tained a considerable war chest to support his army and
navy. Roger’s accomplishments did not go unnoticed:
a contemporary observed that Roger “did more asleep
than others did awake.”
Roger II’s personality and lineage should not be
ignored in assessing his reign. He was described as
the fairly stereotypical “Viking” warrior: tall, loud,
regal, ruthless, and skilled from childhood on. Roger’s
upbringing was anything but standard: he was probably
raised in the royal court at Mileto in Calabria, where he
was schooled in Greek and Arabic. When he was king,
his court at Palermo was famous for its eclectic group
of western and eastern intellectuals. This tradition con-
tinued in Sicily long after Roger’s death.
When Roger died, at age fi fty-eight, he was survived
by his third wife, Beatrice of Rethel, and their new
daughter, Constance. Constance would eventually marry
the son of Frederick I Barbarossa, Henry VI, thereby
uniting the Norman and Hohenstaufen lines. In 1151,
before his death, Roger had ensured the succession by
naming and crowning as his heir his fourth son (his
oldest surviving son), William I. William’s mother was
Roger’s fi rst wife, Elvira, daughter of Alfonso VI of
Castille. A modern historian summed up Roger’s reign
by noting, “From his father he had inherited a county; to
his son he bequeathed a kingdom.” This kingdom would
endure, largely intact, under the guidance of his son
and grandson, William I and William II. They inherited
the tradition of a strong, centralized monarchical rule
established by their illustrious forebear.
Older scholarship proclaimed that Roger II had
created the “fi rst modern state.” More recent work has
suggested that the kingdom was not so unifi ed as had
previously been thought, and that Roger’s apparent ac-
ceptance of the different cultures over which he ruled
was motivated more by political expediency than by
laudable tolerance. Roger’s reign was an “absolute”
monarchy that recognized the weaknesses of this unique
kingdom and harnessed its strengths: a large geographic
territory, surrounded by ambitious and watchful neigh-
bors, and populated by people of vastly different reli-
gious, cultural, and administrative backgrounds. Roger
II encouraged tolerance in this multiethnic state when
it was politically necessary; overall, he expected strict
obedience to his rule.
Roger’s last wish, to be buried in the cathedral of
Cefalù, which he had founded in 1131 outside Palermo,
was not granted; he rests in the cathedral at Palermo.
Nevertheless, the fusion of eastern and western architec-
tural and artistic elements at Cefalù refl ects the character
of Roger’s reign: innovative and intimidating political
authority set against a glittering backdrop of cultural
assimilation and coexistence.
See also Roger I
Further Reading
Editions
Alexander of Telese. Alexandri Telesini Abbatis Ystoria Rogerii
Regis Sicilie Calabrie atque Apulie, ed. Ludovica De Nava.
Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, Fonti per la Stroria
d’ltalia, 112. Rome: Nella Sede dell’Istituto, 1991.
Brühl, Carlrichard. Rogerii II: Regis diplomata Latina. Codex Dip-
lomaticus Regni Siciliae, Series 1, Diplomata Regum et Prin-
cipum e Gente Normannorum, 2(1). Cologne: Böhlau, 1987.
Catalogus Baronum, ed. Evelyn Jamison. Rome: Istituto Storico
Italiano per il Medio Evo, 1972.
The Liber Augustalis or Constitutions of Melfi Promulgated by
the Emperor Frederick II for the Kingdom of Sicily in 1231,
trans. James Powell. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University
Press, 1971.
Critical Studies
Abulafi a, David. The Two Italics: Economic Relations between
the Norman Kingdom of Sicily and the Northern Communes.
Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1977.
——. Italy, Sicily, and the Mediterranean, 1100–1400. London:
Variorum Reprints, 1987.
——. The Western Mediterranean Kingdoms 1200–1500: The
Struggle for Dominion. London: Longman, 1997.
Amari, Michele. Storia dei musulmani di sicilia, 2nd ed.,
ed. G. Levi della Vida and C. A. Nallino, 3 vols. Catania,
1930–1939.
Capitani, Ovidio. “Specifi c Motivations and Continuing Themes
in the Norman Chronicles of Southern Italy in the Eleventh and
Twelfth Centuries.” In The Normans in Sicily and Southern
Italy: The Lincei Lectures 1974. Oxford; Oxford University
Press, 1977, pp. 1–46.
Caspar, Erich. Roger II (1101–1154) und die Gründung der
normannisch-sicilischen Monarchie. Innsbruck: Wagner,- (See also Italian version: Ruggero II (1101–1145) e
la fondazione della monarchia normanna di Sicilia, intro.
Ortensio Zecchino. Rome, 1999.)
Chalandon, Ferdinand. Histoire de la domination normande
en Italie et en Sicile, 2 vols. Paris: Librarie A. Picard et fi ls, - (Reprint, 1991.)
——. “The Conquest of South Italy and Sicily by the Normans”
and “The Norman Kingdom of Sicily.” Cambridge Medieval
History, 5, 1926, pp. 167–207.
Cuozzo, Errico. Catalogus Baronum commentario. Istituto
Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, 101. Rome: Nella Sede
dell’Istituto, 1984.
——. “Quei maledetti normanni”: Cavalieri e organizzazione
militare nel mezzogiorno normanno. Naples: Guida, 1989.
Drell, Joanna. “Family Structure in the Principality of Salerno
under Norman Rule.” Anglo-Norman Studies, 18, 1996, pp.
79–103.
––––. “Cultural Syncretism and Ethnic Identity: The Norman
‘Conquest’ of Southern Italy and Sicily.” Journal of Medieval
History 25(3), 1999, pp. 187–202.
Falkenhausen, V. von. “I gruppi etnici nel regno di Ruggero II e
la loro partecipazione al potere.” In Società, potere, e popolo
nell’età di Ruggero II: Atti delle terze Giornate normanno-
sveve—Bari, 23–25 maggio 1977. Bari: Dedalo Libri, 1979,
pp. 133–156.
Jamison, Evelyn. “The Norman Administration of Apulia and
Capua, More Especially under Roger II and William I.” Pa p e rs
of the British School at Rome, 6, 1913, pp. 211–481. (See also
2nd ed., ed. D. R. Clementi and T. Kolzer, 1987; published as
a separate monograph.)
——. “The Sicilian Norman Kingdom in the Mind of Anglo-
ROGER II