[617] Ord. Vit. 767 B. “Petrus cum filiis suis Ansoldo et Tedbaldo Mauliam, aliique municipes quos singillatim nequeo nominare, firmitates suas procaciter tenuere.” On the house of Maule and its works, see Ord. Vit. 587 et seqq. Peter is described as “filius Ansoldi divitis Parisiensis.”
[618] Ord. Vit. 767 A. “Simon juvenis munitiones suas auxiliante Deo illæsas servavit. Simon vero senex servavit Neëlfiam.” See the marriage of the younger Simon with Agnes of Evreux, Ord. Vit. 576 C, and his exploits, 836 C. Of him in the fourth generation came our own Simon. But, according to the Art de Vérifier les Dates, “Simon senex” was dead before this time.
[619] See N. C. vol. iii. p. 133.
[621] Ord. Vit. 767 B. “Interea, dum Guillelmus rex pro regni negotiis regrederetur in Angliam, treviis utrobique datis, serena pax Gallis dedit serenitatis lætitiam.”
[622] Orderic (773 D), immediately after recording the submission of the Cenomannian castles, goes on to draw a harrowing picture of the sufferings of England during the King’s absence; how “Rannulfus Flambardus jam Dunelmi episcopus, aliique regis satellites et gastaldi, Angliam spoliabant, et latronibus pejores, agricolarum acervos, ac negotiatorum congeries immisericorditer diripiebant, nec etiam sanguinolentas manus a sacris cohibebant.” He then goes on to describe the special wrongs of the Church, and adds, “Sic immensi census onera per fas perque nefas coacervabant, et regi trans fretum, ut in nefariis seu commodis usibus expenderentur, destinabant. Hujusmodi utique collectionibus grandia regi xenia præsentabantur, quibus extranei pro vana laude ditabantur.” They then cried to God who had raised up Ehud to slay the “rex pinguissimus” Eglon, which sounds rather like a prayer for the coming of Walter Tirel. But the chronology is utterly confused. The time of which Orderic is speaking is the year 1098; yet he makes Flambard already Bishop of Durham, which he was not till 1099, and he makes Anselm withstand all these oppressions and go away because he could not hinder them. But, as we well know, Anselm was already gone in 1097.
Henry of Huntingdon also (vii. 20) notices the special oppression during the continental war. The King “in Normannia fuit, semper hosticis tumultibus et curis armorum deditus, tributis interim et exactionibus pessimis populos Anglorum non abradens sed excorians.”
[623] Chron. Petrib. 1099. “Se cyng Willelm … to Eastron hider to lande com and to Pentecosten forman siðe his hired innan his niwan gebyttlan æt Westmynstre heold.”
[624] See vol. i. p. 557.
[625] Chron. Petrib. 1096. “Ðis wæs swiðe hefigtime gear geond eall Angelcyn ægðer ge þurh mænigfealde gylda, and eac þurh swiðe hefigtymne hunger, þe þisne eard þæs geares swiðe gedrehte.”