Angevin kings of England

The Angevin kings of England (/ˈændʒɪvɪn/; "from Anjou") were Henry II and his sons, Richard I and John, who ruled England from 1154 to 1216. With ancestral lands in Anjou, they were related to the Norman kings of England through Matilda, the daughter of Henry I, and Henry II's mother. They were also related to the earlier Anglo-Saxon kings of England through Matilda's great-great-great grandfather, Aethelred the Unready. Their descendants, the main line of Plantagenets, continued to rule England until 1485; some historians make no distinction between the Angevins and the Plantagenets, while others name John's son Henry III the first Plantagenet king.^{[2][3][4][5][6]}

Henry II gained control of a large collection of lands in western Europe which would retrospectively be referred to as the

The expansion of Henry's power caused conflict with Louis VII of France and his successor Philip II, who were the feudal overlords of his French territories. Henry also struggled to control his sons Henry, Geoffrey, Richard, and John, who rebelled against him in 1173–4, 1183, and 1189.

Henry died in 1189 and was succeeded by his eldest living son, Richard, whose reputation for martial prowess won him the epithet "Cœur de Lion" or "Lionheart".^[8] He was born and raised in England but spent very little time there during his adult life, perhaps as little as six months. Despite this Richard remains an enduring iconic figure both in England and in France, and is one of very few kings of England remembered by his nickname as opposed to regnal number.^[9] When Richard died, his brother John – Henry's fifth and last surviving son – took the throne. In 1204, John lost many of the Angevins' continental territories, including Anjou, to the French crown. He and his successors were still recognized as dukes of Aquitaine. The loss of Anjou, for which the dynasty is named, and other French fiefs made John the last of the Angevin kings of England.^[10]

Terminology

Angevin

The adjective Angevin is especially used in English history to refer to the kings who were also counts of Anjou—beginning with Henry II—descended from Geoffrey and Matilda; their characteristics, descendants and the period of history which they covered from the mid-twelfth to early-thirteenth centuries. In addition, it is also used pertaining to Anjou, or any sovereign, government derived from this. As a noun, it is used for any native of Anjou or Angevin ruler. As such, Angevin is also used for other

The term "Angevin Empire" was coined in 1887 by Kate Norgate. As far as it is known, there was no contemporary name for this assemblage of territories, which were referred to—if at all—by clumsy circumlocutions such as our kingdom and everything subject to our rule whatever it may be or the whole of the kingdom which had belonged to his father. Whereas the Angevin part of this term has proved uncontentious, the empire portion has proved controversial. In 1986, a convention of historical specialists concluded that there had been no Angevin state and no empire but the term espace Plantagenet was acceptable.^[12]

Plantagenet

The Angevins descend from Geoffrey II, Count of Gâtinais and Ermengarde of Anjou. In 1060 this couple inherited, via cognatic kinship, the county of Anjou from an older line dating from 870 and a noble called Ingelger.^[16][17] The marriage of Count Geoffrey to Matilda, the only surviving legitimate child of Henry I of England, was part of a struggle for power during the tenth and eleventh centuries among the lords of Normandy, Brittany, Poitou, Blois, Maine and the kings of France. It was from this marriage that Geoffrey's son, Henry, inherited the claims to England, Normandy and Anjou that marks the beginning of the Angevin and Plantagenet dynasties.^[18] This was the third attempt by Geoffrey's father Fulk V to build a political alliance with Normandy. The first was by marrying his daughter Matilda to Henry's heir William Adelin, who drowned in the wreck of the White Ship. Fulk then married his daughter Sibylla to William Clito, heir to Henry's older brother Robert Curthose, but Henry had the marriage annulled to avoid strengthening William's rival claim to his lands.^[19]

