Week 3: The struggle for the Crown, 1066-1199
Tuesday
Music:
Bernart de Ventadorn, “Can vei la lauzeta mover” (9:42 min.):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-j4uFTdfTn8
“Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine” (4:41 min.):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WceunelR1Mk
“Queen Eleanor’s Confession” (Child Ballad 156), sung by Tim Hart and Maddy Prior (5:13 min.):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoKLn3aEOyE
Videos:
SheWolves — England’s Early Queens (3 of 3): Matilda and Eleanor (50:05 min.; start at 8:40 min.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdbN7k6Qnc0
David Starkey’s Monarchy, 2: Medieval Monarchs
(54:44 min.),
(Henry II, 00:26-11:45 min.)
(John: 12:44-17:52)
(Henry III, to 1258: 17:53-22:22)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyQsBAng4_0&feature=related
Robert Bartlett, Inside the Medieval Mind: Power (Part 4 of 6)
(9:58 minutes)
(start at 4:40- end, King John)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0OzKRtjO30&feature=related
Robert Bartlett, Inside the Medieval Mind: Power (Part 5 of 6)
(9:58 minutes)
(00:00 – 1:48, Magna Carta)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg0NrC2EiJ0&feature=related
Readings:
Bartlett, England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, pp. 1-25 (Introduction; The Struggle for the Succession, and the Angevin Empire)
Maps:
The Angevin “Empire”:
http://www.heritage-history.com/maps/philips/phil035.jpg
Henry III’s territories:
http://www.heritage-history.com/maps/gardiner/gard012.jpg
Medieval England and Wales:
http://www.heritage-history.com/maps/philips/phil034.jpg
Wales and the Marches in the Thirteenth Century:
http://www.heritage-history.com/maps/philips/phil036c.jpg
Map of England by Matthew Paris
http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/takingliberties/images/319matthewparismapbig.jpg
Family Trees:
The Norman and Angevin/Plantagenet kings of England, 1066-1377:
http://hoocher.com/Henry_II_of_England/Norman_Plantagenet_Kings.gif
The Dukes of Normandy, 846-1135:
http://historyofengland.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e0fd1b4a970b017d3be90328970c-pi
The Norman kings of England:
http://historyofengland.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e0fd1b4a970b017c31baa490970b-pi
The descendents of Henry II and Eleanor of Acquitaine:
http://historyofengland.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e0fd1b4a970b017744982c3b970d-pi
The Norman Conquest to Richard I (1066-1199)
Video:
Animated Bayeux Tapestry (second half):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDaB-NNyM8o
The back-story (According to the Normans)
Edward the Confessor, King of England, is elderly and childless. He decides to name his maternal cousin William, Duke of Normandy, as his heir. Edward sends his brother-in-law, Harold Godwinson, Earl of Wessex, the most powerful noble in England, on a diplomatic visit to Normandy. He is shipwrecked, arrested, and delivered to Duke William as a prisoner. William offers to release Harold unharmed if Harold will swear an oath to support William’s claim to be the heir to Edward’s throne. Harold swears and returns to England. There is another claimant waiting to claim the throne England: Harald Hardrada, King of Norway.
(Click here for an animated [and abbreviated] version of the second half of the tapestry)
| 1066 | January: Death of Edward “the Confessor” and accession of his brother-in-law Harold Godwinson as King of England Spring: Halley’s Comet is seen as a fearsome omen September: invasion of Harald of Norway, who is defeated by Harold Godwinson at Stamford Bridge October: invasion of William, duke of Normandy, whose Norman-French army, with archers and cavalry, defeats Harold Godwinson at the battle of Hastings |
| 1066-1087 | Reign of William I “the Conqueror” (click here for a map of William’s dominions) |
| 1086 | Domesday Book (click here for an online glossary to Domesday Book) |
| 1087-1100 | William II “Rufus” |
| 1100-1135 | Henry I “Beauclerk” Establishment of Itinerant Justices and Exchequer |
| 1135-1154 | Stephen: anarchy (struggle for crown vs. Henry I’s daughter Matilda, widow of Emperor Henry V, and wife of Geoffrey, Count of Anjou) |
| 1154-1189 | Henry II Plantagenet, son of Empress Matilda and Geoffrey, count of Anjou marries Eleanor, duchess of Aquitaine (d. 1204; former wife of Louis VII of France) (click here for map of his “Angevin empire”) expands royal justice, leading to development of common law of England attempts to bring clergy under royal justice, leading to clash with Thomas Becket, chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury (murdered 1170; event commemorated on the seal of Arbroath Abbey) invades and partly conquers Ireland clashes with wife and sons, and with Philip II “Augustus” of France |
| 1189-1199 | Richard I “the Lionheart” spends only 6 months of reign in England; goes on 3rd Crusade and on return is captured and held to ransom by Germans, while Philip II “Augustus” of France attempts to conquer English possessions in France (Click here for a story about the recent examination of Richard’s embalmed heart.) |
Sample Primary Source
Chronicle account by Roger of Wendover, monk of St. Albans, of King John‘s loss of Normandy to King Philip Augustus of France in 1203-4. John’s queen was Isabelle, heiress of the count of Angoulême; John had married her in August 1200, when she was twelve years old. Because Isabelle had been betrothed to the vassal of an important Poitevin lord, John de Lusignon, and because de Lusignon appealed the matter to King Philip, the French king used the pretext of King John’s refusal to appear before his court in Paris to invade King John’s French possessions. A major prize was Philip’s capture of the castle on the “Rock of Andelys” — Richard the Lionheart’s gem, Château Gaillard:
How the nobles of England deserted king John in Normandy.
