King Stephen, the English church, and a female mystic:
Christina of Markyate’s Vita as a neglected source for the
council of Winchester (August 1139) and its aftermath

Karen Bollermann

a

, Cary J. Nederman

b

,

*

a

Humanities and Arts, Arizona State University, Polytechnic campus, 7001 E. Williams Field Rd., Mesa, AZ 85212, United States

b

Political Science, Texas A&M University, 4348 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843–4348, United States

Keywords:
King Stephen
Christina of Markyate
Geoffrey de Gorham
Henry of Blois
Theobald of Bec
William of Malmesbury
Church
St Albans abbey
England
Twelfth century

a b s t r a c t

One of the central reasons for the disintegration of royal authority
(sometimes called ‘the Anarchy’) during the reign of King Stephen
of England is generally thought to have been his troubled rela-
tionship with the English church. The king was summoned to
appear before the legate in England, Henry of Blois, bishop of
Winchester (who was also Stephen’s brother), at a church council
called for Winchester on 29 August 1139, in order to show cause
for his conduct in arresting several prominent bishops and in
confiscating their property. Several major chroniclers discuss the
events leading up to and occurring at the council of Winchester,
especially William of Malmesbury in his Historia novella and the
anonymous Gesta Stephani. The versions of events contained in
these sources are not entirely consistent. The present paper
examines yet another recounting of the events of the council,
seldom appreciated by historians of twelfth-century England,
presented in the Vita of Christina of Markyate (c.1096/98–c.1155/
66), composed by an anonymous monk of St Albans between 1140
and 1146. Christina was close to the abbot of St Albans, Geoffrey de
Gorham, who was probably the patron of the Vita and who quite
likely attended the Winchester council and apparently became
involved in its aftermath. These events are recorded in some detail
in the Vita, presenting us with a vivid recounting of the council and
the immediate consequences thereof. The narrative of the Vita
contains a somewhat different picture of the personalities
and occurrences surrounding the Winchester council than we

*

Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses:

[e-mail]

(K. Bollermann),

[e-mail]

(C.J. Nederman).

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Journal of Medieval History

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Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

encounter in the chronicles. The current essay compares the Vita to
the standard accounts. We argue that the Vita may be the earliest
and possibly most reliable source for the events of the council.
Moreover, if we privilege the report of the Vita, the council
becomes an especially significant moment in the breakdown of
relations between Stephen and the English church.

Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

One of the central reasons for the disintegration of royal authority (sometimes called ‘the Anarchy’)

during the reign of King Stephen of England is generally thought by historians to have been his troubled
relationship with the English church. Graeme White has lately observed how scholars commonly
allude to ‘a cataclysmic end both to the smooth running of the royal administration and to the spirit of
harmony between king and Church’ occasioned by the aftermath of Stephen’s ascension to the throne.

1

Although Stephen’s claim to the crown after the death of King Henry I in 1135 initially enjoyed strong
ecclesiastical support, within five years or so this clerical backing had been greatly eroded.

2

The story of

this breakdown has often been narrated and need be recounted only briefly. In June 1139, Stephen
ordered the arrest of three English bishops d Roger of Salisbury, Alexander of Lincoln, and Nigel of
Ely d who had held important offices in the administration of Henry I, following an alleged brawl
between their retainers and the members of another noble entourage that occurred during a royal
council that month in Oxford. Stephen was supposedly encouraged to doubt the loyalty of these
bishops and was concerned in particular about their control of a number of castles of strategic
significance; the latter he placed under his command. In response, the king was summoned to appear
before the legate in England, Henry of Blois, bishop of Winchester (who was also Stephen’s brother), at
a church council called for Winchester on 29 August 1139, in order to show cause for the arrests and
confiscations. Many scholars have proposed that Henry promulgated this summons in a fit of pique,
using his legatine power to reproach his brother, who in the previous year had passed him over for
appointment as archbishop of Canterbury (Theobald of Bec instead was elevated to the post). The
council itself is ordinarily regarded as a pyrrhic victory for Stephen: no formal settlement was reached,
and the king was permitted to retain the castles, but his commitment to upholding the liberties of the
Church (promised by him in both his coronation oath and in a charter granted in 1136) was placed in
doubt, and the subsequent deterioration of ecclesiastical backing was set in motion.

3

Several standard chronicles discuss the events leading up to and occurring at the council of

Winchester, although no official record of its proceedings survives. The main account is given by
William of Malmesbury in his Historia novella.

4

Scholars have repeatedly asserted that William was

present at the council.

5

Yet nothing in his narrative expressly supports this hypothesis, in contrast to

his statement that he attended and participated in a later assembly (also held at Winchester),
permitting him to base his report of that meeting on direct recollection.

6

In the absence of such an

1

Graeme J. White, Restoration and reform, 1153–1165: recovery from civil war in England (Cambridge, 2000), 23. See H.A.

Cronne, The reign of Stephen 1135–54: anarchy in England (London, 1970), 38; and Edmund King, ‘Introduction’, in: The anarchy of
King Stephen’s reign, ed. Edmund King (Oxford, 1994), 16–17.

2

Versions of this story are found in: R.H.C. Davis, King Stephen 1135–1154 (London, 1967), 31–5; John T. Appleby, The troubled

reign of King Stephen (1135–1154) (London, 1969), 64–73; Cronne, The reign of Stephen, 93–9; K.J. Stringer, The reign of Stephen:
kingship, warfare and government in twelfth-century England (London, 1993), 64; and Jim Bradbury, Stephen and Matilda: the civil
war of 1139–53 (Phoenix Mill, 1996), 48–55. More sceptical are Kenji Yoshitake, ‘The arrest of the bishops in 1139 and its
consequences’, Journal of Medieval History, 14 (1988), 97–114; David Crouch, The reign of King Stephen, 1135–1154 (Harlow, 2000),
97–100; and Donald Matthew, King Stephen (London, 2002), 92–3. For a critique of the scepticism, see Thomas Callahan, Jr., ‘The
arrest of the bishops at Stephen’s court: a reassessment’, The Haskins Society Journal, 4 (1992), 97–108.

3

See Edward J. Kealey, Roger of Salisbury: viceroy of England (Berkeley, 1972), 199. An English translation of the charter is

provided by Cronne, The reign of Stephen, 125–6.

