5 leyser - german aristocracy

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The Past and Present Society

The German Aristocracy from the Ninth to the Early Twelfth Century. A Historical andCultural SketchAuthor(s): K. LeyserSource: Past & Present, No. 41 (Dec., 1968), pp. 25-53

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THE GERMANARISTOCRACY ROMTHENINTH TO THE EARLYTWELFTHCENTURYA HISTORICALAND CULTURALSKETCH

THE HISTORY OF GERMANSOCIETYIN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES IS FORthe most part the history of the German aristocracy,clerical and lay.For no other social group do we possess the materialsand the resourcesto form a coherent picture. The agrarian structure of the East-Frankish regions is known to us in patches only: a few estate surveys,censiers nd Hofrechte ere and there reveal classes of dependantsranging from rent-paying free men under their lord's mundeburdium(protection and lordship) or advocacy to very much more heavilyburdened customarytenants with different names in different regions.But the insights these sources afford do not allow us to speak of thesemen as part of a Germansociety. Nor is this mere accident. Thesemen belonged to so many smaller regional and local societies centredon great monasteries or bishoprics like St. Gallen, Fulda, Werden,Corvey, St. Emmeran (Regensburg) and Worms. Except for theservices and taxes they owed and the placita (pleas) which they hadto attend, sometimes to be punished and always to be mulcted, thedoings of their masters entered but dimly into their horizon. Thesame cannot, of course, be said of the men who later came to challengeand to enter the aristocracy, the ministeriales.But if they, or rathertheir fore-runners,served in the wars and at the courts of their bettersthey still belonged to and rose only in their own lord's familia andhousehold. Theirs too was an enclosed and confined world. Thereis little evidence in the early eleventh century tllat they and their like,for instance the more honoured servants of the abbots of Fulda andHersfeld formed independent connections, joined forces or nursedcommon grievances.l Until they did, from about IIOO onwards, itis difficult to speak of them as a class.9 Their self-assertion in the

1 According to the service-code (Dienstrecht)of the Bamberg ministeriales(I057-64) a man could however seek employment outside the lordship of hismaster if the latter had no use for him and would not give him a fief. SeeMonumentaBambergensia,d. P. Jaffe (Bibliotheca Rerum Germanicarum,v,Berlin, I869), p. 5I. Some of ArchbishopBardo of Mainz'sservientes esertedhim to join the emperorConrad II (I024-39).2 An important,early case of ministeriales elonging to variouslords joiningforces n defenceof theirstatuswas the murderof Count Sigehardof Burghausenat Regensburg in II04. He had tried to worsen the rights of his own men.For this incident see G. Meyer von Knonau, 3fahrbucheresDeutschenReichesunterHeinrich V. undHeixlrichV. (Leipzig, I904), V, pp. I95-8.


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26 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Iroyal service which so infuriateda Lampertof Hersfeld and theSaxonBrunocouldnot achieve his in a day. Their new solidaritiesand corporaterights were at first local. The aristocracyaloneformeda politicaland cultural ociety (albeitanarchic)n the Reichas a whole.The narrativeourcesof the tenthandearlyeleventh enturieswereoverwhelminglyhe workof the moreor less privilegednhabitants fmonasteries, athedral ommunities nd courts. When they spokeof the poor,the pamperi,hey sometimesmeant he non-nobles atherthan the destitute, but they rarely did speak of them.3 In thebiographies f greatpersonages,ike the ladiesof the Ottonian ouse,HenryI's queenMathildaand Otto I's Adelheid,almsgiving layeda largepart and in describingt the authorsof these works mitatedthe commonplaces f hagiography nd the vitae (Lives) of greatprelates. But throughout he accent lay not on the social goodachieved r on socialservice,but on the purchasing ower n heavenwhich hese charities ommanded. Thietmar f MerseburgwroteofTagino, the archbishopof Magdeburg I004-IOI2): "becausehisweakconstitution id not allowhim to fast he madeamends or thisby the lavishnessof his alms-giving".4 Alms and washing he feetof the needyweregoodfor the souls of the donors;wheresuch hingsare described n the vitae, they belonged to a widely accepteddevotionalrepertoirewhereby the great could practise humility.They did not denoteeithera closerrelationshipo the unfortunate r,on the part of the biographers, ny interest in their lot. On thecontrary hat interest was all self-centred:their own privilegedconnectionwiththe patronor the subjectof their iterary oil. Whentimes weredangerous, s they were n the early enth centuryduringthe Hungarian aids, and when monksand clerks had to flee withtheir shrines o find shelter n some walledcity or countryhide-outwhat heyresentedmostwashaving o minglewiththe commonherd,the vulgus. To return o Archbishop aginoof Magdeburg: e had

3 On this see K. Bosl, "Potens und Pauper. Begriffsgeschichtliche tudienzur gesellschaftlichenDifferenzierung m fruhen Mittelalter . ." in Fruhformender Gesellschaftm mittelalterlichen uropa Munich-Vienna,I964), pp. I06-34.4 Thietmar of Merseburg,Chronicon, i.64 (ed. R. Holtzmann, MonumentaGermaniae Historica [hereafter MGH], Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum[hereafterSRG], new ser. ix, Berlin, I955), p. 354.5Adam of Bremen, Gesta Hamtnaburgensis cclesiae Pontificum, .s3 (ed.B. Schmeidler MGH. SRG., Hanoverand Leipzig, I9I7], p. 54): "clerumvulgomixtum". Cf. also the Chronicle f Moyenmoutier, h. 6 (MGH. ScriptorumTomus [hereafterSS], iv, p. 89): "In Mediano autem coenobio . . . vix singuliclerici feruntur resedisse nonnullis mensibus, easdem tantum observantesexcubiasvulgarisparrochiae".


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 27the gifts of gentlenessand compassion ut preferred o be on closetermsonly withnoblesandto keep helow-bornout of his company.Annals,chronicles,Livesand Gestawerewritten or an aristocraticaudience,whether t wastonsuredor belted,aminority, r as shallbeseen, a tiny minorityamongwhat was a minorityof the populationin any case. It couldnot be otherwise or thesevery ew were he onlymen and womenworth nfluencing relltertaining. The assumptionwas thatnobilityhad meritand meritagairlwas innate n blood. Inthe episcopalbiographies f the tenth and early eleventhcenturiesthe nobleancestryof the futurebishop wasset down as a matterofcourseandalways ollowedby an accountof his even noblervirtues.Degeneracy,a problem to most aristocracies,was an individualfailing. Noblekinscoulddecay,come o grief n a feudandend up inexile or gradually oose their wealth but this did not shake theconfidence ndthe beliefs of their fellows or the writerswho tell usof such misfortunes. Conversely he ascentof a pazcpernto theranksof the high nobilitywas, even in the Church,a rare event intenth-centuryGermany. The outstandingexample was Willigis,archbishop f Mainz rom975 to IOI I . Thietmar f Merseburgwhoshould haveknown, spoke of his "vile"origins but to him almostanyoneborn below his own high aristocratic ircles was less thanequal. Willigis'sparents eenl to havebeeIl ree and noble but theywerepoorand ivedas peasants. Betweenmerenobiles ndnobilissimia wide gulf stretched. Heaven tself had to intervene o point toWilligis's uture greatnessand so we readthat on the night of hisbirth all the draught-cattlen his mother'shouse also had maleoffspring.8Prodigiesat the birth of saintswere a stock-in-trade fhagiography,but Thietmar, though he esteemed the archbishophighly, did not think of him as a saint. Only his career wasmiraculous. In IOI4 and IOI9 the EmperorHenryII, for purposesof his own,promoted wo clerksof unfreeparentageo the smallandpoor see of Eichstatt. The chronicler f the dioceserecorded heir

6 Thietmar,Chronicon, i.6s, (p. 354). Conversely Bishop Notker of Liegewas praised for his affability towards the mediocres. See Anselm's GestaEpiscoporumLeodiensiurn, h. 30 (MGH. SS., vii, p. 206). The rigoristicAnselm dislikedcourts and their inhabitants.7 A strong protest against this literary convention came characteristicallyfrom the circle of the early Lotharingian monastic reformers. See John ofSt. Arnulf's Life of ffohncf Gorze (abbot of Gorze960-74), ch. 7 (MGH. SS.,iv, p. 339)-8 Thietmar, iii.s (p. I02). The standingof Willigis's parentshas been muchin dispute. Thietmarwrote(loc. Cit.): "Felix mater,quam Dominus pre caeteriscontemporalibus uis in tantum visitavit, ut prolemnobilioribuscoequalemveletiam nonnullismeliorempareret". If Willigis hadbeen altogetherplebeianhewould have had to say "nobilibuscoequalem".


