[Illustration: 123.jpg RICHARD I.]
RICHARD I.
{1189.} The compunction of Richard, for his undutiful behavior towards
his father, was durable, and influenced him in the choice of his
ministers and servants after his accession. Those who had seconded and
favored his rebellion, instead of meeting with that trust and honor
which they expected, were surprised to find that they lay under disgrace
with the new king, and were on all occasions hated and despised by him.
The faithful ministers of Henry, who had vigorously opposed all
the enterprises of his sons, were received with open arms, and were
continued in those offices which they had honorably discharged to their
former master. This prudent conduct might be the result of reflection;
but in a prince like Richard, so much guided by passion, and so little
by policy, it was commonly ascribed to a principle still more virtuous
and more honorable.
Richard, that he might make atonement to one parent for his breach
of duty to the other, immediately sent orders for releasing the queen
dowager from the confinement in which she had long been detained; and he
intrusted her with the government of England, till his arrival in
that kingdom. His bounty to his brother John was rather profuse
and imprudent. Besides bestowing on him the county of Mortaigne, in
Normandy, granting him a pension of four thousand marks a year, and
marrying him to Avisa, the daughter of the earl of Glocester, by whom he
inherited all the possessions of that opulent family, he increased
this appanage, which the late king had destined him, by other extensive
grants and concessions. He conferred on him the whole estate of William
Peverell, which had escheated to the crown: he put him in possession
of eight castles, with all the forests and honors annexed to them:
he delivered over to him no less than six earldoms, Cornwall, Devon,
Somerset, Nottingham, Dorset, Lancaster and Derby. And endeavoring, by
favors, to fix that vicious prince in his duty, he put it too much in
his power, whenever he pleased, to depart from it.
The king, impelled more by the love of military glory than by
superstition, acted, from the beginning of his reign, as if the sole
purpose of his government had been the relief of the Holy Land, and the
recovery of Jerusalem from the Saracens. This zeal against infidels,
being communicated to his subjects, broke out in London on the day of
his coronation, and made them find a crusade less dangerous and attended
with more immediate profit. The prejudices of the age had made the
lending of money on interest pass by the invidious name of usury: yet
the necessity of the practice had still continued it, and the greater
part of that kind of dealing fell every where into the hands of the
Jews, who, being already infamous on account of their religion, had no
honor to lose, and were apt to exercise a profession, odious in itself,
by every kind of rigor, and even sometimes by rapine and extortion. The
industry and frugality of this people had put them in possession of all
the ready money which the idleness and profusion common to the English
with other European nations, enabled them to lend at exorbitant and
unequal interest. The monkish writers represent it as a great stain
on the wise and equitable government of Henry, that he had carefully
protected this infidel race from all injuries and insults; but the zeal
of Richard afforded the populace a pretence for venting their animosity
against them. The king had issued an edict, prohibiting their appearance
at his coronation; but some of them, bringing him large presents from
their nation, presumed, in confidence of that merit, to approach the
hall in which he dined: being discovered, they were exposed to the
insults of the bystanders; they took to flight; the people pursued them;
the rumor was spread that the king had issued orders to massacre all the
Jews; a command so agreeable was executed in an instant on such as fell
into the hands of the populace; those who had kept at home were exposed
to equal danger; the people, moved by rapacity and zeal, broke into
their houses which they plundered, after having murdered the owners;
where the Jews barricadoed their doors, and defended themselves with
vigor, the rabble set fire to their houses and made way through the
flames to exercise the pillage and violence; the usual licentiousness of
London, which the sovereign power with difficulty restrained, broke
out with fury, and continued these outrages; the houses of the richest
citizens, though Christians, were next attacked and plundered; and
weariness and satiety at last put an end to the disorder: yet when the
king empowered Glanville, the justiciary, to inquire into the authors
of these crimes, the guilt was found to involve so many of the most
considerable citizens, that it was deemed more prudent to drop the
prosecution; and very few suffered the punishment due to this enormity.
But the disorder stopped not at London. The inhabitants of the other
cities of England, hearing of this slaughter of the Jews, imitated the
example: in York five hundred of that nation, who had retired into the
castle for safety, and found themselves unable to defend the place,
murdered their own wives and children, threw the dead bodies over the
walls upon the populace, and then setting fire to the houses, perished
in the flames. The gentry of the neighborhood, who were all indebted to
the Jews, ran to the cathedral, where their bonds were kept, and made
a solemn bonfire of the papers before the altar. The compiler of the
Annals of Waverley, in relating these events, blesses the Almighty for
thus delivering over this impious race to destruction.
The ancient situation of England, when the people possessed little
riches and the public no credit, made it impossible for sovereigns to
bear the expense of a steady or durable war, even on their frontiers;
much less could they find regular means for the support of distant
expeditions like those into Palestine, which were more the result
of popular frenzy than of sober reason or deliberate policy. Richard
therefore knew that he must carry with him all the treasure necessary
for his enterprise, and that both the remoteness of his own country
and its poverty, made it unable to furnish him with those continued
supplies, which the exigencies of so perilous a war must necessarily
require. His father had left him a treasure of above a hundred thousand
marks; and the king, negligent of every consideration but his present
object, endeavored to augment his sum by all expedients, how pernicious
soever ta the public, or dangerous to royal authority. He put to sale
the revenues and manors of the crown; the offices of greatest trust
and power, even those of forester and sheriff, which anciently were so
important,[*] became venal; the dignity of chief justiciary, in whose
hands was lodged the whole execution of the laws, was sold to Hugh de
Puzas, bishop of Durham, for a thousand marks; the same prelate bought
the earldom of Northumberland for life;[**] many of the champions of the
cross, who had repented of their vow, purchased the liberty of violating
it; and Richard, who stood less in need of men than of money, dispensed,
on these conditions, with their attendance. Elated with the hopes of
fame, which in that age attended no wars but those against the infidels,
he was blind to every other consideration; and when some of his wiser
ministers objected to this dissipation of the revenue and power of the
crown, he replied, that he would sell London itself could he find a
purchaser.[***] Nothing indeed could be a stronger proof how negligent
he was of all future interests in comparison of the crusade, than his
selling, for so small a sum as ten thousand marks, the vassalage of
Scotland, together with the fortresses of Roxborough and Berwick, the
greatest acquisition that had been made by his father during the course
of his victorious reign; and his accepting the homage of William in
the usual terms, merely for the territories which that prince held in
England.[****] The English of all ranks and stations were oppressed by
numerous exactions: menaces were employed both against the innocent and
the guilty, in order to extort money from them; and where a pretence
was wanting against the rich, the king obliged them, by the fear of his
displeasure, to lend him sums which he knew it would never be in his
power to repay.
[* The sheriff had anciently both the
administration of justice and the management of the king’s
revenue committed to him in the county. See Hale, of
Sheriffs’ Accounts.]
[** M. Paris, p. 109.]
[*** W. Hemming, p. 519. Knyghton, p. 2402.]
[**** Hoveden, p. 562. Rymer, vol. i. p. 64. M.
West. p. 257.]
But Richard, though he sacrificed every interest and consideration to
the success of this pious enterprise, carried so little the appearance
of sanctity in his conduct, that Fulk curate of Neuilly, a zealous
preacher of the crusade, who from that merit had acquired the privilege
of speaking the boldest truths, advised him to rid himself of his
notorious vices, particularly his pride, avarice, and voluptuousness,
which he called the king’s three favorite daughters. “You counsel well,”
replied Richard; “and I hereby dispose of the first to the Templars, of
the second to the Benedictines, and of the third to my prelates.”
