Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
until Robert arrived in 1072 with substantial reinforcements that the city fell into Norman
hands. Impressed by the island's cultured Arab lifestyle, Roger shamelessly borrowed and
improved on it, spending vast amounts of money on palaces and churches and encour-
aging a cosmopolitan atmosphere in his court.
By 1130 most of southern Italy, including Sicily, was in Norman hands and it was only
a question of time before the prosperous duchy of Naples gave in to the inevitable. It did
so in 1139 - the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was thus complete.
BORN TO FIGHT
In the late 10th century, Norman fighters began to earn a reputation across Europe as fierce and tough mercenar-
ies. As inheritance customs left younger sons disadvantaged, younger brothers were expected to seek their for-
tunes elsewhere which they did with remarkable success.
According to one legend, Norman involvement in southern Italy began in 1013 at the shrine of St Michael at
Monte Sant'Angelo, when Latin rebel Meles, chaffing under Byzantine authority, invited the Normans to serve
him as mercenaries. By 1030 what had begun as an offer of service in return for booty became a series of unusu-
ally successful attempts at wresting control from local warlords.
In the forefront of the Italian conquests were the brothers Hauteville: the eldest William 'Bras de Fer' (Iron
Arm; c 1009-46), who controlled Puglia, and Robert Guiscard (the Cunning; c 1015-85), who rampaged over
Calabria and southern Campania. By 1053, after six years of incessant fighting, Robert had defeated the com-
bined forces of the Calabrian Byzantines, the Lombards and the papal forces at Civitate.
Up to this point the Normans (as mercenaries) had fought both for and against the papacy as their needs had re-
quired. But Robert's relationship with the Vatican underwent a radical transformation following the Great Schism
of 1054, which resulted in a complete break between the Byzantine and Latin churches. In their turn, the popes
saw in the Normans a powerful potential ally, and so in 1059 Pope Nicholas II and Robert signed a concordat at
Melfi, which invested Robert with the titles of Duke of Apulia (including Basilicata) and Calabria. In return
Robert agreed to chase the Byzantines and Saracens out of southern Italy and Sicily and restore the southern king-
dom to papal rule.
Little would the pope suspect that Roger would go on to develop a territorial monarchy and become a ruler
who saw himself as detached from the higher jurisdiction of both Western and Eastern Emperor - or even the
pope himself.
