CORBEIL, WILLIAM OF (d. 1136), archbishop of Cant erbury, was born probably at Corbeil on the Seine, and educated at Laon. He was soon in the service of Ranulf Flambard, bishop of Durham ; then, having entered the order of St. Augustine, he became prior of the Augustinian foundation at St. Osyth in Essex. In 1123 he was chosen archbishop of Canterbury, and as he re fused to admit that Thurstan, archbishop of York, was inde pendent of the see of Canterbury, this prelate refused to conse crate him, and the ceremony was performed by his own suffragans. Proceeding to Rome the new archbishop found that Thurstan had anticipated his arrival and had prejudiced Pope Calixtus II.; however, the exertions of the English king Henry I. and of the emperor Henry V. prevailed, and the pope gave William the pal lium. The archbishop's next dispute was with the autocratic papal legate, Cardinal John of Crema, which ended in William himself being appointed papal legate (legatus natus) in England and Scotland, an important precedent in the history of the English Church. The archbishop had sworn to Henry I. to support the claim of his daughter Matilda to the English crown, but never theless he crowned Stephen in Dec. 1135. He died at Canterbury on Nov. 21, 1136. William built the keep of Rochester Castle, and finished the cathedral at Canterbury, which he dedicated with great pomp in May 1130.
See the article by F. Tout in the Dict. of Nat. Biog., where earlier work on the subject is summed up.