Richard, jealous of attempts which might be made on England during his
absence, laid Prince John, as well as his natural brother Geoffrey,
archbishop of York, under engagements, confirmed by their oaths, that
neither of them should enter the kingdom till his return; though he
thought proper, before his departure, to withdraw this prohibition. The
administration was left in the hands of Hugh, bishop of Durham, and of
Longchamp, bishop of Ely, whom he appointed justiciaries and guardians
of the realm. The latter was a Frenchman of mean birth, and of a violent
character; who by art and address had insinuated himself into favor,
whom Richard had created chancellor, and whom he had engaged the pope
also to invest with the legantine authority, that, by centring every
kind of power in his person, he might the better insure the public
tranquillity. All the military and turbulent spirits flocked about the
person of the king, and were impatient to distinguish themselves against
the infidels in Asia; whither his inclinations, his engagements, led
him, and whither he was impelled by messages from the king of France,
ready to embark in this enterprise.
The emperor Frederic, a prince of great spirit and conduct, had already
taken the road to Palestine, at the head of one hundred and fifty
thousand men, collected from Germany and all the northern states. Having
surmounted every obstacle thrown in his way by the artifices of the
Greeks and the power of the infidels, he had penetrated to the borders
of Syria; when, bathing in the cold river Cydnus, during the greatest
heat of the summer season, he was seized with a mortal distemper, which
put an end to his life and his rash enterprise.[*]
[* Benedict. Abbas, p. 556.]
His army, under the command of his son Conrade, reached Palestine; but
was so diminished by fatigue famine, maladies, and the sword, that it
scarcely amounted to eight thousand men, and was unable to make any
progress against the great power, valor, and conduct of Saladin. These
reiterated calamities attending the crusades, had taught the kings of
France and England the necessity of trying another road to the Holy Land
and they determined to conduct their armies thither by sea, to carry
provisions along with them, and by means of their naval power to
maintain an open communication with then own states, and with the
western parts of Europe. The place of rendezvous was appointed in the
plains of Vezelay, on the borders of Burgundy.[*] {1190.} Philip and
Richard, on their arrival there, found their combined army amount to
one hundred thousand men;[**] a mighty force, animated with glory and
religion, conducted by two warlike monarchs, provided with every thing
which their several dominions couid supply, and not to be overcome but
by their own misconduct, or by the unsurmountable obstacles of nature.
[* Hoveden, p. 660.]
[** Vinisnuf, p. 305]
The French prince and the English here reiterated their promises of
cordial friendship, pledged their faith not to invade each other’s
dominions during the crusade, mutually exchanged the oaths of all their
barons and prelates to the same effect, and subjected themselves to the
penalty of interdicts and excommunications, if they should ever violate
this public and solemn engagement. They then separated; Philip took the
road to Genoa, Richard that to Marseilles, with a view of meeting their
fleets, which were severally appointed to rendezvous in these harbors.
They put to sea; and nearly about the same time were obliged, by stress
of weather, to take shelter in Messina, where they were detained during
the whole winter. This incident laid the foundation of animosities which
proved fatal to their enterprise.
Richard and Philip were, by the situation and extent of their dominions,
rivals in power; by their age and inclinations, competitors for glory;
and these causes of emulation, which, had the princes been employed
in the field against the common enemy, might have stimulated them
to martial enterprises, soon excited, during the present leisure and
repose, quarrels between monarchs of such a fiery character. Equally
haughty, ambitious, intrepid, and inflexible, they were irritated
with the least appearance of injury, and were incapable, by mutual
condescensions, to efface those causes of complaint which unavoidably
rose between them. Richard, candid, sincere, undesigning, impolitic,
violent, laid himself open on every occasion to the designs of his
antagonist; who, provident, interested, intriguing, failed not to take
all advantages against him: and thus, both the circumstances of
their disposition in which they were similar, and those in which they
differed, rendered it impossible for them to persevere in that harmony
which was so necessary to the success of their undertaking.
The last king of Sicily and Naples was William II., who had married
Joan, sister to Richard, and who, dying without issue, had bequeathed
his dominions to his paternal aunt Constantia, the only legitimate
descendant surviving of Roger the first sovereign of those states who
had been honored with the royal title. This princess had, in expectation
of that rich inheritance, been married to Henry VI., the reigning
emperor;[*] but Tancred, her natural brother, had fixed such an interest
among the barons, that, taking advantage of Henry’s absence, he had
acquired possession of the throne, and maintained his claim, by force
of arms, against all the efforts of the Germans.[**] The approach of the
crusaders naturally gave him apprehensions for his unstable government;
and he was uncertain whether he had most reason to dread the presence
of the French or of the English monarch. Philip was engaged in a strict
alliance with the emperor, his competitor: Richard was disgusted by his
rigors towards the queen dowager, whom the Sicilian prince had confined
in Palermo because she had opposed with all her interest his succession
to the crown. Tancred, therefore, sensible of the present necessity,
resolved to pay court to both these formidable princes; and he was not
unsuccessful in his endeavors. He persuaded Philip that it was highly
improper for him to interrupt his enterprise against the infidels by
any attempt against a Christian state: he restored Queen Joan to her
liberty; and even found means to make an alliance with Richard, who
stipulated by treaty to marry his nephew Arthur; the young duke of
Brittany, to one of the daughters of Tancred.[***]
[* Benedict. Abbas, p. 580.]
[** Hoveden, p. 663]
[*** Hoveden, p. 676, 677. Benedict. Abbas, p.
615.]
But before these terms of friendship were settled. Richard, jealous both
of Tancred and of the inhabitants of Messina, had taken up his quarters
in the suburbs, and had possessed himself of a small fort, which
commanded the harbor; and he kept himself extremely on his guard against
their enterprises. The citizens took umbrage. Mutual insults and attacks
passed between them and the English: Philip, who had quartered his
troops in the town, endeavored to accommodate the quarrel, and held a
conference with Richard for that purpose. While the two kings, meeting
in the open fields, were engaged in discourse on this subject, a body
of those Sicilians seemed to be drawing towards them; and Richard pushed
forwards in order to inquire into the reason of this extraordinary
movement.[*] The English, indolent from their power, and inflamed with
former animosities, wanted but a pretence for attacking the Messinese:
they soon chased them off the field, drove them into the town, and
entered with them at the gates. The king employed his authority to
restrain them from pillaging and massacring the defenceless inhabitants;
but he gave orders, in token of his victory, that the standard of
England should be erected on the walls. Philip, who considered that
place as his quarters, exclaimed against the insult, and ordered some
of his troops to pull down the standard: but Richard informed him by a
messenger, that though he himself would willingly remove that ground of
offence, he would not permit it to be done by others; and if the French
king attempted such an insult upon him, he should not succeed but by the
utmost effusion of blood. Philip, content with this species of haughty
submission, recalled his orders:[**] the difference was seemingly
accommodated, but still left the remains of rancor and jealousy in the
breasts of the two monarchs.