Inheritance custom and Angevin practice

As society became more prosperous and stable in the 11th century, inheritance customs developed that allowed daughters (in the absence of sons) to succeed to principalities as well as landed estates. The twelfth-century chronicler Ralph de Diceto noted that the counts of Anjou extended their dominion over their neighbours by marriage rather than conquest.^[20] The marriage of Geoffrey to the daughter of a king (and widow of an emperor) occurred in this context. It is unknown whether King Henry intended to make Geoffrey his heir, but it is known that the threat presented by William Clito's rival claim to the duchy of Normandy made his negotiating position very weak. Even so, it is probable that, should the marriage be childless, King Henry would have attempted to be succeeded by one of his Norman kinsmen such as Theobald II, Count of Champagne, or Stephen of Blois, who in the event did seize King Henry's English crown. King Henry's great relief in 1133 at the birth of a son to the couple, described as "the heir to the Kingdom", is understandable in the light of this situation. Following this, the birth of a second son raised the question of whether custom would be followed with the maternal inheritance passing to first born and the paternal inheritance going to his brother, Geoffrey.^[21]

According to William of Newburgh, writing in the 1190s, the plan failed because of Geoffrey's early death in 1151. The dying Geoffrey decided that Henry would have the paternal and maternal inheritances while he needed the resources to overcome Stephen, and left instructions that his body would not be buried until Henry swore an oath that, once England and Normandy were secured, the younger Geoffrey would have Anjou.^[22] Henry's brother Geoffrey died in 1158, too soon to receive Anjou, but not before being installed count in Nantes after Henry aided a rebellion by its citizens against their previous lord.^[23]

The unity of Henry's assemblage of domains was largely dependent on the ruling family, influencing the opinion of most historians that this instability made it unlikely to endure. The French custom of partible inheritance at the time would lead to political fragmentation. Indeed, if Henry II's sons Henry the Young King and Geoffrey of Brittany had not died young, the inheritance of 1189 would have been fundamentally altered. Henry and Richard both planned for partition on their deaths while attempting to provide overriding sovereignty to hold the lands together. For example, in 1173 and 1183, Henry tried to force Richard to acknowledge allegiance to his older brother for the duchy of Aquitaine, and later Richard would confiscate Ireland from John. This was complicated by the Angevins being subjects of the kings of France, who felt these feudal rights of homage and the right of allegiance more legally belonged to them. This was particularly true when the wardship of Geoffrey's son Arthur and lordship of Brittany was contended between 1202 and 1204. Upon the Young King's death in 1183, Richard became heir in chief, but refused to give up Aquitaine to give John an inheritance. More by accident than design this meant that, while Richard inherited the patrimony, John would become lord of Ireland and Arthur would be duke of Brittany. By the mid-thirteenth century, there was a clear unified patrimony and Plantagenet empire but this cannot be called an Angevin Empire as by this date Anjou and most of the continental lands had been lost.^[24]

Arrival in England

Henry I of England named his daughter

• In 1151, Count Geoffrey died before having time to complete his plan to divide his inheritance between his sons Henry and Geoffrey, who would have received England and Anjou respectively.
• Louis VII of France divorced Eleanor of Aquitaine whom Henry quickly married, greatly increasing his resources and power with the acquisition of Duchy of Aquitaine.
• In 1153, Stephen's son Eustace died. The disheartened Stephen, who had also recently been widowed, gave up the fight and, with the Treaty of Wallingford, repeated the peace offer that Matilda had rejected in 1142: Stephen would be king for life, Henry his successor, preserving Stephen's second son William's rights to his family estates. Stephen did not live long and so Henry inherited in late 1154.^[28]

Henry faced many challenges to secure possession of his father's and grandfathers’ lands that required the reassertion and extension of old suzerainties.

In 1171, Henry invaded Ireland to assert his overlordship following alarm at the success of knights that he had allowed to recruit soldiers in England and Wales, who had assumed the role of colonisers and accrued autonomous power, including Strongbow. Pope Adrian IV had given Henry a papal blessing to expand his power into Ireland to reform the Irish church.^[31] Originally, this would have allowed some territory to be granted to Henry's brother, William, but other matters had distracted Henry and William was now dead. Instead, Henry's designs were made plain when he gave the lordship of Ireland to his youngest son, John.^[32]

