Chapter XIV: A Baronial Feud. The Siege of a Castle.
We have visited St. Aliquis in days of peace, and at peace the seigneury remains while we tarry. But peace and pageants no more deadly than tourneys are seldom the continuous state of things. "Rumors of wars" there are every day; actual wars every few years. Let the saints be praised if such contests are largely local, are not bitterly fought out, and are composed before they have caused worse things than the harrying of certain villages of helpless, innocent peasants.
In spite of the efforts of clergy and of kings it will be truthfully written of feudal France that "war was practically a permanent scourge almost everywhere. In the society of that day war was the normal state." When these wars are waged by mighty kings one can at least take the comfort that perhaps they are settling long-standing questions concerning many people, and, however dreadful, may pave the way for lasting peace. Such a war has lately found its climax in the decisive battle of Bouvines, whereof more anon. But most of the wars are for miserably petty stakes. Time was when every insignificant sire holding a feeble tower considered that he had the right to declare war on any neighbor with whom he argued the rights to a trout stream. Yet the case is changing. Suzerains are insisting that the lower class of vassals arbitrate their quarrels and not embroil the neighborhood. Nevertheless, the superior type of barons still claim war as their "noble right." The amount of local fighting can hardly be computed.
Varieties of Baronial Wars
There is something abnormal about a powerful seigneur who (if blessed with a long lifetime) does not have at least one war with each of his several suzerains, a war with the bishops and abbots with whom he has contact, a war with each neighboring noble of equal rank, unless their houses are unwontedly friendly, and a war with at least some of his own vassals. A war can start out of a dispute about a bit of land, an ill-defined boundary, or the exact obligations of a feudal tenure. Theoretically, the suzerain can interfere between wrangling vassals. Practically, he had better let them fight it out, at least till there seems real danger that their fiefs will be permanently injured. Then he can sometimes compel a truce.
Unfortunately, however, God often permits the bitterest wars to be fought within the fief itself. Sons fight with fathers—"the Old Man" will not let his grown boys rule the seigneury to their liking.[67] Younger brothers battle with elder brothers over the inheritance. Nephews attack uncles who seem prolonging their guardianship. Sons even attack a widowed mother to seize her dower lands. These are only some of the things which make the devil rub his taloned fingers.
Nevertheless, certain limitations are intruding, customs that have nearly the force of law.[68] For example, if a vassal attacks his suzerain, none but his own family (among his noble followers) can aid him. Also, in any case, at least a week's notice must be given ere the war is commenced. After the war does begin, forty days' respite must also be granted your foe's relatives ere attacking them. In the interval they are entitled to proclaim their neutrality and so to become safe. Again, one is supposed to respect priests and women and minors. Finally, if a truce is made the suzerain is bound to punish the violators. Such understandings rob warfare of part of its horrors, but do not prevent infinite blood and misery.
As for that motive which prevails in other ages for waging wars—patriotism—often it does not seem to exist so vitally. Certainly Frenchmen ought to make a common front against Germans, Italians, English, etc., but lapses from this obligation are not always condemned as morally outrageous. Quite recently the Count of Boulogne, being at odds with King Philip, took money from both the King of England and the Emperor of Germany to raise up enemies against the King of France; and the count evidently felt that this was a proper measure against an obnoxious suzerain. The great significant tie is that of personal loyalty.[69] It is horrible to betray the prince to whom you have sworn fealty. A suzerain will call out his host by a summons to "my vassals," he will seldom think of appealing to "my fellow countrymen."
Few Battles and Little Strategy
We have said that wars are incessant; yet there is one strange thing about them—pitched battles are very rare. The campaigns abound in petty skirmishes—valorous duels, surprises of small castles, occasional clashes of cavalry, and, above all, in the pitiless ravaging of the lands, farms, and villages of the helpless peasantry. What better way to put pressure on your foe than to reduce his villeins to such misery that they can render him nothing in money or kind and that he thus be brought to poverty? If you have the weaker force you will not think of meeting an invader in battle. You will shut yourself up in your castles when you see the burning villages, stifle your pride, remain passive, and trust that after the "forty days' service" of your enemy's vassals is expired they will weary of the operations and not venture to besiege your strongholds. Then when the foe's army is beginning to disperse you can employ some neutral baron or abbot to negotiate peace.
