Richard Fitz Nigel

Richard fitz Nigel (also Richard Fitzneale , Richard fitz Neal or Richard of Ely ) (* around 1130, † September 10, 1198 ) was an English clergyman. Before 1160 he became royal treasurer , which he held until shortly before his death. From 1189 he was also Bishop of London .

origin

Richard Fitz Nigel was a likely illegitimate son of Nigel , the treasurer of King Henry I , who became Bishop of Ely in 1133 . His father and also his uncle Roger of Salisbury had long been among the leading officials in the English treasury . Richard later referred to his successor as Treasurer, William of Ely , as a relative. Richard's mother was believed to be from England. His father and his uncle Roger of Salisbury ensured the young Richard a good education, which also gave him a basic understanding of logic and Roman law .

Promotion to Treasurer

During the contest for the succession to the throne, the so-called anarchy , Richard was taken hostage by King Stephen in 1144 , who wanted to assure himself of the loyalty of his father. When, after the end of the anarchy, King Henry II took over, Richard's father reorganized the treasury and took over the office of treasurer again. Richard was probably already taking on leading positions in the treasury at that time, before he took over the office of treasurer from his father before 1160. Allegedly, in 1159, his father paid £ 400 to the king, who needed money for his planned campaign against Toulouse .

As treasurer, Richard initially stood in the shadow of his father, who only died in 1169, but was seriously ill from 1166 at the latest. As a result, Richard soon took on far-reaching tasks. In 1173 he raised taxes in Bedfordshire , Buckinghamshire , Kent , Oxfordshire and Sussex together with Nicholas de Sigillo and Reginald de Warenne . In 1175 he bought horses which he brought to the king's French possessions. In Normandy he was then possibly involved in the reform of the financial administration in 1175. As was customary at the time with royal officials, Richard did not only take on tasks in financial management. In 1179 he served as a traveling judge, holding negotiations in numerous counties of South West England, but also in Berkshire and Oxfordshire. In addition, he served as a royal judge at the court in Westminster , where he had to deal with several, but not always, lawsuits for taxes and cash payments. In addition, he took on numerous different tasks, such as the end of the 1180s when he had to look after a king's falcon , or in 1189 when he was unsuccessful in mediating in the dispute between Archbishop Baldwin of Canterbury and the Cathedral Priory of Canterbury. From 1177 onwards, Richard received £ 20 annually from the income of the Essendon and Bayford royal estates in Hertfordshire .

Spiritual career

Elected Bishop of London

Richard had already become Archdeacon of Ely in his father's diocese around 1158 at the latest . After his father became seriously ill from 1164, at the latest in 1166, he probably took over the administration of the Diocese of Ely . He also had a benefice as a canon at London's St Paul's Cathedral . Presumably in December 1183, Richard was appointed Dean of Lincoln . There he bought several dilapidated houses in the churchyard of the cathedral , had them demolished and rebuilt as the residence of the dean. In 1186, the Lincoln Cathedral Chapter wanted to elect him bishop, but surprisingly the king rejected the election of Richard and two other candidates. Instead, he appointed the Carthusian Hugo as the new bishop. On September 15 or 16, 1189, the new King Richard I in Pipewell Abbey appointed Richard as the new bishop for the diocese of London, which had been vacant since 1187 . On December 31, 1189, Richard was ordained bishop in Lambeth in the presence of twelve bishops. As bishop, he resigned his previous spiritual offices, but retained the office of treasurer.

Role in the power struggles during King Richard's absence

Before Archbishop Baldwin of Canterbury embarked on the Third Crusade , he held a synod in Westminster on February 19, 1190, at which he appointed Richard his deputy in the Archdiocese of Canterbury. As a result, he became involved in the dispute with Bishop Hugh de Nonant , whom Baldwin had forbidden to take over the offices of sheriff of Warwickshire , Staffordshire and Leicestershire . Nonant had promised the archbishop that he would resign and not take over again. Richard was supposed to keep this promise, but apparently Nonant did not actually resign from the lucrative offices, although he also assured Richard that he would.

During the absence of King Richard I on the crusade and the subsequent imprisonment of the king in Germany, Richard was a leader in the power struggle between Johann Ohneland , the king's brother, and the justiciar and chancellor William de Longchamp . From October 15 to 16, 1190 Richard took part in a synod that William de Longchamp, who was also the papal legate , held in Westminster. In 1191 Johann Ohneland resisted his brother's orders and returned to England. In the summer of 1191 an open civil war for supremacy in England loomed between him and Longchamp. Richard, along with other prelates, was one of the mediators who tried to settle the conflict on July 28, 1191 at a conference in Winchester. As a result of the arbitration, Richard took over administration of the royal Bristol Castle . The conflict broke out again in mid-September when Longchamp had Geoffrey , the half-brother of King Richard and John and Archbishop of York arrested on his arrival in England. Here dragged Longchamps men Archbishop force from the sanctuary in Dover, where he had taken refuge. Richard condemned this monstrous assault, went to Longchamp near Norwich and threatened to impose an interdict on him . He then traveled to London, where on October 2, 1191 he received the released Geoffrey with honor. Johann Ohneland wanted to take advantage of this weakening Longchamps and called a council meeting at the Loddon Bridge between Reading and Windsor . Richard accompanied Longchamp from Windsor to the meeting with other magnates and prelates. However, Longchamp feared an ambush and fled back to Windsor and then on to London. As a result, numerous barons and bishops also moved to London, where the decision in the power struggle between Johann and Longchamp came. On October 8th, numerous barons and bishops, including Richard, swore allegiance to the king in London's St Paul's Cathedral . On October 9, 1191, the Chapter of Westminster Abbey elected their prior William Postard in place of Longchamp's brother as the new abbot. Postard was installed by Richard as abbot at St Paul's Cathedral. On October 10, Richard finally attended the council meeting in Westminster, while Longchamp was deposed as justiciar.

