William of Malmesbury on Kingship

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January 2005

Original Article

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

BJÖRN WEILER

William of Malmesbury on Kingship

BJÖRN WEILER

University of Wales, Aberystwyth

Abstract

This article uses the historical works of William of Malmesbury to explore notions and
concepts of kingship in Norman England. It argues, first, that his understanding of the royal
office owes more to traditional, even patristic, concepts of secular power than historians
have been willing to accept, and, secondly, that his concept of a ruler’s duties was more
concerned with issues of proper behaviour, symbolic actions and moral leadership than those
aspects of Anglo-Norman kingship which modern scholars have traditionally explored.

illiam, sometime librarian of the Benedictine abbey of Malmes-

bury, ranks among the most prolific and original minds of
twelfth-century England. He composed works of exegesis, col-

lections of Marian miracles, canon law, classical and patristic texts. He
also wrote several historical texts, including a series of saints’ lives; the

Gesta Regum

, the history of the kings of England from the Saxon inva-

sions to the reign of Henry I; the

Gesta Pontificum

, the deeds of the Eng-

lish prelates during the same period, both of which had been completed

.1125; and the

Historia Novella

, which he embarked upon in the late

1130s, and which concentrated on the history of English affairs during
the reign of Stephen up to 1142.

His style and approach, especially the

exercises in ‘source criticism’, the carefully crafted and nuanced por-
trayal of individual characters, and a desire to revive classical standards
of Latin, have endeared him to modern historians,

while the range and

For a list of Malmesbury’s known works see William of Malmesbury,

Gesta Regum Anglorum

, ed.

and trans. R. A. B. Mynors, R. M. Thomson and M. Winterbottom (2 vols., Oxford, 1998 –9)
[hereafter

Gesta Regum

], ii, pp. xlvi–xvii. Throughout this article reference to Malmesbury’s writ-

ings will be to book and chapter (where given in the edited text followed by page numbers). Earlier
versions of this article were read as papers at conferences in Leeds and Nijmegen. The article also
draws on discussions and exchanges within the British Academy Research Network ‘Political Cul-
ture in Norman and Angevin England (1066 –1272) in Comparative Perspective’.

Rodney Thomson,

William of Malmesbury

(Woodbridge, 2

rev. edn., 2003) [hereafter Thomson,

William of Malmesbury

], pp. 14 –39; Michael Winterbottom, ‘The

Gesta Regum

of William of

Malmesbury’,

Journal of Medieval Latin

, v (1995), 158 –73; Richard W. Southern, ‘Aspects of the

European Tradition of Historical Writing IV: The Sense of the Past’,

Transactions of the Royal His-

torical Society

, 5th ser., xxiii (1973), 243 – 63; Antonia Gransden,

Historical Writing in England,

c.550–c.1307

(1974) [hereafter Gransden,

Historical Writing

], pp. 166 – 8, 174 – 6; V. H. Galbraith,

Historical Research in Medieval England

(1951), pp. 11–19.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

depth of his coverage led to Malmesbury’s historical works being among
the most widely copied of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.

In this

article, Malmesbury’s historical oeuvre will be used to explore his con-
cept of kingship. Although in recent years analysing the representation
of kingship in historical narratives has become a fruitful means for
scholars in investigating theories of political power,

few attempts have as

yet been made to tap into the rich Latin historiographical tradition of
post-Conquest England.

This article suggests that examining Malmes-

bury’s thought on kingship will broaden our understanding not only
of historical writing in the twelfth century but also of contemporary
debates about the nature and function of a ruler’s office. After all, in
order to understand medieval politics not only should the means and
mechanisms by which they were conducted be explored, but also the
values against which they were judged.

The undertakings of kings were central to Malmesbury’s writing. The

Gesta Regum

is by far the longest of his surviving works while relations

between kings and bishops form a core element in the

Gesta Pontificum

and those between king and barons in the

Historia Novella

. Among his

hagiographical writings, the

vitae

of SS Dunstan and Wulfstan deal at

length with the relationship between saint and ruler. Kings and their
actions interested Malmesbury, and they impinged upon the life of the
institutions and communities whose past he sought to record. Further-
more, Malmesbury wrote with a clear didactic purpose in mind. When
presenting the Empress Mathilda with a copy of the

Gesta Regum

, for

instance, Malmesbury explained how ‘in the old days books of this
kind were written for kings or queens in order to provide them with
a sort of pattern for their own lives, from which they could learn to
follow some men’s successes, while avoiding the misfortunes of others’.

He made a similar point in the prologue to the

Historia Novella

, written

at the behest of Earl Robert of Gloucester: ‘for what is more to the
advantage of virtue or more conducive to justice than recognizing the
divine pleasure in the good and punishment of those who have gone

Gesta Regum

, i. xiii–xxi; Thomson,

William of Malmesbury

, pp. 36 – 8; Gransden,

Historical

Writing

, pp. 179–80.

Ludger Körntgen,

Königsherrschaft und Gottes Gnade. Zu Kontext und Funktion sakraler Vorstel-

lungen in Historiographie und Bildzeugnissen der ottonisch-frühsalischen Zeit

(Berlin, 2001); Sverre

Bagge,

Kings, Politics and the Right Order of the World in German Historiography c.950 –1150

(Lei-

den, 2002); idem,

From Gang Leader to the Lord’s Anointed. Kingship in Sverris Saga and Hákonar-

saga Hákonarsonar

(Odense, 1996); T. N. Bisson, ‘On not eating Polish Bread in Vain: Resonance

and Conjuncture in the Deeds of the Princes of Poland (1109–1113)’,

Viator

, xxix (1998), [hereafter

Bisson, ‘On not eating Polish Bread’], 275–89; Kornél Svozák, ‘The Transformation of the Image
of the Ideal King in Twelfth-Century Hungary’,

Kings and Kingship in Medieval Europe

, ed. Anne

J. Duggan (1993), pp. 241–63.

The exception in the context of this article is Joan Gluckauf Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship in

William of Malmesbury’s

Gesta Regum

and

Historia Novella

’,

Mediaeval Studies

, xxxviii (1976),

[hereafter Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’], 351–71, which uses a more narrow source base and
is primarily concerned with an almost Victorian interest in Malmesbury’s ‘constitutional’ thought.

Gesta Regum

, pp. 10 –13.

BJÖRN WEILER

astray?’

Malmesbury thus placed himself in an established tradition of

writing secular history for the instruction and benefit of his readers.

This is not to say that detailing the actions and deeds of kings, judging
their moral value and delineating the lessons that Malmesbury’s audi-
ence and readers might draw from them, was his sole concern,

but

regardless of what particular type of history Malmesbury was writing (be
it secular, ecclesiastical, institutional or hagiographical), the question of
proper and legitimate exercise of royal power was one that mattered.

Using William of Malmesbury’s historical writings to explore his

concept of royal authority departs from previous examinations of twelfth-
century English kingship in a number of ways. Historians have tradition-
ally sought to trace fundamental legal or constitutional principles that
define the exercise of kingship or to see a learned ideology expressed in
the ceremonies of royalty.

This approach, however, does not always

reflect the complexity of medieval politics,

and sets aside, for instance,

the relationship between theoretical pronouncements on kingship, and
the ideals, values and expectations of a ruler’s subjects. What was it that
those who were ruled expected their rulers to do? What principles were
kings to abide by? What were the ethical and moral norms against which
their actions were judged, and by which they could be legitimized? One
means of answering these questions is to explore the way the exercise of
royal power was represented in works of history. In fact, the writing of his-
tory was inevitably also the writing of a commentary on contemporary
affairs.