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28 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Ioriginswithregret,andthe subsequenteturnof nobleprelateswithelief.9The culturaland politicalpassivityof ruralpopulationsn theariousGerman egionswasnot seriouslydisturbed,et alonejolted,efore helastquarter f theeleverlthentury. Beforeweturn o theuestionof change t is worthaskingwhether he townsmenof thearliermiddle-agesparticipatedmorecloselythanthe peasantrynhelife of the greatchurches, astlesandcloisterswhichformed heoreof most urbansettlements. It mustbe recalled hat in manyurghshe mostactive, ndependent ndenterprisingectionof theopulationivedin separate uarters, ftenatsomedistancerom hecclesiasticaloundations. At Trier hearchbishopetween994and008 built a stone-wall oundthe mainclericalcitadel o make heegregationmore effective.0 However importantthe economicunctionsndrewards ftraders ndcertain killedcraftsmenn theseentres ayhavebeenweonlymeet hemoccasionallyn thewritingsf heir betters. Before955 merchants rom Mainz and VerdunervedOtto I on embassies o Constantinoplend Cordoba,aterheniskingshiphadadvancedn eminence nlybishopsandcountsereent on such missions.ll At Regensburg,n 983, a royalerchantndhiswifecanbefound o havemadeconsiderablerantsfuildingsandlands,withinandoutside he city,to the monasteryft. Emmeranorthesakeof theirsouls. Theywereby no meanshenlyonesof theirkindto havedoneso.l2Merchantswere thus men of some consequence n Ottonianermanyndtheirsafetyenroulematteredotheir ordsandpatrons.owever,hattheirworldwaslikewe hearfromonlyone andthatostileource n the earlyeleventhcentury, he bookwhich,underheitleDeDiversitate emporum,lpertof Metzdedicatedo Bishopurchardf BlormsbetweenI020 and I024. Alperthad migratedntohe dioceseof Utrechtand in his work,an accountof con-emporaryvents n the region,he paused o describehe merchantsAnonymusaserensis, haps. 25-7 (MGH. SS., vii, pp. 260 f.).E. Ennen,FruAgeschichteerEuropaischentadt (Bonn, I953), p. I43.1iudprand of Cremona, Antapodosis,vi.4 (Die WerkeLiudprandsvonremona,d. J. Becker [MGH. SRG., Hanover and Leipzig, I9I5], p. I54).OnheVerdunmerchantsent with Johnof Gorzeas bearerof Otto I's presentsohe alifAbd ax-Rahman II see the Life of3fohnof Gorze,ch. I I7 (MGH.S.v,p. 370).12 K. Bosl, "Die Sozialstruktur der mittelalterlichen Residenz- undernhandelsstadtRegensburg. Die Entwicklung ihres Burgertums vom.-I4.Jahrhundert",in Untersuchungenur Gesellschaftlichen truktur derittelalterlichentadrein Europa(Vortrageund Forschungenherausgegebenomonstanzer Arbeitskreisfur mittelalterlicheGeschichte, xi, Konstanztuttgart,966), pp. I2I-5.


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 29

of Tiel and their diseordantways. He looked upon them as a raee ofruffians whose lawlessness was an offenee and should be stopped.Perjury eounted for nothing in this trading settlement on the Waal:a man of Tiel, if he held something in his fist, would swear with theother hand that it was not there. Adultery did not rank as a erimethere and Alpert ended his digression with an aeeount of theirdrinking-bouts and their eommon funds -in faet their guild.l3That they had one is important but Tiel, the Imperial toll-station onthe way to England, was rather exeeptional. It lay somewhatout ofthe loeal bishop's reaeh and for at least half a eentury we have nothingto eeho Alpert's deseription of these seeming outeasts who werenonetheless privileged, wealthy and useful. There is evidenee thatprelates worried about the rapid growth of population in unexpeetedplaees where there were as yet few ehurehes arld relies and that theywanted to keep an eye on sueh developing towns in their dioeeses.Arehbishop Brun of Cologne (953-965), Otto I's brother sent thebody of St. Patroclus to Soest in Westphalia beeause this flourishingand populous eentre was C'almostgnorant of worship''.l4In general the towns too belonged to or were dominated by thearistoeraeyand its leaders,espeeially the bishops, some abbots and, ofeourse, the kings. NVemust now return to them, the nobilesnd theireultural roots in early medieval Germany. Historiansof institutionsand erities of writers sueh as the great Saxon historian Widukind ofCorvey no longer like to eontrast too sharply purely Germanie,Christian and elassieal elements in this context. Even the mostheroie saga in the form we possess it eonErontsus with literacy andthis was only possible through christianization. When Widukind ofCorvey related the pre-Christiantraditions of his people, the Saxons,he weighed the report of their rlordieorigins against the story he hadlleard in his youth that they were deseended from the MacedoniansofAlexander's army and in the end he thought that the latter was nearerthe truth. Etymologiealrefleetions led him to tllis view, and for allhis family- and Saxon stem-pride he looked baek as a seholar.loAgain, the famous ox-earts on which the last Merovingian kings, inEinhard's derisory story, were seen going to the assemblies of theFranks are now thought to be imitations of the mode of travel used bylate-Roman provincial governors. Their link with the primeval

3 Alpert, D? DiversitateTemporum,i.20 (MGH. SS., iv, pp. 7I8 f.).14 De TranslationeSancti Patrocli (MGH. SS., iv, p. 28I): ". . . locum . . .rebus seculi opulentum,populoplenum, . . . sed religionisadhucpene ignarum".15 Widukind of Corvey, RerumGestarumSaxonicarumLibri Tres, i.2, (ed.H.-E. Lohmann and P. Hirsch [MGH. SRG., Hanover, I935], p. 4) and cf.i.I2 (p. 20 f.).


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3o PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Iforests is doubtful.l6 We must therefore be careful also when wespeak of a secular aristocratic culture as against that of the Church.The inmates of great monasteries ike St. Gallen or Tegernsee were thecousins and brothers of lay nobles whose values and interests in thetenth century they went on sharing-to some extent. These twohouses have been mentioned here because two of Germany's greatestearly medieval Latin epics are associated with them, the Walthariusand Ruodlieb.l7Both poems had for their subjects heroes who wereforced to serve distant rulers and founded their ascent, fortunes andfamilies by proving themselves in all situations. They appealed tothe day-dreams, if not also the conscience of the lay nobility.Walthariusnd Ruodliebmoreover did not stand alone and thesecular clergy were no less interested in this genre of literature thanthe monks. Sometime between Ios7 and I064 the scholastic2>s(master of the school) of Bamberg cathedral, Meinhard, wrote to oneof his fellow-clerks bewailing the life of their bishop, Gunther, whoinstead of reading St. Augustine and Gregory the Great spent histime with Attila and Dietrich and may even have composed epics forhis court-entertainers.l8Charlemagnecaused the age-old songs praising the deeds of ancientkings, possibly his predecessors, to be written down. His son Louisthe Pious was anxious to forget all those he had learned as a boy.l9Of Otto the Great we do not know whether he personally patronisedand encouraged the cult of the Saxon stem-saga as Widukind hasrendered it but we can be sure that the king, his nobles and the

16See J. M. Wallace-Hadrill's eview of A. H. M. Jones, The Later RomanEmpire, n the Eng. Hist. Rev., 1xxx I965), p. 789.17 The debate about the origin of the surviving Waltharius as not yet closed.If it is Carolingian, hen another and now lost version remains connected withEkkehardI of St. Gallen and the earlier tenth century. See EkkehardIVCasus S. Galli, ch. g (MGH. SS., ii, p. I I8). Ruodlieb was written atTegernsee, probablyby a monk not long after I050. For a text with a line byline English translationsee Ruodlieb,TheEarliestCourtlyNovel. IntrodfuctionText, TranslationCommentary nd TextualNotes, by E. H. Zeydel (Universityof North CarolinaStudies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures,xxiiiChapel ffill, I959). This edition will be referred to here for the sake ofconvenience.18See BriefsammlungenerZeit Heinrichs V, ed. C. Erdmannand N. Ficker-mann (MGH. Die Briefe der deutschen Kaiserzeit, v, Weimar, I950), no. 73p. I2I; and C. Erdmann, Studieszzur BriefliteraturDeutschlands m elftenffahrhundert,Schriftendes Reichsinstituts ur alteredeutsche Geschichtskunde,i, Leipzig, I938), p. I02. For all Meinhard's grumbles Bishop Gunther(Ios7-6s) was also the patronof one of the noblest early Germanreligioussongs,the Ezzolted.19Einhard, VitaKaroli Magni, ch. 29 (6th edn., O. Holder-Egger [MGH.SRG., Hanover and Leipzig, I9I I], p. 33) and Thegan, Vita HludowiciImperatoris, h. I9 (MGH. SS., ii, p. 594).


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 3 I

clericalelite of the bishoprics and royal monasteriesnursed commonbeliefs about the ancestralnobility of their kind. It was to them notthe cause that would have been blasphemous but at least thenecessary condition of their recent successes both in the militiaChristi nd the even more tangible militiaagainst Slavs, Hungariansand enemies within, successes which, the victors claimed, supportedthe militiaChristiby creating peace and prosperity. These againwere measuredby the extent of lordship, the size of tribute and theamount of booty gained. The Ottonian empire did not differ verymuch from the Frankishin the value its aristocracyattachedto thewealth and power which might be acquired by successful wars ofconquest. They were the rewards of those nobilissimimoresofwhich Widukind had spoken to justify the transfer of kingship froma Frankish house to the Saxon Herlry I.20 We must not be surprisedhowever to find these values looking different in Widukind and thepoems from what they looked like in practice.The aristocracyof early medievalGermany,or ratherher disparateand in themselves only half-formed stem-regions - Franconia,Swabia, Bavaria,Saxony and Lotharingia - has been studied frommany points of view: all-Germanpolitical and constitutionalas wellas local, dynastic and genealogical. Its egotism and unconstructivebehaviour towards rulers who were thought to be concerned withGermanunityin the tenth and eleventhcenturies ncurredthe censuresof patriotic historians of the Medieval Reich, especially Giese-brecht's.2l The unpredictability of its feuds and its a-politicalpursuit of patrimonial aims were held to be responsible for theunfortunateterritorial structure of Germany which only blood andiron could mendin I866. For the constitutionalhistoriansagain,themost importantproblemwas the transiormationof the early medievalnobility into a strictly graded hierarchy with an estate of princesfollowed by counts and free lords, down to the humblest ranks ofministeriales,hemselves the vassals of other ministeriales.Thisorder, the Heerschild,nown in the first place from the legal sourcesof the thirteenth century, seemed to prescribefor the empire a muchmore immobile and caste-ridden aristocraticsociety than existed inEngland or even France. There the initiative of the kings was orcame to be greaterthan in Germany and restricted the autogenous,inherentkind of authorityand lordshiptheir vassalsclaimed. In thisschool of studies, pioneeredby Julius Ficker in the I860S and holding

20 Widukindof Corvey,ResgestaeSaxonicae,.2s (p. 38).21 See W. von Giesebrecht, Geschichteer deutschenaiserzeit, th edn.(Leipzig, I88I), i, pp. 284-95as an example.


