão, father-in-law of Gonçalo Mendes the King’s chancellor.80 Soeiro was also to be denied ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the region which was transferred to the Bishop of Évora in accordance with the old Visigothic diocesan divisions.81 To further dismay the Bishop of Lisbon, the king was soon to show himself a supporter of his adversaries. Somewhat ironically, a new self-confidence brought to Afonso by the recent military success and, on the back of it, successes in Rome, especially the Licet Venerabilis and the reissued Manifestis Probatum, enabled the king to embark on a policy designed to limit and reduce the now dangerously burgeoning powers of those who had been largely responsible for bringing about those very same triumphs, namely his own clergy. Certainly it was no coincidence that, beginning from around the time of the transference of Alcácer to the Order of Santiago which, being commanded by a relative of the King’s chancellor, kept the town and its region securely under royal control, there was a marked change in Afonso’s previously benign attitudes towards his Church and a concomitant downturn in the fortunes of Soeiro of Lisbon. As such, his fall from grace is perhaps best seen as resulting less from any personal animosity the King may have harboured for the Bishop of Lisbon and far more from Soeiro’s circumstance as a leading member of an institution perceived by the Crown to be undermining its authority. Indeed, in the resulting struggle, Soeiro soon became a prominent contender in a prolonged nationwide conflict between Portuguese royal and ecclesiastical power. It was a bitter fight for hegemony that would grow progressively more acrimonious and would continue long after the deaths of Afonso II in 1223, and of Soeiro himself, some ten years later.
79 For an analysis of the relevant passages of the bull, see Branco, ‘Os Homens do Rei e a Manifestis Probatum’, pp. 153–55. 80 Livro dos Copos, coord. Paula Pinto Costa, nota de apresentação de Luís Adão da Fonseca, vol. 1 in Militarium Ordinum Analecta, N°. 7 (Porto: Fundação Eng. António de Almeida, 2006), N°. 181, p. 324. 81 Pereira, Os Cavalheiros de Santiago em Alcácer do Sal, p. 35.
SUERIUS and the ‘First Portuguese Crusade’ 95
Soeiro remembered Ultimately, although his career was long, spanning over twenty years, and certainly eventful, it was above all for his achievement in the conquest of Alcácer that Soeiro of Lisbon wished to be remembered – or – for which he was remembered. His lapidary epitaph was simple: LORD SUARIUS BISHOP OF LISBON LIES HERE WHO DURING THE REIGN OF ALFONSO II CONQUERED ALCACER DO SAL FROM THE MOORS IN THE YEAR 121782 Upon the rough-hewn stone lid of his sarcophagus, today found in a cloister chapel in Lisbon Cathedral, there are engraved three bold motifs, all more or less equal in size and prominence. One, perhaps the simplest to interpret, is a crosier, almost certainly present to indicate Soeiro’s episcopal status. Another is in the shape of a cross, perhaps also of straightforward significance, especially on the tomb of a cleric. Yet, it is not the familiar Portuguese cross, a version of the cross pattée, with splayed points and convex ends, sometimes referred to as croix pattée alésée arrondie and found on so many royal chancellery documents produced during Soeiro’s lifetime. Rather, it is the simple cross of the ordinary crusader. Almost certainly Soeiro Viegas, a preacher, probably the principal preacher, of the first documented Portuguese crusade, the Crusade of Alcácer do Sal, took the cross himself, the carving on his tomb persisting as testament to the fact. Finally, it is through this connection that we come to understand the presence of the third motif. It is an unmistakable palm tree, symbol of the Iter per Hispaniam, a miraculous sign to each and every passing crusader of the sanctity of the war on the Portuguese-Andalusi frontier.
82 DOMINUS SUARIUS ULIXBONENSIS EPISCOPUS HIC JACET QUI REGNANTE ALFONSO II A MAURIS ALCASSARUM SALIS ERIPUIT ANNO DE 1217; Mário Barroca, Epigrafia Medieval Portuguesa, 3 vols (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2000), vol. 2 book 1, pp. 745–46; cf., comments on crusader epitaphs in Phillips, The Second Crusade Extending the Frontiers of Christendom, p. 30.
96 (a)
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(c)
(d)
Figure 4 Tomb of Bishop Soeiro Viegas (SUERIUS) with details inset showing motifs: crusader cross, palm tree, bishop’s crosier, Cloister, Lisbon Cathedral (photographs – the author).
In search of the author, GOSUINUS
Boaventura – an erstwhile intuition, a modern legacy GOSUINUS is an unusual name, and one scarcely if ever found in Iberia. This feature, along with a few other scant observations, prompted Fortunarto de São Boaventura,1 monk of Alcobaça and historian of his Order writing in 1827, to suspect that the author may have been Goswin of Bossut, known to have flourished between 1231 and 1238 as a monk in the Cistercian abbey of Villers in Brabant. In his lengthy Latin Commentariorum on the manuscripts of the fundo of Alcobaça,2 Boaventura included a short chapter dedicated to the Carmen where, besides offering various codicological remarks, he devoted a few lines to outlining his reasons for advancing Gosnwin’s authorship. These, amounting to little more than an intuition, can be summarised as follows. In deciphering the acrostic, he noted that in spelling out SUERIUS the poem uses far more lines than in spelling out GOSUINUS, the former taking up 166 lines and the latter only 54 and accordingly identified the former as the dedicatee, Soeiro Viegas bishop of Lisbon, and the latter as the author. He then went on briefly to consider the attributes of this author as revealed in the work. First, he observed that the author spoke as one who had come with the fleet in so far as he demonstrated a clear sense of ‘us’ being the Frankish arrivals and ‘them’ being the Portuguese, or other peoples encountered. Boaventura gave the following examples: line 209. Hic ducibus nostris sua concessitque, deditque. line 215. Est hic Ulixbonae praesul, qui tot bona nostris Contulit, etc.
1 Born locally in Alcobaça in 1777, Boaventura was elected Archbishop of Évora in 1832 during the Liberal-Miguelist civil war which propelled him into exile two years later in Rome where he died in 1844; Daniel Estudante Protásio, ‘D. Frei Fortunato de São Boaventura’, in Dicionário de Historiadores Portugueses da Academia Real das Ciências ao Final do Estado Novo (accessed 7 August 2020). 2 Fr Fernando de São Boaventura, Commentariorum de Alcobacensi mstorum bibliotheca . . . etc. 3. Vols (Coimbra: Typographia Academico-regia, 1887), Vol. III, Ch IX, pp. 525–28.
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Next, Boaventura highlighted the title of the Carmen as given in the Manuscript, Quomodo capta fuit Alcacer a Francis, and opined that it is clearly the Franks that are being celebrated, as opposed to any of the Hispanic contingents participating in the episode. Further, he stated his belief that the text contained certain French idiomatic elements which for him indicated the author was a French speaker. Additionally, Boaventura explained that, since he had examined over a thousand documents in various Portuguese Cistercian archives and in several municipal and family archives and singly failed to find any mention of the name Gosuinus, he was driven to conclude that it was not a Portuguese name. These aspects, along with the presence of certain ‘exotic’ words, impelled him strongly (vehemens) to suspect that the GOSUINUS of the acrostic was in fact Goswin of Bossut, cantor of the Cistercian Monastery of Villers in Brabant and author of the Vita of one Arnulf, a lay brother of Villers, a work that was known to Boaventura.3 It was in a poem appended to that Vita, which Boaventura asserted was also by Goswin, that he found a resonance of style with the Carmen, particularly through the use of the aforementioned exotic words which, in the case of the poem appended to the Vita were, in his opinion, of Greek and Hebrew origin.4 Sadly, Boaventura did not particularise this exotic vocabulary, nor did he specify the French idiomatic traces he had detected. Instead, Boaventura reserved this analysis for a future work which, as far as we know, he never produced.
Beyond Boaventura Thus bequeathed the components of an incipient investigation, today we are in a privileged position to pursue it towards something approaching a conclusion. During the two centuries that have elapsed since the first appearance of Boaventura’s Commentariorum, a good deal has been unearthed about the world into which the Carmen was introduced, including the early history of the kingdom of Portugal, the Cistercians of Brabant, and a good many individuals both lay and ecclesiastical whose activities in one way or another informed or affected the conditions of its production. In particular, since Boaventura’s day, another two Lives have come to light attributable to the authorship of Goswin of Bossut; the Life of Ida the Compassionate of Nivelles and the Life of Abundus, monk of Villers.5 3 Goswin de Bossut, Vita Arnulfi, ed. by D. Paperbroek, Acta Sanctorum (Antwerp, 1709) June, VII, pp. 606–31; (Paris, 1867), pp. 558–79. 4 Boaventura gave the following examples eudochiam and aginistae which occur at lines 17 and 20 of, De Converatione et obitu illius; Acta Sanctorum, p. 579; cf., Maria Teresa Lopes Pereira, ‘Memória Cruzadística do Feito da Tomada de Alcácer (1217) (Com base no Carmen de Gosuíno)’, 2° Congresso Histórico de Guimarães – Actas do Congresso, vol. 2 (Guimarães: Câmara Municipal de Guimarães – Universidade do Minho, 1996), pp. 321–57, at p. 327. 5 All three Lives have now been the subject of critical editions, a survey of these being included in Martinus Cawley’s 2003 publication, Send Me God, containing Goswin’s Lives in English translation, along with two introductions; one by Barbara Newman and one by Cawley himself. Cawley’s translations are also helpfully accompanied by extensive notes, including geographical references to the Villers area, statutes and decisions of General Chapters, scriptural references and crossreferences between the Lives; Cawley, Send Me God; references herein are to the paperback edition (Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006).
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Even so, not a great deal is known about the person and life of Goswin himself. In accordance with the conventions of his time, Goswin’s work gives no indication of his name; he is identified only because, sometime shortly after his death, an unknown scribe added the following incipit to the Villers manuscript of the Vita Arnulphi: Here begins the preface to the life of the servant of God, Arnulf, a lay-brother of Villers, written by a religious man of blessed memory, Gosuinus, formerly a monk and cantor of that very same [Abbey].6 Through similarity of style, he was in 1909 identified also as the author of the Life of Abundus, and in 1947, as the author of Ida of Nivelles.7 In the 1990s, Martinus Cawley subjected all three texts to computer-aided analysis and revealed many more similarities of style and expression, reinforcing the identification of Goswin as their common author.8 As for Goswin hailing from Bossut, Cawley draws attention to an oral tradition to this effect preserved at Villers and mentioned in the Acta Sanctorum.9 If we accept this, we may reasonably speculate that Goswin’s Bossut could have been a predecessor to what is today the French-speaking village known as Bossut-Gottechain, some twenty kilometres to the northeast of the abbey of Villers.10 An area crossed by two principal rivers, the Scheldt to the north and the Meuse to the south, Villers and its region is well served by a matrix of tributaries and, already by the beginning of the thirteenth century, networks of river transport were well established, as were roads, serving a densely populated land rich in agriculture. Testament to the early and prolific urban growth in the area is one of the first appearances of the word ‘burgess’ (Latin burgensis) denoting a person enjoying juridical status as a full member of a chartered urban community, in a charter of 1066 from the town of Huy, only forty or so kilometres from Villers, and hometown of the monk Abundus whose Vita was penned by Goswin.11 Although the abbey itself was suitably located in its own Cistercian ‘desert’, being 6 Incipit prefacio in vita famuli Dei fratris Arnulfi conversi Vilarensis edita a pie memorie viro religioso nonno Gosuino quondam monacho et cantore eiusdem loci; Berlin, Staatsbibliothek. Theol. Lat. Qu. 1951 I (fols. 1–40); Thomas Falmagne, Un Texte en Contexte, Les Flores Paradisi et le Milieu culturel de Villers-en-Brabant Dans La Première moitié du 13e Siècle (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), pp. 64–65, at p. 520. 7 Éduard de Moreau and René Maere, L’Abbaye de Villers-en-Brabant au XIIe et XIIIe siècles, études d’histoire religieuse et économique (Brussels: A. Dewit, 1909), pp. xxx–xxxi; Simone Roisin, L´Hagiographie cistercienne dans le diocèse de Liège au XIIIe siècle (Louvain: Bibliothèque de l’Université, 1947), pp. 55–58; Cawley, Send Me God, pp. 6–7. 8 Cawley, Send Me God, pp. 1–26. 9 Acta Sanctorum (Antwerp, 1709) June, VII, pp. 606–31 at 607E; Cawley, Send Me God, p. 7. 10 There is also a town, Boussu, south of Saint-Ghislain, a Walloon municipality located in the Belgian province of Hainaut, about 50 miles to the southwest of Villers. 11 Robert Bartlett, The Making of Europe, Conquest, Colonization and Cultural Change, 950–1350 (London: Penguin, 1994), p. 177.
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at some distance from the inhabited world, it was nevertheless on the bank of the Dijle, which ensured fresh water, close to a quarry for ease of access to stone for building, and near an intersection of road and river for ease of communication with the outside.12 Whilst ecclesiastically Villers belonged to the diocese of Liège, Goswin’s secular lords would have been the dukes of Brabant. Indeed, a handful of charters from twelfth- and thirteenth-century Liège and Brabant include the names of members of a certain family ‘de Bossut’ among the ducal entourage. These various individuals, thought to belong to the same family,13 who are referred to in the twelfth century as ministeriales (members of the ducal household enjoying high social status whilst remaining technically unfree) appear to have experienced a change of status in the thirteenth century when the ministerialis label generally fell into disuse. For example, in a charter issued in 1152 by Henry II, bishop of Liège to the Cistercian abbey of Aulne, in Hainaut, one Alexander de Bossut is mentioned as an ‘eminently honest man’ and ministerialis of Godfrey III, Count of Louvain.14 However, in a charter issued in 1220 by Duke Henry I of Brabant in favour of the Benedictine Abbey of St Nicasius of Rheims, one Henry de Bossut appears with the title of miles,15 whilst in a separate charter granted by Duke Henry to the Abbey of Florival in Brabant,16 a certain Alexander de Bossut appears as dominus.17 The practical effects of this apparent movement up the social order from high status but unfree, to high-status and free, or indeed to noble status, in thirteenthcentury Brabant, is still a matter of debate, consideration of which would take us far from our remit.18 For present purposes, it is sufficient for us to observe that if, as seems likely, Goswin de Bossut cantor of Villers was a scion of this family, he would have come from a moderately or substantially wealthy background. Indeed, one ‘Gossuinus’ ‘de Bossut’, coinciding with the floruit established for Goswin cantor of Villers, is to be found in a charter of 1236 executed by Bishop John of Liège in favour of Aulne Abbey, where the de Bossut family also appear linked to the families of Bonlez (Bonler) and Chaumont (Chamont),19 a family mentioned as both free and noble in the twelfth-century sources.
12 Thomas Coomans, L’Abbaye de Villers-en-Brabant. Construction, configuration et signification d’une abbaye cistercienne gothique (Brecht: Editions Racine, 2000), p. 42. 13 I am grateful to Godfried Croenen for drawing this to my attention. 14 honesti homines ministeriales ducis Godefridi Arnulfus de Filforh et Alexander de Bossut; copy in the cartulary of the abbey of Aulne, Mons, Archives de l’Etat, Cartulaires, 1, fol.316r. (transcription provided by G. Croenen). 15 J. Cossé-Durlin, Cartulaire de Saint Nicaise de Reims (Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1991), p. 438, no.355. 16 a nunnery first mentioned as Cistercian in 1237; John Frederic Hinnebusch, The Historia Occidentalis of Jacques de Vitry (Fribourg: Fribourg University Press, 1972), p. 263. 17 Anderlecht, Archives de l’Etat, Archives ecclésiastiques du Brabant, no. 6985. 18 For a treatment of the issues see P. Bonenfant and G. Despy, ‘La noblesse en Brabant aux XIIe et XIIIe siècles’, Le Moyen Âge, 64 (1958), 27–66. 19 Iohannes, Dei gratia Leodiensis episcopus, universis presentem paginam inspecturis in Domino salutem. Universitati vestre notum facimus quod nos donationes decime de terris sartalibus in
In search of the author, GOSUINUS
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Then, as today, the Brabant region was divided by a language frontier, with a version of Dutch being spoken in the north and a version of French being spoken in the south. Bossut and Villers fell on the French speaking side of the divide, in harmony with Boaventura’s identification of French elements in the Carmen. It is possible to calculate Goswin’s date of birth around 1195 and Cawley has suggested, from various references in the Lives and Goswin’s manifest scholarly learning, that he may have received part of his education in Paris.20 Certainly, his office as cantor would have required of him a high degree of literacy and also musical skill. The cantor was one of the most important positions in the abbey after the abbot and the prior, entailing various administrative responsibilities in addition to the direction and instruction of the choir, supervision of the correct performance of the liturgy, upkeep of service books ensuring they were recopied as needed, and selecting suitable readings for the refectory. Ex officio Goswin would have been a composer of music and three of his works have survived, two historiae and one pium dictamen. The historiae, one in honour of Marie of Oignies, and another in celebration of the lay brother of Villers, Arnulf Cornibout, the same Arnulf of Goswin’s Vita Arnulfi, have survived in a manuscript now preserved in the Brussels Royal Library that is very likely autograph.21 The pium dictamen, also composed for Arnulf, is preserved in the Familien-Fidei-KommissBibliothek in Vienna.22
Literary tradition at Villers Goswin was active during what Édouard de Moreau described as la belle époque of Villers that marked the spiritual and temporal zenith of the Abbey.23 This ‘Golden Age’, according to Moreau, was concurrent with the incumbencies of six Abbots whose tenures spanned the years between 1197 and 1248. Goswin’s known works, however, were all executed under the tenure of William of Brussels,
20
21 22 23
territorio de Gotenchien quas iamdudum fecerunt Arnulphus de Filfort, Alexander de Bossut, Erpho et Gervasius, fratres de Chamont, per manum venerabilis predecessoris nostri Henrici, quondam Ledicensis episcopi, ecclesie de Alna, Cysterciensis ordinis, eas etiam donationes quas post modum eidem ecclesie fecerunt in eadem decima de eisdem terris sartalibus Renerus, clericus, de Bossut, et fratres eius Gossuinus et Henricus, necnon et Fastradus de Bonler, tam de terris quas dicta ecclesie acquirere posset quam de illis quas iam acquisierat, ratas omnino et acceptas habemus. Mons, Archives de l’Etat, Cartulaires, 1, fol.318v (transcription provided by G. Croenen). Cawley places his date of birth at around 1200, however, as will become clear in the following exposition, a date earlier by some five or so years is unobjectionable on the available evidence and is substantially more cogent when postulating Goswin’s presence in the Alcácer expedition of 1217, possibly discharging priestly duties among crusaders. Ms II 1658; and see Pieter Mannaerts, ‘An exception to the Rule? The Thirteenth-Century Cistercian Historia for Mary of Oignies’, Journal of the Alamire Foundation, 2010, vol. 2, Part 2, pp. 233–69 at pp. 233–36. Ms 7909, Familien-Fidei-Kommiss-Bibliothek, Vienna. Moreau and Maiere, L’Abbaye de Villers. . . etc., p. 40 et seq.; Falmagne, Un Texte, pp. 27–34.
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sometimes referred to as William of Dongelberg, or Dongelbert (1221–1236).24 Although the library at Villers was well stocked with the theological works usually found in thirteenth-century Cistercian houses,25 original literary production at the Abbey during the relevant period was remarkable in so far as it offered up none of the exegeses, collections of sermons and liturgical works produced in houses belonging to the Order in previous decades. Rather it was almost entirely narrative. In the first place there are two compilations; the Chronica Villariensis Monasterii, the Chronicle of the Abbey presenting short entries listing the abbots of Villers in chronological order, and the Gesta Sanctorum Villariensium, which presents more lengthy and detailed biographies of members of the congregation noted for their piety, irrespective of their rank.26 However, identifiable as standing apart from these two works, there is a substantial corpus of Vitae, three of which are also included in the Gesta. These Vitae are remarkable because they mark a departure from earlier Cistercian tradition where the subject of a Vita was usually a man who had demonstrated feats of outstanding leadership, enterprise and endeavour, frequently in the face of great hardship during the foundation of a monastic community, or some other high-ranking member of the Order, often an abbot destined for sainthood. The Vitae produced at Villers, on the contrary, are almost exclusively concerned with persons of relatively low standing and, also remarkably, with the lives of women. In these aspects, the Vitae of Villers represent a substantial portion of an identifiable literary trend prevalent in the Southern Low Countries27 in the early thirteenth century which Barbara Newman describes as ‘a canon probably unique in the annals of hagiography’. Indeed, with at least eight Vitae attributable to Villers out of a total of twenty-four Southern Netherlandish Lives, the Abbey appears to have more or less led the field in the production of hagiographical literature in the region.28
24 Martinus Cawley, ‘Four Abbots of the Golden Age of Villers’, Cistercian Studies Quarterly, 27 (1992), 299–327, at 302. and Send Me God, p. 3. 25 For an unparalleled survey of the contents of Viller’s library and literary production in the Abbey up to 1250, see Falmagne, Un Texte, Annexe 2, ‘Le Scriptorium de Villers Catalogue Raisonné des Manuscrits’, pp. 425–539. 26 The complete text of the Chronica Villariensis monasterii appears, ed. by G. Waitz in MGH Scriptores, vol. 25 at pp. 192–219, along with extracts from the Gesta Sanctorum Villariensium at pp. 220–35; however, the complete texts of both works are included in the earlier but highly serviceable edition included in Thesaurus Novus Anectdotorum, 3:1267–310, ed. by E. Martène and U. Durand (Paris, 1717) reprinted in facsimile (New York: Burt Franklin, 1968). 27 Here I gratefully adopt the terminology used by Newman and her reasons for it as given in her ‘Preface’ in Cawley’s Send Me God at p. xxx. 28 Ibid., pp. xxx–xxxi, indeed only four of the Lives, with the exception of those contained in the Chronica of Villers treat of higher ranking ecclesiastics; Manaerts, ‘An exception to the Rule?’, p. 244; cf. Cawley, Send Me God, p. 4., who describes the genre as ‘part of a greater Villers corpus’. Newman helpfully lists her ‘Canon of Thirteenth-Century Southern Netherlandish Saints Lives’, Send Me God, pp. xlviii–xlix.
