The Plantagenets: The Kings That Made Britain (2 page)

The loss of territory in what was becoming France went hand in hand with a concentration on consolidating and securing royal control within the British islands. The political classes in those areas farthest from the centre of government in London and the southeast frequently challenged Henry II and his descendants. With difficulty, the kings brought Wales under effective control, but Scotland defied repeated attempts to incorporate it into the Plantagenet empire, and Ireland was settled by waves of land-hungry baronial colonists, who then lived largely independently of the crown. These centuries were marked by frequent disputes between king and barons, which sometimes escalated into civil war. For the most part, however, the political rivals had recourse to law and negotiated their rights and responsibilities in the royal council and parliament. By the late 14th century the shire gentry and the urban mercantile class had staked a claim to be represented in parliament.

The story of the Plantagenet centuries is complex, but fascinating. We can touch it still via the graceful churches and massive castles their builders have left us. The events and personalities of these centuries confront us in the plays of Shakespeare. Film and television epics bring to life the deeds
of Becket, King John and Henry V. We enjoy the mythic ‘medievalism’ of Robin Hood and other legends. And sometimes – just sometimes – we reconnect with the men and women of those bygone centuries, as we did when Richard III’s body was disinterred from the place of its unceremonious, post-Bosworth dumping. That historic discovery demonstrated how different our world is from that of 1485. And the world of 1485 was very different from that of 1154. What follows is an account of those 331 years of transition.

HENRY II 1154–89

ANCESTORS of HENRY II

The kings who ruled from 1154 to 1485 took their name from the heraldic device of Geoffrey of Anjou, the founder of the line – a sprig of yellow broom, known in Latin as
planta genista
. The earlier rulers of the dynasty were also known as Angevins (from Anjou). Geoffrey never actually ruled England. He had extensive territories in what is now France but only held England in the name of his wife, Matilda.

The complex family rivalries that form the background of Henry’s accession began with the death without a male heir of his grandfather, Henry I. It was the late king’s wish that his daughter, Matilda, should inherit the crown. By marrying her to Geoffrey he created an extensive bloc of territories extending from the Scottish border to the Loire, and his intention was that the son of Matilda and Geoffrey, christened Henry, should ultimately enjoy undisputed control of this extensive empire.

Unfortunately, several of England’s powerful barons were not prepared to accept the rule of a woman, and they offered the crown to Stephen (who had been brought up at Henry’s court), the only available legitimate grandson of William the Conqueror. The result was almost two decades of internal chaos. Rival baronial armies fought for Stephen and Matilda, and the Scots and Welsh took advantage of England’s weakness to invade. Monastic chroniclers lamented the appalling
state of the country and, because their prayers seemed to avail nothing, they called this a period when ‘Christ and his saints slept’. In 1153, after another exhausting military campaign, Stephen and Henry reached an accord in the Treaty of Wallingford. Henry was acknowledged as king of England but Stephen would be regent for his lifetime. Stephen died the following year. Henry had already entered into his continental inheritance on the death of his father (1151), and he was, at last, able to assume the rule of the considerable territory his grandfather had planned that he should have. His first task was to restore peace and good order to his English domains.

1154–8

At the age of 21 Henry was a vigorous, ambitious, no-nonsense young king, who enjoyed military campaigns and had little interest in the pomp and ceremony of kingship. He was energetic and impulsive, but, when necessary, he exhibited great mental stamina, worked long hours and needed little sleep.

Henry hastened to pay homage to Louis VII, his nominal feudal overlord, before crossing the Channel to deal with his troublesome English subjects, and his decisive action took most of his opponents by surprise. He expelled the Flemish mercenaries on whom Stephen had had to rely and forced barons to dismantle the castles they had built without royal licence. By the end of 1155 he had restored a semblance of order and sound administration to much of the country, but
he then had to return to sort out problems in his French possessions. The need to maintain personal control of lands separated by 20 miles of sea was a basic problem with which Henry had to contend throughout his reign. In 1157 he was back to root out the last vestiges of opposition and obliged King Malcolm IV of Scotland to restore lands that he had recently claimed. The chronicler William of Newburgh laconically remarked: ‘The king of England had the better of the argument by reason of his greater power.’
¹

The Welsh princes posed a more difficult problem. English barons who controlled the Marches (the borderlands) were perennially locked in territorial competition with the Welsh rulers who, at the same time, were trying to extend their boundaries eastwards. During the previous reign Owain, prince of Gwynedd, in north Wales, had expanded his territory and expelled many English settlers.

In July 1157 Henry launched a campaign against him. The result was almost disastrous. The king was caught in an ambush near Flint, and most of his bodyguard was killed. Believing that Henry was dead, his army turned tail, and all would have been lost had not Henry fought his way out of the ambush and rallied his men. The king’s characteristic persistence so impressed Owain that he sued for peace and did homage to Henry. Only when Henry had garrisoned the border strongly did he turn his attention to the other recalcitrant Welsh princes. They, however, followed Owain’s lead.