Even when kings are in the field, with really large armies, somehow the opposing forces seldom risk a decisive encounter. They maneuver, skirmish, and negotiate underhandedly with the uncertain elements in the hostile camp. The upshot often is that the invading army, having devoured all the provisions in the open country and not daring to besiege strong cities with a powerful enemy close at hand, retreats homeward.
Of course, sometimes there are great battles with great results. Such in the eleventh century was Senlac, when Duke William the Norman won all England. Such, more recently, was the famous day at Bouvines. Such marked several of the Crusades against the Infidels, particularly the great and successful First Crusade, and the Third Crusade, when Richard the Lion Hearted seemed to come nearer than any other feudal general to being a really able tactician, if not a great strategist.
These battles are few and far between—and even the mighty Richard's ideal style of fighting was rather that of a headlong cavalier followed by only fifteen knights and with his ponderous ax hewing a bloody lane through a host of Infidels, than that of a careful commander coolly directing a mighty army. Besides, most of the wars between second-class barons involve very small forces. They are only affairs for hundreds. If matters come to grips, the best captain is he who orders "Advance, banner bearer! Follow me, vassals!" and leads the headlong charge.
Enormous pains have been taken in training the individual warrior. For personal prowess the French cavalier is as formidable an individual as ever shared the sins of mankind. But he is trained only in simple evolutions when maneuvering in companies. He dislikes taking orders. He wearies of long campaigns. His camps are very unhygienic and subject to pestilence. Wars, in short, are to him superb games, exciting, spiced with danger, and played for large stakes—which give the zest; but, save in the Crusades and certain other rare cases, the higher objects which supply wars with their sole justification escape him entirely. "Warfare," in the true scientific sense of the word, is something whereof your baron is usually in complete ignorance.
Earlier in this recital it has been seen that Baron Conon, soon after he obtained the seigneury, engaged in a brisk feud with the Viscount of Foretvert. This was so like many other feuds in the region that it is well to obtain an authentic history thereof from Father Grégoire, who knows all the circumstances.
Beginning of a Feud
The origin of the quarrel (he tells us) was commonplace. Doubtless the viscount had a contemptuous opinion of his then young and untried neighbor. There was a wood betwixt the two seigneuries which had been haltingly claimed by Foretvert; but all through terrible Baron Garnier's time none but St. Aliquis peasants had been suffered to cut fagots there. Now suddenly Huon, one of the forester's helpers, appeared before Conon in a piteous plight. His thumbs had been hewn clean off. He had been chopping timber on the debatable land, had been seized by the viscount's men, haled before their master, and the latter had ordered this treatment, adding, with a grin: "This is the drink penny for touching a twig in my forests. Tell your young lord to spread these tidings among his villeins."
When Conon had heard this taunt, his squires trembled at the workings of his face. Then and there he pulled out his sword, placed his hands on the hilt, pressing upon the reliquary, and swore "By God's eyes!"[70] that he would make the viscount and all the spawn of Foretvert swallow enough of their own blood to be drunk to damnation.
"Certes," says Father Grégoire, "he could not as a Christian baron do less; for the lord who lets another seigneur oppress his villeins is no lord; and if he had failed to resent such an insult none of his vassals would have obeyed him."
That same day one of Conon's squires rode to Foretvert. He bore a "cartel," a bunch of fur plucked from his master's pelisson.[71] He was only a young squire, but carried his head high. There was some danger in being such a messenger. The squire had to be as insolent as possible without actually provoking Foretvert to violate the protection due to a herald. Into the great hall of the offending seigneur strode said squire, carrying a bough of pine in his left hand, the bunch of fur in the right. His coming had been anticipated. The greetings, as he was led up to the dais where the viscount presided, were cold and ceremonious. Then the squire straightened his slim form and shook out his long mantle.
"Sire Viscount, my master, the Baron of St. Aliquis, demands of you satisfaction. If you do not make good the wrongs you have done to him and his, I loyally defy you in his name."
And down he flung the cartel.
"It is fitting," returned the viscount, mockingly, "a mere boy should be a squire for a lad. Tell your very youthful master that I will soon teach him a lesson in the art of war."
So with a few more such exchanges the squire rode homeward. Meantime at St. Aliquis things were stirring. The great bell on the donjon was ringing. Zealous hands were already affixing the raw hides to the projecting wooden hoardings upon the battlements. All the storehouses for weapons in the bailey were being opened for a distribution of arms. From the armory forge came a mighty clangor of tightening rivets. The destrers must have caught the news, they stamped so furiously in the stables. In the great hall Conon sat with Adela (a wise head in martial matters), Sire Eustace, and the other knights in serious debate.
