Charter A Week 79: A New Aquitaine?

Last time we were in Aquitaine, Bishop Stephen II of Clermont was getting his local authority reinforced through a renewed connection to royalty. Yet there was a cloud on the horizons: the presence of William Towhead, count of Poitiers, on the Loire with him. William’s position in the first half of the 950s was difficult, not least because when Louis IV died Hugh the Great was able to exploit the new king, Lothar, to attack him. Nonetheless, William fought Hugh off, and even pushed eastwards to try and suborn an old royal ally:

CC no. 1.825 (June 955/shortly thereafter, Huillaux/Ennezat)

Since, in the laborious pilgrimage of this world, whilst it is yet allowed and whilst the time is right and the days of salvation are seen to be at hand, provision ought to be made with every fibre of one’s being that if we can do anything good we should put aside all delay and not hesitate to carry it out, making our debtors those whom we know truly to consult for the safety of the body in the present and whom we little doubt will be judges of our souls in future. Because after death we can do nothing good, we deem it worthwhile to give satisfaction to the Hidden Judge before we are led to that subtle and incomprehensible Judgement. We should not cease to wipe what we have negligently committed clean with the hand of penitence however we can in this brief life.  

Therefore I, Stephen, an unworthy sinner, and my wife named Ermengard, considering the enormity of our sins, and – which is more salubrious – delighting to hear the sweetest voice of our lord Jesus Christ, which says ‘Give alms and behold, everything will be clean unto you’, and also that which holy Scripture admonishes us, saying ‘the riches of a man are the redemption of his soul’, donate because of this exhortation and admonition something from the goods of our property to God and His holy apostles Peter and Paul at the place of Cluny, which the humble abbot lord Aimard is seen to preside over. The place is sited in the district of Mâconnais, and is consecrated in veneration of the blessed mother of God Mary, ever-virgin, and of the same apostles. These goods are sited in the county of Auvergne, in the bishopric of Autun: that is, the indominical curtilage which is called Huillaux with a chapel which is built in honour of the blessed mother of God Mary, where St Leotald rests in body. 

We make this donation on this condition: whilst we live, I, Stephen and my wife Ermengard, we should hold and possess it, and the rulers of the abovenamed place should hold the chapel in vestiture with everything which is seen to pertain to that chapel. After both of our deaths, we donate and wish to be donated in perpetuity to Lord God, as we have often already said, as much as is beholden or seen to be beholden to that curtilage or to that chapel which is built therein in its entirety, for the remedy of our souls, and for the remedy of the souls of our parents, and in addition for the salvation of the living and the rest of the dead, with serfs and freedmen, fields, meadows, vineyards, woods, waters and watercourses, mills, houses, buildings, with everything thereon, mobile and immobile goods, incomes and renders, cultivated and uncultivated lands, sought and to be sought, beholden or pertaining to that inheritance, as is ruled and possessed by us at the present time, so that the rulers of the said monastery and those serving God therein might, without interruption by anyone, firmly and solidly hold it always in perpetuity. 

If anyone, which we do not believe will come to pass, we ourselves (God forbid!) or anyone at all joined to us by kinship, a son or a daughter, a nephew, or anyone else at all, might against divine right become an invader or contradictor of this donation spontaneously made by Us, and endeavours to transfer the good named to God and entrusted to His saints into their uses, in the first place let them incur the wrath of God Almighty, Whose goods they have presumed to by rash daring, let them be bound by the chains of a terrible anathema, and unless they come to their senses, let them be subject to every curse, and let this donation endure firm. 

S. Stephen and his wife Ermengard. Heldin. Rainald. Robert. Caro. Warner. 

Enacted publicly at Huillaux. 

Boso wrote and gave this in the month of June, in the year of the Lord’s incarnation 952 [sic], in the 3rd indiction, in the 1st year of the reign of King Lothar, who commanded a precept be made about the same donation and signed it with his seal. 

At lord Stephen’s command, this charter was read in the court at Ennezat before the lord count William [Towhead], in the presence of lord Stephen [II], bishop of the Auvergne, on the day when the lords of the Auvergne gathered with the aforenamed count and commended themselves to him; and he had the male and female serfs who were not there to be written by name. These are their names: Bladald, who is vicar of that power, with his wife, named Ermentrude, and their sons and daughters, and another named Godin with his wife and their sons and daughters, and as well all the other serfs who are seen to pertain to the same power.

This charter was confirmed and corroborated in the same assembly, at the prayer of lord Stephen, who asked it to be made. S. lord Stephen, bishop of Auvergne, Count William, Viscount Robert [of Clermont], Abbot Robert [of Mozac], Girbern, Theotard, Stephen, Viscount Dalmatius [of Brioude], Heldin, William, Deodatus. 

The church at Ennezat as it exists today (source)

This document’s dating is all out of whack, which is an issue. We also have at least two different events being described here, and probably three: the giving of Stephen’s gift at Huillaux, Lothar’s confirmation of it, and the assembly at Ennezat. Ennezat definitely followed Huillaux, so the question becomes twofold: 1) when was Lothar’s diploma relatively; and 2) when did these events take place in absolute terms?

The second question is easiest to answer. The Ennezat assembly is almost certainly summer 955, and most historians will give you that date. In fact, they’ll normally tell you June 955; but the charter’s June dating probably attaches more properly to the Huillaux donation than to the Ennezat assembly. In any case, though, the latter probably followed shortly after the former. The main question then is when Lothar’s diploma was issued. Here, we have to confess that given that the charter as it currently survives is evidently a melange, it could really have been at any point in his reign. However, we do have to consider when, exactly, Lothar would have been interested in confirming Stephen and Ermengard’s donation. (I am here assuming that the diploma was specifically in regard to this donation rather than merely mentioning it as part of a general confirmation.) What I want to have happened is a first donation, perhaps in 952, which was then confirmed at Lothar’s coronation (we can surmise relatively easily that Stephen and Ermengard’s patron Stephen of Clermont was there). Realistically, though, there’s no particular reason to assume that the original donation was prior to the charter being written in 955, and – as we’ll see in upcoming weeks – the early 960s would provide a better point for that diploma to be issued.