Tancred, who for his own security desired to inflame their mutual
hatred, employed an artifice which might have been attended with
consequences still more fatal. {1191.} He showed Richard a letter,
signed by the French king, and delivered to him, as he pretended, by the
duke of Burgundy; in which that monarch desired Tancred to fall upon the
quarters of the English, and promised to assist him in putting them
to the sword as common enemies. The unwary Richard gave credit to the
information; but was too candid not to betray his discontent to Philip,
who absolutely denied the letter, and charged the Sicilian prince with
forgery and falsehood. Richard either was, or pretended to be, entirely
satisfied.[***]
[* Benedict. Abbas, p. 608.]
[** Hoveden, p. 674.]
[*** Hoveden, p. 688. Benedict. Abbas, p. 642,
643. Brompton, p. 1125]
Last these jealousies and complaints should multiply between them, it
was proposed that they should, by a solemn treaty, obviate all future
differences, and adjust every point that couid possibly hereafter become
a controversy between them. But this expedient started a new dispute,
which might have proved more dangerous than any of the foregoing, and
which deeply concerned the honor of Philip’s family. When Richard,
in every treaty with the late king, insisted so strenuously on being
allowed to marry Alice of France, he had only sought a pretence for
quarrelling, and never meant to take to his bed a princess suspected
of a criminal amour with his own father. After he became master, he
no longer spake of that alliance: he even took measures for espousing
Berengaria, daughter of Sanchez, king of Navarre, with whom he had
become enamored during his abode in Guienne.[*] Queen Eleanor was daily
expected with that princess at Messina;[**] and when Philip renewed to
him his applications for espousing his sister Alice, Richard was obliged
to give him an absolute refusal. It is pretended by Hoveden and other
historians,[***] that he was able to produce such convincing proofs of
Alice’s infidelity, and even of her having borne a child to Henry, that
her brother desisted from his applications, and chose to wrap up the
dishonor of his family in silence and oblivion. It is certain, from the
treaty itself which remains,[****] that, whatever were his motives, he
permitted Richard to give his hand to Berengaria; and having settled all
other controversies with that prince, he immediately set sail for the
Holy Land. Richard awaited some time the arrival of his mother and
bride, and when they joined him, he separated his fleet into two
squadrons, and set forward on his enterprise. Queen Eleanor returned to
England; but Berengaria, and the queen dowager of Sicily, his sister,
attended him on the expedition.[*****]
[* Vinisauf, p. 316.]
[** M. Paris, p. 112. Trivet, p. 102. W. Heming.
p. 519.]
[*** Hoveden, p. 688.]
[**** Bymer, vol. i. p. 69. Chron. Dunst. p. 44.]
[***** Benedict. Abbas, p. 644.]
The English fleet, on leaving the port of Messina, met with a furious
tempest; and the squadron on which the two princesses were embarked was
driven on the coast of Cyprus, and some of the vessels were wrecked
near Limisso, in that island. Isaac, prince of Cyprus, who assumed the
magnificent title of emperor, pillaged the ships that were stranded,
brew the seamen and passengers into prison, and even refused to the
princesses liberty, in their dangerous situation, of entering the harbor
of Limisso. But Richard, who arrived soon after, took ample vengeance on
him for the injury. He disembarked his troops; defeated the tyrant, who
opposed his landing; entered Limisso by storm; gained next day a second
victory; obliged Isaac to surrender at discretion; and established
governors over the island. The Greek prince, being thrown into prison
and loaded with irons, complained of the little regard with which he was
treated; upon which Richard ordered silver fetters to be made for him;
and this emperor, pleased with the distinction, expressed a sense of the
generosity of his conqueror.[*] The king here espoused Berengaria, who,
immediately embarking, carried along with her to Palestine the daughter
of the Cypriot prince; a dangerous rival, who was believed to have
seduced the affections of her husband. Such were the libertine character
and conduct of the heroes engaged in this pious enterprise!
The English army arrived in time to partake in the glory of the siege
of Acre or Ptolemais, which had been attacked for above two years by the
united force of all the Christians in Palestine, and had been defended
by the utmost efforts of Saladin and the Saracens. The remains of the
German army, conducted by the emperor Frederic, and the separate bodies
of adventurers who continually poured in from the west, had enabled the
king of Jerusalem to form this important enterprise;[**] but Saladin
having thrown a strong garrison into the place under the command of
Caracos, his own master in the art of war, and molesting the besiegers
with continual attacks and sallies, had protracted the success of the
enterprise, and wasted the force of his enemies.
[* Benedict. Abbas, p. 650 Ann. Waverl. p. 164.
Vinisauf, p 328 W. Heming. p. 523.]
[** Vinisauf. p 269, 271, 279]
The arrival of Philip and Richard inspired new life into the Christians;
and these princes acting by concert, and sharing the honor and danger
of every action, gave hopes of a final victory over the infidels. They
agreed on this plan of operations: when the French monarch attacked
the town, the English guarded the trenches: next day, when the English
prince conducted the assault, the French succeeded him in providing for
the safety of the assailants. The emulation between those rival kings
and rival nations produced extraordinary acts of valor: Richard, in
particular animated with a more precipitate courage than Philip, and
more agreeable to the romantic spirit of that age, drew to himself the
general attention, and acquired a great and splendid reputation. But
this harmony was of short duration, and occasions of discord soon arose
between these jealous and haughty princes.
The family of Bouillon, which had first been placed on the throne of
Jerusalem, ending in a female, Fulk, count of Anjou, grandfather
to Henry II. of England, married the heiress of that kingdom, and
transmitted his title to the younger branches of his family. The Anjevan
race ending also in a female, Guy de Lusignan, by espousing Sibylla, the
heiress, had succeeded to the title; and though he lost his kingdom by
the invasion of Saladin, he was still acknowledged by all the Christians
for king of Jerusalem.[*] But as Sibylla died without issue during the
siege of Acre, Isabella, her younger sister, put in her claim to that
titular kingdom, and required Lusignan to resign his pretensions to her
husband, Conrade, marquis of Montferrat. Lusignan, maintaining that
the royal title was unalienable and indefeasible, had recourse to
the protection of Richard, attended on him before he left Cyprus, and
engaged him to embrace his cause.[**] There needed no other reason for
throwing Philip into the party of Conrade; and the opposite views of
these great monarchs brought faction and dissension into the Christian
army, and retarded all its operations. The templars, the Genoese, and
the Germans, declared for Philip and Conrade; the Flemings, the
Pisans, the knights of the hospital of St. John, adhered to Richard and
Lusignan, But notwithstanding these disputes, as the length of the siege
had reduced the Saracen garrison to the last extremity, they surrendered
themselves prisoners; stipulated, in return for their lives, other
advantages to the Christians, such as restoring of the Christian
prisoners, and the delivery of the wood of the true cross;[***] and this
great enterprise, which had long engaged the attention of all Europe and
Asia, was at last, after the loss of three hundred thousand men, brought
to a happy period.
[* Vinisauf, p. 281.]
[** Trivet, p. 104. Vinisauf, p. 342. W. Heming.
p. 524.]
[*** This true cross was lost in the battle of
Tiberiade, to which it had been carried by the crusaders for
their protection. Rigord, an author of that age, says, that
after this dismal event, all the children who were born
throughout all Christendom, had only twenty or twenty-two
teeth, instead of thirty or thirty-two, which was their
former complement (p. 14.)]