Mustering the Vassals
Simultaneously, messengers were pricking away to all the little villages and to the fortalices of the vassals. To the villeins they cried: "The baron proclaims war with Foretvert. Bring your cattle and movables near to the castle for protection." To the vassals they announced, "Come with all the men you are bound in duty to lead, seven days from to-day, to St. Aliquis, armed and provisioned for service; and hereof fail not or we burn you." This right to burn the dwellings of vassals who failed to obey the summons to the ban was one of long standing in feudal lands. Other messengers proclaimed the ban by blowing the trumpet at every crossroads in the barony. To have disobeyed this call would have been the depth of feudal depravity. None of the vassals ventured to hesitate. On the contrary, most of them, like good liegemen, affected to show joy at this chance to follow their seigneur, crying at once, "My horse! My horse!" and ordering out all their retainers.
The abbot of the monastery now, as duty bound, visited both leaders and vainly tried to negotiate peace. He met with courteous thanks and prompt refusals. While he was thus squaring with his conscience, Conon was notifying all his outlying relatives. He was also sending to several powerful barons who had received armed assistance from St. Aliquis in the past, and who were now tactfully reminded of this fact. He likewise sent an especially acceptable messenger to his suzerain the duke, to convince the latter that Foretvert was entirely wrong, and that the duke had better not interfere. Thanks to this energy and diplomacy, by the end of the week the whole countryside had been roused, the peasants had driven most of their cattle so close to St. Aliquis castle that they could be protected, and many villeins, deserting their hovels, were camping in the open (it being fine summer weather) in the space between the barbican and bailey. As for Conon, with pride he mustered his "array"—one hundred knights or battle worthy squires; two hundred sergeants—horsemen of non noble birth; and some seven hundred footmen—villeins with long knives, pikes, arbalists, big axes, etc.—of no great value in open battle, but sure to have their place in other work ahead.
From Foretvert reports came in of similar preparation. But the viscount had quarreled with some of his relations. He had broken a promise he once made to help a certain sire in a feud. His immediate vassals responded to his call, but they felt that their lord ought to have consulted them ere provoking St. Aliquis so grossly. In a word, their zeal was not of the greatest.
Nevertheless, the viscount, an impetuous and self-confident man, having hastily assembled his forces, the very day the week of intermission ended invaded Conon's territory. He expected to find his enemy's peasants still in the fields and the St. Aliquis retainers in the process of mustering. To his amazement, he discovered that the villages were almost empty and most of the cattle driven away. Nevertheless, he foolishly allowed his men to scatter in order to ravage everything left at their mercy. Soon hayricks were burning, standing crops were being trampled down, and the thatch on the forsaken huts was blazing. Here and there troopers were driving before their spears oafish peasants who had lingered too long. The hands of these wretches were tied behind their backs. Beside them trudged their weeping wives and children. Every sheep, pig, and chicken discoverable was, of course, seized.[72] The ravagers soon had enough booty to load their horses to such a degree that one of Foretvert's more experienced knights warned him his men were becoming dangerously encumbered in case of an encounter.
A Passage at Arms
The viscount laughed at these fears, yet was about to sound trumpets to recall the foraging parties; when, lo! down a wood road, through a forest that had been imperfectly scouted, came charging the whole St. Aliquis levy, with Conon's great banner racing on ahead. Half of the viscount's men were dispersed; the other half barely got into a kind of order when their enemies were upon them, thrusting, slashing, and laying about like fiends. Such being the case, Foretvert had cause to bless the Virgin that he got safely from the field. He only did so because his squire most gallantly stabbed the horse of Sire Eustace just as he was closing with the viscount. The squire himself was brained by the seneschal's mace an instant later. Five of the Foretvert knights were slain outright, despite their armor. Four more were pulled from their horses and dragged off as prisoners for ransom.
Of the foraging parties, the leaders got home by putting their horses at speed, but the miserable footmen were intercepted by scores. Many of these were slain while dropping their sinful booty. About forty were taken prisoners, but, being only villeins (from whom no ransom was to be expected), Conon promptly hanged ten as a warning against further ravaging of his lands, and took the other thirty back to his castle to be hanged later in case this first hint should not prove effective.[73]
This unusually decisive engagement ought, in the opinion of many, to have ended the war. Conon now invaded the Foretvert domains and with proper precautions sent out his ravaging parties, who soon taught their foes a lesson as to how to devastate a countryside. But the viscount, although sorely shaken and deserted now by many, arrogantly refused to make those concessions which Conon declared "his honor required ere he could think of peace." The war thus promised not to terminate until, by incessant raids and counter-raids, the peasants of both seigneuries had been brought to the edge of starvation.
