Count Robert of Paris (1832) was the second-last of the Waverley novels by Walter Scott. It is part of Tales of My Landlord, 4th series, along with Castle Dangerous. The novel is set in Constantinople at the end of the 11th century, during the build-up of the First Crusade and centres on the relationship between the various crusading forces and the Byzantine Emperor Alexius I Comnenus.
Composition and sources After completing Anne of Geierstein at the end of April 1829, Scott's energies were devoted principally to non-fictional works, most notably a two-volume History of Scotland. But a new novel was always on his schedule; by February 1830, Scott had determined on a narrative of the First Crusade, and was soon undertaking appropriate research while working on Tales of a Grandfather and Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft. The title Robert of Paris was settled by 5 September, and composition began in November.For a full account of the composition see Walter Scott, Count Robert of Paris, ed. J. H. Alexander (Edinburgh, 2006), 381–405.
In spite of concern caused by unfavourable comments on the opening chapters by James Ballantyne and Robert Cadell, Scott finished the first volume before the end of January 1831, using the services of William Laidlaw as amanuensis when he was available. In mid-March, Scott thought the second volume was complete and began the third, but there had been a miscalculation, and he had to provide additional material to bring the second volume up to the usual length. Towards the end of April only a third of the final volume remained to be written, but Scott was delayed by objections by Ballantyne and Cadell to Brenhilda's pregnancy and her combat with Anna Comnena.
After a fitful attempt to change his text, Scott laid it aside to work on the second French series of Tales of a Grandfather (which was never completed), and then spent late June, July, and August writing Castle Dangerous, before completing Count Robert on 14 September: these final stages involved a good deal of textual maneuvering, including the provision of extra material consisting of an approach by Alexius to the Manichaeans, which in the event was not needed. Two days later, on 16 September, Scott accepted a suggestion by J. G. Lockhart that Count Robert should appear together with Castle Dangerous as a fourth series of Tales of my Landlord. After he had left for the Mediterranean on 29 October, Cadell and Lockhart radically revised Scott's text without any further authorial input, completing their work early in November.
The two principal sources for Count Robert were Histoire de l'Empereur Aléxis by Anna Comnena, included in Histoire de Constantinople by Louis Cousin (1672–74), and The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776–88) by Edward Gibbon. Scott was more inclined towards Gibbon's sceptical approach as opposed to Anna's panegyrics.Ibid., 498–502.
Editions Tales of my Landlord, Fourth and Last Series, dated 1832, was published on 1 December 1831 by Robert Cadell in Edinburgh and Whittaker and Co. in London. The print run was 5000, and the price two guineas (£2 2s or £2.10). Scott may have had some input into the text of the 'Magnum' edition of the series, which appeared posthumously as Volumes 46, 47, and 48 (part) in March, April, and May 1833; he sent Lockhart a list of errata from Naples on 16 February 1832, but it has not survived. He also provided an introduction for Castle Dangerous, but apparently none for Count Robert.Ibid., 405, 423–24.
The standard modern edition of Count Robert of Paris, by J. H. Alexander, was published as Volume 23a of the Edinburgh Edition of the Waverley Novels in 2006; this is based on the first edition, with extensive emendations mainly from the surviving fragments of manuscript and proofs, which are designed to restore as much of Scott's original work as possible.
Plot introduction Set in Constantinople at the time of the First Crusade, Count Robert of Paris portrays the impact of Western medieval values and attitudes on the sophisticated Romano-Greek classical society of the Byzantine Empire. The two main characters are Count Robert, a Frankish knight, and Hereward, an Anglo-Saxon refugee from the Norman conquest of England, serving as a mercenary soldier in the Varangian Guard of the Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. Count Robert was based on an actual but minor historical figure who disrupted negotiations between the Crusader leaders and the Emperor by occupying the latter's throne when it was temporarily vacated.
Plot summary
This section of the article includes text from the revised 1898 edition of Henry Grey's A Key to the Waverley Novels (1880), now in the public domain.
At the end of the 11th century, the Byzantine capital of Constantinople was threatened by Turkic nomads from the east, and by the Franks from the west. Unable to rely on his Greek subjects to repel their incursions, the emperor was obliged to maintain a body-guard of Varangians, or mercenaries from other nations, of whom the citizens and native soldiers were very jealous. One of these, the Anglo-Saxon Hereward, had just been attacked by Sebastes, when a Varangian officer, Tatius, intervened and led him to the palace. Here he was introduced to the imperial family, surrounded by their attendants; and the Princess Anna was reading a roll of history she had written, when her husband Brennius entered to announce the approach of the armies composing the first Crusade. Convinced that he was powerless to prevent their advance, the emperor offered them hospitality on their way; and, the leaders having agreed to acknowledge his sovereignty, the various hosts marched in procession before his assembled army.