This leaves us with the events of 955 themselves. If so, then this charter gains an interesting frisson. Much of the context for this act has been covered before on this blog long ago, but in fact there’s some crucial chronological nuance which means that picture needs a little revising. To summarise, William Towhead had been an ally of Louis IV, but ties had loosened after the late 940s. Then, when Louis died in 954, Hugh the Great took partial control of his young son Lothar’s regime, and was – according to Flodoard – ‘given’ Aquitaine by the king. This was a final attempt by Hugh to regain his position as uncontested second man in the kingdom, and I think it prompted something much like what Raymond Pons of Toulouse had done almost twenty years earlier. Unlike Raymond, William did not claim to be ‘duke of the Aquitanians’ – yet – but he did move into Auvergne, a place none of his ancestors had held any interest. We’ve seen before that William’s infringing on Stephen of Clermont’s territory was not without friction, and it also prompted Hugh to respond with the military attack on Poitiers we discussed in passing last time – according to Richer, William marched to Poitiers directly from Auvergne. William’s rejection of the authority of Hugh and Lothar basically failed. He kept Poitiers, but his authority in Auvergne became yet more precarious. However, William may have been down, but he was not out. The struggle for Aquitaine was just beginning.

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Charter A Week 75: New Peace, Old Tricks

In early 950, Louis IV and Hugh the Great finally agreed to an Ottonian-brokered peace deal. One of the effects of this was a de facto division of the West Frankish kingdom into spheres of Carolingian and Robertian influence. However, this peace was fragile. Part of the reason was that Louis’ and Hugh’s subordinates were not necessarily compliant: they had their own personal interests, and a peace between their masters did not always affect their behaviour. Flodoard, for instance, tells us that in 950 both one of Louis’ subordinates (Ragenold of Roucy) and one of Hugh’s (Theobald the Trickster) infringed the peace deal. Notably, whereas Louis persuaded Ragenold to step back, Hugh was unable to do the same with Theobald. Louis responded by rattling sabres, displaying public support for Hugh’s enemy Arnulf the Great of Flanders and – going back to his strategies of the 940s – seeking to strengthen his alliances in the south.

In 951, Louis set out for Aquitaine. As we’ve seen in previous weeks, there were reasons to think he’d find a good reception there. Bishop Stephen of Clermont, the big cheese of the Auvergne, had probably been appointed by Louis, and had certainly backed him over Hugh when Louis was imprisoned in 945. However, this doesn’t appear to have translated into concrete support in the key years of the late 940s, and it makes sense that Louis would have wanted to renegotiate his relationship with central Aquitaine. Moreover, a little before 951, Stephen had reorientated his strategies of legitimacy:

CC no. 1.792 (c. 950)

In the name of Lord God Eternal.

Stephen, by grace of the Holy Spirit bishop of Auvergne.

If it can be done, I want it to be known to all Christ’s followers in common how I and my father Robert and his wife Hildegard endeavoured to summon to the place which is called Sauxillanges the abbot named Aimard from the monastery of Cluny, who delegated monks therein to build up the same place in accordance with the Rule, both for the salvation of our souls and also for the remedy of Count Acfred [II of Aquitaine], who bestowed that allod on God Almighty, of whom my same father was also an almsman; and for the soul of William [the Pious], the first and greatest duke; and as well for the younger William [the Younger], and for the rest of all our relatives, and all the Christian faithful living and dead, such that they might busy themselves to offer prayers to God Almighty there. 

Therefore, we established concerning this matter that from this day forth for all time the same place should be held and disposed and ordained, with God’s help, legally and in accordance with the Rule by the aforesaid abbot and after his death by his successors and by the monks of Cluny.

If, perchance, anyone is displeased that we have so ordained the goods which were given to God Almighty (as is written in the aforesaid place’s charter), they should remember that Lord Jesus gave His Church, which He deigned to call His bride, and which He bought with his own and precious blood, to the blessed Peter, prince of the apostles, commanding not merely once but also twice and three times that he should nourish this flock. And thus, because of this, we prohibit and call to witness in God and through God and through Lord Jesus that no prince, no bishop succeeding me in this episcopal office, nor any invader should presume to prey upon, devastate, or diminish the goods of this place, nor exact any service or dues from the power of this place with any trickeryor ordain anything unjustly using episcopal authority as an excuse, nor exercise dominion over anything by the power of his situation.  

Witnesses: Stephen, bishop of the Auvergne. Viscountess Hildegard. Bishop Otgar [unknown see, probably southern Aquitanian]. Viscount Robert [of Clermont]. Viscount Eustorgius. Stephen, abbot of Mozac. Abbot Robert [of Mozat]. Gilbert. William. Hector. Godo. Andrald. Albion. Desiderius. Hugh. Eliseus. Bernard. Roger. Prior Bernard. Keymaster Stephen. Archdeacon Deodatus. Stephen son of Theotard. Theotard. Eldin. Another Eldin. Gulfer. 

Stephen, like a number of central Aquitanian elites in the first part of the tenth century, kept alive the memory of the Guillelmid dukes, and Sauxillanges became a lieu de memoire par excellence, even if Acfred II wouldn’t have appreciated it. In fact, subordinating Sauxillanges to Cluny would have particularly galled him… In any case, though, this charter shows Stephen and his family, the viscounts of Clermont, putting Sauxillanges into a Cluniac orbit. My best reading of this is that it was an act of ideological reconciliation: with Ralph of Burgundy out of the way, the two halves of the Guillelmid monastic legacy could finally team up, and Stephen and his family, who – as you can see here – claimed to follow in Guillelmid footsteps, could present a past of central Aquitanian regional hegemony where troubles had been smoothed over.

In 951, Louis showed up with an army, evidently expecting trouble. However, the major magnates of Aquitaine – Charles Constantine of Vienne (on whom more next time), William Towhead of Poitiers, and Stephen II of Clermont – appeared and submitted to him. There were several meetings. Stephen’s submission took place, significantly, at Pouilly-sur-Loire, a traditional meeting place for meetings between Aquitanian magnates and West Frankish kings going back to the ninth century. The only surviving documentary evidence for this is the following charter:

D L4 no. 37 = CC no. 1.763 = ARTEM no. 1604 = D.Kar VIII.8 (3rd February 951, Pouilly-sur-Loire)

In the name of the holy and indivisible Trinity.

Louis, by propitiation of divine mercy king of the Franks.

If in giving work to divine worship We endeavour to raise God’s Church to the highest state of holy religion, We use royal custom and the privileges of Our predecessors.

Wherefore let the skill of all the faithful of the holy Church of God both present and future know that the venerable Bishop Stephen [II] of Auvergne, approaching Our Presence, reverently asked that We might deign to confer by a precept of Our Regality certain goods, the same goods which the late Count Acfred [II of Aquitaine] bestowed on God and His saints from the right of his property in the district of Auvergne for the remedy of his soul and that of his relatives to build up the Rule of St Benedict there, for the monastery of Cluny and its abbot, and this We did. 

Whence We commanded this decree of Our Highness to be made and given to Aimard, abbot of the aforesaid monastery, through which the same abbot and his successors might perpetually hold the aforesaid goods in their entirety just as is contained in the charter of the aforesaid Count Acfred, disturbed by no-one.

