1066 (28 page)

What, then, could be the true reason for making an allusion to the scandal of Ælfgifu of Northampton at this point in the Bayeux Tapestry? The import of the scene remains enigmatic; the answer can only be guessed. A principal contention of this book is that Count Eustace II of Boulogne is a much more important person in the tapestry than has conventionally been thought. He may even have been its patron. To depict the scandal of Ælfgifu is not simply to hold her up for vilification and amusement, it is to vilify the product of her illicit connivances, Swein and Harold Harefoot. It is to remind those observers of the eleventh century who knew of the matter that Swein and Harefoot were of low and illicit birth (those who did not know would simply be amused by the enigma). Indeed, the most obvious way, and perhaps the only way, of illustrating ignominious birth, purely pictorially, is to make an allusion to the parent. If the true point of the scene is to show up the bad blood of Swein and Harefoot, the chief point of that must have been to vilify Harold Harefoot in particular.
²²
It was Harold Harefoot who was primarily responsible for the terrible murders of Alfred and so many men of Boulogne in 1036. This was something that directly affected Count Eustace. Whatever he thought of Earl Godwin, the vilification of Harefoot would not have been inimical to his own viewpoint.

Nor would it be inimical to a point of view more favourable to the memory of Earl Godwin, for it singles out for vilification, not Godwin, but, by implication Harefoot. Harold, like his father, would presumably have argued that Harefoot alone was responsible for the crimes of 1036. At any rate, to show up Harefoot in the tapestry represents common ground between a Boulonnais and a more Godwinist point of view on the grisly matter of Alfred's murder and the slaughter of the men of Boulogne. Perhaps the artist's intention was to do no more than that.

20

Wadard and Vital

He approached the question with dry humour. White pointed out that an ancestor who came over with William the Conqueror was formerly regarded as an appendage that no English gentleman should be without. 'When a man rose in the world,' he continued, 'one of his first cares was to adopt an eligible ancestor. And the adoption of an ancestor was in many ways a much easier operation than the adoption of a child.' For instance, he surmised, it would be difficult to adopt a child who did not actually exist, but there was on the other hand no difficulty in adopting an imaginary ancestor. Again a child usually had relatives and their consent to the adoption had to be obtained; but a person who wished to adopt somebody else's ancestor never troubled about such formalities. 'Thus,' White went on, 'a really popular ancestor might accumulate quite a number of unconnected families as his descendants, much as a comet might develop a number of tails, or a Hollywood star a number of husbands, although I believe that the stars usually shed one husband before adopting the next.'

There were many in White's audience who were rather inclined to believe in the Falaise Roll. Disconcerted by the mocking tone with which White had begun his lecture, they listened edgily to what he had to say next. The compilers of the Falaise Roll and the list at Dives-sur-Mer had certainly undertaken a very great deal of work; but what divided them from serious researchers was the reliability of the sources used. To White and most historians, reliance could only be placed on the very earliest historical records, and unfortunately these mention only a handful of William's companions by name. White considered that the reliable sources were limited to William of Poitiers and the Bayeux Tapestry. On the basis of these two sources he came up with his own list comprising a meagre thirteen 'companions' who could be proved, in the strictest sense, to have been directly involved in the battle on the Norman side. Descent in the male line could not now be shown from any of these persons. Even our Wadard and Vital were not accorded the distinction of being proven warriors at Hastings, for the tapestry merely illustrates them in the run-up to the battle and they occur in no other historical account. Wadard is shown organising the plunder of food in the days beforehand [scene 37; plate 8] and Vital [scene 46; plate 9] is a scout shown speaking to Duke William shortly before the commencement of actual hostilities.

When White had concluded his paper, his colleague Dr T. R. Thomson rose to echo the same conclusions and even went so far as to imply that the compilers of the Falaise Roll were 'charlatans'. This now provoked an angry reaction from the floor. A Mr Townroe stood up to read out a letter from Professor Macary, the historian from Falaise who had worked extensively on the list. Macary had taken umbrage at the unfriendly attitude of the Society of Genealogists' previous note and now indicated that he was not prepared to enter into any further discussions on the matter. A Mr de Carteret gallantly rose to defend the probability that his eponym had been a 'Companion of the Conqueror'. Others made similar protests and the meeting concluded on a distinctly unfriendly note. In summing up the chairman, Lord Ferrer, likened the verbal sparring to another Battle of Hastings.

