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EARLY MEDIEVAL MERCENARIES

THE CONNECTION BETWEEN mercenary and employer is money. Early Germanic tribesmen might serve in Roman armies, but for their own wars they relied on promises of booty, oaths of loyalty and ancient tribal traditions. Mutual protection was also important, and coercion, too. It is a mistake to think of the German tribes as composed of pure racial or linguistic groups – tribes dissolved and reformed repeatedly, often with only a mythological connection to the royal family; clans were not limited to blood relatives and those who married members, but were practical means of assuring mutual aid and protection. Although in moments of danger blood might be thicker than water, oaths to give aid were thicker yet – and since some of these groups were little more than bands of brigands, we could say, ‘thick as thieves’.

We can look upon the late Roman legion alternatively as a mercenary force or professional army. The commanders recruited young barbarians, trained them, and made them loyal to themselves; they left alone Roman citizens and serfs, who were too important to the economy to be wasted in service along the frontiers – they were needed to produce crops and pay taxes. No taxes, no food = no army. When the defences of the western empire collapsed, the government there lost much of its ability to collect taxes, after which it could not raise armies to restore the frontiers and internal order. In the east, in contrast, in that part of the Roman state we call the Byzantine Empire, vast areas remained untouched by rampaging invaders. This made it possible for the emperors to restore agricultural production in devastated regions, and thus to survive for many centuries to come.

Constantinople was the heart of the Eastern Roman Empire, and although the emperors and people there all spoke Greek, they still considered themselves Roman. The city remained Greek-speaking until 1453, then Greek in spirit even longer; and more than a few Greeks today believe that it should be Greek again.

The emperors’ Roman predecessors had hired Germans because they considered them good warriors and likely to be loyal. This lasted until the Germans took over the government of the western empire themselves. Then Byzantine emperors replaced their Germans with a new farmer-soldier class and a wide variety of hired barbarians. The emperors were very practical on military matters. Most of all they advised flexibility, which could be achieved by selecting the right mix of mercenaries for each war.

Byzantine armies were models of efficiency and organisation. The emperors raised competent generals to command, men who had been formally trained in strategy and tactics; and who had modern technologies such as Greek fire to call upon. The military manuals advised commanders to study the enemy’s army, then raise forces appropriate for countering its strengths and playing upon its weaknesses; the central striking force was often composed of mercenaries – the Varangian Guard being the most famous.

Byzantine wealth naturally attracted the attention of greedy neighbours – pagan Persians, Muslim Arabs, Bulgars and Russians who eventually adopted Byzantium’s Orthodox faith, western Christians and ultimately Muslim Turks. The Byzantine armies fought off all but the last, and even then were able to delay the final Turkish triumph for centuries.

VIKINGS

The western counterpart of the Byzantine Empire was created by Charlemagne and eventually became known as the Holy Roman Empire. Roman institutions, however, were few – principally maintained by the Church – and this Frankish state soon collapsed under the weight of Muslim, Hungarian and Viking attacks. The rulers of the successor states parcelled out lands to men who could provide military protection and supervise basic governmental services. Such a primitive system was viewed with disdain by Byzantines.

In turn, western Europeans who prided themselves on once having been associated with Rome, or at least with the name Roman, looked upon the Vikings as simple barbarians. While there was some truth to this assessment, it was also misleading. In many ways – in literature, art and maritime technology – the Vikings were a very sophisticated people; they also possessed a vitality that seemed to be lacking elsewhere.

In the ninth century Scandinavians overran many of their neighbours’ territories. While Danes went to southern England and Normandy, and Norwegians to Scotland, Ireland and Iceland, the Swedes went east, sailing up rivers into what is today Russia, then transferring to rivers leading down to the Islamic and Byzantine worlds. Most took along goods for sale – usually human beings collected along the shores of the Baltic and North Seas; later Vikings served in the famed Varangian Guard.

At Saint Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, one dining room is (or used to be, in an era when it was acceptable to portray Vikings as warriors rather than as merchants, settlers and explorers) decorated with a large map of medieval Europe, with the Viking raids indicated by little burning buildings. The area of Poland is blank because while the Vikings left enough survivors elsewhere to record their depredations, their devastation of the Polish coast was almost total. (Some scholars see a connection between the words Slav and Slave, reflecting the huge numbers of Slavs who were sold down the Russian rivers.) This slave trade was one basis for the prosperity of the Scandinavian economies. Male slaves often ended up as eunuchs, the women as servants and concubines.

Viking warriors served Scandinavian kings as bodyguards and tax collectors, but the best pay and the most alluring off-duty attractions were to be found in Constantinople.

THE VARANGIAN GUARD

In 987 the Byzantine emperor Basil II (976–1025) asked Vladimir of Kiev to lend him some 6,000 warriors. From that time on, Basil’s armies were invincible; when he crushed the powerful Bulgarian state, he became known as ‘the Bulgar killer’. He advanced the borders of the Byzantine state to the Danube River in the north and into Syria in the east. Scholarly opinion is divided as to Vladimir’s ethnic origins. Russians say that he was a Slav; almost everyone else thinks he was a descendant of Viking immigrants. It doesn’t really matter. What is important is that from that time until 1204, when western crusaders captured Constantinople, the Varangian Guard was there to defend imperial interests.