And that this emolument of Our authority might be inviolably conserved through the course of times to come, confirming it below with Our own hand, We commanded it be signed with the impression of Our signet.

Sign of lord Louis, the most glorious king.

Odilo the notary re-read and underwrote on behalf of Archbishop Artald [of Rheims].

Enacted at the estate of Pouilly-sur-Loire, on the 3rd nones of February [3rd February], in the 6th indiction, in the 15th year of the reign of the glorious King Louis. 

The original diploma (source linked above).

Whilst this diploma is significant, it is also straightforward. Despite everything which had happened over the years, despite the many shocks the realm had undergone since the foundation of Sauxillanges in 927, the fundamental dynamic of early medieval kingship had changed little. Stephen of Clermont led a regional aristocratic group, to which he gave Louis access; in return, Louis legitimised Stephen’s position at the head of that group. Way back in my original series of posts on Aquitaine, I noted how important this royal connection was to Stephen, and this was a key link in the chain, next to 945 and 962. This significance came down to the place itself: as Stephen stood in Pouilly, where Aquitanian rulers from Charles the Child to Bernard Plantevelue had met their West Frankish overlords, he must have felt the symbolic resonances empowering his rule. However, Stephen was not there alone. Probably at Pouilly with him was William Towhead, count of Poitiers. The Poitevin counts did not normally come that far east, and one wonders how many plans occurred to William along the journey…

Charter A Week 69: That Stephen of Clermont Charter in Full

Sometimes in Charter A Week, there’s a document which I think is so important that it has to be translated, but precisely because it’s so important, I’ve already discussed it at length. Such a one is this week’s act, and so this week’s post will be concomitantly shorter than usual. Without further ado, here’s the text:

Grand Cartulaire de Brioude no. 434 (7th October 945, Saint-Germain-Lembron)

In the name of the holy and individual Trinity.

Stephen, by assent of divine mercy, extraordinary bishop of the church of Clermont, most worthy in life and customs.

I wish to make it known to all those administering the cares of the holy Church of God, that is, present and future, and all the famous of the Earth, that, I, Bishop Stephen, most humble servant of the servants of God, considering the disaster of human fragility, in order that the pious and merciful Lord might deign to loosen something of the frightfulness of my crimes, both for me and for my lord King Louis and his wife and their offspring, and for the souls of my father Robert and his wife Aldegard and my mother Adalgard who is dead and my uncles, to wit, Eustorgius, Matfred and Guy, and my cousin Stephen, and my brothers Eustorgius and Robert, and my uncle Armand and his son Amblard and Eustorgius son of Eustorgius, and also Abbot Robert [of Mozat] and his brothers, and all Our kinsmen and faithful men, and all Our friends and enemies, I render to my Creator, the Lord, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and I bestow upon the blessed Julian of the church of Brioude, who did not decline to endure a death sentence for Christ, the place and estate which is named Saint-Germain-Lembron, with manses, fields, meadows, vineyards, woodlands, and three churches, of which one is dedicated in honour of Saint Germanus, the other in honour of Saint John the Baptist, and the third in honour of Saint Clement, martyr of Christ, with male and female slaves who live now and might be born or beogtten therein later, with mills and all the tithes pertaining to the same churches, and as much as, by gift of God, I have there in the present day, or which in posterity, I, Bishop Stephen, and Abbot Robert, might be able to justly acquire, I render to the Lord, Creator of All, in its entirety, so that it might be under the domination and power of the blessed Julian and his canons, and I give and transfer them from my power into their domination, so that they might have, hold and possess them such that it might be seen to be subject from the present day under the tutelage of the blessed Julian just like the monastery which is called Chanteuges, which is constructed in honour of the blessed Marcellinus and the blessed Julian and the blessed Saturninus; thus let the estate of Saint-Germain-Lembron, with churches and all its appendages, after my death, be in the tutelage and domination of the church of the blessed Julian.

I, Bishop Stephen, although unworthy, desire, if the Lord gives me the space of life, to construct a little monastery in the aforesaid place, and, by disposition of divine grace, I desire to establish there in the aforesaid little place, in honour of the Eternal King and the twelve apostles, twelve monks, so that they monks might, for all the days of their life, serve God, fear the Lord, love the Lord, and to observe the precept of the blessed Benedict and their abbot according to their men and possibility, for that they might constantly exhort the Lord for me and the statue of the holy Church of God day and night.

Thus, I, the aforesaid Stephen, wish to hold the aforesaid things for the days of my life, under my power and tutelage, and each year, in census, at the time of the vine harvest, I should have ten pecks gathered into the cellar of the blessed Julian, until such time as, by disposition of God, I might establish twelve monks in the aforesaid place; after twelve monks have been established there, let them pay no census, except, on appropriate days, let them say a prayer after Matins, and rise from the earth, and let each, prostrate, sing two psalms, of which the first should be Beati omnes qui timent Dominum, for the salvation of the living, and the other Lauda anima mea Dominum for the rest of the dead, at Primes, at Terce, at Sext, at Nones, and similarly at Vespers, let both them and their successors do this.

After my death, I wish to add that no king nor count nor bishop nor abbot nor father nor brother nor uncle nor any kinsman might presume to arise with rash daring against this page and against those monks who, by disposition of God, have come into that place, or presume to go, act or disturb it with any calumny, unless they come to their senses and to emendation, let them incur the wrath of God Almighty and the offence of the saints, and be immersed in the deepest inferno with Dathan and Abiron, Ananias and Saphira, and with Judas, betrayer of the Lord, and in addition let they who presumed to do it be compelled to pay twenty pounds of the purest gold, and not vindicate what they seek. And it pleased me that, after my death, it should remain in the hand and domination of Abbot Robert, son of Gozbert, so that for the days of his life, for the love of God and the remedy of my soul and all the Christian faithful, he might rule, build and govern the aforesaid place, so that in future he might merit to hear that desirable voice which the Lord says to His faithful: ‘Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things; I will make thee ruler over many things, enter thou into the joy of thy lord’.

But that this charter might be firm and true through time to come, I, Bishop Stephen, of my own free will, asked it be written and confirmed, and I asked it be confirmed by the hands of noble men. If it should happen, which I little believe, that any son of Belial should arise who might with rash daring wish to twist this render to God Almighty and donation to the blessed martyr Julian from the power of God and the tutelage of the blessed Julian into their uses, and they are such a strong person that no-one is able to resist them, let all their presumption be frustrated in a vacuum, and in addition let these things revert to my relatives through their succession.

