Henry II Book

HENRY II - CONTENTS - CHAP. PAGE I. HENRY FITZ-EMPRESS f. . 4 1 11. HENRY II., KING OF ENGLAND . 14 111. THE WELSH WARS . . . . . 26 IV. FOREIGN AFFAIRS . 400 V. THE STRUGGLE WITH BECKET . . 500 VI. IRISH AFFAIRS . . 101 VII. THE REBELLION OF THE YOUNG KING . 122 VIII. HENRY AND HIS SONS-HIS DOWNFALL AND DEATH . . 145 kIX. LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF THE REIGN . . 175 X. F NANCE . . 194 . XI. THE ENGLISH NATION UNDER HENRY If. . 212 J . BIBLIOGRAPHY . . 236 APPENDIX ITINERARY OF HENRY 11. . 241 INDEX . 253 V ILLUSTRATIONS GREAT SEAL OF HENRY AS KING Obverse frontispiece PAGE SEALS OF HENRY AS DUKE OF NORMANDY facing 6 GREAT SEAL OF HENRY AS KING Reverse . ,, 14 MAP ILLUSTRATING THE CAMPAIGNS OF HENRY 11. IN FRANCE Y, 40 SEAL OF LOUIS VII. . , v 44 SEAL OF ROGER, ARCHBISHOP OF . YORK . ,, 56 HENRY 11. DISPUTING WITH BECKET 3, 64 SEAL OF THE c c KING HENRY . ,, 90 THE MURDER OF BECKET . ,, 98 IRISHWOMAN PLAYING A ZITHER IRISHMEN ROWING IN A CORACLE ,, 104 IRISH AXEMEN . ,, 110 SEAL OF mI LIAM THE LION . ,, 140 SEALS OF GEOFFREY, SON OF HENRY II., AND CONSTANCE OF BRITTANY, HIS WIFE ,, 144 vii . . . vlll ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE SEAL OF JOAN, DAUGHTER OF HENRY 11. facing 150 SEAL OF THOMAS BECKET, ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY i ,, 156 SEAL OF HUGH, BISHOP OF LINCOLN SEAL OF GEOFFREY THE BASTARD, AS BISHOP-ELECT OF LINCOLN 3, 170 SEAL OF JOHN AS COUNT OF MORTAIN TOMB OF HENRY 11. AT FONTEVRAULT . . 174 SILVER PENNIES ,, 208 HENRY CHAPTER I a HENRY FITZ-EMPRESS WHEN the White Ship went down on 25th November 1120, carrying with her the only legitimate son of Henry I., the succession to the English throne became a question of great moment. Henrys daughter, Maud, had been married to Henry V., Emperor of Germany, in 1114 it was clearly impossible for England and Normandy to be ruled in conjunction with the Empire, and Maud had no children to whom her fathers crown might pass. The kings unruly brother, Robert of Normandy, was still alive, but a prisoner in England and his , son William, the most formidable candidate for the throne, was destined to die in Flanders in 1128. But before death had removed this dangerous and unpopular competitor, a fresh solution of the difficulty had become possible. Mauds husband, the emperor, had died in 1125, l and on 1st January 1127, l Later writers, anxious to depreciate Henry 11. even to the extent of making him illegitimate, and his mother a bigamist, retailed a legend to the effect that the Emperor Henry V. had not died at this time, but had retired secretly into ct monastery Giraldus Cam brensis, Op. viii. 300. King Henry declared Maud his heir, and caused the peers to swear to accept her as his successor in England and in Normandy. There was no precedent for female sovereignty in either country, and it was probably not anticipated that she should reign alone, but rather that she should by marriage bestow the crown upon some fitting partner. The important matter of this marriage Henry had virtually undertaken to submit to the decision of his barons, but at the end of May lX27 he betrothed her, with an absence of preparation that amounted almost to secrecy, to Geoffrey, son of Count Fulk of Anjou, a boy of - fourteen, eleven years the junior of his bride. The marriage, as Henry had foreseen, was unpopular, though the addition of the neighbouring provinces of Anjou and Maine to Normandy made the King of England the most powerful of all the feudatories of France...Read More