Robert Guiscard and the Normans in Sicily

Oh my bad man sorry I didn't read properly what time period you wanted.

Yeah its hard to find proper second hand accounts about that period unless its in an introduction to a bigger book about the Norman kingdom.

Do you go to uni by any chance?

>G. A. Loud, The age of Robert Guiscard : Southern Italy and the Norman conquest ( Harlow : Longman, 2000).
>G.A. Loud,‘Southern Italy in the eleventh century’, in The new Cambridge medieval history . Vol. 4. Pts 1 and 2, c.1024-c.1198 IV(2), pp. 94-119.

>J.J. Norwich, The Normans in the South 1016-1130 (London : Longmans, 1967)
>D.J.A. Matthew, The Norman kingdom of Sicily (Cambridge : Cambridge University Press ,1992)
> G.A. Loud, Conquerors and churchmen in Norman Italy (Aldershot : Ashgate, 1999)
>The society of Norman Italy, ed. by G.A. Loud and A. Metcalfe (Boston : Brill, 2002)

Nope, that's bullshit.
He /did/ do the coffin business. But that's against a monastery, if you believe William of Apulia (who was writing for Pope Urban + Guiscard's heir). The Viking version is also recorded as happening before, but I can't remember whom the chronicler was. The inclusion of Guiscard doing it in the story was a way of showing how 'viking' and dangerous the Normans still are at this point. (Guiscard was a bandit lord who kept ransoming people early on)

While he plundered hither and thither, he was unable to capture any castrum or city, and so he resorted to a strategem to enter a certain place, which was very difficult of access since there were many inhabitants, and the monastic community which was living there would allow no stranger to enter. The cunning [Robert] though up an ingenious trick. He told his people to announce that one of their number had died.
The latter was placed on a bier as though he were dead, and on Robert's order was covered with a silk cloth which concealed his face (as it is the custom of Normans to cover bodies). Swords were hidden on the bier under the 'body's' back. The 'body' was carried to the entrance of the monastery to be buried there, and this pretended death deceived those who could not be taken in by living men.

While a simple funeral service was being conducted the man who was about to buried suddenly sprang up; his companions seized their swords and threw themselves on the inhabitants of the place who had been deceived by this trick. What could those stupid people do? They could neither fight nor flee, and all were captured. Thus, Robert, you placed your first garrison in a fortress! He did not however destroy the monastery, nor did he expel the monastic community from it. Robert gathered a very powerful force in this castrum, and became even more beloved by his men since he was both mighty in war and wise in counsel. He was called the count of this region, and considered as such especially by those who were accompanied by their own following of knights. One of these was called Torsten, another Hareng, and [there was] the warlike Roger. To these he gave towns in the area which had been conceded to him.

(William of Apulia, The Deeds of Robert Guiscard, trans.G.A. Loud (unpublished), pp. 23-24.

Cheers, I'll look into those, any recommendation on those if I like it colorful? Like plunder and adventures and such?

Nope, no Uni, just personal interest.

Look at some of the primary sources.
>Amatus of Montecassino, The history of the Normans , trans. by G.A. Loud & P. Dunbar (2004)
>Geoffrey Malaterra, The deeds of Count Roger of Calabria and Sicily and of his brother Duke Robert Guiscard
>William of Apulia, The deeds of Robert Guiscard by William of Apulia

That said, note that chroniclers have a reason for why they represent things a certain why. e.g. William of Apulia writing about a sea monster on the eastern coast that Guiscard kills represents the threat from Byzantium that he defeats in Italy.

Also, if you're interested in Guiscard's later invasion of Byzantium, check out the early bits of
>E.R.A. Sewter (trans.), The Alexiad of Anna Comnena (Penguin Classics 1969)

There are a load of secondary accounts of it. The issue is that most aren't in English. Or weren't, anyway. There's been a large increase in the last 20 years or so, albeit with most of the work coming from G.A. Loud

I'm currently reading Robert Guiskard, 1015-1085. Ein Normanne erobert Süditalien by Richard Bünemann
Which is good with sources and all, but a bit on the dry side. So I wanted a book a bit more colorful, after all, Guiscard was a very colorful person.

Bump

Where do these pictures come from? I see them all over the place but have no idea what they're from.

Osprey. Take them with a grain of salt.

Most of the heavy lifting was done by his elder brothers William and Drogo and some other norman adventurers like the Drengots who had come to Mezzogiorno decades before Robert anyway, Robert inherited a lot of his kingdom from them

Annas book is quite good, even though she hates Guiscard she is positively moist for him as far as his personal attributes go.

It also rams home how effective armored knights were compared to nearly any other force when used properly.

Ok, thanks, I'll definitely look into that.

In fairness, she was an old as shit, living in a monastery and dying from brain cancer when she went about working on histories to add to the work of her dead husband.

Bump

But how did a tiny band of Normans manage to carve out a sizable kingdom in Italy, far away from their own lands and with next to no support?

