Amazing & Extraordinary Facts About Kings & Queens (10 page)

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icknamed ‘Longshank’ for his tall stature, Edward I was hailed as a mighty king – ‘Hammer of the Scots’ and great castle-builder who famously necklaced Wales with a ring of impregnable forts. One of England’s stongest ever kings went far towards unifying Britain under a radical reforming of the law.

It is to Edward that we owe thanks for introducing the Model Parliament, which lay the foundations of the present English system. The common law courts too developed during his reign. Edward was undoubtedly years ahead of his time in the advances he brought to society. But it must not be forgotten that his rule allowed little toleration. Iron fist, not soft glove, was the order of the day.

One of his infamous blitzes was on public morality. Believing that the citizens of his capital were being corrupted by loose women, Edward banned prostitutes from operating anywhere in the City of London. His decree maintained that ‘houses of women of evil life’ also encouraged thieving and murder. Prostitutes were forbidden from living within the City walls, and any contravention would result in 40 days in jail. The net effect, of course, was to drive the business across the Thames to Bankside in Southwark, which lay outside the City’s jurisdiction. There, licensed brothels and ‘stews’ (bath-houses) sprang up everywhere after this measure was introduced.

In a further attempt at ‘cleansing’ society, Edward infamously issued an edict in 1290 requiring the immediate expulsion of all Jews from England. Outbreaks of anti-Semitism had occurred intermittently over the last century, as stories circulated that Jews committed atrocities. The reality was that their traditional role as money-lenders had run its course. High taxation, enforced loans and property confiscation had left most of the 3000 or so members of the community bankrupt.

R
obert I of Scotland wore two hats: one as servant in the court of the English king Edward I, the other as warrior in the cause of Scottish independence. Whenever a revolt against the English was raised Bruce would join it. After defeat he would swear allegiance again to the English throne.

Once crowned king of Scotland at Scone, however, Bruce never looked back. His commitment to winning independence from the belligerent Edward, who had overrun most of Scotland, was never in doubt.

But the going proved tough. His compatriots suffered heavily at the hands of the English and Bruce himself was forced into hiding on the island of Rathlin, off the Antrim coast (it is here that the legend says Bruce learned to persevere by watching a spider repeatedly trying to spin its web until it succeeded).

His lands were confiscated, his wife and daughter imprisoned, and three of his brothers were executed. Many captives of the English king had their heads paraded on spikes as a tactic to intimidate the enemy.

In fact this had the opposite effect. When Edward I finally died and his weaker son, Edward II, took the throne, the Scots felt rejuvenated. Everywhere they rallied to Bruce’s banner – and nowhere was victory sweeter than at Bannockburn.

The focus of the clash between the two armies would be Stirling Castle. In the seven years since Edward II became king, the Scots had recovered virtually all the lands taken by his father. All that remained was this stronghold at Stirling.

Standing high up on a rock overlooking the marshy plain of Bannockburn, the fort guarded the key crossing point of the River Forth. On Midsummer’s Day, 1314, an anxious commander in charge of the castle, Sir Philip Mowbray, had struck a bargain with the waiting Scots that he would hand over the fort to them unless the English army appeared before sunset that day.

Just in time Edward appeared on the banks of the Bannock. With him was an immense army of 2,500 professional knights on horseback and 15,000 infantry. Mowbray rode out to meet Edward to try to persuade him not to fight, but the English king felt the urge of his noblemen to engage.

In preparation, a cavalry unit was sent to reconnoitre the Scottish position and its leader Humphrey Bohun came face to face with Robert the Bruce at the summit of a hill. As Bohun charged with a lance, Bruce dispatched his assailant with a single blow from his axe. The encounter seemed to prefigure the larger outcome, as the English never really recovered from this demoralising setback. The following morning, in an impetuous effort, the cavalry charged uphill at a phalanx of Scotsmen set with pikes that sunk sickeningly into the oncoming horses. A fierce hand-to-hand battle followed and witless English archers stationed behind them started shooting arrows into the backs of their own men.

Amid the confusion, there suddenly appeared over the hill a swarm of marauding Scottish irregulars. The English fled in disarray and hundreds were cut down trying to escape across the marsh. Edward rode up to the castle. Mowbray refused him, forcing the king to flee eastwards and board a waiting ship. Meanwhile some 1600 Englishmen were captured.

Despite being outnumbered three to one, the Scots won a famous victory in a single day. The battle proved deicisive as Edward’s army was forced to exit Scotland for good. Thus Bannockburn lives on in Scottish memories as the day when the old enemy was finally vanquished. No English king has subsequently ever conquered Scotland.

