Lionheart
( Making of England - 4 )
Stewart Binns
Lionheart is the latest thrilling historical novel in Stewart Binns’s epic Making of England series.
1176 – England
King Henry II reigns over a vast empire that stretches the length of Britain and reaches the foothills of the Pyrenees. But he is aging, and his powerful and ambitious sons are restless.
Henry’s third son, Richard of Aquitaine, is developing a fearsome reputation for being a ruthless warrior. Arrogant and conceited he earns the name Richard Lionheart for his bravery and brutality on the battlefield.
After the death of his brothers, Richard’s impatience to take the throne, and gain the immense power that being King over a vast empire would bring him, leads him to form an alliance with France.
And so, Richard begins his bloody quest to return the Holy Land to Christian rule.
Stewart Binns’ Making of England series features Conquest, Crusade, Anarchy and his latest historical page-turner, Lionheart.
Stewart Binns
LIONHEART
To all those who love history
Maps
MAP I
England in the Twelfth Century
MAP II
Europe in the Twelfth Century
MAP III
The Eastern Mediterranean and Holy Land in the Twelfth Century
MAP IV
The Routes to the Third Crusade
MAP V
The Holy Land during the Third Crusade
Introduction
Towards the end of the reign of Henry II, the Plantagenet Empire stretched across a huge swathe of north-west Europe. The Scots had declared their fealty to Westminster, and Ireland and Wales both acknowledged the English King as their liege lord. Across the Channel, all French domains – save those of the King of the Franks, in Paris, and the Count of Toulouse – were part of a vast realm that stretched from the north of Scotland to the Pyrenees.
Like his father before him, and his Norman predecessors before that, Henry was all-powerful, especially when allied with his remarkable wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine. Fortunately, their lineage included sufficient sprinklings of the blood of their diverse subjects, including the English, to keep any adversaries at bay. However, Henry and Eleanor produced eight offspring who were so formidable they were soon called the ‘Devil’s Brood’. They included two future queens and two kings, but the most remarkable of all was the sixth child, Richard, Duke of Aquitaine, who would be called ‘Lionheart’ before the age of twenty – and fifteen years before he would become King of England.
His physical presence, his domineering personality and his remarkable military prowess – not only as a general of armies but also in hand-to-hand combat – made him a legend in his own lifetime. His struggles during the Third Crusade against the Sultan Saladin (himself one of the most revered men in Muslim history) soon became one of the most compelling stories of the Middle Ages.
But there was more to Richard’s lineage than he realized. When he became King of England on 6 July 1189, there were two men with him who had been charged with protecting the young King and guiding his future. One of them was a knight of the realm, chosen for his martial skills and personal integrity, and the other was a monk, a wise man of letters, who carried vital clues about Richard’s past – evidence that would shape his future and that of England. This is their story.
1. Old Man
When I first saw the old man, it was as if I was looking at an apparition, a venerated image held in my memory since childhood.
As a boy, I had been told the stories about England’s ancient heroes many times: the great King Harold and his mighty housecarls, who fought to the death at Senlac Ridge in a valiant attempt to defeat the Conqueror’s Norman army; the gallant defenders of the Siege of Ely, the last of the brave souls who had defied Norman rule; and the most courageous of them all, Hereward of Bourne, the leader of England’s final rebellion, about whom people still spoke with hushed reverence.
These men of legend wore their hair and beards long, carried the round shields of Saxon tradition and went into battle wielding their fearsome battleaxes. But they were from another time, a distant memory. Senlac Ridge had happened over a hundred years ago, and even though there were a few old men alive who claimed that their grandfathers could remember Hereward and the early days of the Conquest, no one really believed them.
Now everyone trimmed their hair and beards like our Norman masters. We wore Norman clothes, with their elaborate embroidery and rich colours, and we carried Norman weapons and armour. To all intents and purposes, we were Normans – except in our hearts, which still coursed with English blood.
But the old man in front of me did not resemble a Norman. Apart from his age – he must have been well into his seventies – he was the epitome of the English heroes of the past. Of a winter’s eve, when I had sat by the fire and listened to my father tell me tales of Old England and enjoyed the ancient ballads sung to me by my mother, in my imagination I had conjured images of formidable warriors just like the man I now faced.
He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a prodigious mane of silver-grey hair flowing down the back of his heavy cloak. His hoary beard fell in gentle waves and came to rest on his chest. His weapons and armour, unmistakeably Old English, shone with a lustre born of diligent care. With eyes that were clear and sharp and skin that, although wrinkled and weathered, glowed with ruddy health, he was the living embodiment of a little boy’s fantasy of heroes long gone.
But he was a contemporary lord and, by the look of the heavy seal on his ring and the ermine trim to his cloak, an earl of the realm. As far as I knew, all our lords were Normans. How was it possible for a man to be a Norman earl and yet appear to be the embodiment of England’s past?
