n on the Continent as Normans, plundered Charles's
dominions as they had plundered England, and at last settled in them
as they had settled in parts of England. In =912= Charles the Simple
ceded to their leader, Hrolf, a territory of which the capital was
Rouen, and which became known as Normandy--the land of the Normans.
Hrolf became the first Duke of the Normans, but his men were fierce
and rugged, and for some time their southern neighbours scornfully
called him and his descendants Dukes of the Pirates. In process of
time a change took place which affected both Normandy and other
countries as well. The West Frankish kings were descended from Charles
the Great; but they had failed to defend their subjects from the
Normans, and they thereby lost hold upon their people. One of their
dependent nobles, the Duke of the French, whose chief city, Paris,
formed a bulwark against the Normans advancing up the Seine, grew more
powerful than themselves. At the same time the Normans were becoming
more and more French in their speech and customs. At last an alliance
was made between Hugh Capet, the son of Hugh the Great, Duke of the
French (see p. 63), and Richard the Fearless, Duke of the Normans. The
race of Charles the Great was dethroned, and Hugh became king of the
French. In name he was king over all the territory which had been
governed by Charles the Simple. In reality that happened in France
which AEthelred had been trying to prevent in England. Hugh ruled
directly over his own duchy of France, a patch of land of which Paris
was the capital. The great vassals of the crown, who answered to the
English ealdormen, only obeyed him when it was their interest to do
so. The most powerful of these vassals was the Duke of the Normans.
In =1002= the duke was Richard II.--the Good--the son of Richard the
Fearless. In that year AEthelred, who was a widower, married Richard's
sister, Emma. It was the beginning of a connection with Normandy which
never ceased till a Norman duke made himself by conquest king of the
English.

5. =Political Contrast between Normandy and England.=--The causes
which were making the English thegnhood a military aristocracy acted
with still greater force in Normandy. The tillers of the soil, sprung
from the old inhabitants of the land, were kept by their Norman lords
in even harsher bondage than the English serfs. The Norman warriors
held their land by military service, each one being bound to fight for
his l