After William, Duke of Normandy, conquered England in 1066, he lost no moment to institute and firmly enforce his own will upon the whole. First, all lands belonged to the crown. Its title and use would be granted only to faithful nobles who swore earnest fealty to him. At the same time these landholdings earned by the price of unswerving loyalty were governed by William’s own inflexible rules.
William declared that if one of his barons attacked another, by that wrongful action the aggressor’s holdings were automatically held forfeit and reverted to the crown. During days of relative peace under Norman rule, this arrangement went far to minimize any danger of the sort of useless losses too often wreaked upon European lords by greed and petty quarrels among their number.
After nearly a century of such firm control, came a comparatively brief era of less than a full score of years during which royal restraints were shattered …
Three times before his death, the Conqueror’s youngest son, Henry I, King of England and Duke of Normandy, made his barons and bishops swear to accept his daughter, Empress Matilda (the young window of the Holy Roman Emperor), as ruler after him. Nonetheless, when he died in 1135, his nephew, Stephen of Blois, seized the English crown. By 1139, Matilda’s illegitimate half-brother, Earl Robert of Gloucester, had rallied the forces of the western barons on her behalf and with 140 knights accompanied her from Normandy to Arundel to launch an attempt to regain the throne for her.
And thus began the period in English history known as the Anarchy. With the intermittent civil strife there was no clear leader in the land. Some nobles supported Matilda, others Stephen, and most used the conflict as an excuse for fighting amongst themselves for their own gain. Many vacillated between the two contenders, playing one against the other to win lucrative bribes of land and titles.
As the conflict progressed, many landholdings had two claimants, one ceded the fief by Matilda, the other by Stephen, and all lands were held only by right of the personal power of their lords. Unless the local lord was unusually strong and fair, there was little peace in the countryside and the roads were no longer as safe as they had been in King Henry’s day. Bands of robbers roamed everywhere, taking what they could from the strife-ridden land.
At long last came the invasion of Matilda’s son, Henry, and with the 1153 agreement struck between him and Stephen the prospect of an unchallenged succession returned and the peace was restored in England.