A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



other, Liulf, a new-comer and a layman. This man was a rich thane who, to 

 escape the fury of the Normans, had removed with all his household to 

 Durham, attracted to the north no doubt by the kinship between his wife and 

 earl Waltheof. 1 Leobwine, the displaced favourite, filled with jealousy, 

 resorted to Gilbert, the bishop's nephew, and with him conspired for Liulf's 

 destruction. 2 The two organized an attack on Liulf's house, where they 

 butchered him and his whole family. It is likely that Gilbert's motive was 

 hostility to the Northumbrian magnates who had been opposing him in his 

 attempt to introduce Norman customs. 3 In any case the outrage seems to have 

 given rise to a blood-feud which took on a political aspect owing to the 

 position of the men involved, the bishop and the relatives of the murdered 

 woman, members of the comital family of Northumberland. It should 

 be noticed, too, that the affair was essentially part of the conflict of the two races. 

 The bishop attempted to negotiate, but the affair was mismanaged ; a tumult 

 ensued, in which the bishop and the greater part of his following were murdered.* 

 Certain inferences of great importance for the subject in hand may 

 be drawn from these events. William seems deliberately to have tried a 

 policy of conciliation with the north country and to have insisted only on a 

 superficial feudalization of this region. He restored the native earl and 

 installed the bishop, who admitted the English to his household and council. On 

 the other hand, he built a castle over which he retained the usual feudal rights, 

 and he certainly regarded Walcher as a baron and tenant-in-chief. 6 The 

 bishop's fee was probably charged with a certain amount of knight-service 

 ten is the number indicated in a later record. 6 



1 The status and connexion of this Liulf are of importance. Florence calls him ' nobilis generosusque 

 minister' (loc. cit.), and before the Conquest at least the word 'minister' would be the normal rendering of the 

 vernacular ' thegn ' ; see the numerous passages collected in Guilhiermoz, Origint Je la Noblesse, 8696. Liulfhad 

 married Algitha, daughter of Aldred the earl, and aunt to Waltheof, and it must have been this connexion rather 

 than the miraculous intervention of St. Cuthbert (supplied by Florence) that brought him to Durham in the 

 troubled times. See, besides the particulars in Symeon, an important charter in which earl Waltheof presents 

 Morkar, son of Liulf, along with a substantial endowment to the monks at Jarrow, in Hist. Dunelm. Scrip. Ires, 

 (Surtees Soc.), App. pp. xviii.-xix. This charter, besides indicating the composition of the bishop's council, shows 

 that Liulf must have come to Durham beforehand probably considerably before, 1077, the date of WaltheoPs death. 



8 The chroniclers place these events in the year 1080 ; the bishop was murdered on Thursday, May 14. 



8 Symeon makes the bishop responsible for the irritation in Northumberland, but his words suggest the 

 interpretation put upon them in the text ; 'suos licenter quae voluissent et hostiliter nonnulla facientes, non 

 refrsnabat, indigenarum animos ofFendebat. . . . Milites quoque nimis insolenter se in populo habentes, 

 multos szpius violenter diripiebant, aliquos etiam ex majoribus natu interficiebant. ' Symeon of Durham, i. 114. 

 Liulf would naturally have been the representative of the native or reactionary party in the bishop's council, 

 but the test clause of Earl WaltheoPs charter cited above shows many other English names. 



4 Walcher perfectly understood the situation and said to Leobwine when he heard the news of the 

 murder, 'You have destroyed yourself and me and all of my household who are of your race.' Still he made 

 an attempt to compose the trouble, and a meeting was arranged at Gateshead on the border of the bishopric and 

 Northumberland. The leaders of the Northumbrians were another Waltheof and Eadulf Rus, great-grandson 

 of that Uchtred whom Knut had made earl of Northumberland. These men came to Gateshead with no 

 confidence in the bishop, who had imprudently continued his intimacy with Leobwine and Gilbert after the 

 murder, and the proceedings soon grew tumultuous. The bishop, attended by his clerics and more honour- 

 able knights, withdrew to the church and sent out Gilbert and a company of knights to continue the negotia- 

 tion. But the Northumbrians fell upon them, sparing only 'duobus . . . Anglicis ministris propter con- 

 sanguinitatem.' They then set fire to the church and killed the bishop and the rest of his following. 



6 This may be inferred from the account of William Rufus's dealings with Bishop William I. recorded in 

 the pamphlet known as ' De Injusta Vexatione Willelmi Episcopi I.' in Symeon of Durham, \. 170-195. The 

 whole question of the feudal status of the bishop was then (1087-1088) raised and argued, and the bishop's 

 contention that he ought to be tried canonically, i.e. as a prelate, not as a tenant-in-chief, was disallowed. The 

 chief representative of the king's view was Lanfranc, who had, with the Conqueror, reorganized the English 

 Church ; but hear his words, ' Nos non de episcopio sed de tuo te feodo judicamus,' and then he cited the 

 famous case of Odo of Bayeux, whom he and the Conqueror had judged quJ earl of Kent. Of. cit., p. 184. 



6 ReJ Bk. of the Exch. (Rolls Ser.), 416-418 ; see on this subject Round, Feudal England, 225 ff. 



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