FRÜHMITTELALTERLICHE STUDIEN

FRÜHMITTELALTERLICHE
STUDIEN
Jahrbuch des Instituts für Frühmittelalterforschung
der Universität Münster
in Zusammenarbeit mit
Arnold Angenendt, Dietrich Hofmann, Volker Honemann, Albrecht Jockenhövel,
Christel Meier, Friedrich Ohly und Ruth Schmidt-Wiegand
untcr Mitwirkung
von
Karl Hauck
herausgegebenvon
HAGEN
KELLER
und JOACHIM
\VOLLASCH
29. Band
w
DE
G
1995
WALTER
DE GRUYTER
" BERLIN
ýýIPG
" NEW
YORK
PHILIPPE
BUC
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
Liutprand of Cremona on Dynastic Legitimacy
Liutprand (d. ca. 972), later bishop of Cremona, was a traitor. Chaplain to
Hugh of Provence, king of Italy (926-945), he passed before his master's death in the
service of Hugh's longtime rival, Berengar II (d. 966). He soon abandonned Berengar
for the rising power in Lombard politics, the Saxon king of Germany, Otto I (d. 973),
possibly becoming a member of the Royal Chapel'. This final shift in allegiancesmay
have occured as early as 951, date of Otto's short-lived first expedition to Northern
Italy2.
From that year on, 951, Otto had cast a long shadow over Lombard politics: he
had been received as king in Pavia and had issued diplomata for the regnumItaliae as rex
Loitgobardorum.
The Ottoman intervention south of the Alps was an almost unavoidable
consequence of the Saxon kings' hegemonic status in the Test: Otto (and perhaps
P.
his
father
Henry
I
936]) was a king with imperial stature and with imperial
already
pretensions. First, by at least 955, Otto could pose as victorious war-leader (imperator),
`nations',
his
thanks to
triumph over the pagan
the Hungariangentes3.Second, Otto
Recent biography in JoNATHAN Su i-oUtin,
Liudprand of Cremona, Bishop, Diplomat, Historian.
Studies of the Man and his Age (Biblioteca degli ))Studi Medievalia 14) Spoleto 1988, as well as in KARL
J. LEYsER,Ends and Means in Liudprand of Cremona, in: Byzantinische Forschungen 13,1988, pp. 119143 (reps in: IDEat, Communications and Power in Medieval Europe, 2 vols., London 1994,1, pp. 125142). Liutprand's membership in the Ottoman Royal Chapel is argued for (but circularily) by JOSEF
FLECKENSTEIN,
Die Hofkapelle der deutschen Könige (Schriften der MGH 16.1-2) 2 vols., Stuttgart
1959-1966,2, p. 46, p. 53.1 would like to thank here Dom Alibert, Gerry Caspar}; Patrick Geary, Igor
Gorevich, Hagen Keller, Gavin Langmuir, Michael MacCormick and Barbara Rosenwein, as well as the
Berkeley Medieval Circle in front of which I presented a draft of this paper in January 1994.
2 As surmised (but on slim grounds) by NIKoIAUs STAUBACH,Graecae Gloriae. Die Rezeption des
Griechischen als Element spätkarolingisch-frühottonischer Hofkultur, in: ANTON voN EUW-PETER
SCHREINER,
Kaiserin Thcophanu. Begegnung des Ostens und Westens um die Wende des ersten Jahrtausends,2 vols., Cologne 1991,1, pp. 343-367, at p. 365.
3 On this and the following, see first and foremost the twinned essays of HEAtrr BEUMANN, Das
Kaisertum Ottos des Großen, and HEINRICHBUrt: aEa, Der Weg Ottos des Großen zum Kaisertum,
repr. in an amplified version in: Hu. anrr BEVatANNand HEINRICHBiirrNER, Das Kaisertum Ottos des
Großen. Zwei Vorträge (Vorträge und Forschungen Sonderband 1) Sigmaringen 1963. Beumann's essay
appears also in IDEat,Wissenschaft vom Mittelalter. Ausgewählte Aufsätze, Cologne 1972, pp. 411-458.
HAGENKELLER,Jlarbaba orumpugrw Zum Stellenwert eines biblischen Vorbilds in Widukinds Deutung
.
der ottonischen Königsherrschaft, in: HAGENKmu.ER-Ntxouus STAUBACH,
eds., Iconologia sacra. Mythos, Bildkunst und Dichtung in der Religions- und Sozialgeschichte Alteuropas. Festschrift für Karl
Hauck zum 75. Geburtstag (Arbeiten zur Frühmittelalterforschung 23) Berlin 1994, pp. 417-437, has
recently demonstrated the prcgnance of the Maccabees's model, champions of the pure faith versus
idolatry after an era of political and religious decadence, for the young Ottoman dynasty.
Philippe Buc
208
Saxon
One
925)
father
the
his
(like
was critical:
regruumr
ruled over several regnna4.
after
kings had control over Lotharingia, heartland of the Carolingian empire, and therefore
Otto
in
Aachen
It
in
Aachen.
that
was
Charlemagne's
tomb
palace, church, and
of
in
his
Lotharingia;
had
Henry
920s,
936.
In
in
king
been
acquired
the
had
crowned
last years, he may already have planned an expedition to Italy5. Were the Saxon rulers
drawn there by the possession of the Holy Lance? It has been argued that this reliking
had
Rudolf
BurItalian
to
transmitted
of
nobles
quary-insignia, which rebellious
hands,
Italy6.
Or
Henry's
in
had
to
a
claim
conveyed
then
passed
gundy, and which
dukes
by
kings
just
drawn
the combination of
and
other
there
as so many
were they
family
bonds
harkening
back
for
of
and
rulers
outside
a power-vacuum which called
had
Northern
Italy's
been
imperial
Carolingian
nobility
aristocracy?
the
to the age of
implanted there by Charlemagne, in a move to displace the original Lombard ruling
it still saw itself as ethnically Frankish,
first
half
In
the
tenth
century,
the
of
group.
Burgundian, or Alemannian. It readily called on transalpine relatives for help in civil
'Reichsaribe
Otto
Henry
Now
the
original
considered scions of
nor
can
neither
wars.
family ties with the aristocracy south of the Alps. But
have
did
Nor
they
stokratie'.
kings
Burgundy
Provence
the
of
of
and
their
and
rivals
neighbors
the maneuvers of
dukes
Bavaria
Swabia
independent
highly
the
and
of
vassals
their
- sucked
even of
4 The epithet invictissinrus
proclaimed the military legitimacy of the Saxon kings from Otto's first diplomata
diplomata
in
931
932,
in
Henry's
It
had
and
and was used steadily after 934 - his great
appeared
on.
See
dates
933.
KURT-ULRICH
Königskanzlei
imperiales
JiCHKE,
Hungarians
to
the
und
victory against
Königtum im zehnten Jahrhundert, in: Historisches Jahrbuch 84,1964, pp. 288-333, repr. in: HARALD
ZIMMERMANN,Otto der Große (Wege der Forschung 450) Darmstadt 1976, pp. 137-199, esp. pp. 170189. Retroactively, Liutprand would make Henry I into a quasi-imperial ruler over the Bavarians, SwabiSaxons
imperial
Franks
Lotharingians,
as
well
as
an
conqueror of, and tribute receiver from
and
ans,
BECKER,
Die Werke Liudprands von Cremona
the Danes and Slavs.SeeAntapodosis 3.48, ed. by JOSEPH
(MGH Scriptores reuen germanicarum in usum scholarum) Hannover 31915, p. 82:12-18.
S According to the famous and much disputed passagein Widukind, Rerum gestarum Saxonicarum 1.40,
(MGH
SS
Hannover 1935, p. 59:9-10:
in
)
LOHMANN
HIRSCH-H.
PAUL
germ.
schol.
rer.
us.
ed.
-E.
`Having subjugated all the surrounding nations, at last (portrenro)he made arrangements to set out for
Rome, but stuck by illness he interrupted his journey (iterj.' Cf. BEUMANN(as n. 3) p. 428, pp. 445446.
doubts
See
debated
the
oversceptical
of EUGENio DUPRETHESEIDER, Otto I. und
argument.
much
Ottos des Großen (Mitteilungen
des
Italien, in: Festschrift zur Jahrtausendfeier der Kaiserkrönung
Ergänzungsband 20.1) Vienna 1962, pp. 53-69, at
Instituts für österreichische Geschichtsforschung,
6A
See
ADOLF HOFMEISTER,Die heilige Lanze, ein Abzeichen
57,
consensus.
p.
against an over-enthusiastic
des alten Reiches (Untersuchungen zur deutschen Staats- und Rechtsgeschichte 96) Breslau 1908; ALder heiligen Lanze Heinrichs I., in: Deutsches Archiv 6,1943,
Zur
Geschichte
BRACKMANN,
BERT
heilige Lanze Heinrichs I., in: Deutsches Archiv 6,1943,
Die
KLEwrrz,
HANS-WALTER
400-411;
pp.
der heiligen Lanze durch Heinrich I., in: Historische
Erwerbung
LINTZEL,
Zur
MARTIN
42-58;
pp.
Schriften,
1961,
in
Ausgewählte
Berlin
IDEM,
303-310,
171.2,1951,
Zeitschrift
pp. 85-91;
repr.
pp.
PERCY ERNST SCHRAMM, Die »Heilige Lanze«, in: Herrschaftszeichen
und Staatssymbolik. Beiträge zu
ihrer Geschichte vom dritten bis zum sechzehnten Jahrhundert (Schriften der MGH 13/II) Stuttgart
1955,2, c. 22, pp. 492-537; HLAWITSCHKA (as n. 7) p. 84; JosEF HöRLE, Die sogenannte »Beschreibung
der heiligen Lanze« bei Liutprand von Cremona (Antapodosis IV 24 u. 25), in: Archiv für mittelrheiBÜTTNER, Heinrichs I. Südwest- und Westpoli63-80;
HEINRICH
14,1962,
Kirchengeschichte
pp.
nische
50-56;
1964,
KARL HAUCK, Erzbischof
Constance
2)
Forschungen,
Sonderband
(Vorträge
pp.
tik
und
Adalbert von Magdeburg als Geschichtsschreiber, in: HELMUT BEUMANN, ed., Festschrift Walter Schle306,
316.
276-353,
1973-1974,2,
Cologne
2
p.
p.
at
pp.
vols.,
singer,
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
209
the Saxons southward as well. The logic inherent to hegemonic power and the need
to play a blocking game against neighboring competitors thus conspired to pull the
Ottonians across the Alps7.
Italy was a fractious land. Liutprand's first masters, Hugh and Berengar, were
related by marriage: Hugh's niece Willa (d. 966), daughter of another Willa and of
Hugh's full brother Boso, was Berengar'swife. Yet they were bitter competitors; marital
alliances did not successfully paper over conflicts heightened by exalted ancestry. Both
Hugh and Berengar belonged to established lines of the Carolingian imperial aristocracy. The marquessesof Friuli had attained the royal and imperial crown with BerenEberhard
(d.
