Welcome to the British History Podcast. My name is Jamie and this is episode 456.

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William's first year as King had probably not gone down as he had hoped.

And as Bishop Odo and his co-conspirators boarded their ships and sought sanctuary in Normandy,

Rufus could only return to court and count the rest of his problems. And for one, there was still the matter of Bishop

William of Durham. And we're going to tell his story for a couple reasons.

First, it's messy and I love mess, but beyond that,

the Bishop of Durham's story is a window into the legal chaos of late 11th century England and it's a perfect

example of the chasm that's growing between King Rufus and the Church.

And on top of that, everyone in this story is just terrible.

And the main figures involved take a problem and then choose to escalate it at every chance they get, which as we're going to discuss

as we go on is kind of a defining characteristic of this new Norman aristocracy.

So here we go.

Now, you'll remember Bishop William of Durham is the guy who initially snitched on Odo,

only to switch sides flee Rufus's court and become a rebel himself.

Well, while the rebellion in the south was playing out, up north in Durham, things were going a bit wild as well.

Because when Bishop William fled, Rufus had issued an arrest warrant.

And that meant there were people coming after him. Now one of the defining

characteristics of Rufus's early reign was that he kept on his father's people and this

...