ABSTRACT
The life of a chancery clerk, envoy and chronicler in the twelfth century was an exciting and perilous one.
May therefore all behold my human labours, the magnitude of things and the dimension of this work, which I have written up to this hour in some corners of the imperial palace, travelling on horseback, under a tree, or secluded in the woods, which I have dictated during sieges of castles, in the perils of many battles, and not as a hermit, in a monastery or in any other place of peace, but amidst the confusion and ceaseless commotion of things, in wars and on campaigns, in all the noise of the court, and wherever I had the chance between all my daily duties as chaplain, at day and at night, during mass and at all the day’s hours, at table and during hunts, when letters were to be written and during the daily arrangement of new lodgings, while making a living for me and mine, and throughout several major legations, which brought me twice to Sicily, thrice to the Provence, once to Spain, frequently to France, and forty times from Germany to Rome and back, and between all the incessant great duties and responsibilities which I was given at the imperial court. 1
