Giraldus  was  also  drawn  into  political  affairs  in  England.  As  a  curial  clerk  this  was
arguably  inevitable,  but  it  can  be  argued  that  he  was  imprudent  in  the  degree  to
which  he  advertised  his  political  allegiances.69  In  his  autobiography,  De  Rebus  a  Se
Gestis,  Giraldus  is  reticent  about  his  reasons  for  leaving  the  court,  maintaining  that
his  departure  was  due  to  his  realizing  the  incompatibility  between  the  courtier’s  and
the  scholar’s  life.70  As  we  have  seen,  he  had  fallen  victim  to  malicious  rumours  of
disloyalty  spread  by  William  Wibert,  who  asserted  that  Giraldus  conspired  with  his
Welsh  kinsmen  in  Deheubarth  against  the  crown.  Giraldus  attributed  his  difficulties
at  court  to  Wibert,  but  the  crucial  reason  for  his  departure  may  well  have  been  that  he
was  caught  on  the  wrong  side  of  the  constitutional  crisis  which  blew  up  during
Richard  I’s  absence  on  crusade  and  subsequent  imprisonment  in  Germany.71  During
that  absence  Giraldus  appears  to  have  become  associated  with  Richard’s  younger
brother,  Prince  John,  whom  he  had  accompanied  to  Ireland  in  1185;  John  apparently
offered  Giraldus  the  bishopric  of  Llandaff,  which  lay  within  the  lordship  of  Glamorgan
  (held  by  John  at  that  time),  an  offer  which  was  refused.72  By  October  1191
John  had  succeeded  in  engineering  the  expulsion  of  his  brother’s  chief  justiciar,
William  Longchamp,  and  had  taken  over  as  regent  in  his  place.73  In  c.  1193  Giraldus
wrote  a  life  of  Geoffrey,  archbishop  of  York,  an  illegitimate  son  of  Henry  II,  which
was  extremely  hostile  to  Longchamp  (to  whom,  two  years  earlier,  Giraldus  had
dedicated  his  Itinerarium  Kambriae)  as  well  as  to  Hubert  Walter,  thereby  revealing
his  allegiance  to  John’s  party.74  The  following  year,  however,  Richard  was  released
from  his  German  captivity,  Longchamp  was  restored,  and  John  was  compelled  to
submit  to  his  brother’s  authority.  Despite  the  further  volte-face  represented  by  the
dedication  of  the  Descriptio  Kambriae  to  Hubert  Waiter,  it  is  very  likely  that  Richard’s
  return  ended  Giraldus’s  curial  career.75  There  then  developed  a  growing
disenchantment  with  the  Angevin  dynasty,  which  reached  its  apogee  in  1216-17,
when  Giraldus  wrote  a  poem  welcoming  Prince  Louis  of  France  on  the  latter’s
invasion  of  England  at  the  request  of  a  baronial  faction  hostile  to  John.76  Giraldus’s
connections  and  preoccupation  with  Wales  did  not  prevent  him,  then,  from  engaging
with  political  events  in  England,
What  attracted  Giraldus  to  Hereford  and  Lincoln  were  their  libraries  and  the  presence
of  other  scholars.  For  Giraldus  the  scholar,  England  possessed  intellectual  as  well  as

69  Richter,  Giraldus  (as  n.  6)  p.  86.
70  Giraldus,  Opera  1  p.  89.  This  dichotomy  had  previously  been  emphasized  by  John  of
Salisbury  in  his  Policraticus  of  1159:  Nederman,  Pohcraticus  (as  n.  19)  p.  4.
71  Richter,  Giraldus  (as  n.  6)  pp.  84-7;  Michael  Richter,  Gerald  of  Wales,  in:  Traditio  29
(1973)  pp.  383-4;  Gillingham,  Henry  II  (as  n.  35)  p.  235  n.  57.
72  Giraldus,  Opera  1  pp.  61,87.
11  J.  T.  Appleby,  England  without  Richard  1189-1199,  London  1965,  Chap.  3.
74  Giraldus,  Opera  4  pp.  355-431.
75  Bartlett,  Gerald  (as  n.  6)  pp.  64-5.  Dimock  dated  the  completion  of  the  Descriptio,  and
hence  its  dedication  to  Hubert,  to  the  beginning  of  1194:  Giraldus,  Opera  6  p.  xxxiv.
76  Bartlett,  Gerald  (as  n.  6)  pp.  91-9.

57