Henry II had inherited a vast empire stretching from Scotland in the north to the Pyrenees in the south. Recent acquisitions by his family, the House of Anjou, had left England in control of around one third of modern France. Henry’s father, George of Anjou, had become Duke of Normandy in 1144, while Henry had married Eleanor of Aquitaine. He was also Matilda’s son and he had inherited her claim to the English throne.
Henry II had granted Staffordshire to Ranulf II, 4th Earl of Chester, while he was young and some barons were jealous of the gift. Ranulf was served poisoned wine at the house of William Peverel and three of his men died; Ranulf died in agonising pain soon afterwards. Henry exiled Peverel as soon as he was crowned.
Henry II also introduced ‘cutage’, a tax paid in lieu of military service. In 1157 Hugh Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, refused to pay, so the king marched his army into Hugh’s area and forced him to submit.
Roger de Clare, 2nd Earl of Hertford, and William Fitz Robert, 2nd Earl of Gloucester, promised to aid each other against all others except the king along the Welsh border in 1154. Three years later Henry II instructed Roger to invade South Wales, telling him he could keep all the lands he could conquer. But Rhys ap Gruffydd harassed Roger’s advance towards Carmarthen until he was forced to agree a truce. But an angry Gruffydd raided Clare’s new lands after his nephew Einion was assassinated. Clare refused to hand over Einion’s murderer so Gruffydd recaptured Cardigan, forcing Henry II to invade the area in 1165.
Aubrey de Vere, 1st Earl of Oxford, was betrothed to Agnes, the daughter of Henry of Essex in 1163. But the marriage ran into problems when his father-in-law was accused of treason and then lost the judicial duel that followed. So de Vere tried to have the marriage to his child-bride annulled only to learn that Pope Alexander III refused permission. Aubrey refused to take Agnes back until he was threatened with excommunication if he did not restore her conjugal rights. They would eventually have four sons, securing the de Vere line.
Henry II had claimed he was Brittany’s overlord when Conan de Penthièvre died in 1148. His son, also Conan, inherited the Earldom of Richmond when he came of age in 1156 but his stepfather, Odo, seized his inheritance when his mother died. Conan turned to England, hoping for support, but Henry II annexed Nantes while his brother, Geoffrey, banished Conan’s uncle Hoël. Conan fought to reunite Brittany, only to have Henry II cancel his earldom.
Peace in Brittany was achieved in 1160 when Conan married Henry’s cousin Margaret. Six years later Conan asked Henry II for help against the rebellious Breton barons but he had to betroth his 5-year-old daughter to the king’s teenage son Geoffrey to secure it. Henry then invaded Brittany and forced Conan to abdicate, so he could claim it on behalf of his son. Henry II eventually claimed Brittany for himself when Conan died in 1171.
Meanwhile, an argument over how the money destined for the Crusader States should be collected had caused a war between England and France. King Louis VII had joined with the Welsh, the Scots and Bretons in an attack on English-owned Normandy. The French would be forced to retire and desert their allies after their military arsenal was destroyed. Henry counter-attacked the rebels in Brittany but Geoffrey wanted it for himself and he joined the revolt against his father in 1172; they would reconcile two years later.
Henry II had confiscated Richard de Clare’s Earldom of Pembroke because he had sided with Stephen against Empress Matilda. Richard, also known as Strongbow, soon became involved in an Irish feud. Diarmait Mac Murchada had abducted Derbforgaill, wife of King Tighearnán Ua Ruairc of Breifne, back in 1152. The High King, Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair, retaliated by seizing Leinster from Diarmait in 1167, so he went to Aquitaine to ask Henry II for help to recover his province. Although the king was unable to send troops, he did offer his moral support to Diarmait.
Diarmait then visited Richard de Clare and he agreed to send an army to Leinster in return for marrying Diarmait’s daughter Aoife and becoming heir to his province. Clare sent Raymond FitzGerald across the Irish Sea, when Henry gave his consent two years later, and he captured Leinster; Clare joined him soon afterwards. Diarmait died in May 1171 and his son Domhnall rebelled, so Clare captured more territory. King Henry was concerned about this developing rival kingdom so he forced Clare to surrender his towns and castles and return to Wales. He left behind a mixture of Irish and English lords ruling south-east Ireland on behalf of the English crown.
Thomas Becket was appointed Archbishop of Canterbury in 1162 and immediately tried to recover the rights associated with his new post. Henry put forward the Constitutions of Clarendon in 1164, demanding a weakening of Rome’s influence and less powers for the Church, but Beckett stormed out of a meeting in Northampton Castle in October and went into exile in France.
Becket returned to his post in 1170 after prolonged negotiations with King Louis VII and Pope Alexander III. But he immediately upset Henry by handing out excommunications to those who had crowned Henry the Young king a few months earlier. Henry uttered a curse along the lines of ‘who will rid me of this troublesome priest?’ (versions vary) and four knights decided to murder the archbishop.