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Poetic tradition of Villers Given the nature of the Carmen what is of more significance for us herein is yet another extraordinary feature of literary life at Villers; the importance afforded to poetry. Whilst there was no express Cistercian ban on poetry, the Order was uneasy with it. Bernard’s secretary, Nicholas of Clairvaux, writing to a prospective monk says that, even if he received poems from a friend, he would be forbidden from reading them, ‘For here we do not accept anything written in verse’.29 In 1199, the General Chapter issued a statute banning rhythmical poetry (rythmos), decreeing that monks who produced it were to be sent to other houses, only being allowed to return with the permission of the General Chapter.30 However, in spite of the broad wording of the prohibition, it almost certainly applied only to a particular type of rhymed poetry. Indeed, the statute appears to have been provoked principally by the controversial works of Hélinant de Froidmont and Bertran de Born who produced poems in 1193–1197 and 1197/1198, respectively. The Order considered their compositions destabilising and dangerous probably, on the one hand, due to Hélinant’s vehement criticism of the clerical hierarchy and, on the other, due to Bertran’s secular ribaldry.31 Nevertheless, it is clear that poetry in general caused discomfort in Cistercian houses, eliciting a mixture of responses. Yterus of Waschey, a monk of Clairvaux who, at the end of the twelfth century, himself produced a poem of some 215 verses on the duties of monastic life in terms akin to the most severe pronouncements of St Bernard, leaves a recommendation that ‘to weep is befitting of a monk, not to fabricate meter!’32 Not everyone took him at his word and, at around the
29 Epistola XV (before 1151), PL cxcvi: 1610, B-C; Birger Munk Olsen, ‘The Cistercians and Classical Culture’, Cahiers de l’institut du Moyen Âge grec et latin, Université de Copenhague vol. 47 (1984) p. 64–102. 30 Monachi qui rythmos fecerint, ad domos alias mittantur non redituri nisis per generale capitulum; Canivez, Statuta, I, p. 232. 31 William D. Paden, Jr., ‘De monachis rithmos facientibuts: Hélinant de Froidmont, Bertran de Born, and the Cistercian General chapter of 1199’, Speculum, vol. 55, No 4 (Oct., 1980), pp. 669–85. The statue was included in the Codification of 1202, but was omitted from those of 1220, 1237 and 1257; La codification cistercienne de 1202 et son evolution ultérieure, ed. by Bernard Lucet (Rome: Editiones Cistercienses, 1964), X.26, p. 126 and Les codifications cisterciennes de 1237 et de 1257, ed by Bernard Lucet (Paris: Centre national de la Recherché scientifique,1977). Whilst Bertran was generally offensive to Cistercian sensibilities through his frivolity and worldliness, Hélinant’s indignation at corruption within the clergy and in particular the accumulation of wealth, however canonical, came at a sensitive time when the Waldensian heresy was very much on the rise. Worryingly for the General Chapter, his vernacular Vers de la Mort was being recited in public; Paden, ‘De monachis rithmos’, p. 680. 32 Olsen, ‘The Cistercians and Classical Culture’, p. 81; P. Edmond Mikkers, ‘Robert de Molesme’ in Spiritualité cistercienne. Histoire et doctrine Coll. ‘Bibliothèque de spiritualité’ (Paris: Beauchesne, 1998) at p. 450 note 8; Jean Leclercq, ‘Les divertissesments poétiques d’Itier de Vassy’, Analecta Cisterciensia 12 (1956), 296–304 – Flere decet monachum, non fabricare metrum.
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same time, an unknown English Cistercian wrote the series of rhythmical verses known as the Jubilus rhythmicus de nomine Jesu.33 Further, Gunther of Pairis Abbey at Orbey in Alsace, who had produced poetical works before entering the Order, included short verse passages at the end of each chapter of his prose history of the Fourth Crusade, Historia Constantinopolitana and, famously, Conrad of Eberbach prefaced his Exordium Magnum (1221) with a verse prologue. What is unusual about the Cistercians of Villers, however, is their confident, unabashed and enthusiastic embrace of verse form. Both the Chronica and the Gesta are replete with versified entries. In the former, we note that almost the entirety of the entry for Abbot Nicholas (1237– 1240)34 consists of verse. First we are treated to a full fifty-three-line rhyming poem expressing his religiosity and said to have been written by Nicholas himself at the end of his terminal illness (in extrema infirmitate).35 Following this, the entry continues with the words, ‘After the death of this true shepherd this epitaph was produced’ whereupon there follows a lengthy elegy in thirty lines of rhyming verse.36 The Chronica also report the poetical talents of Abbot Arnulf of Louvain (1240–1248), who, having retired from the abbacy, obtained for himself a scriptorium (quod est in auditorio prioris) where during hours spent waiting to hear confessions, he whiled away the time by converting Raymond of Penafort’s great manual of canon law for confessors, Summa de casibus poenitentiae, into Latin verse.37 Furthermore, there are many inclusions in both the Chronica and in the Gesta of versified epitaphs,38 not forgetting to mention those attached to Goswin’s Lives, which, whether composed by him or not, were the produce of the same cultural milieu. Additionally, the Gesta contains the lengthy Vita Franconis, written in the form of a ballad, entirely in regular rhyming Latin quatrains, concerning the monk Francon of Arquennes (Arquenne, or Arkenna), a former knight and castellan of Montenaken who, with his twin sons, went on the Fifth Crusade before joining the Villers community.39 Typically, the author of the work is not revealed in the 33 34 35 36 37
F. J. E. Raby, A History of Christian-Latin Poetry (Oxford: Clarendon, 1953), pp. 329–30. Sometimes referred to as Nicholas de Sombreffe. MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 204, para 22; Martène and Durand, III, 1285–88 Ibid., p. 205. MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 208. Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 321, and Send Me God, p. 5. Martène and Durand, III, 1292. On Arnulf’s versification of the Summa, its manuscript and transmission, see Falgmagne, Un Texte., at p. 68 and p. 394 et seq. 38 e.g., for Abbot Conrad, MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 199, Martène and Durand, III, 1276; for Abbot William, MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 204, Martène and Durand, III, 1285; and the four epitaphs at MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, pp. 216–17, Martène and Durand, III, 1303. 39 Francon d’Arkenna, Berend Wispelwey, compiler, Biographical Index of the Middle Ages (Hawthorne, Walter de Gruyter, 2008), p. 389, ‘Francon [Franco] d’Arquennes (fl. 1220)’; Le Folklore Brabançon, 1985, p. 298; cf. Cawley, Send Me God., p. 6; the complete text of the poem is included in Martène and Durand III, 1333–39, it is also to be found in Acta Sanctorum, 12–13 December, p. 32; also cf., Commission Royale D’Histoire, Compte rendu des séances de la Commission royale d’histoire etc’ (Tome X 11 Janvier-5 Avril, 1845) at p. 266 et seq. where an extract appears under the title, ‘De Nonno Francone de Arkenna monacho, prius milite probatissimo. Rithmice’.
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surviving manuscripts and has, hitherto, remained anonymous. There will be more to say on the identity of the mystery author of the Vita Franconis a little later. Other ballads survive in the Gesta but in an abbreviated form, which Cawley plausibly suggests is because the compiler became careless in his summarising, ‘with the result that line after line of his unformatted prose remains in rhythm and rhyme’.40 To add to the previously mentioned examples, Cawley has identified a further poetic form found in at least two Vitae, James de Vitry’s Vita Mariae Oigniacensis and the anonymous Vita Idae Lovaniensis,41 which although not produced in Villers, are more or less linked to the Abbey. This form he terms ‘the devout jingle’, a short piece in Latin or Romance forming part of the prayer repertoire of less lettered members of a particular community. Further examples of the form are to be found in Caesarius of Heisterbach’s Dialogus Miraculorum.42
Goswin of Bossut and Gosuinus of Alcácer Whilst Boaventura’s lead has shown some promise in terms of Goswin’s chronology, literary environment, and perhaps even style, we are yet to arrive at GOSUINUS, author of the Carmen. Clearly, a convincing fusion of the two identities requires a far more specific, if not a unique, connection. Initially, that link appears to be provided in the opening lines of the Carmen: Idleness of the mind despoils the peace of the flesh And the river that is without movement stinks the more quickly. Unless they have been tended either houses or arable lands grow decrepit Neglected, the thorn bush becomes stepmother to its roses.43 and in the reflection of those lines in the prologue of Goswin’s Life of Abundus: Idleness is inimical to the soul. Plough land once neglected, and not harvested again and again produces only fern-weed fit for the fire.44 Both texts make more or less clear reference to the Rule of Benedict, Ch. 48.1, Otiositas inimical est animae – ‘Idleness is the enemy of the soul’,45 immediately followed by a reference to a line from one of Horace’s Satires in Satirae Book I,
40 Cawley, Send Me God, p. 6; see for example Martène and Durand III, 1322 A. 41 Ida the Eager of Louvain, Medieval Cistercian Nun, trans. Martinus Cawley (Lafayette, Guadalupe, 2000). Examples are Vita Mariae Oigniacensis, 98; Vita Idae Lovaniensis, I.10d, II.6b, II.13a–14a. 42 DM, 7.38. 43 Segnicies mentis, bona corporis ocia carpunt, / Et citius motu qui caret amnis olet / Culta nisi fuerint, vel tecta, vel arua, senescent, / Fit neglecta suis spina noverca rosis; Carmen, lines 1–4. 44 Quum ociositas inimical est anime ac neglectis urenda filix innascitur arvis, si non frequenti cultura aratro renoventur; Msgnr A. M. Frenken, ‘De Vita Van Abundus Van Hoei’, Cîteaux, 10 (1959), pp. 5–33., at p. 11. Goswin, Life of Abundus, Eng., trans. by Cawley, Send Me God., p. 209. 45 RB, pp. 248–49.
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III, at lines 34–37: namque neglectis urenda filix innascitur agris – ‘If you once neglect a field bracken appears which eventually has to be burnt out’.46 Each then proclaims the intent to oust the evils of idleness through the authorial act of writing. Whilst further textual similarities may remain to be discovered, let us for now pass on and observe another common feature. Both the Carmen and the Vitae make little or no mention of proper names. Instructive in this respect is the passage from Goswin’s ‘The Life of Ida of Nivelles’ at Ch.16.47 If any should ask why, both here and elsewhere, the names of persons included in our narrative are kept under seal of silence, let them know this has been done deliberately. For if the names were widely published in the ears of many, the persons, if still alive, might either be put to shame by the vituperation of their evil, or else unsuitably uplifted by the praises of their good. A similar desire to maintain anonymity is manifested by Caesarius of Heisterbach, Goswin’s contemporary, who in the prologue to the Dialogus Miraculorum, says I have introduced in the manner of a dialogue, two persons, to wit, a novice who asks questions, and a monk who gives the answers; because, when the name of the author is withheld the tongue of the detractor finds nothing to feed upon.48 The links between Heisterbach and Villers were strong and numerous and, as will become clear, it is likely personal relations existed between Caesarius and Goswin. Goswin’s policy of anonymity, for which Goswin himself apologises explicitly no less than three times in the Vitae (Ida 16e, Arnulf II 18b, Abundus, 9d), and the similarity of these same apologies was an important indication that Goswin was the author of all three Vitae.49 The only proper name explicitly mentioned in the Carmen occurs within the couplet at lines 15–16, Petrus, which as mentioned earlier, appears to be a simultaneous reference to the pope and to the bishop of Lisbon. The other names appearing in the Carmen are hidden by artifice. These are the two names, SUERIUS and GOSUINUS, only decipherable in the 46 The Satires of Horace, ed. by Arthur Palmer (New York: St Martin’s Press, 1968), p. 12. The complete sentence is as follows: Denique te ipsum / Concute, num, qua tibi vitiorum inseverit olim / Natura aut etiam consuetudo mala; manque / Neglectis urenda filix innascitur agris, ‘So give yourself a shaking / In case the seeds of wickedness have already been planted in you / By nature or by some bad habit. If you once neglect a field / Bracken appears which eventually has to be burnt out’, Eng. trans. by Niall Rudd in Horace Satires and Epistles, Persius Satires (London: Penguin Books, 2005) at p. 12. 47 Cawley, Send Me God, p. 54. 48 Caesarius of Heisterbach, The Dialogue on the Miracles, Eng. trans. by Henry von Essen Scott and C.C. Swinton Bland (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1929), vol. 1, p. 2. 49 Roisin, L’Hagiographie cistercienne, p. 58; Cawley, Send Me God, p. 54 (Ida 16e), p. 187 (Arnulf II 18c), p. 224 (Abundus, 9d), also pp. 6 and 35 n. 18.
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acrostic device. Could it be that this is the result of a compromise struck between an author’s desire to adhere to his Cistercian convention of anonymity and his commissioner’s desire for publicity? Use of such a device is uncommon yet, significantly, we have an example of its occurrence in the Dialogus Miraculorum, a work produced in a Cistercian Abbey not far from Villers and definitely within its friendship network. Here we must revisit the quotation from Caesarius’s prologue given earlier. The complete sentence is as follows: Now that I might arrange my examples the more effectively, I have introduced, in the manner of a dialogue, two persons, to wit, a novice who asks questions, and a monk who gives the answers; because, when the name of the author is withheld, the tongue of the detractor finds nothing to feed upon; nevertheless, if any desire to know his name let him put together the initial letters of the twelve books.50 As in the Carmen, the reader is encouraged to decipher the acrostic by an explicit instruction contained in the text. When the initial letters of the twelve books of Caesarius’s Dialogus are duly assembled, they spell the words CESARII MVNVS, which can be rendered in English as ‘the function of Caesarius’, which may indeed be a reference to his occupying the office of novicemaster at Heisterbach and would certainly be appropriate given the nature of the work.51
A previous commissioner? Whilst Bishop Soeiro may have been the ultimate commissioner of the work, the author of the Carmen appears to declare a previous commissioner or addressee: The verses which you now hold in your hands, somebody else partly held in theirs before. He who inspired me will erase the verse in the end. Do not be amazed: I wrote for the one whose grace Was well known to me, and I was not known to you.52 Although the meaning is multi-layered and, in part, may be taken to refer to God, there is the discernible possibility that GOSUINUS, if Goswin, is also referring to his abbot, who at the time of the voyage to Alcácer would have been Walter of Utrecht (1214–1221).
50 The Dialogue on the Miracles, vol. 1, p. 2. The emphasis is mine. 51 Goswin also uses the term munus (Frenken, Vita Abundi, p. 12) which Cawley translates as ‘contribution’ in ‘The Life of Abundus’, Send Me God, at p. 210. See also Cawley’s comment on the same page at note 6, ‘In the Bible, munus means “gift”, but usually with traces of the classical meaning: “office, function, service”. See Deuteronomy. 2:29, Ecclesiastes, 50:21, Daniel: 5:17. 52 Carmen, lines 227–30.
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Walter of Utrecht, Abbot of Villers Born sometime before 1160 to an upper-echelon family of Utrecht,53 Walter, whose high birth was matched by a suitable education including secular learning, was renowned for his knowledge of the quadrivium. He was well known to the Dominican, Thomas of Cantimpré, who admired Walter for his great education and marvelled at how a man so intellectually gifted could at the same time be so humble.54 Indeed, he had been a teacher in the town before entering the Cistercian Order at Vaucelles, Clairvaux’s thirteenth daughter-house founded in 1132 by St Bernard. In addition to the various passages contained in the Chronica concerning Abbot Walter, Caesarius of Heisterbach appears to have known him personally rather well and he features with an impressive frequency in the Dialogus, including as the narrator (almost raconteur) of several lengthy exempla which Caesarius has him deliver in direct speech. In addition, Caesarius remarks upon his ‘holy amiability’, sua sancta jocunditate, which Cawley, not unreasonably, interprets as his sense of humour, examples of which can be found in the Dialogus and in the Chronica.55 Walter was also periodically subject to mystic experiences as several of Caesarius’s exempla indicate, including two in which he personally receives the ‘gift of tears’.56 Such episodes find easy parallels in the experiences of the central protagonists of Goswin’s three Vitae, Ida, Arnulf and Abundus. Cawley even wonders if Abundus may have been the young monk who, in one exemplum, sends the heavenly tears to Walter.57 That certain thematic links are readily identifiable between Abbot Walter, as depicted in the Dialogus, and the known works of Goswin cantor of Villers, is hardly extraordinary since we may suppose them to be instances of a shared spirituality prevalent during the same historical period in two nearby Cistercian houses that maintained close links with one another. Of course, what concerns us here is the identification of possible connections between Abbot Walter and the original version of the Carmen that is now lost to us. Was Walter of Utrecht the intended recipient of the work? To put the question another way – is Walter the ‘somebody else’ who partly held the verses in his hands before Bishop Soeiro Viegas of Lisbon?58 Certainly Walter was an exponent of the Villers poetic tradition since we can point to the survival of at least one of his poems in the Chronica. Since the Chronica is at best a laconic work, who knows how many more of Walter’s poems were available to the compiler of the Villers chronicles, for which he could not find the space (or the inclination) to include? If Walter’s
53 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 314. 54 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 314, Thomas of Cantimpré, Bonum Universale de Apibus, 2.26. 55 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 315. Examples of Walter’s sancta jocunditate can be found in DM at 2.XIX and also in MGM, Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 200, para. 10. 56 DM, 2.XX and 2.XXI. 57 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 318. 58 Would there have been an acrostic G U.A.L.T.E.R I. U. S.?
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evident amenability to poetry is accepted, since he was not only a poet himself but presided over a house where poetic talents were nurtured, we may imagine that he would not have been displeased to receive a well-crafted versified account in a correct classical form appealing to Walter’s renowned scholarly bent, telling of the overseas progress of one of his protégée monks. Further, there is ample reason to suspect Walter of Utrecht may have had a special interest in events taking place overseas. Walter was an energetic traveller, as we discover from several references to him in the Chronica and in the Dialogus Miraculorum.59 In particular, in the latter, we learn of a former student of Walter, one Otto of Xanten who, having been miraculously cured of an ailment, took the cross in gratitude and shortly thereafter visited Walter whilst he was still at Vaucelles. Curiously Otto, in recounting the story of his cure to his former novicemaster, exclaims ‘would that you had not been here [in Vaucelles] that we might have crossed the sea together!’60 The implication being that Walter was so known for his keenness to go on crusade that, had he been present with Otto at the time of his cure, he would have been sure to have used it as a pretext for taking the cross. Although when appointed to the abbacy he was no longer a young man, at the time being described as of poor eyesight due to his advancing years, he frequently undertook lengthy journeys and even died whilst travelling.61 Indeed, he appears to have remained prodigiously active, presumably in good health until the end and certainly fit enough in 1217 for Henry I Duke of Brabant to invite him to join his crusade expedition to the East.62 The Cistercian General Chapter, to which Henry duly made his request for Abbot Walter to accompany him, had been presided over by Walter’s former pupil, Conrad of Utrecht, who had also preceded Walter as Abbot of Villers.63 Perhaps in affectionate deference to his former novicemaster, Conrad left the decision up to Walter.64 Although Walter did not in fact depart for the Fifth Crusade, perhaps simply because the proposed expedition of Henry I ultimately failed to take place,65 Walter had been active in promoting the grand 59 60 61 62
Walter’s predilection for wayfaring is highlighted by Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, pp. 314–16. DM, 7.XXII. Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 316; MGH, Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 200, para. 10. Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 314. Henry had been recruited for the Fifth Crusade during the legation of Robert Courçon and is an addressee of the letter of Pope Honorius III, August 7, 1216, Regesta Honorii papae III etc., ed. Pietro Pressutti, 2 vols (Rome: Typographia Vaticana, 1888–1895), vol. 1, No. 14 Powel, Anatomy of a Crusade, pp. 34–35, and 39. 63 Conrad had been Abbot of Villers (1209–1214) before being promoted to Clairvaux and then to Cîteaux, soon thereafter to be appointed Cardinal Bishop of Porto; Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 307–14. 64 Petitio ducis Brabantiae de abbate de Villari secum ducendo ad partes transmarinas admittitur, ita quod voluntati dicti abbatis relinquitur utrum cum ipso volverit transfretare. Canivez, Statuta, vol. 1, p. 482, 1217, para.73. 65 Having taken the cross, Duke Henry failed to depart on the expedition; Powel, Anatomy of a Crusade, p. 228; Reinhold Röhricht, Studien zur Geschichte des Fünften Kreuzzuges (Aalen: Scientia-Verl, 1968) (Innsbruck: Neudr. der Ausg 1891), p. 95; idem, Testimonia minora de quinto bello sacro e chronicis occidentalibus excerpsit et sumptibus societatis illustrandis orientis
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venture. We learn, again from Caesarius, that Abbot Walter was an active preacher of the Fifth Crusade, that he was concerned to encourage and support of his fellow crusade preachers, and that he took an active interest in the foreign affairs of his region, later attending the important Diet of Frankfurt in April 1220.66 Let us pause for a moment to consider in a little more depth, the possible reasons that led Duke Henry to go to the trouble of making a formal request to the Cistercian General Chapter that the aging Abbot Walter, who was probably in his sixties at the time, accompany his proposed expedition to the Holy Land. As Abbot of a large and thriving Cistercian house, Walter was already heavily burdened with responsibilities of all kinds, spiritual as well as necessary temporal, administrative duties, to say nothing of his active promotion and support of several women’s houses in the region, notably La Ramée. Certainly, there would have been other clerics available who, being far less encumbered with domestic chores, were more available to travel abroad and who could equally well have served the Duke’s spiritual needs. Did the attraction of Abbot Walter lie in the fact that Henry and Walter were both veterans and old comrades-in-arms of a previous crusade? Henry I of Brabant had been one of the leaders of the crusade launched in 1197 by Emperor Henry VI. Having made his preparations for the expedition at the Diet of Gelnhausen, Duke Henry’s expedition was one of the first to depart in spring of 1197.67 His fleet followed the familiar western passage along the European Atlantic coasts and through the Strait of Gibraltar.68 It stopped at least once in southwestern Iberia, Roger of Hoveden reporting a passing attack on Muslim-held Silves.69 Had Walter, a young monk priest, accompanied that expedition, perhaps as the priest serving on Henry’s ship? If so, Walter would not only have had previous crusading experience, but he would also have been familiar with Iberia, perhaps even with the newly Christian city of Lisbon and, within its diocese, with the great new Cistercian foundation at Alcobaça which, like his own Abbey of Villers, was a daughter house founded directly from Clairvaux under Abbot St Bernard. Once again, until further information comes to light, we may only speculate. Comfortably enough, however, we can at least imagine that Abbot Walter, whilst feeling that his responsibilities and his age compelled him to stay at home this time, may have sent some of his ordained monks to serve the Fifth Crusaders as pastors. Among them, perhaps, was one Goswin, for he was almost certainly a priest, as we shall see.
