deposits were discovered in Saxony during the eleventh century. Through Italy and the inland waterways of Russia these goods were traded for luxuries from the east, particularly silks and spices, which were at once valuable and relatively easy to transport.

The development of such trade gave lords fresh sources of income. In the first instance it offered easy targets for robbery or for the extraction of tolls. The construction of many northern French castles in relatively weak sites close to roads was one manifestation of this trend. Great lords and kings reacted sharply against these acts, partly under injunction that it was their Christian duty to do so, but also because they could thereby establish a monopoly on tolls themselves. In the late eleventh century a count of Flanders was renowned for having boiled alive a knight who had taken vengeance at a fair, while Louis VI of France ( 1108-37) spent much of his reign campaigning against lords who preyed on traders; this did not prevent either of them from requesting such dues themselves. Other lords took more positive action to encourage trade within their territories, and of this there is no better example than the way in which the counts of Champagne in the twelfth century encouraged a great annual cycle of fairs in which Flemings and Italians dealt with each other. The volume of trade was so considerable that the coin of the district became the model for the standard currency in much of Italy in the second half of the twelfth century. Behind this there may also have been another more baleful trend; it is possible that the cost of the north's imports was not yet covered by the value of its exports, and could only be met by the export of bullion.

Lords at Prayer

When Henry the Lion associated his own dedication to Christ with dreams of a more secular nature, he made a connection fundamental to his time. Kings identified their duties to their subjects with their obligations to God, and defined them as the punishment of oppressors, protection of the helpless (particularly widows, orphans, and churches), and extension of the

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