As time passed the guard was recruited from ever more distant regions – first Russia, then Scandinavia, and finally England and Iceland. The decline in Viking recruits after the Christianisation of Scandinavia perhaps reflects the desire of the Viking kings to live in peace. They had overrun England and parts of France and Ireland and wanted more than anything to collect taxes peacefully. Ending the raids would also reduce the likelihood of potential rivals earning a military reputation. As a result, young men looking for work as mercenaries had to travel far. And Constantinople was, if anything, far away.

Except for critical moments during rebellions and foreign invasions, the Varangian Guard rarely left Constantinople; the name apparently came from the oath they had taken, but this, like many details passed down by oral tradition, is unclear. The Scandinavian mercenaries had their own barracks not far from the imperial palace, conveniently located for protecting the imperial person and his family. They were also employed to suppress the riots that could be anticipated at major sporting events and for arresting nobles and religious leaders who incurred imperial wrath.

The commander of the Varangian Guard ultimately became a kingmaker. The best example was Harald Hardrada (1015–66), himself king of Norway after 1047, a tall but well-proportioned warrior with long blond moustaches and one eyebrow permanently arched. He had, according to the appropriately named King Harald’s Saga, fled Norway after rebels had killed his half-brother, Saint Olaf, in 1030. Harald made his way to Byzantium, found employment with the emperor, and was soon the Guard’s commander. For several years he often won battles or concluded sieges by cleverness and cunning rather than sheer physical prowess; he was known for his ruthlessness, his pride and his long memory for insults. His saga by Snorri Sturluson, found in the Heimkringla, is filled with tales of his valour and enterprise.

One anecdote concerned the Varangians’ freedom from direct control by the Greek commander of the army, which fundamentally meant that Harald could keep his men out of dangerous situations. The decisive dispute that settled the matter did not occur in the face of the enemy, where Harald could be accused of disloyalty, disobedience and cowardice, but on the march. One evening the Vikings arrived first at the assigned campsite, where they chose the most comfortable place to spend the night. When the commander arrived, he ordered the Varangian Guard to move so that he could pitch his own tents there. Harald challenged his right to give this order, since the Varangian Guard was solely under the command of the emperor and empress. When the dispute reached the point that each side was pulling out its weapons, Harald suggested that the two commanders draw lots, the loser to withdraw his claims both to the campsite and the larger question of command. The commander agreed, on condition that the two lots to be drawn would be identical except for the mark made by the two men. When the commander had made a sign on his mark, Harald asked to see it so that he would not accidentally duplicate it. The Greek showed him his lot, after which Harald made his mark and put it in the container from which a trustworthy referee would draw one lot. However, the instant that the marker was drawn, Harald snatched it from the referee’s hand and threw it far into the water. The Greek objected, saying that now nobody would know who had won. Harald, however, said that all they had to do was look at the remaining lot; they would see that the Greek’s mark was upon it; therefore, the one that had been drawn and then thrown away had to be Harald’s.

Harald did not trust the emperor to safeguard the treasure he was accumulating, but sent it immediately to Jaroslav of Novgorod for safe keeping. He sacked four towns in Sicily and Africa, each time by a clever ruse. The last city was far too large and well defended to take by storm; the only chance to get into the city was by trickery. Harald started by spreading the word that he was ill, then that his condition had worsened, and lastly that he had died, after which his men requested permission to bury Harald inside the city’s church. The monks dutifully came out to take the coffin, but the Vikings arranged to drop it right in the gate, thus preventing the defenders from closing it when the rest of the army charged.

A later expedition took Harald to Jerusalem, then even further east so that he could bathe in the Jordan. Although normally only half-Christian in spirit and actions (he later had two wives at one time), he donated great riches to the churches in the holy city. No point in not buying eternal life insurance when the opportunity presented itself.

Harald’s plans to leave Byzantine service was not good news to the emperor, Michael IV (1034–41), who would have difficulty replacing him, and even less welcome to the fifty-five-year-old empress, Zoe, who was rumoured to have lusted after his handsome body. Michael was acting on politics rather than potential romantic affairs when he confined Zoe to a convent, but it was a mistake. Michael died suddenly and unexpectedly – as had Zoe’s first husband, Romanus III, in 1034. Zoe returned to the palace, married her husband’s incompetent and unattractive nephew, Michael V, thereby placating those who insisted on a male ruler.

In the complicated power struggle that followed Harald threw his support to Zoe, whose best claim to exercise power was being the niece of Basil II and for a knowledge of perfume manufacture unrivalled until the twentieth century. She seems to have put her knowledge of chemistry to the process of invigorating her husbands, then ‘devigorating’ them. Her efforts to become pregnant at an advanced age reflect better on her determination than her understanding of biological principles. Michael V eventually tired of the effort. He had first been her lover, then her husband, and finally he wanted to be emperor on his own. He packed Zoe off to a convent.

Michael might have got away with this if Zoe had not been so popular, if he had been more able or if he had cultivated the support of the Varangian Guard. But arresting Harald on charges of misappropriating public funds was one mistake too many. Michael V was overthrown in 1042 by a conspiracy involving dynastic loyalists, careerist politicians and the Varangian Guard. Harald restored Zoe to power, then blinded her husband and sent him to a monastery.

The episode fits perfectly into the stereotype of ‘Byzantine politics’ – a court characterised by jealousy, secrecy, complex plots and universal corruption. It was the perfect environment for an ambitious mercenary general to rise to prominence. Had Harald’s royal blood been Greek rather than Norwegian, he could have become emperor; perhaps, despite his being a foreigner, he could have married Zoe and ruled as long as she lived. But that seemed a poor career move. He said no.