Sign of Bishop Stephen. Sign of Robert, father of the lord bishop, who conceded this and confirmed it with his own hand. Sign of Aldegard. Sign of Eustorgius, uncle of the lord bishop. Sign of Robert. Sign of Eustorgius. Sign of Desiderius. Sign of Armand.

This cession given on the seventh of October, at the estate of Saint-Germain-Lembron, in the 10th year the reign of King Louis, ruling France and Aquitaine.

As I say, I’ve discussed this in detail elsewhere, so I’ll quickly summarise and then if you like you can read the fuller treatments. In 944, Louis IV had gone to Aquitaine again, a visit probably occasioned by the impending demise of Raymond Pons of Toulouse. During that visit, he settled several questions, and that probably included appointing Stephen as bishop of Clermont. This charter is what Koziol calls an ‘accession act’, staking Stephen and his faction’s claim to be the most important group in the old Guillelmid sphere of influence.

As such, it’s quite important that Louis IV heads up the list of people for whom the canons of Brioude are to pray. Stephen’s authority as a regional potentate was closely tied to royal authority, and we can see that in this charter. This is significant, because as we’ve had cause to note before, the West Frankish kings are not usually supposed by historians to have much impact on Aquitanian politics at all. This charter, then, acts as a useful counter to the standard narrative, and gives us a look into the political and ideological world of a bishop and regional magnate.

Revisiting Louis V in Aquitaine II: Divide and Fail to Conquer

Last time, we looked at Richer of Rheims’ account of Louis V’s kingship in Aquitaine and I suggested that it may not be worth taking it entirely seriously as an explanation for why Louis failed. This time round, we’ll be looking at the situation in Aquitaine around 980, and I’ll be suggesting my own explanation for what went wrong. Let’s start by zooming on the woman at the centre of events: Louis’ wife Adelaide-Blanche. Louis was Adelaide’s third husband, the first two being a nobleman named Stephen of Gévaudan (although he was never count), with whom she had two sons named Pons and Bertrand; and Raymond dux Gothorum, with whom she had a son named William Taillefer. These two men take us into the two key regions of Auvergne and Toulouse.

Auvergne we’ve largely covered already in other posts, but to summarize: Bishop Stephen II of Clermont, the most important man in the area for decades by now, is getting very old and probably dying. Other important figures – notably Amblard of Lyon and Stephen of Gévaudan himself – have died. There are a number of people who want to re-carve the pie, including Bishop Stephen’s nephew Viscount Guy of Clermont and Adelaide’s sons Pons and Bertrand. Toulouse is a little more complicated, although the most complicated thing is the genealogy, which we’ve already got out of the way. This does means that I get to reveal to you that this particular extended digression actually has a point! The upshot is as follows: sometime in the early 970s, Count Raymond son of Ermengaud seems to have usurped Toulouse from Raymond ‘the Disinherited’ (to use Sébastien Fray’s useful nickname), the grandson of Raymond Pons. (Perhaps he owed his good fortune to the backing of dowager countess Garsindis, Raymond Pons’ widow, with whom he appears in a charter for Saint-Michel de Gaillac and who in turn richly endowed his son Hugh in her will; possibly she preferred her brother-in-law and nephew to her stepson.) He in turn was succeeded in the mid-970s by his own son Hugh (II), but Hugh disappears from the scene relatively shortly afterwards. Hugh’s successor wasn’t a son or brother of his, nor a scion of Raymond Pons’ family, but a cousin of both Hugh (II) and Raymond ‘the Disinherited’, also called Raymond. This Raymond appears to have had pretentions: Richer calls him ‘duke of the Goths’ – not a technical term, because as previously established Richer doesn’t have much in-depth knowledge of Aquitaine in this period – but a marker of someone whom Richer thinks is really important in the area. Moreover, what we can see of Raymond’s activity suggests very widespread ambitions indeed: on one hand, his marriage to Adelaide-Blanche, giving him a potential ‘in’ to the area around Mende, Vieille-Brioude, and even Le Puy; on the other hand, we are fairly confident he is the (unnamed) count of Toulouse who launched an attack on Count Roger the Old of Carcassonne around 980. My best guess is that having usurped Toulouse the young conqueror was trying to vindicate his position through military glory. His death shortly afterwards, along with the situation in the Auvergne, led to a power vacuum.

It was this power vacuum that Lothar was trying to exploit. Louis’ marriage to Adelaide put him right in the middle of these networks, with Pons and Bertrand as his stepsons, their uncle Bishop Guy of Le Puy – an old ally of Lothar’s – backing him, and Toulouse up for grabs. Lothar also tried other means to win allies – it’s far from certain, but there’s a decent chance that contrary to what I have previously implied, Guy of Clermont received his comital title from Lothar at this time.

So, the year is 982. (At the moment, the impression I get is that the scholarly consensus is that Louis’ reign lasted from 980-982, and I don’t think that’s right. The basic belief here is that the diplomas of Lothar dating to 982, which are unquestionably in Auvergne, are from the king’s second trip south, to pick up Louis rather than to drop him off. However, there are two pieces of evidence which point in favour of the later date. The less convincing is that Adhemar of Chabannes’ Commemoratio of the abbots of Saint-Martial in Limoges has Lothar arriving in Limoges in 983/4. The more convincing is that a charter for the abbey of Fleury is dated to 982, which it specifies is Louis V’s first year as king. This cannot mean the year of his coronation – the abbot of Fleury was at Louis’ coronation in 979 – and it’s unlikely that Fleury, an abbey whose abbot was appointed by Lothar, would have got his regnal years wrong (they don’t habitually in other charters), so the logical follow-on is that it refers to Louis’ first year as king in Aquitaine.) Louis is packed off to Aquitaine. Two years later, he’s back again. What went wrong?

Fundamentally, I think the problem was one of mismatched expectations. Lothar clearly expected Adelaide-Blanche’s connections within the region to be used to cement Louis’ control. However, sources show that Adelaide’s position was nowhere near as strong as the northerners thought. For one thing, she was in open conflict with the abbey of Brioude, which resulted in her and her sons’ excommunication, a serious blow to their legitimacy. Even once Adelaide backed down in the quarrel, the canons of Brioude refused to acknowledge Louis as king. Even more, Pons and Bertrand don’t seem to have wanted to play ball. Around this time, they captured Prior Wigo of Le Puy, a favourite of Bishop Guy, and imprisoned him in Mende. This particular conflict seems to have been one where Guy of Auvergne was on the other side. Guy was an ally of other cathedral dignitaries from Le Puy, and eventually lost his life in an attack on Mende. Given the importance of these people to any regime in Auvergne, Guy of Puy and Guy of Auvergne versus Pons and Bertrand was a cleavage right down the middle of Louis’ regime.

