The Plantagenets: The Kings That Made Britain Read online

  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:

  1 If a controversy arises between laymen or between laymen and clerks or between clerks concerning … presentation of churches it shall be treated … in the court of the lord king.

  2 Churches of the lord king’s fee cannot be permanently bestowed without his consent.

  3 Clerks charged and accused of any matter summoned by the king’s justice shall come into his court to answer there to whatever … should be answered there and in the church court to … what should be answered there. However, the king’s justice shall send into the court of holy church [to] see how the matter shall be treated there. And if the clerk be convicted or confess the church ought not to protect him further.

  4 It is not permitted for archbishops, bishops or priests of the kingdom to leave the kingdom without the lord king’s permission …

  5 Excommunicate persons ought not to give security for an indefinite time … but only give security and pledge for submitting to the judgement of the church in order that they may be absolved.

  6 Laymen ought not to be accused save by dependable and lawful accusers and witnesses in the presence of the bishop … And if there should be those who are deemed culpable but whom no one wishes or dares to accuse, the sheriff upon the bishop’s request shall cause 12 lawful men of the neighbourhood … that they will show the truth of the matter according to their conscience.

  7 No one who holds of the king in chief or any of the officials of his demesne is to be excommunicated or his lands placed under interdict unless the lord king … first gives his consent …

  8 As to appeals which may arise, they should pass from the archdeacon to the bishop, and from the bishop to the archbishop. And if the archbishop fail in furnishing justice the matter should come to the lord king at last, that at his command the litigation be concluded in the archbishop’s court … and not pass further [i.e., to Rome] without the lord king’s consent.

  9 If litigation arise … concerning any holding which a clerk would bring to charitable tenure [e.g., a hospital] but a layman would bring to lay fee, it shall be determined on the decision of the king’s chief justice by the recognition of 12 lawful men …

  10 If anyone who is of a city, castle, borough or demesne manor of the king shall be cited by archdeacon or bishop for any offence for which he ought to be held answerable to them and despite their summonses he refuse to do what is right, it is fully permissible to place him under interdict but he ought not to be excommunicated before the king’s chief official of that vill shall agree …

  11 Archbishops, bishops and ecclesiastics of the kingdom who hold of the king in chief have their possessions of the lord king … and answer for them to the king’s justices and ministers and follow and do mall royal rights and customs, and they ought, just like other barons, to be present at the judgement of the lord king’s court …

  12 When an archbishopric or bishopric or an abbey or priory of the king’s demesne shall be vacant, it ought to be in his hands and he shall assume its revenues and expenses as pertaining to his demesne. And when the time comes to provide for the church, the lord king shall notify the more important clergy of the church and the election should be held in the lord king’s own chapel … And there before he be consecrated let the elect perform homage and fealty to the lord king as his liege lord for life, limbs and earthly honour, saving his order.

  13 If any of the great men of the kingdom should forcibly prevent archbishop, bishop or archdeacon from administering justice in which he or his men were concerned, then the lord king ought to bring such a one to justice …

  14 Chattels which have been forfeited to the king are not to be held in churches against the king’s justice, because they belong to the king whether they be found inside churches or outside.

  15 Pleas concerning debts which are owed on the basis of an oath or in connection with which no oath has been taken are in the king’s justice.

  16 Sons of villains should not be ordained without the consent of the lord on whose land it is ascertained that they were born.

  Henry demanded that the leaders of the church swear an oath to abide by these rules. Becket obeyed but then changed his mind and all the bishops followed his lead.

  There were furious arguments, and the king resolved to have Becket stripped of his position in the church. In November he had the archbishop arraigned on charges of breaking his oath. After the trial Becket fled abroad, and from his refuge in France he tried to persuade the pope to condemn Henry’s ecclesiastical policy and to place him under interdict. He was supported by Louis VII, who was now anxious to break up Henry’s continental empire.

  Continuing with his work of restoring stable government under a strong, centralized monarchy, Henry decreed the Assize of Clarendon in February 1166. This was the beginning of a long process to transform English law. During the civil war the system of local justice had broken down, crimes had gone unpunished, properties had been seized by force or occupied by squatters. The Assize of Clarendon supplied the machinery for settling disputes and establishing the supremacy of royal courts over those held by barons and bishops. Sheriffs were empowered to empanel juries in all communities to make enquiry into alleged crimes. The accused were to be presented in the king’s court, and their guilt or innocence was to be established by local juries. This was not the beginning of the jury system, but it was the beginning of the ousting of all other methods of determining guilt, such as compurgation, whereby an accused was acquitted if he could persuade (or bribe) enough neighbours to testify to his innocence, and trial by ordeal.

  The legal reform established three types of assize courts: novel disseisin explored cases of alleged dispossession of property, mort d’ancestor considered issues of inheritance, and darrein presentment established who had the right to present clergy to vacant benefices. The increased activities of the royal law courts would have dwindled over the years were it not for a new impetus given to the keeping of written records. Sheriffs and other law officers sent in their reports (pipe rolls), which were logged and stored by the Exchequer. Royal letters and other important documents were similarly filed, thus building up an archive of documentary evidence, which could be referred to in subsequent cases.