924),
I
of
son
marquess
and of the Carolingian princess Gisla/Gisela.
gar
Berengar II was this first Berengar's grandson. Hugh was descended as well from a
Carolingian princess, his mother Bertha, daughter of Lothar II. His original powerbase vas outside Italy proper, in Provence, but over his years as king of Italy he had
managed to uproot his half-brothers from the marquisate of Tuscany, there to establish
his illegitimate son Hubert as princeps.`Italians always seek to have the use of two
masters, in order to coerce the one by the fear of the other': 8 Liutprand's famous
hints
inversion
a
shameful
at
of the normal order in potestar,in which kings
sentence
fear.
For the modern historian, it also
their
to
through
coerce
subjects
virtue
should
emblematizes the multi-dimensionality of tenth-century peninsular politics. Indeed,
besides the house of Friuli and the so-called 'Hugonides', yet other figures peopled
the Italian chessboard - the Burgundian king Rudolf II (d. 937) or the marquessesof
Tuscany, and interlopers from the two South German duchies, Swabia and Bavaria, as
distant
Byzantine
Any
as
emperors.
well
would-be rulers also had to contend with the
lust for power of lesser, but no less hungry, men and women, the Roman aristocracy
`senatress'
its
famous
Theodora and the pope-maker \farozia. Even counts,
with
bishops and judges had to be placated and bribed - ever insecurely - with gifts of
lands and privileges9.
7
8
9
See B&rrNEx and BEUMtANN(as n. 3), as well as HAGEN Rua , Das Kaisertum Ottos des Großen im
Verständnis seiner Zeit, in: Deutsches Archiv 201,1964, pp. 325-388, repr. in: ZIMMERMANN(as n. 4)
pp. 218-295, who shows that, for later historiography at least, from at least ca. 950 (that is well before
his imperial coronation) Otto had had imperial power if not the imperial name. EDUARDHIAwrrscHEA,
Franken, Alemannen, Bayern und Burgunder in Oberitalien (774-962). Zum Verständnis der
fränkischen Königsherrschaft in Italien (Forschungen zur oberrheinischen Landesgeschichte 8) Freiburg
im Breisgau 1960, has analysed the transalpine bonds which fostered outside intervention in Italy; see
also PANKRAZFRIED,Alemannen und Italien vom 7. bis 10. Jahrhundert, in: Die transalpinen Verbindungen der Bayern, Alemannen und Franken bis zum 10.Jahrhundert, ed. HELMUTBEUMANN-WERNER
SCHRÖDER
(Nationen 6) Sigmaringen 1987, pp. 347-358, and Awls SCHMID,Bayern und Italien vom
7. bis zum 10. Jahrhundert, in: ibid. pp. 51-91.
Antapodosis 1.37 (as n. 4) p. 27:30-31.
Terrorand timor: from at least Isidore of Seville, Sententiae 3.47.1-3.51.4, JEAN-PAULMIGNE (PL 83)
SiüxNr, Peaatamund potutax Der Sündenfall und die Entstecols. 720-723, on whom see WOLFGANG
hung der herrscherlichen Gewalt im mittelalterlichen Staatsdenken (Beiträge zur Geschichte und Quellenkunde des Mittelalters 11) Sigmaringen 1987, pp. 95-102, to High Medieval exegesis,on which see
PHILIPPEBuc, L'ambiguüte du Lives Prince, pouvoir et peuple dans les commentaires de la Bible
(Theologie Historique 95) Paris 1994, p. 105, p. 117, p. 136, p. 180, pp. 197-205. On the constellation
of forces, see GINA FASOU,I re d'Italia (888-962), Florence 1949; Giovi. i, I TAa. cco, Egemonie
sociale e strutture del potere net mcdiocvo italiano, Torino 1974, pp. 189-218 (English translation: The
Struggle for Power in Medieval Italy, Cambridge [UKj 1989, pp. 151-176); and (still) ADOLF HornIEIsTEa,Markgrafen und Markgrafschaften im Italischen Königreich in der Zeit von Karl dem Großen bis
210
Philippe Buc
After having served Hugh as a chaplain, Berengar as counsellor, envoy, notary10,
Constantinople,
Liutprand
his
Empire
Eastern
the
to
of
offered
skills
and ambassador
to the Northern hegemon. He would later become Otto's own emissary to the Byzantines. But he first served his Saxon master through his writings. Diplomatic
office
could only sharpen Liutprand's political acumen. Political envoys - one will think of
Philippe de Commynes and Nicolo Machiavelli - tend to be sharp analysts of the
first
Commynes,
Like
to Charles the Bold of Burgundy and
servant
power-systemll.
then to the Burgundian duke's arch-enemy, Louis XI of France, the traitor Liutprand
destroy
he
had
felt
betrayed12.
have
The first
the
the
those
to
repute
of
need
may
`Antapodosis'
is dedicated to a Mozarabic bishop, Recemund of Elvira;
his
preface of
it presents the work as a straightforward history of the kingdoms North of the Pyrebetween
itself
Italy,
Germany,
Indeed,
the
weaves
narrative
and Byzantium. But
nees.
the third book explicitly frames it as a literary revenge for some unknown slights
Berengar had inflicted upon Liutprand. Antapodosi.: in Greek, retribution13. Generations of positivistic historians found this quest for vengeance one of the grounds to
dismiss the `Antapodosis' (like Liutprand's two other surviving historical works, the
`Historia Ottonis' and the `Legatio Constantinopolitana')
as an unreliable historical
however,
in
identifying
Their
key points where he twisted reality,
very
work,
source14.
provides the solid basis of an assessment of Ljutprand's techniques and purposes. We
can now move on to examine the interplay between means and ends, hoping in the
process to clarify both.
auf Otto den Großen (774-962), in: Mitteilungen des Instituts fur österreichische Geschichtsforschung,
Ergänzungsband 7.1, Vienna 1907, pp. 215-435, esp. p. 371 f. On Berengar I, we are waiting for Barbara
Rosenwein's study; on Hugh, see now PATRICKJ. GEARY,Phantoms of Remembrance. Memory
and
Oblivion at the End of the First Millenium, Princeton 1994, pp. 135 f
10 This is probably how one ought to gloss tecretorumclot contciatat cphtolarum tignator- Antapodosis
...
5.30 (as n. 4) p. 149:4-7. My thanks to John C. Robinson on this. Under Otto II, chaplains
were often
(as n. 1) 2, p. 76.
used as envoys and called consiliariiand contecretalet,
see FLECKENSTEIN
11 SeeJEAN DUFOURNET,La destruction des Mythes dans les Memoires de Ph. de Commynes (Publications romanes et franfaises 89) Geneva 1966. GIRo1i to ARNALDI,Liurprando e la storiografia contemporanea nell'Italia centro-settentrionale, in: La Storiograßa altomedievale, 2 vols. (Settimane di Studio
17) Spoleto 1970,2, pp. 497-519, at pp. 505-507, notes how Liutprand's experience in the politics
of
the royal court at Pavia accounts for his cynical keennessas an observer of Byzantine politics.
12 DUFOURNET'S
argument (as n. 11).
13 Antapodosis 1.1 (as n. 4) pp. 3-5 and 3.1, pp. 73-74; LEYSER(as n. 1), argues for the importance
of
the first dedication; for him, the 'Antapodosis' called on the Mozarabs to renounce peaceful accomodaHistoria oder Satira? Zur literarischen
tion with their Muslim lords in Spain. NIKOLAUSSTAUBACH,
Stellung der AntapodosisLiudprands von Cremona, in: Mittellateinisches Jahrbuch 24-25,1989-1990,
pp. 461-487, esp. pp. 467-469, underlining the similarities in contents and form with Rather of Verona,
reads 'retribution' in the wide senseof providential rewards and punishments for good and bad kings.
(as n. 6) p. 7: "..., das zum großen Teile mehr einer Anekdotensammlung mit
14 See, e.g., HOFMEISTER
". A kinder assessment (and
historischem Hintergrunde, als wirklicher Geschichtserzählung gleicht
...
Liudprand of Cremona, Preacher and Homilist, in: K
constructive historiography) in KARL J. LEYSER,
WALSH-DIANAWOOD,The Bible in the Medieval World. Essays in memory of Beryl Smalley (Studies
in Church History, subsidia 4) Oxford 1985, pp. 45-60, at pp. 55-56 (repr. in: IDEAL,Communications
(as n. 13) summarizes
and Power in Medieval Europe, 2 vols., London 1994,1, pp. 111-124). STAUBACH
JOHANN
the positions of different historians on Liutprand's reliability and purposes. CARLDÄNDLIKER
JACOBMüLLER,Liudprand von Cremona und seine Quellen (Untersuchungen zur mittleren Geschichte
1) Leipzig 1871, remains the classic and most useful positivistic study of the 'Antapodosis'.
Italian Nussics and German Matrons
211
The prime purpose of Liutprand's work was service to Otto I. Like contemporary
`Antapodosis'
first
in
their
manuscripts, presented
miniature to a ruler or a saint15, the
was a servitium. A senitiunr with specific political intentions, directed at a specific (and
in the tenth century necessarily narrow) audience: no wonder that all its surviving
manuscripts are to be found North of the Alps (none in Italy), and that its diffusion
seems to have been at first (in the tenth and eleventh century) limited to the Ottonian
kingdoms". In the later 'Historia Ottonis', Liutprand would devote himself to assassi`Legatio'
deposition;
his
(besides
justifying
the
the
nating
character of a pope and
justifying Liutprand's failure as ambassador) would ridicule Byzantine claims to cultural
and political hegemony. Both works would target a clear and single enemy: one pope
`Antapodosis'
is confusing to
The
his
East
Roman
state.
and
allies, one monocentric
its readers precisely because it aims at a confused set of multiple enemies. The multiAtto
Italian
itself
factor
is
the
political
system.
the
of
confusing structure
plicity
a
of
A
for
it:
Vercelli
plicant
polycentric
sophistael'.
non
cbaos
e,.
of
would renounce accounting
kings,
involving,
their councillors,
peers,
as
and
almost
polity
an unstable equilibrium
marquesses, bishops ... 18 The Ottomans did not compete against a single rival, but
rather against an aristocratic plurality.
Be it as it may, the struggle could be fitted within a binary (or ternary) structure.
The `Antapodosis' is crafted as an implicit dyptich opposing Lombardy and Saxony.
It is actually a tryptich if one considers the information Liutprand gives on Byzantium.
In the `Legatio', but in the `Antapodosis' as well, the Byzantine political system is
subtly denigrated by one who knew it well. Liutprand may have been constituting an
denial
for
Otto's
Constantinopolitan
of
armory
potential counter-attack against any
imperial titles". The contrast between Italy and Germany, on which I shall concentrate,
15 Examples in HENRYMAtR-HA1cnNC,Ottonian Book Illumination. An Historical Study, 2 vols., London
1991,2, pp. 57-60, pp. 96-98.
16 Cf. JosEF BECKER,Textgeschichte Liutprands von Cremona (Quellen und Untersuchungen zur lateinischen Philologie des Mittelalters 3.2) Munich 1908, pp. 42-43, and InEM, introduction to his edition
(as n. 4) pp. xx ii-xxxiii. This faintly suggests that Iiutprand's prime audience was German. The Metz
fragment could derive from an exemplar brought by bishop Theoderic after his Italian journey in the
Die Vita des Johannes
service of Otto I (970-972), sec BECKER,p. 43, and PETERCHRtsrtANJACOBSEN,
de
Gorze
1`
GERHARD
OEXLE,
in:
PARtssE-Orin
L'abbaye
Gorze,
Mict-sE.
au
siecle, Nancy 1993,
von
`propaganda'.
for
issue
below,
21,
25-50,
See
41.
the
and
pp.
at n.
of audience
at p.
