A Crown In Heaven: January 2014

HISTORIANS ON THE DECISION TO ATTACK THE TRENCAVEL LANDS

By the time twenty years of war over the Languedoc drew to a close with the Treaty of Paris in 1229, much had happened, but the immediate effect on the Occitan nobility was not as great as might be expected. The Counts of Toulouse, though defeated by the French crown, were still lords of their domains. The Counts of Foix still ruled theirs. It is only the Trencavels who lost utterly, and their loss was both the first and last effect of two decades of holy war throughout the region. Their lands had been the first to be attacked in the campaign of 1209; their Viscount imprisoned until his untimely death; their capital at Carcassonne seized and used as the crusaders' headquarters. Their last heir, Raymond II, had fought against the crusaders alongside his neighbours the Counts of Toulouse and Foix, but at the Treaty of Paris, he was formally dispossessed of all of his lands and sent into exile while they were not. In this light, the Albigensian Crusade could appear to be a war against the Trencavels rather than against heresy or against Count Raymond of Toulouse.

The previous post examined the question of why the crusade initially attacked the Trencavel lands as presented in the primary sources: the Pope's letter and the tales of William of Tudela and Pierre des Vaux-de-Cernay. This post will present subsequent historians' different answers to this question. It would not be fair to go further without pointing out the debt this analysis owes to Elaine Graham-Leigh, whose book "The Southern French Nobility and the Albigensian Crusade" is devoted to this subject.

The following points, established from the primary sources in the previous post, should be kept in mind:

1. Both Raymond of Toulouse and Raymond-Roger Trencavel attempted to submit to the Church in order to avoid invasion by the crusaders. Raymond of Toulouse's submission was accepted while Raymond-Roger Trencavel's was refused.

2. Raymond of Toulouse's submission and the resultant safeguarding of his lands was anticipated by Pope Innocent III when he called the crusade, and Raymond's delegations had been received in Rome well in advance of the crusade's muster. His reconciliation was therefore, presumably, anticipated by the papal legates leading the crusade.

3. The authors of the primary sources do not discuss any decision-making process on the part of the crusaders. Both William of Tudela and Pierre des Vaux-de-Cernay note that the crusade marched towards Beziers without explaining why.

THE HISTORIANS

Zoe Oldenbourg in "Massacre at Montsegur" (1959):

"Though Raymond VI was no longer an Enemy of the Faith, the Crusaders had not gone to all this trouble for nothing. The Legates had already marked down their first victim for destruction, the first of many 'abettors and instigators of heresy' in Languedoc. The property of the Viscount of Beziers had long been regarded as 'heretic's land' par excellence, and the young Viscount possessed neither the boldness nor the duplicity which characterized his uncle and liege lord, the Count of Toulouse." (p. 110)

Oldenbourg here differs from many later historians in claiming that the leaders of the crusade planned, in advance, to target the young Viscount as "their first victim." While this does seem likely, it is not at all clear that Oldenbourg's contention that the Viscount's property had "long been regarded as 'heretic's land'" is supported. Three generations earlier, in 1145, Bernard of Clairvaux had preached against alleged heretics in the Languedoc, but his tour of the area did not specifically focus on the Trencavel lands, and the more recent legatine preaching campaigns had not focused on them either.

Jacques Maudale in "The Albigensian Crusade" (1967):

"It was [Arnaud-Amalric] who was responsible for the appalling massacre of Beziers and the burnings at Minerve and Lavaur. It was he who refused to listen to the luckless Raymond-Roger Trencavel, the first victim of a Crusade directed not primarily against him but against Raymond VI of Toulouse." (p. 64)

Maudale does not venture an opinion on why Raymond-Roger Trencavel was "the first victim" of the crusade, but does attribute the decision solely to the papal legate, Arnau Amalric, who led the army at that time.

