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Documentary, The Plantagenets - Part 1 - The Devils Brood
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00:00In early medieval France, the Count of Anjou became enthralled by a mysterious woman.
00:18They married and had several children.
00:21But the Count grew concerned, because his wife always left church before Mass was celebrated.
00:34One day, he ordered his knights to stop her.
00:42But she pulled free and flew out through a window.
00:51The Countess of Anjou was never seen again.
00:58According to this legend, all fifteen Plantagenet kings of England were descended from the demon Countess of Anjou.
01:05Her blood flowed in their veins.
01:07And over the centuries, this provided an explanation for the fierce temper, the bloody family feuds and the brutality of the Plantagenets.
01:16Richard the Lionheart himself once declared defiantly,
01:18From the devil we came, and to the devil we will go.
01:27In the medieval world, all politics was family politics.
01:32And the Plantagenet family dominated England for more than 300 years.
01:38Through some of the nation's most famous and infamous kings.
01:42King John, Henry the Fifth, Richard the Third.
01:53They were driven by dynastic ambition, striving to expand their power beyond their French homeland.
02:00In the process, the culture and politics of the British Isles were transformed.
02:04England's distinctive system of justice was established.
02:11Parliament was born.
02:13And the great Gothic cathedrals transformed the landscape.
02:22The Plantagenets developed a new style of warfare in their attempt to claim Scotland.
02:28They conquered Wales.
02:31And half of Ireland.
02:34And their great royal castles hammered home their power.
02:41When the Plantagenets won the Kingdom of England, it was shattered and lawless.
02:47Under their rule, it was transformed into one of the best-governed states in Christendom.
02:53But their story is one of intrigue, conflict and violence.
02:58They fought their enemies, but also turned on each other.
03:01Sons made war on fathers.
03:03Brothers betrayed brothers.
03:05Powerful queens conspired.
03:07The future of Western Europe would be shaped by this extraordinary dynasty.
03:12This Devil's Brood.
03:13The story of England's longest reigning dynasty begins here in Anjou, Western France.
03:4112th century France was dominated by its great barons rather than by its nominal king.
03:50And these fertile farmlands of the Loire Valley were the domain of the Count of Anjou.
03:59In 1128, an enraged princess arrived here.
04:03Her name was Matilda, and she was the only surviving legitimate child of King Henry I of England,
04:08and his acknowledged heir.
04:11Her father had commanded her to marry a 15-year-old boy, Geoffrey, the eldest son of the Count of Anjou.
04:17Matilda was outraged.
04:19She was 26 years old.
04:21She was the granddaughter of William the Conqueror.
04:23She was the widow of the mighty Holy Roman Emperor.
04:26She always called herself Empress.
04:28Geoffrey was the heir of a mere Count.
04:30Matilda was notoriously willful, but in the selection of a husband she had no say.
04:42Princesses were a powerful tool used by Europe's medieval dynasties to expand their territories.
04:49King Henry hoped that the arranged marriage at Le Mans Cathedral would produce a male heir,
04:57who would ultimately become Count of Anjou, Duke of Normandy, and King of England.
05:09Things didn't go according to plan.
05:11Both Geoffrey and Matilda were proud and quarrelsome people,
05:14and after a tumultuous year they separated.
05:17But this was, above all, a political union,
05:21and a reconciliation was soon imposed.
05:24Matilda rejoined her teenage husband and performed her royal duty,
05:28giving him three sons in three years.
05:31This ended any doubts about the succession,
05:34and also laid the foundations of a powerful new dynasty.
05:38Le Mans Museum contains the only surviving image of Geoffrey of Anjou.
05:51It once adorned his tomb.
05:58This plaque contains one of the earliest examples of heraldry,
06:02that system of vivid symbols through which the ruling families of Europe
06:05were beginning to proclaim their dynastic pride.
06:09The distinctive pattern of blue and white on the inside of Geoffrey's cloak
06:14is called ver, representing the winter pelt of squirrels.
06:18And the golden lions on his shield were adopted by his descendants as the royal coat of arms,
06:24and ultimately became one of the most familiar national symbols of England.
06:28Geoffrey was an energetic, intelligent man with golden red hair.
06:37By all accounts, he was handsome and known as Geoffrey the Fair.
06:43But he also had another name.
06:46It comes from the Latin for the broom plant.
06:50Planta genista. Plantagenet.
06:55No one knows for certain why Geoffrey was called Plantagenet.
07:01One theory is that it's because he wore a sprig of the plant in his hat.
07:05But in any case, for over 300 years, none of his descendants bore the name.