Zoe, resenting rejection, began to listen to Harald’s enemies. Soon Harald heard the call of Norway, where the usurper had become unpopular; the moment seem right for a Christian to sit upon the northern throne again.

Harald, having assessed Zoe’s governing abilities as minimal and her physical attractiveness even lower, escaped from the great city and sailed for home with legendary quantities of moveable wealth, reputedly taking with him for a short while the empress’s niece, who was ready to marry him. Harald tarried in Novgorod on his voyage long enough to woo Jaroslav’s daughter, Ilsabe – ‘the golden lady in Russia’. As Snorri wrote in his rhymed story:

The warlike king of Norway

Won the match of his desire;

He gained a king’s daughter

And a hoard of gold as well.

Such was the literature that inspired future generations of Scandinavian youths to dream of fame and fortune, earned as mercenaries abroad.

SAXON ENGLAND

The Saxons had conquered England from the Romano-British in the fifth and sixth centuries, effectively eliminating them as a factor in language, religion and government, leaving behind only the semi-mythical stories of King Arthur to commemorate the long and bitter struggle. The Saxons in their turn fell victim to the Vikings in the ninth and tenth centuries, but with less dire results; when Danes and Norwegians overran most of the British Isles, they only forced the Saxons, Scots and Irish to pay tribute.

The most important Viking physical presence was in eastern and central England, in the Danelaw, where they gave new vigour to the economy, especially to the town of York. Saxon resistance to the Vikings in the west led to a union of the petty kingdoms under King Alfred (871–99), who hired the first English mercenaries, Frisian sailors who had their own reasons for disliking Danes and liking regular pay; later kings hired professional guards called housecarls. Eventually all Saxons accepted Danish sovereignty as long as the king remained far away. King Canute (1016–35) is remembered more for his self-deprecating wisdom than his empire stretching all the way to Estonia.

When the Saxons achieved independence again, they did not dismantle the fiscal apparatus for collecting tribute money. This income made the Saxon king rich despite England being a comparatively poor country. Similarly, the Northmen who gave their name to Normandy made that region more important than its natural resources should have allowed.

The Norman Conquest of Saxon England began with a dispute about which of six men would be the successor of Edward the Confessor (1042–66); only three, however, had the military resources to be serious contenders–William the Bastard, Harold Godwinson and Harald Hardrada, who had become King of Norway in 1047.

The saintly king’s vow of chastity had disrupted the smooth transfer of power that was the chief virtue of hereditary succession. The three leading candidates had equally good claims on the crown. However, Harold Godwinson, earl of Wessex, was at Edward’s deathbed. According to Snorri, Harold bent over Edward’s mouth, then stood up to call on all witnesses to testify that the king had named him his successor. There were many sceptics, men who were used to politicians’ wiles; among them was Harold’s own brother, Tostig.

Harold was the son of Godwin, who had governed England for Canute. Godwin had selected Edward as king during the last succession crisis, and had dominated the compliant ruler with one significant exception, when Edward had exiled him temporarily. Godwin returned, but died in 1053 before he could guarantee the succession to his son Harold. This son was the favourite of the Witan, the Saxon assembly, which was actually in session when Edward passed away. Harold Godwinson was known to most of the thanes, as the Saxons called the landed warrior class, because he had carried out many of the tasks associated with daily governance after his father’s death, and his sister had been Edward’s chaste and loyal wife. He met two of the four characteristics set by the Witan for the next ruler: he was a man of character and ability, and he was English. Forty-four years of age, he was at the height of his physical and mental powers. However, he was not of royal blood and the king had not indicated his wishes, not even on his deathbed, except perhaps in Harold’s ear.

Awkwardly, Harold’s brother, Tostig, the eldest of Godwin’s five sons, thought that he had the better claim to be head of the family and, hence, king. Edward’s favourite, Tostig had been sent north to defend the borderlands against the Scots in 1065, but his men had provoked a rebellion among the very people they were to protect. The rebels killed his closest associates, seized the treasury, and marched south to demand that the king give them a better governor. Tostig, who had been hunting when the crisis arose, accused Harold of provoking it. Harold, in the presence of the king, swore that he was innocent of any involvement. Edward, unable to raise troops to put down the rising, reluctantly ordered Tostig into exile. This was a mistake.

Tostig went to first to Denmark, hoping to persuade King Sven II (Canute’s grandson, king 1047–76) to support his cause; but that monarch said that he too old and feeble for such an enterprise (he was forty-six). Then Tostig sailed to Norway and approached King Harald Hardrada. For fifteen years Harald had been making annual raids into Denmark, but recently he had made peace with King Sven. Now Harald was bored. Moreover, he was touched to the quick by Tostig’s taunt that he had fought hard to possess Denmark, but would not accept England when it was being handed to him. More to the point, Harald’s warriors were probably short of cash after two years without an opportunity to loot somebody. Still, many Vikings were aware that one Saxon housecarl would be equal to two Norwegian yeomen, and that there were many of them, all wearing mail armour and wielding large axes. Others scoffed at this – Vikings were unbeatable, they boasted, and they had almost always bested the English.