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32 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Iits own with HeinrichMitteis's fine comparativeegal and feudalsurveys,the idea of the state still held the centre of the stage.22Another group of scholars, n particularWalter Schlesinger,hasshownthat from the startthe noblespossessed ordshipand powersin their own right, outside the king's reach, and that the Reichthereforewas born particularistic nd did not merely drift in thatdirectionbecauseof mishapsand catastrophesike the extinctionofdynasties,royal minorities and the collision with the papacy.23However his school oo hasnot quiteabandonedhe ideaof a "centralauthority"which, n the guise of the kingship,mightor shouldhaveprevailed. More recentlystill a mainlyprosopographicalpproachto the nobility, ts functionsand achievementsn the Frankish ndpost-Erankish eichhas ed to a re-examinationf the family-structureof the aristocracyn the earlymiddleages. The inspiration eEndthese efforts ame rom GerdTellenbachwhoseschool,especiallyheworkof Karl Schmid,has greatlyalteredall existingperspectives nthe subjectand could be important lso for the study of the Anglo-Saxonnobilityof this period.Many yearsago Tellenbachdrew attention o the decisiverole ofa smallgroupof leading amilies n the ninth-centuryEast-Frankishkingdomwhosemarriage-alliancesiththe Carolingiansndfar-flungconnectionswith one another n his view set them off againstnobleswith only ocalroots.24 The historyandgenealogies f thesefamiliesthus became mportant n orderto understand he workingsof theFrankish mpire n its good daysand bad. It was KarlSchmidwhoconcluded, n the courseof such investigations,hat until the mid-eleventh centuryat least it is quite impossible o look upon thesearistocraticlansas dynastiesn the modern ense,familieswhichcanbe traced rom generationo generation nd identifiedby theirplaceof residenceand high offices ike countshipsand duchies. In tlleninth and tenth centuriestlle historian s at a loss to Snd thiscontinuitynot because he sourcesare poorer,but because he verystructure f familieswas different. The aristocraciesf CarolingianEuropewere madeup of very arge amily-groups onsciousof theirnobility by their descent from a great ancestorwhose name was

22 J Ficker, Vom Heerschilde Innsbruck, I862); H. Mitteis, Der Staat deshohez Mittelalters,4th edn. (Weimar, I953).23 W. Schlesinger,Die Entstehung er LardesherrschczftDresden, I94I), andreprinted with a new introduction (WissenschaRliche Buchgesellschaft,Darmstadt, 964), esp. pp. 26I-S24 G. Tellenbach, "Vom Karolingischen Reichsadel zum deutschenReichsfurstenstand", in Herrschaft und Staat im Mittelalter (Wege derForschung, ii, Darmstadt,I956)t pp. I9I-242.


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY N THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 33perpetuatedn their own and by their membershipof the group.Maternalkin matteredas much as paternaland even more f it wasdeemed o be nobler. A nice exampleof its importance s that ofEadgith, he half-sisterof the Englishking Athelstanwho in 929marriedOtto,alreadymarkedout amonghis brothersas Henry I'ssuccessor. Hrotsvitha f Gandersheim escribed his match n herGestaOltonis nd dweltcarefully n theancestory f the bride. Shewasthedaughter f Edward he Elderbya "most llustrious"motherwhereasAthelstanhad sprung rom an unequalunionwith a womanof rather ndifferent irth.25 In somecaseswe knowthe motherofa greatmagnate ather han his fatherand this is thought o be notmerelyaccidental. The most importarltourceswhich Tellenbachand his schoolemployedwith muchsuccess o recognize nd dentifythese large families are the LibriMemoriales f South German,Lotharingian nd Italian monasteries,ike St. Gallen, Reichenau,Remiremontnd S. Giulia n Brescia. Thousandsof nobles duringthe ninth andtenth centurieshad theirnamesenteredon the pagesof these booksto participaten the benefitswhichthe prayersof thereligiouscommunityconferredboth in life and in death. Hereidentifiablendividuals nd christiannamestypicalof a givenfamilyrecur n groupsof entries ach imeassociatedwithothernameswhichin turn spill over into further entries. The persons who causedthemselves o be so recordedwere husconscious f belonging o verylargekinswhich hrough ntermarriagelendedwith other argekins,cognatescounting or no less thanagnates o makethe connection.Someof the individualswe encountern this way were distinguishedbishops,counts,margraves nd, of coursekingsand dukes;othersremainedotallyobscureand cannotbefound n any othersourcebutthe LibriMemoriales.We are a longway off from dynastiesnamedafter their castles and endowedfrom fatherto son with the samelordships comital,margravialr less andthe sameadvocacies fmonasteries. The transformatiorlf t}leseGrossfamiliennto smaller,more circurllscribed nd close-knit families with a much morecontinuoushistorywas the realsignificance f the so-calledsCrisefthe dynasts"which an older generation f historians onnectedwiththe long cisTil arsof the reignsof HenryIV and HenryV and theInvestitureConflict. The late eleventhand the first half of thetwelfthcentury hus saw a fundamentalhange n the structure f theGermanaristocracy. Only then did it become possible to base

25 Hrotsvitha,Gesta Ottonis,11.75-97, in HrotsvithaeOpera,ed. P. v. Winter-feld (MGH. SRG. Berlin and Zurich, I965)) p. 206 f.


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34 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Idynastiespermanently n the possessionof great offices,counties,advocacies, ot to mentionduchies, andgraviatesnd margraviates.26These viewshavewon a wide measure f assent, omeof it perhapsa little reluctantand weighted with reservations.27They invite,however, negeneral bservation.Based s heyare o singularly ntheLibriMemoriales,he religiousassociation f nobleswith the prayersof a monastic ommunity, hey run the risk, n a ratherunusualandintriguing orm,of confusing onsciousnessndbeing. They assumethat, because hese men were consciousof being membersof a verylarge and fluid groupfor the purposeof having heir memorykept,they were consciousof this for all otherpurposesas well. In East-Frankish hronicles, nnals,episcopaland abbatialLives and in themiraclesof saints, nobles stand out as individuals, ighting feudsagainstone another, eizing church ands, restoring hem now andagainand foundingreligioushouses for complexmotives. Kinshipand ntermarriageetween he leading amilies ather han nstitutionsof government eld this world ogether n the tenth century,and yetthe group-consciousnessostulatedby the new interpretation f theLibri Memoriales arely appears outside them. When men hadbecome rich and powerful agnatic preferences ended to prevail.Fathers trove or theirsons andfelt the full bitterness f losing hemprematurely. They did not relish leaving their hereditaso somedistantkinsmenbut harsh circumstancesike the short expectationof life forced hem to face this prospect. Evenso manypreferredofound monasteries nd nunnerieswith the whole of their fortuneinstead. Otto I's friend, MargraveGero, s a good example.When ninth- and tenth-centurywriterswere particularly nxiousto mention he maternal ather han the paternal ncestryof a great

26 K. Schmid, "Zur Problematikvon Familie, Sippe und Geschlecht, Hausund Dynastie beim mittelalterlichenAdel", Zeitschrift ur die GeschichtedesOberrheins, v (I957), pp. I-62; "Uber die Struktur des Adels iin fruherenMittelalter", 3rahrbuchur frankische Landesforschung,ix (I959), pp. I-23;"Neue Quellen zum Verstandnisdes Adels im I0. Jahrhundert",Zeitschrift .d. Gesch.d. Oberrheins,Viii (I960), pp. I85-232; "Religioses und sippenge-bundenes Gemeinschaftsbewusstseinn fruhmittelalterlichenGedenkbuchein-tragen", DeutschesArchiv ur Erforschung es Mittelalters, (I965), pp. I8-8I.See also Studien und Vorarbeitenzur Geschichtedes grossfrankischen ndfruhdeutschenAdels, ed. G. Tellenbach (Forschungen zur oberrheinischenLandesgeschichte, v, I957).

27 E.g. F. v. Klocke, "ProsopographischeForschungsarbeitund moderneLandesgeschichte",Westfalische orschungen,i (I958), pp. I96 ff.; and also tlleinterve?ations of K. Lechner, M. Mitterauer and K. F. Werner on the theme"Les classes dirigeantes de l'Antiquite aux Temps modernes", XII CongresInternational es SciencesHistoriques, , Actes (Vienna, 29 Aug.-s Sept., I965),pp. I55-8, I58 f., I62-4.


