The household and entourage of Charles I of Anjou, king of the Regno, 1266 85

The household and entourage of 2004 Original2004 Historical Research Charles I of Anjou 0 1 3 77Institute August 00 0950-3471 Historical Publishing HISR Articles Oxford, UKof Blackwell Research Ltd

Jean H. Dunbabin
St. Annes College, Oxford

Abstract

This article attempts to reconstitute from the scrappy surviving records Charles Is household and court. For a conqueror, the choice of companions could have serious political implications. While Charless immediate domestic circle was French in origin and organized on the example of Louis IXs household, he deliberately encouraged and paid for the attendance of men from Provence and the Regno, both in his travelling entourage and at his great court appearances at liturgical feasts. Beyond these intimates, he accepted into his fidelity, and therefore into his broader court circle, a wide range of talented individuals from all parts of his empire.

Medieval monarchs and great lords automatically assumed that their power was made visible to their subjects by the number and importance of the men who surrounded them when they took centre stage, whether on state occasions or on everyday travels. For no monarch was his public appearance more significant than for a conqueror whose task it was to impose his rule on an often resentful people. The wider the range of great men who could be attracted to the conquerors entourage, the greater his chance of persuading lesser men to give the new regime a chance. The better-equipped and more competent-looking the military element that surrounded him, the more inhibited spectators might feel from plotting in favour of the dispossessed. Because a new rulers entourage was clearly intended as a political statement in itself, it is worthy of study by historians. At a less theatrical level, a conquerors choice of companions and confidants can be suggestive of his underlying aims, the fruit of those usually unspoken but keenly felt attempts to combat hostility among his people. Knowing a little about these companions and the terms on which they attended their ruler can therefore sometimes be unexpectedly enlightening about the rulers sensitivity to his new subjects feelings. At another level, rulers households and courts, because they are better recorded than those of lesser men, offer precious insights into social and economic conditions. The costs and composition of a court, where they can be traced, tell us something about consumption, trade and social
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mobility in the country over which the ruler ruled.1 Unfortunately, the evidence that survives for these important matters for the second half of the thirteenth century is both sparse and difficult of interpretation. But even hints are worth having. In February 1266, Charles, count of Provence and of Anjou, youngest brother of Louis IX of France, won the battle of Benevento against Manfred, illegitimate son of the Hohenstaufen emperor, Frederick II, and succeeded to the throne of Sicily and southern Italy, hereafter called the Regno. Charles had already been crowned the previous month by five cardinals performing the duty for Pope Clement IV, who had planned the campaign. But it was Charless military victory, which included the slaying of Manfred, that transformed the situation. He could now start to impose his will on the people of the Regno. In August 1268, he repeated his military triumph by totally defeating at Tagliacozzo the GermanItalian army of Corradin, the last surviving male of the direct Hohenstaufen line.2 After two and a half years of nervous uncertainty, there was no major obstacle left in the new kings path. He could set about transforming himself from conqueror into ruler. From then until the great rebellion, the Sicilian Vespers of 1282 (which came close to destroying completely what he had achieved), Charless aim was to turn chaos into tranquillity, a usurpation into a legitimate and popular monarchy. This transformation, as it affected the choice of Charless immediate entourage, was not simple. In the first place, large numbers of those Frenchmen who had fought for him against Manfred went back to France, after Tagliacozzo if not before the final battle. Others, whom he persuaded to remain with him for a little longer, had no desire to become permanent residents of the Regno. Their service was essentially short term. There was rather greater willingness to stay among his men from Provence, to whom the Regno was less strange than it was to the French.3 And he had the powerful support of a certain number of Italian families who had been expelled by the Hohenstaufen and who had made a triumphant return to their homeland in Charless army.4 But if his regime was to survive, if he was to win over permanently the large number of local lords who had initially supported him but allowed themselves to be seduced by the siren cry of Hohenstaufen restoration in early 1268, he had to create a much wider foundation of support. While
1 M. Vale, The Princely Court: Medieval Courts and Culture in North-West Europe, 1270 1380 (Oxford, 2001), pt. 1. 2 J. Dunbabin Charles I of Anjou: Power, Kingship and State-Making in 13th-Century Europe (1998), pp. 45. 3 S. Pollastri, La noblesse provenale dans le royaume de Sicile (1266 82), Annales du Midi, c (1988), 40529. 4 Of these, the most important were the San Severini, the Ruffi, the Pignatelli, the Lentini, the Dragoni and the Fasinelli.

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the obvious way was by gifts, of which Charles both made and recorded many,5 a more subtle and perhaps less expensive way was by granting special powers of access to the royal court. With such access came the potential for acquiring all sorts of short-term privileges (and responsibilities) that, in addition to increasing a mans wealth, raised his status in the eyes of his neighbours. Unlike lands, privileges could be withdrawn at the first sign of disloyalty; and the effect of such grants on the permanent revenue of the crown was less deleterious than the grant of land. There were, however, costs involved: in particular, it was necessary to enhance the desirability of access to the court by making life there pleasurable and profitable to nobles on their regular visits. At the beginning of Charless reign, his court and his army headquarters were to all intents and purposes identical hardly surprisingly, given the danger surrounding him. Once peace was established, they began to diverge. But because, throughout his reign, the king chose to move around his kingdom to keep his eye upon it, some at least of the characteristics of military life remained. This itinerant habit which Frederick II had also followed6 preserved in the household a degree of discipline and discomfort: it highlighted the role of the royal body guards; it gave a crucial task to the men who provided horses and carts for transport; and it virtually excluded women from membership. Furthermore, the resemblance to an army was initially accentuated by the fact that those who had provisioned and financed Charless victorious campaigns were, naturally enough, the first members of what became his household. The two crucial positions of chamberlain and chancellor 7 were held by members of the Beaumont family, a distinguished Angevin lineage whose members had long been devoted comital servants. Geoffroi de Beaumont, a cleric, had negotiated loans for Charles with the papacy and others before he became the second chancellor of the Regno. Pierre de Beaumont had been a recruiter of soldiers for Charless armies and became his chamberlain. Pierre de Beaumonts closeness to the king meant that, as long as he remained in the Regno, the chamberlain was nominally the chief financial officer of the crown, the receiver of all taxes and the disburser of all monies. But even before his departure in 1272, his appointment as count of Montescaglioso and his military interests had ensured that day-to-day financial business fell more and more into the hands of his assistants, the two magistri rationales. With Pierres return to France, the magistri rationales, now supported by three treasurers, took over the bulk
5 See I Registri della Cancelleria angioina, ed. R. Filangieri and others (45 vols., Naples, 1950 2000) (hereafter R.C.A.), x (Liber Donationum Caroli Primi). References are to registers/ collections and document numbers therein. 6 D. Abulafia, Frederick II: a Medieval Emperor (1988), p. 253. 7 Geoffroi de Beaumont was actually Charless second chancellor, but the firsts tenure of office was so short as to make little impression.

