Richard I of England

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Richard I (8 September 1157 – 6 April 1199) was King of England from 1189 until his death. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Aquitaine and Gascony, Lord of Cyprus, Count of Poitiers, Anjou, Maine, and Nantes, and was overlord of Brittany at various times during the same period. He was the third of five sons of King Henry II of England and Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Childhood

Richard was born on 8 September 1157,[1] probably at Beaumont Palace,[2] in Oxford, England, son of King Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. He was a younger brother of Count William IX of Poitiers, Henry the Young King and Duchess Matilda of Saxony.[3]As the third legitimate son of King Henry II, he was not expected to ascend to the throne.[4] He was also an elder brother of Duke Geoffrey II of Brittany; Queen Eleanor of Castile; Queen Joan of Sicily; and Count John of Mortain, who succeeded him as king. Richard was the younger maternal half-brother of Countess Marie of Champagne and Countess Alix of Blois. The eldest son of Henry II and Eleanor, William, died in 1156, before Richard's birth.[5] Richard is often depicted as having been the favourite son of his mother.[6] His father was Angevin-Norman and great-grandson of William the Conqueror. Contemporary historian Ralph of Diceto traced his family's lineage through Matilda of Scotland to the Anglo-Saxon kings of England and Alfred the Great, and from there legend linked them to Noah and Woden. According to Angevin family tradition, there was even 'infernal blood' in their ancestry, with a claimed descent from the fairy, or female demon, Melusine.[7][8]

While his father visited his lands from Scotland to France, Richard probably spent his childhood in England. His first recorded visit to the European continent was in May 1165, when his mother took him to Normandy.[9] His wet nurse was Hodierna of St Albans, whom he gave a generous pension after he became king.[10] Little is known about Richard's education.[11]

Coronation and anti-Jewish violence

Richard I was officially invested as Duke of Normandy on 20 July 1189 and crowned king in Westminster Abbey on 3 September 1189.[12] Richard barred all Jews and women from the investiture, but some Jewish leaders arrived to present gifts for the new king.[13] According to Ralph of Diceto, Richard's courtiers stripped and flogged the Jews, then flung them out of court.[14]

When a rumour spread that Richard had ordered all Jews to be killed, the people of London attacked the Jewish population. Many Jewish homes were destroyed by arsonists, and several Jews were forcibly baptised.[15] Some sought sanctuary in the Tower of London, and others managed to escape. Among those killed was Jacob of Orléans, a respected Jewish scholar.[16] Roger of Howden, in his Gesta Regis Ricardi, claimed that the jealous and bigoted citizens started the rioting, and that Richard punished the perpetrators, allowing a forcibly converted Jew to return to his native religion. Baldwin of Forde, Archbishop of Canterbury, reacted by remarking, "If the King is not God's man, he had better be the devil's".[17]

Realising that the assaults could destabilise his realm on the eve of his departure on crusade, Richard ordered the execution of those responsible for the most egregious murders and persecutions, including rioters who had accidentally burned down Christian homes.[18] He distributed a royal writ demanding that the Jews be left alone. The edict was only loosely enforced, however, and the following March further violence occurred, including a massacre at York.

His life

By the age of 16, Richard had taken command of his own army, putting down rebellions in Poitou against his father.[19] Richard was a central Christian commander during the Third Crusade, leading the campaign after the departure of Philip II of France and scoring considerable victories against his Muslim counterpart, Saladin, although he did not retake Jerusalem from Saladin.[20]

Richard spoke both French and Occitan.[21] He was born in England, where he spent his childhood; before becoming king, however, he lived most of his adult life in the Duchy of Aquitaine, in the southwest of France. Following his accession, he spent very little time, perhaps as little as six months, in England. Most of his life as king was spent on Crusade, in captivity, or actively defending his lands in France. Rather than regarding his kingdom as a responsibility requiring his presence as ruler, he has been perceived as preferring to use it merely as a source of revenue to support his armies.[22] Nevertheless, he was seen as a pious hero by his subjects. He remains one of the few kings of England remembered by his epithet, rather than regnal number, and is an enduring iconic figure both in England and in France.[23]

Death

Richard died on 6 April 1199 in the arms of his mother, and thus "ended his earthly day".[24] Because of the nature of Richard's death, it was later referred to as "the Lion by the Ant was slain".[25] According to one chronicler, Richard's last act of chivalry proved fruitless when the infamous mercenary captain Mercadier had the crossbowman flayed alive and hanged as soon as Richard died.[26]