66 67 68 69
latini monumentis (Osnabrück, Ger: Otto Zeller, 1968) (Reprod. phototypica, 1882), p. 344; idem, Beiträge zure Geschichte der Kreuzzüge (Berlin: Weidmannsche buchhandlung, 1874), vol. II, p. 369. DM, 3, XIV. Steven Runciman, A History of the Crusades, 3 vols (London: Penguin, 1990), vol. III, p. 91; Annales Marbacenses, in MGH Scriptores, vol. 17, p. 167. On this expedition, see Graham Loud, ‘The German Crusade of 1197–1198’, Crusades, vol. 13, N°1, 1 June 2014, pp. 143–71. Roger de Hoveden, Chronica magistri Rogeri de Houedene, ed. by William Stubbs (London: Longmans, 1870), IV, p. 26.
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Nevertheless, persuasive as these evidential strands may appear, there is no escaping the substantially contrasting styles of the relatively straightforward Vitae of Goswin of Bossut and GOSUINUS’s Carmen, a complex and frequently obscure work. Significant is that, at the time of writing his Lives, Goswin’s literary master was no longer the poet-mystic-intellectual Walter of Utrecht, but William of Brussels (1221–1238). It was Abbot William who requested Goswin write the Life of Ida, and it was also probably William who later asked him to write the Life of Arnulf. Tellingly, perhaps, Abbot William appears to have insisted that Goswin simplify his style. In this respect, Goswin makes the following frank admission, laced with characteristic Cistercian humility, in the prologue of the Life of Ida: As Jerome put it to Bishop Heliodorus scant imagination will not hold up under grandiose materials; rather will it succumb in the very act of venturing upon a task beyond its strength. Yet this is just what has happened to me. I confess it, and I do not blush. I have undertaken to write the Life of Christ’s virgin, Ida, undistinguished though I am by any oratorical fluency and unaware of any imaginative subtlety adequately equipping me to couch it in fitting words. What largely excuses me is an order from my abbot, obliging me to set out the Life in a fairly simple style. In doing this, I have relied, not on my own limited imagination, but on that almighty Lord who opens the dumb mouth and makes infant tongues fluent of speech.70 Evidently, Goswin himself preferred a more sophisticated approach, and he had a reputation for it. In that case we may expect to see something of his personal literary stylistic tastes emerging to a larger degree in his authorship of a work undertaken, not as a commission from his abbot, but on his own initiative, the Vita of his close friend, the devoted and passionately Marian monk Abundus of Huy; a work for which Goswin had first to obtain the cooperation of Abundus himself, who was still living at the time (indeed the Vita contains no account of his death) and also the permission of his Abbot William: ‘my idea has been to get my lord abbot’s permission and briefly set down in writing the life of Brother Abundus, a monk of ours’.71 That the same comparative clarity of style is as present in the Vita Abundi, as it is in the Lives of Ida and Arnulf does not necessarily indicate that the stylistically divergent Carmen is by a different author. The most plausible explanation for this lies in Goswin’s probable motivation for writing the Vita Abundi. Rather than seeking to use this Vita as a vehicle for showcasing his literary tastes and skills, Goswin may well have been dissatisfied with the view of his world as depicted through the Vitae previously commissioned from him. Certainly there is the sensation that Goswin is at best ambivalent regarding the extremes of Arnulf’s selfinflicted torments, whereas in the Life of Ida, Cawley has suggested the author
70 Ida Prol. a and Prol.b, Cawley, Send Me God, p. 29. 71 Life of Abundus, Prol. b, Cawley, Send Me God, p. 209.
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may have been less than comfortable with ‘certain gaps in Ida’s liturgical life’.72 In order to redress the balance and do justice to his view of the world he inhabited and evidently loved, he wrote the Vita of a fellow choir monk whose experience of Cistercian life was closer and more ‘true’ to his own. It was, then, during Goswin’s early and more complicated phase that Goswin/ GOSUINUS composed the Carmen. Moreover, he composed the first version of the Carmen not for Abbot William, but for Abbot Walter, a man of perhaps substantially different literary tastes and for a purpose different from that which his later Vitae (particularly Ida and Arnulf) were intended to fulfil. Apparently Abbot William, although eminently disposed to mysticism, was also occupied with more mundane matters such as settling some of the monks of Villers into a suitably austere regime, and it is in this context that the commissioning of the Vita of the brutally ascetic Arnulf can be understood.73 The Vita of Ida, on the other hand, appears to have been part of William’s continuation of the policy, so strong at Villers, namely the support of beguines and other mulieres religiosae, with the focus on Ida’s Eucharistic ecstasies undoubtedly designed to serve the ongoing battle against heresy. Whilst these Vitae were arguably intended for the edification of choir monks and to be used as materials for preaching, the original Carmen was designed to fulfil an entirely different purpose, under a different abbot, under entirely different circumstances – it sought to report back to a superior, Abbot Walter, the events of an overseas adventure, in a literary style that would be personally pleasing to him.
Goswin the priest We speculated over the possibility of Goswin being somehow Walter’s envoy on the Fifth Crusade and, in so doing, the matter of his ordination was briefly postulated. Let us now examine the evidence for this quality in Goswin, since it carries important implications for his identity as the author of the Carmen. Throughout the three Vitae, but especially in the Lives of Ida and of Arnulf, Goswin is forthright in his condemnation of misbehaving priests. This is a sure indication that he also enjoyed that status and was, thus, speaking primarily to his peers.74 This sacramental dignity is of great significance when it comes to placing Goswin on board a ship carrying crusaders since, being a priest, he could fulfil the important role of ship’s pastor, as perhaps his Abbot Walter had done some twenty years before. The presence of such an officer on board crusader ships appears to have been standard among northern crusader fleets. The Crónica de Portugal de 1419 in giving account of the 1189 conquest of Silves informs us that thirty-six priests had accompanied the crusader fleet which, taken with information included in the De expugnatione Lyxbonensi that each ship carried one priest,
72 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 301. 73 Ibid., p. 320. 74 Cawley, Send Me God, p. 7, p. 16.
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lends considerable weight to the figure of thirty-six crusader vessels provided by the author of the De Itinere Navali.75 As for Abbot Walter requesting information from Goswin concerning the progress of the expedition, the history of the crusades throws up multiple examples of superiors requesting reports from subordinates, including accounts of western Iberian exploits such as, almost certainly, the De expugnatione Lyxbonensi in its original underlying version and very probably the De Itinere Navali.76 Let us further note the example of the very clear precedent that is provided in a version of the so-called ‘Lisbon Letter’, an epistolary account of the conquest of Lisbon extant in six slightly differing transcriptions.77 In the rendition dispatched by the monk Duodechin of Lahnstein to the Abbot of Disibodenberg, we read that the letter is sent recounting news of ‘the naval expedition which was carried out to Lisbon . . . since your authority earnestly requested it’.78 Certainly, there can be little doubt that news of the progress of crusading enterprises would have been eagerly received in Villers. Besides maintaining famously close links with the Ducal house of Brabant, noted for its crusading credentials, and Abbot Walter’s involvement in crusade preaching, Villers presents further close links with the Crusades through two anonymously written Lives which treat of members of the Villers community who had formerly been crusaders, the aforementioned versified Vita of Francon of Arquennes, knight and Fifth Crusader before becoming a monk of Villers, and the Vita of Gobert of Aspremont, knight and crusader, then lay monk of Villers (1189–1263).79 Of course, to this crusading context must be added the very foundation of Villers by Bernard of Clairvaux at the height of his preaching of the Second Crusade, during his tour of the Low Countries in 1146/47.
Goswin’s circle As a contributor to the distinctive Southern Netherlandish canon of perhaps just over two-dozen Vitae, Goswin de Bossut belonged to a relatively small circle of like-minded contemporaries.80 This rarefied set includes the Cistercian
75 Crónica de Portugal de 1419, p. 96; DEL pp. 56–57; DIN pp. 591–676. 76 Examples are included in Crusade and Christendom. ed. by Bird et al; and see Letters from the East, Crusaders, Pilgrims and Settlers in the 12th-13th Centuries, trans.by Malcolm Barber and Keith Bate (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010). 77 Annales Sancti Disibodi, in MGH Script. ed., by G. W. Waitz, in MGH Scriptores, vol.17 (Hanover: Hahn, 1861), pp. 27–28; Jonathan Phillips, ‘St Bernard of Clairvaux, The Low Countries and the Lisbon Letter of the Second Crusade’, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History/Vol. 48/Issue 03/ July 1997, pp. 485–97; Susan B. Edgington, ‘The Lisbon Letter of the Second Crusade’, Historical Research lxix (1996), 328–39. 78 Annales Sancti Disibodi, ed. by G. H. Pertz, in MGH Scriptores, vol. 17 (Hanover: Hahn, 1861), p. 27. 79 Cawley, Send Me God., p. xlix. 80 On the regional toponym ‘Southern Netherlands’ as most appropriate given the local political complexities of the period, see Newman, ‘Preface’ in Cawley, Send Me God, at p. xxx, note 2; for a list of the Vitae included in the Southern Netherlandish canon, see p. xlviii.
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monks Philip of Clairvaux and Henry of Saint-Bernard-on-the-Scheldt, the Premonstratensian canon Hugh of Floreffe, the Augustinian canon James of Vitry, and his protégée and later critic, the Dominican Thomas of Cantimpré. To these names, a number of other prominent figures can be identified as active in Goswin’s world. Certainly, among those very likely known to Goswin, although there might have been no direct personal link, is the renowned Fifth Crusade advocate, Oliver Scholasticus of Cologne. Pope Innocent III had called upon Oliver to preach the crusade on Goswin’s own home turf in Brabant as part of a wider brief including other Low Countries areas with profound links to the Alcácer expedition – Flanders, Frisia, the diocese of Utrecht, and Westphalia.81 In this respect, mention has already been made of the inclusion in the Carmen of the miraculous appearance of a cross in the sky, notably reminiscent of the miraculous crosses appearing in the skies over Frisia during Oliver’s crusade preaching in June 1214. It is significant perhaps that Oliver had reported these wonders in a letter addressed to Count Peter and Countess Jolander of Namur, a town only some 27 km from Goswin’s Villers.82 Furthermore, it is through Oliver that we may trace another link with events surrounding the Alcácer campaign mentioned in the Carmen, since, during his preaching tour, he lodged for a few days with Abbot Emo of the Premonstratensian Abbey of Floridus Hortus (Wittewierum) in Frisia.83 Importantly, Emo, in compiling his Chronicon of the abbey,84 included an anonymous eyewitness account of the Frisian contingent that had joined the northern fleet voyaging to the East,85 but whose personnel had refused to participate in the expedition to Alcácer, insisting on their journeying to Palestine without deviation. One element connecting a good many of the individuals that in one way or another conditioned Goswin’s environment and perhaps ring directly or indirectly in the Carmen, was the diverse and prodigious educational milieu of Paris which had propelled the city into the vanguard of academic life in northern Europe.86 Oliver, Emo and James of Vitry had all received at least part of their education in Paris, it being known that Oliver met with James whilst sojourning in the city and also with Robert de Courçon, all three later appointed preachers for the Fifth 81 Kenneth M. Setton, ed., A History of the Crusades, 5 vols (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969–1989), vol. 2, p. 381. 82 Oliver of Paderborn, Die Schriften des Kölner Domscholasters, pp. 285–86; trans. Riley-Smith, Crusades, Idea and Reality, pp. 135–36. 83 Cf., Moolenbroek, ‘Signs in the Heavens’, p. 262. 84 Emo began the chronicle of his monastery in 1204, known as Emonis Chronicon. It was continued by his successor Menko; Emonis et Menkonis Werumensium Chronicon, ed. by Ludwig Weiland, MGH, Scriptores, vol. 23 (Chronica aevi Suevici), pp. 454–572. It appears that Emo met Oliver on his return from Rome in 1212 and later met him again in 1214 when Oliver was preaching the crusade in Frisia. The Emonis Chronicon reports the visit of Oliver to Floridus Hortus on 1 June 1224 where he celebrated the feast of Pentecost in the company of Abbot Emo; Alemparte, Arribadas, p. 85. 85 The report was extracted and edited by Rhöhricht and is included in his Quinta Belli Sacri Scriptores Minores as De Itinere Frisonum, at pp. 57–70. 86 Cf., A. B. Cobban, The Medieval Universities, their development and organization (London: Methuen, 1975), p. 78.
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Crusade by Innocent III.87 It was also in the Paris schools where, a generation later, James of Vitry’s erstwhile acolyte Thomas of Cantimpré would receive instruction, and his preaching materials, like those of James and Oliver Scholasticus, are replete with echoes of Parisian learning.88 Goswin of Bossut demonstrates a most precise knowledge of Parisian student life through the inclusion in his Vita Arnulfi of an anecdote concerning the devotions of a pious landlady, matron of a student hostel, ‘the one facing the cathedral of Notre Dame’ catering to Brabantine students.89 If we may suppose Goswin, whose known works demonstrate a clear erudition, was also a sometime frequenter of the Paris schools, this would provide another plausible platform for connecting him to people in his purlieu, geographical and literary, for whom links may be suspected, but not established. Certainly, among the Paris alumni are at least three authors included in Newman’s canon of Southern Netherlandish Vitae, Philip of Clairvaux and Henry of Saint-Bernard-on-the Scheldt, for whom it is difficult to find connections to Goswin beside their being fellow Cistercians, and Hugh, canon of the Premostratensian abbey of Floreffe, author of the Vita of Yvette of Huy, a muliere religiosa who features in Goswin’s Vita Abundi where she is presented advising the young Abundus to join a Cistercian monastery.90 Further, Goswin’s probable Paris education and his later position as cantor of Villers link him to the production at Villers during the first half of the thirteenth century of a major literary work, the monumental patristic florilegium, the Flores Paradisi.91 He is known to have been involved in the production of the work during his incumbency as cantor in the 1230s, however, since the work took several years to produce, indeed the Flores Paradisi contains nearly 14,000 excerpts from some 350 patristic works, it is possible to imagine Goswin being involved in its preparation from a considerable time before that.92 This would have held great
87 R. Heistand, ‘Oliver Scholasticus und die Pariser Schulen zu Beginn des 13. Jahrhunderts: Zu einem neuen Textfund’ Jahrbuch des Kölnischen Geschichtsvereins, 59 (1987), 1–34, at 16–18; H. Kümper, ‘Oliver of Paderborn’, in G. Dunphy, ed., The Encyclopaedia of the Medieval Chronicle, vol. 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2010), pp. 1166–67. Innocent III appointed Oliver, James and Robert official preachers in Quia maior. 88 Jessalyn Bird, ‘Crusade and Conversion after the Fourth Lateran Council (1215): Oliver of Paderborn’s and James of Vitry’s Missions to Muslims Reconsidered’, Essays in Medieval Studies, 21 (2004), 23–47. 89 Life of Arnulf, II, 16a – 16e; Cawley, Send Me God pp. 183–84; and see, p. 183, note 152; Supplement by Thomas of Cantimpré to the Vita Mariae Oigniacensis, ed. by D. Papebroeck in Acta Sanctorum (Paris, 1867), June, V, pp. 572–81. In this respect, Cawley refers us to a note in the Acta Sanctorum citing Les Antiquitez de la ville de Paris, which describes Parisian student hostels, including the information that each one accommodated students of a particular nationality; Claude Malingre, Les Antiquitez de la ville de Paris (Paris, 1640), IV: 950–1005. 90 On Juette (Ivette) of Huy, see inter alia, Jennifer Carpenter, ‘Juette of Huy, Recluse and Mother (1158–1228): Children and Mothering in the Saintly Life’, in Power of the Weak: Studies on Medieval Women, ed. by Jennifer Carpenter and Sally-Beth MacLean (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1995), pp. 57–93. 91 Brussels, Royal Library, Ms 2003032. 92 Concerning the personnel involved in the compilation the Flores Paradisi, three Villers incumbents are outstanding; Arnulf of Louvain, abbot, 1240–1248, and two cantors, Goswin of Bossut,
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potential for expanding his social horizons since the contents of this vast work could not be harvested solely from the library of Villers, substantial as it was, and it is possible Goswin was one of those scribe-copyists, sent upon what Thomas Falmagne has described as voyages littéraires, involving travelling to other monasteries, sometimes as far afield as Signy, Clairvaux and Cîteaux to collect materials from their libraries.93 Against this dynamic but general background of vigorous travel and exchange between religious and their various houses, no doubt greatly facilitated by the relatively plentiful presence of roads and navigable rivers in the FlandersNetherlands-Rhineland region, the activities of a number of key individuals emerge to show specific promise in relation to Goswin and GOSUINUS. One of them in particular must be added urgently to the distinguished rollcall of luminaries recited so far. Already briefly mentioned, Caesarius of Heisterbach does not strictly belong among the previously mentioned authorial canon of Southern Netherlandish Vitae, yet he looms large in the literary landscape all the same and demands our attention here. Importantly, his Dialogus Miraculorum contains information about the conquest of Alcácer that is highly significant.
Goswin and Caesarius of Heisterbach Villers maintained very close links with Heisterbach. Not only were both affiliated to the same mother house of Clairvaux, but Abbot Charles of Villers (1197– 1209) had been a member of the foundation party of Heisterbach. Charles, a knight and once member of the bodyguard of the Archbishop of Cologne before one day being converted on the way home from a tournament, had initially entered the Cistercian Abbey of Himmerod. The Archbishop of Cologne, alarmed at the migration of young men from his diocese to the abbey, requested another abbey be founded nearer his own city. In this way in 1188–89 Heisterbach Abbey was established and Charles was appointed prior. Caesarius knew him well, possibly as his own novicemaster, and there are several references to him in the Dialogus.94 Within less than a decade of the foundation of Heisterbach, Charles was promoted to the abbacy of Villers; however, he kept in regular contact, not only with Caesarius, but also with the other monks of his former home. Famed in the secular world for his martial skills and horsemanship, Charles had not been a scholar. Conscious of his educational failings, he sought to make up for it by recruiting the best minds available to him. The policy was not lost on Abbot Guy of Clairvaux wo praised Charles for gathering to his abbey ‘great and highly honoured persons’.95 It was Charles who recruited the nobleman, Conrad of Urach, second son of Count Egino IV of Urach and scion of the aristocratic Zähringen during the 1230s and, later, Thomas of Louvain who appears to have occupied the post during the 1260s; Falmange, Un Texte, pp. 64–66. 93 Falmagne, Un Texte, pp. 274–76. 94 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 304. 95 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 306.
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family through his mother Agnes. Conrad, whose privileged background launched him on an impressive trajectory of speedy ecclesiastical advancement, succeeded Charles in the abbacy of Villers before, shortly thereafter, being promoted to Clairvaux, and then quickly on to Cîteaux and from there, in 1219, to appointment as cardinal-bishop of Porto and St Rufina under Honorius III.96 Conrad, however, was but one among many talented and eager young men recruited by Abbot Charles who made sure he took care to enlist the more senior and scholarly Walter of Utrecht to instruct them and doubtless encourage them in the love of learning and the desire for God. Within these arrangements, it is possible to imagine a certain youth, one Goswin of nearby Bossut, perhaps singled out by Charles for his devout nature, good education and musical turn, who was welcomed into Villers and promptly placed under Walter’s care. Caesarius, entirely contemporary with Goswin, published his Dialogus Miraculorum only ten years before Goswin began his Vitae.97 The anecdotes contained in Goswin’s Lives are strongly reminiscent of Caesarius’s work whilst, at the same time, the Dialogus contains multiple references to Villers, as might be expected. It would appear, therefore, that Goswin and Caesarius were acquainted. This is all very well for establishing likely relations between Goswin and Caesarius – but what of Goswin and GOSUINUS author of the Carmen? Caesarius frequently gathered the information he included in the stories of his Dialogus Miraculorum from eyewitnesses, including returning crusaders, which should not surprise given the location of Heisterbach in the archdiocese of Cologne, a land renowned for a numerous production of crusaders which will have seen, in Caesarius’s time, a great deal of coming and going from the East.98 Caesarius’s stories relating to Henry of Ulmen, a crusader with close links to Heisterbach who participated in the Fourth and Fifth Crusades, may well be based on information communicated orally by Henry himself.99 The same is likely in the case of Caesarius’s report of the devastation caused by an earthquake in Cyprus which he dates very specifically to 1222, leaving a distinct impression 96 On Conrad see generally Falko Neininger, Konrad von Urach (d.1227): Zähringer, Zisterzienser, Kardinallegat (Paderborn: Schöningh, 1994). 97 Cawley, Send Me God, p. 29. 98 See inter alia, Brian Patrick McGuire, ‘Written Sources and Cistercian Inspiration in Caesarius of Heisterbach’, Analecta Cisterciensia 35 (1979): 227–82, and idem, ‘Friends and Tales in the Cloister: Oral Sources in Caesarius of Heisterbach’s Dialogus Miraculorum’, Analecta Cisterciensia 36 (1980), 167–247, both reprinted in, idem, Friendship and Faith: Cistercian Men, Women, and their Stories, 1100–1250 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002). 99 DM 4.30 and 8.54; William J. Purkis ‘Crusading and Crusade Memory in Caesarius of Heisterbach’s Dialogus Miraculorum’, Journal of Medieval History, 39:1 (2013), 100–27, at 122–23. For other references to Henry of Ulmen, see See Jean Longnon, Les compagnons de Villehardouin: recherches sur les croisés de la quatrième croisade (Geneva: Droz, 1978), pp. 246–7, and Paul Riant, Exuviae sacrae Constantinopolitanae. 2 vols. (Paris: Éditions du Comité des travaux historiques et scientifiques, 2004), 2: 82, 87–8, 175, 176, 178, 185, 280–3. For Henry’s role in the translation of the relics of a fragment of the True Cross and a tooth of St John the Baptist obtained from Hagia Sophia in Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade, see H. Klein, ‘Eastern Objects, Western Desires: Relics and Reliquaries between Byzantium and the West’, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 58 (2004), p. 283–314, at pp. 300–6. See also, Powell, Anatomy of a Crusade, pp. 75, 227.
