The English Navy in the Twelfth Century*

2020 ◽  
Vol 135 (575) ◽  
pp. 743-774
Author(s):  
Susan Raich Sequeira
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Royal Navy ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Territorial Expansion ◽  
Royal Power ◽  
Crucial Component ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Trading Networks ◽  
Shed Light

Abstract This article investigates the naval strategies of England’s post-Conquest kings, especially from c.1100–1189, a period for which modern scholarship has yet to recognise the existence of a royal navy. It demonstrates that post-Conquest kings deployed warships, summoned defensive fleets, and launched their own invasion navies throughout the long twelfth century. Previously unnoticed evidence for the maintenance of warships under Henry II is discussed and records of fleet recruitment are used to shed light on the systems behind naval levies. Given all this evidence, it can firmly be concluded that there was a navy at the disposal of England’s Anglo-Norman and Angevin kings. The origins of this navy are twofold. Firstly, twelfth-century tactics drew on Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Danish systems and precedents, suggesting the long continuity of post-Conquest naval activities rather than sudden naval innovation under any particular king. The ‘English navy’ therefore did not decline after the Norman Conquest, nor was it a new foundation of Richard I. Secondly, England’s twelfth-century rulers relied upon the maritime skills and co-operation of coastal and port inhabitants across the realm. These coastal denizens’ motivations for participation in royal navies reveal both the extent and the limitations of English royal power. Royal naval activities took place against the backdrop of a European north that was becoming ever more connected by sea routes. English navies were therefore a crucial component of territorial expansion and warfare across a realm situated in the midst of extensive pan-European trading networks.

Leges Scocie and the Lawcodes of David I, William the Lion and Alexander II

2009 ◽  
Vol 88 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-288 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Legal Procedure ◽  
Royal Power ◽  
Manuscript Tradition ◽  
Anglo Norman

This paper examines Leges Scocie (LS), the main source used by Patrick Wormald in ‘Anglo-Saxon Law and Scots Law’. It is shown here that the capitula of LS reveal much not only about the development of legal procedure in Scotland but also about the nature of medieval Scottish society in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. In the process of this discussion, some conclusions put forward by Wormald about this material are questioned. This paper also shows that the ‘laws’ of David, William and Alexander II, once believed to be nebulous texts without any clear manuscript form, are, in fact, coherent legal compilations worthy of study in their own right. This corrects the impression that the early laws of Scotland survive in a manuscript tradition too late and too complicated to be studied with any fruitful results and thus opens up the material in volume i of The Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland for further study. The paper concludes by arguing that the evidence contained in all these lawcodes can provide rather different narratives of subjects that are key to our understanding of Scotland during the central Middle Ages: the exercise of royal power, the ‘Anglo-Norman Era’ and the extent of the Scottish state before the twelfth century.

The Cult of St Edmund, King and Martyr in Medieval Ireland

2018 ◽  
Vol 136 (4) ◽  
pp. 223-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francis Young
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
14Th Century ◽  
Patron Saint ◽  
12Th Century ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Christ Church ◽  
Medieval Ireland ◽  
The Middle Ages

St Edmund, king and martyr (an Anglo-Saxon king martyred by the Vikings in 869) was one of the most venerated English saints in Ireland from the 12th century. In Dublin, St Edmund had his own chapel in Christ Church Cathedral and a guild, while Athassel Priory in County Tipperary claimed to possess a miraculous image of the saint. In the late 14th century the coat of arms ascribed to St Edmund became the emblem of the king of England’s lordship of Ireland, and the name Edmund (or its Irish equivalent Éamon) was widespread in the country by the end of the Middle Ages. This article argues that the cult of St Edmund, the traditional patron saint of the English people, served to reassure the English of Ireland of their Englishness, and challenges the idea that St Edmund was introduced to Ireland as a heavenly patron of the Anglo-Norman conquest.

