[1522] See N. C. vol. iv. p. 714.
[1523] We learn a great deal about Robert on the crusade from the Life of Lanfranc by Ralph of Caen, in the fifth volume of Muratori. One passage describing his character has been already quoted. We shall see some special cases as we go on. But it is worth while to compare the “regius sanguis Willelmides” of c. 22 with the picture in c. 58. In this last Robert makes up to the English at Laodikeia “spe dominationis.” Were they to help him in any attempt on the English crown?
[1524] I refer to Sir Francis Palgrave’s chapter “Robert the Crusader,” the eleventh in the fourth volume of his “Normandy and England.” He goes further off from the scene of our common story than I can undertake to follow him.
[1525] Will. Malms. iv. 350. But our best account just at this moment is that by Fulcher of Chartres in the “Gesta Dei per Francos,” which Orderic (718 B) witnesses to as a “certum et verax volumen.” Here we read (385), “Nos Franci occidentales, per Italiam excursa Gallia transeuntes cum usque Lucam pervenissemus, invenimus prope urbem illam Urbanum apostolicum, cum quo locuti sunt comes Robertus Normannus, et comes Stephanus, nos quoque cæteri qui voluimus.”
[1526] Fulcher (u. s.) graphically describes this scene; “Cum in basilica beati Petri introissemus, invenimus ante altare homines Guiberti, papæ stolidi, qui oblationes altari superpositas, gladios suos in manibus tenentes, inique arripiebant: alii vero super trabes ejusdem monasterii cursitabant; et inde deorsum ubi prostrati orabamus, lapides jaciebant.”
[1527] Ord. Vit. 724 D. “Rogerius dux, cognomento Bursa, ducem Normanniæ cum sociis suis, utpote naturalem dominum suum, honorifice suscepit.”
[1528] He is “Marcus Buamundus” in Orderic, who afterwards (817 A) tells the story of his two names. When he went through Gaul, he stood godfather to many children, “quibus etiam cognomen suum imponebat. Marcus quippe in baptismate nominatus est; sed a patre suo, audita in convivio joculari fabula de Buamundo gigante, puero jocunde impositum est. Quod nimirum postea per totum mundum personuit, et innumeris in tripertito climate orbis alacriter innotuit. Hoc exinde nomen celebre divulgatum est in Galliis, quod antea inusitatum erat pene omnibus occiduis.” Orderic is always careful about names, specially double names. See another account in Will. Malms. iv. 387.
[1529] Orderic (724 D) says merely “quoddam castrum,” but it appears from Geoffrey Malaterra (iv. 24) and Lupus Protospata, 1096 (Muratori, v. 47), that the place besieged was Amalfi. Count Roger of Sicily brought with him ten thousand Saracens.
[1530] Ord. Vit. u. s. “Sibi tandem optimum afferri pallium præcepit, quod per particulas concidit, et crucem unicuique suorum distribuit, suamque sibi retinuit.”
[1531] Fulcher, 585. “Tunc plurimi de pauperibus vel ignavis, inopiam futuram metuentes, arcubus suis venditis, et baculis peregrinationis resumptis, ad mansiones suas regressi sunt. Qua de re viles tam Deo quam hominibus facti sunt: et versum est eis in opprobrium.” So William of Malmesbury, iv. 353, who adds that “pars pro intemperie soli morbo defecit.”