second son of Alfred the Great, and with his sister Aethelflaed was
carefully educated at the court of his father. During his father's
lifetime he took an active part in the campaigns against the Danes,
especially in that of 894, and as early as 898 he signs a charter as
"rex," showing that he was definitely associated with his father in the
kingship. He succeeded his father in October 899,[1] but not without
opposition. The Aetheling Aethelwold, son of Alfred's elder brother
Aethelred, seized Wimborne and Christchurch. Edward advanced against him,
and Aethelwold took refuge among the Danes in Northumbria. In 904
Aethelwold landed in Essex, and in the next year he enticed the East
Anglian Danes to revolt. They ravaged all southern Mercia and, in spite
of Edward's activity, returned home victorious, though Aethelwold fell in
the battle of the Holme. In 905 or 906 Edward made a peace with the East
Anglian and Northumbrian Danes at "Yttingaford," near Linslade in
Buckinghamshire, perhaps the peace known as "the Laws of Edward and
Guthrum." In 909 and 910 fresh campaigns took place owing to southerly
raids by the Danes, and victories were won at Tettenhall and Wednesfield
in Staffordshire.[2] From 907 onwards Edward and his sister Aethelflaed,
the Lady of the Mercians, were busy strengthening their hold on Mercia
and Wessex. Forts were built at Lincoln (907), "Bremesbyrig" (910),
"Scergeat" and Bridgenorth (912), and when in the year 911 Aethelflaed's
husband Aethelred died, Edward took over from Mercia the government of
London and Oxford, with the lands belonging to them, i.e. probably
Oxfordshire and Middlesex. The policy of constructing "burhs" or
fortified towns was continued. Hertford was fortified in 911, Witham in
912, while Aethelflaed fortified Cherbury in Shropshire, "Weardbyrig" and
Runcorn (all in 915). In 913 the Danes in Eastern Mercia gave
considerable trouble, and in 914 a fresh horde of pirates, coming from
Brittany, sailed up the Severn. They raided southern Wales, but were
hemmed in by the English forces and besieged until they promised to
leave the king's territory. Edward watched the southern shores of the
Bristol Channel so carefully that the Danes failed to secure a hold
there, and were ultimately forced to sail to Ireland. In the same year
Edward fortified Buckingham and received the submission of the jarls and
chief men of Bedford. In 915 he fortified Bedford itself, Maldon in 916,
and Towcester and "Wigingamere" in 917. In the last-mentioned year
Edward captured and destroyed the Danish stronghold of Tempsford, and
later in the year he took Colchester. An attack by the Danes on Maldon
failed, and in 915 Edward went to Passenham and received the submission
of the men of the "borough" of Northampton. The Danish strongholds of
Huntingdon and Colchester were now restored and repaired, and Edward
received the submission of the whole of the East Anglian Danes. Before
midsummer of this year Edward had fortified Stamford, and on the death
of his sister he received the submission of the Mercians at Tamworth.
There also three kings of the North Welsh took Edward as their lord.
Nottingham was now fortified; Thelwall in Cheshire (919) and Manchester
soon followed; Nottingham was strengthened by a second fort; Bakewell
was fortified and garrisoned, and then came the greatest triumph of
Edward's reign. He was "chosen as father and lord" by the Scottish king
and nation, by Raegenald, the Norwegian king of Northumbria, by Ealdred
of Bamborough, and by the English, Danes or Norwegians in Northumbria,
and by the Strathclyde Welsh.
With the conclusion of his wars Edward's activity ceased, and we hear no
more of him until in 924 he died at Farndon in Cheshire and was buried
in the "New Minster" at Winchester. He was thrice married: (1) to
Ecgwyn, a lady of rank, by whom he had a son Aethelstan, who succeeded
him, and a daughter Eadgyth, who married Sihtric of Northumbria in 924.
This marriage was probably an irregular one. (2) To Aelflaed, by whom he
had two sons--Aelfweard, who died a fortnight after his father, and
Eadwine, who was drowned in 933--and six daughters, Aethelflaed and
Aethelhild nuns, and four others (see AeTHELSTAN). (3) To Eadgifu, the
mother of Kings Edmund and Edred, and of two daughters.
AUTHORITIES.--_Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_ (ed. Plummer and Earle, Oxford);
Florence of Worcester (Mon. Hist. Brit.); William of Malmesbury,
_Gesta regum_ (Rolls Series); Simeon of Durham (Rolls Series);
Ethelweard (Mon. Hist. Brit.); Birch, _Cartularium Saxonicum_, Nos.
588-635; _D.N.B._, s.v. (A. Mw.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] See Stevenson's article in _Eng. Hist. Rev._ vol. xiii. pp.
71-77. The whole chronology of this reign is very difficult and
certainly is often impossible of attainment.
[2] It is possible that these battles are one and the same; the
places are within 2 to 3 m. of each other.
EDWARD, "THE MARTYR" (c. 926-978), king of the English, was the son of
Edgar by his wife Aethelflaed. Edward's brief reign was marked by an
anti-monastic reaction. Aelfhere, earl of Mercia, once more expelled many
of the monks whom Bishop Aethelwold had installed. There seems also to
have been some change in administrative policy, perhaps with regard to
the Danes, for Earl Oslac, whom Edgar had appointed to Northumbria, was
driven from his province. In ecclesiastical matters there were two
parties in the kingdom, the monastic, which had its chief hold in Essex
and East Anglia, and the anti-monastic, led by Aelfhere of Mercia.
Conferences were held at Kirtlington in Oxfordshire and at Calne in
Wiltshire in 977 and 978, but nothing definite seems to have been
decided. On the 18th of March 978 Edward's reign was suddenly cut short
by his assassination at Corfe Castle in Dorsetshire. The crime was
probably inspired by his stepmother, Aelfthryth, who was anxious to
secure the succession of her son Aelthelred. The body was hastily
interred at Wareham and remained there till 980, when Archbishop Dunstan
and Aelfhere of Mercia united in transferring it with great ceremony to
Shaftesbury. Edward seems to have been personally popular, and the poem
on his death in the chronicle calls his murder the worst deed in English
history. Very shortly after his death he was popularly esteemed to be
both saint and martyr.
See _Saxon Chronicle_; _Vita S. Oswaldi_ (_Hist. of Ch. of York_,
Rolls Series); _Memorials of St Dunstan_ (ed. Stubbs, Rolls Series).
(A. Mw.)
EDWARD, "THE CONFESSOR" (d. 1066), so called on account of his
reputation for sanctity, king of the English, was the son of Aethelred
II. and Emma, daughter of Richard, duke of Normandy, and was born at
Islip in Oxfordshire. On the recognition of Sweyn as king of England in
1013, Aethelred, with his wife and family, took refuge in Normandy, and
Edward continued to reside at the Norman court until he was recalled in
1041 by Hardicanute. He appears to have been formally recognized as heir
to the throne, if not actually associated in the kingship, and on the
death of Hardicanute in 1042 "all folk received him to be king," though
his actual coronation was delayed until Easter 1043. A few months later
Edward, in conjunction with the three great earls of the kingdom, made a
raid on the queen-mother Aelfgifu, or Emma, seized all her possessions
and compelled her to live in retirement.
In the earlier years of the reign the influence of Earl Godwine was
predominant, though not unopposed. His daughter Edith or Eadgyth became
Edward's queen in 1045. But the king's personal tastes inclined much
more to foreigners than to Englishmen, and he fell more and more into
the hands of favourites from beyond the sea. Between Godwine,
representing the spirit of nationalism, and these favourites (especially
their leader Robert of Jumieges, successively bishop of London and
archbishop of Canterbury) there was war to the knife. In 1046 Magnus,
king of Norway, who had succeeded Hardicanute in Denmark and claimed to
succeed him in England as well, threatened an invasion, but the
necessity of defending Denmark against his rival Sweyn Estrithson
prevented him from carrying it into effect. In 1049, Godwine's son
Sweyn, who had been outlawed for the seduction of the abbess of
Leominster, returned and demanded his restoration. This was refused and
Sweyn returned into exile, but not before he had with foulest treachery
murdered his young kinsman Beorn. He was, however, inlawed next year.
The influence of Godwine, already shaken, received a severe blow in 1051
in the appointment of Robert of Jumieges to the archbishopric of
Canterbury, and the same year saw the triumph of the foreigners for the
moment complete. Edward, indignant at the resistance offered by the men
of Dover to the insolence of his brother-in-law Eustace of Boulogne and
his French followers, ordered Godwine to punish the town. Godwine
refused. The king at the prompting of the archbishop then summoned a
meeting of the witan, at which the old charge against Godwine of
complicity in the murder of the Aetheling Alfred was to be revived. About
the same time came news of a fresh outrage by the foreigners. Godwine
gathered his forces and demanded redress, while the earls Leofric of
Mercia and Siward of Northumbria hastened to the side of the king. Civil
war seemed imminent, but at length a compromise was effected by which
the matter was referred to a meeting of the witan to be held at London.
At the appointed time Godwine presented himself at Southwark. But his
followers were rapidly deserting him, nor would the king give hostages
for his security. Alarmed for his safety, he fled to Flanders, while his
son Harold went to Ireland. But their exile was brief. The tale of
Godwine excited universal sympathy, for it was realized that he
represented the cause of national independence. Encouraged by assurances
from England, he sailed thither, and joining forces with Harold sailed
along the south coast and up the Thames. The king would have resisted
but found no support. Yielding to circumstances, he allowed himself to
be reconciled, and Godwine and his house were restored to their old
position. The queen at the same time was brought back from the monastery
of Wherwell, whither she had been despatched after her father's flight.
The foreigners had already ignominiously fled the country, and
henceforth the influence of Godwine, and, after his death, of Harold,
was supreme. In 1063 Harold made a great expedition into Wales, in which
he crushed the power of King Gruffyd, who was killed by his own people.
But despite his prowess and his power, he was the minister of the king
rather than his personal favourite. This latter position belonged to his
younger brother Tostig, who on the death of Siward in 1055 was appointed
earl of Northumbria. Here his severity and arbitrary temper rendered him
intensely unpopular, and in 1065 his subjects broke into revolt. They
elected Morkere as their earl, then marching south demanded Tostig's
banishment. Edward desired to crush the revolt by force of arms, but he
was overborne and forced to submit. The election of Morkere was
recognized, and Tostig went into exile. Intensely mortified at this
humiliation, the king fell sick, and henceforth his health failed
rapidly. He was unable to gratify his intense desire to be present at
the consecration of his new abbey of Westminster, the foundation of
which had been the chief interest of his closing years, and on the 5th
of January 1066 he died.