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that the details were told to him directly by returning crusaders.100 However, in his story of the conquest of Alcácer and certain associated miraculous happenings, Caesarius could hardly be more explicit: ‘These things were told me by some who were present at the battle’. Several details are especially outstanding in the light of the Carmen. In the first place there is the inclusion of two of the three miracles included in the Carmen, the appearance of the heavenly army, and the scattering of the Saracen ships. a large number [of Saracens] were taken prisoner. And when they were led through the army, they asked the Christians to let them see the standards of the victors, asserting that a whiteclad host, wearing red crosses upon the breast, had put their multitude to flight. Furthermore also, the galleys which they had brought over the sea against the Christians were put to flight by the terror of that celestial vision. When the pilgrims heard this, they gave thanks to Christ, who deigned to send from heaven the support of His martyrs to their aid. These things were told me by some who were present at the battle, and heard from the mouths of the Saracens what I have related.101 Typically, Caesarius does not name his informants, but we must admit the possibility that among them was, author of the Carmen, GOSUINUS, for whom Goswin, fellow author and cantor of Heisterbach’s nearby sister house, Villers, is a prime candidate. Indeed, Caesarius appears well informed on Portuguese affairs and, among the details he includes, is that the ‘blessed Vincent’ is the patron saint of that country (regionis)102 and that the name of the Bishop of Lisbon, is ‘Severus’ (i.e., Soeiro, or SUERIUS). Although Caesarius mentions the presence of the Bishop of Évora, this prelate is not named, which may indicate that, for Caesarius’s informants, this cleric was of somewhat lesser importance in their narrative.103 Nevertheless these details, save for the miracles, are reported in the eyewitness testimony of a cleric of Neuss included in the Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum,104 which, as Joseph Greven has convincingly shown, was almost certainly used by 100 DM,10.48; Purkis, ‘Crusading and Crusade Memory’, p. 123. 101 Eng. trans., The Dialoge on Miracles, p. 68; Qui cum per exercitum ducerentur, quaerebant a Christianis signa victorum, asserentes candidissimam aciem cruces rubeas in pectore gerentes, suorum multitudinem in fugam convertisse. Insuper et galeae quas per mare contra Christianos conduxerant, coelestis illius visionis terrore sunt fugatae. Quod peregrini audientes, gratias egerunt Christo, qui martyrum suorum auxilia eis destinare dignatus est de coelo. Haec mihi relata sunt ab his qui certamini interfuerunt, et ex ore Sarracenorum quae dicta sunt audierunt; DM Vol II, 8.LXVI p. 137. 102 DM Vol II, p. 157. 103 The Bishop of Évora was also named Suerius, yet it is clear that this prelate is not named in the text. 104 Gesata Crusigerorum Rhenanorum, ed. by Reinholdus Rhoricht, in Quinti Belli Sacri Scriptores Minores (Geneva: J. G. Flick, 1879), pp. 27–56.
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Caesarius.105 This report is reproduced with only minor alterations in Continuatio III of the Chronica Regia Coloniensis, with the addition of three miracles, in fact the same three miracles listed in the letter of the Portuguese clergy to Honorius III immediately following the Alcácer victory.106 However, evidence that Caesarius should be taken at his word, that he did indeed receive information directly from those that had been present on the campaign, in addition to his using the report of the cleric of Neuss (which he does not mention), is provided through the fact that he only includes two miracles in his story, the appearance of the heavenly army and the dispersal of the Saracen ships, both of which appear in the Carmen. Had he been aware of the notion that the timely and unexpected appearance of the Templars had also been considered a miracle, he is sure to have included it, suggesting that, whilst he was familiar with the Neuss account (but not with the report in the Chronica Regia), he had relied on oral testimony directly communicated to him of miracle stories circulating among the Christian forces at Alcácer.107 The notion that the author of the Carmen was among his informants finds support in that the arrival of the reinforcements is included in the Carmen, but rather without a flavour of the miraculous beyond it being a beneficial event which duly occurs, rather conventionally and generically in the Christian universe, through the ‘granting of God’.108 As Brian Patrick McGuire has opined, whilst it may be possible Caesarius borrowed from the Chronica Regia, it is more likely he is being precise when he states that he heard of the miraculous events from crusaders who were present at the battle and spoke to the Saracen prisoners.109 Yet, although these connections are alluring, they are by no means conclusive, and it is notable that Caesarius does not include the miracle contained in the Carmen of the appearance of the cross in the sky. Whilst this is by no means fatal to the proposition of the author being among Caesarius’s informants, it is clear that
105 Joseph Greven, ‘Kleinere Studien zu Cäsarius von Heisterbach’, Annalen des historichen Vereins für den Niederrhein 99 (Köln, 1916), pp. 1–35, at pp. 11–18. 106 Continuatio III (S. Pantaleonis prima) a. 1200–1219, in Chronica Regia Coloniensis Waitz, G., ed. (Hanover: MGH Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum in Usum Scholarum Separatim Editi, 1880) (SS rer. Germ vol. 18), pp. 197–251, at pp. 239–42. Cf., Ex Historia Expeditionis in Terram Sanctam, Ibid., pp. 341–43, the work of the anonymous chronicler of Neuss, extracted from Gesata Crusigerorum Rhenanorum. Greven suggests that the scribe of the Continuatio III was familiar with the letter sent to Honorius and had ‘awkwardly’ (ungeschickt) included the three miracles contained therein in his copy of the text; Greven, ‘Kleinere Studien zu Cäsarius von Heisterbach’, p. 34. 107 Cf., Greven, ‘Kleinere Studien zu Cäsarius von Heisterbach’, pp. 32–35. 108 This is notably in accordance with the Neuss chronicler who writes, quoting the Apostle James (4:6), ‘Almighty God, who “resisting the proud, gives grace to the humble” brought them aid in the middle of the night in the person of Peter, master of the Templars’; Eng. trans. Jessalyn Bird et al. Crusade and Christendom, p. 156; omnipotens Dei, qui superbis resistens humilibus suam dat gratiam, dignatus est suos confortare, in tantum ut in ipso medie noctis spatio nobis in auxilium mitteret Petrum magistrum milicie Templariorum; Quinta Belli Sacri, p. 32. (Waitz, MGH, SS rer. Germ vol. 18, p. 341). 109 McGuire, ‘Written Sources and Cistercian Inspiration’, pp. 236–7. See also Purkis ‘Crusading and Crusade Memory’, p. 123.
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further corroboration for GOSUINUS being Goswin of Bossut is needed. Fortunately, it is to hand.
Goswin’s Villers and Mulieres religiosae That one of Goswin’s three surviving musical works is a historia for the important recluse and mystic, Marie of Oignies, suggests his links to two other literary giants of the Southern Low Countries – James of Vitry, who sometime before taking up his position as Bishop of Acre in 1216, authored the Vita Mariae Oigniacensis; and his younger disciple, Thomas of Cantimpré, who later produced a supplement to it, Supplementum ad vitam B. Mariae d’Oignies a B. M. Jacobo de Vitriaco. Importantly, Goswin’s Villers shared this fascination with remarkable women. Whilst it is a matter of some debate whether Goswin composed the office for Marie’s local veneration at Villers or for some other purpose, such as to comprise part of her canonisation file, or to commemorate the moment of the translation of her relics,110 what is beyond doubt is that the work arose in the circumstances of the close, indeed almost obsessive, relationship of his abbey with various mulieres religiosae, béguinages, and houses of nuns in the Southern Low Countries amid an unprecedented explosion of female spirituality.111 Indeed, figures for the diocese of Liège alone show that as many as fifteen Cistercian nunneries were founded between 1200 and 1229, with another sixteen being founded in the decade 1230–1240.112 Abbot Walter of Villers had driven an energetic policy of founding or seeding houses for nuns within the diocese of Liège, including the incorporation of Ida of Nivelles’s own convent of Kerkom and its transfer to La Ramée. Such was his enthusiasm for the creation and nurture of houses for women and their incorporation into the Cistercian Order that he came within danger of overextending his resources and began to run out of personnel for the provision of these new houses with chaplains and lay brothers. Ultimately, he was compelled to pass on the responsibility for as many as eight newly founded convents to the Abbot of Cîteaux.113
110 For the debate over the precise circumstances of its production see Mannaerts, ‘An Exception to the Rule?’ pp. 233–69; also, Martinus Cawley, ‘Mulieres Relgiosae in Goswin of Villers’, Vox Benedictina, 9 (1992), 99–107; and cf., Newman, Send Me God, p. xxxiii. 111 On the Belgian feminine religious movement see, inter alia, especially Ernest W. McDonnell, The Beguines and Beghards in Medieval Culture (New York: Octagon, 1969); Walter Simons, Cities of Ladies, Beguine Communities in the Medieval Low Countries 1200–1526 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003); and The Texture of Society, Medieval Women in the Southern Low Countries, ed. by Ellen E. Kittell and Mary A. Suydam (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004). 112 Jean-Baptiste Lefèvre, ‘Sainte Lutgarde d’Aywières et son temps (1182–1246)’, Collectanea Cisterciensia, 58:4 (1996), 277–335, at 320. 113 Chronica Villariensis, MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 200, para. 10; Cawley, Four Abbots, p. 316.
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Walter’s successor, Abbot William, although he terminated Walter’s policy of sending out monks to serve the women as pastors, continued the abbey’s intense interest in the encouragement of female religious. No doubt aware that Walter had been a little too ambitious in this direction, William only accepted the role of Father Immediate for the Abbey of Val-Duc, founded with an endowment made by Henry II, Duke of Brabant, in 1232. Almost certainly William made this single exception in deference to the close links Villers enjoyed with the ducal family. In all other cases, William preferred to restrict himself to the role of advisor on suitable sites for new feminine foundations whilst passing paternity of them to the Abbot of nearby Aulne. At the same time, outside the Order, béguinages, including those at Leuven, Tienen, Brussels and especially Nivelles, were powerfully supported by William, both through his personal involvement in their affairs and through his generous giving of alms.114
Goswin and James of Vitry Given the pioneering involvement of Villers with charismatic women, it would be unsurprising to discover ties between the abbey and, that most famous champion of beguines, James of Vitry. Certainly, he had no doubts that the spirituality of Marie d’Oignies sprang from the pullulating gardens of Cistercian theology. At the very beginning of Book I of Marie’s Vita, describing her childhood, James is careful to include the following episode within just a few lines of the opening: Once . . . when some Cistercian brothers were passing in front of her father’s house, she glanced up at them and, admiring their habit of religion, she followed them stealthily; when she could do no more, she put her own feet in the footprints of those lay brothers or monks from her great desire.115 Here, James leaves an early and clear message that there can be no doubt about Marie’s orthodoxy, a principal theme in the work. Since Marie’s childhood was spent at her family home in Nivelles, only fifteen kilometres west of Villers, it has been assumed, very reasonably, that those passing religious were from that Abbey, perhaps proceeding to or from a nearby grange.116 Nor is this the only reference in the work to a specifically Cistercian world; the Vita contains several,
114 Moreau, L’Abbaye, xxiv; Mannaerts, ‘An Exception’, p. 241. A great deal more can be said about William’s involvement with female religious which often caused controversy at Villers and sometimes spilled over into the General Chapter, both concerning the financial support he lavished upon them and also when he took with him, when he was promoted to Clairvaux, the paternity of La Cambre, a house with strong traditional ties to Villers from the time of Abbot Charles. See, inter alia, Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, pp. 323–24 and the references contained therein. 115 Vitry, Cardinal Jaques de, The Life of Marie D’Oignies, trans. with Intro. by Margot H. King (Toronto: Peregrina, 1989) at Book 1, Chapter 11A, p. 27. 116 Mannaerts, ‘An Exception’, p. 242.
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including Marie’s vision in which she converses with St Bernard, who appears possessed of the wings of an eagle117 and the fact that the entire work is dedicated to Fulk (former troubadour of Marseilles) Bishop of Toulouse, formerly Abbot of the Cistercian house of Le Thoronet. In the Prologue to the Vita, James tells us that Fulk had been ‘exiled from his own city by the heretics and had come to the countries of Gaul to beg for help against the enemies of the faith’. He had arrived to the diocese of Liège having heard of the great reputation of the region’s holy women. Indeed, James’s two overriding aims for writing the Vita emerge clearly in the Prologue; one is explicit, that the work is intended as a tool for preaching against heresy,118 the other, obvious but implicit, is an intention to confirm and extol the Christian orthodoxy of the beguines.119 How fitting then, that he finds a direct link with Villers, a house renowned for its support of mulieres religiosae, and his heroine Marie d’Oignies. Goswin, a contemporary of James of Vitry, although probably his junior by some twenty or more years, clearly knew his Vita Mariae well and used it as the foundation for the office. We may speculate that the office was commissioned from Goswin by Abbot William, who had also commissioned from him the Vitae of Arnulf and of Ida of Nivelles. Whilst it is clear that Goswin was very familiar with James’ Vita Mariae, we can only speculate as to whether the two men were personally acquainted. Almost certainly the canons of Oignies were well known to the monks of Villers; inter alia they are mentioned in Goswin’s office for Marie and the town of Oignies is only 20 km south of Villers on the other side of the River Sambre. Further, Abbot Walter, the likely commissioner of the Carmen in its first version was, like James of Vitry, a preacher of the Fifth Crusade and both men appear to have been active in that capacity in the same geographical region at the same time. Add to this Walter’s and James’s interest in the promotion of the mulieres religiosae, and it appears almost inconceivable that James had not been a visitor to Villers, perhaps even a frequent one. That a copy of his Vitae Mariae existed in the Villers library is certain since a copy of it had originally been part of the codex that had contained the unique manuscript of Goswin’s office for her.120
117 For example, later in the Vita, in order to confirm Marie’s continuing devotion to the Cistercian path, James has her experience a vision of Bernard of Clairvaux; ‘St Bernard, the father and luminary of the Cistercian Order, appeared to her as if winged, and he stretched his wings around her. When she asked what kind of wings they were, he replied that, like an eagle, he attained the high and subtle things of Divine Scripture through high flying and that the Lord had opened to him many of the heavenly secrets’. The Life of Marie D’Oignies, Chapter 90, p. 103; and cf., Mannaerts ‘An Exception’, p. 253. 118 The Life of Marie D’Oignies, Ch. 9, pp. 23–24. 119 See ibid., Ch. 4 at p. 18, ‘they affixed new names against them, just as the Jews called Christ a Samaritan’ (John 8:48). This is a clear reference to the malicious labelling of the Flemish mulieres religiosae as ‘beguines’, a derogatory term which was growing in currency at the time, although James himself never uses it. 120 On this codex and its attributes see Mannaerts resumée, ‘An Exception’, p. 233 et seq; Goswin’s office for Marie of Oignies, Celebris hec festivitas/Gaude Maria filia Syon exists in a unique manuscript, probably autograph, today housed in the Brussels Royal Library (Ms II 1658).
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Goswin and Thomas of Cantimpré At best, we can only conclude that it is more likely than not that Goswin had some personal contact with James of Vitry; however, our travels along this road have not been in vain since the cultural, literary and geographical possibilities for the links between these two authors inform Goswin’s possible links to James’s younger disciple, Thomas of Cantimpré. Here the evidence is somewhat more compelling and, crucially, brings us closer to the Carmen. Contacts between Thomas of Cantimpré and Villers are confirmed both by the early incorporation of several of his works in the library of Villers during the thirteenth century,121 and through the many explicit references to Villers in Thomas’s writings.122 Abbot Walter, the likely addressee of the first version of the Carmen, was also known to Thomas, who mentions him in his Bonum universal de apibus.123 Thomas has much more to say, however, of Abbot William (1221–1236), during whose abbacy flourished at least four members of Villers who were the subjects of Vitae; Arnulf the lay brother (d. 1228), Abundus, who lived under William for at least fifteen years, the ex-knight and Fifth Crusader, Francon, whose Vita wholly in verse, we have already briefly mentioned, and one Geoffrey Pachomius.124 Thomas claims to have seen William experiencing the gift of tears for himself,125 and it is likely that Thomas was a fairly frequent visitor to Villers where he learned of other members of the community blessed with prophetic abilities: In monasterio ipso multos vidimus sanctos et plerosque qui spiritu prophetie et miraculis claruerunt.126 Of course, it would be hardly surprising to find Thomas frequenting Villers from time to time, given the geographical proximity within which various religious operated and also the fact that Thomas had been appointed as confessor in the female house of Valduc,
121 Falmagne, Un Texte, passim, including at pp. 39, 47 and 508. 122 For example, in his Bonum universale de apibus, written 1254–1263, he recounts the story of how Abbot Conrad of Villers (1209–1214) received a vision of Marie of Oignies during a nighttime visit to pray at her tomb. Bonum universale Book I, Ch.9. However, a far earlier version of this story can be found in Thomas’ Supplementum to the Vita Mariae, written in about 1230, but where the name of the protagonist is not revealed, ‘since he forbids that he be named’. According to this version, the protagonist, ‘a certain bishop’, told the story to the prior of Oignies who passed it on to Thomas; Thomas of Cantimpré, Supplement to the Life of Marie D’Oignies, ed and trans. by Hugh Feiss (Toronto, 1990), p. 46. Mannaerts’ dating of the incident, if historical, to within the first year of Marie’s death which occurred on 23 June 1213, ‘for by the end of 1214 Conrad had been elected abbot of Clairvaux’, cannot be correct. Rather it appears the incident took place much later after Conrad had become a cardinal since Thomas describes him as ‘a certain bishop . . . who came suppliantly and devoutly from Italy’; Mannaerts, ’An Exception’, p. 243. 123 Bonum universale, 2.26, cited in MHG 10; Cawley ‘Four Abbots’, p. 318; Falmagne, Un Texte, p. 66. 124 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 325; for the references and dates of Francon and Geoffrey Pachomius, see Roisin, L´Hagiographie, p. 78, et seq. 125 Chronica Villariensis, MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 202, para 16, Hunc specialissime detitum lacrimus vidimus. . . 126 Ibid., p. 204, para 20.
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possibly by the nuns themselves of whom Abbot William was their Father Immediate.127 Whilst William almost certainly commissioned at least two lives from Goswin, and we know that Goswin wrote the Vita Abundi at his own initiative with William’s permission, Cawley speculates that during this very fecund literarily period for the cantor, the Abbot himself might have become the subject of a Vita now lost to us. Indeed, Thomas of Cantimpré tells us very clearly that he had seen some written matter concerning Abbot William’s many divine visions: de quibus nonnulla vidimus scripita et approbata.128 Although the Chronica of Villers contain two of Thomas’s complete stories about William that are quoted verbatim from the Bonum, one recounting the miraculous feeding of ox meat to a poor pregnant woman129 and another concerning a usurer of Namur,130 these, as Thomas explains in his text, are told to him by others; they are not taken from the written material he had seen. Rather, the information contained in that material recounted visions experienced by William that he shared only with his close companions at Villers, ut illi dixerunt qui hominem secretius cognoverunt, in tantum divine contemplationis assiduitate vacabat, ut ei Dominus multa in visione monstraret.131 Cawley suggests five episodes contained in the Chronica and one from the Dialogus Miraculorum, that could have been sourced from this material; three concern William hearing confessions,132 another three concern the Mass.133 Certainly, the overtly mystical nature of these vignettes resounds strongly with Goswin’s conventionally accepted corpus of Vitae. Was Goswin the author of the source material? Did he show this work to his direct contemporary134 and fellow author Thomas during one of the latter’s visits to Villers? Again, we are in the land of speculation. However, the possibility of a direct connection between the two biographers gains some considerable strength when considering the evolution of Thomas of Cantimpré’s hagiographic method. Simone Roisin, the first scholar to submit Thomas’ works to such analysis, noticed an increasing concern for the expression of inner mystical experience of the divine as his literary output progressed. She noted that, in his earlier works, such as his Supplement to Mary of Oignies and Christina the Astonishing, Thomas had been 127 Abbot William’s willingness to allow female communities to appoint their own pastors apparently caused considerable controversy, see Cawley, Four Abbots, p. 324; cf., Barbara Newman, ‘Possessed by the Spirit: Devout Women, Demoniacs, and the Apostolic Life in the Thirteenth Century’, Speculum, 73:3 (July 1998), 733–70, at 743. 128 Chronica Villariensis, MGH Scriptores, Vol 25, p. 202 at para 16. 129 Ibid., pp. 201–2, at para 16, Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 319 and p. 322. 130 Chronica Villariensis, MGH Scriptores, vol. 25 p. 204, at para 20. 131 Ibid., p. 202 at para 16. 132 Ibid., p. 200 at para 11, p. 201 at para 13; DM IX, 31. 133 Chronica Villariensis, MGH Scriptores, Vol 25, p. 201 at para. 14, and p. 203 at para.19; Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 326. 134 According to the age suggested for Goswin herein, he would have been perhaps some six years older than Thomas who was born 1201.
