William was born on 25 October 1102, the second legitimate child of his father Duke Robert. He was the duke’s third son, however, for Robert had two much older illegitimate sons from a long-term liaison in the late 1070s or early 1080s with a young French woman (allegedly the former sexual partner of an aged priest, whom the young duke cuckolded). William was fated to be the tragic hero of twelfth-century Normandy. His mother, Sybil of Conversano, died a few months after his birth, possibly because of complications caused by the delivery, although contemporary gossip alleges that she was poisoned by a group of envious Norman noblewomen. Little is known of the boy’s early life, until he appears in the sources in the aftermath of his father’s final defeat at Tinchebray in 1106. Then a boy of four, he came into the hands of his uncle. King Henry. The king, in something of a quandary, decided to give custody of the boy to Duke Robert’s elder illegitimate daughter, the countess of Arques, and her husband. Count Elias de St-Saens, formerly a pillar of the cause of the duke, and the principal magnate of the Norman region of Talou. It may be that the king was in fact doing no more than confirming a family arrangement made by Duke Robert after his wife died, when his daughter (whose name is unknown) was asked to take charge of her baby brother.
For his first ten years, the boy William Clito had a standard aristocratic upbringing in upper Normandy, where his guardian controlled the castles of St-Saens and Bures. It was a good time for the boy, whose sister and her husband clearly regarded him with great love and affection. But in the fourth year after the battle of Tinchebray, the security abruptly ceased. King Henry became nervous about the use to which dissident Norman nobles and French agents might put the boy, and soon after August 1110 sent agents to take custody of William. Henry had taken care to choose a time when Count Elias was away from home, calculating on catching the St-Saens household by surprise. But for once the king was outflanked, since Count Elias understood him all too well. His people were on alert and hustled William Clito away into hiding and then brought him to Elias secretly. The count would not give up his charge, seeing it perhaps as a sacred duty to his imprisoned lord, Duke Robert. Leaving his wife and possessions, he smuggled William Clito over the frontier and into perpetual exile. King Henry immediately confiscated St-Saens and gave it to his new crony, the earl of Surrey; the immediate fate of Elias’s wife and children is unknown, although a daughter, Mathilda, appears in England under royal protection in the reign of Stephen, by the end of which time Count Elias’s son and Namesake had recovered his father’s patrimony in Normandy. It seems likely that it was the noble King Stephen who restored the family’s possessions after 1135.
For the next eighteen years, William Clito wandered north-western Europe in company with his guardian and brother-in-law, who acted first as his tutor and protector, later as his friend and military chief. Their wanderings can be reconstructed to some degree: which is testimony to the public interest of people of the time in the exile and sad fate of the young prince. One of his first hosts was the dissident border magnate, Earl Robert de Belleme, who offered immediate support and assistance against the hated tyrant, Henry. Earl Robert was at the time working closely with King Louis VI in attempting to undermine King Henry in the duchy, so an immediate link was made between William Clito’s cause and the agenda of the Capetian kings. Count Elias and Robert de Belleme apparently began their moral campaign with the issue of letters to the princes surrounding Normandy, stating William Clito’s case and asking for all sorts of aid, moral, financial and military. This was ominous for King Henry. In Duke Robert he had been dealing with an opponent of fitful energy and little political imagination. Robert’s son and his advisers were more acute, opportunistic and had the energy of desperation. They devised a difficult case for the king to answer: they said Henry was excluding William Clito from his rightful inheritance, and holding prisoner his heroic Crusading brother - who was also his lord. William Clito’s case was attractive to King Henry’s rivals, for the boy could be used to justify any action against the king as an act of charity and justice. When Robert de Belleme was captured and imprisoned by Henry in 1112, Clito and his small entourage were welcomed in turn by his cousin, the young Count Baldwin VII of Flanders, son of his father’s friend and companion on Crusade. Baldwin provided William with a home and ample support, and knighted him in 1116 at the early age of fourteen.
As William Clito came to manhood in Flanders, the king his uncle alienated more and more Norman magnates by the decisiveness of his exercise of rule in the duchy. A strong party grew up in Clito’s support in Normandy. Chroniclers of the time make much of the boy’s alleged poverty and insecurity as he grew up. It is likely enough that he was shadowed and pursued by King Henry’s agents wherever he was, but it is also unlikely that his chief sponsors, King Louis VI and Count Baldwin, would have allowed their principal weapon against Henry to lose its edge. The tales of poverty and fear come from William Clito’s camp: it was a powerful way of embarrassing the king who was persecuting him, and another way of eliciting sympathy. It was certainly effective propaganda. The Clito party was able to earn the sympathy even of Orderic Vitalis, a professed admirer of King Henry. Orderic had heard that the boy preferred exile and poverty to the offer from his uncle of three counties to rule over in England. It is hardly surprising therefore that, when Amaury de Montfort laid claim to the county of Evreux in 1118, Amaury and his Norman supporters assisted and expanded their cause by rallying around the rebel banner of William Clito.