Richard's heart was buried at Rouen in Normandy, his entrails in Châlus (where he died), and the rest of his body at the feet of his father at Fontevraud Abbey in Anjou.[27] In 2012, scientists analysed the remains of Richard's heart and found that it had been embalmed with various substances, including frankincense, a symbolically important substance because it had been present both at the birth and embalming of the Christ.[28]


Richard produced no legitimate heirs and acknowledged only one illegitimate son, Philip of Cognac. As a result, he was succeeded by his brother John as King of England. However, his French territories initially rejected John as a successor, preferring his nephew Arthur of Brittany, the son of their late brother Geoffrey, whose claim was by modern standards better than John's. The lack of any direct heirs from Richard was the first step in the dissolution of the Angevin Empire.[29]

Genealogy

References

  1. ↑ Flori, Jean (1999), Richard the Lionheart: Knight and King, Translated by Jean Birrell, Edinburgh University Press, ISBN 978-0-7486-2047-0.p.1
  2. ↑ Gillingham, John (2002) [1999], Richard I, London: Yale University Press, ISBN 0-300-09404-3.p. 24.
  3. ↑ Flori, Jean (1999), Richard the Lionheart: Knight and King, Translated by Jean Birrell, Edinburgh University Press, ISBN 978-0-7486-2047-0. p. ix.
  4. ↑ Flori 1999, p. 2.
  5. ↑ Flori 1999, p. 2.
  6. ↑ Flori 1999, p. 28.
  7. ↑ Gillingham, John (2002) [1999], Richard I, London: Yale University Press, ISBN 0-300-09404-3.p. 24.
  8. ↑ Huscroft, R. (2016) Tales From the Long Twelfth Century: The Rise and Fall of the Angevin Empire, Yale University Press, pp. xix-xx
  9. ↑ Gillingham, John (1979), p 32.
  10. ↑ Gillingham, John (2002) [1999], Richard I, London: Yale University Press, ISBN 0-300-09404-3.p. 28.
  11. ↑ Flori 1999, p. 10.
  12. ↑ Gillingham 2002, p. 107
  13. ↑ Flori 1999f, pp. 94–5 (French).
  14. ↑ Flori 1999f, p. 95 (French).
  15. ↑ Flori 1999f, p. 95 (French).
  16. ↑ Graetz (1902)
  17. ↑ Flori 1999f, pp. 465–6 (French). As cited by Flori, the chronicler Giraud le Cambrien reports that Richard was fond of telling a tale according to which he was a descendant of a countess of Anjou who was, in fact, the fairy Melusine, concluding that his whole family "came from the devil and would return to the devil".
  18. ↑ Flori 1999f, pp. 319–20 (French).
  19. ↑ Turner, Ralph V.; Heiser, Richard R (2000), The Reign of Richard Lionheart, Ruler of the Angevin empire, 1189–1199, Harlow: Longman, ISBN 0-582-25659-3. p. 71
  20. ↑ Addison, Charles (1842), The History of the Knights Templars, the Temple Church, and the Temple, London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans. pp. 141–149.
  21. ↑ Flori, Jean (1999f), Richard Coeur de Lion: le roi-chevalier (in French), Paris: Biographie Payot, ISBN 978-2-228-89272-8.p. 20 (French).
  22. ↑ Harvey, John (1948), The Plantagenets, Fontana/Collins, ISBN 0-00-632949-7. pp. 62–64
  23. ↑ Harvey, John (1948), The Plantagenets, Fontana/Collins, ISBN 0-00-632949-7. p. 58.
  24. ↑ Alison Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine: By the Wrath of God, Queen of England (Random House, 2011), p. 319
  25. ↑ Marion Meade, Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Biography (1977), p. 329
  26. ↑ Flori 1999f, p. 238 (French)..
  27. ↑ Flori 1999f, p. 235 (French).
  28. ↑ Charlier, Philippe (28 February 2013). Joël Poupon, Gaël-François Jeannel, Dominique Favier, Speranta-Maria Popescu, Raphaël Weil, Christophe Moulherat, Isabelle Huynh-Charlier, Caroline Dorion-Peyronnet, Ana-Maria Lazar, Christian Hervé & Geoffroy Lorin de la Grandmaison. "The embalmed heart of Richard the Lionheart (1199 A.D.): a biological and anthropological analysis". Nature. 3. doi:10.1038/srep01296. PMC 3584573 Freely accessible. PMID 23448897.
  29. ↑ Peter Saccio Leon D. Black (2000). "Shakespeare's English Kings: History, Chronicle, and Drama" (Chapter VIII, John, The Legitimacy of the King; The Angevin Empire). Oxford University Press
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