Guillaume de Nangis

Guillaume de Nangis (English: William of Nangis; died 1300) was a French chronicler of the 13th century. The chronicle had later continuations by other authors.

Quotes

Continuator of Nangis

Luc d'Achery, ed., Spicilegium, vol. iii, pp. 70–80

• Unius antiqui . . . . sanctior et melior videbatur; unde et ob ejus bonitatem et antiquitatem pater vocabatur. . . . Cum funis esset brevior dimittens se deorsum cadere, tibiam sibi fregit, auri et argenti præ maximo pon-dere gravatus.
  • It is asserted, that at Vitry forty Jews, in the king's prison, seeing that they were sure to die, and desirous to escape from falling into the hands of the uncircumcised, unanimously agreed to get one of their old men, who passed for a good and holy person, and whom they called their father, to put them out of the world. He would not consent, except upon condition of a young man's being associated with him in the task. When all were killed, and these two alone remained, each sought to die by the other's hand. The old man gained the point, and by his prayers persuaded the young one to put him to death. The young man, seeing himself left alone, collected the gold and silver which he found on the corpses, made himself a rope out of their dresses, and let himself down from the top of the tower. But the rope being too short, and the weight of gold too heavy, he broke his leg, was taken, confessed all, and met an ignominious death.
  • P. 79; reported Jules Michelet, History of France, tr. G. H. Smith (New York, 1882), vol. i, p. 406

• The king [Philip the Tall] had begun to lay down regulations, that throughout his kingdom but one uniform measure should be used for wine, corn, and all merchandise; but he was prevented by illness from carrying his work through. The said king also proposed, that all the coin throughout the kingdom should be reduced to one uniform standard; and, as the execution of so great a project would have been very expensive, he was said to have resolved, seduced by false councils, to have extorted the fifth part of their goods from his subjects. He dispatched deputies on this business into the different districts; but the bishops and barons, who had long enjoyed the right of coining, according to difference of place and the wants of the people, as well as the communities of the good cities of the kingdom, (ainsi que les com munautés des bonnes villes du royaume,) having withheld their consent from the project, the deputies returned to their master without having succeeded in their negotiation.
  • P. 79; reported in Michelet (1882), vol. i, p. 402

• . . . a Gascon lord [Jordan de Lille] famed for his high birth, but ignoble through his robberies. . . . to extend his crimes, murders, and rapes, supporting bands of assassins, the friend of robbers, a rebel to the king. He might yet, perhaps, have escaped. One of the king's men had come to seize him; he slew him with the very staff on which were the royal arms, the ensign of his office. Summoned to trial, he came to Paris attended by a brilliant escort of the noblest counts and barons of Aquitaine. . . . This did not save him from being thrown into the prison of the Chatelet, condemned to death by the master of the parliament, and the evening before Trinity day, being dragged at horse's tail and hung on the common gibbet.
  • P. 80 [ann. 1323]; reported in Michelet (1882), vol. i, pp. 402-3

See also

• Blanche of Burgundy

External links

• Encyclopedic article on Guillaume de Nangis on Wikipedia