The Norman rebellion of 1118-19 was not in the end a success for William Clito’s cause. It started well, with Count Baldwin leading an army into upper Normandy, powerfully helped by the counts of Eu and Aumale, Clito’s kinsmen. The army of the counts was too powerful for King Henry to withstand in the field. It marched to assault the key fortresses of Arques and Bures along the line of the little River Bethune, perhaps with the intention of restoring them both to Count Elias (to whom they had belonged), but in September 1118 Baldwin of Flanders was wounded in the siege of Arques and was put out of action. The army of the counts regretfully pulled back to the border; but what was worse for William was that Count Baldwin’s wound had serious longterm consequences, eventually killing him in June 1119. Before Baldwin’s death, William Clito had already moved (or was sent) to join the court of King Louis, who was planning his own invasion of Normandy down the Seine valley. Clito was in the king’s company when the French army met the Anglo-Norman defenders of the duchy at Bremule on 20 August 1119, and rode as a bacheler (that is, a retained young knight) in King Louis’s guard. He barely escaped capture in the ensuing catastrophe, which ended his chances of freeing his father and winning Normandy for the time being. He may not have appreciated the generosity of his cousin and rival, William atheling, who sent him back the horse he had lost in the battle, with other gifts of ‘necessities’. It only rubbed in the message that Clito was needy.
Following the death of Count Baldwin and the defeat at Bremule, King Louis did not give up the struggle. He continued to take responsibility For William Clito and his cause. Louis was very alert to the potential for embarrassing Henry with his nephew’s plight. In October 1119 he brought William with him to his meeting with Pope Calixtus at Reims. Pale, tall and heavily-built, the king made an eloquent and powerful plea against Henry of England before the papal throne at the great door of the cathedral of Reims, his voice echoing back from the west front. Supported by many of the French princes, and with the handsome and youthful figure of the Clito at hand, Louis accused Henry of invading his realm, seizing the duchy of Normandy, imprisoning its duke and exiling and dispossessing its heir. When the archbishop of Rouen and the Norman prelates who were present stood up and attempted to intervene on Henry’s behalf, they were shouted down. It was a most satisfactory coup for the French king, whether or not it achieved anything for young William. When King Henry met the pope in person the next month on the Norman frontier, he could only protest at the injuries done to him and repeat the offer he had made to William Clito: to treat him as if he were his son and endow him with suitable lands and honors. Naturally enough William ignored the bait, and the pope could do no more for him.
The Norman rebellion of 1123-24 also had for its rationale the restoration of William Clito. The young Norman conspirators behind the rebellion wanted the young pretender as their duke; they were as uninterested in William’s septuagenarian father as they were in his uncle. King Henry. With Henry now without a male heir, the cause of Clito was advancing strongly within his realm. On King Louis’s part Amaury de Montfort worked hard (if not selflessly) in William’s interest, not least in his scheme in 1123 to secure a marriage alliance for William with a daughter of Count Fulk of Anjou. The girl was to bring with her to William the county of Maine, which Fulk had abstracted from Norman control. It would be a perfect base for operations against King Henry. Fulk seems to have lavished money and troops in his prospective son-in-law’s interest, seeing the downfall of an Anglo-Norman realm united under Henry as imminent. The marriage took place but unfortunately fell victim to Henry’s astute appeal to canon law, which forbade the marriage of cousins within the degrees which William Clito and Sibyl of Anjou enjoyed. Calixtus II annulled the marriage in August 1124 just after the collapse of the rebellion. The rebellion’s failure seems to have made Fulk philosophical about the loss of his new son-in-law, and William returned wifeless to Louis VLs court to await his next opportunity.
