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Rh saddle, was all but made prisoner; William, his younger son, was wounded; the whole besieging army was ignominiously put to flight (January 1079), and nothing remained for the Conqueror but to give a favourable hearing to his rebel son's promises of submission on his father's pledging himself to leave Normandy to him at his death.

As soon as William the Conqueror had closed his eyes (9 September 1087) and Robert had become Duke of Normandy the barons rose, seized some ducal castles, and spread desolation through the land. The anarchy soon reached its height when the rupture between Robert and his brother William occurred. Thenceforward revolt never ceased within the duchy. Aided by the King of England who sent them subsidies, the rebels fortified themselves behind the walls of their castles and braved the duke's troops; in November 1090 the rebellion spread even to the citizens of Rouen. Weak and fitful as he was in character, even Robert was forced to spend his time in besieging the castles of his feudatories, who, luckily for him, agreed no better with one another than with their duke. In 1088 he besieged and took St Céneri, in 1090 Brionne; in 1091 he besieged Courci-sur-Dive, and then Mont-St-Michel, where his brother Henry had fortified himself; in 1094 he besieged Bréval.

Thus incessantly occupied in defending their authority in their own territories, the Dukes of Normandy, like the Counts of Anjou and like all the other great feudatories of the kingdom, found themselves in a position which made it impossible for them seriously to threaten the power of the Capetian sovereign. Each ruler, absorbed by the internal difficulties with which he had to struggle, followed a shifting policy of temporary expedients. The period is essentially one of isolation, of purely local activity.

Since France was thus split up into fragments, it would be in vain to attempt to give a comprehensive view of it. The more general aspects of civilization, the feudal and religious life of the eleventh century, both in France and in the other countries of Western Europe, will be examined in succeeding chapters. But some information must be given touching the characteristics of each of the great fiefs into which France was then divided, e.g. in what manner these states were organised, what authority belonged to the ruler of each of them, who and what were those counts and dukes whose power often counterbalanced that of the king. Owing to the lack of good detailed works on the period, something must necessarily be wanting in any attempt to satisfy curiosity on all these points.

Flanders. On the northern frontier of the kingdom the county of Flanders is one of the fiefs which presents itself to us under a most singular aspect. Vassal both of the King of France for the greater part of his lands, and of the Emperor for the islands of Zeeland, the