Queen of the Conqueror: The Life of Matilda, Wife of William I (13 page)

This group of Norman aristocrats—or
comtes
—in whom William vested power was extraordinarily tight-knit. Together with the
vicomtes
, the second tier of nobles, they served as agents of ducal justice, finance, and military administration. They occupied castles on William’s behalf, which gave them a pivotal role in the defense of the duchy and the maintenance of order within it. It was thus through these men that the duke implemented his authority at a local level, and the fact that national and local power was concentrated in so few hands lent William’s system of government a cohesion that was unrivaled elsewhere in contemporary Europe.

As well as being the nexus of political power, the ducal court was also a center of culture and refinement, largely thanks to Matilda’s influence. Her husband was a military man at heart, and this was reflected by the company that he kept. He preferred rough, bawdy entertainments to the refinements favored by more learned rulers, and he often used violence in jest. On one occasion, he beat a forester with an animal bone for querying a grant to a monastery.
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That he took such pleasure in terrifying and humiliating the victims of his cruel jests proved him more a bully than a man of genuine humor.

Although the duke did welcome poets to court, the surviving works that were presented to him were often crude rhymes rather than the eloquent and romantic verses that Matilda inspired.
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As one recent commentator has observed, “this was a rough existence, the life of a crude, unlettered soldier, always surrounded by men of similar accomplishments and interests.”
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This is perhaps not surprising, given that William was far more used to living off the countryside while on campaign than enjoying the niceties of court ceremonials.

But it was Matilda, rather than William, who increasingly set the tone for court life. Having been raised in one of the most cosmopolitan courts in medieval Europe, she soon brought her influence to bear on the etiquette and ceremonial of the Norman court. Given her interest in intellectual pursuits, it was no doubt thanks to her that literature flourished there. She and William became active literary patrons, and the chronicler Jumièges noted approvingly that “illustrious men excellently versed and learned in letters” surrounded the duke and his family.
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As well as encouraging Latin poets, the Norman ruling house commissioned histories of its dynasty from the likes of Dudo of Saint-Quentin and William of Poitiers.

Matilda’s role at court included overseeing the preparation of the banquets held in honor of important visitors or to mark significant days in the religious calendar. The fare served was among the finest of any court in Europe, influenced by French and Scandinavian cuisine. An array of meats and poultry was presented, including venison, pork, beef, swan, heron, and duck, all flavored with spices and dressed with rich sauces. The entertainments that followed were provided by musicians, jesters, dancers, and poets, and would last long into the night. Such occasions were devised for more than mere frivolity, however. They were a highly effective way of emphasizing the potency and prestige of the Norman dynasty.

In between the magnificent occasions of court, William and Matilda’s daily life there would have followed a more routine pattern. The duchess’s household, like her husband’s, was strict in its observances, and she heard Mass every day. For the duke, this was followed by several hours of rigorous exercise. His great passion was hunting. A satirical poem written shortly after his death claimed: “He loved the stags so very much, as if he were their father.”
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If anyone killed a stag or a wild boar unlawfully, his eyes were “put out” as a punishment.
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William would typically go hunting in the morning, return for lunch, and continue the chase or embark upon martial training in the afternoon.

Matilda lived a more sedentary life, but she was by no means idle. Her time would be taken up with hearing petitions, overseeing her accounts, and receiving important visitors. Her leisure hours would have been
spent with her ladies, either embroidering, reading, or conversing. They may also have played or listened to music. Contemporary manuscript drawings show a variety of instruments, such as early forms of harps, viols, and horns. The resident court minstrels would sometimes be joined by singers, who performed the popular ballads of the day. Other pastimes at court included games such as chess and “tables,” a form of backgammon.

For all the stability and status of William and Matilda’s regime that their court life suggests, the specter of the papal ban was forever in the background. But in 1059, everything changed. In January of that year, Nicholas II deposed Benedict X and was formally elected pope. The ousted Benedict soon began drumming up a powerful opposition force, and Duke William saw an opportunity. He quickly offered the new pope military assistance against Benedict in the hope that it would persuade him to revoke the ban on his marriage to Matilda. As an insurance measure, he sent representatives to Rome to reinforce his case. The duke’s two-pronged strategy worked. At a Lateran Council convened that Easter, Pope Nicholas granted a retrospective papal sanction for their union. Perhaps repeating the arguments used by William’s negotiators, he “wisely pointed out that if he were to order a divorce this might cause a serious war between Flanders and Normandy.”
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William and Matilda’s triumph was complete.

