Chapter Ninety-eight

 

 

A Gathering in France

 

 

Leaving Genoa, Tristan and a small delegation traversed the Alps and moved into central and southern France, spreading word of the impending crusade against the Saracens and the approaching arrival of Pope Urban II from Rome. Odo de Lagery had been well known throughout France since his days as Grand Prior at Cluny. Crossing the Alps, he enjoyed a wildly receptive welcome from his native Frenchmen. He made public speeches within a number of large cities, and arrived in Clermont, France on November 15^th, where he was joined by his First Counsel, Tristan de Saint-Germain. This meeting had been highly publicized throughout France, and was promoted as a hugely significant synod where Pope Urban would lay out his full ecclesiastical agenda to the people of the province of Auverge.

Word of a call to arms against the Saracens had filtered across the Alps from Italy well in advance of Tristan’s delegation to France, but the work of Tristan and his delegation as they spread from one province to another ensured that all France was aware that this and other important topics would be broached by Pope Urban at the Council of Clermont, including the situation with King Philippe’s illegal marriage to Bertrade of Montfort. Just as in Italy, it was the topic of the Saracens that fueled the imagination of the public. Tristan and his fellow legates, therefore, had little problem arousing the crowds.

Of all those speaking on behalf of Pope Urban, none could match the fervor of that master of oratory, Peter the Hermit of Amiens, who decided on his own that he would represent the Pope’s cause against Islam. Embracing Urban’s call to arms, he rode tirelessly from city to city astride his small donkey, preaching his personal vision of what Christians should do in the face of this heathen threat from the East, which to him was for everyone to abandon life in France and march immediately to the Holy Land. Everywhere he appeared he spread hatred for the Saracens and love for Christianity, often inciting violent riots that careened out of control. As there were no Saracens in France for Peter’s mobs to abuse, they often transferred their anger over the Saracens onto the Jews of France for some reason, burning down their homes and shops and driving them from town. Undeterred by such misguided reactions from his followers, the Hermit ardently continued to preach against Islam. “Oh, abandon your farms, abandon your cities and your crafts in the name of the Lord!” he would cry entering every new city. “Take to the roads, march eastward to the Holy Land and defeat the Saracen in the name of God!” And incredibly, as he slowly made his way to Clermont for the purpose of listening to Pope Urban speak on the topic of this holy crusade, hundreds of peasants began to abandon their farms and villages and take to the road behind him. By the time the Hermit gained Clermont, a rabble of over a thousand impoverished men, women, and children followed in his wake.

Countess Mathilda and General Padule had also crossed the Alps to attend the Council of Clermont, as did Guillaume and the Danes.

“Such a gathering I have never seen!” proclaimed Orla as they maneuvered the crowded roads of Clermont now choked with wagons, coaches, military contingents, caravans, people of foot, on horseback and mule, all coming to see and hear Pope Urban II of Rome, the Holy Father of Christianity.

“Ja, Father! Tis like a grand circus watching all these people!” cried Hroc, who found great entertainment watching the steady flow of humanity clogging the road ahead. He had also noticed the extraordinary number of pretty young French girls lining the road and his eyes were following one as he said this.

“Ho, there, Hroc!” cried Orla, “What are you staring at, boy?”

Turning red, Hroc quickly took his gaze off the girl he had been eyeing ahead of him on foot, and gave his father a toothy grin. “Nothing!” he said, sheepishly.

“He’s looking at that little French pastry to his side!” snorted Crowbones, loud enough for the girl to hear.

The girl looked at Crowbones a moment, then looked over at Hroc who was purple with embarrassment and pretending that he had done nothing. The girl smiled and waved her hand in a friendly arc of greeting, which in turn quickly brought a smile to Hroc’s face.

“Ho!” bellowed Orla, “FiveHands is growing up, Crowbones!”

“J-ja,” stammered Guthroth, not wishing to be left out of the banter. “F-FiveHands has a w-woman!”

 

***

 

As the date of the Council approached, the availability of overnight accommodations within Clermont quickly disappeared and tent cities began to appear around the entire perimeter of Clermont itself. Many of the aristocrats, foreseeing such a development, came prepared and began to set up extravagant camps outside the city walls. They also, of course, instructed their guards to keep the less fortunate a good distance away. The town burghers, craftsmen, and merchants, consequently, were forced to set their tents and campsites further beyond the city walls. These people in turn were offended by the rabble that Peter the Hermit had brought to Clermont, and forced them to find shelter in the surrounding woods as they had no tents and were poorly provisioned, which caused many of them to beg and steal.

The actual Council of Clermont began on November 19^th and was to extend until November 29^th. In convoking this meeting of three hundred high clerics from all over France, Urban urged the three hundred bishops and abbots he summoned to bring with them the prominent lords of their provinces, thus turning this council into a mixed synod of ecclesiastics and laymen of the Catholic Church.

Although one of the major issues to be discussed was Pope Urban’s call to arms against the Saracens on behalf of Byzantium and the Holy Land, there were many other topics to be discussed, the first of which was the administration and enforcement of Benedictine reform, whose origin was rooted in the Black Monks of Cluny Monastery in Burgundy, France, the very monastery where Tristan and Guillaume had been sent as young boys by their mother Asta in 1073. It must be remembered that clerical concubinage, promiscuity, and marriage were still widespread throughout much of Europe at this time, especially among non-Benedictine orders of monks and priests. The discussion on the topic of celibacy and chastity for clergymen, therefore, often grew heated. Embracing the rigid reforms laid out by Pope Gregory after his ascendency to the Papacy in 1073, Pope Urban refused to veer from the path of Gregory’s stringent reforms, and demanded that all Catholic clergymen adhere to these reforms.

