The history of Flanders - Chapter 6
The origin of the county of Flanders: Boudewijn V
Written by: Charles
Vanderhaegen - slightly modified and translated by Herman Boel - Edited
by David Baeckelandt July 2008
Published with kind permission of Charles Vanderhaegen.
Boudewijn V takes office
Boudewijn IV, called with the Beard and fifth count of Flanders, died on 30 May 1035 and was buried in the Saint Pieter abbey in Ghent. From his marriage with Ogiva of Luxembourg he had two children: a son, also called Boudewijn and who will succeed him as Boudewijn V, and a daughter who will later marry Hendrik II, the count of Leuven.
When Boudewijn V took over the authority over Flanders from his deceased father, the county was relatively peaceful. This lasted several years due to Boudewijn's excellent relation with his brother-in-law Hendrik I, king of France. Boudewijn's father had asked the French king Robert II to marry his daughter and the French king had agreed. That marriage ensured him of relative peace at the southern border of the county.
It was all peace and quiet at the eastern border. Boudewijn V also had an excellent relation woth the German emperor Hendrik III . He even sent his oldest son, the later Boudewijn VI, to be educated at the German court and ensured him of the command of the mark Antwerp in 1045.
The struggle against the Guardians
Due to this quiet period, Boudewijn V could fight the guardians of the abbeys. The struggle against these so-called "guardians" is a piece of Flemish history in itself. All abbeys in the county were in custody of the count. The count therefore had to guarantee the immunity of the abbeys' possessions and to protect all its inhabitants against appropriations or wrong-doings. In return the liegemen and serfs of the abbeys were obligated to join the count's army in time of war while the abbey had to pay the count at regular times, sometimes with money, sometimes in kind, sometimes both.
As the counts were unable to execute this guardianship locally, they ordered certain persons in the abbey's area to wield themselves the count's power in his name. Those persons were called the underguardians or simply guardians. These"guardians", however, were short of memory because when Arnulf I, Boudewijn V's great-grandfather, died, they forgot that they were only observants for the count and started to act as independent masters who answered no one. They called upon the abbeys' armed force for their personal interests, levied taxes, administered justice without the count's approval and assigned themselves a number of rights that even the count did not have as guardian. In practice they turned the domains they guarded into their own personal seigniories.
Neither Arnulf II nor Boudwijn IV had had the time to oppose the guardians' actions. With Boudewijn V this changed. As soon as he was in power, he tried to rectify matters by returning the lawful property to the abbeys and to end the judicial powers of the guardians. From then on it was the count who decided what duties the guardians had to do, what rights they were given? At the same tume the strict ascesis of the Benedictine monasteries was reinstated. Boudewijn's actions were influenced by the reformist abbot Richard de Saint-Vannes who lived in Verdun and who tried to reinstate the strict monastery life that had been lost by the panic of the year 1000 and the unlawful action of the guardians.
A conflict with county Holland
Hardly had the order be restored or another battle was at hand. The count of Holland Diederik IV, in the Netherlands also known as Dirk IV of Friesland, informed Boudewijn he refused to acknowledge the Flemish count's authority over Walcheren, the accompanying Zeeland islands and the so-called Vier Ambachten any further. This was the area Boudewijn IV had been given by the German emperor as a reward for his support in the battle between the empire and the Lorraine rebels.
Boudewijn regarded this refusal as a serious insult to his deceased father and was therefore an excellent opportunity to warrant a campaign against Diederik. Boudewijn invaded county Holland and defeated the weaker Dutch army in no time. It was more a punitive expedition as Boudewijn did not gain much by his victory. Boudewijn did not take any new land, but had Diederik vow no longer to claim the Zeeland region or to dispute the Flemish count's authority over it. The border between the county of Flanders and county Holland thus remained unchanged.
The battle with Hainout (Henegouwen)
After the succesfull campaign against the Dutch count, there was only a short period of rest. In 1040 the count of Hainaut, Rainir V, died and was succeeded by his son Herman, called of Mons. This accession gave Boudewijn a fearsome enemy as Herman could not accept that the Valencijn area, part of Hainaut, and the Enema mark had been conquered by Boudewijn IV under the approval of the German emperor Hendrik II. This approval had been more like a gift to the Flemish count because of his help in the German fight against Lorraine rebels.
Herman of Mons was a very firm man who did not like dawdling. Only a few years after his accession to the throne he started his "reconquering campaign". In 1041 Boudewijn V had marched with his army to the region of Orléans to assist his brother-in-law Hendrik I of France in his battle against a group of rebellious liegemen. Herman did not hesitate to take advantage of the situation and march with his army to the mark Ename. He conquered it quickly. The castle that the German emperor Otto II had built there in 980 and which had been destroyed by Boudewijn IV, was rebuilt to defend the mark against a possible attach by Boudewijn.