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of the Regnos financial administration, leaving to future chamberlains only the management of the kings personal income. As the magistri rationales began to be referred to as of the Great Court, so they distanced themselves from the chamber and the itinerant way of life. By 1275 they were usually to be found in Naples; by 1277 they were established firmly in the Chateau dOeuf in that city.8 The other central government officials were either never part of the household, as was the case with the judges and other judicial figures, or they established themselves as separate from the household earlier than the financial managers, as did the chancellors, or towards the end of the reign, as did the keepers of the royal archive. As a consequence of all this, by the early twelve-seventies the household was becoming more distinct from the army headquarters. The harsh suppression of rebellion in Sicily in 1270 and the end of the disastrous Tunis crusade in 12701 brought a relative slowing of the tempo in the Regno that allowed Charles to think about his immediate surroundings. His mind began to run on comfort and convenience as possible goals of a more established way of life. He initiated an ambitious programme of restoring and rebuilding the royal castles, palaces and hunting lodges that provided his normal residences.9 He demanded elegant reception areas, private chambers, windows, terraces and chapels. He sent instructions to his officials asking that fires be lit and everything prepared for royal visits.10 He ordered lavish amounts of food to be gathered from the neighbourhoods where he was to stay, and devoted special attention to the water supplies there.11 Charless concern for the physical environment was matched by a growing interest in the organization of the people who surrounded him, the members of his immediate domestic household. He began to consider who should be responsible for the day-to-day provision of his own and his followers necessities, who should shoulder the burden of ensuring that all was arranged and ready for them at their next place of residence, and who would guard them and their possessions as they rode from place to place. He also thought about the entourage with which he should be surrounded when he appeared in public before his subjects, who would enhance his standing, who would add to the dignity of the occasion. Then he considered how he could best reward faithful counsellors and how he could attract to his court those whose feelings towards him were at best ambivalent. While it is reasonably easy to infer from Charless letters his wishes in the matter of castles or food supplies, the evidence is more oblique about his aspirations for his household and affinity.
Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, p. 188. Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, pp. 188 9, 211. It is worth noting that Charles usually provided his own place of residence. He did not as a rule demand hospitality from ecclesiastical houses or his magnates while in the Regno. 10 R.C.A., lxxxix. 245. 11 Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, pp. 188 9, 210 11.
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In comparison with the poverty of records for royal households in other countries at the time, Angevin sources for the Regno are rich. Charles of Anjous registers were scrupulously compiled. They contained extensive lists of the names of those received into the household for 1267, 1270, 1271, 1272, 1275, 1276 and 1278;12 there were also details of payment for various members for Christmas 1277, for March to May 1278, and fragments of wages lists for 1279 and 1280.13 The change in method of recording after 1277, from listing the names of those received into the royal household to cataloguing the costs involved in their membership, may reflect Charless new determination that chamber expenditure (the chamber was responsible for paying household expenses) should be properly audited. Alternatively it may be a question of which records have survived.14 The value of these lists of both type lies in the fact that they were descriptive, not normative as were the household ordinances that elsewhere constitute the earliest information on which historians can build.15 On the other hand, the lists were written for a practical purpose, and assume knowledge on the part of the reader which the historian does not have. Therefore gaps have to be filled in by interpretation. The purpose of the lists detailing reception of new members was to permit those who dispensed hospitality of one form or another to know who was entitled to enjoy it. In some cases it is not difficult to guess why a list was compiled. The earliest list, for 1267, seems not to have been compiled until after Geoffroi de Beaumonts resignation from the chancery in 1271, presumably because those in charge of the household desperately needed some form of memorandum for the names that were still relevant once they could no longer call upon Geoffrois doubtless capacious memory.16 As it survives, it is in three fragments. In later years
12 Lists: 1267 8 (R.C.A., ii. 62, 253 and xiv, add. to reg. 2, 10); 1270 (R.C.A., xx. 216 18); in camp at Carthage (R.C.A., xxi. 152); 1270 1 (R.C.A., xxii. 1809 76); 1272 (R.C.A., xxxvii. 793); 1275 6 (R.C.A., lxxi. 56 140); 1276 7 (R.C.A., lxxix. 249 319); different version (R.C.A., lxxviii. 518); 1278 (R.C.A., lxxxii. 574). 13 Christmas 1277 payments (R.C.A., lxxxv. 4, 5, 10); payments in 1278 (R.C.A., lxxxv. 110, 119); accounts for March to May 1278 (R.C.A., lxxxii. 588); payments in 1279 (R.C.A., xci. 182 9, plus 170, 177, 178, 180 and possibly 173); fragments of payments in 1280 (R.C.A., cxx. 10410). 14 When Archivio di Stato di Napoli was destroyed by the retreating German army in 1943, the originals of the massive registers compiled by Charles I of Anjous civil servants were burned to cinders. The team which, under Riccardo Filangieri, began after the war the daunting task of collecting together and publishing all the documents that had been previously published or copied by scholars so that at least part of the archive might survive (R.C.A.), was dependent upon what earlier historians had found significant and chosen to preserve in their notes. Losses are particularly likely for matters relating to the household, because these were not of particular interest to most 19th- and early 20th-century historians. The Filangieri team were particularly indebted in this area to the work of C. Minieri Riccio. 15 On household ordinances, see Vale, pp. 4256. 16 R.C.A., ii. 62.

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when the king was away from home, the household officers particularly required a record to keep up with what were no doubt somewhat spurof-the-moment invitations on Charless part to join his following. The lists from these years also shed light on Charless motivation in making additions to his household. In 1270, for example, he was in Carthage on what he must just have realized would be an abortive crusade. On his journey back home, he attached to his household some ex-crusaders whom he probably hoped to attract as permanent settlers to his kingdom.17 Similarly, part of the list for 1276 was compiled largely in Rome and Viterbo, and contained some names whose adherence to Charless court was almost certainly confined to the period of his stay in the papal states, but upon whose goodwill he might in future hope to rely.18 The other lists, produced when he was at home in the Regno, seem to reflect Charless desire to widen his patronage, to give large numbers of the upper ranks of Regno society the chance to spend a brief period in his presence, to enhance loyalty to him, and to help to create some common cultural assumptions among the upper classes of his singularly diverse kingdom.19 In order to take the subject further, it is necessary to explain one serious problem that arises in handling the evidence. The household lists were apparently compiled by clerks working from copies of grants made to individuals. In some cases the clerks preserved at least partial details of what was granted, in other cases they omitted them all and simply entered a group of names under one heading. Consequently it cannot be stated categorically, for example, that all knights named in the lists enjoyed the status of those who were specifically said to be of the household and entitled to eat at court. But equally it is probable that they did. The same uncertainty applies to other privileges; because these were well understood at the time, there was no need to spell them out in each case. Furthermore, it is not clear whether most grants were for a short term, or until they were specifically withdrawn, or for life. But while these important details elude us, the household lists, reinforced by the information from the wages lists, are sufficient to give a hazy overall picture of the men among whom Charles spent his life. Charless entourage can be envisaged in terms of three concentric circles, each circle enjoying distinct privileges and obligations, but with a considerable degree of overlap at the boundaries.
17 E.g., the seneschal of Vermandois (R.C.A., xxii. 1817); Matthieu du Plessi (R.C.A., xxii. 1814); Gilles de Blemur (R.C.A., xxii. 1834). 18 R.C.A., lxxix. 249319. 19 It is, however, worth remembering that Edward I, who operated under fewer constraints than Charles, also had among his household knights men from Germany, Savoy and Lombardy (see Records of the Wardrobe and Household, ed. B. J. Byerly and C. R. Byerly (2 vols., 197786), and particularly vol. i, 12856, p. xl). The author is grateful to John Maddicott for drawing her attention to these records.

