Lionheart moe-4

by Stewart Binns

  HENRY VI, HOLY ROMAN EMPEROR

  When Henry added the Kingdom of Sicily to his personal and imperial domain, in December 1194, he became the most powerful monarch in the Mediterranean and Europe. He died of malaria in Messina, on 28 September 1197, although many believed he was poisoned.

  HUGH III, DUKE OF BURGUNDY

  The most loyal of all the French lords after the departure of his King, Philip of France, he stayed with the Lionheart until the summer of 1192. He died on 25 August 1192, but there is no record of the cause of his death. King Richard was accused of being behind it by Philip, Bishop of Beauvais, a close friend of Conrad of Montferrat. According to the chronicler Richard of Devizes, the Bishop of Beauvais said that Richard ‘had ordered Marquis Montferrat’s throat cut, that he poisoned the Duke of Burgundy; that he was an extraordinarily savage man and as hard as iron’.

  JOAN OF SICILY

  Joan was married in October 1196, at Rouen, as the third wife of Raymond VI of Toulouse. She was the mother of his successor, Raymond VII of Toulouse, and had a daughter, Mary, born in 1198. Raymond treated Joan badly, and she was afraid of him. In 1199, while pregnant with a third child, Joan travelled northwards, hoping for the protection of her brother, Richard the Lionheart, but he had just died. She then fled to her mother, Queen Eleanor, at her court at Rouen, where she was offered refuge and care. She died in childbirth and was buried at Fontevraud Abbey.

  JOHN, KING OF ENGLAND

  When John became King, in 1199, war with France was renewed. By 1206, John had lost Normandy, Anjou, Maine and parts of Poitou. He became increasingly unpopular as taxes rose dramatically to pay for his campaigns and his rule was more and more ruthless. His barons became ever more belligerent until civil war broke out, in May 1215. When the rebels seized London, John was compelled to negotiate and, on 19 June, at Runnymede on the River Thames, he accepted the baronial terms embodied in the Magna Carta, which limited royal power, ensured feudal rights and restated English law. It was the first formal document stating that the monarch was as much under the rule of law as his people, and that the rights of individuals were to be upheld even against the wishes of the sovereign.

  LEOPOLD V, DUKE OF AUSTRIA

  Leopold’s share of Richard the Lionheart’s vast ransom, said to be twenty-three tons of silver, is thought to have formed the foundation for the Austrian mint, and was used to build new city walls for Vienna, as well as to found the towns of Wiener Neustadt and Friedberg in Styria. However, the Duke was excommunicated by Pope Celestine III for having taken prisoner a fellow crusader. In 1194, Leopold’s foot was crushed when his horse fell on him at a tournament in Graz and he subsequently died of gangrene. He was buried at Heiligenkreuz Abbey near Vienna.

  MERCADIER

  After the death of King Richard, Mercadier entered the service of John, his successor. On Easter Monday, 10 April 1200, he was assassinated while on a visit to Bordeaux to pay his respects to Eleanor of Aquitaine. His murderer was a man-at-arms employed by Brandin, a rival mercenary captain in the service of King John.

  PHILIP AUGUSTUS, KING OF FRANCE

  When John became King in 1199, Philip invaded John’s French domains, forcing him to surrender Normandy, Brittany, Anjou, Maine and Touraine. Philip later conquered Poitou. In 1214, at Bouvines, the French defeated the allied forces of King John, the Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV and those of the Count of Flanders. The victory established France as a major European power. Philip continued the construction of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, built the first Louvre, paved the main streets and walled the city. He died on 14 July 1223 and was buried in the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Denis.

  PHILIP OF COGNAC

  Although thought to be King Richard’s illegitimate son, little is known of him. Philip had reached adulthood by the end of the 1190s, when his father married him to his ward, Amelia, the heiress of Cognac in Charente. However, she died without issue. It is thought he died early in the 1200s.

  PIERRE BASIL

  Despite the pardon Pierre Basil received from Richard the Lionheart, a vengeful Mercadier would have none of it. Shortly after the Lionheart’s death, he had the boy dragged into the bailey of Castle Chalus-Chabrol where, in front of a large crowd, he was flayed alive. Mercadier justified his action by saying that although the King might have forgiven him, he had not.