In many ways, Malmesbury provides an ideal starting point for

investigating twelfth-century concepts of kingship: his oeuvre spanned
the whole range of historiographical genres, he wrote with a clear didactic
purpose, and for a very specific group of patrons, which included the king’s

William of Malmesbury,

Historia Novella

, ed. Edmund King, trans. K. R. Potter (Oxford, 1998)

[hereafter

Historia Novella

], pp. 3 – 4.

Gesta Regum

, pp. 14 –15. See also Nancy F. Partner,

Serious Entertainments: The Writing of His-

tory in Twelftth-Century England

(Chicago and London, 1977), especially pp. 194 –226.

See also Thomson,

William of Malmesbury

, p. 32.

Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’; J. E. A. Joliffe,

Angevin Kingship

(1955); E. H. Kantorowicz,

The King’s Two Bodies: A Study in Medieval Political Theology

(Princeton, 1955); idem,

Laudes

Regiae: A Study in Liturgical Acclamations and Mediaeval Ruler Worship

(Berkeley, 1946); Percy

Ernst Schramm,

Geschichte des englischen Königtums im Lichte der Krönung

(Weimar, 1937); Walter

Ullmann,

Principles of Government and Politics in the Middle Ages

(1974)

;

H. E. J. Cowdrey, ‘The

Anglo-Norman

Laudes Regiae

’,

Viator

, xii (1981), 39 –78; and Janet L. Nelson, ‘The Rites of the

Conqueror’,

Anglo-Norman Studies

, iv (1981), 117–32, 210 –21.

This also applies to a third strand of enquiry, which is primarily concerned with the legal, fiscal

and administrative apparatus of kingship. See Geoffrey Koziol, ‘England, France, and the Problem
of Sacrality in Twelfth-Century Ritual’,

Cultures of Power, Lordship, Status, and Process in

Twelfth-Century Europe

, ed. T. N. Bisson (Philadelphia, 1995), pp. 124 – 48; C. Warren Hollister,

‘Anglo-Norman Political Culture and the Twelfth-Century Renaissance’,

Anglo-Norman Political

Culture and the 12

-Century Renaissance: Proceedings of the Borchard Conference on Anglo-

Norman History, 1995

, ed. C. Warren Hollister (Woodbridge, 1997), pp. 1–16; C. W. Hollister and

J. W. Baldwin, ‘The Rise of Administrative Kingship: Henry I and Philip Augustus’,

American His-

torical Review

, lxxxiii (1978), 867–905.

Hans-Werner Goetz,

Geschichtschreibung und Geschichtsbewußtsein im hohen Mittelalter

(Berlin,

1999) [hereafter Goetz,

Geschichtsschreibung

], pp. 227–38, 243 –59.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

wife, his daughter, son and nephew. Malmesbury was thus in a unique
position to use the past to provide lessons for the future.

This article does not seek to establish the reality behind Malmesbury’s

depiction of the past.

Whether his portrayal of individual rulers was

accurate or not is irrelevant for the particular questions this article
strives to answer.

Like any historian of the twelfth century, Malmes-

bury filtered the events he recorded through his own expectations of
what was good or bad behaviour, and of what constituted good or bad
kingship, and it was against these values that he judged political actions
and political actors. If this meant taking sides, then it was taking sides in
favour of those who were morally right and required neither explanation
nor justification.

It is with his ideals and concepts that this article is

concerned, and not the accuracy of his reporting. Secondly, Malmesbury
should not be viewed in isolation from the intellectual and cultural
milieu within which he wrote. Because his approach to sources often
seems deceptively close to that of modern academic historians, there has
been a tendency to treat Malmesbury as a modern intellectual, rather
than the twelfth-century Benedictine monk that he was. He has thus
been criticized either for an interest in irrelevant marvels or for his mor-
alizing tone,

or has been portrayed as a rational humanist, untainted by

the theological concerns commonly associated with medieval historical
writing.

In fact, it can be argued that Malmesbury’s writings as well as

It should also be noted that the date of composition of the

Gesta Regum

(

.1125) coincided with

a succession crisis in England, and that the recipients of the

Gesta

– Henry I’s daughter Mathilda,

his illegitimate son Robert of Gloucester, and his nephew David of Scotland – were also those who
were either likely to succeed Henry, or who would play an important role in choosing his successor.
See Karl Leyser, ‘The Anglo-Norman Succession 1120 –1125’,

Anglo-Norman Studies

, xiii (1990),

225 – 42; C. Warren Hollister, ‘The Anglo-Norman Succession Debate of 1126: Prelude to
Stephen’s Anarchy’,

Journal of Medieval History

, i (1975), 19 – 41.

As has been done, rather splendidly, for instance, by Emma Mason, ‘William Rufus: Myth and

Reality’,

Journal of Medieval History

, iii (1977), 1–20; Simon Keynes, ‘A Tale of Two Kings: Alfred

the Great and Aethelred the Unready’,

Transactions of the Royal Historical Society

, 5th ser., xxvi

(1986), 195–217. See also Thomas Callahan Jr., ‘The Making of a Monster: The Historical Image
of William Rufus’,

Journal of Medieval History

, vii (1981), 175–86.

This follows Franti

ek Graus, ‘Die Herrschersagen des Mittelalters als Geschichtsquelle’,

Ausgewählte Aufsätze von Franti

ek Graus (1959–1989), ed. Hans-Jörg Gilomen, Peter Moraw and

Rainer C. Schwinges (Stuttgart, 2002) [hereafter Graus, ‘Die Herrschersagen’], pp. 3 –27.

Goetz, Geschichtsschreibung, pp. 208–16. Historians debating the factual accuracy of medieval

chroniclers all too often fail to grasp the fundamental complexity of medieval historical writing.
The debate whether Malmesbury was a bad historian or not because he favoured the earl of
Gloucester in the war against King Stephen provides a case in point. See R. B. Patterson, ‘William
of Malmesbury’s Robert of Gloucester’, American Historical Review, lxx (1965), 983–97; idem,
‘Stephen’s Shaftesbury Charter: Another Case against William of Malmesbury’, Speculum, xliii
(1968), 487–92; and J. Leedom, ‘William of Malmesbury and Robert of Gloucester Reconsidered’,
Albion, vi (1974), 251– 65.

D. H. Farmer, ‘Two Biographies by William of Malmesbury’, Latin Biography, ed. T. A. Dorey

(1967), pp. 155 –76.

Thomson, William of Malmesbury, pp. 26 –7; John Gillingham, ‘Civilizing the English? The Eng-

lish Histories of William of Malmesbury and David Hume’, Historical Research, lxxiv (2001), 17– 43,
which, on pp. 38–9, uses Malmesbury’s interest in economic growth as an indication that Malmesbury
was not bound by theological concepts or norms. For a recent critique of Gillingham’s approach

BJÖRN WEILER

his concept of kingship were firmly anchored in the intellectual and liter-
ary milieu of the early twelfth century, and that they formed part of a
clerical culture steeped in the Bible and patristic theology.

At first sight, William of Malmesbury’s concept of kingship consists

of a relatively formulaic set of duties: maintaining the peace;

defending

the realm;

practising piety, founding, endowing or re-establishing

monastic houses, ensuring that not a whiff of simony poisoned the
English church;

and upholding justice, usually through the swift and

decisive punishment of criminals, but also by combating witchcraft and
adultery.

Little about this list is unusual. In fact, it merely repeats a

well-established canon of royal duties that can be traced back to the
church fathers and their Roman forebears.

However, venturing beyond

the mere listing of abstract values, and exploring what Malmesbury
actually did with them, how he applied them to evaluate and judge the
actions and events which he sought to recover and reconstruct, a more
complex picture emerges. The following will place the portrayal and
definition of a ruler’s virtues and duties within the broader context of
the ethical principles underpinning Malmesbury’s view of the right order
of politics. What exactly was it that made a good king good and a bad
king bad? How did Malmesbury seek to reconcile abstract ethical
precept with political reality? How did he expect his ideals to work in
practice?

