EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II.
EDWARD I., =1272--1307.= EDWARD II., =1307--1327.=
LEADING DATES
Accession of Edward I. 1272
Death of Alexander III. 1285
The Award of Norham 1292
The Model Parliament 1295
The First Conquest of Scotland 1296
Confirmatio Cartarum 1297
Completion of the Second Conquest of Scotland 1304
The Incorporation of Scotland with England 1305
The Third Conquest of Scotland 1306
Accession of Edward II. 1307
Execution of Gaveston 1312
Battle of Bannockburn 1314
Execution of Lancaster 1322
Deposition of Edward II. 1327
[Illustration: Great Seal of Edward I.]
1. =The First Years of Edward I. 1272--1279.=--Edward I., though he
inherited the crown in =1272=, did not return to England till =1274=,
being able to move in a leisurely fashion across Europe without fear
of disturbances at home. He fully accepted those articles of John's
Great Charter which had been set aside at the beginning of the reign
of Henry III., and which required that the king should only take
scutages and aids with the consent of the Great Council or Parliament.
The further requirement of the barons that they should name the
ministers of the crown, was allowed to fall asleep. Edward was a
capable ruler, and knew how to appoint better ministers than the
barons were likely to choose for him. It was Edward's peculiar merit
that he stood forward not only as a ruler but as a legislator. He
succeeded in passing one law after another, because he thoroughly
understood that useful legislation is only possible when the
legislator on the one hand has an intelligent perception of the
remedies needed to meet existing evils, and on the other hand is
willing to content himself with such remedies as those who are to be
benefited by them are ready to accept. The first condition was
fulfilled by Edward's own skill as a lawyer, and by the skill of the
great lawyers whom he employed. The second condition was fulfilled by
his determination to authorise no new legislation without the counsel
and consent of those who were most affected by it. He did not, indeed,
till late in his reign call a whole Parliament together, as Earl Simon
had done. But he called the barons together in any matter which
affected the barons, and he called the representatives of the townsmen
together in any matter which affected the townsmen, and so on with the
other classes.
2. =Edward I. and Wales. 1276--1284.=--Outside England Edward's first
difficulty was with the Welsh, who, though their Princes had long been
regarded by the English Kings as vassals, had practically maintained
their independence in the mountainous region of North Wales of which
Snowdon is the centre. Between them and the English Lords Marchers,
who had been established to keep order in the marches, or border-land,
there was nothing but hostility. The Welshmen made forays and
plundered the English lands, and the English retorted by slaughtering
Welshmen whenever they could come up with them amongst the hills.
Naturally the Welsh took the side of any enemy of the English kings
with whom it was possible to ally themselves. Llewelyn, Prince of
Wales, had joined Earl Simon against Henry III., and had only done
homage to Henry after Simon had been defeated. After Henry's death he
refused homage to Edward till =1276=. In =1282= he and his brother
David renewed the war, and Edward, determined to put an end to the
independence of such troublesome neighbours, marched against them.
Before the end of the year Llewelyn was slain, and David was captured
and executed in =1283=. Wales then came fully under the dominion of
the English kings. Edward's second son, afterwards King Edward II.,
was born at Carnarvon in =1284=, and soon afterwards, having become
heir to the throne upon the death of his elder brother, was presented
to the Welsh as Prince of Wales, a title from that day usually
bestowed upon the king's eldest son. At the same time, though Edward
built strong castles at Conway and Carnarvon to hold the Welsh in awe,
he made submission easier by enacting suitable laws for them, under
the name of the Statute of Wales, and by establishing a separate body
of local officials to govern them, as well as by confirming them in
the possession of their lands and goods.
[Illustration: Group of armed knights, and a king in ordinary dress.
Date, _temp._ Edward I.]
3. =Customs Duties. 1275.=--Though Edward I. was by no means
extravagant, he found it impossible to meet the expenses of government
without an increase of taxation. In =1275= he obtained the consent of
Parliament to the increase of the duties on exports and imports which
had hitherto been levied without Parliamentary sanction. He was now to
receive by a Parliamentary grant a fixed export duty of 6_s._ 8_d._ on
every sack of wool sent out of the country, and of a corresponding
duty on wool-fells and leather. Under ordinary circumstances it is
useless for any government to attempt to gain a revenue by export
duty, because such a duty only raises the price abroad of the products
of its own country, and foreigners will therefore prefer to buy the
articles which they need from some country which does not levy export
duties, and where, therefore, the articles are to be had more cheaply.
