The Kingdom in the Sun

by John Julius Norwich

  Three months later, in March 1171, Manuel Comnenus offered William his daughter Maria for the second time. The princess no longer possessed quite the attractions of five years before; in the interim her stepmother had given birth to a son, Alexius, and the succession to the Byzantine throne was again assured. But she was still an Emperor's daughter, her dowry would be worthy of her

  1 Confided in a letter to Humbald, Bishop of Ostia, in 1169.

  2 See p. 149n.

  rank and the marriage would, with any luck, put a stop to her father's eternal meddling in Italian affairs.1 The offer was accepted, and it was agreed that Maria should arrive in Apulia the following spring.

  On the appointed day William, accompanied by his twelve-year-old brother Prince Henry of Capua, Walter of the Mill and Matthew of Ajello, was waiting at Taranto to greet his bride. She did not appear. On the next day there was still no sign of her, nor on the next. After a week of waiting, the King decided to make the pilgrimage to Monte Gargano and the cave of the Archangel Michael. That would take him another ten days at least; Maria would surely have arrived by the time he returned. But when on 12 May he was back on the coast at Barletta, it was to learn that there was still no news. Clearly the girl was not corning; the Greeks had deceived him. Angry and humiliated, he started for home. Still worse misfortunes were to come. The royal party had intended to pass through Capua, where young Henry was to be formally invested with his Principality; shortly before they reached the city, the boy came down with a raging fever. He was hurried to Salerno and thence by ship to Sicily; but when William followed a few weeks later, his brother was dead.2

  Why had Manuel changed his mind at the last moment, incurring the lasting bitterness of Sicily's young King ? He never, so far as we know, apologised or explained, and his motives remain a mystery. The most probable answer is that Frederick Barbarossa had begun bidding for Maria's hand on behalf of his own son; but to us the incident of the bride that never was is important for one reason only; it explains the resentment against Constantinople that was to smoul­der in William's heart for the rest of his life—a resentment that was to cost both Sicily and Byzantium dear in the years to come.

  What made this snub from Constantinople still more galling to the

  1 In the past three years or so Manuel had sent handsome contributions for the rebuilding of Milan, destroyed by Frederick in 1162; poured, as one chronicler put it, 'a river of gold' into Ancona; and married his niece to one of the Frangipani to assure himself of support in Rome.

  2 According to an old tradition, perpetuated by several of the more venerable historians of Sicily, Prince Henry at his death was betrothed to a daughter of King Malcolm of Scotland. There is no truth in this story. King Malcolm IV, who reigned from 1153 to 1165, not only died unmarried and without issue, but was known during his lifetime as the Virgin King.

  King of Sicily was the fact that he was already beginning to envisage an important role for himself in the eastern Mediterranean. Though without any personal appetite or aptitude for military activity, he cherished immense political ambitions which soared far beyond the existing boundaries of his realm. The mere thought of how his father had thrown away his North African possessions—almost without a struggle—was enough to rouse his anger; he preferred to look upon himself as a successor to his grandfather Roger and to Robert Guiscard, as a young scion of the Hautevilles whose destiny it was to win for Sicily a new and glorious overseas empire.

  For the time being, at least, there could be no question of reconquer­ing the territories along the North African coast. The Almohads were now supreme; thanks to their brilliant admiral Ahmed es-Sikeli (the Sicilian)—our old friend Caid Peter1—they had built up a fleet of their own which, if not the equal of William's, might still prove a dangerous adversary. They were also in a position, if so inclined, to stir up trouble among the Sicilian Muslims, by no means all of whom had forgotten the terrors of recent years. Fortunately the Almohads remained well-disposed towards their northern neighbour; trade was flourishing, and their leader, Abu-Yakub Yusuf, was anxious to keep his hands free for his projected conquest of Spain—an enter­prise which was ultimately to lead to his death. William, headstrong as he was, had no wish to make trouble in that quarter.3

  Ffis expansionist dreams would have to be directed elsewhere; and he was consequently more than a little intrigued to receive, some time during 1173, a letter from Amalric, the Frankish King of Jerusalem. It appeared that the Fatimids of Egypt, incensed by the abolition of their Cairo Caliphate the previous year, had decided to rise in rebellion against their overlord Nur ed-Din, King of Syria, and his local vizier, Saladin. Knowing that the whole question of Christian survival in the Levant depended in the last resort on Mus­lim disunity, Amalric had undertaken to give the Egyptians all the help he could; he was now canvassing the princes of the West for support.