Jonathan Sumption in "The Albigensian Crusade" (1978):

"Then, on 22nd June, Raymond [of Toulouse] took the cross himself, promising on the Gospels to help and advise the army of God and to do all that its commanders asked of him. This last act was possibly Raymond's shrewdest political stroke .... Raymond knew that it was too late to halt the crusade .... But by taking the cross he would earn the immunity of a crusader; his titles and dominions would be protected except perhaps for those that were in the hands of the Cathars. He would become a leader of the crusade which would thereby be transformed into a war against Raymond's greatest enemy, Raymond-Roger Trencavel, viscount of Beziers. When the crusaders had destroyed the Trencavels, their resources and perhaps their enthusiasm would be exhausted and Raymond would be left in effective control of his principality for the first time since his accession." (p. 84)

Sumption is the first of the historians in my collection to blame Raymond of Toulouse for the initial direction of the crusade. After this assessment, many other historians followed suit, forming a collective portrayal of Raymond as a malignant and clever opportunist who manipulated the confused and directionless crusaders into attacking the Trencavels in order to further his own political aims. Sumption goes further than anyone else by suggesting that Raymond, despite his vilification by the Pope, became "a leader of the crusade" capable of transforming not only its direction but its purpose.

Malcolm Lambert in "The Cathars" (1998):

"Raymond [of Toulouse] warded off imminent threat by professing repentance, accepting terms and submitting to a humiliating penance .... He joined the army as crusader for the minimum forty days, perhaps in his cunning way hoping to gain by an attack on his rival, the 24-year-old Raymond-Roger, viscount of Beziers, who had declined to join with Raymond in submission." (p. 102)

Lambert follows Sumption in assessing the targeting of the young Viscount as due to Raymond of Toulouse's "cunning". He differs from Sumption in portraying Raymond as a somewhat reluctant crusader -- "for the minimum forty days" -- rather than as one of its leaders. Lambert's assessment that Raymond-Roger Trencavel "had declined to join with Raymond in submission" doubtless comes from William of Tudela's report cited in the previous post. However, William clearly portrayed Raymond's discussions with his nephew as a request for a cease-fire and defensive alliance: "[Raymond] begged him not to attack him; let them stand together in defence." There is no indication that Raymond of Toulouse ever requested his nephew to submit to the Church. Nonetheless, the young Viscount did attempt to submit and was refused -- a vital fact ignored by Lambert.

Malcolm Barber in "The Cathars" (2000):

"However, Raymond VI, after a fruitless attempt to persuade Raymond Roger Trencavel to make common cause with him, decided to cut his losses by undergoing a penitential scourging and then, in June, joining the crusaders. ... Nevertheless, this did mean that the main force of the crusade was initially directed against the two chief Trencavel cities of Beziers and Carcassonne, despite William of Tudela's view that Raymond Roger was 'certainly Catholic', and despite the fact that, until this time, the pope had been almost exclusively concerned with placing the blame on the shoulders of Raymond of Toulouse. By turning to the weapon of the crusade, the Catholic authorities had in practice abandoned the attempt to unpick the strands of Languedocian society and thus isolate the heretics." (pp. 120-121)

In this summation, Barber reports the facts much as they appear in the primary sources. His conclusion in the last sentence, however, suggests that "the Catholic authorities" in attacking the Trencavel lands were no longer trying "to unpick the strands of Languedocian society". This would be true if the Trencavel were not already isolated and if an attack on them might serve to unite the other nobles of Languedoc against the crusade. A few years later, however, Elaine Graham-Leigh would present a powerful argument that the choice of the Trencavels was an astute one, demonstrating a nuanced understanding of those very strands of Languedocian society.