  ROBERT THORNHAM

  After King Richard’s death, Robert Thornham allied himself to King John. He was appointed Seneschal of Anjou and of Gascony, in 1201. In 1205 he was made High Sheriff of Surrey before returning to France as Seneschal of Poitou. He died on 26 April 1211.

  SALADIN

  Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub was born in Tikrit, Iraq, a Muslim of Kurdish origins. Despite being Christendom’s most formidable opponent, his achievements, nobility and chivalry won him universal respect among Christians as well as Muslims.

  Saladin died of a fever on 4 March 1193 in Damascus, not long after King Richard left the Holy Land. At the time of his death, he possessed one gold piece and a handful of silver. He had given away his immense wealth to the poor. He was buried in a mausoleum in the garden outside the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus.

  SAPHADIN

  Al-Adil (Saphadin to the crusaders), the younger brother of Saladin, was born in June 1145 in Damascus. Following Saladin’s death, he played the role of kingmaker during the succession dispute between Saladin’s sons and became governor of Damascus. He was later proclaimed Sultan and ruled wisely over both Egypt and Syria for nearly two decades until 1217. He encouraged trade and good relations with the crusader states, but took up arms again on hearing news of the Fifth Crusade, despite being over seventy years old. He fell ill and died while on campaign, in August 1218, and was succeeded by his son Malik al-Kamil.

  WILLIAM MARSHAL

  William Marshal supported King John after Richard’s death and did so to the end of his reign. John created him the First Earl of Pembroke. After John’s death, William became regent for the young King Henry III. Fulfilling a vow he had made while on crusade, he was invested into the order of the Knights Templar on his deathbed. He died on 14 May 1219, at Caversham, and was buried in the Temple Church in London, where his tomb can still be seen. The title ‘Earl Marshal of England’, an honour now held by the Dukes of Norfolk, originates from his name.

  Glossary

  ALAUNT

  A now extinct breed of dog, thought to be the ancestor of large modern breeds, such as mastiffs. They were used to hunt large animals, including bears and boar, and as guard dogs.

  AMALFI CROSS

  The Maltese cross, also known as the Amalfi cross, is the symbol associated with the Knights Hospitaller (the Knights of Malta) and with the island of Malta.

  ANGEVIN

  The House of Anjou, usually referred to simply as the Angevins, was a noble family of Frankish origin that emerged as the rulers of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and the Kingdom of England in the twelfth century.

  Through the marriage of Geoffrey of Anjou to the Empress Matilda, the family achieved control of England and Normandy, and the marriage of Geoffrey’s son Henry II (Curtmantle) to Eleanor of Aquitaine expanded the family’s holdings into what was later termed the Angevin Empire.

  After King John lost the Angevins’ continental territory, along with Anjou itself, to the Capetians (Kings of France), in 1204, the family became known as the House of Plantagenet, adopting Geoffrey’s nickname, and ruled England until the reign of Richard II, after which the succession was disputed by two cadet branches, the House of Lancaster and the House of York.

  Although Richard the Lionheart’s army in the Third Crusade is usually referred to as the ‘English’ army, it was in fact an Angevin army and would have contained many more from south of the Channel than from north of it.

  ANTIOCH, SIEGE OF

  The capture of the great fortress of Antioch was vital to the success of the First Crusade – without control of Antioch, the crusaders could not have moved on to Jerusalem. The siege lasted for
seven and a half months, and conditions for the crusaders were often worse than for those inside the city. Located in the valley of the Orontes, in mountainous country, the city itself was on the valley floor, with the almost impregnable citadel high in the mountains above. Antioch finally fell on 9 February 1098.

  APOPLEXY

  Apoplexy was the word used for centuries to describe sudden loss of consciousness and death. Strokes and heart attacks would often have been described as apoplexy in the past.

  ARBALEST

  An arbalest (or arbelist) is one who shoots a crossbow. The term can also be applied to the bow itself. An arbalest was much larger than earlier crossbows and had greater tensile strength, giving it a greater force. The strongest windlass-pulled arbalests could be accurate up to 300 yards. A skilled arbalest could shoot two bolts per minute. Arbalest is a medieval French corruption from the Roman name arc ballista.

