Memory, Symbol, and Arson: Was Rome "Sacked" in 1084?

Abstract

Even this ignores some of Robert's dramatic accomplishments. One of the twelve sons of Tancred of Hauteville, Robert, with Richard of Dieppe, traveled to southern Italy sometime around 1046. There they joined Richard's uncle, now count of Aversa (a new town just north of Naples), and several of Robert's elder brothers, who were already securing a reputation for themselves as warriors and emerging lords in Apulia. Within four years Richard became count of Aversa, and Robert was parlaying a gift for raiding livestock and small towns into fame and a position of dominance among his fellow Normans of southern Italy. Robert was engaged in almost ceaseless fighting from the time of his arrival until his death in 1085. He campaigned tirelessly against the Lombard, Byzantine, Arab, and Nor man lords of Italy; crushed Pope Leo IX at Civitate in 1053 only to form an alliance with his successor; then pressed into Albania, Thessaly, and Africa, until he, along with his brother Roger and Richard of Aversa, controlled southern Italy and most of Sicily. These lands, united into a single kingdom under Robert's nephew, Roger II of Sicily, would remain a single political unit for over seven centuries.3 As his epigrapher notes, by the time of Robert's death he had defeated