The Normans; told chiefly in relation to their conquest of England

by Sarah Orne Jewett

Then there was a fight with the bishopric of Chalons, which interests us chiefly because Richard's son and namesake first makes his appearance. Renaud, the son of Otho William, who had lost the dukedom of Burgundy, had married a Norman damsel belonging to the royal family of Rolf. This Renaud was defeated and captured by the Count-Bishop of Chalons, of whom we know something already. He was loyal to King Robert of France, you remember, in the war with Burgundy, and now he treated Renaud with terrible severity, and had broken his vows, moreover, by getting married.

King Robert gave the Normans permission to march through his dominions, and seems to have turned his back upon the Count-Bishop. There was a succession of sieges, and the army burned and [Pg111] destroyed on every side as it went through Burgundy, and finally made great havoc in one of the chief towns, called Mirmande in the chronicles, though no Mirmande can be heard of now in that part of the world, and perhaps the angry Normans determined to leave no trace of it for antiquarians and geographers to discover. The Count-Bishop flees for his life to Chalons, and when he was assailed there, he was so frightened that he put an old saddle on his back and came out of the city gates in that fashion to beg for mercy. The merry historian who describes this scene adds that he offered Richard a ride and that he rolled on the ground at the young duke's feet in complete humiliation. One might reasonably say that the count made a donkey of himself in good earnest, and that his count's helmet and his priestly, shaven crown did not go very well together.

The third Richard covered himself with glory in this campaign, however, and went back to Normandy triumphant, to give his old father great pleasure by his valor. But Richard the Good was very feeble now, and knew that he was going to die; so, like Richard the Fearless, he went to Fécamp to spend his last days.

When he had confessed to the bishops, he called for his faithful barons, and made his will. Richard was to be his successor, and his courage and honesty deserved it; but the old father appears to have had a presentiment that all would not go well, for he begged the barons to be loyal to the good youth. Robert, the second son, fell heir to the county of Exmes, upon the condition that he should be faithful [Pg112] to his brother. There was another son, Mauger, a bad fellow, who had no friends or reputation, even at that early day. He was a monk, and a very low-minded one; but later he appears, to our astonishment, as Archbishop of Rouen. No mention is made of his receiving any gift from his father; and soon Richard the Good died and was buried in the Fécamp Abbey. In after years the bones of Richard the Fearless were taken from the sarcophagus outside the abbey door, and father and son were laid in a new tomb near the high altar.

All this early history of Normandy is told mainly by two men, the saga-writers of their time—William of Jumiéges, who wrote in the lifetime of William the Conqueror, and Master Wace, of Caen, who was born on the island of Jersey, between thirty and forty years after the conquest of England. His "Roman de Rou" is most spirited and interesting, but, naturally, the earlier part of it is not always reliable. Both the chroniclers meant to tell the truth, but writing at a later date for the glory of Normandy, and in such a credulous age, we must forgive them their inaccuracies.

They have a great deal more to say about Richard the Good than about his two sons, Richard and Robert. Richard was acknowledged as duke by all the barons after his father's death, and then went in state to Paris to do homage to King Robert. This we learn from the records of his contract of marriage with the king's daughter, Lady Adela, who was a baby in her cradle, and the copy of the settlements is preserved, or, at least, the account of the dowry [Pg113] which Richard promised. This was the seigneurie of the whole Côtentin country, and several other baronies and communes; Cherbourg and Bruot and Caen, and many cities and lands besides. Poor little Lady Adela! and poor young husband, too, for that matter; for this was quite a heartless affair of state, and neither of them was to be any happier for all their great possessions.

In the meantime Robert, the Duke's brother, was not in the least satisfied, and made an outcry because, though he was lord of the beautiful county of Exmes, the city of Falaise was withheld from him. There was a man from Brittany who urged him to resent his wrongs, and made trouble between the brothers; Ermenoldus he was called, the theosophist; and there is a great mystery about him which the old writers stop to wonder over. He was evidently a sort of magician, and those records that can be discovered give rise to a suspicion that he had strayed far eastward with some pirate fleet toward Asia, and had learned there to work wonders and to compass his ends by uncanny means.

There was a siege of Falaise, which Robert seized and tried to keep by main strength; but Richard's army was too much for him, and at last he sued for peace. The brothers went back to Rouen apparently the best of friends; but there was a grand banquet in Rolf's old castle, and Richard was suddenly death-struck as he sat at the head of the feast, and was carried to his bed, where he quickly breathed his last. The funeral bell began to toll while the banquet still went on, and the barons made themselves merry in the old hall. [Pg114]

There was great lamentation, for Richard was already much beloved, and nobody doubted that he had been poisoned. So Robert came to the throne of Normandy with a black stain upon his character, and during all the rest of his life that stain was not overlooked nor forgotten.

As for the baby-widow, she afterward became the wife of the Count of Flanders, Baldwin de Lisle, and she was the mother of Matilda, who was the wife of William the Conqueror.