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 3 5

personage hey did not alwayswish to pass genealogicalvalue-judgements utmayhavehadotherreasons. Animportantxampleused to demonstratehe possiblesuperiorityof cognatiomaternalkin)overagnatio paternal in),is the wayin whichthe Carolingianhouse-historianspokeof Hildegard,Charlemagne'secondwifeandthemother f Louis hePious. EinhardaudedherSwabian ncestryandThegan,Louis hePious'sbiographer,dded hatonhermother'sside she was descended romthe SwabianDuke Godfrid(c. 7IO).NeitherEinhardnorTheganmentionedherfatherGerold,a Frank.Yetwe know hathe wasneithera nonentitynoraman o beashamedof, rather hecontrary. Thetwobiographersadspecialreasons orbeing so fussy over Hildegard'sSwabian orbears: heywantedtomake amendsfor the Carolingians nd heal old wounds whichCharlemagne'satherPippinandespeciallyhis uncleCarlmann adstruckwhen they ordered he executionof some leadingSwabiannobles n 746anddeprivedHildegard's inoftheirducatus. Einhardand Thegan's lines of praise for Hildegard'smaternalancestrydiscreetly eiledapastfeudin thehope t wouldbeforgotten.28The term cognatiowas not uniformlyused by early medievalwritersor even by the scribesof charters o meankinshipon themother's ide. Often t stood orrelationshipenerally s in classicalliterature. When n IOI4 Hildegundis,he abbessof the Westfaliannunnery of Geseke, placed herself and her house under themundeburdiumprotection nd ordship) f thearchbishopf Cologneshe tookthis gravestepbecause he was,as she declared,he lastofher cognatiowho could rule the convent. By this she meantherdirect descentfrom her paternalgrandfatherHaold, throughherfatherBernhardndthis wasas it shouldhavebeen. ForwhentheHaoldfamily beganto found Gesekein the middleof the tenthcentury hey reserved he abbacy o the womenof Haold's ineageand headvocacyo hisownandhisbrother'sons. OttoI'sdiplomafor thefoundation26October52) sanctioned llthesearrangementsand they wererememberedn the charterof ArchbishopHeribert(999-IO2I) recordingthe transferof IOI4. Here then cognatioactuallymeantagnatio,descent roma maleancestor. Hildegundis

8 K. Schmid, "Zur Problematik . .", pp. 22 ff. Einhard, Vita Karoli,ch. I8 (p. 22) andThegan, VitaHludowici, h. 2 (MGH. SS., ii, p. 590 f.). Onthe relationsof Franksand Alemansin the eighth centurysee I. Dienemann-Dietrich,"Der frankischeAdel in Alemannien m 8. Jahrhundert",Grundfragender AlemannischenGeschichteVortrageu. Forschungen, i, Igs2 and reprint,I 962), pp I 49-92


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36 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Iwas by no means kinless but her female affinitydid not meet theconditions f the 952 settlement.29K. Schmidhas rightly questioned he methodsof the traditionalschoolof historical enealogistswho aimed,at whatever train o theevidence, t gapless amily-treesor earlymedieval ristocraticociety.But the fluidityof the kin-groups ound ll the LibriMemorialess sogreat hat the excessivecertainties f the old schoolare in dangerofbeingreplaced y chaos. The circumstancehatnoblesentered heirkindredand affinity, iving and dead,does not provethat they failedto distinguish etweennearer nd moredistant ies of kinshipor ruleout close agnatic eelingandthinking. The structure f the Germannobilitycannotbe perceived olely from the LibriMemoriales hichreveal but one facet of its "self-awareness".The situationsandenduringnecessitieswhichdetermirledhatstructuremustbe lookedfor elsewhere.We must begin with the customsof inheritance. These, as willbe seen, did not drawmen ogetherbut, on the contrary, ivided hemand created endemic unrest and tension especially in the moresuccessful nd wealthier amiliesof the aristocracy. High bloodwasa pre-requisite f nobility,but its most tangibleexpressionwas thepossession f landand ordship. The organizationf the CarolingianReich, he methods he Carolingians nd their nobles employed odominate nd exploit heirconquestshad creatednew kindsof powerin the formof high oices, or rather,as far as Germanys concerned,it hadtransplantedheseformseastof the Rhine. Frankishmmigrenoblesor local friendsof the regime n Bavaria,Swabiaand Saxonybecame counts, margraves r even dukes. These positions weremuchcovetedand set new standardsor the familieswhese membersheld them and, of course, or those who did not. It was not enoughto have possesseda high office or a royal connectiononce; theseadvantageshad to be perpetuatedby inheritance. But here theaspirationsof successful individualscame into conflict with the

29 For Otto I's diploma see MGH., Die Urkunden er deutschenKonige ndKaiser, i (Hanover, I879-84), no. I58, pp. 239 f. Archbishop Heribert'scharter(StaatsarchivMunster, Geseke5) reads: "Modo vero ipsa . . . abbatissacognationis suae quae huic predicto loco praeesse potuerit in se finemconspiciens . .". For further referencessee F. W. Oediger, Die RegestenderErzbischofevon Koln, i, 630 (Publikationender Gesellschaft fur RheinischeGeschichtskunde,xxi, Bonn, I954-6I), p. I88. The text of the charter s silenton the descent of the advocacy and it is possible that this remained with theHaold family for a time at least. Their genealogyand history in R. ScholkopfDie SachsischenGrafen,9I9-I024 (Studien und Vorarbeitenzum HistorischenAtlas Niedersachsens, xxii, Gottingen, I957), pp. I4I-7 and table, should betreatedwith caution.


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 3 7

time-honouredprincipleof division,of treatingthe proprietas fa family-groups a wholeto whichbrothers,uncles,cousins, ay andclerk,hada claim. Intenth-century axonywomen,evennunswerenot excluded,or although ustomplaced hembehind hemen, theirbetterexpectations f life - andherenuns excelledthemselvesmeant that large inheritancesaccumulated n their hands. Co-hereditas,f it was not checkedby a highrate of mortality, ould eadto the progressiveragmentationf a greatfortune. It could alsoshiftpossessionsromkin to kinor at leastbringabouta continuousre-distribution f wealth within an important amily. This wasespecially ikely to happenwhen a father died too soon, leavingbehindhim a son or sons of tenderyears. Their inheritancewasthen n jeopardy ot becauseheiruncleswereproverbially ickedbutbecausethe house neededa head to take chargeof its lands anddependants ndthe rnilitesvassals)neededa commanderwhom heycouldfollowwith confidence.Thesemovements f propertydid not always akeplacepeacefullyandthey suggestthatallod was not reallya stablebase to supporthighrank. The holderof a ducatus, margraviater comitalofficewasof courserewarded y landsandrevenueswhichwerepartof hisfief,but theseagain ethim apart romhisless fortunate insmenwhocould not sharetilem; nor could they alwaysbe equallydividedamongsthis sons. The favour Otto I, for instance,showed toHermannBillungbadlyupset the equilibriumwithinhis family: atfirsthis brotherWichmann ecamean enemyandwhen he died hissonsaccusedHermann f havingcheated hem in the distribution ftheir father's nheritance.30The dissipationof allods by partitionandmarriagemade t allthe more mportanto beableto passon fiefsof office ikecountships rld o possessasmanyaspossibleof these,sothat at least two sons could enjoyhonourswhich,from the tenthcenturyonwardsf not before,came o be identifiedmoreand morewithHochadelhigh nobility). Additionalons andoccassionallyllbutone wereplaced n the Churchwhere he cathedralsnd he royalchapelofferedcareers o those with the best connections, mbitionand, not least of all, talent. This left the monasteries or thedisinherited, ut in tenth-century t. Gallen omeof the monkswerereportedo be rich andto live in affluence. From he ninthcenturyonwardsa grantof land or revenues romlandwas expectedwhenplacinga child n a house ike Corvey, ndthe reformed bbeysof theeleventhdidnot reject uch giftseither.

30Widukind,op. cit., ii.4 (p. 7o) and iii.24, 25 (p. II6).


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38 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 IPromotion to the highest eeelesiastieal honours, arehbishopries,

bishopries and royal abbeys, depended on royal favour; this alsomattered more than has been thought in the ease of duehies,margraviates and eountships. When kingship was sueeessful andvigilant it eould sometimes make the preearious tenure of honoursvery real. With so many failures of direet lines and in the newlycreated eastern marehes of Saxony, nephews and more distantkinsmen depended on the king's goodwill to sueeeed, and the pagesof Thietmar of Merseburg reveal what shrewd use the emperorHenry II eould make of these opportunities. If kingship wasdefeetive it forfeited eontrol over high appointments as did Henry IVand later Henry V in Saxony and then it also failed to provide thegains in war whieh inereased the fund of land, rewards and honoursavailable for distribution amongst an ever pressing and numerousnobility. After I077 Henry IV might advanee his followers but itdepended on them what they eould make of their new positions. HisHohenstaufen son-in-law sllrvived as duke of Swabia north of theDanube, and Wipreeht of Groitzseh, thanks to his marriagewith thedaughter of a Bohemian duke, in the valley of the Mulde and theUpper Elbe.The German aristoeraeystruggled with these problems generationafter generationand they explain most of its perennial euds, rebellions,outrages as well as its more positive aehievements like internalcolonization. Its needs for more lands and lordship were insatiable,given the system of partible inheritanees from whieh neither kingsnor dukes nor lesser powers eould depart against the pressures ofestablished elaims. In the OttonianReichonly the highest dignitieseseaped partition, and in the eleventh eenturycomitatust least beganto break up inside families. Even before, they had not been stableand mappable entities. It is interesting to see the ways in which thefamily-group was to be reeoneiled to the outstandingposition aehievedby one of its members, how eousins or more often brothers were tobe made to share the heightened dignity and standing an oEce-fiefrepresented. Joint tenures were not uneommon in early as well aslater medieval Germany. For the most part however the lesserkinsmen of a eount or margrave or a bishop had to be content withthe opportunities such positions might afford them in the future.Soon after Udo of Reinhausen had become bishop of Hildesheim inI079 his widowed sister Beatrix wrote a long letter to him fromFraneonia, asking him to see to it that her daughter Sophia who wasbeing pursued by an inferior suitor should be married as befittedher birth. For the other daughter, Burtgarda,who was "a bride in