17 Attonis qui fertur Polipticum quod appellatur Perpendiculum, 'argumentum', ed. and German translation by GEORGGoEtz (Abhandlungen der philologisch-historischen Klasse der sächsischenAkademie
der Wissenschaften 372) Leipzig 1922, p. 14:10.
18 Cf. GIOVANNtTABAcco, Regno, impero ed aristocrazie nell'Italia postcarolingia, in: 11secolo di ferro.
Mito e rea16 del secolo X, 2 vols. (Settimane di Studio 38) Spoleto 1991,1, pp. 243-271. Correspondingly, Liutprand spares no Italian magnate, c£ M1cHAEt.RE1-rscHtER,Liudprand von Cremona. Eine
Studie zum ost-westlichen Kulturgefäie im Mittelalter (Frankfurter wissenschaftliche Beiträge, Kulturwissenschaftliche Reihe 14) Frankfurt 1981, pp. 16-17.
19 RENTSCHi ER (as n. 18) p. 14, shows that almost all the emperors in the 'Antapodosis'
are negative
figures. But one cannot follow him in arguing that Liutprand exemplifies a growing lack of understanding between East and West. The ambassador was efficient in denigrating because he knew only too
well what he was denigrating, sec ARNAtnt (as n. 11) pp. 505-507; JOHANNES KODER-THOMAS WEBER,
Untersuchungen
Liutprand von Cremona in Konstantinopel.
zum griechischen Sprachschatz und zu
13) Vienna 1980, p. 99; and
Aussagen in seinen Werken (B)zantina Vindobonensia
realienkundlichen
LEYsER (as n. 1). Sc; c. &, Antapodosis 4.6 (as n. 4) pp. 154: 5-155: 15: '\Vhen I came in [the palace of
Magnaura] the [mechanical] lions roared, and the birds
I remained unmoved either by terror
sang,
...
212
Philippe Buc
serves similar ends. Through this dyptich, Liutprand aims at undermining the legitimacy of the greatest magnates implanted in Lombardy, Otto's rivals from 951 on for
the title of rex Langobardorum - for convenience's sake I shall call Otto's competitors
`Italians' or `Lombards', although this does not necessarily correspond to their selfascribed ethnic identity or geographical origin20. Conversely; the dyptich sacralizes the
Saxon ruler's family, papering over its numerous internal conflicts and presenting it in
the context of providential history. Liutprand's book should thus be seen as a document arguing for the greater legitimacy of the Ottonians, composed as the Saxon
king's plans for the conquest of the imperial crown were crystallizing. Perhaps the
work aimed at legitimizing the new course in Ottonian policy (incepted with Liudolf's
956/957 intervention in Italy) for a specific (and given the limits of Early Medieval
limited)
public: those members of the aristocracy who had
of
communication,
means
backed and warranted the Augsburg pact of 952 by which Otto had invested Berengar
and Adalbert
with Italy. Indeed, the geographical location of the earliest surviving
manuscripts hints that the intended public was German. That Liutprand stopped writing around the imperial coronation of 962 (devoting himself instead to the `Historia
Ottonis') may indicate that the `Antapodosis' had lost its usefulness after the success
of Otto's Italian plans21.
How does Liutprand compose his dypdch? The strategiesare many. There is, for
instance, the constant tendency attributed to Lombard dynasts: they ally with pagan
or amazement, because I had previously inquired about all those things from people who well knew
them. ' By the tenth century, the 'nations' knew well that the Byzantines would try to impress them
through ceremonies, and alternately played, or refused to play, the game. On Byzantine-Ottonian relaDas Zweikaiserproblem im früheren Mitteltions in the 950s and early 960s, see WERNEROHNSORGE,
alter. Die Bedeutung des byzantinischen Reiches für die Entwicklung der Staatsideein Europa, Hildesheim 1947, pp. 49-58; IDEM,Abendland und Byzanz. Gesammelte Aufsätze, Weimar 1958;
and recently
STAUBACH
(as n. 2) pp. 353-367. The era was one of redefinition; the Ottonians
and their Byzantine
counterparts watched one another with great care. RUDOLFHIESTAND,Byzanz und das Regnurn Italicum
im 10. Jahrhundert. Ein Beitrag zur ideologischen und machtpolitischen Auseinandersetzung
zwischen
Osten und Westen, Zürich 1964, paints a good portrait of Italy's situation between Eastern
and Western
powers.
20 On this question, see HLAWITSCHKA
(as n. 7) passim. The best English-language discussion
of ethnogenHistory of the Goths,
esis is in the introductory remarks to the American version of HERWIGWOLFRAM,
J. GEARY,Before France and Germany.
translated by THOMASDuNLAr, Berkeley 1988; see also PATRICK
The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World, New York 1988, ch. 1.
21
For HAUCK (as n. 6) p. 303, from 960 on (I would argue, possibly earlier), once Otto had been
called
into Italy, the 'Antapodosis' became much more than the private polemics of a disgruntled
cleric
against Berengar II, it became "ottonenfreundliche Propaganda". For \V VON STErrEN, Der Niederschlag liudolfingischer Hausüberlieferung in den ersten Werken der ottonischen Geschichtsschreibung, Diss. Erlangen 1954, p. 25 f., the 'Antapodosis' aimed at leading Otto to intervene in Italy. It is
more probable that it aimed at justifying such an intervention. See MARTIN LINTZEL, Studien über
Liudprand von Cremona, in: Historische Studien 233,1933, pp. 57-76, at p. 61, repr. in: IDEM, Ausgewählte Schriften, 2 vols., Berlin 1961,2, pp. 384-398, at p. 388. As argued in a recent article, one
cannot think of 'propaganda' in the modern sense of the term, directed at a wide-ranging political
class - FELICELIFSHITZ,Dudo's Historical Narrative and the Norman Succession of 996, in: Journal
of Medieval History 20,1994, pp. 101-120, at pp. 106-107.1 thank Hagen Keller (letter of 27/07/94)
for his suggestions on the function of the 'Antapodosis' and its aristocratic audience in the
context of
952-962. One detects the need to justify the new turn in Otto's politics as well in Hrotsvitha
of
Gandersheim, Gesta Ottonis, vv. 481 ff., vv. 596 ff., vv. 696 ff., ed. HELENEHOMEYER,
Hrotsvithae opera.
Mit Einleitung und Kommentar, Munich-Paderborn 1970, pp. 424-425, pp. 428-429, pp. 432-433.
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
213
Hungarians to unleash them against their own Christian rivals - and accessorily, but
devastatingly, on the Italian cities and countryside22. Berengar II even used the pretext
of paying tribute to the pagans to enrich himself by pocketing his subjects' contributions and handing over to the Magyars counterfeit bullion. This attitude would have
carried negative meaning for a Saxon audience accustomed to consider its princes
through the lenses of the story of the MaccabeesV3.Henry of Saxony was not such a
falsifier of royal duties. He forced the heretofore indomitable Danes to give tribute.
He refused to pay off the Hungarian raiders and defeated them in 933 to `the holy
and wonderful (sanctaat mirabilis) battle-cry; Kyrie Eleison'. Inspired by the Lord,
Henry had secured divine favor by promising to renounce simony forever24. Implicitly,
the Lombard dynasts stood further condemned by Otto I's steadfast stand versus the
Hungarians at the battle of the Lech (955) -a victory Liutprand's incomplete `Antapodosis' does not recount but which it alludes to25. On this particular point (the
attitude toward the Hungarians) the dyptich was probably grounded in facts. A second
opposition, much more constructed, contrasted manipulative Lombard political rituals
and sanctifying Ottonian political rituals, setting up a radical contrast between selfserving, destructive politics and sacralizing, consensus-building power. This conscious
`clean
between
and propagandistic opposition
manipulation and
power' shall provide
the axis of another study. Liutprand's evident partisanship26 shall have allowed one, it
is hoped, to uncover an important structure in medieval polemics, the dyadic pair
good ritual - bad ritual.
u See LEYsER(as n. 1) p. 126 and n. 21, for Hugh of Italy and the Carolingian emperor Arnulf, to which
one should add Berengar 1, see Antapodosis 2.42 (as n. 4) p. 56:25-27. The Byzantines caused the
Saracen invasion of Sicily and Southern Italy, see Antapodosis 2.45, pp. 57-58.
Zs Antapodosis 5.33 (as n. 4) p. 151:8-17; the 'Historia Ottonis', 6, ed. BECYER(as n. 4) p. 163:5-23,
would accuse Berengar II and his papal ally of summoning the Hungarians for armed help against the
Ottonians. TutoTHy REUTER,Plunder and Tribute in the Carolingian Empire, in: Transactions of the
Royal Historical Society 5'. s. 35,1985, pp. 75-94, has shown how the legitimacy of ninth-century
rulers depended on their receiving, as opposed to giving, tribute to the 'nations'. On the confluence
of religious and military legitimacy under the early Ottomans, see now KELLER(as n. 3), especially
pp. 432-436, where the author surmises a Maccabean exemplariness in Saxon circles antedating Widukind's 'Rerum gestarum saxonicarum libri tres'.
24 Antapodosis 3.19 (adding the Slavs) and 3.48 (as n. 4) p. 82:12-18 and p. 100:8-12; Antapodosis 2.2431, pp. 49-52, esp. 2.27, p. 50:22-34 and 2.30, p. 51:22-25. For the kjrie in battle, see ALBERTMICHAEL
KOENIGER,Die Militärseelsorge der Karolingerzeit (Veröffentlichungen aus dem kirchenhistorischen
Seminar München 4.7) Munich 1918, pp. 56-57, and MICHAEL McColu ucr, Liturgie et guerre des
Carolingiens ä la premiere croisade, in: ' 1fil1ia Cb,ici e Crociata nei secoli XI-XIII. Atti della undecima
Settimana internazionale di studio, Mendola, 28/02-1/09 1989 (Miscellanea del Centro di studi medioevali 30) Milan 1992, pp. 211-240, here pp. 229-230.
25
Cf.
BünrIER
E
does
(as
3)
64
but
Liutprand
950,
to
n.
pp.
not
recount
posterior
events
alludes to Otto's
.
victory in Antapodosis 1.5 (as n. 4) p. 7.1-4: a 'people, whose cruelty almost all nations experienced;
by God's mercy it [now] does not dare even mutter, terrified by the power of the most holy and
...
most victorious king Otto (as we shall elaborate later)'. By 962, Otto had obtained the imperial crown;
Liutprand may no longer have found it necessaryto complete a work he had incepted to prepare for
the Saxon take-over of Lombard Italy.
26 For LINTZEL (as n. 21) p. 59 resp. p. 386, Liutprand is the most clearly political author of the tenth
century; and the one whose political aims and views are the clearest. I am working on a study of
medieval theories of political ritual, tentatively entitled: The Dangers of Ritual. On the Politics of
Medieval Anthropology; in which I shall deal with Liutprand.
