The Normans in Normandy: Expanding Normandy

In the 1990s medieval historians were very preoccupied with border studies. English interest in the history of Normandy predates this preoccupation, however, for the events of 1066 gave us an almost proprietorial interest in the emergence of the territorial principality on the other side of the English Channel that had provided the Norman kings and the Anglo-Norman aristocracy. The publication therefore of an important new work by Pierre Bauduin is of some importance[1].

The early history of Normandy is a complex and has focussed on the survival of the Frankish institutions in the area of northern France settled by the Vikings or Northmen and on the assimilation of those Normans into Frankish society. Dominating the debate have been the two great Norman historians of the second half of the twentieth century, Michel de Boüard and Lucien Musset. Boüard saw the arrival of the Normans as a profound ‘discontinuity’ and, using the evidence of political institutions.  Boüard restated the traditional interpretation of Norman history that the old Frankish estates had survived the disruption of the Norman settlement echoing the views advanced from 1945 by Musset, based on his detailed archival research. It is this latter view of continuity that was taken up in 1982 in the first British study devoted exclusively to the early history of Normandy by David Bates[2].

The study of the Norman border, where the emerging Norman polity came into contact with its neighbours, clearly has much to contribute to this debate. At the very end of the Second World War, Jean-François Lemarignier published an investigation of feudal homage ceremonies that took place on borders, and Lucien Musset himself has since discussed the frontier. The stimulus for Pierre Bauduin was, however, a series of local studies which looked in detail at border zones. In the late 1980s, Judith Green published a study of the Vexin, but it was the work of Gérard Louise that inspired Pierre Bauduin. Louise spent more than twenty years studying the lordship of Bellême, where Normandy borders the county of Maine, and concluded that it was a ‘fenêtre ouverte’ for the king of France. Bauduin’s ideas were also stimulated by a late intervention in the continuity debate by Eleanor Searle, who stressed the Scandinavian links of the Norman ducal family. Furthermore, in France an anthropological perspective has been used to great effect by Régine Le Jan[3].

Pierre Bauduin has also taken account of much recent work on the text as construct. In this debate the important text is De moribus et actis primorum Normanniae Ducum, the work of Dudo, a canon of Saint-Quentin in Picardy, who was commissioned at the beginning of the eleventh century by Duke Richard II (996–1026) to write a history of Normandy. There is no better description for what has happened to Dudo’s work than the neologism that it has been comprehensively ‘rubbished’. The most damning critique was that of Henri Prentout in the early twentieth century, but, as scholars have come to understand the cultural and literary context in which he operated, Dudo has to some extent been recalled from the depths of historical disapproval[4].

Dudo presented a picture of a separate Norman people, who settled in an area deserted after generations, of Viking attack. After conversion to Christianity, it was the historic mission of the dynasty founded by Rollo, the Viking chief, to lead a new Christian people, the Normans. In their military successes over their hostile Frankish neighbours, the newly Christianised Normans were presented as agents of divine punishment. Here we have the origin of the ‘Norman myth’, discussed by R. H. C. Davis in the mid 1970s, for the work of Dudo informs all the other Norman writers, such as William of Jumièges and Orderic Vitalis, both of whom developed the theme of the military prowess of the uniquely Christian Normans, a notion later translated to the southern Italian and Sicilian experience by Italo-Norman chroniclers such as William of Apulia and Geoffrey Malaterra. The image of Normandy that Dudo constructed has pervaded the historiography and still hangs over the early history of the principality[5].

After setting the historiographical and geographical contexts, Bauduin looks at the origins of the frontiers of upper Normandy. In the ninth century the name of one of the original Merovingian kingdoms, Neustria, had survived and was still applied to the area west of Paris. Its administration had been revamped to counter the power of the Breton rulers and, as Viking raids increased during the ninth century, expedients such as the fortified bridge at Pîtres were devised to prevent the Vikings penetrating the inland areas. This was Marc Bloch’s first feudal age, when the castle is about to develop and defence is becoming localised, with an additional perspective of the territorial strategies, pursued by individual families such as that led by Robert, marquis of Neustria.

