The Story of Britain part 3

08Oct11

The rest of the Norman kings!

Richard I – Lionheart! It turns out he was not that great. I know him from Robin Hood, where he was beloved and brave and such. He was viewed that way at the time, too. But did you know he only went to England twice in his entire reign? Two times in ten years! Also, under his careless reign the Jewish people were slaughtered. See, they had loaned money to the Crusaders, and then the Crusaders came back and did not want to repay the loans. Instead of coming up with a payment plan or something, the Crusaders just murdered the Jews.

He died as he lived, fighting his millionth stupid war.

A word for his betrothed, poor Princess Alice of France. Okay – first Lionheart was supposed to marry her, so she was sent to live in the English court. Rumor is that Henry II (the king, her fiance’s father) took her as a mistress AND knocked her up. And then Richard married someone else while they were still engaged. Then her father offered her to John as part of a deal where he got France and John got England. That deal also fell through. She eventually married a duke, but wow. Always a bridesmaid, eh, Alice?

John – Note there has only been one John. My guess is that no one else wanted to be a King John because he was so shitty. Also see: Robin Hood. John had been trying to get the throne for twenty years already, like an impatient jerk. There was another heir in the mix – his young nephew Arthur of Brittany was actually the rightful heir, as John’s older brother’s son. But whatever, everyone decided to go with John because Arthur was so young. Arthur, at 16, was trying to nab more Norman territory in France when John captured him. Did John later sneak into his chamber and murder him? Maybe!

Putting aside John’s murderous tendencies, he was also bad at running a country. He ran afoul of the Pope and got England put under an interdict, meaning no Mass, no weddings, no funerals, etc. The people did not like that so much. He also lost the English holdings on the Continent,. The one long-view good thing he did, signing the Magna Carta, which basically invented liberty, he immediately reneged on. He ran away, and England was very nearly taken over by France. John saved everyone by dying from eating fruit (hahah!), leaving England with half the land he’d started with, and a 9 year old to run things.