Alongside rituals of submission there were other relationships which could bind king and pope. In 1144, at the beginning of the negotiations between Roger II and Pope Lucius II, ‘the king and his sons, the duke and prince,
prostrated themselves on the ground and kissed the pope’s feet, and then received the kiss on the mouth’.116 The kiss of peace was traditionally a symbol of reconciliation and the restoration of amicitia. Klaus van Eickels has suggested that the addition of the kiss to the twelfth-century meetings between the kings of England and France was intended to strengthen the equality between the two and lessen the humiliation of submission. The kiss was a form of ritualized amicitia.117 In that context we can also listen to Romuald’s chronicle, wherein Pope Lucius was described as the amicus of the king.118 The king of France and the king of England referred to each other as amici, at the same time as one performed homage to the other.119 Pope Gregory VII had acknowledged the bonds of amicitia which joined him to both William the Conqueror of England
Viator 37 (2006), 275-99 at 290-99. My thanks to Dr Taylor for providing me with a copy of her paper prior to publication.
116 Loud, Creation, p. 248.
117 van Eickels, ‘“Homagium” and “Amicitia”’, p. 137.
118 Romuald, p. 424; trans Loud, Creation, p. 261.
119 Romuald, p. 424; trans Loud, Creation, p. 261.
and Sancho Ramirez of Aragon.120 When the kiss of peace (‘the kiss on the mouth’) immediately followed the osculum pedum – the kiss on the feet – the interplay of both submission and equal friendship is clear.
Romuald also stated that Lucius II was the compater of Roger II. This was a different relationship between the two men than lord and man, or king and pope or friend and friend. Compaternitas was spiritual kinship: it meant fellow-father and was used between a god-parent and an actual parent of a child.121
‘[C]o-parenthood bound the compatres to co-operate, to accede to one another’s wishes, and to respect one another.’122 There was precedent for a Christian ruler to be the compater of a pope: Pippin – the first Carolingian king and father of Charlemagne – had called Pope Stephen his compater. This seems to have been because his sons were anointed by the pope and hence the king and pope were both ‘fathers’ of Pippin’s sons.123 There is no evidence that Lucius II was
actually godfather to one of Roger’s children, or that he anointed or baptized one of Roger’s children. Nonetheless the use of the term by Romuald shows how he wished to represent the alliance between king and pope. The
relationship of compaternitas was pseudo-familial; the godfather and natural father were bound together by spiritual kinship. The papacy had previously been bound to the Carolingian dynasty by compaternitas in the eighth century.
There is not, as far as I am aware, any evidence that the author of Romuald’s chronicle was intending to draw a comparison with the Frankish kings, but it is clear that Romuald was trying to suggest that it was not ‘lordship’ which linked
120 Cowdrey, Gregory VII, pp. 642, 647
121 J. H. Lynch, Godparents and Kinship in Early Medieval Europe (Princeton NJ, 1986), pp. 5-6, 48-9, 192-201.
122 Lynch, Godparents and Kinship, p. 198.
123 T. F. X. Noble, The Republic of St Peter: The Birth of the Papal State, 680-825 (Philadelphia, 1984), pp. 269-70; J. H. Lynch, Christianizing Kingship: Ritual Sponsorship in Anglo-Saxon England (NY, 1998), pp. 119-20. See also Lynch, Godparents and Kinship, p. 195.
the Normans and the papacy. Compaternitas was a relationship of equality: both men were ‘fathers’ of the same child.
Actual kinship between the Norman king and papacy had been earlier used by the antipope Anacletus to form an alliance. In early 1134 King Roger granted 240 ounces of gold annually to the Pierleone family – Pope Anacletus’
family – and accepted their homage and fidelity.124 In 1130 Anacletus had granted the royal title to Roger and stipulated that Roger and his heirs must perform homage and fidelity to the pope. That privilege had been witnessed by John Pierleone and Roger Pieleone, Anacletus’ brothers, and four other
Pierleoni.125 Several of these witnesses were amongst those of the family who performed homage to Roger in 1134. Not only was the 1134 grant a useful cash gift to a papal ally but it was also intended to bind the papacy to the king.
Roger and Anacletus were bound together as ‘homage-kin’: Roger had done homage and sworn (or at least committed to do homage and swear) to Anacletus, and Anacletus’ family had done homage and sworn to Roger.
Kinship and homage were used together to form a bond between the antipope and his ally.
This familial link was also recognized by Innocent II’s party. At the council of Pisa (1135) the excommunication of ‘Peter Leone [Anacletus], and his brothers and supporters’ was followed by the excommunication of ‘the
aforesaid Roger of Sicily’.126 Roger was spoken of in the same terms as
Anacletus’ family. Following the death of Anacletus II in 1138, Innocent drew two of the Pierleoni, Leo and his son Peter, to his party and conceded to them control of the city of Sutri.127 They had both been parties to the 1134 profession
124 Loud, Creation, pp. 308-10.
125 Houben, Roger II, p. 53. For the 1130 grant of Anacletus see below.
126 Loud, Creation, p. 309-10.
127 Italia Pontificia, i: Rome, ed. P. F. Kehr (10 vols in 12 to date, Berlin, 1906-), p. 190.
of homage from the Pierleone to Roger II.128 This might have been an initial attempt on Roger’s part to come to terms with Innocent, through his familial allies.
In the same way as homage, these relationships of kinship, amicitia and compaternitas bound the king to the pope. Like homage they were flexible, able to be changed to fit circumstances. Homage was nothing as simple as an entry into vassalage nor was it viewed as the constitutive act of Siculo-Norman rule by either king or pope.129