The Fallen Crown

by Griff Hosker

  The first of those at the bridge had recovered and seeing us, just fifty paces up the road, began to hasten towards us. I pulled on the knight's horse's reins as I pushed his mortally wounded body from the horse. As it rose, I slipped my leg over the cantle and slapped its rump. The horsemen were less than twenty paces from me. I saw my squires turn in their saddles. I waved my sword and shouted, "Ride! Ride!"

  I leaned forward over this strange horse and began to speak to it. "Come on my beauty, show me how you can run!" It seemed to respond. I risked a glance under my arm and saw that they were no longer closing with me. We had five more miles to run. I knew that Oxford was not far ahead but until I saw the gates of its welcoming walls then we were not safe. When my horse began to labour I knew that he was hurt. The horsemen behind must have sensed it for a couple of them began to gain on me. My next glance showed that the main group was fifty paces from me but two of them were less than ten paces behind and they were closing.

  I heard a voice from ahead, "Hurry, my lord! We are almost there!"

  There was no point in killing this brave beast. I began to slow. I slipped my dagger into my left hand. I had to time this well. When I felt that they were close I pulled back hard on the reins and then hacked to the right, blindly with my sword. My horse stopped and my sword struck flesh and bone. My triumph was short lived as a sword struck my left side. I felt something crack and then the warm flow of blood. The rider had drawn ahead of me and he turned to charge me. I spurred my horse and, standing in the saddle, rammed the dagger into his mouth which was screaming his victory. My dagger was torn from my hand. I looked over my shoulder. The enemy were thirty paces from me. They would soon begin to gain but I could not surrender. It was not in me. I would ride until I died or until they caught me. I dug my heels into the flanks of this brave horse and he responded moving forward towards Oxford.

  Ahead of me I saw that my men had stopped and were turning. "Ride! Ride!" The exertion was too much. I began to feel dizzy. The road itself seemed to be moving. That was impossible I know. Nor could I keep my eyes open. I felt a sudden sharp pain in my side and then I felt blackness envelop me. I knew nothing more.

  Epilogue

  I was back in Constantinople. I was playing with my first sword and my friend Basil was laughing as I struck the edge against a marble statue knocking off a finger in the process. I heard my father shouting at me to be more careful and I ran after Basil. As I ran into the marble I fell over and all went black. I heard my father say, sternly, "Alfraed, wake up. Alfraed wake up."

  I did not want to wake up. I did not want to get into trouble and I lay there feigning sleep. And then I smelled rosemary and the voice was not my father's but the Empress and she whispered, in my ear, "Wake up my love. You cannot leave me alone! We have so much to do."

  I opened my eyes and saw that we were in a candle lit chamber. In the doorway stood a priest and Sir Edward. My old friend was grinning, "What happened?"

  The Empress shouted, "Praise be to God! He is saved. I owe you much Father Abelard."

  "It was God's will and this one was strong."

  "Fetch food and wine. Tell his squires that he lives. They will worry!"

  Sir Edward said, "I will watch the door, my lady."

  As he turned his back the Empress kissed me, "I thought you were dead. It has been three days since you were brought in by Sir Richard more dead than alive. You had lost so much blood that I feared you had none left."

  I nodded and closed my eyes. Then I opened them and said, "My men?"

  "Sir Harold and Edgar have wounds too but they live. We are safe here and my brother is on his way with his army. We will fight again for the throne. At least we still have Stephen secure." I tried to rise. "No Alfraed, you shall not stir until the priest says you are well. When my brother reaches us then we can make decisions and plan but you do not move. I thought I had lost you." She stroked my brow and the touch was so tender I felt as though we were one.

  "But you have not and I am tougher than I look but you, my Empress, the coronation, you have lost the crown."

  "No Alfraed, it is not lost, it has fallen and with your help I shall pick it up again. We have not come this far to give up so easily. We will prevail. It will just take a little longer. Now lie back and let me take care of you. Your men will keep us safe; at least until my brother comes."