The virtues of Edward were monkish rather than kingly. In the qualities
of a ruler he was conspicuously deficient; always dependent on others,
he ever inclined to the unworthier master. But the charm of his
character for the monastic biographer, and the natural tendency to
glorify the days before the Norman oppression began, combined to cast
about his figure a halo which had not attached to it in life. Allowed to
keep her property by William the Conqueror, his widow, Edith, passed the
remainder of her life at Winchester, dying on the 19th of December 1075.
SOURCES.--A number of lives of Edward are brought together in a volume
of the Rolls Series entitled _Lives of Edward the Confessor_, and
edited by Dr H.R. Luard (London, 1858). Of these by far the most
valuable is the contemporary _Vita Edwardi_, which would appear from
internal evidence to have been written by an unknown writer soon after
the Norman Conquest--some time between 1066 and 1074. The other chief
authorities for the reign are (1) the _Saxon Chronicle_, (C. Plummer,
Oxford, 1892-1899); (2) _Florence of Worcester_, ed. B. Thorpe,
English Historical Society (London, 1848-1849). Reference may also be
made to J.M. Kemble, _Codex diplomaticus aevi Saxonici_ (London,
1839-1848). (C. S. P.*)
EDWARD I. (1239-1307), king of England, born at Westminster on the 17th
of June 1239, was the eldest son of Henry III. and Eleanor of Provence.
He was baptized Edward after Edward the Confessor, for whom Henry had
special veneration, and among his godfathers was Simon de Montfort, earl
of Leicester, his aunt Eleanor's husband. His political career begins
when the conclusion of a treaty with Alphonso X. of Castile, by which he
was to marry the Spanish king's half sister Eleanor, necessitated the
conferring on him of an adequate establishment. His father granted him
the duchy of Gascony, the earldom of Chester, the king's lands in Wales
and much else. The provision made was so liberal that Henry's subjects
declared he was left no better than a mutilated king. In May 1254 Edward
went to Gascony to take possession of his inheritance. He then crossed
the Pyrenees, and in October was dubbed knight by Alphonso and married
to Eleanor at the Cistercian convent of Las Huelgas, near Burgos. He
remained in Gascony till November 1255, but his father was too jealous
to allow him a free hand in its administration. After his return, the
attempts of his agents to establish English laws in his Welsh
possessions brought Edward into hostile relations with the Welsh. Here
also his father would give him no help, and his first campaign brought
him little result. Edward became extremely unpopular through his
association with his Lusignan kinsfolk, his pride and violence, and the
disorders of his household. In 1258 his strenuous opposition to the
Provisions of Oxford further weakened his position, but, after the
banishment of the foreigners, he began to take up a wiser line. In 1259
he led the young nobles who insisted that the triumphant oligarchy
should carry out the reforms to which it was pledged. For a moment it
looked as if Edward and Leicester might make common cause, but Edward
remained an enemy of Montfort, though he strove to infuse his father's
party with a more liberal and national spirit. He was the soul of the
reconstituted royalist party formed about 1263. In 1264 he took a
prominent part in the fighting between the king and the barons. At the
battle of Lewes his rash pursuit of the Londoners contributed to his
father's defeat. Two days later Edward surrendered to Leicester as a
hostage for the good behaviour of his allies. He was forced to give up
his earldom of Chester to Leicester, but at Whitsuntide 1265 he escaped
from his custodians, and joined the lords of the Welsh march who were
still in arms. With their aid he defeated and slew Leicester at Evesham
on the 4th of August 1265.
For the rest of Henry III.'s reign Edward controlled his father's policy
and appropriated enough of Leicester's ideals to make the royalist
restoration no mere reaction. So peaceful became the outlook of affairs
that in 1268 Edward took the cross, hoping to join the new crusade of St
Louis. Want of money delayed his departure till 1270, by which time St
Louis was dead, and a truce concluded with the infidel. Refusing to be a
party to such treason to Christendom, Edward went with his personal
followers to Acre, where he abode from May 1271 to August 1272. Despite
his energy and valour he could do little to prop up the decaying
crusading kingdom and he narrowly escaped assassination. At last the
declining health of his father induced him to return to the West. He
learned in Sicily the death of Henry III. on the 16th of November 1272.
On the 20th of November, the day of Henry's funeral, he was recognized
as king by the English barons, and from that day his regnal years were
subsequently computed. Affairs in England were so peaceful that Edward
did not hurry home. After a slow journey through Italy and France he did
homage to his cousin Philip III. at Paris, on the 26th of July 1273. He
then went to Gascony, where he stayed nearly a year. At last he landed
at Dover on the 2nd of August 1274, and was crowned at Westminster on
the 18th of the same month.
Edward was thirty-five years old when he became king, and the rude
schooling of his youth had developed his character and suggested the
main lines of the policy which he was to carry out as monarch. He was a
tall, well-proportioned and handsome man, extravagantly devoted to
military exercises, tournaments and the rougher and more dangerous forms
of hunting. He had learned to restrain the hot temper of his youth, and
was proud of his love of justice and strict regard to his plighted word.
His domestic life was unstained, he was devoted to his friends, and
loyal to his subordinates. Without any great originality either as
soldier or statesman, he was competent enough to appropriate the best
ideas of the time and make them his own. His defects were a hardness of
disposition which sometimes approached cruelty and a narrow and pedantic
temper, which caused him to regard the letter rather than the spirit of
his promises. His effectiveness and love of strong government stand in
strong contrast to his father's weakness. Though he loved power, and
never willingly surrendered it, he saw that to be successful he must
make his policy popular. Thus he continued the system which Montfort had
formed with the object of restraining the monarchy, because he saw in a
close alliance with his people the best means of consolidating the power
of the crown.
The first years of Edward's reign were mainly occupied by his efforts to
establish a really effective administration. In carrying out this task
he derived great help from his chancellor, Robert Burnell, bishop of
Bath and Wells. Administrative reform soon involved legislation, and
from 1275 to 1290 nearly every year was marked by an important law. Few
of these contained anything that was very new or original. They rather
illustrate that policy which caused Dr Stubbs to describe his reign as a
"period of definition." Yet the results of his conservative legislation
were almost revolutionary. In particular he left the impress of his
policy on the land laws of England, notably by the clause _De Donis_ of
the Westminster statute of 1285, and the statute _Quia Emptores_ of
1290. The general effect of his work was to eliminate feudalism from
political life. At first he aimed at abolishing all franchises whose
holders could not produce written warranty for them. This was the policy
of the statute of Gloucester of 1278, but the baronial opposition was so
resolute that Edward was forced to permit many immunities to remain.
Though the most orthodox of churchmen, his dislike of authority not
emanating from himself threatened to involve him in constant conflict
with the Church, and notably with John Peckham, the Franciscan friar,
who was archbishop of Canterbury from 1279 to 1292. The statute of
Mortmain of 1279, which forbade the further grant of lands to
ecclesiastical corporations without the royal consent, and the writ
_Circumspecte Agatis_ of 1285, which limited the church courts to
strictly ecclesiastical business, both provoked strong clerical
opposition. However, Peckham gave way to some extent, and Edward
prudently acquiesced in many clerical assumptions which he disliked. He
was strong enough to refuse to pay the tribute to Rome which John had
promised, and his reign saw the end of that papal overlordship over
England which had greatly complicated the situation under his father.
Besides administration and legislation, the other great event of the
first fifteen years of Edward's reign was the conquest of the
principality of Wales. It was part of Edward's policy of reconciliation
after the battle of Evesham that in the treaty of Shrewsbury of 1267 he
had fully recognized the great position which Llewelyn ab Gruffyd,
prince of Wales, had gained as the ally of Simon de Montfort. However,
Llewelyn's early successes had blinded the Welsh prince to the
limitations of his power, and he profited by Edward's early absences
from England to delay in performing his feudal obligations to the new
king. Even after Edward's return Llewelyn continued to evade doing
homage. At last Edward lost patience, and in 1277 invaded north Wales.
He conducted his campaign like a great siege, blocking all the avenues
to Snowdon, and forcing Llewelyn to surrender from lack of supplies. He
thereupon reduced the Welsh prince to the position of a petty north
Welsh chieftain strictly dependent on the English. For the next five
years Edward did his best to set up the English system of government in
the ceded districts. The Welsh resentment of this soon gave Llewelyn
another chance, and compelled Edward to devote the years 1282-1283 to
completing his conquest. In 1284 he issued the statute of Wales, which
provided for a scheme for the future government of the principality.
Edward is often called the conqueror of Wales, but in truth he only
effected the conquest of Llewelyn's dominions. The march of Wales was
only indirectly affected by his legislation, and remained subject to its
feudal marcher lords until the 16th century.
Edward was very careful in his foreign policy. Though preserving nominal
peace with his cousin Philip III. of France, his relations with that
country were constantly strained. After Philip III.'s death in 1285,
Edward crossed the Channel in 1286, to perform homage to his successor,
Philip the Fair. He remained abroad till 1289, busied in attempts to
improve the administration of Gascony, and making repeated and finally
successful efforts to end by his mediation the still continuing struggle
between the houses of Anjou and Aragon. His long absence threw the
government of England into confusion, and on his return in 1289 he was
compelled to dismiss most of his judges and ministers for corruption. In
1290 he expelled all Jews from England.
The affairs of Scotland furnished Edward with his chief preoccupation
for the rest of his reign. After the death of Alexander III., in 1286,
Scotland was governed in the name of his granddaughter Margaret, the
Maid of Norway. The English king had suggested that Edward of Carnarvon,
his eldest surviving son, should marry the little queen of Scots, and
thus bring about the union of the two countries. Unluckily the death of
Margaret in 1290 frustrated the scheme. The Scottish throne was now
disputed by many claimants, and the Scots asked Edward to arbitrate
between them. Edward accepted the position, but insisted that, before he
acted, the Scots should recognize him as their overlord. The claimants
set the example of submission, and soon the chief Scots nobles followed.
Thereupon Edward undertook the arbitration, and in 1292 adjudged the
throne to John Baliol. The new king did homage to Edward, but his
subjects soon began to resent the claims of jurisdiction over Scotland,
which Edward declared were the natural results of his feudal supremacy.