With such a large territory to govern Henry needed efficient administrators, and he found an excellent servant in Thomas Becket. Thomas came from a knightly family,
received a good education and earned a place as personal assistant to the Archbishop of Canterbury. In 1155 Henry made him chancellor of England. Despite the difference in their ages (Thomas was about 15 years the senior), a warm friendship sprang up between the two men. In many ways Becket was Henry’s mentor, a man of iron will who encouraged the king to exercise unyielding authority.

The king relied heavily on Becket, who not only proved himself able in handling the complex details of government but also provided that kingly display for which Henry had no taste. On an embassy to Paris in 1158 the chancellor impressed everyone with the size and magnificence of his retinue. First came 250 foot soldiers, then Becket’s hunting hounds led by their keepers. The ambassador’s household goods filled eight wagons, and he brought another two wagons of English beer with him. Some 28 packhorses now followed, carrying gold and silver plate, rich clothes and altar furnishings for Becket’s private chapel. Last of all the chancellor appeared, attended by 200 mounted knights, falconers, pages, clerks and stewards. Henry was delighted with such shows of opulence, which impressed foreign dignitaries with the splendour and wealth of the English court.

1159–69

Henry was determined to reinforce the power of the crown permanently. This meant securing all his frontiers and asserting royal justice over the law courts, which were operated by the barons and the church. But he was not content
simply to consolidate and rule effectively his inherited lands. He saw himself as the most powerful ruler of western Christendom. His mother, Matilda, had by her first marriage been empress of the Holy Roman Empire and had been much involved by her husband in the administration of his vast territory. Henry, eager to show himself more than the equal of King Louis of France and the Emperor Frederick, was always on the lookout for ways of extending his own boundaries. Half of his considerable estates in western France had come to him on his marriage to Eleanor, the eldest daughter and heiress of William X, Duke of Aquitaine in 1152. She had a claim to the county of Toulouse, which extended from Aquitaine to the Mediterranean coast and which controlled some of the most vital trade routes in Europe.

In 1159, when Count Raymond V of Toulouse declined to recognize Henry’s overlordship, Henry gathered an enormous army to enforce his will. He levied taxes to pay for foreign mercenaries, and he obliged all his feudal barons to attend him with their own armed retainers. These included King Malcolm of Scotland and one of the Welsh princes. Henry’s great army successfully fought its way southwards to the very gates of Toulouse. But there it stopped. Early in 1160 Louis VII arrived in Toulouse to support Raymond (who was married to his daughter). Henry was stymied; according to the feudal code anyone taking arms against his overlord was guilty of rebellion, and Henry was obliged to call off the siege. By the terms of the truce reached in May 1160 he lost much of his recently conquered territory. This marked the limit of Henry’s territorial expansion, but it
nevertheless established him as the most influential ruler in Europe, and he often acted as arbiter in the disputes that sprang up between rival monarchs.

Henceforth, Henry concentrated on strengthening control of his own lands and modernizing their administration. He knew that effective kingship depended on both personal contact with his people and a trusted network of officials to carry out his will, and he travelled constantly throughout his extensive dominions. Peter of Blois reported in a letter to a friend: ‘He does not linger in his palaces like other kings but hunts through the provinces inquiring into everyone’s doing, and especially judges those whom he has made judges of others.’
²
It was in order to exert more royal control over the church that Henry had Becket installed as Archbishop of Canterbury in May 1162.

In this same year the Welsh once more gave him trouble. Henry promptly led his army into south Wales, seized the castle of Llandovery and forced Prince Rhys of Deheubarth to do homage. For good measure, Henry had all the Welsh princes and King Malcolm of Scotland come to a council meeting at Woodstock and reaffirm their oaths of loyalty. But something more significant happened at this gathering. Henry’s revenue-raising proposals were strongly opposed by the new Archbishop of Canterbury. Thomas Becket sent out a signal that he was not going to be the king’s mindless agent. Next year the two old friends clashed again. Henry claimed the right to have members of the clergy who were guilty of crimes handed over to royal justice. Becket insisted that men in holy orders were not subject to secular law but should be
disciplined by their ecclesiastical superiors. During the chaos of Stephen’s reign church leaders had increased their rights and privileges, and Becket was determined to make sure that they were not forced now to surrender the power they had gained.

Henry was equally determined to regain the crown’s position as sole arbiter of justice within the realm. He was not the sort of man to tolerate defiance, and he knew well that any sign of weakness on his part would be an encouragement to any unruly or discontented vassals (such as the Welsh and Scottish rulers). He summoned the bishops to another meeting at Clarendon in January 1164 and set before them a document, the Constitutions of Clarendon, setting out the traditional relationship between crown and mitre and making it clear that the king’s justice applied to
all
the king’s subjects. The sixteen points were: