SHE-WOLVESTheWomenWho

RuledEnglandBeforeElizabeth

HELENCASTOR

ForHelenLenygon,andinmemoryofMaryYates

Topromoteawoman tobear rule, superiority,dominion or empireabove any realm, nationor city is repugnant tonature, contumely toGod, a thing mostcontrarious to hisrevealed will andapprovedordinance,andfinally it is thesubversion of goodorder, of all equity and

justice.JOHN KNOX, The First

Blast of the TrumpetAgainst the MonstrousRegiment of Women,1558

I know I have the bodyof a weak and feeblewoman, but I have theheart and stomach of aking, and of a king ofEnglandtoo.

QUEEN ELIZABETH 1,1588

Contents

TitlePageListofillustrationsPreface

BEGINNINGS

1 6 July 1553: TheKingisDead2 Long Live theQueen?MATILDA:LADYOFENGLAND

1 This Land GrewDark

2MathildaImperatrix3LadyofEngland4 Greatest in HerOffspringELEANOR: AN INCOMPARABLEWOMAN

1 An IncomparableWoman2 The War Without

Love3 By the Wrath ofGod, Queen ofEngland4 Surpassing AlmostAll the Queens ofThisWorldISABELLA:IRONLADY

1 OneMan So Loved

Another2 Dearest and MostPowerful3‘SomeoneHasComeBetweenMy HusbandandMyself’4IronLadyMARGARET: A GREAT ANDSTRONGLABOUREDWOMAN

1OurLadySovereign2 A Great and StrongLabouredWoman3MightandPower4 The Queen SustainsUsNEWBEGINNINGS

1 6 July 1553: LongLivetheQueen

2 Not of Ladies’Capacity3AQueenandBytheSame Title a KingAlsoNote on Sources andFurtherReadingIndex

AbouttheAuthorBytheSameAuthorCopyright

ListofIllustrations

1 Four kings of England:

from the AbbreviatioChronicorumAngliae ofMatthew Paris, BritishLibrary MS CottonClaudius D.VI f.9. ©The British LibraryBoard. All rightsreservedFABFABOI.

2 The wedding feast ofMatilda and EmperorHeinrich V: CorpusChristi College,Cambridge, MS 373 f.95v, courtesy of the

Master and Fellows ofCorpus Christi College,Cambridge.

3 Effigies of Eleanor ofAquitaine and Henry IIin Fontevraud Abbey:The Bridgeman ArtLibrary.

4SealofPhilippeII,fromtheCentre Historique desArchives Nationales,Paris: Giraudon/TheBridgemanArtLibrary.

5SealofKingJohn,fromthe

Centre Historique desArchives Nationales,Paris: Giraudon/TheBridgemanArtLibrary.

6 Isabella of France and hertroops at Hereford(English School, 14thcentury,onvellum):TheBritish Library/TheBridgemanArtLibrary.

7 Tomb effigy of Edward IIinGloucester Cathedral:ScalaImages.

8 The earl of Shrewsbury

presenting a book ofromancestoMargaretofAnjou: from the‘Shrewsbury Book’,British Library MSRoyal 15 E.VI f. 2v. ©The British LibraryBoard. All rightsreservedFABFABOI.

9 Edward VI, c.1550,attributed to WilliamScrots. The RoyalCollection © 2010 HerMajesty Queen

ElizabethII.10LadyJaneGrey,1590s,by

unknown artist. ©National PortraitGallery,London.

11 Edward VI’s ‘device forthe succession’: InnerTemple Library PetytMS 538.47 f.317,courtesy of the MastersoftheBenchoftheInnerTemple. Photograph ©IanJones.

12 Mary I, 1554, by Hans

Eworth or Ewoutsz:SocietyofAntiquariesofLondon/The BridgemanArtLibrary.

13 Great Seal of England ofQueen Mary and KingPhilip, 1554: BritishLibrary Cotton CharterXVI 4C. © The BritishLibraryBoard.AllrightsreservedFABFABOI.

14PrincessElizabeth,c.1546,attributed to WilliamScrots. The Royal

Collection © 2010 HerMajesty QueenElizabethII.

15 Elizabeth I, ‘The PelicanPortrait’, c.1575,attributed to NicholasHilliard. © NationalMuseums,Liverpool.

16ElizabethI,‘TheRainbowPortrait’, c.1600,attributed to IsaacOliver: courtesy of theMarquessofSalisbury.

Preface

Thisisanattempttowritethekind of book I loved to readbefore history became myprofession as well as my

pleasure. It is about people,andaboutpower.Itisaworkof story-telling, ofbiographical narrative ratherthan theory or cross-culturalcomparison. I have sought toroot it in the perspectives ofthe people whose lives andwords are recounted here,rather than inhistoriographical debate, andtoformmyownsense,sofaras the evidence allows, oftheir individual experiences.

In the process, I hope theirlives will also serve toilluminate a bigger storyabout the questions overwhich they fought and thedilemmas they faced – andonethatcrossesthehistoricaldivide between ‘medieval’and ‘early modern’, anartificial boundary that noneof them would haverecognisedorunderstood.What the evidence allows

is,ofcourse,verydifferentas

we look back from thesixteenth to the twelfthcentury.ThefaceofElizabethI isalmostas familiaras thatofElizabeth II, and the storyof her life can be piecedtogether not only from thecopious pronouncements ofher government, but alsofrom notes and letters in herown handwriting and fromthe private observations ofcourtiers and ambassadors,scholars and spies. Four

hundred years earlier, withthe significant exception ofthe Church, English culturewas largely non-literate.Memoryandthespokenwordwere the repositories oflearning for the many, thewritten word only for theclerical few. A historian,relying on the remarkableendurance of ink andparchment rather than avanished oral tradition, cannever knowMatilda, who so

nearly took the throne in the1140s,ascloselyoraswellasherdescendantElizabeth.Butweknowagreatdeal,all thesame, about what Matildadid, andhowshedid it; howshe acted and reacted amidthe dramatic events of aturbulent life; and how shewas seen by others, whetherfrom the perspective of abattlefield or that of amonastic scriptorium. If thesurvivingsourcescannotgive

us an intimate portraitsuffused with privatesentiment, they take usinstead to the heart of thecollision between personalrelationships andpublic rolesthat made up the dynasticgovernment of a hereditarymonarchy.Thesestoriesalsotracethe

changing extent andconfigurationoftheterritoriesruled by the English crownwithin a European context

that was not a static bloc ofinterlockingnation-states,butan unpredictable arena inwhich frontiers ebbed andflowed with the shiftingcurrents of warfare anddiplomacy. That context liesbehind one consistentinconsistency within thesepages: I have used differentlinguisticformstodistinguishbetween contemporaries whosharedthesamename.Ihavechosen not to disturb the

familiar identification of themain protagonists by theiranglicised names, but I hopenevertheless that suchdifferentiationmightnotonlyhave the convenience ofclarity,butalsogiveaflavourof the multilingual world inwhichtheylived.All quotations from

primary sources are given inmodernised form; I haveoccasionally made my ownminor adjustments to

translationsfromnon-Englishtexts. I have chosen not topunctuate the narrative withfootnote references, butdetails of the principalprimary and secondarysources used and quoted inthe text, along withsuggestions for furtherreading, appear at the end ofthebook.

*I owe many debts of thanksincurredinthewritingofthis

book – first among them, tomyagent,PatrickWalsh,andmy editors, Walter Donohueat Faber andTerryKarten atHarperCollins in theUS.Fortheir unfailing support andexpert guidance, and forWalter’s ever perceptiveadvice at critical moments, Iammorethangrateful.Thankyou too to Kate Ward atFaber,whohasdoneasuperbjob of seeing the book (andme) through the production

process. Three institutionsprovided a frameworkwithinwhich thebook tookshape: Iam very lucky to countSidney Sussex College,Cambridge, as my academichome; Ashmount PrimarySchool is a community ofwhichIfeelprivilegedtobeapart, for a fewyears at least;andHornseyLibrary (and itscafe)offeredarefugewithoutwhich I might never havefinishedwriting.Ihopeitwill

be evident howmuch I havelearned from other historiansworkinginthefield,manyofthem friends and colleagues,and among themall I shouldmention particularly JohnWatts, who found time toread a large section of thebook to invaluable effect. Ihope too thatmy friends andfamilyknowhowmuch theirgenerosity, support andinspiration have meant:heartfelt thanks to all, and

especially toBarbara Placidoand Thalia Walters, the bestof neighbours past andpresent. I owe more than Ican say to Jo Marsh, KatieBrownandArabellaWeirfortheirunstintingfriendshipandtheir strength and wisdomwhen I needed it most. Myparents, Gwyneth andGrahame, and my sisterHarriethavereadeverywordof what follows with aninsightandattention todetail

ofwhichIwouldbeinaweifI weren’t so busy thankingthem, for that and so muchelse.Andspecialthanks,withall my love, to my boys,JulianandLucaFerraro.The book is dedicated to

two of the most inspiringhistory teachers I could everhavewishedfor.