It was September 1176. I had been summoned to Wolvesey Castle in Winchester by the royal warrant of the man I served, Henry Plantagenet, King Henry II. I was part of the King’s retinue at Westminster and commanded a squadron of his cavalry. I had been dubbed a knight of the realm, which, as an Englishman, was as high as I could hope to rise in the military hierarchy of the Norman army. I was twenty-five years old and needed only to complete another eight to ten years’ service before having sufficient savings to buy a small estate and live out my days in relative comfort. I would have needed a wife, of course, and I had already begun to cast my eye over suitable young ladies within London’s merchant families.
Again, I was hindered by my kith and kin. The ladies of the court were almost all from Norman families and, in the main, beyond the reach of a lowly Englishman like me, no matter how eligible I may have thought I was. However, many of London’s merchants were Englishmen who had managed to make their wealth by cosseting the Norman elite. So, one of their daughters was the finest bride a young buck of my modest lineage could hope for.
Life’s course seemed fixed for me; I had done well, especially for an Englishman, and, as often as I could, I remembered to tell myself to count my blessings. But a life with a secure future is not necessarily a contented one. I often yearned for more, but what ‘more’ might be was never clear to me. When the yearnings became stronger, I made them go away by convincing myself that everyone wanted more in their lives – money, women, adventure, fame – and that it was childish to crave unattainable rewards.
Although I could make the hankerings disappear for a while, they would always come back, especially during the long cold winters in our meagre barracks in Westminster. Being a professional soldier appeared to offer a life of adventure and reward, but it was usually monotonous and dreary. Apart from occasional skirmishes against the Welsh princes, when we would reinforce the King’s garrisons at Glastonbury and Gloucester, we spe
nt most of our time providing the King’s bodyguard and enduring the endless tedium of court ceremonials.
I had led my squadron on two of the King’s forays against raiders in the Scottish borders, but the actions had been brief and routine. One had brought but a brief glimpse of the enemy – and, even then, only of their rear ends as they fled into the Cheviots to skulk in their hilltop lairs – and the other had been no more than a hunting expedition, as we ran down and despatched a fleeing band of brigands who were too frightened to stand and fight.
But I had been involved in one serious encounter, one that had won me my knight’s pennon and bloodied me in the forbidding truths of war.
It happened in 1171, shortly after I had been given command of my own conroi of cavalry. They were a motley assembly: a few reliable Anglo-Normans; half a dozen trustworthy Englishmen; and a dubious selection of Welsh, Bretons and Angevins, whose only loyalty was to the purse on offer. We had been sent by King Henry to join a small force led by Raymond FitzGerald, a powerful warlord from Pembroke and second-in-command to Richard de Clare, Second Earl of Pembroke, known to everyone as ‘Strongbow’.
De Clare and FitzGerald were made of stern stuff. The offspring of marriage settlements between Norman lords who had invaded South Wales and the daughters of Welsh princes whose domains had been surrendered, they had been raised on the lawless fringes of the Norman Empire.
FitzGerald was the grandson of Nest, daughter of Rhys ap Tewdwr, who had been described as the ‘Helen of Wales’. Her beauty had led her into the bed of Henry Beauclerc, King Henry’s grandfather. Nothing daunted FitzGerald, and when Strongbow asked him to lead an expedition to Ireland – to begin the conquest of the island on behalf of the King – he took only 10 knights and 100 men, including my conroi of 25 cavalry.
We landed at Baginbun Head on the Hook Peninsula, near Waterford, where we were besieged in our hastily fortified camp by a combined force of Irishmen and Ostmen. Facing an army at least 3,000 strong, we were vastly outnumbered. But when FitzGerald saw their chaotic and ill-disciplined approach, he devised a cunning ploy.
We had rounded up a large herd of cattle shortly after our landing and enclosed them in our compound. I was ordered to set them loose and use my horsemen to drive them headlong into the oncoming enemy ranks. The terrified cattle careened into the enemy like a battering ram, bowling over the front ranks like skittles and scattering most of the rest. FitzGerald then led his infantry in a charge, and they proceeded to cut down the hapless remnants in large numbers.
I then pursued those fleeing the scene; we killed dozens and rounded up many more. Some we ran down on horseback, but when our mounts became exhausted we dismounted and scoured the countryside on foot, inflicting more slaughter. It was the worst bloodletting I had been involved in.
It was one-sided and brutal, and I lost all sense of danger. As night drew in, many of my men receded into the gloom and, save for a few, I became detached from the rest of the conroi. When I checked who was with me, I felt suddenly alarmed that none seemed reliable. My English and Norman colleagues were nowhere to be seen, and I appeared to have only a small contingent of Angevins and Bretons. I became concerned; I had made the fundamental mistake of acting without thinking of the consequences. Then, out of the darkness, a dozen or more Ostmen were upon us in an instant. Instead of coming to my side as a disciplined unit, and despite my orders not to do so, my men scattered in every direction. Fortunately, most of the Ostmen followed them, sensing blood. Even so, I was left with four adversaries, all seething with anger from the mauling they had been given earlier.
I acted without hesitation; my training and discipline took over, and I launched myself at them rather than wait for their assault. For the first time, I realized how effective my years of training had been. I could move with more fluid speed than my adversaries could muster, and my blows were more accurate and powerful. I cut them down without mercy, and although I suffered a few gashes, mostly absorbed by my armour – and one heavy blow to the side of my helmet, which made me reel a little – within a few moments all four men were at my feet, their blood mingling in pools.
