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The Idea of the Angevin Empire*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2014

Bernard S. Bachrach
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Extract

In a compelling study published in 1973, Warren Hollister and Thomas Keefe argued that the Angevin Empire, “an aggregation of diverse provinces that differed from Henry I's tightly-integrated Anglo-Norman state not merely in size but in fundamental character …, was Henry Plantegenet's own creation, born of his youthful ambition and achieved through his skill and good fortune.” Hollister and Keefe demonstrate conclusively that King Henry I had no such empire in mind when he arranged the marriage of his widowed daughter Matilda to Geoffrey Plantegenet, the fourteen-year-old heir to the counties of Anjou, Maine, and Touraine.

In attempting to ascertain the origins of the Angevin Empire, however, are we limited only to a choice between Henry I's intentions and Henry II's ambition? Might we not ask what Count Fulk the Young, Geoffrey's father, had in mind when he arranged the marriage of his son to the heiress Matilda? John Le Patourel has suggested that Fulk was pursuing the normal Angevin practice of expanding the family's dominions. Le Patourel maintains that “this expansion took a familiar form, the acquisition of rights by marriage, inheritance or in other ways, and their enforcement by war.” For the Angevins the alliance between Geoffrey and Matilda ended a century of warfare between Anjou and Normandy. “Henry I was somewhat furtive over this marriage,” Le Patourel observes, but “in Angers it was a triumph.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 10 , Issue 4 , Winter 1978 , pp. 293 - 299
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1978

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Footnotes

*

Support for my research on the Angevins has been provided by a grant from the American Council of Learned Societies.

References

1 Hollister, C. Warren and Keefe, Thomas K., “The Making of the Angevin Empire,” The Journal of British Studies, 12 (1973):25CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Hollister set forth his views on the close connection between Normandy and England in “Normandy, France and the Anglo-Norman Regnum,” Speculum, 51 (1976):202–242CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 Hollister, and Keefe, , “Making of the Angevin Empire,” pp. 1–25Google Scholar, but cf. Le Patourel, John (The Norman Empire [Oxford, 1976])Google Scholar who considers the Normans to have been expansionist and (p. 87) maintains that Henry I's “grandoise plan” was “capped by the marriage in 1128.”

3 Le Patourel, John, “The Plantegenet Dominions,” History, 50 (1965):291CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Le Patourel has (see n. 2) somewhat changed position regarding Henry I's aims and attitude.

4 Chartrou, Josephe, L'Anjou de 1109 à 1151 (Paris, 1928), pp. 23–24Google Scholar.

5 Halphen, Louis, Le comté d'Anjou au XIe siècle (Paris, 1906), pp. 62–65 and 189–190Google Scholar, and Le Patourel, , “Plantegenet Dominions,” pp. 290–291Google Scholar.

6 Werner, Karl Ferdinand, “Untersuchungen zur Früzeit des französischen Fürstentums (9.-10. Jahrhundret),” Die Welt als Geschichte, 18 (1958):270–274Google Scholar. Werner's argu-arguments have been accepted by Guillot, Olivier (Le comte d'Anjou et son entourage au XIe siècle, 3 vols. [Paris, 1972], 1:8–11)Google Scholar, and Martindale, Jane (“The French Aristocracy in the Early Middle Ages: A Reappraisal,” Past and Present, 75 [1977]:10.)CrossRefGoogle Scholar See ibid. n. 20 for older views.

7 Hollister, and Keefe, , “Making of the Angevin Empire,” pp. 14, 17–18Google Scholar.

8 Geoffrey Plantegenet's biographer, John of Marmoutier in Historia Gaufredi Ducis (Chroniques des comtes d'Anjou, ed. Halphen, L. and Poupardin, R. [Paris, 1913], p. 225)Google Scholar, justifies Geoffrey's invasion of Normandy in 1135 by claiming that the count of Anjou was trying to secure Henry's inheritance. Geoffrey ruled Normandy from 1144 until 1150. The observation by Hollister and Keefe, (“Making of the Angevin Empire,” p. 18)Google Scholar that “Henry I had employed a single chancellor for his Anglo-Norman realm, and Geoffrey would doubtless have done the same for Normandy and Anjou had it been intended that they be permanently joined,” ignores “the Angevin idea of empire” (see below) and would seem to assume that Henry I's way of organizing diverse dominions was the only way to do it.

9 Haskins, Charles H., Norman Institutions (Cambridge, Mass., 1918), pp. 130–132CrossRefGoogle Scholar (followed by Hollister, and Keefe, , “Making of the Angevin Empire,” p. 18Google Scholar), seems to have believed that as early as 1141, Geoffrey already knew what he was going to do in 1150.