At last the Scots deprived John of nearly all his power, repudiated
Edward's claims, and made an alliance with the French. During the years
of the Scottish arbitration Edward had slowly been drifting into war
with France. The chronic difficulties caused by French attempts to
confine Edward's power in Gascony were now accentuated by the quarrels
between the sailors and merchants of the two countries. In 1293 Edward
was persuaded by his brother, Edmund, earl of Lancaster, to yield up
Gascony temporarily to Philip the Fair. But Philip refused to restore
the duchy, and Edward, seeing that he had been tricked, declared war
against France, at the very moment when the Scottish resistance gave the
French a firm ally in Britain. To make matters worse, the Welsh rose in
rebellion. It was therefore quite impossible for Edward to recover
Gascony.
The most critical years of Edward's reign now began. He saw that he
could only meet his difficulties by throwing himself on the support of
his own subjects, and convoked, in 1295, a representative parliament of
the three estates, which has been called in later times the Model
Parliament, because it first illustrated the type which was to be
perpetuated in all subsequent parliaments. "What touches all," ran
Edward's writ of summons, "should be approved of all, and it is also
clear that common dangers should be met by measures agreed upon in
common." The parliamentary constitution of England was established as
the result of Edward's action.
Secure of his subjects' allegiance, Edward put down the Welsh revolt,
and conquered Scotland in 1296. When quiet was restored to Britain, he
hoped to throw all his energy into the recovery of Gascony, but new
troubles arose at home which once more diverted him from his supreme
purpose. Led by Archbishop Winchelsea, Peckham's successor, the clergy
refused to pay taxes in obedience to the bull of Pope Boniface VIII.,
called _Clericis Laicos_. Edward declared that if the clergy would not
contribute to support the state, the state could afford them no
protection. But the clerical opposition was soon joined by a baronial
opposition. Headed by the earls of Hereford and Norfolk, many of the
barons declined to join in an expedition to Gascony, and Edward was
forced to sail to the French war, leaving them behind. Thereupon the
recalcitrant barons forced upon the regency a fresh confirmation of the
charters, to which new articles were added, safeguarding the people from
arbitrary taxation. Edward at Ghent reluctantly accepted this
_Confirmatio Cariarum_, but even his submission did not end the crisis.
In the same year (1297), all Scotland rose in revolt under the popular
hero William Wallace, and next year (1298), Edward was forced to
undertake its reconquest. The battle of Falkirk, won on the 22nd of
July, was the greatest of Edward's military triumphs; but, though it
destroyed the power of Wallace, it did not put an end to Scottish
resistance. Bitter experience taught Edward that he could not fight the
French and the Scots at the same time, and in 1299 he made peace with
Philip, and, Eleanor having died in November 1290, he married the French
king's sister Margaret (c. 1282-1318), and some years later obtained the
restitution of Gascony. In the same spirit he strove to destroy the
clerical and baronial opposition. He did not succeed in the former task
until a complacent pope arose in his own subject, Clement V., who
abandoned Winchelsea to his anger, and suffered the archbishop to be
driven into exile. The baronial leaders could not be wholly overthrown
by force, and Edward was compelled to make them fresh concessions.
It was not until 1303 that Edward was able to undertake seriously the
conquest of Scotland. By 1305 the land was subdued, and Wallace beheaded
as a traitor. But Edward had hardly organized the government of his new
conquest when a fresh revolt broke out under Robert Bruce, grandson of
the chief rival of Baliol in 1290. Bruce was soon crowned king of Scots,
and at the age of seventy Edward had to face the prospect of conquering
Scotland for the third time. He resolved to take the field in person;
but the effort was too great, and on the 7th of July 1307 he died at
Burgh-on-Sands, near Carlisle. His death destroyed the last faint hope
of conquering Scotland, and showed that the chief ambition of his life
was a failure. Yet his conquest of Wales, his legislation, his triumph
over his barons, his ecclesiastics, and the greatest of French medieval
kings indicate the strength and permanence of his work. He was buried
at Westminster under a plain slab on which was inscribed _Edwardus
primus Scottorum malleus hic est. Pactum serva._
By Eleanor of Castile Edward had four sons, his successor Edward II. and
three who died young, and nine daughters, including Joan, or Joanna
(1272-1307), the wife of Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester (d. 1295),
and then of Ralph de Monthermer; Margaret (1275-1318), the wife of John
II., duke of Brabant; and Eleanor (1282-1316), who married John I.,
count of Holland, and then Humphrey Bohun, earl of Hereford (d. 1322).
By Margaret of France the king had two sons: Thomas of Brotherton, earl
of Norfolk, and Edmund of Woodstock, earl of Kent.
The principal modern authorities for this reign are: W. Stubbs,
_Constitutional History of England_, vol. ii. chaps. xiv. and xv.
(1896); T.F. Tout, _Edward I._ (1893), and _Political History of
England, 1216-1377_, pp. 136-235 (1905); R.B. Seeley, _Life and Reign
of Edward I._ (1872); R. Pauli, _Geschichte von England_, iv. pp.
1-198 (Hamburg, 1864-1875); W. Hunt, article on "Edward I." in
_Dictionary of National Biography_; J.E. Morris, _Welsh Wars of Edward
I._ (Oxford, 1901); and C.V. Langlois's _Philippe le Hardi_ (Paris,
1887). (T. F. T.)
EDWARD II. (1284-1327), "of Carnarvon," king of England, the fourth son
of Edward I. by his first wife Eleanor of Castile, was born at Carnarvon
Castle on the 25th of April 1284. The story that the king presented the
new-born child to the Welsh as their future native prince is quite
unfounded, for Edward was only made prince of Wales in the Lincoln
parliament of 1301. When a few months old, he became by his elder
brother's death the heir to the throne, and Edward I. took great pains
to train him in warfare and statecraft. He took part in several Scots
campaigns, but all his father's efforts could not prevent his acquiring
the habits of extravagance and frivolity which he retained all through
his life. The old king attributed his son's defects to the bad influence
of his friend, the Gascon knight Piers Gaveston, and drove the favourite
into exile. When Edward I. died, on the 7th of July 1307, the first act
of the prince, now Edward II., was to recall Gaveston. His next was to
abandon the Scots campaign on which his father had set his heart.
The new king was physically almost as fine a man as Edward I. He was,
however, destitute of any serious purpose, and was, as Dr Stubbs says,
"the first king after the Conquest who was not a man of business." He
cared for nothing but amusing himself, and found his chief delight in
athletics and in the practice of mechanical crafts. He was not so much
vicious as foolish, and wanting in all serious interests. He had so
little confidence in himself that he was always in the hands of some
favourite who possessed a stronger will than his own. In the early years
of his reign Gaveston held this role, acting as regent when Edward went
to France--where, on the 25th of January 1308, he married Isabella, the
daughter of Philip the Fair--and receiving the earldom of Cornwall with
the hand of the king's niece, Margaret of Gloucester. The barons soon
grew indignant at Edward's devotion to his "brother Piers," and twice
insisted on his banishment. On each occasion Edward soon recalled his
friend, whereupon the barons, headed by the king's cousin Thomas, earl
of Lancaster, went to war against king and favourite, and in 1312
treacherously put Gaveston to death. Edward was not strong enough even
to avenge his loss. He was forced to stand aside and suffer the realm to
be governed by the baronial committee of twenty-one lords ordainers,
who, in 1311, had drawn up a series of ordinances, whose effect was to
substitute ordainers for the king as the effective government of the
country. But in all the ordinances nothing was said about the commons
and lower clergy. Parliament meant to the new rulers an assembly of
barons just as it had done to the opponents of Henry III. in 1258. The
effect of their triumph was to change England from a monarchy to a
narrow oligarchy.
During the quarrels between Edward and the ordainers, Robert Bruce was
steadily conquering Scotland. His progress was so great that he had
occupied all the fortresses save Stirling, which he closely besieged.
The danger of losing Stirling shamed Edward and the barons into an
attempt to retrieve their lost ground. In June 1314 Edward led a great
army into Scotland in the hope of relieving Stirling. On the 24th of
June his ill-disciplined and badly led host was completely defeated by
Robert Bruce at Bannockburn. Henceforth Bruce was sure of his position
as king of Scots, and his pitiless devastation of the northern counties
of England was his wild vengeance for the sufferings his land had
previously experienced from the English. Edward's disgraceful defeat
made him more dependent on his barons than ever. His kinsman, Thomas of
Lancaster, had now an opportunity of saving England from the
consequences of the king's incompetence. He had shown some capacity as a
leader of opposition, but though he had great wealth, and was lord of
five earldoms, he had small ability and no constructive power. In his
desire to keep the king weak, he was suspected to have made a secret
understanding with Robert Bruce. Before long the opposition split up
under his incompetent guidance into fiercely contending factions. Under
Aymer of Valence, earl of Pembroke, a middle party arose, which hated
Lancaster so much that it supported the king to put an end to
Lancaster's rule. After 1318 the effect of its influence was to restore
Edward to some portion of his authority. However, the king hated
Pembroke almost as much as Lancaster. He now found a competent adviser
in Hugh le Despenser, a baron of great experience. What was more
important to him, he had in Despenser's son, Hugh le Despenser the
younger, a personal friend and favourite, who was able in some measure
to replace Gaveston. The fierce hatred which the barons manifested to
the Despensers showed that they could hate a deserter as bitterly as
they had hated the Gascon adventurer. They were indignant at the favours
which Edward lavished upon the favourite and his father, and were
especially alarmed when the younger Despenser strove to procure for
himself the earldom of Gloucester in right of his wife, Edward's niece.
At last, in 1321, the barons met in parliament, and under Lancaster's
guidance procured the banishment of the Despensers. The disasters of his
friends inspired Edward to unwonted activity. In 1322 he recalled them
from exile, and waged war against the barons on their behalf. Triumph
crowned his exertions. Lancaster, defeated at Boroughbridge, was
executed at Pontefract. For the next five years the Despensers ruled
England. Unlike the ordainers, they took pains to get the Commons on
their side, and a parliament held at York in 1322 revoked the ordinances
because they trenched upon the rights of the crown, and were drawn up by
the barons only. From this time no statute was technically valid unless
the Commons had agreed to it. This marks the most important step forward
in Edward II.'s reign. But the rule of the Despensers soon fell away
from this wise beginning. They thought only of heaping up wealth for
themselves, and soon stirred up universal indignation. In particular,
they excited the ill-will of the queen, Isabella of France. Craftily
dissembling her indignation, Isabella kept silence until 1325, when she
went to France in company with her eldest son, Edward of Windsor, who
was sent to do homage for Aquitaine to her brother, the new French king.
