When Rollo died he was succeeded by
his son William Longsword, and from an incident mentioned by Mr T.A. Cook
in his "Story of Rouen," we can see the attitude of the Normans towards
Charles the Simple. He had sent down to Rouen two court gallants to
sympathise with the Princess Gisela, his daughter, for the rough treatment
she had received at the hands of Rollo, but they were both promptly siezed
and hanged in what is now the Place du Marche Vieux.
Great stone castles were beginning to appear at all the chief places in
Normandy, and when Duke Richard had succeeded Harold Blacktooth we find
that the Duchy was assuming an ordered existence internally. The feudal
system had then reached its fullest development, and the laws established
by Rollo were properly administered. With the accession of Hugh Capet to
the throne of France, Normandy had become a most loyal as well as powerful
fief of the crown. The tenth century witnessed also an attempt on the part
of the serfs of the Duchy to throw off something of the awful grip of the
feudal power. These peasants were the descendants of Celts, of Romans, and
of Franks, and their efforts to form a representative assembly bear a
pathetic resemblance to the movement towards a similar end in Russia of
to-day. The representatives of the serfs were treated with the most fearful
cruelty and sent back to their villages; but the movement did not fail to
have its effects, for the condition of the villains in Normandy was always
better than in other parts of France.
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