The viscount, of course, reckoned that at the end of their ordinary "forty days' service" Conon's vassals and allies would leave him. Most feudal levies were wont thus to melt away, after a very short campaign, and leave their leader bereft of almost all save his immediate retainers. Foretvert could then regather his men and resume the contest. But the saints so ordered it that Conon had been a thrifty seigneur as well as a popular suzerain and neighbor. He now offered his allies and vassals good deniers if they would serve until the autumn rains. He also hired the services of some fifty horsemen and two hundred footmen, led from Lorraine by an iron-handed soldier of fortune, Ritter Rainulf of the Moselle, who would put his German mercenaries at the beck of about any baron offering good silver. Mercenaries did not serve for "forty days," but for as many months as they received steady wages—a great advantage.
Conon likewise hired a base-born fellow, Maître Jerôme. The knights complained that the baron gave him too great pay and confidence, but Maître Jerôme had been one of the king's best engineers in the siege of the great castle, Château Gaillard, on the Seine, when Philip Augustus took that supposedly impregnable fortress from John of England in 1204. Now the castle of Foretvert itself was almost as strong as St. Aliquis, and no siege thereof was worth considering. But the viscount had a smaller fortalice, Tourfière, which lay closer to Conon's lands and was not so formidable.
Siege of a Castle
Tourfière consisted merely of a single curtain of walls around the courtyard of a central keep, with, of course, a palisaded barbican before the gate. There was a moat, but not deep, and flooded only in wet weather, and the foundations of this stronghold did not rest, apparently, on solid rock—a matter upon which Maître Jerôme laid great stress after a discreet reconnaissance. Suddenly, to the amazement of many, Conon with all his forces appeared before Tourfière and summoned its castellan, Sire Gauthier, the viscount's nephew, to surrender—a demand refused with derision.
A CATAPULT
A sort of sling which one tightened with the aid of a windlass and which threw heavy projectiles.
Sire Gauthier commanded some twenty knights, squires or sergeants, also at least ninety armed villeins—a sufficient force, it seemed, for a small castle, especially as the women in the place could drop stones, throw down burning pitch hoops, pour boiling water, and help twist back the casting engines. The defenders thus prepared to resist with energy, confident that Conon could not keep his heterogeneous levies together much longer and that the siege would break up ignominiously. But, despite his villein blood, Maître Jerôme ordered the siege in a marvelously skillful manner. No chess player could have moved his pieces better than did he. First he persuaded the baron to resist his impulse to attempt the walls by a sudden rush with scaling ladders, pointing out that Gauthier, besides his arbalists, had four great trenchbuts (stone-hurlers worked by counterweights) and also two catapults, giant bows mounted on standards and able to send a heavy arrow clean through a man in full armor.
"We must take Tourfière by the crowbar and spade, and not by the sword, fair Seigneur," said Jerôme, smilingly; whereupon a great levy of Conon's serfs began cutting timber and building a palisade all around the besieged castle, to stop sorties or succoring parties. Meantime Jerôme was directing the making of trenchbuts and catapults for the besiegers. With these they soon smashed the wooden hoardings which had protected the battlements, making it impossible for the garrison to mount the walls, save at a few places or in great emergencies, lest they be picked off by the attackers' arbalists. The trenchbuts also cast small kegs of "Greek fire" (a compound of pitch, sulphur, and naphtha) inside the castle court. These terrible fire balls could not be quenched by water, but only by sand. By desperate efforts, indeed, the defenders prevented decisive harm, but some of the buildings in the courtyard were burned and Sire Gauthier's men became wearied in their efforts to fend off disaster.
In bravado the defenders took two prisoners and hanged them on the highest tower. Conon retaliated by immediately hanging four prisoners just out of bowshot of the castle, and causing his largest trenchbut to fling a dead horse clear over the battlements and into the court. Meantime a remarkable energy of the assailants, just outside their palisades, was observable by Sire Gauthier. The castellan took counsel with his most experienced men, for the besiegers seemed shaping very many timbers.
Siege Engines and Towers
AN ATTACK WITH THE AID OF A TOWER
(From Viollet-Le-Duc); the moat has been filled up, the tower covered with skins to protect it from fire and rolled up to the wall.
