Backman Clifford R. The Worlds of Medieval Europe
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254 THE CENTRAL MIDDLE AGES
from discovery, rousing chases through forests and fields, tournaments, battles
against enemies and mythological beasts. The best of them, such as Lancelot, Yvain,
or Erec and Eneid by Chre´tien de Troyes, or Eliduc by Marie de France, still make
wonderful reading today.
One of the more interesting components of courtly love was its use of social
inversion: the lover usually falls in love with a woman who is his social superior
and is hence unattainable; in fact, as often as not, she is the wife of the lover’s
lord—as with Lancelot and Guinevere. Although always erotically charged, these
love-relationships are usually sexless; the most a lover can hope for from his be-
loved is a chaste kiss or the delight of being allowed to carry the beloved’s hand-
kerchief or a lock of her hair. This chasteness represented what courtly culture
regarded as a perfect form of love: a man’s physical love for a female—straight-
forward lust—they held to be essentially self-love, a desire for one’s own pleasure,
and hence a love that is inward-turned; the ordinary shared love between husband
and wife was something to be treasured, but its mutuality was its imperfection.
On the other hand, courtly love—a pure love given absolutely to a woman without
hope or expectation of anything in return—was an idealized Christian love, a love
that poured out unconditionally. The courts believed that it ennobled one’s spirit
to love in this way; it made one a better man. Hence these courtly loves were
made public and the topic of song and celebration. In the case of Lancelot, falling
in love with Arthur’s wife was not wrong at all; turning that ideal love into an
active sexual relationship, though, was an unpardonable crime that led to every-
one’s ruin.
Europe had always retained a panoply of well-developed vernacular cultures
and literatures, but these had been passed on orally. For centuries Latin had held
sway as the language for all forms of writing—liturgical and exegetical works,
legal contracts, scientific treatises, poetry and drama, histories, letters, law codes,
or whatever—since Latin was the only language known by all educated people.
Latin was the common tongue that held Christendom together and gave it, in a
linguistic sense at least, a cohesive identity. A poem written by a Scotsman could
be read and appreciated by an audience in Vienna; a stage drama by Hrotsvitha
von Gandersheim could be performed by nuns in Aquitaine; a medical treatise
written in Salerno could be studied in Denmark. To medieval minds, the only
things worth writing down, since writing materials were expensive, were things
that could be read by everyone. A history written in a local vernacular dialect—
and it is important to bear in mind that Europe’s vernacular tongues were all
small regional dialects rather than the large national languages that we think of
today—could not be read by anyone outside one’s small region, and hence was
of little practical value to anyone. These facts explain the prejudice against ver-
nacular literature that was common from the start of the Middle Ages until the
twelfth century: A poem written in early Catalan dialect was an inferior poem—
not necessarily because Catalan was an intrinsically “inferior” language to Latin,
but because the simple fact that only Catalans could read it made it of less uni-
versal import.
Attitudes began to change toward the end of the eleventh century and espe-
cially over the course of the twelfth. Most of the earliest vernacular writings were
works that by their very nature were not intended for universal application: A
physician writing a health regimen for a patient, for example, hardly needed to
keep the interests of all Christendom in mind and was concerned only that his
patient adhere to the diet and exercise schedule he was prescribing. Similarly,
letters between businessmen discussing what items to buy at the Champagne fairs,
THE RENAISSANCES OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY 255
in what quantities, and at what prices, were hardly intended for a wide audience;
in fact the narrower the audience the better, in this case. Much of the earliest
vernacular writing we have is of this private nature, and a lot of it makes fasci-
nating reading. Modern medievalists who encounter these documents in European
archives, however, suffer from the very problem that the universal use of Latin
was intended to resolve: We all know Latin but not many of the regional dialects.
Vernacular poetry, fables, legends, histories, and popular songs had been
passed on orally for generations. Indeed, considering that most of this material
was not written down until the twelfth century, it is surprising how much has
survived. Every story is changed in its telling, though, so it is difficult to know
how closely the finally written-down versions correspond to the earliest oral ren-
ditions either in terms of content, or in the tongues employed. In fact, it seems
clear that much traditional literature was intentionally reworked and reformed in
the writing, since the decision to preserve that literature on parchment was often
related to budding nationalistic schemes fostered by the emergence of the new
states of the central Middle Ages. Poets of the age continued to write in Latin
(Peter Abelard was himself a Latin poet of note, even though he also wrote some
vernacular love songs), and much of their work is quite good; but the vernacular
poetry of the time quickly surpassed the Latin in both quantity and quality.