England, however, was, in Edward's time, and for many years
afterwards, an exception to the rule. On the Continent men could not
produce much wool or leather for sale, because private wars were
constantly occurring, and the fighting men were in the habit of
driving off the sheep and the cattle. In England there were no private
wars, and under the king's protection sheep and cattle could be bred
in safety. There were now growing up manufactures of cloth in the
fortified towns of Flanders, and the manufacturers there were obliged
to come to England for the greater part of the wool which they used.
They could not help paying not only the price of the wool, but the
king's export duty as well, because if they refused they could not get
sufficient wool in any other country.
4. =Edward's Judicial Reforms. 1274--1290.=--Every king of England
since the Norman Conquest had exercised authority in a twofold
capacity. On one hand he was the head of the nation, on the other hand
he was the feudal lord of his vassals. Edward laid more stress than
any former king upon his national headship. Early in his reign he
organised the courts of law, completing the division of the _Curia
Regis_ into the three courts which existed till recent times: the
Court of King's Bench, to deal with criminal offences reserved for the
king's judgment, and with suits in which he was himself concerned; the
Court of Exchequer, to deal with all matters touching the king's
revenue; and the Court of Common Pleas, to deal with suits between
subject and subject. Edward took care that the justice administered in
these courts should as far as possible be real justice, and in =1289=
he dismissed two Chief Justices and many other officials for
corruption. In =1285= he improved the Assize of Arms of Henry II. (see
p. 154), so as to be more sure of securing a national support for his
government in time of danger.
5. =Edward's Legislation. 1279--1290.=--It was in accordance with the
national feeling that Edward, in =1290=, banished from England the
Jews, whose presence was most profitable to himself, but who were
regarded as cruel tyrants by their debtors. On the other hand, Edward
took care to assert his rights as a feudal lord. In =1279=, by the
statute _De religiosis_, commonly known as the Statute of Mortmain, he
forbade the gift of land to the clergy, because in their hands land
was no longer liable to the feudal dues. In =1290=, by another
statute, _Quia emptores_, he forbade all new sub-infeudation. If from
henceforth a vassal wished to part with his land, the new tenant was
to hold it, not under the vassal who gave it up, but under that
vassal's lord, whether the lord was the king or anyone else. The
object of this law was to increase the number of tenants-in-chief, and
thus to bring a larger number of landowners into direct relations with
the king.
[Illustration: Nave of Lichfield Cathedral, looking east. Built about
1280.]
6. =Edward as a National and as a Feudal Ruler.=--In his government of
England Edward had sought chiefly to strengthen his position as the
national king of the whole people, and to depress legally and without
violence the power of the feudal nobility. He was, however, ambitious,
with the ambition of a man conscious of great and beneficent aims, and
he was quite ready to enforce even unduly his personal claims to
feudal obedience whenever it served his purpose to do so. His
favourite motto, 'Keep troth' (_Pactum serva_), revealed his sense of
the inviolability of a personal engagement given or received, but his
legal mind often led him into construing in his own favour
engagements in which only the letter of the law was on his side,
whilst its spirit was against him. It was chiefly in his relations
with foreign peoples that he fell into this error, as it was here
that he was most strongly tempted to lay stress upon the feudal tie
which made for him, and to ignore the importance of a national
resistance which made against him. In dealing with Wales, for
instance, he sent David to a cruel death, because he had broken the
feudal tie which bound him to the king of England, feeling no sympathy
with him as standing up for the independence of his own people.
7. =The Scottish Succession. 1285-1290.=--In the earlier part of
Edward's reign Alexander III. was king of Scotland. Alexander's
ancestors, indeed, had done homage to Edward's ancestors, but in
=1189= William the Lion had purchased from Richard I. the abandonment
of all the claim to homage for the crown of Scotland which Henry II.
had acquired by the treaty of Falaise (see pp. 154, 159). William's
successors, however, held lands in England, and had done homage for
them to the English kings. Edward would gladly have restored the old
practice of homage for Scotland itself, but to this Alexander had
never given way. To Edward there was something alluring in the
prospect of being lord of the whole island, as it would not only
strengthen his own personal position, but would bring two nations into
peaceful union. Between the southern part of Scotland, indeed, and the
northern part of England there was no great dissimilarity. On both
sides of the border the bulk of the population was of the same Anglian
stock, whilst, in consequence of the welcome offered by the Scottish
kings to persons of Norman descent, the nobility was as completely
Norman in Scotland as it was in England, many of the nobles indeed
possessing lands on both sides of the border. A prospect of effecting
a union by peaceful means offered itself to Edward in =1285=, when
Alexander III. was killed by a fall from his horse near Kinghorn.