Tostig’s original plan was to become king himself, but King Harald was not willing to undertake such a venture for only a little money. Besides, he probably enjoyed taunting the petitioner (his nickname means ‘hard bargainer’); for a Viking a bare-knuckles negotiation was almost as much fun as a brawl, and it could last longer, without anyone being actually killed. When Harald asked Tostig why Norwegians should fight to make one brother king of the English rather than another, when no Englishman could be trusted for anything, Tostig changed the argument: he said that Harald should become king himself; for his part, Tostig was ready to settle for the governance of Northumbria, with perhaps an appointment to rule England whenever Harald would be absent (which would be most of the time). Harald, satisfied with this proposal, soon had an army ready to sail.

King Harald entered the tomb of St Olaf, trimmed the holy corpse’s beard and nails, then threw away the key. When he joined the fleet of 200 warships and more supply vessels, an aged woman saw ghostly carrion birds perched on every prow; she remarked that they were awaiting the prince’s feast. The old troll had it right in at least one respect: the warriors on board had an appetite for a rich meal of human flesh and bones. She was also right in suggesting that Harald would be the chief course. But Harald, certain of his ‘luck’, was unmoved. He was turning his back on Norway; his future was in England, at least what would be left of it by the time his warriors were sated. He was fifty years old, plenty of time left for more adventures, for greater ambitions.

The third candidate was William, duke of Normandy (1035–87). The Norman nobles were descendants of Viking immigrants, but their blood had been mixed with that of French counts and knights and they had enthusiastically adopted the language and customs of their subjects. In a way the Normans combined the best and worst traits of both their ancestral culture and their adopted one. Most importantly, they could never stay quietly at home. War was their natural environment, and when a feud was not available locally, they sought a conflict out abroad.

Some wild young Norman knights had already gone to Italy in 998 as mercenaries. William’s father, Robert the Devil, had encouraged more of them to go south, out of his hair and into somebody else’s. Just as well. When he became a pilgrim and set off for the Holy Land, he named his illegitimate son William his successor, hardly anticipating that he himself would die on the journey. That the seven-year-old William survived to adulthood was a miracle. His upbringing must have been the most arduous training in statecraft on record, and even at age eighteen, when he announced that he would assume the government personally, he had to subdue a dangerous revolt by his vassals. Henceforth he kept his knights employed at foreign wars, encouraging even more to go to southern Italy. The most prominent of the Normans there – Robert Guiscard (†1085) – made himself master of Naples and assisted his brother, Roger (†1101), in conquering Sicily. They became the protectors of the Papal States against the Holy Roman emperor and provided many volunteers for the First Crusade. The ties with Normandy would remain important for several generations; this gave French monarchs excuses to intervene there from the thirteenth century on.

William’s claims to the Saxon throne were shaky. Once in the past, he said, Edward had promised to name him king. Sometimes William suggested this was in 1042 before Edward had left Normandy to become king himself, when William was a teenager; sometimes it was during a meeting in 1051, when William visited the king during Godwin’s exile – there were many Normans at the court at that time. William’s claim was reinforced in 1064, when Harold found himself in Normandy, either on a diplomatic mission or driven ashore by storms. According to William, Harold swore to become his ‘man’ (the act of homage from the Latin homo) and then to do all that he could to assure that William would be elected king. Storytellers disagree as to where this oath was given and of what it consisted.

What might have happened was that Harold used this promise to secure his pre-eminent position in the government just as Tostig had done with Harald Hardrada – a oath of fealty that cost nothing but would secure him from disaster should Edward recommend William to the Witan as the next king. In the meantime, William could boast of his future prospects: he was now only a duke, but soon enough he would be a king.

Strangely, when William heard of Edward’s death, he had only one question of Harold: would Harold marry William’s daughter as he had promised? Harold, however, had both a long-term mistress and an intended bride. He was not willing to give up either for an under-aged fiancée. Instead, Harold moved quickly to obtain election by the Witan and be crowned. When he heard of the mobilisations in Norway and Normandy, he ordered his army to assemble.

The core of Harold’s force were the housecarls, professional soldiers equipped with mail armour, shields and axes. The mass of troops came from the militia, called the fyrd, most of which was composed of thanes, landowners who were willing to fight enthusiastically in defence of their homes; warriors of the lower classes were meagrely armed and of indifferent spirit.

William called an assembly of his vassals in the spring. His proposal to build a fleet to transport the army to England was not well received. Vikings had never hesitated to board ships to attack enemy lands, but Vikings were foot-soldiers. Normans fought in mail armour from horseback, hurling spears and slashing with swords; no one had experience in transporting large numbers of warhorses in Viking-style vessels. The lack of space meant that there would be too few rowers to guarantee reaching the English coast if the winds were not favourable; any contrary breeze would drive many vessels far off course, which would not have been a disaster for an ordinary merchantman, but no merchantman was ever loaded with knights and their mounts. Also, by the time a fleet could be ready to sail, it would be autumn, and the weather would be unpredictable. If a summer crossing of the Channel was a daunting prospect, an autumn crossing was positively frightening.

William tried to persuade his vassals not only to agree that his cause was just, but also to promise to bring twice as many men as their feudal contracts stipulated. They balked at that. They were willing to perform their feudal duties, but they made it clear that it was up to him to recruit the army.

The duke’s efforts to recruit his peers failed equally miserably. Neighbouring counts and dukes saw no advantage in assisting him to become even more powerful; already he was a regional bully, a menace to everyone. He had more success with the pope, who was eager to ‘reform’ the English church, that is, to force it to accept recent doctrines that increased papal authority. The pope declared William’s venture holy (the term ‘crusade’ was still unknown), with spiritual benefits for everyone. This may have been meant as a warning to the German emperor, who was extending his authority over the Holy Roman Empire by using church resources, but the pope was not ready to tip his hand there yet. First England, which paid the lucrative ‘Peter’s Pence’ to the pope, then the rest of Christendom.