  ARTUQID

  The Artuqid dynasty was a Turcoman dynasty that ruled in Eastern Anatolia, Northern Syria and Northern Iraq in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

  ASSASSINS

  The origins of the Order of Assassins can be traced back to around 1080. The order’s first Grandmaster, Hassan-i Sabbah, was a passionate devotee of Isma’ili beliefs. Because of the unrest in the Holy Land caused by the Crusades, Hassan-i Sabbah found himself not only fighting other Muslims, but also the invading Christian forces.

  The name ‘Assassins’ may have come from the Arabic hashishi, meaning ‘hashish users’. It could also have derived from the Egyptian Arabic word hashasheen, meaning ‘noisy people’ or ‘troublemakers’.

  ASTROLABE

  An astrolabe, from the Greek astrolabos, meaning ‘star-taker’, is an elaborate measuring device historically used by astronomers, navigators and astrologers. It was used to locate and predict the positions of the sun, moon, planets and stars, to determine local time and latitude and for surveying and triangulation.

  ATABEG

  Atabeg, Atabek or Atabey, the equivalent of a prince, is an hereditary title of nobility of Turkic origin, indicating the lord of a region or province, usually subordinate to a monarch.

  ATHELING

  The Anglo-Saxon name for the heir to the throne. Interestingly, the name ‘Clito’ – as in William Clito, the son of Robert, Duke of Normandy, and claimant to the English throne – was a Latin version of the same thing. The Germanic form was ‘Adelin’ – as in William Adelin, the son of King Henry I (Beauclerc) and heir to the throne, who drowned in 1120.

  ATTAR OF ROSES

  Attar of roses, or rose oil, is a fragrant oil distilled from fresh petals of the rose family. Rose oils are a valuable ingredient of fine perfumes, liqueurs, scenting ointments and toilet preparations.

  BAILEY

  See ‘motte and bailey’.

  ‘BALLAD OF ROBYN OF HODE’

  The earliest printed version of ‘The Ballad of Robyn of Hode’ appeared sometime after 1492, called a ‘Gest of Robyn Hode’, a printed version of an old ballad which told of the bravado of heroic outlaws who fought for the oppressed and downtrodden. The earliest handwritten version is called ‘Robin Hood and the Monk’. It is preserved in manuscript form at Cambridge University. Written around 1450, it contains many of the elements still associated with the legend. Several historians argue that at least part of the folklore associated with the story of Robin Hood may have been inspired by the deeds of Hereward of Bourne (also known as ‘The Wake’).

  BEZANT

  A gold coin from the Byzantine Empire.

  BLACKLETTER

  Blackletter, also known as Gothic script or Gothic minuscule, was a script used throughout western Europe from approximately 1100 until well into the seventeenth century. Blackletter is sometimes called Old English.

  BLOODY FLUX

  Bloody flux is the old name for dysentery, an inflammatory disorder of the intestine. It results in severe diarrhoea containing mucus and/or blood in the faeces, with fever and abdominal pain. If left untreated, dysentery is often fatal.

  BODKIN

  A bodkin is a type of arrowhead, a squared metal spike used extensively during the Middle Ages. The name comes from the Old English word bodkin (or bodekin), a type of sharp, pointed dagger.

  BOLTON PRIORY (NOW ABBEY)

  Bolton Priory flourished until the early fourteenth century, when Scottish raiders caused serious structural damage to the priory, resulting in the temporary abandonment of the site. Building work was still going on when the Dissolution of the Monasteries resulted in the termination of the priory in 1539. The east end remains in ruins. The nave of the abbey church was in use as a parish church from about 1170 onwards. It survived the Dissolution of the Monasteries and is still used to this day.

  BRAIES

  Braies are a type of pantaloon worn in the Middle Ages. In the later Middle Ages they were used exclusively as undergarments. Braies generally hung to the knees or mid-calf, resembling what are today called shorts. They were made of cotton or linen.