Territory was ceded to the Viking leader Rollo by the Carolingian king, Charles the Simple (893–922), in the Treaty of Clair-sur-Epte, conventionally dated to 911, although the earliest contemporary reference to the cession dates from 918. Bauduin sees this act in its Frankish context, as the king strove to maintain his position against the increasing powers of the great lords. The king’s chosen ally, whom Bauduin describes as the “king’s Norman”, was admitted to the circle of Frankish lords, and the marriages of Rollo and his two children, William Longsword and Gerloc, into the families of the most important lords demonstrate that acceptance. The foundation of Normandy was not a sign of Frankish weakness in the face of Viking attack according to Bauduin, but a conscious act of policy, calculated to procure the services of a military leader of proven ability, and those services were as likely to be used in internal power struggles as in repelling external attack.

The precise limits of the land ceded to the Normans are unclear. Dudo indicated that the whole of the area now known as Normandy, together with Brittany was ceded, but there is no contemporary support for this. The annalist Flodoard of Rheims in fact mentions three instances in which territory was ceded in 911, 924 and 933, and Bauduin’s research supports this view. He examines material on the Evrecin, the area around Evreux in southern Normandy and could locate no satisfactory references to Norman influence there until the 980s.  However, he does identify coastal Picardy as an area of opportunity for the rulers of Rouen. After the deposition of Charles the Simple in 922, the area was susceptible to rivalries. The counts of Flanders pushed southward and the Norman rulers of Rouen moved east. The prize seems to have been, even at this early stage, the potentially lucrative connection with England. The counts of Flanders already had a family connection through the marriage of Baldwin II (879–918) to Aelfthryth, the daughter of King Alfred, and King Louis IV of France (936–954) was, of course, Louis d’Outremer, since he had been exiled among his mother Eadgifu’s people when his father, Charles the Simple, was deposed. The movement into Picardy was not without setback for the Normans.  The second member of Rollo’s dynasty, his son William Longsword (933–42), was killed at Picquigny probably by the agents of the count of Flanders, leaving a young son, Richard I, and a lengthy minority.

For a hundred years from 888, the kingship of the Franks alternated between two families: Charles the Simple’s successors and the descendants of Robert, marquis of Neustria. Count Richard I of Rouen (942–996) developed an alliance with the latter family when he married Hugh the Great’s daughter Emma, but after Hugh’s death in 956 that family lost influence. Some of their extensive property in the former Neustria, particularly the area around Chartres and Châteaudun, slipped from their control into that of another family, whom historians describe as the Thibaudians after the family’s founder, Theobald. Just as the marquises of Neustria had challenged the powers of the king, so now their own power was fragmented. Rivalry between the newly-established Thibaudian family and the barely established counts of Rouen took off in the 960s as the Thibaudians sought the support of the Carolingian kings and the counts of Rouen remained allied with the family of Hugh the Great.

During the 980s and 990s the Evrecin was the site of their battles, and there was to be continued conflict there right up to the 1060s, with Norman influence moving southwards only slowly. Bauduin has measured this southward expansion of the counts of Rouen through claim and counter-claim to the town of Dreux and a meticulous examination of the history of local families and the strongholds they held. He assigns a particularly important role to Ralph, half-brother of Richard I, who held the castle of Ivry-la-Bataille on the River Avre. He suggests that Ralph was established here and at Pacy in the stand-off between the Normans and the Thibaudians at the end of the tenth century. He sees locally established warriors gravitating to Ralph’s service at the castle, and bringing their customs with them.

Ralph of Ivry was among the first of the Norman lords to be given the title ‘count’. In contrast with the title inflation of the rest of northern France, where local lords started to call themselves counts, the Norman counts of Rouen kept the title for their own use until they adopted the style of dukes of Normandy. Thereafter the title of count was sparingly conferred upon close family members, such as Ralph, who were given specific military tasks. The title retained, to some degree, the characteristics of the Carolingian office of count: it was granted by the duke, it was revocable and it held the specific duties of defence and the administration of the duke’s rights. Ralph of Ivry played an important role in consolidating ducal power, both on the southern frontier and further west in lower Normandy, and many of his interests and responsibilities descended to his son-in-law Osbern the Steward, and to his grandson, William fitz Osbern, the companion of the Conqueror. As pressure from the south again heightened in the 1050s, Duke William built a castle at Breteuil, which he entrusted to William fitz Osbern.

In considering the Norman/Picardy border in the eleventh century, Bauduin notes a similar focus of ducal influence at Arques, where William the Conqueror’s uncle William was established from the late 1030s with the title of count. Another ducal cousin was established at Eu and by the second half of the eleventh century a comital dynasty was in place. It was in this area that the Norman dukes made greatest use of the politics of matrimony. A sister of Duke Robert II (1027–35) was married to Baldwin IV of Flanders; a ducal cousin, Godgifu, sister of Edward the Confessor, was married to the count of Boulogne; William the Conqueror married Matilda of Flanders. William’s sister Adelaide became the wife of the Count of Ponthieu, and there is detailed discussion of the emergence of the county of Aumale which she carried to her next two husbands.

