02. History -- The Normans, The BBC, The Papacy, and The Teaching of History

8/9/2019 02. History -- The Normans, The BBC, The Papacy, and The Teaching of History

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THE NORMANS, THE BBC,

THE PAPACY AND US!

As one who watched both Professor Robert Bartlett's 'Normans' andDan Snow's 'Norman Walks', let me say how much I enjoy the

BBC's sense of history and these two items in particular.

Hitherto I have admired the BBC sense of history. But on recentreflection I find that I must reconsider this view. Indeed, I have toadmit of a general problem that now pervades my entire viewing ofthese wonderfully formal historical offerings, ones prejudicesdrawing one decisively if reluctantly towards Pillars of Wisdom,where, as Oscar Wilde reminds us, even in a pitiable medievalgutter some spirits see the stars.

The problem revolves entirely around our notion of the Papacy aswell as our notion of the Nation State. By my reckoning, theNormans not only beat the crap out of everyone for not beingNormans and good Christians, but they made French the languageof the people for at least 400 years after their conquest. In

administration, law, architecture -- practically everything -- anynotion we have even of Saxon England is reviewable backwards.Moreover, what does that say of our idea of England, Ireland ,

Scotland, Germany, Italy, and the European Nation State?

One cannot be blamed for thinking that during the Dark Ages andthe Early Middle Ages, there was little or nothing known of theNation States or how -- if at all -- they were conceived. And whilethe middle ages was ubiquitously violent and volatile -- and can

often be likened to a game of chess, played out for real by endlesspetty kings (mostly relatives) and neighbouring city states(especially in Italy) -- the real governor of the European land mass,never to be found on a Chess Board, was the Pope.

It was a time when everyone was running off to Rome to pay onesrespects to the sole overlording religion in Italy. The story of Jesushad been doing the rounds and, as Wycliffe had pointed out, thecorruption of mother Church was so horrific, that the Popes next

move was to swamp Europe with young men called Benedictines,Franciscans, Dominicans, etc., etc.. The church became the biggest

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employer in Europe for hordes of unwanted young men and womenwho could not afford a horse, a sword, a helmet, a suit of mail, akite shield, a long bow and a romping great horse! In a way, thecrusades was a means of enlisting holy men into the church smilitary knighthood: and this is an insight that ought not to be

discounted today, when the RC Church recruits all over the worldfor people who are prepared to embark upon an individuallyinspiring career, but who in reality are co-opted into a terriblearmy.

In any event, the emergence of the institution of the Papacy,should be kept in mind, not just as a means of understanding thecoincidence and agenda of the Normans, but also with the partplayed by the Papacy with respect to the military exploits of thosewho came before the Normans as well as those who came after --the Papal manipulation of the Byzantines, for example, theLombards, the Franks, and only then, when needs must, with theViking-cum-Normans.

The Normans are neither the beginning nor the end of history; norare they an item -- however interesting -- to be considered solelyin their own environment. If -- as we are tired of reiterating -- All

history begins now, with our consciousness and knowledge of thepast, and of what the past means for us now, then the Normansare most instructive by reference to their relationship with the moreenduring Papacy. While the genius of the bloody Normans waspartly to be seen in their assimilability, the messianic designs of thePapacy are infinitely more significant to our understanding ofWestern and World history as a whole.

With the present enthusiasm for Norman history and the Middle

Ages at an unprecedented high, there is the very strong possibilitythat we (and the gurus at the BBC) may not see the wood for thetrees, thereby missing one of the great opportunities (and to mymind duties) of public broadcasting, namely, to educate the public,thereby making the much more aware of the daily contemporaryforces at play in our time.

Although it might be reserved for another programme, it isunfortunate that this rather central aspect of the middle ages is

never really captured by the historians. It is as if there is someprotocol that precludes the influence and management of these

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military affairs by the Papacy from being recounted in the samebreadth as the 'secular powers'. It is as if the Normans wereentirely autonomous in their military agenda and the ragingantagonisms between Papacy and Emperor, between the spiritualsword and the temporal sword was never an ubiquitous military

reality.