  1 See p. 256.

  2 It was not until 1181, however, that William was to conclude a formal treaty of peace with the Almohads—which he sealed, according to the historian Abdul-Wahid al-Marrakeshi, by sending Abu-Yakub a ruby the size and shape of a horseshoe.

  It was just the kind of opening that William was looking for; an opportunity to make his name in the East, to show the rulers of Outremer—and Manuel Comnenus too, for that matter—that a new Christian leader, and one to be seriously reckoned with, had emerged on the Mediterranean stage.1 He responded with enthusi­asm. Command of the expedition was given to his first cousin Tancred, Count of Lecce, bastard son of Duke Roger of Apulia, now long since forgiven for his part in the coup against William I in 1161; and on an appointed day in the last week of July 1174 a massive Sicilian fleet appeared off Alexandria—two hundred ships, if the Arab chroniclers can be believed, carrying a total of thirty thousand men, including fifteen hundred knights; another thirty-six vessels for the horses, forty for stores and provisions, and six for siege materials.

  Had King Amalric seen this huge force, he would doubtless have been as impressed as William had hoped. But King Amalric was dead —of dysentery, just a fortnight before the Sicilians' arrival. And his death meant that there was no Frankish contingent from Jerusalem waiting to join forces with them. Nor was this the only unpleasant surprise in store. Saladin had already uncovered the plot against him and had crucified the ringleaders. There would be no revolt after all. Tancred and his men disembarked to find themselves on hostile territory, utterly unsupported. Almost at once the Alexandrians, who had previously retreated within their walls, burst out again, set fire to the Sicilian siege engines and followed up with a night attack that threw the invaders into total confusion. By now Saladin, apprised of the landings by carrier pigeon, was hurrying up from Cairo at the head of an army. He need not have troubled. Long before he arrived Tancred had given the order to re-embark and the Sicilian ships had disappeared over the horizon, leaving behind them three hundred knights whose retreat had been cut off and who, after heroic but hopeless resistence, were taken prisoner.

  To give him his due, William had inherited all his grandfather's resilience. He does not seem to have been particularly cast down by the disaster, and showed it by sending, for the next few summers,

  1 Another Arab historian, al-Maqrisi, claims that a Sicilian fleet had already been sent to the Levant in 1169, to assist in the Frankish siege of Damietta. But no other source confirms this, and extracts from one of Saladin's letters quoted by Abu-Shama strongly imply that no Sicilian ships were present on that occasion.

  annual raiding parties to harry the Egyptian coast. But none of these operations was of any real political importance; in the Crusader states of the Levant they passed virtually unnoticed. And they certainly did not obscure the plain fact that William II's first foreign adventure had ended in catastrophe.

  The murder of Thomas Becket, deeply as it had shocked all Christian consciences, had no lasting effect on Anglo-Papal relations. At Avranches on 21 May 1172, having performed a public penance and given various promises for the future—
some of which he actu­ally kept—Henry II received his absolution; thenceforth, with his abrasive archbishop no longer there to complicate matters, his reconciliation with the Pope was complete. Where Alexander led, the states of Europe were quick to follow; and it was not long before Henry found his diplomatic position stronger than at any time in the previous decade.

  William of Sicily, having attained his majority, was among the first of his fellow-rulers to re-establish contact, and for the next few years the two Kings maintained a cordial if rather spasmodic corres­pondence. Curiously, however, neither seems to have liked to resurrect the marriage proposal—not even after the Byzantine fiasco of 1172, when William was once more on the lookout for a wife. When at last the idea was raised again, it came not from William or Henry but from a more august source than either—Pope Alexander himself.