Alexander's only descendant was Margaret, a child of his daughter and
of King Eric of Norway. In =1290= it was agreed that she should marry
the Prince of Wales, but that the two kingdoms should remain
absolutely independent of one another. Unfortunately, the Maid of
Norway, as the child was called, died on her way to Scotland, and this
plan for establishing friendly relations between the two countries
came to naught. If it had succeeded three centuries of war and misery
might possibly have been avoided.
8. =Death of Eleanor of Castile. 1290.=--Another death, which happened
in the same year, brought sorrow into Edward's domestic life. His wife
Eleanor died in November. The corpse was brought for burial from
Lincoln to Westminster, and the bereaved husband ordered the erection
of a memorial cross at each place where the body rested.
[Illustration: Effigy of Eleanor of Castile, queen of Edward I., in
Westminster Abbey.]
9. =The Award of Norham. 1291--1292.=--Edward, sorrowing as he was,
was unable to neglect the affairs of State. On the death of the Maid
of Norway there was a large number of claimants to the Scottish crown.
The hereditary principle, which had long before been adopted in regard
to the succession to landed property, was gradually being adopted in
most kingdoms in regard to the succession to the crown. There were
still, however, differences of opinion as to the manner in which
hereditary succession ought to be reckoned, and there were now many
claimants, of whom at least three could make out a plausible case.
David, Earl of Huntingdon, a brother of William the Lion, had left
three daughters. The grandson of the eldest daughter was John Balliol;
the son of the second was Robert Bruce; the grandson of the third was
John Hastings. Balliol maintained that he ought to succeed as being
descended from the eldest: Bruce urged that the son of a younger
daughter was nearer to the common ancestor, David, than the grandson
of the elder: whilst Hastings asked that Scotland should be divided
into three parts--according to a custom which prevailed in feudal
estates in which the holder left only daughters--amongst the
representatives of David's three daughters.[15] Every one of these
three claimants was an English baron, and Bruce held large estates in
both countries. The only escape from a desolating civil war seemed to
be to appeal to Edward's arbitration, and in =1291= Edward summoned
the Scots to meet him at Norham. He then demanded as the price of his
arbitration the acknowledgment of his position as lord paramount of
Scotland, in virtue of which the Scottish king, when he had once been
chosen, was to do homage to himself as king of England. Edward, who
might fairly have held that, in spite of the abandonment of the treaty
of Falaise by Richard, he had a right to the old vague over-lordship
of earlier kings, appears to have thought it right to take the
opportunity of Scotland's weakness to renew the stricter relationship
of homage which had been given up by Richard. At all events, the
Scottish nobles and clergy accepted his demand, though the commonalty
made some objection, the nature of which has not been recorded. Edward
then investigated carefully the points at issue, and in =1292= decided
in favour of Balliol. If he had been actuated by selfish motives he
would certainly have adopted the suggestion of Hastings that Scotland
ought to be divided into three kingdoms.
[Footnote 15: Genealogy of the claimants of the Scottish throne:--
DAVID I.
1124-1153
|
Henry
|
----------------------------------------------
| | |
MALCOLM IV. WILLIAM David, Earl of Huntingdon
1153-1165 THE LION |
1165-1214 -------------------------------------
/ | | |
/ | | |
/ Margaret Isabella Ada
ALEXANDER II. _m._ Alan, Lord _m._ Robert Bruce _m._ Henry
1214-1249 of Galloway | Hastings
| | | |
ALEXANDER III. Devorguilla Robert Bruce Henry
1249-1285 _m._ John Balliol the Claimant Hastings
| | | |
| ---------------- | |
Margaret | | | John
_m._ Eric, king Margaret JOHN BALLIOL Robert Bruce Hastings,
of Norway _m._ John, the 1292-1296 | the
| Black Comyn | | Claimant
| | | |
Margaret, | Edward Balliol ROBERT BRUCE
The Maid of John, the Red 1306-1329
Norway Comyn]
[Illustration: Cross erected near Northampton by Edward I. in memory
of Queen Eleanor built between 1291 and 1294.]