As the eleventh century passed, however, the Vexin border became more problematic, and it was a raid across this border that was to cost William the Conqueror his life in September 1087. The River Epte had marked the border of Norman influence since the earliest cession to Rollo, but the authority of the archbishop of Rouen extended further south, and in the early eleventh century numerous Norman religious houses held lands on either side of this frontier. Here the Normans’ neighbours were the counts of Amiens, Valois and Vexin, with whom, from the mid-tenth century, relations were generally cordial, culminating in the joint pilgrimage of Count Walter I and Duke Robert I of Normandy to the Holy Land in 1035. From the 1050s, however, there was a rapprochement between the counts and the kings of France, and William the Conqueror began to fortify this border, just as the others had been fortified. William Crespin was given the castle of Neaufles and Hugh of Grandmesnil was established at Neufmarché. The retirement to a monastery by Simon, Count of Amiens/Valois/Vexin in 1077 gave King Philip I (1060–1107) an opportunity to seize his lands, and brought the king of France into direct contact across the River Epte with William who was now king of England, as well as duke of Normandy.

Bauduin makes observations from the borders of Normandy and from there he discerns that the picture of political and territorial stability within the duchy in the tenth and eleventh centuries is illusory. The congruence of the duchy of Normandy and the archdiocese of Rouen was a product of the second half of the tenth century as the energetic society that emerged there expanded beyond the limits of the original area ceded to Rollo. Bauduin notes that during the eleventh century the dukes had the ability to control the frontiers through castles and the right of exile, but did so in partnership with a newly emerged aristocracy that had territorialised their power, seized the profits of office and built castles. For Bauduin, William the Conqueror’s great achievement was to work with this aristocracy, when these developments were likely to weaken ducal power. Border security was achieved in a different way in each sector, but in the 1060s, as a result of the deaths of King Henry I of France and Geoffrey of Anjou, William was sufficiently confident to capitalise on the links with England that had been developing for two hundred years, and in September 1066 he set sail for England.

So, does Baudiun’s thesis hold water?  His analysis of the relationships of family to location is detailed and powerful, and he shows the dynamic of the ducal/aristocratic partnership at work. One lineage might gain through ducal patronage at the expense of another; thus the Gournays benefited from the fall of William of Arques in 1053, and the duke might offer a reliable man an opportunity in an area where he had no landed interests, just as he entrusted Hugh of Grandmesnil with Neufmarché. Bauduin is strong on this ducal direction of the border families, but not every family can have been implanted at ducal behest. As Norman influence expanded from Rouen some locally established families must have been won over and convinced of the advantages of working with the ruler of Rouen or his agent. Just as Roger of Montgomery had to find ways of working with local families when William the Conqueror encouraged him to takeover the lands to the south of Normandy inherited by his wife, Mabel of Bellême, so the Normans must have had to work with locals in earlier periods. Otherwise Musset’s argument about continuing institutions is undermined.

It is not easy to find direct evidence for this. Bauduin comments on the absence of material both for the very early period and for the twenty years or so in which Richard I laid the foundations for Norman polity that is described by Dudo. Much has been deduced from examining the patrimony of Norman religious houses: the policy of Robert, marquis of Neustria is revealed in looking at the property of the abbey of La Croix-Saint-Ouen, while changing political fortunes in the north east are demonstrated by the history of the College at La Ferté-en-Bray. Bauduin is adept at finding the less well known sources; indeed, in her preface Regine Le Jan compliments him on his excellent knowledge of the written sources, but there is, in the final analysis, not much material to be found. Thus might it not be the case that the partnership of the dukes with a territorialised aristocracy that Bauduin sees in the eleventh century could also be found in the tenth century, if we had the evidence? Might Dominique Barthelémy’s observation about revelation rather than revolution be helpful here?

 

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[1] Pierre Bauduin La première Normandie (Xe–XIe siècles): sur les frontières de la haute Normandie: identité et construction d’une principauté, Caen 2004.