Elaine Graham-Leigh in "The Southern French Nobility and the Albigensian Crusade" (2005):

"Based on military considerations, the decision to aim the first crusade campaign against Beziers and Carcassonne appears to support the view of the crusade as unrelated to the politics of Languedoc, selecting targets according not to who owned them but to their strategic importance. However, it is by no means certain that such straightforward military reasoning was paramount in the choice of the targets of the crusade. It can be argued on the contrary that Raimond Roger's lands were attacked by the crusade because they were held by Raimond Roger and that in making such an attack the crusaders were engaging with the political and social realities of early thirteenth-century Languedoc." (p. 46)

"That the crusaders' campaign against Beziers and Carcassonne was specifically directed at Raimond Roger himself, and not simply at two desirable towns affected by heresy, is indicated by the crusaders' attitudes to Narbonne. Narbonne was a large and important town, the seat of the Metropolitan and a wealthy commercial centre, situated east of Carcassonne and south-west of Beziers. ... The crusaders appear to have received the submission of Narbonne in 1209 .... The crusaders, however, do not seem to have bothered to take control of the town themselves. Following his surrender, Viscount Aimery [of Narbonne] gave some rather unenthusiastic support to the crusaders, but they themselves do not appear to have maintained any presence in the town. ... In their acceptance of Aimery's surrender and their subsequent departure from Narbonne, the crusaders demonstrated a different attitude towards the town than towards Beziers and Carcassonne, one which cannot be readily accounted for. If it is assumed that the crusaders were embarking on a war of conquest in Languedoc, Narbonne should have been rich and important enough to attract their attention, while, if they are credited with more religious motives, there is no evidence to suggest that Narbonne was notably free from heresy in comparison with its neighbours." (pp. 51-53)

"Raimond Roger's attempted surrender to the legate indicates that the difference in the treatment received by Narbonne from that meted out to Beziers and Carcassonne by the crusaders cannot be explained simply in terms of the apparent difference in responses which the crusaders encountered from these towns. It suggests that the significant difference between Narbonne, Beziers and Carcassonne was that the latter were towns belonging to Raimon Roger and the former was not." (pp. 54-55)

Graham-Leigh goes on to build a convincing case that it was ecclesiastical policy, set by Innocent III and carried out by Arnaud Amalric and then by Simon de Montfort which dictated the conquest of the Trencavel lands. She explains that the Trencavels lacked serious military allies in their neighbours, especially the Counts of Toulouse and Foix, who in the event made peace with the crusade in the first campaign season even while Beziers was burned and Carcassonne taken. Even within what might be considered the domain of Raimond Roger Trencavel, lesser lords such as Pierre Roger de Cabaret and Bernard de Saissac, were more concerned with defending their own castles than hastening to the young Viscount's side when he faced the crusading army. In this light, the special treatment singled out for the Trencavels seems to have been quite astute -- the first target of the crusade was one which would not unite the Languedoc in opposition.

Claire Taylor in "Heresy in Medieval France, 1000-1249" (2005):

"It [the Crusade] mustered in Lyon in June 1209 and approached the Languedoc via the Rhone valley, anticipating the confiscation of such lands as it could wrestle from the protectors of heretics. The excommunicate Raymond VI sought reconciliation with the Church as it approached, not only because of this army but because his lands in the Agenais had been attacked by an earlier expedition. ... This they [his clerical friends] did successfully in Rome, so that when the main crusade arrived Raymond had already, on 18-22 June, taken the cross and could not be attacked. The lands of Viscount Raymond-Roger Trencavel in the eastern Languedoc were targeted instead." (p. 188)

In describing the crusaders' anticipation, Taylor suggests that they had no particular plan other than to attack any lands held by "protectors of heretics" but without specifying how they would determine that any given land-holder was one.

Christopher Tyerman in "God's War" (2006):

"The main expedition mustered at Lyons on 24 June 1209 and set out down the Rhone at the beginning of July. By this time the whole strategic context of the expedition had been thrown into confusion from which it never properly emerged. The expected target, Raymond of Toulouse, suddenly became an ally, no doubt to the relief of those of his vassals and close relatives who were marching with the crusaders.

...

Cheated of their expected victim, the crusaders turned their attention to the Trencavel lands, incontestably riddled with heretics, even though the young and engaging viscount himself was recognized as orthodox. This made little difference. The crusade needed an enemy; Raymond of Toulouse short-sightedly promoted an opportunity to destroy a troublesome vassal while escaping attack himself." (pp. 589-590)

Tyerman here follows previous historians in blaming Raymond of Toulouse for selecting his nephew as a target. He differs from them, however, in considering the choice to be "short-sighted" rather than "cunning" or "shrewd". Even if Raymond could have directed the course of a crusade which initially set out to fight him, however, Tyerman does not offer any suggestion of what a more "far-sighted" course would have been.