Basically:
>The land was divided as fuck. Lombards v Lombards. Lombards V Byzantines. Arab raids.
>Depending on the account, Normans wander though and get hired/get hired as mercs after fighting off a muslim raid/get invited in to help a revolt against Byzantium
>Normans work as mercs for everyone
>get a base, which fucks up and monks drive them out
>wander around, keep working as mercs for everyone
>normans all slowly start gaining wealth and land
>Slowly nibble away at everyone else
>Not a united 'Norman' force. Normans winning their own lands and fighting each other but also helping each other
>eat up Lombard and Byzantine towns
>Beat up the Pope when he tries to lead an army against them, then got on their knees and sucked him off in exchange for support
>Pope invests them with land in exchange for help against Germans
>Guiscard and co continue to warband about, tries to carve out land for his second son in Byzantium, gets fucked and dies
>Shit falls apart a bit between his heirs
>Later, Roger II of Sicily manages to unite all the Norman areas
>Kingdom of Sicily now exists.jpg

Ok, but why the Normans? It's not like they are from around the corner and there where tons of vicious bastards from all over Europe for hire at the time.

Weeeell...
>Lands in Normady are under political strife issues
>land is going to the main heir, side ones get fuck all
>Some Normans stumble into employment on their way back from a pilgrimage
>send notes back to their mates going 'dude, lots of work here'
>later on (till around 1120), more Normans (+ french + bretons) slide over because >chance to gain land >loot >adventure
Then they kinda just mix in with the Lombards and greeks. e.g. instead of Say 'Roger' the Norman, you get 'Roger, son of a Norman' etc.

Bump

Well, I can understand that the choose southern Italy over northern England.
So they basically fucked over Byzantine because they where good catholic boys and such?

Always found the Hautvilles to be a very interesting bit of history, I don't really have anything to add sadly.

The Crovan dynasty and norse-gaels I also found interesting, slightly similar I suppose.

>implying the division actually mattered before 1204
No.
It's more 'hey look the Lombard princes are losing their authority, and Lombards keep rebelling against the Byzantines who are focused on fighting the Bulgarians and Turks. Lets work for everyone, then slowly eat them from the inside like a virus.'
>good catholic boys
Guiscard got excommincated.
Heck, a number of Popes tried to remove the Normans (making deals with the Byzantines/Lombards to try and force them out).
It changes because
>shit we can't get rid of them
>fuck the HRE hates me
>fuck it we'll use the Normans. Invest them with land, in exchange for some support against the German Emperor

This was the 1000s-1100s. Normans were the ultimate military adventuring murderhobos. They love creating overnight states with only England succeeding to survive.

>Guiscard got excommincated.
Happens to the best of us, my family was anathema'd twice for trifling reasons.

Undermining and leading armies against the Church is a bit different than whatever got your family in trouble I'd think.

More like just because they could, because the Byzantines (and Arabs) didn't have the kind of diplomatic presence in Western Europe that would actively ruin Norman family alliances and communication/travel lines.

Well, nice try but no.
It's more
>The pope investing Guiscard with land included a 'and sicily when it is conquered'
>Political instability in Sicily
>Work with Muslim leaders and respect local religions when invading
>Most of the work is done by Count Roger
>Guiscard, meanwhile, has a fucking issue
>Guiscard needs land and gold to hand out to keep his fellow murderhobos happy
>Guiscard doesn't have much authority like a feudal lord, more a war band leader (revolt occurs when he asks for wedding gifts for his kids marriage)
>Michael of the ERE decides to bring Normans into orbit of the empire
>Offers marriage alliance
>Guiscard plays hard to get while peeing fanboying about
>Guiscard marries his daughter off to Emperor's son, Guiscard gains legitimacy/titles + GOLD
>standardbyzantinepoliticalupheavel.jpg
>Michael forced out, fucks off to be a monk
>Guiscard needed that fucking gold
>Can't expand into Sicily since Roger has claimed that
>Can't go into North Africa since too far
>Can't go up into Italy since Pope is 110% mad at land expansion there
>Byzantium looks weak from internal strife
>Need land for his other son (lest he end up fighting his heir)
>idea.jpg
>Gather up a monk to act as the fake emperor
>install to 'restore the fake emperor'
>Byzantine civlians laugh at this because 'that 's not the emperor, fuckwit'
>Guiscard tries to carve out some land for his heir
>this goes wrong
>Guiscard ends up going back to Italy to save the pope + put down a revolt
>Guiscard ends up burning Rome

was meant for

...

Actually that was #1 on the list, second time it was the same, just now with 100% protestantism.

Huh. Sounds like your ancestors were cunts

No, just freedom fighters against a tyrannical prince-abbot of the HRE. Maybe they got carried away a bit when they plundered the abbey and harassed the lands, but then it was the early 15th century and fuck them if they can't take a joke.

>freedom fighters meme
>looting religious buildings and harassing locals
So terrorists at the worst and bandits at best?

No wonder they got excommunicated.