In 1172, Henry II tried to give his landless youngest son John a wedding gift of the three castles of Chinon, Loudun and Mirebeau. This angered the 18-year-old Young King, who had yet to receive any lands from his father, and prompted a rebellion by Henry II's wife and three eldest sons. Louis VII supported the rebellion to destabilise Henry II. William the Lion and other subjects of Henry II also joined the revolt and it took 18 months for Henry to force the rebels to submit to his authority.^[33] In Le Mans in 1182, Henry II gathered his children to plan a partible inheritance in which his eldest son (also called Henry) would inherit England, Normandy and Anjou; Richard the Duchy of Aquitaine; Geoffrey Brittany, and John Ireland. This degenerated into further conflict. The younger Henry rebelled again before he died of dysentery and, in 1186, Geoffrey died after a tournament accident. In 1189, Richard and Philip II of France took advantage of Henry's failing health and forced him to accept humiliating peace terms, including naming Richard as his sole heir.^[34] Two days later, the old king died, defeated and miserable in the knowledge that even his favoured son John had rebelled. This fate was seen as the price he paid for the murder of Beckett.^[35]

Decline

On the day of Richard's English coronation, there was a mass slaughter of Jews, described by Richard of Devizes as a "holocaust".^[36] After his coronation, Richard put the Angevin Empire's affairs in order before joining the Third Crusade to the Middle East in early 1190. Opinions of Richard by his contemporaries varied. He had rejected and humiliated the king of France's sister; deposed the king of Cyprus and sold the island; insulted and refused to give spoils from the Third Crusade to Leopold V, Duke of Austria, and allegedly arranged the assassination of Conrad of Montferrat. His cruelty was exemplified by the massacre of 2,600 prisoners in Acre.^[37] However, Richard was respected for his military leadership and courtly manners. Despite victories in the Third Crusade he failed to capture Jerusalem, retreating from the Holy Land with a small band of followers.^[38]

Richard was captured by Leopold on his return journey. He was transferred to Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor, and a 25-percent tax on goods and income was required to pay his 150,000-mark ransom.^[39][40] Philip II of France had overrun Normandy, while John of England controlled much of Richard's remaining lands.^[41] However, when Richard returned to England he forgave John and re-established his control.^[42] Leaving England permanently in 1194, Richard fought Philip for five years for the return of holdings seized during his incarceration.^[43] On the brink of victory, he was wounded by an arrow during the siege of Château de Châlus-Chabrol and died ten days later.^[44]

His failure to produce an heir caused a succession crisis. Anjou, Brittany, Maine and Touraine chose Richard's nephew Arthur as heir, while John succeeded in England and Normandy. Philip II of France again destabilised the Plantagenet territories on the European mainland, supporting his vassal Arthur's claim to the English crown. Eleanor supported her son John, who was victorious at the Battle of Mirebeau and captured the rebel leadership.^[45]

Arthur was murdered (allegedly by John), and his sister Eleanor would spend the rest of her life in captivity. John's behaviour drove a number of French barons to side with Philip, and the resulting rebellions by Norman and Angevin barons ended John's control of his continental possessions—the de facto end of the Angevin Empire, although Henry III would maintain his claim until 1259.^[46]

After re-establishing his authority in England, John planned to retake Normandy and Anjou by drawing the French from Paris while another army (under Otto IV, Holy Roman Emperor) attacked from the north. However, his allies were defeated at the Battle of Bouvines in one of the most decisive battles in French history.^[47][48] John's nephew Otto retreated and was soon overthrown, with John agreeing to a five-year truce. Philip's victory was crucial to the political order in England and France, and the battle was instrumental in establishing absolute monarchy in France.^[49]

John's French defeats weakened his position in England. The rebellion of his English vassals resulted in

Legacy

House of Plantagenet

Historians^[who?] use the period of Prince Louis's invasion to mark the end of the Angevin period and the beginning of the Plantagenet dynasty.^{[citation needed]} The outcome of the military situation was uncertain at John's death; William Marshall saved the dynasty, forcing Louis to renounce his claim with a military victory.^[51] However, Philip had captured all the Angevin possessions in France except Gascony. This collapse had several causes, including long-term changes in economic power, growing cultural differences between England and Normandy and (in particular) the fragile, familial nature of Henry's empire.^[53] Henry III continued his attempts to reclaim Normandy and Anjou until 1259, but John's continental losses and the consequent growth of Capetian power during the 13th century marked a "turning point in European history".^[54]