BEGINNINGS

6July1553:TheKingis

Dead

The boy in the bed was justfifteenyearsold.Hehadbeenhandsome, perhaps evenrecently; but now his facewas swollen and disfiguredby disease, and by thetreatments his doctors hadprescribed in the attempt toward off its ravages. Theirfailure could no longer bemistaken. The hollow greyeyes were ringed with red,and the livid skin, oncefashionably translucent, was

blotched with sores. Theharrowing, bloody cough,which for months had beenexhaustingly relentless,suddenly seemed morefrightening still by itsabsence: each shallow breathnow exacted a perceptiblephysical cost. The fewremaining wisps of fair hairclinging to theexposed scalpwere damp with sweat, andthe distended fingersconvulsively clutching the

fine linen sheets werenailless, gangrenous stumps.Edward VI, by the grace ofGodKingofEngland,Franceand Ireland, Defender of theFaith, and Supreme Head ofthe Church of England, wasdying.Hewas the youngest child

of Henry VIII, thatmonstrously charismatic kingwhoseobsessivequest foranheir had transformed thespiritual and political

landscapeofhiskingdom.Ofthe boy’s ten older siblings,seven had died in the wombor as newborn infants. Onebrother, a bastard namedHenryFitzroy–createddukeof Richmond and Somerset,earl of Nottingham, lordadmiralofEngland,andheadoftheCounciloftheNorthatthe age of six by his dotingfather – reached hisseventeenth birthday beforesuccumbing to a pulmonary

infection in the year beforeEdward’s birth. His twosurviving half-sisters, pale,pious Mary and black-eyed,sharp-witted Elizabeth, hadeachbeenwelcomed into theworld with feasts, bells andbonfires as the heir to theTudor throne; but they weredeclared illegitimate – Maryat seventeen, Elizabeth as atwo-year-old toddler – whenHenry repudiated each oftheirmothersinturn.

WhenEdwardwasborn intheearlyhoursof12October1537, therefore, he was notsimply the king’s only son,but the only one of Henry’schildren whose legitimacywas undisputed. ‘England’sTreasure’, the panegyristscalled him, and Henrylavished every care on thesafekeeping of his ‘mostpreciousjewel’.Bytheageofeighteen months, the princehad his own household

complete with chamberlain,vice-chamberlain, stewardand cofferer, as well as agoverness, nurse and four‘rockers’ of the royal cradle,all sworn to maintain ameticulousregimeofhygieneand security around theiryoung charge. If the kingcould do nothing to alter thefact that Edward wasmotherless – Jane Seymour,Henry’s third queen, had satin state at her son’s torch-lit

christening three days afterhisbirth,butdied less thanafortnight later – he dideventuallyprovidehimwithastepmother whoseintelligence and kindnesstouchedadeepchordwiththeboy. Katherine Parr, theking’s sixth wife, was aclever,vivaciousandhumanewoman who befriended allthree of the royal children.She was already close toPrincessMary,whomshehad

previously served as a lady-in-waiting; and to nine-year-old Elizabeth and five-year-old Edward she brought amaternal warmth they hadnever before known,encouraging their intellectualdevelopment and enfoldingthem within a passablefacsimileoffunctionalfamilylife. ‘Mater carissima’,Edward called her, ‘mydearest mother’, who held‘thechiefplaceinmyheart’.

But Henry died, adecaying, bloated hulk, inJanuary 1547. Nor couldEdward,kingatnine,dependon the continuing support ofhis beloved stepmother. Thebond of trust between themwasbrokenonlyfourmonthsafter his father’s death byKatherine’s impetuousremarriage to his maternaluncle, the dashing ThomasSeymour.Shediedlittlemorethan a year later after giving

birth to her only child, ashort-lived daughter namedMary. The young king nowfoundhis family fragmentingaround him. ThomasSeymour, reckless andrestlessly ambitious, wasbrought down by his ownextravagant plotting sixmonths after the loss of hiswife. He was convicted oftreason and executed inMarch 1549 on the authorityoftheprotectorateregimeled

by his brother, the duke ofSomerset. Just seven monthslater, Somerset himself fellfrom power, and wasbeheaded on Tower Hill inJanuary1552.Edwardhadlosthisfather,

stepmotherandtwounclesinthe space of five years. Hestill had his half-sisters, buthis dealings werestraightforward with neitherof them. He and Mary,twenty-one years his senior,

were touchingly fond of oneanother; but they wereirrevocably estranged as aresult of the religiousupheavals precipitated bytheir father’s convolutedmatrimonialhistory. In1527,Henry had been implacablydetermined to annul hismarriage to his first wife,Mary’s mother, Katherine ofAragon.Butthepope–atthatmomentbarricadedwithintheCastel Sant’Angelo while

Rome was sacked by theforcesofKatherine’snephew,the Holy Roman EmperorCharles V – had been in noposition to grant Henry thedivorce he so urgentlydesired. And if papalauthority would not sanctionthe dictates of Henry’sconscience, then papalauthority, Henry believed,couldnolongerbesanctionedby God. Convinced that theblessingofasonandheirhad

been denied him because hisunion with Katherine wastainted by her previousmarriagetohisbrotherArthur–andintentonbegettingsucha blessing on the bewitchingformofAnneBoleyn–Henrybroke with Rome, anddeclared himself SupremeHead of the Church ofEngland.For the king, this was a

matter of jurisdiction, notdoctrine. In terms of the

fundamental tenets of hisfaith, Henry remained aCatholictotheendofhislife.But, with the ideas ofProtestant reformers gainingcurrency across Europe, itprovedimpossibletoholdtheline that the new EnglishChurchwassimplyaformoforthodoxCatholicismwithoutthepope.FewofhissubjectswhosharedHenry’sdoctrinalconservatismfounditaseasyas their king to discard the

spiritualpowerofthe‘bishopof Rome’. Meanwhile, themost fervent support for theroyal supremacy came fromthose who wished for moresweepingreligiouschange.Thus it was that Edward’s

education was entrusted toProtestant sympathisers.Henry, of course, expectedthem to subscribe exactly tohis own idiosyncratic brandof portmanteau theology, buttheir influenceonaboywho

later described the pope as‘the true son of the devil, abad man, an Antichrist andabominable tyrant’ wasunmistakable. Mary, on theotherhand,hadbeenbroughtupagenerationearlier,whenherfatherwasstillengagedindefending the faith of Romeagainst the challenge of theapostate Luther. The newreligion espoused by herbrother could be nothing butanathema to her, when

vindication of her mother’shonour and of her ownlegitimacy was inextricablybound up with adherence topapal authority. From 1550,their mutual intransigenceembroiled them in a bitterwrangle over Mary’sinsistence on celebratingmass in her household, inopen defiance of theproscriptions of Edward’sProtestantgovernment.Between Edward and

Elizabeth, there was no suchspiritual breach. Elizabethwasthelivingembodimentofthe Henrician Reformation –thebabyborntoAnneBoleynafterHenryhadusedhisnewpowers as Supreme Head ofhisownChurchtosecurethedivorce which the pope hadrefused him. Just asattachment to Rome was anindissoluble part of Mary’sheritage,soseparationfromitwasofElizabeth’s.And, like

Edward, she had beenexposedtothe‘newlearning’both inherhumanist-inspirededucation and through theevangelical influences inKatherine Parr’s livelyhousehold.ConformingtotheProtestant reformationinstituted by Edward’sministers therefore presentedElizabeth with no crisis ofconscience. The teenageprincess adopted the plain,unadorned dress commended

by the reformers with suchausterity that Edward calledher ‘my sweet sisterTemperance’. (More cynicalobservers noted not only thepolitical expediency of thisostentatious godliness, butalsohowwellthesimplestylesuited her youth and strikinglooks – a conspicuouscontrast to the unflatteringeffectof theheavily jewelledcostumes favoured by thirty-five-year-oldMary).

But Elizabeth’s subtleintelligencewasofadifferentstamp from the deeply felt,dogmaticpietyofherbrotherand sister, albeit that thistemperamental resemblancebetween Edward and Maryleft them stranded onopposite sides of anunbridgeablereligiousdivide.Elizabeth was cautious,pragmatic and watchful,acutely aware of thethreatening instability of a

worldinwhichherfatherhadorderedthejudicialmurderofher mother before her thirdbirthday.Shehadnomemoryofatimewhenherownstatusand security had not been atbest contingent, and atworstexplicitly precarious. As aresult, she conducted herpolitical relationships andreligious devotions withdiplomatic flexibility, ratherthantheemotionalabsolutismof her siblings. (‘This day’,

she said when told of theexecution of ThomasSeymour, ‘died a man withmuch wit and very littlejudgement’ – a shrewd andstartlingly opaque responsefrom a fifteen-year-old girlwhohadnotbeenimmunetoSeymour’s charms, and hadonly narrowly avoided fatalentanglementinhisgrandioseschemes.)Despite their ostensible

religious compatibility, then,

Edward and Elizabeth werenot close. They had beenbrought together in January1547 to be told of theirfather’s death – and clung toone another, sobbing at thenews – but saw each otheronly rarely in the years thatfollowed. Still, if the youngkinglackedtheemotionalandpoliticalsupportofimmediaterelativesathiscourt,ithardlymattered, given that Edwardwould one day surely marry

and father a family of hisown. He had been formallybetrothed in 1543, at the ageof five, to his seven-month-old cousin Mary Stuart, theinfantqueenofScotland.ButtheScotswereunhappyaboutthe implications of thismatrimonial deal – whichthreatenedtosubjectScotlandtoEnglishrule–forthesamereason that the English werekeen to pursue it.Unsurprisingly, the Scots

resisted subsequent attemptsto enforce the treaty throughthe ‘rough wooing’ of anEnglisharmylayingwaste tothe Scottish lowlands, and in1548Marywasinsteadtakento Paris to renew the ‘AuldAlliance’ between Scotlandand France by marrying thefour-year-olddauphin,heirtotheFrenchthrone.A French bride – the

dauphin’s sister Elisabeth –was later proposed for

Edward himself; but in themeantimehefoundfriendshipwithin his household, in theboys who shared hiseducation. His closestcompanions were HenrySidney, whose father wassteward of Edward’shousehold; Sidney’s cousinsHenry Brandon, the youngduke of Suffolk, and hisbrotherCharles;andBarnabyFitzpatrick,sonandheirofanimpoverished Irish lord. In

1551 Fitzpatrick was sent toFrance to complete histraining as a courtier and asoldier, but Edwardmaintained an affectionatecorrespondence with his‘dearest and most lovingfriend’ – even if Barnabyfailedtocomplywithsomeofthe king’s more serious-minded requests; ‘… to theintentwewouldseehowyouprofit in theFrench,’Edwardwroteearnestly,‘wewouldbe

glad to receive some lettersfrom you in the Frenchtongue, and we would writetoyouagaintherein’.The young king and his

friends were taught by someof the finest humanistscholars in England. Edwardmastered Latin before hereached his tenth birthday.Not only could he converseeloquently in the languageand compose formal Latinprose, but he read and

memorised volumes ofclassical and scriptural texts.Intheyearsthatfollowed,heacquiredafluentcommandofGreek and French, and atleast a smattering of ItalianandSpanish,throughtrainingwhichwasnotonlylinguisticbut rhetorical, philosophicaland theological. His readingof Cicero, Plato, Aristotle,Plutarch, Herodotus andThucydides provided theintellectual basis for his

weeklyoratio,anessayintheform of a declamation,written alternately in Greekand Latin, which he wasrequiredtodeliverinfrontofhis tutors each Sunday. Hestudied mathematics andastronomy, cartography andnavigation, politics andmilitary strategy, and music,learning to play both thevirginalsandthelute.His ‘towardness in

learning’couldnotbedenied,

but his attempts to emulatetheeasyathleticismforwhichhis ebullient father had beenadmiredwerelesssuccessful.As a youngman, Henry haddistinguished himself as anexpert in the saddle and onthe tournament field.He hadbeen tall andwellmade, likehis maternal grandfather,Edward IV: both stood oversix feet, and were famedacross Europe for theirphysical prowess and

striking beauty (at leastbeforetheappetiteforexcesswhich they also sharedtransformed both their looksandtheirhealth).EdwardVI,on the other hand, hadinherited his mother’s slightbuildalongwithher fairhairand grey eyes, with atendency, by some reports,for his left shoulder to standhigherthanhisright.Herodewell, and hunted regularly,but the surviving records of

his first attempts in thetiltyard,where his father hadso excelled, suggest that itwasnotanarenainwhichheimmediately felt at home. Inthe spring of 1551, Edwardledagroupoffriendsdressedin team colours of black silkand white taffeta, againstchallengers in yellow led bytheyoungearlofHertford,inasportingcompetitionto‘runatthering’–thatis,totiltatametalcirclethangingfroma

post, victory going towhichever rider succeeded incarryingitoffonthepointofhis lance. ‘The yellow bandtookit twicein120courses,’thekingnoteddisconsolately,‘andmy band touched often,which was counted asnothing, and took never,which seemed very strange,and so the prize was of mysidelost.’But, unlikely though it

seemed that he would rival

hisfather’schivalricexploits,this slender, solemn boywasnot noticeably frail. In hisearlychildhood,policyratherthan medical scrutiny haddictated the reports ofEdward’s health relayed byforeign ambassadors at hisfather’scourt.WhenaFrenchmarriage alliance was underconsideration, François I’senvoy told his royal masterthat four-year-old Edwardwas ‘handsome, strong, and

marvellouslybigforhisage’.When the negotiations brokedown, he observed that theprince had ‘a naturalweakness’ and wouldprobably die young. In truth,Edward had suffered onlytwoseriousillnesses:malaria,contracted atHamptonCourtPalace just after his fourthbirthday in the autumn of1541, from which herecovered completely in amatter of weeks, and an

attackofwhatwasdiagnosedas measles and smallpox atthe beginning of April 1552.Again, his recovery wasrapid. By 23 April he wasstrongenoughtoshouldertheheavyceremonialrobesoftheOrder of the Garter on StGeorge’sDayatWestminsterAbbey,andon2MayEdwardwrote to his closest friend,Barnaby Fitzpatrick, toapologise for the break intheir correspondence.Hehad

been‘alittletroubledwiththesmallpox’, he said, ‘… butnow we have shaken thatquiteaway’.He knew how lucky he

was. A year earlier, he hadriddeninfullarmourthroughthe streets of London todispel rumours that he hadfallen victim to the epidemicof sweating sickness whichhad taken hold of southernEngland. But this defiantroyal display could not

protect his friends from thevirulent disease. Themysterious ‘English Sweat’hadarrivedonEnglishshoresatthesametimeastheTudordynasty only a little morethan half a century earlier,perhaps brought across theChannel by the Frenchmercenaries who fought forEdward’s grandfather, thefuture Henry VII, atBosworth Field. It was nowendemic – the outbreak of

1551wasthefifthsince1485– and deadly. That summer,the terrifying symptoms –fever, dizziness, intenseheadaches,rashes,paininthelimbs and a drenching sweat– appeared in Cambridge,where Henry and CharlesBrandon, thedukeofSuffolkandhisbrother,hadbeensenttostudyatStJohn’sCollege.Theyleftthetownassoonastheycould,butitwasalreadytoo late.HenryBrandondied

on 14 July.Charles inheritedhis brother’s title on hissickbed; he was duke ofSuffolk for half an hourbefore he too perished. Theywere sixteen and fourteenyearsold.Edward was already well

aware of life’s fragility, andhe had his uncompromisingfaith to sustain him in hisgrief.Nonetheless, thedeathsoftheBrandonbrotherscastapall over the court that

summer, despite the lavishreception laid on for threenoble emissaries sent by theFrench king, Henri II, toinvest Edward with thechivalricOrder ofStMichel.The visit went well enough,butseveralonlookers,Frenchand English, includingEdward’sprincipaltutorJohnCheke, expressed concernabout the unremittingdemands placed on thethirteen-year-old king by this

elaborate diplomaticchoreography, on top of theregular pressures imposed byhis schooling and the dailymeetings of his PrivyCouncil.Edward’s illness the

following spring intensifiedthose worries, but he wasrobustenoughbythesummerof1552toundertakeastatelyprogress through Sussex,Hampshire, Wiltshire andDorset,bestowingonsomeof

his wealthiest subjects thecostly honour of entertainingtheir king and hisforbiddingly large entouragefor days at a time.Throughout the trip, Edwardsent regular bulletins toBarnabyFitzpatrick,whowasnow serving with Henri II’sarmyatNancy.‘Whereasyouhave all been occupied inkilling of your enemies,’ hetold his friend, ‘in longmarchings, in pained

journeys, in extreme heat, insore skirmishings and diversassaults, we have beenoccupied in killing of wildbeasts, in pleasant journeys,in good fare, in viewing offaircountries,andhaverathersoughthowtofortifyourownthan to spoil anotherman’s.’It was apparent – howevermuchEdwardhimselfrefusedto admit it – that even thesedelightful diversions couldnow tax his stamina. But

there still seemed no causefor serious concern about hiswellbeing by Christmas,when the court threw itselfinto extravagant festivitiesunder the direction of the‘Lord of Misrule’, agentleman of the royalhousehold temporarilytransformed into the anarchicringleader of the season’sentertainments.By Easter 1553, however,

thecourtpageants–andwith

them the king’s health – hadtaken a more ominous turn.At thepalaceofWestminsterthat April, theMaster of theRevels presented a cavalcadeof Greek Worthies wearingheadpieces ‘moulded likelions’ heads, the mouthdevouring the man’s headhelmetwise’, attended bytorch-bearing satyrs, eachequipped with a pair of‘oxen’s legs and counterfeitfeet’.Butafterthemusicand

thetumbling,tothemenacingbeatofasingledrum,camea‘Masque of Death’, amacabre parade of ghastlyfigures, each one ‘doublevisaged, the one side like amanandtheotherlikedeath’,bearing shields adorned withthe heads of dead animals.And by then, as the playerscapered, the horrifyingpossibilitywasemerging thatEdwardmight bewatching atableauofhisownfate.

His physicians did notknow it, but an attack ofmeasles,suchastheonefromwhichthekinghadrecovereda year earlier, serves tosuppress the victim’sresistance to tuberculosis.And at the beginning ofFebruary 1553 – just twomonthsbeforetheMasqueofDeath stalked throughWestminster’s great hall –Edward had fallen ill with afeverish, chesty cold which

he could not shake off. Sixweeks later he was stillconfined to his chambers,Charles V’s ambassadorJehan Scheyfve reported tothe emperor in encryptedFrench, ‘and it appears thathe is very weak and thin,besideswhich I learn from agood source that his doctors…areof theopinionthat theslightest change might placehis life in great danger’. InApril,Edward ralliedenough

to be allowedbrief, carefullysupervised outings in thespring sunshine in thegardens at Westminster, andafter the Easter festivities hewas parcelled up in velvetand furs to be transporteddown the Thames by river-barge to his favourite palaceatGreenwich, the great gunsof the Tower of Londonboominginsaluteastheroyalflotillapassedby.Afortnightlater, however, Ambassador

Scheyfve noted that the kinghad ventured outside onlyoncesincehisarrivalthere.A‘trustworthy source’ had letslipthatEdwardwaswastingaway, and that his rackingcough was now bringing upblood and alarminglydiscolouredsputum.In public, the king’s

councillorsloudlymaintainedthe fiction that his recoverywas imminent. John Dudley,duke ofNorthumberland, the

ruthless politician who hadsupplanted Edward’s uncle,Protector Somerset, as hischief minister in 1549,announced firmly on 7 Maythat ‘our sovereign lord doesbegin very joyfully toincrease and amend’. ButScheyfvewas in no doubt ofthe iron fist that lay beneaththe surface of these velvetassurances.Theroyaldoctorswhoseunhappyresponsibilityit was to preside over the

king’s slow decline hadrequested the benefit of afresh medical opinion, andreinforcements to their rankshad been recruited; but allthose who treated Edwardwere ‘strictly and expresslyforbidden, under pain ofdeath, to mention to anyoneprivatedetailsconcerning theking’s illness or condition’,the ambassador reported.Meanwhile, gossip on thestreetsofthecapitalabouthis

failing health wasdiscouraged more forcibly:three Londoners who hadbeenoverheardtosaythatthekingwasdyinghadtheirearscutoffinpunishment.Edward himself was also

pressed into service in theattempt to stem the flood ofrumour and counter-rumour.He was now too weak toshowhimself intheopenair,oreven to standunaided,buton20Mayhewasheldupat

a window of GreenwichPalacetowatchasthreegreatshipssetoutfromtheThameson a voyage of explorationmasterminded by theVenetian cartographerSebastian Cabot. CaptainedbySirHughWilloughbyandpiloted by the talentednavigatorRichardChancellor,the Bona Esperanza, BonaConfidentia and EdwardBonaventurehadbeenfundedby a joint-stock company of

merchants and courtiers tosearch for a passage throughthe north-eastern seas to thetraderoutesofChina.Itwasaglorious sight– the tall shipsandtheircrewsdeckedoutinpale blue as they took theirleave, while the cannonthundered and the crowdscheered.Proppeduppainfullybehind Greenwich’s ornateglass,Edwardcouldnotknowthat two of the three vesselssetting off with such hope

would never see Englandagain. The small fleet wasseparated by a storm off theNorwegian coast little morethan two months later.Richard Chancellor, at thehelm of the EdwardBonaventure,reachedtheportof St Nicholas on theWhiteSeaandpressedonbysledtoMoscow,wherehisoverturestotheTsar,IvantheTerrible,established English tradingprivilegessosuccessfullythat

the China Company becamethe Muscovy Companyimmediately on his return.But Hugh Willoughby – adistinguishedsoldierwhohadbegged for this commanddespite his inexperience atsea – was not so fortunate.Lacking Chancellor’s expertguidance, the BonaEsperanza and BonaConfidentia meandered upand down the Russian coast,hopelessly lost, until in

September they droppedanchorinarcticwatersofftheuninhabitedshoreofLapland.The ice-bound ships,containing the frozen bodiesof Willoughby and his men,were found by Russianfishermen the followingsummer.Edward, whose black-and-

gold desk was often heapedwithmaps and atlases besidehis brass quadrant andastrolabe,hadbeenexcitedby

Cabot’s ambitious plans; andthe duke ofNorthumberland,at the head of the youngking’s government, was aformer lord admiral ofEngland who had beeninstrumental in bringingCabotfromhisSpanishhometoLondonandassemblingthewealthy syndicate to backWilloughby’smission.ButinMay1553, as the three shipsdisappeared into the haze ofthe horizon, Northumberland

had no time to savour thefruits of his labours. Despitethe belligerent optimism ofthe duke’s publicpronouncements, it wasobvious that Edward wouldnot survive to see the returnoftheshipthatborehisname.Hewasnot seenagainat thepalace windows. Barely ableto leavehisbed,hewasnowrunning a constant fever. Hecoughed incessantly, and hisface and legsbegan to swell.

The noxious treatmentsadministered by his anxiousdoctors became ever moreoppressive: his head wasshaved to permit theapplicationofpoulticestohisscalp, and the stimulantsprescribed as ‘restoratives’lefthimunabletorestwithoutheavy draughts of opiates.Whispered conversations inthe corridors at GreenwichandatWestminsternolongerdebated whether the king

would die, but when.Everythingnowdependedonwho would succeed him –and that was a matter ofterrifyinguncertainty.Henry VIII had moved

heaven and earth – almostliterally, given theconvulsions he hadprecipitated in his subjects’spiritual lives – in his effortto secure a male heir. In theend,allhishopeshadcometorest on the narrow shoulders

of one boy, who had provedtoo fragile to sustain them.And, extraordinarily, therewas no one left to claim thetitle of king of England. Forthe first time in thekingdom’s history, all thecontendersforthecrownthatEdward was about torelinquishwerefemale.Thisunprecedentedlackof

a king-in-waitingwas in partthe result of Tudor paranoiaabout the dilute solution of

royalbloodthatflowedintheTudorlineitself.True,HenryVII, the firstTudormonarch,could trace his descent fromEdward III, the mightywarrior-king who had ruledEngland in the fourteenthcentury.But thatdescenthadcome via the Beauforts,illegitimate offspring ofEdward III’s son John ofGaunt–abastardfamilywhohad later been legitimised byact of parliament but

explicitly excluded from theroyalsuccession.HenryVII’sacquisition of the crown onthebattlefieldatBosworth in1485thereforehadeverythingto do with the unpredictableeffects of civil war, andnothingtodowithbirthright.Henry VIII’s dynastic

claims were less tenuous,thanks to his mother,Elizabeth ofYork, the eldestdaughter of Edward IV andsisterofthemurderedprinces

in the Tower. But neither ofthe two Henrys would everadmit that her role had beenmore than that of a fittingconsort for the ‘rightful’Tudor monarch. Meanwhile,both kings had engaged in acull of the survivingrepresentatives of thePlantagenetbloodline.FewofElizabeth of York’sremaining royal cousins diedin their beds; some were cutdown on the battlefield,

othersontheblock.ViolencehadbroughttheTudorstothethrone,andviolencenowleftthem unchallenged inpossessionofit.Butthisnewdynastywasa

young sapling compared tothe Plantagenet family tree,andhadproducedfewboystofill its branches. Henry VIIhad been an only child, bornto a thirteen-year-old motherwho never conceived again.He fathered eight children:

onlyfoursurvivedinfancy,ofwhomtheeldest,Arthur,diedat fifteen, leaving oneyounger brother, the futureHenry VIII, and two sisters,Margaret and Mary. Both ofthese Tudor princesses madeglittering but short-liveddiplomaticmatches,Margaretto the king of Scotland andMary to the king of France.Both then married again inwidowhood, Margaret toArchibald Douglas, earl of

Angus, a powerful Scottishlord, and Mary – inheadstronghaste,onlyweeksafter the death of her firsthusband – to CharlesBrandon,dukeofSuffolk,thehandsome best friend of herbrother,KingHenry.By 1553 Henry VIII and

his sisters, Margaret andMary,weredead.AsHenry’ssonEdwardhoveredbetweenfervent prayer and feverishdelirium, all eyes turned to

his siblings and cousins, thepossible contenders for histhrone. The prospects werenot reassuring. There wereEdward’s two half-sisters,Mary and Elizabeth, both ofwhom had been declaredillegitimatemore than fifteenyearsearlier.TherewasMaryStuart,theten-year-oldqueenof Scots, granddaughter ofMargaret Tudor by her first,royalmarriage,whowasnowlivinginParisastheintended

wifeoftheheirtotheFrenchthrone. Margaret’s secondmarriage – a violentlytempestuous relationship thatended in divorce – had lefther with a single daughter,Margaret Douglas, whoselegitimacy had also beenbrought into question by herparents’ separation. Therewas Frances, sole survivingchild of the love-matchbetweenMaryTudorandhersecond husband Charles

