The Oaths of Alexios I Komnenos and Count Raymond IV of Toulouse in Robert the Monk’s Historia Hierosolimitana

Bibliographic Data

ID21418579
AuthorsKenneth M Coyne (corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume66
Pages67-98
Publication date2022-01-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueNottingham Medieval Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0078-2122 • E-ISSN: 2507-0444
PublisherBrepols Publishers NV (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1484/j.nms.5.132194
OpenAlexW4317347540
LanguageEN
References cited27

Robert ‘the Monk’s’ First Crusade history Historia Iherosolimitana (c. 1110) provides a description of the negotiations between its leaders and the Greek emperor Alexios I Komnenos (1054–1118). Robert uses direct speech to represent oaths sworn respectively by Count Raymond IV of Toulouse (1041–1105) and Alexios, which makes his account unique within crusades historiography and, more importantly, very rare within contemporary narrative texts. Nevertheless, these oaths have remained unstudied by historians of medieval feudal relations. This article reveals that a close textual analysis of the context of these oaths, and the terminology Robert employs therein, shows that he used them within a clear system or protocol within the negotiations he imagined had occurred between the two parties. Thus, this article sheds further light on the complex topic of feudal relations in northern France during the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries. The article will, as a secondary outcome of the analysis, also provide new interpretations of small sections of both the Historia, and Robert’s source text, the Anonymous Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum

Ancient history · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Byzantine Studies and History · History · Medieval History and Crusades

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