13
Apart
from the court poets of the Carolingian Renaissance, the only Latin poets with
anything like a wide reputation these days are the anonymous “Goliardic poets”—
chiefly university students and itinerant scholars who took time off from their
studies to pen ribald verses on the glories of carefree drinking and womanizing.
This material is entertaining as light verse, but most of it is negligible as poetry.
Vernacular literature focused on a handful of principal genres: epic poetry,
lyric poetry, verse romances, prose fables, and religious drama. Epic poetry per-
haps had the longest genealogy; it dated back to the earliest centuries of the me-
dieval period, to the arrival of the Germanic tribes in the west. These violent
poems are known today as chansons de geste (“Songs of Great Deeds”) and they
typically tell a rousing tale of derring-do, usually against almost impossible odds,
by a central warrior hero. Each Germanic tribe had its own repertory. The now-
fragmentary Song of Hildebrand
14
is one of the oldest, and it illustrates the themes
of struggle, bravery, and grim fate that were characteristic of the genre. Hildebrand
is the earliest written epic; it can be traced to the scriptorium at Fulda, in lower
Saxony, around the year 800, and it is believed by many to have been a personal
favorite of Charlemagne’s. The oldest surviving Anglo-Saxon epic is Beowulf,
which happens to survive in its entirety. Handed down orally for generations, it
found its way into print sometime around the year 1000. The closest thing to a
national epic for the Franks is the Song of Roland,
15
a vast celebration of slaughter
and revenge.
Scores of these chansons de geste survive from across feudal Europe, and it
is no coincidence that the bulk of them were finally put into writing during feu-
dalism’s formative period. The chansons de geste helped to celebrate the great role
of the warrior elites who defended society and gave it leadership; they present us
with a militarized and stratified world in which the links between lord and vassal
13. It is worth noting that hardly any non-specialist in medieval history can even name a single Latin
poet of the Middle Ages, whereas almost everyone has at least heard of the great vernacular poets like
Geoffrey Chaucer and Dante Alighieri.
14. See the discussion in Chapter 3.
15. See the discussion in Chapter 6.
256 THE CENTRAL MIDDLE AGES
are the bedrock of social cohesion and survival. Scholars now group these songs
into several cycles, each dealing with the same character or set of characters. The
so-called Charlemagne Cycle, of which the Song of Roland is an example, consists
of over twenty epic songs in which Charlemagne has a role. His role in Roland in
large; in others it is considerably smaller. An “Alexander Cycle” gathers together
several chansons whose narratives center on the character of Alexander the Great,
the ancient Greek emperor who was a popular figure in the literature of the Middle
Ages. The Song of Hildebrand is representative of the “German Cycle” of epics about
ancient Germanic heroes. The last main grouping is the “Arthurian Cycle” of epic
stories about the legendary figure of King Arthur and his knights at Camelot. Most
of the chansons de geste make exciting reading and show considerable poetic
craftsmanship.
A different type of vernacular poetry predominated in southern Europe. Here
poets extolled the virtues of love, rather than the feats of the battlefield, in lyric
poems of great subtlety and beauty: They praised beauty, sensitivity, constancy,
and gallantry. Often with a welcome erotic element. The lyric poets were known
as troubadours. The word derives from the Occitan verb trobar, meaning “to com-
pose,” which suggests that the southern poets prided themselves on being original
authors of their verses as opposed to the “mere scribes” who wrote down the
ancient chansons of the north. That may be overly fanciful, but it is clear that
troubadour poetry differed dramatically from northern verse in content, form, lan-
guage, and theme. The earliest troubadour poet whose works survive was William
IX, the duke of Aquitaine and count of Poitou (1071–1126), and the grandfather
of Eleanor of Aquitaine. He left behind a number of fine love songs, a few bawdy
lyrics, and this delightful jeu d’esprit that suggests that there really was a pervad-
ing sense of difference from and rivalry with the feudal north:
I’ll write a verse now just for fun,
One not about me or anyone,
One not about a youth in love.
Or anything along that course.
I’m writing it out in the sun
While riding on my horse.
I cannot say when I was born,
I am not happy but I’m not forlorn,
Still I’m ill at ease and unsure of
What I’m going to do next.
Bewitched by an enchantress, I’m feeling torn;
In fact I’m rather perplexed.
I can’t tell real life from a dream
And must be told when day would seem
To have begun. My heart’s a-scream
With bitterness and confusion;
I care so little I might blaspheme—
Just a stab at resolution.