Brandon; and Frances in herturn was now the mother ofthree girls, Jane, Katherineand Mary Grey. Frances’syounger sister EleanorBrandonhaddiedsomeyearsearlier,but she toohad leftadaughter, Margaret Clifford.In these nine women – theoldest nearly forty, theyoungest not yet ten – werevestedtheremaininghopesoftheTudorline.Extraordinary though it

mightseem,theirsexwastheexplicit focus of littlediscussion in the fraughtcircumstances of May 1553.It was, after all, what theyhad in common. Whatmattered now was whatseparated them: the issues ofprinciple – questions of birthand faith – and the urgentpolitical calculations thatwould identify the nextmonarch from among theirnumber.HenryVIIIhadbeen

in no doubt of the decisivefactor in determining thesuccession, should the worstever happen to his only son:his own blood, he haddeclared, should prevail. Therights of his eldest child,Mary, and then his seconddaughter,Elizabeth,toinheritthe crown after their brotherwere upheld in the Act ofSuccession of 1544 andconfirmed in their father’slast will, despite Henry’s

unwavering insistence, inother contexts, on theirillegitimacy. It was a tributeto Henry’s overwhelmingpersonal authority that thetacit contradiction betweenhis daughters’ bastardy(whichhadbeenenshrinedinstatute law in the1530s) andtheirstandingashisheirswasnotchallengedinhislifetime.By1553,however, theold

king had been dead for sixyears, and even his fearsome

spirit could not compelobedience from beyond thegrave. So much so that theimpetus to set aside theclaimsofhisbloodlinesprangfrom the contentious processby which an equallyfundamental embodiment ofhisrule–theHenricianChurchofEngland–hadalsobeen abandoned. Since hisdeath in1547, the successiveregimes led by the dukes ofSomerset and

Northumberland haddismantled the doctrinalconservatism of Henry’sreligious settlement in favourof the evangelicalProtestantism in which theiryoung king believed soardently. For centuries,English church buildings hadbeen infused with the sights,sounds and smells of theCatholic liturgy, the notes oftheLatinmassechoingonairmade visible by the scented

smoke of candles andincense, while theintercessory presence of thesaints took tangible form notonly in carefully preservedfragments of flesh and bone,butinrichlycolouredimagespaintedonplasterandworkedin glass, stone, wood andalabaster. Now, in only twoyears, parish churches hadbeen transformed. By 1549,walls had beenwhitewashed,statues smashed and shrines

dismantled.Plainwindowsletthelightshineinonplacesofworship dedicated to theword – and no longer theimage–ofGod.Processions,pageants and mystery playswere outlawed. Chantrychapels, founded to providemasses and prayers to speedthe passage of sinful soulsthrough Catholic purgatory,were dissolved. Andworshippers in this newstripped-down Edwardian

Church found theLatinmass– the most fundamentalexpression of the Christianfaith for as long as thekingdom of England hadexisted – replaced by thespoken English liturgy ofArchbishop Cranmer’s newBookofCommonPrayer.Resistance to these drastic

innovations took thefrightening form of armedrebellion in Devon andCornwall in the summer of

1549, and helped to bringdown Protector Somerset’sgovernment that autumn.Butthe pace of religious changeonly increased under hissuccessor, the duke ofNorthumberland.Conservative bishops weredeprived of their sees;bonfires of Catholic service-bookswerelit;preciousplateand vestments weresummarilyconfiscated;andin1552 Cranmer produced a

second, radically revised andunequivocally Protestantprayer book. Only monthslater, however, the youngking’s rapidly deterioratinghealth threatened toundo the‘godly reformation’ overwhich he had presided.Should Edward die – apossibility that had to befacedbythespringof1553–the Act of Succession wouldhand the crown to his eldersister Mary, whose devotion

totheoldfaithhadprovedasresolutely immovable asEdward’s allegiance to thenew. It was a prospect thatwas wholly unacceptable toboth the king and his chiefminister: to Edward, becausehecouldnotcountenance theideathathisowndeathmightprecipitate his subjects backinto papist darkness; toNorthumberland, because hisProtestant convictions wereunderpinned by the political

certainty that his owncareer,and perhaps his life, wouldnot long survive Mary’saccession.Edward was only fifteen,

buthewasaTudorkingwhobelieved in his authority tocommand the future just asmuch as his father had done.Despite the troublesometechnicality that, as a minor,he could not make a legallybindingwill – and that, evenif he could have done so, a

privatedocumentwouldhaveno power to overturn an actof parliament – Edwardcarefully composed what hecalled ‘my device for thesuccession’. Drafting andredraftinginhisownhand,hemethodically set aboutexcludinghisCatholicsister’sright to his throne. Religionwas the essence of the issue,but – disquieteningly forEdward – Mary’s faithofferednoformaljustification

for prohibiting herinheritance. The question ofher legitimacy, however,proved to be more fertileground. Their father’sinsistence that Mary was abastard,evenashenominatedherasherbrother’sheir,gaveEdwardamplescopetoargue(as letters patent drafted byhis legaladvisers laterput it)thatshewas‘clearlydisabledtoask,claim,orchallengethesaidimperialcrown’.Itwasa

tacticwhichwouldalsostrikea collateral target. If Marywasillegitimate, thenso, too,was his younger sisterElizabeth, a committedbeliever in the reformedreligion.Butthat,clearly,wasan outcome Edward wasprepared to accept, whetherbecausehewasconvincedofhis sisters’ bastardy, orbecause he knew thatElizabeth’sProtestantismwasmore politic and less full-

heartedthanhisown.The decision to set aside

Mary and Elizabeth solvedoneproblem–theintolerablepossibility that Catholicismmightberestored–butraisedanother:towhom,then,couldEdwardentrusthiscrownandhis legacy? The Act ofSuccession had alreadydiscountedthedescendantsofHenry VIII’s elder sisterMargaret,andEdwardhadnomorereasonthanhisfatherto

restore them. Margaret’sgranddaughterandheir,MaryStuart,wasastaunchCatholicwho, as queen of Scotlandand dauphine of France,personified the traditionalalliance between England’stwo most enduring enemies.Her proximity to the Englishthrone had been a powerfulelement of her appeal as aprospective daughter-in-lawto the French king, Henri II;but the threat of England

being subsumed into a newFranco-British empire ruledfrom Paris was sufficientlyalarming to undermine anychancethatshemightbeseenas a viable claimant inLondon.The lone remaining

contenders, therefore, werethe heirs of King Henry’syoungersister,Mary,andhersecond husband, CharlesBrandon, duke of Suffolk.Edward, of course, knew the

Brandon family well. Hischildhood friends Henry andCharles Brandon,whose losshehadfeltsodeeplyin1552,were not his blood relatives,but sons of the duke’sremarriagetoafourteen-year-old heiress just threemonthsafter Mary Tudor’s death.However, Tudor bloodflowedintheveinsofMary’sdaughter Frances Brandon,whose husband,HenryGrey,thenewdukeofSuffolkafter

thedeathsofhiswife’syounghalf-brothers, was a memberofEdward’sPrivyCouncil.Inthe early spring of 1553, theailingking–‘notdoubtinginthe grace and goodness ofGod but to be shortly by hismightypowerrestored toourformerhealthandstrength’–still saw the claims to thethrone of Frances Brandonand her three daughters as asafety net rather than animminent political reality.

Thefirstdraftofhis ‘device’accordingly nominated as hissuccessorsany future sons towhomFrancesmightyetgivebirth, to be followed by themale heirs of her (as yetunmarried) daughters, Jane,KatherineandMaryGrey.By May, however, there

could no longer be anyquestionbutthatEdwardwasdying. If the king stilllabouredunder anydelusionsabout his prospects of

recovery, Northumberlandcould not afford to indulgethem, since the twinimperatives of safeguardingthe fledgling EdwardianChurch and securing theduke’s political career werenow matters of criticalurgency.At the beginning ofJune,withNorthumberlandathis bedside, Edward oncemore took up his pen toamend his ‘device’ for thesuccession. Where the

original draft spoke of thecrown descending to theunborn sons of FrancesBrandon’s eldest daughter –‘theLadyJane’sheirsmale’–the king now altered the textto read ‘the Lady Jane andher heirs male’. With theaddition of two smallwords,JaneGreybecamethechosenheirtoEdward’scrown.It seemed the perfect

solution. Jane was fifteenyears old, an exceptional

scholar and a fiercely devoutadherent of the sameevangelical faith as Edwardhimself. She had also, on 21May, becomeNorthumberland’s daughter-in-law,when shemarriedhisteenage son, GuildfordDudley, in a magnificentceremony at the duke’sLondon home. But Jane wasan unwilling bride, forcedinto unhappy compliance outof duty to her ambitious

parents, and it was far fromclear whether her regalresponsibilitieswould be anymore welcome than hermarital ones, either to Janeherself, or to the realm shenow stood to inherit.Certainly, Edward’s sisterMary, who had beendispossessed of so much inher thirty-seven years,wouldnotstandquietlybywhileherrights as ‘princess ofEngland’werepassedoverin

favour of a slip of a girlrepresenting a Church Maryhated.Assooftenbefore,sheand her brother were evenlymatched in the intensity oftheir convictions, Mary’sdetermination to lead herpeople back to the true faithofRomeeveryinchtheequalof Edward’s resolve to savethem from it. And in thatcampaignshewouldhopeforthesupportofhercousin,theHoly Roman Emperor