Archbishop Baldwin of Canterbury had died during the Crusade in late 1190. After this news reached England, the election of a successor was delayed by the power struggle between Longchamp and Johann Ohneland. After all, Richard played an essential part in calling the English bishops together in November 1191 to elect a successor. However, since Richard was still being held up by official business in London, the monks of the Cathedral Priory of Canterbury were able to anticipate the bishops by electing Bishop Reginald fitz Jocelin of Bath as the new Archbishop on November 27th . Reginald died at the end of 1191. Due to the captivity of the king, another election was delayed until the spring of 1193. Finally, Richard called a new meeting of bishops, which on May 30, 1193 elected Hubert Walter , the candidate named by the king, as the new archbishop. This time too the monks of the cathedral priory had anticipated the bishops, but since they had also elected Hubert Walter, this had no consequences. Richard was able to announce the result of the election. At the enthronement of Hubert Walter on November 7th, however, there was a dispute between Richard and Gilbert de Glanville , the Bishop of Rochester, about priority at the ceremony. Gilbert de Glanville claimed precedence as the archbishop's chaplain, while Richard claimed it as dean of the bishops of Canterbury . Ultimately, the two bishops were able to reach a compromise.

Richard appeared to maintain his privileges as a high-ranking bishop on other occasions, just as he was concerned with his rank as treasurer. This preservation of his privileges led to a conflict with Archbishop Geoffrey of York in March 1192. He resided in the New Temple in London to attend a council meeting. As he walked from the New Temple to the meeting, he had a processional cross carried forward. This right was contested to him by Richard and the other bishops of the ecclesiastical province of Canterbury. They threatened Geoffrey with excommunication if he had the cross carried forward again, and Richard forbade church services and bells to ring in the New Temple while Geoffrey was staying there. Thereupon Geoffrey did not have a cross carried forward.

Loyal supporter during the further reign of Richard I.

During the reign of King Richard, Richard retained his importance for the royal administration. In April 1193 he was one of the guards of the ransom that had been collected for the king's release. On April 10, 1194 he was one of the bishops who excommunicated Johann Ohneland and his followers as peace breakers in Westminster Abbey. When King Richard returned to England from his captivity, Richard had a prominent role in the re-coronation of the king on April 17, 1194 in Winchester by being allowed to sit on the king's left. Richard remained a loyal supporter of the king for the next few years. When Hubert Walter asked the bishops at a council meeting in Oxford in 1197 to provide the king with an additional 300 knights for the war in Normandy, Richard openly supported this demand, while Bishop Hugo of Lincoln rejected it. Richard was a regular and occasional royal judge at Westminster until 1196. He also served as a judge on other occasions, for example on July 22, 1192 in Hertford or as a traveling judge in Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk.

As bishop Richard sponsored the cathedral school of St Paul's Cathedral, where the respected Ralph de Diceto was dean.

Activity as a writer

Richard was known not only for his offices but also for his writings. In the late 1170s, Richard wrote his book Dialogus de Scaccario ( Dialogue on the Treasury ), which is his best known work. It is both a financial management manual and a song of praise for his family who faithfully served the king. The work was added later, although this was not necessarily done by Richard. The work consists of two parts. In a fictitious dialogue between a teacher and a student, the first part describes the officials and the structure of the treasury. The second part contains the description of the work. Together with the little developed later Tractatus de legibus of de Glanville Ranulf heard Richards work of the oldest manuals for the secular administration. According to his own statement, he also wrote a work called Tricolumnis , a short history of England during the reign of Henry I , which, however, has not survived.

Works

• Dialogue about the Treasury = Dialogus de scaccario . With an introduction by Marianne Siegrist-Müller. Artemis, Zurich 1963 (German)
• Dialogus de Scaccario = The course of the Exchequer . Edited and translated by Charles Johnson. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1983. ISBN 0-19-822268-8 (English)

literature

• Felix Liebermann: Introduction to the Dialogus de scaccario . EA Huth, Göttingen 1875
• John Hudson: Administration, Family and Perception of the Past in Late Thwelth-Century England: Richard Fitznigel and the Dialogue of the Exchequer . In: Paul Magdalino: The Perception of the past in twelfth-century Europe . Hambledon, London 1992 (eBook), pp. 75-99

Web links

• John Hudson: Richard Fitz Nigel (c.1130–1198). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861411-X , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of 2004

predecessor	Office	successor
Adelelm	Treasurer of the Exchequer around 1159–1196	William of Ely
Gilbert Foliot	Bishop of London 1189–1198	William de Ste Mère-Église