A.d. 1203. King John spent Christmas [25 December 1202] at Caen in Normandy, where, laying aside all thoughts of war, he feasted sumptuously with his queen daily, and prolonged his sleep in the morning till breakfast time. But after the solemnities of Easter [6 April 1203] had been observed, the French king, having collected a large army, took several castles belonging to the king of England, some of which he levelled to the ground, but the stronger ones he kept entire. At length messengers came to king John with the news, saying, the king of the French has entered your territories as an enemy, has taken such and such castles, carries off the governors of them ignominiously bound to their horses’ tails, and disposes of your property at will, without any one gainsaying him. In reply to this news, king John said, ” Let him do so; whatever he now seizes on I will one day recover;” and neither these messengers, nor others who brought him the like news, could obtain any other answer. But the earls and barons, and other nobles of the kingdom of England, who had till that time firmly adhered to him, when they heard his words and saw his incorrigible idleness, obtained his permission and returned home, pretending that they would come back to him, and so left the king with only a few soldiers in Normandy . . .
How king John came to England and exacted large sums of money from the nobles.
King John at length seeing his fault, and that he was destitute of all military supplies, took ship in all haste and on St. Nicholas’s day [6 December 1203] landed at Portsmouth. Then urging against the earls and barons as an excuse, that they had left him in the midst of his enemies on the continent, by which he had lost his castles and territories through their defection, he took from them the seventh part of all their moveable goods; and in this act he did not refrain from laying violent hands on the property of conventual or parochial churches, inasmuch as he employed Hubert [Walter] archbishop of Canterbury as the agent of this robbery in regard to the church property, and Geoffrey Fitz-Peter [Earl of Essex], justiciary of England, for the goods of the laity, and these two spared no one in the execution of their orders. The French king, when he learnt that the king of England had left his transmarine territories, went in great strength to each of the towns and castles of the district, explaining to the citizens and governors of castles that they were deserted by their lord. He also said that he was the principal lord of those provinces, and that if the English king should ignominiously abandon them, he had no intention of losing the superior authority which belonged to him; wherefore he begged of them as a friend to receive him as their lord since they had no other; but he declared with an oath, that if they did not do this willingly, and dared to contend against him, he would subdue them as enemies and hang them all on the gibbet or flay them alive. At length, after much disputing on both sides, they unanimously agreed to give hostages to the king of the French, for their keeping a truce for one year; after which time, if they did not receive assistance from the king of the English, they would thenceorward acknowledge him as their ruler, and give the cities and castles up to him; having effected this the French king returned to his own territories. . .
![Hubert [Walter] archbishop of Canterbury](http://viewfinder.english-heritage.org.uk/gallery/450/AA4/AA42_01359.jpg){kind=link}
How Normandy with other transmarine possessions yielded to the rule of the French king.