But Philip, instead of pursuing the hopes of further conquest, and of
redeeming the holy city from slavery, being disgusted with the ascendant
assumed and acquired by Richard, and having views of many advantages
which he might reap by his presence in Europe, declared his resolution
of returning to France; and he pleaded his bad state of health as
an excuse for his desertion of the common cause. He left however, to
Richard ten thousand of his troops, under the command of the duke of
Burgundy; and he renewed his oath never to commence hostilities against
that prince’s dominions during his absence. But he had no sooner reached
Italy than he applied, it is pretended, to Pope Celestine III. for
a dispensation from this vow; and when denied that request, he still
proceeded, though after a covert manner, in a project which the present
situation of England rendered inviting, and which gratified, in an
eminent degree, both his resentment and his ambition.
Immediately after Richard had left England, and begun his march to
the Holy Land, the two prelates whom he had appointed guardians of the
realm, broke out into animosities against each other, and threw the
kingdom into combustion. Longchamp, presumptuous in his nature, elated
by the favor which he enjoyed with his master, and armed with the
legantine commission, could not submit to an equality with the bishop
of Durham: he even went so far as to arrest his colleague, and to extort
from him a resignation of the earldom of Northumberland, and of his
other dignities, as the price of his liberty.[*] The king, informed of
these dissensions, ordered, by letters from Marseilles, that the
bishop should be reinstated in his offices; but Longchamp had still the
boldness to refuse compliance, on pretence that he himself was better
acquainted with the king’s secret intentions.[**] He proceeded to
govern the kingdom by his sole authority; to treat all the nobility
with arrogance; and to display his power and riches with an invidious
ostentation. He never travelled without a strong guard of fifteen
hundred foreign soldiers, collected from that licentious tribe, with
which the age was generally infested: nobles and knights were proud
of being admitted into his train his retinue wore the aspect of royal
magnificence; and when in his progress through the kingdom, he lodged in
any monastery, his attendants, it is said, were sufficient to devour in
one night the revenue of several years.[***]
[* Hoveden, p. 665. Knyghton, p. 2403.]
[** W. Heming. p 528,]
[*** Hoveden, p. 680. Benedict. Abbas, p. 626,
700. Brompton, p. 1193.]
The king, who was detained in Europe longer than the haughty prelate
expected, hearing of this ostentation, which exceeded even what the
habits of that age indulged in ecclesiastics; being also informed of the
insolent, tyrannical conduct of his minister, thought proper to restrain
his power: he sent new orders, appointing Walter, archbishop of Rouen,
William Mareshal, earl of Strigul, Geoffrey Fitz-Peter, William Brie
were, and Hugh Bardolf, counsellors to Longchamp, and commanding him to
take no measure of importance without their concurrence and approbation.
But such general terror had this man impressed by his violent conduct,
that even the archbishop of Rouen and the earl of Strigul durst not
produce this mandate of the king’s: and Longchamp still maintained an
uncontrolled authority over the nation. But when he proceeded so far as
to throw into prison Geoffrey, archbishop of York, who had opposed
his measures, this breach of ecclesiastical privileges excited such a
universal ferment, that Prince John, disgusted with the small share he
possessed in the government, and personally disobliged by Longchamp,
ventured to summon at Reading a general council of the nobility and
prelates, and cite him to appear before them. Longchamp thought it
dangerous to intrust his person in their hands, and he shut himself,
up in the tower of London; but being soon obliged to surrender that
fortress, he fled beyond sea, concealed under a female habit, and was
deprived of his offices of chancellor and chief justiciary, the last of
which was conferred on the archbishop of Rouen, a prelate of prudence
and moderation. The commission of legate, however, which had been
renewed to Longchamp by Pope Celestine, still gave him, notwithstanding
his absence, great authority in the kingdom, enabled him to disturb
the government, and forwarded the views of Philip, who watched every
opportunity of annoying Richard’s dominions. {1192.} That monarch first
attempted to carry open war into Normandy: but as the French nobility
refused to follow him in an invasion of a state which they had sworn to
protect, and as the pope, who was the general guardian of all princes
that had taken the cross, threatened him with ecclesiastical censures,
he desisted from his enterprise, and employed against England the
expedient of secret policy and intrigue. He debauched Prince John from
his allegiance; promised him his sister Alice in marriage; offered to
give him possession of all Richard’s transmarine dominions; and had not
the authority of Queen Eleanor, and the menaces of the English council,
prevailed over the inclinations of that turbulent prince, he was ready
to have crossed the seas, and to have put in execution his criminal
enterprises.
The jealousy of Philip was every moment excited by the glory which the
great actions of Richard were gaining him in the east, and which, being
compared to his own desertion of that popular cause, threw a double
lustre on his rival. His envy, therefore, prompted him to obscure
that fame which he had not equalled; and he embraced every pretence of
throwing the most violent and most improbable calumnies on the king of
England. There was a petty prince in Asia, commonly called the Old Man
of the Mountain, who had acquired such an ascendant over his fanatical
subjects, that they paid the most implicit deference to his commands;
esteemed assassination meritorious when sanctified by his mandate;
courted danger, and even certain death, in the execution of his orders;
and fancied, that when they sacrificed their lives for his sake, the
highest joys of paradise were the infallible reward of their devoted
obedience.[*] It was the custom of this prince, when he imagined
himself injured, to despatch secretly some of his subjects against the
aggressor, to charge them with the execution of his revenge, to instruct
them in every art of disguising their purpose; and no precaution was
sufficient to guard any man, however powerful, against the attempts of
these subtle and determined ruffians. The greatest monarchs stood in awe
of this prince of the assassins, (for that was the name of his people.
whence the word has passed into most European languages,) and it was the
highest indiscretion in Conrade, marquis of Montferrat, to offend
and affront him. The inhabitants of Tyre, who were governed by that
nobleman, had put to death some of this dangerous people: the prince
demanded satisfaction; for as he piqued himself on never beginning any
offence,[**] he had his regular and established formalities in requiring
atonement: Conrade treated his messengers with disdain: the prince
issued the fatal orders: two of his subjects, who had insinuated
themselves in disguise among Conrade’s guards, openly, in the streets
of Sidon, wounded him mortally; and when they were seized and put to the
most cruel tortures, they triumphed amidst their agonies, and rejoiced
that they had been destined by Heaven to suffer in so just and
meritorious a cause.
[* W. Heming. p. 532. Brompton, p. 1243.]
[** Rymer vol. i. p. 71.]
Every one in Palestine knew from what hand the blow came. Richard
was entirely free from suspicion. Though that monarch had formerly
maintained the cause of Lusignan against Conrade, he had become sensible
of the bad effects attending those dissensions, and had voluntarily
conferred on the former the kingdom of Cyprus, on condition that he
should resign to his rival all pretensions on the crown of Jerusalem,[*]
Conrade himself, with his dying breath, had recommended his widow to the
protection of Richard;[**] the prince of the assassins avowed the action
in a formal narrative which he sent to Europe; yet, on this foundation,
the king of France thought fit to build the most egregious calumnies,
and to impute to Richard the murder of the marquis of Montferrat,
whose elevation he had once openly opposed. He filled all Europe with
exclamations against the crime; appointed a guard for his own person, in
order to defend himself against a like attempt; and endeavored, by these
shallow artifices, to cover the infamy of attacking the dominions of a
prince whom he himself had deserted, and who was engaged with so much
glory in a war universally acknowledged to be the common cause of
Christendom.
[* Vinisauf, p. 391.]
