DIVISION Of THE HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91125 WOMEN AND THE LEGITIMISATION OF SUCCESSION AT THE NORMAN CONQUEST ..i.<,1\lUlE o� \\"" ,.<"'.:� Eleanor Searle �� � � � i".'.'. ..... 0 ::5 Q � ,,;,., � � � (I'� ....<i' "f></1: "' ""� SHALL W\,._"' 328 SOCIAL SCIENCE WORKING PAPERJuly 1980 ABSTRACT Marriage in the European military classes of the eleventh­ century entailed a transfer of property and the commencement of a new . family that had claims to inheritance. This being so, it is argued ,f l dJtu "'"'""' ' \ \ f.. •1 {; that the arrangement of women's marriages within vassal-groups would l 05\VUU /Ho.I•·"·' have been subject to the same 'public' scrutiny as was male ;-, .. .i' .-� · inheritance. Evidence is presented that suggests that this was the Ca� • 11 I • I !'·• "·'m ' case, and that at the arrangement of a woman's marriage the ? inheritance of her family might be channeled through her to her I /; . i .-.C'DIJD �-. I husband, if he were preferable to lord and vassal-group to the males ' .. -"- ''",_f,,.,, L ' K R E ·- n.1�;V'J :_ L./ _.1\J M C E� - --"'- in the family. This model of marriage and inheritance is then applied . · · L ... - • 3"""''" . e• k to the evidence of the Norman conquest of England. Two marriage­ ,,.. ..,, ,.�. l ,,,, ' - � ' ' . ·I .. ;/ · ' '""' \ \ patterns emerge. First, lesser lords and knights legitimised their -{cvtJ Q.· . �- -;.;· 'r==:::: t ......,._< \ occupatio n of Anglo-Saxon manors assigned them by their lords, through �-� (< . \, \ J' I . the means of marriage to Anglo-Saxon women, declared to be heiresses. � ' - I ' " , ' ··C' - � r .;" "'''' _, Secondly, among the magnates, legitimisation of membership in their . •" w / "' � ' ) N. L \ /'> E A I group remained the point, and pattern, of marriage. Norman magnates i .?' I ,r·�'''" � '"';• De • o>,,•[[ � <' )( -:'" c_v J_/. i who employed the first pat tern of legitimisation did not marry the \ ;:;!: f.-,,c! , E; Ti ' • . �-.:.i· · ' " '· . €'>Cl"drr ;:r/ k \ I hrc>\�h•rv L 1:1 _,. !.. • daughters of the Anglo-Saxon magnates, but lived with them, in unions � J, S •L"'·,r., '- ' � , '' ' ' ' ) '- ,· /- ' ' ' '. 11 . acce pted by the natives, but not presented to their own group for --. .·0',. ">°" ! J ," , / ;" � · - _,; , C "d' >' " T , n-· .. J I ' ", » � -- '" _ ,: - :'" " t � --.U. •�/ approval. The few Anglo-Saxon magnates who survived were denied - D � •" '-"'"�� ' T /! --J ED U " , " � . / \.\ >. "m""' · "•-, '] j - marriage with Norman women, for, it is argued, such marriages would . " ' "'""/ •, \' ' ____ ' " " / - - "'. '-..-{ '\ (°" --"1 . '! ' have involved acceptance in the magnate-group of Normans. William the '" "" " I I _ � I'_, . , l / - ., -(, ' ,.,_.c c WG t;; "'' ' · >\ [' ' ( :. L . .:V ' - - · •• \ •O \ ' Conqueror attempted to secure such legitimisation for the English, but � - �� • I .. ---- - M[U · ' " c_r., A P ""' /); j', ) /• ,�""·o " d '' :: "-. ·, ' failed to convince his vassals. The interests of the king/duke and . r:J ,,. , r !, C ,, \ �, ' "... ) . «·, ' .c.'=·- /"'{ '' '� y- -� . ;,· · � / \ .,<· , . his great Norman vassals are thus shown to have been in opposition: \I • I .. j ,. c , .. : < ·------- / ". \ he appears to have wished the English earls to remain in possession, '' • , / , -.. .. 1,, ,, "" , p while his vassals wished to dis place them. His acquiescence suggests P H .. ,.,,, '., l ----- ·'"""") that the power of a vassal-group over its lord -- the 'constitutional' l """• , �"'--5�-�� �-:;,_J , .... power to advise, consent and deny consent -- was highly developed at an earlier time than is usually assigned it. �_)·-- " """'" " " 2 marriage for his daughter , sister , neice orHcousin (cognatam) let him speak to me ab out it . But I wi ll not take anything from him fo r this permission , nor will I fo rbid him to give her , save if he should wish WOMEN AND THE LEGITIMISATION OF SUCC ESSION to marry her to my enemy .' He then of course promises to arrang e the AT THE NORMAN CONQUEST 2 marriage of the orphaned he iress with the counsel of his barons . Eleanor Searle I propose taking the statement very seriously too , as an expression of good lordship -- and not just of good ro yal lordship. A mal e wi th a claim to inherit could be contro lled directly, for he 'Did not Rou , my ancestor and founder of our people , along with our ancestors , defeat the French king? •••no r could would one day present himself for acceptance as vassal and peer. A the French king hope for safety until he had humbly bestowed both daughter and the land called by you No rmandy .' woman , if she were ever to be declared an heiress , had to be controlled at