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WILLIAM I. (OF ENGLAND). 



WILLIAM I. (OF ENGLAND). 



712 



handeling over de Nederduytsche Tael- en Letterkunde opzigtelyk de 

 Zugdelyke Provintien der Nederlanden), which was commenced in 

 1819 and completed in 1824. In this work, which extends to two 

 octavo volumes, ho aimed at tracing the literary history of Flanders 

 and Brabaut from the 13th to the 19th century, showing that 

 literature had flourished in those countries as long as the national 

 language was cultivated, but that it had declined since the religious 

 wars which led to the separation of the North and the South Nether- 

 lands, because from that period Latin, and particularly French, had 

 been looked upon as the only instruments of literary cultivation in 

 the Catholic Netherlands, while the use of the native dialect, or of 

 one nearly akin to it, had been abandoned to the Protestants of the 

 Seven United Provinces. There was an outcry against the author of 

 this work on two accounts, one from the antagonists of the union of 

 Belgium with Holland, who stigmatised him as a sycophant of the 

 government because his views tended to recommend the government 

 measure of the introduction of Dutch as the official language, the 

 other from zealous Catholics, who were indignant that a Catholic 

 should maintain the superiority of the literature of the Protestant 

 North to the Catholic South. The dissertation had great value at the 

 time of its appearance as the only attempt at a connected history of 

 Flemish literature, but the additional light since thrown on the subject 

 by the researches of Willems himself and of several others has had 

 the effect of rendering it in some degree obsolete. From the time of 

 its publication Willems was looked upon as the champion of the 

 Flemish cause, which he defended against all enemies and in particular 

 against Van de Weyer [WEYER, VAN BE] in a French pamphlet, entitled 

 ' Do la langue Belgique,' which appeared in 1829, only a year before 

 the violent severance of Belgium and Holland. 



The revolution of 1830 appeared at first eight to be a mortal blow 

 to the prospects of the Flemish language, and also to the fortunes of 

 its champion. Willems had been placed by the Dutch government in 

 the advantageous post of a receiver of some public dues at Antwerp, 

 where he had been previously appointed by the city as an assistant 

 keeper of archives. He had also been, in conjunction with Van de 

 Weyer, one of the commission for publishing the historical monuments 

 of the South Netherlands. Of these posts he was deprived by the 

 provisional government of Belgium, and sent in an obscure position, 

 with a reduced salary, to the small town of Eecloo, where, declining 

 the offers of the Dutch government to place him in a more advan- 

 tageous position in Holland, he remained for four years. By that time 

 the indignant remonstrances of some of the chief literary men of 

 Belgium, and in particular of his old opponent Van de Weyer, aroused 

 the government to a sense of his unworthy treatment, and in 1835 he 

 was placed at Ghent in a situation similar to that he had occupied at 

 Antwerp. While at Eecloo he hud published a modern Flemish 

 version of the celebrated mediaeval poem of ' Reynard the Fox,' which 

 he maintained to be of Flemish origin ; on the sale of a copy of an 

 old Flemish manuscript of the poem at London, in the auction of 

 liichard Heber's library, he applied to the Belgian government to 

 secure it for Belgium, it was purchased at his recommendation for 

 160/., and in 1836 the poem was printed under his editorship, with a 

 preface, in which he maintained his views with great ability. From 

 this time his life flowed in a course of literary labours and honours. 

 A society was formed at Ghent "for the encouragement of the Low- 

 Dutch language and literature," which published a periodical, the 

 'Belgian Museum' (Belgisch Museum), under the editorship of 

 Willems, which was so entirely his work, that at his death it suddenly 

 ceased, and was brought to a close, with, for its last article,, the life of 

 Willems, from which this notice has chiefly been taken. It extends to 

 ten volumes, and is full of interesting matter. The cultivation of the 

 Flemish language, which he had first promoted, went on increasing. In 

 1841 a Flemish festival was held at the University of Ghent; two years 

 later a meeting of the " Taelverbond," or " Language Association," at 

 Brussels, at which Willems officiated as president. The movement was 

 too powerful to be withstood by the government. Willems had no lon- 

 ger to fear disgrace for his exertions, and had already, in 1838, been 

 named a knight of the order of Leopold. The Flemish movement still 

 appears to make progress, and the meetings which have been held of 

 distinguished literary men of both the North and South Netherlands 

 appear likely to result in placing the language in Belgium in a higher 

 degree of estimation than it has been for centuries. Willems however 

 was not destined to witness this triumph. He died at Ghent on the 

 24th of June 1846, after a very brief illness, of an apoplectic attack. 



The list of his works given in the ' Belgisch Museum' is forty-three 

 in number, thirty-four in Flemish, five in French, and the remainder 

 in both languages. The most important that have not been already 

 mentioned are his ' Mengelingen van vaderlandschen Inhoud ' (Miscel- 

 lanies on National Subjects), Antwerp, 1827-30; the 'Rhymed Chro- 

 nicle of Jan van Heelu ; ' the ' Rhymed Chronicle of Brabant, by Jan 

 de Klerk,' edited for the Belgian Historical Commission ; and the 

 ' Chronicle of Edward the Third, king of England, written in rhyme 

 in 1347 by Jan de Klerk,' and first published by Willems at Ghent in 

 1840. 



