The fling at Roman greediness is in the true English style of all times; but, in the connexion in which it stands, the idea which it suggests is that Herbert, who had once bought his bishopric of the King, bought it again of the Pope.
On the name Losinga see De Rémusat, Anselme, 199; Diez, Etymologisches Wörterbuch, i. 255. It seems to come from laudare.
The Letters of Anselm.
The letters of Anselm throw so much light on the events of the time, they open to us so many bits of local and personal detail, both in England and in Normandy, that we are not only thankful for the help which they give us for this period, but sometimes feel a certain grudge that we have no help of the same kind for earlier periods. Anselm’s correspondents are found in all lands and in all ranks. All his letters are of course in Latin, a tongue which must, one would think, have in many cases needed to be interpreted to those to whom the letters came. A touch or two in any natural language, whether English, French, or whatever may have been the exact form of Romance spoken at Aosta, would have been, not only a relief, but a precious source of knowledge. But for this of course we must not look in these times, whether from Anselm or from any one else.
In several places in the text I have used the letters of Anselm among my most important materials. They form one of our sources for the details of his own appointment to the archbishopric (see p. 400), while his correspondence with Cardinal Walter has given us (see p. 537, and [vol. ii. p. 41]) some details not found elsewhere with regard to the campaign against Robert of Mowbray. We have also had, in one of his letters to Archbishop Hugh of Lyons (iii. 24, see p. 419), Anselm’s fullest account of the questions which led to the Assembly at Rockingham. The correspondence of course goes on into the reign of Henry, and many of the letters which pass between the King and the Archbishop are in fact state papers, and are, as such, inserted by Eadmer in his history. The immediate historical value of these belongs of course to a time later than that dealt with in the present volume. But the whole series is full of matter bearing on English affairs, and on the affairs of other persons and places in which we are interested. I will therefore go on to mention some of the matters connected with our own and kindred subjects which are suggested by the letters here and there. Many are addressed to Lanfranc, Gundulf, Priors Henry and Ernulf of Canterbury, and others who play parts of more or less importance in our story. A good many are to princes of various lands, many to devout ladies, with the names of some of whom, as those of Countess Adela, the daughter of the Conqueror, and Countess Ida of Boulogne, we are already familiar. There are also the special “ladies and mothers” (dominæ et matres) of the church of Bec, who, without embracing the monastic profession, had given themselves to a devout life under the shadow of the monastery (Chronicon Beccense, Lanfranc, ed. Giles, i. 202; De Nobili Crispinorum Genere, ib. 347; Anselm, Epp. ii. 26, 51; iii. 138). These were Basilia the wife of Hugh of Gournay—who himself, with Hugh of Meulan, the father of the famous Count Robert, became a monk at Bec—her niece Amfrida, and Eva, the widow of William Crispin. There are also a crowd of letters to prelates, nobles, monks, nuns, and persons of all kinds, which throw incidental light on various points in the history of the time.
The close connexion between Bec and England comes out very early in the series. It is perhaps not inappropriate that the earliest mention of England concerns its money, which was so much sought after beyond sea. This is in i. 13, where a moneyer of Arras, who wishes to turn monk, but who has first to pay his debts, is sent by Anselm, not yet abbot, to Lanfranc, already archbishop, who will give him a hundred shillings of English money towards paying them. In i. 15 he writes to Henry, seemingly the future Prior of Christ Church, who was already in England, with a piece of advice which we should hardly have expected from Anselm. Being a monk, he is not to go into Italy to try to defend his sister whom a certain rich man unjustly claims as a slave or villain (“ire de Anglia in Italiam sororem tuam defendere, quam audis quemdam divitem indebitæ servituti calumniose subjicere”). (It is less unreasonable when (iii. 127) he counsels the nun Matilda not to go and visit her lay kinsfolk.) In another letter (i. 35) Anselm speaks of the number of Normans who were crossing into England, and how few of them there were whom he could trust with a letter (“Licet multi Northmanni ad Anglos transeant, paucissimi tamen sunt qui, me sciente, hoc faciant; in quibus paucissimis vix est aliquis quem nostrum legationem sine dilatione et non negligenter facturum confidam”). This is written to Maurice, a monk of Bec, who, with some others, had moved to Canterbury. Of the English monks at Bec (i. 65) I have already said something (see p. 375). When Anselm becomes abbot, and has to deal with the possessions of the monastery in England, the references to English matters naturally thicken, as in ii. 3, 4, 5, 6. This last is addressed to Richard of Clare and his wife Rohais or Rohesia, the daughter of Walter Giffard, of whose name the old commentator Picard oddly says, “insuper nomen Rohais pleno gutture personat Anglismum.” The next letter (iii. 7) shows that some of the Normans who passed into England did not always choose the best parts of our character to copy. For a monk named Henry is rebuked for drinking to excess at gild-meetings. Here an English word thrusts itself in, and we read, “audio quia in multis inordinate se agit, et maxime inbibendo, ita ut in gildis cum ebriosis bibat et cum eis inebrietur.” In ii. 9 Anselm records one of his own journeys to England, and his reception at Lyminge by Lanfranc. We have more references to his own English journeys and those of others in ii. 13, 18, 19, 26 (a most remarkable one, of which I have spoken in N. C. vol. iv. p. 440), 27, 30, 45, 46 (where he prays for the forgiveness of a runaway monk called Moses of Canterbury), 47, 53.
Anselm’s letters as archbishop are of course yet fuller of the English history of the time. The first part of the third book is wholly taken up with the correspondence following on his appointment to the archbishopric. The second letter in this book is a most remarkable letter from Anselm’s friend Osbern (see p. 374) strongly exhorting him to accept the archbishopric. He is not to set up his own will against the will of the whole English Church which calls for him as its chief;
“Ut enim in offenso dulcissimo mihi amore tuo loquar, aut cunctis, quod non credimus, meliorem te fateberis, quippe cui soli revelatum est quod universæ Anglorum ecclesiæ fas non erat revelari; aut facias necesse est quod universalis Anglorum ecclesia suadet, hoc est, ut pontificalis infulæ principatum inter beatos apostolos sustinere non renuas.”
Osbern goes on to say that Anselm has already proof enough that it is God’s will that he shall take the offered post. In so doing, he gives a vivid picture of the circumstances of the appointment and of the Red King’s momentary reform;