Geoffrey de Mandeville: A study of the Anarchy

by John Horace Round

But, keeping close to the "fiscal earls," let us now see whether, as alleged, they were deposed by Henry II., and, if so, to what extent.

According to Dr. Stubbs, "amongst the terms of pacification which were intended to bind both Stephen and Henry ... the new earldoms [were] to be extinguished."[816] Consequently, on his accession as king, "Henry was bound to annul the titular creations of Stephen, and it was by no means certain within what limits the promise would be construed."[817] But I cannot find in any account of the said terms of pacification any allusion whatever to the supposed "fiscal earls." Nor indeed does Dr. Stubbs himself, in his careful analysis of these terms,[818] include anything of the kind. The statement is therefore, I presume, a retrospective induction.

The fact from which must have been inferred the existence of the above promise is that "cashiering of the supposititious earls" which rests, so far as I can see, on the statement of a single chronicler.[819] Yet that statement, for what it is worth, is sufficiently precise to warrant Dr. Stubbs in saying that "to abolish the 'fiscal' earldoms" was among the first of Henry's reforms.[820] The actual words of our great historian should, in justice, be here quoted:—

"Another measure which must have been taken at the coronation [December 19, 1154], when all the recognized earls did their homage and paid their ceremonial services, seems to have been the degrading or cashiering of the supposititious earls created by Stephen and Matilda. Some of these may have obtained recognition by getting new grants; but those who lost endowment and dignity at once, like William of Ypres, the leader of the Flemish mercenaries, could make no terms. They sank to the rank from which they had been so incautiously raised" (Early Plantagenets, pp. 41, 42).

"We have no record of actual displacement; some, at least, of the fiscal earls retained their dignity: the earldoms of Bedford, Somerset, York, and perhaps a few others, drop out of the list; those of Essex and Wilts remain. Some had already made their peace with the king; some, like Aubrey de Vere, obtained a new charter for their dignity: this part of the social reconstruction was despatched without much complaint or difficulty" (Const. Hist., i. 451).

Before examining these statements, I must deal with the assertion that William of Ypres was a fiscal earl who "lost endowment and dignity at once." That he ever obtained an English earldom I have already ventured to deny; that he lost his "endowment" at Henry's accession I shall now proceed to disprove. It is a further illustration of the danger attendant on a blind following of the chroniclers that the expulsion of the Flemings, and the fall of their leader, are events which are always confidently assigned to the earliest days of Henry's reign.[821] For though Stephen died in October, 1154, it can be absolutely proved by record evidence that William of Ypres continued to enjoy his rich "endowment" down to Easter, 1157.[822] Stephen had, indeed, provided well for his great and faithful follower, quartering him on the county of Kent, where he held ancient demesne of the Crown to the annual value of £261 "blanch," plus £178 8s. 7d. "numero" of Crown escheats formerly belonging to the Bishop of Bayeux. Such a provision was enormous for the time at which it was made.

Returning now to the "cashiering" of the earls, it will be noticed that Dr. Stubbs has great difficulty in producing instances in point, and can find nothing answering to any general measure of the kind. But I am prepared to take firm ground, and boldly to deny that a single man, who enjoyed comital rank at the death of Stephen, can be shown to have lost that rank under Henry II.

Rash though it may seem thus to impugn the conclusions of Dr. Stubbs in toto, the facts are inexorably clear. Indeed, the weakness of his position is manifest when he seeks evidence for its support from a passage in the Polycraticus:—

"The following passage of the Polycraticus probably refers to the transient character of the new dignities, although some of the persons mentioned in it were not of Stephen's promoting: "Ubi sunt, ut de domesticis loquar, Gaufridus, Milo, Ranulfus, Alanus, Simon, Gillibertus, non tam comites regni quam hostes publici? Ubi Willelmus Sarisberiensis?" (Const. Hist., i. 451 note).

For this passage has nothing to do with "the transient character of the new dignities": it alludes to a totally different subject, the death of certain magnates, and is written in the spirit of Henry of Huntingdon's De Contemptu Mundi.[823] The magnates referred to are Geoffrey, Earl of Essex (d. 1144); Miles, Earl of Hereford (d. 1143); Randulf, Earl of Chester (d. 1153); Count Alan of Richmond (d. 1146?); Simon, Earl of Northampton (d. 1153); and Gilbert, Earl of Pembroke (d. 1148).[824] Their names alone are sufficient to show that the passage has been misunderstood, for no one could suggest that the Earl of Chester or Earl Simon, Waltheof's heir, enjoyed "new dignities," or that their earldoms proved of a "transient character."[825]

Of the three cases of actual displacement tentatively selected by Dr. Stubbs, Bedford may be at once rejected; for Hugh de Beaumont had lost the dignity (so far as he ever possessed it[826]), together with the fief itself, in 1141.[827] York requires separate treatment: William of Aumâle sometimes, but rarely, styled himself, under Stephen, Earl of York; he did not, however, under Henry II., lose his comital rank,[828] and that is sufficient for my purpose. The earldom of Dorset (or Somerset) is again a special case. Its existence is based—(1) on "Earl William de Mohun" appearing as a witness in June, 1141; (2) on the statement in the Gesta that he was made Earl of Dorset in 1141; (3) on his founding Bruton Priory, as "William de Mohun, Earl of Somerset," in 1142. The terms of the charter to Earl Aubrey may imply a doubt as to the status of this earldom, even in 1142, but, in any case, it does not subsequently occur, so far as is at present known, and there is nothing to connect the disappearance of the title with the accession of Henry II.[829]