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The records for the innermost circle, what may be called the domestic household, are fragmentary.20 As might be expected, they are at their least helpful in the very disturbed early years of the reign and in the period after the outbreak of the Sicilian Vespers in March 1282. Nevertheless, there is enough information to ascertain that the personnel was overwhelmingly French. To be surrounded by his own countrymen, to imitate the royal household best known to him, that of his brother King Louis IX,21 was a natural aspiration in one who, beyond the confines of his own residences, had to operate all the time with men whose education and assumptions were very different from his own. Relaxation, in so far as it was compatible with what remained an itinerant and often dangerous way of life, could be best secured in a familiar setting. Hence the ad hoc arrangements necessitated by campaigning slowly gave way to the emergence of an inner domestic circle that could, with only a few adjustments, have been transferred to the royal court in Paris. It was, however, rather less formalized in nomenclature than its Parisian equivalent. In the 1276 and 1277 lists, the officer in charge of the household was called seneschal.22 Later either the pantler or the head chamberlain was normally the chief official mentioned in the records (but this change may reflect the growing emphasis on finance in the later records). There was often more than one chamberlain, whose task it was to deal with the day-to-day financial affairs of the king. In that capacity, he might well be sent on business to anywhere in Europe where the king had concerns.23 Then there came the more strictly domestic royal servants: the pantler (there was sometimes more than one pantler, which perhaps allowed for variation in the tasks they performed),24 the cup-bearer (estancion again there could be more than one),25 the fruiterer ( fruitier) and by 1277 also the fourrier,26 who may well, like his French counterpart, have acquired growing importance in the last few years of the reign.27 These men were principally occupied in supplying the household. The cup-bearer was
20 In addition to the destruction of the Angevin archive in 1943, on the effects of which see n. 14 above, the domestic records of most monarchies and great lordships suffered for many centuries after this from only spasmodic collection because the need for record was less evident than in most other spheres of administration ( F. Heal, Hospitality in Early Modern England (Oxford, 1990), pp. 50 2). 21 See E. Lalou, Le fonctionnement de lhtel du roi du milieu du XIIIe sicle au milieu du XIVe sicle, in Vincennes aux origines de ltat moderne, ed. J. Chapelot and E. Lalou ( Paris, 1996), pp. 14555. On Charless household officers, see C. Minieri Riccio, Cenni storici intorno i grandi uffizii del Regno di Sicilia durante il regno di Carlo dAngi ( Naples, 1872). 22 R.C.A., lxxix. 249. 23 R.C.A., v. 64. 24 R.C.A., xliii. 28. 25 There is a certain confusion here, in that the estancion was sometimes called the butler; he must be distinguished from the butler of the Regno, which was an honorary title. 26 R.C.A., lxxxii. 574. 27 Lalou, p. 150. Interestingly, these named officials obtained specified salaries in the list of general household salaries in R.C.A., lxxxv. 5.

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usually in charge of buying the wine, while the fruiterer was often asked to find wax. Their task of supply might take them quite a long way from the kings presence. The fruiterer, for example, was sent to Florence to get various necessities.28 Yet while they performed relatively menial tasks, they also had an opportunity to engage in noble activities along with other members of the household. One of Charless pantlers, Renaud Gelart, won fame at tourneying.29 Some of these office-holders remained at court for several years; Jean de Torchevache, probably the most enduring, began as cup-bearer and then was promoted to chamberlain. 30 Giovanni di Brayda was a valet of the household for nine years before being promoted to pantler, an office he held for at least three years. 31 Others appeared more briefly on the lists. These officials were supported by numbers of lesser men clerks to the chamber, valets of the household, porters, ostlers and messengers, along with a trumpeter whose job it was to announce the kings arrival, 32 and, on one occasion, a jongleur from Paris.33 Some of these members of the supporting cast were specifically named in the earlier lists of the reign, but they featured less and less in the later records. It is therefore almost impossible to work out how many of them there may have been at any one time. By way of comparison, when Guillaume de lEtandard was sent to Rome to become Charless vicar there in 1281, his household consisted of himself, his physician, eight judges, twelve notaries and one chaplain, with enough servants to make the total up to sixty that is, thirty-seven. If this was a normal proportion between officials and servants, then Charless household in 1277 (when we know that there were ninety-one members above the salt) will have had perhaps 130 servants. That these were not all French is clear, as is the fact that Charles could put pressure on them to perform tasks others were reluctant to undertake.34 But otherwise they were hardly ever mentioned. At the end of the reign, when the fighting in Sicily and Calabria became intense, the number of household servants was further swollen by the addition of a group of ordinary paid soldiers. 35 Of equal importance with the household officers, but usually somewhat distinct from them, were the royal cooks, sometimes as many as five, supported by minions;36 and the marshal of the royal stables with his clerk
R.C.A., v. 64. Die Chronik des Saba Malaspina, ed. W. Koller and A. Nitschke (Monumenta Germaniae Historica Scriptores, xxv, Hanover, 1999) (hereafter Chronik des Saba Malaspina), p. 260. 30 R.C.A., xliv. 87; xlv. 109; lxxxv. 110. 31 R.C.A., lxxxv. 97. 32 R.C.A., lxxi. 140. 33 R.C.A., xxxvii. 793. 34 R.C.A., lxxvi. 279 shows 4 members of the household taking up residence in Lucera, which Charles had cleared of its Muslim inhabitants and was attempting (without much success) to repopulate. 35 R.C.A., cxii. 76. 36 R.C.A., xci. 170 mentions 5 unnamed cooks.
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and retinue of grooms.37 Rather more distant were the falconers and the keepers of the royal menagerie, who were presumably in attendance only when the court was at places suitable for their entertainment value to be appreciated. These laymen were balanced in the household by a small but influential body of clerks. Of these one was the royal almoner, usually a member of the mendicant orders.38 Unlike his brother Louis IX, Charles did not have an officially named confessor;39 but he always had at least one chaplain sometimes as many as four who may have performed that function, and frequently a clerk to assist the chaplains.40 In addition, there were always other clerks whose function remained undefined, but who will have found plenty to keep them occupied in the endless recordkeeping and letter-writing that Charles demanded of all his servants. At least some of these clerks, including the almoner and the chaplains, will have perambulated with the king on most, if not all, of his journeyings. On the costs of providing for this travelling household there are only a few precious pieces of evidence. In 1277, the household officials received a loan of 300 uncie of gold to pay for their wages (probably for three months),41 and specific amounts from this sum were designated for the pantlers, the cup-bearers, the master cook, the fourrier, the clerk of the stable and the fruiterer.42 Apart from wages, however, there is no evidence on that occasion for any precise sums being disbursed. The lists of supplies demanded for the household, of which many are recorded, did not note costs.43 Nor were the costs of horses and carts hired for travelling given. On one occasion in late 1277, a sum of 5,000 golden florins was paid to the chamberlains to cover the expenses of the household and to provide money for the purchase of grain. 44 For the three months from March to May 1278, household expenses were reckoned at 672 uncie and twenty-four tari.45 But what was comprehended in this sum is not specified.
For regulations governing the stables, see R.C.A., lxxxii. 67. R.C.A., lxxix. 211; lxxxii. 574. 39 On Louis confessor see X. de la Selle, Le Service des mes la cour: Confesseurs et aumniers des rois de France du XIIIe au XVe sicle (Paris, 1995), p. 41. 40 R.C.A., lxxviii. 518; lxxxii. 574. 41 Other mentions of wages are usually for a 3-month period. On the coinage current in the Regno, see M. Fuiano, La politica monetaria di Carlo dAngi, in Carlo I dAngi in Italia: studi e ricerche ( Naples, 1974), pp. 26185. 42 R.C.A., lxxxv. 4, 5. 43 E.g., when the king went to Rome in 1278, he ordered the chamberlain in Rome to store supplies of corn, hay, vegetables, salt eels, sugar, wax and wine for the households arrival (R.C.A., lxxxii. 214). 44 R.C.A., lxxxv. 23. Charles gives the exchange rate of 5 florins to the uncia. There were 30 tari to the uncia. Between 1277 and 1284 there were 6 tari to the Florentine florin ( P. Spufford, Handbook of Medieval Exchange ( Royal Historical Society Guides and Handbooks, xiii, 1986), p. 59. The total was therefore 1,000 uncie, which is higher than the other totals offered for 3 months. 45 R.C.A., lxxxii. 588.
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The decision to be perpetually on the move had important consequences for the royal entourage. The enterprise was costly and caused resentment in those localities required to assist. Large numbers of horses and carts had to be assembled to take the king, his servants and their possessions from place to place.46 Sometimes hay had to be borrowed while on the move to cover a deficiency. 47 Temporary residences had to be arranged for short stays along the way. There was loud complaint when local officials seized bedding and utensils from inhabitants to provide for the royal trains needs.48 And royal castles had to be fitted out and prepared. The burden imposed on the officials and inhabitants of the localities through which the cavalcade passed created some obligation on the kings side to cut down on numbers. Neither the queen (Charles was married first to Beatrice of Provence and then to Margaret of Nevers) nor the royal children habitually travelled with the king: they had households of their own, usually in Naples. As the chief administrators dropped out of the household, their enormous collections of records no longer had to be moved.49 In some respects, therefore, travelling became simpler. But Charles could not afford to have his dignity compromised, even within the Regno, by appearing in public surrounded by a meagre entourage. When he went beyond the Regnos borders visits to the papal states were frequent he felt acutely the need to strike a fine figure. In calculating the proper size and luxury of his train, he had to balance sensitivity to the tax-payers wishes against keeping up appearances at all times. Despite Charless attempts to improve the quality of the hospitality that he and his followers received, and despite the fact that the itinerary did bring some times of relaxation, such as stays at the hunting lodge at Lagopesole, much of the travelling must have been wearisome and exhausting. For the older or the more uxorious among Charless companions, permission to leave the kings service with his blessing will often have been perceived as a boon. Yet while they remained with Charles, their hours of hardship were punctuated by brief periods of festivity and state. Charles celebrated the great liturgical feasts of the Church in style, joined by his wife and family, and by temporary members of his entourage, who all partook of grand meals and fine entertainment. As the reign went on, these celebrations were increasingly likely to take place in Naples. The building there of Chateau Neuf, projecting into the harbour, between 1279 and 1284, provided Charles with a magnificent backdrop for display. On these occasions, the court
46 R.C.A., cxiii. 6. It took 30 animals to transport the kings records from Lagopesole to Melfi (R.C.A., xcii. 212). 47 R.C.A., xcii. 260. 48 R.C.A., viii. 462. 49 R.C.A., lxxxii. 11 refers to the transport of 11 registers to Naples.