A start can be made with a passage from the Gesta Regum about the

court of William Rufus:

The knightly code of honour disappeared; . . . long flowing hair, luxurious
garments, shoes with curved and pointed tips became the fashion. Softness
of body rivalling the weaker sex, a mincing gait, effeminate gestures and a

see Nicholas Vincent, ‘The Strange Case of the Missing Biographies: The Lives of the Plantagenet
Kings of England 1154 –1272’, The Art of Medieval Biography. Essays in Honour of Frank Barlow,
ed. Sarah Hamilton and Julia Crick (forthcoming). The author would like to thank Professor Vin-
cent for providing him with an advance copy of this paper.

Encapsulated perhaps best by the description of Alfred the Great’s reign: ‘on public highways,

he would order bracelets of gold to be hung up at crossroads, to mock the greed of passers by,
for no one dared steal them’ (Gesta Regum, ii. 122, pp. 190 –1). On this topos see also Graus,
‘Die Herrschersagen’, pp. 11–17, and Timothy Reuter, ‘Die Unsicherheit auf den Straßen im
europäischen Früh- und Hochmittelalter: Täter, Opfer und ihre mittelalterlichen und modernen
Betrachter’, Träger und Instrumentarien des Friedens im hohen und späten Mittelalter, ed. Johannes
Fried (Sigmaringen, 1996), pp. 169–202.

Gesta Regum, ii, 148, pp. 238 – 41; ii, 155, pp. 254 –5; ii, 196, pp. 348 –9.

On attending mass see Gesta Regum, iii, 267, pp. 492–3; on founding monasteries see Gesta

Regum, ii, 148, pp. 238 –9; on re-establishing monasteries see William of Malmesbury, Saints’ Lives:
Lives of SS. Wulfstan, Dunstan, Patrick, Benignus and Indract, ed. and trans. M. Winterbottom and
R. M. Thomson (Oxford, 2002) [hereafter Saints Lives, Vita Wulftsani/Dunstani], Vita Dunstani, ii,
2, pp. 238–9; on opposition to simony see Saints’ Lives, Vita Wulfstani, i, 11, pp. 44 –7.

Saints’ Lives, Vita Dunstani, ii, 9, pp. 256 –7; Gesta Regum, v, 399, pp. 724 –5.

For an introductory survey see: Henry A. Meyers, Medieval Kingship. The Origins and Develop-

ment of Western Monarchy in all Stages from the Fall of Rome to the Fifteenth Century (Chicago,
1982), pp. 15 –58; Björn Weiler, ‘The Rex Renitens and the Medieval Ideal of Kingship, ca. 900 –ca.
1250’, Viator, xxxi (2000), [hereafter Weiler, ‘The Rex Renitens’], 1– 42, esp. 23–38.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

liberal display of the person . . . such was the fashion of the younger men.
Spineless, unmannered, they were reluctant to remain as Nature had
intended they should be; they were a menace to the virtue of others and
promiscuous with their own.

Rufus’s court acted in a manner that according to Malmesbury was con-
trary to nature, immoral and depraved. The king’s entourage, moreover,
betrayed some of its key political functions: rather than upholding noble
values, they destroyed them; rather than defending virtue, they threat-
ened it; instead of acting like warriors, they were spineless and effete.

The chronicler’s criticism was not, however, limited to Rufus’s knights,

but included the king as well: he ‘used no diligence to correct them, but
rather made a display of negligence, so bringing on himself great and
indelible discredit’. Not only did Rufus fail to intervene to correct and
discipline the members of his household, even worse he seemed to con-
done their behaviour by making a show of his lack of concern. He
thereby acted contrary to some of the basic notions going back to the
church fathers about the role and function of kingship.

Rufus fell short

of expectations on several fronts: he should never have tolerated such
immoral behaviour, and should have done his utmost to correct his
courtiers’ habits. More importantly, by correcting this type of behaviour
he would have fulfilled one of his most noble functions, and would have
set an example to inspire his subjects with moral rectitude. After all, in
Malmesbury’s eyes, upholding justice involved not only dealing with
robbers, thieves and coiners, but also meant addressing moral issues.
William Rufus failed in his duties not only because he condoned sinful
deeds, but also because he refused to lead by example.

The king’s duty to lead by example was central to Malmesbury’s con-

cept of royal authority, and he frequently indicated successful kingship
by a ruler’s ability to inspire his subjects to imitate his actions and dis-
position. As Malmesbury had explained to the earl of Gloucester: ‘The
excellence of great men . . . inspires the affection even of those who are
far off, so that men of lower degree adopt as their own the virtues of
those above them.’

Alfred the Great’s son Edward, for instance, man-

aged to win the loyalty and backing of his subjects because ‘he [n]ever
came off second in any contest’. In fact, so accustomed did his subjects
become to success, that ‘they flung themselves into the fray even without
taking advice from the king and his captains . . . ; thus enemies came to

Gesta Regum, iv, 314, pp. 558–61. For the issue of long hair – a recurrent theme with Malmes-

bury – see Robert Bartlett, ‘Symbolic Meanings of Hair in the Middle Ages’, Transactions of the
Royal Historical Society, 6th ser., iv (1994), 43–61.

Most notably Augustine’s dictum rex a rectum agere: Augustine, De Civitate Dei, ed. Bernard

Dombart and Alphons Kalb, 2 vols., Corpus Christianorum Series Latina xlvii–xlviii (Turnhout,
1955), xvii, 20, ii. 586 –9; and Isidore of Seville’s definition: rex a regere, and, non autem regit, qui
non corrigit, Isidori Hispalensis Episcopi Etymologiarum Sive Originum Libri XX, ed. W. M. Lind-
say, Scriptorum Classicorum Bibliotheca Oxoniensis (2 vols., Oxford, 1911), ix, 3 (no pagination).

Gesta Regum, pp. 10 –11.

BJÖRN WEILER

be despised by the soldiers and not taken seriously by the king.’

Virtu-

ous behaviour in a ruler was reflected in the virtues of his people. This
was by no means limited to military leadership, but extended to all those
qualities which made a good king. In Malmesbury’s vita of St Dunstan,
for instance, the fervour with which King Edgar heeded the saint’s advice
in reforming his court soon translated itself into the maintenance of
peace and justice across the realm: ‘the nobles . . . dared to do little or
nothing contrary to law and justice when they saw their master so obedi-
ent to Dunstan.’

Similarly, that Henry I was ‘absorbed in the honeyed

sweets of books’, aware that ‘a king unlettered was a donkey crowned’,

was reflected in the intellectual accomplishments of the English aristo-
cracy. In fact, Malmesbury claims that during a meeting between Henry’s
court and that of Pope Calixtus II, the king insisted that two of his
noblemen meet the cardinals in debate. Not surprisingly, the English
nobles carried the day, and ‘the cardinals were not ashamed to confess
that these western territories had a far more flourishing literary culture
than they had ever heard of or imagined in their own country.’

A king,

in short, had to lead as well as to correct. If a ruler performed his func-
tions well, then the realm would thrive, his subjects would live in peace
and prosperity, and divine good will would be with him.

All this was intrinsically linked to public behaviour, to the manners

and etiquette by which conformity with abstract moral values was pub-
licly expressed. Boorishness in a king could not be tolerated, and it is
thus not surprising that William of Malmesbury praised the display of
urbanitas or mansuetudo, of ease of manners and civility in the actions of
good kings.

In fact, so important was a high standard of civilized

behaviour to Malmesbury, that he listed among the chief virtues of King
David I of Scotland that ‘he had . . . rubbed off all the barbarian gaucherie
of Scottish manners’ and that ‘he gave a three year exemption from the
payment of dues to any of his countrymen who was prepared to raise his
standard of comfort in housing, in elegance of dress, and of civility in
diet.’

