Bourne was a hive of activity. Its fields were verdant with crops, fruits and vegetables; its artisans and retailers were busy servicing the needs of its farmers and those travellers who chose to visit the village on their way along the ancient road to the north, which ran nearby.
To my dismay, the old Saxon church was being pulled down when we arrived. The new lord, Baldwin FitzGilbert de Clare, a descendent of one of the Conqueror’s most trusted henchmen, had decided to build a new abbey church in grand Norman style to accommodate a community of Arrouaisian monks he wanted to bring from Flanders. Such was the intended scale of the new abbey, FitzGilbert had ordered that all the old Saxon graves be ploughed over. Thankfully, the local villagers, horrified by the thought, had removed all the human remains from the cemetery in the dead of night and reburied them deep in Bourne Wood.
Delighted to meet a descendant of Hereward, several of the locals were happy to escort me to the hidden burial ground, where they left me to pay my respects. They had built a small pile of stones, a shrine to the memory of Adela of Bourne and all the villagers who had been slaughtered at the hands of Ogier the Breton – murders that had been ordered by William the Conqueror in an act of vengeance for Hereward’s continuing opposition to his rule. Almost the entire village had perished – except the young boy Sweyn, later to become my father, who escaped to hide in the forest, and a young Adela and two companions. They had been raped and abused by the Normans for several days until my grandfather rescued them. The dead included my great-grandparents: Leofric, Thegn of Bourne, and his wife, Aediva.
I spent over an hour there reflecting on my heritage. It was an eerie place for me. Norwich was one of the largest burghs in the realm and I had lived right in its heart in the cathedral precincts. Alone, deep in an almost impenetrable wildwood, surrounded by the ghosts of my ancestors, I began to realize why my mother had suggested my itinerary. There was something unsettling about the wildwood – it seemed challenging, putting me on my guard – but it was an emotion to draw strength from, to meet the challenge, not a feeling of which I should be afraid. Many people thought that when the wind blew, making the trees groan and their leaves shrill, it was the Green Man talking to them. I listened hard. It was not a threatening voice, though certainly primordial, but soothing, reminding me that it was ageless, like nature itself.
Our next port of call was Pennard Hill near Glastonbury. I left my men in the burgh and rode east. My mother’s map was easy to follow and precisely accurate, as I had known it would be. The glade was also just as she had described it: an idyllic natural dene flanked by tall oaks, limes and elms. From its edge it was just possible to glimpse the ancient Tor of Glastonbury.
The two oaks in the centre marked the resting places of my grandmother Torfida and my mother’s twin sister, Gunnhild. The older tree, planted fifty years ago, was already over seventy feet tall, the smaller one at least fifty feet in height. It was a chastening thought to imagine that the two trees had once been tiny saplings. I spent two nights camped in the glade between the pair of oak trees, thinking about the two women and drawing strength from what they had endured and achieved. Like the people of Bourne, both women had died in pain, but their resting place was strikingly tranquil. They were now far removed from their suffering, and I found that calmed my anxieties.
Hereward had always said that Torfida was a seer like her father. I hoped it was true and that, from her grave, she would be able to imbue me with some of her wisdom. I carved my own personal tribute into the two trunks of the trees, in honour of Torfida’s precious memory. I wrote in Latin, something I knew my grandmother would appreciate – my mother had taught me Latin, just as Torfida had taught her. On Gunnhild’s I carved: Aeternum vale (Farewell Forever), and on Torfida’s: Non est ad astra mollis e terris via (There is no easy way from the earth to the stars).
My next task was more of a challenge. My mother had always wondered where the remote home of the Old Man of the Wildwood might have been. After assimilating everything she had been told by both Hereward and Torfida, she calculated that the spot was two miles due north-west of a milestone on the Fosse Way, sixteen miles from Cirencester, in an area known as Chedworth Wood. Even with this precision, it was a very large area of forest to search. So when I left my men in Cirencester, I told them not to expect me for some time.