And this is my problem, mostly with Professor Bartlett's otherwiseexcellent account. Catholicisms (and Christianitys) need forconstant crusades is not just an incident of the twelfth century, butwhenever the thinking public have reason to discard the Christianmyth-makers, a new antagonism specifying the fears betweenCommunism-and-Fascism or Jewry-and-Catholicism or Catholicism-and-Islam is made to appear on the world scene. This historicaldivision and its orchestrated amplification has its uses today asmuch as yesterday, and if we do not learn to recognise it for what itis, then we are doomed yet again to repeat it, and allow ourselvesto be defeated by those powers who best use these religiousdivision.

And while Professor Bartlett is absolutely correct to point out thatthe Norman conjuncture has a significance for us all today, I would

suggest that the most important aspect of this conjuncture is not somuch a description of Norman triumphs (however important) butthe continual alliances made by the Papacy with the most militarilygifted (and brutal) contemporaries available, whether they beLombard, Frank, Norman, Spanish, Austrian, Italian, German orCroatian, or whether, like the Americans, they possess and areprepared to use the Atomic bomb.

Which brings me to my second -- and connected -- problem!

If, instead of following up the Invasion of Britain with the Normanexploits in Southern Italy, the story as told is reversed -- that is,to demonstrate the exploits of the Normans in Southern Italy first,and the ensuing clash and shared agreement between Papal andNorman forces, then one might all the easier see the enduring dealwhich the Papacy struck with the Normans -- reference being madeperhaps to a similar deal being struck with Constantine as far backas the fourth century, and respectively with the Lombards, and with

the Franks, etc..

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This perspective could well be moved forward through the crusadesagainst the Pagans,Jews, Albigensians, Huguenots and assortedProtestants. Indeed, if we look at the reign of King John (1167 1216), we see this thesis of expanding Papal and Christianhegemony made perfectly real. And if we look to Wycliffe for an

explanation of these events, it becomes clear that it is Papal greedthat prompts a new consciousness of the nation state (of England),as well as the perpetual role adapted by the Roman Church in worldpolitics.

It is a thesis that is capable of being carried forward to the religiouswars, the religious affiliations of Charles 1 (and his wife), as well asthe litany of wars in Europe down to our own times. (Is Tony Blairsposition so different to that of Charles 1?)

More recently, we can follow the thesis right down to crusadeagainst the Masons, to the Cristeros War in Mexico in the 20s, tothe crusade against the Communists in the 30s 40s and adinfinitum, inspiring protocols with Mussolini, Franco, Hitler,Salazar, Croatia, and the Americans, and even forward to theassault on Russia and Vietnam by the combination of JP11,Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, and in our own time

through the illegal war in Iraq and Afghanistan by Benedict XVI,Tony Blair and George Bush.

Nothing, it seems to me, provides a greater threat to world peacethan the present unstable state of Christianity. Without a crusade --or at least a juxtapositional defining of Christianity and Islam,Christianity and Atheism, etc. -- Christianity sees itself as awasting back-water. The several Jesuitical Universities andcolleges, and their allies all over the world (but especially in the US

and India) are, it seems to me, on standby to create and amplifythis focal antagonism. Whether in China, Venezuela, Britain orbehind President Obamas back, the same war that has ragedthroughout the entire Christian era still persists.

Isnt it time to drag Christianity into the open, unmask its janus-like militant/mendicant face, and observe its messianic heart ?

The Christian Conquest, both in its religious zeal and its ancillary

compulsion to conquer the world, has always been known to theworld. That this struggle, constantly made universal by the

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relentless missionary zeal of the churches, has hardly beentouched, much less analyzed. Dare one suggest to the BBC thatProfessor Bartletts account of the Normans be re-conceived in thislight; that a discussion panel be invited to carry the exploits of theNormans forward into the succeeding centuries that have truly

marred the landscape of Europe and the World. Isnt it time to lethistory and our sense of history inform our present consciousnessof its intimate ties with religious imperialism? Isnt it especiallyopportune, now that the Catholic Church is visibly driving the worldinto an Islam/Christian , Religious/Secular, Christian/Atheism,

Darwinian/Creationist divide, to examine the role of Christianityand the Papacy in this world-wide agitation for world dominance?

It has been well said that all history begins NOW. Let us thereforeuse Professor Bartletts account of the Normans as a starting pointtowards our understanding of NOW in all its mea-culpa dimensions!

Seamus Breathnach

www.irish-criminology.com

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http://www.irish-criminology.com/http://www.irish-criminology.com/

02. History -- The Normans, The BBC, The Papacy, and The Teaching of History

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