Henry VIII of England.^[14]

Descent

Through John, descent from the Angevins (legitimate and illegitimate) is widespread, and includes all subsequent monarchs of England and the United Kingdom. He had five legitimate children with Isabella:

• Henry III – king of England for most of the 13th century
• Richard – a noted European leader and King of the Romans in the Holy Roman Empire^[55]
• Joan – married Alexander II of Scotland, becoming his queen consort.^[56]
• Isabella – married the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II.^[57]
• Eleanor – married William Marshal's son (also called William) and, later, English rebel Simon de Montfort.^[58]

John also had illegitimate children with a number of mistresses, including nine sons—

Llywelyn the Great of Wales.^[60]

Contemporary opinion

The chronicler Gerald of Wales borrowed elements of the Melusine legend to give the Angevins a demonic origin, and the kings were said to tell jokes about the stories.^[61]

Henry was widely criticised by contemporaries, even in his own court.^[62][63] Nevertheless, William of Newburgh, writing after his death, commented that "the experience of present evils has revived the memory of his good deeds, and the man who in his own time was hated by all men, is now declared to have been an excellent and beneficent prince".^[64] Henry's son Richard's contemporary image was more nuanced, since he was the first king who was also a knight.^[65] Known as a valiant, competent and generous military leader, he was criticised by chroniclers for taxing the clergy for the Crusade and his ransom; clergy were usually exempt from taxes.^[66]

Chroniclers

Roger of Hoveden and Ralph de Diceto were generally unsympathetic to John's behaviour under Richard, but more tolerant of the earliest years of John's reign.^[67] Accounts of the middle and later years of his reign are limited to Gervase of Canterbury and Ralph of Coggeshall, neither of whom were satisfied with John's performance as king.^[68][69] His later negative reputation was established by two chroniclers writing after the king's death: Roger of Wendover and Matthew Paris. The latter claimed that John attempted to convert to Islam, but this is not believed by modern historians.^[70]

Constitutional impact

Many of the changes Henry introduced during his rule had long-term consequences. His legal innovations form part of the basis for English law, with the Exchequer of Pleas a forerunner of the Common Bench at Westminster.^[71] Henry's itinerant justices also influenced his contemporaries' legal reforms: Philip Augustus's creation of itinerant bailli, for example, drew on Henry's model.^[72] Henry's intervention in Brittany, Wales and Scotland had a significant long-term impact on the development of their societies and governments.^[73] John's reign, despite its flaws, and his signing of Magna Carta, were seen by Whig historians as positive steps in the constitutional development of England and part of a progressive and universalist course of political and economic development in medieval England.^[74] Winston Churchill said, "[W]hen the long tally is added, it will be seen that the British nation and the English-speaking world owe far more to the vices of John than to the labours of virtuous sovereigns".^[75] Magna Carta was reissued by the Marshal Protectorate and later as a foundation of future government.^[52]

Architecture, language and literature

There was no distinct Angevin or Plantagenet culture that would distinguish or set them apart from their neighbours in this period.

Latin or the church.^[76]

The Angevins were closely associated with the

Raymond VII of Toulouse and John's wife—Isabella of Angoulême.^[77] Henry III visited the abbey in 1254 to reorder these tombs and requested that his heart be buried with them.^[78]

Historiography

According to historian John Gillingham, Henry and his reign have attracted historians for many years and Richard (whose reputation has "fluctuated wildly")^[79] is remembered largely because of his military exploits. Steven Runciman, in the third volume of the History of the Crusades, wrote: "He was a bad son, a bad husband, and a bad king, but a gallant and splendid soldier."^[80] Eighteenth-century historian