[2] Michel de Boüard ‘De la Neustrie carolingienne à la Normandie féodale, continuité ou discontinuité?’, Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, volume xxviii (1955), pages 1–14; Lucien Musset ‘Notes pour servir d’introduction à l’introduction à l’histoire foncière de la Normandie: les domaines de l’époque franque et les destinées du régime domanial du IXe au XIe siècle”, Bulletin de la Société des Antiquaires de Normandie, volume xlix (1942/5), pages 7–97; David Bates Normandy before 1066, Longman, 1982.

[3] Jean-François Lemarignier Recherches sur l’hommage en marche et les frontières féodales, Lille, 1945; Lucien Musset ‘Considérations sur la genèse et le tracé des frontières de la Normandie’, Media in Francia: recueil de mélanges offerts à K. F. Werner, Paris, 1989, pages 309-18; Judith Green ‘Lords of the Norman Vexin’ in War and Government in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of J. O. Prestwich, ed. John Gillingham and James Holt, Woodbridge, 1984, pages 46–63; Gérard Louise La seigneurie de Bellême Xe–XIIe siècles: dévolution des pouvoirs territoriaux et construction d’une seigneurie de frontière aux confins de la Normandie et du Maine à la charnière de l’an mil, two volumes, Flers, 1992/3, special issues of Le Pays bas-normand; Eleanor Searle Predatory Kinship and the Creation of Norman Power, 840–1066, Berkeley, California, 1988; and, Régine Le Jan Famille et pouvoir dans le monde franc (VIIe - Xe siècles): essai d’anthropologie sociale, Paris, 1995.

[4] Dudo of Saint-Quentin De gestis Normanniae ducum seu de moribus et actis primorum Normanniae ducum, ed. Jules Lair, Mémoires de la Société des Antiquaires de Normandie, volume xxii (1865), translated Eric Christiansen History of the Normans, Woodbridge, 1998; Henri Prentout Étude critique sur Dudon de Saint-Quentin et son histoire des premiers ducs normands, Paris, 1916.

[5] R. H. C. Davis The Normans and their Myth, 1976; qualified by G. A. Loud ‘The Gens Normannorum – myth or reality?’, Anglo-Norman Studies, volume iv (1981), pages 104-16

The Normans in Normandy: When did the Vikings become Norman?

There are paradoxes in the history of tenth-century ‘Normandy’: violent invasion, but in the longer term a settlement which preserved many essentially Carolingian features… In the end, we must think of a fusion of cultures.”[1]  The Viking settlers took up the Frankish customs way of life so completely that within a few generations of their arrival little of their Viking heritage remained. One explanation for this is that the number of settlers was few and that they were quickly absorbed into the local population. Or perhaps there was a brief violent takeover, after which the Vikings adopted the customs of their neighbours out of necessity and political pressure.

Contemporary Latin sources called these settlers Northmanni but this described both the Vikings and, much later, the Normans. It was a general term used to describe the Scandinavians who had become active in northern Francia in the ninth and tenth centuries. But no distinction was made in the tenth century between the Vikings of Neustria and the Vikings in other parts of the rest of Francia and elsewhere.  The major problem with uncovering the history of the early Viking settlement of Neustria is the lack of sources from the early decades of the tenth century, when the settlement was formalised. The Vikings recorded their history later and the sources we do have are written by the Franks. The later Norman histories are problematic because of their interest in buttressing and legitimate the infant state[2].   The sources viewed the tenth-century as a violent time. Frankish lords fought for political dominance and, on the fringes of the Frankish kingdom, smaller groups of peoples fought for supremacy against each other and against the Franks. In the ninth-century, mobile Viking forces had often sailed up the Seine and besieged Paris, or simply ravaged areas inside Francia.  It is hard to tell where these war-bands wintered, though it becomes clear in the annals that the gains for Viking raiders were so great that they began to winter in Francia instead of returning to Scandinavia.

In the early part of the tenth-century, the Neustrian or Breton March was still regarded as part of the Frankish kingdom by the Franks. The Viking raids reached their height during a period of instability in the Frankish kingdoms. An element of luck had played a part in allowing the Frankish kings to rule over an undivided kingdom for many years, in spite of the custom of dividing lands equally between sons on the death of their father. Peppin the Short, Carloman his son and Charlemagne his grandson ruled over an unbroken kingdom. But on the death of Charlemagne’s son Louis the Pious in 840, Francia was at last split. There was a period of fragmentation, with Francia divided into three kingdoms: West Francia, Lotharingia, and East Francia. Charles the Simple, King of West Francia (later to become France) from 898 to 922, regained pre-eminence in the Frankish lands after this period of struggle, though other factions existed. It was this political instability that Viking leaders exploited as they fought and befriended their Frankish counterparts.