He then went to Valencijn in 1042 or 1043 and also succeeded in reconquering that area.
When Boudewijn returned from France a year later, he faced an accomplished fact. In 1047 there was a final agreement regarding the areas. The agreement stipulated that the Valencijn area would remain in the hands of the count of Hainaut, while Ename was returned to Flanders.
It is worthwhile noting that from then onwards the mark Ename, which had been a flourishing trading place between Flanders and Lorraine for more than 50 year, faded away in favour of Oudenaerde.
The French-German alliance wavers
The fact that the agreement between Herman van Bergen and Boudewijn V was so easily made, was due to a profound change to the West European political climate since 1044.
The relatively peaceful relationship between the West European rulers turned into a fierce animosity in 1044. A first cause was the collapse of the loyal alliance between the French king Hendrik I and the German emporer Hendrik III. Hendrik I had even been married twice to a German queen. The first time with Mathilde, daughter to emporer Konraad II, and the second time with a German princess who was also called Mathilde.
For some unknown reason Hendrik III decided he wanted to marry Agnes, the foster daughter of the French count Godfried of Anjou. With growing anxiety the French king heard about the emperor's plan. Godfried was a very powerful man and Hendrik I feared this marriage between the German emperor and a French princess would endanger his throne. He tried with all possible means to change the German emperor's mind, but to no avail. The emperor needed the influence of the counts of Anjou in the south of France to realise his international ambitions, and went ahead with the marriage in 1043.
Lorraine is again the scene of battle
At around the same time, the German authority in Lorraine was again threatened. Since the 10th century, Lorraine, which covered the area between Friesland and the Jura, was divided in two duchies: Upper Lorraine and Lower Lorraine. Both duchies came under the autority of Gothelo I in 1033. Gothelo was a loyal liegeman to the German emperor. At his death in 1043, Othelo left three sons: Godfried II, also called with the Beard, Gothelo II, also called the Lazy, and Frederik. From the inheritance of Gothelo I, Godfried II got Lower Lorraine and Gothelo II got Upper Lorraine. Frederik of Lorraine, the third son, was kept out of the inheritance and retired to priesthood. He would later even become pope Stefanus IX.
The division of Lorraine found no favour with Godfried. Being the eldest son of Gothelo he thought he had a right to the whole of Lorraine and not only to the northern part. He therefore called upon some of his nobles to support his ambitious plan to unite Lorraine under his power. But his plan failed. The German emporer Hendrik saw this plan as a threat to his authority and had Godfied captured. He held him captive for more than a year.
Shortly after that, in 1046, Gothelo II died without leaving any heirs. Godfried thought he would finally had his chance and claimed Upper Lorraine as heir of his brother. But he failed a second time as the emperor donated the duchy to Frederik of Luxembourg. This way Hendrik avoided the a unified Lorraine which would be powerful enough to one day become fully independent from the emperor.
Godfried felt himself robbed of what should legally have been his and decided to settle the inheritance problem with arms. This meant war between Lorraine and the German empire.
When Boudewijn V heard about this he understood instantly that he should choose Godfried's side, not because of any grudge against the German emperor, but because he saw an alliance with Godfried as an interesting opportunity to consolidate the Flemish power with respect to the German empire, as his father had tried to do before. There was no lack of allies to attack the German emperor. In 1046 he left for France and succeeded in convincing his brother-in-law Hendrik I to join the alliance against the German emperor. A second agreement was made with Herman van Henegouwen with whom he would come to a settlement in 1047 on the mark of Ename and the region around Valencijn. A third ally was the count of Holland, Diederik IV, against whom he had fought in 1044 to safeguard his possessions in Zeeland. Diederik IV thought the alliance with Godfried and Boudewijn to be an opportunity to extend his power to the south, at the expence of the bisshop of Utrecht.
War begins
The first of the allies to start the attack was the king of France, Hendrik I. In spring 1047 he prepared a campaign in the direction of Aachen. It never came that far. Godfried van Anjou, whose foster daughter was married to the German emperor, came back from Italy after he had heard about the scheduled French campaign, and threatened in his turn the French king with war if he did not renounce his plans. Hendrik was afraid of the count of Anjou's power and ceased his preparations to enter Lorraine. He withdrew from the alliance.
After this Lorraine gave the signal to start the attack. Diederik of Holland immediately invaded Utrecht and succeeded to capture the city and to drive the bisshop away. Hendrik III came to the aid of his loyal bisshop, but his attached against Diederik failed. The emperial army had to deal with abominable weather conditions and were constantly attached by West Frisian guerrillas who gave him so much trouble he had to withdraw with heavy losses.