At the same time, Adelaide’s position in Toulouse was evidently shaky. Her son William Taillefer was young at the time, and either Raymond the Disinherited or his son appears to have taken the opportunity to force their way back into power there. Around 983, an unnamed count of Toulouse (but definitely not William) forced Abbot Bernard of Solignac into the abbey of Beaulieu by force of arms. Indisputably, by the early eleventh century, Raymond the Disinherited’s family was firmly in place as counts of Rouergue, a position they are likely to have consolidated by precisely such actions as the conquest of Beaulieu. In Gothia like in Auvergne, Adelaide’s family connections were not building-blocks, they were highways directly into conflict.

There was also one particular rivalry without these regions. Recall that Raymond dux Gothorum had been defeated c. 980 by Roger the Old of Carcassonne. Roger’s family was relatively new-come to its comital rank, and after that rank had been attained around the mid-tenth century Roger seems to have spent about twenty years chilling. However, when things kicked off in the region in the late 970s, Roger made his own bid for regional hegemony. Seemingly convinced that St Hilary fought in person by his side, he defeated his northern and southern neighbour and by the early 980s assumed the titles of ‘duke’ and ‘margrave’. It is a little dangerous arguing from this, but in a charter of 984 he switched from dating by Lothar’s reign to AD dating. This could indeed be a coincidence, but it could also signal a rejection of royal authority. If Louis’ aim was to step into the shoes of Raymond dux Gothorum, he was stepping directly into the role of Roger’s rival, and there was no reason for the count of Carcassonne to accept him.

Carcassonne today (source)

What we have, therefore, is not the situation Richer describes, where Louis’ fecklessness led him inexorably to personal and political ruin; but the result of an array of difficult challenges, most notably pre-existing cleavages in what was supposed to be his support base. Lots of people wanted him there, but they wanted him to come in and support them against their foes. He entered the game positioned as a player rather than as an umpire. His key power, that of being the fons et origio of legitimate authority, was pre-broken – his allies couldn’t help him because they were caught up in local quarrels and he couldn’t help them because he was already parti pris. 

Yet More On the Origins of the Peace of God

Recently I was talking to one of my colleagues and expressed the opinion that pretty much everything written on the Peace of God is mad, including my own stuff. I think this is the fault of the material rather than the historians, but it does mean that doing anything involving the Peace can lead you to some very strange places. I say this by way of introduction for more-or-less the region you might imagine: I’ve come up with a theory of the proto-Peace of God’s origins, and it’s not what you might expect.

I’ve written on this blog before that we can’t really think of the actions of Stephen II in Auvergne and Guy of Puy in the Velay in the mid-to-late-tenth century as being ‘the Peace of God’ – that’s far too reified. Nonetheless, I’ve argued that Stephen of Clermont in particular assembled an interlocking suite of claims linking assemblies, oaths, and a discourse surrounding the word pax, peace. Where precisely Stephen got this idea from left me stumped – but something new has turned up.

So let’s turn out attention waaaay to the east, to Lotharingia in the 950s. We’ve recently become familiar with Lotharingia under Charles the Simple, possibly one of the most stable decades of its late- and post-Carolingian history. Most of the rest of the time, Lotharingia is a basket case. Otto the Great, after he came to power in 936, had to face a series of powerful dukes. He got lucky here: the most powerful, Gislebert, drowned after losing a battle in 939; but even after that Otto’s own appointee, Conrad, teamed up with Otto’s son Liudolf in a rebellion in the early 950s. After Liudolf and Conrad had been defeated, Otto appointed his own brother, Archbishop Bruno of Cologne, as duke of Lotharingia.

A twelfth-century Ottonian genealogical table. Bruno is in the top row on the right. (source)

Bruno’s reign went… okay. There were a few more rebellions, the most noticeable being that of Reginar III in the late 950s which is often although incorrectly adduced as the context for Gerberga’s Kriegsfahne which we’ve spoken about here before. However, for the most part Bruno was able to handle the situation in Lotharingia reasonably well. Bruno’s combination of secular and religious authority had a distinctly viceregal tint: Bruno’s biographer has Otto the Great tell the archbishop and newly-appointed archduke that ‘both priestly religion and royal power swell in thee’, and Bruno does seem to have had a direct share in royal power. It is not therefore terribly surprising to find that Bruno’s first actions when he got to Lotharingia were to summon the magnates of the region to Aachen, and tell them regie maiestati et sue ipsorum fidei pollicitationes nullas preponerent – i.e., that they should not abandon their oaths to him and his brother. If they did violate the ‘peace of the Church’, he would deal with them most severely.

Our source for this is the Vita Brunonis, written by a cleric from Cologne named Ruotger. Ruotger seems to have known Bruno, and certainly to have admired him – part of the text’s mission appears to have been to defend Bruno from the people who thought that his wielding of worldly power was distinctly dubious. He wrote shortly after Bruno’s death, apparently under the patronage of his successor Folcmar, who had also been closely connected with the dead archbishop; and Henry Mayr-Harting has characterised the text as aiming at ‘some kind of official status’.  It is therefore striking that the closest work we have to Bruno’s circles, we have assemblies, oaths, and (a theme which occurs throughout the Vita, not just in the bit I’ve quoted above) a discourse of peace.

There’s no reason historians would have picked up a link between Bruno and the Peace of God. Bruno’s activity looks like (one type of) Ottonian governance in action, and the Peace is so very far away. But the fact that this was all taking place in the late 950s is important, because if ever Stephen of Clermont were going to encounter Bruno of Cologne, it would have been at exactly this point. First, Stephen and Bruno almost certainly met at the coronation of King Lothar, very shortly after the events described above. We know Bruno was there, and it’s very probable Stephen was because he appears to have interceded for a charter which was confirmed at a placitum in 955. Second, there were also ongoing links between the western Ottonians and the Auvergne during this very period. I have never been happier for hyperlinks than in the following sentence, but we have already seen both Bruno and other major Church figures with ties to the Ottonian court such as Amblard of Lyon playing a major role in negotiating peace in the Auvergne in the latter part of the 950s.

What I think is happening here, then, is that as regional supremo in his own patch, Stephen is taking Bruno as a model to be imitated. Absent the Ottonian royal context, this is a lot weirder-looking, and the Vita Amabilis implies that Stephen was as if not more controversial than Bruno in seeking to claim worldly authority. But it does mean we can, perhaps, put the proto-Peace into what we already know about tenth-century governance rather than have it spring fully-formed out of the forehead of one brilliant bishop.