When her business was over, Isabella declined to return to her husband
as long as the Despensers remained his favourites. She formed a criminal
connexion with Roger Mortimer of Wigmore, one of the baronial exiles,
and in September 1326 landed in Essex accompanied by Mortimer and her
son, declaring that she was come to avenge the murder of Lancaster, and
to expel the Despensers. Edward's followers deserted him, and on the 2nd
of October he fled from London to the west, where he took refuge in the
younger Despenser's estates in Glamorgan. His wife followed him, put to
death both the Despensers, and, after a futile effort to escape by sea,
Edward was captured on the 16th of November. He was imprisoned at
Kenilworth Castle, and a parliament met at Westminster in January 1327,
which chose his son to be king as Edward III. It was thought prudent to
compel the captive king to resign the crown, and on the 20th of January
Edward was forced to renounce his office before a committee of the
estates. The government of Isabella and Mortimer was so weakly
established that it dared not leave the deposed king alive. On the 3rd
of April he was secretly removed from Kenilworth and entrusted to the
custody of two dependants of Mortimer. After various wanderings he was
imprisoned at Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire. Every indignity was
inflicted upon him, and he was systematically ill-treated in the hope
that he would die of disease. When his strong constitution seemed likely
to prevail over the ill-treatment of his enemies he was cruelly put to
death on the 21st of September. It was announced that he had died a
natural death, and he was buried in St Peter's Abbey at Gloucester, now
the cathedral, where his son afterwards erected a magnificent tomb.
Edward's wife, Isabella (c. 1292-1358), bore him two sons, Edward III.
and John of Eltham, earl of Cornwall (1316-1336), and two daughters,
Isabella and Joanna (1321-1362), wife of David II., king of Scotland.
After the execution of her paramour, Roger Mortimer, in 1330, Isabella
retired from public life; she died at Hertford on the 23rd of August
1358.
See R. Pauli, _Geschichte von England_, iv. pp. 199-306; T.F. Tout,
_Political History of England_, 1216-1307, pp. 236-304, and article in
_Dictionary of National Biography_; W. Stubbs, _Constitutional
History_, vol. ii. pp. 319-386, and _Introductions to Chronicles of
the Reigns of Edward I. and Edward II._ in Rolls series.
(T. F. T.)
EDWARD III. (1312-1377), "of Windsor," king of England, eldest son of
Edward II. and Isabella of France, was born at Windsor on the 13th of
November 1312. In 1320 he was made earl of Chester, and in 1325 duke of
Aquitaine, but he never received the title of prince of Wales.
Immediately after his appointment to Aquitaine, he was sent to France to
do homage to his uncle Charles IV., and remained abroad until he
accompanied his mother and Mortimer in their expedition to England. To
raise funds for this he was betrothed to Philippa, daughter of the count
of Hainaut. On the 26th of October 1326, after the fall of Bristol, he
was proclaimed warden of the kingdom during his father's absence. On the
13th of January 1327 parliament recognized him as king, and he was
crowned on the 29th of the same month.
For the next four years Isabella and Mortimer governed in his name,
though nominally his guardian was Henry, earl of Lancaster. In the
summer he took part in an abortive campaign against the Scots, and was
married to Philippa at York on the 24th of January 1328. On the 15th of
June 1330 his eldest child, Edward, the Black Prince, was born. Soon
after, Edward made a successful effort to throw off his degrading
dependence on his mother and her paramour. In October 1330 he entered
Nottingham Castle by night, through a subterranean passage, and took
Mortimer prisoner. On the 29th of November the execution of the
favourite at Tyburn completed the young king's emancipation. Edward
discreetly drew a veil over his mother's relations with Mortimer, and
treated her with every respect. There is no truth in the stories that
henceforth he kept her in honourable confinement, but her political
influence was at an end.
Edward III.'s real reign now begins. Young, ardent and active, he strove
with all his might to win back for England something of the position
which it had acquired under Edward I. He bitterly resented the
concession of independence to Scotland by the treaty of Northampton of
1328, and the death of Robert Bruce in 1329 gave him a chance of
retrieving his position. The new king of Scots, David, who was his
brother-in-law, was a mere boy, and the Scottish barons, exiled for
their support of Robert Bruce, took advantage of the weakness of his
rule to invade Scotland in 1332. At their head was Edward Baliol, whose
victory at Dupplin Moor established him for a brief time as king of
Scots. After four months Baliol was driven out by the Scots, whereupon
Edward for the first time openly took up his cause. In 1333 the king won
in person the battle of Halidon Hill over the Scots, but his victory did
not restore Baliol to power. The Scots despised him as a puppet of the
English king, and after a few years David was finally established in
Scotland. During these years England gradually drifted into hostility
with France. The chief cause of this was the impossible situation which
resulted from Edward's position as duke of Gascony. Contributing causes
were Philip's support of the Scots and Edward's alliance with the
Flemish cities, which were then on bad terms with their French overlord,
and the revival of Edward's claim, first made in 1328, to the French
crown. War broke out in 1337, and in 1338 Edward visited Coblenz, where
he made an alliance with the emperor Louis the Bavarian. In 1339 and
1340 Edward endeavoured to invade France from the north with the help of
his German and Flemish allies, but the only result of his campaigns was
to reduce him to bankruptcy.
In 1340, however, he took personal part in the great naval battle off
Sluys, in which he absolutely destroyed the French navy. In the same
year he assumed the title of king of France. At first he did this to
gratify the Flemings, whose scruples in fighting their overlord, the
French king, disappeared when they persuaded themselves that Edward was
the rightful king of France. However, his pretensions to the French
crown gradually became more important. The persistence with which he and
his successors urged them made stable peace impossible for more than a
century, and this made the struggle famous in history as the Hundred
Years' War. Till the days of George III. every English king also called
himself king of France.
Despite his victory at Sluys, Edward was so exhausted by his land
campaign that he was forced before the end of 1340 to make a truce and
return to England. He unfairly blamed his chief minister, Archbishop
Stratford, for his financial distress, and immediately on his return
vindictively attacked him. Before the truce expired a disputed
succession to the duchy of Brittany gave Edward an excuse for renewing
hostilities with France. In 1342 he went to Brittany and fought an
indecisive campaign against the French. He was back in England in 1343.
In the following years he spent much time and money in rebuilding
Windsor Castle, and instituting the order of the Garter, which he did in
order to fulfil a vow that he had taken to restore the Round Table of
Arthur. His finances, therefore, remained embarrassed despite the
comparative pause in the war, although in 1339 he had repudiated his
debt to his Italian creditors, a default that brought about widespread
misery in Florence.
A new phase of the French war begins when in July 1346 Edward landed in
Normandy, accompanied by his eldest son, Edward, prince of Wales, a
youth of sixteen. In a memorable campaign Edward marched from La Hogue
to Caen, and from Caen almost to the gates of Paris. It was a plundering
expedition on a large scale, and like most of Edward's campaigns showed
some want of strategic purpose. But Edward's decisive victory over the
French at Crecy, in Ponthieu, on the 26th of August, where he scattered
the army with which Philip VI. attempted to stay his retreat from Paris
to the northern frontier, signally demonstrated the tactical superiority
of Edward's army over the French. Next year Edward effected the
reduction of Calais. This was the most solid and lasting of his
conquests, and its execution compelled him to greater efforts than the
Crecy campaign. Other victories in Gascony and Brittany further
emphasized his power. In 1346, David, king of Scots, was also defeated
and taken prisoner at Neville's Cross, near Durham. In the midst of his
successes, however, want of money forced Edward to make a new truce in
1347. He was as far from the conquest of France as ever.
Edward returned to England in October 1347. He celebrated his triumph by
a series of splendid tournaments, and completed his scheme for the
establishment of the order of the Garter. In 1348 he rejected an offer
of the imperial throne. In the same year the Black Death first appeared
in England, and raged until 1349. Yet the horrors which it wrought
hardly checked the magnificent revels of Edward's court, and neither the
plague nor the truce stayed the course of the French war, though what
fighting there was was indecisive and on a small scale. Edward's martial
exploits during the next years were those of a gallant knight rather
than those of a responsible general. Conspicuous among them were his
famous combat with Eustace de Ribemont, near Calais, in 1349, and the
hard-fought naval victory over the Spaniards off Winchelsea, in 1350.
Efforts to make peace, initiated by Pope Innocent VI., came to nothing,
though the English commons were now weary of the war. The result of this
failure was the renewal of war on a large scale. In 1355 Edward led an
unsuccessful raid out of Calais, and in January and February 1356
harried the Lothians, in the expedition famous as the Burned Candlemas.
His exploits sank into insignificance as compared with those of his son,
whose victory at Poitiers, on the 19th of September 1356, resulted in
the captivity of King John, and forced the French to accept a new truce.
Edward entertained his royal captive very magnificently, and in 1359
concluded with him the treaty of London, by which John surrendered so
much that the French repudiated the treaty. Edward thereupon resolved to
invade France afresh and compel its acceptance. On the 28th of October
he landed at Calais, and advanced to Reims, where he hoped to be crowned
king of France. The strenuous resistance of the citizens frustrated this
scheme, and Edward marched into Burgundy, whence he made his way back
towards Paris. Failing in an attack on the capital, he was glad to
conclude, on the 8th of May 1360, preliminaries of peace at Bretigny,
near Chartres. This treaty, less onerous to France than that of London,
took its final form in the treaty of Calais, ratified by King John on
the 9th of October. By it Edward renounced his claim to France in return
for the whole of Aquitaine.
The treaty of Calais did not bring rest or prosperity either to England
or France. Fresh visitations of the Black Death, in 1362 and 1369,
intensified the social and economic disturbances which had begun with
the first outbreak in 1348. Desperate, but not very successful, efforts
were made to enforce the statute of Labourers, of 1351, by which it was
sought to maintain prices and wages as they had been before the
pestilence. Another feature of these years was the anti-papal, or rather
anti-clerical, legislation embodied in the statutes of Provisors and
Praemunire. These measures were first passed in 1351 and 1353, but often
repeated. In 1366 Edward formally repudiated the feudal supremacy over
England, still claimed by the papacy by reason of John's submission.
Another feature of the time was the strenuous effort made by Edward to
establish his numerous family without too great expense. In the end the
estates of the houses of Lancaster, Kent, Bohun, Burgh and Mortimer
swelled the revenues of Edward's children and grandchildren, in whose
favour also the new title of duke was introduced.
