[Footnote 200: The two ablest recent writers on Hildebrand, the Right Reverend Dr. A.H. Mathew (_The Life and Times of Hildebrand_, 1910) and Dr. W. Martens (_War Gregor VII. Mönch?_, 1891, and _Gregor VII._, 2 vols. 1894--an invaluable study), hold that he never took the vows. The chief biography of Hildebrand on the Catholic side is now the Abbé O. Delarc's _Grégoire VII. et la Réforme de l'Église au XI siècle_ (3 vols., 1889). Slight but excellent sketches will be found in F. Roquain's _La Papauté au moyen âge_ (1881) and _Hildebrand and His Times_ (1888) by W.R.W. Stephens. Older writers like Voigt, Gfrörer, Villemain, and Bowden are now of little use. The original authorities are as numerous as they are unreliable. The partisans of Gregory (chiefly Bonitho and Donizo) are scarcely more scrupulous than the partisans of Henry (Benzo, Benno, Guido, etc.), or those of Rudolph (Lambert, Berthold, Bruno, etc.). Fortunately we have a large number of Gregory's letters, and, as usual, I rely chiefly on these.] [Footnote 201: The reformers of Milan worked chiefly among the poor, especially in the "old-clothes quarter," or _Pataria_. Hence the name of the party.] [Footnote 202: The word "cardinal" occurs occasionally in early ecclesiastical literature in its literal meaning of "important," and is applied to clerics of various orders. After the fifth century it is restricted at Rome to the first priests of each of the _tituli_ (quasi-parishes) into which the city was divided. They numbered twenty-eight in the eleventh century. In the course of time the name was also given to the seventeen leading deacons of Rome and the seven suburbicarian bishops.] [Footnote 203: In this last case we have the assurance of Hildebrand himself that he dictated the Papal policy. Years afterwards he wrote to William (_Ep._, vii., 23) that, when the Norman envoys came to ask Papal approval of his design, it was generally censured as an unjustifiable raid, and Hildebrand alone induced Pope Alexander to send the Normans a banner: on condition, he adds, that William secured the payment of Peter's Pence by the reluctant English and in other ways promoted the interests of Rome. But even William did not dream that his acceptance of the banner made England, in Hildebrand's opinion, a fief of the Roman See!] [Footnote 204: _Ep._, i., 1.]