Mark Gregory Pegg in "A Most Holy War" (2008):

"The enmity [of the other crusaders] toward Raimon was understandable -- he certainly understood it -- as all those who had signed themselves with the cross had done so weeks and months earlier with the fierce intention of assailing him and expunging heretics from his territories. Yet -- remarkably, importantly -- even though the count was apparently no longer the enemy of Christ, the thrill and purpose of the crusade was no less dampened and no less focused. Raimon as a crusader did not change the fact that the serpents and little foxes were invading Christendom from his cities and castra. A landscape of pestilence still existed between the Garonne and the Rhone that needed to be cleansed through holy war and, while the peccant roots of heresy were momentarily beyond His sword, the shoots and branches of the plague could be sheared and hacked. Arnau Amalric, with this in mind, surveyed the horizon and, gauging what lay between him and His eventual victory over the Provinciales heretici, decided to attack the lands of the twenty-four-year-old Raimon Roger Trencavel, viscount of Beziers, Carcassonne, Razes, and Albi ...." (p. 69)

"[Milo the papal legate] always intended to attack Raimon Roger sooner or later, as he (and so Arnau Amalric) despised the nephew almost as vehemently as they did the uncle. Guilhem de Tudela's excursus into why the Trencavel territories were targeted by the crusaders, a contrary tale that blamed (and praised) everyone, was no more than songful supposition about a fateful decision he did not understand. The troubadour was not alone in his ignorance. There can be no doubt -- despite arguments to the contrary, then and now -- that Raimon was startled by the selection of his nephew as the new objective of the holy expedition. The count, of course, wanted to deflect the crusade away from himself, but, as to where or to whom, that is far from clear; he never suggested Raimon Roger." (p. 70)

Pegg asserts, as Graham-Leigh had suggested, that it was the intention of the legates (Milo and Arnau Amalric) to attack Raimon Roger Trencavel and he firmly rejects the idea that Raymond of Toulouse could have or would have made the decision. In stating that the Count of Toulouse was "startled" by the decision, however, the same problem arises as in Tyerman's statement of the opposite: if the target had not been Raimon Roger Trencavel, then whom else? Surely no one considered that the crusaders would go turn around and go home with their pledge to wage holy war unfulfilled.

Laurence Marvin in "The Occitan War" (2008):

"By 24 June the bulk of the crusader army had formed in the city of Lyon. Up until that point the leaders intended to invade the heretically infected western lands of the Count of Toulouse, since he was the main noble villain identified by the church as harboring heretics. That changed when the count became a crucesignatus himself on 22 June. He immediately made use of his new status and met the crusader army as it left the city of Valence, ninety-one kilometers south of Lyon along the Rhone valley. At a meeting with the crusade leadership, Raimon VI managed to convince them of his sincerity .... Since the leaders and rank and file of the army were still determined to punish someone for heresy, Raimon convinced the crusade leadership to invade his nephew's lands in the viscounty of Beziers, Carcassonne and Albi. Though Raimon VI was Raimon-Roger Trencavel's maternal uncle, the Raimondine and Trencavel houses had been at odds for most of the past century. Convincing the crusade to attack his nephew must have relieved and delighted Raimon VI, since he had deflected a huge army bent on destruction from his own lands to those of one of his greatest rivals." (pp. 37-38)

As another historian following the tradition of blaming the Count of Toulouse for the decision, Marvin emphasizes the suddenness of the decision, as if to suggest that a great confusion came over the crusaders on 22 June when Raymond joined them and that it was this sudden confusion which allowed them to be convinced to begin their campaign at Beziers. This ignores, however, the months of diplomatic efforts which preceded Raymond's formal ritual of reconciliation. Raymond had discussed his submission with Arnau Amalric much earlier. He had sent delegations to Rome to obtain the Pope's approval. The formalities of 22 June had been previously arranged by Milo, the papal legate. It is simply not possible that this took anyone by surprise.