10 Guillot, , Le comte d'Anjou, 1:43–45, 102–104Google Scholar. Hollister, and Keefe, (“Making of the Angevin Empire,” pp. 18–25Google Scholar) are certainly correct when they observe that Geoffrey Plantegenet's decision to give Anjou to Geoffrey the Younger makes clear that he did not intend to build a state on the Anglo-Norman model. Keefe, Thomas K. (“Geoffrey Plantegenet's Will and the Angevin Succession,” Albion, 6 [1974]:267)CrossRefGoogle Scholar demonstrates his complete ’Norman” orientation when he observes ’the Union of Normandy and Anjou in 1151 was not meant to be permanent.” There was no ’union,” merely possession in the hands of the same man. Note also p. 269: ’Anglo-Norman custom, then, did not prohibit the kind of plan attributed to Geoffrey Plantegenet.” This is not really meeting the point. Geoffrey was not an Anglo-Norman; he was Angevin. His actions, however, were consistent with the Angevin tradition.

11 Guillot, , Le comte d'Anjou, 1:8–12Google Scholar.

12 See, for example, Recueil des chartes de l'abbaye de Cluny, ed. Bruel, Alexandre (Paris, 1883), nos. 1475 and 2484Google Scholar.

13 Richard, Alfred, Histoire des comtes de Poitou, 778-1204, 2 vols. (Paris, 1903), 1:238–239Google Scholar, and Halphen, , Le comté d'Anjou, pp. 60–61Google Scholar.

14 Lot, Ferdinand, Les derniers carolingiens (Paris, 1891). pp. 81, 127, 367Google Scholar; Balmalle, Marius, “Les comtes de Gevaudan et Brioude,” Almanack de Brioude (Brioude, 1964), pp. 251–52Google Scholar; and Bachrach, Bernard S., “A Study in Feudal Politics: Relations Between Fulk Nerra and William the Great, 995-1030,” Viator, 7 (1976):113CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

15 For a general discussion of Guy, see Guillot, , Le Comte d'Anjou, 1:3–4, 139–140, 211–212Google Scholar.

16 See note 12.

17 Bachrach, , “Feudal Politics,” p. 113Google Scholar.

18 Ibid.

19 Lot, , Les derniers carolingiens, pp. 126–129, 367–368Google Scholar.

20 Ibid., pp. 128-129, 166. Adelaide subsequently married Count William of Aries and their daughter Constance was married to King Robert through the efforts of Fulk Nerra. Bachrach, , “Feudal Politics,” p. 113Google Scholar.

21 Historia pontificum et comitum Engolismensium, ed. Boussard, J. (Paris, 1957), ch. 24 and his commentary, pp. xviii, and p. 16, n. 3Google Scholar.

22 Halphen, , Le comté d'Anjou, p. 54Google Scholar.

23 Faye, Leon, “De la domination des comtes d'Anjou sur la Saintonge,” Revue d'Anjou, 2 (1853): 1–21Google Scholar, examines the evidence, but is hyper-critical.

24 Bachrach, , “Feudal Politics,” pp. 117–119Google Scholar.

25 See note 13.

26 de La Borderie, Arthur, Histoire de Bretagne (Paris, 1898), pp. 2, 423Google Scholar.

27 Bernard S. Bachrach, “When did Fulk Nerra become Count of Anjou?” (forthcoming.)

28 Latouche, Robert (Histoire du comté du Maine pendant le Xe et le XIe siècle [Paris, 1910], pp. 56, 110)Google Scholar finds nothing of value. Cf. Actus Pontificum cenomannis in urbe degentium, ed. Busson, G. and Ledru, A. (Le Mans, 1901), p. 353Google Scholar, which must refer to Geoffrey. On Angevin penetration of Maine by Geoffrey and probably by his father as well, see Bib Nat. Coll. Baluze, vol. 76, fol. 256, and cf. the discussion of this document by Guillot, , Le comte d'Anjou, 2:42–43Google Scholar.

29 Halphen, , Le comté d'Anjou, pp. 14–15Google Scholar.

30 Cf. Le Patourel, (“The Plantegenet Dominions,” p. 298)Google Scholar who uses the term empire to mean ’an assemblage of ‘lands’ or ‘dominions’ under one ruler.” The preposition “under” is not as clear as one might like.

31 Most of these works have been published in Chroniques des comtes d'Anjou, ed. Halphen and Poupardin. Additional material is found in Recueil de chroniques de Touraine, ed. Salmon, A. (Tours, 1854)Google Scholar; Chroniques des églises d'Anjou, ed. Marchegay, P. and Mabille, E., (Paris, 1869)Google Scholar; and Recueil d'annales angevines et vendômoises, ed. Halphen, L. (Paris, 1903)Google Scholar.

32 Lot, Ferdinand, “Geoffroi Grisegonelle dans l'épopée,” Romania, 19(1890):377–393CrossRefGoogle Scholar.