Meanwhile Boudewijn had marched with Godfried to Nijmegen where they destroyed the imperial palace, built by Charlemagne and set fire to the rural estates after plundering them. From there onwards Boudewijn returned to Flanders while Godfried went to Verdun to plunder the city and to reduce the beautiful church of Our Lady in ashes.
The French-German alliance restored
Hendrik III had to look upon al those destructions with sorrow. Due to his exhausting campaign in Holland he had not been able to react against Godfried and Boudewijn. He understood that he had to gain time to raise a new army. But in order to be sure that the French king would not again turn against him, he entered into negotiations with him and promised him to cede part of Lorraine to him if he would keep away from the war. Hendrik I accepted the proposal by which Boudewijn could no longer count on help from the French king in his war against the German emperor.
Meanwhile in Lorraine, the advance of Godfried's and Diederik's troops along the banks of the rivers Rhine, Mosel and Meuse reached dangerous proportions. But fortune was on his side. On 15 May 1048 Diederik was murdered in Dordrecht by a group of merchants from Cologne.
In spring of 1049 the emperor started his counterattack and marched with a new and powerful army against Godfried who, afraid for the imperial army, submitted to the emperor and was deposed by him.
Boudewijn is on his own
Boudewijn
had lost all of his allies and was all alone in facing the imperial
army. The emperor hesitated to attack the Flemish count immediately as
he still regarded him as his worst enemy. In order to stun the Flemish
count's army, he appealed to the English king Edward the Confessor and
the Danish king Sven II to send a fleet to Flanders which would force
Boudewijn to post a part of his army along the Flemish coast to repel a
possible attack of English and Danish troops. At the same time he was
excommunicated by Pope Leo IX (image), a
relative of Hendrik III, because he had burnt down the church in
Verdun. This accusation was false as it had been Godfried who had
committed this sacrilege. Nevertheless, Boudewijn remained
excommunicated.
Now that a large part of the Flemish army was stuck at the Flemish coast, Hendrik III thought the time had come to march against the Flemish count with a great chance for success. He invaded the south of Flanders with a vast army and arrived at Kamerijk where everything was destroyed. He then marched to Bruay and besieged the stronghold. Boudewijn understood he could not keep the war on going without running the risk of losing his entire county to the German throne. He therefore initiated negotiations with the emperor.
In the fall of 1050 he went to Aachen where he declared his submission to the emperor, probably without the intent of honouring it. Anyway, the emperor had enough reasons not to punish his rival too severely for his alliance with the Lorraine rebellions, and accepted the submission on the condition that Boudewijn would renounce the mark Antwerpen which has been given to him as a gift by the emperor in 1045.
The reason Boudewijn got away with such a reasonable condition was thte fact that the emperor feared a new alliance between the Flemish count and the French king. Now the Lorraine rebellion had been suppressed, Hendrik III was determined not to honour his agreement with the French king of 1049, namely that he would keep the French king aloof from the Lorraine conflict. In a possible conflict with the French king over this, the emperor would make sure Boudewijn kept aloof. So it seemed wisest to treat the Flemish count gently.
Marriage policy
It now became quiet in the county and Boudewijn had some time to spend with his family. His wife Adèle or Adelheid, who was called the countess-queen (la comtesse-reine) because she was the daughter of the king of France, had given him five children: three boys and two girls. The oldest of the latter was called Mathilde and in 1053 Boudewijn gave her to Willem the Bastard in marriage. He was the duke of Normandy and was later called William the Conqueror. With this marriage Boudewijn confirmed that the old anti-Norman politics of his ancestors was no more.
Just after this marriage, Herman of Henegouwen, who had fought alongside Boudewijn against the emperor, died. Richildis, his widow, was still young and held the regency over the county in name of her two chilfren. Richildis was not only master of Henegouwen but was also free to marry anyone she chose. Boudewijn saw an opportunity to expand his county at the expense of Henegouwen. Without hesitation he approached Richildis and offered her to marry his oldest son Boudewijn, the later Boudewijn VI. Richildis did not say 'no' to this offer but she did not say 'yes' either. In case she accepted the marriage proposal, she feared the anger of her liege lord, the German emperor, who would have to face a union of the counties Flanders and Henegouwen. That would strengthen Flanders' power even more.