214
Philippe Buc
I shall concentrate in this article on a third contrast. The `Antapodosis'
sets up
German
hussies
Italian
(morally
between
(morally
and
virtuous)
corrupt)
a comparison
been
have
Italy
Tenth-century
is
It
may
not
regulated
power.
about
of course
matrons.
by the political economy of love of Marshall Sahlins' Hawai. Nevertheless, if "the rank
differentiate the claims of rival
through
their
mothers
transmitted
respective
tabu
and
lineage
bound
be
heirs",
to
and
are
at the center of
sexuality
contending
chiefs and
political argument27.
The most disquieting and unreliable aspects of Liutprand's `Antapodosis'
owe
defects
in
intelliform
being
to
as
opposed
to
authorial
purpose,
authorial
their
and
This
historians
branded
long
been
has
Liutprand
trait
misogynist.
some
a
attrigence.
bute to his clerical estate; they see in it an ominous foreshadowing of eleventh-century
`Antapodosis'
deny
denigrates
One
that
the
cannot
on
women28.
attacks
reformists'
his
Queen
\Xrilla,
her
homonyfigures29.
Liutprand
female
portraits
of
crafts
powerful
`the
hussy',
Roman
Bertha,
Tuscany,
Marozia
Ermengard
Willa
and
of
mous mother
indiscriminate
farcical
the
as
charges
of
techniques
as
well
scatology
of
using the
from
list
Marozia's
The
male
conquests
seems
culled
the
of
polyandry or adultery.
Who's Who of the Northern Italian aristocracy; the `shameless hussy' gives her favors
to Pope Sergius III, Alberic marquess of Spoleto, \Vido marquess of Tuscany, and
finally Hugh of Provence, king of Italy (926-945)30. Marozia's contemporary Willa of
Tuscany, wife of King Hugh's disgraced brother Boso, having been captured by Hugh's
men, attempts to preserve from plunder her husband's precious gem-studded baldric
by hiding it in her private parts. In itself, the match of object (nrirae lougitudinis et
balteunr) and place (secretion corporir parse) is both unlikely and salacious,
latitudinis
...
and hints at disorderly female sexuality. Willa is stripped naked, a scurrilous servant
discovers the trick and proceeds to extract the girdle, slowly; ostentatiously and to the
27 MARSHALL SAHLINS, Islands of History,
Chicago 1985, pp. 20-21.
28 SUZANNEF. WEMPLE,Sanctity and Power. The Dual Pursuit of Early Medieval Women, in: RENATE
BRIDENTHALet al., Becoming Visible. Women in European History; Boston 21987, pp. 131-151, at
p. 148, calling Liutprand a "monkish [sic] chronicler ... utterly incapable of explaining the source of
this power". No wonder. Earlier historians could take Liutprand's portrait seriously; and bemoan the
"pornocracy" as a symptom of tenth-century barbarity and anarchy; thus LUDO HARTMANN,Geschichte
Italiens im Mittelalter, Gotha 1911,3.2, p. 195: "Die Weiberpolitik dieser Zeit, die mit den am schwersten zu kontrollierenden Mitteln und durch die menschlich einfachsten Motive ohne jede Hemmung
wirkte, ist auch ein Ausfluß der Anarchie jener barbarischen Zeit. " Ibid. p. 210, on Theodora and
Marozia in Rome: "Man kann sie nicht mit dem üblichen sittlichen Maßstabe unserer Tage messen; um
zur Macht zu gelangen und zu genießen, verwendeten sie ebenso unbedenklich die Mittel, die ihnen
zu Gebote standen, wie ihre männlichen Zeitgenossen ihre Waffen, da das asketische Ideal der alten
Kirchen verblaßt war und die anarchischen Zustände soziale Hemmungen bei den Machthabern nicht
aufkommen ließen." The best analysis of Liutprand's women is ENZA COLONNA,Figure femminili in
Liutprando di Cremona, in: Quaderni medievali 14,1982, pp. 29-60.
29 Neither for that matter can one deny the presence of reformist themes in the `Antapodosis'. \X'e saw
how Henry I renounces simony (above, at n. 24). Yet this episode, just as Otto's refusal to give the
abbey of Lorsch to a count whose military support he critically needed prior to Breisach (Antapodosis
4.28 [as n. 4] pp. 123:12-124: 27; see STAUBACH[as n. 13] p. 481), is as much a factor of Liutprand
wanting to exalt the Saxon rulers as it is of his committment to reform.
30 Antapodosis 2.48,3.18,3.44-45 (as n. 4) p. 59:1-8, p. 81:19-22, pp. 96:12-97: 26.
Iuliin
Hussics and Gern=
\Istrons
215
sound of his own ignoble guffaws (ha! ha! be.)31. We move from sexualized sword-belt
to militarized sexual organ with her homonymous daughter. Queen Willa, wife of
Liutprand's
personal enemy King Berengar II, indulges in an adulterous liaison with
her chaplain Dominic, 'a
small priest, puny in height, soot-colored, rustic, hairy, intractable, rough, shaggy, wild, uncouth, crazy; rebellious, iniquitous, with a tail-like appendage'. The Queen saves herself by having spells cast upon her husband. Dominic
undergoes castration, and those who perform the operation upon him reveal the
reason of Willa's affections for such an unlikely creature: 'He who bore [such] Priapic
arms was a worthy object of love for his mistress'32. Bertha (d. 925), widow of Adalbert of Tuscany (d. 915), and mother of King Hugh, is able to resist King Berengar I
(888-924) through systematic infidelity; in Liurprand's words because she had 'made
quite a few men her faithful (Adetu) through cunning and bribes as well as the exercise
of the sweetness of love'. Her daughter Ermengard (d. 932) is 'her equal in Aphrodite's charms'33. \\rife of Adalbert of Ivrea (d. 923), Ermengard too maintains and
even increases her power in her widowhood through judiciously distributed sexual
favors. As Enza Colonna has pointed out, "the sexual democracy" Liutprand attributes
to Ermengard could hardly meet with the approval of the aristocratic tenth century.
'obtained dominion over
Once widowed, Ermengard, according to the 'Antapodosis',
all Italy; and the reason for this power was that (which is most disgusting to say) she
had carnal commerce with all, not only princes but even non-nobles'. A prime victim
of her charms was King Rudolf of Burgundy; ruler of Italy from 924 to 92634.
That these vilified creatures stood high in importance and public recognition is
attested to by contemporary sources. In one of Berengar II's diplomata, the reviled
Willa appears as 'Queen \\rilla, our beloved wife, who shares in our governance (consors
regna)'.The technical term corrrorrrt,grri implied an actual sharing in political power,
traditional in Italy under certain circumstances; King Lothar used it both for his spouse
Adelheid and for his partner-rival Bcrengar3S.As for Bertha, Hugh's mother, she was
31 Antapodosis 4.12 (as n. 4) pp. 110:6-111: 16. \Villa, sent bad: in Burrurdia, dequa criundafi eras(p. 110:12),
bore a name attested in the Burgundian royal family: see Willa, Rudolph I's widow and Hugh's first
wife, and \\'U42, niece of Rudolf 11, with RE.1E PourARDIN, Le royaume de Bourgogne (Bibliotheque
de I'Ecole des Hautor Etudes 163) Paris 1907, p. 28 n. 2, pp. 42-43. But even though the reverse might
strengthen this article's argument, one should follow HoFntctsrER (as n. 9) p. 406 n. 5: "Daß Willa eine
Tochter König Rudolfs 1. von Hochburgund sei, ist nur eine Vermutung" against GEORGESDE MANTEYER,La Provence du premier au douzieme siede, Paris 1908, pp. 122-123 (see the same's flimsy
justifications in his 'Les origins du duche dc Savoie', Paris 1899, pp. 160-162).
32 Antapodosis 5.32 (as n. 4) pp. 150:3-151: 7. For Dominic's portrait, I draw on the translation by F. A.
WRIGHT,The Works of Liudprand of Cremona, London 1930, p. 199.
33 Antapodosis 2.55-56 (as n. 4) p. 63:3-9 and p. 63:12-13.
34 Antapodosis 3.7 (as is. 4) p. 77:7-13; 3.8-11, pp. 77:14-79: 5; COLONNA(as n. 28) p. 48.
35 D. B.II. 14 (960), cd. Lutes ScxtAPAREtu,I diplomi di Ugo e di Lotario, di Berengario II e di Adalberto
(Fonti per la storia d'Italia 38) Rome 1924, p. 333:9-10; Lothar's wife Adelheid was araantirsinlaconiux
nostraet rorrorr rr ei norm in 950, D. L. 14, p. 282.7-8, so was Berengar in the same's D. L. 8 of 948,
p. 267:3-5: i rune reurt prtitierr Brm gsrii irdjti n."a,rbiorit rrýrique no fei summ consortir,cf. FASOU(as n. 9)
p. 165. For the quasi-constitutional powers of Italian queens, especially when there was no male coregent (son or rh-al-partner), see CARLOGutno lion, Cantos rrgni: La Regina nel diritto pubblico
,
italiano dci secoli IX-X, in: Archivio giuridico Filippo Serafini 135,1948, pp. 7-32 (pp. 16-18 for
Lothar and Bcrengar II), and accessorily SltxIA KoNECN'; Die Frauen des karolingischen Königshauses.
Die politische Bedeutung der Ehe und die Stellung der Frau in der frinkischen Herrscherfamilie vom 7.
216
Philippe Buc
`the
factor
be
in
from
far
Italian
Byzantium:
to
politics
a major
as
as
considered
elder
for ten years after the death of Adalbert her husband' 36.
(ebasileusen)
Bertha
reigned
...
The marchioBoniface and Bertha's daughter Ermengard appear jointly in one of Rudolf II of Burgundy's diplomata as `consiliariito [our] royal power', a title which, as
Hagen Keller convincingly argues, denotes not so much subjection but rather a conErmengard managed to accumulate
tractual participation in royal authority (polestar)37.
power through her descent from Bertha and Adalbert of Tuscany as well as by virtue
forced
Adalbert
her
her
Ivrea
to
she
to
to
capital
was
pass
of
on
marriage
stepof
-a
Anscar?
her
death
)38.
II
(after
Berengar
the
son
of
son
This quasi-constitutional influence explains the great wealth of these women, a
influence.
Italian
dynasts
in
helped
this
to
turn
perpetuate
generously
which
wealth
became
for
desirous
thus
these
prizes
men
their
of accumulatwomen
wives;
endowed
ing power. In 937, on the day after their marriage, King Hugh gave his new wife
Bertha (Rudolf II's widow) a dos comprising one castellum,one abbey; and about 2,000
manses; on the same day, Bertha's daughter Adelheid, married to Hugh's son Lothar,
king
key
domains
from
(cartes)and lesser caries,
three
three
the
abbeys,
young
received
for a sub-total of about 4,580 manses - about 20,000 people altogether (enough,
land,
Carolingian
to
to
the
to send about 1,600
ratios
apportioning
service
according
identical
levy).
