they in their turn would swear to be true to Paschal so long as they retained their 'regalia'. The archbishop, however, refused, and the emperor turned on him with anger, and denounced him as a traitor who had misled him to the peril of his soul. On this the archbishop gave way, and swore as was proposed. The bishops for the most part took their conditional oath; and the English envoys swore an oath which seems to have been diversely interpreted. The emperor's interpretation is plainly given in two documents which he issued immediately afterwards: they had sworn, he declares, on their king's behalf that Henry and his whole realm would stand faithfully by the emperor, would adhere always to Paschal as pope, and would henceforth have no dealings with Roland the schismatic—that is with Alexander the Third. A less explicit account of the oath is found in two contemporary reports transmitted to pope Alexander—viz. that the English envoys swore on the king's behalf that he would observe whatsoever the emperor swore to observe in the matter.[1] Probably their oath was even less definite than this: for a story preserved by John of Salisbury suggests that their instructions must have been that the king of England would stand by the emperor 'against all men, except only the king of France'. When the emperor through his interpreter said 'Alexander is a mortal man, and he is not the king of France: I take it then that he is not excepted from the phrase against all men. Say whether you accept my interpretation or not'; then John of Oxford replied that the emperor's meaning was his also, and in this sense he would take the oath.[2]
The whole incident is perplexing; but if this story be true—and some truth there must be in it—we have a clue to the strange fact that John of Oxford had to bear the brunt of subsequent accusations, while his fellow envoy escaped the charge of perjury. The intervention of an interpreter may have had something to do with the emperor's misunderstanding; and it is certain that he was wholly deceived by the archbishop of Cologne, who had assured him that the English king and bishops would be with him. The English envoys were men of high standing and exceptional ability, and it is quite inconceivable that they should have ventured to commit K. Henry to the extent that the emperor imagined. The moment the report of the proceedings reached Normandy, Rotrou the archbishop of Rouen wrote to the cardinal Henry, who had come to France on the Becket affair, and expressly denied on the king's behalf that either by himself or his envoys he had sworn to recognise Paschal, or had made any promise to that effect. In the former negotiations about the marriage, he said, the German ambassadors had tried hard to extract such a promise, but in vain; for the king refused to do anything inconsistent with his loyalty to the pope and the king of France. The absurdity of the story, he added, was shown by the fact that the English king had not got so many as fifty bishops.
In the sequel, as we have said, Richard of Ilchester does not seem to have been expressly charged with having sworn to recognise Paschal. John of Oxford was so charged again and again, and Becket excommunicated him at Vezelay on Whitsunday 1166 on this ground as well as on another.[3]
