The child of Robert II of France with the "goose-like neck a

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The child of Robert II of France with the "goose-like neck a

Legg inn av Gjest » 13 okt 2006 06:33:28

Several years ago on this community, under my old username, I mentioned
that I had seen a reference to King Robert II of France and his second
wife, Bertha of Burgundy, allegedly having a deformed child. At the
time I could not remember the source for this statement, but just
tonight I found the book I read this information in. From Richard
Storrs' *Bernard of Clairvaux: The Times, the Man and His Work*:

"King Robert, laying seige to an abbey in Burgundy, seeing a fog
steaming up from the river, thought that the saints were appearing to
fight against him, and precipitately fled with his army. His second
wife, Bertha, his marriage with whom the Church had disapproved, was
reported to have given birth to a monster, with a goose-like neck and
head."

The source Storrs cites for this in his footnote is "Peter Damiani. See
Michelet, Hist de France, tom. ii, p. 152, note."

Checking Michelet, his account of this is as follows: "We know the
story, or fable, of Robert's abandonment by his servants, who threw
everything he had touched into the fire; and the legend of Berthe, who
was delivered of a monster. Upon the portal of several cathedrals is
seen the statue of a queen with a goose's foot; it is, probably, meant
to represent Robert's wife."

Michelet cites "P. Damiani epist. 1, ii, ap. Scr. Fr. x. 492. Ex qua
suscepit filium, annerinum per omnia collum et caput habentum. Quos
etiam, virum scilicet et uxorum, omnes fere Galliarum episcopi communi
simul excommunicavere sententia. Cujus sacerdotalis edicti tantus omnem
undique populum terror invasit, ut ab ejus universi societate
recederent etc. -- see Bullet's Dissertation sur la reine Pedauque (on
the goosefoot queen)."

Checking Georges Duby's *The Knight, the Lady and the Priest: The
Making of Modern Marriage in Medieval France*: It seems Peter Damian
wrote a letter at some point between 1060 to 1072 to Abbot Didier of
Monte Cassino that the son of Robert II and his illicit spouse was born
with "a head and neck of a goose". This account would've been written
about sixty years after this incident occured, if it occured at all.

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