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cross the entire span of the Middle Ages just three kings were deposed by violence off the battlefield: Edward II, Richard II and Henry VI. All three had something in common which accounted for their fate. Each had a liking for incompetent favourites who engendered hatred among the nobles and people alike.

No sooner had Edward II been sworn in as king than he introduced to the court a ‘friend’, an effeminate French knight, Piers de Gaveston, with whom the new king appeared to be infatuated. Not only was this ‘upstart’ granted more power than any other advisor in the king’s company, but, confident in his royal favour, he would cavort about upsetting and humiliating other nobles around him.

Gaveston would greet them not in the usual courteous manner expected in gracious circles but with nicknames: the earl of Warwick became the ‘Black Hound of Arden’; the earl of Lancaster, ‘Churl’; the earl of Lincoln, ‘Burstbelly’; and the earl of Gloucester, ‘Horeson’. Before long Edward was obliged to banish the troublesome knave, but within a year had reinstated him. Trouble bestirred.

Edward himself went through the proper motions of marrying, indeed the beautiful princess Isabella, daughter of King Philip IV of France, and together they had children. But this union was severely undermined by his homosexual relationship with Gaveston. The queen eventually joined ranks with Edward’s resentful barons and challenged his authority. The result was civil war.

A league of nobles forced the king to agree to a council of ‘Ordainers’ charged with running the country in his place. Top of the agenda was the banishment of Gaveston. Again, he complied, yet soon returned. Forced into an act of deceit, the Ordainers pretended to offer him safe passage to France if he surrendered. Accepting their terms, Gaveston was instead led to Scarborough Castle where he fell into the hands – certainly not the arms – of his worst enemy, the earl of Warwick, or ‘Black Hound of Arden’. This time there would be no escape. Gaveston was summarily executed.

This liaison apart, Edward failed in other important duties as defender of the realm. He lost all the territory of Scotland his father had so determinedly won. In fact the Scots even made incursions into the north of England, reaching as far as York.

If this did not end his credibility as king, Edward’s next move surely did. Seemingly with no care for the consequences, he introduced to the court a new French lover in the shape of Hugh le Despenser and showered him with all the extravagant favours enjoyed by his predecessor. Enough was enough. Queen Isabella now amassed an army under joint leadership with her lover Richard Mortimer, and with some ease overran the country. Edward was captured and imprisoned in Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire. The end was nigh.

Locked in a secure bedchamber, the king was subjected to a series of horrific tortures. It was said that the device used was subtle enough as to leave no mark on the royal body. While cushions were held over Edward’s head, a plumber’s heated soldering iron was thrust into his bowels. One wag of the time confided, ‘He who lives up the arse, dies up it.’

The regicide officially remained a mystery, and Edward’s many enemies had got satisfaction. However, Isabella and Mortimer would not survive their triumph long either. The heir to the throne, Edward III, avenged his father’s murder by having Mortimer executed and consigning his mother to a nunnery for the rest of her days.

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n a century that witnessed deep discord between king and country, Edward II’s accession to the throne came as a welcome relief. Here at last was a monarch his subjects could respect. He gave to a society which prided itself on chivalry the opportunity to prove itself.

The pomp and pageantry of knightly service flourished as never before under Edward. Setting out to recreate the glamorous world of Arthur and his noble knights at Camelot, Edward founded a new order in chivalry known as the Order of the Garter after his great victory at the Battle of Crécy in 1348.

At a Round Table tournament held in Windsor to honour his magnificent fighting corps, there was a moment when Edward graciously stooped to pick up the slipped garter of the Countess of Salisbury. As he did so, the king reprimanded his mocking courtiers with the words, ‘
Honi soit qui mal y pense
’ – ‘Evil to him who evil thinks’. The utterance was adopted as the proud motto of the Order, which became the highest honour in the land and is still awarded in the Garter Chapel at Windsor Castle.

Ironically, 1348 was the year when much of the nation was reduced to its knees, not in chivalrous gesture but in abject misery, as the Black Death plague swept in from the continent wiping out a third of the population. The fall out was such that even seven years later the king was complaining of plague detritus on the River Thames blocking the passage of the royal barge.

However, for three decades Edward led by example, pursuing his ambition to be king of France. Lords and squires delighted in the chance to prove their courage and to make a fortune from ransoms obtained from prisoners-of-war. Extravagance, ostentatiousness and vanity were all qualities the king possessed – and all were admired by his people.