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THE GERMANARISTOCRACYN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 39Christ" he was to find suitable advancement, no doubt an abbacy.For herself she wantedjustice about allods which another brother,bythen deceased,had takerl rom her. Her sons exiled in Saxony wereto be included in any peace the Saxons might make with Henry IV.The great war betweenthe Salianking and Rudolf of Rheinfeldenwasat its height when this Carl Erdmanncalled it the earliest Germanfamily letter-was written.3l It is arresting because it reveals asituation so very like the one described in Ruodlieb. Here the herohas to go illtOexile because his lords have let him down and failed toreward him while landing him with many feuds. Beatrix'ssons toohad to leave their home because they could not cope with theirenemies. Ruodlieb's mother is left in charge of his lands and housewhile he seeks better service in exile. Like Beatrixshe had outlivedher husband and it was common for aristocraticwidows to be left incontrol of family fortunes and to enjoy great authority. The "rexmaior" (the greater king) of the poem advises his departing miles,Ruodlieb, never to marrywithout his mother's collsent and he letshim go home at her request. Needless to say, he, the mother andRuodlieb himself all echo their horror about unequal marriages.32Socially the whole kin was meant to sharethe honour which fell toone of its members. This is nowheremore poignantly expressedthanin the speech which Wipo, Conrad II's biographer places in themouth of his hero at the most critical moment of his career.33 Thescene is at Kamba where the archbishops,bishops and princes of allthe stemlands of the Reichassembled in I024 to elect a successor toHenry II who had died childless. Nearness to the Ottonianswas thecriterion but Conrad shared this equallywith a younger cousin alsocalled Conrad. The younger man, characteristically,had come topossess the lion's share of the Salian family's patrimony simplybecause the elder Conrad'sfather died too soon, leaving his son anorphan- a good exampleof wealth shiftingwithinakin. Butnowtheoutcome of the Kur (election) would mean that one of the cousinsmust be wholly overshadowedby the other and this is how the older

31 See Briefsammlunge7 der Zeit HeinrichsIV, pp. 64-7 and Erdmann,St^dzen,p. I64.32 R^codlieb,, 1l. 476-87; XVi, 1l. I4-I6 and 55-7 (ed. Zeydel,pp. 74-5, I30-I,

I 32-3).33 For what follows see Wipo, GestaChuonradimperatoris,h. 2, in WipowzisOpera,3rd edn., ed. H. Bresslau (MGH. SRG., Hanoverand Leipzig, I9I5),

pp. I3-20 and esp. p. I7, 1l. 32 ff. Wipo's Gesta are Englished in ImperialLives and Lettersof the EleventhCentury, ranslatedby T. E. Mommsen andK. F. Morrison(Recordsof Civilization, xvii, New Yorkand London, I962),pp. 52-I00. The translationhereis my own.


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4o PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 IConradn whose avoureventswerealreadydrifting riedto preparehis relative or his disappointment:The greatesthonour and supremepower will now be with us and it comes tous in such a way that it will remain with one of us if we wish it. Thereforeit seems to me that if this honour is joined to one of us the other shall notlack a share n it in some way or another quodammodo)... If the kinsmenofkings are honouredfor the kings' sake and as all wish to treatus as we treatedone anotherso that really the promotionof one of us depends on the goodwillof the other, well then who can be more fortunate than either of us if theother reigns ?Conrad he Youngerwas made o feel the sole kingmakern Wipo'soratory.Let us thereforebe careful [the futureking continues]and not put a strangerbefore a kinsman, an unknown before one who is known lest this day, so farone of joy, shall bring us lasting misfortune if we deal ill with the goodwillthe whole people (populus)wishes to show us.Wipo, like Widukindbefore him, used the wordpopulus when hemeantnobles. But what mattersmost in this homilyby whichtheyoungerConradwas to be consoledwith the penumbra f participa-tion is the sentiment:bettera cousin hana stranger.By no meansall the membersof a royal ens obeyed he lesson asthe bitterfeuds in the Ottonianhouse, the risingsof 938-40, 953-4,the g70s and 984 show, nor did the youngerConrad. The existenceof commanding eightswhichcouldnot easilybe sharednot only hadthe consequence f disruptinghe solidarity f kinsmenwhichrestedon parity.34 It also meant that the higher nobility did not like tosee Iessermen, still ingenui but not of the leadinggroups,ride intotheirmidst. During he periodof Ottonianmilitary xpansion longthe easternbordersof Saxonyand Thuringia he best opportunitiesfor advancementwere monopolizedby a few, mainly East-Saxonfamily-groups. Eachclancould hushope o accommodate ore haIlone of their own in princelypositions. Only a handfulof comitalkins are knownfor ninth-centurySaxony;by the end of the tenththere appear o be at least 27.35 Not all individualcounts can beassigned o a stirps but of those who can, very few seem to havebelonged o familieswith no counts n their ancestryand even here

34 The feeling that sudden riches alienated a man from his blood-relations sstronglyvoiced in Ruodlieb, , 1l. 426-9 (pp. 70-I).35 The five families isted in S. Kruger,Studien ur SachsischenGrafschaftsver-fassung im 9. 3rahrh?cndertStudien u. Vorarbeiten z. Histor. AtlasNiedersachsens,xix, Gottingen, I950) might be comparedwith the twenty-fivebuilt up by Scholkopf,Op. cit. The Billungs and the counts of Stade must beadded to her figure whatever its justification. For a critical comment seeSchmid in Zeitschrift fur Wurttembergische andesgeschichte, xiii (I964),

pp. 215-27-


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY N THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 4 Iit is difficult to be sure. Countships and burgraviatesmight come toless important kindreds by way of sub-infeudation and this couldmean, from the early eleventh century onwards, through the favourof bishops. Yet even here they had to meet stiff competition fromthe second or third sons of the most eminent bloods. Of Thietmarof Merselrurg's our brothers, for instance, two went into the Churchas he hacl done, one, Henry, succeeded his father as count and theother, Frederick, commanded Bishop Thietmar's knights and laterbecame bllrgraveof Magdeburg.36

The distancebetween great nobles (primores) and lesser ones, theirmilites (vassals) was vast and the great took care to keep it that way.To prove this there are some good examples. In 938 Otto I had tofight against his half-brother, Thangmar, who had resorted to armsbecause he thought himself cheated of his mother's inheritance. Theking by a rapid march trapped him in the Eresburg. Thangmar fledinto the chapel where he placed his weapons and his golden necklaceupon the altar,perhaps as a sign of surrenderratherthan the symbolicrenunciation of a claim to the kingship. The bastard-son of a noble,Thiadbold, struck at him but was wounded and soon died as hedeserved to do. Then another of the mere milites, called Meginzo,killed Thangmar with a lance as he climbed in through the windownear the altar. The king did not know about this; he had not beenpresent, as Widukind is anxious to tell his readers, but when he heardhe was outraged by his men's presumption. Even as an enemyhis half-brotherwas sacrosanct for underlings and nobodies such asMeginzo. But he could not punish him or his fellows because heneeded them. The wars against the enemies who threatened hisprecarious possession of the kingship had only just begun and hecould not demoralize his milites. On the other hand if Thangmarwas immune, even as a rebel, his followers werepromptly strung up tomake an example.37Another instance of the savage revenge that could await anoffending vassalis related by Adam of Bremen. In Io48 ArchbishopAdalbert invited the emperor Henry III to visit Bremen which layquite outside the usual royal itinerary. No king had ever been inthese regions before. His very coming was felt to be a threat to thelocal balance of power between the Billung family and the arch-

3 6 See R. Holtzmann's ntroduction o his edition of Thietmar, p. xv.37 Widukind, ii.II (p. 77). The story of Thangmar's death should becomparedwith William Rufus's narrowescape fromthe vulgusmilitumat MontSt. Michael: see William of Malmesbury,GestaRegum, v. 309 (ed. W. Stubbs,Rolls Series,London, I889, ii, p. 364).