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was swollen by large numbers of important visitors who came to pay their respects and hoped to promote their own interests with the king. Many of these visitors bore the title familiaris, which indicated a close link with the king; in some cases the link was that they had earlier been members of his domestic household.50 So on these grand occasions the king was surrounded, first by his normal domestic officials and servants, then by a circle of temporary members who were obliged to attend the feasts for a set period, and finally by a much larger circle of members of what he called his familiarity. While it must have been quite clear to Charless officials who the members of each of these groups were, it is not easy for the historian to disentangle them from the surviving records. For example, there were the household knights, beyond the strictly domestic circle, but permitted to eat at the royal board. That Charles was accompanied everywhere by armed men cannot be doubted; thirteenthcentury kings always had bodyguards, and a king like Charles, who had many enemies, certainly needed them. He always travelled with his own armour in two large coffers and his hauberks and other protective gear in eight leather bags.51 He was always at the ready; and presumably he did not plan to fight on his own. Besides, there is incontrovertible evidence of the existence of household knights at Charless court. But just how many there were at any one time and how constant was their attendance on the king is less than clear from the sources. At Christmas 1277, there were thirty-six knights described as of ostel non terrains,52 which seems to mean that they had not yet been enfeoffed. At that date they received wages for three months, which suggests (as does ostel) that they were regular travelling members of the household. In the 12778 note on wages, seventeen knights of the household were in receipt of wages of four uncie, of whom it was said that they had no lands, and thirty-one knights received wages of two uncie, although they already had lands.53 In the former category came Hugues le Roux de Sully, soon to be chosen as Charless general in charge of the war against the Greeks; in the latter came Guillaume and Philippe de Lagonesse, members of a family of Charless most devoted servants, Hugues de Conches, of a Marseilles merchants family who had worked his way up by service in Charless fleet, and Bertrand des Beaux of Berre54 of the great Provencal family. This second group almost all bore the title domini.55 A year later, there were thirty-five knights in each category, with many of the same

See below, pp. 3324. R.C.A., xci. 48. 52 R.C.A., lxxxv. 10. 53 R.C.A., lxxxv. 110, 119. 54 Bertrand was also referred to as banneret of the household (R.C.A., lxxxii. 574). This seems to be a unique appellation in Charless household. 55 R.C.A., lxxxv. 10.
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names still there.56 It is inherently unlikely that those who possessed lands hereafter called the enfeoffed knights were expected to travel regularly with the household, since they were probably settled, married men with strong local duties. But perhaps they attended Charles on some kind of rota system. They presumably also joined the king for the great feasts or other major public occasions like family weddings. But if this is true of them, can we be sure that the knights of the household without lands (the unenfeoffed) were regular attendants on the king? Was there a rota for them? Or were some of them only bound to appear for special occasions? Their relatively high wages suggest regular attendance. The account for March to May 1278, which deducted a small sum for days of absence from the wages paid to knights of both categories, shows that a sharp eye was kept on this issue.57 Those familiar with the ways of the English court in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries may perhaps look among the knights mentioned for names of those who were in the future to become major figures in the history of the Regno.58 They may think of the significance accorded by Orderic Vitalis to membership of Henry Is military household,59 see parallels between the situations of Henry I and of Charles of Anjou, and expect to find among Charless knights either those whose talents he was nurturing or those whose families rebellious tendencies he feared. Yet these do not seem to have been particularly conspicuous features of Charless choices, except in so far as in both categories of knights there were large numbers of men from Provence, the Regno and Achaia, given their position in the entourage in order to balance the French among Charless domestic servants, and thus to quell discontent. Charles had other means of trying to control the children of those who had rebelled against him.60 His enfeoffed knights were usually drawn from those whose position in the Regno was already secured. Occasionally, as with Amaury de la Roche, who became a household knight in 1278,61 the aim of the grant was to strengthen the ties between Charles and families beyond the Regno whose alliance he sought, in this case the rulers of Athens. 62 But for the most part, membership of the household conferred only temporarily increased status (and a wage) on those already enfeoffed. The unenfeoffed were, it is true, usually less socially privileged. It was a useful step up the ladder for a young man of modest background to be
56 R.C.A., xci. 182 9. This perhaps suggests that a document is missing from the previous years account and that Charles actually employed another 18 unenfeoffed knights. 57 R.C.A., lxxxii. 588. 58 See J. Prestwich, The military household of the Norman kings, Eng. Hist. Rev., xcvi (1981), 135. 59 The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis, vi, ed. M. Chibnall (Oxford, 1978), p. 196. 60 See Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, pp. 623. 61 R.C.A., lxxxv. 103. 62 See Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, p. 92.

