William de St-Calais

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William de St-Calais
William of St Calais from an 11th Century manuscript of St Augustine's Commentary on the Psalter
Denomination Catholic
Senior posting
See Diocese of Durham
Title Bishop of Durham
Period in office 1081–1096
Predecessor William Walcher
Successor Ranulf Flambard
Religious career
Previous post Abbot of St Vincent, Le Mans
Personal
Date of death January 2, 1096

William de St-Calais (also Calais or Carileph or Carilef) (d. 1096), was a medieval Norman monk, abbot of the abbey of St Vincent in Le Mans in Maine and Bishop of Durham. It was King William I of England who nominated him to the see of Durham in 1080. While bishop, William replaced the canons his cathedral chapter with monks, and began the construction of Durham Cathedral. Besides his ecclesiastical duties, William also served as a commissioner for Domesday Book. He served both King William I and his son, King William II as a councilor and advisor. Soon after William II's ascension to the throne, the bishop was considered to be the new king's chief advisor.

When the king's uncle, Odo of Bayeux raised a rebellion, the bishop was implicated in the revolt, and the king laid siege to the bishop in the bishop's stronghold of Durham. Later the bishop was put on trial for treason. A contemporary record of the trial, the De Iniusta Vexacione Willelmi episcopi, is the first detailed contemporary report of an English state-trial that survives. Imprisoned briefly, the bishop was allowed to go into exile after his castle at Durham was surrendered to the king. St-Calais went to Normandy, where he became a leading advisor to Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy and the elder brother of King William. By 1091, however, the bishop had returned to England and regained royal favor.

Once back in England, the bishop once more became a leading advisor to the king. It was St-Calais who negotiated with Anselm, abbot of Bec in regards to Anselm becoming Archbishop of Canterbury in 1093, and in 1095, it was the bishop of Durham who prosecuted the royal case against Anselm, now archbishop. In his bishopric, William started the construction of the cathedral, as well as endowing his cathedral library with books, including copies of canon law texts. The bishop was also active is defending the north of England against Scots raids. Before his death, he made his peace with Anselm, who blessed and consoled William.

Contents

[edit] Early life

William was a Norman and a native of Bayeux,[1] and may have been a member of one of the clerical dynasties of Bayeux.[2] He studied at Bayeux under the bishop of Bayeux, Odo of Bayeux, who was the half-brother of Duke William of Normandy.[3] Other bishops educated at Bayeux around this time included Archbishop Thomas of York and Samson, Bishop of Worcester.[4] Symeon of Durham, the medieval chronicler, considered William to be well educated in classical literature and scripture, and at some point William acquired a knowledge of canon law.[2] He was a Benedictine monk at St Calais in Maine and the prior of that house before becoming abbot of St Vincent-des-Prés near Le Mans in Maine.[3] King William I nominated to the see of Durham on November 9, 1080 and he was consecrated on either December 27, 1080 or 3 January 1081.[5][6] His elevation was probably a reward for diplomatic services he rendered the king in France.[7]

[edit] Bishop of Durham

Symeon of Durham, the chronicler of Durham, asserted that when William was consecrated by Archbishop Thomas of York, William managed to avoid professing obedience to the archbishop, which, if true, would have considerably freed William from interference in his diocese.[8] After his appointment, William decided to replace his cathedral chapter of secular clergy with monks, and consulted the king and Lanfranc archbishop of Canterbury before eventually going to Rome to receive the permission of Pope Gregory VII.[9] In 1083 he expelled the married clergy from the cathedral,[10] and he moved a small community of monks from Bede's old monastery at Jarrow to Durham to form the new chapter. The group was started when a Norman ex-knight and monk of Evesham Abbey, Reinfrid, had joined an English monk of Winchecombe Abbey, Eadwine, in founding a small monastic cell at Jarrow.[11] After they were settled, the bishop named Eadwin the prior and arranged for lands to be set aside to support the monks.[9]

William enjoyed good relations with his cathedral chapter, and they supported the bishop when construction began on a new cathedral in 1093.[12] This is the current Romanesque Durham Cathedral.[13] He also gave a set of constitutions to the cathedral chapter that were modeled on Lanfranc's rule for Canterbury.[14] Symeon of Durham said the bishop acted towards the monks of his chapter as a loving father, and the monks fully returned the sentiment.[15] William is said to have exhaustively researched the old customs of the cathedral from before the Norman Conquest preparatory re-establishing monks in the cathedral.[16]