4

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, ed. and trans. K.R. Potter (London, 1955), 29–34.

5

Davis, King Stephen, 34; Rodney M. Thomson, William of Malmesbury (Woodbridge, 1986), 3; and Crouch, The reign of King

Stephen, 100 note 49.

6

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 52.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

434

explicit statement, we must assume that William was working from second-hand knowledge. Another
widely cited, although briefer, recounting may be found in the anonymous Gesta Stephani.

7

Compressed accounts of the council are also given by Henry of Huntingdon and Roger de Hoveden.

8

Interestingly, several other important chroniclers d such as Orderic Vitalis, Roger of Wendover, John of
Worcester, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle d mention the arrest of the bishops but make no reference at
all to the council (although, in the case of Roger of Wendover, an addition was made to the chronicle,
apparently by Matthew Paris later in the thirteenth century, that discusses the Winchester assembly).

9

The versions of events contained in these sources are not entirely consistent, as we shall see below.
Indeed, the most recent editor of the Gesta Stephani, R. H. C. Davis, at one point notes a ‘flat contra-
diction’ between that text and the account provided by William of Malmesbury.

10

The reasons for these

conflicts presumably have much to do with the loyalties and historical judgments of the different
chroniclers (William supported the Empress Matilda’s cause; the Gesta Stephani author sided with
Stephen), as well as with the source materials (eyewitness reports, written and oral, in addition to
other indirect accounts) on which they relied.

The present paper explores yet another version of the events of the council, heretofore under-

appreciated by historians of twelfth-century England, presented in the Vita of Christina of Markyate
(c.1096/98–c.1155/66), composed by an anonymous monk of St Albans during her lifetime.

11

This

work is primarily an account of Christina’s mystical visions and her struggles to establish herself as
a woman of profound spiritual insight. But because Christina was also close to the abbot of St Albans,
Geoffrey de Gorham (c.1100–1146), who was enmeshed in the political upheavals of Stephen’s reign
and the ecclesiastical responses to them, her Vita includes a report of the events of 1139 that
embellishes and extends d and also sometimes in important ways contradicts d the chronicles.

Some brief background about this text may be useful. The sole surviving manuscript documenting the

life of Christina (London, British Library, MS Cotton Tiberius E. I), damaged in the devastating Ash-
burnham House fire of 1731, is a folio manuscript written during the second quarter of the fourteenth
century and bound together with John of Tynemouth’s Sanctilogium Angliae and several additional saint’s
lives.

12

Christina’s Vita concludes the volume.

13

The Vita text comprises three quires of eight leaves,

though the last quire is missing the eighth leaf.

14

The extant narrative closes abruptly mid-sentence with

events in 1142 and does not account for the remaining years of Christina’s life.

15

Because the manuscript

does not relate the whole of Christina’s life, the Vita’s editor C. H. Talbot was convinced that an additional
quire, covering her later years, is likely missing as well.

16

Relying on this assumption, Talbot and other

earlier scholars posited that the Vita was composed around 1160 for one of several potential patrons, the
most likely of whom is Robert de Gorham, Geoffrey de Gorham’s nephew and later abbot of St Albans.

17

Recently, however, Rachel Koopmans has argued that the writing of Christina’s Vita, clearly

undertaken at the behest of some patron was abruptly abandoned. Thus, the existing narrative is

7

Gesta Stephani, ed. and trans. K.R. Potter and R.H.C. Davis (Oxford, 1976), 73–81.

8

Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, ed. and trans. Diana Greenway (Oxford, 1996), 719–23; Roger de Hoveden, The

annals of Roger de Hoveden, trans. Henry T. Riley, 2 vols (London, 1853), vol. 1, 234–6.

9

Orderic Vitalis, The ecclesiastical history of Orderic Vitalis, ed. and trans. Marjorie Chibnall, 6 vols (Oxford, 1969–80), vol. 6,

531–5; Roger of Wendover, Flowers of history, trans. G.A. Giles (London, 1849), 490–1; John of Worcester, The chronicle of John of
Worcester, volume III: the annals from 1067 to 1140, ed. and trans. P. McGurk (Oxford, 1998), 266–9; The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed.
Dorothy Whitlock with D.C. Douglas and Susie I. Tucker (New Brunswick, 1969), 200–1.

10

Gesta Stephani, 80 note 2.

11

The life of Christina of Markyate. A twelfth century recluse, ed. and trans. C.H. Talbot (Toronto, 1998).

12

Life, 1.

13

Note that, although Talbot (Life, 1) asserts Christina’s Vita is written in the same scribal hand as the rest of the Tiberius

manuscript, Rachel Koopmans finds it is written in a different hand (‘The conclusion of Christina of Markyate’s Vita’, Journal of
Ecclesiastical History, 51 (2000), 696–7 and note 128). Koopmans also notes significant differences in rubrication, initials,
rulings, and use of catchwords between the rest of the Tiberius texts and the Vita such that she finds it very likely the Vita was
a late addition to the codex.

14

Life, 4.

15

Life, 4. She was known to be alive in 1155/6 and perhaps lived until 1166.

16

Life, 4–5.

17

Life, 8–10; and Christopher J. Holdsworth, ‘Christina of Markyate’, in: Medieval Women, ed. Derek Baker (Oxford, 1978), 196.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

435

largely complete and only one final leaf is missing.

18

Moreover, in light of the manuscript’s near-

completeness, scholars now identify Abbot Geoffrey as the best candidate for the Vita’s patron.

19

As

Koopmans demonstrates, the underlying tensions within the St Albans community over Geoffrey’s
years of solicitous financial support of Christina’s hermitage came to the fore following his unexpected
death in 1146, resulting in both withdrawal from formal association between the two houses and
disinterest in continuing Geoffrey’s efforts to venerate Christina by means of commissioning her Vita.

20

This discord, combined with the Vita’s remarkable silence on Geoffrey’s death, reinforces the notion of
Geoffrey as the Vita’s sponsor. Taking these considerations into account, as well as the fact that the
scribe was a St Albans monk writing during Christina’s lifetime, the Vita was most likely begun c.1140
and abandoned at Geoffrey’s death in 1146.