  For Alexander was growing uneasy. Sicily was still his most important ally against Frederick Barbarossa, and it was vital for him that this alliance should be maintained. An ill-advised marriage, however, could destroy it overnight. There had already been one bad moment in 1173 when Barbarossa, to everyone's surprise, had offered William one of his own daughters—a proposal which, if accepted, would have delivered up all South Italy to imperial control and left the Papacy surrounded. Fortunately the King had turned it down; but the very thought of such an eventuality and its consequences had been enough to stir the Pope to action. The Sicilian marriage, he had decided, was too important to be left to chance. He himself would have to intervene.

  The alacrity with which both Kings responded to Alexander's new overtures makes it even more surprising that they had not reopened the discussions on their own initiative; and early in 1176 three specially accredited Sicilian ambassadors, the Bishops-Elect of Troia and Capaccio and the Royal Justiciar Florian of Camerota, left Palermo to make a formal request on behalf of their sovereign for Joanna's hand. On their way they were joined by Archbishop Rothrud of Rouen, and at Whitsuntide they presented themselves before the King in London. Henry received them warmly. Although for form's sake he had to summon a council of prelates and nobles to consider the question, their unanimous agreement was a foregone conclusion. But before the betrothal could be announced there remained one further—and potentially embarrassing—preliminary; William had sensibly stipulated that he would enter into no formal commitment without some assurance as to the physical attractions of his bride. The ambassadors therefore proceeded to Winchester, where Joanna was living with her mother Eleanor—held captive by the King since her involvement in her sons' rebellion three years before—'to see', in the words of a contemporary chronicler,1 'whether she would be pleasing to them'. Fortunately, she was. 'When they looked upon her beauty,' he continues, 'they were delighted beyond measure.' Back to Palermo hurried the Bishop of Troia with an English embassy led by John, Bishop of Norwich, bearing letters signifying the King's consent to the match; his col­leagues meanwhile stayed in England until Joanna should be ready to leave.

  Though she was still only ten years old, Henry was determined that his daughter should travel in a state appropriate to her rank and the occasion. To the Bishop of Winchester he entrusted the task of engaging a suitable household and preparing her wardrobe, while he himself ordered seven ships to be made ready to carry the party safely across the Channel. In mid-August he held a special court at Win­chester where he showered the Sicilian ambassadors with presents of gold and silver, clothes, cups and horses, and formally surrendered

  1 Roger of Hoveden, whose authorship of the Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi— formerly known by the name of Abbot Benedict of Peterborough—has now been established by Lady Stenton {English Historical Review, October 1953.)

  Joanna to their care. Then, accompanied also by her uncle, Henry's natural brother Hameline Plantagenet, the Archbishops of Canterbury and Rouen and the Bishop of Evreux, the little princess rode off to Southampton and, on 26 August, set sail for Normandy. Her passage through France was smooth; her eldest brother Henry escorted her as far as Poitiers, where her second brother Richard took over, conducting her safely through his own Duchy of Aquitaine and the tributary County of Toulouse to the port of St Gilles.

  At St Gilles Joanna was greeted in King William's name by Richard Palmer and the Archbishop of Capua. Twenty-five of the King's ships were waiting in the harbour; henceforth the princess's safety was in Sicilian hands. But it was the second week in November, and the winter gales had begun in earnest. The news may already have reached the party that, not long before, two other vessels escorting the Bishop of Norwich back from Messina had foundered, with the loss of all the presents William was sending to his pro­spective father-in-law; in any event it was decided not to risk the open sea at such a time, but to sail along the coast, keeping as close inshore as possible. Even this journey seems to have been uncom­fortable enough; six weeks later the fleet was still no further than Naples, and poor Joanna was suffering so severely from sea-sickness that it was decided to remain there over Christmas, giving her a chance to recover her strength—and, perhaps, her looks. She would then complete the journey overland.