As Emperor Comnenus, however, moved forward to receive the homage of Count Bohemond, his vacant throne was insolently occupied by Count Robert of Paris, who was with difficulty compelled to vacate it, and make his submission. The defiant knight, accompanied by his wife Brenhilda, afterwards met the sage Agelastes, who related the story of an enchanted princess, and decoyed them to his hermitage overlooking the Bosphorus. Here they were introduced to the empress and her daughter, who, attended by Brennius, came to visit the sage, and were invited to return with them to the palace to be presented to the emperor. At the State banquet which followed, the guests, including Sir Bohemond, were pledged by their royal host, and urged to accept the golden cups they had used. On waking next morning, Count Robert found himself in a dungeon with a tiger, and that Ursel was confined in an adjoining one. Presently an aggressive orangutan descended through a trap-door, soon followed by the armed Sebastes. Both were overpowered by the Count, when Hereward made his appearance, and undertook to release his Norman adversary.
A treasonable conference was meanwhile taking place between Tatius and Agelastes, who had failed in endeavouring to tamper with the Anglo-Saxon; and the countess had been unwillingly transported by the slave Diogenes to a garden-house for a secret interview with Brennius, whom she challenged to knightly combat in the hearing of her husband. Having hidden the count, Hereward encountered his sweetheart Bertha, who had followed Brenhilda as her attendant, and then obtained an audience of the imperial family, who were discussing recent events, including a plot in which Brennius was concerned for seizing the throne, and received permission to communicate with the Duke de Bouillon. Bertha volunteered to be his messenger, and, at an interview with the council of Crusaders at Scutari, she induced them to promise that fifty knights, each with ten followers, should attend the combat to support their champion.
Having made his confession to the Patriarch, while Agelastes was killed by the orangutan as he argued with Brenhilda respecting the existence of the devil, the emperor led his daughter to the cell in which Ursel was confined, with the intention of making him her husband, instead of Brennius. She had, however, been persuaded by her mother to intercede for the traitor, and Ursel was merely placed under the care of the slave doctor Douban to be restored to health after his long imprisonment. The emperor had decided that Brennius should fight the Count of Paris, instead of the countess, and all the preparations for the combat had been made, when the ships conveying the Crusaders hove in sight; and, after defeating the Greek fleet, they landed in sight of the lists. Brennius, in the meantime, was pardoned, and, in answer to shouts of discontent from the assembled crowd, Ursel was led forth to announce his restoration to liberty and the imperial favour, and the conspiracy was crushed. Hereward then appeared to do battle with Count Robert, and, saved from the knight's axe by Bertha, he joined the Crusaders, obtaining on his return the hand of his betrothed, and, ultimately, a grant of land from William Rufus, adjacent to the New Forest in Hampshire, where he had screened her when a girl from the tusk of a wild boar.
Characters Principal characters in bold Alexius I Comnenus, Greek Emperor of Constantinople The Empress Irene Doukaina, his wife Anna Comnena, their daughter Nicephorus Briennius, her husband. Astarte and Violante, her attendants Achilles Tatius, officer of the Imperial Varangian Guard Hereward, an Anglo-Saxon, his subaltern Stephanos Castor, a wrestler Lysimachus, a designer Harpax, centurion of the Immortals - a corps of the Greek army Ismail, a Muslim guard of the Immortals Sebastes of Mitylene, another guard Nicanor, commander-in-chief of the Greek army Zosimus, Greek patriarch Michael Agelastes, a sage Leaders of the First Crusade Godfrey de Bouillon Peter the Hermit Count Baldwin (future Baldwin I of Jerusalem) Count de Vermandois Bohemond I of Antioch Prince Tancred of Otranto (future Tancred, Prince of Galilee) Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse Count Robert of Paris Brenhilda, Countess of Paris Toxartis, a Scythian chieftain Agatha, afterwards Bertha, Hereward's betrothed Diogenes, a Negro slave Zedekias Ursel, a rival for the throne Douban, a slave skilled in medicine Sylvan, an ourang-outang
Chapter summary The chapter numbering follows the Edinburgh Edition. In other editions (where there are substantial differences in the text, especially towards the end of the novel) Chapters 24 and 25 are not divided: the different numbers are given in square brackets.
Volume One
Ch. 1: The narrator provides a brief history of Constantinople and its decline before introducing the Emperor Alexius.
Ch. 2: A succession of citizens react to the Anglo-Saxon Hereward walking and sleeping at the Golden Gate. He repels an attack by Sebastes, one of the guard under the centurion Harpax, before being escorted to the imperial palace by Achilles Tatius, who fills him in on procedures.
Ch. 3: Achilles introduces Hereward at Court, where Anna Comnena asks him to indicate any inaccuracies in her account of the battle of Laodicea.
Ch. 4: Hereward is moved by Anna's reading of her account of the battle, where his brother died.
Ch. 5: Anna's husband Nicephorus Briennius brings news of a new advance by the Crusaders. Hereward gives his unfavourable view of the Normans.
Ch. 6: Achilles asks Hereward to observe the conduct of the sage Agelastes, with a view to ascertaining how he obtains influence at Court.
Ch. 7: Alexius gives orders to impede the Crusaders' advance. After transmitting this welcome news to his fellow-Varangians, Hereward is conducted by a black slave to the ruins of the temple of Cybele.
Ch. 8: At the temple Hereward resists the advances of Agelastes, who tempts him with theological unorthodoxy and an invitation to favour Achilles above the Emperor, and claims to be able to give him news about his beloved Bertha. Achilles and Agelastes plot against Alexius. Achilles teases Hereward about Agelastes.