21

If the new attributions of the dating and patronage of the Vita are correct,

22

the account given there

of the August 1139 Winchester council would have been nearly contemporaneous and quite likely
based on eyewitness reports. It is probable, although the Vita does not expressly say so, that Geoffrey
attended the council, as did nearly all of the English prelates, and he apparently became involved in its
aftermath.

23

In this connection, as in many other situations, the abbot sought Christina’s prayerful

intervention to assist him in extricating himself from a difficult bind.

24

These events are recorded in

some detail in the Vita, presenting us with a vivid recounting of the council and the immediate
consequences thereof. More interestingly, the narrative of the Vita contains a somewhat different
picture of the personalities and occurrences surrounding the Winchester council than we encounter in
the chronicles conventionally employed to reconstruct the ecclesiastical response to the arrest of the
bishops. Among scholars who have closely studied the period of Stephen’s reign, we are aware of only
two who demonstrate any cognisance of the Vita. Edward J. Kealey, in his biography of Roger of Salis-
bury, mentions it merely in passing as containing interesting details about the council, but he does not
provide any analysis of its relationship to other reports of the council.

25

More recently, David Crouch

cites the Vita briefly in order to confirm the basic narrative found in William’s Historia novella.

26

Perhaps the reason for scholarly disinterest in the Vita stems from the traditional dating of its
composition to c.1160, rendering its presentation of the events at Winchester temporally distant from
their occurrence.

If one accepts Koopmans’s earlier dating and her attribution of patronage of the Vita, however,

a very different picture emerges. We propose in the current essay to compare the Vita to the standard
accounts with the dual purposes of providing additional information about the council and of offering

18

Koopmans, ‘Conclusion’, 694–5.

19

Life, 679–80. In a later article, Koopmans argues that the Vita was undertaken to enhance St Albans above all else (‘Dining at

Markyate with Lady Christina’, in: Christina of Markyate: A twelfth-century holy woman, ed. Samuel Fanous and Henrietta Leyser
(London and New York, 2005), 154). Furthermore, Jane Geddes asserts that the richly illuminated St Albans Psalter was altered
during the course of its production to become a meditational gift for Christina by Geoffrey himself, who, she believes, was the
Psalter’s third scribe (‘The St Albans Psalter: the abbot and the anchoress’, in: Christina of Markyate, ed. Fanous and Leyser,
197–216).

20

Koopmans, ‘Conclusion’, 685–95. For further discussion of this tension, see also Kathryn Kelsey Staples and Ruth Mazo

Karras, ‘Christina’s tempting: sexual desire and women’s sanctity’, in: Christina of Markyate, ed. Fanous and Leyser, 192. These
concerns are raised in the Gesta abbatum monasterii S. Albani attributed to Thomas Walsingham, ed. H.T. Riley, 3 vols (Rolls
series, 28; Chronica monasterii S. Albani, 4, London, 1867–69), vol. 1, 95, 103.

21

See Koopmans, ‘Conclusion’, 663–75, for a complete discussion of the Tiberius manuscript’s relationship to an interpolation

of materials from the Vita into the Gesta Abbatum and to an early seventeenth-century summary of the Vita by Nicholas
Roscarrock.

22

Koopmans’s dating of the Vita has been accepted, explicitly or implicitly, by Stephanie Hollis and Jocelyn Wogan-Browne, ‘St

Albans and women’s monasticism: lives and their foundations in Christina’s world’, in: Christina of Markyate, ed. Fanous and
Leyser, 25–52; Staples and Mazo Karras, ‘Christina’s tempting’, 184–96; Geddes, ‘The St. Alban’s Psalter’, 197–216; and E.A. Jones,
‘Christina of Markyate and the hermits and anchorites of England’, in: Christina of Markyate, ed. Fanous and Leyser, 229–53.

23

Koopmans, ‘Dining at Markyate’, 147, believes that Geoffrey and Christina’s sister, Margaret, were the main sources

employed in the composition of the Vita, rather than direct interviews with Christina, a view that supports the assertion that
the recounting of the events of 1139 contained there derived from Geoffrey himself.

24

This is attested by the Gesta abbatum, vol. 1, 104–5.

25

Kealey, Roger of Salisbury, 190, 196–7.

26

Crouch, The reign of King Stephen, 100, 101.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

436

an alternative understanding of what transpired there that may change how historians interpret its
significance. While Davis is surely right to say that ‘it is impossible to know’ whether one version of the
events at Winchester is more correct or accurate than another,

27

the sheer fact that the Vita is grounded

in the experiences of Geoffrey, whose knowledge of the political situation was intimate, lends to its
account a strong measure of plausibility. Moreover, unlike the chroniclers, who often shaded their
presentations of events to suit their own views, the author of Christina’s Vita had perhaps less of
a political axe to grind, inasmuch as he was writing with a quite different agenda in mind, namely, to
promote the holiness of his subject.

In order to sustain our argument, we must first turn to the main chronicles on which scholars have

usually relied for their scholarship about the council of Winchester. According to William of Malmes-
bury, the assembly was called by the newly appointed papal legate, Henry of Winchester, who
strenuously objected to the precedent set by the treatment of the bishops. William attributes to Henry
the following speech: ‘If the bishops had in anything stepped aside from the path of justice, then it was
not for the king to judge them, but for the canon law; without a general council of churchmen they
should not have been deprived of any property.’

28

In order to enforce the terms of canon law and to

uphold the liberty of the church, Henry ‘bade his brother to attend a council which he was to hold at
Winchester on August 29’.

29

In attendance at the council were the recently elected Theobald of Can-

terbury and ‘almost all the bishops of England’, who were addressed by Henry concerning the affront to
the church caused by Stephen’s conduct. Henry charged ‘the archbishop and the others [to] take
counsel together about what should be done’, promising to execute their decision even at risk to his
own life and possessions.

30

Stephen did not directly obey the summons, however, sending his earls as

delegates to inquire the reason for the legate’s command to appear. Henry explained the cause at
length, only to receive the response that Aubrey de Vere, ‘a man practiced in many kinds of cases’,
would present the king’s reply to the charges.

