The history of Flanders - Chapter 15
Diederik Van den Elzas, 15th count of Flanders
Written by: Charles
Vanderhaegen - slightly modified and translated by Herman Boel - Edited
by David Baeckelandt July 2008
Published with kind permission of Charles Vanderhaegen.
Diederik van den Elzas ascends the Flemish throne
Willem Clito, who was the 14th count of Flanders for a short while, was cut down in battle on 27 July 1128 before the gates of Aalst. As he had no offspring, the Flemish throne was available for whoever the Flemish dignitaries considered worthy of it.
In fact, a successor to Willem Clito had already been found in February 1128 when Iwan van Aalst had spoken to Willem at the gates of Gent and has asked him to stop the violence against the Flemish cities or leave the country in which case the rule of the county would be given to another man, 'someone capable and worthy of rule'. What Willem dit not know at the time, was that 'that other man' had already been chosen: Diederik Van den Elzas.
Diederik Van den Elzas, born in 1095, was the oldest son of Diederik II, duke of Upper Lorraine, and Gertrudis van Vlaanderen, the oldest daughter of Robrecht de Fries. As Robrecht's grandson he had an undeniable right to the Flemish throne. Already in 1127, after the death of Karel den Goede, he had defended his rights to the Flemish throne but due to French King Lodewijk VI the throne had gone to Willem Clito.
Clito, however, had messed up. Diederik made use of this and
had come to Flanders on 11 March 1128, albeit at the request of two
Flemish nobles, Daniel van Dendermonde and Iwan van Aalst, to assist
the Flemish in their rebellion against Clito. Shortly thereafter, i.e.
on 26 March 1128, he came with three knights to Brugge where the gates
were opened to him. He immediately received all support as he promised
the burghers important trade facilities with Holland, thanks to his
half-sister Geertrui, counetss-mother of Holland.
This encouraged Iwan van Aalst and Daniel van Dendermonde to have
Diederik elected as count by the citizens of Brugge on 30 March.
Everything went quickly now. Merely two days later, on 1 April,
Diederik made an entrance in the city while the traditional reciprocal
oaths were made by the new count and the burghers of Brugge and Gent.
Diederik was now legally the new count of Flanders as far as Brugge and
Gent were concerned. On 11 april Diederik was welcomed in Rijsel and
was also recognized as count by the city dignitaries.
Meanwhile the civil war, which started in August 1127, was raging on without much success for Diederik. It finally ended in his advantage by Clito's death on 27 July 1128. This good result allowed Diederik to get himself quickly recognized as count of Flanders by the rest of Flanders.
His ascension to the Flemish throne was also swiftly accepted abroad. French king Lodewijk VI gave him the investiture of Flanders without problem. Lodewijk VI quickly resigned himself with the loss of Willem Clito whom he had appointed count of Flanders. The fact that Diederik behaved as a loyal liegeman of the French king in his own level-headed way and also fulfilled his liegeman duty to the French king, was no doubt the reason.
English king Henry I was equally pleased with Willem Clito's death. He had always considered Clito to be a danger to his possessions in Normandy which he had unlawfully claimed at the expense of his brother Robert, Willem Clito's father. He now (in 1129) recognized Diederik as the only legal count of Flanders and even went as far as reinstating the fief which he had agreed to with Robrecht II but which he had suspended after Robrecht's death.
As far as Flanders is concerned, Diederik made the oath of fealty to king Lotharius one year later, namely on 23 March 1130.
Diederik confirms his power as count
As Diederik was solidly on the Flemish throne, he could devote all of his attention to the future, the insurance of the continuation of his line: a son or sons to take over after his death and a daughter or daughters to marry off. This could only be ensured by a good and fecund marriage. There would be two of them. The first marriage was made between 1130 and 1134 with a certain Suanehilde, or Swanechilde or also called Zwaanhilde, who gave him a daughter that was called Laurette.
Swanechilde must have died shortly after (the year is unknown) because in 1134 Diederik married again, this time with Sybilla van Anjou, daughter of Foulques V, count of Anjou, and since 1131 also king of Jerusalem. In this second marriage seven children were born, four boys and three girls, of which the oldest, Boudewijn, year of birth unknown, died in 1150. His second son, Filips, was born in 1142 and will later succeed him as count of Flanders. Yet another of Diederik's sons, Pieter, will later (in 1167) be appointed bisshop of the diocese Kamerijk by the emperor, against the wish of Boudewijn van Henegouwen.