07:10Kings don't need surnames.
07:11But it's proved a useful label for historians to describe that long line of monarchs
07:17who descended from Matilda and the young Geoffrey of Anjou.
07:24Fifteen Plantagenets would be crowned kings of England.
07:28But they had to fight to win the throne.
07:33Henry I had named Matilda his heir.
07:35But when he died in 1135, the English throne was seized by Matilda's cousin, Stephen.
07:51The Plantagenets fought back.
07:53Geoffrey led a successful invasion of Normandy,
07:56which had been part of Henry I's dominions,
07:58while Matilda crossed the channel to claim her crown.
08:01This started almost two decades of civil war.
08:03Government virtually collapsed,
08:06and England descended into a period of bloody conflict,
08:09often called simply, the Anarchy.
08:16The Peterborough Chronicle describes England's fate
08:20as the Plantagenets fought to secure their birthright.
08:24God and his saints slept.
08:28Every powerful man built his castle
08:30and filled it with devils and evil men.
08:36They grievously oppressed the wretched people of the land.
08:41They tortured them for their gold.
08:44And when the people had no more to give,
08:49they plundered and burned.
08:50In the winter of 1142, the war turned against Matilda.
09:03Her cousin Stephen besieged her here in Oxford Castle.
09:07Her garrison held out for three months,
09:10but with their supplies running low, they were close to surrender.
09:13One wintry night, Matilda wrapped herself in a white cloak.
09:21Camouflaged against the heavy snow, she slipped out of a side gate.
09:26She crossed the frozen river in front of the castle,
09:33and managed to pass unseen through the ranks of Stephen's army.
09:38Matilda trudged for seven miles through the frigid night.
09:44She eventually made it to the safety of Wallingford Castle.
09:47Now she was free to continue her struggle.
09:52For another decade, civil war ravaged England.
09:56The fighting could only be brought to a stop when her eldest son came of age.
10:01A male heir, a direct descendant of Henry I.
10:10Matilda's son Henry was a charismatic young man
10:12who'd inherited Matilda's determination and temper.
10:17Along with Geoffrey Plantagenet's red hair, intelligence and boundless energy.
10:23Henry also inherited his parents' claims to the English throne and much of northern France.
10:31As a young man, he was granted Normandy.
10:35Later, he inherited Anjou.
10:39He then expanded Plantagenet territory again through a profitable and unexpected marriage.
10:50This is the great hall of the Ducal Palace in Poitiers.
10:54Home of the court of Aquitaine.
10:56That vast and wealthy principality that encompassed a quarter of the French lands.
11:01The Duke had an only child.
11:04A beautiful and well-educated daughter called Eleanor.
11:07When she was about 15, her father died unexpectedly.
11:12Eleanor of Aquitaine was now the greatest catch in Europe.
11:17The King of France, Louis VII, snatched the prize.
11:24But Louis couldn't hold onto Eleanor or Aquitaine.
11:28The King was a pious man, but his new queen was ambitious and worldly.
11:37Eleanor once said, I've married a monk, not a monarch.
11:43And there was another problem.
11:49The French King needed a son.
11:52And Eleanor gave birth only to girls.
11:55After 15 years and two daughters, Louis persuaded the church to declare the marriage void.
12:01The great heiress was once again available.
12:09Suitors circled, eager to obtain her hand and her lands.
12:14But Eleanor was headstrong and independent.
12:18She was determined to marry the man who could help her fulfill her own dynastic ambitions.
12:22Henry Plantagenet.
12:32Eleanor sent word to Henry to meet her in Aquitaine.
12:37As she made her way there from Paris, Eleanor had to evade kidnappers who wanted to marry her forcibly and lay claim to her lands.
12:45Henry and Eleanor married in a hastily arranged ceremony in Poitiers Cathedral.
13:04This was a scandalous marriage.
13:08Henry was 19, Eleanor around 30.
13:12And Eleanor's union with the King of France had been annulled only two months earlier.
13:22The French King had been outmanoeuvred by his ex-queen and Henry Plantagenet.
13:27He was humiliated by the scandal and he'd also lost half his territories.
13:32By inheritance, by conquest and now by marriage, Henry had built up an enormous conglomeration of lands in France.
13:38And soon he and Eleanor would have four sons to secure the future of the dynasty.
13:44But the French King never forgave the Plantagenet upstart.
13:48The Plantagenets were still fighting for their birthright in England.
13:58But the dynasty was thriving.
14:01A decade after Henry and Eleanor's wedding, this cathedral was completely rebuilt in the new Gothic style sweeping across France.