Reginald FitzUrse, Hugh de Morville, William de Tracy and Richard le Breton, entered Canterbury Cathedral and tried to arrest Becket. He refused, so they murdered him. Becket was made a saint and Henry paid penance at his tomb while the murderers were excommunicated and sent on crusade.
Young Henry was unhappy. He was not allowed to make any decisions and he was kept short of money. Matters came to a head when King Henry gave three of his castles to his youngest son John. Young Henry and his brothers Geoffrey and Richard fled to Paris where they were welcomed by King Louis. Queen Eleanor tried to reach them but she was captured en route.
Young Henry promised lands to William of Scotland and the Counts of Boulogne, Flanders and Blois to get their support. Several barons also gave him their support because they had personal grievances against the king. William de Ferrers had had the title of the Earl of Derby and Peveril Castle taken from him because his father had supported Stephen while Hugh Bigod, 1st Earl of Norfolk, was eager to revive feudal power and had been promised Norwich Castle by Young Henry.
Henry secretly travelled back to England in the spring of 1173 to organise an attack on the rebels and he then returned to the Continent to face Louis and the Young King. Robert de Beaumont, 3rd Earl of Leicester, landed at Walton, Suffolk, in September where he was joined by Hugh Bigod, 1st Earl of Norfolk, at Framlingham. But Henry’s chief minister, Justiciar Richard de Luci, captured them both at the battle of Fornham in Suffolk on 17 October.
Henry crushed the opposition in south-west France early in 1174 while Henry’s illegitimate son Geoffrey stopped William the Lion’s raids across the Scottish border. Philip, Count of Flanders, then invaded southern England but Henry’s visit to Becket’s tomb in Canterbury Cathedral restored everyone’s confidence in his royal authority. The rebellion in England ended following the capture of William the Lion at Alnwick and Henry then returned to Normandy to defeat Louis at Rouen. King Henry would release the rebellious barons and let them keep their titles but he confiscated a number of strategic castles. He also charged them for the cost of stopping the rebellion with a new tax called the ‘Forest Fine’.
William the Lion had succeeded Malcolm the Maiden as king of Scotland in 1165. He wanted to retake Northumbria because Henry had confiscated it from him in 1157 and he seized the opportunity during Henry the Young King’s revolt in 1173. He was captured as he led a charge at the battle of Alnwick in 1174 shouting, ‘now we shall see which of us are good knights.’
William was forced to swear allegiance to Henry II at York Castle in 1175 and had to pay for the English army which occupied Scotland. Henry II also chose William’s bride, Ermengarde, under the Treaty of Falaise, taking Edinburgh Castle as the dowry. Only then was William allowed to return to Scotland where he faced prolonged revolts in Galloway. It was many years before Ermengarde bore William an heir but they eventually had four children. Meanwhile, William was busy fathering six illegitimate children, and their descendants would lay claim to the Scottish crown in years to come.
Geoffrey had angered his brother, King Henry, by joining Henry the Young King’s rebellion. He also annoyed King Philip II with his treacherous deals at the French court and then upset Rome by robbing churches. Geoffrey eventually married Constance, Duchess of Brittany, in 1181 but not many mourned him when he was trampled to death by a horse during a tournament in Paris in 1186. Henry II married the widowed Constance to the loyal Ranulf de Blondeville, 6th Earl of Chester, one of England’s most powerful earls.
William, 2nd Earl of Gloucester, made Henry II’s youngest son John his heir, when his own son Robert Fitz Robert died in 1166. John was also betrothed to William’s daughter Isabella in 1176 even though they were cousins and the marriage contract included a promise to find an alternative husband if Pope Alexander III banned the wedding. William died in 1186 and John assumed Isabella’s Earldom of Gloucester but Pope Clement III banned them from having sexual relations when the couple married three years later. The Archbishop of Canterbury then voided the marriage and placed their lands under interdict.
One of Robert’s sisters, Amice, had been married to Richard de Clare, 3rd Earl of Hertford. They too were cousins and the Pope instructed them to separate even though they had been married for twenty-five years. In doing so he was stopping Clare’s claim on the Gloucester estates.
King Phillip II of France tried to seize the province of Berry south of Paris in 1188 so Henry offered it to the loyal William Marshal. He included the hand of Dionisia of Châteauroux in the deal and Marshal accepted. Henry had argued with Richard, Count of Poitou, over Aquitaine for some time but their feud escalated when the king refused to let his heir go on a crusade. It resulted in war when Richard attacked France, undermining Henry’s attempts to make a truce with King Philip. The French King exploited the situation by allying with Richard in 1189. Philip and Richard ambushed the ailing King Henry at Le Mans but William Marshal skilfully covered the English retreat to Chinon. He unhorsed Richard during a skirmish but only killed his horse, as a warning to the treacherous prince.