Now his succession was secure, Diederik could devote all his attention to restoring order, "peace" as it was called at the time. This meant that he will try to establish his power in all possible areas and even increase it. He succeeded by gradually obtaining the large fiefs that depended on nobility by making use of certain seignorial lines becoming extinct. When the head of a dynasty died, he seized the opportunity to add the family's areas to the crown, regardless of the lawful successors whom he sometimes bribed to give up their rights.
The result of this policy was the disappearance of quite a number of baronies in Flanders and the return of semi-independent counties and seigniories at the southern border, which had been lost under the previous counts, to the rule of the Flemish count. This made Diederik the true ruler in Flanders, i.e. both of the lords and of the cities.
To Diederik this was still not enough. He dreamt of the Holy Land. In 1138 he undertakes a first crusade to the Near East and in 1148 he participates in the second crusade.
Diederik and the second crusade
At Christmas 1145 French king Lodewijk VII (Lodewijk VI had died in 1137) responded to the request by pope Eugenius III for a new crusade (or rather: an armed pilgrimage) to the Holy Land. The French nobles were not very enthusiastic to participate in such a pilgrimage, so Lodewijk needed to think of something to ignite their enthusiasm.
He did this by appealing to the 55 year old abbot Bernardus of Clairvaux, who had drawn up the code of order of the Templars a few years before, and by asking him to publicly, via an oracle, pronounce on God's will with respect to the new crusade that had been suggested by the pope and the French king.
On 31 March 1146, when Bernardus took the floor in the cathedral of Vézelay in Bourgogne, there were so many people that the whole distinguisged religeous-political company had to move to the open field, just as had happened fifty years earlier in Clermont. There the abbot gave the divine oracle which was not hard to predict. His legendary eloquence could easily convince the crowd that it was the will of God to immediately obey the call of the pope and the French king. This is probably what earned the abbot his nickname doctor mellifluus, i.e. "sweet-voiced doctor".
In any case, the mass hysteria began and the calls "God wants it" and "give us crosses" resounded all over Western Europe. Because of this great success Bernardus could write the following to the pope a few days later: "I opened my mouth, I spoke and soon the amount of crusaders multiplied endlessly... Everywhere there are widows whose husbands are still among the living". This macabre description would become reality in a horrific way.
Diederik also heard the word of Bernardus, whom he knew
personally as it was Bernardus who had incited him to found the abbey
of Clairlarais for the Cistercian movement as well as the chapel in
Brugge which would later be connected to the legend of the Blood of the
Lamb.
To date it is not clear what possessed pope Eugenius III and the French
king to call on Western Europe for a new crusade as Jerusalem was still
in the hands of the crusaders. Perhaps it is the fall of Edessa, in the
beginning of 1145, and the forthcoming threat to Jerusalem that
inspired them.
In any event, the call for a new crusade filled Diederik with enthusiasm. As he was dreaming of a principality in Palestine, he marched with a Flemish army around Whitsun 1147 and with the German emperor Konrad III to the Near East. Little later they will be followed by a French army headed by Lodewijk VII. After they crossed the Balkans plundering and lootering, the crusaders' army arrived at the gates of Constantinople in September 1147. A few weeks later the Flemish and German armies are joined by the French army of Lodewijk VII.
The emperor of Byzantine, Manuel I, however, was not amused with the coming of the crusaders whom he considered a threat. He therefore decided to conclude a treaty with the Seljuq, who he had always fought as his predecessors had done, but who he now considered to be a good ally to engage the army of crusaders.
The French were in a bad mood when they arrived at Constantinople, because the Germans who had preceded them, had ransacked a lot of villages and cities so that the French troops regularly had to enter mere ghost towns. This did not contribute to a good understanding between the different armies, which resulted in the Germans crossing to Asia Minor to continue their journey while leaving the French at the gates of Constantinople.
In order to get rid of those annoying French troops as fast as possible, the Byzantine emperor spread the rumor that the Germans had gained a big victory against the Turks in Nicea. This urged the French to also cross the Bosporus and head for Nicea hoping to get their hands on a piece of the war booty. They were greatly disappointed as the Germans had not gained a victory at Nicea at all, but on the contrary had been crushed so heavily by the Turks that only one out of ten had survived.
Bernardus of Clairvaux calls for a second crusade in Vézelay.
After an engraving of G.H. Moke, published in "Een andere Leeuw van
Vlaanderen" (Another Lion of Flanders) by Juliaan van Belle.
The French found the German army, or what was left of it, in a deplorable situation but could not do anything else but take note of the catastrophe as it was out of the question to attack the Turks. King Konrad and some faithful followers and the pitiful remainder of the German army decided to join Lodewijk VIl and his army and proceed through Anatolia to the coast in order to find boats to make the rest of the journey by boat. They partly succeeded but it did not really matter much. The crusade was a failure.