14:14Structurally stronger pointed arches allowed these dramatic soaring vaults.
14:22And vast windows.
14:24Henry and Eleanor graced the new cathedral with the gift of this wonderful east window.
14:34It's one of the oldest stained glass windows in France.
14:37The royal couple are themselves depicted on it, along with their four sons, presenting their gift to God.
14:53It proclaims the piety of the Plantagenet dynasty and their family solidarity.
15:07Henry now set his sights on winning the greatest prize of all.
15:20The English crown.
15:22Crossing the channel with a small army, Henry found England devastated by nearly two decades of the civil war between Stephen and Matilda's supporters.
15:44His arrival persuaded many barons to join the Plantagenet cause.
15:57Henry's and Stephen's armies confronted one another here at Wallingford Castle.
16:03These few mounds and walls are all that remain of one of the mightiest fortresses of medieval England.
16:08Stephen was besieging the castle and Henry had come to relieve Matilda's loyal forces.
16:15The armies faced one another across the river.
16:19A contemporary chronicle, the Gesta Stephanie, describes what happened next.
16:23It was a terrible thing to see so many armed men with drawn swords, ready to kill their relatives and fellow countrymen.
16:38And so, the chief men on each side shrank in horror from civil war.
16:51And the destruction of their kingdom.
17:02Because the two armies refused to fight, Stephen and Henry were forced to talk.
17:06According to the chronicles, they met outside the castle, one on either side of the stream.
17:13And eventually, they came to an agreement.
17:16King Stephen would continue to rule.
17:19But he recognised Henry as his lawful heir.
17:23The very next year, Stephen was seized by a terrible pain in the gut and a flow of blood.
17:30The king was dead.
17:32The negotiations that began here would lead to more than three centuries of Plantagenet rule in England.
17:41On the 19th of December, 1154, Henry II became the first Plantagenet king of England.
17:52This French-speaking monarch now ruled a vast empire that stretched from the Scottish borders...
18:02...to the Pyrenees...
18:05...to the Pyrenees.
18:14Henry's first priority was to restore peace and order.
18:17He tore down hundreds of the barons' castles.
18:29Then, to extend Plantagenet power across the country, Henry turned to the law.
18:35This manuscript, which is more than 800 years old, is one of the treasures of Balliol College Oxford.
18:47It contains a text known as Glanville, the earliest guide to the workings of the English law.
18:53It was written during the reign of Henry II, and is one of the foundations of the English legal system.
19:00These are its opening words.
19:03Royal power should not only be adorned with arms to fight rebels and hostile peoples, but also with laws to rule its subjects in peace.
19:13Henry inherited a complex judicial system, where cases could be heard in a variety of local courts.
19:21In order to concentrate power in his own hands, Henry introduced swift and consistent royal justice, as set out here in Glanville.
19:31Henry established central courts at Westminster, and sent newly appointed royal justices on a circuit around the country.
19:44These circuit judges would meet regularly and agree to follow one another's decisions, thus ensuring common practice throughout England.
19:55A distinct method of law-making emerged. Laws now evolved through precedent, as well as royal decree.
20:10Disputes over land were important in this agricultural society.
20:14Traditionally, they had been determined by trial by battle, in which the opponents exchanged blows to resolve the issue.
20:20Only the king could summon a body of men to give a verdict on oath.
20:26So royal justice could offer a new, non-violent alternative, something not available in the baronial courts.
20:34Trial by jury.
20:36Every free man can retain his right in his tenement, and avoid the doubtful outcome of a duel.
20:43When the twelve knights have been chosen, they are to be summoned to come to court, to swear on oath which party has the greater right.
20:53This legal revolution was motivated by Henry's royal and dynastic ambitions.
20:59But it laid the foundations for the common law, the system that still governs legal practice and procedure, in England and in the United States, to this day.
21:09Henry's imposition of Plantagenet control alienated many English barons.
21:19It also provoked a power struggle between crown and church.
21:24It came to a head in a bitter conflict between Henry and one of his most loyal friends, Thomas Becket.
21:34Becket was the son of a London merchant who'd enjoyed an extraordinary rise to power.
21:41Henry had made him his chancellor, in charge of the day-to-day running of the government on the king's behalf.
21:47And he'd acquired enormous wealth.
21:49While Henry disdained luxury and pageantry, his chancellor revelled in it.
21:54But the two were close friends.
21:55William Fitzstephen, who later served as Becket's clerk, says that the two of them hunted, joked and played together like boys.
22:03The unexpected reverse in the friendship came in 1162, following the death of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
22:17The king was convinced that Becket would make an ideal replacement.