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chosen as a household knight of his king. In some cases it might lead to advancement to the ranks of the aristocracy, as it did with Giovanni Mansella of Salerno, who was received into the royal household at Catania in January 1271.63 In 1272 he was sent to fight at Piacenza, where he was seriously wounded.64 Later he was made podest of Ascoli,65 was rewarded with land and counted among the barons of the kingdom. 66 By the end of the reign, he was justiciar of the Capitanate, a very important if onerous position.67 Giovannis rise was slow, steady and unusually high. Charles did recognize a few of his household knights as consiliarii, which indicated that he valued their opinions and that further advancement in royal service might be anticipated.68 But the bulk of the household knights seem to have ended up as castellans on the royal demesne, responsible positions but of strictly limited power or social consequence. Even Amaury de Montdragon, whose family connections might have given him a claim to better, followed up his promotion to knight of the household in 1270 by a long stint as a castellan.69 Only when the rebellion of the Sicilian Vespers began seriously to threaten Charless position did he become generous, both in lands and in offices, with those who had once been close to him and on whose loyalty he was now totally dependent. 70 Perhaps more like Prestwichs household knights, both in social position and in leadership potential, were some of the valets who appeared on each of the household lists. This category is confusing. A small number of valets undoubtedly did attend upon the king day after day wherever he went, and probably looked after his clothes and personal effects. In 1276 nine new ones were created with the specific task of guarding the money being sent to the royal chamber.71 But until the war effort of the late twelve-seventies (when Charless attention was focused on defeating the emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus) there were usually more valets than knights in each household list far too many to be necessary for the kings comfort. For Christmas 1277, they received wages for attendance for the days of the feast alone, which may imply that many of them were usually at court only on grand occasions. Surprisingly, among the valets were to be found the scions of the greatest families in the Regno Raimond of Les Beaux, the Provencal aristocrat; and Roger della Marra, the son of Giozzelino della Marra, the kings chief financial
R.C.A., xxii. 1812. R.C.A., xlviii. 478; xlix. 181. 65 R.C.A., lxvi. 257. 66 R.C.A., lxvi. 135. 67 R.C.A., cviii. 17. 68 R.C.A., lxxi. 128, 130; lxxvi. 258. 69 R.C.A., xcviii. 147. 70 For the large number of promotions and gifts of lands offered in 1283 and 1284, see R.C.A., cxx. passim. 71 R.C.A., lxxvi. 41.
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agent from Ravello. These shared the title along with relatives of popes and cardinals.72 The valet of the thirteenth-century Regno was often far from being the equivalent of his fourteenth-century English counterpart who enjoyed a status just below that of gentility.73 Like the household knights, valets were drawn from all the various peoples over whom Charles ruled. While valets were by definition young men, quite how young is hard to be sure.74 Some of them kept the status for much more than one year. 75 Some were used by the king for tasks too difficult for local officials to cope with;76 one was even put in charge of the kings re-established monopoly of the Regnos salt trade.77 Others were given lesser but still responsible tasks,78 which hardly suggests immaturity as a universal characteristic. On the other hand, some of those (inevitably the grander) about whose later lives there is information seem to have been just out of boyhood. In the Christmas 1277 list of expenses, valets and pages were treated together, suggesting that this group comprised both young men and boys sent to court to learn manners and manly pursuits. 79 The obvious way to try to make sense of this disparate information is, as with the household knights, to assume that there were in practice two categories of valets, one grander than the other. Those of lesser birth ( household valets) were retained to be useful, the grander to be ornamental. Yet they shared the same title and most of the same privileges. As with the knights, distinguishing between high birth and service as claims to promotion at Charless court was a relatively subtle matter. The aristocratic young men were crucial contributors to the magnificence of Charless entourage as it was perceived by outsiders. There was, however, more to their presence than this. Like most medieval kings, Charles appreciated the value of being surrounded by the sons of important people. It permitted him to get to know them and to cement their loyalty to him. He certainly considered that he was bestowing a privilege on them. In a letter that he wrote to Gui de Forez, by then justiciar of Otranto, the king reminded Gui that he was a member of the royal household, had been brought up at the kings side, and had met with affectionate treatment from him. This circumstance made Guis
R.C.A., lxxi. 87, 98. S. Walker, The Lancastrian Affinity, 136199 (Oxford, 1990), p. 11. They seem more like the esquires of honour found, although in decline, at the later Angevin courts (see F. Piponnier, Costume et vie sociale: la cour dAnjou XIVeXVe sicle (Paris, 1970), p. 248). 74 The author relies here on Larousse, Dictionnaire de lancien franais: le Moyen Age ( Paris, 1992), p. 610. 75 Giovanni di Brayda, for example, was a valet of the royal household from 1271 to 1283, and pantler for the last 3 years of this time (R.C.A., xcviii. 88). 76 R.C.A., lxxvi. 314; lxxxix. 140. 77 R.C.A., lxxvi. 324. 78 R.C.A., lxxvi. 41; cviii. 156. 79 R.C.A., lxxxv. 10.
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fault in failing to carry out royal orders much worse and meant that punishment would certainly come upon him.80 As Charles saw it, all privileges had their corresponding responsibilities. The frequency with which the lists were issued suggests both that the majority of the grander valets enjoyed their status only temporarily, and that Charles wanted to entertain as many as possible of the Regnos young aristocrats. On the other side of the fence, the young men probably enjoyed the companionship of their peers, the chance to catch the kings eye, and a whole new freedom away from parental supervision. The time spent attending court functions was a rite of passage on their path to adulthood. Because the position of valet was in normal circumstances advantageous to both parties, men solicited it for their young relatives. In one case at least, the pleas of an uncle that the king take on his nephew are recorded, as is the uncles long service to the crown.81 When the nephew (or grandson) of the kings most trusted physician became a valet,82 privileged access to the kings ear can be assumed. There will have been a marked desire on the part of second-rank Angevin supporters to have their status confirmed by securing a place at court for one of their sons. Importunity on their part seems likely. On the other hand, Charles probably took the initiative himself in making links with the families of the popes and the cardinals, as well as with his French relations and other great lords. He certainly appreciated the value of their public appearances by his side. One feature of the lists clearly marked out the valets from the knights: while nothing was ever said about the knights horses the king seems to have supplied these83 the entries about valets (of both categories) specified the number of horses (usually one, but it could be up to five) for which they would receive either fodder or an allowance in lieu while they were at court. The rulers of the Regno had long been accustomed to giving such allowances for those who campaigned outside the kingdoms borders with them.84 Whether Charles innovated in extending these allowances to those who attended on him cannot be determined. But whereas the valets wages for being present at a feast were the same for all members of the category, both social distinction and particular service could be rewarded by increasing the number of horses fed at the kings expense. In 1276 Raimond des Beaux was paid for five horses, three for himself and two for his own valet,85 this unprecedented award a sign of how welcome was the presence of this young nobleman at
R.C.A., lxxxvi. 557. R.C.A., xiv. 1144. 82 R.C.A., lxxi. 56. 83 He certainly paid for replacements for horses lost in war or on royal service, which suggests that he supplied them in the first place (see, e.g., R.C.A., cxiii. 8). 84 See the arrangements made by Frederick II (Constitutiones regni Siciliae, ed. G. Carcani (1786; repr. Messina, 1992), pp. 3834). 85 R.C.A., lxxix. 317.
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court. Less elevated people could be rewarded in the same way. For example, two men who had been allowed fodder for one horse each were subsequently granted another between them.86 Presumably the half-valets who very occasionally appear in the lists were valets entitled only to half the fodder needed to feed a horse.87 The other reward that might be increased was the right to meals. Bouche du cour at Charless court apparently still meant actual presence at the royal board, not an allowance in lieu. For example, a Roman noble received as valet in February 1277 was allowed, in addition to food for three horses, the privilege of bringing with him a friend when he ate at court. 88 Whether he was free to choose when he came or was obliged to make certain defined appearances is not stated. But, judging by the royal kitchens constant demands for spices, sugar and other luxury goods, and by the order for special cloths for the tables, bouche du cour must have been a privilege worth having.89 Knights, valets and clerks might be asked to turn their hand to any sort of business that required doing while they were at court. There were, however, more specialized members of the household doctors, surgeons and lawyers who, in addition to attending feasts, made themselves available to the king whenever he should need their particular skills. Here Charles could exploit the intellectual riches of the Regno, developed at the medical school at Salerno and at the university of Naples. Although the later thirteenth century was far from marking the peak of achievement at Salerno, and its most famous exponent, Giovanni di Procida, was prosecuted as a traitor to Charless cause, the king was nevertheless prepared to pay the salaries of the schools masters, sometimes at a high rate. However, he also encouraged medical studies at Naples and tried, with only moderate success, to lure other Italian and French doctors down to the Regno.90 There was, therefore, a pool of candidates for him to choose from when he nominated physicians and surgeons to his household. Those nominated were expected not just to cure the sick among the royal entourage but to tend wounds and to buy the medicines that could be carried around in the royal train.91 In addition, they might be required to test the competence of others who wished to practise medicine in the Regno. While Charles accepted the right of the medical schools to examine their own candidates, he regarded the right to practise within his domain as his to grant.92 Those of his physicians who earned his trust were well rewarded. For example, M. Thomas of Florence, who
86 87 88 89 90 91 92

