purified the cathedral, which had suffered in the late disturbances.
Politically Robert seems to have followed the guidance of Henry of Winchester; he witnessed Stephen's Salisbury charters in December 1139, but after the coming of the empress he joined her and was regularly present at Matilda's court during 1141 (Round, pp. 46, 64, 82–3, 93). When, in 1143, Miles of Gloucester demanded a heavy contribution from the church lands, Robert withstood him. The earl resorted to violence, and Robert then excommunicated him and his followers, and laid the diocese under an interdict (Gesta Stephani, pp. 101–2). Gilbert Foliot appealed to the legate against Robert's severity (Foliot, Epist. 3). Miles died soon afterwards, and Robert was one of the bishops who decided the dispute between the monks of Gloucester and canons of Llanthony as to the earl's place of burial. In 1145 he was commissioned by Eugenius III to decide the suit of Oseney Abbey with St. Frideswide's as to the church of St. Mary Magdalen at Oxford (Annales Monastici, iv. 26). In the spring of this year he witnessed a charter of Stephen in association with Imarus, the papal legate. In 1147 he adjudicated on a dispute between the abbeys of Shrewsbury and Seez as to the church of Morville (Eyton, i. 35, viii. 214). In 1148 Robert, though in feeble health, went at the pope's bidding to attend the council at Rheims, where the heresy of Gilbert de la Porrée was to be considered. King Stephen allowed only Robert and two other bishops to go to the council (John of Salisbury, Hist. Pontificalis ap. Mon. Hist. Germaniæ, xx. 519). On the third day of the council Robert fell ill, and he died at Rheims on 16 April (Anglia Sacra, ii. 315–19; the date is given variously as 14 April (Chron. S. Petri Glouc. i. 18). On his deathbed Robert was visited by the pope, and received absolution from many archbishops and bishops. There was a hot contest between the monks of Rheims and the bishop's clerks as to who should have the honour of Robert's burial, but he was ultimately buried at Hereford (Anglia Sacra, ii. 319–21). Robert was called ‘the good bishop’ (Annales Monastici, iv. 26). In the midst of feudal anarchy he stood forth as the fearless champion of peace and justice. William of Malmesbury, writing in Robert's lifetime, says his fame was so high that the pope trusted him in English affairs next to the legate and archbishop (Gesta Pontificum, p. 305). His learning and piety are extolled not only by his eulogiser, William of Wycumb, and by the canon of Llanthony, but by many other writers of his time (ib. p. 304; Chron. S. Petri Glouc. i. 18; R. de Torigni, p. 121; Gesta Stephani, p. 101; John of Hexham, ii. 284). There are three letters addressed to Robert de Bethune among the epistles of Gilbert Foliot (Epp. 9, 50, 74, ap. Migne, Patrologia, cxc. 754, 780, 794). A letter from Robert to the famous Suger, abbot of St. Denys, is extant among the latter's letters (Migne, clxxxvi. 1359).
[William of Malmesbury's Gesta Pontificum, Chron. S. Pet. Gloucestriæ, Gesta Stephani, Richard of Hexham, and Robert de Torigny ap. Chron. Stephen, Henry II, and Richard I, John of Hexham ap. Symeon of Durham, Annales Monastici (all these in Rolls Ser.); Cont. Flor. Wig. (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Chron. of Llanthony, ap. Dugdale's Monasticon Anglicanum, vi. 131–133; Round's Geoffrey de Mandeville; Eyton's Antiquities of Shropshire. There is a life of Robert de Bethune by his friend and chaplain William of Wycumb, who was fourth prior of Llanthony; it is printed in Wharton's Anglia Sacra, ii. 299–321.]
ROBERT of ‘Salesby’ (fl. 1150?), chancellor of Sicily, is described by John of Hexham as ‘oriundus in Anglia, scilicet in Salesbia.’ Mr. Raine renders this by Selby, but in Twysden's ‘Scriptores Decem’ and in the Rolls Series (ap. Sym. Dunelm. ii. 318) ‘Salesberia’ is read. If Robert was of Salisbury, and not of Selby, it is possible that he may have been connected with the great English chancellor and justiciar, Roger of Salisbury. Robert was one of many Englishmen who found employment under the Norman kings of Sicily in the twelfth century. Romuald of Salerno speaks of Robert, the chancellor of King Roger, directing the defence of Campania against the Pisans and the emperor in 1132–3 (Muratori, vii. 188 D); but Roger's chancellor at this time was Guarinus (Grævius, iii. 847, and Regiæ Capellæ Panormitanæ Notitia, p. 2), and Alexander Abbas, in his ‘De Gestis Rogerii,’ ascribes to Guarinus the part assigned by Romuald to Robert (Grævius, v. 115–16). Guarinus was still chancellor in 1137, but Robert was chancellor on 28 April 1140 (ib. iii. 1091; Reg. Cap. Panorm. p. 4). He attested charters of King Roger, at all events as late as 1148 (Grævius, iii. 726, 887, 956, 1361). In 1146 St. William of York, after his rejection by the pope, took refuge with Robert (John of Hexham, pp. 150–2, Surtees Soc.). John of Salisbury (Policraticus, vii. 19) relates how Robert, the English chancellor of King Roger, deceived certain would-be simoniacs. In ordinary course the chancellorship would have led to a bishopric, and possibly the chancellor is the Robert who was bishop of Messina, 1151–66.
