‘Oh Simon de, dear brother-in-law! How I would like to take my royal fist to your wretched jaw!’ King Henry III. The meeting of the Easter parliament in 1258 which had resulted in the humiliating Provisions of Oxford left King Henry seething. The mere memory of having to put his seal to that offensive piece …
‘The brother in-law who became the unbrotherly outlaw!’ Well, that would come later, but to begin with everything was sweetness and light. Oh! Oh! For a happy family life! Well, that involves men, women and children! King Henry was devoted to his wife and children and could not bear to be separated from them for …
In March 1219, Henry’s regent, the redoubtable and resolute peerless knight, Sir William Marshall breathed his last. The eleven year old king must have felt the loss acutely. ‘Loyal to the end to the Plantagenet family most royal! Until he left the confines of this mortal coil! Sir William Marshall, in King Henry’s service, did …
The King is dead, long live the king! In death, John managed to achieve that which he could not do in life; he thwarted the will of King Philip ‘Deesgusting’ Augustus. He left as his heir, his son, the nine year old prince Henry. Taken under the wing of that great knight, William Marshall, young …
‘ The captains and the king, departed, their faces adorned with smiles! These lasted but a few yards, not miles!’ ‘King John would die in 1216, the following year! But few if any would shed a tear!’ T’was but a false peace and the king and the rebellious barons both made preparations for the hostilities …
‘On the fair field at Runnymede, the barons would force John to rein in his terrible greed!’ The year 1214 saw the continuing conflict between John and Philip ‘de-esgusting’ Augustus. John had sought support among the English barons for an invasion of France, but found that interest was at best lukewarm. In the event, many …
‘The people known as the Jews, had always to the English Crown paid their dues! Now John behaved in a way that gave every child of Israel, a particularly nasty case of the blues!’ In his desperate quest for money, John turned to England’s Jewish community and taxed them mercilessly. In 1210 he had the …
‘Now that John’s French empire had been disastrously lost! He turned west in an attempt to recoup the enormous cost’! Ireland had been the first land bequeathed to John,and for a while it was expected that it would be the only one that he would inherit. ‘To John, the youngest son, a mere morsel of land! …
In 1215 the English barons forced King John to sign Magna Carta (Great Charter) at Runnymede. This document was an important turning point in the history of the English monarchy. The king did not want to agree to its provisions so why did he sign it? The reason lay in John’s own character. Losing Normandy …