His advisers were divided in opinion. Some said that Conon was planning to build a beffroi. This was a most ambitious undertaking ordinarily used only in great sieges. A beffroi was a movable tower built of heavy timbers and raised to at least the height of the wall attacked. Its front was covered by rawhides to repel arrows and fire-balls. It was worked forward on rollers or clumsy wheels until close to the hostile parapet. Then, when almost touching, a swinging bridge from the summit was flung across to the wall, a host of assailants swarmed up a ladder in the rear and over the bridge to the battlements. The defenders then needed all their valor to keep their castle from speedy capture.
Others in the garrison, however, derided the idea that a beffroi was projected. It would be winter ere such a complicated structure could be completed. They said that the baron was preparing battering rams and a "cat." The battering ram was simply a heavy timber with a metal head, swung by chains from a kind of wooden trestle. Set up close under a wall it was pulled back and forth by ropes, and by repeated blows knocked down the masonry. The "cat" was a long, narrow, tent-shaped structure of heavy timbers covered with hides or iron to turn missiles from the parapets. One end of this was built out until it came into contact with the walls, when skillful miners under its protection quarried their way through the masonry with pickaxes.
A MANTELET IN WOOD
These methods were easier to prepare than the beffroi, although not so effective. The defenders felt sure they would be used when the attackers were seen making mantelets, large wooden shields mounted on small wheels, to protect the crossbowmen when they crept up to clear the walls—a needful preliminary to advancing either the cat or the ram. Their certainty increased when one night, by a sudden rush, Conon's men stormed through the weak palisade of the barbican and, forcing their way near to the walls, began filling up the moat with fascines—bundles of fagots. By using his trenchbuts and catapults to best advantage, Sire Gauthier felt confident, however, that he had prevented them from leveling the moat sufficiently to make a firm foundation for siege engines. The Tourfière men, therefore, shouted arrogantly: "Take your time, St. Aliquis hirelings! Your 'Madame Cat' will never gnaw our rats."[74]
Presently, after a couple of weeks, the besiegers were seen in great activity, as if arraying themselves for an assault. Gauthier was convinced they were about, in desperation, to try to scale his walls with ladders. Then of a sudden a panic-stricken sergeant ran up to his watchtower. Wafts of smoke were escaping near the foundations of the curtain wall near the gate!
Undermining the Wall
ATTACK ON A WALL WITH THE AID OF THE SAP
At the top of the wall the scaffolding can be seen (theoretical figure from Viollet-Le-Duc).
Gauthier instantly realized what had happened, but it was too late. Under an elaborate feint with other preparations, Maître Jerôme had taken advantage of the soft ground beneath the castle and had driven a mine, beginning at a safe distance in the rear and cunningly concealing the entrance and the earth excavated until it was fairly under a vital section of the wall. Then a large chamber had been cleared and wooden posts soaked with tallow had been put under the masonry to keep it from falling on the miners. As the last of them retreated, a torch was set to the woodwork, the whole chamber having been crammed with inflammables. Presently the fire ate away the posts. With a thundering crash a vital section of the wall collapsed.
The besieged had not realized the situation in time to drive a countermine or to erect a second wall inside the danger point. The moment the St. Aliquis men saw the wall topple they rushed forward. The defenders met them bravely in the breach and there was bloody swordplay, but the thrust of numbers was irresistible. Gauthier and part of his men fled, indeed, to the donjon and barred the entrance, but they were utterly demoralized. All the women and children, packed into the tower, were shrilly lamenting the dead and were otherwise frantic. Most of the provisions had been in a storehouse outside the donjon. The end, therefore, was certain. At the end of the next day the garrison in the donjon surrendered on promise of life and limb for all, and courteous treatment for the knights.
The storming of Tourfière ended the war. Conon might, indeed, have ruined Foretvert utterly, but now the duke intervened. It was not for his interests to have any vassal rendered unfit to meet his feudal obligations. Conon, however, was able to exact very high terms. For evacuating Tourfière he obtained the cession of a village whose peasants paid very large dues, and two of the viscount's best vassals also transferred their homage to St. Aliquis. The contending parties swore to peace upon the most precious relics at the abbey, and exchanged the kiss of amity. Henceforth Foretvert, a sadder and wiser seigneur, has been outwardly friendly with his powerful neighbor and even came as a sulky guest to Alienor's wedding.