[** Brompton, p. 1248.]
But Richard’s heroic actions in Palestine were the best apology for
his conduct. The Christian adventurers under his command determined,
on opening the campaign, to attempt the siege of Ascalon, in order
to prepare the way for that of Jerusalem; and they marched along the
sea-coast with that intention. Saladin purposed to intercept their
passage: and he placed himself on the road with an army, amounting to
three hundred thousand combatants. On this occasion was fought one
of the greatest battles of that age; and the most celebrated, for the
military genius of the commanders, for the number and valor of the
troops, and for the great variety of events which attended it. Both
the right wing of the Christians, commanded by D’Avesnes, and the left
conducted by the duke of Burgundy, were, in the beginning of the day,
broken and defeated; when Richard, who led on the main body, restored
the battle; attacked the enemy with intrepidity and presence of mind;
performed the part both of a consummate general and gallant soldier; and
not only gave his two wings leisure to recover from their confusion, but
obtained a complete victory over the Saracens, of whom forty thousand
are said to have perished in the field.[*] Ascalon soon after fell into
the hands of the Christians: other sieges were carried on with equal
success; Richard was even able to advance within sight of Jerusalem, the
object of his enterprise; when he had the mortification to find that he
must abandon all hopes of immediate success, and must put a stop to his
career of victory. The crusaders, animated with an enthusiastic ardor
for the holy wars, broke at first through all regards to safety or
interest in the prosecution of their purpose; and trusting to the
immediate assistance of Heaven, set nothing before their eyes but fame
and victory in this world, and a crown of glory in the next. But long
absence from home, fatigue, disease, want, and the variety of incidents
which naturally attend war, had gradually abated that fury, which
nothing was able directly to withstand; and every one except the king of
England, expressed a desire of speedily returning into Europe. The
Germans and the Italians declared their resolution of desisting from the
enterprise: the French were still more obstinate in this purpose: the
duke of Burgundy, in order to pay court to Philip, took all
opportunities of mortifying and opposing Richard:[**] and there appeared
an absolute necessity of abandoning for the present all hopes of further
conquest, and of securing the acquisitions of the Christians by an
accommodation with Saladin, Richard, therefore concluded a truce with
that monarch; and stipulated that Acre, Joppa, and other seaport towns
of Palestine, should remain in the hands of the Christians, and that
every one of that religion should have liberty to perform his pilgrimage
to Jerusalem unmolested. This truce was concluded for three years, three
months, three weeks, three days, and three hours; a magical number,
which had probably been devised by the Europeans, and which was
suggested by a superstition well suited to the object of the war.
[* Hovelen, p. 698. Benedict. Abbas, p. 677.
Diceto, p. 662 Brompton, p. 1214.]
[** Vinisauf, p. 380.]
The liberty in which Saladin indulged the Christians, to perform their
pilgrimages to Jerusalem, was an easy sacrifice on his part; and the
furious wars which he waged in defence of the barren territory of Judea,
were not with him, as with the European adventurers, the result
of superstition, but of policy, The advantage indeed of science,
moderation, humanity, was at that time entirely on the side of the
Saracens; and this gallant emperor, in particular, displayed, during
the course of the war, a spirit and generosity, which even his bigoted
enemies were obliged to acknowledge and admire. Richard, equally martial
and brave, carried with him more of the barbarian character, and
was guilty of acts of ferocity which threw a stain on his celebrated
victories. When Saladin refused to ratify the capitulation of Acre,
the king of England ordered all his prisoners, to the number of five
thousand, to be butchered; and the Saracens found themselves obliged to
retaliate upon the Christians by a like cruelty.[*]
[* Hoveden, p. 697. Benedict Abbas, p. 673. M.
Paris, p. 115. Vinisauf, p. 846. W. Heming. p. 531.]
Saladin died at Damascus soon after concluding this truce with the
princes of the crusade; it is memorable that, before he expired, he
ordered his winding-sheet to be carried as a standard through every
street of the city; while a crier went before, and proclaimed with
a loud voice, “This is all that remains to the mighty Saladin, the
conqueror of the East.” By his last will, he ordered charities to be
distributed to the poor, without distinction of Jew, Christian, or
Mahometan.
There remained, after the truce, no business of importance to detain
Richard in Palestine; and the intelligence which he received, concerning
the intrigues of his brother John, and those of the king of France,
made him sensible that his presence was necessary in Europe. As he
dared not to pass through France, he sailed to the Adriatic; and being
ship-wrecked near Aquileia, he put on the disguise of a pilgrim, with a
purpose of taking his journey secretly through Germany. Pursued by the
governor of Istria, he was forced out of the direct road to England,
and was obliged to pass by Vienna, where his expenses and liberalities
betrayed the monarch in the habit of the pilgrim; and he was arrested by
orders of Leopold, duke of Austria. This prince had served under Richard
at the siege of Acre; but being disgusted by some insult of that haughty
monarch, he was so ungenerous as to seize the present opportunity of
gratifying at once his avarice and revenge; and he threw the king into
prison. {1193.} The emperor, Henry VI., who also considered Richard as
an enemy, on account of the alliance contracted by him with Tancred,
king of Sicily, despatched messengers to the duke of Austria, required
the royal captive to be delivered to him, and stipulated a large sum of
money as a reward for this service. Thus the king of England, who had
filled the whole world with his renown, found himself, during the most
critical state of his affairs, confined in a dungeon, and loaded with
irons, in the heart of Germany,[*] and entirely at the mercy of his
enemies, the basest and most sordid of mankind.
The English council was astonished on receiving this fatal intelligence,
and foresaw all the dangerous consequences which might naturally arise
from that event. The queen dowager wrote reiterated letters to Pope
Celestine; exclaiming against the injury which her son had sustained,
representing the impiety of detaining in prison the most illustrious
prince that had yet carried the banners of Christ into the Holy Land;
claiming the protection of the apostolic see, which was due even to the
meanest of those adventurers; and upbraiding the pope, that, in a cause
where justice, religion, and the dignity of the church, were so much
concerned, a cause which it might well befit his holiness himself to
support by taking in person a journey to Germany, the spiritual thunders
should so long be suspended over those sacrilegious offenders.[**]
The zeal of Celestine corresponded not to the impatience of the queen
mother; and the regency of England were, for a long time, left to
struggle alone with all their domestic and foreign enemies.
The king of France, quickly informed of Richard’s confinement by a
message from the emperor,[***] prepared himself to take advantage of the
incident; and he employed every means of force and intrigue, of war and
negotiation, against the dominions and the person of his unfortunate
rival. He revived the calumny of Richard’s assassinating the marquis of
Montferrat; and by that absurd pretence he induced his barons to violate
their oaths, by which they had engaged that, during the crusade,
they never would, on any account, attack the dominions of the king of
England. He made the emperor the largest offers, if he would deliver
into his hands the royal prisoner, or at least detain him in perpetual
captivity he even formed an alliance by marriage with the king of
Denmark, desired that the ancient Danish claim to the crown of England
should be transferred to him, and solicited a supply of shipping to
maintain it.
[* Chron. T. Wykes, p. 35.]
[** Rymer, vol. i. p. 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, etc]
[*** Rymer, vol. i. p. 70.]