R.C.A., lxxi. 117. R.C.A., lxxi. 74. R.C.A., lxxix. 285. R.C.A., xci. 39, 72. See Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, pp. 21418. R.C.A., viii. 327. Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, p. 217.

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taught medicine at Naples, normally received the allowance given for three horses, later increased to four,93 in addition to the salary of twelve uncie of gold for his teaching;94 furthermore, as has already been remarked, his young relative was taken into the household as a valet, and he acquired some land held in fee of the crown.95 While Thomas may only have been at court for celebrations and when specially summoned, Jean de Nesle (the only French doctor known to have been lured down to the Regno) was probably at court for much of the time, having no alternative place of residence during his relatively short visit.96 While there, he compiled a chronicle of great interest to his royal patron. 97 Lawyers newly graduated from the university of Naples which had been founded to turn out civil servants were handpicked to join Charless household. Since the king paid the salaries of doctors of civil law while they were teaching at Naples, his persuasive powers were great. In any case, few will have wished to resist the invitation. The challenge of helping a king to decide which of the various legal measures introduced by his predecessors were to be recognized as part of the custom of the realm, and which were to be ditched as part of Hohenstaufen tyranny, must have been alluring. Because legal expertise was so central to Charless needs, he quickly developed a good eye for talent in that sphere. Sperano da Bari the Younger, Bartholomeo di Capua and Andrea di Isernia all began their careers in his household. The position was compatible with teaching in the university and also advising private clients on cases; it was an essential step on the ladder that led to the lifelong post of counsellor to the king. Since all the categories of household members thus far mentioned were sometimes included in the household lists, it is probable that all (with the exception of messengers, cooks assistants and others who were clearly of the lower orders) enjoyed the honours, favours, privileges, prerogatives, immunities, exemptions and graces which, along with hospitality, were ascribed to domestic familiars in the records.98 Some of these we know: they all received wages, loans,99 and robes; some got wardships,100 and favours for their relatives;101 one who was murdered got a special commission of enquiry to find the killers.102 They also probably benefited
R.C.A., lxxi. 139. R.C.A., xlvii. 31. 95 R.C.A., xlvii. 400. 96 Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, pp. 208 9. 97 R.C.A., cviii. 33. 98 R.C.A., xlvi. 25. 99 R.C.A., lix. 20. 100 R.C.A., xciv. 197. 101 E.g., Giovanni di Brayda, a valet, obtained the right of free passage across the Regno for himself, his 6 brothers and other relatives (R.C.A., xviii. 841); and Jean Torchevache got a prebend for a clerical nephew (R.C.A., lx. 96). 102 R.C.A., xvi. 251.
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from tax concessions and assistance in the law courts. Even so, there are signs that some were tempted to take more than belonged to them. Members of Charless household were accused of claiming hospitality for themselves when they were not accompanying the king, and of removing from peasants food and utensils at their pleasure.103 But the complaints about this came early in the reign; better discipline may have prevailed later. One way and another, the pains of household membership (which included an open act of adherence to a monarchy regarded by some as totally illegitimate and by others as tyrannical) were balanced by a very considerable variety of sweets, most of which were not particularly expensive from the kings point of view. The account for Christmas 1277 gives us a reasonably full picture of the household thus far described as it appeared when gathered together for a grand occasion. On 10 January 1278 the king commanded that the ninety-one sets of robes that he had conferred on his knights, clerks and servants at Christmas be paid for. The knights, clerks and servants were also to receive two and a half uncie each by way of wages in arrears. The thirty-six unenfeoffed knights were to receive their three-monthly wages of four tari a day, also in arrears. Valets and pages ( garons) were to be paid at a daily rate for twenty-four days from 13 December to 5 January; together, their food and wages amounted to 165 uncie. The scribe added the total bill up to 904 uncie and fifteen tari (although I make the total 913 uncie and fifteen tari ).104 The mixture of liberality and parsimony involved in this accounting was typical of Charless whole approach to administration. The picture that the register entry provides is of a large court, much of it assembled only for twenty-four days but surrounding an inner core of the kings permanent servants, a picture which is compatible with the hints derived from other entries in the register. For those who came to participate in the celebration for other purposes, the kings entourage will have created a formidable but also a magnificent impression. However, such impressions did not come cheaply. By the following spring, costs had risen sharply. For the three months from March to May 1278, the household officers were, as has been said, given 672 uncie and twenty-four tari for expenses. However, this excluded costs for the wages and allowances for the knights, valets, clerks, physicians and others, which were entered separately and came to considerably more than that sum. Combining the expenditure and the wages, then including both the costs of liveries for Easter and the money paid for replacing horses for members of the household, the total came to 1,718 uncie and twenty-five tari for three months.105 This was approaching twice the bill for the three months leading up to Christmas 1277. The 1278 account
103 104 105

R.C.A., vol. ii, reg. x, additiones: Documenti tratti da varie fonti, 94, 95. R.C.A., lxxxv. 10. R.C.A., lxxxii. 588.

