DECEMBER                                                                                                                  2008

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

WILLIAM’S GHOST:

Robin Hood, Barack Obama
And the Norman System of Elite Perpetuation

Charles S. Viar

Barack Obama’s election as the 44^th President of the United States has been widely hailed as a watershed in American history. Among the general populace there is a widespread sense that Obama’s victory has brought one era to a close, and opened another. But for many black Americans, the election holds an even deeper and more poignant meaning: four centuries after their ancestors were first brought to these shores in chains, 143 years after the emancipation of their descendents, and 44 years after achieving lawful equality, Obama’s victory heralds the success of a centuries long struggle for acceptance by the larger and predominantly white society. For as one black commentator remarked, “Having the legal right to apply for membership is one thing. Being accepted by the Membership Committee is quite another.”

Within the context of the American experience, this interpretation is doubtless true. But when viewed from the larger historical perspective of the English-speaking peoples, the African-Americans’ struggle for acceptance seems more deeply rooted in an ancient system of elite co-option and perpetuation. For nine centuries beyond the Civil Rights Movement stands the ghostly apparition of William the Conqueror, who guides it still.

II.

Centuries of relentless strife followed the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD.  According to historians and archeologists, not single book was penned nor a single stone structure erected for more than two hundred years; and it was not until Charlemagne consolidated power as King of the Franks in 771 AD that a semblance of political authority was restored. After successful military campaigns in Saxony, Italy, Corsica, Sardinia, Spain, Poland, Hungary and beyond, on Christmas Day of 800 AD Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne Imperator Romanorum in St. Peter’s Basilica. Having checked the Saracen advance in Spain and subdued the East, Charlemagne imposed a series of sweeping and far-reaching reforms that rationalized currency, civil administration, military organization, education, and even the ecclesia. Had the Fates not turned against him, Western Europe might well have experienced a Golden Age of peace and prosperity.

But it was not to be. Even before Charlemagne claimed the purple, Norse raiders landed upon the tidal island of Lindisfarny in 793, and sacked the abbey there with such ferocity that it shocked a world accustomed to casual brutality. Apparently emboldened by the success of the raiders, Danish King Godfred built a rampart across the length of the Schleswig Isthmus seven years later, and – from the safety of the 30 kilometer earthwork – launched a series of devastating attacks upon Frisia and Flanders. Although Godfred was assassinated before he could fulfill his boast of marching upon Charlemagne’s capital at Aachen, scores of other Norse warlords and kings-presumptuous stepped forward to take his place. For the next 255 years, the orderly and peaceful world that Charlemagne had imposed upon the West was recast by the relentless and savage attacks of the Vikings. 

III.

The two and a half centuries of war that began with the sack of Lindisfarny Abbey not only altered the course of European history, but transformed European society, governance, and geography as well.

The first of these transformations involved the hyper-militarization of Europe. Throughout his reign, Charlemagne had relied upon massed formations of infantry drawn from free-holders. After his death, Charlemagne’s successors found the slow moving infantry formations they had inherited were unable to cope with the Vikings’ sea borne attacks. In response to the threat, they constructed fortifications manned by permanent garrisons along Europe’s coasts and estuaries, and placed ever-greater emphasis upon rapid-reaction forces composed of heavily armed horsemen. Because the cost of horses and armor was beyond the means of most free-holders, large land grants were awarded to select individuals in exchange for hereditary lifetime service as armored cavalry.

This led to the second great transformation, in which a military aristocracy displaced the proto-democratic system of free-holder infantry commanded by officers that were – often – elected by the soldiers they led. As Charlemagne’s successors mobilized their nations for war without end, a new form of feudalism characterized by an increasingly rigid and hierarchical social structure inevitably arose. 

But the third great transformation was by far the most consequential. For it was the Viking occupation of North Western France that set in motion an ironic chain of events that gave rise to the English-speaking nations of the world, and to the system of elite renewal and perpetuation that governs them still.

IV.

The European mobilization took more than a century to complete, and by then the Empire had been divided into three. During this time, the Vikings gained control over the entire length of Europe’s coastline and established sizeable settlements in England, Scotland, Ireland, and North West France. Aided by shallow-draft boats that could be operated with equal ease in the white waters of the European littoral and the continents’ rivers and larger streams, the Norsemen began moving inland. In 885 the Vikings marched upon Paris; and had they mastered siege equipment, they might well have taken the French capital. But the Vikings’ lack of military engineers saved the city on this and other subsequent occasions, as increasingly effective French defenses inflicted an ever-larger toll upon them. Wearying of the game, the invaders signed a treaty with the French in 911. In exchange for French recognition of their conquests, they agreed to convert to Christianity, acknowledge the King of France as their master, and defend the French coast against their still warlike kin. Thus did the Duchy of Normandy arise.