But the most successful of Philip’s negotiations was with Prince
John, who, forgetting every tie to his brother, his sovereign, and his
benefactor, thought of nothing but how to make his own advantage of the
public calamities. That traitor, on the first invitation from the court
of France, suddenly went abroad, had a conference with Philip, and made
a treaty, of which the object was the perpetual ruin of his unhappy
brother. He stipulated to deliver into Philip’s hands a great part of
Normandy:[*] he received, in return, the investiture of all Richard’s
transmarine dominions; and it is reported by several historians, that he
even did homage to the French king for the crown of England.
In consequence of this treaty, Philip invaded Normandy; and by the
treachery of John’s emissaries, made himself master, without opposition,
of many fortresses--Neufchatel, Neaufle, Gisors, Pacey, Ivrée: he
subdued the counties of Eu and Aumale; and advancing to form the siege
of Rouen, he threatened to put all the inhabitants to the sword if they
dared to make resistance. Happily, Robert, earl of Leicester appeared in
that critical moment, a gallant nobleman, who had acquired great honor
during the crusade, and who, being more fortunate than his master in
finding his passage homewards, took on him the command in Rouen, and
exerted himself, by his exhortations and example, to infuse courage into
the dismayed Normans. Philip was repulsed in every attack; the time of
service from his vassals expired; and he consented to a truce with
the English regency, received in return the promise of twenty thousand
marks, and had four castles put into his hands as security for the
payment.[**]
[* Rymer, vol. i. p. 85.]
[** Hoveden, p, 730, 731. Rymer, vol. i. p. 81]
Prince John, who, with a view of increasing the general confusion, went
over to England, was still less successful in his enterprises. He
was only able to make himself master of the castles of Windsor and
Wallingford; but when he arrived in London, and claimed the kingdom
as heir to his brother, of whose death he pretended to have received
certain intelligence he was rejected by all the barons, and measures
were taken to oppose and subdue him.[*] The justiciaries, supported by
the general affection of the people, provided so well for the defence
of the kingdom, that John was obliged, after some fruitless efforts,
to conclude a truce with them; and before its expiration, he thought it
prudent to return into France, where he openly avowed his alliance with
Philip.[**]
Meanwhile the high spirit of Richard suffered in Germany every kind of
insult and indignity. The French ambassadors, in their master’s name,
renounced him as a vassal to the crown of France, and declared all his
fiefs to be forfeited to his liege lord. The emperor, that he might
render him more impatient for the recovery of his liberty, and make him
submit to the payment of a larger ransom, treated him with the greatest
severity, and reduced him to a condition worse than that of the meanest
malefactor. He was even produced before the diet of the empire at Worms,
and accused by Henry of many crimes and misdemeanors; of making an
alliance with Tancred, the usurper of Sicily; of turning the arms of the
crusade against a Christian prince, and subduing Cyprus; of affronting
the duke of Austria before Acre; of obstructing the progress of the
Christian arms by his quarrels with the king of France; of assassinating
Conrade, marquis of Montferrat; and of concluding a truce with Saladin,
and leaving Jerusalem in the hands of the Saracen emperor.[***]
[* Hoveden, p. 724.]
[** W Heming. p. 556.]
[*** M. Paris, p. 121. W. Heming. p. 536.]
Richard, whose spirit was not broken by his misfortunes, and whose
genius was rather roused by these frivolous or scandalous imputations,
after premising that his dignity exempted him from answering before any
jurisdiction, except that of Heaven, yet condescended, for the sake of
his reputation, to justify his conduct before that great assembly. He
observed, that he had no hand in Tancred’s elevation, and only concluded
a treaty with a prince whom he found in possession of the throne: that
the king, or rather tyrant, of Cyprus had provoked his indignation by
the most ungenerous and unjust proceedings; and though he chastised
this aggressor, he had not retarded a moment the progress of his chief
enterprise: that if he had at any time been wanting in civility to the
duke of Austria, he had already been sufficiently punished for that
sally of passion; and it better became men, embarked together in so holy
a cause, to forgive each other’s infirmities, than to pursue a slight
offence with such unrelenting vengeance: that it had sufficiently
appeared by the event, whether the king of France or he were most
zealous for the conquest of the Holy Land, and were most likely to
sacrifice private passions and animosities to that great object: that
if the whole tenor of his life had not shown him incapable of a base
assassination, and justified him from that imputation in the eyes
of his very enemies, it was in vain for him, at present, to make his
apology, or plead the many irrefragable arguments which he could produce
in his own favor: and that, however he might regret the necessity, he
was so far from being ashamed of his truce with Saladin, that he rather
gloried in that event; and thought it extremely honorable that, though
abandoned by all the world, supported only by his own courage, and
by the small remains of his national troops, he could yet obtain such
conditions from the most powerful and most warlike emperor that the East
had ever yet produced. Richard, after thus deigning to apologize for his
conduct, burst out into indignation at the cruel treatment which he
had met with; that he, the champion of the cross, still wearing that
honorable badge, should, after expending the blood and treasure of his
subjects in the common cause of Christendom, be intercepted by Christian
princes in his return to his own country, be thrown into a dungeon, be
loaded with irons, be obliged to plead his cause as if he were a
subject and a malefactor, and, what he still more regretted, be thereby
prevented from making preparations for a new crusade, which he had
projected, after the expiration of the truce, and from redeeming the
sepulchre of Christ, which had so long been profaned by the dominion of
infidels. The spirit and eloquence of Richard made such impression on
the German princes, that they exclaimed loudly against the conduct of
the emperor; the pope threatened him with excommunication; and Henry,
who had hearkened to the proposals of the king of France and Prince
John, found that it would be impracticable for him to execute his and
their base purposes, or to detain the king of England any longer in
captivity. He therefore concluded with him a treaty for his ransom, and
agreed to restore him to his freedom for the sum of one hundred and
fifty thousand marks about three hundred thousand pounds of our present
money of which one hundred thousand marks were to be paid before
he received his liberty, and sixty-seven hostages delivered for the
remainder.[*] The emperor, as if to gloss over the infamy of this
transaction, made at the same time a present to Richard of the kingdom
of Arles, comprehending Provence, Dauphiny, Narbonne, and other states,
over which the empire had some antiquated claims; a present which the
king very wisely neglected.
[* Rymer, vol. i. p. 84.]
The captivity of the superior lord was one of the cases provided for by
the feudal tenures; and all the vassals were in that event obliged to
give an aid for his ransom. Twenty shillings were therefore levied on
each knight’s fee in England; but as this money came in slowly, and
was not sufficient for the intended purpose, the voluntary zeal of the
people readily supplied the deficiency. The churches and monasteries
melted down their plate, to the amount of thirty thousand marks; the
bishop, abbots, and nobles, paid a fourth of their yearly rent; the
parochial clergy contributed a tenth of their tithes; and the requisite
sura being thus collected queen Eleanor, and Walter, archbishop of
Rouen, set out with it for Germany; {1194.} paid the money to the
emperor and the duke of Austria at Mentz; delivered them hostages for
the remainder, and freed. Richard from captivity. His escape was very
critical. Henry had been detected in the assassination of the bishop of
Liege, and in an attempt of a like nature on the duke of Louvaine; and
finding himself extremely obnoxious to the German princes on account
of these odious practices, he had determined to seek support from an
alliance with the king of France; to detain Richard, the enemy of that
prince, in perpetual captivity; to keep in his hands the money which
he had already received for his ransom; and to extort fresh sums from
Philip and prince John, who were very liberal in their offers to him. He
therefore gave orders that Richard should be pursued and arrested; but
the king, making all imaginable haste, had already embarked at the mouth
of the Schelde, and was out of sight of land when the messengers of the
emperor reached Antwerp.