Moreover, in the dedicatory letter of the Gesta Regum, Malmes-

bury extolled David for being ‘so mild in address, so easy of access, with

Gesta Regum, ii, 125, pp. 196 –7. Cf. also the statement concerning Alfred Gesta Regum, ii, 121,

pp. 186–9. See also Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’, 360, for the king’s role as leader in battle.

Willelmi Malmesbiriensis Monachi De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum Libri Quinque, ed. N. E. S. A.

Hamilton (London, 1870) [hereafter Gesta Pontificum Anglorum], i, 18, pp. 26 –7; for the English
translation see: William of Malmesbury, The Deeds of the Bishops of England (Gesta Pontificum
Anglorum), trans. David Preest (Woodbridge, 2002) [hereafter Deeds of the Bishops], p. 19. Cf. also
Saints’ Lives. Vita Dunstani, ii, 9 (p. 256 –7), ii, 14 (pp. 264 –5), ii, 18 (pp. 268 –9).

Gesta Regum, v, 390, pp. 708–11. Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’, 362.

Gesta Regum, v, 406, pp. 734 –7.

Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’, 361, for a contrary view.

Gesta Regum, v, 400, pp. 726 –7. See the very perceptive comments on this passage made by John

Gillingham, ‘The Beginnings of English Imperialism’, Journal of Historical Sociology, v (1992),
392– 409, and also reprinted in his The English in the Twelfth Century ( Woodbridge, 2000), pp. 3 –
18. Although the moral and theological aspects of civilitas have not been noted by Gillingham,
they only strengthen his argument.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

a natural kindliness of mien which encourages the diffident and a char-
acteristic courtesy which does away with the haughty air of royalty’.

Elegance and ease of manners were but the public demonstration of a
person’s moral refinement.

Similarly, when recording a vision that

Archbishop Maurilius of Rouen had of life after death, Malmesbury
included a description of angels who were escorting the late prelate’s soul
to Paradise. These celestial beings ‘matched the highest standard of eleg-
ance in countenance and in raiment; the courtesy of their language was
equal to the brilliance of their apparel.’

Elegance and ease of manners

were outward tokens of virtue in heaven as they were on earth.

A good king was thus expected to behave like Æthelstan I: ‘to the

servants of God he was well-disposed and gracious, to laymen cheerful
and courteous; to magnates he was serious in consideration of his own
position; for lesser folk, condescending to their humble status, he laid
aside the haughty air of royalty and was mild and affable.’

Similar

language was used to characterize William the Conqueror,

and when

describing the early promise of William Rufus, Malmesbury emphasized
the degree to which training in mansuetudo, in correct and polite beha-
viour, formed part of the young boy’s upbringing, and how it destined
him to succeed his father to the English throne.

Correct behaviour

included politeness,

but above all a concern for the honour, status and

standing of a ruler’s subjects, as in the case of Henry I who maintained
peace and justice ‘without shame to his nobility’.

By being affable and

approachable, a prince demonstrated that he complied with one of his
chief duties: to protect those who could not protect themselves. They
could seek his backing without fear or difficulty. Furthermore, he demon-
strated that he had not succumbed to a temptation facing everyone who
held secular power: to succumb to the allures of power, and, as a result,
to act haughtily or arrogantly towards others.

Thus, ease of manners

denoted more than mere politeness.

In this context it should be noticed how, in dealing with William

Rufus, Malmesbury painted a careful contrast between the king’s public
face as a protector of the wicked, and the fact that, ‘at home and in the
chamber with his private friends, he was all mildness and complaisance,
and relied much on jest to carry a point, being in particular a merry critic

Gesta Regum, pp. 2–3.

C. Stephen Jaeger, The Origins of Courtliness: Civilizing Trends and the Formation of Courtly

Ideals, 939–1210 (Philadelphia, 1985) [hereafter Jaeger, The Origins of Courtliness].

Gesta Regum, iii, 268, pp. 494 –7.

Ibid., ii, 134, pp. 214 –15.

Ibid., iii, 267, pp. 492–3.

Ibid., iv, 305, pp. 542–3.

Saints’ Lives, Life of St Dunstan, i, 12, pp. 194 –7.

Gesta Regum, v, 411, pp. 742–5.

This, too, was firmly rooted in patristic thought on the exercise of secular power. See Gregory

the Great, Regula Pastoralis, ed. Floribert Rommel, trans. Charles Morel, introduction, notes and
index by Bruno Judic, Sources Chrétiennes ccclxxxi–ccclxxxii (2 vols., Paris, 1992); Weiler, ‘The Rex
Renitens’, 22– 4.

BJÖRN WEILER

of his own mistakes, so as to reduce the unpopularity they caused and
dissolve in laughter.’

Rufus, in short, was fully aware of his own short-

comings, but refused to do anything about them. The king possessed the
outward skills of a good ruler, but none of the inner disposition. This
heaped further opprobrium upon him, and did so by emphasizing a
point already evident in the king’s studied indifference towards his
courtiers’ antics: not only was he aware that his actions were morally
wrong, but, rather than mending his ways, he made light of the wrong
done by him. He was thus the worst kind of culprit: a persistent offender
who consistently spurned the opportunity to atone for his deeds.

Rufus was not an isolated case. Indeed, a ruler’s political ineptitude

was frequently expressed through his public moral failings. This is per-
haps most strikingly illustrated by the image Malmesbury painted of
King Eadwig, who was wont

to violate his own chastity almost every hour of the day. For he had fallen
captive to the wondrous beauty of one Aelfgifu, . . . and he followed her in
everything. The wretched woman had in constant attendance on her a
daughter . . . And the story went that Eadwig played around with both
mother and daughter, having his way with them alternately.

Even worse, Eadwig did not confine his depravity to the bedchamber, but
let it publicly interfere with the exercise of his royal office: during his
coronation, the king absented himself from the celebratory meal, ‘alleging
necessities of nature’ but in reality to consort with his two female com-
panions. Eventually St Dunstan went to search for him, and found him
‘sprawled between his whores, his crown flung off, some way away on the
floor’.

The potent symbolism of the discarded crown should be noted.

Malmesbury paints a poignant image of the rex inutilis, the useless king,
who rejects – and who ultimately is to lose – his crown, the sign of his
royal duties, in order to satisfy carnal desires. It comes as no surprise that
Eadwig failed to prove himself a capable and virtuous leader of his people.
He initiated a persecution of monks that nearly brought monastic life
in England to a halt, he expelled his own mother from court, and ultim-
ately lost his kingdom by driving his subjects to rebellion.

Eadwig’s

inability to act as a king should act was symbolized by his sexual
excesses. His failure rested not so much with the fact that he committed
adultery but with the circumstances of its public display: even his coro-
nation, the occasion when a new ruler solemnly declared his obligations
towards the realm and the community of his subjects, was despoiled by
the king’s unwillingness to restrain his libido. A public display of immor-
ality unmasked an ineptitude which was as personal as it was political.

Gesta Regum, iv, 312, pp. 556 –7.

Saints’ Lives, Vita Dunstani, i, 27, pp. 224 –7.

Ibid., pp. 226–7.

Ibid., i, 28, pp. 228–31; ii, 3, pp. 238 – 41. This contradicts Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’,

355 – 6.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

There was, thus, both a pragmatic and a symbolic dimension to the

question of moral behaviour. Just as a virtuous king would find his
virtue reflected in his subjects, so a depraved ruler would find his short-
comings replicated and enlarged. This is exemplified by Æthelred the
Unready’s inability to show the energy and drive expected of a king: ‘The
king meanwhile, active and well-built for slumber, put off such important
business and lay yawning; and if he ever thought better of it to the extent
of even rising on one elbow, at once either sloth was too much for him or
fortune was against him, and he sank back into wretchedness.’