According to most historians, the Normans were quickly assimilated. Few in numbers and overwhelmingly young and male, they intermarried freely, adopted the French language, and raised their children as Frenchmen.Yet even after the passage of a century, they remained distinctive. For as Geoffrey Malaterra observed, the Normans were:

Specially marked by cunning, despising their own inheritance in the hope of winning a greater, eager after both gain and dominion, given to imitation of all kinds, holding a certain mean between lavishness and greediness, that is, perhaps uniting, as they certainly did, these two seemingly opposite qualities…

 

They were enduring of toil, hunger, and cold whenever fortune laid it on them, given to hunting and hawking, delighting in the pleasure of horses, and of all the weapons and garb of war.

 

Flexible, adaptive, and innovative, the Normans won renown as exceptionally able soldiers and – more importantly – supremely competent governors.

V.

All these traits were still in evidence 156 years later when William the Conqueror invaded England in 1066. The illegitimate son of Robert I, Duke of Normandy, William asserted a tenuous claim to the English throne after the death of Edward the Confessor. Opposed by the Archbishop of York – who had crowned Harold Godwinson as King – but supported by Pope Alexander II, William landed an army of 7000 men at Pevensey Bay in Sussex before marching upon Hastings. There on the 14^th of October, William imposed his claim by defeating Harold’s English army in a hard-fought battle. Coroneted in Westminster Abby on Christmas Day, King William spent the next fourteen years quelling the land.

Prior to the Normans, conquerors frequently employed various types of genocide to subdue the conquered: the defeated males were most often slaughtered, the females were either taken as slaves or sold into slavery, and the forcibly vacated lands were resettled by the victors. Although King Clovis had eschewed the tactic in order to create a unified French nation, Charlemagne nonetheless employed it against portions of Germany three centuries later. But annihilating the enemy was not an option for William – for like his progenitors in Normandy, he lacked the demographic resources to colonize the lands he had conquered. With perhaps 5000 knights drawn from an estimated 2000 aristocratic families, William’s only option was to establish a modus vivendi with the two million Anglo-Saxons he had subjugated.

Driven by necessity and design, William adopted a policy of conciliation. The civilian populace went unmolested, and in exchange for an oath of allegiance the surviving Anglo-Saxon nobles were permitted to retain their lands and titles. A series of bloody revolts, however, soon compelled him to adopt a more forceful strategy. As he despoiled the rebellious countryside in a deliberate effort to starve Northern England into submission, William also initiated a massive program to fortify and garrison strategic sites. Between 1068 and William’s death nineteen years later, the Normans are believed to have built more than 500 motte and bailey castles across the English countryside. But unlike similar fortifications the Normans had constructed in France, these were not designed to defend against foreign invasion. Their purpose was to ensure Norman rule through a policy of intimidation and reprisal.

VI.

By the time William died in 1087, Norman control was complete. But while subdued, the English countryside remained sullen; and rebellion was an ever-present possibility. With an estimated 92 per cent of the Anglo-Saxon nobility killed in battle or stripped of their titles, lands, and governing authority for insurrection, the native population looked upon the new regime as an alien occupation. It was within this context of seething anger and resentment that the legends of Robin Hood first arose.

Whether Robin Hood actually lived remains an open question. Although some historians believe the legends are loosely based upon an actual figure, most are inclined to view them as folk tales reflecting the longings of a conquered people for a hero to deliver them from bondage. According to the first interpretation – the one favored by Hollywood – Robin Hood was a champion of social justice. But according to the second, he was most likely a conflation of various Anglo-Saxon resistance leaders that battled the Norman Occupation from the forests and swamps of central England. The first makes for rollicking fun and adventure; the second gave rise to a political strategy of elite renewal and perpetuation so subtle that it has passed almost unremarked for nine centuries.

In a 1991 motion picture, John Irvin touched upon this strategy.  In his film, Robin Hood is depicted as an Anglo-Saxon noble that has managed to retain his title, lands, and authority by virtue of his friendship with a powerful Norman Lord. But after clashing with his patron over the brutal mistreatment of one of his English serfs – and then publicly disparaging Norman justice – Robin is declared an outlaw. Fleeing to Sherwood Forrest to escape arrest and execution, Robin initiates a carefully calculated and tightly focused insurrection. His goal is not to drive the Normans from England, but merely to force them to acknowledge the rights of the conquered population. His loyalty to King Richard – and the Norman system of rule – is never in doubt.

Barely noted is the fact that Robin’s insurrection played into Norman hands. Having failed in their initial attempt to conciliate the defeated Anglo-Saxons, and lacking the manpower to forever maintain their rule by force, the Normans are acutely conscious of their need for Anglo-Saxon support to perpetuate their power. Guided by this coldly realistic understanding of their predicament, Robin’s Norman antagonist deftly exploits the conflict to achieve William’s original goal by granting under duress concessions the Normans would have freely made had the English not rebelled against them.

VII.