22:24Someone who would support him in curtailing the judicial powers of the church.
22:29Once Becket was in office, he immediately resigned as chancellor and devoted himself to the interests of the church.
22:38The two of them soon clashed over the proper limits of priestly power.
22:43Becket supported the church's view that the clergy should not be subject to King Henry's royal courts,
22:49but should be tried in special church courts, where the worst punishment, even for rape or murder, was expulsion from the clergy.
23:02Becket refused to compromise.
23:05In fear of the king's wrath, he spent six years exiled in France.
23:10In 1170, he reached a form of reconciliation with the king and came home.
23:19But, from the pulpit in Canterbury, he immediately began to excommunicate all who had crossed him.
23:26This news provoked an outburst of demonic, plantagenet fury.
23:35I have brought up and raised some feeble and wretched men in my kingdom who are not loyal to their lord,
23:41whom they allow to be mocked so shamefully by some low-born clergyman.
23:44Legend has simplified King Henry's words into,
23:49Who will rid me of this turbulent priest?
23:57Four knights decided they understood the king's wish.
24:03In Canterbury, they found Becket eating in the bishop's palace.
24:09Harsh words were exchanged.
24:11The archbishop then made his way through these cloisters and into the cathedral.
24:26The four found Becket here, in the north transept.
24:30They attempted to drag him back outside, but the archbishop clung to a pillar,
24:34calling them pimps and madmen.
24:36They struck out.
24:42The first blows felled Becket.
24:45Then, one of the knights hit him with such force that he sliced off the top of his head.
24:52The sword itself shattered on the paving stones.
25:00The knights spread Becket's brains on the floor and ran off, one of them calling out,
25:05this one won't rise again.
25:06This one won't rise again.
25:07This one won't rise again.
25:29Within days, stories began to circulate that Becket's blood had miraculous powers.
25:34Soon, people with fevers, tumours, swollen legs were being cured by a single drop.
25:44The Pope declared Becket a saint.
25:48Pilgrims came here in their thousands.
26:00They purchased little badges or tokens like this one, and they would take these home and wear them on their clothes or on their hats.
26:06Or they might acquire flasks like this, containing a tiny drop of Becket's blood diluted in water.
26:16And they would wear them around their necks for protection, or even drink the water in the hope of a miraculous cure.
26:22These objects show that Becket was more successful in death than he had been in life.
26:31Henry's expansion of Plantagenet power had turned many nobles against him, and Becket's murder shattered his reputation in France.
26:56Henry struggled to hold his sprawling empire together.
27:05He had limitless energy, and was never in the same place for long.
27:09King Louis of France once said of him,
27:11Now in England, now in Normandy, he must fly rather than travel by boat or horse.
27:18The French king was always eager to stir up dissension in the Plantagenet family.
27:22He was still furious about Eleanor's marriage to Henry.
27:26Complicating matters was Eleanor herself.
27:29She may have been Henry's queen, but she was not always his ally.
27:32In fact, the greatest threat to Henry came from his own wife and children.
27:47Henry and Eleanor had three daughters and five sons together.
27:51Four of the boys lived to adulthood.
27:54Henry, Richard, Geoffrey, and the youngest and the king's favourite, John.
28:04After John's birth, Eleanor moved back to Aquitaine.
28:10She insisted her favourite son, Richard, be made Duke.
28:14Her scheme was to rule her homeland in his name.
28:21But Henry frustrated Eleanor and his teenage son.
28:25Plantagenet's sons were impatient to exercise real power.
28:32They had been brought up to command, trained in deadly warfare,
28:36their political marriages often arranged in infancy.
28:39At the age of 20, Henry himself ruled half of France
28:42and had been promised the throne of England.
28:45His sons were equally ambitious.
28:52Henry and Eleanor's eldest son, Henry the Younger,
28:56sparked the first great Plantagenet family implosion.
29:01His father had agreed to let him be crowned Joint King of England,
29:06but refused to trust him with any authority or independent income.
29:10Encouraged by Louis of France, young Henry raised a rebellion against his father.
29:19His younger brothers, Richard and Geoffrey, also joined the revolt.
29:24They were supported by disaffected French counts
29:30and some of England's most powerful barons.
29:32Then Eleanor joined the fray.
29:42Medieval kings often faced rebellious sons.
29:45A rebellious queen was less common and more shocking.
29:49So when Eleanor was caught attempting to cross France to join her sons,
29:52Henry regarded this as the greatest betrayal of all.
29:56Perhaps even more shocking was the fact that she was disguised as a man.