31

De Vere’s answer to the accusations was three-fold:

first, the bishops were directly responsible for breech of the king’s peace at Oxford by encouraging their
men to brawl; second, the bishops (particularly Roger of Salisbury) were suspected of sympathising
with the claim of the Empress Matilda to the throne of England; and third, Roger was guilty of
corruption by robbing the royal treasury during the period of his service to Henry I and had voluntarily
agreed to restore the castles to Stephen in recompense.

32

Roger retorted that he was not a servant of

Stephen’s and that his clerical immunity was intact; he furthermore threatened appeal from the
council to a higher court, presumably Rome. Henry, sitting in judgment, asserted that the king must
first restore the property of the bishops and leave it to the Church to determine whether the charges
were valid; clerical exemption outweighed royal grievances.

33

After a two-day delay, the archbishop of

Rouen, a noted partisan of Stephen’s cause, arrived at Winchester and announced that only if the
bishops could demonstrate their entitlement to their castles under the terms of canon law would he
support their restoration. Not only did he evince doubt that such a legal defence could be mounted, but
he additionally argued that the bishops had a duty to hand over their property to the king in times of
strife.

34

De Vere added a not very veiled threat that any of the bishops who were considering an appeal

to Rome against the king should beware: ‘no one of you should presume to do this, for if anyone went
anywhere out of England contrary to his [Stephen’s] wish and the majesty of the crown it might be

27

Gesta Stephani, 80 note 2.

28

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 28: Sic porro dicebat: si episcopi tramitem iustitie in aliquo transgrederentur, non

esse regis, set canonum iudicium; sine publico et ecclesiastico concilio illos nulla possessione priuari debuisse.

29

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 28: quapropter, uigorem canonum experiendum ratus, concilio, quod quarto

kalendas Septembris celebraturus erat Wintonie, fratrem incunctanter adesse precepit.

30

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 29–30: Dicto die omnes fere episcopi Anglie, cum Thetdbaldo archiepiscopo

Cantuarie qui Willelmo successerat, uenerunt Wintoniam[...]. Proinde archiepiscopus et ceteri consulerent in medium quid
opus esset facto: se ad executionem concilii nec pro regis, qui sibi frater erat, amicitia, nec pro dampno possessionum, nec etiam
pro capitis periculo, defuturum.

31

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 30–1: homo causarum uarietatibus exercitatus.

32

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 31–2.

33

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 32.

34

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 32–3.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

437

difficult for him to return’.

35

The council thereafter broke up on 1 September without coming to any

final determination. William implies that a combination of fear of reprisal and concern about whether
the pope might take their side prevented the congregated prelates from issuing a proclamation of
excommunication upon the king.

36

William’s report of the council is rounded out by an act of deference

to Stephen on the part of the legate and the archbishop: ‘they fell as supplicants at the king’s feet in his
room and begged him to take pity on the Church, pity on his soul and reputation, and not suffer
a divorce to be made between the monarchy (regnum) and the clergy (sacerdotium)’.

37

William

concludes that, while Stephen responded with respect, he ultimately failed to make good on the
entreaty of Henry and Theobald.

The Gesta Stephani presents a somewhat different, and much attenuated, description of events at

Winchester.

38

The author says only that ‘a council was held in England’ at which ‘it was stringently

enacted that any receptacles of war and disturbance in the hands of any of the bishops should be
handed over to the king as his own property’.

39

No mention is made of who summoned the council. The

author implies that the council, when faced with the king’s rationale for his actions, resolved the
matter satisfactorily. On the one hand, it capitulated to his confiscation, yet at the same time it upheld
the principle that the physical restraint of the ‘Lord’s anointed’ by a secular authority was by no means
permissible. Moreover, the Gesta Stephani states that, in the face of the council’s judgment, Stephen
deferred and acknowledged his guilt: ‘he softened the harshness of the Church’s severity by a humble
submission, and putting aside his royal garb, groaning in spirit and with a contrite heart, he humbly
accepted the penance enjoined for his fault’.

40

According to the Gesta Stephani, then, the council

formulated a satisfactory solution to the crisis posed by the arrest of the bishops, and Stephen piously
bowed before the authority of the Church. The author makes no reference to the king sending delegates
to plead his case, leaving us to infer that the king appeared personally before the council in order to
defend himself.

Henry of Huntingdon’s Historia Anglorum treats the council of Winchester in even briefer

compass.

41

He leaves aside any report of the discussion that occurred at Winchester or of any judgment

that ensued. Rather, he remarks simply that ‘when Henry, bishop of Winchester, the king’s brother,
held a council at Winchester, he and Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury, and all the bishops present,
fell at the royal feet, begging in most eager supplication that to gain their free forgiveness of all of his
offences against the said bishops, he should restore their possessions to them’. But Stephen instead
heeded the ‘advice of evil men’, scorning the ‘awesome abasement of so many great ones’ and refusing
to accede to their wishes. Henry of Huntingdon concludes that this was the cause of Stephen’s
downfall: ‘Because of this, the house of King Stephen was exposed to eventual ruin’.

42

Henry of

Huntingdon thus confirms some elements of William of Malmesbury’s version of events, but leaves his
readers to conclude that the eminences of the English church tried, without success, to broker a deal by

35

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 33: quia, si quis contra uoluntatem suam et regni dignitatem ab Anglia quoquam

iret, difficilis ei fortassis reditus foret.

36

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 33–4.

37

William of Malmesbury, Historia novella, 34: suppliciter enim pedibus Regis in cubiculo affusi, orauerunt ut misereretur

ecclesia, misereretur anime et fame sue, nec pateretur fieri discidium inter regnum et sacerdotium.

38

Gesta Stephani, 80: Fuit post hoc habitum in Anglia concilium et firme statutum ut quaecumque in quorumlibet epis-

coporum manu belli essent ac tumultus receptacula, tanquam propria regis regi permitterentur. Vbi etiam rex de temeraria,
quam in episcopos commisit, inuasione publice accusatus, ratione ualida, ut putauit, et efficaci se et suos excusauit. Sed quia ab
omni clero iuste prouisum et discrete fuit diiudicatum, nulla ratione in christos Domini manus posse immittere, ecclesiastici
rigoris duritiam humilitatis subiectione molliuit, habitumque regalem exutus, gemensque animo et contritus spiritu, commissi
sententiam humiliter suscepit.

39

Gesta Stephani, 81.

40

Gesta Stephani, 81.

41

Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, 722: Nec longe post, cum Henricus Wintoniensis episcopus, frater regis, iam

legatus Romane ecclesie, concilium apud Wintoniam teneret, ipse et Tedbaldus Cantuariensis archiepiscopus, et onmes episcopi
qui aderant, ad pedes regios deuoluti sunt, deuotissima supplicatione poscentes, ut episcopis predictis possessiones suas
redderet, ut omnia in eo commissa regi benigne condonarent. Sed rex, prauorum consilio, tot et tantorum tam uerendam
prosternationem despiciens, nichil eos impetrare permisit. Ob quod patefacta est domus regis Stephani finitime
condempnationi.

42

Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, 723.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

438

means of abject abasement. The act of supplication is presented as a strategy for shifting Stephen’s
position regarding the bishops rather than as a formal act of concord in the face of a highly contentious
situation. Roger de Hoveden repeats Henry of Huntingdon’s account of the council almost verbatim,
adding no matters of detail or interpretation absent from the Historia Anglorum.

43

Before we examine how the narration of the Winchester council and its aftermath in the Vita of

Christina compares to the chronicles, it is necessary to understand in greater detail why the text comes
to address these events at all, namely, because of her relationship with Geoffrey de Gorham. The Vita
itself can be read as bipartite d Christina’s life pre-Geoffrey and post-Geoffrey.

44

The early part of the

Vita narrates Christina’s life from her childhood as a member of the locally powerful Anglo-Saxon
nobility in the area of Huntingdon through the many difficulties she encountered as she strove to
pursue a monastic life. Christina eventually took up residence at Markyate, where she attracted a small
following of female religious around her. Despite the Vita’s insistence upon her mystical abilities and
spiritual rectitude, she was prevented for many years from making a formal profession of faith,
a situation that clearly plays a role in her pivotal first encounter with the very powerful Norman abbot
of nearby St Albans, Geoffrey.

45

A dramatic encounter marks the introduction of Geoffrey into the Vita, precipitated by a vision in

which Alvered, a deceased monk from St Albans, appears to Christina, exhorting her to deter Geoffrey
from some secret and evil plan. Geoffrey, whom the text describes as an arrogant man, having received
the substance of Christina’s vision via one of her familiars, angrily denounces the message, dismissing
both vision and visionary as nothing more than dream and dreamer. Some days later, after Christina
devotes herself to prayer on this matter, Geoffrey experiences a night vision during which the same
Alvered reprimands Geoffrey for failing to heed Christina’s message, while several other dark figures
physically beat him, leaving marks visible the next morning. This encounter and its affirmation of
Christina’s visionary abilities effected a profound change in Geoffrey and inaugurated an intimate
spiritual relationship between the mystic and the abbot.

46

From this point forward, Christina’s Vita concerns itself with Geoffrey’s increasing reliance on

Christina for spiritual guidance, as well as with Geoffrey’s substantial material provision for her
community, a growing source of friction within the St Albans community that developed into outright
criticism of Geoffrey and of his relationship with Christina.

47

Geoffrey oversaw Christina’s consecration

in a service performed at St Albans.

48

He also eventually secured the charter of land grants to Markyate

and its formal establishment as a priory.

49

The Vita’s primary interest, however, lies in chronicling the

development of Geoffrey’s spiritual relationship with Christina. From the moment of his ‘conversion’
experience, Geoffrey ‘often visited the servant of Christ, heard her admonitions, accepted her advice,
consulted her in doubts, avoided evil, bore her reproaches’.

50

Initially, much of Christina’s advice seems

to fall under the rubric of spiritual guidance, fortified by her continued ability to ‘know [.] instantly in
spirit’ any ill word or deed Geoffrey might commit, even when far from her presence, and then to

43

Roger de Hoveden, Annals, 236.

44

Samuel Fanous also sees the Vita as bipartite but in terms of genre, wherein the first part falls within the tradition of the

lives of virgin martyrs and the second part within the tradition of ascetic martyrdom (‘Christina of Markyate and the double
crown’, in: Christina of Markyate, ed. Fanous and Leyser, 53).

45

See Staples and Mazo Karras, ‘Christina’s tempting’, 192–3, for a discussion of the Vita’s preoccupation with establishing

Christina’s purity in the absence of a formal profession.

46

Scholars generally situate this relationship within the larger context of spiritual friendships, such as those between Jerome

and Paula and between Dunstan and Aethelflaed. For discussions of Christina’s relationship with Geoffrey as one of spiritual
friendship, see Hollis and Wogan-Browne, ‘St Albans and women’s monasticism’, 33–5; C. Stephen Jaeger, ‘The loves of Christina
of Markyate’, in: Christina of Markyate, ed. Fanous and Leyser, 108–11; and Ruth Mazo Karras, ‘Friendship and love in the lives of
two twelfth-century English saints’, Journal of Medieval History, 14 (1988), 316–18.

47

On this, see Life, 29; Gesta abbatum, vol. 1, 95, 103; Koopmans, ‘Conclusion’, 677–8; and Staples and Mazo Karras, ‘Christina’s

tempting’, 192.

48

Life, 146–7. In fact, she was consecrated by Alexander, bishop of Lincoln, one of the three bishops arrested and subject to

confiscation of lands and goods by King Stephen in 1139, precipitating the council of Winchester that summer.

49

Life, 15. See also Gesta abbatum, 103–4. Markyate Priory was formally consecrated in 1145, though Geoffrey had been

working toward that for some time prior.

50

Life, 138–9: Denique vir ille famulam Christi postea frequentare. exhortaciones audire. monita suscipere. de incertis con-

sulere. prohibita refugere. increpaciones sustinere.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

439

reproach him for it.

51

It is perhaps no wonder that Geoffrey began to rely more and more heavily on

Christina’s wisdom in helping him negotiate all manner of business.

52

The culmination of Christina’s influence over Geoffrey, however, comes when he turns to her for

guidance concerning larger ecclesiastical and political affairs. The first such occasion to which the Vita
bears witness transpired in 1136 when, following Stephen’s election as king, he summoned Geoffrey to
court to receive orders to travel to Rome to obtain papal blessing of Stephen’s reign. Although, when
Geoffrey received the royal summons, he did not yet know its purpose, he immediately besought
Christina’s prayers on his behalf regarding it. Having received the king’s orders, Geoffrey was never-
theless released from the obligation through the prayerful intercession of Christina.

53

Again in 1139,

Geoffrey was chosen as one of several representatives of the Church in England to attend a papal
council in Rome and, again, Geoffrey, having related the nature of the business ‘concerning himself and
the realm’ to Christina, was released from this dangerous journey through her entreaties ‘to the eternal
King’.

54

The discussion of the council of Winchester contained in the Vita occurs within this broader context

of Abbot Geoffrey’s consultations with Christina concerning various ecclesiastical and political events
of the late 1130s and early 1140s.

55

In the case of the arrest of the bishops, Geoffrey was pulled, quite

against his will, into the centre of the conflict, and he sought Christina’s aid in extricating himself. The
passage opens with the explanation that Stephen captured and imprisoned Roger of Salisbury and
Alexander of Lincoln (Nigel of Ely is not mentioned) ‘on the wicked instigation of some of his favourites
[.] because he suspected them of being too powerful in wisdom, castles, wealth, and relatives’. Since
such treatment was ‘out of keeping with their position and ecclesiastical status’, the Vita says, Stephen
was ‘called to account for this action by Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury, and by some of his
suffragans’. In reply, the king ‘gave his word that he would answer to the judgment of the Church on
their capture’, agreeing to meet on an appointed date at Winchester.

56

51

Life, 140–1.

52

Christina encouraged Geoffrey to found several other religious institutions and to make significant donations of St Albans’

assets to the poor. Koopmans, ‘Conclusion’, 684; and Koopmans, ‘Dining at Markyate’, 148.

53

Life, 160–1.

54

Life, 164–5.

55

Life, 166–9: Eodem anno prefatus rex .S. ex quorumdam satellitum suorum consilio. sed perverso. in curia sua consistentes.

duos cepit episcopos. Rogerum scilicet Saresberiensem et Alexandrum Lincolniensem. eo quod suspectos eos haberet. utpote
prudencia. castris pecunia. parentibusque munitos. captosque custodie illorum nec dignitati nec ordini congrue deputavit.
Interpellatus pro hiis a Cantuariensi archiepiscopo Tetbaldo et a quibusdam suis suffraganeis spopon dit ecclesiasticam se super
eorum captura subiturum censuram. Condictoque tempore apud Wyntoniam conveniunt. Hinc rex cum obtimatibus et satel-
litibus suis. hinc archiepiscopus. episcopi abbates fere tocius Anglie. cum multo clero religioso. in presencia Romani legati
Wyntoniensis scilicet episcopi Henrici de tanto negocio tractaturi. Convenitur rex de sponsione subeunde censure. sed abiurat
nullum in hiis <a> se subeundum iudicium. nisi <sibi> sueque parti sit consonum. Attemptatur regis clemencia nec ostenditur.
ecclesiastica proponitur censura. Sed contempnitur. Quid plura? Discidium regni sacerdociique hostiles moliuntur ecclesie
inimici. cum ecce rex quorundam profundioris astucie consilio se senciens pregravari. ne presens anathematis multaretur
baculo. Romam appellare compellitur. Cumque utrinque Romam transmittendi disponerentur nuncii: ad ecclesie ius exe-
quendum cum ceteris quibusdam venerandus abbas predictus electus est Gaufridus. dignus omnium arbitrio qui iura sciret
ecclesie conservare. Quid ageret? Reniti non erat consilii. Negocium suscipere: gravis erat discriminis. Interminatus namque
fuerat rex rerum omnium proscripcionem qui contra se romanum arriperent iter. Hinc iam fractus corpore laborem viribus
preponderare cernebat. Hinc pauperum quorum cure pius provisor desudabat flexus gracia. iter arripiendum eorum perpen-
debat dispendium. Verumtamen unum erat sibi solacium. et illud solidum. divinum de hiis inquirere consilium. Parvipendebat
enim omnem mundi gloriam. divine vel in modico preponere voluntati. Maturans itaque ad dulce sibi notumque remedium.
domini famulam dico Christi Christinam. Mandata denunciat. mandatorumque discrimen. Orat. supplicat instat. ut pro cause
magnitudine Deum propencius interpellet volentemque virginem fletibus magis concitat. Discedit abbas. nullius nisi laboris
itineris certus. Illa causam miserata dilecti. sed et plusquam corporis anime verens detrimentum. illum solum propter quem
cuncta reliquerat. horum agendorum invocat provisorem. Interea dum oracionis fieret protencio sicut solebat in exstasi rapta.
vidit se salvatoris assistere presencie. illumque suum pre cunctis familiarissimum intra bracchiorum suorum girum pectori suo
constrictum inclusisse. Sed dum timeret ne forte sicut vir muliere robustior et de se quoquomodo posset excutere: videt sal-
vandorum subventorem Ihesum manu pia suas manus non consertis digitis. sed aliis aliis superpositis iunctas constringere ne
minus in manuum iunccione quam in lacertorum fortitudine ad retinendum dilectum robur sentiretur. Hiis ita perceptis non
modico gestiens uberes reddit gracias. et quod amici curam noverit exemptam. maxime tamen quod et sponsi dominique sui
viderit presenciam. Nec enim mora. Dei disponente clemencia omnes destinati laboriosi missonem senserunt itineris.

56

Life, 166–7.