  I nodded and squeezed her hand, "I will be your champion unto death! I am still the Knight of the Empress."

  She smiled and kissed me again, "You will always be my champion, my Champion of England," and I was content.

  The End

  Glossary

  Al-Andalus- Spain

  Angevin- the people of Anjou, mainly the ruling family

  Battle- a formation in war (a modern battalion)

  Booth Castle – Bewcastle north of Hadrian’s Wall

  Butts- targets for archers

  Cadge- the frame upon which hunting birds are carried (by a codger- hence the phrase old codger being the old man who carries the frame)

  Cadwaladr ap Gruffudd- Son of Gruffudd ap Cynan

  Captain- a leader of archers

  Chausses - mail leggings. (They were separate- imagine lady's stockings!)

  Conroi- A group of knights fighting together. The smallest unit of the period

  Demesne- estate

  Destrier- war horse

  Doxy- prostitute

  Fess- a horizontal line in heraldry

  Galloglass- Irish mercenaries

  Gambeson- a padded tunic worn underneath mail. When worn by an archer they came to the waist. It was more of a quilted jacket but I have used the term freely

  Gonfanon- A standard used in Medieval times (Also known as a Gonfalon in Italy)

  Gruffudd ap Cynan- King of Gwynedd until 1137

  Hartness- the manor which became Hartlepool

  Hautwesel- Haltwhistle

  Liedeberge- Ledbury

  Lusitania- Portugal

  Mansio- staging houses along Roman Roads

  Maredudd ap Bleddyn- King of Powys

  Martinmas- 11th November

  Mêlée- a medieval fight between knights

  Moravians- the men of Moray

  Mormaer- A Scottish lord and leader

  Mummer- an actor from a medieval tableau

  Musselmen- Muslims

  Nithing- A man without honour (Saxon)

  Nomismata- a gold coin equivalent to an aureus

  Outremer- the kingdoms of the Holy Land

  Owain ap Gruffudd- Son of Gruffudd ap Cynan and King of Gwynedd from 1137

  Palfrey- a riding horse

  Poitevin- the language of Aquitaine

  Pyx- a box containing a holy relic (Shakespeare’s Pax from Henry V)

  Refuge- a safe area for squires and captives (tournaments)

  Sauve qui peut – Every man for himself (French)

  Sergeant-a leader of a company of men at arms

  Serengford- Shellingford Oxfordshire

  Surcoat- a tunic worn over mail or armour

  Sumpter- pack horse

  Ventail – a piece of mail which covered the neck and the lower face.

  Wulfestun- Wolviston (Durham)

  Maps and Illustrations

  Map courtesy of Wikipedia

  Battle of Lincoln 1141

  Stockton Castle c 1141

  Historical note

  The book is set during one of the most turbulent and complicated times in British history. Henry I of England and Normandy’s eldest son William died. The king named his daughter, the Empress Matilda as his heir. When her husband, the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire died and she remarried. Her new husband was Geoffrey of Anjou and she had children by him. (The future Henry II of England and Normandy- The Lion in Winter!)

  I have used the modern spelling of many words in the book. That is because they are well known and I do not wish more confusion than my editor claims I cause normally! Stockton, for example was Stocc tun while Hartburn was Herrteburne
. I apologise to purists. I have used the word Saxon many times both for the language and the people. The invasion of the Normans had only taken place some fifty or sixty years before this book was set. Both the language and the people would change and evolve. The Normans tried to impose their language upon the Saxons who already lived there. It did not work and Anglo-Saxon or English as it became known prevailed. Part of this was due to the fact that the Norman ladies used Saxon/English nannies to look after their babies and children. As they spoke to them in their native tongue the young Normans grew up speaking English. Of course many Norman words became part of English- honour, chivalry, ham, lake but it took another century, until after the time of Richard 1st, for one language to be used throughout the land. In my next book I will change the word Saxon for English. By the time of Henry 1st's death the ordinary folk thought of themselves as English.