When he was banished by King Edward, my grandfather had to forage in the wildwood with no tools, weapons or provisions. So, following in his footsteps, when I arrived in Chedworth I tethered my horse and sallied forth in the clothes I stood up in with just a seax in my belt.
The first few days were full of activity, as I made a camp, built some shelter and found food and water. My military training with the Earl of Norfolk was invaluable; without it, I would not have survived. Once I became settled and felt secure, I began to plan my search.
Drawing on my mother’s inestimable wisdom, I found elevated ground and climbed high into its tallest trees so that I could begin to plot the lie of the land. That took me several days. I then began my search by pacing the large plots of ground I had organized into squares on my ground plan. Despite all my diligence, the exercise was tedious. I had to put my faith in my mother’s research and instincts. But two weeks into my quest, just when my enthusiasm was waning rapidly, I found what I was looking for.
It was as it had been described to me: a small, natural meadow with a fast-flowing stream running through it. At the edge of the meadow, hard against a stony outcrop, were the unmistakable remains of a man-made stone hearth. Little else was visible, other than a few bits of rotting timber that had once supported a lean-to and a few rusty old iron implements half hidden in the ground, more of which emerged as I trampled the undergrowth over the following days.
I stayed in the Old Man of the Wildwood’s lea for over a week. I set traps and strung rabbits, just like he must have done. I lit fires and roasted my game, as he would have. At night I listened to the wind and the noises of the forest. I tried to imagine the violent storm when he first appeared just yards from Hereward, a fateful meeting that my grandfather had described to my mother in vivid flashes of memory. I thought about their long and profound conversations together, enfolded in the heart of the wildwood. It was a calming and reflective experience, one that I will never forget.
Did my pilgrimage to my family’s burial grounds fundamentally change me? Did I feel the presence of the Green Man, or understand what he represents? Did I absorb any of the wisdom of the Old Man himself? The answer to all of those questions is probably, ‘Yes, a little.’
But what I certainly found was a strong sense of humility. I felt meek in the face of the power and complexity of the natural world that surrounds us, and humbled by the memories of the deeds of my family. Most importantly, I understood that from humility comes strength – something that now dawned on me for the first time in my life. I realized that trying not to be overawed by things that we ought to find daunting is an arrogance that leads to weakness. Having a real sense of one’s own frailties and anxieties, and knowing how to deal with them, is the solid foundation of courage and strength.
I was reminded of the five abiding truths embodied by the Talisman, truths that my mother had repeated to me over and over again but which I was only now beginning to understand: the need for discipline, to control the darkness within us; the value of humility, to know that only God can work miracles: the basis of courage, to overcome our fears and anxieties; the purpose of sacrifice, to forfeit ourselves for God and for one another; and the power of wisdom, to understand the Talisman itself and not to fear it.
My passion for my homeland also became stronger through my vigils at the graves of my family in their resting places. Even though I admired th
e great cathedral of Norwich, and all the other Norman architectural triumphs being built all over England, they were not part of my heritage. My heritage was the fens, heaths and forests of old Saxon England and the uplands of our Celtic cousins.
In the Old Man of the Wildwood’s glade, time stood still; not even mighty cathedrals and colossal mottes and baileys will stand the test of time like nature itself. As I reflected on that, my ambition to preserve our folk heritage and protect our ancient liberties, just as my family had done, was made steadfast.
Conscious that I alone was the inheritor of that tradition, I had found the responsibility overwhelming just a few weeks ago in Norwich, but now I was reinvigorated to realize that I could find a way to make my contribution to England’s future.
I was now ready to collect my men from Cirencester and begin the search for my own destiny.
Fulham Palace, 6 October 1186
Dear Friend,
Thank you for your letter, which arrived yesterday. The politics of Rome leave a lot to be desired – I don’t envy you. I’m glad my packages offer some welcome distraction; I hope your life continues to prosper and the politics of Mother Church are not too distressing. All is calm here, except for the usual tensions between York and Canterbury. The Bishop of Rouen often asks me to act as intermediary – not easy, as I’m sure you know.