29:59This is the ancient chapel of St. Radagond,
30:18carved into the cliffs below the Plantagenet fortress of Chinon in Anjou.
30:23It's been a place of worship since Roman times.
30:32In 1964, this 12th century fresco was discovered under centuries of grime.
30:39It's widely agreed that they are the Plantagenets.
30:47And it could be significant that their cloaks have the same blue and white lining
30:51as we find on Geoffrey Plantagenet's funerary plaque.
30:54But it's not quite certain who they are.
30:56It could be Henry II and his four sons.
30:59The first crowned figure being Henry II,
31:01and the other crowned figure being Henry the Young King,
31:05who was the only son of an English king to be crowned in his father's lifetime.
31:09But one scholar claims to see Eleanor of Aquitaine being led off into captivity in England,
31:16where she was in fact held a prisoner by her husband for the next 16 years.
31:20With his formidable wife imprisoned in England,
31:41Henry did battle with the French king, the rebel barons,
31:44and his own sons for 18 months.
31:51The rebels claimed that Thomas Becket, the new martyr, was on their side.
31:56And Henry sought to ward off the martyr's anger
31:59by a remarkable act of public atonement for the murder.
32:02At the height of the rebellion, the proud Plantagenet king came to Canterbury.
32:07Here, at the west gate, he dismounted, removed his shoes,
32:10and walked barefoot through the crowded streets.
32:24Henry made his way to the shrine of his murdered friend.
32:29He removed his cloak to reveal a hair shirt,
32:33and submitted to being beaten bloody by the bishops and monks.
32:37He spent the night prostrate on the bare stone floor.
32:48Henry's salvation came quickly.
32:53The very next day, his troops won a stunning victory over his enemies,
32:58and soon they were all brought to submission.
33:01But Henry had been forced to abase himself before the clergy,
33:03and recognised the authority of the church.
33:06Tension between monarchy and church was never fully resolved.
33:10But the Plantagenet settlement with the Pope held for the next 350 years.
33:19There was no settlement between the Plantagenets and the French monarchy,
33:24despite a new king, Philip, taking the throne.
33:26He encouraged Henry the Younger and his brother Geoffrey to rebel again.
33:35This time, they attacked their brother Richard's Duchy of Aquitaine,
33:39and occupied the city of Limoges.
33:41Henry the Second marched on the city and rode up to the walls, hoping to reason with his sons.
33:53Henry the Younger ordered archers to fire on his own father.
34:09An arrow narrowly missed the king.
34:13A few months later, young Henry was struck down with dysentery.
34:24To fight against your father and against the king was a sin.
34:28And Henry believed that his illness was divine retribution.
34:32As an act of penance, he gave away all his possessions.
34:36He lay on a bed of ashes, dressed in a hair shirt, with a noose around his neck like a common criminal.
34:41Young King Henry died with nothing but the sapphire ring his father had sent him as a token of forgiveness.
34:50When he heard of the death of his eldest son, old King Henry said,
34:55He cost me much, but I wish he lived to cost me more.
34:59Now, it was Richard's turn to betray his father.
35:07And once again, the French King was the family traitor's ally.
35:13The two spent the summer pursuing the aging Henry around France.
35:19They eventually besieged him here, in his birthplace, Le Mans.
35:34In order to deny his assailant supplies and a base,
35:38Henry ordered that the suburbs outside the city walls should be put to the torch.
35:41But the wind changed and the flames leapt over these ancient Roman walls into the city itself.
35:49Henry was forced to abandon Le Mans.
35:52Ill and exhausted, he had to submit to his treacherous son.
35:57But as he gave Richard the kiss of peace, he whispered in his ear,
36:00God grant that I do not die until I have avenged myself on you.
36:16Too sick to walk, Henry was carried here to Chinon Castle.
36:20He was shown a list of those who had rebelled against him.
36:27At its head was the name of his youngest and favourite son.
36:33Is it true, he said, that John, my heart, whom I have loved more than all my other sons, has abandoned me?
36:40On the 6th of July, 1189, betrayed by his wife and every son, Henry, the first Plantagenet King of England died.
36:50His last words are said to have been, shame, shame on a conquered king.
37:01The King of England's body was buried here, in the abbey of Fontevro in Anjou.
37:06The Plantagenet's future now lay in the hands of Richard, a dynamic and bloodthirsty warrior.
37:27One of Richard's courtiers said he was furious in arms, rejoicing to travel only on bloodstained roads.
37:40But when he arrived here to stand vigil over his dead father's body,
37:46he is said to have wept bitterly over the king he had betrayed.