After the imprisonment of the king's half-brother Odo of Bayeux, Pope Gregory VII complained to the king about the imprisonment and about the fact the king was not allowing papal letters to be delivered to bishops without the king's permission. In order to placate the pope, the king dispatched William, possibly with Lanfranc, to Rome to explain to the pope the king's reasoning for imprisoning Odo.[17] William also served as a commissioner for Domesday Book, in the southwestern part of England.[18] Some historians have argued that William was the driving force behind the organization of the whole Domesday survey.[2]

[edit] Rebellion

A detail from the Bayeux Tapestry showing Odo of Bayeux
A detail from the Bayeux Tapestry showing Odo of Bayeux

Soon after the ascension of King William II of England the bishop became one of the king's most trusted lieutenants,[19] along with the king's uncle Odo of Bayeux.[20] Later chroniclers often referred to the position that Bishop William held as justiciar, although the formal office did not yet exist.[21] Around Easter 1088 though, when Odo of Bayeux and many of the magnates revolted against the king and tried to place the king's elder brother Robert Curthose, duke of Normandy on the throne, William behaved suspiciously. When the king set off with the bishop and some troops to counter Odo in Kent, the bishop suddenly deserted the king and shut himself up in the castle at Durham.[2] William was the only bishop that did not actively aid the king, but the rebelling magnates included Roger de Montgomery earl of Shrewsbury, Robert de Mowbray earl of Northumbria, and Odo's brother Robert count of Mortain. The rebellion failed by the end of the summer.[22] William continued to hold out in Durham for a while, at first claiming he had never actually rebelled, and then when the king approached with an army, only agreeing to come out after he received a safe conduct that would allow him to attend a trial while his men continued to hold the castle.[23][24] From his actions, it appears likely that the bishop did rebel, whatever his statements to the contrary, although northern chronicles maintained his innocence.[19][20]

[edit] Trial

William was brought before the king and royal court for trial on November 2, 1088 at Salisbury.[23][25] Before the trial, the king seized his lands. At the trial, William held that as a bishop, he could not be tried in a secular court and refused to answer the accusations. Lanfranc presented the king's case and declared the lands confiscated were held as fiefs, and thus the bishop was tried as a vassal, not as a bishop. William objected and continued to refuse to answer the allegations. After numerous conferences and discussions, the court held that the bishop could be tried as a vassal in a feudal court. William then asked for an appeal to Rome, which was rejected by the king and the judges. Those judging the case held that because the bishop never answered the formal accusation, and because he appealed to Rome, his fief was forfeit.[24][26][27] Although William claimed to be defending the rights of clergy to be tried in clerical courts and to appeal to Rome, his fellow bishops did believe him. Lending support to their belief is the fact that William never pursued his appeal to Rome, and that later in 1095, he took the side of the king against Anselm of Canterbury when Anselm tried to assert a right to appeal to Rome.[20]

During the course of the trial, Lanfranc is said to have stated that the court was "trying you not in your capacity as bishop, but in regard to your fief; and in this way we judged the bishop of Bayeux in regard to his fief before the present king's father, and that king did not summon him to that plea as bishop but as brother and earl."[28] Unlike the later case of Thomas Becket, William received little sympathy from his fellow bishops, and most of the bishops and barons judging the case seem to have felt that the appeal to Rome was made to avoid having to answer an accusation that the bishop knew was true.[29] The final judgement was only reached after the king lost his temper and exclaimed "Believe me, bishop, you're not going back to Durham, and your men aren't going to stay at Durham, and you're not going to go free, until you release the castle."[30] The extant De Iniusta Vexacione Willelmi episcopi details the trial of William before the king.[29] This work is the first detailed contemporary report of an English state-trial that survives.[20]

[edit] Return to favour

The facade of Durham Cathedral, which was started by William de St-Calais in 1093
The facade of Durham Cathedral, which was started by William de St-Calais in 1093