The days are getting shorter and the wind colder. The Thames has taken on that brooding look it gets through the dark days of winter. Today my journey back from St Paul’s was agonizingly cold. The wind on the river sprayed water over me for the entire journey and the oarsmen struggled against the wind and the flow so much that they had to rest at Chelsea Reach for twenty minutes to get their breath.
Perhaps foolishly, but it is a cold evening, I have let the young monks light a small fire in the cloister to roast some chestnuts. It is a jovial way to spend a cold evening, but I don’t think my Dean will approve. Even so, it warms the bones and the soul a little.
My scribes are already complaining about their workload, and yet we are only at the beginning of Harold’s story. He is now heading towards your homeland; unlike me, at least he will soon be in warmer climes.
Yours in God,
Gilbert
4. Arsenale
We soon found passage on a Breton trader from Bristol to Fécamp. It was a long and difficult journey with some fierce weather to contend with off the Cornish coast, especially around Lizard Point, where we had to take shelter for several days. We made better time after that with a good westerly behind us in the Channel. We got our land legs back in Fécamp, where Eadmer and Toste were both able to eat properly again after days being as sick as dogs during the crossing.
We were in Rouen within days – the seat of government of our Norman masters, and a place that had figured prominently in my family’s history. Normandy was everything I had expected it to be. My mother could speak several languages and had taught me the language of our lords and masters from an early age. An upbringing among Norman craftsmen and clerics had shown me their many virtues as builders of fine monuments and as devout Christians. But I had also been witness to their proclivity for violence and cruelty, and to the ruthless behaviour of their soldiers and lords. Their homeland reflected my experience of their presence in England, studded by towering testaments to their pride; it was an unyielding place, unforgiving of its enemies and of any of its own miscreants who broke the law or slighted its hierarchy.
We spent some time in Rouen observing the ordered and disciplined city, and I also made another excursion. This time not to a family shrine, but many miles to the west of Normandy, to Tinchebrai, a remote, heavily wooded valley, to see the site of the battleground where, ten years earlier, my father had fallen in the service of Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, on that fateful day when Robert lost everything to Henry Beauclerc.
My father had no known grave, but I knew from those who witnessed his demise on the field that he had been mortally wounded by a lance through his chest. Sadly, no one knew what became of his body, so I walked around the site looking for the remnants of the mass graves that had been dug for the dead. The local people helped me identify several mounds of earth, and I used my instincts to select a spot that might be his final resting place.
I had brought a small silver crucifix with me from Norwich, which the old Bishop, Herbert de Losinga, had blessed for me. I dug a small hole on the top of the mound for the cross and said a prayer in memory of the noble Sweyn of Bourne, the father I never knew. I had been a boy of eight when he died, and there had been times in my childhood when I resented the fact that my father had never visited us in Norwich. But my mother always reassured me that he loved me very much. She emphasized that personal sacrifice was at the heart of our family’s legacy. My grandfather’s generation was prepared to sacrifice everything for England’s just cause, and my father had given his life to protect his brother-in-arms, Robert Curthose.
She would always remind me how part of that sacrifice often involved the denial of the normal pleasures of life, how she was denied the presence of her father for many years and had no idea of his fate or whereabouts, and how my father’s loyalty to Robert Curthose consumed his entire life.
I thought about how loneliness must be one of the greatest trials of a life devoted to a cause. Was I prepared for such a burden? Would I be prepared to die for a cause, or to save the life of another, like my illustrious predecessors?
These were questions I could not yet answer with any certainty. But I knew that my chosen path meant that, one day, I would be able to.
My duties in honour of my family done, and in a much better frame of mind than when I left Norwich, we began our long journey to the Holy Land.