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may have been more inclusive. Alternatively, the number of people attached to the household may have increased rapidly as the financial year went on. The latter hypothesis is compatible with Charless habit of issuing invitations to join his household at any point in the year. We know that both the king and the magistri rationales scrutinized expenditure closely.106 A balance had to be struck between keeping Charless companions happy and wasting money. The kings ambitious campaigns abroad had to be paid for; parsimony at home was desirable where it could be achieved. But resisting the operation of Parkinsons Law was almost impossible. The accounts of Christmas 1277 and MarchMay 1278 are unusual in specifically mentioning the robes given to members of the household. Presumably winter and summer clothing was issued automatically each year to at least some members of the immediate entourage. 107 Cloth was certainly ordered and the order recorded on many occasions. 108 The special demands of the queens household, with its large feminine constituent, also often made their way into the records.109 Records were kept of the uniforms provided for those who worked in the royal stable and menagerie.110 The comparatively sparse evidence for household robes is more likely to be the result of their being distributed automatically than of their being distributed only occasionally.111 If a gift of robes was usually made at the great feasts, as it clearly was at Christmas 1277 and it is hard to see how it could have been made on any other occasion to those who were not travelling members of the household then the newness of the entourages apparel will have added to the general gaiety and splendour of the moment. There is some evidence that spectators were struck by this: Saba Malaspina, describing the knighting of Charles of Salerno, Charless heir, in 1272, drew particular attention to the brilliant display of coloured robes worn by the men and women who accompanied the king and queen to the ceremony.112
106 See, e.g., his expostulation against the lavishness with which the queens entourage was lodged and fed (R.C.A., lxxviii. 563). 107 Cf. Vale, pp. 93135, esp. p. 115. 108 E.g., Jean de Vilemaroi, a royal clerk in Anjou, was ordered to send large amounts of various cloths (R.C.A., lx. 173; see also R.C.A., xci. 72, 82; xxiv, Documenti tratti da altre fonti, 7). 109 R.C.A., lxxxv. 8; cxiv. 53. 110 R.C.A., lxxix. 144. 111 It would have been odd if Charles gave no liveries to those whom he accepted into his household in Carthage in 1270, because Gui de Dampierre, count of Flanders, had a livery list for those whom he was receiving at the same time (see Vale, pp. 11516). Those who were counsellors in Anjou definitely received robes (R.C.A., lxxxiii. 31). 112 Chronik des Saba Malaspina, p. 233. But by Pentecost 1278, 37 knights were each issued with two and a half uncie for their robes, showing that responsibility for provision had passed to the individuals. Obviously not all household knights received either robes or a sum of money in lieu; but the records do not permit of a clear division between unenfeoffed and enfeoffed knights on this matter.

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Beyond the members of the household lay the last overlapping circle, those whom Charles received into his familiarity, the members of what might be called his court circle, both in the Regno and in the other lands he ruled where his representatives held court in his stead. Charless familiarity included all the members of his household thus far mentioned, but also a very large number of loyal servants, some but not all of whom had earlier been either valets or knights. From the repetition of the formula in various letters, it would seem that grants of familiarity usually began with the highflown statement, We receive into our familiarity those in whom probity of morals is evident, virtue illuminates clearly and praiseworthy acts commend.113 In one case, this introduction was followed by a brief genealogy of the holder. His family claimed to have come from France to Rome in 898, and then moved to Carcassonne in 1002.114 From Charless point of view, this family history, combined with the fact that the present scion had found his way to the Regno, will have seemed to point to a natural link among the various peoples he ruled. It was a parable of post-Carolingian Mediterranean Europe and therefore worth recording. His distinguished pedigree earned for its holder the sum of thirty uncie of gold a year for life, and all the privileges enjoyed by members of the household. The supposition must be that, when the newly-created familiaris happened to be at court, he could join in the ceremonial and eat there. When not there, he might still hope for loans or help in legal affairs. But what he was supposed to do in return for this privileged position was not spelled out. The contract with the man from Carcassonne is unique in the fullness of its record; in other cases the clerks abbreviated, usually simply giving the name of the man received as familiaris. We cannot therefore be sure that this was a standard grant. The financial settlement in particular was almost certainly more generous than others received. However, the opening formula and the privileged position are likely to have been standard. Other evidence shows that some kind of oath was exacted from new familiares.115 Usually the holder of a grant of familiarity also received a letter which demanded that he should be treated with all appropriate deference in view of his status.116 Again, exactly what this deference involved is unclear. The contract had something in common with the military indentures used by Charless recruiting agents for his Italian campaign of 12648.117 Both kinds of contract point to the degree of
R.C.A., xiv. 677. R.C.A., xcvi. 3. 115 R.C.A., xlv. 115. 116 E.g., R.C.A., lxxix. 265. 117 Such indentures were certainly used for Louis IXs 1270 crusade; and the circumstances of Charless recruitment drive suggest a similar vehicle (see N. Housley, The Italian Crusades: the Papal-Angevin Alliance and the Crusades against Christian Lay Powers, 12541343 (Oxford, 1982), pp. 14852).
114 113

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literacy taken for granted among the aristocrats of the period. That written documents establishing personal loyalty should have proliferated in the Regno is indicative of Charless deep-rooted fear of rebellion; a man who had taken the oath of familiarity and then broke his word could be clearly indicted of treason, a capital offence.118 Furthermore, the terms of the oath normally bound its taker for life. Despite the accompanying privileges, the commitment was not to be made lightly. In the last three years of Charless reign, when the rebellion of the Sicilian Vespers threatened to spread across the whole of the Regno, there must have been many among the familiares who regretted their open adherence to the regime. But before that date, incorporation in the familiarity was a necessary preliminary to the acquisition of a job in the kings service. The story of Charless familiares is also the story of his government and politics. It cannot be told in a short article. Membership of the familiarity was in the later thirteenth century what knigsnhe had been in the Carolingian period.119 Bishops, archdeacons, abbots, doctors, lawyers, judges, architects, military men, those with naval backgrounds, those related to the king, important people from, of and in all his territories, made up the kings familiarity. In return for their privileged position, virtually all of them were required to perform services, either in return for a salary or for free, for the king, either occasionally or almost all the time. From the ranks of his familiares Charles chose his diplomats, his generals, his judges of the great court, his top civil servants, his justiciars (the senior local officials), his counsellors. The last category is the most interesting in this context, in that important individuals given the title of consiliarius et familiaris appeared frequently in the household lists (but there were far too many familiares overall for us to assume that their grants were all supposed to have been recorded in the lists). In some cases, those accorded this status cannot normally have been anywhere near Charless court, but had the title conferred upon them in order to bolster loyalty to the king in a newly conquered or acquired part of his dominions. So the archbishop of Durazzo was received as consiliarius et familiaris in 1275.120 Other distant clerics were similarly honoured because they undertook ecclesiastical business for Charles in his French lands. 121 On the other hand, the archbishop of Sorrento, with an identical title, was recorded as being a long-term member of the household because he could not live in his archbishopric a formula which may have meant
118 119