  A cog was a small trading ship which developed from the Viking knarr. It had high sides and a flat bottom. There was one sail and steering oar on the starboard (steer board) side. By this time some had had small wooden castles built at the bow and stern and these were used to house archers. These ships would be built bigger as the centuries wore on. They had no deck save at the stern where the ship was conned. The holds were covered with canvas when they had goods to transport.

  I have introduced Eleanor of Aquitaine in my books and she is an important figure. She was about 8 in 1129 and her father was Duke William. As she eventually marries Matilda's son I thought I would keep her in my books. The Empress Matilda did leave her husband in 1130. It was not a happy marriage.

  The Emperor John Komnenos fought against the Hungarians under King later Saint Stephen. He lost and had to sue for peace. The incident with our hero is purely fictional.

  There was never an Earl of Cleveland although the area known as Cleveland did exist and was south of the river. At this time the only northern earls were those of Northumberland. The incumbent was Gospatric who rebelled against England when King Henry died.

  The Scots were taking advantage of a power vacuum on their borders. They did, according to chroniclers of the time behave particularly badly.

  "an execrable army, more atrocious than the pagans, neither fearing God nor regarding man, spread desolation over the whole province and slaughtered everywhere people of either sex, of every age and rank, destroying, pillaging and burning towns, churches and houses"

  "Then (horrible to relate) they carried off, like so much booty, the noble matrons and chaste virgins, together with other women. These naked, fettered, herded together; by whips and thongs they drove before them, goading them with their spears and other weapons. This took place in other wars, but in this to a far greater extent."

  "For the sick on their couches, women pregnant and in childbed, infants in the womb, innocents at the breast, or on the mother's knee, with the mothers themselves, decrepit old men and worn-out old women, and persons debilitated from whatever cause, wherever they met with them, they put to the edge of the sword, and transfixed with their spears; and by how much more horrible a death they could dispatch them, so much the more did they rejoice."

  Robert of Hexham

  Following the birth of the second of Matilda and Geoffrey's two children relations between Matilda and her father became strained. Many Normans disliked the idea of handing power to Anjou. There were many minor incursions and rebellions, many of them supported by the French. It was following Stephen of Blois' sudden coronation that kingdom and dukedom were divided. Stephen controlled England and Matilda fought to claim Normandy. Matilda’s half brother, Robert of Gloucester (one of Henry’s bastards) declared for Matilda and a civil war ensued. The war went on until Stephen died and was called the anarchy because everyone was looking out for themselves. There were no sides as such. Allies could become enemies overnight. Murder, ambush and assassination became the order of the day. The only warriors who could be relied upon were the household knights of a lord- his oathsworn. The feudal system, which had been an ordered pyramid, was thrown into confusion by the civil war. Lords created their own conroi, or groups of knights and men at arms. Successful lords would ensure that they had a mixture of knights, archers and foot soldiers. The idea of knights at this time always fighting on horseback is not necessarily true. There were many examples of knights dismounting to fight on foot and, frequently, this proved to be successful.

  The word Fitz shows that the owner of the name is an illegitimate son of a knight or is used, with the lower case, to show the mother as in Henry fitz Empress. As such they would not necessarily inherit when their father died. There were many such knights. William himself was illegitimate. Robert of Gloucester was also known as Robert of Caen and Robert Fitzroy.

  Ridley, the father of my hero, was in three earlier books. There were two regiments of Varangians: one was English in character and one Scandinavian. As the bodyguards of the Emperor they were able to reap rich rewards for their service.

  The Normans were formidable fighters. The conquest of England happened after a single battle. They conquered southern Italy and Sicily with a handful of knights. Strongbow, a Norman mercenary took a small mercenary force and dominated Ireland so much that as soon as a force of Normans, led by the king land, all defence on the island crumbled. In one of Strongbow's battles a force of 100 knights defeated 4000 Irish warriors!