the moment of her marriage -- from the first to the last Wi lliam the Conqueror addressing his barons on the eve of the battle of Hastings: Huntingdon , 2 01 3 of them . Now, the chronicles of the No rman conquest take marriage very Historians are faced not only with the search for new data , seriously. Indeed , once one begins to examine them , marriage is a but with the continual need to reexamine the assumptions they bring to continuing theme of the Norman settlement in England . I wo uld argue the ir interpretation of data . This is peculiarly necessary for that if we too take the ir theme seriously , we wil l see a modified medievalists . Men do not necessarily articulate the logic of their picture of the politic s, perhaps even something new ab out the social choices , and we are in constant peril of attrib ut ing our own chronology , and the means of reducing the violence, of that assumptions to men and women unlike us , and thus mis understanding the settlement . The attempt to see whether they have anything to te ll us normal operation of their institutions . should be made if only because men at the time took them seriously . For several years now , I have been trying to look anew at some They were in the process of forming political.institutions out of the problems in inheritance in feudal society through the light thrown on raw materials of family and war-b and loyalty . Marriage among them wa s the institut ion by control ov er women's marriage.I Henry I's carefully arranged . It certa inly entail ed a transfer , with the bride, coronation charter of 1100 takes the matter very serio us ly ; it is the of possessions and claims to inheritance. That being so , marriage third capitulum , coming after control over the church and male within any vassal group was necessarily political , for it involved a inheritance. 'If any baron or any of my men should wi sh to arrange a 3 4 shift in the resources by which the group maintained itself. It in terdependen t group wa s the only right a man,could possibly have to a involved an ac ceptance of the woman's husband as a legitimate holder share in the resources by which that group pro tected itse lf . A man of that resource and perhaps more importantly a legitima te claimant to did homage to his lord for hi s land , but no wi se lord wo uld take membership in the group should the men of the family die or prove homag e wi tho ut a decision of his court of vassals: their declaratio n themselves unwo rthy as heirs . If marriages are looked at in this way , that Xi s�· I propose that it is inconceivable that they could have taken place Inheritance is recruitment , then . Security implied the witho ut a group ac ceptance , and this was no doubt particularly true of necessity of continuing to demonstrate the qualities that secured great marriages . No thing wa s more constantly anxio us than inheritance acceptance. Just as the rules of inheritance we re of necessity and recruitment , and marriage entailed both. Inheri tance in the flexible , so tenure could no t be unquestioned . It is important to seignorial wo rld of the eleventh-century could be neither automatic rememb er this lest we overestimate the seriousness of the fault tha t no r governed by rigid rules . From the lord's point of view this is might lead to dispossession . The fault of Mab el of Belleme's father , easy enough to see , for he could no t afford an in effective , hostile or Wil liam Talvas , was not tha t he wa s disloyal to hi s Norman lord and even unreliable vassal . But it is as true of the vas sal group . A peers . It wa s that he could no t control hi s disloyal son , Arnold . We lord's vassals -- the claimant's prospec tive peers -- had an anxio us do not know why his son Oliver was unacceptable as his heir -- but he in terest in the claimant's qualities . No vassal group could well wa s so . The sis ter , Mabel , wa s the heir , and Oliver wa s thereafter afford to have members who we re in themselves incapable, or unab le to maintained wi thin the family until old age when he became a monk . inspir e and hold the loyal ty of their own men . The unstable man , even Oliver ma y have been moved by the example of his merry uncle who had the unknown man , was un thinkab le as an heir , becaus e he wa s resigned the lord ship and part of its lands, and had preferred to be unthinkab le as a peer . We concentrate on the lord when we think of bishop of the lordship 's diocese. The cost of inheriting wa s no t low , the warrantor of a vassal's land . But , by the very logic of feudal and there must have been sons who preferred no t to pay so dearly. To power , he did not act alone .