The compilers of the Falaise Roll included not only Wadard and Vital but hundreds of others as well. They used the poet Wace extensively. Wace, writing an account of the battle a century after it had happened, gives us 116 additional names, but his lateness as a source has generally meant that he has been dismissed by modern historians as unreliable. More obviously unreliable are the various redactions of the 'Battle Roll', which purports to be a record of the principal knights who fought at Hastings preserved at Battle Abbey, the monastery that William founded on the spot where Harold fell. The 'Battle Roll' is nowadays considered to have been compiled only in the fourteenth century and to be worthless as evidence. Following the stormy meeting of the Society of Genealogists the matter rested for another decade. In the 1940s the question was re-examined by Professor David Douglas.
²
Using scattered charter evidence, the
Carmen de Hastingae Proelio
and Orderic Vitalis, Douglas was able to stretch the number of persons who were proven, or at least highly probable, companions-in-arms of Duke William up to twenty-seven identifiable individuals. On the basis of the Bayeux Tapestry, Wadard and Vital were now accorded the distinction of falling into the 'highly probable' category. This White was now prepared to concede. Although they are not actually shown taking part in the battle, it does indeed seem highly probable that both Wadard and Vital were present and fought at Hastings. The artist evidently had his own reasons for limiting the named warriors in the actual battle scenes to the trio of more important men - Odo, William and Eustace.

The latest interpretation of the
Carmen
adds a handful of further names to the small roster of proven or highly probable companions - the French baron Robert Gilfard, Hugh, brother of Count Guy of Ponthieu, and Taillefer. Robert Gilfard and Hugh of Ponthieu are named in the
Carmen
(along with Count Eustace and Duke William) as those who kill Harold. Taillefer juggles with his sword at the front line of the invading army. Although dismissed as a figure of romance, the early date now attributed to the
Carmen
suggests that Taillefer was a real person, though like Robert and Hugh he was very probably French rather than Norman. Dr Elisabeth van Houts has reassessed the evidence of the 116 predominantly Norman names given to us by Wace and also shown that, whilst it is not infallible, Wace's list should not be dismissed as cursorily as it has been in the past.
³

Wadard and Vital, then, are part of a very select group of individuals - those whose presence at Hastings is evidenced by a strictly contemporary source. But why does the tapestry single out Wadard and Vital, two lesser-ranking Norman knights, from amongst others whose names are known and myriad more whose names have been lost? It is not that they are depicted performing any great feat of bravery; on the contrary, they seem deliberately to have been given secondary roles. The names of Wadard and Vital occur in no other account of the invasion. It seems that it is not what they did but who they were that commended them to the tapestry's artist. The first clue was discovered in the nineteenth century: both Wadard and Vital were knights attached to Bishop Odo of Bayeux and they received extensive lands from him in conquered England. Their precise significance, however, has remained an abiding mystery.

At first sight, it might seem that Wadard and Vital are merely names stitched in wool, persons too insignificant for any substantial evidence of their lives to have survived. We might, therefore, choose to pass over them without much comment or a second glance. This, however, would be wrong. The evidence of the Domesday Book that both were knights of Bishop Odo has proved to be only the starting point, and other information has come to light. As research into the Bayeux Tapestry progressed, scholars looked for evidence of Wadard and Vital in their native Normandy. It was noted that prior to 1066 both appeared side by side as witnesses to a land grant to the abbey of Saint-Pierre-de-Preaux, which is situated in the Risle valley in the central part of the duchy. They also appear severally in two other documents of that abbey. It has been deduced from this that, whatever their connection with Odo, they were tenants of the abbey of Preaux. What is also noteworthy is that Odo's father, Herluin of Conteville, is associated in documents with the abbey of Preaux and it was situated near to the abbey of Grestain, which had been founded by him. This may indicate an early connection between Wadard and Vital and the family of Odo's father. Vital additionally appears to be the owner of some houses in Caen, also held from Bishop Odo.
⁴

The undoubted connections of Wadard and Vital with Odo have been interpreted by some as providing almost conclusive proof for the view that Odo was the tapestry's patron. The precise reason, however, why it should have been appropriate to depict these particular knights of Odo, among many others, has remained obscure. The tenor of this book has been to cast doubt on the idea, which has long reigned unquestioned, that Odo was the tapestry's patron. Rather it has been argued that Count Eustace II of Boulogne may have had a much closer involvement in the making of the tapestry than has hitherto been believed and that he may, in fact, have been its patron. Yet if Eustace was the tapestry's patron, why should he, or perhaps his designer, have wanted to depict men loyal to Odo so obscure as Wadard and Vital? Could either of them have had some connection with Count Eustace II of Boulogne? Or did either of them have some special connection with the designer of the work? Clearly, we need to investigate the lives of these two obscure men more closely, so far as the available evidence allows.