In 1369 the French king, Charles V., repudiated the treaty of Calais and
renewed the war. Edward's French dominions gladly reverted to their old
allegiance, and Edward showed little of his former vigour in meeting
this new trouble. He resumed the title and arms of king of France, but
left most of the fighting and administration of his foreign kingdoms to
his sons, Edward and John. While the latter were struggling with little
success against the rising tide of French national feeling, Edward's
want of money made him a willing participator in the attack on the
wealth and privileges of the Church. In 1371 a clerical ministry was
driven from office, and replaced by laymen, who proved, however, less
effective administrators than their predecessors. Meanwhile Aquitaine
was gradually lost; the defeat of Pembroke off La Rochelle deprived
England of the command of the sea, and Sir Owen ap Thomas, a
grand-nephew of Llewelyn ab Gruffyd, planned, with French help, an
abortive invasion of Wales. In 1371 the Black Prince came back to
England with broken health, and in 1373 John of Lancaster marched to
little purpose through France, from Calais to Bordeaux. In 1372 Edward
made his final effort to lead an army, but contrary winds prevented his
even landing his troops in France. In 1375 he was glad to make a truce,
which lasted until his death. By it the only important possessions
remaining in English hands were Calais, Bordeaux, Bayonne and Brest.
Edward was now sinking into his dotage. After the death of Queen
Philippa he fell entirely under the influence of a greedy mistress named
Alice Perrers, while the Black Prince and John of Gaunt became the
leaders of sharply divided parties in the court and council of the king.
With the help of Alice Perrers John of Gaunt obtained the chief
influence with his father, but his administration was neither
honourable nor successful. His chief enemies were the higher
ecclesiastics, headed by William of Wykeham, bishop of Winchester, who
had been excluded from power in 1371. John further irritated the clergy
by making an alliance with John Wycliffe. The opposition to John was led
by the Black Prince and Edmund Mortimer, earl of March, the husband of
Edward's grand-daughter, Philippa of Clarence. At last popular
indignation against the courtiers came to a head in the famous Good
Parliament of 1376. Alice Perrers was removed from court, and Duke
John's subordinate instruments were impeached. But in the midst of the
parliament the death of the Black Prince robbed the commons of their
strongest support. John of Gaunt regained power, and in 1377 a new
parliament, carefully packed by the courtiers, reversed the acts of the
Good Parliament. Not long after Edward III. died, on the 21st of June
1377.
Edward III. was not a great man like Edward I. He was, however, an
admirable tactician, a consummate knight, and he possessed extraordinary
vigour and energy of temperament. His court, described at length in
Froissart's famous chronicle, was the most brilliant in Europe, and he
was himself well fitted to be the head of the magnificent chivalry that
obtained fame in the French wars. Though his main ambition was military
glory, he was not a bad ruler of England. He was liberal, kindly,
good-tempered and easy of access, and his yielding to his subjects'
wishes in order to obtain supplies for carrying on the French war
contributed to the consolidation of the constitution. His weak points
were his wanton breaches of good faith, his extravagance, his frivolity
and his self-indulgence. Like that of Edward I. his ambition transcended
his resources, and before he died even his subjects were aware of his
failure.
Edward had twelve children, seven sons and five daughters. Five of his
sons played some part in the history of their time, these being Edward
the Black Prince, Lionel of Antwerp, duke of Clarence, John of Gaunt,
duke of Lancaster, Edmund of Langley, afterwards duke of York, and
Thomas of Woodstock, afterwards duke of Gloucester. John and Edmund are
also important as the founders of the rival houses of Lancaster and
York. Each of the last four was named from the place of his birth, and
for the same reason the Black Prince is sometimes called Edward of
Woodstock. The king's two other sons both died in infancy. Of his
daughters, three died unmarried; the others were Isabella, who married
into the family of Coucy, and Mary, who married into that of Montfort.
AUTHORITIES.--The two chief modern lives of Edward III. are W.
Longman's _Life and Times of Edward III._, and J. Mackinnon's _History
of Edward III._ Neither work can be regarded as adequate, and in some
ways J. Barnes's quaint _History of Edward III._ (1688) is less
unsatisfactory. The general history of the time can be read in W.
Stubbs's _Constitutional History of England_, vol. ii. chapters xvi.
and xvii.; in T.F. Tout's _Political History of England_, 1216-1377,
pp. 301-441; in R. Pauli's _Geschichte von England_, iv. pp. 307-504;
and in Edward's life by W. Hunt in the _Dictionary of National
Biography_. For the Hundred Years' War, see E. Deprez's _Les
Preliminaires de la guerre de cent ans, 1328-1342_, and H. Denifle's
_La Desolation des eglises, monasteres et hopitaux en France pendant
la guerre de cent ans_. For economic and social history see W.J.
Ashley's _English Economic History_, and W. Cunningham's _Growth of
English Industry and Commerce during the Early and Middle Ages_. For
the end of the reign see S. Armitage Smith's _John of Gaunt_, J.
Lechler's _Wiclif und die Vorgeschichte der Reformation_, translated
as _Wycliffe and his English Precursors_, R.L. Poole's _Wycliffe and
Movements for Reform_, and G.M. Trevelyan's _England in the Age of
Wycliffe_. (T. F. T.)
EDWARD IV. (1442-1483), king of England, son of Richard, duke of York,
by Cicely Neville, was born at Rouen on the 28th of April 1442. As a boy
he was styled earl of March, and spent most of his time at Ludlow. After
the Yorkist failure at Ludlow field in October 1459, Edward fled with
the earls of Salisbury and Warwick, his uncle and cousin, to Calais.
Thence in the following July he accompanied them in their successful
invasion of England, to be welcomed in London, and to share in the
victory over the Lancastrians at Northampton. After the acceptance of
Richard of York as heir to the crown, Edward returned to the Welsh
marches, where early in the new year he heard of his father's defeat
and death at Wakefield. Hastily gathering an army he defeated the earls
of Pembroke and Wiltshire at Mortimer's Cross on the 2nd of February
1461, and then marched on London. He was acclaimed by the citizens in an
assembly at Clerkenwell, declared king by a Yorkist council, and took
possession of the regality on the 4th of March. Soon after the new king
and the earl of Warwick went north, and on the 28th of March won a
decisive victory at Towton.
Edward owed his throne to his kinsmen the Nevilles, and he was content
for the time to be guided by them. For himself he was young and fond of
pleasure. Still he made frequent progresses, and took some part in the
fighting that went on in the north during 1462 and 1463. But he was
absent from the final victory at Hexham on the 14th of May 1464, and was
at the very time engaged in contracting a secret marriage with
Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Woodville, Lord Rivers, and widow of Sir
John Grey of Groby (d. 1461). The marriage was disclosed at Michaelmas,
much to the vexation of Warwick, who in pursuit of his foreign policy
had projected a match with a French princess. Edward heaped favours on
his new relatives; his father-in-law was made treasurer, and great
marriages were found for his wife's sisters and brothers. In foreign
affairs also Edward thwarted Warwick's plans by favouring an alliance
with Burgundy rather than France. There was, however, no open breach
till 1469, when Warwick, taking advantage of the unpopularity of the
Woodvilles, and supported by the king's next brother George, duke of
Clarence, appeared in arms. Edward was surprised and made prisoner at
Middleham, and Rivers was beheaded. For six months Edward had to submit
to Warwick's tutelage; then on the occasion of a rising in Lincolnshire
he gathered an army of his own. Sir Robert Welles, the leader of this
rebellion, made a confession implicating Warwick, who fled with Clarence
to France. The king thought himself secure, but when Warwick and
Clarence made terms with the Lancastrian exiles, Edward in his turn had
to seek refuge in Holland (September 1470). His brother-in-law, Charles
of Burgundy, at first refused him any assistance, but at last furnished
him with money, and on the 14th of March 1471 Edward and his brother
Richard landed with a small force at Ravenspur near Hull. Marching south
he was welcomed at London on the 11th of April, defeated Warwick at
Barnet three days later, and the Lancastrians at Tewkesbury on the 4th
of May. From thenceforth Edward's possession of the crown was secure.
His position was strengthened by the birth of a son (2nd of November
1470, during his exile), and by the wealth which he acquired through the
confiscation of the estates of his opponents. Clarence had made his
peace with Edward, but was at enmity with his other brother Richard of
Gloucester, who now married Warwick's second daughter and claimed a
share in the Neville inheritance. Their rivalry and Clarence's continued
intrigues furnished Edward with his chief domestic difficulty; the
trouble was ended by the judicial murder of Clarence in 1478.
The only serious enterprise of these latter years was the short French
war of 1475, from which Edward was bought out by the treaty of
Pecquigny. As foreign policy it was inglorious, and involved a departure
from Edward's earlier plan of a Burgundian alliance. However, it shows a
certain recognition of England's need to concentrate her energies on her
own development. The annual subsidy which Louis XI. agreed to pay
further served Edward's purposes by providing him with money for home
government, and enabled him to avoid possible trouble through the
necessity for too frequent parliaments and heavy taxation. So Edward's
personal rule became in its character autocratic; but it was in the art
of courting popularity and concealing despotism that he most shows
himself as a type of tyranny. He lacked neither ambition nor capacity,
but was indolent and only exerted himself spasmodically. He could be
ruthless, but was not habitually cruel. His strongest weapons were the
fine presence, the affable manners (even with citizens), and the love of
pleasure and entertainments which secured his personal popularity. In
his last years he was given to self-indulgence and scandalous excesses,
which did not, however, alienate the London citizens, with whose wives
he was too familiar. Most of the power at court was in the hands of the
Woodvilles, in spite of their unpopularity; the more arduous work of
administration in the north was left to Richard of Gloucester. If as a
prince of the Renaissance Edward was the first to rule tyrannically in
England, he also deserves credit as a patron of the new culture and
friend of Caxton; he further resembles his Italian contemporaries in the
commercial purposes to which he applied his wealth in partnership with
London merchants.