Invoking
Eve's
the
to
creation,
arengae of these twinned
a general
men
diplomata proclaim - through theological language - the function of these marital
be
Adam's
helper
Eve
to
was
and the procreator of a human race which
alliances.
depleted
the
tenth angelic order and (on this earth) maintain peace within
refill
would
its own ranks because of its shared origin. The first human couple is a type of the
(itself exemplary) association of Christ and His Church. The arenga's exalted
'Herrschaftstheologie'
thus reflects the important status and political function of these
women: associates, helpers, warrantors of peace. It suggests through the language of
devolve
the
role
which
could
upon Italian princesses, that of a virtual coexegesis
regent39.
bis zum 10. Jahrhundert (Dissertationen der Universität Wien 132) Wienna 1976, pp. 118 f., on Empress
Die Frau als Herrscherin. Studien zur 'consors regni' Formel im
Angilberga, with THILO VOGELSANG,
Mittelalter, Göttingen 1954, p. 21. Commenting on a specific but representative example, MoR, p. 17,
states: "Non si tratta ... di diritti ereditari passati ad Adelheide dal marito [Lotario], ma di un diritto
originario, consuetudinariamente ricognosciuto in Italia alla regina."
36 HOFMEISTER(as n. 9) pp. 391-404, with reference to Constantine VII, De administrando imperio,
J. H. JENKINS(Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantine 1) Washington
cap. 26,2nd. ed. G. MORAVCSIK-R.
1967, p. 113, in which the Byzantine emperor Constantine VII was clearly trying to exalt the grandmother of his son's wife.
37 HAGEN KELLER,Zur Struktur der Königsherrschaft im karolingischen und nachkarolingischen Italien.
Der consiliariusregis,in: Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken 47,1967,
pp. 123-223, especially pp. 188-191, pp. 200-202, and p. 210, citing D. 6 of Rudolf II, cd. LuiGI SCHIAPARELIJ,I diplomi Italiani di Lodovico III e di Rodolfo II (Fonti per la scoria d'Italia 37) Rome 1910,
p. 112:6-8: conriliariosnostrereglepotestatir,cf. MOR (as n. 35) pp. 16-17.
38 HLAWITSCHKA
(as n. 7) p. 103.
39 12 December 937, DD. U + L. 46 and 47, ed. SCHIAPAREW(as n. 35) pp. 139-144; cf. F sou (as
.
n. 9) p. 140, who identifies the domains, and KARL Bost, GesellschaftsgeschichteItaliens im Mittelalter
(Monographien zur Geschichte des Mittelalters 26) Stuttgart 1982, p. 78. Probably assuming a ratio
between mansusand iugeraunchanged since Late Antiquity; HIESTAND(as n. 19) p. 180, estimates the
surface corresponding to Bertha's share to 1,500 square kilometers. Abbatia probably means dominion
over, and revenues of the abbey.
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
217
The question remains. Does clerical misogyny account for the `Antapodosis's'
viciously distorted portraits? Does Liutprand depict Italian politics as a `pornocracy'
because he is blind to the realities of power and offended by a feminine influence he
can only attribute to sex40?Such an explanation fails in the face of the positive image
Liutprand paints of Ottonian women - Adelheid, Gerberga, Ida, Mathilda41. No misogyny there. Saxon women enjoyed a great degree of power and landed wealth42. Yet
the `Antapodosis' presents this category in an unfailingly positive light. Gerberga,
Otto's sister, rebukes her other brother, the rebel Henry; and refuses to offer him
shelter in her Lotharingian fortresses43.She was not one to foster disorder within her
own family. Adelheid, daughter of Rudolf II of Burgundy, married to King Lothar (d.
950), is `both most beautiful and shapely (formabouestissiniam),
and graced with moral
The `Antapodosis' is remarkably silent about the
probity (moi7mrprobitategratiosam)'44.
fact - necessarily known to Liutprand - that Adelheid had already become Otto's
second wife (951) as well as about the idea, attested in tenth-century German historiography, that she had transmitted to him a claim to dominion over Italy45. Yet the
claims existed, compounded by Adelheid's prestigious ancestry; she `sprang from a
royal stock through her close and remote ancestors' - Pippin I of Italy and Louis the
Pious46. Otto demonstrated them in liturgical form through a 952 donation to the
monastery of Saint-Ambrose near Milan `for the benefit of, and help (remedio)to our
40 "Significantly, Liutprand
had no wish to find any explanation for their importance other than gross
...
sexual licence, the only reason he could think of for their incomprehensible control over men; their
power offended against all his assumptions about the world. " \\ ickham goes on, pointing to the real
reasons behind women's power in Lombard politics: "It may be better to see them as focal points of
dynastic continuity (as heiresses,or the guardians of infant sons) in an age where lineage-consciousness
Early Medieval Italy, London
among the aristocracy was becoming more important. " CHRIS\\VICKHAAt,
1981, pp. 118-119.
41 COLONNA(as n. 28) pp. 39-42, p. 58.
42 KARL J. LEYSER,Rule and Conflict in an Early Medieval Society: Ottonian Saxony, Oxford 1979, pp. 4973. The women of the Saxon aristocracy held as much land and power, if not more, than their Italian
counterparts. But they secured their position more through monastic foundations (protected by the
king) than through remarriage. Latest bibliography and assessment of the nunneries' historiography in
GERD ALTHOFF, Gandersheim and Quedlinburg. Ortonische Frauenklöster als Herrschafts- and Überlieferungszentren,
in: Frühmittelalterliche
Studien 25,1991, pp. 123-144.
43 Antapodosis 4.34 (as n. 4) pp. 127:21-128: 2.
44 Antapodosis
4.13 (as n. 4) p. 111"20-22. Compare the Annals of Quedlinburg, a. 951, ed. GEORG HEINIbique rex itlrictissinms
RtcH PERTz (NIGH SS 3) Hannover 1839, p. 58: 3-15: Otto nexperrea7t in Italian
...
Otto Adelheidmir rrginan, tultu detoram, coasilio prolidam,
et uniterra n,"orum honestate ralde praeclaram, et regali
arorum atarorumque prosapia orlon, eaniugeilustrusinto, Latbario sduat rege, iant tunc riduatam, connubiali sibi
rinculo sodandant adquisitit, talus chant consilia rrgnum Langobardiat, quad illi baereditatio lure cesserat,cum Betingero
tiranuo ditioni swat suhiugalur.
45 ERNs-r KARra, Herrscherlegitimation
10. Jahrhunderts
Saxonicarum
(Historische
3.7 and 3.9-10
des
and Reichsbegriff in der ottonischen Geschichtsschreibung
Forschungen 10) Stuttgart 1985, pp. 40-41. \Vidukind, Return gestarum
(as n. 5) pp. 108-109, prefering a power legitimized by military virtue,
does not peep a word about Adelheid's importance for the crown of Italy, unlike the Annals of Quedlinburg (text n. 44). See as well as Hrotsvitha
of Gandersheim, Gesta Ottonis, vim:467-470 (as n. 21)
p. 424: rev Italicusgratido Hlotharius itftdus morho, , undo ducessit ah isto, Itabae rrgll!! nt linquens fllerrt0 re1111e17dum summae reginat, sibi quam socia:il amore. CE MOR (as n. 35) pp. 17-20.
46 Annals of Quedlinburg, a. 951 (text above n. 44). See GuN-rHER \VoLF, Über die Hintergründe der
Erhebung Liudolfs von Schwaben, in: Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte, Germanistische Abt. 80,1963, repr. in Zlr, utER.\IANN (as n. 4) pp. 56-69, at pp. 58-59.
218
Philippe Buc
soul and that of our spouse Adelheid as well as for the help to the soul of our
942,
Hugh
had
designated
late
King
Lothar'.
In
Lothar
the
this
and
predecessor,
monastery as a family necropolis; it already celebrated Bertha's memoriaas well as that
I.
By
952,
Adelheid's
first
husband,
including
Lothar
Otto's
Carolingians
of a series of
diploma tells us, rested buried there, in a subterranean chapel under the main church;
Saint-Ambrose's monks were to take daily care of the lighting in this chapel and
perpetually celebrate the mass for King Lothar's sake. Otto, through this donation,
thus attempted to bind spiritually with Lothar, and beyond him with his royal sib,
`Ansippung'47.
Liutprand
have
been
liturgical
it
cannot
as
were
a
unaware
up
setting
(covering
The
incomplete
the
of
nature
work
events until april
of such maneuvers.
950 and then breaking off) may account for this omission. Unless we wish to ascribe
it to authorial subtlety: the diplomat seldom stated his master's intention explicitly. It
is anyway clear that Liutprand, in the know, took care to endow Adelheid with the
dynasts
Italian
denied
he
the
wives
of
virtue
- virtue crowning king-worthy gratia48.
Mathilda's virtues are portrayed immediately after a chapter devoted to King
Hugh's unfaithful mistresses - Liutprand may have intended here an implicit contrast49. Widow of Henry of Saxony, she did not offer her body after her husband's
death to the best candidate. Rather, `beyond what I ever saw or heard matrons do,
his
frequent
in
for
of
sins
the dead and
expiation
masses
offered
unceasingly
she
[herself] as a living sacrifice to God'50. Liutprand anticipates here the saintly portraits
by
later
Saxon
historiography
Mathilda
hieratic,
produced
of
sacerdotal and iconic51
47
48
49
50
Si
Compare D.U. + L. 64 (below, n. 68) with D. O.I. 145, Die Urkunden der deutschen Könige und
Kaiser, 1. Die Urkunden Konrad I. Heinrich I. und Otto I. (MGH Diplomata regum et imperatorum
Germaniae 1) Berlin '1956, p. 226:25-32, dated from Cuomo, 15 ii 952 annoregnidomni Ottonisrrgis hic
in Italia primo. Bernard king of Italy (d. 818) was also buried there.
COLONNA(as n. 28) p. 40 n. 15, on the connection of bonnsturand gratiarur to dignitac.
See below, Antapodosis 4.14 (as n. 4) pp. 111:26-112: 17.
Antapodosis 4.15 (as n. 4) pp. 112:26-113: 2. Liutprand's renerabilireins [Heinrich roniux regniqueconsors
ex eadem
genieallows the shades of monastic religio(renerabi/is)and polestar(ronsorrregm)to descend upon
the Queen. The term renerabiliscould denote a lay abbacy; see KARL BRuNNERin: HERWIG\VOLFtu, t
et al., Intitulatio II. Lateinische Herrscher- und Fürstentitel im neunten und zehnten Jahrhundert (Mitteilungen des Instituts für österreichische Geschichtsforschung, Ergänzungsband 24) \ ienna 1973,
p. 201, p. 309 (for Otto duke of Saxony).