Charles V – whoseambassador Jehan Scheyfvecontinued to despatchominous reports of Edward’sphysical decline – aswell asthe backing of an as yetunknown number of herprospectivesubjects.Asaresult,June1553was

amonthofmounting tensionand barely suppressed fear.The princesses Mary andElizabeth, who had beenprevented from seeing their

brother since theearly stagesof his illness,were nowkeptin ignorance of the progressof the disease, beyond whatthey could glean of thespeculation spreading fromthe capital to their homestwenty miles north, atHunsdon and Hatfield. Theduke of Northumberlandreinforced the garrison at theTowerofLondonandorderedroyal warships into theThames; and the king’s

lawyers and councillorswerecalled in secret to hisbedchambertoputtheirsealsto Edward’s ‘device’ forLady Jane’s succession. TheChief Justice of theCourt ofCommon Pleas, Sir EdwardMontagu, apprehensivelydemurredonthegroundsthatthe scheme was not onlylegally unenforceable butcriminal,eventreasonable,bythe terms of the Act ofSuccession of 1544. But a

combination of the fury of adyingboyandapromisethattheplanwouldimminentlyberatifiedbyparliamentbroughtthe judges to heel. Theirimprimatur persuaded thosecouncillors who stillhesitated, ArchbishopCranmer foremost amongthem, to append theirsignatures to the document.At the beginning of July,Princess Mary was at lastsummoned to the king’s

bedside. Northumberlandplanned to accommodate herinsomesuitablysecureroyallodging–theTower,say–onher arrival in the capital. Itwas hardly surprising thatMary fled in the oppositedirection, taking refugeinstead at her estates inNorfolk, which werereassuringlyclosetothecoastshould escape provenecessary,andsurroundedbyherloyalretainers.

Now,ontheafternoonof6July,thekinglayinthegreatgilded bed, transformed bytheextremityofhissufferinginto a figure of grotesquepathos.Hewasnotalone:hispersonal physician, GeorgeOwen,whohadbeenpresentat his birth fifteen yearsearlier, was in constantattendance, quietly assistedby Christopher Salmon, afavourite among Edward’svalets. His devoted friend

BarnabyFitzpatrickhadbeenunable to return as Edwardhad wanted, detained byfamily responsibilities inIreland. Instead, twogentlemen of the king’schamber–SirThomasWrothand Sir Henry Sidney,Edward’s companion sincechildhood – kept vigil at hisbedside. But he was beyondhelp. The imminentinevitability of his death hadbeen reported to the royal

courts of Europe for weeks,and time and again Edwardhad defied the rumours; butthe stimulating effects of thepowerful drugs his doctorshadadministeredwerefadingas their toxins poisoned analreadyfailingbody.Nowhelay still and silent, eyesclosed in the swollen,darkened face, the disfiguredhands motionless. For amoment it seemed as thoughthe shallow breathing had

stopped; but then Edwardbegan tomurmur to himself,the prayer inaudible but itspurpose clear. Sidney tookhiminhisarms,andheldhimuntilhedied.Outside, a summer storm

raged. Later, it was said thatthe howling darkness thatengulfed London was thewrath of Henry VIII,thundering from the grave atthe thwartingofhiswill.Hisson was dead, and with him

died Henry’s vision of aglorious line of Tudor kings.Amid the chaos andconfusion, one thing alonewascertain:forthefirsttime,awomanwould sit upon thethroneofEngland.

LongLivetheQueen?

‘I cannotwell guide nor rulesoldiers,andalsotheysetnot

by a woman as they shouldset by a man.’ So wroteMargaret Paston, a Norfolkgentlewoman contemplatingthe unhappy necessity ofdefending one of herproperties against a rivalclaimant almost a centurybefore Edward VI’s death.She had her own reasons foremphasising her limitations:recently widowed andexhausted by years in thefront lineof similar disputes,

she wanted to leave hergrown-up sons in no doubtthat they, not she, now boreresponsibility for holding thefamilyfort.Nevertheless,shewas right, and about morethan her own situation. In afewcharacteristicallysuccinctandforthrightwords,shehadidentified the principalpractical constraints onfemale rule in medievalEngland.They were constraints that

were evident in the mosticonic image of poweravailabletoMargaretandhercontemporaries. The greatseal by which royalcommands wereauthenticated was thephysical manifestation of thecrown’s authority, a pictorialrepresentation of England’sruler that was instantlyrecognisable to the vastmajority ofEngland’s peoplewho had neither set eyes on

their monarch nor learned toread the documents fromwhich the redwax hung.Onone side of the seal the kingsat in state to give justice tohispeople,orbandsceptreinhis hands; on the other herodeatoweringwarhorse,hissword unsheathed in defenceofhiskingdom.Butawomancouldnot sit

asajudge,norcouldsheleadan army. Physically, womenwere equipped for the

differentlyhazardousworkofchildbearing, rather than towearandwieldheavysteelonthe battlefield. Culturally,theywerebynature–thatis,as designed by a divinecreator– lesser thanmen.Attheirbest, thesesofter,frailerbeingsmightcomplementthesterner masculine virtues oftheir lords and masters withthe feminine ones of mercy,mildness and maternalnurture.Atworst, theymight

lead men astray with theirinconstancy,theirirrationalityandtheircapacity–aswhorerather than madonna – forsexualsin.Eitherway,itwasin obedience, modesty,assistance, supplementarity,that a woman’s place laywithin the order of God’screation. And, as such, awomanwasnomorecapableofleadershipinpeacethaninwar.That, at least, was the

theory. Experience,depending on individualcapabilities, might be lessabsolute. Margaret Pastonwas intentonpointingout toher sons that they shouldnotdepend on her as captain ofthe family’s defencesprecisely because –resourceful and indomitableas shewas – she had had toplay the role before, sendingtoherhusbandinLondonforcrossbows and poleaxes as

wellasthesugarandalmondsthat usually made up hershopping lists. It was notideal, then, but nor was itunthinkable that a womanmight occupy a position ofcommand or control.Supplementarity, after all,might mean that a wife ormother could be called uponto protect the interests of ahusband or son if they weretemporarily absent orhampered by youth or

infirmity; and femaleassistance might betransmuted into influence orevenguidanceinthehandsofa woman possessed ofparticular intelligence,charismaorwill.Nevertheless, there were

limitstowhatawomancoulddo.Thepowerofamonarch,his authority instituted andsanctioned by God, wasimplicitly and inherentlymale.Inpractice,therewerea

number of ways in whichsuch power might beacquired, but all of themreinforced that most basicidentification. The dynastythat ruled Margaret Paston’sEngland could trace itsdescent back to DukeWilliam of Normandy, awarrior who had madehimself a king on thebattlefield in 1066. TheBayeux Tapestry, telling thestoryofthatmilitaryconquest

in elegantly enigmaticembroidery,depictsjustthreewomenwithin its narrative –oneanamelessvictimofwar,another caught up in a now-unfathomable sexual scandal,and the third, Edith, wife ofEdward the Confessor andsister of Harold Godwinson,anarchetypalfigureoffemalevirtue at the deathbed of herroyal husband. All aremarginal figures in amasculine world, vastly

outnumbered even by thehorsesandshipsoftheduke’sinvasion force, let alone bythe men of his army. AndWilliam’s forcible accessioninterrupted an older traditionwhereby the Anglo-Saxonnobles chose their king fromamong the men of the royalbloodline. This opportunityforthejudiciousweighing-upof personal qualities had theunfortunate habit ofdescending into a bloodbath,

as candidates for the thronesought to demonstrate theirown kingly ruthlessness andeliminate their rivals in onefell swoop – but,whether anAnglo-Saxon monarch waschosen by consensus orviolent competition, therewas no doubt that he wouldbemale.It was only gradually, as

new precedent and newcustom began to beestablished in Norman

England, that primogenitureemerged as the definingprinciple of the royalsuccession. Heredity, ofcourse, risked bestowing theright to rule on daughters aswell as sons.ThedevelopingcommonlawwithinEngland,for example, allowed femaleheirstoinheritland,albeitnoton the same terms as theirmale counterparts: an eldestson would succeed to anestateinitsentirety,whereas,

intheabsenceofamaleheir,daughterswouldeachreceivean equal share. But akingdomcouldnotbedividedin the same way as asmallholding, a manor oreven an earldom; and by thesixteenth century very littlehad been unequivocallyresolvedabout thepossibilityof female succession to theEnglishthrone,otherthantheevident fact of itsundesirability.

In some ways, thecircumstances of 1553appeared to offer moreencouraging signs for theprospects of a femalesovereign than had been thecase even fifty years earlier.Tudor anxiety about theconspicuous vulnerability ofthe fledgling dynasty hadcombined with the personalfrailtiesofthelasttwoTudorkings to diminishexpectations of the monarch

as warrior. Henry VIII hadbeenat first too irreplaceableand then too incapacitated,and Edward VI simply tooyoung, to lead an army intobattle.Instead,thenewmodelof the humanist prince,entering the fray on theintellectual rather than themilitary front line, offered aparadigm of government bybrain rather than brawn fromwhich women were lessobviouslyexcluded.