10. =Disputes with Scotland and France. 1293--1295.=--The new king of
Scotland did homage to Edward for his whole kingdom. If Edward could
have contented himself with enforcing the ordinary obligations of
feudal superiority all might have gone well. Unfortunately for all
parties, he attempted to stretch them by insisting in =1293= that
appeals from the courts of the king of Scotland should lie to the
courts of the king of England. Suitors found that their rights could
not be ascertained till they had undertaken a long and costly journey
to Westminster. A national feeling of resistance was roused amongst
the Scots, and though Edward pressed his claims courteously, he
continued to press them. A temper grew up in Scotland which might be
dangerous to him if Scotland could find an ally, and an ally was not
long in presenting himself. Philip IV. now king of France, was as wily
and unscrupulous as Philip II. had been in the days of John. Edward
was his vassal in Guienne and Gascony, and Philip knew how to turn the
feudal relationship to account in France as well as Edward knew how to
turn it to account in Scotland. The Cinque Ports[16] along the
south-eastern shore of England swarmed with hardy and practised
mariners, and there had often been sea-fights between French and
English sailors quite independently of the two kings. In =1293= there
was a great battle in which the French were worsted. Though Edward was
ready to punish the offenders, Philip summoned him to appear as a
vassal before his lord's court at Paris. In =1294=, however, an
agreement was made between the two kings. Edward was for mere form's
sake to surrender his French fortresses to Philip in token of
submission, and Philip was then to return them. Philip, having thus
got the fortresses into his hands, refused to return them. In =1295= a
league was made between France and Scotland, which lasted for more
than three hundred years. Its permanence was owing to the fact that it
was a league between nations more than a league between kings.
[Footnote 16: Sandwich, Dover, Hythe, Romney, Hastings; to which
were added Winchelsea and Rye as 'ancient towns,' besides several
'limbs' or dependencies.]
11. =The Model Parliament. 1295.=--Edward, attacked on two sides,
threw himself for support on the English nation. Towards the end of
=1295= he summoned a Parliament which was in most respects the model
for all succeeding Parliaments. It was attended not only by bishops,
abbots, earls, and barons, by two knights from every shire, and two
burgesses from every borough, but also by representatives of the
chapters of cathedrals and of the parochial clergy. It cannot be said
with any approach to certainty, whether the Parliament thus collected
met in one House or not. As, however, the barons and knights offered
an eleventh of the value of their movable goods, the clergy a tenth,
and the burgesses a seventh, it is not unlikely that there was a
separation into what in modern times would be called three Houses, at
least for purposes of taxation. At all events, the representatives of
the clergy subsequently refused to sit in Parliament, preferring to
vote money to the Crown in their own convocations.
[Illustration: Sir John d'Abernoun, died 1277: from his brass at Stoke
Dabernon: showing armour worn from about 1250 to 1300.]
12. =The first Conquest of Scotland. 1296.=--In =1296= Edward turned
first upon Scotland. After he crossed the border Balliol sent to him
renouncing his homage. "Has the felon fool done such folly?" said
Edward. "If he will not come to us, we will go to him." He won a
decisive victory over the Scots at Dunbar. Balliol surrendered his
crown, and was carried off, never to reappear in Scotland. Edward set
up no more vassal kings. He declared himself to be the immediate king
of Scotland, Balliol having forfeited the crown by treason. The
Scottish nobles did homage to him. On his return to England he left
behind him the Earl of Surrey and Sir Hugh Cressingham as guardians of
the kingdom, and he carried off from Scone the stone of destiny on
which the Scottish kings had been crowned, and concerning which there
had been an old prophecy to the effect that wherever that stone was
Scottish kings should rule. The stone was placed, where it still
remains, under the coronation-chair of the English kings in
Westminster Abbey, and there were those long afterwards who deemed the
prophecy fulfilled when the Scottish King James VI. came to take his
seat on that chair as James I. of England.
13. =The Resistance of Archbishop Winchelsey. 1296--1297.=--The
dispute with France and the conquest of Scotland cost much money, and
Edward, finding his ordinary revenue insufficient, had been driven to
increase it by unusual means. He gathered assemblies of the merchants,
and persuaded them without the leave of Parliament to increase the
export duties, and he also induced the clergy in the same way to grant
him large sums. The clergy were the first to resist. In =1296=
Boniface VIII., a Pope who pushed to the extreme the Papal claims to
the independence of the Church, issued the Bull, _Clericis laicos_, in
which he declared that the clergy were not to pay taxes without the
Pope's consent; and when at the end of the year Edward called on his
Parliament to grant him fresh sums, Winchelsey, the Archbishop of
Canterbury, refused, on the ground of this Bull, to allow a penny to
be levied from the clergy. Edward, instead of arguing with him,
directed the chief justice of the King's Bench to announce that, as
the clergy would pay no taxes, they would no longer be protected by
the king. The clergy now found themselves in evil case. Anyone who
pleased could rob them or beat them, and no redress was to be had.
