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HISTORY

OF

THE CONQUEST OF ENGLAND

By the Normans.

BOOK VIII.

FROM THE BATTLE OF THE STANDARD TO THE INSURRECTION OF THE POITEVINS AND BRETONS AGAINST HENRY II.

1137-1189.

Vassalage of the kings of Scotland-Political state of Scotland-Populations of Scotland-Social equality and language of the Scots-Highland and island clans-Hostility of the Scots to the Anglo-NormansEntry of the Scots into England - Assembling of the Anglo-Norman army-Battle of the Standard-Invasion of the Welsh-Conquests of the Normans in Wales-Bernard de Neuf Marché-Richard d'Eu, called Strongbow-Norman monks and priests in Wales-Norman bishops driven out by the Welsh-Manners and character of the Welsh-Civil war among the Anglo-Normans-Vexations and ravages committed by the Normans-King Stephen besieges Bristol-Attack on the Isle of Ely-Stephen made prisoner-Matilda elected queen of England-Her arrogance-Matilda driven from London by the citizens-Revival of the party of Stephen-Landing of Henry, son of Matilda-Termination of the civil warr-Eleanor, duchess of Aquitaine-Marriage of Eleanor with the son of Matilda--State of southern Gaul-Its population-Its social state-Henry II. of England-Expulsion of the FlemingsMixture of races-Saxon genealogy of Henry II.-War of Henry II. against his brother-War against the Bretons-Submission of Brittany -National insurrection of the Bretons-Their defeat-Insurrection of the Poitevins-Peace between the kings of France and England-Termination of Breton independence-Message of a Welsh chieftain to the king of France-War against the Toulousans-Character of the southern Gauls.

THE friendship which, at the period of William's conquest, had been suddenly formed between the Anglo-Saxon people and that of Scotland, although cooled since by several cir

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On the day,

cumstances, had never been entirely broken. indeed, when Malcolm Kenmore, king Edgar's brotherin-law, was constrained to confess himself the vassal of the Conqueror, a kind of moral barrier was raised between the Scottish kings and the English by race; but Malcolm himself and his successors ill endured this condition of vassalage that force had imposed on them. More than once, seeking to throw it off, they became aggressors of the Anglo-Normans by way of reprisal, and marched south of the Tweed; more than once, also, the Normans passed that river, and the oath of feudal subjection was, by turns, broken and renewed, according to the chances of war. Besides, the kings of Scotland never reckoned among the duties they had contracted in accepting the title of liegemen, the obligation to close their country against the Anglo-Saxon emigrants.

The multitude of men of all ranks and conditions who, after a futile struggle against the invaders, expatriated themselves to Scotland, considerably augmented there the previous mass of Germanic population established between the Tweed and the Forth. The kings who succeeded Malcolm were not less generous than he to these refugees; they gave them lands and offices, and admitted them into their state-council, where gradually the true Scottish language, the Gaelic or Erse, was supplanted by the Anglo-Danish dialect, spoken in the lowlands of Scotland. By the same revolution, the Scottish kings discarded the patronymic surnames which recalled to mind their Celtic origin, and only retained simple proper names, Saxon or foreign, as Edgar, Alexander, David, &c.

The hospitality which the chiefs of Scotland accorded to the men of Saxon race flying from the Normans, was, as we have already seen, offered by them also to men of Norman race, discontented with the share which had fallen to them in the division of the conquest, or banished from England by the sentence of their own chiefs. These sons of the conquerors came, in great numbers, to seek fortune where the conquered had found refuge. Most of them were tried soldiers; the Scottish kings took them into their service, delighted to have Norman knights to oppose to the Normans beyond the Tweed. They received them into their intimacy, confided high commands to them, and even, to render their

court more agreeable to these new guests, studied to introduce into the Teutonic language spoken there, many French words and idioms.1 Fashion and custom gradually naturalized these exotic terms throughout the country south of the Forth, and in a short time the national language became there a singular medley of Teutonic and French, in about equal proportions.

This language, which is still the popular dialect of the inhabitants of southern Scotland, retained but very few Celtic words, Erse or Breton, most of them expressing features peculiar to the country, such as the various accidents of an extremely various soil. But, notwithstanding the little figure made by the remains of the ancient idiom of the Scottish plains in the new language, it was easy to see, in the spirit and manners of the population of these districts, that it was a Celtic race, in which other races had mingled without entirely renewing it. Vivacity of imagination, the taste for music and poetry, the custom of strengthening the social bond by ties of relationship, marked out and recognised in the most distant degree, are original features which distinguished then, and still distinguish, the inhabitants of the left bank of the Tweed from their southern neighbours.

Further westward in the plains of Scotland, these features of Celtic physiognomy appeared more strongly impressed, because the people there were more removed from the influence of the royal cities of Scone and Edinburgh, whither the multitude of foreign emigrants flocked. In the county of Galloway, for instance, the administrative authority was, up to the twelfth century, only regarded as a fiction of paternal authority; and no man sent by the king to govern this country could exercise his command in peace, unless he was accepted as head of the family, or chief of the clan, by the people whom he was to rule.2 If the inhabitants did not think fit to assign this title to the king's officer, or if the old hereditary chief of the tribe did not voluntarily yield him this privilege, the tribe would not recognise him, for all his

1 The charters of the kings of Scotland towards the close of the tenth century were superscribed: N. omnibus per regnum suum Scotis et Anglis salutem. In the twelfth century the form was: Omnibus fidelibus Francis, et Anglis et Scotis. (Dugdale, Monast. Anglic. passim.)

2 Caput progeniei. (Ken-Kinneol, Charta Alexandri II. apud Grant, Descent of the Gaels, p. 378.)

royal commission, and he himself was soon fain to resign or sell this commission to the chief preferred by the people.'

In the places where the emigrants from England, Saxons or Normans, obtained territorial domains on condition of fealty and service, they built a church, a mill, a brewery, and some houses, for their people, which the Saxons called the hirède, and the Normans la menie. The collection of all these edifices, surrounded by a palisade or a wall, was called l'enclos or the tun, in the language of the lowlands of Scotland. The inhabitants of this inclosure, masters and servants, proprietors and farmers, composed a sort of little city, united like a Celtic clan, but by other ties than relationship, by those of service and pay, obedience and command. The chief, in his square tower, built in the midst of the more humble dwellings of his vassals or labourers, resembled in general appearance the Norman of England, whose fortress dominated the huts of his serfs. But there was a great difference between the real condition of the one and of the other. In Scotland, the subordination of the poor to the rich was not servitude; true, the name of lord, laird, in the Teutonic language, and of sire in the French, was given to the latter, but as he was neither a conqueror, nor the son of a conqueror, he was not hated, and none trembled before him. A sort of familiarity brought more or less nearly together the inhabitant of the tower and the dweller in the cottage; they knew that their ancestors had not bequeathed to them mortal injuries to revenge upon each other.

When war assembled them in arms, they did not form two separate peoples, the one horse, the other foot; the one clothed in complete steel, the other denied spurs under penalty of ignominious punishment. Every man, armed according to his means, in a coat of mail or a quilted doublet, rode his own horse, well or ill-caparisoned. In Scotland, the condition of labourer on the domain of another man, was not humiliating as in England, where the Norman term villain has become, in the vernacular tongue, the most odious of epithets. A Scotch farmer was commonly called the gude-man; his lord could only demand from him the rents and services mutually settled between them; he was not

1 Charta Thomæ Flemyng, ib. p. 377.

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