Ontheotherhand,theveryfact that the tumultuousupheavalsinEnglishlifeovertheprevioustwodecadeshadbeen fundamentallypredicated on Henry VIII’sdesperation for a son hadreinforced the manifestdeficiencies of his rejectedalternative, a female heir, inthe minds of his subjects.And while the claim to thethrone, suchas itwas,of theentire Tudor dynasty had

come through a woman,Henry VII’s mother had stillbeenalive in1485 to seeherson crowned. Why then, ifwomencouldindeedrule,hadWestminster Abbey not rungwith cheers at the coronationofQueenMargaretBeaufort?In fact, the protracted andbloodycivilwarsfromwhichHenry Tudor had sounexpectedly emergedvictorious had gone a longway towardsuggesting thata

combinationofmilitaryforceand plausible fitness forpower was more likely tosecure the crown than strictadherence to the hereditaryprinciple. It seemed possible,therefore, that the lessons ofrecent history might countwomen out of contentionaltogether.Certainly, that was the

conclusion to which EdwardVIhadcomewhenhefirstsatdown to draft his ‘device for

the succession’. The youngkinghadamethodicalaswellas a scholarly mind, and hehadabsorbedwitheveryfibreof his being his father’sconviction that a monarchcould shape his kingdom byroyal fiat in the form ofstatute and ordinance.Government now proceededby the framing of detailedlegislativeregulation,andtheoriginal version of Edward’s‘device’ therefore set out a

logicalplanfortheinstitutionof a new set of rules thatwould provide England witha legitimate, Protestant and,crucially, male monarch tosucceedhim,shouldhefailtohave a son of his own. Hissisters were not legitimate;hisScottishcousinswerenotProtestant; which left hisGreycousinsasthemeansbywhich thecrownwouldpass,after the model of his great-grandmother Margaret

Beaufort, through the femaleline to rest on themale headof oneof their as yet unbornsons.Butlifewastoomessyand

unpredictable to be mouldedeven by the formidable willofaTudorking.Edwardhadnot planned to die at fifteen,and with his last illness hisdesigns for the future of hiskingdom fell apart. Thenomination of Jane Grey ashis successor abandoned

logical principle in favour ofpragmatic improvisation,since Janewas a female heirwhose mother, from whomher claim derived, was stillliving. This, then, was nowholesale acceptance offemale succession but anattempt to preserve the spiritof Edward’s intentionsthrough a lone anomaly – alegitimately born, Protestantwoman who would, byEdward’s explicit

specification, pass on thecrown to her ‘heirs male’.Should his scheme succeed,then, England’s first queenregnantwouldalsobeitslast.Should his father’s willprevail, on the other hand,andhissisterMaryinheritthecrown, then an entirelydifferent precedent would beestablished.In 1553, therefore, the

future of female rule wasabout to be tested, in

principleand inpractice.Butfemale rule in England alsohadapast. In1153–exactlyfour hundred years beforeEdward’sdeath,inaworldasremote from Tudor Englandas the sixteenth century isfromthetwenty-first–acivilwar that had raged for twodecades was brought to anend with the sealing of apeace treaty at Winchester.That civil war had beencaused by the claims of a

womanwhocould–and,hersupportersbelieved, should–have been the first queen toruleEnglandinherownright.Matilda, daughter ofHenry Iand granddaughter of theConqueror,cametantalisinglyclosenotonly toestablishingher right to the throne, butalso to securing anunequivocalholdonpower.She did so in a political

worldwhereboundaries,lawsand precedents were drawn

and redrawn with almostevery generation – partlybecause of the fluidity of anuninstitutionalisedgovernment, and partlybecause newly NormanEngland was not bound bythe example of its Anglo-Saxon past. In one sense,then,thismilitarisedsociety–where monarchs wererequiredtobesoldiers,feudallordsattheheadofapersonalfollowing – offered little

scope for female leadership.But at the same time, therewere few formal, explicitlyarticulated obstacles standingin the way of female rule.And despite contemporaryassumptions about thelimitationsofhersex,Matildatested the presupposition ofmale sovereignty almost todestruction.She did not succeed; nor

did she unequivocally fail.Because her challenge ended

in concession andcompromise, the precedent itset was partial and complex.Women,itseemed,couldnotexpect to exercise royalpower in their own right, butMatilda both transmitted herclaim to her son and playedan influential role in hiscounsels. The lesson of herfailure to secure the throne–and the story of the fourcenturies that elapsed beforethe claims of her female

Tudor descendants – wastherefore notstraightforwardly that of theexclusion of women frompower inEngland. Instead, itappeared that theconventional roles of wifeand mother might, in someunconventionalcircumstances, offeropportunities for governmentto be guided by a femalehand.Between the twelfth and

the fifteenth centuries threemore exceptional women –EleanorofAquitaine,Isabellaof France and Margaret ofAnjou – discovered, asqueens consort and dowager,how much was possible ifpresumptions of male rulewere not confronted soexplicitly. Eleanor governedEngland during the longabsenceofher‘mostbelovedson’, Richard the Lionheart.Isabella challenged her

husband’s misrule,championing the cause oflegitimate government in thename of her young son, thefuture Edward III. Margarettookup the standardof royalauthority in defence of herinfant son and herincapacitatedhusband,HenryVI.Allthreehadthefreedomto act because their powerwas exercised under thelegitimisingmantleofamalemonarchy.

But such freedom hadlimits. Eleanor found herselfable to play the elderstateswoman only after shehad spent fifteen years incustody for her involvementin a rebellion against herhusband, Henry II. Isabella’sfailure to comprehend theresponsibilities of power aswellasitsrewardsresultedinher overthrow not long afterthat of her husband, EdwardII.AndMargaret’sattemptto

shoulder her husband’s deadweight gradually collapsed,alongwithhisgovernment,asit became clear that the willanimating this compositeroyalauthoritywasnotthatofthekinghimself.Freedom to act, in other

words,didnotmeanfreedomfrom censure andcondemnation.Therisk thesequeens ran was that theirpowerwouldbeperceivedasa perversion of ‘good’

womanhood, a distillation ofallthatwasmosttobefearedin the unstable depths offemalenature.Theunease, ifnot outright denunciation,withwhichtheirrulewasmethascoalescedintheimageofthe she-wolf, a feral creaturedriven by instinct rather thanreason, a sexual predatorwhose savagerymatched thatofhermate–orexceeded it,even, in the ferocity withwhich she defended her

young. ‘She-wolf of France,but worse than wolves ofFrance’, ShakespearefamouslydubbedMargaretofAnjou:

How ill-beseeming is it inthysex

To triumphlike anAmazoniantrullUpon their

woes whomFortunecaptivates!

AndtheappellationwaslaterextendedbyThomasGray toher countrywoman, EdwardII’squeenIsabella(‘She-wolfof France, with unrelentingfangs/Thattear’stthebowelsofthymangledmate…’).The visceral force of this

image drew on a

characterisation of femalepower as grotesque andimmoral that had surfacedwith remarkable speed in anumber of vituperativelyexplicit polemics once theprospect of a femalesovereign became animminent reality in 1553.Most resounding of all wasThe First Blast of theTrumpet Against theMonstrous Regiment ofWomen, unleashed from

Geneva in 1558 by theProtestant firebrand JohnKnox. This tract, and othersadopting a similar stance,werecomposedinreactiontothe specific political andreligiousdevelopmentsofthemid-1550s,buttheargumentsthey made had deep rootswithin English politicalculture. Female ‘regiment’ –or regimen, meaning rule orgovernance – was‘monstrous’ – that is,

unnatural and abominable –because women were doublysubordinate to men, once byreasonofEve’screationfromAdam’s rib, and againbecause of her transgressionin precipitating the fall fromEden. And therefore ‘topromote a woman to bearrule,superiority,dominionorempire above any realm,nationorcity is repugnant tonature, contumely to God, athingmost contrarious to his

revealed will and approvedordinance,andfinallyitisthesubversion of good order, ofall equity and justice’, Knoxringingly declared, beforeelaborating several thousandwords of largely circularvariation on that pungenttheme.Bythisargument,then,any

exercise of power by awoman was a manifestationof the female propensity forsin; and the Old Testament

offered a ready identificationoffemaleruleasasexualisedtyranny in the infamousfigure of Jezebel, wife ofKing Ahab, who exploitedher hold over her husbandand their two sons to turnIsrael away from God andsubject its people toimmorality and injustice.‘Such as ruled and werequeenswereforthemostpartwicked, ungodly,superstitious, and given to

idolatry and to all filthyabominations, aswemayseein the histories of QueenJezebel…’ wrote ThomasBecon, a Protestant preacherand homilist, in 1554.Knox,whose favoured rhetoricalmode inclined markedlytoward fire and brimstone,tackled the subject withobvious relish: ‘Jezebel mayforatimesleepquietlyinthebed of her fornication andwhoredom, she may teach

anddeceiveforaseason;butneither shall she preserveherself, neither yet heradulterous children fromgreat affliction, and from thesword of God’s vengeance…’ And Knox’s blastingtrumpetwasdirectednotonlyatwomenwhosought toruleintheirownright,butalsoatthose whose authority, likethat of Jezebel herself,depended on their husbandsandsons.