The joy of the English was extreme on the appearance of their monarch,
who had suffered so many calamities, who had acquired so much glory,
and who had spread the reputation of their name into the farthest east,
whither their fame had never before been able to extend. He gave them,
soon after his arrival, an opportunity of publicly displaying their
exultation, by ordering himself to be crowned anew at Winchester; as if
he intended, by that ceremony, to reinstate himself in his throne, and
to wipe off he ignominity of his captivity. Their satisfaction was
not damped, even when he declared his purpose of resuming all those
exorbitant grants which he had been necessitated to make before his
departure for the Holy Land. The barons also, in a great council,
confiscated, on account of his treason, all Prince John’s possessions
in England and they assisted the king in reducing the fortresses which
still remained in the hands of his brother’s adherents.[*] Richard,
having settled every thing in England, passed over with an army into
Normandy; being impatient to make war on Philip, and to revenge himself
for the many injuries which he had received from that monarch.[**] As
soon as Philip heard of the king’s deliverance from captivity, he wrote
to his confederate John in these terms: “Take care of yourself: the
devil is broken loose.”[***]
[* Hoveden, p, 737. Ann. Waverl. p. 165. W.
Heming. p. 540.]
[** Hoveden, p. 740.]
[*** Hoveden p. 739]
When we consider such powerful and martial monarchs, inflamed with
personal animosity against each other, enraged by mutual injuries,
excited by rivalship, impelled by opposite interests, and instigated by
the pride and violence of their own temper, our curiosity is naturally
raised, and we expect an obstinate and furious war, distinguished by the
greatest events, and concluded by some remarkable catastrophe. Yet are
the incidents which attended those hostilities so frivolous, that scarce
any historian can entertain such a passion for military descriptions as
to venture on a detail of them; a certain proof of the extreme weakness
of princes in those ages, and of the little authority they possessed
over their refractory vassals The whole amount of the exploits on both
sides, is the taking of a castle, the surprise of a straggling party, a
rencounter of horse, which resembles more a rout than a battle. Richard
obliged Philip to raise the siege of Verneuil; he took Loches, a small
town in Anjou; he made himself master of Beaumont, and some other places
of little consequence; and after these trivial exploits, the two kings
began already to hold conferences for an accommodation. Philip insisted
that, if a general peace were concluded, the barons on each side should
for the future be prohibited from carrying on private wars against
each other; but Richard replied, that this was a right claimed by
his vassals, and he could not debar them from it After this fruitless
negotiation, there ensued an action between the French and English
cavalry at Fretteval, in which the former were routed, and the king of
France’s cartulary and records, which commonly at that time attended his
person, were taken. But this victory leading to no important advantages,
a truce for a year was at last, from mutual weakness, concluded between
the two monarchs.
During this war, Prince John deserted from Philip, threw himself at his
brother’s feet, craved pardon for his offences, and by the intercession
of Queen Eleanor was received into favor. “I forgive him,” said the
king, “and hope I shall as easily forget his injuries as he will my
pardon.” John was incapable even of returning to his duty without
committing a baseness. Before he left Philip’s party, he invited to
dinner all the officers of the garrison which that prince had placed in
the citadel of Evreux; he massacred them during the entertainment; fell,
with the assistance of the townsmen, on the garrison, whom he put to the
sword; and then delivered up the place to his brother.
The king of France was the great object of Richard’s resentment and
animosity. The conduct of John, as well as that of the emperor and duke
of Austria, had been so base, and was exposed to such general odium and
reproach, that the king deemed himself sufficiently revenged for
their injuries; and he seems never to have entertained any project of
vengeance against any of them. The duke of Austria, about this time,
having crushed his leg by the fall of his horse at a tournament, was
thrown into a fever; and being struck, on the approaches of death, with
remorse for his injustice to Richard, he ordered by will all the English
hostages in his hands to be set at liberty and the remainder of the debt
due to him to be remitted: his son, who seemed inclined to disobey these
orders, was constrained by his ecclesiastics to execute them.[*] {1195.}
The emperor also made advances for Richard’s friendship, and offered to
give him a discharge of all the debt not yet paid to him, provided he
would enter into an offensive alliance against the king of France; a
proposal which was very acceptable to Richard, and was greedily embraced
by him. The treaty with the emperor took no effect; but it served to
rekindle the war between France and England before the expiration of the
truce.
[* Rymer, vol. i. p. 88, 102.]
This war was not distinguished by any more remarkable incidents than the
foregoing. After mutually ravaging the open country, and taking a few
insignificant castles, the two kings concluded a peace at Louviers, and
made an exchange of some territories with each other.[*] {1196.} Their
inability to wage war occasioned the peace; their mutual antipathy
engaged them again in war before two months expired. Richard imagined
that he had now found an opportunity of gaining great advantages over
his rival, by forming an alliance with the counts of Flanders, Toulouse,
Boulogne, Champagne, and other considerable vassals of the crown of
France.[**] But he soon experienced the insincerity of those princes;
and; was not able to make any impression on that kingdom, while
governed by a monarch of so much vigor and activity as Philip. The most
remarkable incident of this war was the taking prisoner, in battle, the
bishop of Beauvais, a martial prelate who was of the family of Dreux,
and a near relation of the French king. Richard, who hated that bishop,
threw him into prison, and loaded him with irons; and when the pope
demanded his liberty, and claimed him as his son, the king sent to his
holiness the coat of mail which the prelate had worn in battle, and
which was all besmeared with blood; and he replied to him in the terms
employed by Jacob’s sons to that patriarch: “This have we found: know
now whether it be thy son’s coat or no.”[***] This new war between
England and France, though carried on with such animosity that both
kings frequently put out the eyes of their prisoners, was soon finished
by a truce of five years; and immediately after signing this treaty,
the kings were ready, on some new offence, to break out again into
hostilities, when the mediation of the cardinal of St. Mary, the pope’s
legate, accommodated the difference.[****] This prelate even engaged the
princes to commence a treaty for a more durable peace; but the death of
Richard put an end to the negotiation.
[* Rymer, vol. i. p. 91]
[** W. Heming, p. 549. Brompton, p. 1273. Rymer,
vol i. p. 94.]
[*** Genesis, chap, xxxvii. ver. 32. M. Paris, p;
128. Brompton, p. 1273]
[**** Rymer, vol. i. p. 109, 110.]