How do the chronicles help?

Historians who attempt to reconstruct the early history of Normandy face a number of problems[3]. The sources are few and, worse still, their accuracy is often to be doubted. Palgrave[4] warned that “if you accept the task you must accept Dudo or let the work alone.” Today, the chronicle of Dudo of St Quentin is viewed with so much suspicion by historians that, even where his account tallies with other contemporary writers, he is still distrusted. But without Dudo we have little evidence. The Frankish historian Flodoard of Reims[5] provides some information about Normandy in the first half of the ninth-century, there are a few references to early Normandy in Scandinavian sources and even a late Welsh source. Later Norman sources for this period do exist, but many of these are based on Dudo’s account, so must be treated with caution. With such a lack of literary material, historians are left with the results of research from archaeology and analysis of place-name. The interpretation of archaeological evidence is difficult and the conclusions that can be drawn from it can be even vaguer than literary sources. The historian’s task in chronicling early Norman history is thus a difficult one, and the conclusions reached are, by necessity, limited in nature.

Dudo of St Quentin was born c. 960 in Vermandois. He wrote De moribus et actis primorum Normanniæ ducum (The Deeds of the Early Dukes of Normandy) from about 996 to the time he became Dean of St Quentin in 1015[6]. The earlier history, including some highly questionable and fictional details, was based on Virgil’s Aeneid and Jordanes’ Getica. His main informant for the details of his history was Count Rodulf of Ivry. Commissioned originally by Duke Richard I, the chronicle ended with the death of Richard in 996[7]. Dudo appears to know a great deal about Rollo[8], and he is the only source for the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, where Charles the Simple granted Rollo the lands around Rouen in 911. Rollo is baptised and, in return, receives the grant of land.  The bishops said to Rollo, who was unwilling to kiss King Charles’s foot: “You who receive such a gift ought to kiss the king’s foot.” And he said: “I shall never bend my knees to another, nor shall I kiss anyone’s foot.” Compelled, however, by the prayers of the Franks, he ordered one of his soldiers to kiss the king’s foot. The man immediately seized the king’s foot, put it to his mouth and kissed it while the king was still standing. The king fell flat on his back. This raised a great laugh and greatly stirred up the crowd.”  A great story, but almost certainly a legend. Dudo was the official chronicler of the Rollonid dynasty, and he portrays Rollo as the leader of the Vikings in many campaigns and battles, perhaps too many for historians to believe it. The facts of Rollo’s early years as leader of the early Normans are therefore lost in the illusion of later myths. Nonetheless, some of the essential details in Dudo’s story have some validity. Though Dudo is the only source who dates the agreement between Rollo and Charles at 911, this does appear to be a highly plausible date for the agreement.

It is unclear when Viking raiders began to settle in the coastal area, but there is some evidence from the few documents that survive from this period. A Carolingian charter of 905 records Charles the Simple’s grant of two serfs of the Crown from the pagus of Rouen to his chancellor Ernestus. This was the last royal charter in Normandy.  Three months later, some idea of the turmoil in the region can be concluded from a charter of 906 that records the transfer of relics from Saint-Marcouf (now in Manche, Basse-Normandie) to Corbény “because of the excessive and prolonged attacks of the pagans.”   In 918, Charles the Simple granted the lands of the old abbey of La Croix-Saint-Leufroi to the abbey of Saint-Germanin-des-Prés “except that part of the abbey’s lands that we have granted to the Normans of the Seine, namely to Rollo and his followers, for the defence of the kingdom.”  The treaty recording this land grant to Rollo no longer exists, but it is clear that between the dates of these two royal proclamations, Rollo and his followers had established themselves.

The decisive event may have been a battle at Chartres in 911. Later Norman tradition tends to agree with this and places Rollo at the centre of events, though some historians question this. One reading of the sources is that as a result of this battle, the Vikings were appeased with a grant of land in order to contain and control them. Flodoard of Reims tells us that the Vikings had been granted the lands around Rouen “had some time ago been given to the Northmen on account of the pledges of Charles who had promised them the breadth of the country.” Flodoard’s account is important because it appears to give a contemporary view of the period. He was a canon of Reims, and wrote his annals from c. 925 until his death in 966. The only problem is that he was some distance from Normandy, and the history of Normandy was not his principal concern.