Louis VI was once again nothing if not loyal to William, and he was prepared to make real and important sacrifices in his support. With great generosity, in January 1127 Louis bestowed his own county of the Vexin on William, with all its castles and demesne, a magnificent base with which to threaten Normandy and foment future revolts. This was probably the occasion when Queen Adela of France married the young prince to her own half-sister. Even more was offered to William Clito when the county of Flanders became vacant on the childless death of Count Charles on 2 March 1127. Louis VI marched promptly into Flanders and set up his headquarters in the south of the county at Arras on 13 March, with William Clito in his entourage. A week later he summoned the barons of Flanders to meet him to discuss the future of the county. He had already rejected one possible candidate, William of Ypres, an illegitimate son of Count Robert ITs younger brother who was known to have the support of King Henry of England. On 30 March 1127 the barons of Flanders assented to the nomination of William Clito as count by King Louis, and elected him unanimously. After a formal act of investiture, the king wrote to all the cities of Flanders giving as his reasons that William ‘formerly grew up among you from infancy to boyhood and then to strong young manhood. It is well known that he has always had good habits and you will be able to direct him so that he will observe good customs and be gentle and docile as you see fit’.Io
King Louis’s intentions in nominating William Clito as count of Flanders were less altruistic than he claimed. He had created a major new player in northern French politics. William was now claiming one of the wealthiest and most populous of the French principalities, with claims and influence which spread to the northern Norman border. It would be suprising indeed if, as soon as he was in full control of his new realm, he did not use it to assail Normandy and reclaim his patrimony. That was undoubtedly what Louis wanted, and what King Henry feared. But first, of course, William had to get a firm grip on Flanders, and that was something which Henry was going to do his utmost to prevent. Henry was already involved in the succession contest By the time Louis crossed into Flanders, and had sent money to his own favoured candidate, William of Ypres. At that time Henry could not have imagined how dangerous the situation was about to become for him - his plan was simply to keep the county in turmoil and promote a harmless candidate of his own. As soon as William Clito’s election was known to him (he is said to have heard the news in Easter week at Woodstock), Henry sent his trusted nephew and aide. Count Stephen of Mortain and Boulogne, to take control of a military and diplomatic campaign to oppose him.
William and King Louis rode north through Flanders, by way of Bethune, Therouanne and Lille, and were received in procession by the city of Bruges on 5 April. This was a good start to his rule, and he issued his first charters as count to that city and its church. But conditions remained dangerous and uncertain, especially in the west of the county, where William of Ypres was still in arms. William Clito found that his progress towards the key city of St-Omer was fraught with danger; indeed many of the conspirators who had murdered Count Charles were still on the loose. It was not until 16 April that he reached St-Omer in the west of his new realm. But he was in very good humour. An account survives of the young count’s reception outside the city by an armed company of grinning boys with whom he playfully scuffled, making himself their captain by seizing their banner. So to smiles and cheers he rode into the city in procession with the city elders and clergy. In the meantime French forces were moving to corner his rival, the count of Ypres, in western Flanders. The count was trapped in the streets of his own city, when the townsfolk betrayed him to the French on 26 April.
In less than a month, Count William Clito had established his authority over the cities and barons of most of Flanders, which was a heavy blow to his uncle. But once King Louis left the county, early in May 1127, William’s problems began in earnest. Count Stephen of Boulogne, his first cousin, had arrived from England with a great sum of money and was at work putting together an anti-Clito coalition. A writer in the thick of the troubles, Walter of Therouanne, reported a rumour that King Henry was claiming Flanders as his own inheritance rather than let William Clito get it unopposed. Henry attempted to gain the assistance of Godfrey, duke of Brabant, his father-in-law, although with no success. He had more luck in buying the support of dissident northern Flemish barons and powerful factions in the Flemish cities which favoured England for the sake of trade. Realising where the source of all the trouble was. Count William assembled an army to move against Boulogne and Count Stephen. Count Elias de St-Saens was still at his side, and one of William’s first acts was to bestow on his faithful friend the lordship of Montreuil-sur-Mer on the southern borders of Boulogne as a springboard into enemy territory. In August 1127 William Clito crossed into Boulogne with fire and sword and attempted to intimidate Stephen into submission.