You got a couple points wrong:
1. My ancestors where freedom fighters and true revolutionaries. Mostly because they won and we still hold the lands to the very day. Now while this is the same line of work like bandit, the success makes the big difference.

2. Prince abbot Kuno was a cunt, and so was the Archduke Leopold IV. They where pressing the poor farmers with insane levels of taxation, no wonder the entire region rebelled. The abbot and the church and the Habsburg sent in their armies, but luckily for my ancestors they where pretty good at beating the piss out of knights and nobles.

3. Harassing the lands of your enemy is standard procedure in medieval warfare, my ancestors just have been very efficient at it and crown and abbey lands near by where plentiful. Maybe during some of the rougher years they turned this to their main occupation, but an in all they kept to the rules of war that where valid at the time. Also they where not known for excessive violence like torture or some shit, just quick with the axe.

4. We got fucking Anathema'd! Now thats a bit over the top. They didn't even use the minor excommunication, no, full Anathema!
I could understand that in the second instance, when they indeed turned Protestant, but not in the 15th century. Anathema is reserved for heresy against the faith, which we didn't do, there was not even a religious dispute, it just happened that the cunt they where rebelling against was an abbot, so the church fucked them over. If it would have been just some noble they would have got away with Imperial ban (they got banned) and thats that. No need to drag Jesus into this mess.

I am very proud of them, democratic and progressive revolutionaries against the tyranny of the feudal system and the yoke of the church. And that in a time where you would be flayed or burnt alive for things like that.

Thats them btw, outnumbered 10:1 and still kicking the shit out of abbot Kuno and his merry men.

So many of those guys look like they're high or on acid

>1000 yard stare

>implying success makes a terrorist any less of a terrorist
>being proud of terrorists
>'democratic'
>implying that joining the Swiss Confederation and getting granted freedom from the obligations is 'muh freeedom from tyrany'

Pathetic.

>t. butthurt Habsburg

Brit actually. Just not a fan of people jerking themselves off over terrorists because 'muh ancestors'.

Regardless, the building in the pic is pretty damn neat.

Side note for anyone reading source material that is translated: Castle/Castela in South Italy isn't a castle in the english sense. It's a fortified village. Similar to the ones the Byzantines had in Asia Minor/Bulgaria.

Hey, you are free to appease to whomever you lie, we choose to be free and thats the way it is for 600 years now.
Yes, the castle is very nice, especially that little flag on top of it.

>I am very proud of them, democratic and progressive revolutionaries against the tyranny of the feudal system and the yoke of the church.

What a faggot you are

Many butthurt kneebenders here.

Back on track, I read in some primary sources about Robert Guiscard getting one of his men to punch a Lombard horse, then they gave the Lombards another horse in compensation.

Basically saying; hey look, we're tough, honourable and rich. Don't fuck with us.

Can't remember the source though, got it as a handout from my tutor at university and it's gone out with the rest of the paper scraps that adorned my desk during finals.

Well, it's not in Loud's translation of Deeds of Robert Guiscard, at any rate.

It's in Geoffrey Malaterra

Since they lacked a fortress [castrum] through which they could protect themselves from the inhabitants of that area, they built one, which was called Melfi. There were though only five hundred knights there when the Greeks who ruled that land raised a huge army from Calabria and Apulia, numbering nearly sixty thousand troops, and marched against them, intending to drive them right out of the country. They sent an envoy ahead of them to inform them that they should choose what they preferred, either a battle with them next day, or they would be granted a truce to cross back over the border unharmed. The envoy who had been sent on this mission rode a particularly handsome horse. One of the Normans, Hugh Tudebusis, started to pat this horse.

He wanted the Greeks to be told something amazing about him and his fellows which might terrify them, and so he struck the horse in the neck with his bare fist and with one blow knocked it down as though it was dead. The other Normans rushed forward and picked up the Greek, who had been thrown to the ground with his horse and was laying there as if dead, although he himself was not injured, but merely afraid. The horse however they dragged to a cliff and threw off. The Greek, who had only just been restored to his senses by the Normans' assistance, received a better horse from them and reported back to his compatriots that they were prepared for battle. But when he told the leaders of his people all that had happened to him, they were struck with fear and admiration. They kept this information to themselves, afraid that if it was spoken about openly the army might flee in terror.

Geoffrey Malaterra, 'The Deeds of Count Roger of Calabria and Sicily and of Duke Robert Guiscard his brother', trans. by G.A. Loud (unpublished), pp. 9-10.

This isn't Guiscard, btw. It's William the Iron Arm and Count Drogo.

>Count Drogo.
and his merry horse punchers

Anna's book is in btw

Was the Norman administration/state like the others of the time? Or did they have an advanced administration?

That's the one, ta!
This is probably why I only got a 2:1

They basically absorbed and used the Lombard/Greek/Arab administration, with a bit brought in from Normandy

Hey, you only need a 2:1 after 3 years to do a masters, not all bad.

After a year of Clive Burgess and Parish Churches, a masters is the last thing I want to do. Great guy, boring as fuck.