Death of William Rufus (1100): Killed in the New Forest

The death of William Rufus on 2 August 1100 is one of the great mysteries of English history. King William II was killed by an arrow while hunting in the New Forest, and within three days his younger brother Henry had seized the royal treasure and been crowned. Whether the shot was an accident or murder has been debated ever since.

Background

William II, nicknamed Rufus, probably because of his ruddy complexion, was the third son of William the Conqueror, victor of the Battle of Hastings. On the Conqueror’s death in 1087 the eldest son, Robert Curthose, received Normandy, while William received England and was crowned on 26 September 1087. The youngest brother, Henry, got money but no land.

Rufus was a capable soldier but unpopular with churchmen. He kept bishoprics vacant to collect their revenues, quarrelled bitterly with Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury, who went into exile in 1097, and relied on the hated minister Ranulf Flambard. He never married and had no children, which left the succession open.

In 1096 Robert mortgaged Normandy to William for 10,000 marks to fund his part in the First Crusade. In the summer of 1100 Robert was on his way home with a new wife and money to redeem the duchy, and by agreement he was heir to England.

What happened

On the afternoon of 2 August 1100 the king went hunting in the New Forest, the royal game reserve created by his father. With him were his brother Henry, members of the Clare family and Walter Tirel, lord of Poix in Ponthieu, who was married into the Clares.

According to William of Malmesbury and Orderic Vitalis, writing a generation later, the hunters spread out to wait for deer. An arrow, shot by Tirel at a stag or glancing off it, struck the king in the chest and killed him. Tirel rode away and escaped to France. Henry rode at once to Winchester and took control of the treasury on 3 August. He was crowned at Westminster on 5 August by Maurice, Bishop of London, since Anselm was abroad.

The king’s body was left behind and carried to Winchester on a cart by local countrymen, according to the chroniclers. He was buried in Winchester Cathedral with little ceremony.

Accident or murder?

Monastic chroniclers presented the death as God’s punishment for a sinful king. Several noted that the New Forest had already claimed two family members: Rufus’s elder brother Richard died there in a hunting accident in the 1070s, and Robert’s illegitimate son, also called Richard, was killed there in May 1100.

Modern suspicion centres on Henry. He was in the hunting party, moved with remarkable speed and gained the crown just before Robert returned. The Clares were rewarded by the new king. Against this, no contemporary accused Henry, accidents with arrows were common in group hunts, and Tirel, who had nothing to lose by then, swore to Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis that he had not been near the king. Historians such as Frank Barlow lean towards accident; others, such as Emma Mason, argue for a conspiracy. The evidence cannot settle the question.

A twentieth-century theory that Rufus died as a willing pagan sacrifice has been rejected by historians, as there is no evidence for it.

Consequences

Henry I issued a Charter of Liberties promising to end his brother’s abuses, recalled Anselm and married Matilda of Scotland, a descendant of the old English royal line. Robert Curthose invaded in 1101 but accepted a pension. In 1106 Henry defeated and captured him at Tinchebray and held him prisoner until his death in 1134, reuniting England and Normandy. Henry’s own succession plans would later collapse in the White Ship disaster.

The New Forest and royal hunting

The New Forest had been created by William the Conqueror around 1079 as a royal hunting ground. In Norman England a “forest” meant land subject to special forest law, which protected deer and their habitat for the king’s sport and punished poaching severely. Its creation involved the removal of some settlements, and English chroniclers resented it bitterly.

Hunting was the favourite pastime of the Norman kings, and it was dangerous. Hunters with bows waited while deer were driven past them, often in dense woodland and fading light, so stray arrows were a real risk. For the chroniclers, the fact that three members of the Conqueror’s family died in the same forest seemed more than coincidence.

Timeline

• 1087, 26 September: William II is crowned king of England.
• 1096: Robert Curthose pawns Normandy to William and leaves on crusade.
• 1097: Archbishop Anselm goes into exile after quarrelling with the king.
• 1100, 2 August: William is killed while hunting in the New Forest.
• 1100, 3 August: Henry seizes the treasury at Winchester.
• 1100, 5 August: Henry I is crowned at Westminster.
• 1106, 28 September: Henry defeats Robert at Tinchebray.
• 1107: The tower of Winchester Cathedral collapses over Rufus’s tomb.

Why it matters

The death of William Rufus changed the course of the Anglo-Norman monarchy. It gave the crown to Henry I, one of medieval England’s most effective rulers, and denied it to Robert. The unanswered question of whether a king was murdered by his own brother has also made the episode a lasting favourite of historians and storytellers.