Читать книгу The Empire and the Papacy, 918-1273. Investiture Contest, Crusades & The Famous Conflicts онлайн

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Hugh the Great was rewarded by the renewal in his favour of the title ‘Duke of the French,’ which had already been borne by his father Robert in the days of Charles the Simple. This title suggested a power, half military and half national, analogous to that held by the dukes of the nations in Germany. ⁴³ But if this were the case, Hugh’s power as duke would have probably been restricted to ‘Francia,’ a region which, in common speech, was now limited to the Gaulish regions north of the Seine. It is not clear, however, that the power of the Duke of the French had any territorial limitation other than that of the limits of the West Frankish kingdom as prescribed by the treaty of Verdun. Wherever Louis ruled as ‘king,’ Hugh wielded authority as ‘duke.’ He was a permanent prime minister, a mayor of the palace, a justiciar of the Anglo-Norman type, rather than a territorial duke. Indeed, Hugh’s chief domains were not in ‘Francia’ at all. Despite his possession of Paris, his chief fiefs were still in the cradle of his house, the district between the Seine and Loire, to which the term Neustria was now commonly applied. Here his authority stretched as far westwards as the county of Maine, which he had obtained in his youth from the weakness of Rudolf of Burgundy. Moreover, in the lack of all central royal authority, half the chief vassals of the north had thought it prudent to commend themselves to the mighty lord of Neustria, and, with the Duke of Normandy at their head, had become his feudal dependants. Hugh was no longer simply a great feudatory. Even in name, he was the second man in Gaul. In fact, he was a long way the first.