I have a lady-love, fine and pure,
But who she is I am not sure
And where she lives is anyone’s guess.
But she treats me in a way I can endure.
THE RENAISSANCES OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY 257
Anything!—as long as the Normans on their tour
Stay out of Poitou, I confess.
I adore this woman, though I have not yet
Laid eyes on her; I’m told she does not set
Much store by what I think—but I don’t let
That bother me. I never forget
There are some others, three or four
That I’m just as faithful to—maybe more.
I feel ill: like death has me in its hold,
And I know nothing except what I’m told.
I wish a doctor would be so bold
As to tell me what’s going on, like a man of honor.
If he cures me, I’ll give him gold;
If not, then he’s a goner.
My verse is done, and if you please
I’ll send it off now, at my ease;
There is a man up in Anjou
Who claims to know a thing or two
About all manner of poetry;
But I don’t believe it at all—do you?
Troubadours delighted in poking fun at their own works in this way, but the bulk
of their verse consists of genuine expressions of love and desire, longing and
loneliness.
Not all the troubadours were from Mediterranean Europe, nor were they all
men. Reinmar von Hagenau, the court poet at the ducal palace in Vienna in the
1190s, composed some fine lyric verse like this wedding song:
An end to my yearnings seems nowhere in sight.
And so to my beloved do I turn, as is right.
She I will love every day that I live,
Knowing that she, only she, has the power to give
Joy to my sorrow; and it’s a marvel to me
That she can do this so effortlessly.
I now know no joy that depends not on her,
And there is no one else of whom I can say:
“She, only she, is my Easter Day.”
My heart to her I entirely confer.
She lives in my, and I in her, breast—
As God, to Whom no one can lie, will attest.
Perhaps the best of the female troubadours, of whom we are familiar with roughly
two dozen, was a woman known only as the Countess of Dia, even though only
four of her poems survive. She was born around 1140. Like many other women
troubadours, she deals with a painful theme:
I have been of late in fretful mood
Over a knight who once was mine.
I want it always understood
That I loved him with a love sublime.
258 THE CENTRAL MIDDLE AGES
But now I see I’ve been betrayed
Because I wouldn’t make love with him.
In my naked nights and in day, full arrayed,
I dwell on this mistake so grim.
Stage plays were another strength of vernacular culture. Itinerant players were
a frequent sight in medieval Europe, traveling from town to town, even village to
village, and putting on productions of farces, musical pageants, and religious dra-
mas. In fact, although the roots of western drama reach back to pagan Athens, its
development in Europe was closely linked to that of the Christian church. The
dramatization of Biblical stories by stage-players was a popular means of religious
education for the illiterate rural world; it was certainly easier to get labor-hounded
peasants to watch a play than it was to get them to sit through a sermon. In fact,
in most medieval villages the open space—it seems too optimistic to call it a
green—in front of the local church was the usual site for performing stage plays
when a touring troupe passed through. Since plays were not an official church
ceremony, they did not need to be performed in Latin, and in any case it made
better sense, given their pedagogical function, to have them in the vernacular.
These Biblical dramas are called mystery plays.
16
Related to them, though rather
later in time, are the so-called morality plays, in which personified human attributes
(Pride, Lust, Patience, Charity, etc.) disputed between themselves, and the miracle
plays, which were dramatized versions of saints’ lives. The earliest surviving mys-
tery play is the anonymous twelfth-century Anglo-Norman work called the Jeu
d’Adam (“Adam’s Play”); better known are the German Passion Plays, especially
the one at Oberammergau; and the English dramas that comprise the Wakefield
Cycle and the so-called N-Town Cycle. The stagecraft of these early works is often
highly effective. Here, to offer the briefest of illustrations, are a few lines from the
English Noah’s Flood. In the scene, the rains of the Great Flood have just begun
and Noah and his children are pleading with Noah’s wife—who will not get
aboard the ark unless she can bring her friends (here called gossips, in an archaic
English usage), and they are preparing to drink a farewell toast to each other
before they drown.
GOSSIPS: The flood comes fleeting in full fast,
On every side that spreadeth full far.
For fear of drowning I am aghast;
Good Gossip, let us draw near.
And let us drink ere we depart,
For oftentimes we have done so.
For at one draught thou drink a quart,
And so will I do, ere I go.
NOAH’S WIFE: Here is a pottle of Malmsey
17
good and strong;
It will rejoice both heart and tongue.
Though Noah think us never so long,
Yet we will drink atyte.
