The King’s Assassin (50 page)

Bouvines destroyed for ever King John’s chances of recovering his lands on the continent, and this for many of his noble subjects was the last straw. A victorious king – such as, say, Richard the Lionheart, who was also no slouch when it came to squeezing the country for cash – is a good king, as far as the medieval military caste was concerned. If the King could lead his barons to victory, the accompanying tide of wealth in ransoms of captured enemies, seized lands and booty from a ransacked countryside was likely to keep all of them quiet and happy. If the King lost, the nobles were likely to find themselves or their relatives in chains and faced the very real risk of financial ruin. War was business in the thirteenth century, you might argue that it still is. I find a parallel between medieval warfare and the way we see the economy in the twenty-first century. When a modern economy is doing well, house prices rising, unemployment low, governmental sins are more readily forgiven. But when recession bites, ministerial heads roll and the government of the day is likely to be kicked out. In the thirteenth century, so it was with war. Much would be forgiven a successful warrior-king but woe betide a man like John who consistently lost crucial battles.

The medieval historian J. C. Holt famously wrote that ‘the road from Bouvines to Runnymede was direct, short and unavoidable’, and while some might quibble with ‘unavoidable’, the defeated king was in a far weaker position after the battle, militarily and financially, and his barons were, as a result, far less intimidated by him. If Bouvines had been a great victory, or even just a very lucrative one like the successful raid on Damme the year before, I think it unlikely that the English barons would have rebelled and there would have been no Magna Carta.

Incidentally, Bouvines – which is a scarcely remembered engagement in the English-speaking world – has huge recognition-value, even fame, in France. It was fundamental in the development of the French kingdom and confirmed the French King’s sovereignty over Normandy and Brittany. It was, perhaps, the most important battle that most British people have never heard of.

If you would like to read more about Bouvines, Magna Carta and King John’s struggles with his barons I would thoroughly recommend W. L. Warren’s superb
King John
, Sean McGlynn’s excellent
Blood Cries Afar
and Danny Danziger and John Gillingham’s very entertaining
1215: The Year of Magna Carta
.

Of course, the issuing of Magna Carta in June 1215 was not the end of the story. Nine weeks afterwards, at King John’s behest, the Pope annulled the Great Charter and excommunicated all the rebel barons. Civil war immediately broke out once more all across the land … but that is a story for another day, another book.

Robin and Alan may not rest on their laurels just yet.

Angus Donald

Tonbridge, March 2015