Conse-

quently, the English army lacked a leader, and the king’s subjects the
drive, the conviction and loyalty on which a king depended. In fact, the
ultimate victory of the Danish invaders was due to Æthelred’s failure to
reward the loyalty of his subjects. They may well have been willing to
follow, but he was unable to lead.

The same principle is evident in Malmesbury’s description of William

Rufus. The king’s unwillingness to correct evil in himself and others was
evident not only in his refusal to make his courtiers behave in a more
manly fashion, but also in the patronage he extended to men like
Ranulph Flambard, who ‘skinned the rich, ground down the poor, and
swept other men’s inheritances into his net’.

He even made them strip

the altars of the saints of gold and silver.

That is, the king’s chief finan-

cial adviser was prone to violate some of the basic principles on which
legitimate royal authority was founded, and he did so with his monarch’s
knowledge and backing. Similarly, the way that Stephen of Blois suc-
ceeded to the throne was reflected in the political difficulties he faced. In
Malmesbury’s eyes, Stephen was a usurper and a perjurer, who repeat-
edly broke his word, and who could not be trusted. If the king was
unwilling to stand by his promises, that same behaviour could be
expected from his subjects, so that the political history of Stephen’s reign
was thus one of plunder and rape, of quickly shifting alliances, and of
robbers seizing their neighbours’ lands.

In short, just as a good king

would inspire virtue, loyalty and prosperity among his subjects, a bad
one would enable them to let their vices run free, and would ultimately
bring upon them penury, foreign invasions and civil unrest.

This links

with the passage about follicular depravity at Rufus’s court. A public
display of personal immorality heralded disasters for the kingdom as a

Gesta Regum, ii, 165, pp. 272–3.

Ibid., iv, 314, pp. 558–9.

Ibid., 318, pp. 562–3.

Historia Novella, i, 18, pp. 30 –3.

This echoed traditional concepts – most popularly expressed in Pseudo-Cyprianus, De xii Abu-

sivis Saeculi, ed. Siegmund Hellmann, Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen
Literatur, 3rd ser., iv (1910), 1– 62; see also Marita Blattmann, ‘ “Ein Unglück für sein Volk”: Der
Zusammenhang zwischen Fehlverhalten des Königs und Volkswohl in Quellen des 7.–12. Jahrhun-
derts’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien, xxx (1996), 80 –102; Rob Meens, ‘Politics, Mirrors of Princes
and the Bible: Sins, Kings and the Well-being of the Realm’, Early Medieval Europe, vii (1998),
345–57.

BJÖRN WEILER

whole, as Malmesbury expounded in his Vita Wulfstani, describing the
morals of King Harold’s court where ‘men who blushed to be what they
had been born, and let their hair flow like women, would be no more use
than women in the defence of their country against the foreigner. No one
would deny that this was shown to be very true that same year when the
Normans arrived’.

The manner in which Malmesbury constructed the character and per-

sonality of his protagonists was highly sophisticated. The juxtaposition
between good kings and bad ones was rarely clear cut and unambiguous.
Even some of the most maligned rulers in Malmesbury’s oeuvre were
granted redeeming features. William Rufus, for instance, was praised as
much for his courage and generosity

as he was condemned for his greed

and his unwillingness to rein in his court and household. Malmesbury’s
portrait of Harold Godwinson is equally complex. In the Vita Wulfstani,
for instance, Malmesbury described at great length how Harold ‘who
was already showing by his lordly behaviour his desire for the throne . . .
had a particular liking for Wulfstan’, and was prepared to make a detour
of up to thirty miles to meet the saint. In fact, Harold’s willingness to do
Wulfstan’s bidding frequently embarrassed the saint.

Godwinson may

have been a usurper, but he still had some good qualities. Even Stephen
had some redeeming features: he was affable and strenuous in war, as
much as he was unreliable, too kind and overly generous.

Good kings also had vices and shortcomings. For instance, a whole

chapter of the Gesta Regum is devoted to complaints about the Con-
queror’s financial exploitation of his new kingdom.

Even his monastic

patronage gave cause for concern: some people claimed that he plun-
dered old houses to enrich new ones. At the same time, these criticisms
were embedded in a comprehensive catalogue of virtues: William was
humble to his inferiors, and fearsome to his enemies; no foreign people
dared to attack England;

he attended mass daily, and during his reign

‘bishops made no progress by ambition, and abbots none by bribes’.

Malmesbury did not expect his good king to be a saint. Rather, doing as
much of a good thing as circumstances permitted was what, in Malmes-
bury’s eyes, frequently distinguished a virtuous ruler. William the Con-
queror, for instance, was ‘a practising Christian as far as a layman could
be’.

Similarly, when explaining why he dedicated the Gesta Regum to

Saints’ Lives, Vita Wulfstani, i, 16, pp. 58 –9. Malmesbury made a similar point in the Historia

Novella, i, 5, pp. 10 –13, where he described, how in 1129 –30, at a time when Henry I was seeking
to ensure the succession of his daughter Mathilda (which ultimately collapsed in 1135), a predilec-
tion for long hair developed among the knightly classes of England.

Gesta Regum, iv, 309, pp. 550 –1; iv, 320, pp. 564 –7.

Saints’ Lives, Vita Wulfstani, i, 7, pp. 34 –5.

Historia Novella, i, 15, pp. 28 –9.

Gesta Regum, iii, 280, pp. 508 –11.

Ibid., 258, pp. 476 –9.

Ibid., 267, pp. 492–3.

Ibid., pp. 492–3.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

Robert of Gloucester, Malmesbury extolled the earl’s many virtues,
including his love of literature: ‘In your exalted station you steer a praise-
worthy middle course, neither neglecting knightly exercises for the sake
of letters, nor rejecting letters, as some do, for the sake of knighthood.’

In effect, Malmesbury took into account the secular station of rulers and
princes, and the different demands and pressures to which they would
thus find themselves exposed. Perfection would be unobtainable to them,
but what they could do was strive for as high a standard of accomplish-
ment as possible.

The awareness that rulers and princes were exposed to the snares

and temptations of the world also meant that they were prone to vices –
foremost among them greed and adultery – which, deplorable as they
might be, were none the less typical of their status and function within
society. As far as greed was concerned, Malmesbury saw two closely
entwined but none the less distinct evils: profligacy and an undue desire
for financial gain. The first defined itself by the unwise use of money, the
spendthrift waste of inherited funds, and all too often was the result of
or the reason for the latter. William Rufus, Robert Curthose, Harold
Godwinson and Stephen of Blois were prime examples of the evils a
wasteful ruler would bring upon himself and his subjects. William Rufus,
after a good beginning, came to a bad end because of his unquenchable
thirst for money. His generosity was famed across Europe, and soon
brought him penury, and led him to the sinful exploitation of the
Church.

Similarly, Robert Curthose lost the backing of his Norman

subjects not only because of his military failure and his weak character,
but also because of his profligate nature. For instance, rather than spend-
ing his wife’s dowry on repaying the loan for which he had pawned
Normandy to Henry I – as his father-in-law had intended him to do – ‘he
flung [it] into the laps of actors and wastrels’.

These men ultimately lost

either their political status or their eternal soul because they did not
abide by a basic distinction, which Malmesbury elaborated right at the
beginning of his coverage of Rufus’s reign: the distinction between the
prodigal and the liberal.

The former poured ‘out their money on pur-

poses of which they will leave a brief memorial in this world or none at
all’,

while the latter spent their wealth for the benefit of those who

could not help themselves.

Harold Godwinson and Stephen of Blois were different from Rufus

and Curthose because they put material wealth above what was morally
right. In the Vita Wulfstani, for instance, Malmesbury described Harold
as someone ‘who thirsted for greater power on account of his wealth’.