As Richildis kept on hesitating and Boudewijn was losing his patience, he marched against Henegouwen en besieged the countess' castle in Bergen (Mons) to force her to accept the marriage proposal. All the sabre rattling was probably pretence as the whole scenario had been agreed upon beforehand by Boudewijn and Richildis. This way the emperor could not accuse Richildis of freely accepting the proposal. Nor did he have any legal motive to sue her because she had married without his consent. Besides, Richildis had no arms nor munition in her castle and could do little else than submit herself to the count. Shortly thereafter the marriage was made through which both counties were united under one single power.
We should add to this that the two children from Richildis' first marriage had been excluded from succession. The eldest of the two, a boy, was infirm and retired in priesthood. He will later become bisshop of Chartres under the name Roger. The second child, a girl and quite the religious type, went to a convent where she remained for the rest of her life and died peacefully at the age of 40.
Another war
Anyway, the emperor had to watch the whole marriage ceremony but could not leave it simply at that. However, as his army was stuck in North Italy, he could not act military. So pending a punitive expendition against Boudewijn he had the married couple excommunicated on grounds of Richildis and Boudewijn being relatives. Richildis was the daughter of Hedwige, daugther to Hugo Capet. Boudewijn's mother Adèle was the granddaughter of the same Hugo Capet. Richildis and Boudewijn were therefore relatives. Later the excommunication was lifted and the legality of the children from this marriage was never disputed.
Meanwhile the war in North Italy had ended and the emperor was free to march against Boudewijn. But instead of preparing the emperor's attack, Boudewijn V himself and his son Boudewijn, now also called Boudewijn of Bergen (Mons), marched in 1053 against the emperor. They took advantage of the absence of Bisshop Theodinus of Liège and attached the stronghold Thuin at the banks of the river Samber. The stronghold was completely destroyed and the surrounding area ruined. From there onwards they went to the river Meuse where Huy was attacked, one of the main places of the principality. It was also completely destroyed. They dared not attack Liège itself. This city was too well defended to be taken without a longlasting siege. That is why Boudewijn withdrew his army and entrenched himself on the left bank of the river Scheldt, the natural border between Flanders and Lorraine.
They did not need to wait long for the imperial army. In the summer of 1054 the emperor marched to Flanders and deployed his army on the right bank of the river Scheldt, about two miles north of Valencijn. He immediately started all preparations to build a bridge ovber the river in order to attack Boudewijn's army on the left bank. But Boudewijn remained vigilent and the bridge plan failed. Boudewijn understood that eventually he would not be able to prevent the imperial army to cross the river and therefore withdrew. With this withdrawal he left the whole southern area of the county to the invaders. Hendrik II destroyed all that came on his way, exactly as his predecessor Hendrik II had done in 1007 in his war against Boudewijn IV. He now marched to Rijsel (Lille). He did not succeed in taking the city. But a few weeks later he besieged Doornik which capitulated due to a lack of food.
There the imperial army came to a standstill due to an unexpected early winter that made it impossible to march further north. Boudewijn took advantage of the absence of the imperial danger by repairing the fortress of his birth city Lille and to build a solid wall of defence around the city. Oudenaerde was also fortified as were the walls around Gent, Brugge and Sint-Omaars. In the spring of 1055 Boudewijn launched a counterattack. He was aided by Godfried II, his former ally in the Lorraine war. Together they marched to the mark Antwerpen that belonged to the county Lower Lorraine and was given by the emperor to Frederik van Luxemburg in 1046, to great annoyance of Godfried ll who had always considered this area to be his lawful property.
Luckily for Boudewijn, the emperor was not able to march again to Flanders as the French king had repeatedly reminded the emperor of his promise to give him part of Lorraine. The emperor refused to honour that promise. A new German-French war was imminent but never started. In October 1056 Hendrik III suddenly died and left a son who was still too young to become emperor. Empress Agnes, who was regent, did not feel much to continue the war and made peace with Boudewijn.
On the Reichstag in Cologne in December 1056 the peace was confirmed. Boudewijn maintained all his fiefs in Lorraine and his son remained count of Henegouwen and Valencijn.
Europa during Boudewijn's rule
(click on the image for a larger version)
The last years of Boudewijn V
After the peace with Germany Boudewijn V had a very peaceful life. The great count who was nicknamed From Rijsel, died on 1 September 1067 and was succeeded by his oldest son Boudewijn VI.
His second son Robrecht married in 1063 to Geertrui, widow to Floris, cound of Holland. He will later be called Robrecht the Frisian and will be regarded as one of the greatest counts in Flemish history.
Bibliography:
1. LE GLAY, Edward. "Histoire des comtes de Flandre", Brussel 1943.
2. GANSHOF, F.L. "Vlaanderen onder de eerste graven", Standaard, Brussel 1944.
3. DHONT, J. "Korte geschiedenis van het ontstaan van het graafschap Vlaanderen", Brussel 1943.