  The combination of heavy horse and archers working together became uniquely English. The 12th century saw its genesis and it culminated in the army of Henry V which defeated a much larger army. To work properly the two arms had to work together. When the Scottish light horse managed to get at the English archers at Bannockburn the English lost the battle. Even Henry V's brother the Duke of Clarence made mistakes. When he left the safety of his archers he and his knights were easily defeated. The archers relied upon the huge number of arrows they could release. Even when fighting at Agincourt where the plate armour could deflect most of the arrows the sheer number they used still managed to find cracks in the armour. They often used a flat trajectory to try to penetrate the tiny gaps in the helmet through which the men at arms peered. Most importantly the English archer was unique in that he was a master light infantryman. He could use a sword and a buckler and he knew how to kill.

  Ranulf Flambard was the controversial Bishop of Durham who was imprisoned in the tower by Henry for supporting his brother. Although reinstated the Bishop was viewed with suspicion by the king and did not enjoy as much power as either his predecessors or his successors. He had been something of a womaniser in his younger days and he tried to make up for that by giving to the poor when he was older. He was responsible for much of the defensive works of Durham Castle and was truly a Bishop Prince. He died around 1128. The incident with the Bishop being held captive is pure fiction. However he died in 1128 and there was a great deal of unrest while King Henry was away in Normandy. The Gospatric family did show their true colours when the Scottish king tried to take advantage of the internal strife between Stephen and Matilda and invade England. A leopard does not change his spots. The land between the Tees and the Scottish lowlands was always fiercely contested by Scotland, England and those who lived there.

  Geoffrey Rufus became Bishop of Durham and he had a clerk called William Cumin (Comyn). Comyn became Bishop of Durham. Geoffrey Rufus fell out of favour when he failed to support his castles. Norham was left isolated and fell to the Scots giving them control over that corner of the Anglo-Scottish border.

  Hartness (Hartlepool) was given to the De Brus family by Henry and the family played a power game siding with Henry and David depending upon what they had to gain. They were also given land around Guisborough in North Yorkshire.

  Squires were not always the sons of nobles. Often they were lowly born and would never aspire to knighthood. It was not only the king who could make knights. Lords had that power too. Normally a man would become a knight at the age of 21. Young landless knights would often leave home to find a master to serve in the hope of treasure or
loot. The idea of chivalry was some way away. The Norman knight wanted land, riches and power. Knights would have a palfrey or ordinary riding horse and a destrier or war horse. Squires would ride either a palfrey, if they had a thoughtful knight or a rouncy (pack horse). The squires carried all of the knight’s war gear on the pack horses. Sometimes a knight would have a number of squires serving him. One of the squire’s tasks was to have a spare horse in case the knight’s destrier fell in battle. Another way for a knight to make money was to capture an enemy and ransom him. This even happened to Richard 1st of England who was captured in Austria and held to ransom.

  At this time a penny was a valuable coin and often payment would be taken by ‘nicking’ pieces off it. Totally round copper and silver coins were not the norm in 12th Century Europe. Each local ruler would make his own small coins. The whole country was run like a pyramid with the king at the top. He took from those below him in the form of taxes and service and it cascaded down. There was a great deal of corruption as well as anarchy. The idea of a central army did not exist. King Henry had his household knights and would call upon his nobles to supply knights and men at arms when he needed to go to war. The expense for that army would be borne by the noble.

  The border between England and Scotland has always been a prickly one from the time of the Romans onward. Before that time the border was along the line of Glasgow to Edinburgh. The creation of an artificial frontier, Hadrian’s Wall, created an area of dispute for the people living on either side of it. William the Conqueror had the novel idea of slaughtering everyone who lived between the Tees and the Tyne/Tweed in an attempt to resolve the problem. It did not work and lords on both sides of the borders, as well as the monarchs used the dispute to switch sides as it suited them.

  The manors I write about were around at the time the book is set. For a brief time a De Brus was lord of Normanby. It changed hands a number of times until it came under the control of the Percy family. This is a work of fiction but I have based events on the ones which occurred in the 12th century.