the statement',[1] or that 'the match itself was a very probable one, for the parties were of approximately equal rank and wealth'[2] or that 'it is possible' that William de Archis was identical with William de Pont de l'Arche,[3] which is quite impossible.[4] Accordingly, when he has to deal with the statement in his 'Chronicle' that Hubert de Rye was put in charge of Norwich Castle 'after the flight of de Guader', he claims 'there is nothing unlikely on the face of it of [sic] the appointment'.[5] Let us see. It is common ground that Norwich was placed in charge of William Fitz Osbern[6] (earl of Hereford). Mr. Rye asserts that he was succeeded by
(2) Ralph de Guader, whose wife Emma was daughter of this William Fitz Osbern, held the castle against the king after his flight in 1074–5.[7]
Now it is a fact that Ralph fled on the approach of the royal forces in 1075; but how could he hold 'the castle against the king after his flight' therefrom and when, moreover, the king was in Normandy, not in Norfolk? But Mr. Rye's grammar, we must remember, is a law unto itself. It was, of course, Emma herself who stood the siege.[8]
Let us now return to Mr. Rye's chapter on 'The governors, castellans and keepers' of Norwich Castle.[9] We there read that 'at the same time that the castellanship was put in the charge of Hubert de Rye it would seem (Hudson, p. vi[10]) that Wm. Fitz Osbern, the father-in-law of Ralph de Guader, was given charge of the county'. Now Mr. Rye styles Hubert 'the Castellan of 1074'[11] on the ground of the Chronicle's statement that to him 'was committed the tower of Norwich after the flight of Ralph de Waer',[12] which flight, we have seen, he dates 'in 1074–5'.[13] As a fact, Ralph fled from Norwich in 1075, so that the alleged castellanship of Hubert cannot have begun earlier than that. Therefore it also cannot have been earlier than 1075 that William Fite Osbern 'was given charge of the
- ↑ p. 40 b, 'there is no direct evidence for or against the statement'.
- ↑ p. 42 a.
- ↑ p. 45 b.
- ↑ See p. 13 above, where I have shown he actually finds in this statement valid evidence.
- ↑ p. 17.
- ↑ The authority for this is William of Poitiers, who is duly cited by Freeman.
- ↑ p. 17.
- ↑ See, for a fuller account of all this, Freeman, Norman Conquest, iv (ed. 1871), pp. 64, 67, 73, 252–3, 573–84. William Fitz Osbern was entrusted with Norwich (pp. 72–3) before the king left for Normandy in March 1067; but when the Danes landed in 1069 (c. August) 'William Fitz Osbern was no longer in command' there. The man who then 'commanded at Norwich' was 'Ralph of Wader' (pp. 252–3).
- ↑ p. 17.
- ↑ I am in no way responsible for this citation, nor do I know from which paper it is taken.
- ↑ p. 79.
- ↑ pp. 17, 33 b.
- ↑ p. 17.
