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Frieslands oudheid Halbertsma, Herrius

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Publication date: 1982

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Citation for published version (APA): Halbertsma, H. (1982). Frieslands oudheid. s.n.

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SUMMARY

The Frisian people can boast that they have kept their own name and lived on the sane lands for nore than two thousand years. The footprints of their anoestors in the rron Age have been found ou the nud-fLat deposits on both sides of the vlie-stream. There is, noreover, every reason to believe that their culture was the direct coutinuation of that of the nud-fIat farmers who cane to settle on the creek deposits of Drechterland in westfriesl-and in the Bronze Age. The etymorogy of the name trFrisiantt has not yet been determined, though the word should be Germanic. rnitially their language was the so-calred Bel- gianr which stood between Germanic and. cer-tic. rn Rornantimes rrFrisiitt the thought of themselves as belonging to the rtGerma- nirr .

cl-assical writers bestowed considerably attention upon the Fri- sians in view of the fact that expeditions by Drusus, Tiberius, Gernanicus, and corbulo to the mouth of the Eems, the ln/ezer, and the Elbe went through and along the regions where they dwelt. subjugated by Drusus in the year 12 Bc, they gained great renown among the Germans by the success of their rebellion against their Roman governor olennius in AD 28. They besieged. casterlum Flevum, defeated the Roman army sent to relieve this military stronghold, and could only again be brought to heel in 42: rrClarun inde inter Germanos Frisiun nomenil. Shortly thereafter, Augustust EIbe policy was abandoned, and the Neder-Rijn and its tributary, the Oude Rijn, which empties into the North sea at Katwijk, were declared. to be the 'rlimesrl of the Rornanenpire. The territory of the Frisians, arttrans- rhenana gensrt, accordingly came to lie juet outside the empire. To ensure the safety of this frontier, a wide strip of l_and along the northern border of the Rhine-lines was kept unpopu- lated. For the rest, the territory of the Frisians for the next three centuries was confined to the area between the Oude Rljn -792-

and the nouth of the Eens. Their dwelling-nound.s lay in a nar- row fringe spread. over the clay along the coast, and also dee- per inland around the great lakee. rt was a society that was doninated by cattle raising and con- pletely orientated on water transport. Exca.vations have shown that the Frisians were quite pro'perous, owned. rarge farm- steads and were abre to obtain bronze utensirs, pottery, orna- nentsr and the like fron the Gallo-Roman hinterland. At the tine of Enperor Nero, the Frisians under the cornmandof verritus and ualorix tried to take possession of new dwerling- -ground on the etrip depopulated for nilitary reasons but were prevented fron doing so by force. But even before the arrival of the Ronans, groups of Frisian emigrants had already swarned southward. The Frisiavones r4'ere probably a branch of the Fri- sians. They settled between the estuaries of the l"laas a.nd.Scheld rivers. The Romans did not di.sturb them there. r,ater on they rrcivitastf, forrned their own siniLar to those of the Batavi and the cananefates, and supplied auxiriary troops for the occupa- tion of Britannia until the fifth century. Among these troops t ere also Frisians who did. not call themselves Frisiavones, and. who apparently served in the arny voluntarily, since after the year 4/, inhabitants of the coastal regions north of the oud.e Riin were no longer con6cripted into military service.

As soon as the written sources of history again start to flow after the period of nass enigration of peoples, the Frisians prove to have botii renained loyal to their ord hone sites, and to have expanded. thein consid.erabry. The tseowulf epic nentions ItFrEscyni.ngtt a whose kingdon on the nouths of the Rhiue was alarned by an attack by Eygelac, the swedish ru1er. Thie event took place around the year J2J. rn 528 there is once agaia a Frisian king, called Aldgisl" He probably resided at utrecht where he extended hospitarity for the winter to Archbishop t,liI- friedr vho had fled fron York, and protected. hirn against Ebroin, the Frankish maior-domo. rn those days busy trade rel"ationshipe :i {! k I + _793-