37:50As he did so, blood began to pour from the dead king's nostrils.
37:54According to medieval beliefs, this was sure sign of the presence of a murderer.
38:04The traitorous son would become the great English hero, Richard the Lionheart.
38:10But he could speak barely a word of English.
38:14He visited his kingdom only briefly for his coronation,
38:17and in the ten years of his reign spent only six months in the country.
38:26The moment he became king, Richard had his mother Eleanor released from captivity and made regent of England.
38:33Richard, the favourite son, bestowed on his mother the power of doing whatever she wished in the kingdom.
38:42He himself regarded England primarily as a source of money to fund his wars,
38:48to assert Plantagenet power in France, or to win glory and spiritual merit on crusade.
38:53He once said, I would sell London if I could find a buyer.
39:03Europe had been gripped by crusading fever since Jerusalem had fallen to Saladin's Muslim forces.
39:10The prestige of reclaiming the holy city was irresistibly appealing to the warlike new king.
39:18Philip of France also vowed to go on crusade.
39:23The two kings arranged to meet here at Vaiselais Abbey in Burgundy.
39:29The chronicle of the Third Crusade describes how these hills and valleys were filled with the tents and pavilions of two vast armies.
39:41It looked like a new city.
39:48Richard and Philip spent two days here planning the campaign.
39:52They considered their crusade an armed pilgrimage.
39:58Their hardships would earn them absolution for their sins.
40:07They swore a sacred oath, agreeing to divide the spoils of war equally.
40:13The two great pilgrim armies then set out for the Holy Land.
40:18But on the way, the grand alliance forged here turned sour.
40:33In Sicily, Richard caused outrage by reneging on a childhood betrothal to the French king's sister.
40:40The old feud between the Plantagenets and the French monarchy was reignited.
40:46The armies then made their way separately to the Holy Land.
40:52Philip arrived first and joined a Christian siege of the strategically crucial port of Acre.
41:01The Plantagenet army arrived seven weeks later.
41:05Richard immediately assumed command and re-energized the faltering assault.
41:10Richard already had a reputation for ferocity and his name struck fear into the Muslims.
41:21The King of England was a very powerful man, wrote one of Saladin's officials.
41:25A man of great spirit and courage.
41:27He'd fought many great battles and had a burning passion for war.
41:30Muslim mothers told their children, be good or the King of England will get you.
41:37Within two months of his arrival, the city that had held out for two years, surrendered.
41:42Once again, a French king was humiliated by a Plantagenet.
41:51Announcing his crusade complete, Philip returned to France.
41:56Richard fought on.
41:59But his arrogance turned many allies into enemies.
42:07After 18 months, Richard headed home.
42:10But en route was captured and imprisoned by the Duke of Austria.
42:14One of the enemies he'd made in the Holy Land.
42:17The Plantagenet Empire was left in the hands of his mother and his younger brother, John.
42:32It had always been difficult to fit the youngest Plantagenet son into the family plans.
42:37There had been no territories left to award John and he'd been nicknamed Lackland.
42:42Henry had finally managed to make him Lord of Ireland.
42:50But John wanted the English crown.
42:54He began plotting with Philip of France.
43:00In exchange for his backing, John agreed to hand him the strategically vital Vexin region,
43:06guarded by this great border fortress of Gisor.
43:08Gisor protected the gateway between the lands of the King of France in that direction,
43:14which began just beyond the castle walls,
43:17and Plantagenet Normandy, with its capital at Rouen, just a day's ride away in that direction.
43:23John was making a terrible mistake.
43:26By agreeing to surrender the Vexin, he was leaving Normandy defenceless.
43:30John and Philip did their best to make sure Richard stayed in his prison.
43:39But Eleanor was doing all she could to free her favourite son.
43:44Eventually, Eleanor managed to raise the enormous ransom.
43:51Thirty-four tons of silver. A king's ransom indeed.
43:55Philip sent John word.
43:58Beware, the devil is loosed.
44:00On Richard's return, John was forced to submit.
44:09Richard then set about reconquering what John had lost.
44:14In 1197, Richard confronted Philip's army before the walls of Gisor.
44:19Richard is said to have ridden at the French, just as a raving lion starved of food runs on his prey.
44:32As they fled, Philip and his knights crowded onto the bridge at Gisor in such numbers that it collapsed.
44:39Twenty knights drowned.
44:41King Philip was dragged out alive, but was said to have drunk of the river.
44:45Richard had Philip on the run.
44:55Richard had survived many savage campaigns far from home.