Last, William sent out a call for volunteers. Warriors flocked in from all parts of the French kingdom, mostly young knights, probably younger sons who had little chance of inheriting enough land to maintain their noble status. In lieu of pay, he promised to give them estates now held by Saxons – as it was often put, ‘to rely on the duke’s generosity’. When that news reached England, the Saxon thanes realised that they had to stand by Harold or lose everything.

Most notable among William’s allies were Bretons. They composed an entire wing of his army at the battle of Hastings. Brittany was a major breeding ground of mercenaries from that time on.

THE BATTLE OF STAMFORD BRIDGE

Harold perceived that Duke William was a greater threat than the Norwegian monarch. His subjects had agreed with him, the fyrd even remaining at the Channel for six weeks beyond the term required by their feudal obligations. But there was a limit to what could be expected of vassals, and by mid-September it seemed obvious to everyone that it was unlikely that William could launch a fleet; no sane man would attempt to sail from Normandy in the face of a north wind and worsening weather. Moreover, there was hardly any food left along the coastline to feed the army. Harold had barely sent the fyrd home when news arrived that King Harald Hardrada had landed in the north.

The Norwegian king had actually sailed in mid-August, but he had stopped in the Shetland Islands and in Scotland to recruit more troops. Therefore, he did not arrive on the English coast until mid-September. He first captured York, using a feint to lure the militiamen from behind their ditch, then striking so hard that his men were able to walk across the ditch on Saxon bodies without wetting their feet. Three days later York surrendered, after which the king announced that he would hold a public meeting at Stamford Bridge; there he would distribute rewards to his followers and to those Saxons who surrendered in time. King Harald then relaxed, apparently believing that Harold Godwinson was far away on the south coast awaiting the arrival of the Normans.

Harold Godwinson, however, was no longer on the Channel. At the head of his housecarls he made an incredible forced march northward, the last 200 miles in five days, arriving at Stamford Bridge without warning. King Harald and Tostig were not even properly armed when they saw an army approaching – fine shields and shining coats of mail, with weapons glittering like ice. Was it local Saxons coming to surrender? It couldn’t be a hostile force – Harold could not have arrived so swiftly. Still unsure who it was, Tostig recommended retreating to the ships. But Harald Hardrada believed that he and a handful of men could hold the oncoming foe at the bridge. It was a matter of pride. And a Viking belief in fate. And in luck. Harald sent messengers to his men at the ships, urging them to hurry forward, then took up his position at the bridge.

According to Snorri’s tale, Harald’s black horse stumbled as he rode around to inspect his troops. Nimbly he darted to his feet, saying, ‘A fall is fortune on the way.’ As Harold of England saw this, he asked who the big man with the blue tunic and beautiful helmet was. Told that it was Harald, he commented how large and strong he appeared, but that it appeared that his luck had run out this day.

When Tostig asked Harold how much English land he would give King Harald to go away, Harold replied, ‘seven feet’ to be buried in, seven feet because he was unusually tall. Tostig was another matter. Harold offered him Northumberland, but he refused to pay Tostig’s supporters for their service. Some of Tostig’s troops were Flemish mercenaries, who needed paying. Tostig, his honour touched, refused; surprisingly, he did not reveal Harold’s identity during the negotiations, because the Vikings would likely have slain him then and there, ending the war before it started. Harald did not know his opponent by sight, but when he asked who had spoken so well, Tostig told him it had been Harold. The Norwegian king commented that he was a little man, but that he stood proudly in his stirrups.

In such a way battle was chosen over compromise. Each knew that it would be an unusually bloody affair, with men with axes chopping away grimly at one another. But from Harold Godwinson’s point of view, speed was important – he had a tactical advantage and the greater numbers. Delay would work only for King Harald, who must have been watching the horizon for sign of his men.

As the Saxons came on, King Harald raised his banner, called ‘Land-waster’, then fought like a mad-man, a berserker, until he was hit by a chance arrow in the eye or throat. Harold then offered to spare Tostig, his men, and the surviving Vikings, but they replied that they would rather die than surrender to Englishmen. And so they did. Tostig fell after defending the royal standard bravely, together with most of the Vikings who had exhausted themselves in hurrying to the fight in full battle gear.

It had been a costly victory. The Vikings had fought to the death. Harold’s troops were completely exhausted, and many were wounded. But they had less than a week to recover before news came that William had landed in the south.

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS

The Bayeux Tapestry pictures the events of the invasion from the Norman point of view. William’s crowded ships made the crossing without difficulties, the men and horses spilling out on to terra firma, happy that no hostile force was there to attack before they had recovered from seasickness, fright and exhaustion. The troops then spread out to loot and burn. It was what the mercenaries had looked forward to from the beginning.

Harold made his return from York to London in only four days, resting his army there while awaiting reports from his scouts and asking William what terms he would accept to return home. William reminded Harold of his earlier oath, then demanded that he be recognised as king. Harold chose to fight.