already existed between the land of the Frisians and York, as vrel1 as London' Wilfried.rs experiences provided the impetus to the arrival of various Anglo-Saxon rnissionaries, of whornWill-i- brord, Boniface, al-ias Winifred., l{i11ehad, and Lebuinus, alias Liafvrin, are the best known. By the time ulil-librord arrived in Friesland in the year 59O, AIdgisI was no longer there, and King Redbad or Radbod ruled over the rrregnum Fresonumrt. Although this king did nothing to hinder Willibrord and his eleven companions, his negative atti- tude towards the Christian faith did not foster the favourable condition that Wil-fried had formerly had with Atdgisl. Iuloreover, shortly before, major-domo Pepin II had d.eprived Radbod of the southern part of the Frisian kingdonr, including Dorestad and Utrecht, ffciterior Fresiarr, as Beda expresses it. The Oude Rijn was in the peace treaty between Pepin and Radbod recognized to be the frontier between the area that Radbod.had to surrender and the area that he was allowed to keep. On further reflection, V/illibrord Left Friesland again and went to call on Pepin. For a while he stayed in Antwerp, and from there he applied. himself to missionary work in Brabant. Frankish sources call Radbod ftduxtr, not rrrexrr, and make it appear that Radbod was a usurper, who was compelled by war to give up the occupation of the estuaries of the Scheld, Maas, and Rhine. Ia accordance with this view, Meo- vingian kings l-aid a cLaim to the ruins of the limes-castell-a along the Neder- and Oude Rija, and so added them to the crown estates. There are also indications that Aldgisl and Radbod had intended one of these castella, ItVetus Traiectumtt or rfVetus ci- vitasrr, Utrecht, to be their trpalaciunrr. As soon as Itciterior Fresiart was pacified, Pepin sent triillibrord and his eleven companions to that area to preach the Christian faith. Willibrord was consecrated bishop at Rome in 695. Subse- quently Pepin gave him possession of the Utrecht castellum, so that he could establish the see of the Frisian archbishopric there. In so doing, Pepin not on)-y laid the foundation of lhe later bishopric of Utrecht but also of the Kingdon of the Nether- -794-

lande, in so far that this bishoprio forns the geographical core of the Dutch nation. The civil war that broke out in Fraace after the death of pepin in 714 gave Radbod the opportunity to retake ttciterior Fresiaft. After the d.eath of the Frisiaa ruLer hirnself Ln f1), however, charl-ee }lartel regained this territory and added Kennenerland to itr so that thereafter the frontier uitb nor-occupied Fries- land was fixed by the Vlie-Btream.

The power of the Frieian kings nuet have been considerable. This nay also be gathered fron the great care with which pepin pre- pared for his expedition to Doreetad ehortly before 59O, which ended in the fJ-ight of King Radbod. ret hls d.efeat did not read to the conpJ.ete erinination of the Frisian king because pepia alrowed hin to keep that part of his kingdon which extended north of the oud.e Rijn. Moreover, a marriage took prace between Radbodrs daughter, Theudeeinda, and Grinoald, the youngest soa of Pepia. Apparentry, the intention was to Join the Frisian and carolingiaa fanilies in this way. Due to the earry death of both partners, however, the narriage accomplished nothing. Another indication of hov pouerful KLng Rad.bod.stirl was at tbe ead of hie life was that the nevs that he was engaged in aagetr- bling an army uaa enough to fiLr arr France with fear and, trem- bring. Radbodfs death produced sighs of relief in many quarters. Fron Engrand, st Boniface received eongratulations on Rad.bodrs denise - it nust have been a sign fron Heaven, so that Boniface could finally uadertake to convert the Frisians to Christianity. ra the year 115, Boniface had been in fact courageous enough to nake his way to Utrecht via Dorestad. Although ao hiadrance rr/a6 placed ia his path, the atnoophere was 60 tense that no one dared to speak up for christianity. After naki-ug aa exploratory tour of Radbodrs kingdon, Boniface returned to Englancl safely but with nothing accoupliehed,. IIe was to make a second attempt Ln l1), but then under a luckier 6tar. -795-

With Radbodrs death, the strength of his kingdom also seerns to have dissipated. Nothing is known of a successor or the conti- nuation of a rrregia stirpstr, and it apparently.'required little ef fort on Charles l"lartelr s part to occupy trciterior lrre- siarr, including Kennemerland. tn 734 he was ready for the leap across the V1ie. In that year he defeated a tr'risian arny at the mouth of the Boorne, the boundary between Oostergo and Westergo, in which battle the Frisian ?rduxttlost his life. The border of the -b-rankish empire shifted eastward to the Lauwers, at the boundary between Oostergo and Humsterland. lrihen Will-ibrord died, the monastery that he had founded at Utrecht to be the base of his mission to the Frisions faced with an autho- rity vacuuttt, due to the lack of a successor of his stature. More- over, it had failed to follow up the recovery of the territory between the Vlie and the Lauwers by converting it to Christia- i nity. The Archbishop of Colo64nesar,r in this situation a ready ! reason to put an end to the special status of Utrecht. Ihis deeply offended the elderly Boniface. As ncustosrr of the orpha- ned l'risian archbishopric, in 753 he l-eft his high office in Mainz to ]ook after itself end set off for Utrecht for the third time. Fron there he undertook two missionary journeys to the coastal region of the Vlie. The last one, in the spring of 754, was to prove fata] to him. In the early morning of ! June, 754, a gang of robbers attacked his tented camp on the bank of a creek and killed more than fifty peoplerincluding Boniface him- self. On the spot where Boniface was felled by the sword, a rrtumulusrr was erected by order of the rrpraefectusrr, Abba, Count of Oostergo, and was to serve as the base for a memorial church. This mound for the church was necessary because of the proxi- mity to the sea, which regularly inundated the surrounding area. Mociern Dokkum derives from this tumul-us. The sensational attack di-d not lead to the immediate annexation of the adjoining coastal area between the Lauwers and the iiems, where the murderers came from. For the time being, it was enough -?96-