II. —Decorated Initials in English MSS. from A.D. 900 to 1100

Archaeologia ◽  
1945 ◽  
Vol 91 ◽  
pp. 107-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Wormald
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Ample Evidence ◽  
The Past ◽  
Outline Drawing ◽  
History Of ◽  
Norman Invasion ◽  
Do So

A recent beautiful publication by Mr. Mynors of the MSS. in the Cathedral Library at Durham has raised an important point in the history of English illuminated MSS. Up to now there has been a tendency to regard the Norman Conquest as constituting a complete break with the past accompanied by the introduction of a new style of illumination. There is, of course, no doubt that in many spheres of life the Norman occupation of England did do away with many characteristics of Anglo-Saxon England. But this is not the whole story. A change in one department of life does not mean a revolution in another. In the realm of literature, for instance, Professor Chambers has shown that the Conquest did not interrupt the writing and development of vernacular prose. Mr. Mynors's book produces ample evidence to confirm a suspicion long held by some, but not uttered, that much of the ornament used by illuminators of English MSS. during the first fifty years after the Conquest is directly descended from motives in use in England long before the Norman invasion. To Mr. Mynors's evidence from Durham, examples of illuminated MSS. from Canterbury may be added in order to show that the famous outline drawing style of the English MSS. of the tenth and eleventh centuries had healthy descendants in the early years of the twelfth century. The best place to see this continuity is in the illuminated initials of these MSS. In order to do so it is necessary to examine the development of initial ornament in England during the tenth and eleventh centuries.

COURT CASES AND LEGAL ARGUMENTS IN ENGLAND, c.1066–1166

2000 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 91-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Hudson
Keyword(s):  
Legal History ◽  
Court Cases ◽  
Direct Link ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Royal Power ◽  
Legal Reforms ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Legal Arguments ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractTHE relationship between law, the power of participants in disputes, and the structure of society and politics is always a complex one. It is also, not surprisingly therefore, controversial in writings on jurisprudence, modern law, and legal history. In this paper I argue for the importance of legal norms in the conduct of disputes in England in the period between the Norman Conquest and the early Angevin legal reforms. This importance is certainly related to the extent of Anglo-Norman royal power. However, in a wider context I shall argue against any necessary, simple, and direct link between political structure and the existence and influence of legal norms.

After Alfred

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pauline Stafford
Keyword(s):  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Royal Power ◽  
Politics Of History ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Vernacular History ◽  
King Alfred

This book traces the development of a group of anonymous, vernacular, annalistic chronicles—‘the Anglo-Saxon chronicles’—from their genesis at the court of King Alfred to their end at the Fenland monastery of Peterborough. It reconsiders them in the light of wider European scholarship on the politics of history-writing. It covers all surviving manuscript chronicles, with detailed attention being paid to palaeography, layout, and content, and identifies key lost texts. It is concerned with production, scribe-authors, patrons, and audiences. The centuries these chronicles cover were critical to the making of England and saw its conquest by Scandinavians and Normans. They have long been part of the English national story. The book considers the impact of this on their study and editing. It stresses their multiplicity, whilst identifying a tradition of writing vernacular history. It sees that tradition as an expression of the ideology of a southern elite engaged in the conquest and assimilation of old kingdoms north of the Thames, Trent, and Humber. The book connects many chronicles to bishops and especially to archbishops of York and Canterbury. Vernacular chronicling is seen, not as propaganda, but as engaged history-writing closely connected to the court, whose networks and personnel were central to the production of chronicles and their continuation. The disappearance of the English-speaking elite after the Norman Conquest had profound impacts on them, repositioning their authors in relation to the court and royal power, and ultimately resulting in the end of the tradition of vernacular chronicling.

Historical Outline and the Geography of ‘Anarchy’

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oliver H. Creighton ◽  
Duncan W. Wright ◽  
Michael Fradley ◽  
Steven Trick
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Characteristic Feature ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
English Channel ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Asymmetric Warfare ◽  
Historical Outline ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
English Society

This chapter covers two areas: it provides a sketch of English society and landscape in the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries, and presents a year-by-year chronology of Stephen’s reign. At the point of Stephen’s accession to the throne in 1135, the longer-term impacts of the Norman Conquest on English society and landscape were still being played out. Ethnicity and identity in the period were fluid, and so mid-twelfth-century England was a developing Anglo-Norman state rather that a subjugated dominion. While ‘the Anarchy’ of Stephens reign is frequently styled as a civil war, the conflict was unusually complex and protracted, and involved more than two opposing sides. The period saw persistent asymmetric warfare on the borderlands of Wales, a succession of incursions from Scotland and Angevin invasions from across the English Channel, while a struggle for control of Normandy dominated the wider strategic landscape. The most characteristic feature of conflict during the period was an unprecedented series of internal rebellions, led by disloyal, disenfranchised or marginalised magnates and underlain by regional grievances.