The next issue to be settled was the matter of King Philippe who had repudiated his wife, Queen Bertha of Holland, for being too fat, and in 1092 had married Bertrade of Montfort despite the fact that she was already married to Count Fulk of Anjou. King Philippe had been excommunicated by the Archbishop Hugh of Lyons in 1094 for adultery and bigamy, but Pope Urban had temporarily rescinded that excommunication at the Council of Piacenza, and subsequently suspended Archbishop Hugh of Lyons from office. As the Council of Clermont neared, King Philippe had still refused to take back his rightful wife, and remained married to Bertrade of Montfort. Taking a bold stand at Clermont, Pope Urban reversed his earlier judgment and proclaimed the formal excommunication of the French King, which greatly pleased Tristan and restored in him much faith in both Odo de Lagery and the Gregorian Church itself. It must be remembered that Philippe, although the King of France, was neither the most wealthy nor the most powerful aristocrat in France, nor did he possess most of the actual geographic landspace of France. His opponents in both the Church and among the French aristocracy, therefore, were well pleased by Pope Urban’s excommunication of the errant king, especially the southern nobles. Pope Urban did stipulate that King Philippe’s excommunication would be withdrawn if Philippe would denounce his illegal marriage and return to his lawful wife, Queen Bertha.

It was not until November 28^th, the next to the last day of the Council of Clermont, that Pope Urban was scheduled to address the issue of the Saracens, Byzantium, and reclamation of the Holy Land for Christianity. This, of course, was the subject that had most captured the imagination of those who had travelled to listen to the Pope, especially the nobles and the knights. Furthermore, this was the only portion of the Council of Clermont that had been declared open to the public. It was originally scheduled to take place within the grand Romanesque cathedral of Clermont, but the crowds had swollen to such proportions that the session had to be moved to an open field outside the city gates.

As preparations were being made to hastily construct an outdoor pavilion for the Pope in the meadow to the east of the city gates, Tristan and Guillaume made their way toward the masses that were already gathering there.

“Never seen a crowd this big and so charged with anticipation,” said Guillaume, “or so unified in spirit.”

“All of Europe is uniting,” said Tristan, “which is difficult to comprehend in light of all the bloodshed, feuding, the Investiture War, the in-fighting within England, Normandy, and Flanders.” Then, gazing at a small rise in the distance overlooking the pavilion area, he pointed to it. “Look there, Guillaume, knights wearing opposing heraldry standing side by side. Who would have ever thought to see such a sight?”

As they continued walking, they soon came about a large mass of human rabble gathered to the west of the speaking pavilion. Appalled at the condition of these people, Tristan began to converse with several of them in an effort to inquire about their origin. “We’ve followed the Hermit of Amiens here from all over France,” came the reply.

“The Hermit of Amiens?” said Tristan. “Peter the Hermit?”

“Yes, he told us that we must…”

“Ho there, lad!” a loud voice interrupted, as a short, squatty man appeared from within the knot of paupers, wearing simple hair shirt and trousers, no shoes, his hair disheveled as though he had been living in the wild. It was the Hermit. “God’s bells! Everything’s unfolding as I foretold,” he cried, his eyes glazed, his hands raised high above his head. Then he tilted his head as his eyes grew wide and he pointed skyward. “Oh, you who have doubted me these years! Now do you admit that the Lord speaks to me directly? I prophesized that Odo de Lagery would wear the Pope’s crown years ago. God told me so. I told you that things would go poorly if Desiderius became the Pope, and how dearly did the Church pay! And even you, Tristan de Saint-Germain, I told you when you were a young boy that you’d sow the seeds of war one day, and that day has arrived! Tis you who went to Constantinople. Tis you who came back and spread the word, just as a man sows the spring seed! Tis you who turned the Pope’s ear and laid the groundwork for this great mobilization of Christian soldiers that shall soon go to the Holy Land. So, Tristan de Saint-Germain, what do you say now about old Peter the Hermit, eh?”

Tristan considered Peter’s words a moment while Guillaume peered at the Hermit, repulsed. “Is this not the strange little fellow that we encountered at Lord Truffault’s manor years ago?” whispered Guillaume to Tristan.

Tristan had already begun to answer the Hermit. “As always with you, Peter,” he said, “there was enough truth in what you prophesized to startle and confuse. I am still not as convinced about your own divinity as you are. Tell me, what in God’s creation is this mass of people you have assembled here? They appear hungry, ill clothed, and destitute.”

“The army of God, boy! Nearly a thousand, and by the time this crusade launches, it will be fifty thousand, or a hundred thousand!”

“Army?” said Guillaume, shaking his head in disbelief. “Surely you jest, either that or you’ve gone mad. No, this is no army.”

“Indeed,” agreed Tristan. “These people can scarcely care for themselves let alone travel across the continent and face the Turks!”

“Oh, the inspiration of God will drive them forward and sustain them, as will prayer, and they shall overcome the heathen horde and retake the Holy Land!”

“God in Heaven,” Tristan whispered, pulling the Hermit aside as those around them were intently listening to every word being said, “have you lost your mind? This crusade is a military venture, not a pilgrimage! These people can’t fight… they’ll only get in the way.”

“No! No!” the Hermit shouted, moving Tristan aside with a sweep of the hand. “This is no day for naysaying! I’ll not listen to such talk, especially from you who have doubted me for so many years, even in the face of truth after truth that has come about just as prophesized!” Then the Hermit walked away, talking to the sky with gestures of his head and hands.”

Guillaume and Tristan regarded each a moment, then beheld the pitiful gathering of dispossessed people before them. “Surely these people understand that he’s basically leading them to slaughter?” shrugged Guillaume.

Before Tristan could answer, a young boy of about eleven who was listening tugged at Guillaume’s arm. “No,” he said, “you are wrong, Sir, for God speaks to the Hermit directly, and has told him that we shall prevail.”