to despatch a single punitive expedition. only after the death of King Pepin in 758 d.id the wars of Charlemagne against the saxons provide euch an opportunity. The missioneries followed on the heels of the army - the justification being that earlier experience had proved that a single expedition accomplished littte, and that a solitary missionary risked his life need- lessry. Just as willibrord had waited for the pacification of rrciterior Fresiatt, and Boniface the occupatioa of the river area of the Utrecht-Vecht and Kennemerl_and, now Liudger, the first Frisian nissionary, went into action after charlemagne had smoothed the way for him in the coastal areas on both si- des of the Eems. willehad dtd the sane in the coastar regions on both sides of the Wezer, and so did Liafwin, after Hamal_and had been opened up frorn Deventer.

The written sources provide only superficial information on the nature of Frj-sian paganisnrthe trfana et delubratr, within which the tridolatt were placed., and the gruesone sacrificial practices. The most detaiLed source is the Vita Vulframni, which surprj-ses us with many details on the life of King Rad.bod, and which al- ready contains all the motifs which we encounter in the Rad.bod ga8as.

The Norman invasions of the ninth century took a heavy toll- of the Frisian coastal areae, but it did not tota13,,y disrupt the indigenous society. The attempt by Godfried the Dane to found a Frisian Nornandy could only be foiled. by a conspiracy, in r*hich tvo Frisian counts, GeruLf and Gardulf, played an impor- tant part. The story ended with Godfriedts nurder at Spijk, near Lobith, in BB5. Thereafter Gerulfts star was in the ascendant; his ancestors most probably came from Westergo. His eldest son Waldger built up an empire in Teisterbant and the Utrecht-Vecht region, his youngest son Diederik did the sane in the coastal area between the Scheld and the Vlie. Waldger's empire wa6 short-lived, but Diederik laid the foundations for the county of Hol-l-and. -797 -

The name of waldgerrE son, Radbodo, raises the question as to what the relationship could have been with the Frisian rrregia stirpsrt. The name Gerutf dieappeared fron the genealogical tree after the early death of his grandson, rrGerolf iuvenisrl, to be replaced by Diederik as the reading nane. Gardolf we rneet once again as count of suthergo, the hinterland of staveren.

'fowards the end of the tenth century, the first signs became apparent of a tendency which was to lead to the establishnent of thett],ibertas Fresonumrrin course of the next two centuries. The inaccessibility of the l-risian coastal- areas obliged the l-ords to make concessions which in some cases ended in complete independence for the Frisians, a situation rather simil_ar to contemporary developnents in switzerland. rn other cases, events took an opposite turn because the popuration did not become al-ienated from its lord, but rather the l-atter became alienated frorn the king. This is what happened to the counts of Hol]and. Demographic differences nay perhaps explain this development. rrsil-vae, rn the county of ilolland, the or riparian wood.s recrai- med on a large scale since the tenth century, acquired much greater dimensions than the sandy an cray soiLs already inhabi- tated for so long time past. By introducing 1-and.rents, car-cu- lated according to the land area under cultivation, the count obtained a strong grip on the category of his subjects, who in number began to rival with the population of the ad.joining Itord landrt. The lord had rittre d.ifficurty in subjecting these newly acquired areas to the process of feudarization. rn doing sor the focal point of his county shifted to the river region of the oude Riin, which - its cray banks arready having had a long history of cultivation - became the great artery of the immense, newly reclaned peat bog polders in the former wilder- ness of the hinterland. The county even derived its name from ttHol-lant,r originally a modest,rcomitatusrr situated along the Oude R{jn hal-f-way between Leiden and Utrecht. _?98_

Recl,anation work on such a scale did not occur in Weetfrieeland. The process evolved, ae it did in the coastal regioas on the far- ther side of the VLie, where society retained a Eore cons€r?a- tive character, and the feudal systen had little opportunity to take ho1d. There too, it is truo, recLanations were carried out in the ripuarian voode, or trsilvaerr, betwecn the terp areas and the higher sandy soiLs beyond. However, the Lords no longer aay any posaibillty of d.rawing as nuch profit as in the county of Eolland, or the Utrecht rrSticht and Overstichttr. Developnents in the county of Hollancl uere largely reeponsj-bLe for the fact that the Frisian language and Frisian judicial systen had to yield to the Dutch language and the county judicial sya- ten. The transition wan coopleted in the course of the twelfth century, ubile at the sane tine, the lordre authority was reduced in the Frisian districts, which 1ay north of Kennemerland and east of the VIie. These prooessee have J.eft their tracea on Dutch society to the present day, aa can be obeerved in the sur- vival of a national Frisian coneciouaneag in Westfriesland and the province of Friesland, on both sides of the Vlie.