HOLTZMANN(MGH SS rer. germ. n.s. 9) Berlin 1955, p. 26:21Thietmar, Chronicon 1.21, ed. ROBERT
32, insists on Mathilda's devotion to memoria.She fed the poor, as well as birds -a seemingly strange
action which modern-day Bosniac folklore interprets as feeding the souls of the dead. Dying, Mathilda
agonizes over the salutarismemoriaof her son William, Chronicon 2.18, p. 60.4-8. See also her deathbed scene in the `Vita Mathildis reginae antiquior', cap. 13, ed. BERNDScxürre, Die Lebensbeschreibungen der Königin Mathilde (MGH SS rer. germ. in us. schol. 66) Hannover 1994, p. 138:7-10: 11fathilda transmits to her niece the calendar (computarium)containing the names of the dead magnates,
entrusting thus to her her soul, Henry's, and 'all thosefide/u whose memoriathis document cultivated' 'Vita
finally
(as
42)
72
Mathildis regime posterior', cap. 8, ed. Set-tfrrrE (as
LEYSER
the
p.
n.
see
- and
above) pp. 159:16-160: 7, where she offers her golden armillaeas a countergift for Henry's first funeral
mass. PATRICKCoRBET,Les saints ottoniens. Saintete dynastique, saintete royale et saintete feminine
autour de Pan mil (Beihefte der Francia 1) Sigmaringen 1986, p. 36, p. 199, notes Liutprand's (still
muted) precocity in sanctifying Mathilda - his Saxon contemporaries Hrosvitha and \\'idukind do not
'Vita
harp
first
fully
developped
in
the
posterior' and later Brun of Querfurt and
on a sanctity
yet
Thietmar. On the dangers of seeking too much 'Ottoman dynastic propaganda' in tenth-century Saxon
texts (as opposed to the interests of the monasteries or churches which produced them), see GERD
ALTHOFF,Causa scribendi und Darstellungsabsicht. Die Lebensbeschreibungen der Königin Mathilde
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
219
But other sources preserved the traces of conflicts between lVfathilda and Otto her
first-born son, possibly after the latter's marriage to Edgith of Wessex (which introduced a second queen in the family)52. Mathilda, one learns from her second `Life',
preferred her second-born, Henry. This information comes from the early eleventh`Vita
dededicated
Henry
II,
Mathildis
to
the
text
person
of
century
posterior', a
scended from Otto's younger brother, it evidently partakes of one of the work's main
biases: to exalt the junior branch on the Ottonian dynasty now ruling in the person
of Henry II in the context of the immediate aftermath of his disputed accession.
Mathilda's preference for her younger son Henry leads to conflicts within the royal
family but foreshadows his descendant's accession to the throne53. But the 973/4
`Vita Mathildis reginae antiquior' (a source undistorted by Henry II's accession) also
reports problems between mother and elder son. It claims that the Devil had pushed
Otto to despoil his mother of the wealth she had endowed monasteries with -a sin
for which God scourged the Saxon king-54. Yet closer in time to the `Antapodosis',
the presence of tensions is hinted at by silences in sources dating from Mathilda's own
lifetime: by the absence of Otto and Edgith in memorial entries comprising Mathilda
and her kindred, and, conversely, by the non-mention of Mathilda in Otto's royal
diplomata from 936 to 946, the date of Edgith's death. Far from being a meek matron,
part in the turmoils which followed, in
Saxony, the establishment of royal primogeniture55. Thus, Liutprand organized his
feminine figures into a dyptich contrasting German matrons and Italian hussies. Or
Mathilda
played an important
and self-willed
rather - for the ethnic origins of these women do not matter as much as the aristoOttonian
bearing
kindreds
into
printhey
children
cratic or royal
which
ended up
cesses and women of dynasties contending for power in Northern Italy.
There is a dyptich56. How does it operate, and to which ends? Ends go beyond
the simple opposition of virtue and vice, and the issue of good and ill familial repute.
und andere Beispiele, in: Micn&EL BoRGoLTE-HExnA1 SPILLING,eds., Litterae Medii Aevi. Festschrift
Johanne Authenrieth, Sigmaringen 1988, pp. 117-133.
52 KAIU. LEYSEA,
Die Ottonen und Wessex,in: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 17,1983, pp. 73-97, especially
P" 80.
53 Vita Mathildis reginae posterior, cap. 5 (as n. 51) pp. 155:14-156: 13, with cap. 9, p. 161, and cap. 16,
pp. 175-178. See BERM) Scttvrre, Untersuchungen zu den Lebensbeschreibungen der Königin Mathilde (MGH Studien und Texte 9) Hannover 1994, pp. 82-110. Thietmar, writing after Henry II's
accession, conveys this same tradition: arrenrnt ronnulü eardemhoc turnaperedie enitui se,quod iuniorfilier
possidnrt- Chronicon 1.21 (as n. 51) p. 28:2-5.
suinnt Heinricutpatrit sedem
54 Vita Mathildis regime antiquior, cap. 8, XI (as n. 51) p. 124:2-4. See ALTrtoFF (as n. 51) pp. 125-126,
but with the critiques of ScrivrrE (as n. 53) pp. 70 f£
55 See Schmid's arguments and remarks, Knxt. Scriarto, Neue Quellen zum Verständnis des Adels im 10.
Jahrhundert, in: Zeitschrift für die Geschichte des Oberrheins 108, N. F. 69,1960, pp. 185-202, repr.
in: Eovnxn Htawrrscrixn, Königswahl und Thronfolge in ottonisch-frühdeutscher Zeit (Wege der
Forschung 178) Darmstadt 1971, pp. 389-416, at pp. 413-414 n. 71, with LEYSER(as n. 52) pp. 80-84,
despite MnxrIN L rrzri's doubts in his Miszellen zur Geschichte des 10. Jahrhunderts. V: Heinricus
natus in aula regali, in: Berichte über die Verhandlungen der SächsischenAkademie der Wissenschaften
zu Leipzig, phil.-hist. Klasse 100.2, Berlin 1953, pp. 86-95, repr. in: IDEat, Ausgewählte Schriften (as
n. 21) 1, pp. 276-281.
56 Lutprand's strategy found a victim in Coxarr (as n. 51) p. 257, who writes of Ottoman queens that
"leur stature apparait encore mieux ä 1'evocation des reines italiennes du K` s., brocardees par Liutprand
dc Cremone".
220
Philippe Buc
We may suspect (for example, in the case of Alarozia) that Liutprand travestied real
marital alliances into purely sexual liaisons, which as such could not entail the transfer
of property and legitimacy from first husband through wife to second husband57. But
the author aimed probably less at lateral alliances than at descent and filiation. If
Italian women are unfaithful, how can they transmit to their children their cuckholded
husbands' blood-rights, especially royal parentage? The reader suspects WWWilla's
offspring to be not of kingly (Berengar's),but of servile (Dominic's) patrilineage. Women
can also transmit their own ancestors' prestige (as opposed to conveying their husbands') - but evidently with difficulty when their children were illegitimate. And it is
be
telling
that
this
point
a
silence
should
mentioned, which leads one to a second
at
hypothesis. At no point does Liutprand mention or even hint that some of his Italian
hussies were actually Carolingian women. In fact, the `Antapodosis' is remarkably
silent about Carolingian blood. I would argue that this is purposeful. Carolingian blood
and royal blood are two different but related issues.Liutprand's main aim was probably
to deny royal patrilineage altogether58; the alleged immorality of Italian noblewomen
threw a doubt on their children's potential claims to a royal patrilineality unsullied by
bastardry. But the author seems to have desired as well to obliterate descent from
Carolingian rulers. I shall try to argue for, admittedly e silentio, Liutprand's erasure of
the Carolingian ancestry of Otto's rivals in Italy59. For readers to whom this seems
too speculative, there remains the first thesis,which I shall deal with concurrently with
the second: by attacking women's virtue the author was besmirching Italian dynasts'
bloodlines and sapping their throneworthiness.
In the tenth century, albeit increasingly rivaled as a vector of legitimacy by \VestSaxon and Ottonian parentage, Carolingian blood transmitted by women could still
favorise the ascent to the throne of a man whose male ancestors had never been
57 See similarily Gregory of Tours' refusal to make senseof Merovingian kings' habit of striking
a carnal
alliance with their deceasedbrothers' widows, as in the case of Chlothar 1, Libri historiarum, 4.9 (English translation by LEwis THORPE,Gregory of Tours, The History of the Franks, London 1974, p. 203).
One of the reasons why Guntram is bonusrex is because,instead of sleeping with Theudechild, Charibert's widow, he packs her off to a nunnery and takes control of her treasure, Libri historiarum, 4.26
(It-IORPE,pp. 220-221). On Gregory and kings, see now HEthzwt_wt&NN(as n. 71) esp. pp. 158-167,
with the latest bibliography. I shall deal with Merovingian kings and ritual in the second chapter of my
Dangers of Ritual (as n. 26).
58 DÄNDLIKER-MÜLLER (as n. 14) p. 170, remark: "... wie wenig weit zurück
er seine Geschlechtsregister
führt, gerade diejenigen der italienischen Fürsten, die er sonst aus verschiedenen Gründen
mit besonderer Aufmerksamkeit
behandelt und wiederholt vorbringt
über die zweite Linie
verfolgt
er
nie
...
hinaus. " But Duke Otto, Otto Is grandfather, is known to have been ara; in Antapodosis 1.24 (as
n. 4)
p. 21: 12-15.
59 See, for another example of purposeful omissions, the case of \\ idukind, who passed over the foundation of Magdeburg and the Eastern missions, to which he was opposed - GERDALTHOFF,\Vidukind
von Corvey. Kronzeuge und Herausforderung, in: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 27,1993, pp. 253-272,
esp. pp. 258 f. In making Liudgard the wife of Louis the Child (rather than that of Louis the lounger)
the same Widukind may have purposefully falsified the Ottonian family's marital connections to make
her brother the Saxon duke Otto the nearest heir of the last eastern Carolingian, see IDESt,Adelsund
Königsfamilien im Spiegel ihrer Memorialüberlieferung. Studien zum Totengedenken der Billunger
und
Ottonen (Münstersche Mittelalter-Schriften 47) Munich 1984, pp. 224-226, commenting on \Vidukind
1.16 (as n. 5).
221
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
kingsGO.All the contenders for the Italian throne in the first half of the tenth century
were descended from daughters of Carolingian emperors61. That women mattered in
Lombard genealogies is confirmed, a contrario, by Liutprand's comment about the
Greeks. The Byzantines did not care that Romanos' promised bride should have been
a bastard (as opposed to legitimate) daughter of King Hugh, because for them only
paternal descent counts62. Carolingian ancestry - something which Otto sorely
lacked - among northern Italian dynasts had to undergo a damnatiomemoriaeif Ottonian claims to the Lombard crown and to the Empire were to be secure. Some of the
`Antapodosis's' most important female characters were descended from Charlemagne.
Their names themselves- Bertha, Gisla, Ermengard - are pointers to the blood they
carry63. Gisla, Berengar II's mother, bore her grandmother's name - that of the sole
der Deutschen Kaiser seit Karl dem
VON DUNGERN, Thronfolgerecht
and Blutsverwandtschaft
Großen, Papiermühle 21910, with KARL-FERDINA:. D W'ERNER,Die Nachkommen
Karls des Großen bis
um das Jahr 1000 (1.-S. Generation), in: WOLFGANG BRAU:.'FEts-PERCY E. SCHRAMM, eds., Karl der
60 Orro
and Nachleben, 4: Das Nachleben, Düsseldorf 1967, pp. 403-479, at pp. 419-422.
KONECNY (as n. 35) pp. 132-133, would argue that in Italy Carolingian descent counted less and less
and that only Louis III called explicitly on his Carolingian ancestry. I do not mean to argue against
Werner that Charlemagne's blood was the main factor in royal
common sense and Karl-Ferdinand
Große. Lebenswerk
legitimacy: See also HIESTAND (as n. 19) pp. 152-153, pp. 203-204. On the importance of West-Saxon
blood, see LEYSER (as n. 52). Otto did not yet have at his disposal the idiom later developped by late
Ottonian and early Salian political society (on which see HAGEN KE t ER Herrscherbild und HerrschaftsStudien 19,1985,
legitimation.
in. Frühmittelalterliche
Denkmäler,
Zur Deutung der ottonischen
pp. 290-311).