Similarly, Stephen was not only a perjurer but also a spendthrift, who by

Ibid., v, 447, pp. 798 –9.

Ibid., iv, 314, pp. 558 –61.

Ibid., 389, pp. 704 –5.

Ibid., 313, pp. 556 –9.

Ibid., pp. 556–7.

Saints’ Lives, Vita Wulfstani, i, 7, pp. 34 –5.

BJÖRN WEILER

his largesse attracted unsuitable followers and who won the backing of
the English magnates because of his generosity, and not because he was
suitable for exercising the office of king.

Malmesbury’s argument is

subtle. Neither Harold nor Stephen sought the throne out of a desire to
enrich themselves – Harold had no need to, and Malmesbury criticized
Stephen not because he was eager to collect money, but because he dis-
pensed with it too easily. Rather, he disputed that material wealth could
compensate for a lack of moral or legal right. Any power derived
through financial might rather than suitability or upright character
would quickly evaporate the moment an individual’s funds had been
exhausted. Consequently, the king would be unable to exercise his office
in full, and he would be forced either, like Stephen, to fight rebellions
and unrest, or to go down the route of William Rufus, who, in his desire
to find new ways of raising funds, would violate the very principles upon
which the proper exercise of kingship was based.

Greed and profligacy were the steady companions of secular politics,

and frequently went hand in hand with a second vice: sexual licence.
Obviously, truly ideal kings remained chaste, even running the risk, as
the Conqueror had done, of being rumoured to be impotent.

One of

the defining features, for instance, of the Canmore dynasty of Scotland
was that they were not prone to ‘a vice common to kings’ and ‘never
took a woman to their bedchamber who was not their legitimate wife,
nor did any one of them bring a stain upon their reputation by keeping
a mistress’.

Adultery could be condoned, but only if it was followed by

penance, or if it conformed to certain rules of sexual behaviour. The
tenth-century King Edgar, for instance, accorded saintly status after
death, was also known for his unrestrained libido, of which Malmesbury
lists two examples. First, Edgar abducted a nun from her convent, and
forced her repeatedly to have intercourse with him. However, when
reprimanded by St Dunstan, Edgar showed true remorse by fasting for
seven years, and by refusing to wear his crown for another seven.

The

second instance involved a serving wench who, to prevent her mistress

Historia Novella, i, 18, pp. 30 –3.

A similar attitude emerges from two accounts in the Gesta Regum, ii, 169–70, pp. 284 –91. On

these episodes see Monika Otter, Inventiones: Fiction and Referentiality in Twelfth-Century English
Historical Writing (Chapel Hill and London, 1996), pp. 97–102.

Gesta Regum, ii, 168, pp. 284 –5.

Ibid., iii, 273, pp. 500 –1.

Ibid., v, 400, pp. 726 –7.

Ibid., ii, 158, pp. 258 –9. Cf. also Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, i, 18, p. 27; The Deeds of the Bishops,

19. The symbolism of Edgar’s refusal to wear a crown should be noticed. This was not without
precedent. A roughly contemporary example, though one that was probably unknown to Malmes-
bury, was that of King Lászlo I of Hungary (d. 1095), who refused to wear a crown, partly in com-
pensation for the fact that he had wrested it from his brother (Legenda Sancti Ladislai Regis, ed.
Emma Bartoniek, Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, ii (Budapest, 1938), p. 517). See also Weiler,
‘The Rex Renitens’. The ultimate models for this type of behaviour were probably those of David
and Nathan in the Old Testament, and of St Ambrose and Theodosius in late antiquity. See, for a
more detailed discussion in a Byzantine context, Gilbert Dagron, Emperor and Priest: The Imperial
Office in Byzantium, trans. Jean Birrell (Cambridge, 2003), pp. 114 –24.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

from ending up as a royal concubine, took the latter’s place in the king’s
bedchamber. When Edgar discovered the trick, he raised the maid ‘to a
position of high honour, and loved her, and her only, remaining faithful
to her alone as his bedfellow until he took Ordgar’s daughter Ælfryth as
his lawful wife’.

In both cases, therefore, the king atoned for his trans-

gression, either by penance or by entering into a monogamous relation-
ship with his mistress. He sinned, but his act of atonement not only
washed away that sin, but also turned him into a virtuous paragon.
Awareness of one’s shortcomings should be followed by correcting one’s
errors, by penance and a better life. This, ultimately, was the key differ-
ence between a tyrant like Rufus and a saint like Edgar. It also puts into
perspective Malmesbury’s famous passage about Henry I’s extramarital
endeavours:

All his life he was completely free from fleshly lusts, indulging in the
embraces of the female sex . . . from love of begetting children and not to
gratify his passions; for he thought it beneath his dignity to comply with
extraneous gratification, unless the royal seed could fulfil its natural pur-
pose; employing his bodily functions as their master, not obeying his lust
as its slave.

Henry I, like many of his predecessors, indulged his royal libido, but, like
Edgar, he also atoned for his transgressions. He may not have forsworn
food for seven years, but he stayed within the wider parameters of con-
temporary sexual morality. Unlike the escapades of his brother’s court,
his own were staunchly heterosexual and he did not let his lusts and
desires interfere with the exercise of his royal office. Malmesbury only
maligns sexual excess when it prevented a king from doing his duties.
This had been one of the chief criticisms of Eadwig, who preferred to
consort with his mistresses rather than participate in his coronation, and
it is also echoed in Malmesbury’s description of Philip I of France, who
‘with advancing years was absorbed in lechery, and . . . became the
bondslave and plaything of adulterous passion’.

As a result, Philip was

excommunicated and his realm was plunged into a political and religious
crisis. This, in turn, reflected a point made concerning Vortigern and the
beginning of the Anglo-Saxon invasions in the fifth century: the king was
‘unready and unwise, devoted to carnal pleasures and the servant of
almost every vice’. He was even rumoured to have had sexual relations
with his daughter. As a result, ‘he paid no attention to business, and
wasted the substance of his realm on riotous living.’

The same thrust of

criticism underpins Malmesbury’s condemnation of the predilection for
long hair among the young men at Rufus’s court and – in the Vita Wulf-
stani – at Harold Godwinson’s. By acting and even wearing their hair like
women, the king’s knights proved themselves incapable of performing

Gesta Regum, ii, 159, pp. 258 – 61.

Ibid., v, 412, pp. 744 –7.

Ibid., 404, pp. 730 –3.

Ibid., i, 4, pp. 20 –1.

BJÖRN WEILER

one of their essential functions: the defence of the realm. Henry I, by
contrast, may have had many mistresses, but he did not allow his libido
to interfere in the governing of his kingdom. Malmesbury’s condemna-
tion of sexual excess rested as much with the moral evil which had been
committed, as with its ultimate consequences: sinful living, profligacy
and greed prevented a ruler from doing his duties, thus causing civil war,
foreign invasions and poverty. Men were weak and easily succumbed to
their desires, especially if ruled by princes who were unwilling or incap-
able of leading by example.

Just as sinners could atone for their misdeeds, so good kings could turn

into bad ones. This is perhaps best exemplified by William Rufus, who
‘was a man of high principles, which he himself obscured as in process of
time he became unduly harsh; in such a way did vices creep into his heart
little by little in place of virtues that he could not tell the difference’.

The king’s slide into depravity began when he had to hire mercenaries to
prevent unrest. These had, however, to be paid, and, more importantly,
leading them required a steady display of largesse. All of this contributed
to William’s need for money, and the great lengths to which he went to
get it. He even resorted to keeping bishoprics and abbacies vacant so that
he could usurp a see or convent’s revenue,

and ‘the noose itself was

slackened from the bandit’s neck if he had promised something to the
king’s advantage.’