18
JAPHETH: Mother! We pray you all together—
For we are here, your own childer—
16. The term refers to the players, not the plays; it derives from the medieval French word mestier,
meaning the me´tier or trade of the performers.
17. Roughly, two quarts of sweet wine.
18. Atyte: meaning “at once.”
THE RENAISSANCES OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY 259
Come into the ship for fear of the weather,
For His love, that you bought!
NOAH’S WIFE: That will I not for all your call
But
19
I have my Gossips all!
SHEM: I’faith, mother, yet thou shall,
Whether thou will or nought.
[He drags her aboard.]
NOAH: Welcome, wife, into this boat.
[She slaps him in the face.]
NOAH’S WIFE: Have thou that for thy note!
20
NOAH: Aha, Mary! This is hot!
It is good for to be still.
Ah, children! Methinks my boat remeves
21
Our tarrying here me highly grieves.
Over the land the water spreads.
God do as He will.
The single most popular vernacular work of the Middle Ages was the Romance
of the Rose. It was begun by Guillaume de Lorris sometime in the 1230s, and he
completed about four thousand lines of verse narrating a dream-vision in which
the poet wanders through an enchanted walled garden filled with personifications
like Lord Mirth, Lady Gladness, Friend, Villainy, and of course Love. The poet-
narrator falls in love with a perfect rose at the center of the garden—the rose itself
being an allegorical symbol for perfect womanhood—and the “story” of the poem,
to the extent that it has one, is of the narrator’s journey to reach the rose. Lorris
died leaving his poem unfinished, but his work was taken up by Jean de Meun,
who probably qualifies as the most enthusiastic literary heir in western history.
De Meun added another eighteen thousand lines to the poem, thereby making it
as long as Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey combined (and to some readers, making the
reading of it seem to last as long as the Trojan war). Lorris was an elegiac, lyrical
idealist with a delicate poetic touch. De Meun, though stylistically gifted, was a
scholastic theorist of love, determined to elaborate an entire system of human
emotions and psychological states. What began as a dreamy love-vision became,
in de Meun’s hands, a kind of summa amatoria, an encyclopedic road-map of the
human heart. The poem’s popularity, which continued right through the Renais-
sance, was nothing short of phenomenal and provides a good example of the
passion for complex order that characterized the High Middle Ages.
Far less ambitious than the Romance of the Rose, but also far more fun to read,
were the rambunctious popular fables known as fabliaux. These were witty, irrev-
erent, and often salacious, short stories in verse. Fabliaux were a chiefly French
phenomenon and a decidedly urban one. Bourgeois attitudes toward aristocrats,
the Church, peasants, work, leisure, sex (and more sex), food and drink, and the
human body itself
22
are on full display here. Merchants, tradesmen, free farmers,
bakers, millers, and butchers are the professions most often represented, and the
fabliaux give us a glimpse of their lifestyles. Adultery and seduction (or attempted
19. But: meaning “unless.”
20. Note: meaning “trouble.”
21. Remeves: meaning “sails off” or “starts to move.”
22. In some fabliaux that I don’t dare to quote from, the characters’ genitalia talk to one another, detach
themselves from their owners, adopt more flattering dimensions, and happily go their own merry ways.
260 THE CENTRAL MIDDLE AGES
seduction) are the two most common themes; interestingly, the adulterers are far
more often wives with lovers than they are husbands with mistresses, and by far
the greatest number of seducers (or attempted seducers) are priests. But this is the
post-reform Church, so most of the attempted seductions fail. The fabliaux indulge
in broad and often heavy-handed humor, but in general they are stories told with
wit and style; most of them are a pleasure to read even today, and they provide
an intriguing glance at urban life and its real or imagined foibles.
S
UGGESTED
R
EADING
Texts
Abelard, Peter. History of My Misfortunes.
———. Sic et Non.
Abelard, Peter, and He´loı¨se. Letters.
Anselm of Canterbury. Prayers and Meditations.
Bernard of Clairvaux. Five Books on Consideration.
———. On Loving God.
———. Sermons.
Bracton, Henry. On the Laws and Customs of England.
John of Salisbury. Policraticus.
Lombard, Peter. Sentences.
de Lorris, Guillaume, and Jean de Meun. The Romance of the Rose.
Trotula. The Diseases of Women.
Troyes, Chre´tien. Complete Romances.
Source Anthologies
Bogin, Meg. The Women Troubadours (1976).
Doss-Quinby, Eglal, Joan Tasker Grimbert, Wendy Pfeffer, and Elizabeth Aubrey. Songs of the
Women Trouve`res (2001).
