Thibout, Marc. “L’abbaye de Sénanque.” Congrès archéologique (Avignon et Comtat-Venaissin)
121 (1963):365–76.
SENESCHAL
. The seneschal (Lat. dapifer) originated as an officer of the royal household concerned
with keeping the king’s itinerant entourage properly supplied with the produce and
revenues of scattered royal estates. When, after a period of obscurity, the seneschal
emerged in the 11th century as one of the “great officers of the crown,” he quickly
became the senior royal official. In this sense, his role can be traced back to the
Merovingian mayor of the palace and forward to the grand master of the household in the
later Middle Ages.
The king’s household was still the principal organ of the central government in the
11th and 12th centuries, and the seneschal enjoyed great importance. He was the leading
military commander and the one to whom the prévôts, the principal domainal officers in
the field, were supposed to report. Three important men held the position of seneschal for
much of the 12th century, Anseau de Garlande, Raoul de Vermandois, and Thibaut de
Blois, each from a more prestigious family than his predecessor. Thibaut, as count of
Blois, was a major territorial lord. When he died in 1191, Philip II Augustus allowed the
position to remain vacant.
Meanwhile, important territorial lords had their own staffs of major household
officers, with the seneschal holding senior rank. In many great fiefs, he acted as
lieutenant in the lord’s absence, being in charge of military, judicial, and financial
matters. When the French kings began to absorb great fiefs into the royal domain, they
preferred to retain existing institutions that had proven workable. The seneschals, now
royal appointees, continued to be the chief administrative officers of such territories, and
the lands under their control became known as sénéchaussées. By the second half of the
13th century, these officers, found mostly in southwestern France, were roughly
comparable with the bailiffs (baillis) who served as the king’s chief regional officers in
the northern part of the kingdom. In the late Middle Ages, the realm con.tained between
thirty and forty districts governed by a bailiff or a seneschal. By that time, both types of
officer had largely military responsibilities, as their former judicial and financial duties
were performed by specialized subordinates.
John Bell Henneman, Jr.
Fesler, James W. “French Field Administration: The Beginnings.” Comparative Studies in History
and Society 5 (1962–63):76–111.
Lot, Ferdinand, and Robert Fawtier. Histoire des institutions françaises au moyen âge. 3 vols.
Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1958, Vol. 2: Institutions royales.
Michel, Robert. L’administration royale dans la sénéschausée de Beaucaire au temps de saint
Louis. Paris: Picard, 1910.
Rogozinski, Jan. “The Counsellors of the Seneschal of Beaucaire and Nîmes 1250–1350.”
Speculum 44(1969):421–39.
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