There were reasons for Harold to delay. Time was on his side in every way – his housecarls would have been more rested – each day more troops would have joined his army, and once all England was mobilised, he might be unbeatable; even without waiting for the warriors from the northern shires, his army would soon outnumber William’s decisively. On the other hand, Harold learned only now that he had been excommunicated by the pope! Perhaps it was best to strike at William’s forces quickly, before this fact sank in among the pious Saxons of England. Also, he did not want to abandon the rich southern shires to his opponent, who might establish an effective base there and become impossible to root out. Those who knew the Norman skill at constructing castles were not willing to throw away their lives in hopeless assaults later. Better to fight now.

Harold may have wanted to drive William out of England, but he understood that footmen had to stand on the defensive against horsemen. Therefore, he could not simply march south and attack. His strategy had to be more subtle. He chose a ridgeline near Hastings, a place that William had to pass to break into open country or give up his campaign. Harold may have had about 8,000 men, slightly more than William, but his army had fewer archers and no cavalry. Harold’s men stood in deep ranks, relying on their shields for protection, on their spears and axes for victory in close combat. William wanted a mobile battle, using his archers and horsemen to overwhelm the Saxons at first one point, then another.

The decisive moment came when William’s cavalry charge failed and in its disorderly retreat caused some infantry units to flee the field rather than be trampled by the warhorses. One wing of the Saxon army, overly excited by their success, ran down the hill in pursuit. William rallied his cavalry, then expertly cut off that body of Saxons from their comrades on the hill and slaughtered them. On a level ground Norman horsemen were invincible.

The remaining Saxons remained immobile at the crest of the hill, undoubtedly appalled and disheartened by the disaster they had witnessed, William reorganised his forces, pointed them toward the Saxon position, then charged. The Norman assaults were beaten back again and again, but there was no way for the Saxons to turn the repulses into a rout. All afternoon the fighting continued, with the Saxon army slowly being ground down. At last, surrounded at the top of the hill, the Saxons scarcely had room to swing their axes or the strength to do so. But any warrior who moved out from the shield wall to gain space to strike at his foes became a target for the Norman archers.

As the archers saw that the Saxon shields – some round, but others a distinctive kite-shape – were catching most of their missiles, they raised the trajectory, so that the arrows came down at a steeper angle. According to the Bayeux Tapestry, two possible interpretations of Harold’s death are possible: one that an arrow passed through his visor, giving him a fatal wound; or that he was cut down by a horseman. In either case, Harold’s death was decisive: the surviving housecarls and thanes fled for their lives.

William was no longer ‘the Bastard’. Henceforth, he was William the Conqueror.

NORMAN ENGLAND

William did not occupy England swiftly. He had lost too many men, and there were strong cities and fortifications still in Saxon hands; moreover, many of his men fell ill, and he was unwell, too (making one wonder what the outcome would have been if Harold had delayed combat for another week). But there was no one to organise resistance. Harold, Tostig and two other brothers were dead. God seems to have spoken on the question of who was the rightful monarch. The churchmen recognised William as king. After that there was no going back.

The Normans’ roundabout advance on London left a wide trail of death and destruction that led to further collapse of Saxon will. Those Saxons who could sought to ingratiate themselves with their new ruler, but few were able to do without forfeiting most of their property. Many fled the country.

William built a number of powerful castles, the most famous being the White Tower in London. So strong that it could only be taken by starvation, and then only if the attackers controlled the Thames as well as the land, the Tower loomed over the eastern part of the city, its garrison always ready to swarm out in defence of royal interests. Such a garrison might well be composed of mercenaries, men who would have little or no sympathy with the merchants, artisans and workmen of London – middle- and low-class scum who were nature’s chosen victims, the lawful prey of those who understood how to better themselves in the opinion of the world and in material possessions.

As William turned his attention to raising the money necessary to finance his military occupation of the country, he lost whatever potential he had for reconciling the Saxons to his governance. But that was irrelevant: William had to pay his troops, and therefore his subjects had to pay him. He succeeded well in the south, where the bulk of his forces were concentrated and where the richest lands lay. No one dared complain, at least not loudly – the mercenaries may not have spoken English well, but they understood when Saxon voices sounded resentful.

DANISH INTERVENTION

William was less successful in the north, whose cities and towns had lost comparatively few men at Hastings. His earls easily occupied the major cities, but usually found them abandoned. The inhabitants were not far off, in the hills, and soon enough they swooped down on the newcomers, wiping out several careless Norman garrisons.

A critical moment came in 1069, when King Sven arrived with an army of Danes, Poles, Saxons and Frisians. Most were undoubtedly mercenaries. He had good reason to expect a warm reception. After all, the money to raise his army had come from the north, where almost everyone wanted to see a return of the good old days of King Canute – an absentee ruler who, nevertheless, saw to the preservation of peace and order.

The Danish campaign began well. In the spring Sven joined with the Saxon army of resistance, captured York and massacred the first Normans to oppose him. But afterward, as he looked at the sacked and burned city, Sven realised that he lacked supplies for the winter. Returning home was his best option. Perhaps he could return in the spring.

William had meanwhile hurried north, surprising two Danish forces and slaughtering them. Then, once he realised that Sven was sailing away, William began to deal with the king’s Saxon allies. Leaving behind small garrisons to hold the castles, he went into the hills. Although the Saxon warriors probably evaded his forces most of the time, the peasantry could not. William slaughtered farmers and their animals, burned houses, barns and fields, and made it impossible for anyone to plant crops for the coming year.

The next year there was massive starvation in the north. There was almost nobody left to resist William’s subsequent punitive expeditions – brutal plundering raids known as the ‘Harrying of the North’. There was no point to another Danish intervention.