Our first port of call was Paris. Like London, an ancient Roman city of fine buildings, it was bursting with merchants and artisans, busy with their trade and products. The lord of Paris and the French was King Louis VI, ‘Louis the Fat’ to his subjects. Perennial enemies of the Normans – their neighbours just a few miles to the north – we joined one of the King’s squadrons as mercenaries to see how they trained and fought. After several weeks of slack and ill-disciplined training, with no military adventures in the offing, we decided to move on. But not until after an incident had occurred that would sound an ominous echo much later in my journey.
We were drinking in a hostelry by the banks of the Seine, a fine river not unlike the Thames in London, when two knights walked in with the swagger of men of some importance. They were fearsome-looking characters who had the aura of seasoned warriors – indeed, so much so that the loud noise of animated conversation and banter among the drinkers dropped noticeably as they sat down.
For a few minutes, we paid them no more attention until sudden shouts made us turn round. As we did so, one of the knights, the larger of the two, got to his feet and raised his sword to deflect a blow from the sword of an assailant bearing down on him. In the same instant, he raised his Norman mace high above his head and brought it crashing down on to the helmet of his attacker. It was a mighty blow; the helmet all but disintegrated and blood spewed down the face of its hapless wearer, who collapsed to the ground in a heap. The victim did not move. I suspect he was dead before he hit the floor.
Blood had splashed across our table and our instincts made us jump to our feet and draw our swords. As we did so, the imposing knight turned to face us, quickly followed by his companion. I held my sword at arm’s length, no more than a yard from the knight. I will never forget the look on his face. He was totally calm – as if he had just got up to leave, rather than having brutally crushed the skull of an opponent. He looked at me carefully before speaking in perfect No
rman.
‘Your name, Sir Knight?’
‘Harold of Hereford.’
‘I have no argument with you. You may sheath your weapon.’
He smiled at me benignly – like a priest comforting one of his flock – and, with his companion in his wake, walked away before I could reply. As the landlord carried away the body of the stricken man, I asked him the name of the knight who had killed him.
His answer was blunt.
‘If you want to know his name, go and ask him. But if I were you, I’d leave well alone.’
‘I’m only asking you for his name.’
‘I don’t know his name; he’s a knight from Champagne, and the other one is from further north. They are veterans from the Great Crusade and have been causing trouble for months. They say they are God’s avenging angels, sent to punish evil-doers.’
Eadmer and I helped the landlord haul the body into the alleyway. After he had sent a young boy to alert the city’s garrison to the killing, the landlord turned to me.
‘Thank you. They say this knight has the blessing of Galo, the Bishop of Paris, and that he flogs himself in the crypt of Notre Dame three times a day. If you ask me, he’s just a killer. Stay away from him.’
Although I did not know his name, the knight’s rugged face was etched in my memory. I would meet him again – but not for almost three years.
Disenchanted with service for the King of the French, we left Paris a few days later and continued along the ancient route to the south via the fine cities of Dijon, Geneva and Montreux. The journey was uneventful – except for the marvels of the almost never-ending diversity of dukedoms, principalities, languages and customs.
We stayed longer than expected at Martigny, an important fortified town in the Alps, just to admire the remarkable scenery – both in terms of its mountainous vistas and its more venal attractions. All five of us found bounteous female companionship in the thriving Alpine burgh. It was a temporary home to many travellers from all parts of Europe, including scores of unattached young women on their way to famous nunneries in the dukedoms of Italy. For many families in northern Europe unable to provide a sufficient dowry for their daughters, a prestigious convent in Tuscany or the Papal States was an ideal home for a surplus daughter. They usually travelled in groups, nominally guarded by a small retinue of ageing warriors, and were often allowed far more liberty than they would have been accorded as individuals. To our delight, more than a few looked forward to an ascetic life of devotion and toil with some reluctance and were keen to partake of the pleasures of the flesh before such joys were forever denied them by the confines of the nunnery.
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