Changing Thegns: Cnut's Conquest and the English Aristocracy

1984 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 375-387 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katharin Mack
Keyword(s):  
Eleventh Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Edward The Confessor

England was conquered twice in the eleventh century: first in 1016 by Cnut the Dane and again in 1066 by William Duke of Normandy. The influence of the Norman Conquest has been the subject of scholarly warfare ever since E.A. Freeman published the first volume of his History of the Norman Conquest of England in 1867—and indeed, long before. The consequences of Cnut's conquest, on the other hand, have not been subjected to the same scrutiny. Because England was conquered twice in less than fifty years, historians have often succumbed to the temptation of comparing the two events. But since Cnut's reign is poorly documented and was followed quickly by the restoration of the house of Cerdic in the person of Edward the Confessor, such studies have tended to judge 1016 by the standards of 1066. While such comparisons are useful, they have imposed a model on Cnut's reign which has distorted the importance of the Anglo-Scandinavian period. If, however, Cnut's reign is compared with the Anglo-Saxon past rather than the Anglo-Norman future, the influence of 1016 can be more fairly assessed.

The Modus Medendi and the Benedictine Order in Anglo-Norman England

1982 ◽  
Vol 19 ◽  
pp. 25-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne F. Dawtry
Keyword(s):  
Ancient World ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Drug List ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Medical Learning ◽  
Medical Treatises

The Benedictines played an important part in the development of medicine in England between 1066 and 1215. In pre-conquest England, the care of the sick had been based upon little more than the practices of Anglo-Saxon leeches which were largely founded upon superstition. Botany had become a drug list and medicine had deteriorated into little more than a collection of formulae. After the Norman conquest, chiefly through the influence of Benedictine scholars from the continent, medical learning in England began to be based upon the writings of the ancient world. These included not only the works of Galen and Hippocrates but also anonymous medical treatises in Latin such as the De Modo Medendi.

Domesday Book and Anglo-Norman Governance

1975 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 175-193 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sally P. J. Harvey
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Magna Carta ◽  
Domesday Book

Domesday Book stands accused of isolation and its historians stand convicted of isolated devotion to Domesday studies. The isolation is not entirely splendid. ‘An inestimable boon to a learned posterity but a vast administrative mistake’ was the brief verdict of Mr Richardson and Professor Sayles in their treatment of the governance of England from the Norman Conquest to Magna Carta. Reviewing recent Domesday studies Dr King judged that research ‘in so arid a climate’ has maintained the gap between Domesday Book and its use in eleventh-and twelfth-century government, and made ‘the inquiry into the resources of the tenants-in-chief look rather more lonely than before, and rather less necessary’.

Conclusion: Harold Godwinson, the last Anglo-Saxon in the Welsh borderlands

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lindy Brady
Keyword(s):  
Distinct Region ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
English Identity

Writing the Welsh borderlands in Anglo-Saxon England concludes with the Latin Life of Harold Godwinson, an understudied text set during the transition from Anglo-Saxon to Anglo-Norman England. The Vita Haroldi continues to depict the Welsh borderlands as a distinctive territory where two peoples came together across the temporal divide of the Norman Conquest. This work claims that Harold was not killed at the Battle of Hastings, but survived and lived for many years afterwards disguised as a hermit in the Welsh borderlands. Harold’s curious Vita is a fitting microcosm of this book. The Welsh borderlands serve as the cultural intersection between Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman England, the last place where English identity is preserved after the Norman arrival. Yet Harold, the last Anglo-Saxon, can survive only within the borderlands, a cultural nexus of Anglo-Saxon and Welsh. The Vita Haroldi underscores the reputation of the Welsh borderlands as a distinct region where two peoples came together, even from a perspective of longing for a lost English past after the Norman Conquest.

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