They soon therefore evaded their obligation to obey the Bull, and paid
their taxes, under the pretence that they were making presents to the
king, on which Edward again opened his courts to them. In the days of
Henry I. or Henry II. it would not have been possible to treat the
clergy in this fashion. The fact was, that the mass of the people now
looked to the king instead of to the Church for protection, and
therefore respected the clergy less than they had done in earlier
days.
14. =The 'Confirmatio Cartarum.' 1297.=--In =1297= Edward, having
subdued the Scots in the preceding year, resolved to conduct one army
to Flanders, and to send another to Gascony to maintain his rights
against Philip IV. He therefore called on his barons to take part in
these enterprises. Amongst those ordered to go to Gascony were Roger
Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, and Humfrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford. They
declared that they were only bound to follow the king himself, and
that as Edward was not going in person to Gascony they would not go.
"By God, Sir Earl," said the king to one of them, "you shall either go
or hang." "By God," was the reply, "I will neither go nor hang." The
two earls soon found support. The barons were sore because Edward's
reforms had diminished their authority. The clergy were sore because
of their recent treatment. The merchants were sore because of the
exactions to which they had been subjected. Archbishop Winchelsey
bound the malcontents together by asking Edward to confirm _Magna
Carta_ and other charters granted by his predecessors, and by adding
other articles now proposed for the first time, so as to preclude him
from demanding taxes not granted by Parliament. Edward found that the
new articles restricted his action more than it had been restricted by
the older charters. He was deeply vexed, as he thought that he
deserved to be trusted, and that, though he had exacted illegal
payments, he had only done so out of necessity. He saw, however, that
he must yield, but he could not bring himself to yield in person, and
he therefore crossed the sea to Flanders, leaving the Prince of Wales
to make the required concession. On October 10, =1297=, the
_Confirmatio Cartarum_, as it was called, was issued in the king's
name. It differed from _Magna Carta_ in this, that whereas John had
only engaged not to exact feudal revenue from his vassals without
consent of Parliament, Edward I. also engaged not to exact customs
duties without a Parliamentary grant. From that time no general
revenue could be taken from the whole realm without a breach of the
law, though the king still continued for some time to raise tallages,
or special payments, from the tenants of his own demesne lands.
15. =Wallace's Rising. 1297--1304.=--Whilst Edward was contending with
his own people his officers had been oppressing the Scots. They had
treated Scotland as a conquered land, not as a country joined to
England by equal union. Resistance began in =1297=, and a rising was
headed by Wallace, a gentleman of moderate fortune in the western
lowlands. Wallace's bold and vigorous attacks gained him the
confidence of the lesser gentry and the people, though the nobles,
mostly of Norman descent, supported the English government, and only
joined Wallace when it was dangerous to stand aloof. In the autumn, an
English army advancing into Scotland reached the south bank of the
Forth near Stirling. Wallace, who showed on that day that he was
skilful as well as brave, drew up his army on the north bank at some
little distance from the narrow bridge over which the English must
come if they were to attack him. When half of them had crossed, he
fell upon that half before the troops in the rear could advance to its
succour. Wallace's victory was complete, and he then invaded England,
ravaging and slaughtering as far as Hexham.
16. =The Second Conquest of Scotland. 1298--1304.=--In =1298= Edward,
who had been unsuccessful on the Continent, made a truce with Philip.
Returning to England, he marched against Wallace, and came up with
him at Falkirk. The battle which ensued, like William's victory at
Senlac (see p. 96), was a triumph of inventive military skill over
valour content to rest upon ancient methods. The Scots were hardy
footmen, drawn up in three rings, and provided with long spears.
Against such a force so armed the cavalry of the feudal array would
dash itself in vain. Edward, however, had marked in his Welsh wars the
superiority of the long-bow drawn to the ear--not, as in the case of
the shorter bows of older times, to the breast of the archer--and
sending its cloth-yard shaft with a strength and swiftness hitherto
unknown. He now brought with him a large force of bowmen equipped in
this fashion. At Falkirk the long-bow was tried for the first time in
any considerable battle. The effect was overwhelming: a shower of
arrows poured upon a single point in the ring of the spearmen soon
cleared a gap. Edward's cavalry dashed in before the enemy had time to
close, and the victory was won. Wallace had had scarcely one of the
Scottish nobles with him either at Stirling or at Falkirk, and unless
all Scotland combined he could hardly be expected to succeed against
such a warrior as Edward. Wallace's merit was that he did not despair
of his country, and that by his patriotic vigour he prepared the minds
of Scotsmen for a happier day. He himself fled to France, but Scotland
struggled on without him. Some of the nobles, now that Wallace was no
longer present to give them cause of jealousy, took part in the
resistance, and only in =1304= did Edward after repeated campaigns
complete his second conquest of the country.