45:02But in the spring of 1199, his luck ran out.
45:06While laying siege to the castle of a rebellious baron in Aquitaine, he was struck by a crossbow bolt.
45:20Returning to his tent, he broke off the shaft, but the head was too deeply embedded in his shoulder.
45:34The wound festered.
45:36Richard wrote a last letter to his mother, Eleanor, asking her to come to him.
45:40But it was too late.
45:41His body was buried alongside his father in the abbey of Fontevrault.
45:47The heart of the lion, said to be of great size, was interred in the Norman capital, Rouen.
45:53John was now the only surviving son of Henry and Eleanor.
46:04His older brother, Geoffrey, had died in 1186.
46:10But just as the English crown seemed in his grasp, he faced another contender for the throne.
46:17Geoffrey's teenage son, Arthur.
46:23John quickly secured his coronation at Westminster.
46:27But yet again, the French king provoked a Plantagenet family feud by supporting Arthur's claim to the English crown.
46:37Wicked uncles are a common feature of medieval dynastic politics.
46:42Like John, they're usually younger brothers.
46:44They watch from the sidelines as an older brother attains the exalted position of king.
46:51But if that brother dies, it's understandable that they might think,
46:55I could tolerate being subordinate to my older brother, but not to my snotty-nosed nephew.
47:01And in this violent world, it's not surprising if the uncle sometimes decides that the nephew must be eliminated.
47:08In 1202, Arthur led an army into Anjou, hoping to capture his grandmother, Eleanor.
47:21The great Plantagenet matriarch was now 80.
47:26John rushed to Anjou to free her, and young Arthur was captured.
47:39No one is certain what happened to Arthur after that.
47:41But a contemporary chronicler claims that Arthur's own jailer told him of the boy's fate.
47:48According to him, John at first kept his 16-year-old nephew a prisoner.
47:53But then one night, after dinner, when John was drunk and full of the devil,
47:58he went to Arthur's cell and killed him with his own hands.
48:03Then tied a huge stone around the corpse and tossed it into the river Seine.
48:15Philip of France refused to make peace with John until Arthur was handed over alive.
48:23He probably knew this was impossible.
48:25One by one, John lost the Plantagenet's French domains.
48:34In 1204, Philip conquered Plantagenet Normandy.
48:39After 300 years, it was now fully part of France once again.
48:44Soon, all that remained of the Plantagenet's continental empire was Gascony,
48:50a fragment of Eleanor's great duchy of Aquitaine.
48:53Eleanor spent her final years here in Fontevro Abbey.
49:00She lived to see her only surviving son, John, lose the great European empire she had founded and fought for.
49:07She died as the French king was closing in for his final assault on Normandy.
49:11She was buried here, alongside Henry, the husband she had betrayed, and Richard, the son she loved the most.
49:21With France lost, John was determined to tighten his grip on England.
49:34He dispossessed barons who opposed him, and exploited his royal powers to accumulate vast personal wealth.
49:47Like his father, John also resented Rome's power in his realm.
49:52And in 1206, he refused to accept the Pope's latest choice of Archbishop.
49:58In retaliation, the Pope deployed his most fearsome weapon.
50:04The Kingdom of England was placed under an interdict.
50:07This meant that all church services in England were suspended.
50:11The churches and cathedrals stood empty.
50:13No baptisms or marriages could take place in church.
50:16The dead could not be buried in churchyards.
50:19No church bells were heard in England.
50:22And this lasted six years.
50:24For believers in the so-called Age of Faith, this must have been deeply disturbing.
50:30But it made John rich.
50:31John hit back by confiscating the clergy's possessions.
50:41Here at Lincoln Cathedral, the bishop received a letter from John informing him that royal custodians
50:48would seize everything owned by clergy refusing to perform their duties.
50:57John had a malicious sense of humour.
50:59He ordered that all the priests' mistresses should be locked up and held to ransom.
51:05The King and the Pope eventually came to terms.
51:08John would accept the Pope's nominee as Archbishop,
51:12but he would keep all the money that he'd squeezed out of the church.
51:20But John wanted more money.
51:23He was determined to fund an army to win back his Plantagenet birthright.
51:29The territories he had lost in France.
51:34His English barons didn't share his dynastic ambition and were not enthusiastic.
51:40But John began to squeeze them dry, extracting what he needed through draconian taxes
51:47and by exploiting the royal courts his father had established.
51:55John soon became richer than any English king before him.
51:59The hostility this provoked was compounded by John's reputation for lechery.
52:05He was accused of sleeping with the wives and daughters of his barons and he certainly fathered at least half a dozen illegitimate children.