It is clear from his account that the Vikings and the Franks were in constant struggle. In 925, Flodoard records that “the Normans of Rouen broke the treaty which they had once made and devastated the districts [pagi] of Beauvais and Amiens. Those citizens of Amiens who were fleeing were burned by a fire for which they were ill-prepared.” The Franks responded by plundering Rouen: “they set fire to manors, stole cattle and even killed some of the Normans.” Count Herbert led another force against the Vikings towards the east, and surrounded them in a camp on the coast.   “It was this very same camp, situated on the coast and called Eu that the Franks surrounded. They broke through the rampart by which the camp was surrounded in front of its walls and weakening the wall, climbed all. Once they had won possession of the town by fighting, they then slaughtered all the males and set fire to its fortifications. Some, however, escaped and took possession of a certain neighbouring island. But the Franks attacked and captured it, although with a greater delay than when they had seized the town. After the Normans, who had been preserving their lives by fighting as best they could, had seen what had happened and had let slip any hope of survival, some plunged themselves into the waves, some cut their throats and some were killed by Frankish swords, while others died by their own weapons. And in this way, once everyone had been destroyed and an outrageous amount of booty had been pillaged, the Franks returned to their territory.”

This vivid description gives historians a sense of the violence of the age. The Vikings were marauding all across the northern coastal regions of Francia, though Neustria does seem to be the main area of their settlement. However, they were certainly not confined to this area, or prepared to accept its boundaries. In 937, Flodoard tells us, “The Bretons retreated to their homeland after their long peregrinations fought in frequent battles with the Normans, who had invaded the territory which had belonged to them, next to their own. They ended up the stronger in many of these battles and reclaimed their own territory.”  Rollo is mentioned in 925 as princeps (leader) of the Northmen at Rouen. Although not mentioned at the time, evidence from the 918 charter strongly suggests that the Norman chroniclers are correct in saying that Rollo led the army from the start. However, Dudo’s reference to the Treaty of St Clair-sur-Epte is uncorroborated and should be dismissed as unreliable. Dudo was also misleading when describing the terms of the settlement. The granting of “the land from the river Epte” tallies with the other sources, but the granting of Brittany does not. Neither does the scene of the utter wilderness hold true: if the land granted by Charles to the Vikings was “uncultivated by the ploughshare, entirely deprived of herds of cattle and flocks of sheep and lacking in human life”, then why do Scandinavian place-names only form a minority of all place-names throughout Normandy? Entertaining though Dudo’s tale may be, his chronicle, and those of his followers and imitators, cannot be trusted for the early history of Normandy and historians must resign themselves to establishing a few bare facts in the midst of later distortions.

The extension of Normandy’s borders can be seen in Flodoard’s history.  King Ralph conceded Bayeux and Maine [Cinomannis et Baiocae] in 925 according to Flodoard, though there are doubts about the concession of Maine. Later in 933, the Normans were given Avranchin and Cotentin. Excluding Maine, this established Normandy in the approximate form that it existed in 1066.  The Cotentin peninsula was also settled by Vikings independently of the Vikings under Rollo at Rouen. These early years were violent times. The Normans were constantly warring, fighting with the Franks in 923, but principally concerned with expanding their own sphere of influence. The people of Bayeux revolted against Viking rule in 925, a year after they had been transferred to the control of the counts of Rouen. Dudo recalls a revolt against William Longsword by a certain Riulf: “fiercely filled with infamous perfidy”.

Against all the stresses and the strains, against internal revolt and external threats, Normandy had secured its position by the middle of the tenth-century and, though its security was threatened many times, the Norman territory was strongly governed and able to throw off its enemies. This might perhaps lead us to view the treaties between the Franks and the Vikings as more significant than they were at the time. All the evidence suggests that the boundaries were relatively fluid. Agreements were made, and Vikings baptised, but these baptisms often proved temporary affairs. In the 920s, the archbishops of Rouen and Reims both wrote letters on the subject of Vikings who remained pagan despite having converted. Herveus of Reims asked the Pope: “What should be done when they have been baptised and re-baptised, and after their baptism continue to live in pagan fashion, and in the manner of pagans kill Christians, massacre priests, and, offering sacrifices to idols, eat what has been offered?”

There is little evidence for the widespread introduction of Scandinavian institutions or lifestyle. Although in 1013 Duke Richard II welcomed a group of Vikings at Rouen, too much should not be read into this. The leaders, Richard and Olaf, may have felt some commonality, but this cannot be discovered. Just as Frankish nobles and kings had welcomed Vikings and baptised them as Christians, in the hope of converting them into a friend and not making them an enemy, so Richard did with Olaf and his Vikings. Olaf had ravaged Brittany, but had allowed himself to be converted by Richard. The Normans were really now more Franks than Scandinavians. Dudo claims that at the time of William Longsword, Scandinavian speech was obsolete at Rouen, and it is indeed probable that the native tongue was soon adopted. On the eve of the first Crusade, the Norman knight Bohemond was able to ask, rhetorically, “Are we not Franks?”

How does archaeological and place-name evidence help?

The land divisions in Normandy appear to have remained unchanged from the Frankish to the Norman eras. Jacques Le Maho’s[9] study of the Pays de Caux shows a continuity of seigneurial residences, and it has been argued that there was greater continuity in this region than in other parts of Francia. The Vikings did bring slavery with them, but this did not last beyond the first century of occupation. The Normans seems to have been highly integrated with the Franks. One piece of evidence for this is the Fécamp coin horde, including some coins struck at mints in Cologne, Arles and Pavia. In Scandinavia, Norman coins cease to appear in hordes after the early eleventh century, appearing instead in Francia and Italy. This suggests a continuation of trading links with Scandinavia for a while, but with a steadily increasing Norman emphasis on contacts with the continent. Frankish justice was adopted; the Scandinavian thing did not become established.

The study of place-names provides an insight into early Normano-Viking settlement. The comprehensive study undertaken by Jean Adigard des Gautries[10] tells the story of the Viking influx. Taking all place-names with a possible or definite Scandinavian influence, it can be seen that these are especially numerous in the Cotentin peninsula and along the coast, with another large cluster in the Pays de Caux. They were also numerous “all along the great invasion route that was the Seine” and down the other rivers as well: evidence of the Vikings carrying on their raiding, travelling by ship across sea and along rivers.  It seems quite likely that when Rollo had his territorial claims to Neustrian March recognised, he based his administration around a coastal group of settlements already in existence due to the activities of other Vikings over a number of years. However, Scandinavian place-names never formed a local majority over pre-existing Frankish names, even in the areas of highest Scandinavian place-name density. One explanation for this is the swift adoption of the local tongue by the Normans.

Frank Stenton[11] made a good point when he compared place-names in Normandy and the English Danelaw. He pointed out that place-names with Viking personal name elements also had Scandinavian suffixes, for example Grimsby: the Viking personal name Grim and the suffix -by, the Scandinavian word for village. He compared this to Normandy, where place-names that have Viking personal names very often have native endings, for example,  Grémonville, the ending of which comes from the Latin villa. The former indicates a large settlement of Vikings, who named places in their own tongue. The latter might only show that while the Viking incomers founded and took over places, it was the local population who actually named these places. This could be an indication of the extent of the Viking settlement in Normandy.

Archaeological evidence can tell us little about early settlement. Patrick Perin[12], examining the evidence found around the lower Seine, admits that the “archaeological documentation is singularly lean.” There is evidence for Scandinavian presence: Viking swords and axes have been found, although Perin points out that despite two finds in the ground that were probably buried as part of a funeral, the arms found were all in the river. While this shows that Vikings were present here, it is not clear whether the finds are mainly from settlements or mainly from marauding hordes before the settlement era. This evidence adds little to our knowledge. It is clear that Northmen were present in Normandy for a long time, but the archaeology is scarce and cannot be pinpointed in time to give a clearer picture of the early years of the Viking settlement. The lack of finds does not trouble David Bates unduly, though. “If an extensive colonisation can be argued for in England despite the absence of significant archaeological finds, then the same conclusion seems feasible for Normandy.” The lack of Viking finds does not automatically discount a sizeable Viking settlement, but if this was the case then the settlers very quickly adopted Frankish customs.

Whatever the size of the settlement, there is another debate on the speed of integration. “Whichever way we turn”, writes Ralph Davies[13], “we have to admit that the Viking society of Rollo and his companions was something quite different from the Norman society of the eleventh century. The one developed from the other, but the development was not effective until the two races had merged and the Northmen had, for all practical purposes, become Frenchmen.” The level of integration is difficult to tell, and David Bates and Eleanor Searle hold different views on this. Bates believes that the Viking incomers quickly became integrated into the native society, so that they had soon adopted Frankish manners and institutions. Searle’s position is that they remained self-consciously Viking until the mid-eleventh century[14].