Political elites are self-defined: they are the few that make the decisions for the many. Regardless of the manner in which elites are selected – though brute force, inheritance, or democratic election – they are ubiquitous. For in every nation, the many are ruled by the few.

Although that tautology is maddening for philosophers, the more difficult problem posed by elite rule is biological. Because the likelihood of lineal succession declines with each generation, elites face relatively rapid extinction. For that reason, family, ethnic, or even racially based elites cannot perpetuate their control for historically meaningful timeframes without co-opting new members from the ranks of those they rule. This problem was well understood in Ancient Rome, where exceptional citizens drawn from every corner of the Empire were routinely elevated to Senatorial Rank, and perhaps even better in Norman England. Given their meager demographic resources, the Normans had no choice but to eventually co-opt the conquered Anglo-Saxons, and bring them into their system – perhaps not as equals, but nearly so – with the promise that their children or at least their grandchildren would one day achieve full equality. By co-opting Robin and his Anglo-Saxon followers, the Normans triumphed in apparent defeat.

Unable to negotiate an accord with an amorphous and leaderless population, the formative nature of Norman oppression – and the Anglo-Saxon resistance it deliberately provoked, molded, and shaped – eventually provided the necessary preconditions for the accommodation that eluded William. For appalling as it may be, it is nonetheless a fact that equality means little if not hard-won; and it is upon this perverse quirk of human nature that William’s successors built their system of elite perpetuation:

Exploit the conquered for as long as you are able. But when you can no longer rule by force alone, apologize for the past, co-opt their leadership, and bring them into the system - first as underlings, and then eventually as equals.

Although rarely recognized and never publicly acknowledged, this system is clearly identifiable throughout the histories of England, its successor state Great Britain, and the larger British Empire; and it remains everywhere in evidence throughout the English-speaking world today. With the exception of the American colonies – an aberration occasioned by an unassimilated King plagued by episodic madness – the British have never fought to retain power over their subjects abroad. After periods of more or less lengthy oppression, they invariably accommodated the demands of their imperial subjects in accordance to the formulae above, by apologizing – however insincerely – for past injustices, co-opting the leadership of the once conquered, and acceding to their demands. In the process, they created a global English-speaking elite whose interests are closely tied to their own.

The Norman system of elite perpetuation is a part of America’s cultural legacy, and it is likewise evident throughout our history as well. Like the Normans in England, British settlers tried first to achieve a modus vivendi with the Native American tribes, but when that failed they adopted a policy of control strikingly similar to that employed by William. Indeed, the wooden forts that sprang up upon the colonial landscape were almost identical to the Norman motte and bailey castles that preceded them.

This pattern continued to manifest after the American colonies seceded from the British Empire. For as British historians are quick to note, the Anglo-American elite that emerged from the Revolutionary War was deeply ambivalent about extending the blessings of liberty to all; and for that reason, the more cautious faction that prevailed reached back into history to ensure the survival of the still-tentative Republic. Beginning with the Alien and Sedition Acts, each succeeding wave of immigrants was subjected to rigid controls and often-egregious exploitation. But as they organized in response, they were able to secure their rights in protracted struggles often aided by war. German immigrants of the 1840’s commanded battalions of more recent Irish immigrants in the Civil War, as Irish immigrants and their descendants’ commanded battalions of Italian, Polish, and Jewish immigrants in World War I. By the time of the Second World War, the descendants of involuntary African immigrants were commanding units of their own; and after that war, multi-racial formations as well. And like other groups before them, they legitimized their struggle against injustice through service. For like the Robin Hood of legend, they took pains to ensure their loyalty to the larger system was never in doubt.

Within the American experience, the African-Americans’ struggle for equality and acceptance is often regarded as a special case because their forbearers were brought to these shores in chains. But when one steps back and views their efforts from the broader sweep of history, it seems much closer to the traditional pattern. For while it is tempting to attribute the oppression of African-Americans to racism alone, it is an oft-forgotten fact that European immigrants had been freed from serfdom for at least one generation, and often several more. Thus from the perspective of the elite, the less onerous treatment they received was appropriate to their condition. In contrast, the African-Americans were in fact if not in name a conquered people; and for that reason the treatment they received was more akin to that the Normans visited upon the Anglo-Saxons. For while the legal status of African-American slaves was slightly worse than that of Anglo-Saxon serfs, their conditions of servitude were virtually identical. One need only substitute a motte and bailey castle for a plantation manor to grasp the point.

Viewed from that perspective, Barack Obama’s election as the 44^th President of the United States is far more than a triumph for African-Americans. It is also a triumph for the Norman system of elite renewal and perpetuation, which first arose in Occupied England and later spread throughout the English-speaking world to become the unstated global norm. 

For almost a millennia, that system has employed deliberate oppression and carefully calculated accommodation to slowly and methodically mold and shape an ever-more inclusive political elite that now spans the world. For by accident or design, it was William the Conqueror that set in motion the process of global integration; and it is his ghostly hand that guides it still.