17. =The Incorporation of Scotland with England. 1305.=--In =1305=
Wallace, who had returned from France, but had taken no great part in
the late resistance, was betrayed to the English. His barbarity in his
raid on Northumberland in =1297= (see p. 221) had marked him out for
vengeance, and he was executed at Tyburn as a traitor to the English
king of Scotland, whose right he had never acknowledged. Edward then
proceeded to incorporate Scotland with England. Scotland was to be
treated very much as Wales had been treated before. There was to be as
little harshness as possible. Nobles who had resisted Edward were to
keep their estates on payment of fines, the Scottish law was to be
observed, and Scots were to be chosen to represent the wishes of their
fellow-countrymen in the Parliament at Westminster. On the other hand,
the Scottish nobles were to surrender their castles, and the country
was to be governed by an English Lieutenant, who, together with his
council, had power to amend the laws.
18. =Character of Edward's Dealings with Scotland.=--Edward's
dealings with Scotland, mistaken as they were, were not those of a
self-willed tyrant. If it be once admitted that he was really the lord
paramount of Scotland, everything that he did may be justified upon
feudal principles. First, Balliol forfeited his vassal crown by
breaking his obligations as a vassal. Secondly, Edward, through the
default of his vassal, took possession of the fief which Balliol had
forfeited, and thus became the immediate lord of Balliol's vassals.
Thirdly, those vassals rebelled--so at least Edward would have
said--against their new lord. Fourthly, they thereby forfeited their
estates to him, and he was therefore, according to his own view, in
the right in restoring their estates to them--if he restored them at
all--under new conditions. Satisfactory as this argument must have
seemed to Edward, it was weak in two places. The Scots might attack it
at its basis by retorting that Edward had never truly been lord
paramount of Scotland at all; or they might assert that it did not
matter whether he was so or not, because the Scottish right to
national independence was superior to all feudal claims. It is this
latter argument which has the most weight at the present day, and it
seems to us strange that Edward, who had done so much to encourage the
national growth of England, should have entirely ignored the national
growth of Scotland. All that can be said to palliate Edward's mistake
is that it was, at first, difficult to perceive that there was a
Scottish nationality at all. Changes in the political aspect of
affairs grow up unobserved, and it was not till after his death that
all classes in Scotland were completely welded together in resistance
to an English king. At all events, if he treated the claim of the
Scots to national independence with contempt, he at least strove,
according to his own notions, to benefit Scots and English alike. He
hoped that one nation, justly ruled under one government, would grow
up in the place of two divided peoples.
19. =Robert Bruce. 1306.=--It was better even for England that
Edward's hopes should fail. Scotland would have been of little worth
to its more powerful neighbour if it had been cowed into subjection;
whereas when, after struggling and suffering for her independence, she
offered herself freely as the companion and ally of England to share
in common duties and common efforts, the gift was priceless. That
Scotland was able to shake off the English yoke was mainly the work of
Robert Bruce, the grandson of the Robert Bruce who had been one of the
claimants of the Scottish crown at Norham. The Bruces, like Balliol,
were of Norman descent, and as Balliol's rivals they had attached
themselves to Edward. The time was now come when all chances of
Balliol's restoration were at an end, and thoughts of gaining the
crown stirred in the mind of the younger Bruce. After Edward's last
settlement of Scotland it was plain that there was no longer room for
a Scottish vassal king, and Bruce was therefore driven to connect his
own aspirations with those of the Scottish nation. He had, however,
one powerful rival amongst the nobles. John Comyn--the Red Comyn, as
he was called--had been one of the many claimants of the throne who
appeared before Edward at Norham, and he still looked with a jealous
eye upon all who disputed his title. He was, however, persuaded in
=1306= to meet Bruce in the Grey Friars Church at Dumfries. As Bruce
pleaded his own right to the crown, Comyn denounced him as a traitor
to Edward. Bruce answered by driving his dagger into him. "I doubt,"
cried Bruce, as he rushed from the church, "that I have slain the Red
Comyn." "I will mak sicker" (_make sure_), said Kirkpatrick, who was
in attendance upon him, and, going in, completed the murder. Bruce
made for Scone and was crowned king of Scotland in the presence of
many of the chief nobility.