  Henry wasted no time in enforcing the Assize of Clarendon. Within weeks officials were sent out to conduct a general survey of England, county by county. Hundreds of offenders were brought to book and their misdemeanours entered in the pipe rolls together with their punishments – usually fines.

  The sheriffs did not escape examination. It was obvious to the king that giving these officers extended powers could encourage corruption. When complaints reached him of sheriffs who had exceeded their remit or lined their own pockets Henry despatched the ‘Inquest of the Sheriffs’. His agents were to make enquiry: ‘As to whether anyone was unjustly accused under that Assize (Clarendon) for reward or promise or out of hatred or in any other unjust way, and whether any of the accused were released or a charge withdrawn for reward or promise of favour, and who accepted a bribe.’3

  Even the great men of the realm were not exempt from investigation. Reports came into Henry’s chancellery of barons abusing their tenants or defrauding the king of his revenues. The prodigious activities of the royal officers and the vigilance of the king and his councillors in reading and responding to the information that reached the itinerant court are remarkable, especially when we consider that Henry spent most of these years outside England
.

  In January 1169 Henry and Louis VII met at Montmirail, between Le Mans and Chartres, to compose their differences. To allay the French king’s fears about the mighty Angevin empire Henry revealed his plan to divide his patrimony among his three sons, but in the midst of their discussions Thomas Becket turned up at Montmirail, asking to be reconciled to his king.

  1170–74

  In May 1170 the 37-year-old king made his biggest mistake, setting in train events that ended in tragedy and blackened his name for posterity. He had his eldest son, Henry, crowned by the Archbishop of York. This reinforced his promise to divide his inheritance, but it was also a deliberate sign of defiance to Becket and Louis. It angered Becket because to preside at coronations was the prerogative of the Archbishop of Canterbury. It annoyed Louis because his daughter, Margaret, who was the wife of the young Henry, was excluded from the ceremony. Henry II was making it clear that any reconciliation would be on his terms. Becket protested vigorously at his treatment and was backed by the pope, who threatened to excommunicate Henry.

  On 22 July 1170, Becket and the king met at Fréteval, on the road between Tours and Chartres, and some kind of reconciliation took place, but the personal animosity between the two men remained as strong as ever. Henry was in no hurry to let the archbishop return, and it was 30 November before Becket, on his own initiative, crossed the Channel. His attempt to restore his authority led to fresh conflicts with bishops and secular lords, and these were reported back to Henry at his Normandy manor near Bayeux. He gave vent to his anger in the presence of several of his retainers, though it is doubtful that he uttered the words, ‘Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?’ Be that as it may, four of Henry’s household knights took it upon themselves to be the king’s avenging angels. They hurried back to England and, on 20 December 1170, murdered Becket in his own cathedral.

  News of the outrage shocked Europe, and no one was more upset than Henry, who realized the negative effect it would have on his standing inside and outside his own dominions. It handed Pope Alexander III a propaganda initiative, and in order to recover the church’s goodwill Henry was obliged to negotiate. By the Compromise of Avranches (May 1172) he had to relax some of the Constitutions of Clarendon relating to the power of the bishops and their courts. In August he did public penance for Becket’s death and received absolution.

  It seemed to many of Henry’s subjects that the overmighty king, who had for years been increasing royal power at the expense of the barons and bishops, had, at last, overreached himself and been humbled. This was not Henry’s view of things. In fact, he spent the autumn and winter of 1171–2 extending his empire still further. In September he assembled an army of 4,000 troops on the Welsh coast for an invasion of Ireland, a project he had been planning for a long time. In 1166 he had taken under his protection the deposed king of Leinster, Diarmait Mac Murchadha. This native ruler died in May 1171, and the man who took his place as self-appointed leader was his son-in-law, Richard de Clare, known to his followers as Strongbow, an immigrant knight from Wales.

  It was to prevent de Clare becoming the powerful head of a potentially rival state that Henry now decided to act. So impressive was Henry’s show of force that all the native and immigrant leaders of eastern and southern Ireland did homage to him without a battle being fought. Strongbow was forced to acknowledge Henry as his liege lord and received from the king’s hands fresh grants of the lands he already held. Henry strengthened the existing fortifications, arranged for the building of new castles and installed Hugh de Lacy at Dublin as his viceroy. He also established a colony of Bristol merchants in the city and thus set in train its rise to the status of an important and prosperous commercial centre.

  In the spring of 1172 Henry returned to the continent to make his peace with the pope, but the church was not his only problem. By now his enemies were multiplying. They included his own family. The coronation of young Henry had been a means of keeping control of England while the king was elsewhere, and the boy had only been given minimum power and resources. Now aged 18, he decided that he wanted to be king in reality, and discontented barons and churchmen were only too ready to make him a figurehead for a revolt against the ‘tyrant’ Henry II. When, early the next year, the king angrily refused to accede more power, his son fled for support to the court of Louis VII. He was joined by his brothers, Richard and Geoffrey. Their mother, Queen Eleanor, tried to follow, disguised as a man, but Henry’s officers discovered her and returned her to her husband, who had her placed under close – and permanent – guard. The failure of her escape bid to join the royal princes in Paris condemned her to 16 years’ captivity. She was housed in honourable confinement in various palaces, but she and her husband seldom met. Henry referred to her as his ‘hated queen’, and there was occasional talk of divorce. Henry had taken up with his mistress, Rosamund Clifford. But whether this was before 1173 (and therefore a cause of Eleanor’s desertion) is not known.