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The Vita describes the scene at Winchester in quite precise detail: ‘On the one side was the king with

his barons and followers, on the other the archbishop, bishops, abbots of almost the whole of England,
with a multitude of clergy to discuss so important a matter in the presence of the Roman legate,
namely, Henry, bishop of Winchester’. Was Abbot Geoffrey among those in attendance? The text does
not say so explicitly, but given the prestige and wealth of St Albans, he would certainly have been
invited (and expected) to participate. Or is it even possible that the anonymous author of the Vita
himself was present among multo clero religioso? The latter must remain purely a matter of speculation.
In any case, the Vita depicts King Stephen as intransigent. Although ‘cited on his promise to undergo
sentence, [.] he refused to submit to any judgment on these matters unless it were favourable to
himself and his party. The king’s mercy was requested, but refused; ecclesiastical censure was
threatened, but disdained’. The Vita does not blame Stephen personally for his unwillingness to submit,
but instead points a finger at unnamed ‘enemies of the Church’ who sought to ‘bring about a split
between the monarchy and the clergy (regni sacerdociique)’. Stephen comes to realise, however, that he
will not get his way at the council, and so ‘suddenly the king, feeling that he was being overborne by the
machinations of certain people whose cunning was abnormally deep, was compelled to appeal to Rome
in order to avoid the sentence of immediate excommunication’. Stephen, that is to say, discerned that
he would more likely receive justice on his own terms from the papal curia than from his own prelates.
We may infer from this that the council of Winchester ended indecisively, without any final disposition
of the charges against Stephen.

57

Nor does the story of the bishops end there. Rather, according to the Vita, ‘both sides [.] arranged to

send representatives to Rome’. Among those chosen to ‘uphold the rights of the Church’ was Abbot
Geoffrey, who, the Vita tells us, was ‘judged, in the opinion of all, as best capable of preserving the rights
of the Church’. This thrust Geoffrey into a considerable and potentially dangerous dilemma as he had
previously been commissioned to travel to Rome on behalf both of Stephen in 1136 and of the Church
earlier in 1139. On the one hand, it would be imprudent to resist the commission. But, on the other
hand, the abbot’s health was fragile. Moreover, ‘the king had threatened with confiscation of their
property all those who went to Rome to contest his will’. Geoffrey, who was known for his munificence
toward the poor, feared that he would be deprived of the resources to continue his charitable works.
For guidance, the abbot turned to Christina: ‘He begged, pleaded, implored her, seeing the importance
of the case, to intercede with God’. Christina assented to his request, and she prayed deeply for him,
having an ecstatic vision of Jesus embracing her, which the Vita describes at some length. As a result of
her rapture, Christina becomes convinced that her ‘friend’, Geoffrey, will be spared the role of emissary
to Rome. The passage closes with a confirmation of this conclusion: ‘And within a short time by the
disposition of God’s mercy, all those who were being sent abroad heard of their dismissal from the
difficult journey’.

58

The appeal to the pope was evidently called off, although the text gives us no idea

who either made the selection of the delegates or the decision to cancel the appeal.

The version of the events surrounding the council of Winchester in the Vita obviously differs from

the chronicle sources in ways that are illuminating. Broadly speaking, the novelty of the passage can be
characterised in terms of its accounts of the calling of the council, the conduct of the defence, and the
fate of the appeal to Rome. Most modern scholars have assumed that the recently consecrated arch-
bishop of Canterbury, Theobald, was an ancillary figure at Winchester and that the council was largely
organised and conducted through the offices of Henry of Winchester. As Kealey remarks, ‘Archbishop
Theobald [.] was there, but Bishop Henry was the guiding voice in all of the deliberations’.

59

This

conclusion, extrapolated from William of Malmesbury’s account, coincides with two historiographical
commonplaces: first, that Henry used the council as a way of exacting revenge on his brother Stephen
over the failure of the latter to translate him from Winchester to Canterbury;

60

and second, that

57

Life, 166–7.

58

Life, 166–9.

59

Kealey, Roger of Salisbury, 190. See also Avrom Saltman, Theobald archbishop of Canterbury (London, 1955), 16; and Appleby,

The troubled reign of King Stephen, 70. Most of the standard accounts simply make no mention of Theobald’s presence at or
involvement in the council whatsoever.

60

See Davis, King Stephen, 29–30; and Cronne, The reign of Stephen, 128–31.

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Theobald was initially a weak prelate who had to struggle to work himself out from under the authority
exercised by Henry due to his family connections and legateship.

61

The narrative of the Vita sets both of

these claims in question. Although Henry as legate chaired the proceedings, the St Albans author
clearly states that it was Theobald who challenged Stephen’s actions in arresting the bishops and who
was responsible for convening the council. Theobald is thus presented as a vigorous and confident
prelate, rather than as a weak and timid one. Nor does the Vita invite us to conclude that Henry had any
invidious motives or vindictive agenda; indeed, the fact that Stephen and Henry were brothers is not
mentioned in the text.

Another aspect of the council ordinarily taken for granted, again on the basis of William’s Historia

novella, is that Stephen did not appear in person there, but instead sent his nobles and Aubrey de Vere
to plead on his behalf.

62

The Vita, by contrast, places the king in Winchester, present at the council, and

in charge of his own defence. This lends support to the inference drawn from the Gesta Stephani of the
king’s attendance. Whether or not Stephen was an active participant in the council is a matter of some
interest. In William’s version, the king’s absence opens the way for his advocates to pursue a case
against the bishops before the clerical audience, in effect, to put Roger, Alexander, and Nigel on trial.
Thus, William reports the litany of charges against them. The defence of royal behaviour is essentially
an offensive strategy to shift blame to the allegedly disruptive bishops. In the Vita, however, it is
Stephen’s conduct that is on trial, since he appears before the council and had promised previously that
he would answer to the Church. Although he presents himself, Stephen evidently changed his mind
and employed the issue of jurisdiction as his sole line of defence: the council simply had no right to
compel him to release his captives and to restore their property. On either account, Stephen shows
contempt for the legal status of the council.

Finally, there is the question of what was achieved at the council of Winchester. As we have seen,

the chroniclers vary in their answers. William asks us to think of it as a victory (however temporary) for
the king because excommunication was avoided and an appeal to Rome was prohibited, while Theo-
bald and Henry abased themselves before him;

63

the Gesta Stephani author, on the other hand, claims

that the contending parties reconciled the rights of regnum and sacerdotium, while Stephen humbled
himself before the Church and did penance for his evil deeds.

