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Mediaeval English History
Session 3. The Angevin Empire
Bibliography
A. Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Pimlico, 2000
W.L. Warren, Henry II, Berkeley, 1973
R. Barber, The Devil’s Crown: Henry II, Richard I, John, London, 1978
K.O. Morgan (ed.), The Oxford History of Britain, Oxford, 1983
J. Harvey, The Plantagenets, Fontana, 1959
J. Gillingham, The Life and Times of Richard I, London, 1973
Antonia Fraser (ed.), The Lives of the Kings and Queens of England, Futura, 1977
1. A Fateful Marriage
Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, nicknamed “Plantagenet” because he wore a sprig of yellow broom or planta genista in his cap, had conquered most of Normandy by 1144, and in 1150 he ceded the territory to his son Henry. Henry as Duke of Normandy married Eleanor of Aquitaine on 18th May, 1152. He was only 19, while Eleanor was around 30. She had come from a failed marriage with Louis VII of France, whom she had grown to dislike intensely. In 1151, while Henry was in Paris on a peace mission to Louis she had met Henry, and an affair de coeur developed.
Henry came to England in 1153 to negotiate with Stephen (Matilda had abandoned her quest for the throne by this time), whereupon they agreed (Treaty of Westminster, Dec. 1153) that Stephen should rule until his death, when Henry should succeed. In the event, Stephen died within the year and in 1154 Henry became king.
Eleanor brought to Henry of Anjou all her holdings in southern France, while Henry’s own holdings were Anjou and Normandy, which latter his father had conquered over the previous decade. Together the couple possessed an empire stretching from the Scottish border to the Pyrenees. This marriage was to set the scene for the entire Middle Ages.
2. Henry II, Curtmantle, as King (1154 – 1189)
Henry was part Norman (through his mother, Matilda), part French (through his father, Geoffrey of Anjou), but because of his patrilineal descent he founded a new dynasty, called the Plantagenet, after his father’s cap. There was a legend (not unique to the Plantagenets) that a diabolical ancestress, Melusine, married one of the early counts, but her one defect was a refusal to attend Mass. When four knights tried to force her, she broke away, and flew shrieking out the window with two of her children. From this legend came the adage regarding the Angevins and Plantagenets, “From the Devil we came; to the Devil we shall go”. It was after 331 years of this dynasty, to prove uncannily true.
On accession Henry moved to dismantle the power of the repressive barons, who had ravaged and oppressed the country during Stephen’s reign (the Anarchy, 1135 - 1154), and established a system of justice which was to become his hallmark. In addition to the feudal courts, where the lord of the manor presided, there were the public courts. Henry expanded the jurisdiction of royal courts, amalgamated the disparate feudal and county courts, moved to abolish the old Germanic trials by ordeal and battle, and instituted the system of jury trial. By these reforms a body of common law began to emerge, and a legal system which could survive the administration of incompetent kings. By these reforms, Henry waged war on crime, necessary after the excesses of the Anarchy.
One development during this reign is the appearance from 1156 onwards of the “Pipe Rolls” (except for one earlier one from 1130). These are yearly financial records of the sheriffs and royal officials of each county for the royal Exchequer.
Hence in every way Henry proved a most able administrator and judge of men.
Warren makes this assessment:
“The customary law was no longer adequate for the needs of a changing society, and the revived Roman Civil Law had made men aware of the possibilities of rational jurisprudence…it was a moment fraught with peril…There was danger, too, of imitating the inquisitorial methods which the Church was developing in the ecclesiastical courts. This was a very real danger, since some of Henry’s most able advisers were originally trained in the service of the Church. It could have imparted to the administration of royal justice an authoritarian bias from which only revolution could have rescued it. But Henry chose instead to take English customary law, trim it, knead it, reshape it, and give it the transforming touch of genius.” Warren, Henry II, p.360.
3. The Quarrel with Thomas Becket
Were it not for this unfortunate affair, Henry might well have earned the sobriquet “the Great” for his other achievements. However, the Becket quarrel casts a shadow over his whole reign, and he is remembered as Becket’s proxy murderer.
The issue between Henry and Becket has its background in the “Lay Investiture” controversy which dominated the Church in that age. Hildebrand, who became pope in 1073 as Gregory VII, opposed the emperor (Henry IV) who claimed to have the right to invest a bishop-elect with the ring and staff, and to receive homage prior to consecration. Anselm in 1100 opposed Henry I on the same grounds, although they came to a compromise in 1107. Also involved was the royal prerogative versus papal authority, a quarrel which later erupted in the reign of John, and which eventually led to a complete disruption under Henry VIII in 1534. Briefly outlined, the issues were as follows
¨ In the immediate circumstance, Henry’s desire to prosecute in royal courts clergy who had already been convicted in ecclesiastical courts. The penalties in the later, Henry believed, were too light. For Thomas this was double jeopardy.
¨ Under the Constitutions of Clarendon (1164) Henry declared that the king, not the pope, had authority over the English Church. While Thomas agreed at first to these, he quickly recanted, and after his murder Henry was forced to acknowledge church powers in his realm.
In another respect the quarrel was a by-product of his legal reforms and determination to “get tough” on crime, and bring a unified and comprehensive system of justice under the control of the Crown.
Hence Henry’s troubles began when Becket became Archbishop of Canterbury in June, 1162, and then became both pious ascetic and champion of the Church’s privileges. Open conflict with Henry led to Becket’s flight to France in 1164. When they seemed to be reconciled in 1169 Becket returned from his exile, but he then opposed the coronation of Henry’s eldest son, also called Henry, in 1170. At Henry’s indiscreet remark wishing to be rid of “this troublesome priest” four knights headed for England (Henry was in France) and murdered Becket while he was at prayer in Canterbury Cathedral on 29th Dec. 1170.
Summary: a troublesome priest indeed who was better out of the way, even if the method was deplorable. After the furore had died down Henry was really at the height of his power.
4. Internal Family Squabbles; the Empire Collapses
Henry had more problems with his troublesome family. His plan was to partition the empire among his sons, but this all came unstuck. The young Henry wanted more than simply a royal title, while the others wanted more than their father was prepared to grant. The discontent came to open revolt in 1173-4, probably at the behest of the now estranged Eleanor. The failure of this revolt led to Eleanor’s house arrest for the remainder of Henry’s reign.
When Henry died in 1183, and Geoffrey in 1186, things seemed calmer, but then Richard intrigued with the powerful Philip II of France. At stake were the holdings in France, especially the rich prize of the Aquitaine. In mid-1189 Richard and Philip embarked on war against Henry, invaded Maine, and forced Henry to retreat. When Henry saw a list of the rebels and saw John’s name at the top it was the final blow: Henry had tried to organise for John to succeed to the empire, especially the Aquitaine, and now John had slunk over to the opposing side.
After a ten-year reign by Richard, who spent a mere six months in England, John was at last to gain the kingdom. However, under this unscrupulous coward the Angevin Empire was to fall apart. After a century of internal efforts at pacification of the unruly barons, ending with the emergence of the first Parliament (Henry III), and partially successful unification of the entire island under the English Crown (Edward I), attention was turned to regaining the lost empire in an ultimately futile quest known as the Hundred Years’ War.
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