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concerned to relate physical miracles observable in the human world, whereas it was ascetic qualities he was keen to emphasise in Margaret of Ypres. Finally his preoccupation was with mystical virtues in his Life of Lutgard of Aywières, arguably his most mature work. Roisin saw in this progression a reflection of Thomas’s own spiritual development, which she attributed to an increasingly Cistercian influence in his life. In short, she concluded that, somewhere between writing the Vita of Christina the Astonishing and that of Lutgard of Aywiéres, during the 1230s, Thomas must have become familiar with the trilogy of Vitae usually attributed to Goswin.135 Barbara Newman has thought the hypothesis plausible. Certainly, Thomas’ Vita of Lutgard, is reminiscent of Goswin’s Vita of Ida of Nivelles, yet these similarities could be explained by the subjects’ shared quality as Cistercian nuns. However, the similarities between Thomas’s Christina the Astonishing and Goswin’s Arnulf, particularly their tortuous physical penitential suffering, are far more intriguing. In Newman’s opinion, Thomas clearly shared two of Goswin’s preoccupations, namely his concern to bring a transparency into the inner mystical life and to emphasise the bonds, both mystical and temporal, within a religious community.136 Drawing together the various commonalities between the two authors, Newman’s endorsement of Roisin’s hypothesis is difficult to resist: Both hagiographers valued such mystical experiences as visions, revelations, and ecstasies, and more strikingly, both shared a confidence that these extraordinary states could be communicated with ease, whether in words or in direct, telepathic access to the souls of others. Further, both wrote for and about a broadly conceived network of spiritual friends transcending the boundaries of language, gender and religious profession.137 Nevertheless, one may be forgiven for asking what this has to do with Goswin as GOSUINUS author of the Carmen, a poetical account of a military conquest in Iberia. The link is both in the ‘mystical’ and in the ‘poetical’ and, in particular, the poetical account of the life of a member of the Villers community, which is perhaps one of the most striking examples of versified works produced at the Abbey during its entire Golden Age, the rhythmical ballad, the Vita Franconis. This Life of Francon of Arquennes, a Fifth Crusader turned monk, written contemporaneously with Goswin’s Vitae is addressed to a certain ‘illustrious Thomas’ (O Thoma clare).138 135 Simone Roisin, ‘La Méthode hagiographique de Thomas of Cantimpré’, in Miscellanea Historica in Honorem Alberti de Meyer, 2 vols (Louvain: Bibliothèque de l’Université, 1946), vol. 1, pp. 546–57; Barbara Newman, ‘Introduction’, in Thomas of Cantimpré, the collected Saint’s Lives (Tourhout: Brepols, 2008), pp. 18–19. 136 See Newman, Send Me God, pp. xlvi–xlvii, for her suggestion that Goswin characterises the inner life through sublimity, transparency and community. 137 Newman, ‘Introduction’, p. 19. 138 Martène and Durand, 1339a.
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Goswin and Francon of Arquennes The family d’Arquennes appears in several documents, the earliest dating to the twelfth century with Francon himself being attested during the first quarter of the thirteenth.139 The earliest reference to him records his presence among the soldiery in England in 1213, perhaps in the context of negotiations between Flanders and King John in a prelude to imminent hostilities with France. Next we find him at the beginning of 1220 at Damietta during the Fifth Crusade where, along with his two sons, ‘F’ and ‘W’, he witnesses a deed of donation in favour of the Teutonic Order made by Walter Berthout Lord of Mechelen, of lands and rights around Grootlo in Brabant.140 It is not clear when Francon set out for the Holy Land, but his presence among Walter’s close associates as a witness to the donation141 suggests he was in some way connected to Walter’s crusading entourage. A vassal of Duke Henry of Brabant, who as mentioned earlier, took the vow but did not depart, Walter had travelled to the East sometime after January 1218 with his family ensemble including his sons and his wife, a grouping of relatives and household members common among bands of crusaders during the period.142 In accordance with this convention, we note the presence of Francon’s own two sons on the expedition.143
139 Roisin, L´Hagiographie cistercienne, p. 41. 140 J. T. de Raadt, ‘A propos d’un diplome relative à la maison des Berthout’, in Annales de La Société D’archéologie de Bruxelles (1888–1889), vol. II, pp. 100–07, at p. 103; Rohricht, Studien zur Geschichte des Fünften Kreuzzuges, p. 70. The correct date of the Charter is 27 January 1220; Godfried Croenen, Familie en Macht, De Familie Berthout en de Brabantse Adel (Leuven: Universitaire Pers Leuven, 2003), p. 38. It appears the charter was made on Walter’s deathbed since it is addressed to his kinsmen in Brabant, and it is clear from the preamble that he had been wounded. Walter never returned from Egypt, presumably dying shortly after the execution of the charter; Croenen; ibid., p. 302. Like Francon of Arquenne, Walter had been in the service of John Lackland, being attested in England between October 1215 until June 1216; for this information I am indebted to Godfried Croenen. In the thirteenth-century manuscript copy kept in the University Library, Cambridge, of Oliver of Paderborn’s Historia Damiatina, at Chapter 29 where the participants in a battle are named, there is found following Walter’s name the inscription, qui apud Damiatam post captionem civitavis diem clausit extremum; MS ff.1.25.4, fol. 69v; see Thomas W. Smith, ‘Oliver of Cologne’s Historia Damatiana: A New Manuscript Witness in Dublin, Trinity College Library MS 496’, Hermathena 194 (2017 for 2013) 37–68, at p. 55. 141 Raadt, ‘A propos’, p. 106. 142 Powel, Anatomy of a Crusade, p. 81–82; Walter is last recorded in Brabant witnessing a charter of Duke Henry of Lotharingia in January 1218; Cartuaire de l’abbaye d’Affligem et des monastières que en dépendaient; Analectes pour servir à l’histoire ecclésiastique de Belgique, 2ième section: Cartulaires et documents éntendus, 1 (1894)-5(1901), ed. by E. De Marneffe, p. 375. His first recorded appearance in the East is at Damietta in 1219, where in the company of William Count of Holland he witnesses a charter of Egidius Bertous in favour of the Teutonic Order; De Oorkonden van Pitsenburg, commanderrij van de Duitse Ridderorde te Mechelen (1190–1794), Voor 15 marrt 1190–21 October 1299, ed. by A. James (Antwerpen: Provincie Antwerpen, 1991). 143 Powell gives Walter Berthous’s date of departure for the crusade as autumn of 1218; Anatomy of a Crusade, p. 82.
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In a dramatic passage from Oliver Scholasticus’s ‘The Capture of Damietta’ we find Walter fighting a heroic action shoulder to shoulder with the leaders of the Alcácer fleet, the counts of Holland and of Wied.144 It follows that we can surmise Walter, on arriving in the East, quite naturally attached himself to the contingent containing his associates and fellow countrymen already present including, very plausibly, Francon of Arquennes, which had sailed earlier in the fleet that had attacked Alcácer. If this is correct and with Francon, thus, likely present at the crucial conquest subject of the Carmen, several elements of the Vita Franconis become highly relevant and are inextricably linked with the identification of Goswin of Bossut as the probable author of both of these works. The Vita Franconis, a lengthy poem of eighty-two quatrains, very much a ballad and, indeed, probably intended to be sung,145 deals for the most part with Francon’s life and death as an aged lay brother in Villers. Nevertheless, early in the work there is a powerful invocation of Francon’s former profession as a lionhearted (corde leoninus) knight and, in particular, an account of his exploits on the Fifth Crusade in Chaldea. Notably, Chaldeans is a term frequently used to denote the Muslims of Iberia.146 Only one battle is described and, although the geographic location is unspecified, it is possible to recognise certain key moments in the conquest of Alcácer do Sal, several of which are recounted in the Carmen. Indeed, the bellicose episodes described in the Vita, in so far as they can be ascribed to historical events, fit much more nearly the conquest of Alcácer than any of the other actions of the Fifth Crusade whilst, curiously, there is no mention whatsoever of the dramatic and eminently narratable battle for Damietta at which Francon was almost certainly present. The relevant sequence of the Vita occurs at verses IV–IX. Here we learn that Francon sets sail under prosperous winds for the lands of the Saracens (Pagani); that a rumour quickly spreads among the Saracens that a Christian army has landed; that the Saracens assemble a great army to repulse the Christian force; that another Christian force arrives in support of the already landed maritime force; and that a great battle takes place resulting in great
144 Oliver of Paderborn, ‘The Capture of Damietta’, Ch. 29 in Christian society and the Crusades, 1198–1229: sources in translation, ed. by Edward Peters (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971), p. 82. It is notable that Henry of Ulmen, one of Caesarius’s likely informants was captured in the same action, as also reported by Oliver in the same passage of his chronicle. 145 Cf. Cawley, Send Me God, p. 6, ‘It is a sheer delight to the ear and we can imagine it being sung to the assembled community on a feast-day afternoon’. Meanwhile, I have noticed it works perfectly to the tune of the well-loved English Christmas carol Good King Wenceslas. Cf., the bawdy thirteenth-century song, Tempus adest Floridum, in Carmina Burana, ed. by Alfons Hilka, Otto Schumann, and Wilhelm Meyer (Heidelberg: C. Winter, 1978), No. 142. 146 Norman Roth, Jews, Visigoths and Muslims in Medieval Spain, Cooperation and Conflict (Leiden: Brill, 1994), p. 50; Kenneth B. Wolf, Conquerors and Chroniclers of Early Medieval Spain (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1990), pp. 48–50; and cf., Pedro López de Ayala, Crónica del rey don Pedro, in Bilbioteca de Autores Espanõles (monograph series) 66 (Madrid, 1875), p. 420.
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carnage.147 Crucially, at verse VII, there occurs the single mention of a certain Dominus Sugerus. Franco miles inclytus, Christianus versus In congressu praelii audax et severus, Et cum eo pariter Dominus Sugerus Invaserunt barbaros, velut Oliverus. This can be none other than Bishop Soeiro Viegas (SUERIUS) of Lisbon, the name Sugerus being a common variation of the name Suerius, other versions of the name include Severus, Suario, Suarius, Sueiru, Suerii, Suerio, Suero, Sugerii, Sugerio, Sugerius, and Sueyro.148 The author opted for ‘Sugerus’ because it has only three syllables and better fits the remarkably rigid metre of the poem which is strictly maintained throughout. Each line has precisely thirteen syllables with a caesura occurring between syllables seven and eight. As the poem stands, if the author had written ‘Dominus Suerius’ he would have been one syllable over his six-syllable limit for the part of the line following the caesura, and he cannot use the common alternative ‘Severus’ because he has just used severus in the previous line. The Fifth Crusade was an almost unmitigated failure for Latin Christendom, one of the only positive outcomes being the conquest of Alcácer in Iberia. Perhaps this is why the Vita Franconis makes no specific mention of such renowned events as the conquest of the chain tower or the capitulation of Damietta since, ultimately, all was futile. Rather, the author chooses to celebrate Francon’s role in an undoubted Christian victory, perhaps one that he himself witnessed. Whilst keeping the geographical location of the event vague, the author mingles his narrative with episodes very obviously designed to cast Francon in the role of the great Christian hero, Roland; not only does Francon defeat a gigantic Saracen champion (Giganteus corpore, ac superbus mente)149 in single combat, mirroring Roland’s defeat of the giant Ferracut in the Pseudo Turpin,150 but Sugerus is expressly likened to Roland’s faithful friend Oliver ‘the valiant and the noble’151 who, in the Song of Roland, with his sword Hauteclaire famously makes short work of many a pagan enemy.152 The comparison is emphasised in the rhyming of Sugerus with Oliverus in the last two lines of the stanza. Whilst the lauding of Francon would be expected, such celebration of Sugerus/Suerius, the only other character in the entire poem apart from Fancon to be named, is surprising and suggestive of a personal knowledge of the Bishop and his central role in events at
147 Cf., Carmen, lines 29, 91, 113–16, 120–21, 132–38. 148 There is no record that I have been able to find of a crusader bearing any variation of that name having taken the vow in the relevant period; cf., Powel, Anatomy of a Crusade, pp. 242–43 and Rohricht, Studien zur Geschichte des fünften Kreuzzuges, p. 124–29. 149 Vita Franconis, verse IX. 150 The chronicle of Pseudo-Turpin: Book IV of The Liber Sancti Jacobi (Codex Calixtinus) ed. and Eng. trans. by K. R. Poole (New York: Italica Press, 2014), Ch.17, pp. 40–48. 151 Song of Roland, Eng. trans. by Glyn Burgess (London: Penguin, 1990), p. 34 at verse 12. 152 Song of Roland, verses, 103, 107, 126, 127, 144, etc.
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Alcácer, either on the part of Francon or the Vita’s author, or perhaps both. Indeed, it is impossible to know how much detail was imparted to the author by Francon himself and how much material the author may have deemed apt to add in, either from his own experience, or from other sources, in order to serve his literary ends. According to the Vita Franconis, with Francon having defeated their champion, the Saracens become dispirited and call for a truce; the parallel with the overcoming of Alcácer, the fortifications of which are presented almost as a character in the Carmen, is notable.153 Francon, celebrated not only in the Christian camp but also among the Saracens for his great morality, courage and humility, is then sent to negotiate the treaty with the Soldanus (the Saracen chieftain) whose admiration and trust he has won.154 Finally, the opening section of the poem ends with brief news that Francon’s twin sons, although famed for their prowess in arms, ultimately perish on the crusade and that Francon, deciding to spurn a life of luxury and exchange it for one of monastic rigour, enters the monastery of Villers.155 Since the real Francon of Arquennes appears once more in the historical record in a charter of 1225 in which he makes a donation of some woodland to the Convent of La Ramée, where his daughter had just been admitted as a nun, it is likely that Francon’s entry into Villers occurred shortly thereafter.156 As to Goswin’s authorship of the Vita Franconis, there are several important clues. Perhaps the least specific is that the author was a monk from Villers. This is clear from a number of indicators including his use of noster when speaking of the Cistercian Order and of Francon himself,157 and also through the presence of entire verses dedicated to extolling the virtues of Villers,158 to prayers for the prosperity of the Abbey,159 and to exhortations encouraging its monks to perseverance.160 Further, it is evident that the author is a generation or so younger than Francon since he does not hesitate to describe him as being ‘white as a swan because of his old age’ and ‘weakened by age’,161 thus the author’s age accords comfortably with that herein postulated for Goswin. Most compelling of all, however, is the obvious presence in the Vita Franconis of a trait identifiable as peculiar to Goswin’s canon, namely a celebration of mysticism firmly espoused to a keen awareness that accounts of mystic experience are likely to receive a frosty reception in some quarters, including among religious. This characteristic, conspicuously present in each of the lives comprising the trilogy of Vitae hitherto attributed to Goswin,162 is especially strong in the Vita
153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162
Carmen, lines 97–100. Vita Franconis, verses XII–XVII. Ibid., verses XVIII-XIX. Roisin, L´Hagiographie, p. 41. E.g., Vita Franconis, verses XXVI, XXVII. E.g., Ibid., verses LXXVII, LXXX. E.g., Ibid. E.g., Ibid., verses LXXIV/LXXV. Ibid., verses XXI and XXVI. Cawley, Send Me God, ‘The Life of Ida of Nivelles’ at p. 56, 17e; ‘The Life of Arnulf’, at p. 146, I.10d and ‘The Life of Abundus’, at p. 224, 9d.
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Franconis. From verse LVII onwards, the author’s voice emerges in powerful condemnation of those who would sneer at mystic experience. The tirade is constructed around the scenario of Francon’s deathbed where the crusader-turnedmonk, on the point of death, begins to sing a sweet and divinely inspired song; Quod cum Franco debuit cursum consummare, / Quoddam dulce canticum coepit decantare. However, some of those monks present extended derisive smiles to each other making mockery of the phenomenon. A particular monk standing close by who much loved the aged Francon, almost certainly the author himself, reproves the mockers for their scoffing. Believing the song to have been of divine inspiration the monk begs Francon to sing one more song in order to shake the smirking monks from their senseless incredulity. Francon, although virtually on his last breath, obliges by singing another verse as if to refute those who he has understood have offered him offence, Temquam vellet dicere, ‘volo confutare / Monachos quos audio mihi insultare’. Indeed, there is a powerful personal note in the sensation that some of the individuals at whom the author’s criticism is aimed, might well have been able to identify themselves in the work. Sed praesentes aliqui quia nesciebant Quid hoc esset canticum, aut intelligebant Quondam ad alterutrum risum emittebant Et tanquam ludibria vana deridebant.163 The likely significance of Francon’s song for Goswin the cantor, the abbey’s musical director, merits a little elucidation. In this respect notable is Falmagne’s observation that, whilst the compilers of the Flores Paradisi systematically excluded patristic works of hagiography, history, science, natural philosophy and especially the liberal arts, occasional exceptions were made.164 The single exception with respect to the liberal arts was a selection of eleven extracts from Book 6 of Augustine’s De Musica.165 This is a work that Goswin can hardly fail to have known well, especially Book 6 which, as Augustine himself said, contains the essence of all the preceding five books.166 Entitled Deus numerorum aeternorum fons et origo, the volume describes ‘the ascent from rhythm in sense to the immortal rhythm which is truth’.167 In short Augustine here seeks to show how music
163 Vita Franconis, verse, LIX. 164 Abbot Arnulf of Louvain, author of the Prologue to the Flores Paradisi appears to have been distinctly opposed to secular learning and had opposed Abbot Stephen Lexington of Clairvaux in his drive to provide monks with university education; Chronica Villariensis, MGH Scriptores, vol. 25, p. 208, para 28. 165 Falmagne, Un Texte, p. 363. 166 Augustine, Letters, vol. 2, Nº 101, p. 17. 167 Dialogues philosophiques. De musica libri sex: texte de l’édition bénédictine, ed. by Guy Finaert and François Joseph Thonnard (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1947); John Stevens, Words and Music in the Middle Ages: Song, Narrative, Dance and Drama, 1050–1350 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008), p. 13.
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properly played or sung168 is united with the Pythagoran theory of the Music of the Spheres. Since numbers define music (harmony, rhythm, metre etc.) and numbers are eternal, because everything eternal comes from God, the originator of rhythm and music must also be God.169 Accordingly therefore, Francon’s sweet singing, in addition to being miraculous and ecstatic, demonstrates that his spiritual life reflects the eternal cosmic design which conforms to the laws of equality, unity and order found in music which is Divine, and so Francon’s song is indicative of his saintliness.170 However, man’s pride, Augustine tells us, can disrupt this heavenly scheme and prevent the soul from appreciating what is good in music by diverting its attention to sensory pleasure which is a thing below the soul.171 Sure enough, at least four verses of the Vita Fanconis are given over to berating the scoffers specifically for their pride and warning them that their ruin is at hand.172 Finally, having spent a full eleven verses in a biting tirade against the shameless mocking of his anti-mystic brethren,173 the author draws his work to a close and in so doing is careful to dedicate it to a certain ‘illustrious Thomas’. Quia cibus nimius soet generare, Vomitum, propterea nolo prolongare, Opus hoc unterius, sed O Thoma clare, Meam hic terminiam volo terminare.174 This can hardly be anyone other than Thomas of Cantimpre, Goswin’s likely comrade in the literary promotion of their shared view of Low Countries mysticism and who himself includes a similar episode of miraculous singing in his Vita Beatae Christina Mirabilis.175 168 Augustine writes, ‘Music should be defined as ars bene modulandi: that is, how to make controlled variations of sound in the right way’. De Musica, Bk 1.2. 169 Kathi Meyer-Baer, ‘Psychological and Ontological Ideas in Augustine’s de Musica’, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 11:3 (March 1953), 224–30. 170 Further, it is likely that the rigid and extraordinarily rhythmical form of the Vita Franconis, which never strays from its format of thirteen syllables a line over the entire length of 82 regular rhyming quatrains, very much in the style of a ballad, is intended to reflect both that Francon’s life was lived entirely in harmony with God’s plan and, more concretely, that the monk Francon lived at Villers entirely within the strict observance of the Rule. 171 De Musica, 6.13; Brian Brennan, ‘Augustine’s De Musica’, Vigiliae Christianae, 42:3 (September 1988), 267–81, at 275. 172 Vita Franconis, verses, LXV–LXVIII. 173 Ibid. 174 Ibid., verse LXXVIII. 175 Thomas of Cantimpré, The Life of Christina Mirabilis, trans. by Margot H. King (Torronto: Peregrina Publishing, 1989) Ch.35. p. 29. Vita Beatae Christina Mirabilis Virginis, ed. By J. Pinius, Acta Sanctorum, Iul (1868), vol. V, pp. 637–60. In a remarkable example of ‘sonic mysticism’ James of Vitry reports that Marie d’Oignies performed a full three days and nights of miraculous, catechistic singing as she lay dying; The Life of Marie D’Oignies, Eng. trans. by Margot H. King (Toronto: Peregrina Publishing, 1989), pp. 111–15. See also Ulrike Wiethaus, ‘The Death Song of Marie d’ Oignies: Mystical Sound and Hagiographical Politics in Medieval Lorraine’, in The Texture of Society, ed. by Ellen E. Kittell and Mary A. Suydam (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), pp. 153–79.
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If we can thus conclude Goswin’s likely authorship of the Vita Franconis, can we also attribute to him the authorship of the Carmen? The specificity of the information included in the Vita Franconis readily associable with Alcácer, particularly the appearance of Dominus Sugerus, taken alongside the chronological, geographical and textual coincidences highlighted earlier, indicate an answer in the affirmative. This being so, it is clear we must now extend Goswin’s canon to include at least the Vita Franconis and the Carmen, if not also a lost Vita Wilhemi Brusseli Abbatis. Some three decades ago, Cawley had put a question which now, in the light of the foregoing, acquires an eminently rhetorical glow: ‘Were Goswin and Thomas, the biographers of Ida and Lutgard, friends? William, I am sure would have wished it so’.176
Goswin and Suerius The search for GOSUINUS has, so far, lead us in a complex dance around the cultural Southern Low Countries. In an attempt to cast a constructive framework over a collection of data that may sometimes appear as disparate and haphazard as it is heterogeneous, it is now high time to ‘put the pedal to the metal’ and attempt some kind of summing-up; indeed, autentis Fortuna iuvat, a denouement. If GOSUINUS author of the Carmen is indeed Goswin of Bossut, why might we find him, a voyager on a ship of northern crusaders, on the crucial expedition to Alcácer do Sal in 1217? Brief allusion has already been made to the preaching of the Fifth Crusade on Goswin’s home-turf and even to his acquaintance with some of those preachers, but for more precise information, we must now look to Goswin the ecclesiastic, to Goswin the priest and, importantly, to Goswin, monk of the Cistercian Order. In so far as he is a priest, we have already noted that there is ample precedent for his possible role as a ship’s pastor. Abbot John of Cantimpré, the subject of Thomas of Cantimpré’s earliest Vita, was ordained a priest at about twenty-two years of age.177 If we similarly accept Goswin’s ordination to have taken place whilst he was in his early twenties, we must place Goswin’s birthdate back by some five years from the date suggested by Cawley; this would make him roughly the same age as his friend and fellow monk Abundus (b.1189), an adjustment which is unobjectionable since it raises no contradictions in relation to what is presently known of Goswin’s life. Save for this meagre observation, since we are denied any more personal or specific information, we must now concern ourselves with what may be revealed through reports of events around the Alcácer do Sal of the Carmen. Once again, we find ourselves in the realms of speculation; however, we may at least comfortably imagine Goswin as a young priest in 1217. Having taken his
176 Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, p. 326. 177 Cf., Newman, ‘Introduction’, p. 23.
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crusade vow with his Abbot Walter’s permission amid the general crusade furore drummed up in the Low Countries by preachers such as Abbot Walter himself, James of Vitry, Oliver of Paderborn and others, Goswin is appointed to serve as the pastor on a ship of crusaders headed to Palestine along the Atlantic route. On the way, being a member of a contingent from the Southern Low Countries and not part of the dissenting Frisian brigade, Goswin is present at the conquest of Alcácer do Sal. As a Cistercian monk Goswin would have been in good company since one of the supporters of the expedition to Alcácer was Abbot Pedro of Alcobaça who was present during the campaign, and whose abbey, like Villers was affiliated to Clairvaux.178 Of course, Alcobaça lay within the diocese of Lisbon which was under the control of Bishop Soeiro Viegas who, as far as we know, appears to have enjoyed good relations with that great Cistercian house of Portuguese Estremadura and its monks, a number of whom will have been present at Alcácer in the entourage of their abbot. Since the Almohads had sought to deprive the besiegers of fuel and forage, the trees in the immediate area had been felled or burned and there was a dire shortage of timber in the Christian camp. As a result, eight of the crusaders’ ships had to be dismantled to make siege engines, and perhaps especially the two wooden towers which finally brought about the capitulation of the town. This we know from the letter sent by Honorius III to the Bishops of Lisbon and Évora and the Prior of Santiago at Palmela in response to their request, following the conquest, that the crusaders be granted papal permission to stay to fight the Muslims in Iberia. Although Honorius refused, he did absolve from their vows those crusaders who were destitute and those of the eight ships that had been cannibalised.179 Let us suppose Goswin was on one of those ships and was thus released from his vow to go to the East. Perhaps now at something of a loose end, Goswin stayed in Portugal for some time, perhaps along with those members of his crew who decided not to return to the Low Countries. Indeed, that some personnel of the fleet had, anyway, anticipated some form of settlement in Portugal may be reflected in the Carmen where Portugal is described as a terra vivenda (l.34), a possible indication that some saw it as a land of opportunity.180 Bishop Soeiro had in fact experienced grave dissent within his cathedral during his absence at Alcácer, and on his return he was forced to dismiss several of his canons and replace them with his own appointees. It is without difficulty we may suppose that in searching for suitably qualified candidates he would have had available to him some foreign clerics who had supported him at Alcácer, who had been his comrade-in-arms and who were now ‘stranded’ in Iberia. If so, it is unlikely a well-educated Brabantine cleric, unable to complete his voyage to the Holy Land since his ship was lost, would have escaped Soeiro’s notice. Never
178 Monumenta Henricina, No. 26, pp. 48–49. 179 Ibid., No. 29, pp. 54–55. 180 Carmen, line 34.
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one to miss an opportunity, it is not difficult to imagine Soeiro suggesting to Goswin that his mission in Christ could be accomplished very nicely on the Portuguese frontier with Islam. Was Goswin, the priest and man of letters, recruited by Soeiro to the Chapter of Lisbon following the conquest of Alcácer? Perchance, if as would seem quite possible for the author of the Carmen, his talent for poetic composition, and especially perhaps for music, had become apparent to the bishop. Could Goswin have been appointed cantor of Lisbon Cathedral? In fact, there is a perfect gap in the known list of cantors of Lisbon. Fernando Peres, who as we have seen had probably accompanied Bishop Soeiro at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215, had been cantor from 1208 until 1217, the year in which he ceases to be identified in the documentation as an officer of the Chapter of Lisbon, appearing instead as a member of the Dominican Order. From 1217 there is an empty space of some eight years until Master Pedro Nunes is documented occupying the position in 1225.181 Goswin, likely already possessed of a good Paris education which would have included music (part of the quadrivium) would have been a tempting choice in the context of the changes wrought by Soeiro in his cathedral in late 1217 or 1218. That his name has not survived in the Cathedral records may be explained by the notorious and catastrophic dearth of surviving documentation for the see of Lisbon owed to a succession of disasters over the centuries including wars, rebellions and several earthquakes, notably that of 1755. It would be at about the time of Goswin’s postulated appointment to the Cathedral of Lisbon that Bishop Soeiro saw, or was informed of, Goswin’s chroniclepoem of the conquest of Alcácer do Sal, which the monk had prepared in a classical style for his abbot at home in Villers, the highly cultured and academic Walter (1214–1221). This text, possibly requested of Goswin by the abbot before the former’s embarkation, is entirely in accordance with the poetic tradition then in vogue at Villers, a most remarkable phenomenon in a Cistercian house. Impressed by Goswin’s literary flair, Soeiro commissioned the monk to write a version of his poem highlighting and praising the bishop’s participation in the Alcácer campaign and lamenting his unjust treatment once the conquest had been achieved. Goswin accordingly obliged by producing the version of the Carmen that has survived to us. Soeiro then used, or intended to use, the work as a lever in his attempt to bring about an international Portuguese crusade and perhaps also to have himself appointed as legate to lead it. At the same time the Carmen would have been useful to the bishop in his political manoeuvring around the court of King Afonso II and various ecclesiastical institutions amid the turmoil of serious disputes between Afonso II and the Church, and also perhaps within the violent factional confrontations plaguing his diocese stemming from a notorious rivalry between himself and his own dean, his former learned friend Vicent Hispano, that had come to a head whilst the prelate had been away at Alcácer.182
181 Maria João Branco, ‘Dignidades de Lisboa (1147–1250)’, in O conceito de soberania régia etc., vol. II, pp. 120–22. 182 On this dispute see Sousa Costa, Mestre Silvestre e Mestre Vicente.
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Since Soeiro was bishop of the diocese in which the Cistercian monastery of Santa Maria de Alcobaça was located, he would have been responsible for the discharging of various official functions within the monastery (e.g., the ordination of priests) and there is no indication of disharmony between prelate and abbey in the relevant period.183 If Goswin was a Cistercian monk in the service of Bishop Soeiro, then here is yet another avenue for direct contact between Goswin and the monks of Alcobaça, with the likelihood of direct links being enhanced by the quality shared by Villers and Alcobaça of houses affiliated to Clairvaux and founded, within a few years of each other, by the great St Bernard himself. In short, one way or another it is probable the monks of Alcobaça knew Goswin and were therefore familiar with his Carmen written, of course, at their own bishop’s bidding. Further, by the beginning of the thirteenth century, the monks of Alcobaça, enjoying a degree of affluence from the revenues generated by their granges, and already with a functioning scriptorium, had embarked on the assemblage of what would soon become the largest and most important manuscript library of the Portuguese Middle Ages.184 Engaged in copying texts from wherever they were available including from Clairvaux, or closer to home from Santa Cruz de Coimbra or Lorvão, it can readily be imagined that among the texts that might have been available to them were those of the Cathedral of Lisbon including Goswin’s Carmen, manuscripts today long destroyed over the ensuing turbulent centuries.
Goswin and the De Expugnatione Scalabis Also present in the Lisbon Cathedral library was a version (or indeed the autograph) of the De Expugnatione Scalabis, the account of the 1147 conquest of Santarém, the unique manuscript of which immediately precedes the Carmen in Codex Alc.415. That the Scalabis was not produced in the scriptorium of Santa Cruz de Coimbra, as once thought, is suggested by a significant divergence of detail between the Scalabis and a section in another work describing the conquest of Santarém, the Vita Teotonii, the Life of the first Prior of Santa Cruz, which is known to have been produced in Santa Cruz in the latter twelfth century. Whereas in the Vita Teotonii, King Afonso Henriques confides his plan to conquer Santarém only to D. Teotónio and his monks of Santa Cruz, in the Scalabis Afonso Henriques extends his confidence to ‘the rest of the clergy and the people’.185 If
183 Cf., Fortunato de Almeida, História da Igreja em Portugal, ed. by Damião Peres (Porto: Portucalense Editora, 1967–71) (1ªed. 1910–1928), p. 130. 184 José Mattoso, ‘Condições Económicas e Soaciais da Circulação de Códices na Península Ibérica’, in Portugal Medieval, Novas Interpretações, ed. by idem (Lisbon: Casa Moeda, 1983), pp. 347–64, p. 362; see also, Aires A. Nascimento, ‘Concentração, Dispersão e Dependências na Circulação de Manuscritos em Portugal, nos séculos XII and XIII’, in Coloquio sobre Circulation de Códices y Escritos entre Europa y la Peninsula en los siglos VIII-XIII. Actas. 16–19 septiembre 1982 (Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 1988), pp. 61–85. 185 Cf., Nascimento, ‘O Júbilo da Vitória’, p. 1221
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the Scalabis was not produced in Santa Cruz, and Alcobaça would not be founded until 1152–1153, circumstances indicate the Cathedral of Lisbon as the likely point of origin of a primitive version of the text. As has already been outlined, the Scalabis, a ‘poem in prose’,186 is a work presented in a form close to a liturgical office, there being identifiable in the work the traces of a Matins invitatory complemented by a historia.187 Since the Carmen follows directly on from the Scalabis, both texts filling completely the last quire (a de facto appendix or addendum) to Codex Alc. 415 and was copied at about the same time, perhaps in the same hand, we must, at least put the question that now seems obvious. Was Goswin, at that time cantor of Lisbon Cathedral, also the author of the Scalabis, perhaps taking his raw material from an earlier text, as he would later use James of Vitry’s Vita Maria as the basis for his Office for Marie D’Oignies? Certainly, the exhortation contained in the work to massacre the Saracen inhabitants of Santarém would be utterly out of place in a Portuguese text produced in the mid-twelfth century, but perfectly in keeping with the ideology of a Cistercian monk of the first quarter of the thirteenth century. As we have seen, by late 1217/early 1218 it appeared that the fate of the Christian peninsula had been left to the Portuguese and indeed, more specifically, to the Portuguese clergy and the military orders; King Afonso II of Portugal (1211–23) himself being incapable of pursuing wars on al-Andalus through a combination of health problems and internal disputes.188 It comes as little surprise, therefore, that immediately following the conquest of Alcácer, the Portuguese leaders of the campaign rushed an urgent letter to Honorius III in the hope that he would exercise the Quia maior proviso and authorise a full international crusade in Portugal.189 The opportunity for decisive Christian action in western Iberia had also been clear to Count William of Holland, leader of the foreign crusading fleet, who also wrote to the pope asking for instructions on what to do, whether to stay and finish the job in Portugal or continue to the Holy Land.190 It is quite possibly within this flurry of activity that the Carmen was produced, since it is strong in crusading rhetoric and includes, among its various instances of divine intervention, miracles recalling both past and present crusading ventures – a wondrous heavenly army is seen in the sky, clearly reminiscent of that reported by the Gesta Francorum at the Battle of Antioch during the First Crusade,191 whilst ‘bang-up-to-date’ is the appearance of a miraculous cross in the sky, remarkably similar to that reported during Oliver of Paderborn’s preaching
186 187 188 189 190 191
Herculano, História de Portugal, vol. 1, pp. 447–85. Cf., Nascimento, ‘O Jubilo da Vitória’, pp. 1217–18. For Afonso II see Vilar, D. Afonso II. Monumenta Henricina, No. 25, pp. 45–48. Ibid., No. 26, pp. 48–49. Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum, ed. and trans. by Hill, liber ix, pp. 69–70.
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of the Fifth Crusade.192 Powerful efforts appear already to have been underway for some considerable time in the kingdom, to attract foreign fighters, particularly seaborne crusaders passing the coast, to join the war on the Portuguese frontier by, as much as possible, presenting the war on the Andalusi Muslims as imbued with the highest sanctity and spiritual value. In view of the likely substantial contribution to those efforts of Bishop Soeiro of Lisbon commissioner of the Carmen,193 the prospect of an attempt to sanctify the crucial conquest of Santarém in a manner reflecting liturgical practices in the Holy Sepulchre commemorating the conquest of Jerusalem, appears less preposterous. Indeed, on this premise, we must consider the possibility that the Scalabis might have been commissioned of the able Goswin by Bishop Soeiro at around the same time the prelate entrusted to the monk the task of producing the Carmen. It would have been from the office in celebration of the conquest of Santarem, postulated earlier, that the text surviving to us in Alc.415 was fashioned in an editing process to modify the work in order to make it more suitable for inclusion in a codex, almost certainly a lectionary, comprising a good deal of historical narrative, possibly destined for use in Matins, Masses, and in the refectory at Alcobaça. Whether this editing was undertaken by Goswin himself, or by some other scribe, may never be known; however, as set out in Part I herein, it is likely that what we have in the Scalabis is not, as has been previously thought, a product of the weeks immediately following the conquest of Santarém in 1147, nor of the Portuguese royal propaganda campaign of the 1180s, but a thirteenth-century Cistercian adaptation. Ultimately, if we may suppose Goswin of Bossut is the GOSUINUS of the Carmen, then we have a plausible explanation for the anomalous elements of the Scalabis residing in the likelihood of his hand in the authorship of this important and intricate text, hitherto considered anonymous.
Goswin’s finale Having postulated the extension of Goswin’s canon to include the Carmen, the Vita Franconis, perhaps a lost Vita Guilhelmi Abbati Villariensis (Goswin’s Abbot William) and possibly the Scalabis, let us conclude by noting that his career drew to a close at a time when mysticism was being increasingly undermined. As scholasticism became more open to Aristotle and prepared itself to face up to the challenges of Abelard, in the impending age of Bonaventure, Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas, monastic communities found themselves torn between centuries of patristic authority and the temptation of the new rational process with all 192 Oliver of Paderborn’s letter to Count Peter and Countess Jolanta of Namur, June 1214, in Oliver of Paderborn, ‘Brief an den grafen von Namur über die vorgänge in Friesland’, ed. by H. Hoogeweg (Tübingen: Litterarischer Verein, 1894), pp. 285–86; trans. by Riley-Smith, The Crusades, Idea and Reality, pp. 135–36. Indeed, we may legitimately ask if Goswin was not at some time among Oliver’s audiences in the Southern Low Countries. 193 Wilson, ‘Tactics of Attraction’.
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its revelatory promise of a deeper and more complete understanding of Christian truth. Additionally, ever present concerns over heresy meant a growing orientation among the orthodox away from personal experience of the divine and towards a reaffirmation of the unchallenged authority of Scripture. Goswin, perhaps aging and therefore disinclined to move with the times, appears to have been scooped up in the dustpan of this shifting zeitgeist. Nothing is known of his later life, only that by about 1260 one Thomas of Louvain was cantor at Villers.194 Cawley speculates, that after Goswin’s literary patron, the mystic Abbot William, was promoted to Clairvaux in 1237, there was a purge of his close associates entailing Goswin’s dismissal and replacement as cantor.195 Perhaps the scoffers at Francon’s deathbed had been unwilling to forgive Goswin’s acerbic pen. Indeed perhaps, as Cawley has suggested, it is possible to detect Goswin’s own foreboding in the last lines of the Prologue to his Vita Abundi: Let those willing to accept what I write . . . accept it in the Lord’s name and in good faith. As for those unwilling, let them rest assured that no one will be forced to accept my contribution.196
The Carmen, edition and English translation There are three previous inconsistent and inadequate editions of the Carmen. The first was given by Fr António Brandão in 1632 in Part IV of the Monarchia Lusitana;197 the second was produced by Fr Fortunato de Boaventura in his Commentariorum de Alcobacensi mstorum bibliotheca;198 and the third was prepared by Alexandre Herculano and published in 1856 in the Portugalia Monumenta Historica.199 These problems were largely resolved by a fourth edition undertaken by Aires A. Nascimento and published in 2002.200 The edition of the Carmen appearing herein does not deviate substantially from that produced by Nascimento since the manuscript is in good condition and readily legible. The text, however, has never previously been translated into English. Indeed, the only modern language rendering of the Latin to date is the Portuguese translation provided by Aires A Nascimento
194 195 196 197 198
Falmagne, Un Texte, pp. 64–65. For the controversy surrounding Abbot William, see Cawley, ‘Four Abbots’, esp. pp. 319–26. Cawley, Send Me God, pp. 8 and 210, and ibid. note 6; Frenken, Vita Abundi, p. 12. Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana Part 4, pp. 264–67. Fortunato de São Boaventura, Commentariorum de Alcobacensi mstorum bibliotheca libri tres in quibus haud pauca ad rem litterariam illustrandam, ac fortassis augendam facienta, hucusqueabdita, reserantur (Coimbra: Typographia Academico-regia, 1827), vol. III, pp. 633–37. 199 PMH, Scriptores, pp. 101–04. 200 Aires A. Nascimento, ‘Poema de Conquista: A Tomada de Alcácer do Sal aos Mouros (1217)’, Poesía latina medieval (siglos V–XV). Actas del 4° Congreso del ‘Internationales Mittellateinerkomitee’ Santiago de Compostela, 12–15 septiembre de 2002, pp. 619–37.
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accompanying his 2002 edition,201 which supplanted the highly problematic and inaccurate Portuguese translation by Santos Alves which appears in an appendix to the 1974 edition of the Monarchia Lusitana.202
201 Aires A. Nascimento, ‘Tradução em portugês de que modo Alcácer foi tomada pelos Francos’, reproduced in Maria Teresa Lopes Pereira, Os Cavaleiros de Santiago em Alcácer do Sal, Século XII a fins do Século XV (Lisboa: Colibri, 2015), pp. 253–57. 202 Brandão, Monarchia Lusitana, Part IV, pp. 133–36.
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Figure 5 Alc.415 fol. 150r. (photograph, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal)
Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen, Latin text with English translation1
Quomodo capta fuit Alcaser a Francis 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
Segnicies mentis, bona corporis otia carpunt, Et citius motu qui caret amnis olet. Culta nisi fuerint, vel tecta, vel arua, senescunt, Fit neglecta suis spina noverca rosis. Quid mage? Queque situ sordent, metuens mihi tale Si tamen est sensus quid mihi quid ve fuit. Quod nuper Cruce Signatis evenerat, ecce Scribo, licet vili carmine, Christe fave, Scribo sed quare? tempus licet omne revolvas, Utque modo sterilis, et sine messe fui. Sed mihi messis erit, scribendo quod otia tollam, Ne vicium carpant interiora bona. Ergo scribo, fave qui Trinus es, et Deus unus, Ut tua Christocolis pandere facta queam. Ac tu quaeso fave, cui carmina nostra laborant, Cui petre Petri cimba regenda datur. Ecce tuum nomen quinis habet esse figuris, Ut quinos sensus cum ratione regas. Hi, S. et V. gemines, ut amor geminus super astra Te levet: hic fratris est amor, ille Dei. Invenies septem, numeres si quasque figuras, Ut te septeno munere pneuma beet. Quid moror hic? Peto, propositum faveas mihi, Christe Cuncta fovens; tu me complue rore tuo. Uota Peregrinos cupientes soluere quosdam Diversas oras qui tenuere maris. Annos in Christum cum voluis mille ducentos Denos cum septem patria quoque gemit. Innumeris ratibus sulcarunt aequora, Faram Venerunt plures, dampna tulere prius.
1 Alc.415, fols.148v.–150r. Herculano’s title: Gosuini De Expugnatione Salaciae Carmen. NB: lines appearing in bold denote first line of stanza.