Some Issues in Aquitanian History: Wrapping Up

Last year we finished a lengthy trundle through Aquitanian history which began as a spin-off from one sentence in my post-doc grant and has turned into a lengthy chapter subsection and an article idea. Unlike the liturgy series which ran roughly alongside, this one was definitely useful for me. But, alas, all good things come to an end and now it’s time to summarise. We’ll certainly return to Aquitaine – in fact, I’ve planned a different section on the viscounts of the Limousin and the lords of La Marche in the same chapter, so either that’ll work and I’ll have things to report or it won’t and I’ll be able to complain about how nuts the whole area is – but our journey here stops. What have we learned? Actually, don’t answer that (I have the unnerving feeling that for large chunks of my audience the take-home point will be ‘Fraser needs an editor’…). What have I learned?

Look upon my prose ye readers and despair!

Mostly, it’s a question of nuance. The basic argument I came up with for my thesis was about the increasing importance of local ideological communities in the post-Carolingian world, and a large chunk of what I’ve been doing since has been finding out what the right kinds of nuance are to stick on top of that. So on one hand, we’ve definitely got ourselves some local ideological communities in the Auvergne. Stephen of Clermont and his successors are using languages of legitimacy which build on their own local and/or regional traditions which aren’t terrifically portable. They are still mostly built out of the toolbox of elements available to the late-Carolingian world, but putting them together in such a way that it’s particular to their local environment. Even in terms of something as simple as ‘bishop + assembly + abstract concept the Carolingians like’, Stephen and his successors in western Aquitaine look very different to the kind of diocesan synods that his contemporaries are holding in Langres (and the abstract concept is different as well, being ‘peace’ rather than ‘improvement’). These strategies are different rather than alien, but they do need translating for a wider audience. (And indeed, when the Peace of God becomes the ‘Peace of God capital-P’ in the 1020s, this seems to be what happens. There’s actually a gap of a decade plus between meetings fading out in Aquitaine and starting up under royal patronage which no-one has satisfactorily explained yet…)

On the other hand, the Aquitanian business has highlighted two important points. The first is the difference between ‘continuity’ and ‘stasis’. Really in-depth reading helps with this, because looking at William the Pious in the 910s and William the Great in the 1010s, they can look quite different. Maybe my readers find this easier than I do, but identifying continuity, by which I mean gradual and incremental change rather than the dramatic or catastrophic variety, is hard. Nonetheless, this exercise has helped with working out which aspects of Aquitanian ideology are dropping out, which are switching up, and which are actually novel.

Which is the second major point, I think. Stephen II does actually do some novel things. The proto-Peace of God does genuinely look like personal quirk. Look, I would love – I think most people would love – to find some kind of immediate precedent for what happens with councils in Auvergne in the mid-tenth century, but I can’t find one and to the best of my knowledge neither has anyone else (caveat: convincingly). Nonetheless, it clearly struck a chord and got incorporated into the regional sheaf of potential legitimising devises. Maybe you have to be the biggest cheese on the smorgasbord to change the nature of the buffet, but you can do it…

And with that, we bid goodbye to Aquitaine. It’s been fun. But, evidently, now I should go and have some lunch…

Some Issues in Aquitanian History, pt. 9: Peace from the Mountains (Again)

We’re getting towards the end now, folks. So far we’ve seen two attempts to follow Stephen of Clermont as ruler of Auvergne, one big and showy and short-lived and the other smaller-scale but ultimately more successful. Now we have the third immediate attempt, although it’s not per se a ‘succession’ attempt because it begins a few years before Stephen’s death. Still, it’s close enough to his senescence that it’s probably setting up its instigator to be the bishop of Clermont’s successor. So let’s turn our attention to the neighbouring see of Le Puy.

For much of the mid-tenth century, the bishop of Le Puy was a man named Gottschalk. Obviously we can’t say anything about his personality, or even all that much about his career, but he’s always struck me as being fundamentally a bit of a non-entity. Geoffrey Koziol refers to him as ‘the Godfather of Aquitaine’, largely because he features in a royal diploma one time*; but in the handful of private charters he appears in he seems basically harried by the magnates surrounding him. He shows up in the entourage of Raymond of Toulouse in 936, and having the eastern part of his diocese nibbled away by Margrave Geilin of Valence at an undetermined time in the mid-century. In short, he’s not much of a presence, although he’s very long-lived, only dying in around 973.

His successor is a bigger deal, and we’ve met him before: it’s Guy, quondam abbot of Cormery and brother of the count of Anjou Geoffrey Grisegonelle, and also uncle of two important counts in the south-eastern marches of the West Frankish kingdom (or, given that one of them appears to be based in Forez, the western marches of Transjurane Burgundy). Our main information about his reign comes from the Chronicon of the abbey of Saint-Pierre du Puy, written in the twelfth century, although the author does appear to have had earlier sources. This chronicle says that when Guy became bishop, he ordered the people ‘that they should confirm a peace, not oppress the goods of paupers and churches and restore stolen goods, so that they might carry themselves in a manner befitting faithful Christians. When they refused to do this, he commanded [his nephews who were waiting nearby with an army to come by night to the field of Saint-Germain-Laprade, where this was taking place], wishing to force them to swear peace and give hostages for the keeping of it and give back the fields and castles of Notre-Dame [du Puy], and thus it was with God’s help done’.

This appears to have been fairly shortly after his accession in 975, although it’s not dated. It was in any case before Guy dedicated this very cool chapel at Saint-Michel d’Aiguilhe in 984. (source)

We need to be cautious here, because the chronicler was writing presumably with full awareness of how the Peace of God later developed. But actually the core event being described here – return of church goods, language of peace, oath-swearing – fits neatly into what we’ve seen taking place in the 958 charter and the Vita Amabilis. Lauranson-Rosaz wrote a quite good article on the origins of the Peace of God movement in Auvergne, which argues that this is exactly when and where the Peace of God proprement dit began, and he makes a good case that the intellectual genealogy of the Peace goes back here, but it’s vitiated by the fact that he apparently thinks the Peace of God sprung fully-formed out of the head of Zeus – that is, he speaks throughout as though Guy were deliberately implementing the capital-P Peace of God in his territories. As I’ve argued before, though, that can’t possibly be the case because the Peace of God didn’t exist at that point – it might have been coming into existence, but if we don’t want to be teleological, we need to ask what Guy actually thought he was doing.

My suggestion to that is: trying to follow Stephen of Clermont. After all, Stephen was the king’s link to the Auvergne before his death/incapacity, and Guy of Puy very much followed in his footsteps in that regard – more so, perhaps, given he was a royal appointment. By taking over parts of Stephen’s discourse of legitimacy, he could appeal to a political community in eastern Aquitaine which was by the 970s increasingly accustomed to talk in certain terms – peace, oath-swearing, royal ties. In this sense, Guy was another person trying to set himself up as Stephen’s successor.