  Early in the New Year the party was off again, following the coast road through Campania and Calabria, then across the straits to Messina and on to Cefalù; at last, on the night of 2 February 1177, they reached Palermo. William was waiting at the gates to welcome his bride. She was mounted on one of his royal palfreys, and escor­ted by her husband-to-be to the palace which had been prepared for herself and her household—probably the Zisa—through streets so brightly illuminated that, in the words of the same chronicler, 'it might have been thought that the city itself was on fire, and the stars in the heavens could scarcely be seen for the brilliance of the lights'. Eleven days later, on St Valentine's Eve, they were married and garlanded with flowers; and immediately afterwards Joanna, her long hair flowing down over her shoulders, knelt in the Palatine Chapel before her countryman Walter of the Mill, now Archbishop of Palermo, as he anointed and crowned her Queen of Sicily.

  At the time of her coronation, the young Queen was barely eleven, her husband twenty-three. Yet despite the difference in ages the marriage was, so far as we can tell, an ideally happy one. There was no language problem; Joanna, born in France and educated largely at the abbey of Fontevrault, was by her upbringing far more French than English, and Norman French was still the everyday language of the Sicilian court. Her new subjects, too, took her to their hearts and seemed to identify her, as they had her husband, with those radiant, tranquil years when the Kingdom, finally at peace with the world and with itself, prospered and was happy.

  They were quite right to do so; for within a few months of the marriage there occurred in Venice an event which was to put an end to hostilities between William and his most formidable adversary for the rest of the latter's life. On 29 May of the previous year, at Legnano just outside Milan, Frederick Barbarossa had suffered at the hands of the Lombard League the most crushing defeat of his career; and while the Milanese had celebrated their triumph by carving a series of suitable bas-reliefs on the Porta Romana,1 imperial ambassadors had sought out Pope Alexander at Anagni, negotiating the terms of a treaty that would bring an end to the seventeen-year schism and peace to Italy. At last the broad outlines of the agreement emerged; and it was duly arranged to hold, in July 1177, a great conference in Venice—to be attended by the Pope, representatives of both the League and the King of Sicily, and ultimately, when all their deliberations were concluded, by the Emperor himself.

  The two envoys chosen by William were Count Roger of Andria and—fortunately for posterity—Archbishop Romuald of Salerno, who has left us a remarkably detailed account (for him) of all that took place. On the morning of 24 July, he reports, the Pope went early

  1 Or fairly suitable. In his book Italian Sculptors, quoted by Augustus Hare, C. C. Perkins refers to two carved portraits of Frederick and his Empress, 'one of which is a hideous caricature, the other too grossly obscene for description'. The Porta Romana was dem
olished in the eighteenth century; but what is left of it—including Frederick's bas-relief—has been incorporated in a reconstruction now to be seen in the Castello museum.

  to St Mark's and despatched a delegation of cardinals to the Lido, where, at the church of St Nicholas, Frederick was waiting. There the Emperor solemnly abjured his anti-Pope and made formal acknow­ledgement of Alexander as rightful pontiff, while the cardinals in return lifted his long excommunication. Now at last he could be admitted to the Republic, to which he was escorted with great pomp by the Doge in person, the Patriarch of Venice and the cardinals. Landing at the Piazzetta, he proceeded on foot between the two high masts from which flew the banners of St Mark, to the front of the great basilica where Alexander, enthroned and in full pontificals, waited to receive him. Romuald goes on:

  As he approached the Pope, he was touched by the Holy Spirit; venerating God in Alexander, he flung aside his imperial mantle and prostrated himself at full length on the ground before him. But the Pope, with tears in his eyes, gently raised him up, kissed him and gave him his blessing, while the assembled Germans lifted up their voices in a Te Deum. Then, taking him by the right hand, the Pope led him into the church for a further benediction, after which the Emperor retired with his following to the Doge's Palace.1