142 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75
Gosuini de Expugnatione Salaciae Carmen Hic mora fit, naves coeunt, iuratur in unum, Dux legitur, statuit iura tenenda suis. Aura datur, mare sulcatur quampluribus alnis, Portugal ratibus terra vivenda patet. Portus transitur, irascitur Eolus, armat Eurus in classem, deperit aura favens. Anchora nulla ratem retinet, quia restis in ista Rumpitur, hic verrit anchora iacta solum. Haec ruit ad cautes, in humo colliditur illa, Vertitur ista ratis, illa repletur aquis. Et reliquae portum subeunt, sed non sine magno Planctu, namque tulit aspera quaeque ratis. Haec etenim puppim laceram, gemit illa carinam, Haec navis proram plangit, et illa ratem, Cedit hiems, socios compiscant, hic flet opes, hic Ille legens lacerae naufraga membra ratis. Iam reparat vires classis, sua vulnera quaeuis Curatur: resonant littora mille modis. Eurus discedit, Zephirus blanditur, et irae Tanquam paeniteat, se freta blanda parent. E Portu cedit classis, sed ibi tamen haerent Rupe duae naves, naufragiumque ferunt. Auriferi reliqua classis petit ostia Tagi, Hanc recipit portus nomen Ulixis habens. Illam Christicolae laetantur adesse benigne Advena suscipitur, hospitiumque datur. Praesul adest patriae, peregrinos munerat omnes, Convocat, affatur, et pia verba ferit. “O fratres famuli Christi crucis hostibus hostes, Spretores mundi, martiriique decus. Ut patet ad nostras Dominus vos appulit oras, Ut pereat nostrum vestra per arma iugum. Est prope nos castrum super omnia castra nociuum Christicolis, nomen Alcaser illud habet. Al, Deus est, Castrumque, caser, Castrumque Deorum Fertur apud gentes, id venerantur amant. Huc ad perniciem nostram sua munera mittunt, Armaque, cum tempus mortis adesse putant. Castrensesque suo Regi dant quolibet anno Centum Christicolas, soluimus ista quidem. In quinis lustris hominum tria millia quina, Illi ceperunt, sine dedere neci. Rex Christus nobis dabit hic sua Regna merenda. Hostes hos eius mente, terendo manu. Noverit hoc anno vobis sacra terra petenda
Latin text with English translation 143 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120
Navibus, hoc etenim tempus et aura vetant. Vestros consulite nautas, quibus aequoris arcti Aestus, et instantis temporis aura patet. Ergo aliquid facite, Sathanas ne reperiat vos Otia sectantes, quae mala quenque necant. Otia virtutes viciant, et mentis honorem Carpunt et mores propositumque pium. Ergo Crucis famuli sitis crucis hostibus hostes, Hic sit vestra manus officiosa Deo. Alcaser ut pereat, vobis sociemus, iterque Indigenis terra classibus unda dabit.” Haec ad verba Phares in classe fit, improbat una Pars haec dicta, probat altera, scisma manet. Classis dividitur in partes, Marsiliam pars Haec properat, pars haec Alcaser ire parat. Aura datur, mare sulcamus proris, et adimus Alcaser, hic suas carpimus, hostis adest. Hostis adest in equis, saluetur ut una, sed ille Cuspide transfixus, saluus abire nequit. Nam moribundus equum, socios vitamque relinquit. Castra petunt comites, primaque damna gemunt. Ille locus vallo cinctus, fossaque profunda, In muro duplici, turribus innumeris. Armis multimodis, domus haec munita, virisque, Magnanimos reddit, que sua signa colunt. Attamen a muris, postquam pervenimus illuc, Tutius exire non potuere suis. Nam iuxta castrum tentoria ponimus, armis Et munita viris, tutaque classis erat. Ficus, oliva cadunt, nobis properantibus ire Ad murum, quod det fossa repleta viam. Fossa tumet lignis, in nos iurasse videtur Vulcanus, pereunt omnia ligna rogo. Tormentum facimus, murorum saxa rotamus, Sed muros ictus, nilue, parumve movent. Castrum vallamus armato milite, sanguis Funditur, utrinque mortis amara bibunt. Rumor adesse rates nostras clamans quatit urbes Hispanas, in nos arma virosque movent. In nos conspirat Hispania, dirigit in nos Tres Reges, nobis fama revelat idem. Inde metu quatimur, sed nos qui cuncta gubernat Confortat, nobis dat quater octo rates. Custodes dantur classi, nos ag[g]ere fossa Cingamur, excubias ponimus hic et ibi.
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121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165
Ut nos extirpent equitum tria millia quina Et peditum veniunt millia dena quater. Ex nostris quidam bellum dissuadet, abire Admonet, hinc quenquam soluere vota negat. “Non hanc, sed gentem nos debellare iubemur, Quae Christi turbam, quae loca sancta tenet.” Turba favent, homines salvare volens Deus omnes Innovat antiqua signa, suosque iuvat. Crastina cum visura dies pugnam foret, omnes Conspicimus socios, et numeramus equos. Innumeri pedites muniti viribus armis Adsunt, sed centum vix ter habemus equos. Ex improviso quingenti nocte sub ipsa Dante Deo repetunt nos equites et equi. Aurora est, equites tenuit quos spicula nostra Paulum procedunt, hostica castra notant. Tecta sub hoste latet tellus, ad sidera clamor Tollitur, et clangor undique corda movet. Congressus fit utrinque, cruor fluit, en male nostris Succedit, fugiunt, impius hostis adest. Noster eques cedit, sua nudat pectora, munit Dorsum, castra subit, et venit hostis eo. Scandit equos nocte qui venerat hospes, ad astra Respicit, implorat Omnipotentis opem. Astris lucidius quod splendet in aere signum Est Crucis; id nostrum plurima turba videt. Mens redit hoc viso nostris, en noster in hostes Seuit eques, sternit, effugat, immo necat. Agmen in auxilium nostris venit ecce supernum Dante Deo signum quod dedit ante Crucis. Vestis ei splendens ut Sol, ut nix nova candens Suntque suo rosea pectore signa Crucis. Hostis ut has acies novit sua terga prementes Lumina caligant, et sua corda pavent. Hinc fit quod socius socium laedit, latus hasta Perforat hic, illi demetit ense caput. Sternitur hic, ille pedibus calcatur equorum, Hic hominum quidam praecipitantur aquis. Quid magis? Ex illis ter millia dena perisse Credimus, et Reges tunc cecidisse duos. Quod telis comitum cecidere chorive superni, Ipsorum caedis per loca nosse datur. Illorum stragem, quia terna dicta furentes Nostros vidisse, cum nisi prima datur. Contulit ista Deus nobis in luce Iacinti,
Latin text with English translation 145 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210
Et Proti, palma qua celebrata fuit. Gaudemus, Domino canimus, quod talia nobis Fecit, fama novos incutit ecce metus Ut nos confundant, confirmat adesse Galijas Ter denas, petimus, nunc reperimus eas. Qui caelo, qui signa solo dederat, modo fluctus Turbat, et hostiles his periere rates. Obsessos iterum petimus, sed viribus in nos Saxa, trabesque rotant, desuper atque rogum. Ledimur, e muro discedimus, eminus arcu Infestamus eos, sanguine tela madent. Imbuitur populi tellus utriusque cruore Inque vicem bibimus pocula dira necis. Sic nil proficimus, ars viribus additur, ergo Sub terras fodimus, murus ut ipse ruat. Clam fodimus, contrafodit hostis, nititur ipse, Ut noster maneat irritus iste labor. Rixa fit in fovea, ferro, fumoque, rogoque Hic etiam sanguis fusus utrinque fluit. Unde duas turres castri mage turribus altas Ponimus a muris non procul, immo prope. Utraque lignea fit, in castrum despicit, hostem Respicit, ut semper insidietur ei. In mediis castris ut spicula dirigat arcu, Ut sic castrenses mors inopina petat. Inde duo muri facimus tormenta; timorem Haec, sicut et turres, hostibus incutiunt. Colloquium petit hostis, heret, timet, Alcaser ergo Deditur, en nostris ostia quaeque patent. Quotquot erant hostes, et eorum res, peregrinis Cedunt, pars inde cuilibet aequa datur. Nouit Ulixbonam lux tertia post sacra Luce Festa Iesu Christi subdere colla iugo. Post annos septem decies, binosque sub ipsa Luce, datur nobis Alcacar, immo Deo. Post triduum castri dux tingitur amne lavacri Militibus gladii, terraque, rusque datur. Unus, et hoc ipsum est iniuria magna, remansit Alcaser immunis, et nihil inde tulit. Primitus hic etenim, peregrinos movit, ut irent Alcaser, hic et opes hic dedit, atque viros. Et vires, et opes proprias hic in obsidione Castri consumpsit illius, atque viros. Hic ducibus nostris sua concessit, deditque, Cui velut ingrati solvere neutra volunt.
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211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230
Insuper ut castrum captum fuit auxiliisque Consiliisque suis, huic sua iura negant. Decrevitque decem captos exercitus omnis Huic dandos, quos hii detinuere sibi. Est hic Ulixbonae praesul que tot bona nostris Contulit, ast recipit pro bonitate malum. Isti porrigitur ab eis pro necthare mirra, Fel pro melle, scelus proprietate sui. Sis patiens his perversis precor optime presul, Ut pro terrenis det tibi summa Deus. Suscipe quaeso pie mea metra pater venerande, Vilia metra licet quae tibi lego lege. Hic sunt ter quinae partes, hinc quamque figuram Si primam iungas nomina nostra creas. Haec qui scripta legis, quae cernis in his minus apta Ne risum moveant, corrige, sine, tere. Quae modo metra tenes, partim tenuit prius alter, Qui me promovit, ultimo metra teret. Ne mireris: ei scripsi, gratia cuius Nota mihi fuerat, nec tibi notus eram.
How Alcácer was captured by the Franks2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19
Idleness of the mind despoils the peace of the flesh And the river that is without movement stinks the more quickly. Unless they have been tended either houses or arable lands grow decrepit Neglected, the thorn bush becomes stepmother to its roses. What more? Whatever remains stopped grows foul, I fear this in myself If, yet there is some sensibility in me, or [at least some of] what there was, Of that which recently happened to those signed with the cross, behold I write, though in crude verse. Oh, Christ favour it! I write but wherefore? Time allows you to roll-back all things, And although I’ve recently been unproductive and with no harvest, Yet for me the harvest will be in writing because I shall destroy idleness, Lest vices seize the inner virtues. Therefore, thou who art both three-fold and one God, Inspire me to be able to explain these events to the followers of Christ. And I entreat that you, for whom our songs labour, favour it To whom the boat of the rock of Peter is given to be guided. Behold your name contains five [different] figures, Just as you govern the five senses by means of reason. The S. and the U., these you may double so that the twin love lifts you above the stars
2 Heruclano’s title Engl trans., ‘Gosuinus’ Song of the Conquest of Alcácer do Sal’. NB: lines appearing in bold denote first line of stanza.
Latin text with English translation 147 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57
May it comfort you: this one is the love of a brother, the other of God. You will find seven, if you count both these figures, So that the [Holy] Spirit blesses you with the sevenfold gift. Why do I tarry here? I beg of thee show favour to my intentions, Oh Christ Who nurtures all things, mayst thou rain on me with thy dew.3 Pilgrims were anxious to fulfil certain vows Who [came from] different shores of the sea. When you unroll one thousand two hundred years in Christ The homeland [of Christ] also laments ten with seven. They ploughed the seas with countless ships, to the lighthouse Many of them came, they bore earlier damage. In this place a pause was made, the ships came together, the oath was sworn in unison, A commander is picked out, he established the laws that were to be kept by his men. The wind is given, the sea is ploughed by very many ships, Portugal, the land about to be resided in [for a while], stands open for the ships. Porto is passed-by, Aeolus is enraged, he rouses Eurus into the fleet, the favourable wind is destroyed. No anchor holds fast its ship because on this one the rope Is broken, here, another anchor sweeps along the bottom, having been cast in. This one is wrecked on the reefs, that one is dashed aground, This ship is dragged along, that one is filled with water. And the remaining came into port, but not without great Lamentation in so much as every ship endured adversity. This one indeed bemoans a mangled stern, that one bemoans a hull, This one bewails the prow and that one the [entire] ship, The storm yields, the companions recover, this one weeps for what he has lost, here That one [goes] gathering the shipwrecked members of his mangled ship. Now the fleet repairs its strengths, its injuries whatever they be Are cured: the shores resound to a thousand rhythms. Eurus weakens, Zephyrus softens, and of [their] anger As if they were regretful, the seas appear calm. From Porto leaves the fleet, yet there, still stuck On a rock, are two ships and shipwreck they suffer. The rest of the fleet makes for the mouth of the gold-yielding Tagus The port having the name of Ulysses receives it. The Christians are gladdened to arrive there The foreigner is received, and hospitality rendered him. The bishop of the land arrives, he bestows gifts upon all the pilgrims
3 Cf., Deuteronomy, 32:2.
148 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96
Gosuini de Expugnatione Salaciae Carmen He calls them to assembly; he addresses them and pious words he proffers. “Oh brethren, servants of Christ, enemies of the enemies of the cross, Scorners of the world and splendour of martyrdom As stands evident, God brought you to shore on our coasts, In order that by means of your arms our yoke may be destroyed. There is close by us a fortress [which is] above all fortresses injurious To the Christians, that has the name Alcaser. ‘Al’ is the God, and the Fortress ‘caser’ Fortress of the Gods, It is reported among the populace, that they worship [and] love. To this place, to our ruin, they send their tributes And arms, when they suppose the season of annihilation to be near. And the soldiers of the fortress give to their king each year One hundred Christians to which indeed we have been accustomed. In five lustra4 five times three thousand people They have captured or given over to slaughter. Christ the king will bestow upon us the kingdoms that we should deserve. Crushing these his enemies by our hand, according to his plan. He will know that you are making for the Holy Land this year In ships, as a matter of fact the season and the winds forbid [it]. Take counsel of your mariners from the north sea for whom The swells and the winds of the threatening season are evident. Therefore, do ye something lest Satan may come to discover you Pursuing idleness and the evil things that kill anyone. Idleness defiles the virtues and the grace of the mind It erodes, and morals and pious resolution. Therefore, may you be servants of the cross, enemies of the enemies of the cross, May this be your dutiful blow for God. So that Alcaser perishes, may we unite with you and the passage The land will provide for the [Portuguese army], [and] the waves will provide for the fleet.” At these words a disagreement in the fleet occurs, disapproving one Part this speech, the other approving, a schism ensues. The fleet is divided into parts, to Marseilles [that] part Hurries, this part prepares to go to Alcaser. The wind is given, we plough the sea with our prows, and we come To Alcaser, here its women we harry, the enemy appears. The enemy appears on horses, so that one [woman] is saved, but he [her rescuer] Pierced through with a blade, cannot get away unharmed. Now the dying man leaves behind his horse, his comrades and his life. His companions make for the fortress, and they lament their first losses.
4 lustrum, lustri (pl. lustra) = period of five years
Latin text with English translation 149 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139
That place [is] surrounded by a palisade, and a deep ditch On a two-fold wall, innumerable towers. With multiform arms and men, this house is defended, It renders bold, those that cherish its banner. Nevertheless, from its walls after we arrived thither By no means were its men able to come out safely. For we erected tents next to the fortress, by arms And by men defended, and the fleet was protected. Fig trees, olive trees fall for us hurrying to advance To the wall, which would allow the way by means of the filled ditch. The ditch becomes swollen with wood, it seems that against us has conspired Vulcan, they destroy all the wood in a pyre. We build a siege engine, stones of the wall we whirl But the walls, the blows stir little or not at all. The fortress we surround with armed soldiery, blood Is shed, on both sides they drink the bitterness of death. The report being proclaimed [of] the arrival of our ships, shakes the cities Of Muslim Spain, they move arms and men against us. Muslim Spain unites against us, it sends against us Three Kings, the report reveals to us the very same. Thereupon, we shake with fear, yet He who governs all things Comforts us, He grants to us four times eight ships. Sentries are given to the fleet, we are surrounded by a rampart [and] a ditch, We place watches here [on the rampart] and there [over the ditch]. In order that they may extirpate us, five times three thousand cavalrymen And ten times four thousand foot soldiers come. A certain one of our men argues against war, [and] our departure He advises, hence he [tries to] deny anyone fulfilling their vows. “Not these [Saracens], but the [Saracens] we are sworn to fight, Those who are the tormentors of Christ, those who hold the Holy Places!” The rabble supports [him], [but] God wishing to save all men, Renews [His] signs of old and beckons his own. When the following day is about to see the battle, We inspect all the comrades, and we count the horses. Innumerable foot-soldiers armed with strength and weapons Are present, but scarcely three times a hundred horses we have. Out of the unexpected, during that very same night, five hundred, Horsemen and horses repair to us, by the granting of God. It is daybreak, the cavalry comprehends to which location our arrows A short distance shoot-forth, [there] they observe the enemy camp. The ground lies hidden covered beneath the enemy, to the stars the clamour Is raised, and the noise stirs hearts on all sides. Battle is joined on both sides, the gore flows, behold! It goes badly for our men, 140 They flee, the pagan enemy prevails.
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141 Our cavalry retreats, their breasts they leave unprotected [as] they protect 142 [Their] backs, they pass into the camp, and the enemy comes toward that place. 143 The warrior who had come on horseback during the night, to the stars 144 He gazes, he beseeches the Almighty help. 145 Brighter than the stars gleams in the sky the sign 146 It is of the cross; a great many of our multitude see it. 147 After seeing this, the courage returns to our men, behold our cavalry 148 Fiercely attacks the enemy, it scatters them, it drives them away, assuredly it kills them. 149 A heavenly column of troops comes to our assistance, behold! 150 In the place where God had previously given the sign of the cross. 151 Their robes shining like the Sun, white as new snow 152 And there, on their breasts, are the signs of the rose-coloured cross. 153 When the enemy learns of these battle lines pursuing their backs 154 Their eyes cloud over and their hearts are afraid. 155 Because of this the result is that comrade strikes comrade, this one with a spear 156 Pierces a side, that one reaps a head with a sword. 157 This one is laid out, that one is trampled by the hooves of the horses, 158 Here some of the men are thrown headlong into the sea. 159 What more? Three times ten thousand of them perished 160 We believe, and two kings were slain at that time. 161 Because they were slain by the weapons of their comrades or by the heavenly host, 162 Their own massacre of themselves is given to become known throughout the regions. 163 Their destruction was wrought in three raging days 164 Our men witnessed it from the very first. 165 These things God bestowed upon us on the day of Iacintus 166 And Prothus, a prize that was celebrated thereon. 167 We rejoice, we sing to the Lord, that these great things for us 168 He performed, behold a report strikes new fear in us 169 So that they may bring us disorder, the approaching of galleys is confirmed 170 Thrice ten, we look-out for them, presently we espy them. 171 He that had imparted the signs in the heavens and upon the earth, the waves 172 He now stirs up, and here the enemy ships are destroyed. 173 We attack the besieged a second time, but with vigour, onto us 174 They hurl stones and beams together with fire from above. 175 We are injured, from the wall we withdraw, out of reach, with the bow 176 We harass them, the arrows drip with blood. 177 The ground is soaked with the gore of people on each side 178 And, in turn, we drink horrible cups of death. 179 In such a way we accomplish nothing, a trick is added to our strength, therefore
Latin text with English translation 151 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219
Under the earth we dig, so that the wall itself may be brought down. Secretly we mine, the enemy countermines, exerting himself So that this labour of ours is rendered useless. A fight takes place in the excavation with iron and smoke and fire Here too the blood spilled on both sides flows. So, two towers loftier than the towers of the fortress We erect, not far from the wall, indeed close-by [it], Each is made of wood, [each] looks down over the fortress, the enemy Is observed by [the towers] so that [the enemy] is continually harassed by them. [Each] aims its arrows with the bow into the midst of the fortress In order that unexpected death thus may afflict those dwelling within. Thereupon two siege engines we construct at the walls These like the towers cause the enemy to tremble. The enemy asks for parley, they are in a plight, they are terrified, Alcaser therefore Is delivered up, behold! all the gates stand open to our men. All of the enemy and their property Yield to the pilgrims, and equal share is apportioned to each of them. Know that Lisbon, on the third day after the Feast of St Luke Bowed its neck to the yoke of Jesus Christ. After seventy and two years, on the very [day of] Luke, Alcaser is given to us, or more correctly, to God. After three days, the leader of the fortress is immersed in baptismal water, To the Knights of the Sword the land[s] and the farm[s] are given.5 One man, and this itself is a great injustice, remained At Alcaser unrewarded and won nothing thereupon. Originally, this man, as a matter of fact stirred the pilgrims so that they went To Alcaser, here this man also gave resources together with men. And strength and his own resources, this man in the siege Of the fortress, expended those together with men. This man to our commanders relinquished and gave his property, To whom, as if ungrateful, they are willing to pay neither. In addition, although the fortress was captured by his help And his advice, they deny him his right[s]. And he decreed that ten captives out of the entire army To be given to him, which these people kept for themselves. This man is the bishop of Lisbon who so many good things upon us Bestowed, whereas he received, for goodness, evil. To this man was extended by them, for nectar, myrrh Bile for honey, wickedness for his right of possession. I pray may you be patient with these perverse [ones], most honest prelate,
5 Knights of the Order of Santiago da Espada (Saint James of the Sword).
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220 In order that, for the worldly [things you have done], God may give you the highest. 221 Receive my verses I humbly ask, Venerable Father, 222 Crude verses though [they are] which to you I entrust, you read. 223 Here there are three times five parts. If from each 224 The first figure you connect, you create our names. 225 You who read these writings, the less adequate things, which you notice in these 226 Let them not provoke you to laughter, correct them, accept them, [or] erase them. 227 The verses which you now hold in your hands, somebody else partly held in theirs before. 228 He who inspired me will erase the verses in the end. 229 Do not be amazed: I wrote for the one whose grace 230 Was well known to me, and I was not known to you.