20. =Edward's Last March on Scotland and Death. 1306--1307.= Edward,
to whom Bruce was but a rebel and a murderer, despatched against him
the Earl of Pembroke who routed his forces at Methven. The revolt was
suppressed and Bruce's supporters were carried off to English prisons,
and their lands divided amongst English noblemen. The Countess of
Buchan, who had taken a prominent part in Bruce's coronation, was
subjected to an imprisonment of great severity in the castle of
Berwick. Bruce almost alone escaped. He knew now that he had the
greater part of the nobility as well as the people at his side, and
even in his lonely wanderings and hairbreadth escapes he was, what
neither Balliol nor Wallace had been, the true head of the Scottish
nation. Before the end of =1306= he reappeared in Carrick, where his
own possessions lay, and where the whole population was on his side,
and inflicted heavy losses on the English garrisons. Early in July
=1307= Edward, who himself had tarried in Cumberland, once more set
out to take the field in person; but he was now old and worn out, and
he died at Burgh on Sands, a few miles on the English side of the
border.
[Illustration: Edward II.; from his monument in Gloucester Cathedral.]
21. =Edward II. and Piers Gaveston. 1307--1312.=--The new king, Edward
II., was as different as possible from his father. He was not wicked,
like William II. and John, but he detested the trouble of public
business, and thought that the only advantage of being a king was that
he would have leisure to amuse himself. During his father's life he
devoted himself to Piers Gaveston, a Gascon, who encouraged him in
his pleasures and taught him to mistrust his father. Edward I.
banished Gaveston; Edward II., immediately on his accession, not only
recalled him, but made him regent when he himself crossed to France to
be married to Isabella, the daughter of Philip IV. The barons, who
were already inclined to win back some of the authority of which
Edward I. had deprived them, were very angry at the place taken over
their heads by an upstart favourite, especially as Gaveston was
ill-bred enough to make jests at their expense. The barons found a
leader in Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, the son of that Edmund, the
brother of Edward I., who had received the title of king of Sicily
from the Pope (see p. 197). Thomas of Lancaster had very large
estates. He was an ambitious man, who tried to play the part which had
been played by Earl Simon without any of Simon's qualifications for
the position. In =1308= the king yielded to the barons so far as to
send Gaveston out of the country to Ireland as his Lieutenant. In
=1309= he recalled him. The barons were exasperated, and in the
Parliament of =1310= they brought forward a plan for taking the
king's government out of his hands, very much after the fashion of the
Provisions of Oxford. Twenty-one barons were appointed Lords
Ordainers, to draw up ordinances for the government of the country. In
=1311= they produced the ordinances. Gaveston was to be banished for
life. The king was to appoint officers only with the consent of the
barons, without which he was not to go to war nor leave the kingdom.
The ordinances may have been justified in so far as they restrained
the authority of a king so incapable as Edward II. Constitutionally
their acceptance was a retrograde step, as, like the Provisions of
Oxford, they placed power in the hands of the barons, passing over
Parliament as a whole. Edward agreed to the ordinances, but refused to
surrender Gaveston. The barons took arms to enforce their will, and in
=1312=, having captured Gaveston, they beheaded him near Warwick
without the semblance of a trial.
22. =Success of Robert Bruce. 1307--1314.=--Whilst Edward and the
barons were disputing Bruce gained ground rapidly. In =1313= Stirling
was the only fortress of importance in Scotland still garrisoned by
the English, and the English garrison bound itself to surrender on
June 24, =1314=, if it had not been previously relieved. Even Edward
II. was stirred by this doleful news, and in =1314= he put himself at
the head of an army to relieve Stirling. Lancaster, however, and all
whom he could influence refused to follow him, on the ground that the
king had not, in accordance with the ordinances, received permission
from the barons to go to war. On June 24 Edward reached Bannockburn,
within sight of Stirling. Like his father, he brought with him English
archers as well as English horsemen, but he foolishly sent his archers
far in advance of his horsemen, where they would be entirely
unprotected. Bruce, on the other hand, not only had a small body of
horse, which rode down the archers, but he strengthened the defensive
position of his spearmen by digging pits in front of his line and
covering them with turf. Into these pits the foremost horses of the
English cavalry plunged. Edward's whole array was soon one mass of
confusion, and before it could recover itself a body of gillies, or
camp-followers, appearing over a hill was taken for a fresh Scottish
army. The vast English host turned and fled. Stirling at once
surrendered, and all Scotland was lost to Edward. Materially, both
England and Scotland suffered grievously from the result of the battle
of Bannockburn. English invasions of southern Scotland and Scottish
invasions of northern England spread desolation far and wide, stifling
the germs of nascent civilisation. Morally, both nations were in the
end the gainers. The hardihood and self-reliance of the Scottish
character is distinctly to be traced to those years of struggle
against a powerful neighbour. England, too, was the better for being
balked of its prey. No nation can suppress the liberty of another
without endangering its own.