In his search for funds the king thus violated two of

his most important tasks: to protect the Church, and thereby to ensure
the spiritual welfare of his people, and to exercise rigorous justice. What
had started out as a necessary expedient to govern the realm weakened
by its unrestrained exercise what it was meant to strengthen. Rufus’s
unwillingness to abide by the basic principles defining his royal office was
both the cause and the result of his inability to show moral leadership.
He succumbed fully to the snares and temptations of his lofty station.
However, the sophistication of Malmesbury’s argument and his complex
understanding of human nature are apparent in the fact that he never
resorts to painting William Rufus in exclusively black colours. William II
of England was simply someone who had refused to learn the lesson the
past would hold for those who studied it. Many of his faults were no
different from those of William the Conqueror, Æthelred I, Edgar, or
Edward the Confessor, and he faced challenges and difficulties no differ-
ent from those that any other contemporary holder of secular power
would have encountered. The case of William Rufus was all the more
horrifying and deterring because it showed how easily even the best of
intentions could turn a good man into a tyrant.

Malmesbury developed a similar line of argument in his depiction of

Robert Curthose, who, by his inherent good nature, was unable to deny
requests or act harshly against evildoers. As a result, rather than gaining

Ibid., iv, 312, pp. 554 –5.

Ibid., 313 –14, pp. 556 – 61.

Ibid., 314, pp. 558–9.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

him the respect of his subjects, Curthose came to be despised as weak
and ineffectual, so that his subjects looked for an alternative source
of patronage, eventually turning to Henry I.

Like William Rufus,

Curthose exercised one virtue at the expense of others. By placing gener-
osity and forgiveness above justice and protecting those who could not
protect themselves, he proved himself unfit to rule. Curthose lost the
English throne, Normandy and his freedom, because he was unable to
balance generosity with severity. Malmesbury directed similar criticism
at Stephen of Blois. In reporting Stephen’s entry into England in 1135,
and his coronation, Malmesbury paints a carefully crafted picture, which
juxtaposes Stephen’s moral strengths with his weaknesses, and the ultim-
ate reasons for his downfall: ‘[He] was a man of energy, but lacking in
judgement, active in war, of extraordinary spirit in undertaking difficult
tasks, lenient to his enemies and easily appeased, courteous to all:
though you admired his kindness in promising, still you felt his words
lacked truth and his promises fulfilment.’

Stephen had many of the

characteristics that made a successful leader, but he lacked the moral
fibre that made a good king. He disregarded the advice of his ecclesiasti-
cal supporters, and proved unable to temper mercy with justice. He won
followers because of his charismatic personality, his lack of pretension
and his kindness, but he lacked the strength needed to turn his promises
into reality, was easily swayed and was unwilling to punish those who
betrayed him. He failed therefore because his excessive exercise of virtues
turned them into vices.

Princes were exposed to the wiles of the world, and more often than

not they succumbed to them. Those who were wise drew on clerical
advisers to guide them – Edgar had St Dunstan, the Conqueror Lan-
franc, and Henry I Anselm.

Most importantly, they were able to learn

from their mistakes. The ideal relationship between a king and his ad-
visers is perhaps best described in the Gesta Pontificum with regard to
Edgar and St Dunstan. Edgar ‘looked to Dunstan’s advice in all matters
and unhesitatingly did whatever the archbishop was minded to com-
mand’. Dunstan, in turn, was guided by concern for ‘the king’s reputa-
tion and safety’, and either spurred on the king to do what was right
when he was too lenient, or, when Edgar transgressed, admonished him
to return to the path of righteousness.

Their obligation was a mutual

one. While good kings listened to and abided by the counsel of their
clerics, those advising kings were to be aware of the specific challenges
and temptations, obligations and duties of those whom they counselled.

Bad kings, by contrast, normally chose bad advisers. Rather than

heeding the counsel of those who might urge them towards a better life

Ibid., 389, pp. 704 –5.

Historia Novella, i, 15, pp. 28–9. It is worth noting that similar language is used in the Gesta

Regum to describe Harold: Gesta Regum, iii, 238, pp. 446 –7.

For a contrary view, see Haahr, ‘The Concept of Kingship’, 370 –1.

Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, i, 18, p. 27; The Deeds of the Bishops, 19.

BJÖRN WEILER

and way of ruling, they succumbed to the tricks and flattery of those too
cowardly or depraved to stand in their way. A ruler need not be specific-
ally evil to require wise counsel. The ninth-century King Æthelwulf of
Wessex, for example, was by no means a bad king. Being, though, ‘a man
to prefer a quiet life rather than the lordship over many provinces’, he
needed strong clerical advisers: Bishop Swithun of Winchester and
Abbot Æthelstan of Sherborne, who ‘roused him by their constant warn-
ings to some knowledge of his royal duties’.

Edward the Confessor,

similarly, was distinguished by ‘a simplicity of . . . character [which]
made him hardly fit to govern’. Some of his courtiers even mocked the
king openly for his simple ways. His reign is none the less portrayed as a
time of internal peace and freedom from external threats, when even
Wales, ‘that barbarous country [was reduced to] the status of a pro-
vince’.

This was partly due to his advisers – especially Earl Leofric, but

even the otherwise much-maligned Godwins. In 1045, after the death of
Bishop Berhtwald of Ramsbury, for example, Edward was about to grant
the see to one of his Flemish chaplains, a certain Hereman, who was
greedy, loved the good life and planned to dispossess the brethren at
Malmesbury. Ultimately, only the intervention of Earl Godwin and his
family prevented Edward from agreeing to this petition.

Last but not

least, Edward was responsible for the appointment of Stigand, the stereo-
typically corrupt prelate in the eyes of most Norman chroniclers, to the
archbishopric of Canterbury. This was not an intentionally bad choice
on his part, nor did he succumb to bribery. It was simply a case of Sti-
gand being able to influence ‘the innocent and simple-minded king’.

fact, that there was peace at all during Edward’s reign was to Malmesbury
a sign of the favour in which the king was held by God.

Edward’s lack

of interest in matters political, his simpleness of mind, his tendency to
pick the least suitable candidates for bishoprics, and an inability to mete
out harsh justice, would have resulted in civil war under any other king.

In fact, while the failure of rulers was normally the result of their

moral flaws, a king’s success was not solely due to individual merit but
above all to the divine support he enjoyed. This he could earn through
pious deeds, as Edward the Confessor had done, or – like William the
Conqueror and Edgar – by listening to those who reprimanded them for
their moral failings. At the same time, even bad rulers received sufficient
warnings to indicate that they were wronging not merely their subjects
but God. These portents could take a variety of forms, and could be
directed at rulers and ruled alike. St Dunstan, for instance, was given an
early indication of the difficulties Æthelred II would cause at the infant’s

Gesta Regum, ii, 108, pp. 156 –9.

Ibid., 196, pp. 348 –51.

Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, ii, 83, pp. 182–3; The Deeds of the Bishops, p. 121.

Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, i, 23, p. 25; The Deeds of the Bishops, p. 25.

Ibid., ii, 196, pp. 348 –9.

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

baptism, when Æthelred defecated into the baptismal font.

The death

of William Rufus was similarly preceded by numerous visions – Satan
himself appeared,

while the king, on the night before his death,

dreamed that he was being bled. A foreign monk staying at the English
court had a vision in which Rufus visited a Church and started gnawing
at a crucifix until the figure of Christ gave William such a mighty kick
that he fell to the floor with billows of fire and smoke coming out of his
mouth.

Rufus disregarded these warnings: he dismissed stories about

the devil’s appearance with mocking laughter, and ridiculed the vision of
the foreign monk as the ramblings of a greedy cleric out to make money.
Rufus’s depravity was made all the greater by the fact that he refused to
take seriously the warnings God himself had sent him. No wonder, there-
fore, that he suffered eternal damnation.