Edward died at Westminster on the 9th of April 1483, and was buried at
Windsor. By Elizabeth Woodville, who died on the 8th of June 1492, he
had two sons, Edward V. and Richard of York, who were murdered in the
Tower; and five daughters, of whom the eldest, Elizabeth, married Henry
VII. Of his numerous mistresses the most notorious was Jane Shore.
Before his marriage he had been contracted to Lady Eleanor Butler, and
this was alleged by Richard III. to have made his children by Elizabeth
Woodville illegitimate.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Of original authorities for Edward's reign the chief
are the _Continuation of the Cropland Chronicle_ in Fulman's
_Scriptores_; the various London Chronicles, especially for the early
years _Gregory's Chronicle_; Warkworth's _Chronicle_, and the
_Arrivall of King Edward IV._ (a partisan account of events in
1470-1471), published by the Camden Society; the _Paston Letters_ with
Dr Gairdner's valuable Introduction; and for foreign affairs the
_Memoires_ of Philippe de Comines; the collection called _Chronicles
of the White Rose_ is useful. For modern authors, consult Sir James
Ramsay's _Lancaster and York_ (1892), and the _Political History of
England_, vol. iv. (1906), by Prof. C. Oman. (C. L. K.)
EDWARD V. (1470-1483), king of England, was the elder son of Edward IV.
by his wife Elizabeth Woodville, and was born, during his father's
temporary exile, in the sanctuary of Westminster Abbey on the 2nd of
November 1470. In June 1471 he was created prince of Wales. When Edward
IV. died in April 1483 a struggle for power took place between the young
king's paternal uncle, Richard, duke of Gloucester, who had been
appointed as his guardian by Edward IV., and his maternal uncle, Richard
Woodville, Earl Rivers. Gloucester obtained possession of the king's
person, and, having arrested Rivers and some of his supporters, assumed
the crown himself after a very slight and feigned reluctance, on the
ground that the marriage of Edward and Elizabeth Woodville was invalid,
and consequently its issue was illegitimate. At this time Edward and his
brother Richard, duke of York, were living in the Tower of London.
Shortly afterwards a movement was organized to free them from captivity,
and then it became known that they were already dead; but, though it was
the general conviction that they had been murdered, it was twenty years
before the manner of this deed was discovered. According to the
narrative of Sir Thomas More, Sir Robert Brackenbury, the constable of
the Tower, refused to obey Richard's command to put the young princes to
death; but he complied with a warrant ordering him to give up his keys
for one night to Sir James Tyrell, who had arranged for the
assassination. Two men, Miles Forest and John Dighton, then smothered
the youths under pillows while they were asleep. The murder was
committed most probably in August or September 1483. Horace Walpole has
attempted to cast doubts upon the murder of the princes, and Sir C.R.
Markham has argued that the deed was committed by order of Henry VII.
Both these views, however, have been traversed by James Gairdner, and
there seems little doubt that Sir Thomas More's story is substantially
correct.
See RICHARD III.; and in addition, Sir Thomas More, _History of
Richard III._, edited by J.R. Lumby (Cambridge, 1883); Horace Walpole,
_Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of Richard III._ (London,
1768); J. Gairdner, _Richard III._ (Cambridge, 1898); J. Gairdner and
C.R. Markham in the _English Historical Review_, vol. vi. (London,
1891); Sir C.R. Markham, _Richard III._ (1907).
EDWARD VI. (1537-1553), king of England and Ireland, born at Greenwich
on the 12th of October 1537, was the only child of Henry VIII. by his
third wife, Jane Seymour, who died of puerperal fever twelve days later.
The story that the mother's life was deliberately sacrificed by the
performance of Caesarean section is unfounded, although Jane's death
was little noticed amid the rejoicings which greeted the advent of a
male heir to the throne. But in spite of Holbein's vivacious portrait of
Edward at the age of two (now at Hanover), he was a frail child, and a
short life was anticipated for him from his early years. This did not
prevent a strenuous education; until the age of six he was naturally
left in the charge of women, but when he was only seven his tutor Dr
Coxe, afterwards bishop of Ely, writes that he could decline any Latin
noun and conjugate any regular verb (_L. and P._, 1544, ii. 726); "every
day in the mass-time he readeth a portion of Solomon's Proverbs, wherein
he delighteth much." Sir John Cheke, Sir Anthony Cooke and Roger Ascham
all helped to teach him Latin, Greek and French; and by the age of
thirteen he had read Aristotle's _Ethics_ in the original and was
himself translating Cicero's _De philosophia_ into Greek.
Edward was duke of Cornwall from his birth, but he was never prince of
Wales, and he was only nine when he succeeded his father as king of
England and Ireland and supreme head of the church (28th of January
1546/7). His nonage threw power into the hands of Somerset and then of
Northumberland, and enabled Gardiner and Bonner to maintain that the
royal supremacy over the church was, or should be, in abeyance. Projects
for his marriage were hardly even the occasion, but only the excuse, for
Somerset's war on Scotland and Northumberland's subsequent alliance with
France. All factions sought to control his person, not because of his
personality but because of his position; he was like the Great Seal,
only more so, an indispensable adjunct to the wielder of authority. The
Protector's brother tried to bribe him with pocket-money; Northumberland
was more subtle and established a complete dominion over his mind, and
then put him forward at the age of fourteen as entitled to all the power
of Henry VIII. But he was only Northumberland's mask; of his individual
influence on the course of history during his reign there is hardly a
trace. A posthumous effort was made to give him the credit of a humane
desire to save Joan Bocher from the flames; but he recorded with
apparently cold-blooded indifference the execution of both his uncles,
and he certainly made no attempt to mitigate the harassing attentions
which the council paid his sister Mary. This passed for piety with the
zealots, and the persecutions of Mary's reign reflected a halo on that
of the Protestant Josiah. So strong was the regret that rumours of his
survival persisted, and hare-brained youths were found to personate him
throughout Mary's and even far into Elizabeth's reign.
It was well that they were false, for Edward showed signs of all the
Tudor obstinacy, and he was a fanatic into the bargain, as no other
Tudor was except Mary. The combination would probably have involved
England in disasters far greater than any that ensued upon his premature
death; and it was much better that the Anglican settlement of religion
should have been left to the compromising temper of Elizabeth. As it
was, he bequeathed a legacy of woe; his health began to fail in 1552,
and in May 1553 it was known that he was dying. But his will and the
various drafts of it only betray the agitated and illogical efforts of
Northumberland to contrive some means whereby he might continue to
control the government and prevent the administration of justice. Mary
and Elizabeth were to be excluded from the throne, as not sufficiently
pliant instruments; Mary Stuart was ignored as being under Scottish,
Catholic and French influence; the duchess of Suffolk, Lady Jane's
mother, was excluded because she was married, and the duke her husband
might claim the crown matrimonial. In fact, all females were excluded,
except Jane, on the ground that no woman could reign; even she was
excluded in the first draft, and the crown was left to "the Lady Jane's
heirs male." But this draft was manipulated so as to read "the Lady Jane
and her heirs male." That Edward himself was responsible for these
delirious provisions is improbable. But he had been so impregnated with
the divine right of kings and the divine truth of Protestantism that he
thought he was entitled and bound to override the succession as
established by law and exclude a Catholic from the throne; and his last
recorded words were vehement injunctions to Cranmer to sign the will.
He died at Greenwich on the 6th of July 1553, and was buried in Henry
VII.'s chapel by Cranmer with Protestant rites on the 8th of August,
while Mary had Mass said for his soul in the Tower.
J.G. Nichols collected almost all that is known of Edward VI. in his
excellent edition of the king's _Journal_. A few additional facts and
suggestions can be gleaned from the _Letters and Papers of Henry
VIII._ vols. xii.-xxi.; _Acts of the Privy Council_, ed. Dasent, vols.
i.-iv.; Domestic, Spanish, Venetian and Foreign _Calendars of State
Papers_; Froude's _History_; Dixon's _Hist. Church of England_; A.F.
Pollard's _England under Somerset_ and _Life of Cranmer_; and _English
Historical Review_, xxiii. 286, &c. Sir Clements Markham's _Edward
VI._ (1907) emphasizes his interest in geography. (A. F. P.)
EDWARD VII. (ALBERT EDWARD) (1841-1910), king of Great Britain and
Ireland, and of the British Dominions beyond the Seas, emperor of India,
the eldest son and second child of Queen Victoria and of Albert, prince
consort, was born at Buckingham Palace on the 9th of November 1841. He
was created prince of Wales and earl of Chester on the 4th of December
following, and was baptized on the 25th of January 1842. In his
childhood he was educated by the dowager Lady Lyttelton; and in his
boyhood successively by the Rev. Henry Mildred Birch, Mr F.W. Gibbes,
the Rev. C.F. Tarver and Mr Herbert W. Fisher. He afterwards resided at
Edinburgh, studying chemistry in its industrial applications under
Professor (afterwards Lord) Playfair at the university; at Christ
Church, Oxford; and at Trinity College, Cambridge. In November 1858 he
was made a knight of the Garter and a colonel in the army. In 1859 he
travelled in Italy and Spain, and in 1860 paid a visit as "Lord Renfrew"
to the United States and Canada.
Upon the completion of his Cambridge course in June 1861 he joined the
camp at the Curragh. The prince consort died on the 13th of December,
and in 1862 the prince of Wales went for a tour in the Holy Land
(February-June) under the guidance of Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, afterwards
dean of Westminster. Early in 1863 he was sworn of the privy council,
and took his seat in the House of Lords as duke of Cornwall. The estate
of Sandringham, in Norfolk, was purchased for him out of the savings of
his minority, and his town residence was fixed at Marlborough House.
His impending marriage to the princess Alexandra, daughter of Christian
IX., king of Denmark (b. December 1, 1844), had already been announced,
and took place on the 10th of March at Windsor, the beauty and grace of
the princess captivating the heart of the nation. Parliament granted the
prince an income of L40,000 a year, exclusive of the revenues of the
duchy of Cornwall, and he relinquished his right of succession to the
duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. Prince Albert Victor, afterwards duke of
Clarence, was the first offspring of the marriage, being born on the 8th
of January 1864. The births followed of Prince George Frederick Ernest
Albert, afterwards duke of York (see GEORGE V.), on the 3rd of June
1865; Princess Louise Victoria Alexandra Dagmar, by marriage duchess of
Fife, princess royal, on the 20th of February 1867; Princess Victoria
Alexandra Olga Mary, on the 6th of July 1868; and Princess Maud
Charlotte Mary Victoria, afterwards queen of Norway, on the 26th of
November 1869.
From the time of their marriage the prince and princess were prominently
before the country. Queen Victoria remained in retirement, but they
filled her place at important public functions. The prince's readiness
to promote every worthy cause was most marked; no one was a more
constant attendant at meetings for objects of public utility of a
non-political nature, and his speeches were always characterized by
excellent sense. The most important external event of these years was a
tour to Egypt, undertaken in 1869 in company with the duke of
Sutherland, Sir Samuel Baker and others, an account of which was
published by Mrs William Grey. The prince also visited Ireland more than
once, and opened the International Exhibition of 1871.
On the 23rd of November 1871 it was announced that the prince would be
prevented from paying a visit which had been arranged to the Maharajah
Dhuleep Singh by a feverish attack. It soon appeared that the malady was
typhoid, contracted as was supposed, on a visit to Scarborough. The
case became so serious that on November 29 the queen and Princess Alice
hurried to Sandringham. On the 1st of December there was a slight rally,
but on the 8th so serious a relapse occurred that for some days the
prince's life was despaired of. Under the skilful treatment of Sir
William Jenner, Sir William Gull and Sir James Paget, however, the
crisis was surmounted by December 16, and by Christmas day the danger
was regarded as virtually over. On the 27th of February 1872 a
thanksgiving was held at St Paul's, amid imposing demonstrations of
public joy.
In January 1874 the prince of Wales attended the marriage at St.
Petersburg of his brother, the duke of Edinburgh, with the grand-duchess
Marie of Russia. In the same year he paid a historic visit to
Birmingham, where Mr Joseph Chamberlain, not yet a member of parliament,
received him officially as mayor. In March 1875 it was officially
announced that he would make a visit to India, carrying out an idea
originally conceived by the first Indian viceroy, Earl Canning. He was
supposed to travel as heir-apparent, not as representative of the queen;
but the characters could not be kept apart, and in fact the prince's
visit was a political event of great importance. Leaving England on
October 11, he was received at Bombay by the viceroy, Lord Northbrook.
Here he met a very large number of Indian feudatory princes, whose
acquaintance he subsequently improved by visiting at their courts during
the seventeen weeks which he spent in the country. During these four
months the prince travelled nearly 8000 m. by land and 2500 m. by sea,
became acquainted with more rajahs than had all the viceroys who had
reigned over India, and saw more of the country than any living
Englishman. The visit led up to the queen's assumption of the title of
empress of India in the following year.
The prince's life after this date was full of conspicuous public
appearances. In 1885 he visited Ireland at a time of much political
excitement, and was received enthusiastically in many quarters and
without symptoms of ill-will in any. In 1886 he filled the presidency of
the Indian and Colonial Exhibition, opened the Mersey Tunnel, and laid
the first stone of the Tower Bridge. In 1887 a large share of the
arrangements for the queen's Jubilee devolved upon him. On the 27th of
July 1589 his eldest daughter, Princess Louise, was married to the duke
of Fife. In the autumn he paid a semi-incognito visit to Paris, where he
was always highly popular, viewed the Exhibition, and ascended the
Eiffel Tower. In 1890 he opened the Forth Bridge. On the 14th of January
1892, however, a heavy blow fell upon him and his house by the death of
his eldest son, Prince Albert Victor, duke of Clarence, after a brief
illness. The young prince, who with his brother George had made the tour
of the world (1879-1882) in H.M.S. "Bacchante," and after a short career
at Oxford and Cambridge was just settling down to play his part in
public life, had recently become engaged to Princess Victoria Mary of
Teck (b. May 26, 1867), and the popularity of the heir to the crown had
been increased by the expression of his satisfaction at his son's bride
being an English princess. On the 6th of July 1893 the broken thread was
reunited by her marriage to Prince George, duke of York.
The year 1894 was a busy one for the prince of Wales, who became a
member of the royal commission on the housing of the poor, opened the
Tower Bridge, attended the Welsh Eisteddfod and was duly initiated, and
paid two visits to Russia--one for the marriage of the grand-duchess
Xenia, the other for the funeral of the tsar, his brother-in-law. In
1896 he became first chancellor of the university of Wales, and his
first act after his installation at Aberystwyth was to confer an
honorary degree upon the princess. He had already been for some years a
trustee of the British Museum. On the 22nd of July 1896 his daughter.
Princess Maud, was married to Prince Charles of Denmark, who in 1905 was
offered and accepted the crown of the new kingdom of Norway. The
arrangements for the queen's Jubilee of 1897 depended upon the prince
even more than those of the corresponding celebration in 1887: he rode
on the queen's right at the great procession to St Paul's, and as an
admiral of the fleet presided at the naval review at Spithead. In July
1898 the prince had the misfortune to fracture his knee-cap while on a
visit to Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild, but completely recovered from
the effects of the accident. In December 1899, while passing through
Brussels on his way to St Petersburg, he was fired at by a miserable lad
named Sipido, crazed by reading anarchist literature. Fortunately no
injury was done.
It was the especial distinction of Albert Edward, while prince of Wales,
to have been a substantial support of the throne before he was called
upon to fill it. This cannot be said of any of his predecessors except
Edward the Black Prince. He was exemplary in the discharge of his public
duties, and in his scrupulous detachment from party politics. He was a
keen patron of the theatre, and his thoroughly British taste for sport
was as pronounced as his inclination for most of the contemporary
amusements of society. The "Tranby Croft Case" (1890), in which Sir
William Gordon Cumming brought an unsuccessful libel action for having
been accused of cheating at a game of baccarat, caused some comment in
connexion with the prince's appearance in the witness-box on behalf of
the defendants. But it did him no disservice with the people to have
twice won the Derby with his horses Persimmon (1896) and Diamond Jubilee
(1900)--his third victory, in 1909, with Minoru, being the first
occasion on which the race had been won by a reigning sovereign; and his
interest in yacht-racing was conspicuously shown at all the important
fixtures, his yacht "Britannia" being one of the best of her day. His
activity in the life of the nation may be illustrated by his
establishment (1897) of the Prince of Wales's (afterwards King Edward's)
Hospital Fund, his devotion to the cause of Masonry (he was first
elected grand master of the Freemasons of England in 1874), and his
position as a bencher of the Middle Temple, where he also became (1887)
treasurer.
On the death of Queen Victoria on the 22nd of January 1901, the question
what title the new king would assume was speedily set at rest by the
popular announcement that he would be called Edward the Seventh. The new
reign began auspiciously by the holding of a privy council at St James's
Palace, at which the king announced his intention to follow in his
predecessor's footsteps and to govern as a constitutional sovereign, and
received the oaths of allegiance. On the 14th of February the king and
queen opened parliament in state. Shortly afterwards it was announced
that the visit of the duke and duchess of York to Australia, in order to
inaugurate the new Commonwealth, which had been sanctioned by Queen
Victoria, would be proceeded with; and on the 16th of March they set out
on board the "Ophir" with a brilliant suite. The tour lasted till
November 1, the duke and duchess having visited Australia, New Zealand,
the Cape and Canada; and on their return the king, on November 9,
created the duke prince of Wales and earl of Chester. Meanwhile
parliament had settled the new civil list at L470,000 a year, and the
royal title had been enlarged to include the colonial empire by an act
enabling the king to style himself "Edward VII., by the grace of God, of
the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and of all the British
Dominions beyond the Seas, King, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of
India." At the end of May 1902 the long-drawn-out war in South Africa
came at last to an end, and the coronation was fixed for the 26th of
June. But on the 24th, amid general consternation, the king was
announced to be suffering from perityphlitis, necessitating the
immediate performance of an operation; and the coronation, for which
unprecedented preparations had been made, had to be postponed. The
operation--performed by Sir Frederick Treves--was, however, so
marvellously successful, and the king's progress towards recovery so
rapid and uninterrupted, that within a fortnight he was pronounced out
of danger, and soon afterwards it was decided to hold the coronation
service on August 9. Though shorn of much of the magnificence which
would have been added to it in June by the presence of foreign royalties
and the preparations for a great procession through London, the
solemnity duly took place on that date in Westminster Abbey amid great
rejoicings. The king spent several weeks (partly in a yachting trip
round the coast and up to Stornoway) in recruiting his health, and on
the 25th of October he went in procession through the main streets of
south London, when he was most enthusiastically received. Next day the
king and queen attended St Paul's cathedral in state to return thanks
for his restoration to health. On New Year's day 1903 the coronation was
proclaimed in India at a magnificent durbar at Delhi.
At home the king opened parliament in person in February 1903, and on
the 31st of March he sailed from Portsmouth to pay a visit to the king
of Portugal at Lisbon, leaving Lisbon for Gibraltar on the 7th of April.
On the 11th he held a review of the garrison troops and next day left
for Malta, and the tour was continued to Naples (23rd of April). On the
27th of April he was received at Rome by the king of Italy--the first
time an English king as such had been there; and two days later he paid
a visit to Leo XIII. at the Vatican. On May day he was received in Paris
by President Loubet. Later in the year return visits were paid to
England by President Loubet (July) and the king and queen of Italy
(November). On the 11th of May His Majesty paid his first formal visit
to Edinburgh, and held courts at Holyrood. In July the king and queen
went to Ireland, and though the Dublin corporation refused to vote a
loyal address the reception was generally cordial. In September the king
took his annual "cure" at Marienbad, and paid a visit to Vienna, where
he was received by the Austrian emperor. In 1904 again the king and
queen went to Ireland; in June the king was cordially received by the
German emperor at the yacht-races at Kiel, and he included a visit to
Hamburg, where the welcome was hearty. In November the king and queen of
Portugal were entertained at Windsor and at the Guildhall.
The success of King Edward as a promoter of international friendliness,
and the advantage of so efficient a type of kingship, attracted
universal attention, and treaties of arbitration were concluded by Great
Britain with France, Spain, Italy, Germany and Portugal in 1903 and
1904. In his first two years the king had already earned the title of
Edward the Peacemaker, and established his position as a source of new
strength to the state. This reputation was confirmed in the years which
followed, during which the royal hand was to be seen in the progress of
foreign affairs in a manner somewhat new to old-fashioned politicians.
The _entente_ with France was promoted by his influence, notably by his
reception of President Fallieres in England in 1908. It was noticed that
the permanent under-secretary for foreign affairs, Sir Charles Hardinge,
generally accompanied the king, as one of his suite, on his visits
abroad: and the conclusion of the Anglo-Russian agreement (1907)--which
was attributed with some reason to royal policy--was hotly criticized in
Radical quarters. It was pointed out that neither the foreign secretary
(Sir E. Grey) nor any other secretary of state accompanied the king on
his foreign visits. These objections were, however, scouted by the
government, and undeniably public opinion approved of the sovereign's
personal activity in a sphere peculiarly his own. The strengthening of
British influence in Europe, which was the marked result of the
Anglo-French and Anglo-Russian _ententes_, and of the closer ties
between England and countries like Portugal and Spain (whose young king
Alfonso married Princess Ena of Battenberg, King Edward's niece), had,
indeed, temporarily the effect of rousing German suspicion, the view
taken being that the object of British foreign policy was to isolate
Germany; and during 1907 and 1908 the political situation was coloured
by the discussions in the press with regard to Anglo-German rivalry. But
in February 1909 the king and queen paid a state visit to the Kaiser in
Berlin, where the greatest cordiality was displayed on all sides; the
event was prepared for, in both countries, as a means of dispelling the
clouds which had gathered over the relations between England and
Germany, and the success of the visit proved once more how powerful King
Edward's personality could be as an agency for peace and international
amity.
During the year 1909, however, the political situation at home was
developing into an acute constitutional crisis, which seemed likely to
involve the Crown in serious difficulties. Mr Lloyd-George's budget
convulsed the House of Commons and the country, and was eventually
rejected by the House of Lords; and the Liberal government now put in
the forefront of its programme the abolition of the Peers' "veto." As
was hinted, not obscurely, later by the doctors, King Edward, although
certainly not prejudiced against a Liberal ministry, was seriously
disturbed in mind and health by the progress of events, which culminated
in the return of Mr Asquith to office after the elections of January
1910, and in his statement that, if necessary, guarantees would be
sought from the Crown for the purpose of enforcing the will of the
representative chamber. A remarkable sign of the king's discomfort was
his insertion, in the official "King's Speech" at the opening of
parliament, of the words "in the opinion of my advisers," in connexion
with the passage dealing with the House of Lords. The king had been far
from robust for some little time, and while he was taking change and
rest at Biarritz in the early spring of 1910 he had a bronchial attack
which caused some anxiety, although the public heard nothing of it. When
he returned to England there is no doubt that he was acutely affected by
the prospect of being forcibly dragged into the political conflict. In
the country at large there was indeed considerable confidence that the
king's tact and experience would help to bring order out of chaos; but
this was not to be. Within two days the public heard with consternation
that he was ill, and then was dead. On May 5 it was announced that he
had bronchitis; and he died at 11.45 P.M. on the 6th, of heart failure.
On May 17, 18 and 19 there was an impressive lying-in-state in
Westminster Hall, attended by unprecedented crowds; and on May 20 the
burial took place at Windsor, after a great funeral procession through
London, the coffin being followed by the new king, George V., and by
eight foreign sovereigns--the German emperor, the kings of Greece,
Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Norway, Belgium and Bulgaria--besides the
archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria (heir to the throne of
Austria-Hungary), the prince consort of Holland and many other
royalties, and a number of special ambassadors, including Mr Roosevelt
as representative of the United States. Mourning was as sincere as it
was universal; for not only England and the British Empire, but the
world, had lost a king who was both a very human man and a tried and
trusted statesman.
Queen Victoria's long reign had solidly established the constitutional
monarchy; it remained for her son to rehabilitate the idea of English
kingship by showing how the sovereign could be no less constitutional
but personally more monarchical. While prince of Wales he had had little
real training in statecraft, but when he became king his genuine
capacity for affairs was shown. Ably advised by such men as Lord Knollys
and Lord Esher, he devoted himself to the work of removing the Throne
from its former isolation, and bringing it into touch with all sections
of the community for the promotion of social happiness and welfare. His
own love of pageantry and his interest in the stately ordering of court
functions responded, moreover, to a marked inclination on the part of
the public and of "society" for such things. It was significant that
even Radicals and Socialists began to advocate extensions of the
prerogative, and to insist on the active part which the Crown should
play in public life. The king won the genuine affection and confidence
of the people; and in Queen Alexandra he had an ideal consort, to whom
all hearts went out. (H. Ch.)
EDWARD, prince of Wales, known as "THE BLACK PRINCE" (1330-1376), the
eldest son of Edward III. and Philippa of Hainaut, was born at Woodstock
on the 15th of June 1330. Contemporaries called him Edward of Woodstock,
and his surname of the Black Prince cannot be traced back earlier than
the 16th century. It is supposed to have been derived from his wearing
black armour. In 1333 he was made earl of Chester, and in 1337 duke of
Cornwall, being the first duke ever created in England. Nominal warden
of England during his father's absences abroad in 1338 and 1342, he was
created prince of Wales in 1343, and in 1345 he first accompanied his
father on a foreign expedition.
His real career begins, however, with Edward III.'s Norman campaign of
1346. On landing at La Hogue he was knighted by his father, and took a
prominent part in the whole of the campaign. He commanded the right wing
of the English forces at Crecy, and, though hard pressed for a time by
the French, took his full share in gaining the victory. Next year he was
at the siege of Calais, and returned to England in October 1347 with his
father. He was one of the original knights of the Garter, and
participated in his father's chivalrous adventures at Calais in 1349 and
in the battle off Winchelsea in 1350. In September 1355 he was sent to
Gascony at the head of an English army, having been appointed his
father's lieutenant there in July. He was warmly welcomed by the
Gascons, and at once led a foray through Armagnac and Languedoc. By
November he had got as far as Narbonne, whence he returned to Bordeaux,
where he kept his Christmas court. In August 1356 he started from
Bergerac on another marauding expedition, this time in a northerly
direction. He penetrated as far as the Loire, but was there compelled to
retire before the superior forces of King John of France. On the 19th of
September the two armies met in the battle of Poitiers, fought about 6
m. south-east of the city. It was the hardest-fought and most important
battle of the Hundred Years' War, and Edward's victory was due both to
the excellence of his tactical disposition of his forces and to the
superior fighting capacity of his army. The flank march of the Captal de
Buch, which decided the fate of the day, was of Edward's own devising,
and the captivity of King John attested the completeness of his triumph.
He treated his prisoner with almost ostentatious magnanimity, and took
him to Bordeaux, whence they sailed to England in May 1357. On the 24th
of that month he led his prisoner in triumph through the streets of
London. In 1359 he took part in his father's invasion of northern
France, and had a large share in the negotiations at Bretigny and
Calais.
In October 1361 Edward married his cousin Joan, countess of Kent
(1328-1385), the daughter and heiress of Edmund of Woodstock, earl of
Kent, the younger son of Edward I. by his second wife Margaret of
France. The lady, who enjoyed a great reputation for beauty, was in her
thirty-third year, and the widow of Sir Thomas Holand, by whom she had
had three children. Froissart says that the marriage was a love match,
and that the king had no knowledge of it. However, Edward III. approved
of his son's choice, and in July 1362 handed over to him all his
dominions in southern France, with the title of prince of Aquitaine. In
February 1363 Edward and Joan took ship for Gascony, which became his
ordinary place of residence for the next eight years. He maintained a
brilliant court at Bordeaux and Angouleme, and did his best to win the
support of the Gascons. He was not, however, successful in winning over
the greater nobles, who, with John, count of Armagnac, at their head,
were dissatisfied with the separation from France, and looked with
suspicion upon Edward's attempts to reform the administration as being
likely to result in the curtailment of their feudal rights. Edward was
better able to conciliate the towns, whose franchises he favoured and
whose trade he fostered, hoping that they would prove a counterpoise to
the aristocracy. He kept the chief posts of the administration mainly in
English hands, and never really identified himself with the local life
and traditions of his principality. He succeeded in clearing Aquitaine
of the free companies, and kept good peace for nearly six years.
In 1367 Peter the Cruel, the deposed king of Castile, visited Edward at
Bordeaux, and persuaded him to restore him to his throne by force. In
February 1367 Edward led an army into Spain over the pass of
Roncesvalles. After a difficult and dangerous march Edward reached the
Ebro, and on the 3rd of April defeated Bertrand du Guesclin at Najera,
the last of his great victories. He then proceeded to Burgos, and
restored Peter to the throne of Castile. He remained in Castile for four
months, living principally at Valladolid. His army wasted away during
the hot Spanish summer, and Edward himself contracted the beginnings of
a mortal disease. In August 1367 Edward led the remnant of his troops
back through the pass of Roncesvalles, and returned to Bordeaux early in
September. He had exhausted all his resources on the Spanish expedition,
and was forced to seek from the estates of Aquitaine extraordinary
sources of supply. A hearth tax for five years was willingly granted to
him, and generally paid. The greater barons, however, found in this
impost a pretext for revolt. The count of Armagnac, who had already made
a secret understanding with Charles V., appealed against the hearth tax
to the parlement of Paris. Cited before this body in January 1369,
Edward declared that he would answer at Paris with sixty thousand men
behind him. War broke out again, and Edward III. resumed the title of
king of France. Thereupon Charles V. declared that all the English
possessions in France were forfeited, and before the end of 1369 all
Aquitaine was in full revolt. With weak health and impaired resources,
the Black Prince showed little activity in dealing with his insurgent
subjects, or in warding off French invasion. Though too ill to ride on
horseback, he insisted upon commanding his troops, and on the 19th of
September 1370 won his last barren success, by capturing the revolted
city of Limoges and putting the population to the sword. Early in 1371
he returned to England, leaving the impossible task of holding Gascony
to his brother John of Gaunt. In August 1372 he joined his father in an
abortive expedition to France, but contrary winds prevented their
landing, and he now abandoned military life for good. In October he
resigned his principality on the ground that he could not afford to
retain any longer so expensive a charge. His health now rapidly
declined, but he still followed politics with interest, and did what he
could to support the constitutional opposition of the great
ecclesiastics to the administration of John of Gaunt and the
anti-clerical courtiers. His last public act was to inspire the attack
on Lancaster's influence made by the Good Parliament in the spring of
1376. The famous parliament was still in session when he died at
Westminster on the 8th of July. He was buried in the east end of
Canterbury cathedral on the 29th of September, where his magnificent
tomb, erected in accordance with the instructions in his will, may still
be seen. By Joan, "the fair maid of Kent," who died on the 7th of August
1385, the Black Prince left an only son, afterwards King Richard II.
For authorities see EDWARD III. To these may be added W. Hunt's
article in the _Dict. Nat. Biog._; A. Collins's _Life of Edward,
Prince of Wales_ (1740); G.P.R. James's _Life of Edward the Black
Prince_ (1839); J. Moisant's _Le Prince Noir en Aquitaine_ (1894); and
R.P. Dunn-Pattison's _The Black Prince_ (1910). (T. F. T.)