In July 1148 the crusaders tried to seize Damascus but they
failed again, apparently because of Diederik who had personally claimed
the city which made Konrad and Lodewijk drop out. But perhaps this was
only a pretext and the real reason may have been that they had heard
that the notorious Turkish general Noer ed-Din
was on his way with a huge army to relieve the city.
In any case, the crusade had ended and an embittered Konrad III left
the country on 8 September 1148. Lodewijk, as embittered as Konrad,
followed him at Easter 1149 and Diederik finally on 7 April 1150.
Another curious case of the crusade can be mentioned. Eleonora of Aquitania, wife to Lodewijk VII and therefore queen of France, who had followed her husband on his "armed" pilgrimage, had bluntly told her husband one day that he could go to Jerusalem all he liked but that she had had enough of his thoughtless adventures and wanted to move in with her uncle, ruler Raymond of Antiochia, to prepare their divorce. Lodewijk put up a struggle and even threatened with violence, but four years later Eleonora succeeded in having her marriage nullified. She went to England where she married the later Henry II, king of England, became queen of England and mother to Richard Lionheart, the later hero of the third crusade.
Diederik back in Flanders
On 19 February 1147, shortly before his departure for Palestine, Diederik held a meeting with the cardinals of Doornik, Arras, Terwaan and Kamerijk and together with his wife Sibylla and the most prominent dignitaries of Flanders to consolidate the "peace" and to determine how and by whom public order was to be ensured during his absence.
It was decided that Sibylla would act as ruler while, in case Diederik would fall in battle, his son Boudewijn would become count. The latter, however, will never become count as he dies in 1150, shortly before Diederik's return from Palestine.
Sibylla did not have an easy time, as barely had Diederik left or Boudewijn IV of Henegouwen seized the opportunity of Diederik's absence to invade Flanders. He succeeded in marching to Arras. But Sibylla reacted with a counterattack. In the shortest possible time she built an army of loyal soldiers who attacked under her command. They not only succeeded to make them flee but they also penetrated deeply into Henegouwen.
Fortunately the hostilities did not spread any further, thanks to the intervention of pope Eugenius III who was in Reims at that time. He summoned Sibylla and Boudewijn for consultation and succeeded in convincing Boudewijn to cease his unjustified agression. This restored peace for now. We say 'for now', because the hostilities will resume when Diederik returns from Palestine and will not end before 1169, when Filips, son and successor to Diederik, will marry off his sister Margareta to Boudewijn V, son to Boudewijn IV, and concludes a treaty of non-agression with him. This marriage will lead to a second union of the Flemish and Henegouwen counties, which will last no more than the first one.
See Palestine twice more and die
Diederik must have had Palestine in his blood. Notwithstanding the vicissitudes he had endured during the second crusade, he left for that remote country a third time in 1157. He did better than the previous two times as he was not alone but accompanied by his wife Sibylla. She was the daughter of Foulques V, who had been king of Jerusalem between 1131 and 1143. Perhaps Sibylla desired to get to know this country of which her father had been king.
Before he left, Diederik, being the careful and calculating man he was, had left the rule of his land to his son Filips and had that take-over recognized by all States of Flanders. This posed no further problems as in the last few years it had been Filips almost every time who had replaced his father taking the administrative decisions.
This time Diederik will remain in Palestine for three years and will fight the Turks in Antiochia with the soldiers who had followed him. He had some success but did not alter anything to the proportion of power between the crusaders and the Mussulmen.
In 1160 Diederik returns to Flanders, but without Sibylla who preferred to stay in Jerusalem. Despite her relative young age, barely 44 years old, she retreated to the convent of Saint Lazarus.
Whan king Boudewijn III of Jerusalem, son of Foulques V, and brother to Sibylla, died in 1162, she asked Diederik to return once moer to Jerusalem. Which he did. It was his last journey. When Sibylla died in 1165, he returned to Flanders and went to the convent of Waten where he died in 1169.
His son Filips would succeed him.
Bibliography:
1. LE GLAY, Edward. "Histoire de comtes de Flandre", Brussel
1843
2. LEHMAN, Johannes. "De kruisvaarders", Forum Boekerij, Baarn 1976.
3. WARNKOENIG, L.A. "Histoire de la Flandre", M. Hayez, Brussel 1835.
4. WAUTERS, Alphonse. "Thierry d'Alsace", De Busscher Frères, Gent
1863.