See Dunbabin, Charles of Anjou, pp. 21819. See J. Nelson, Kingship and royal government, in New Cambridge Medieval History, ii: c.700-c.900, ed. R. McKitterick (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 4045. 120 R.C.A., lxxi. 131. 121 E.g., a canon of Reims (R.C.A., xlv. 113); a canon of Soissons (R.C.A., xlv. 114); and a canon of Paris (R.C.A.., xxii. 1853).
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simply that the king needed him always at court.122 Usually Charles was reasonably niggardly in granting his familiarity to churchmen of the Regno, perhaps because he thought that many were less than grateful for his concessions to them. In the 1279 fragment, the only prelate counted among the household was the bishop of Trapani.123 But French or Italian prelates who visited the royal court in the Regno acquired the title more easily.124 A substantial number of those described as clerici, consiliarii et familiarii were not men in holy orders. Many, particularly the physicians among them, were clerks rather than clergy.125 A few lawyers fell into this category, but most were simply consiliarii et familiarii, already apparently recognized as pure laymen. That Charles needed a constant stream of legal advice was evident: an outsider, created king by coup dtat yet committed by his promise to the pope to rule his country in accordance with the good laws of the last Norman kings, he needed information on how he ought to govern. The lawyers, like the clergy and the clerks, were highly literate and could be relied upon to give counsel based not just on their personal experience but on the learned sources that they were able to tap. Furthermore, all of these might contribute to the relentless recording of administration of all sorts that was the most marked characteristic of Charless government. Relatively few laymen other than lawyers qualified as consiliarii. If they were fief-holders they were usually described as fideles et familiares, if relations of the king consanguinei et familiares. Perhaps the rarity of swordbearing consiliarii is to be explained by Charless unwillingness to allow laymen competent in war to hang around the court for any length of time. They were needed, either in their own fiefs or in every corner of Charless dominions, to represent him, to fight his battles and to carry out his orders. No doubt he did occasionally take advice from them as he did from his consiliarii, but he regularly relied upon them more for information and for the sensible use of their own initiative at times and in places when crisis loomed. It will have irritated a temperament like Charless that he could not always get his orders to his representatives in the localities in time to dictate what they did. One can imagine him taking the opportunities presented by their rare visits to court to pass on copious instructions about contingency planning. Beyond the familiares of all kinds, there were the short-term visitors to whom were extended privileges of membership of the court for a brief
R.C.A., xlviii. 253. On Pierre de Corneille, archbishop from 1268 to 1275, see N. Kamp, Kirche und Monarchie im staufischen Knigreich Sizilien, i (Munich, 1973), pp. 380 1. 123 R.C.A., xci. 170. 124 E.g., the archdeacon of Rouen (R.C.A., xxxvii. 793); and brother Stephen of Milan (R.C.A., lxxvii. 10; lxxix. 113). 125 For the difference, see J. Dunbabin, From clerk to knight: changing orders, in The Ideals and Practice of Medieval Knighthood II, ed. C. Harper-Bill and R. Harvey ( Woodbridge, 1988).
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period. For example, an Italian nobleman who was invited to stay with Charles at Foggia received three golden tari for each day of his stay, and the right to hospitality both for himself and for six of his own familiares.126 Among the more interesting visitors were those who translated from Arabic the various medical texts which Charles valued for their practical teaching, and those who corrected the first drafts of the translations. 127 Then there was a steady stream of visitors from France, both from his own lands and from the royal demesne, of whom some at least were distant relatives and received a warm welcome. Among these, members of the Courtenay family, including Pierre, the bishop of Orlans, were conspicuous.128 Keeping track of who was or was not eating with the household at any one point must have been an onerous task. While the people who thronged to Charless court on great feast days came from much of the Mediterranean world, the lingua franca there was probably French. It would be natural for everyone to follow the example set by the king himself and by his domestic servants. Charless letters relating to domestic matters were increasingly commonly written in French in the latter half of the reign, which points to the same conclusion. The clergy may have spoken Latin among themselves, and Occitan must have been widely known. But the inhabitants of Achaia were still Frenchspeaking, those from Provence are likely to have learned some French in the course of Charless rule, and it may even be that some aristocratic families of the Regno had remained bilingual long after the Norman settlement in southern Italy and Sicily. On the other hand, the number of loan words from Italian to be found in letters sent out in Charless name argues against any policy of linguistic purity. It cannot have been too difficult for Italian-speaking valets to acclimatize to the speech of the court. Nor, probably, would they have felt excluded from the entertainment provided. Of this, the only known example is Adam de la Halles Robin et Marion, believed to have been performed for the court in 1283 or 1284. The songs and the story of what has been called the first musical129 will have provided light relief for a polyglot army during a period when the fighting was not going their way. The emphasis thus far in this article has been on the household and court as a melting-pot for the various peoples of Charless diverse realms. In the authors view, the evidence points clearly to this as one of Charless main aims. It is therefore wrong to see him as a relentless importer of Frenchmen or as a deliberate subverter of local customs. Nevertheless, as the Sicilian Vespers make plain, there were distinct limits to the success of Charless attempts to create a coherent people, and at least one of those
R.C.A., liv. 129. R.C.A., cv. 1822. 128 R.C.A., viii. 519; xiii. 330. 129 G. Runnalls in The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French, ed. P. France (Oxford, 1995), p. 7.
127 126

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limits can be graphically illustrated on the smaller canvas of the household and court. Specific groups of people had little or no chance of advancing within it. The declining numbers of Greek-speakers in the Regno were very poorly represented, presumably because Charles feared their potential disloyalty during his long struggle with Michael VIII Palaeologus, the Byzantine emperor. Those, or the descendants of those, who had determinedly supported Corradin in 1268 could not have penetrated the magic circle around Charles, even if they had wished to. Much more significantly, nor could the inhabitants of Sicily easily do so. Unlike the Greek-speakers or the ex-traitors, their exclusion was not a matter of deliberate policy. Two important circumstances militated against them. In the first place, the royal demesne on the island was vast, the lands of the Church sizeable. This meant that there were few large aristocratic estates, and consequently few lords who might go to court themselves or send their sons there. The castellans on the royal demesne lacked security of tenure and were kept too busy to devote much time to aristocratic pursuits. Therefore the magnetism of the court was fairly ineffective. Second, before 1282 Charles visited Sicily only on the way to and from Tunisia on the 1270 crusade. This avoidance of the island was initially accidental; but it reflects his steady concern with Rome, Tuscany and Lombardy. He did not wish to travel far from the Regnos northern border. Consequently he established a vicariate in Sicily and left it to his vicar to gather an entourage around him. But no vicar has either the charisma or the patronage of a king. From the Sicilian aristocrats point of view, it was a poor exchange. The rebelliousness and disloyalty shown by the Sicilians to Charles from 1282 onwards was not really surprising. If more of their leading men had had a chance to get to know their king and to earn his goodwill, the Vespers might not have put an end to his rule on the island. Because the evidence we have for Charless household is early compared with that for most European monarchs, it is difficult to say whether its apparently unique aspects its rapidly-changing membership at the periphery, its oath of loyalty, its defined privileges were features of the period, were inherited from his Hohenstaufen predecessors, or were spur-of-the-moment inventions to secure his position. It is more than probable that one feature, its contingent of lawyers and physicians, was inherited from Frederick II, and another, the domestic official positions, from his brother Louis IX. As to his court, the policy of trying to integrate different ethnic groups may have owed something to Frederick II, but it was also shaped by political necessity. Conquerors who hope to hold on to their gains are forced to think more seriously than hereditary monarchs about the creation of a new order. But even hard thinking is no guarantee against successful rebellion.

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