Appendix I Inscribed text, Alc.415 fol. 146v
Inscribed text, Alc.415 fol. 146v El Rey dom Affonso Anrriquez, primeiro Rey de Portugal casou com a ffilha do conde de Solina que avia nome doña mafalda. Este Rey dom Affonso fez a ordem d’Ocres_________ E pobrou E fez o mosteiro de Sancta Cruz de Coinbra, na Era de mil E cento e lxx anos. E fez muy boõ mosteiro quando el hya Filhar Sanctarem aos mouros e hya com el seu hermaño Pedro Afomso, e chegarem e pousarom com suas gentes na serra da mendigua E Pedro Afonso disse a El Rey dom affonso sseu hyrmano e Sehnhor: “Ouviy falar de hũm homem bõo e muy santo que chamam Bernardo e he de huma ordem que chamã de Sam Beento. E Deus filha por elo muytas milagres e não há causa que el a Deus peça que lhe não cumpra E see lho vos dardes aquy terra e lugar em que seya feito hũm mosteiro da sua ordem à honra de sancta maria crede, que logo por a mercee de Deos ffilharedes Santarém.” E el Rey disse “Dom Pedro, escolhede vos hu por bem teverdes hũm lugar e tal onde possa seer fecto hum bõo mosteiro.” E Dom Pedro disse: “Senhor dade lhe toda esta varzea como vay desde Leyrea, vindo pella mar, Ataa aquy.” El Rey disse: “muyto me plaz, comtanto que nas non levermos mais affom nem trabalho em filhar esta villa. E Rogo a esse dom Bernardo que Rogue a nosso senhor Jesus Christo que em tal ora vaamos oje nos que descayam os enimygos da fe do poder que teem.” E Entom sse partiram e foron sse. E en essa dia pella vertu de deus E oraçoes de Sam Bernardo que logo soube per espirito santo ffoy filhada nuylla de Santarém E de tornada El Rey fez o mosteiro de Alcobaça E huma muy Rica abbadia. E quando o comecarom a fazer andava na Era em mil e cento XC annós, E offerto entom a dom Bernardo que entom era abbade de claraval. Este Rey filhou Lyxboa dos mouros E fez hy humma muy Rica ygreja a sua custa. E outrossy fez hy hum muy Rico mosteiro fora Da vila que chamam sam Vincente De fora.
English translation The King Dom Afonso Henriques first King of Portugal married with the daughter of the Count of Savoy who had the name Dona Mafalda. This King Dom Alfonso founded the Order of Ucles.1 And peopled and founded the monastery of Santa 1 Order of Santiago.
154
Appendix I Inscribed text, Alc.415 fol. 146v
Figure 6 Detail. Alc.415, fol. 146v. (photograph, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal)
Cruz, in the Era of 1170 years. And he founded a very good monastery when he went to seize Santarém from the Moors and his brother Pedro Afonso went with him, and they arrived and paused with their army in the Serra da Mendigua. And Pedro Afonso said to King Dom Afonso, his brother and lord, “I have heard talk of a good and very holy man who is called Bernard and he is of an order that is called Saint Benedict. And God makes many miracles for him and there is no cause of which he beseeches God that is not fulfilled for him. And if you give to him here land and [a] place in which a monastery may be founded for his Order in honour of Saint Mary, I believe that immediately, by the mercy of God, you
Appendix I Inscribed text, Alc.415 fol. 146v
155
will seize Santarém.” And the King said “Dom Pedro, you choose, with what you hold to be good, a place suitable where a good monastery could be founded.” And Dom Pedro said, “Lord, give to him all this plain which goes from Leiria, coming from the sea, up to here.” The King said “It much pleases me, in so far as we do not undertake more effort nor work in seizing this town. And I ask of this Dom Bernardo that he asks our Lord Jesus Christ in that prayer that today we are going to cast-down the enemies of the faith from the power they have.” And so, they departed and went on their way. And on that day by the virtue of God and the prayers of Saint Bernard who immediately knew [of the King’s words] through the Holy Spirit, the town of Santarém was seized and, in return, the King founded the monastery of Alcobaça and a very rich abbey. And when they began to build it, it was during the Era of the years, 1190, and he gave it at that time to Dom Bernardo who was Abbot of Clairvaux at that time. This king seized Lisbon from the Moors and built a very rich church at his expense. And, furthermore, he founded there a very rich monastery outside the town which they call São Vicente da Fora.
Appendix II Maps
Muret Santiago de Compostela
er E
bro
Pamplona
Burgos Huesca Palencia Zaragoza
León
River Minho
Navarre
Riv
León
Zamora Braga Guimarães ouro River D Salamanca
Porto
er Mon Riv Coimbra
Lisbon
Minorca Valência
Las Navas de Tolosa
Córdoba Seville Málaga
Cabo de S Vicente
Teruel
Alarcos
Almohad Empire
Silves
Barcelona Tarragona
Majorca
River Tagus
Alcácer do Sal
Lleida
Tortosa
Castile
deg o
Santarém
Aragon
Toledo
Alcobaça
Portugal
Toulouse
Almohad Empire Granada
Balearic Islands
Ibiza Formentera
Murcia
Almeria 100 miles/160 km
Cadiz Gibraltar Tangier
N
Cadiz
Map 1. Iberia at the time of the Fourth Lateran Council, 1215
Almohad Empire
Appendix II Maps
ego
ond
M iver
Coimbra
R
ere êz
rZ
ve Ri
s
Leiria
r ive
R
Alcobaça Alcanede
Torres Novas
Óbidos Santarém Cazambuja
Ri
Alenquer
Southwestern Iberia
ve rT ag us
Vila Verde
Arruda
Mafra Sintra
or
rS
ve Ri
Lourinha
gu Ta
Estremoz
Lisbon
Juromenha
Almada Évora
Palmela Alcacer do Sal
ado
River Guadiana
River S
Moura
Atlantic Ocean
Beja Serpa
Ourique
N
Aljezur Arifana Lagos
Cabo de S Vicente
Map 2. Southwestern Iberia
Sagres
Mértola
Marachique
Mountains of Monchiq ue
25 miles/40 km
Almodovar Mounta
Monchique Silves Alvor
ins of C
Loulé Albufeira
aldeira ¯o
Casela Tavira
Santa Maria de Faro
157
ZEELAND
er M eus
UN
O U N TY F
FL AN
Lille
Sch
S
R
Bossut
T
BRABAN Villers
I
ÈG LI
t
R
FRANCE
E
COUNTY OF LUXEMBOURG
R. Sambre
held
Liège
M Huy
R
MU
NA
HAINAUT
EMPIRE
Namur
Oignies
am
GE LIÈ euse
R MU
NA
LIÈGE
BRA
R. S
S iver
COUNTY OF LOON
Meuse
CAM
N
Louvain
eldt
ER
NT
A EV
TR
OS
Arras
Brussels
TY Nivelles UN CO OF UT INA re HA b
D
COUNTY OF ARTOIS
AALST
ldt he Sc
Y
Dem er
r ve Ri Tournai
O
R.
Lys
Scheldt
Dijle
C
s Ly er Riv
Ypres
B OF
CH
DU
Ghent
NT
BA
RA
Antwerp
e
D
FF
O TY
CO
S ER
LAN
Bruges
Dunkerque
s-Hertogenbosch
Riv
Goswin’s Southern Low Countries
iv er M eu se
Map 3. Goswin’s Southern Low Countries
Battlefront, Santarém 15 March 1147
pl Al
(Marvila)
an
Seserigo
gate Alcáçova
(principal fortification)
Alhanse
River
N
Tagu s
Alhafa
Point of escalade according to the De expugnatione Scalabis
Map 4. Battlefront, Santarém 15 March 1147
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Index
Note: Page numbers in italics indicate a figure on the corresponding page. Abbot William see William of Brussels (Dongelbert) Abundus of Villers (Abundus of Huy) 98–99, 105, 108, 111, 115, 123, 132 Abu Zakariya of Santarèm 9 Acta Sanctorum 99 ad Liberandum papal bull 89 Afonso II of Portugal 77, 78, 79, 92, 93, 94, 134, 136 Afonso Henriques 6, 8, 13, 58, 83, 94, 135; in Alc. 415 codex 153–55; Alcobaça Abbey, founding 55; crusaders, enlisting the help of 80; Doña Mafalda as spouse 5, 67, 153; Lisbon, conquest of 4, 9, 10, 14; Portugal, reign over 1, 11–12, 27, 34–35; Santarèm campaign 2, 3, 13–16, 16–23, 24, 33, 54, 57; sky, witnessing sign in 38–40, 136, 150; speech of 61–65, 66–70 Afonso, Pedro 153, 154–55 Agiologia Lusitano 56 Alberic of Monte Cassino 44 Alcácer do Sal conquest 79, 81, 83, 114, 116, 156, 157; background 86–89; Carmen, as the subject of 5, 90–91, 127, 129; Fifth Crusade, taking place during 2, 128; as the first Portuguese crusade 75, 95; Goswin as chronicling 73, 134; how Alcácer was captured by the Franks 141–46, 146–52; immediate aftermath of conquest 92–94; miracles associated with 118, 119; Quia maior proviso, hoping to trigger 136; speculation regarding 132–33 Alcobaça Abbey (Santa Maria de Alcobaça) 1, 54, 55, 133, 135, 155 al-Din Zengi, Imad 12
Alfonso I (The Battler) 85 Alfonso VI 10, 14, 44, 66 Alfonso VII 8, 10 Alfonso VIII of Castile 80 Alfonso IX of León 75–76 Alfonso X of Castile 48 Allmand, Christopher 48 Almohads 2, 5, 6, 7, 22, 38, 67, 73, 80, 89, 133 Almoravids 7–8, 14, 21, 23, 38, 66 Al-Muwwakil 14 Álvarez de Alvito, Pedro 88 Amatus of Monte Cassino 41 Anais de Santa Cruz II 6 Annales Domni Alfonsi 6, 9, 24 Ansellus of Notre-Dame 53 Apulia 40–41, 61, 67 Arnulf of Chocques 53 Arnulf of Louvain 104 Arnulf of Villers 98, 99, 101, 108 Augustine of Hippo, Saint 48, 130–31 Augustinian Rule 52, 53 Aulne Abbey 100, 121 Baldric of Dol 27, 39 Baldwin I (Baldwin of Boulogne) 12, 52 Barata, José H. 59 Bar Hebraeus 35 Barregão, Martim 88, 94 Benedict, Saint 25–26 Bernard of Clairvaux 13, 103, 122; Afonso Henriques, agreement with 1, 14, 55; in Alc. 415 codex 153–55; daughter houses, as founding 108, 110, 135; Second Crusade, preaching for 12, 113 Berthout, Walter, Lord of Mechelen 126–27
180
Index
Born, Bertran de 103 Blöcker-Walter, Monica 6 Boaventura (Fortunarto de São Boaventura) 97–98, 98–101, 105, 138 Bossut, Alexander de 100 Bossut, Henry de 100 Bouillon, Godefroy de 57 Brandão, António 56, 59, 138 Brito, Bernardo de 59 Burns, Robert I. 48 Caesarius of Heisterbach 105, 106–07, 108, 110, 116–20 Cantemus domino fratres karissimi 25–27, 29, 60 Cardoso, Jorge 56 Carmen 91, 103, 105, 122, 133; acrostic, use of 73, 97–98, 106–07; Alcácer, on the capture of 2, 5, 127; Boaventura as writing on 97, 98, 101; English translation 138–39; Goswin as author 125, 132, 134–35; miracle in the sky, featuring 114, 119, 136; original version as lost to history 108; Pope Innocent III, proviso of 89–91; Soeiro as commissioning 74, 134, 137; as stylistically divergent 111 Cawley, Martinus 99, 101, 108, 111–12, 124, 132, 138 Celestine III, Pope 75 Chevedden, Paul 35 Christina the Astonishing 124–25, 131 Chronicle of Pseudo Turpin 128 Cicero 43, 44, 46 Commentariorum do Alcobacensi mstorum bibliotheca 97, 98, 138 Conrad of Eberbach 104 Conrad of Urach 116–17 Conrad of Utrecht 109 Crónica Adefonsi Imperatoris 32 Crónica Breve de Santa Cruz de Coimbra 54 Crónica de Cister 59 Crónica de Portugal de 1419 54 Crónica Regia Coloniensis 119 David, Charles Wendell 74 De expugnatione Lyxbonensi 5, 9, 74, 112–13 De expugnatione Scalabis see Scalabis De institutione clericorum 44 De Inventione 43 De Itinere Frisonum 84, 86 De Itinere Navali 74, 113
De Laude Spaniae 45 Dialogus Miraculorum 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 116, 117, 124 Diego Gelmirez of Compostela 84–85 Dondi, Cristina 52 Duodechin of Lahnstein 113 Dyer, Joseph 28 Egino IV, Count of Urach 116 Emo of Floridus Hortus (Abbot Emo) 114 encomium urbis genre 44–45 Epitoma rei militaris (De re militari) 48, 49 Erdmann, Carl 75, 87 Estefânio, Abel 6 Estêvão Soares of Braga 77, 93 Eugenius III, Pope 12, 13 Exordium Magnum 104 exordium model 44 Falmagne, Thomas 116, 130 Faria, Albino de 59 Fastos de Santarém 59 Fernando, Count of Flanders 83 Fernando Raimundes of Viseu 76 Fifth Crusade 6, 87, 109, 112, 117, 127; Carmen as describing the events of 2, 73, 90; family d’Arquennes as fighting during 104, 126; Latin Christendom, as a failure for 128; preachers of 110, 114–15, 122, 132, 137 First Crusade 33, 34, 47; Battle of Antioch 90, 136; Historia Hierosolymitana as chronicling 52; Jerusalem, as capturing 31, 56, 81; mirroring technique used in retelling of 39 FitzStephen, William 46 Flores Paradisi 115, 130 Fontes Medievais da História de Portugal 59 Fourth Crusade 81, 104, 117 Fourth Lateran Council 78, 80, 83, 87, 89, 134, 156 Francon of Arquennes 104, 113, 123, 125, 126–32, 138 Fratres de Palmis (Brothers of the Palm) 85 Froidmont, Hélinant de 103 Fulcher of Chartres 27, 52–53 Fulgentius of Ruspe 1 Fulk of Toulouse 122 George of Wied 86–87 Geraldo Sem Pavor 15
Index Gesta Crucigerorum Rhenanorum 88, 118 Gesta Francorum 28, 136 Gesta Frisiorum 84 Gesta Roberti Wiscardi 41 Gesta Sanctorum Villariensium 102, 104–05 Gobert of Aspremont 113 Gonçalves, Gonçalo 22 Gosuini de expugnatione Salaciae carmen see Carmen GOSUINUS see Goswin of Bossut Goswin of Bossut 2, 89, 158; background 98–101; Boaventura, writings on 97–98; Caesarius of Heisterbach and 116–20; Carmen and 89–91; circle of 113–16; Francon of Arquennes and 126–32; Gosuinus of Alcácer and 105–07; Goswin’s finale 137–38; James of Vitry and 121–222; literary tradition surrounding 101–02; as a priest 110, 112–13; Scalabis and 135–37; Suerius and 132–35; Thomas of Catimpré and 123–25; Villers and Mulieres religiosae 120–21; Vitae 74, 104, 108, 111, 117 Greven, Joseph 118–19 Guibert of Nogent 28, 39 Gunther of Pairis Abbey 104 Guy of Clairvaux 116 Henry I, Duke of Brabant 100, 109–10, 126 Henry II, Bishop of Liège 100 Henry VI, Emperor 110 Henry, Count of Portugal 10, 65–70 Henry of Bonn (Popteto Uluinga) 82, 84, 85–86 Henry of Saint-Bernard-on-the-Scheldt 113, 115 Henry of Ulmen 117 Herculano, Alexandre 2, 3, 59, 138 Hispano, Vicente 77, 78, 134 Historia Constantinopolitana 104 Historia Ecclesiastica 85 Historia Hierosolymitana 52–53 Historiarum Adversum Paganos Libri VII 1, 54 Históris de Santarém Edificada 59 History of the Goths 45 Honorius III, Pope 75, 78, 79, 88, 89–90, 93, 117, 119, 133, 136 Horace 105–06 Hrabanus Maurus 44 Hugh of St Fleury 27, 114, 115
181
Ibn Abi Bakr, Sir 14 Ibn al-Athir 35 ibn Ali, Tashfin 7–8 Ibn Ghâlib Muḥammad 20 ibn Tahir al-Sulami, Ali 35 ibn Yusuf, Ali (Emir) 7, 8 Ida the Compassionate: Goswin as biographer of 99, 112, 122, 132; Kerkom convent, residing in 120; Life of Ida 98, 105, 106, 108, 111–12, 125 Innocent III, Pope 77–78, 79–81, 87, 89–91, 92–93, 114, 115 Isidore of Seville 32, 45 Iter per Hispaniam pilgrimage route 84–85, 95 James of Vitry 105, 114–15, 120, 121–22, 123, 133, 136 Jerusalem 31, 85; crusaders, conquest of 28, 33, 35, 38, 137; Jerusalem-bound crusaders 81–82, 84; Jerusalem feast 33, 51–54, 56 John of Cantimpré 132 Jubilus rhythmicus de nomine Jesu 104 Julian of Toledo 32 Krus, Luís 6 Lanfranco of Milan 77, 78 Las Navas de Tolosa 38, 73, 80, 156 Las Siete Partidas 48, 50 Lauds, vesper service of 26, 30 Leclercq, Jean 13 Liberato, Marco 21 Licet Venerabilis papal bull 92, 93, 94 Life of Abundus of Villers 98–99, 105, 106, 115, 123 Life of Lutgarde d’Aywières 125, 132 Lindley Cintra, Luís Filipe 6, 54 Louis VII of France 12 Lourinho, Inês Bailâo 22 Lucius II, Pope 11, 12 Manifestis Probatum papal bull 77, 78, 93, 94 Margaret of Ypres 125 Marie of Oignies 101, 105, 120, 121–22, 124, 136 Martins, Miguel 17 Matins, vesper service of 25–26, 30–31, 52–53, 56, 136, 137 McGuire, Brian Patrick 119 Michael the Archangel 39, 56 Mohab, Martim 18
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Index
Monarchia Lusitana 56, 59, 138, 139 Moreau, Édouard de 101 Namur, Count Peter and Countess Jolanta of 90, 114 Nascimento, Aires Augusto 47, 59, 138–39 Newman, Barbara 102, 115, 125 Nicholas of Clairvaux 103 Nunes, Pedro 134 Oliver of Paderborn 90, 133, 136–37 Oliver Scholasticus of Cologne 114–15, 127, 128 palmers (returning crusaders) 84 Paschal II, Pope 33, 34 Paulus Orosius 1, 54 Pedro of Alcobaça 133 Peres, Fernando (Fernando Pedride) 17, 83, 134 Peter of Aragon 36 Peter of Huesca 36 Philip of Alsace 83 Philip of Clairvaux 113, 115 Piedade e Vasconcelos, Inácio da 59 Pimenta, Alfredo 59 Pons of Barbastro 37 Portugaliae Monumenta Historica Scriptores 2, 59, 138 Prawer, Joshua 56 Primacy of the Spains 92–93 Purkis, William 85 Quantum praedecessores papal bull 12 Quia maior papal bull 80, 89–90 Quomodo capta fuit Alcaser a Francis 2, 98, 141–52; see also Carmen Ramires, Menendo (Mem) 16, 20, 22, 67, 69–70 Raymond of Penafort 104 Relatio de Translatione Sancti Vincentii Martyris 83–84 Robert de Courçon 114 Robert the Monk 39 Roger II of Sicily 8, 40 Roger of Hoveden 110 Roisin, Simone 124–25 Rule of Benedict 25, 28, 105 Sancho I of Portugal 75, 76, 77, 80, 94 Sancho Ramirez of Aragon 11
Santa Cruz de Coimbra Monastery 9, 68, 76, 78, 136; Afonso Henriques as founding 153–54; background 51–54; Teotónio as prior of 16, 24, 135 São Vicente de Fora Monastery 76, 77, 78, 155 Scalabis 9, 41, 45, 59, 73, 75, 158; Alc. 415 codex 1, 6, 54–55, 72, 135–37, 153–55; as historia 29–31; liturgy and 24–25, 25–29, 31–35; military wisdom, as containing 49–50; redacted material 4–7, 31; rhetoric, use of 43–44; Santa Cruz, as the source of 51–54; Santarém campaign 2, 16–18, 19–23, 31–35, 37–38, 46; ‘Secunda Partida’ material as foreshadowing 48–49 Second Crusade 12–16, 80, 81, 113 ‘Secunda Partida’ 48–49, 50 Serrano, Pedro 54–55 Silvestre Godinho of Braga 77, 78 Soalheiro, João 55 Soares, Pedro 76, 79 Soeiro Anes of Lisbon 76 Soeiro of Évora 76, 87, 88 Soeiro Viegas (Soeiro II) 96, 97, 108, 128; in Alcácer do Sal 86–89, 92–95; Carmen, commissioning 74, 107; first Portuguese crusade, orchestrating 75–79; Innocent III and 79–81; Lisbon, as bishop of 75–79, 118, 133–35, 137; as papal legate 91–92; tactics of attraction 81–86 Song of Roland 128 Spiegel, Gabriel 44 SUERIUS see Soeiro Viegas (Soeiro II) Summa de casibus poenitentiae 104 Telo, Archdeacon 51–52, 53 Templars (Order of the Temple) 9, 17–18, 76, 78, 79, 87, 88, 90, 119 Teotónio, Saint 16, 24, 51–52, 53, 135 Teresa, Countess of Flanders 83–84 Third Crusade 80, 82 Thomas of Cantimpré 82, 108, 114, 115, 120, 123–25, 131–32 Thomas of Louvain 138 Urban II, Pope 12, 35–36, 37, 38, 81 Urraca of León, Queen 77 Vegetius 48–50 Venite exultemus Domino (Psalm 94) 25–27, 28
Index Villers Abbey 101, 102, 110; Abbot Charles of Villers 116–17; Abundus of Villers 98–99, 105, 108, 115, 123, 132; Chronica Villariensis monasterii 102, 104, 108–09, 124; female religious, showing support for 120–21; Goswin as cantor of 2, 97, 99, 130; Vita Franconis as produced in 125, 129 Vincent of Zaragoza, Saint 82, 83, 84 Vita Abundi 111, 115, 124, 138 Vita Arnulfi 98, 99, 101, 106, 111–12, 115, 122, 125 Vita Franconis 104–05, 113, 123, 125, 126–32, 137
183
Vita Mariae Oigniacensis 105 Vita Teotonii 24, 135 Walter of Utrecht 107, 108–12, 113, 117 Walter of Villers 120–21, 122, 133, 134 William of Apulia 41 William of Brussels (Dongelbert) 123; béguinages, strongly supporting 112, 121; Goswin, as patron of 111, 122, 138; Vita Guilhelmi Abbati Villariensis 124, 132, 137 William of Holland 136 William of Orange 87, 89 Yvette of Huy 115