The Cambridge History of Egypt Book

This book covers Norman history beginning with their emergence as Viking raiders in Western Europe - with a branch also raiding in Russia - and continues through their illustrious history in France, raiding and then colonizing what became the Duchy of Normandy, which was eventually ceded to them by the King of France. The Vikings were excellent sailors whose boats exceeded in quality those of the peoples they conquered - boats that were not only ocean-going but also could navigate up rivers, which were the "highways" the Vikings used to find cities to raid and many times burn. The Vikings later accepted Christianity and became important patrons of the church in France and Italy - although the Church/Pope was also often their rival politically.

The book describes the Normans' famous invasion of England in 1066, the various struggles between members of the Norman dynasties, and the many struggles with neighboring Frankish, Breton, and Flemish lords and European royal houses. The book explains the early link between England, France, as well as the conquests of the northeastern part of England by the Danish Vikings (the Danelaw) and the invasion of England by Norwegians (under King Harald) at the same time as the Norman Conquest. (The Norwegians were defeated by the English and King Harald killed, however.) The main take-away is the rise of the Danish Viking raiders in France, at first arriving only to loot or demand money from the King of France to leave, later eventually settling around the mouth of the Seine and then little by little conquering the region later known as Normandy. As the centuries passed, there was emigration from Denmark to France, but the settlers became gallicized, so that the conquest of England in 1066 was as much a Frankish conquest as it was a Norman conquest. In fact, the invasion force included Frankish, Flemish, and Breton troops, not just the Norman army.

The book goes on to describe the Hauteville Norman family conquest of Southern Italy and Sicily and the subsequent extension of the Norman "Empire" into the Mid-East, with the seizure of Cyprus and the establishment of a Crusader state in Antioch.

This is a lot of history to cover in a relatively few pages; the recurrence of the same names of Norman rulers century after century - William, Robert, Roger etc. - makes it somewhat mind-numbing and difficult after a while to tell the leaders apart. However, the writer is careful to qualify the historical evidence upon which the narrative is based - the sources aren't many and his discussion of the quality of the source material itself and its authors is itself interesting. There is a helpful time-line appended - but even with the time-line, there is simply an overwhelming amount of action - raids/invasions/wars, alliances/treaties, construction/destruction of cathedrals/monasteries/forts along with innumerable familial events, strategic marriages, intra-family squabbles etc. to keep track of.

This is nonetheless a very interesting if basic account of one of the overlooked forces of the European Dark Ages: The Normans, who originally were Vikings, part of the same group that even landed and tried to establish a colony in Newfoundland, 500 years before Columbus discovered America.

All in all, this is an extremely interesting introduction to an often-overlooked major force in European history - the Normans.

Some quotes:

"[An] ... historical source [of information about the Scandinavians during the period of the 'invasions'] is Scandinavian literature. The earliest examples are the poems written by skalds, court poets who, like Celtic bards or African griots, were given the task of praising the great deeds of those who protected them and their ancestors."

"...the authors of the sagas were men of their time, and the principal aim of their stories was to sing the praises of a particular family or clan of the period at which they were writing."

"The vast majority of the inhabitants of Scandinavia belonged to the category of boendr (singular: bondi). These were free men who enjoyed full political and social rights. The bondi had a fixed abode and at least partly owned the lands he farmed."

"When the Viking expeditions began, the Scandinavian armies were largely composed of boendr, since at that time there was no such thing as a professional army in Scandinavia."

"...[local chiefs] derived their power from the land they owned,the armed entourages they maintained (the lidh or hirdh), and the protection they granted to a certain number of dependents."

"...the emergence of powerful local figures can be observed in many regions. In the absence of reliable texts, archaeology has been of great help..."

"[Excavated] ... sites include large halls where political and religious ceremonies were held... Such centers become more and more common the further we advance in time. They are the signs of a concentration of power, from which the Scandinavian royal families were gradually to emerge."

"The king was chosen by the aristocrats - in other words, the great boendr, or the hersar in Norway - although we do not know exactly how these elections were carried out."

"...model of a weak king, dependent on the important men of his kingdom and exercising only limited power, seems to have prevailed for a long time in Norway and Sweden."

"...the sacred king was the person responsible for the fertility of the land and the fecundity of women. It was he who could keep the climate favorable to the rearing of livestock and the growing of crops by maintaining a good relationship with the gods."

"The kings of Norway tried to inflate their own origins by claiming to be descended from the Ynling dynasty, the issue of the god Freyr. This use of divine genealogies was common in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England. The Svear kings of Sweden also boasted of this semi-divine provenance - a clear demonstration of the connections between the Scandinavian monarchies and religion."

"...power struggles were fierce [in Scandinavian societies]. Forced into exile, the losing candidates often embarked on far-flung expeditions. More generally, it was a way for the boendr to acquire prestigious property and thereby improve their status within the social hierarchy."

"...Scandinavians were ...trying to increase their wealth. At first, some were able to achieve this through normal trade. In doing so, they became aware that some foreign countries were poorly defended and plagued by unrest, even civil war."

"The Scandinavians were well able to combine two activities that to us seem contradictory: they were pirates whenever possible, and merchants the rest of the time."

"Because of ... [their very large warships], they enjoyed an unquestionable naval superiority. The Vikings soon had control over the seas, at least in the whole of Northern Europe, from the Baltic to the Atlantic."

"...'great armies' were made up of troops brought together for the occasion from various sources. Their cohesion depended on the personality of their leader, but also on the success of the expedition: if this failed, the army dispersed and each group was left to try its luck elsewhere."

"From 792, King Offa of Mercia [England] set about putting in place a system of coastal defense in his kingdom, but he died in 796. The period of anarchy that followed would favor the Danish enterprise."

"Wherever they intervened militarily the Vikings had one objective: to accumulate as much wealth as possible."

"The Vikings could not return twice to the same place: they had to go further and further inland to find new, undefended riches."

"These [9th century Frankish] bishops and abbots were politicians who spent little time in their dioceses and had no great interest in spiritual matters."

"...the Carolingian monarchs considered bishops above all as government representatives."

"[In the mid-9th century] The Frankish... King Charles the Bald undertook a massive overhaul of the administration, the aim of which was to strengthen the ability of the territories to resist the advance not only of the Scandinavians but also of the Bretons."

"...the intention was ... to tighten control over the population and facilitate the mobilization of men."

"[Robert the Strong, who had been received the command of the region threatened by the Vikings and Bretons from Charles the Bald in 852] ... was killed at Brissarthe in the autumn of 866 while fighting a combined force of Scandinavians and Bretons."

"[Robert the Strong's] ... heroic death earned him immense prestige, from which his descendants - the Robertians, forerunners of the Capetians - were to benefit."

"This major shift in the population of the lower Seine at the end of the ninth century is not mentioned in any text, but a study of place-names may give us some useful clues."

"...the [place] names seem quite different from those usually found in agricultural areas [as they reflect economic activity]."

"Even more than his father [Rollo, the founder of the Duchy of Normandy], William [Longsword] was totally integrated into the high aristocracy of the [Frankish] kingdom."

"William continued his father's policy of expansion.."

"It seems likely that in the years following the treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, Rollo had respected the commitments he had made to the Carolingian king and was content with the territory conceded to him. The situation changed with the coup led by Robert, Duke of the Franks. In 922, he succeeded in getting himself chosen as king by the aristocracy, and Charles the Simple was deposed. Robert I only had a short time in power. He was killed in 923 at the battle of Soissons. His son-in-law Rudolph, Duke of Burgundy, was chosen as king by the barons."

"After Charles' deposition, Rollo considered himself to be released from his duties to the king."

"In the tenth century... Duke Richard I was determined to keep control over the bishopric of Rouen [Normandy], and so entrusted it to his own son, Robert..."

"[Robert] ... had no hesitation in bringing intellectuals long distances to form what has been called his 'literary coterie.'"

"In about 1030, when he was about twenty, [Duke Robert the Magnificent] ... seems to have manifested a sincere desire for reconciliation with the Church. He may well have been influenced by a number of great lords who wished to redeem their sins by making large gifts and even founding new institutions."

"[Robert's successor] William [the Conqueror] was the undisputed winner [of the Battle of Hastings in 1066]. Much of the English aristocracy lay dead on the battlefield. The advance of he victorious army was now unstoppable. William headed for London, and on Christmas Day 1066 was crowned King of England in Westminster Abbey."

"William the Conqueror remains the greatest figure in Norman history. He created a kind of state that existed nowhere else in the Christian West, an authoritarian feudal monarchy."

"...[the Normans] demonstrated their ability to build castles very rapidly. At first, these castles were simple motte-and baileys, using the rudimentary technique tried out in Normandy during the periods when ducal power had been weakened. Such castles were an excellent way to keep control of a conquered region. The Normans used them in both southern Italy and in England. When the situation had been stabilized, the wooden palisades were replaced by stone walls, especially easy to build in Italy where stone was plentiful."

"Elected 'by the clergy and people of Rome' [in 1058], [Pope] Nicholas II would prove to be a great reformer. His first concern was to remove papal elections from external influences, especially secular ones. The choice of pope as therefore reserved for the college of cardinals of the city and province of Rome."

"Overall, following the era of the founders, especially the founders of kingdoms, the era of the successors leaves us with a rather mixed impression. In England, the Normans were to leave a lasting imprint, but from the beginning the coexistence of the Kingdom of England and the Duchy of Normandy proved problematic. The entity thus created could only be maintained by exceptional figures such as Henry I Beauclerc, Henry II Plantagenet and Richard Lionheart. It only took a weak king, John, to destroy the fine structure inherited from William the Conqueror and Henry II. By 1204, it was all over."

"What truly unites these 'Norman' protagonists...is the spirit of adventure. It took daring for the first Vikings to embark on such hazardous expeditions."

"Thanks to its dukes, Normandy was for a long time the best governed principality in the Kingdom of France. These dukes were of Scandinavian origin, and yet, in order to establish their authority, they used means borrowed from the Franks."

"Once conquered and tamed, England was remarkably well administered, as was the Duchy of Normandy. The same is true of the Kingdom of Sicily, which Roger II and his successors would make the strongest state in Italy."

"...the Kingdom of Sicily had three official languages, Greek, Arabic and Latin."

"One of the principal merits of the Normans is that hey made the most of their military adventures, establishing strong, well-administered states. It was in this way that they left a deep imprint on vast regions of the West, from England to southern Italy. More than adventurers, they proved to be builders, carving out structures which have stood the test of time."