[Illustration: Lincoln Cathedral--the central tower; built about
1310.]
23. =Lancaster's Government. 1314--1322.=--Edward was thrown by his
defeat entirely under the power of Lancaster, who took the whole
authority into his hands and placed and displaced ministers at his
pleasure. Lancaster, however, was a selfish and incompetent ruler. He
allowed the Scots to ravage the north of England without venturing to
oppose them, and as he could not even keep order at home, private wars
broke out amongst the barons. In =1318= Bruce took Berwick, the great
border fortress against Scotland. It was rather by good luck than by
good management that Edward was at last able to resist Lancaster.
Edward could not exist without a personal favourite, and he found one
in Hugh le Despenser. Despenser was at least an Englishman, which
Gaveston had not been, and his father, Hugh le Despenser the elder,
did his best to raise up a party to support the king. In =1321=,
however, Parliament, under Lancaster's influence, declared against
them and sentenced them to exile. Edward took arms for his favourites,
and in =1322= defeated Lancaster at Boroughbridge, and then had him
tried and beheaded at Pontefract.
24. =A Constitutional Settlement. 1322.=--Favourites as they were, the
Despensers had at least the merit of seeing that the king could not
overpower the barons by the mere assertion of his personal authority.
At a Parliament held at York in =1322=, the king obtained the
revocation of the ordinances, and a declaration that 'matters to be
established for the estate of our lord the king and of his heirs, and
for the estate of the realm and of the people, shall be treated,
accorded, and established in Parliaments by our lord the king, and by
the consent of the prelates, earls and barons, and commonalty of the
realm, according as hath been hitherto accustomed.' Edward I. had in
=1295= gathered a full Parliament, including the commons. But there
was no law to prevent him or his successors excluding the commons on
some future occasion. Edward II. by this declaration, issued with
consent of Parliament, confirmed his father's practice by a
legislative act. Unless the law were broken or repealed, no future
statute could come into existence without the consent of the commons.
25. =The Rule of the Despensers. 1322--1326.=--For some years after
the execution of Lancaster, Edward, or rather the Despensers, retained
power, but it was power which did not work for good. In =1323= Edward
made a truce with Scotland, but the cessation of foreign war did not
bring with it a cessation of troubles at home. Edward was entirely
unable to control his favourites. The elder Despenser was covetous and
the younger Despenser haughty, and they both made enemies for
themselves and the king. Queen Isabella was alienated from her
husband, partly by his exclusive devotion to the Despensers and partly
by the contempt which an active woman is apt to feel for a husband
without a will of his own. In =1325= she went to France, and was soon
followed by her eldest son, named Edward after his father. From that
moment she conspired against her husband. In =1326= she landed,
accompanied by her paramour, Robert Mortimer, and bringing with her
foreign troops. The barons rose in her favour. London joined them, and
all resistance was speedily beaten down. The elder Despenser was
hanged by the queen at Bristol. The younger was hanged, after a form
of trial, at Hereford.
[Illustration: Sir John de Creke; from his brass at Westley Waterless,
Cambridgeshire: showing armour worn between 1300 and 1335 or 1340.
Date, about 1325.]
26. =The Deposition and Murder of Edward II. 1327.=--Early in =1327= a
Parliament met at Westminster. It was filled with the king's enemies,
and under pressure from the queen and Mortimer Edward II. was
compelled to sign a declaration of his own wrong-doing and
incompetency, after which he formally resigned the crown. He was
allowed to live for eight months, at the end of which he was brutally
murdered in Berkeley Castle. The deposition of Edward II.--for his
enforced resignation was practically nothing less than that--was the
work of a faithless wife and of unscrupulous partisans, but at least
they clothed their vengeance in the forms of Parliamentary action. It
was by the action of Parliament in loosing the feudal ties by which
vassals were bound to an unworthy king, that it rose to the full
position of being the representative of the nation, and at the same
time virtually proclaimed that the wants of the nation must be
satisfied at the expense of the feudal claims of the king. The
national headship of the king would from henceforward be the
distinguishing feature of his office, whilst his feudal right to
personal service would grow less and less important every year.
[Illustration: Howden Church, Yorkshire--the west front; built about
1310-1320. The tower was built between 1390 and 1407.]