Hanning, Robert, and Joan Ferrante. The Lais of Marie de France (1978).
Somerville, Robert, and Bruce C. Brasington. Prefaces to Canon Law Books in Latin Christianity, 500–
1245: Selected Translations (1998).
Spade, Paul V. Five Texts on the Medieval Problem of Universals: Porphyry, Boethius, Abelard, Duns
Scotus, Ockham (1994).
Thorndike, Lynn. University Records and Life in the Middle Ages (1944).
Studies
Benson, Robert L., and Giles Constable. Renaissance and Renewal in the Twelfth Century (1982).
Berman, Harold. Law and Revolution: The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition (1983).
Biller, Peter, and Anne Hudson. Heresy and Literacy, 1000–1500 (1994).
Clanchy, Michael T. From Memory to Written Record: England, 1066–1307 (1992).
———. Abelard: A Medieval Life (1997).
Cobban, Alan B. The Medieval Universities: Their Development and Organization (1988).
Colish, Marcia L. Medieval Foundations of the Western Intellectual Tradition, 400–1400 (1997).
THE RENAISSANCES OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY 261
Evans, G. R. Bernard of Clairvaux (2000).
Gies, Joseph and Frances. Leonardo of Pisa and the New Mathematics of the Middle Ages (1969).
Grant, Edward. Physical Science in the Middle Ages (1971).
Haren, Michael. Medieval Thought: The Western Intellectual Tradition from Antiquity to the Thirteenth
Century (1992).
Jaeger, C. Stephen. The Origins of Courtliness: Civilizing Trends and the Formation of Courtly Ideals,
939–1210 (1985).
Keen, Maurice. Chivalry (1984).
Keiser, Elizabeth B. Courtly Desire and Medieval Homophobia: The Legitimation of Sexual Pleasure in
“Cleanness” and Its Contexts (1997).
LeGoff, Jacques. Intellectuals in the Middle Ages (1993).
Lindberg, David C. The Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosoph-
ical, Religious, and Institutional Context. 600 BC to AD 1450 (1992).
Luscombe, David. Medieval Thought (1997).
Makdisi, George. The Rise of Colleges: Institutions of Learning in Islam and the West (1981).
Marenbon, John. The Philosophy of Peter Abelard (1997).
McGinn, Bernard. The Calabrian Abbot: Joachim of Fiore in the History of Western Thought (1985).
Morris, Colin. The Discovery of the Individual, 1050–1200 (1972).
Morrison, Karl F. History as a Visual Art in the Twelfth-Century Renaissance (1991).
Muscatine, Charles. The Old French Fabliaux (1986).
Partner, Nancy. Serious Entertainments: The Writing of History in Twelfth-Century England (1977).
Paterson, Linda. The World of the Troubadours: Medieval Occitan Society, ca. 1100–ca. 1300 (1995).
Rosenthal, Franz. The Classical Heritage in Islam (1975).
Sirat, Colette. A History of Jewish Philosophy in the Middle Ages (1990).
Southern, Richard W. St. Anselm: A Portrait in a Landscape (1990).
Stock, Brian. The Implications of Literacy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation in the Eleventh
and Twelfth Centuries (1983).
Weinfurter, Stefan. The Salian Century: Main Currents in an Age of Transition (1994).
Woolf, Rosemary. The English Mystery Plays (1972).
262
CHAPTER 12
8
T
HE
P
APAL
M
ONARCHY
T
he conflict between Gregory VII and Henry IV, for all its drama, hardly
ended the struggles between the reformed Church and the new states of
the medieval west; the conflict was in fact merely a prologue to what was yet to
come. The Concordat of Worms in 1122 had more or less resolved the specific
issues of ecclesiastical appointments and investiture, and in its aftermath a general
lull existed in Church-State tensions. The crusades provided a venue for joint ac-
tion and made the contestants willing to set aside their dispute for a time. Besides,
Europe’s booming prosperity and atmosphere of excitement in the twelfth century
disinclined people to drag out old conflicts at a time when they could instead
devote themselves to reinventing and, they thought, mastering their world. But
the conflict could not be ignored forever. Too much was at stake, and when the
tensions renewed they did so with just as much intensity of feeling as before; the
issues, though, were different this time around.