After the court adjourned, William was held prisoner at Wilton Abbey until his men in Durham relinquished the castle.[23] Once the castle was back in the king's control, William left for Normandy,[23] but no more was heard of his appeal.[24][31] Pope Urban II did write to the king in 1089 requesting that the bishop be restored to his see, but nothing came of it.[32] Once in Normandy, William quickly became one of the duke's principal advisors.[2] On November 14, 1091 he regained the royal favour and his see.[6][33] It was the king's brother Robert Curthose who persuaded the English king to allow the bishop's return,[23] perhaps in conjunction with a service the bishop did for the king in brokering the end of a siege in Normandy that the king's forces were about to lose. St Calais secured the end of the siege, which prevented the loss of the castle.[34] The bishop returned to Durham on September 11, 1091.[35] Thereafter he remained in the king's favour. In fact, in 1093 he was regranted his lands without the need to perform feudal services.[20] For the rest of his life, William remained a frequent advisor of the king.[36][37] It was William, along with Robert, count of Meulan who negotiated with Anselm abbot of Bec in 1093 over the conditions under which Anselm would allow himself to be elected archbishop of Canterbury.[38]

William managed the king's case against Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury at Rockingham in 1095, when Anselm wished to go receive his pallium from Pope Urban II.[39] At that time, William opposed Anselm's attempt to appeal to Rome over the issue and steadfastly maintained the king's position against Anselm.[20] William even advocated that the archbishop be deprived of his lands and sent into exile.[40][41] Later, when the king was negotiating with Walter of Albano, the papal legate sent by Urban to convey the pallium to Anselm and to secure the king's recognition of Urban as pope,[42] William was the king's chief negotiator.[43] The clerical reformers, Eadmer among them, who supported Anselm in these quarrels later tried to claim that William had supported the king out of a desire to succeed Anselm as archbishop if Anselm was deposed, but it is unlikely that William seriously believed that Anselm would be deposed.[44][45][46] William did secure grants from the king in return for his services.[44]

[edit] Diocesan affairs

William faced security issues in his diocese, as Malcolm Canmore, King of Scots, raided and invaded the north of England on a number of occasions. Malcolm claimed Northumbria, in which Durham was located, as part of his kingdom. William managed to befriend Malcolm and secured the king's support for the patron saint of Durham, Saint Cuthbert. Unfortunately, respect for the saint did not mean that Malcolm refrained entirely from raiding the north, and the king was killed in 1093 while once more raiding Northumbria. Both the king and the bishop did all in their power to support Malcolm's sons, who had been educated in England, first Duncan, and then after Duncan's death in 1094, Edgar. Robert de Mowbray, who was earl of Northumbria also challenged the bishop's authority in the north. When Mowbray rebelled again in 1095, the bishop helped the king put down the rebellion. These events did much to make the north more secure.[2]

Also dating to William's time as bishop was a long running dispute between the monks of the cathedral chapter and the bishops. William did not make a formal division of the diocesan revenues between the bishop's household and the monks of the chapter. Nor had he allowed free elections of the prior. He may have promised these things to the monks before his death, but nothing was in writing. When a non-monk was selected to replace William, the monks began a long struggle to secure what they felt had been promised to them, including forging charters ascribed to William that supported their case.[2]

[edit] Death and legacy

A plan of Durham Cathedral, from William Greenwell's Durham Cathedral Eighth Edition 1913
A plan of Durham Cathedral, from William Greenwell's Durham Cathedral Eighth Edition 1913

Shortly before Christmas in 1095, one of William's knights, Boso, fell ill and dreamed he was transported to the afterlife, where he found a large house with gates made of iron. Suddenly, the bishop emerged from the gates, asking the knight where was one of the bishop's servants. The dream guide then informed Boso that this was a warning that the bishop would soon die. Boso recovered and warned the bishop of the dream.[2]

William died on January 2, 1096[6] after falling gravely ill on the previous Christmas Day. Before his death, he was consoled by Anselm and was blessed by his former opponent.[47] He was buried on January 16, 1096 in the chapter house at Durham.[48] The king had summoned him right before Christmas to answer to some unknown charge, and it is possible that the stress of the event caused his death.[49]

As bishop, William gave a copy of the False Decretals to his cathedral library. The manuscript was an edition that had been collected or prepared by Lanfranc for the use of the chapter of Canterbury.[50] He may have used this copy in his trial.[51] The bishop's plea for an appeal to Rome in his trial was grounded in the False Decretals, whether or not it was based on the exact copy of this manuscript.[52] The manuscript itself is now in the Peterhouse Library.[53]

William was known to his contemporaries as an intelligent and able man. He had an excellent memory.[9] Frank Barlow describes him as a "good scholar and a monk of blameless life."[3] Besides his copy of the Decretals, he left at his death over fifty books to the monks of Durham, and the list of those volumes still survives.[54][55]