About that time the French king’s army which for almost a year had been besieging the castle of the Rock of Andelys [i.e., Château Gaillard], had undermined and knocked down a great part of the walls. But the noble and warlike Roger, constable of Chester, still defended the entrance against the French; but at length his provisions failing him, and being reduced to such want, that no one had a single allowance of food, he preferred to die in battle to being starved: on which he and his soldiers armed themselves, flew to horse, and sallied from the castle: but after they had slain numbers opposed to them, they were at length taken prisoners, although with much difficulty. Thus the castle of the Rock of Andelys fell into the hands of the French king on the 6th of March [1204], and Roger de Lacy with all his followers were taken to France, where, on account of the bravery which he had shown in defence of his castle, he was detained prisoner on parole. On this all the holders of castles in the transmarine territories, with the citizens and other subjects of the king of England, sent messengers to England to tell him in what a precarious situation they were placed, and that the time, according to the terms of the treaty, was near, when they must either give up the cities and castles to the king of the French, or consign to destruction the hostages which they had given him. To which message king John answered; and intimated by the same messengers to all of them, that they were to expect no assistance from him, but that they each were to do what seemed best to him. And thus, all kind of defence failing in those provinces, the whole of Normandy, Tours, Anjou, and Poictou, with the cities, castles, and other possessions, except the castles of Rochelle, Thouars, and Niorz, fell to the dominion of the king of the French. When this was told to the English king, he was enjoying all the pleasures of life with his queen, in whose company he believed that he possessed everything he wanted; moreover, he felt confidence in the immensity of the wealth he had collected, as if by that he could regain the territory he had lost.
Source: Roger of Wendover’s Flowers of History, Comprising the History of England from the Descent of the Saxons to A.D. 1235, trans. J. A. Giles, 2 vols. (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1849), vol. II, pp. 206-209, 213-14, available online at
http://books.google.com/books?printsec=frontcover&pg=PA333&id=hjVVdz57dR0C#v=onepage&q&f=false [accessed 22 August 2011].
Practice for Assignment 1 (due Thursday):
(From W. H. Blaauw, “Letters to Ralph de Neville, Bishop of Chichester (1222-24) [sic], and Chancellor to King Henry III,” Sussex Archaeological Collections, 3 (1850), p. 61, no. 677, available online at: http://www.archive.org/stream/sussexarchaeolo62socigoog/sussexarchaeolo62socigoog_djvu.txt [accessed 16 August 2011]. This letter is a follow-up to an earlier letter (no. 676; Letter 9 in my online collection of Neville letters) in which Simon de Senliz requested that Bishop Neville ask the prior of Boxgrave to grant the vicarage of Wauburton to Philip, the bishop’s clerk.)
To his Reverend Lord Ralph, by the grace of God Bishop of Chichester, his devoted Simon de Senliz, greeting, and both devoted and due obedience and reverence in all things. —I send to the feet of your holiness your clerk Philip, bearer of this, returning to your excellency manifold thanks upon bended knees, that by your favour you have been pleased to request the lord prior of Boxgrave about the vicarage of Wauburton. I hope, indeed, that the said prior will assent to your petition, if you would confer with him; which Philip indeed will inform you, by word of mouth, about your business in Sussex, and on that account I send you no other letters at present, and the said Philip will personally explain to you your affairs. May your holiness always fare well in the Lord.
The same letter, broken down into clauses:
To his Reverend Lord Ralph, by the grace of God Bishop of Chichester,
his devoted Simon de Senliz, greeting, and both devoted and due obedience and reverence in all things. —
I send to the feet of your holiness your clerk Philip, bearer of this,
returning to your excellency manifold thanks upon bended knees,
that by your favour you have been pleased to request the lord prior of Boxgrave about the vicarage of Wauburton.
I hope, indeed, that the said prior will assent to your petition, if you would confer with him;
which Philip indeed will inform you, by word of mouth, about your business in Sussex,
and on that account I send you no other letters at present,
and the said Philip will personally explain to you your affairs.
May your holiness always fare well in the Lord.
Horrible Histories song: Stephen vs Matilda (3:10 min.):
http://vimow.com/vn/watch/x2lwjyl_Horrible+Histories+Norman+Family+Tree+Song
Readings:
Bartlett, England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, pp. 28-37 (Court Politics; The Role of Queens), 48-62 (Predatory and Punitive Rule; Rebellion), 90-92 (English Overlordship in the British Isles)
Forms of royal patronage included:
Grants of lands
Grants of offices, with tenure for life or for a fixed term
Grants of wardships or marriages at the king’s disposal
Remissions of taxation
Pardons for offences
Forms of royal control or punishment of magnates included:
Hostage-taking
Fines
Dismissal from office
Public submission or surrender
Confiscation of lands
Military attack
Imprisonment
Mutilation
Execution