61 Short of that, having a Carolingian wife certainly helped such claims. \VotF (as n. 46) esp. p. 60 with
reference to \\Tidukind, Return gestarum Saxonicarum 3.6 (as n. 5) p. 108:1-8, argues that Liudolf's
Italian expedition (which brought him in conflict with his father Otto I's own interests) was grounded
in his marriage to Ida of Swabia (a transmitter of Carolingian blood); he undertook it immediately after
his accession to the Swabian dukedom.
62 Antapodosis 5.14 (as n. 4) p. 137.20-22 quoriam Grec in geniseo.
r nobilitatenon, quaemater,red quisjuerit
pater, inquiruni.
63 See ERICH BRANDENBURG, Die Nachkommen
1935; repr. (Genealogie and
Landesgeschichte 10) Frankfurt 1964, III14b (Gisla daughter of Louis the Pious and wife of Eberhard
of Friulii), V8b (Bertha daughter of Lothar 11), following from then on; WERNER (as n. 60) pp. 420-421
Karls des Großen,
Leipzig
and p. 447, as well as table IIIc15 (Gisla) and Va15 (Bertha); SIEGFRIEDRÖSCH, Caroli Magni Progenies
I (Genealogie and Landesgeschichte 30) Neustadt an der Aisch 1977, has full entries mentioning other
(for Gisla wife of
for the royal line of Friuli-Ivrea
descended from Gisla, CMPdII15
offsprings
(Berengar I), CMPdIV27
(Gisla of Friuli), Cn\lPdV27 (Berengar II),
of Friuli), CMPdIII27
CMPdVI47
(Adalbert). Prudence is called for, however, unlike \Vidukind - see LEYSER (as n. 52)
p. 78 - Liutprand does not mention the hallowed blood brought into the Ottonian family by Edgith
Eberhard
in the eyes of a Lombard (or his German
of Wessex. Unless West Saxon prestige was unimportant
public), the author of the 'Antapodosis'
may have been insensitive to the prestige of all royal bloods,
Carolingian included. But in the second half of the tenth century; Charlemagne, in both Germany and
Italy, was already on his way to acquiring the status of an exemplary figure, see the Reichenau Translatio
(ca. 968), with ROBERT Fotz, Le
sanguinis (ca. 950) and the Chronicle of Benedict of Mont-Soracte
souvenir et la legende dc Charlemagne dans l'empire germanique medieval, Paris 1950, pp. 24-25,
Romanesque Signs, New Haven 1983, pp. 72-73, and AMY G. REpp. 135-137, STEPHEN Ntctiots,
MENSNYDER,The Remembrance of Kings Past. Monastic Foundation Legends and Imaginative Memory
in Medieval Southern
France, forthcoming,
Cornell
U. Press, Ithaca [1ß'1']. Widukind,
Return gestarum
where Thankmar found his
2.11 (as n. 5) p. 76: 14-15, identifies the Eresburg church
tragic death as 'consecrated by pope Leo [111] to saint Peter'. \Vhile unlikely, the attribution
to the
pope commonly associated, in Aquitanian foundation legends (REMENSNYDER, ch. 5), to Charles the
Saxonicarum
222
Philippe Buc
full sister of emperor Charles the Bald". Her father Berengar I was proud of his
Carolingian ancestry65. Hugh and his son Lothar, kings of Italy; knew very well that
they were descended from Charlemagne. King Lothar II's daughter Bertha had
transmitted Carolingian blood to her sons Hugh and Boso (sons of Thietbald of Arles)
and to Wido, Lambert, and Ermengard (the progeny of Adalbert of Tuscany). She
bear
in
her
to
son's diplomata two quite regal epithets, serenisrimaand gloriosiswas made
sima, the latter transmitted to at least Ermengard and Boso66. It was part and parcel
of Hugh and Lothar's legitimacy to celebrate the memoria of their ancestor through
pious foundations. Hugh thus confirmed a donation of Emperor Lothar I to San
Donato of Arezzo; he added to it property inherited from Bertha's dos, requesting the
counter-gift of prayer for himself, his relatives (parentes)and especially his brothers, as
well as for the state of the kingdom67. The royal pair hoped to be buried in SaintAmbrose near Milan, where Bertha's viemoria as well as that of Emperor Lothar I
were celebrated68. King Lothar's very name commemorated this specific Carolingian
Great, is striking, and a probable sign of "le souvenir et la memoire de Charlemagne" in the Saxon
970s. At the other end of Liutprand's world, in Byzantium, his friend Constantine VII, De administrando imperio, cap. 26 (as n. 36) p. 109, could remember Charlemagne as `a man much celebrated in
song and story', a patron of Palestine, and a builder of monasteries.
64 Is it pure accident that the sole mention of Charlemagne is derisive and refers to laudu sang to a falsely
merciful Berengar II? See Antapodosis 5.30 (as n. 4) p. 148:22-24: Quam immensumtune Italis gaudium!
Alterum David venisselatrabant. Sedet magnoKarolo caecabunt [Berengarium) praeferebant.Panegyrists
of
Berengar II may have underlined his Carolingian blood.
65 RENEPOUPARDIN,
Le Royaume de Provence sous les Carolingiens (855-933?) (Bibliotheque de l'Ecole
des Hautes Etudes 131) Paris 1901, p. 166. See also DD. B.I. 2,8,40,124, ed. LuIGI Sct-lIAPARELU,
I
Diplomi di Berengario I (Fonti per la storia d'Italia 35) Rome 1903, p. 9:11-13, p. 34:9-11 & 20-21,
p. 117:6-8, p. 323:7-10, and especially D.B.I. 105 (ca. 911-915), p. 272:1-3, confirming precepts of
Louis, Charles the Fat and Karlmann, quorumprorapir nostrarorusritorido,with testa Berengarii, I, 5: 16,
III, v. 4, IV, v. 6 (MGH Poet. 4.1) Berlin 1899, p. 358, p. 384, p. 395.
66 See D. U. 41, ed. SCHIAPARELLI (as n. 35) p. 127: 22-23, bone menroriae Ben'ae romitrssaeglariasissimae
rnatri
nostrae and D. U. 2, p. 8: 6-7 & 11-12, Ermengardisgloriosissimam romitissam karissimanrquegermanam nostrae,
and Bertaegloriosissimaeabbatissaeconsanguineaenostrar, compare D. U. +L 31, p. 96: 1-7, Adelberti marrbionis
33, p. 102: 11-12, serenusrnrus
et Bertae serenissimae[sic] comilissae karissimae mains nostrae with D. U. +L
anus nosterLotharius imperator, and Hugh's own early self-description (inlitulatio) in D. U. 3, p. 11: 1-2, dirino
munere largiente serenissimusrex. Hugh's full brother Boso is inclitus or iliutrusimus marrbio, but also once,
in D. U. + L. 28, p. 86: 7-8, dilectissimumfratrem et gloriosissimum martbiorem. The diplomata intended to
secure prayers for familial
redemption
and political
success, ob ... nosier crime 'emedium parentunrque
nostrorum et augmentationemnostreprolix necnon ei regni nostri stabilimenium, p. 86: 10-12, efi p. 87: 6-9, a purpose which may explain the familial-official
epithet. Wido and Lambert, Hugh's uterine brothers, do
not appear in Hugh and Lothar's diplomata. For all these terms, see %VoLFF_Ju
t et al. (as n. 50) pp. 33 f.,
p. 199. In D. U. 21, p. 64: 11, Adalbert of Ivrea is gloriasirsimus marcbiq no doubt owing to his father-in-
law emperor Berengar I.
67 D. U. + L. 33, ed. SCHIAPARELU (as n. 35) p. 102: 20-21, p. 103: 22-24, and p. 104: 21-23: dime
meroriae
Lotharius imperator avius nosier
fratrum relirorumque parentum fiat mercedis
ut
nostra
nostrorumque
assplifr...
...
catio, quandam terrain, quam mater nostra suo pretio compararit ... Pro robin statuque regni norm remedioque
animarum nostrarum etfratrum nostrorum orare.
68 D. U. + L. 64 (as n. 35) p. 192:14-15; cf. p. 193:6-7; a gift pro De amoreanimacque
mains et nostrarum
animarumremedioto Saint-Ambrose near Milan secured the place as a necropolis for Hugh and Lothar
(p. 192:6-9): Quamvisenim ceterissacrislocissit famulandum,illi tarnenlocooperapretium estfamulari predia
ac
augerecuipost evocationem
animaererolutumcorpussepulturetradendum.See also D. U. + L. 65 (11 March 943),
pp. 194:7-195: 2, Saint-Antonin of Piacenzapro deiamoreet animaeatii rostri Lotbarii inprratoric ruinscorpus
infra basilicamSanctiAntonini martyrishumatumquiescit,cf. HoE EISCER
(as n. 9) p. 392 n. 2; D. U. +L 59,
Italian Hussies and German Macrons
223
ancestry. Can we imagine that Liutprand, being Hugh's chaplain (and as such probably
involved in the liturgical commemoration
of the royal ancestors) and Berengar II's
ambassador, had no knowledge of his two masters' ancestry? Hugh's descent from
Charlemagne was known to, and prized by the Byzantine emperor Constantine VII,
Liutprand's
friend. But Constantine remained true to Byzantine prejudices in favor of
patrilineality69; in his `De administrando imperio', Charlemagne's blood travels from
father to son (rather than through women), establishing a line from Lothar II to
Adalbert
to Hugh to Bertha, betrothed
to Constantine's own son Romanos70.
Carolingian and royal blood did not contain themselves within the veins of
Hugh's narrow family. From Boso, they passed to his daughter Villa, wife of Berengar II - the man Liutprand proclaimed he had composed the `Antapodosis' against.
For Liutprand, Hugh had been a better rex71, and safely so; he was dead, without
legitimate male children besides the equally dead King Lothar72. Lothar's widow Adelp. 176:12-14: predeauorrm rottmram impsatorunr et regumas parrrtum nostrorum,videlicetDesiderii, Caroli,
Ludotici argueLotbarir, cf. D. U +L 31, p. 96:1-7, which offers a mrta acquired by Bertha and her first
husband Thietbaldpm rrnredioarimarrmAdelberti marrhioriset Bertaescrrniuimae[sic] comitissae
karissimaeque
matrit nottrar, D. U. + L. 32, p. 100:10-14, giving another property acquired by Bertha pro dei amore
animaquematrit rothae; D. U. + L. 45, p. 137:18-20 (cE p. 138:13-14): quatenutseduloorations pro nobis
49, p. 148:6-7 & 12-13: pro Dei amore
matrrquenottra Bela ibidem ad Domirum dirigartur, D.U +L
animarumquenottrarumrrmedioetpro anima n."ahis rottrae Bertae... iruuper et omnemillam terrain quam mater
nortra ... adquishit, D. U +L 56, p. 167:6-8 (cE p. 168:19-20): pro del anrorraninrarrmqueAdelbertimarchionis matruquenostraeBence mri gis eiur as rortrarum arin."arumrrnudio, confirming D. U + L. 31. Hugh's
explicit use of property inherited from Bertha (often from her dos)to endow her nrenroriais noteworthy.