William of Malmesbury did not expect his kings to be perfect, but he

expected them to do as much as a layman could. Transgressions could be
forgiven, but only if sufficient steps were taken to atone for them. Pre-
cisely because they were laymen, and because of the multitude of temp-
tations they might encounter, rulers required advice and counsel. Ideally
this was to come from members of the clergy, especially those who were
or had once been monks. The advice given by these clerics was to ensure
both the king’s own morality and the needs of the realm. In practice this
meant counselling the ruler first and foremost on how to maintain the
moral purity of his kingdom. A moral life combated the inherent weak-
ness of human nature, and thereby aided rulers and ruled alike in per-
forming their functions. A ruler’s moral duty was thus twofold. First, he
had to put the need to defend the realm and to protect those who could
not protect themselves above worldly pleasures or the hope for monetary
gains. Secondly, he had to lead by example. For if a king gave in to temp-
tation, those below him would soon follow, with civil war and unrest the
inevitable consequence. The means by which moral leadership could be
expressed were the king’s public behaviour, his elegance of manners and
the way he interacted with his subjects. One of the means by which moral
leadership could be acquired was through learning and a love for liter-
ature, and especially an interest in and an awareness of the past.

The concept of kingship emerging from Malmesbury’s historiograph-

ical oeuvre was deeply rooted in the intellectual traditions of Benedictine
monasticism and the church fathers. The dangers posed by secular power
formed the basic justification for the monastic claim to moral superior-
ity. Mansuetudo and ease of manners had become a standard element in
the hagiography of the eleventh century, although Malmesbury may have
been one of the first to apply it fully to the description of ideal behaviour

Ibid., 164, pp. 268 –9.

Ibid., iv, 331, pp. 570 –1. In a splendid example for Malmesbury’s use of imagery, he points out

that the devil’s appearance was especially frightful because he sought to engage passers by in small
talk.

Gesta Regum, iv, 333, pp. 572–3.

Gesta Regum, iv, 332, pp. 572–3.

BJÖRN WEILER

for the secular elites of post-Conquest England.

Similarly, his emphasis

on learning and a love of literature should not be understood in the
sense of a desire for intellectual enquiry, but as the quest for moral per-
fection which had been central to the pedagogy of the eleventh century.

Many of the moral lessons he wanted his audience to draw can be traced
back to those texts with which he was most familiar: the classics, and the
church fathers.

His emphasis on the king’s duty to lead by example, for

instance, and to correct as well as reign, was taken straight from the writ-
ings of St Augustine and Isidore of Seville, while both the dangers and
temptations posed by holding secular power, and the fact that an exces-
sive exercise of virtues turned them into vices, formed a key theme in the
writings of Gregory the Great, and in particular of the Regula Pastoralis.
These texts were known to Malmesbury, and formed the staple diet of
monastic education. The premise that a ruler’s moral failings would
harm the realm as a whole, the resulting need for moral leadership, and
the role of the Church in providing moral guidance had been part and
parcel of clerical writings on kingship since late antiquity.

With Malmes-

bury there is not a theology of history as in the writings of Otto of
Freising or Hugh of St Victor, but there is certainly an emphasis on the
moral and thus ultimately theological dimension of royal lordship, which
makes him firmly part not of the Renaissance or the Enlightenment but
of the central middle ages.

Malmesbury’s originality rests less in his concept of kingship than in

how he formulated it. He possessed a subtle understanding of human
nature, and took seriously the instructive purpose of history. Malmes-
bury only needs to be compared, for instance, to the Gallus Anonymus
or Theoderic the Monk, writing in the 1110s and 1150s respectively, to
realize how unusual was his reluctance to offer full condemnation.

Theoderic and Gallus there were either good or bad kings, but there

Jaeger, Origins of Courtliness, pp. 54 – 66, 82–100. See also John Gillingham, ‘From Civilitas to

Civility: Codes of Manners in Medieval and Early Modern England’, Transactions of the Royal
Historical Society, 6th ser., xii (2002), 267– 89.

C. Stephen Jaeger, The Envy of Angels: Cathedral Schools and Social Ideals in Medieval Europe,

950 –1200 (Philadelphia, 1994), pp. 76 –115.

Thomson, William of Malmesbury, pp. 41–3, 49 – 61.

Marc Reydellet, La Royauté dans la littérature latine de Sidoine Apollinaire à Isidore de Séville

(Rome, 1981) for the most detailed account. We should also keep in mind the Carolingian revival
of theoretical writings on kingship, and their possible impact: Hans Hubert Anton, Fürstenspiegel
und Herrscherethos in der Karolingerzeit (Bonn, 1968). Malmesbury was familiar with at least some
of these texts: Thomson, William of Malmesbury, pp. 43 – 4. For the influence of texts like Einhard’s
biography of Charlemagne, used extensively by Malmesbury, see Matthew Innes, ‘The Classical
Tradition in the Carolingian Renaissance: Ninth-Century Encounters with Suetonius’, Interna-
tional Journal of the Classical Tradition, iii (1996 –7), 265 – 82.

Theodori Monachi Historia De Antiquitate Regum Norwagiensium, Monumenta Historica Norwe-

giae: Latinske Kildeskrifter til Norges Historie I Middelalderen, ed. Gustav Storm (Kristiania, 1880),
pp. 1– 68; Sverre Bagge, ‘Theodericus Monachus – Clerical Historiography in Twelfth-Century
Norway’, Scandinavian Journal of History, xiv (1989), 113 –33; Gudrun Lange, Die Anfänge der
isländisch-norwegischen Geschichtsschreibung (Reykavík, 1989), pp. 41–3; Galli Anonymi Cronica et
Gesta Ducum sive Principum Polonorum, ed. Karol Maleczynski, Monumenta Poloniae Historica
Nova Series 2 (Cracow, 1952), reprinted with a facing English translation, introduction and notes

WILLIAM OF MALMESBURY ON KINGSHIP

were few of the grey tones which make Malmesbury’s portrait of individ-
uals so convincing. Malmesbury was a skilled moralist: he always held
out the prospect that sinners might redeem themselves, but he also
warned his audience that rulers need not be evil by nature to turn into
tyrants. Characters like Rufus were all the more frightening because they
started out so well, and because their depravity was initially driven by
necessity rather than greed. They merely succumbed to the very tempta-
tions and vices which defined the everyday culture of Malmesbury’s
aristocratic audience. Each and every one of his secular readers, Malmes-
bury seems to imply, might have turned out to be another William
Rufus.

Malmesbury’s historical writings encapsulate key themes in the

contemporary discourse on secular power and its exercise, and thus provide
valuable insights into the political culture of Anglo-Norman England.

by Paul W. Knoll and Frank Schaer as Gesta Principum Polonorum: The Deeds of the Princes of the
Poles (Budapest, 2003); Bisson, ‘On not eating Polish Bread’, which also highlights a number of
other early twelfth-century dynastic chronicles.

In this context it is worth pointing out that Robert of Gloucester, who had commissioned the

Historia Novella, and who received a copy of the Gesta Regum, and a glowing eulogy in the final
chapters of Book V of the Gesta, was also the patron of Geoffrey of Monmouth and of Geoffrey
Gaimar. In particular the latter on occasion took a stance extolling as virtuous the very people and
the very actions that William condemned. See John Gillingham, ‘Kingship, Chivalry and Love:
Political and Cultural Values in the Earliest History Written in French: Geoffrey Gaymar’s Estoire
des Engleis’, Anglo-Norman Political Culture and the Twelfth-Century Renaissance. Proceedings of
the Borchard Conference on Anglo-Norman History, 1995, ed. C. Warren Hollister (Woodbridge,
1997), pp. 33 –58, at pp. 41– 4 (on William Rufus) and p. 51 (on Edgar’s marital life). Malmesbury
clearly knew his audience.

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