  The years 1173 and 1174 were those of the ‘great war’. Henry’s realms were convulsed by conflict because all his enemies sensed that the time was right to make a concerted strike against a king who had, as they believed, taken too much power into his own hands. The opposition was led by Louis VII, and he was supported by Henry’s sons, the counts of Blois, Flanders and Boulogne, the king of Scotland and numerous English barons, of whom the most prominent was Robert de Beaumont, Earl of Leicester. With armed revolt occurring simultaneously in several parts of his dominions it was extremely difficult for the king to organize effective military response. That he did so is proof of his clear thinking and of his forceful character. His brilliant campaign tactics included a forced march right across Normandy in two days, which took the rebels of Brittany completely by surprise. With his continental enemies in confusion Henry offered talks with his sons, but they remained obdurate, knowing as they did that Henry’s resources were stretched to the uttermost. This meant that he was unable to cross the Channel to attend personally to the situation in England.

  There his deputy, Richard de Lucy, was confronted by a north–south divide. The area to the north of a diagonal line from Felixstowe to Chester was controlled by disaffected barons. He invested the principal rebel stronghold of Leicester but was unable to take the castle because he had to break off the siege in July in order to cope with the Scots. King William, known as the ‘Lion’, had succeeded his brother, Malcolm, in 1165 and it did not take him long to fall out with Henry. In 1168 he formed an alliance with Louis VII – the first example of the ‘Auld Alliance’ of Scotland and France against England. He now raided Northumberland. De Lucy forced him back across the border and would have inflicted considerable damage on the Lowlands had he not been forced to return southwards to face a new menace. In September 1173 Robert de Beaumont raised a mercenary army of Flemings and landed in Suffolk. Having joined forces with the Earl of Norfolk, Hugh Bigod, he plundered Norwich, one of the most prosperous cities in the kingdom (it had received its charter in 1158) and captured the royal Castle of Haughley. The combined rebel army then set off towards Leicester. De Lucy, after a rapid and exhausting march, met them in marshy ground at Fornham, near Bury St Edmunds. There the king’s men won an unlikely victory. Taking advantage of the sodden ground, they put de Beaumont’s men to flight and hacked them to pieces as they floundered in the marsh. Earl Robert was captured and sent under armed escort to the king.

  But the war was not won. As soon as the winter had passed, William the Lion was back again, capturing several northern castles, while his brother, David, marched to Leicester to reinforce the major rebel garrison. The campaign season of 1174 was, like most early medieval campaigns, all about castles. De Lucy captured Huntingdon, but his opponents secured Nottingham. In the north William failed to capture key royalist strongholds at Carlisle and Wark, and Henry’s bastard son (the only son to remain loyal to his father) took the castle of Axholme, the headquarters of Roger de Mowbray, one of the leading opponents of the king. As the war raged to and
fro, de Lucy sent repeated appeals for aid to the king, but Henry knew that Louis and his allies also wanted to see him depart for England; they had almost despaired of ultimate victory as long as the Plantagenet led his own forces against them. In order to lure Henry across the Channel, Count Philip of Flanders launched another invasion in July.

  Henry now moved. His first port of call in England was at Canterbury. Here he carried out one of the most extraordinary and uncharacteristic acts of his reign. He went barefoot and in penitential sackcloth to the shrine of Thomas Becket, spent all night there in solemn vigil praying for the saint’s forgiveness (Becket had been canonized in February 1173). The following day (13 July) he submitted to being scourged by the monks. It was a dramatic gesture intended to deprive his enemies of spiritual support from the martyr. Four days later news arrived that seemed to support the idea that the king’s contrition had won heavenly approval. On the very day of his public penance William the Lion and his knights had been surprised in their camp before the walls of Alnwick by a force of Yorkshire loyalists who emerged out of the morning mist and fell upon them. In the following skirmish the Scottish king was captured. With this boost to the morale of his men Henry acted with his customary decisiveness. He marched north and received the submission first of Huntingdon and then of Northampton. The rebellion in England collapsed completely, and Henry was back in Normandy scarcely a month after he had left.

  In the 12th-century wars between kings and barons, pitched battles were rare. They were costly in terms of men and equipment, and armies, whether of mercenary soldiers or feudal retainers, were expensive to maintain. Combatants protected themselves and their garrisons within the walls of stone castles, which, as the chroniclers reported, were built throughout the country. A castle served several purposes. It provided a home for the lord and his household. It was a prestigious symbol of his power and wealth. It protected the lord and his retainers. It was a base from which he could set out to engage the enemy or make foraging raids. It served as a refuge for the local community in times of real crisis. It is, therefore, not surprising that ‘war’ usually meant ‘siege warfare’.