His most well known legacy is the construction of Durham Cathedral. Although the nave was not finished until 1130, its construction technique of combining a pointed arch with another rib allowed a six pointed vault. This type of vaulting let the building attain a greater height and allowed larger celestory windows and greater light in the building. The technique of the six pointed vault spread to Saint-Etienne in Caen from which it influenced the development of Early Gothic architecture near Paris.[56] The system of rib vaulting in the choir was the earliest usage of that technique in Europe.[57] The historian Frank Barlow called the cathedral "one of the architectural jewels of western Christendom".[2]

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Powell The House of Lords in the Middle Ages p. 36
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barlow "St Calais , William of (c.1030–1096)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
  3. ^ a b c Barlow William Rufus pp. 60-62
  4. ^ Barlow The English Church 1066-1154 p. 58
  5. ^ Fryde Handbook of British Chronology p. 241
  6. ^ a b c Greenway Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1066-1300: volume 2: Monastic cathedrals (northern and southern provinces): Durham: Bishops
  7. ^ Barlow The English Church 1066-1154 p. 64
  8. ^ Barlow The English Church 1066-1154 p. 39
  9. ^ a b c Knowles The Monastic Order in England p. 169
  10. ^ Chibnall Anglo-Norman England p. 42
  11. ^ Douglas William the Conqueror p. 328
  12. ^ Knowles The Monastic Order in England pp. 169-170
  13. ^ Cantor Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture p. 36
  14. ^ Knowles The Monastic Order in England p. 131
  15. ^ Knowles The Monastic Order in England p. 623
  16. ^ Knowles The Monastic Order in England p. 625
  17. ^ Barlow The Feudal Kingdom of England Fourth Edition p. 130
  18. ^ Chibnall Anglo-Norman England p. 111
  19. ^ a b Mason William II pp. 53-55
  20. ^ a b c d e f Poole Domesday Book to Magna Carta pp. 100-104
  21. ^ Lyon A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England pp. 152-153
  22. ^ Powell The House of Lords in the Middle Ages p. 49
  23. ^ a b c d e Crouch The Normans p. 135
  24. ^ a b c Mason William II pp. 64-71
  25. ^ Barlow William Rufus p. 85
  26. ^ Lyon A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England p. 146
  27. ^ Barlow William Rufus pp. 82-89
  28. ^ Quoted in Richardson The Governance of Mediaeval England p. 285
  29. ^ a b Richardson The Governance of Mediaeval England pp. 285-286
  30. ^ Quoted in Crouch The Normans p. 135
  31. ^ Lyon A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England p. 209
  32. ^ Cantor Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture p. 51
  33. ^ Poole Domesday Book to Magna Carta p. 108 footnote 1
  34. ^ Mason William II p. 95
  35. ^ Barlow William Rufus p. 294
  36. ^ Cantor Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture p. 62
  37. ^ Cantor Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture p. 71
  38. ^ Barlow William Rufus p. 306
  39. ^ Powell The House of Lords in the Middle Ages p. 52
  40. ^ Poole Domesday Book to Magna Carta p. 174
  41. ^ Vaughn Anselm of Bec and Robert of Meulan pp. 182-185
  42. ^ There was a rival pope at the time, Antipope Clement III and the king had not recognized either yet.
  43. ^ Cantor Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture p. 92
  44. ^ a b Cantor Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture p. 97
  45. ^ Vaughn Anselm of Bec and Robert of Meulan p. 188
  46. ^ Barlow The English Church 1066-1154 p. 67
  47. ^ Vaughn Anselm of Bec and Robert of Meulan p. 194
  48. ^ Barlow William Rufus p. 356
  49. ^ Mason William II pp. 163-164
  50. ^ Brooke The English Church and the Papacy p. 76
  51. ^ Brooke The English Church and the Papacy p. 109
  52. ^ Stafford Unification and Conquest p. 200
  53. ^ Brooke The English Church and the Papacy p. 162
  54. ^ Knowles The Monastic Order in England p. 523
  55. ^ The list is given in Dunelmensis Ecclesiae Cathedralis Catalogi liborum published by the Surtees Society in volume VII of their works in 1838.
  56. ^ Adams A History of Western Art Third Edition p. 200
  57. ^ Croix Gardner's Art Through the Ages Eighth Edition p. 352

[edit] References

  • Adams, Laurie Schneider (2001). A History of Western Art, Third Edition, Boston, Mass: McGraw Hill. ISBN 0-07-231717-5. 
  • Barlow, Frank (1979). The English Church 1066-1154: A History of the Anglo-Norman Church. New York: Longman. ISBN 0-582-50236-5. 
  • Barlow, Frank (1988). The Feudal Kingdom of England 1042-1216, Fourth Edition, New York: Longman. ISBN 0-582-49504-0. 
  • Barlow, Frank (2004). "St Calais , William of (c.1030–1096)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Retrieved on 2008-04-07. 
  • Barlow, Frank (1983). William Rufus. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-04936-5. 
  • Brooke, Z. N. (1989). The English Church & the Papacy: From the Conquest to the Reign of John, Revised Edition, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-36687-9. 
  • Cantor, Norman F. (1958). Church, Kingship, and Lay Investiture in England 1089-1135. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 
  • Chibnall, Marjorie (1986). Anglo-Norman England 1066-1166. Oxford: Basil Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 0-631-15439-6. 
  • Crouch, David (2007). The Normans: The History of a Dynasty. London: Hambledon & London. ISBN 1-85285-595-9. 
  • Douglas, David C. (1964). William the Conqueror: The Norman Impact Upon England. Berkeley: University of California Press. 
  • Fryde, E. B.; Greenway, D. E.; Porter, S.; Roy, I. (1996). Handbook of British Chronology, Third Edition, revised, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-56350-X. 
  • Greenway, Diana E. (1971). Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1066-1300: volume 2: Monastic cathedrals (northern and southern provinces): Durham: Bishops. Institute of Historical Research. Retrieved on 2008-04-06. 
  • Knowles, David (1976). The Monastic Order in England: A History of its Development from the Times of St. Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940-1216, Second Edition, reprint, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-05479-6. 
  • Lyon, Bryce Dale (1980). A Constitutional and Legal History of Medieval England, Second Edition, New York: Norton. ISBN 0-393-95132-4. 
  • Mason, Emma (2005). William II: Rufus, the Red King. Stroud: Tempus. ISBN 0-7524-3528-0. 
  • Poole, Austin Lane (1955). From Domesday Book to Magna Carta, 1087-1216, Second Edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-821707-2. 
  • Powell, J. Enoch; Wallis, Keith (1968). The House of Lords in the Middle Ages: A History of the English House of Lords to 1540. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. 
  • Richardson, H. G.; Sayles, G. O. (1963). The Governance of Mediaeval England. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 
  • Stafford, Pauline (1989). Unification and Conquest: A Political and Social History of England in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries. London: Edward Arnold. ISBN 0-7131-6532-4. 
  • Tansey, Richard G.; Gardner, Helen Louise; De la Croix, Horst (1986). Gardner's Art Through the Ages, Eighth Edition, San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. ISBN 0-15-503763-3. 
  • Vaughn, Sally N. (1987). Anselm of Bec and Robert of Meulan: The Innocence of the Dove and the Wisdom of the Serpent. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-05674-4. 

[edit] Further reading

  • Aird, W. M. "An Absent Friend: The Career of Bishop William of St. Calais" in Rollason, D. M. Harvey and M. Prestwich (ed.) Anglo-Norman Durham 1093-1193 Woodbridge: Boydell Press 1994
  • Aird, W. M. "St Cuthbert, the Scots and the Normans" Anglo-Norman Studies Volume 16 1994 pp. 1–20
  • Chaplais, P. "William of Saint-Calais and the Domesday survey" in Holt, J. C. (ed.) Domesday Studies: Papers Read at the Novocentenary Conference of the Royal Historical Society and the Institute of British Geographers Winchester 1986 1987 pp. 65–77
  • Offler, H. S. "William of St Calais" Transactions of the Architectural and Archaeological Society of Durham and Northumberland Volume X, 1960 pp. 258-279
  • Rose, R. K. "Cumbrian Society and the Anglo-Norman Church" Studies in Church History vol. 18 1982 pp. 119-135
Roman Catholic Church titles
Preceded by
William Walcher		 Bishop of Durham
1081–1096		 Succeeded by
Ranulf Flambard
Persondata
NAME William de St-Calais
ALTERNATIVE NAMES William de St Calais; William de St Carileph; William de St Carilef
SHORT DESCRIPTION Bishop of Durham
DATE OF BIRTH
PLACE OF BIRTH
DATE OF DEATH January 2, 1096
PLACE OF DEATH