Elisabeth Austin PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

The most elaborate account of the Anglo-Norman church, the
Gesta Pontiflcum, was composed by William of Malmesbury in about
1125 but heavily revised before the monk's death in 71143. William
swallowed Eadmer's version of the primacy dispute whole, and
devoted a disproportionate section of his history to the subject. But
despite a strong Canterbury bias, the historian portrays Thomas of
Bayeux as a virtuous prelate, representing his resistance to Lanfranc
as a momentary aberration. The Gesta Pontiflcum's sister work, the
Gesta Regum Anglorum, has little to say on the subject of Thomas
directly, but illustrates royal attitudes to the church in general. The
breadth of William's interests and the variety of his sources
outweigh the partisan reporting of the primacy dispute, and the
Gesta Pon tiflcum has the singular virtue of showing Thomas of
Bayeux working alongside his fellow-bishops, instead of merely
arguing with them.
Continental chronicles, with one enormous exception, can tell us
little about Thomas. The chroniclers of William's conquest of England
are unanimously unaware or uninterested in Thomas' presence.
William of J umieges perhaps finished his Gesta Normannorum Ducum
in 1072, William of Poitiers wrote the Gesta Guillelmi Ducis
Normannorum et Regis Anglorum soon afterwards, and Guy of
Amiens (if indeed he is the author) composed the Carmen de
Hastingae Proelio about the same time. The three panegyrists make
no mention of Thomas: even if William had taken him into his chapel
by 1066, he apparently played no role in the events of that year.2 9
29The silence of William of Poi tiers, like Thomas a royal chaplain and secular
clerk, is especially unfortunate. F. Barlow, EC1066-1154, n. 21, notes that the
28