In 1200, King
John became involved in a long-drawn out war with France. This
war was expensive and John was forced to introduce new taxes to pay
for his army. This
created a great deal of resentment in England, and John's position
was not helped when, in 1205, the king's army lost control of Normandy,
Brittany, Anjou and Maine.
In 1215, King John made
another desperate attempt to gain control of his lost territory in
France. Once again he was defeated and was forced to pay £40,000
to obtain a truce. When John tried to obtain this money by imposing
yet another tax, the barons rebelled. Richard
of Clare, third Earl of Hertford, was one of the leaders of the
rebellion. Few barons remained loyal, and in most areas of the country,
John had very little support. John had no chance of victory and on
15th June, 1215,
at Runnymede in Surrey, he was forced to accept the peace terms of
those who had successfully fought against him.
The document the king was
obliged to sign was the Magna Carta. In this charter the king made
a long list of promises, including no new taxes without the support
of his barons, a reduction in the power of his sheriffs and the right
of a fair trial for all freemen.
The barons had doubts whether
King John could be trusted to keep his word.
A small group of barons were given the task of making sure that John
kept the promises he had made in the Magna Carta. Two of the barons
chosen were Richard of Clare and his son
Gilbert de Clare.
Soon after he signed the
charter the king appealed to Pope Innocent III for help. The pope
was concerned about this rebellion and decided to excommunicate the
barons who had fought against their king. The pope also provided money
to help King John recruit foreign mercenaries to fight against his
disloyal barons. The civil war resumed. One of King John's main targets
was Richard of Clare and in November,
1215, his troops seized his castle at Tonbridge.
The following year King
John died and was succeeded by his son Henry
III. A year later
Richard de Clare also died. Although the sons of bitter enemies, Henry
III and Gilbert de Clare became close
friends and it was not long before the family were given back Tonbridge
Castle.
Gilbert
de Clare was now the most powerful magnate in England. He controlled
456 manors and when requested, had to supply the king with 260 knights.
In 1230, Gilbert de Clare agreed to help Henry III win back land that
King John had lost in France. The following year Gilbert was killed
while fighting in the king's army.
The
Normans: Classroom Activities
(1)
Extracts from the Magna Carta (1215)
(I) In the first place we have granted to God... that the
English Church shall be free... freedom of elections, which is reckoned
most important and very essential to the English Church...
(II) If
any of our earls, or barons... shall have died, and at the time of
his death his heir shall be of full age... he shall have his inheritance...
(VII) A
widow, after the death of her husband, shall without difficulty have
her inheritance...
(VIII)
No widow shall be compelled to marry, so long as she prefers to live
without a husband...
(XI) If
anyone die indebted to the Jews, his wife shall... pay nothing of
that debt.
(XII) No
scutage or aid (tax) shall be imposed on our kingdom, unless by common
counsel of our kingdom...
(XIV) And
for obtaining the common counsel of the kingdom before the assessing
of an aid or of a scutage, we will cause to be summoned the archbishops,
bishops, abbots, earls, and greater barons...
(XX) A
freeman shall not be fined for a slight offence... and for a grave
offence he shall be fined in accordance with the gravity of the offence...
and a villein should be fined in the same way.
(XXIII) No village or
individual shall be compelled to make bridges or river banks...
(XXX) No sheriff or bailiff...
or other person, shall take the horses or carts of any
freeman for transport duty, against the will of the said freeman...
(XXXV) Let there be one
measure of wine throughout the whole kingdom, and
one measure of ale; and one measure of corn; and one width of cloth...
(XXXIX) No freeman shall
be taken or imprisoned or outlawed or exiled or in anyway
destroyed... except by the lawful judgement of his peers or by the
law of the land.
(XL) To no one will we
sell, to no one will we refuse justice.
(XLI) All merchants shall
have safe and secure exit from England, and entry to England, with
right to be there and to move about... for buying and selling... except
in time of war, such merchants as are of the land at war with us.
And if they are found in our land at the beginning of the war, they
shall be detained, without injury to their bodies or goods, until
information be received by us by our chief justicar how the merchants
of our land found in
the land at war with us are treated; and if our men are safe there
the others shall be safe in our land.
(XLII) It shall be lawful
in future for anyone to leave our kingdom... excepting those
imprisoned or outlawed in accordance with the law in the kingdom...
(XLV) We will appoint
as justices, constables, sheriffs, or bailiffs only such as know
the law of the kingdom and mean to observe it well.
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