The Concordat had generally confirmed the so-called Two Swords theory of
ecclesiastical-governmental relations. This was a doctrine first articulated centuries
earlier by Pope Gelasius I (492–496), according to which it was understood that
God had created both the ecclesiastical power (sacerdotium) and secular royal au-
thority (imperium), and that He intended for them to work in harmony with one
another—the first having dominion over all matters of human existence pertaining
to spiritual life and the latter having jurisdiction over all purely earthly and mun-
dane matters. It was essentially a refinement of Christ’s dictum that one should
“render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and unto God what is God’s.” A simple
enough theory in principle but a messy one in the details. For example: Since
twelfth-century Europe was now governed by territorial law instead of personal
law, could a French citizen convicted of a crime appeal his case to the papacy—
that is, to an authority outside France itself? If an English priest committed a crime
against the king’s law (for example, if he murdered someone), was he to be tried
by the king’s court or by the local bishop’s, and by English law or by canon law?
A German abbot was undeniably a member of the Church, but he was also a
citizen of Germany who used German roads and bridges, was defended by
German soldiers, and bought and sold goods at German markets and fairs. Was
he therefore liable to taxation by the state? If not, why not?
These were the sort of issues debated in the second round of the Church-State
conflict, rather than high-minded disputes over the superiority of pope over em-
peror, or vice-versa. And while the new struggles were more commonly wars of
words between diplomats and legal scholars than conflagrations between armies,
they were intensely dramatic nonetheless and on their outcome rested the ultimate
development of European political society.
THE PAPAL MONARCHY 263
C
HURCH AGAINST
S
TATE
O
NCE
M
ORE
The first king to renew the debate was England’s Henry II (1154–1189). He was
an exceptional ruler, devoted with equal determination to exerting ruthless power
and providing justice for his subjects. His claim to the throne came through his
mother Matilda, the daughter of Henry I (1100–1135), which parentage made him
the duke of Normandy and count of Maine as well; but as the son of Geoffrey
Plantagenet, the count of Anjou, he was also lord to the French territories of Anjou
and Touraine. Finally, as the husband of Eleanor of Aquitaine, who had divorced
France’s Louis VII in the aftermath of the Second Crusade, he controlled Aquitaine,
Poitou, and Auvergne. These holdings, plus some other territories he later seized
on the Continent, made him the master of nearly half of France as well as king of
England. Historians commonly refer to his enormous realm as the Angevin Empire,
although Henry never held or claimed an imperial title. That was the only limit
on his ambitions, though. Henry was determined to expand his authority on the
Continent and ideally to stretch it all the way to the Mediterranean littoral. He
cared little for England and valued it chiefly as a source of revenue and the place
that provided him with a royal title; he much preferred his French lands and never
bothered to learn to speak English. (Neither did his sons Richard the Lionheart
[1189–1199] or John [1199–1216].)
Henry was dedicated to establishing the rule of law and providing justice for
his subjects. This program probably owed more to political pragmatism than high-
minded principle, for the English were more likely to obey a foreign king who
served them well than one who did not, but it is praiseworthy nevertheless. Ef-
fective central government had declined under his predecessor Stephen (1135–
1154) to the point that local barons and sheriffs had become essentially laws unto
themselves. It took Henry nearly twenty years to bring them to heel; by 1170 he
had suspended from office all the sheriffs in the realm and conducted a kingdom-
wide inquest into popular grievances against local officials. Such actions earned
him the respect of the commoners, as did his efforts to develop a single law code
for the entire realm, one that applied to all non-noble citizens and was based as
much as possible on customary practices (hence its name, the Common Law). He
increased the corps of itinerant justices who traveled throughout England holding
public inquests and hearing appeals. Royal justice was fairer, quicker, and less
costly than the seigneurial courts of the local barons, whose judicial functions
declined accordingly just as their military functions were increasingly taken over
by salaried common armies.
1
Henry also regularized the use of trials-by-jury and
did away with the old rural tradition of trial-by-combat. His Assize of Clarendon in
1166 laid the foundations for the modern grand jury system by instructing that
criminal charges could be brought against individuals by anyone with knowledge
of a crime, not merely by a crime’s supposed victim as had been the norm in the
past. If sufficient evidence were brought before the grand jury that an individual
had in fact broken the law, then the jury issued a verdict (from Latin veredictum,
“a thing truly said”) which required the accused person to stand trial. At the actual
criminal trial, however, the traditional method of trial-by-ordeal was usually fol-
lowed; most commonly, an accused criminal was tied with a strong rope and
1. Vassals could commute their military service by paying a special relief called scutage (literally,
“shield-money”). Most were eager to do so, since they preferred to spend their time building up their
economic might and local political power.