Only the last great rising, that of 1075, threatened William’s grasp on the crown, and that only because some of his most trusted vassals were involved. Thenceforth even the most resolute Saxon rebel understood that the only way to survive was through abject surrender.

A RYE TURN OF FORTUNE

William’s unsuccessful efforts to pacify the north without depopulating it may be due less to his inability to pay mercenaries from the sparse crops than from the overlooked fact that climate makes harvests in northern England and Scotland unpredictable. Frenchmen were unwilling to eat what local farmers could raise most easily – rye. Hence, according to William Kapelle of Brandeis University, French culinary tastes were responsible for William’s failure to prevail in the borderlands – his men were simply unwilling to stay where the bread was so, so brown. The reputation of English cookery has never recovered.

It was not that the northerners hated Normans particularly: they had rebelled against Tostig, too. They wanted to govern themselves in their own rough way, with the strongest speaking on behalf of everyone. How could the king guarantee his own authority and still bring quiet to the north? Henry I (1100–35) resolved this problem by offering a few Normans estates there, then leaving the rest to their Saxon owners. This provided a combination of stability and fighting power. Everyone had to worry about the Scots, the king must have thought, let the Saxons wear themselves out fighting them.

SCUTAGE

Despite England’s possessing some of the best records of the Middle Ages, it is still not fully understood how vassals provided garrisons for the royal castles and troops to serve in royal expeditions. In theory, lords and knights were supposed to serve in person, but in practice this was not always possible. The warriors who had fought at Hastings eventually grew old. Garrison service was often unpleasant and boring.

The king, not eager to hear complaints from his vassals, allowed them to provide replacements. Or better yet, he allowed vassals to substitute money payments. But even vassals willing to appear in person with their men found that it was awkward to take skilled farmers and artisans away from work. Most likely they hired common soldiers to replace militiamen, and mercenary horsemen in place of knights.

But there was another force at work. That was the practice of vassals paying the king an additional tax, scutage (meaning ‘shield money’), in place of military service. The kings liked this system. In peacetime the money went straight into the Exchequer; in wartime they could hire strong, healthy young men rather than rely on vassals who might be aged, infirm or lacking in enthusiasm.

One result of this innovation was to separate the military function of English knights from their honorific and monetary roles. Future kings would require well-to-do commoners to become knights, whether they wanted to or not. Their duty, as the king saw it, was first to pay the fees that accompanied the ceremony, and second to pay scutage. Whether they ever appeared in person, equipped for battle, hardly mattered.

This ambiguity toward the nobility of knighthood was common elsewhere in Europe. The term miles and knight were not always synonymous with noble. Modern scholars who attempt to codify the rules of feudalism often end up describing the usages of northern France. That can be misleading.

Still, the rest of Europe often looked to France for models of behaviour and culture, but perhaps most of all the warrior classes, who viewed with envy French knights’ privileges and prestige. Rulers were more likely to copy only the art and architecture. This was especially true in England. Despite the kings being more French than English, they had no desire to import bad habits from the Continent.

Knights of the shires occasionally participated in tournaments, served as justices and tax-collectors, and voted for representatives to Parliament. But it was royal officials, such as the sheriffs, who organised regional defence and recruited young men for service abroad. The knights of the shires might have degenerated totally into pheasant- and fox-hunting elites if the practice of primogeniture had not produced in each generation younger sons with only two career options: the Church or the battlefield.

The younger sons had to do something. Some became mercenaries.

POSTSCRIPT TO THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS

In one of history’s most bizarre ironies, the battle of Hastings was fought again in 1081 in Albania. When the Saxon survivors of the disaster of 1066 realised that William the Bastard was going to confiscate all their lands and honours, they resisted fiercely. By 1069, however, when King Sven withdrew from the island, they understood that their cause was lost. Many Saxon nobles gathered whatever they could quickly on to ships and sailed into exile. Under the leadership of an otherwise unknown thane named Siward, 350 ships made their way to Constantinople, arriving while the city was being besieged by a Turkish army. The Saxons immediately set to work, fighting with their customary skill and determination. The new emperor, Romanus IV (1068–71), was so impressed with their valour, skill and dedication that he rewarded some of their number with estates and enrolled others in a special unit of the Varangian Guard and stationed them on the Albanian coast, an area in danger of being lost to Norman knights and mercenaries from the kingdom of Naples. Fifteen years after the battle of Hastings, Saxon and Normans met in battle at Durazzo, the Adriatic terminus of the old Roman road leading across the Balkans to Constantinople.

The Normans were serving under Robert Guiscard, who was undermining the already shaky position of the new emperor, Alexius Comnenus (1081–1118). Constantinople seemed ripe for plucking, its armies having been crushed by Turkish forces and most of its Asiatic territories lost.

The Saxons seemed to be Comnenus’s last hope. He was confident that if they followed the Byzantine army manual and maintained discipline, that they would prevail. However, according to a widely read account by the emperor’s daughter, Anna Comnena, the warriors from distant ‘Thule’ unwisely charged up a steep hill to get at their ancestral enemies and, exhausted by the effort, were mercilessly slaughtered. The Byzantine Empire survived the disaster, but only barely. From 1081 on, the emperor lost city after city, province after province, to Christian and Muslim foes. In the end all he could think to do was to appeal to Pope Urban II for help in recruiting mercenaries and volunteers. Such a request hurt him to the uttermost depths of his Orthodox Greek soul, to ask the hated Roman pontiff for aid. But he had no choice.