Adalbert of Tuscany, Hugh's stepfather, was associated to Bertha only in D. U. + L. 31 and D. U. + L.
56 (confirming D.U. +L 31), his father Thietbald only in D.U. + L. 34, p. 106:4-6. Adalbert's memoria
was never endowed independently of Bertha, Thietbald's only in D. U + L. 76, p. 225:2-4. Legitimacy
thus came overwhelmingly from Bertha, and was memorialized using what one might call, broadening
the expression of BARa&RARosEiwEIN, To be the Neighbor of Saint Peter. The Social Meaning of
Cluny's Property, Ithaca [NY'] 1989, p. 162, "special property'' - land linking the Hugonides and the
Carolingians through Bertha. San Ambrögio's Carolingian memoriawas especially attached to reenacted
confirmations of Lothar I's gift of Limonta near the Lake of Cuomo (DD trail from DD. Loth. I. 23
and 27 to D. IQ.III. 21); it was alive in 951 when D. O.I. 138 confirmed it (as n. 47) p. 218:18-19.
69 See above, note 62, Antapodosis 5.14.
70 Constantine VII, De administrando imperio, cap. 16 (as n. 36) pp. 109-113, with the genealogy as the
emperor understood it mapped in HIESTA14D(as n. 19) p. 183. This chapter, devoted to Hugh, his
ancestry; progeny, and history, was probably composed before 950 or shortly after, and inserted in the
work in 952 (editors' notes 1, pp. 11-12 with volume 2, London 1962, p. 83). The information may
have come from Liutprand himself as DANDUKEa-MütLEx (as n. 14) p. 53, argue; contra: PouenxwIN
(as n. 65) p. 34 n. 1.
71 CATHERINEDE FIRI,tAS,Etude sur Ic mode de designation des personnes dans les sources narratives A
1'epoquecarolingienne, Diplome d'Etudes Approfondies Paris-Sorbonne 1992, sous la direction d'OuHugh receives the inoculavtERGulu oT, p. 21, remarks that in Liutprand Otto is the rrx 'par excellence":
tion rexdepending on the circumstances (morally positive or negative), and Berengar II, never. Similarily,
MARTIN HEINZEutANN, Gregor von Tours (538-594). )Zehn Bucher Geschichte(. Historiographie and
Gesellschaftskonzept im 6. Jahrhundert, Darmstadt 1994, p. 57, has noticed that Gregory of Tours, in
the table of chapters in book 8 of his 'Libri Historiarum', calls his favorite king, Guntram, simply and
only rex (the author's own king, Childebert, "wird stets durch seinen Namen identifiziert, nie durch
das vertrauliche Anfiihren des Titels rrx allein").
72 Lothar's only child Emma (RdscH [as n. 63] C.\1PdVII40, p. 161) was in Otto's hands, who
affianced
her to the Western Carolingian Lothar in 965 only, see FERDINANDLoT, Les derniers Carolingiens.
Lothaire, Louis \, Charles de Lorraine, 954-991 (Bibliotheque de I'Ecole des Hautes Etudes 87) Paris
224
Philippe Buc
heid (herself of Carolingian blood) was now in Otto's hands; thus Hugh's mother
Bertha, while a flat figure, escaped the worse sexual innuendos before her second
husband Adalbert II's death73.It was critical to sap blood legitimacy at the following
Otto's
his
Adalbert,
Berengar
11
to
the
and
son
rivals and
one
got
closest
generation,
Liutprand's prime targets: Boso's wife Willa was endowed with a deep organ large
baldric
to
of the most generous proportions, and
gem-studded
a
welcome
enough
) potentially welcoming of adultery; her daughter Willa, Bethus (should one assume?
So
for
II's
to
arms74.
much
and
receptive
priapic
was
adulterous
actually
wife,
rengar
biological
his
for
legitimacy
by
Berengar
II
legitimacy
the
of
and
neverthe
alliance of
mentioned male children.
Yet what about Hugh's illegitimate children? Doesn't Liutprand take pains to
bear
including
did
indeed
They
two
a
posterity,
mention a set of three mistresses?
bishops for whom the author had no lost love. But bastards can be doubly spurious.
Hugh's partners were so promiscuous that the king was not the only one to make
descent
be
the
patrilineal
of
exact
of these
thus
certain
them',
not
one could
use of
it
doubtful
have
Liutprand's
that
concluded
was
would
readers
women's children75.
blood.
let
Carolingian
blood
(Hugh's),
of
alone
that any of them was of royal
We are here facing a conscious tactic: the systematic destruction of the dynastic
legitimacy of potential contenders for the Italian throne76. Even royal bastards are
be
be
like
the
the
they
to
offsprings
of
should
suspected
royal;
of
even
possibly not
Dominic, or (in the case of Ermengard) of non-noble lovers. Liutprand himself probehind
his
betrays
his
The
key
the
to
tactic.
political
end
portrait of
the
author
vides
he
behind
the
two
when
explains
possible
rationales
world
an adulterous aristocratic
from
her
had
had
Hugh's
Bertha,
King
mother
no
children
second
a strange rumor:
husband Adalbert of Tuscany, but had acquired babies and passed them off as their
have
from
bed
hand
She
this
to
a
controlling
second
on
needed
offsprings
own.
Adalbert's potenclaafter his death. In both explanations, this story was planted by
Hugh's court. According to the first, Hugh wanted to avoid the charge of incest - in
his
Marozia,
half-brother
he
Rome,
to
eager
marry
widow
of
to
was
acquire
order
Wido, Adalbert's son. The story removed Wido from the sphere of uterine brother1891, p. 54. Hugh's other child by Alda, Lothar's uterine sister Alda (RascH, CMPdVI26, p. 160),
married Alberic, patricius of the Romans (son of Marozia the hussy), and begat Octavian, pope as
John XII (955-963, d. 964). This only child crowned Otto emperor in 962, and was deposed by him
in 963. A pope was in no danger of begetting a legitimate king.
73 See above, at n. 33.
74 See above, n. 31. Another daughter, Bertha, was taken over after her first husband's death by \xrilliam
count of Rouergue 'the rather impure princeps of a most impure tribe ... unworthy not only of sleeping
with her but even of being kissed by her' - Antapodosis 5.31 (as n. 4) pp. 149: 32-150: 2. On her, see
Röscx (as n. 63) CMPdVI33, p. 163.
75 Antapodosis 4.14 (as n. 4) p. 112:15-17: et guonian:nonrex [Hugo] Bolusbis abutebatur,earumnati ex incertir
patribus originemducunt.The expression onginenrducuntsuggestsa focus on line (dams) of descent beyond
one generation.
76 Which technique Liutprand shared with his friend Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, see Fetz HERMANN TINNEFELD,Kategorien der Kaiserkritik in der byzantinischen Historiographie von Prokop bis
Niketas Choniates, Munich 1971, pp. 92-93: Constantine made Michael II a member of a Judaizing
dynasty,
became
descendant
I
Parthian
Basil
the
the Arsacides. Examples of
royal
a
of
while
sect,
western diffamations of queens in KONECNY(as n. 35) p. 103 £, pp. 147-150.
Italian Hussies and German Matrons
225
hood, and made a marital alliance with \iarozia possible. According to the second
explanation, the rumor was aimed at Adalbert's second son, Lambert marquess of
Tuscany, whose power Hugh feared and Boso (Hugh's full brother) envied. Denial of
lineage
for
both
brotherhood
(which
denial
Hugh
of
royal
uterine
meant all at once
denial
brotherhood,
from
Lambert
Bertha's
of
royal
and
and
womb),
could come only
blinded77.
light
Lambert
hostility
treacherous
and
captured
to all-out
a green
was
Thus the savory stories of the `Antapodosis' owe little to Liutprand's hostility to
his
Saxon
but
his
patron's enemies. Nor
to
to
wish
abase
womankind
everything
should one account for these tales by attributing to a "monkish chronicler" some
stolid blindness vis-ä-vis the real basesof tenth-century women's power which pushed
him to find in disorderly fornication the source of their authority. To the contrary,
Liutprand is only too aware of what he is trying to obfuscate, Carolingian blood, and
be
female
he
is
blood.
Both
through
transmitted
trying
could
what
to
of
muddle, royal
legitimation
Women
both
factors
in
be
power.
the
and
of
ancestors;
could
acquisition
beyond
The
in
destructive
them.
primary target
thus
well
were
means a
work aiming
consisted in their men (male children, grandchildren, and husbands), actual or potential
contenders for the Italian crown. Hence conversely (for it takes two to tango) the
image of these males, `weak kings and female-addicted princes'78. Liutprand would
later make himself the hero of his own `Legatio'. In this last work, recounting his
dauntless
Otto
behalf,
Is
Constantinople
ambassador confronts and
to
the
mission
on
Romans
hurls
He
Nicephorus.
Byzantine
the
of
at
self-styled
confounds the
emperor
the eastern empire a revealing insult. They owe their name (and, one should add,
legitimacy) to Romulus `porniogenitus,
that is, conceived in adultery', a reference to the
offspring of an unscrupulous priest (a quasi Dominic) and of the vestal virgin and
`Legatio'
is
It
daughter
Silvia
(a
\\rilla)79.
The
Rhea
the
telling.
taunt
of
quasi
royal
illuminates Liutprand's tactics of more than a decade earlier in the `Antapodosis'. Like
the rulers of Constantinople, the Italian dynasts were not so much porplyrogeniti as
porniogeniti.
Hugo lamberto comminandodenuntiat, ne sefratrenr swum amplius
3.47 (as n. 4) p. 99: 1-35:
roc
...
We
dicere audeat. Is sero
irf1riari rearpossit nu fratrrm sauof esse,nos uno ex corpore eundemqueper
rrrpondit
...
aditum in /stem prodiirse, dudlo cupio cundis rernnrtibus mnprobare ). As HOFMEISTER (as n. 9) pp. 402-404,
Adalremarks, this (actually circulating or imagined) story did not prevent Hugh from commemorating
77 Antapodosis
bert II and Bertha.
78 Reverse implication in SUTHERLAND
(as n. 1) p. 20, who takes Liutprand to be a committed womenhater: "in Antapodosis, as he consciously exposed Berengar, he unconsciously exposed women". Quotafada regempriacipurnveeeminatorum.
tion from the preface, Antapodosis 1.1 (as n. 4) p. 4:30-31: enenorum
See STAUBACH
(as n. 13) pp. 467-469 for another (but not incompatible) reading of the same.
79 Legatio cap. 12, ed. BECKER(as n. 4) p. 182:26-28: Ronrulumfrahicidam, ex quo et Romanidichcunt,porniogeni/um, hocest ex adulteriora/un, Cbrorograpbiairrnatuit Liutprand's reference is to )ordanes, Romana 5152, ed. THEODORMoatatsE.
ti (HIGH Auctores antiquissimi 5.1) Berlin 1882, p. 7. Cf. ArrroNlo CARILE,
Roma a Romania dagli Isaurici ai Comneni, in: Bisanzio, Roma e l'Italia nell'alto medioevo, 2 vols.
(Settimane di Studio 34) Spoleto 1988,2, pp. 531-582, here p. 551.