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42 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Ibishopric. Count Thietmar, a brother of Duke Bernhard II, seemsto have plotted to ambush the emperor near Lesum, a huge estatewhich Conrad II had taken from his widowed aunt Emma, the sisterof Bishop Meinwerk of Paderborn. It was Billung land and theyfeared the archbishop's acquisitive ambitions. The emperorescaped, called Thietmar to account and forced him to fight a judicialduel against one of his own vassals who must have acted as accuserand champion. Thietmar perished, but a few days later his sonThiemo seized this man and hung him by the legs between twosavage dogs until he was dead. It is true that he paid for his vengeancewith arrest aIld lifelong exile but by the standards of his caste he haddone the right thing.38Throughout this period great lords were not squeamish abouthanging or murderingthe vassals of their neighbours. It is as well toknow of such incidents because they show what an idealised worldthat of the poem Ruodliebeally is: idealised, or seeking to establishless savage standards of behaviour. Ruodlieb s now dated byscholars about I050 and one of its main themes is that of noblerevenge, of forgiving one's enemies with interest rather thanperpetuate hostilities. Henry III himself preached these ideas andwished to urge them upon his intractable princes. The circle ofclerks and writers about him to which the author of the poem mayhave belonged, had a task but it was, like the much more ambitiousaims of the Carolingiancourt school, one they were unable to fulfilsuccessfully though we are the richer by Wipo's biographyand poems,perhaps Ruodlieb nd the EcbasisCaptivi, hanks to their efforts.39Education alone could not pacify the lay aristocracy or solve itsproblems.In the very core of the story Ruodliebepicts a world of wishfulthinking, the career of the hero, his ascent from the status of anunconsideredmileswho had only his food and clothes to the ranks ofthe mighty.40 Royal favour was not ubiquitous and the most that hislike could normally hope for was, as has been said, to hold oice as

38 Adam of Bremen, Gesta, ii.8 (p. I49).39 On the theme of noble revenge in Ruodlieb ee W. Braun, Studien zumRuodlieb Quellen und Forschungen zur Sprach- und Kulturgeschichte derGermanischellVolker, N. F. vii, Berlirl, 962), pp. 22-4, 29 f. The connectionof Ruodliebwith Henry III's court and of the Ecbasiseven with his time isdisputed. At the very least howeverthe creatorof Ruodliebwanted to captivateand exhort a noble lay audienceand knew its tastes and resorts well40 Ruodlieb, , 11. 74-7 (pp. 64-5). On the theme of social ascent n the poemsee K. Hauck,


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDI,E AGES 43the vassalsof great ay lords or bishops. Ruodliebat the end of hisservieeat the eourt of the great king is thought worthyof eomitalhonours,perhaps n imitationof Waltharius.4lHe has eonduetedwarsand embassieswith much skill and yet does not expeet a greatdeal. Among he famouscouneilsof wisdomhis royalpatrongiveshim beforehe leaveswe also fitld a warning,neverto lend money ohis lord. It was betterto give outrighton demand. Lendingonlyeausedresentment, ome trap would be laid to find him guilty of anoffence o that he would be glad to lose only his moneyand not lifeaIld imb as well. The authorof eourseused a biblicalsourcehere(Eeelesiasticus, iii. I5) and adviee so eouched was a11 he moreauthoritativeor his audienee.42 As a commenton contemporarylordship t should herefore e takennotice of, althoughwe must notomit also examples f that largitaswhich n all the sourcesappears sa neeessaryvirtue of rulers. Otto I's brother Henry, duke ofBavaria, o Widukind ells us, gave his sister-in-law n marriage oa vassalof modest ortuneand so madehim his socius,his equalandfriend. Her husband Burkhardcan be traced as burgrave ofRegensburg nd margrave f the Bavarian astertlMareh. Probablyhis marriage aisedhim to these honoursbut he seemsto have been"mediocris"only in relation to the stirps regia which Widukindwanted o exaltaboveall others. 3Ruodliebs important o the historianbecause he poem seems tostand betweenthe Reichof the Ottoniansand the first two Salianemperorsand the cataelysmwhich later overwhelmed he Saliandynastyand its inherited, raditional upports. It is imbued withall the pre-oceupations f the lay aristocracy,ncluding ts religiousones. There are the embassies and the lavish presents whichdenoted he respeet n which one rulerand his nobles were held byanother, those gifts whieh placed fortunes into the hands of asueeessfulwar-lordand whieh he could then distributeas rewardsto his followers. OttoI's triumphs ollowed hoseof the Carolingiansin this faithfully. He too reeeived rarities,gold plate, glassware,ivories, perfumes and exotic animals ike apes and ostriches romGreeksand Moslemsafterhis victoryat the Lech,and again he giftsof halfEuropeat his last greatcourtat Quedlinburgn 973. OttoIIIand HeIlry I and their entourage njoyedno less prestige,we know)

41 Ruodlieb,v, 11.402-4 pp.70-I, where however "comitatus" has beenmistranslated)42 Ibid., v, 11.$02-Io (pp. 74-5) and see Braun,Stzwdie?l ZM1}2 Rodlieb, p. 14.


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44 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Ibecause o manyof the gifts they collected ndedup in the treasuriesof their bishops. There also, in the poem, are the gesturesof self-denial when the "greaterking" declinesmost of what his defeatedadversary offers him as compensation.44This could happenoccasionally,or we read that neitherOtto III at Gnesen I000) norHenry II at Ivois in I023 accepted he riches temptinglydisplayedfor them by their "lesser king", Boleslas and Robert the Piousrespectively. They wantedonly relics and took only not to offend.For the rest the moral n Ruodlieb eems to be that aristocraticpowerand right shouldbe temperedby discretion. The greatkingdoes not adviseRuodlieb o foregoconcubines hosen rom his ownbond-women,only they must not become the mistressesof hishousehold.45 He also exhortshim to clingto the road,even f it wasmuddy,rather han ride roughshod hrough he standingcorn butthe motivefor such self-restraintwas prudenceand not that noblesowedrespect o the toils of the husbandman. The angeredpeasantsmight ll-treatand rob a man of rankwho had damaged heir cropsand giventhem high words nto the bargain. This counselfaintlyforeshadowshe provincialpeace-oaths f the late eleventhcenturyand the Landgriedenf the twelfthwhichsought o protectcornfieldsand vineyardsagainstthe depradations f armies and travellers.46That we shouldbe led into a villagecommunity n Ruodlieb'sravelsis in itself of greatsignificance. The households f the old and theyoung peasant we can only guess their status were not poor,and one of them, that of the young man, was accustomedo puttingup noblemenon their journeys. A small present n return or the,perhapsobligatory,hospitalitywas not unusual. The behaviour fRuodlieb's ed-headed ompanion,who mortallywounds his host,also shows he reverseof the medal. The poet, in whathas survivedof his work, ells us nothingabout he businessor the standing f thisman and yet, characteristically, akes t clearthat evil, by its verynature,was plebeianand not noble. The red-head s tried on thespot and again t is worthnotingthat provisions or the instant rialof quarrelsome nd noxioustravellerscan be found in one of the

44 Ruodlieb, , 1l. 203-8 (pp. 60-I).40 Ibid., v, 11. 476-83 (pp. 74-5). Examples of eleventh-century Germannobles jeopardizing he future of their patrimoniesby keeping mistresses andremaining unmarried are not hard to find. Cf. the case of Count Cuno ofWulflingenbelow p. 49.46 Ibid., v, 11.457-60 (pp. 72-3); and cf. the Pax Alsatiensis,c.g (MGH.Constitutiones t Acta Publica, i, cd. L. Weiland [Hanover, I893], no. 429,

p. 6I3): "Equi . . . et vinee et segetes sub hac pacis condictione perpetuopermaneant . .".


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACY IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 45peace-oaths f the latereleventhcentury.47 In the village cenes hepoem seems to herald the at least partial emergenceof the ruralpopulation rom the culturalpassivity and obscurityof the earlymiddleages.Its causes were complex. To say that the growing volume ofcolonizationwithin Germanyand on her Eastern rontiersplacedpeasant abourat a higherpremium nd nduced ords o granteasierterms to their dependants s to use an argumentof convenience.More importantwas the great movementof ecclesiastical eform,for it lookednot onlytowards he humiles ndthe poor or supportbutaimedat bettering heirreligious ituation n a church ess exclusivelyaristocratichan in the past. It sought to providebetter parochialserviceswith the help of communities f canonsregular, hemselvesrecruited ometimes romthe ranksof the ignobiles. The demand orclericalcelibacy or the most part concerned hem. The waves ofagitation n SouthernGermany, speciallySwabiaand Alsace romabout 075 to I095 roused hemfrom heirobscurity ndcarried hemto the fringesof the monastic eformmovemented by Hirsau. Notall the lay-brethren, irsau'smoststartling nnovation, anhavebeennobles (or even ministeriales)hatever he chroniclerBernoldwrotein a momentof elation. In a famouspassagehe has describedhowaristocratic onvertscooked,bakedand looked afterthe pigs of themonksbut he also mentioned he conversion f wholevillagesand ofpeasant girls who renounced marriage.8 That matters is thatnoblesas lay-brethren ndas partof theirnew ives in religion, houldhave imitated he laboursof farm-servarlts,he least privileged lassof agrarian ependants.It is possible also to discoverhere and there a new relationshipbetween alms-giversand alms-takers n the literatureof the lateeleventhand early welfthcentury,a relationship ifferent rom thatwhichspokeso strongly hrough he pagesof earlyIrledievalGermanLives of royaltyand bishops. The charitabledeeds of kings andprelates emained, f course,an essential opic for their biographers

47 Ruodlieb, iii, 11.II ff. (pp. 94-5) and cf. the Pax Dei of I084, C.8 (MGH.Constitutiones,, no. 426, p. 609). On these provisions see also J. Gernhuber,Die Landfriedensbewegungn DeutschlGndis zum Mainzer ReichslandfriedenonI 235 (Bonner Rechtswissenschaftliche Abhandlungen, xliv, Bonn, I952),pp. 206 ff.