Unfortunately, while Count William was fighting on the Channel coast, Henry’s tactics began to come to fruition in Flanders. Lille had rebelled against Count William’s officers at the beginning of August and, although he suppressed the rising, other cities began to distrust him and the dispossessed Norman mercenaries he brought in to increase his army. Troubles brought him back to the northern cities in September and forced him to conclude a three year truce with Stephen of Boulogne. Other dissident lords were also conspiring against him in favour of his most serious rival for Flanders, Thierry, son of Duke Simon of Alsace, and, like the late Count Charles, a grandson of Robert I of Flanders. In February 1128 William was defied first by St-Omer and then by Ghent, and it is clear that English influence and money was behind the trouble, as the cities did not like the embargo King Henry had laid on trade with Flanders. By the beginning of March the situation was fast deteriorating for William Clito. The critical moment came when Thierry of Alsace appeared at Ghent on 11 March and was accepted by the people as the rival count of Flanders. By now only the southern towns and a few barons were loyal to William; the major cities of north and west were supporting a variety of rivals and contenders. William marched on St-Omer and subdued it on 21 March, and then turned on Ypres; but, while he was marching across southern Flanders, Bruges too accepted Thierry within the city walls and acclaimed him as count of Flanders.
The crisis in William Clito’s fortunes as count of Flanders now came fast upon him. He gathered his army of loyal Flemings and Normans at Courtrai in the centre of Flanders, as he pondered a march on the northern cities and on his rival, Thierry. He had William of Ypres Released on condition that he joined his army and added his support to his cause. Letters had also flown to Paris to King Louis, who sent a sheaf of warnings to the Flemish cities announcing his impending arrival in the county and his intention to settle their differences with his nominee. William Clito rode south to meet the king at Compiegne at the end of April, but in his absence Thierry struck out towards Lille and secured its obedience, thus hemming William’s area of control down to the very fringe of the southern march. On 6 May 1128 the king reached Arras and moved north to try to oust Thierry from Lille, while William Clito dug in further north at Ypres, laying waste all the region as far north of Bruges, which he attempted to blockade. But Louis’s attempted siege of Lille failed and, fearing that he would himself be encircled, he evacuated his troops and retreated in confusion across the Flemish frontier. This left Count William isolated and desperate.
On 21 June at Axspoele, south of Bruges, William Clito took the ultimate medieval gamble of a pitched battle with Thierry and his Flemish and German allies. Before battle he had all his knights cut off their long hair, cast off their rich garments and do penance for their sins, as if they were expecting death. The battle was fought on horseback, with William in the front rank of his knights, fighting as if he intended to conquer or die. In the event, his rival’s line was the one that collapsed when Count William withdrew in a feigned retreat and his second echelon caught Thierry’s men in an ambush. The better training of the Normans paid off, and William’s enemies were pursued to the gates of Bruges. William’s cause was now beginning to look up and Bruges was under serious threat. The duke of Brabant realised this. With a mass of imperial auxiliaries, Duke Godfrey opportunistically crossed into eastern Flanders to join William and, on 12 July 1128, laid siege to the castle of Aalst, with an eye to the seizure of Ghent immediately Aalst fell. William Clito rode to meet Godfrey with a large force of knights. He was very active in prosecuting the siege, but one day (possibly 22 July) he was engaged in repelling an attempt to relieve the castle when he was pushed from his horse. He grappled with a foot soldier, struggling to wrench the man’s spear from him. The blade sliced his lower arm and, losing blood, he was hustled away by his men. The wound became inflamed and soon it was clear that it was gangrenous.
As the young count lay in great pain and in a high fever in his tent.
Tended to the end by Count Elias, the siege continued and eventually Aalst surrendered. By then, William had realised that his death was on him. He made his confession and had letters written to King Henry which expressed sorrow for the differences between them and asked his pardon, and pardon also for the Normans who had supported him. He sought admission into the Benedictine community of St-Bertin of St-Omer, and on 28 July 1128 he died at the age of twenty-five. There was one family member at his deathbed; this was John, a clerical son of Bishop Odo of Bayeux, and therefore William Clito’s cousin. He seems to have attached himself to the young count as chaplain. King Henry received back into favour many of the exiles, but the fate of Count Elias is unknown. He may have been one of those supporters of Clito who left for Palestine and did not return. Count William’s body was carried to the abbey of St-Bertin at St-Omer and buried there with due honour, an honour which seems to have increased as the legend of William’s tragedy and chivalry grew. Either the abbey, or later counts of Flanders, paid in the 1180s for the grave to be covered with a remarkable carved military effigy, one of the first ever to be set up within a church; a suitable monument to one of the twelfth century’s more remarkable and famous errant knights. Like his father, who is said to have had a vision of his son’s death while in confinement in Cardiff castle, William Clito experienced great misfortunes and reverses in his own lifetime, but after their deaths both men were suitably rewarded by becoming the objects of a cult of knightliness: secular saints in niches above the political altar on which their lives were sacrificed.
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