WILLIAM I., King of England, styled THE CONQUEROR (in 

 Latin Conqucstor or Conquisitor, in French Conquereur, meaning only, 

 in the language of the feudal system, the acquirer), was the illegiti- 

 mate and only sou of Robert, Duke of Normandy, surnamed Le Diabk 



(the Devil), and was born in 1027. The vulgar story makes his 

 mother the daughter of Fulbert de Croy, a tanner or skinner of 

 Falaise, whom Robert first saw and became enamoured of as she was 

 dancing with some of her female companions : her name, it is said, 

 was Arlette or Harlotta, whence our English ' harlot.' This is a very 

 suspicious etymology. According to the contemporary historian 

 William of Jumieges (Gerneticensis), the Conqueror's mother was 

 Herleva, the daughter of Fulbert, an officer of Duke Robert's house- 

 hold. After Robert's death she married a Norman knight (mile) 

 named Herluin, by whom she had two sons, both of whom made a 

 great figure in their time : Robert, who was created Earl of Montague 

 in Normandy, and Odo, who became bishop of Bayeux ; besides a 

 daughter, who was married to Odo, earl of Albernarle. 



During his father's life he was entrusted to the care of Henry I. of 

 France, at whose court he resided. He succeeded to the duchy of 

 Normandy as William II., on the death of his father in 1035. During 

 his minority the nobles several times revolted against his authority, 

 and Normandy was a scene of constant hostility and desolation. 

 Aided however by Henry I., and still more by the mutual jealousies of 

 the nobles, he was enabled to maintain his position till 1047, when in 

 a battle fought at Val des Dunes, between Caen and Argentau, ho 

 crushed his most formidable competitor, Guido of Macon, who was 

 supported by nearly the whole body of Norman nobles. By the con- 

 sequences of this victory, and of subsequent advantages which he 

 obtained over other assailants, the power of William was so far con- 

 solidated as to le-id him to extend his ambitious views to foreign 

 lands, and especially to the British islands. The commencement of 

 his transactions with England and his acquisition of the crown of that 

 country by the victory of Hastings, or rather Senlac, gained Saturday, 

 14th of October 1065, have been detailed in the articles EDWARD THE 

 CONFESSOR (ii. 707) and HAROLD II. (iii; 299). 



On the death of Harold, Edgar Atheliug was unanimously declared 

 king by the Witan assembled in London ; and the further manage- 

 ment of the war with the Norman invader was committed to the two 

 distinguished brother Earls Edwin and Mor'car. But this opposition 

 soon gave way. After a few days a deputation from the nobility, the 

 clergy, and the citizens of London, headed by the two Saxon earls and 

 the rival king, or pretender to the throne, Edgar himself, waited upon 

 William at Berkhamstead, swore allegiance to him, gave him hostages, 

 and made him an offer of the crown ; and his coronation took place in 

 Westminster Abbey on the 25th of December, from which day accord- 

 ingly is dated the commencement of his reign. 



The Conqueror's first measures were conciliatory ; even in reward- 

 ing bis Norman followers, we are told, he deprived no Englishman of 

 anything to which he had a just claim : he probably limited his seizures 

 to the land and other property of those who had fallen in arms against 

 him. He respected also the public liberties, as well as private rights ; 

 the police of the kingdom were made much more efficient, and at the 

 same time the taxes were collected with lenity. But circumstances 

 made it impossible that this state of things should last long. On the 

 one side a numerous people, the old occupants of the country, exaspe- 

 rated by defeat, and on the watch for revenge ; on the other, a handful 

 of foreign intruders, flushed with recent victory, and feeling that in 

 their swords alone lay their safety, as well as their rights : these were 

 elements sure to produce a speedy explosion, even if William's own 

 passions had been much more temperate or more under control than, 

 they were. The Saxons and the Normans, it is to be remembered, 

 although belonging to the same great Teutonic race, had been rivals 

 and enemies, as far as their history can be traced, from their first 

 appearance in Western and Northern Europe, and this island, originally 

 wrested by the Saxons from their common prey the Celts, had been 

 their chief battle-field for the last two hundred and fifty years; for 

 the Danes, as they were commonly called, who had made repeated 

 descents upon Britain ever since the beginning of the 9th century, 

 were the same people who, under the name of Northmen, or Normans, 

 had in the beginning of the 10th century effected a settlement in 

 France, and had now, in the middle of the llth, achieved the conquest 

 of England. It can hardly be doubted, too, from the character of 

 William, that the mildness of his government in the commencement 

 of his reign was only an artful policy adopted to enable him the better 

 to establish his power before carrying out what in that age, and down 

 to a much later date, were held to be the unquestionable rights of 

 conquest. In fact he could not have retained the dominion of the 

 country, if he had not made it furnish lands and lordships for his 

 followers, as well as a crown for himself. 



A few months sufficed to make an end of the apparent good agree- 

 ment between the English and their new rulers. In March 1067, 

 William, as if with no object beyond showing himself in triumph 

 among his old subjects and receiving their congratulations, returned to 

 Normandy, leaving the government of England in the hands of his 

 half-brother, Bishop Odo, upon whom he had conferred the earldom of 

 Kent, and of William Fitz-Osbern, also one of his relations, whom he 

 had created Earl of Hereford. Whether it was that these regents 

 attempted any new exactions or other acts of oppression, or only that 

 advantage was taken of the absence of their master, not many weeks 

 passed before the natives were up in arms in various parts of the 

 country, William returned from Normandy in December. The 

 ensuing two years witnessed a far more severe contest than that 