48 Bernold,Chronicon, . I083 and a. I09I (MGH. SS. v, pp. 439 and 452 f.).On the lay-brethrenat Hirsau see H. Jakobs,Die Hirsauer, Kolner HistorischeAbhandlungen, iv, Koln Graz, I96I), passim. A youth "plebeiae libertatis"and his father are mentioned among the lay-brethren, he "fratresbarbati"ofZwiefalten: see Berthold of Zwiefalten's Chronicon,ch. 20 (MGH. SS., x,p * I 07) .


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46 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Ibut now a note of personal interest, of real concern for individualsufferers occasionally appears besides the accepted commonplaces.Abbot William of Hirsau, on his way to found a new cell, paused tovisit a hovel. According to Haimo, the author of his Life, he putaside his dignity and severity, sat by the fire with the very poor womanhe found within and enquired how she could live. When he dis-covered that neither she nor her husband knew the creed he taughtthem as much as they were able to understandand asked them to comeand see him at his destination next day. There he received themkindly and looked after their needs. William also seems to havevisited the ailing poor in the almonry and even irstheir villages and tohave taken care that they were decently buried.49 Comforting thesick of any class was normally the task of the parochial clergy and thecritics of Hirsau were not slow to accuse the monks of usurpation.But these incidents in the "Life of Abbot William" should be judgedin a different light. Men of his rank and birth had not, in the tenthcentury, come so close to the pauperi they tried to help.

A like concern for the unfortunatewas, surprisinglyenough, ascribedalso to Henry IV himself, the man whom all the reformers detestedand damned. In the anonymous Life of the emperor his care forthe indigent sick is described with exceptionally lurid, if conventional,details and the author s anxious to show that Henry IV did not merelyorder his servants to do good for him. He also had a fixed llumber ofpauperi fed and supported at his demesne residences and wanted tobe told when someone had died so that he could keep his obit andhave another appointed in his place.50

Necessity forced strange allies upon the king. Deserted by manyof his princes and nobles and some of his bishops Henry IV soughtfriends amongst the lower orders, especially his ministeriales, raisedpeasant armies and shocked clerical Germanyby his close ties with theburgesses of Worms and his encouragementof their like up and downthe Rhine valley. The East-Saxon princes too made use of pettyfreemen to enlarge their rising in I073 and to pack their arinies, withdisastrous results as it turned out. Lastly we must not rejectaltogether as mere figures of speech the taunts of the pamphleteersin the long conflict between emperor and pope. When they tell us

49 Vita WillihelmiAbbatisHirsaugiensis, haps. I7 and 20 (MGH. SS., xii,p. 2I7 and 2I8. The value of this source has been underrated n W. Watten-bach and R. Holtzmann, DeutschlandsGeschichtsquellenm Mittelalter, i, 3(Tubingen, I948), pp. 390 f., and also in Jakobs,op. cit., p. xviii.

50 Vita Heinrici IV. Imperatoris,ch. i, ed. W. Eberhard (MGH. SRG.,Hanover, r8gg), pp. IO f., and the English translation, Imperial Lives andLetter.s, . I03.


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACYN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 47that the great questionsof the daywere being bandiedabout n thewomen'squartersor that the writingsof their opponentshad beenpropagated mongst he crowds,they may have been right for alltheir rhetoric. Manegold of Lautenbachwho amongst othersasserted his in his Liberad GebehardumIO83-IO85) was himselfa plebeianand sometimeswrote ikeone. He wasalso an agitator fgenius; his partisanspraised him for revivingthe revolt againstHenry IV in Alsacesingle-handed. Nobles andknightsflocked ohim to be absolved romexcommunicationnd promisedobedienceto Pope Urban II.51 There is little doubt that the writingsandpreachingsof the anti-Henrician olemicists n the Reichreacheda muchwidercircleand,morestill, founda much argerand sociallymixed audienceamongstthe laity than any literary"publication"had everdone before.These upheavals onfrontedhe leadingstrataof German ocietywith new problems n addition o the age-old ones that were stillwith them: partible inheritances,he striving for parity betweenbrothers ndthe rapid lowof estateswithin amiliesor betweenhemthrough the claims of affinity by marriage. The long wars inGermany uring he lastquarter f theeleventhcenturyandthefiftyyears beforeFrederickBarbarossa'slection f anythingaggravatedthe pressures n noblefortunes. The warsdemandedhat mportantfamiliesand ndividuals adto increaseheirmilitary trengthandtokeep largernumbersof milites hantheir lands couldsupport. Theend of fightingwas in itself dangerous. As longas their menwereemployed hey could alsohope to maintain hemout of the activityof war as such: plunder, oraging,ransomsand any other rewardsthat successfulexpeditionsand raidsmight procure. The growingpractice of enfeoing ministeriales with fragmentsof monasticadvocaciesgainstwhichthe Churchought n vain,had, accordingoEkkehardf Aura, ts cause n the needto keepup war-bands. Theauthorof the "Life of Henry IV" describedwith biting ironytheplight of nobleswho had ived on awar-footingortoo long andwerethreatenedwith impoverishmentnderthe emperor'sLandgriedefI IO3. The familyhistorian f the Welfs n the later welfthcenturynoted hatWelf IV (ob.I IOI) was thefirstof his housewho, n returnfor greatISefs,deigned o becomethe vassalof bishopsand abbots.He did this becausehe had givell too many estatesto his followers

51 In the preface of his Liber ad Gebehardumed. K. Francke, MGH.Libelli de Lite I-mperatorumt Pontificum, , p. 3II), Manegoldcalled himselfsCgenere biectus". For his activities in Alsace see Bernold, Chronicon,a.I094 (MGH. SS., v, p. 46I). A pestilencehelped him.


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48 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Iduring the time of the troubles.52 The Welfs of course were not aloneirl trying to recoup themselves for over-enfeoSments by extortingecclesiastical fiefs.The conditions of the late eleventh and early twelfth cerlturythusdid not unequivocallyfavour, as is usually thought, the consolidationof noble fortunes and their continuity. The wars between the lasttwo Salian rulers, HexlryIV and Henry V, and their more implacableenemies, especially the East-Saxon nobles, only brought it about thatkingship for many years on end was no longer the most importantsource of rewards and favours in the northern and easterIlregions ofthe ReicAt.This only intensiSed the endemic feuds amongstaristocraticcontendersfor spoils and inheritances. After IO85 the warof the East-Saxon bishops and nobles against Henry IV began todegenerate iIlto a number of murderous vendettas between them.Yet neither the religious movement with its cautious interest in theruralvulgGs nor the rise of the ministeriales,he serf-knights, bluntedthe initiative of the high aristocracyor changed their caste very much.It is true that in the expanding society of the twelfth century thefamilies of the nobility could not man all the positions that had to bemanned and this gave the ministerislesheir opportunities to invadespheres of action in government and justice hitherto closed to them.But the primores) the men with important allods, advocacies, count-ships, not to mention higher honours, at their disposal on the wholeand in most regions remained firmly in control. The distance whichhad always separateda few score individuals and families, the minoritywithin the minority, from their milites was decisive. It set certainlimits to the advance of the ministeriales and made it easier for many ofthe less fortunate and economically hard-pressednobles to Inergewiththem. Germanpolitical society, like the areassettled by its enterprise,could thus grow larger without experiencing any fundamental shiftin its leading strata or becoming more homogeneous.There remains the problem of family structure and here theevidence for the persistent and unyielding habits of the aristocracy nthe management of its most vital concerns, especially inheritances,must be set against the evidence for change. The complexity ofclaims upon a given estate was at no time more manifest than when itwas proposed to alienate it to the Church. Irl the tenth and early

52 On the sub-advocacies as fiefs for warriors see Ekkehard, ChroniconUniversale, . I099 (MGH. SS., vi, p. 2I0 f.). On the plight of the nobles withoverlargewarbandssee the Vita HeinriciIV. Imperatoris, h. 8 (ed. cit., p. 28;the translation,ed. cit., pp. I20 f.). For Welf IV see the Historia Welforam,ch. I3 (MGH. SS., xxi, p. 462).


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THE GERMANARISTOCRACYN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 49eleventh century it had always been difficult to protect proprietaryfoundations againstthe importunateresentment of heirs, the kindredof the donor. It was no easier later despite the new libertas ofmonastichouses warrantedby papalprivileges. Men who wished tofound monasteriesstill had to square their kinsmen in all directionslest their plans should come to grief after their deaths. A goodexample of the difficultieswhich even devoted lay patrons of reformhad to contend with comes fromthe foundationhistoryof Zwiefalten,near the Danube in Northern Swabia. It was written in the thirddecade of the twelfth century by one of the monks, Ortlieb, andcompleted by Berthold who became abbot of the house. WhenCounts Cuno and Liutold, commonly called after their castle atAchalm, decided to found a monastery sometime before IO89, theyhad outlived all their brothers so that most of the family's landsamassed in their hands.53 Some of them they held jointly, othersin severalty. Cuno left behind him three illegitimate sons whobecame the property of their unfree mother's lord, Count Hartmannof Dillingen, and could not inherit.54 Liutold was unmarriedandchildless. To make sure however that Zwiefalten should securelyenjoy their gifts they had, first of all, to win over their sisterWilliberga'sson, Count Wernerof Gruningen whose claims, Ortliebdeclared, came before all the other kin's. He received the castles atAchalm with most of the ministeriales s well as half the church andvilla at Dettingen, half the villa of Metzingen and half the church atEndingen.5 That the brothersthemselves only possessed halves inthese lands and revenues suggests earlier divisions. Sometime afterI092 when Count Liutold became the sole survivor, two sons ofanother sister, Mathilda of Horburg, came forward and demandedtheir shares. Ortlieb thought that custom allowed them no claimswhatsoever and that they had alreadyreceived their due out of theirmother's inheritance. But Count Liutold knew better and gavethem the castle of Wulflingen(nearWinterthur)with all the lands andknights in this region, including an estate already granted toZwiefalten.56 This important complex of possessions had come tothe family by the marriage of Cuno and Liutold's father, CountRudolf, with Adelhaid of Mompelgard. The sons of sisters in thiscase were merelythe most importantrelations that had to be reckoned

53 Ortlieb of Zwiefalten,Chronicon,, I (MGH. SS., x, p. 72).54 CasusMonasterSi etrishusensis,ii, 3 (MGH. SS., xx, p. 649), the chronicleof the monasteryof Petershausenof which one of the sons became abbot.55 Ortlieb)Chronicon,.7 (p. 76).6 Ibid., i.8 (p. 77).