Like Louis and Guy of Clermont, Guy of Puy had only partial success – we can’t see him in Auvergne proper, for example. However, he did have major influence in that eastern frontier area with Transjurane Burgundy. Besides some other ‘maybe’ examples that Lauranson-Rosaz suggests are hinted at in the sources, in 994, he masterminded a ‘Peace’ conference at Saint-Paulien which saw him presiding over a massive collection of bishops from all over. In short, insofar as the fragmented source base allows us to tell, Guy actually didn’t do a bad job setting up as Stephen’s heir. But in time his initiative would be taken up by a familiar set of faces. Next time, in the penultimate post in the series, we’ll be looking at William the Great of Poitiers and his attempts to make the ‘duchy of Aquitaine’ a reality.

 

* I am of course being unfair on Koziol’s reasoning, but I do think that fundamental to it is an assumption that anyone who appears as a petitioner in a diploma must be important. Koziol can show quite clearly that Gottschalk is well-connected, but given that anyone who is anyone in this period has ties all over their sphere of action, making the jump from that to ‘hegemonic’ seems, on the basis of his position in the private charter evidence, unjustified.

A Time of Origins in Aquitaine: The Peace of God, Ducal Power, and the “Vita Amabilis”

So I recently had cause to be in Cambridge, and whilst catching up with the University Library there I discovered a fascinating new document which provides insight on Auvergnat history and the Peace of God, and I’d like to share it all with you. You see, I went back to Christian Lauranson-Rosaz’s L’Auvergne et ses marges. This is a very large book, and I’ve never read it cover-to-cover because in addition being very large it’s also quite blinkered and in a lot of ways a bit weird. But you can’t fault it for comprehensiveness, and so it was that I turned to the passage on early eleventh-century Auvergne and found reference to the Vita of St Amabilis of Riom.

A fifteenth-century image of Riom (source)

What does it say? The relevant portion of the text opens with a reference to a Bishop Stephen of Clermont, whom everyone loved. He was a great pastor, and he got everyone in Auvergne to swear an oath to him on holy relics. However, the Devil inspired them to leave the path of peace and they called on William, count of Poitiers and Aquitaine, who attacked Stephen and besieged Riom, although they couldn’t take it. Eventually, Stephen was able to overcome William despite his smaller forces and the count returned home empty-handed.

Now, Lauranson-Rosaz dates this text – as far as I can tell entirely arbitrarily – to the reign of Duke William the Great, around 1015-ish. But I read the excerpts in the footnotes and went ‘Count William of Poitiers fighting Bishop Stephen of Clermont in the Auvergne? That sounds familiar!’ and rushed off to Gallica to check the text. And it turns out if you read the Vita Amabilis, a) there’s no reason at all to put is in c. 1010, but b) there are hints that it is a tenth-century composition. First, the William in question is described as comes Pictavensium et Aquitanicum. By the eleventh century, the counts of Poitiers have been claiming to be dux Aquitanensium for several decades – the terminology is unusually consistent. But right in the 960s, at the very beginning of the dukes’ claims to be dukes, they’re a bit more fluid, and William Towhead is at one point comes ducatus Aquitanici, much closer to the version in the Vita. This is far from proof, but it is suggestive. Just as important is the other name the text gives, that of a cleric named Ragenfred. I was able to look through my charters, and as it happens there isn’t anyone named Ragenfred recorded in the early eleventh century, only in the late tenth. It could still be that this is an otherwise-unrecorded Ragenfred, of course, but personally I’m fairly confident that this is a text written in the 960s.

As a description of Auvergnat politics in the 950s, in addition to according quite well with the other sources, it sheds some extra light. First off, it raises a very exciting possibility about the earliest origins of what would become the Peace of God. Most historians see the Peace as reactive, a response to… well, something, it’s debated, but often social disruption or knightly violence. What the text seems to suggest though is that at its earliest point, swearing an oath to a bishop within a discourse of peace was itself an act of disruption. This makes sense to me – as we’ll see in a couple of weeks, I’m happy seeing the peace tradition, small-p and big-P, not as a pragmatic peacekeeping measure so much as a claim to local or regional authority, so the idea that it started as a hegemonic gesture by Stephen II fits that neatly. This is also probably what annoyed the Auvergnat magnates – as far as I know, taking general loyalty oaths is a royal thing, and Stephen may well have been perceived as a usurper, especially given how tied in he was to royal legitimacy. It’s a shame that we can’t fit it too closely with that 958 charter, because it would be nice to know how the ‘princes of the Auvergne rebelling against one another’ matched with this document’s chronology… (I suspect the 958 charter is after these events, which puts Stephen’s oath-taking in around 954, which is very interesting timing, as King Louis IV would have recently died… More to think on here.)

What it also shows is William Towhead taking advantage of Auvergnat dissension to try and increase his own power there. The counts of Poitou, as we’ve seen before, had no history in the Auvergne and no reason to intervene there – unless they were drawn in. In short, this text might also be an important insight into the origin of the wider hegemony of the dukes of Aquitaine in the early eleventh century as well as into the very beginnings of the Peace of God. Watch this space!

Some Issues in Aquitanian History, pt. 6: The Last Years of Stephen of Clermont

All twenty of them. Thing is, and why this post has been less than forthcoming, is that with the end of hostilities in the Auvergne in the early 960s, we lose even a semblance of narrative. Piecing together tenth-century history is always difficult, but here it becomes close to impossible. We, quite simply, do not have enough evidence to build any kind of story here, let alone the relatively coherent and/or detailed one of the last five posts. Thus, the last twenty-odd years of Bishop Stephen II of Clermont’s career can be covered in about a quarter of the space of the first twenty.

Rather than going chronologically, it’s best to speak about what the evidence does and doesn’t have in it. Let’s start with the basics: when did Stephen die? We know he was still alive in 977, when he is noted as owning land bordering a donation to the monastery of Sauxillanges. After that, things get complicated. A couple of charters from the abbey of Conques have him as being still alive in the thirtieth year of the reign of King Lothar, which should in theory be 984. However, two more charters, one from 981 and one from 980, give the abbot of Conques as Hugh and the bishop of Clermont as Bego respectively, both Stephen’s successors. I think what’s happening here is either that some scribes are taking Lothar’s reign as beginning earlier than 954 (as we know some did) or there’s been a transcription error – Lothar’s XXX-th year and his XXV-th year, or something like that, aren’t too difficult to mix up. It is also possible these charters might be right, but that doesn’t change things too much. Bego and Hugh had both been Stephen’s co-rulers before 980, so even if the by-this-point-rather-elderly bishop of Clermont was still alive, what has probably happened is that he is no longer active – living, but out of the picture. One way or another, we can put the end of Stephen’s career in around 979-980.