There is nothing like fresh blood. It is both disgusting – after all, it signifies pain and death – and captivating, the essence of our lives, like the best of wine. I stared at the ever-increasing flow from the now lifeless bodies and thought about the sons, husbands and fathers I had just killed. All their deeds and memories were now seeping into the ground like water spilled from a pail.
The bodies did not move, nor did they breathe; I was surrounded by the gloom of dusk and the silence of death. I had lost all trace of my men and thought better of stumbling into any more of the enemy, so I found a small gulley to hide in for the night. I did not sleep at first – my heart pumped from the day’s ferment, and my mind was full of thoughts about the drama of the encounter – but eventually I fell into a fitful sleep.
My slumber was full of vivid dreams, the most powerful of which would recur for the rest of my life. It was fanciful, of course, but it seemed so real.
I was standing with the legends of England’s past. It was not clear where we were, but they were all there: the mighty Alfred, King Harold, Hereward of Bourne and many others, all formed into a small, final redoubt of kings, earls and knights. We were on a hill and all around us was an enemy army so large it appeared to be a sea of men and horses. I was behind our legendary leaders, who were taking the brunt of the attack, but suddenly the noble Hereward demanded the attention of King Alfred and pointed to our rear. With a look of alarm, Alfred called to me: Sir Ranulf, look to the rear, hold your position, all England depends on you!
At that point I turned, to be confronted, no more than twenty yards away, by a huge wave of mounted knights. They were a wall of horses and men, armour, shields and swords – a wall so high, I could not see anything behind it. I looked to my left and right and, to my horror, suddenly seemed to be alone. I turned back towards my leaders, who were still there, but their forms were now indistinct, ghostly, as if they were disappearing. But not so the enemy wall. Its men were now within striking distance; I could feel the breath of the huge destriers on my face.
Swords were raised and lances were couched above me. But my response was far from gallant; I lowered my sword, fell to my knees and waited for the blows. However, just when they should have landed, I woke from my fantasy with a jolt of terror and felt the cold sweat of fear all over my body.
It took me many minutes in the dank early morning, in that remote place in Ireland, to regain my composure. I became a warrior that day, and also a man. I discovered what I could do and realized the price that I would always have to pay.
With the return of daylight, I was soon able to find my horse and my men. By midday I had rejoined FitzGerald’s army, where I was treated as a hero.
In hindsight, our actions had been vicious and cruel, but at the time the morality of our actions was not a consideration. Our training as soldiers had become paramount and we had done what we were required to do. The result was that over a thousand of our enemy were either killed or captured. Strongbow returned with a larger army a year later, and King Henry arrived at Waterford with a large fleet shortly afterwards – the first English king to set foot in Ireland. The Irish kings submitted to him in Dublin; the English lordship of Ireland had begun.
I was rewarded for my part in the initial victory at Waterford with my knight’s pennon and a personal tribute from the King.
So, I had done my share of fighting and had killed a few wretched souls in battle. But unlike some of my comrades, it was not an activity that I approached mindlessly. It seemed to me that war was a part of our lives and that soldiers had to fight to keep their kingdom safe and maintain its discipline. Thus it was a means to an end, not an end in itself. Nevertheless, as I had chosen the life of a warrior, I had to excel in my profession in order to survive, and that is what I had always striven to do.
Then, when the direction of my life seemed set and my futu
re predictably clear, came my intriguing summons to Winchester. Did it offer the opportunity for new adventures? I hoped so. I knew I was one of the most highly regarded of the King’s men; my status as commander of a conroi of cavalry attested to that, as did my elevation as a knight. Had I been chosen for a special mission, or just as a mundane messenger for a matter of trivia in the royal household? I feared it would be the latter – except that the old man before me did not appear to be the kind of individual to engage in court trivia.
There had been little prospect of adventure when I was a boy. My father was the local priest of a small community called Heysham on the northern coast, close to Lancaster. His church was an Old Saxon chapel – one of the few built in stone in the entire area – which looked out to sea from atop a rocky headland. He was very proud of his parish and its long history stretching back to the early days of our Christian faith.
He told me that we had Norse blood on both sides of his family and made sure that I was fluent in the Danish languages spoken in the hills to the north and east and across the Western Sea, in Ireland. My mother came from the lands beyond the Great Sands to the north, from a place called Keswick, in the Cumbrian hills, and she was equally proud of her Celtic roots. Hers was a mixed community of Celts and Anglo-Danes, but she was unequivocally a Celt. Her native language was very different from English and Danish; like my father, she made sure that I was fluent in it.
The rule in the house was simple: when we were together, we spoke English; when I was alone with my father, we spoke Danish; and when I was with my mother, it was always Celtic. It was a good grounding in languages, which my father embellished by giving me a strong grasp of Latin and, of course, fluency with the guttural tones of our Norman lords. Latin was difficult, but Norman was less so because, as my father often pointed out, it was based on the language of the Normans’ Viking ancestors, who hailed from the same lands as my Danish forefathers.
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