{1199.} Vidomar, viscount of Limoges, a vassal of the king, had found a
treasure, of which he sent part to that prince as a present. Richard, as
superior lord, claimed the whole; and, at the head of some Brabançons,
besieged the viscount in the castle of Chalus, near Limoges, in order to
make him comply with his demand.[*] The garrison offered to surrender;
but the king replied, that since he had taken the pains to come thither
and besiege the place in person, he would take it by force, and would
hang every one of them. The same day Richard, accompanied by Marcadée,
leader of his Brabançons, approached the castle in order to survey it,
when one Bertrand de Gourdon, an archer, took aim at him, and pierced
his shoulder with an arrow. The king, however, gave orders for the
assault, took the place, and hanged all the garrison, except Gourdon,
who had wounded him, and whom he reserved for a more deliberate and more
cruel execution.[**]
The wound was not in itself dangerous; but the unskilfulness of the
surgeon made it mortal; he so rankled Richard’s shoulder in pulling out
the arrow, that a gangrene ensued; and that prince was now sensible that
his life was drawing towards a period. He sent for Gourdon, and asked
him, “Wretch, what have I ever done to you, to oblige you to seek my
life?” “What have you done to me?” replied coolly the prisoner: “you
killed with your own hands my father, and my two brothers; and you
intended to have hanged myself: I am now in your power, and you may take
revenge by inflicting on me the most severe torments; but I shall endure
them all with pleasure, provided I can think that I have been so happy
as to rid the world of such a nuisance,”[***] Richard, struck with the
reasonableness of this reply, and humbled by the near approach of death,
ordered Gourdon to be set at liberty, and a sum of money to be given
him; but Marcadée, unknown to him, seized the unhappy man, flayed him
alive, and then hanged him. Richard died in the tenth year of his reign,
and the forty-second of his age; and he left no issue behind him.
[* Hoveden, p. 791. Knyghton, p. 2413.]
[** Hoveden, p. 791. Knyghton, p. 2413.]
[*** Hoveden, p. 791. Brompton, p. 1277 Knyghton,
p. 2413.]
The most shining part of this prince’s character are his military
talents. No man, even in that romantic age, carried personal courage
and intrepidity to a greater height, and this quality gained him the
appellation of the Lion-hearted, “Coeur de Lion.” He passionately loved
glory, chiefly military glory; and as his conduct in the field was not
inferior to his valor, he seems to have possessed every talent
necessary for acquiring it. His resentments also were high; his pride
unconquerable; and his subjects, as well as his neighbors, had therefore
reason to apprehend, from the continuance of his reign, a perpetual
scene of blood and violence. Of an impetuous and vehement spirit, he was
distinguished by all the good, as well as the bad, qualities incident to
that character; he was open, frank, generous, sincere, and brave; he
was revengeful, domineering, ambitious, haughty, and cruel; and was thus
better calculated to dazzle men by the splendor of his enterprises, than
either to promote their happiness, or his own grandeur, by a sound and
well-regulated policy. As military talents make great impression on the
people, he seems to have been much beloved by his English subjects; and
he is remarked to have been the first prince of the Norman line that
bore any sincere regard to them. He passed, however, only four months of
his reign in that kingdom; the crusade employed him near three years; he
was detained about fourteen months in captivity; the rest of his reign
was spent either in war or preparations for war against France; and he
was so pleased with the fame which he had acquired in the East, that
he determined, notwithstanding his past misfortunes, to have further
exhausted his kingdom, and to have exposed himself to new hazards, by
conducting another expedition against the infidels.
Though the English pleased themselves with the glory which the king’s
martial genius procured them, his reign was very oppressive, and
somewhat arbitrary, by the high taxes which he levied on them, and often
without consent of the states or great council. In the ninth year of his
reign, he levied five shillings on each hide of land; and because
the clergy refused to contribute their share, he put them out of the
protection of law, and ordered the civil courts to give them no sentence
for any debts which they might claim.[*] Twice in his reign he ordered
all his charters to be sealed anew, and the parties to pay fees for the
renewal.[**]
[* Hoveden, p. 743. Tyrrel, vol. ii. p, 563.]
[** Pryrnne’s Chronol. Vindic. tom. i. p. 1133.]
{1133.} It is said that Hubert, his justiciary, sent him over to France,
in the space of two years, no less a sum than one million one hundred
thousand marks, besides bearing all the charges of the government in
England. But this account is quite incredible, unless we suppose that
Richard made a thorough dilapidation of the demesnes of the crown,
which it is not likely he could do with any advantage after his former
resumption of all grants. A king who possessed such a revenue, could
never have endured fourteen months’ captivity for not paying one hundred
and fifty thousand marks to the emperor, and be obliged at last to leave
hostages for a third of the sum. The prices of commodities in this reign
are also a certain proof that no such enormous sum could be levied on
the people. A hide of land, or about a hundred and twenty acres, was
commonly let at twenty shillings a year, money of that time. As there
were two hundred and forty-three thousand six hundred hides in England,
it is easy to compute the amount of all the landed rents of the kingdom.
The general and stated price of an ox was four shillings; of a laboring
horse, the same; of a sow, one shilling; of a sheep with fine wool,
tenpence with coarse wool, sixpence.[*] These commodities seem not to
have advanced in their prices since the conquest,[**] [19] and to have
still been ten times cheaper than at present.
Richard renewed the severe laws against transgressors in his forests,
whom he punished by castration and putting out their eyes, as in the
reign of his great-grandfather. He established by law one weight and
measure throughout his kingdom;[***] a useful institution, which the
mercenary disposition and necessities of his successor engaged him to
dispense with for money.
[* Hoveden, p. 745.]
[** See note S, at the end of the volume.]
[*** M. Paris, p. 109, 134. Trivet, p. 127. Ann.
Waverl. p. 165. Hoveden, p. 7.]
The disorders in London, derived from its bad police, had risen to a
great height during this reign; and in the year 1196, there seemed to
be formed so regular a conspiracy among the numerous malefactors, as
threatened the city with destruction. There was one William Fitz-Osbert,
commonly called Longbeard, a lawyer, who had rendered himself extremely
popular among the lower rank of citizens; and by defend ing-them on all
occasions, had acquired the appellation of the advocate or savior of
the poor. He exerted his authority by injuring and insulting the more
substantial citizens, with whom he lived in a state of hostility, and
who were every moment exposed to the most outrageous violences from
him and his licentious emissaries. Murders were daily committed in the
streets; houses were broken open and pillaged in daylight; and it is
pretended, that no less than fifty-two thousand persons had entered into
an association, by which they bound themselves to obey all the orders
of this dangerous ruffian. Archbishop Hubert, who was then chief
justiciary, summoned him before the council to answer for his conduct;
but he came so well attended, that no one durst accuse him, or give
evidence against him; and the primate, finding the impotence of law,
contented himself with exacting from the citizens hostages for their
good behavior. He kept, however, a watchful eye on Fitz-Osbert, and
seizing a favorable opportunity, attempted to commit him to custody;
but the criminal, murdering one of the public officers, escaped with his
concubine to the church of St. Mary le Bow, where he defended himself
by force of arms. He was at last forced from his retreat, condemned, and
executed, amidst the regrets of the populace, who were so devoted to his
memory, that they stole his gibbet, paid the same veneration to it as to
the cross, and were equally zealous in propagating and attesting reports
of the miracles wrought by it.[*] But though the sectaries of this
superstition were punished by the justiciary,[**] it received so little
encouragement from the established clergy whose property was endangered
by such seditious practices, that it suddenly sunk and vanished.
[* Hoveden, p 765. Diceto, p. 691. Neub. p 192,
498]
[** Gervase, p. 1551.]
It was during the crusades that the custom of using coats of arms was
first introduced into Europe. The knights, cased up in armor, had no
way to make themselves be known and distinguished in battle, but by
the devices on their shields; and these were gradually adopted by
their posterity and families, who were proud of the pious and military
enterprises of their ancestors.
King Richard was a passionate lover of poetry: there even remain
some poetical works of his composition: and he bears a rank among
the Provençal poets or Trobadores, who were the first of the modern
Europeans that distinguished themselves by attempts of that nature.