52:15He was too covetous of pretty women, wrote one contemporary, and brought terrible shame to the great men of the land.
52:22For this he was much hated.
52:23John trusted no one and made his barons hand over family members as hostages to guarantee their compliance.
52:35When one of his nobles, William de Brayers, prepared to give up his sons, his wife remembered how the king had treated his own nephew.
52:45William de Brayers was the baron who had served as Arthur's jailer.
52:55His wife shouted at him,
52:57I will not hand over my boys to your lord, King John, because he foully murdered his nephew Arthur when he should have kept him in honourable captivity.
53:05The king's reaction was savage.
53:08De Brayers managed to escape to France, but John captured his wife and son and imprisoned them.
53:13He commanded that their food be stopped.
53:17After eleven days, they were found starved to death.
53:21His son's cheeks had been eaten away by his ravenous mother.
53:26Plantagenet cruelty had sunk to new depths.
53:35John's invasion of France failed.
53:37And in May 1215, many English barons renounced their allegiance to him and occupied London.
53:46They demanded a settlement, liberating the nobility from absolute royal power.
53:51In desperation, John agreed to accept the demands they made.
53:59The agreement was issued in a charter sealed at Runnymede.
54:04Magna Carta, the Great Charter, is one of the most famous documents in English history.
54:17Only four copies of the original issue are known to survive, including this one held at Lincoln Castle.
54:25To secure the Plantagenets on the throne, Henry II had concentrated power in the hands of the monarch.
54:36John's abuse of that power showed the dangers of leaving it unchecked.
54:41Magna Carta was the baron's response.
54:43Some of its clauses seem quite mundane, like the one fixing the level of death duties.
54:50But this was a royal power that John had exploited for financial gain.
54:55Other clauses have a more ringing tone.
54:57No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, except by the lawful judgment of his peers and by the law of the land.
55:07To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right and justice.
55:16All the clauses are based on the idea that there is a right way of doing things, enshrined in Magna Carta as the law of the land.
55:24And the most important thing was that it bound both king and subject.
55:29Plantagenet dynastic ambition had provoked a new settlement between the monarchs and those they ruled.
55:41Magna Carta has become an emblem of liberty, but at the time it was a complete failure.
55:48The Pope called it not only shameful and demeaning, but also illegal and unjust.
56:03At John's request, he annulled it.
56:07Once again, the Plantagenets plunged England into civil war.
56:11Many barons decided they would rather be ruled by the French than by John.
56:19The rebels offered the English throne to Prince Louis, son of the Plantagenet's perennial enemy, King Philip of France.
56:27In 1216, Louis landed on the English coast and was warmly welcomed by the rebels.
56:32Some celebrated his arrival as liberation from Plantagenet tyranny.
56:39The madness of slavery is over. Days of liberty have arrived. Happy days at last, after so many evils.
56:47In his seventeen year reign, John had lost most of the Plantagenet empire.
56:56Now, the English crown was at stake.
57:08John led his mercenary army on a rampage, attacking rebel-held areas across southern England.
57:14In Kings Lynn, he contracted dysentery, but refused to rest.
57:27In October, John took a shortcut here, across the marshes of the Wash.
57:35The wagons carrying his vast accumulated treasures were cut off by the incoming tide.
57:44As the king looked on helplessly, men, horses and the treasure he'd acquired so ruthlessly were swallowed up by the quicksands.
57:52Exhausted and broken, John died three days later.
57:56In medieval Europe, the destinies of nations were determined by the lives and the deaths of their ruling dynasties.
58:04And John's death plunged the Plantagenets into crisis.
58:07His son and heir, Henry, was a nine-year-old boy.
58:12Half the kingdom that he'd inherited was in the hands of the French prince who was holding court in London.
58:18The future of the Plantagenet dynasty had never looked so bleak.
58:22In the next programme, the English Empire, the resurgent Plantagenets fight to expand their dominion across Wales and Scotland.
58:39They attempt to win back France.
58:45And Parliament is born in a Plantagenet golden age of pageants and chivalry.
58:51And you can see that at the same time next week.
59:04Next tonight on BBC Two, exploring the themes of culture, courage and fear.
59:09The culture show looks at the art of boxing.
59:11The fruits of culture, courage and faith in Poland.
59:21The nature of life.
59:24The nature of life.
59:26The culture of life.
59:28Ossia Safe souvent.
59:29The nature of life.
59:31No way.
59:33The nature of life.
59:35The nature of life.
59:36The nature of life.
59:38The nature of life.
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