Perhaps to appease his ecclesiastical colleagues, the Pope ordered the duke and duchess to make a penance by founding a monastery “where monks and nuns should zealously pray for their salvation.”
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This was a small price to pay for legitimacy, and William and Matilda undertook it with alacrity. Indeed, they exceeded Nicholas’s instructions, founding hospitals at Cherbourg, Rouen, Bayeux, and Caen “to feed and clothe a hundred poor people, the maimed, the powerless, the infirm, the blind” in reparation.
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But their greatest benefactions by far were the lavish new abbeys that they built. Matilda’s—named La Trinité—was a convent for nuns, while her husband’s, St.-Étienne, was a monastery. The couple chose the same location for their twin projects. Two centuries later, the chronicler Wace reflected:

In Caen at last their work to crown

Two abbeys rose within the town:

Two monasteries side by side
,

That should for monks and nuns provide.
¹¹

William and Matilda wasted no time in setting their architects and craftsmen to work, and both buildings sprang up with astonishing speed—thanks in part to the preponderance of the famous white stone of Caen.
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Before the year 1059 was out, La Trinité was operating under the supervision of the appropriately named Abbess Matilda, who was a cousin of William, and a choir of resident nuns “daily praised the Lord in their hymns.” The abbey must have been built in phases, because in its final incarnation, it was a vast, elaborate edifice that could not possibly have been constructed in the space of a few months. It would be another seven years before it was consecrated, and even then it was unfinished.
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But it is a testament to Matilda’s relief and gratitude at finally having her marriage sanctified that she threw herself into the project with such abandon. She was unquestionably the driving force behind the building of her abbey—and its later success as one of the most influential and prosperous religious houses in the duchy. Her enthusiasm may also have stemmed from a possible interest in architecture inherited from her father, who commissioned a series of splendid new buildings in Flanders during his ascendancy. Her mother, Adela, would surely have proved another inspiration during the project, having herself founded several abbeys and collegiate churches in Flanders.

The attention to detail that Matilda lavished on La Trinité extended to ensuring that the abbey had a sufficiently impressive collection of relics. Once more her interest no doubt derived from her natal family. Her aunt Judith was a renowned collector of relics, and Count Baldwin had once given her a vial of the Holy Blood. Among Matilda’s array were splinters of wood from Christ’s manger and cross, a piece of bread that he had touched, and a strand of his mother Mary’s hair. Meanwhile there was a veritable Aladdin’s cave of minor saints’ body parts: the finger of St. Cecile, a hair of St. Denis, the blood of St. George, and even several entire corpses. This may seem macabre to modern observers, but enormous importance was placed upon such items in the Middle Ages. Bones,
body parts, or other items closely associated with saints were believed to be imbued with that saint’s power, and many miracles were attributed to such relics in popular tales and legends. The better a religious house’s collection, the more blessed it was considered to be.
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That Matilda should amass such an impressive collection for La Trinité reveals not just the meticulous care she showed in the creation of her new abbey, but her own belief in the “magical” powers of the relics. For all her political shrewdness and guile, Matilda was known to be superstitious, and during critical periods of her life she occasionally sought the advice of mystics or magicians—she is recorded to have once consulted the bones of a sheep’s shoulder in the hope of foretelling the future, a practice that was common in her native Flanders.

Matilda’s superstition was by no means unusual among the ruling elite. Interest in magic extended across the entire society of medieval Europe, from kings, princes, and dukes to members of the clergy and even the papacy. It also cut across social boundaries, uniting peasants and noblemen, the uneducated and intellectuals. Most communities had a “wise woman” or “soothsayer” who used the mystical arts to heal the sick or protect against evil. Reading palms, rolling dice, and using randomly selected passages from the Bible to predict the future were widely practiced by such individuals, as well as by members of the clergy. There was also a more sophisticated profession dedicated to the exploration of astrology and alchemy. Training for such a profession took place at universities and other educational establishments, but its expert practitioners were often found at court, which provided an invaluable source of patronage for their endeavors. It was common for rulers to seek the advice of these practitioners, particularly at times of crisis in their reign.

Although many ecclesiasts were involved in the practice of magic, during the tenth and eleventh centuries it was increasingly condemned by the church, which saw it as a threat to its own authority. There was thus an interesting dichotomy between Matilda’s celebrated Christianity and her belief in the mystical arts. In the years to come, it was the latter that she would draw upon more at times of crisis, casting doubt on the apparently intense piety that she was always so keen to display in gestures such as the creation of La Trinité.

Like his wife, William took enormous pride in the building and fitting out of his abbey. Work on St.-Étienne apparently progressed more slowly than on La Trinité, because it was not consecrated until 1077, but like its sister abbey, it was functional from a much earlier date. Lanfranc, by now the duke’s closest ecclesiastical adviser, was appointed abbot in 1063. The Italian’s influence had been increasing steadily during the 1050s and 1060s, and this appointment signified the preeminence that he now enjoyed. It was said that “William venerated him as a father, respected him as a teacher, and loved him like a brother or son.”
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Although they were built for the same purpose, William’s and Matilda’s churches were as different architecturally as their founders were in character. In contrast to the functional starkness of William’s St.-Étienne, with its vast, unadorned west front and imposing towers, La Trinité was complex, intricate, and elaborate. As one later commentator observed: “The one is the expression in stone of the imperial will of the conquering Duke; the other breathes the true spirit of his loving and faithful Duchess.”
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Comparatively little survives of Matilda’s original building today, but the fragments that do—such as the bases of the towers and the arcading of the nave—give an impression of how spectacular it must have been in its heyday.