The Late Middle Ages (XIV-

XVc.c.)

Dealing with the Celts:Wales and Ireland

• In 1284 King Edward I united West Wales with England and made his son Prince of Wales to demonstrate English dominance

• The Norman nobles and Irish chiefs became almost completely independent from the English Crown

Dealing with the Celts: Scotland

• Kingship crisis in 1290. John Balliol as English solution

• The rebellion of the nobles. Stealing the Stone of Destiny

• William Wallace and Robert Bruce – leaders of a Scottish nationalist resistance movement.

• “Edward, the Hammer of Scotts”

• Robert Bruce – king of Scotland: victories, defeats and new attempts. A ”spider” legend

The Scots clergy meeting in 1320, writing to the Pope:

“…for as long as even one hundred of us remain alive, we will never consent to subject ourselves to the domination of the English”

Edward II (1307-1327)

• Unsuccessful campaign in Scotland: completely defeated by Robert Bruce in 1314

• Political weakness and barons’ hostility: was forced to renounce the crown in favour of his son, Edward (the Third)

Edward III (1327-1377)

• Within a few years successfully restored the prestige of the English crown

• Fostered the idea of chivalry, basing the conduct of his court on those of Arthurian legends

• 1344 – a “Round Table” tournament at Windsor: “re-establishing” the “original” Arthurian order of knights. The myth shaped reality.

• 1348 – The Order of the Garter –the prestigious order in today’s Britain. “Honi soit qui mal y pense” (Let him be ashamed who sees wrong in it)- the motto on the coat of arms of the royal family

Edward III’s son Edward

• Became known as the Black Prince in the XVI c. (because of the colour of his armour)

• Like his father was a natural leader enjoying war

• The live embodiment of the principles of chivalry,

• A creator of the Code of Chivalry: according to which a perfect knight should– Fight for his good name if insulted– Serve God and the king– Defend any lady in need

The Hundred Years War (1337-1453)• Scottish-French Alliance: whenever England attacks

one of them, the other should enter the war

• Complicated relations with France: King of England was still the king’s of France vassal (as Duke of Aquitaine) but refused to recognise his overlordship

• French king’s interference with England’s trade interests (wool export to Flanders (Burgundy’s province) and wine import from Gascony (Aquitaine) in exchange of corn and woolen cloth)

The Hundred Years’ War

• The real cause was the clash of trade interests, so it was a trade war with France

• The pretext for the war was that Edward III had claimed the right to the French Crown

The results of the Hundred Years War:

Crecy was one of the greatest English victories against terrible odds.

The English Crown now held both sides of the English Channel as well as an important trading gateway into Europe

•At Crecy he took as his motto ‘Ich Dien’ (‘I serve’) from the standard of the defeated king of Bohemia (still on the 2p coin)

The Black Death (1348-1350) – the most catastrophic outbreak of plague in Europe

• Was in two forms: bubonic and pneumonic

• First came to Britain from black rats from the ship landed in the port of Dorset

• From the port it spread inland and by the end of 1349 covered all of Britain

• Nearly half of the population died. It reached pre-plagued level only by the middle of the XVI c.(4mln)

The outcomes of the Black Death:

• The dramatic fall in population• Shortage and expense of labour• Labourer’s wages rose 2-3 times above the pre-

plague level• Landowners started letting out land to freeman

farmers on “firma” agreement• A new class of “yeomen” (of small farmers

renting manorial lands) came into being – an important part of the agricultural economy even nowadays

The rebels gained access to the Tower of London where they murdered several of the king's ministers, including the Archbishop of Canterbury. An illumination from Froissart's Chronicles.

An encounter of Richard II and Wat Tyler at Smithfield, the occasion when Tyler was killed . An illumination from Froissart's Chronicles..

The Growth of Parliament• 1258 - Simon de Montfort called a council of nobles

–”parliament/parlament” (“a discussion meeting”) which took control of treasury and forced the king to agree to some conditions

• In the later XIV c. representatives from all shires (counties) and towns were summoned to form the House of Commons

• The consent of the Commons was necessary when adopting statutes and introducing extra taxation – which became a key factor in the growth of democracy

Relations with France in the XVc.

• “The Norman Conquest in reverse” at Henry V (1413-1422): conquered the empire (the battle at Agincourt, 1415) and won the French throne (marriage to Katherine de Valois, 1420, baby-son as an heir)

• Henry VI (1422-1477) – lost all French territories but Calais (despite being crowned as the king of France after Joan of Arc success). The Hundred Years War was over.

The Battle of Agincourt 25 October 1415 as recorder in Froissart’s Chronicles. The rival armies can be identified by their heraldic banners, either the lions of England or the lilies of France.

The Wars of the Roses

• Henry VI’ madness (1453) and the question of the succession

• Two main contenders: son Edward (born in 1453 by Princess Margaret) and Richard, Duke of York (who was chosen by the council of nobles and ruled effectively till 1455 when Henry’s sanity suddenly returned)

• The split of nobility: one grouping supporting Henry’s family – the “Lancastrians” (red rose), the other, the “Yorkists” (white rose), supporting Richard

The pendulum of the war was swinging back and forth with the initial success of the Yorkists but eventually the Lancastrians won the decisive victory in the battle of Bosworth, described by Shakespeare in “Richard III”. Henry Tudor (grandson of Henry V’s widow, Katherine, and Owen Tudor of Wales) defeated Richard III and was crowned at the battlefield

It lasted for 30 years (1455-1485) and was also known as “The Thirty Years War”

Richard III.

A late sixteenth century portrait which is based on one painted during the king’s lifetime.

At the battle of Bosworth he was betrayed by his supporters but refused to flee to safety and fought to the last in the best traditions of medieval chivalry.

After Harold’s death in 1066 he was the only English king to die in battle

Economic changes in the XIV c.

• The replacement of raw wool by finished cloth as England’s main export

• Flemings (=the Flemish – from Flanders – now Belgium) move to England in search of work

• “Spinster” is an unmarried woman in contemporary English (from “spinning” all her life)

Language, literature and the arts

• During the XIV c. the English language gradually superseded French as the language of the court and literature.

The political implications of the Hundred Years War with France helped the decline of the French language at court (the language of the enemy)

• The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

• William Caxton printing press

Chaucer's London, a panorama looking over Tower. The view, from a late fifteenth century illumination, somewhat distorts the topography.

Chaucer reading Troilus and Cressida to the court.

The nave of Lincoln Cathedral built between 1209 and 1235.

All over England cathedrals were rebuilt in the thirteenth century in the new Gothic style imported from France.

Sir Geoffrey Luttrell, Lord of Irnham, in Lincolnshire together with his wife, Agnes Sutton, in a miniature in his psalter executed about 1325 to 1335. The manuscript is filled with marginal scenes depicting everyday life in the early fourteenth century.

A 14th century document depicts the granting of Aquitaince to the Black Prince, who kneels before his father, Edward III.

EDUCATION

New College, Oxford, was founded in 1379 to train clergy to fill the places left by the Black Death. By tradition the college was built on the site of the city's plague pit (shown in the picture).

In the XV c. Eton College and King’s College, Cambridge, were founded by Henry VI (1422-1471)