So what was Stephen doing between the early 960s and the later 970s? Ruling Auvergne, probably. The charter evidence from these decades shows that Stephen is pretty much the only substantial authority figure visible in the region – no counts of Poitiers, no viscounts of Brioude that matter, just the bishop. What this says to me is that he probably didn’t face much by way of challenge. Our closest look at him comes from what’s known as the Landeyrat Charter of 972, where he consecrates the abbey-church of Aurillac in the presence of a large assembly. The problem is that this document is at minimum heavily interpolated, although some scholars argue strongly for an authentic core (and that it’s a precursor to the Peace of God, an idea we will return to in a later post), so we need to be cautious in dealing with its actual provisions.

Sauxillanges today. (source)

More interesting is a charter from the cartulary of Sauxillanges. The big problem with this thing is that it is undated, and by formal criteria undatable. It’s not likely to be earlier than about 960, and it can’t be later than 979, and it can’t be pinned down more closely than that. With that said, the man giving the charter, one Rigald, gives off the impression that he’s dying – he appoints people as his executors – and he appears fairly frequently in the 950s but not in the 960s or 970s, so this is probably in the earlier part of the period, 963-965 or so. What’s interesting about this charter is that it features both Stephen, the four main viscounts of the Auvergne, and Archbishop Amblard of Lyon who was himself from a prominent Auvergnat family and had major interests in the region. We saw him last time helping broker peace in the Auvergne, and his presence here surely implies that he remained an important figure there. On his own death in 979, he donated the Auvergnat abbey of Ris to Cluny, so it wouldn’t surprise me if he acted (as in this Sauxillanges act) as a supporter of Bishop Stephen.

By this time, though, a new generation was clearly coming up. Amblard of Lyon was dead, Stephen of Clermont was either dying or incapacitated, and other figures were circling. A new bishop in Le Puy, Guy, was taking some of Stephen’s ideas; a new group of counts was emerging; and King Lothar himself was preparing to take an interest. And that’s what we’ll get into next time…

Exploring the Origins of the Peace of God

Ugh. Y’know, I spent my PhD avoiding the Peace of God movement, and then I started working later and further south, and now I’ve blogged about it, and on Tuesday I went to a really good paper about it, and then there’s all the Aquitanian stuff; and now I’ve kinda got to.

“Why so?” I hear you ask. Well, reader, there is at least a case to be made that if you trace back the intellectual genealogy of these things, you end up with long-time friend of the blog Bishop Stephen II of Clermont. But before I get there, we need to make it clear that you’ve got to be careful when talking about the Peace of God, because it’s not a term from the time, it’s a modern technical term. This might be less important when we’re dealing with the ‘second wave’ of councils around the 1020s, where the influence of one council on another is often very explicit, but in the late tenth century it’s not clear where to draw the line.

Take the 989 Council of Charroux, for instance, often claimed as one of the earliest Peace councils. Absolutely nothing about it cannot be paralleled from earlier tradition. The council claims that there has been a long delay in holding a council and that terrible things have arisen in the land because of it. The 909 Council of Trosly is a fairly direct comparison for this. (That said, one might note that Charroux claims that the council has been delayed and therefore evils have arisen whilst Trosly says that the council has been delayed because evils have arisen, which may indicate an actual strengthening of the power of the conciliar idea by 989; but really I don’t think the difference is particularly important.) Otherwise much of its rhetoric can be compared closely and in some cases verbatim with Carolingian legislation. Notably, the word ‘peace’ does not show up once.

Where it does show up is in 958, at that meeting in Clermont we’ve talked about before. The charter here says… actually, y’know what, it’s short, let’s give you the whole thing:

In the year of the Lord’s Incarnation 958, in the first indiction, it happened in that year that the princes of the Auvergne rebelled against each other in turn. But, with God’s help and in the reign of Bishop Stephen of Auvergne, peace, which passeth everything, currently reigns within our borders.

Meanwhile, it happened that one of our princes, that is, Calixtus, had invaded some of the goods of another: he obtained, that is, the allod of one of the canons, named Amblard, not justly but unjustly.

For this reason, because of what he was holding unjustly, the aforesaid Calixtus and his wife Oda and their children, that is, Peter and Hugh and Stephen, came into the city of Clermont, where Stephen, bishop of that see, shines. Present there were Viscount Robert and Abbot Stephen and Abbot Robert and other lay and clerical lords and monks, and there the said Calixtus recognised that he had held that allod in Gergovie unjustly, and in the presence of that crowd he gave it up and commanded this notice of surrender be made, and he confirmed it with his own hand and had it confirmed by his children and his knights and by everyone.

Sign of Calixtus. Sign of Hugh. Sign of Stephen. Sign of Bishop Stephen. Sign of Viscount Robert. Sign of Abbot Robert. Sign of Abbot Stephen.

Done in the month of September, on Thursday, in the 4^th year of the reign of King Lothar.

Theodoric subscribed.

Told you it was short. Anyway, this is the first use I can find of the combination of a meeting, the word ‘peace’, and the settlement of disputes in a context of violence to show up together in Aquitaine. These are all things that will be develop into the Peace of God, and I think it’s reasonable to see this as a fairly close ancestor, not least because the early ‘Peace of God’ is probably best seen as just one flavour of central Aquitanian discourse which happens to become unusually successful.

Question is, can we push it further back? What I’ve been looking at in the last couple of days is that reference to peace, pax omnia superat. This is a clear reference to Philippians 4:7, ‘the peace of God which passeth all understanding’ (pax Dei quae exsuperat omnem sensem, in the Vulgate – superat is a variant found in some versions of the Old Latin Bible).

Problem is, I’ve been coming up mostly empty. I tried looking in various places for liturgical parallels, and didn’t really find any, although one manuscript of conciliar ordines suggests using it in an assembly for dealing with quarrels, which would be absolutely ideal except that this is only found in a marginal annotation from Mainz. Otherwise, it is also quoted in a section of the 829 Council of Paris about how the council is going to settle civil discord, which given what we now know to be that council’s normative value would also be very useful, except that I can’t find that there’s a manuscript of the council itself in Clermont. I asked some real liturgical specialists, who actually know what they’re doing (thanks, Arthur!) and was told that Philippians is used for readings in Advent, but as this is a summer or early autumn document, I’m not sure there’s direct causation there…

So I wonder if this might not be, in some sense, where the ball starts rolling for this particular strand of political language. It’s not like ‘the New Testament’ is an implausible place for a medieval cleric to be looking for ideas, after all…