  BUCENTAUR

  The Bucentaur was the state galley of the Doges of Venice. It was used every year on Ascension Day up to 1798 to take the Doge out to the Adriatic Sea to perform the ‘Marriage of the Sea’ – a ceremony that symbolically wedded Venice to the sea.

  BURGH

  The Saxon name for a town or city.

  BUTESCARL

  The seaborne equivalent of a housecarl, the medieval equivalent of a modern-day marine.

  CAPETIANS

  The House of Capet ruled the Kingdom of France from 987 to 1328 after succeeding the Carolingian dynasty. The name derives from Hugh Capet, the first Capetian King, who was a descendant of the Carolingians. The direct House of Capet came to an end in 1328, when the three sons of Philip IV all failed to produce surviving male heirs to the French throne.

  CAPPA ROBE

  A long-sleeved, ankle-length ecclesiastical robe, tied at the waist by a corded belt. Usually made from cotton or wool, for Templars it would have had a slit at the front and rear so that it could be worn on horseback. In battle, the cappa would have been worn over a full-body hauberk of chain mail.

  CARUCATE

  The carucate was a unit of assessment for tax used in most Danelaw counties of England, and is found in the Domesday Book. The carucate was based on the area a plough team of eight oxen could till in a single annual season. It was subdivided into oxgangs, or ‘bovates’, based on the area a single ox might till in the same period, which thus represented one eighth of a carucate.

  CASTELLAN

  A castellan was the governor, constable or captain of a castle. The word stems from the Latin castellanus, derived from castellum (castle).

  CASTLE OF THE ROCK

  The castle is now called Château Gaillard and is regarded as the finest fortification of the Middle Ages. Henry IV of France ordered the demolition of Château Gaillard in 1599. Today, its ruins are listed as an historical monument by the French Ministry of Culture and are open to visitors.

  CATAPULT

  Castles, fortresses and fortified walled cities were the main form of defence in the Middle Ages and a variety of catapult devices were used against them. As well as attempting to breach the walls, missiles and incendiaries could be hurled inside, or early forms of biological warfare deployed, such as diseased carcasses, putrid garbage or excrement. The most widely used catapults were the following:

  Ballista

  Similar to a giant crossbow and designed to work through torsion. Giant arrows were used as the ammunition, made from wood with an iron tip.

  Mangonel

  These machines were designed to throw heavy projectiles from a bowl-shaped bucket at the end of an arm. With a range of up to 1,300 feet they were relatively simple to construct, and wheels were added to increase mobility.

  Onager

  Mangonels are sometimes referred to as ‘onagers’. Onager catapults initially launched projectiles from a sling, which was later changed to a bowl-shaped bucket.

 
Springald

  The springald’s design was similar to that of the ballista, effectively a crossbow propelled by tension. The springald’s frame was more compact, allowing for use inside tighter confines, such as the inside of a castle or tower.

  Trebuchet

  Trebuchets were probably the most powerful catapult employed in the Middle Ages. The most commonly used ammunition was stones, but the most effective involved fire, such as firebrands and the infamous ‘Greek fire’. Trebuchets came in two different designs: traction, which were powered by people; or counterpoise, where the people were replaced with a weight on the short end of an arm. A simplified trebuchet was known as a ‘couillard’, where the trebuchet’s single counterweight was split, swinging on either side of a central support post.

  CERDIC/CERDICIAN

  The dynastic name of the Kings of Wessex, who ultimately became Kings of England, from Egbert, King of Wessex in 820, to Edward the Confessor’s death in 1066. The only exceptions were the three Danish kings, Cnut and his sons Harold Harefoot and Harthacnut, between 1016 and 1042. The name reputedly derives from Cerdic, a prince of the West Saxons from circa 600, who was an ancestor of Egbert, the first King of England.

  CHANSON DE GESTE

  See ‘Song of Roland’.

  CHEMISE

  A simple garment worn next to the skin to protect clothing from sweat and body oils, the precursor to the modern shirt. The chemise seems to have developed from the Roman tunica and first became popular in Europe in the Middle Ages. Women wore a shift or chemise under their gown or robe. Men wore a chemise with their trousers or braies, and covered the chemise with garments such as a doublet or robe.