The evidence for this period is patchy and often inconclusive. The early history of Normandy can be told authoritatively only in very bare and plain terms. Tempting though it is to use more expansive and colourful Norman documents, these tell us more about the needs of the developing Norman state than about its early history. For the period he records, 923-966, Flodoard of Reims seems to be a reliable source, though his main focus is not Normandy. As for the Scandinavian impact on Normandy, there does not appear to have been an overwhelming upheaval. Scandinavian tongues appear not to have been spoken more than three generations after the settlement. Administrative districts were kept intact, estates seem to have survived, and on the whole the Normans ruled through Frankish-style institutions. But Michel de Boüard[15] warns against the simple assumption of continuity simply because of a lack of institutional change. He talks of the “vigour, the effectiveness of ducal power in Normandy” and warns that we should never forget the “human factor” in all this. Certainly, Normandy grew as a power once the Vikings had taken control. There is evidence here for both continuity and discontinuity. Since the sources tell us so little, it is a debate that will be hard to resolve.

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[1] David Bates Normandy before 1066, Longman, 1982, page 38.

[2] Two papers are of particular importance on this issue: Pierre Bouet ‘Les chroniqueurs francs et normands face aux invasions vikings’ and Catherine Bougy ‘Comment les chroniqueurs du XII^e siècle ont-ils perçu les invasions vikings?’, in Elisabeth Ridel (ed.) L’Héritage maritime des Vikings en Europe de l’Ouest, Actes du colloque international de la Hague (Flottemanville-Hague, 30 septembre-3 octobre 1999), Presses Universitaires de Caen, 2002, pages 57-74 and pages 75-100 respectively

[3] David C. Douglas, ‘Some Problems of Early Norman Chronology’, English Historical Review volume 65, (1950), pages 289-303.

[4] Francis Palgrave The History of Normandy and of England, four volumes, 1851-1864.

[5] Flodoard of Reims, Les Annales de Flodoard, edited Philippe Lauer, Collection des textes pour servir à l’étude et à l’enseignement de l’histoire 39, Paris, 1905.

[6] Dudo of Saint-Quentin History of the Normans, translated Eric Christiansen, Boydell, 1997.

[7] Henri Prentout Étude critique sur Dudon de Saint-Quentin et son histoire des premiers ducs Normands, Paris, 1916 remains the most detailed study of Dudo.

[8] Lucien Musset ‘L’origine de Rollon,’ in Nordica et Normannica: Recueil d’études sur la Scandinavie ancienne et médiévale, les expéditions des Vikings et la fondation de la Normandie, Studia nordica 1, Paris: Société des études nordiques, 1997, originally published 1982, pages 383–87 is a useful summary of the evidence.

[9] Jacques Le Maho ‘L’apparition des seigneuries châtelaines dans le Grand-Caux à l’époque ducale,’ Archéologie Médiévale, volume 6, (1976), pages 5-148.

[10] Jean Adigard des Gautries Les noms de personnes scandinaves de Normandie en 911 á 1066, 1954.

[11] Frank M Stenton ‘The Scandinavian Colonies in England and Normandy’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4^th series, volume 27, (1945), pages 1-12 but also see the more recent study by Gillian Fellows-Jensen ‘Scandinavian Place-Names and Viking Settlement in Normandy: A Review,’ Namn och Bygd, volume 76, (1988), 113-37, updated and translated into French as Gillian Fellows-Jensen ‘Les noms de lieux d’origine scandinave et la colonisation viking en Normandie: Examen critique de la question’, Proxima Thulé, volume 1 (1994), pages 63-103.

[12] Patrick Périn ‘Les objets Vikings du Musée des Antiquities de la Seine-Maritime á Rouen’, in Recueil d’études en hommage à Lucien Musset, Cahier des Annales de Normandie 23, Caen: Musée de Normandie, 1990, pages 161-188.

[13] R. H. C. Davis, The Normans and Their Myth, London, 1976

[14] Eleanor Searle Predatory Kinship and the Creation of Norman Power 840-1066 and ‘Frankish Rivalries and Norse Warriors,’ Anglo-Norman Studies, volume 8, (1985), pages 198-213.

[15] Michel de Boüard ‘De la Neustrie carolingienne á la Normandie féodale: continuité ou discontinuité,’ Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, volume 28, (1955), pages 1-14.