Pope Urban II, for his part, dared not ask the Germans to help – he was involved in a life-and-death struggle with what later generations called the Holy Roman emperor. Instead, he went to France and asked for volunteers to liberate Jerusalem. Thus, out of a request for mercenaries to rescue Constantinople emerged the First Crusade!

Two partly mercenary armies had fought it out at Hastings and Durazzo, with much more than money at stake. It was an ancestral feud, and once the Saxon ruling class was finally and truly exterminated, England was destined to remain dominated by Normans until the fourteenth century, when at last Norman and Saxon fused together to create a new language and a new nation – England.

William and his successors understood well how to use art, poetry and pageantry as royal propaganda. With all these means they encouraged youths and even experienced warriors to imagine service in a royal army as a step to wealth and higher status; this was not confined to Englishmen (however that term applied), but to all who saw mercenary service as honourable, profitable and (probably) temporary.

THE GOLDEN AGE OF ENGLISH MERCENARIES

For many years British medievalists quarrelled about what constituted the essential nature of English feudalism. What many overlooked was that the foreign rule of the Normans could be maintained only by the use of hired troops; that is, mercenaries. This was to affect everything, from the Exchequer to the strategies and tactics of war.

William the Conqueror’s descendants continued to fill out their armies with mercenaries. But where to get the money? The royal estates were insufficient to his needs – too much land had been given to relatives, vassals and the Church, on the promise they would provide warriors when necessary. This had not worked. The kings relied on taxes to pay bureaucrats and soldiers.

Although we read more about mercenary horsemen than about infantry, most mercenaries seem to have been foot soldiers. Infantry was superior to cavalry in several respects: training was easier, equipment was less expensive, and infantry were well suited to fighting in hills and woods. They were indispensable for garrisons. Moreover, some knights were more interested in preparing for tournaments than battle; time spent on garrison duty was time wasted. The importance of mercenaries became obvious during the most senseless of all English conflicts, the civil war between Stephen (1135–54) and Matilda (Maud, Holy Roman empress 1110–25, who claimed the throne of England 1135–47). This was known popularly as the time when God and His angels slept.

This struggle provides the background for the twenty-one murder mysteries by Ellis Peters (Edith Pargeter, 1913–95), all centring on the fictional Welsh monk, Brother Cadfael. Beginning in 1994 Derek Jacobi began starring on BBC as the medieval monk-detective. To date thirteen episodes have been filmed. As Ron Miller says on the Mystery website of Cadfael, ‘He’s what Sherlock Holmes might have been if born 750 years earlier and bottle-fed on a good deal more of the milk of human kindness than Conan Doyle ever gave him.’

But Cadfael was also a worldly-wise man. Before he entered the monastery to do penance for his sins, he had been a well-travelled warrior. It comes as no surprise to him that the mercenary soldiers he saw in the civil war were less than gentlemen.

In the sixteenth of her Cadfael series, A Rare Benedictine (1979), Peters tells us something about her humble hero’s crusading and seafaring past, and how he became a monk. It was an autumn day of 1120 when Lord Roger was returning from the war in Normandy that Cadfael was introduced as a ‘blunt and insubordinate’ Welshman who was, nevertheless, ‘experienced, and accomplished in arms, a man of his word’. Somewhere, in the Holy Land or elsewhere, he had ‘imbibed the code of arms and wore it as a second nature’ (actions the reader had best not attempt to imagine).

In The Potter’s Field, Peters described King Stephen’s hiring Flemish mercenaries, ‘feared and hated by the civilian population, and disliked even by the English who fought alongside them’. But while the Flemish fought on both sides and would change employers readily, so would the barons and earls. Before long the communities nearest to the nest of pillagers pretending to be Maud’s supporters were glad to have the Flemish protection.

The problem here, as was almost universally the case, was that Stephen and Maud lacked the money to pay all their troops. However, the civil war gave them an advantage over other monarchs who found themselves similarly embarrassed at pay-time – they could confiscate their enemies’ estates and give them to their supporters. Historians often treat gifts as special favours to lords who were already rich, but it was also important in paying off mercenary leaders. How the mercenary leaders chose to pay their troops was their problem.

Some mercenaries settled permanently in England on the estates given to them for their services. Most probably just took their money, found a likely town and opened a bar or inn. Others bought a small farm, married and hired labourers. Yet others, like Cadfael, must have entered the Church, the universal refuge for the aged, the ill and the repentant. A few went home, others dared not appear in the native parishes. Very likely we can discern in names we encounter daily the origins of some of these men: Brett (Breton), Fleming (Flanders), Holland, Berry, French, Ireland, Scott and Welch.

Novels such as Ellis Peters’s form our modern view of medieval life and war every bit as much as do the best historians. This is partly because the novelists read carefully and deeply, but more because they reach a much wider audience. The best historians occasionally appear as ‘talking heads’ on documentaries, but it is the scriptwriter and the director who determine what the audience sees. This is especially true in movies, where the poor technical advisor’s wisdom comes in a distant second to the needs for additional conflict, drama, mystery and a simplified storyline.

Mercenaries had become a part of medieval warfare. If the profession was a poor career choice – disease, injury and death being common fates – it was, nevertheless, an alternative to poverty and boredom. As Kenneth Fowler says in Medieval Mercenaries: ‘War was a lottery, and although the stakes were dangerously high, they were still worth the gamble’. It was a young man’s business, but it could be a lord’s career.