64

The Vita offers us a third outcome,

namely, that neither party to the dispute submitted itself to the other in acts of abasement or peni-
tence. Moreover, the text states that the idea of circumventing the council via an appeal to Rome was
Stephen’s idea d not a clerical one d and that this option was pursued for a time after the participants
departed Winchester. The suggestion that Stephen might have been responsible for initiating the
appeal to Rome raises some intriguing questions, which we do not propose to address here, about
the larger significance of the 1139 Winchester council in the history of England’s fraught relations with
the papacy. In any case, the very point of including the story of the council in the Vita, of course, was to
narrate Christina’s miraculous intervention on behalf of Abbot Geoffrey. The account there does
coincide with one element of William’s report: that Stephen attempted (perhaps successfully) to
interfere with the English church’s ability to send a delegation to Rome to present its side of the case.
But the Vita also makes plain that plans to pursue the appeal to the Roman curia were not immediately
dropped after the 1 September conclusion of the council. Someone d Theobald and Henry are the most
likely candidates d continued to organise a clerical embassy for a time afterward.

How much confidence may we evince that the presentation of the events of August 1139 and

thereafter in the Vita affords a more accurate picture than that found in the chronicles? At a minimum,
we should be more wary of the settled scholarly opinion that privileges either William of Malmesbury’s
account of the August 1139 council of Winchester, or to a lesser extent the rival recounting contained in
the Gesta Stephani, as an authoritative and definitive presentation of events. Some might question, of

61

This is the general appraisal of Saltman, Theobald, 15–41, and Kealey, Roger of Salisbury, 191.

62

Bradbury, Stephen and Matilda, 54; Appleby, The troubled reign of King Stephen, 71; Davis, King Stephen, 34–5; and Kealey,

Roger of Salisbury, 191–2.

63

This view is adopted by Cronne, The Reign of Stephen, 38–9; Crouch, The reign of King Stephen, 100–1; and Appleby, The

troubled reign of King Stephen, 72–3.

64

Essentially the position advocated by Bradbury, Stephen and Matilda, 55.

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course, whether the genre of the Vita should lead us to distrust the factual elements of its narration. If
we regard such a quasi-hagiographical life of a female mystic to be inherently less reliable than the
work of the chroniclers, we would be compelled to diminish or dismiss its value as an historical
document. But keeping in mind that its composition seems to have commenced near the time of the
council d perhaps as early as 1140 d and that the source of the narrative was most probably Geoffrey
himself, there is good reason to suppose that the author would not have embellished upon or fic-
tionalised incidents that would have been widely known and discussed. To do so would quite simply
undermine the hagiographical intent of the Vita by leading its readers to doubt the veracity of other
aspects of its reporting of Christina’s visions and miracles. Both the author of the Vita and its patron had
every good reason to recount historical events as accurately as possible, whereas the major chroniclers,
by contrast, are known for their partisanship in the civil war underway between King Stephen and the
Empress Matilda. We thus maintain that the Vita’s narrative deserves to be treated as a plausible
independent report of the Winchester council.

Indeed, it is possible to make an even stronger claim for the historical standing of the Vita as a source

for the events of the council. The priority usually accorded to William of Malmesbury’s chronicle
derives mainly from the assumptions that he attended the council and that the Historia novella
(probably written in 1141–42) is the earliest extant report of its deliberations. The first premise is
unwarranted, as we have seen, and the second is directly challenged by Koopmans’s redating of the Vita
of Christina. It seems plausible to posit that the version of events reported in the Vita is roughly coeval
to that given in the Historia novella. Moreover, whereas we know nothing about the sources employed
by William of Malmesbury, the Vita seems to have been based directly on one (or more) eyewitness
experiences, either Geoffrey or (more speculatively) the anonymous author himself or (still more
speculatively) both. All of this lends credence to the conclusion that the narrative of the Vita may in fact
be more reliable than that found in the Historia novella when piecing together the confusing yet
important history of relations between King Stephen and the English church in the early days of ‘the
Anarchy’.

The three unique elements of the recounting of the Winchester council in the Vita of Christina of

Markyate thus permit us to place a very different interpretation on the relations of Church and royal
government in the wake of the arrest of the bishops than one normally finds in historical scholarship.
We may see the hand of Canterbury much more actively at work in opposing Stephen from an early
date. The images of Theobald as an initially weak figure and of Henry of Winchester as an emerging
independent force are problematic. Moreover, we may view Stephen as resistant to any form of
submission to clerical authority that would impose restrictions upon his freedom to act as he saw fit. In
1139, Stephen clearly possessed confidence that he could impress his will on the English church,
precisely the position that led to later complaints about him as an oppressor of ecclesiastical liberty.
Finally, on the basis of the Vita of Christina, we may conclude that not only did the council fail to resolve
the key issues at stake in the king’s imprisonment of the bishops and confiscation of their castles, but
also that this unsatisfactory outcome was understood as such by both sides to the dispute following the
closing of the council, as signalled by on-going plans by clerical as well as royal parties to register an
appeal to Rome. From this failure, then, we may detect the seeds of conflict that would soon yield the
crisis of ‘the Anarchy’. Seen through the lens of the Vita of Christina, the August 1139 council at
Winchester consequently proves to be a pivotal moment in the breakdown of royal authority and in the
emergence of the English church as a major source of political opposition to the reign of King
Stephen.

65

Karen Bollermann is Assistant Professor of English in the Humanities and Arts faculty of Arizona
State University’s Polytechnic campus. Her research interests include Old and Middle English poetry
and prose, law in literature, and topics related to women in medieval England. Her most recent

65

The authors wish to thank Marcia Colish, Rachel Koopmans, and Kriston Rennie, as well as two anonymous readers, for

offering generous advice on and suggestions for improving this article. Previous versions of this paper were presented to
audiences at the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies 2008 annual conference and at the Department of
Theology and Religious Studies of the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand.

K. Bollermann, C.J. Nederman / Journal of Medieval History 34 (2008) 433–444

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published work is ‘In the belly, in the bower: maternal practice in Patience’, in: Framing the family.
Representation and narrative in the medieval and early modern periods, ed. Diane Wolfthal and
Rosalynn Voaden (2005).

Cary J. Nederman is professor of political science at Texas A&M University. He is the author or
editor of more than 20 books on the history of European political ideas, and he has
published more than 100 journal articles and book chapters. His latest books are Machiavelli
(2009) and Lineages of European political thought. Explorations along the medieval/modern divide
(2009).

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