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5o PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER 4 Iwith, not the only ones. Five brothershad pre-deceasedthe foundersof Zwiefalten and of these two, Werner, Bishop of Strassburg, andEgino, had reached manhood and received their shares of the family'slands. Their estates lay partly in Alsace and partly in Swabia and atleast one manor, Ebirsheim n Alsace, seems to have been held jointlywith Liutold even though Bishop Werner and Egino sided withHenry IV while Liutold and Cuno followed the anti-king Rudolf ofRheinfelden in the great conflict which divided the Swabianaristocracy. After Egino's death his wife Sophia married again andwith her second husband, Count Conradof Habsburg, had to be giventwenty marks as her share out of the sale of Ebirsheim.57 Themonastery had trouble also with two brothers, named after their seatat Mohringen, who claimed an estate by right of their grandmother,a kinswoman of Count Rudolf. They too therefore were distantlyrelated to the founders of Zwiefalten. The abbey however was notalways the loser by the endless ramificationsof cohereditas.Wernerof Gruningen gave a hamlet to Hirsau which had belonged to hismother Williberga and Abbot Gebhard of Hirsau (another kinsman)had to surrender a holding elsewhere to buy out Count Liutold'srights. The count then gave it to his own monks.58It will be seen that the lands of Zwiefalten's founders lay widelyscattered in Northern Swabia, Alsace and Switzerland. Theirparents had lived at Dettingen despite the building of Achalm Castle.Liutold of Achalm himself was occasionally called "of Dettingen".69Wulflingen seems to have been regarded as a seat of at least equalimportance where Count Cuno took up residence. The descent ofAchalm is especially instructive. Werner of Gruningen and nowalso of Achalm seems to have made over his inheritance to the Welfduke, Henry the Black of Bavariawho promptly gave it to his daughterSophia as a marriageportion when she was joined to Berthold III ofZShringen.0 Stem-seats could thus permutate with bewilderingfrequency within families or change hands so that the traditions ofone kin were thrown into the keeping of another and then passed onagain to a third. It was not only the failure of direct male heirs as inthe case of Cuno and Liutold which brought about these situations.The proliferation of castles by which individuals and later wholefamilies came to be named thus did not necessarily stand for a morestable and unequivocally patrilineal family structure. To achieve

57Ibid.,i.5 PP 74f)58Loc.cit.(pp. 73 f. and 75).59 Berthold of Zwiefalten,Chronicon,h. I6 (MGH. SS., x, p. IO5).60 Op cit.,ch. I8 (p. IO6).


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THE GERMAN ARISTOCRACYN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES SIthis in full measure the German nobles would have had to limit theclaims of female heirs and the fragmentation of estates, includinglordships, it gave rise to. G. Duby has shown that from the latereleventh century onwards, at least the droitde commandementscapeddivision amongst the families of the castellans in the Maconnais.6lThe development in the Reichwas not so clear-cut. Perhaps therewas more scope for multiplying lordship by colonization and newsettlement.As long as the expectations of life did not improve markedlyinheritances remained as fluid as before. For the same reason thepowerful and wealthy matron who outlived husbands and brothers,did not disappearfrom public life. The political history of Saxonyin the first half of the twelfth century was dominated by the largeinheritanceswhich the great families of the eleventh had to leave totheir surviving womanfolk: Wulfhilde and Eilika Billung, Richenzaand Gertrude of Northeim, Oda, Kunigunde and Adelheid ofWeimar-Orlamundeand most of all Gertrude, the sister of MargraveEkbert of Meissen, whose wealth, nobility, and power the chroniclersvied in extolling. C'Saxony'salmighty widow", as the chroniclerEkkehardof Aura calledhernwas one of the pillars of the conspiraciesagainst Henry V in which her son-in-law Lothar of Supplinburgtookthe lead.62 Another bellicose widow, the Welf princess Sophia,whom we have already met as the wife of Berthold of ZShringen,joined her brother Henry the Proud at the siege of Falkenstein(nearRegensburg)with 800 knights in II29 shortly after the death of hersecond husband.63 She could safely be left in charge of theoperations when her brother was called away to another and moreurgent siege by his father-in-law, Lothar, now king. Eilika Billungafter the death of her husband, Count Otto of Ballenstedt, settled atBurgwerben on the river Saale where she built up the castle andbecame the high-handed "advocatissa"of the monastery of Goseck,forcing out one abbot and chosing his successor. From her othercastle at Bernburg she was said to tyrannize the countryside.64Withthe exception of Wulfhilde Billungallthese noblewomensurvivedtheir husbands by at least some years; Kunigunde and Adelheid ofWeimarand the Ekbertine Gertrudeoutlived no less than three.

61 G. Duby, La Societeaux xie et xiie Sieclesdans la regionmazvonnaiseParis,I953), pp. 277-8I, 44In 467-

62 Ekkehard,Chronicon, . I I I2 (MGH. SS., vi, p. 247): "illa prepotensperSaxoniamvidua".63 HistoriaWelforum, h. I7 (MGH. SS., xxi, p. 464).64ChroniconGozecense, i, I9-28 (MGH. SS., x, pp. I54-6) and AnnalesMagdeburgenses,. II38 (MGH. SS., xvi, p. I86).


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52 PAST AND PRESENT NUM*BER 4 IAn over-riding sense of their own powers and rights continued to

govern the relations between magnates and their non-noble subjects,not least of all in the cause of monastic reform itself. The counts ofAchalm evicted their tenants from the site of their planned abbey.65When Margrave Otakar of Styria in IIo7 wanted to turn his secularcanonry at Garsten into a Benedictine monasteryhe dismissed most ofthe clerks. Some, however, were his homines ropriiand these heforced to stay and become monks, and he answered their pleas thatvows should not be extorted from them in no uncertain fashion:"You are mine and so you must agree with me and obey my will ineverything". The ringleader of the opposition was beaten until hegave in. The biographer of Garsten's first abbot recorded this storywith only faint embarrassment and ended it on a note even ofedification. 6 The historiographyof the revived and new monasterieswas as preoccupied with the nobility of their founders as the Ottonianwriters had been. Ortlieb and Berthold of Zwiefalten's devotion tothe counts of Achalm was not exceptional. It is echoed by the Pegaueannalist's heroic biography of his founder, Wiprecht of Groitzschand by the Goseck, Lauterberg and Reinhardsbrunn traditions asrecorded by their historians, to mention only a few.67 Genealogywas the most personal and abiding concern of the great mid twelfth-century Saxon historian known as AnnalistaSaxo.What has been said about the early medieval German aristocracycould perhaps be said also about its neighbours further west withwhom it shared the Frankish past, and even Anglo-Saxon England.Yet the nobility of the Reich ifferedfrom them in changing much less.This is not to assert that the development so well set out by K. Schmiddid not take place at all, only in Germany it remained ncomplete andequivocal. Nor is it suggested that the German nobles were whollyunreceptive of new ideas whether religious, cultural or in the art ofgovernment. They shared, patronized and used the religious reformmovement as their many monastic foundations in the late eleventh andearly twelfth century show. Without them it would have been almostunthinkable. They were willing to exploit the great opportunities ofcolonization and towns which the increase of population madepossible and also to administer their lordships more effectively. Butall this was compatible with and often subordinated to their age-old

65 Ortlieb, .2 (p- 72)-66 Vita Beati BertholdiAbbatisGarstensis,d. H. Pez (Scriptores RerumAustriacarum,Leipzig, I725), ii, col. go.67 On this see H. Patze, "Adel und Stifterchronik",Blatter ur deutscheLandesgeschichte,(I964), pp. 8-8I and ci (I965), pp. 67-I28.


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THE GERMANARISTOCRACY N THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES 53domesticpredicaments ndneeds: partible nheritances, nd how toreconcileparityof statusamongstkin and fellows with the unevendistributionof wealth and power. Their tenacious conservatismmoreover proved infectious to their only immediate rivals andchallengers, he ministeriales. n this way and because hey had tocompetewith men who weresocially o far beneath hem, the noblesescapedbeing swept awayor floodedby the ever-growingocietyofthe twelfth century. They remained ts mastersand the enduringfeaturesof their caste wereeven more important han the changes.MagdalenCollege,Oxford K. Leyser

5 leyser - german aristocracy

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