R. I. Moore in "The War on Heresy" (2012):

"Without hope of repelling such a force, the only move left to Raymond was to join it, earn the crusader's immunity for his own lands and turn the storm against the vicomte of Beziers. Raymond-Roger, grasping at last the depth of his danger, met the army at Montpellier with protestations of innocence and regret and offered to submit on the same terms as Raymond of Toulouse had done. Arnold Amalric declined to hear him and proceeded to Beziers, which on 21 July was sacked, plundered and destroyed by fire.
...
Raymond-Roger himself was seized and chained, despite the safe conduct he had been promised, and died in prison three months later, to be remembered as youthful -- twenty-four years old when he died -- handsome, gallant and foolish, or betrayed. All that he may have been, but he was also the unfortunate legatee of the long and bitter rivalry between the counts of Toulouse and of Barcelona, now kings of Aragon, in which the Trencavel lands were strategically pivotal. There is no real reason to think that the region was especially given to heresy, but it had repeatedly been portrayed as such by those who hoped to dominate it, at least since Count Alphonse Jordan of Toulouse pointed St Bernard in that direction in 1145." (pp. 247-249)

Here, R. I. Moore discounts the theory that the Trencavel lands were attacked because they were more rife with heresy than their neighbours and points out the different treatment of the attempted submissions of Raimon Roger Trencavel and Raymond of Toulouse. He does, however, also follow the tradition of crediting the Count of Toulouse with "turning the storm" against the Trencavels for political reasons.

SUMMARY

There is no consensus among historians about how the Trencavels came to be attacked first in the campaign of 1209. It has been suggested, and refuted, that their people were notably heretical. This theory dovetails nicely with the idea of the Albigensian Crusade as a "war on heresy", but there is little or no evidence to support it. It has more frequently been suggested that Raymond of Toulouse, either deftly or foolishly, manipulated the crusaders into attacking his nephew Raimon Roger Trencavel. As the Count of Toulouse was the originally declared target of the crusade, this requires one to believe that the crusaders gave over the leadership of their war to their intended enemy -- a problem which can be mitigated by exaggerating the suddenness or unexpectedness of Raymond's reconciliation with the Church. Lastly, historians differ on whether the choice of the Trencavel lands was short-sighted and blunt or whether it reflected a more nuanced understanding of the Trencavels' vulnerable position in the society of Languedoc.

The question of how the Trencavel lands came to be initially targeted instead of other cities in the Languedoc, is similar to the question of why the Trencavels were permanently dispossessed while other comital families remained in control of their lands despite having fought the crusaders and lost. In their answers to these two questions, historians go a long way towards describing the nature and result of the entire Albigensian Crusade. Considering the paucity of evidence in the primary sources, it seems more likely that it is their attitudes towards the Albigensian Crusade itself which inform their arguments about the treatment of the Trencavels. Those who see the Crusade as a holy war against religious dissent suggest that the Trencavel lands were especially heretical; those who see it as a primarily expedient military exercise stress the strategic significance of the territories; those who see it as a personal struggle over the allegiance or faith of individual rulers emphasize Raymond of Toulouse's role. In the absence of agreement on this crucial issue, future historians remain at liberty to tell the story in the way which best suits their overall perspective.

After the initial conquest of the Trencavels, Simon de Montfort was made leader of the crusade. It is often said that, under his leadership, the course of the Albigensian Crusade diverted from its original goals to serve his personal hunger for power. In the next post, I'll explore the evidence for and against this proposition and speculate on whether Simon was a power-mad, bloodthirsty warlord (as he is sometimes portrayed) or whether he ended up as a scapegoat for policies and strategies which he had no hand in forming.

Thursday 23 January 2014

A public lecture by R. I. Moore

The Targets of the War on Heresy, part 2

HISTORIANS ON THE DECISION TO ATTACK THE TRENCAVEL LANDS

THE HISTORIANS

SUMMARY