Protestant historians view Henry's role in Thomas Becket's death and his disputes with the French as worthy of praise.^[84] Similarly, increased access to contemporary records during the late Victorian era led to a recognition of Henry's contributions to the evolution of English law and the exchequer.^[85] William Stubbs called Henry a "legislator king" because of his responsibility for major, long-term reforms in England; in contrast, Richard was "a bad son, a bad husband, a selfish ruler, and a vicious man".^[85][86]

He was a bad king: his great exploits, his military skill, his splendour and extravagance, his poetical tastes, his adventurous spirit, do not serve to cloak his entire want of sympathy, or even consideration, for his people. He was no Englishman, but it does not follow that he gave to Normandy, Anjou, or Aquitaine the love or care that he denied to his kingdom. His ambition was that of a mere warrior: he would fight for anything whatever, but he would sell everything that was worth fighting for. The glory that he sought was that of victory rather than conquest.

William Stubbs, on Richard[87]

The growth of the

pipe rolls), for example, has been criticised for not acknowledging uncertainty.^[91] Although many of Henry's royal charters have been identified, their interpretation, the financial information in the pipe rolls and broad economic data from his reign has proven more challenging than once thought.^[92][93] Significant gaps in the historical analysis of Henry remain, particularly about his rule in Anjou and the south of France.^[94]

Interest in the morality of historical figures and scholars waxed during the Victorian period, leading to increased criticism of Henry's behaviour and Becket's death.[95] Historians relied on the judgement of chroniclers to focus on John's ethos. Norgate wrote that John's downfall was due not to his military failures but his "almost superhuman wickedness", and James Ramsay blamed John's family background and innate cruelty for his downfall.^[96][97]

Richard's sexuality has been controversial since the 1940s, when John Harvey challenged what he saw as "the conspiracy of silence" surrounding the king's homosexuality with chronicles of Richard's behaviour, two public confessions, penances and childless marriage.^[98] Opinion remains divided, with Gillingham arguing against Richard's homosexuality^[98] and Jean Flori acknowledging its possibility.^[98][99]

According to recent biographers Ralph Turner and Lewis Warren, although John was an unsuccessful monarch, his failings were exaggerated by 12th- and 13th-century chroniclers.^[100] Jim Bradbury echoes the contemporary consensus that John was a "hard-working administrator, an able man, an able general" with, as Turner suggests, "distasteful, even dangerous personality traits".^[101] John Gillingham (author of a biography of Richard I) agrees and judges John to be a less-effective general than Turner and Warren do. Bradbury takes a middle view, suggesting that modern historians have been overly lenient in evaluating John's flaws.^[102] Popular historian Frank McLynn wrote that the king's modern reputation amongst historians is "bizarre" and, as a monarch, John "fails almost all those [tests] that can be legitimately set".^[103]

In popular culture

Main articles:

Cultural depictions of John of England

Henry II appears as a fictionalised character in several modern plays and films. The king is a central character in James Goldman's play The Lion in Winter (1966), depicting an imaginary encounter between Henry's family and Philip Augustus over Christmas 1183 at Chinon. Philip's strong character contrasts with John, an "effete weakling".^[104] In the 1968 film, Henry is a sacrilegious, fiery and determined king.^[105][106] Henry also appears in Jean Anouilh's play Becket, which was filmed in 1964.^[107] The Becket conflict is the basis for T. S. Eliot's play Murder in the Cathedral, an exploration of Becket's death and Eliot's religious interpretation of it.^[108]

During the Tudor period, popular representations of John emerged.

Richard is the subject of two operas: In 1719, George Frideric Handel used Richard's invasion of Cyprus as the plot for Riccardo Primo, and, in 1784, André Grétry wrote Richard Coeur-de-lion.

Robin Hood

The earliest ballads of

During the 13th century, a folktale developed in which Richard's minstrel

• Angevin Empire, for further information on the Angevin domains
• House of Plantagenet, for details on the successors of the Angevins and the wider family
• Valois House of Anjou
  , other dynasties called "Angevin" by some historians
• Treaty of Louviers, for a peace agreement between King Richard I of England and King Philip II of France
• Capetian-Plantagenet rivalry
  , for an overview of the conflict between Henry II and his descendants against the Kings of France

References

Cited works