Knights such as Wadard and Vital would have been trained for knighthood from an early age.
⁵
A boy destined to become a knight was typically placed in the household of a superior lord between the ages of seven and twelve. Here he would be taught the skills of fighting, riding and hunting. Amid the forests of northern France he would practise with his companions, taking part in warlike games, wrestling, fighting with swords, galloping at targets, shooting with his bow and arrow. It was a dangerous life for a child. In the mid-eleventh century, two of the sons of a Norman lord named Giroie were both killed in separate accidents. One was thrown against a rock whilst wrestling; the other was struck by a misaimed lance while practising with his friends. As he grew older the young squire would take part in mock battles, which were beginning to take the form of tournaments. Not long before 1066, the technique of charging at the enemy on horseback, with the lance couched firmly underarm, had been developed in France; advances in saddle design had made it possible, but it was a manoeuvre that took much practice to perfect. Some knights are shown using this tactic in the Bayeux Tapestry; others use their lances in the more traditional thrown manner. The youngster might then accompany a fully-fledged knight to war, carrying his arms and armour, and taking his warhorse to battle; it would be in this capacity that he might first see action.

Finally, provided he had completed - and survived - his training the young man would be dubbed a knight by his lord. The equipment he now needed - weapons, armour and saddlery - was extremely expensive. Wadard and Vital both wear costly chain-mail armour, they carry a sword and a lance and ride the traditional Franco-Norman warhorse, the destrier. A destrier could cost up to eight times the price of a normal riding horse. The newly dubbed knight might now enter the service of the lord who had trained him, or he might venture further away in the hope of finding a new lord or with dreams of becoming a hero in battle and winning the hand of a rich and beautiful heiress. Life for the settled knight revolved around his lord's baronial hall. One account of the early life of a knight shows him attending the baronial court on a regular basis, sitting at his lord's table, giving counsel and daily practising his skill in arms.
⁶
After the Conquest, Orderic Vitalis gives us an account of the unruly court of Earl Hugh of Chester, where the principal occupations of a veritable swarm of knights and young squires seem to have been feasting, hunting and their own welfare, though additionally the earl's chaplains were at hand to instruct them on matters of religion.
⁷

Nothing is known of the background of either Wadard or Vital, but we may guess that it proceeded something along these lines. It may be that they had been long attached to Odo's household, or that of his father Herluin of Conteville. By 1066 they seem to have attained the status of minor Norman landholders. When the call of war came, the knight was expected to fight for his superior lord, for war was his
raison d'etre.
There was no call to arms more important than the one that resounded throughout Normandy during the first months of 1066. So it was that Bishop Odo of Bayeux must have called up his knights Wadard and Vital, and many others besides, to fight in Duke William's army against Harold of England. Whatever the natural trepidation a soldier might feel at the prospect of war in a foreign land, it offered the hope of loot and advancement in the world. To Wadard and Vital the cause must have seemed just and it would be fought under the protection of the papal banner.

It is impossible to know exactly what Wadard and Vital did on the battlefield of Hastings, what role they had, what feats they performed. Perhaps, however, the reason for their inclusion in the tapestry lies not in the events of 1066 but those involving Odo and Eustace a year later. It has been suggested in this book that the Bayeux Tapestry might have been commissioned by Count Eustace II of Boulogne as a gift of reconciliation to Bishop Odo following his abortive attack on Odo's castle at Dover in the autumn of 1067. If the 1067 rebellion forms the unspoken background to the explicit story told in the Bayeux Tapestry, then it will have determined how the story is presented and the choice of characters. Could it be that Odo's knights Wadard and Vital were also in some way involved in the 1067 incident? All the accounts of this incident agree that Eustace's attack was beaten back by a small number of knights who had been left in charge of Odo's castle. Could this be the answer to the riddle? Might the small number of Odo's unnamed defenders of Dover Castle against Eustace's attack have included Wadard and Vital? Wadard and Vital might easily have been among the remnant of Odo's knights defending Dover Castle after the bulk of his men had departed with him to the north of the Thames - indeed, perhaps they were the primary knights left in charge of the castle. On this scenario, Eustace would have crossed swords, perhaps literally, with one or other of them, and perhaps both. What is more, they might have been the knights who were responsible for capturing his
nepos.
If Eustace sought a reconciliation with Odo following his attack on Dover Castle, and the release of his
nepos,
it would have been entirely appropriate to acknowledge the skill and bravery of Odo's knights, Wadard and Vital, who had inflicted upon him so resounding a defeat against the odds.