The example of themedieval queens who hadexercised power in Englandin previous centuries,therefore, was both complexand troubling, even for thosewho had no wish to emulateKnox and his colleagues inthe articulation of polemicalabsolutes. A woman couldnot easily fit the role of amonarch, moulded as it wasfor a man. Nor could a wifeormotherstepforwardtoact

in place of a husband or sonwithout raising questionsabout the nature of her ruleanditsplaceintherightorderof creation.But shedding theshe-wolf’s skin would comeataprice: the ‘goodwoman’who acknowledged her dutyofobedienceandtheprimacyof her role as a helpmeetcould not, after all, hope tooffer sustained politicalleadership in anymeaningfulsense.

For the Tudor womenconfronting the successioncrisisof1553,then,thebattletosecurethethronewasonlythe first step on a hard roadahead.Theirrighttowearthecrown would not gounquestioned, but thatchallenge was finite andgraspable compared to thetest which the exercise ofpower would present. Infacing that greater test, theyhad every reason not to look

back to their medievalforebears. Those earlierqueens had beencompromised by theprovisional nature of theirauthority, and condemned byhistory for their unnaturalself-assertion. No self-respecting Tudor monarch –self-evidently, of course, fitto rule by God-given right –would need to acknowledgesuch problematic exemplars.It was to kings, not queens,

thatTudor sovereigns lookedfor example andwarning. (‘Iam Richard II, know ye notthat?’ Elizabeth sharplyremarked in response toShakespeare’s meditation onthenatureofkingship.)But thatvery identification

with male sovereigntyemphasises what the Tudorqueens shared with thewomen who had held powerin the centuries before them.Inthelivesofthosewomen–

in their ambitions andachievements, theirfrustrations and failures, thechallengestheyfacedandthecompromises they made –were laid out the lineamentsof the paradox which thefemale heirs to the Tudorthrone had no choice but tonegotiate.Manwas the headof woman; and the kingwasthe head of all. How, then,could royal power lie infemalehands?

MATILDA

LadyofEngland

1102–1167

ThisLandGrewDark

On1December1135,anotherking of England lay dying.

Notaboybutamanofnearlyseventy, Henry I had ruledthe English people for morethanhalfhislifetime.Abull-like figure, stocky andpowerfully muscular, Henrywas a commanding leader,‘the greatest of kings’,according to the chroniclerOrdericVitalis,whoobservedhis rule admiringly from thecloisters of a Normanmonastery. His greatness didnot lie on the battlefield – a

competent rather thanexceptional soldier, Henryavoidedall-outwarfarewherehe could – but in hisjudgement, his charisma andhis acute political brain. Norhadagedimmedhisrelentlessenergy; he had spent thesummer and autumn of 1135on military patrol along theborders of his lands, and inNovember he rode to hislodge at Lyons-la-Forêt,thirtymileseastofRouen,for

the restorative pleasures of ahuntingtrip.But while he was there,

against his doctor’s orders,thekingindulgedinadishoflampreys,aneel-likefishthatwas prized as a delicacy,servedinapiepowderedwithspicesorroastedwithasauceof blood and wine infusedwith ginger, cinnamon andcloves.Perhapshisphysicianwas right about theindigestible richness of the

dish; perhaps the lampreyswere dangerously unfresh; orperhaps the illness by whichHenry was struck that nightwas no more than unhappycoincidence. Whatever thecause,withinacoupleofdaysit was clear that he wasunlikely to survive. As in1553, a king’s mortalitybroughtgreatmenscramblingto his bedside, and thesuccession to his thronebecame a matter of frantic

politicalspeculation.The country whose rule

Henrywasabouttorelinquishwould not have been whollyfamiliar to his Tudordescendants.Englandin1135was a young kingdom – or,rather,anoldkingdomintheupstart hands of a new royaldynasty. There had been aking of all England for twohundredyears, ever since theindependent Anglo-Saxonterritories of Northumbria,

Mercia, Wessex and EastAnglia had first been unitedunderÆthelstan,grandsonofthe great King Alfred.Despite the repeatedshockwaves of Vikingassaultsonthisnewlyunifiedland – assaults so successfulthat the English throne wasappropriatedforatimebytheDanish King Cnut – Anglo-SaxonEnglandhadgrownbythemid-eleventhcentury intoa remarkably powerful,

wealthy and sophisticatedstate. And then, on 14October 1066, on a slopingfield six miles north ofHastings, the flower of theSaxon aristocracy was cutdown by charging horsemenunder the command ofHenry’sfather,William,dukeofNormandy.William claimed to be the

rightful heir of the Anglo-Saxon king Edward theConfessor, but the Norman

conquest of England thatfollowed the slaughter atHastings was nothing lessthanarevolution.TheAnglo-Saxon political caste wassystematically eliminated, asfourorfivethousandthegns–the great Anglo-Saxonlandholders – were violentlydisplaced by a new elite offewer than two hundredNorman barons. French, notEnglish, was now thelanguage of power in

England. And this politicalyearzeroopenedthewayfora new kind of kingship, too.The evolutionary intricaciesof Anglo-Saxon landholdingwere swept away byWilliam’s irruption into thepolitical landscape. Englandwas now the personalproperty of its conqueror, tobe parcelled out at willamong his loyal supportersthrough a chain of feudalrelationships,wherelandwas

grantedfromlordtovassalinreturnforanoathofpersonalfidelity and a pledge ofmilitary service. Suchrelationships were thecurrency of politicsthroughout western Europe,but only in England, on ablank slate wiped clean byconquest, could the kingcreate a feudal hierarchydepending directly on hisown authority, untrammelledbycustomaryrightsandlocal

tradition.England, however, was

only one part of theConqueror’s domains. After1066, the Channel was nolonger a frontier but athoroughfare, carryingWilliam and his mostpowerful subjects betweenthe lands they now held onboth sides of the sea. InEngland, he was a king,imposing his royal will on avanquished people. In

Normandy,ontheotherhand,he remained a duke – not asovereignlordbutavassalofthe king of France. Inpractice, Philippe I had littlehold on his nominalliegeman: he could not comeclosetomatchingthemilitarymight that had enabledWilliam to seize the Englishcrown, nor could he escapetheconstraintsofcustomandprecedent that William’sinvasion had obliterated on

theothersideoftheChannel.Nevertheless, questionsremained about how the newNormankingdomofEnglandmight fit within a map ofEuropewhichwas composednot of neatly interlockingnation-statesbehindpreciselydefined borders, but of aconstantly shifting web ofoverlapping jurisdictions,alliancesandallegiances.Henry was the third

Norman monarch to wield

thisdoubleauthority,afterhisformidable father and hisdandified, overconfidentbrother William, known as‘Rufus’ because of his ruddycomplexion. A child of theConquest, born in Yorkshiretwo years after his father’striumph at Hastings, Henrypersonified the hybridcomplexities of the Anglo-Norman world. He waseducated in England, but –like the Conqueror, who

briefly tried to learn Englishbefore giving it up as a badjob – Henry thought andspokeinNormanFrench.Thetwo greatest contemporaryhistorians who recorded hisexploits and revered hiskingship,OrdericVitalis andWilliam of Malmesbury,were each the son of aNormanfatherandanEnglishmother, one writing in theNorman monastery of StEvroult, the other at

Malmesbury Abbey inWiltshire. And now, inDecember 1135, Henry’sEnglish birth would befollowedbyaNormandeath,as he made his finalconfession and received thelastritesatLyons-la-Forêt.Despite the hush of the

room and the spiritualministrations of thearchbishop of Rouen, theking’s energetic mind couldnot find peace in his final

hours. His overwhelmingpreoccupation, as ithadbeenforthelastfifteenyearsofhislife,was thequestionofwhoshouldsucceedhim–andhehad good reason to beanxious.In the seventy years of its

existence, Norman Englandhadnotyetsettledonameansofdeterminingtheidentityofanewking.Before1066, theAnglo-Saxons had looked totheWitan,thegreatnoblesof

the realm, to choose themanbestsuitedtoleadthemfromamong the Æthelings, directroyal descendants of thesixth-century warrior Cerdic,first Saxon king of Wessex.InNormandy,meanwhile,thedukehimselfhadtraditionallynominated his own heir – inpractice, almost always hiseldest son – to whom hismagnates then swore fidelityandallegiance.Thatwasthewayinwhich

the Conqueror had becomedukeofNormandy,attheageof only seven, and he hadfollowed Norman custom indesignating as his successorthere his eldest son Robert,known as Curthose – ‘shortshanks’ – or, morecontemptuously still,Gambaron – ‘fat legs’ –becauseofhislowstature.InEngland, however, Williamwas not bound by precedent,whether Norman or Anglo-

Saxon. And for the last fouryearsofhislife,thekingandhis eldest son had beenacrimoniously estranged. InSeptember 1087, whenWilliam – now a corpulentbut still powerfully imposingman of sixty – lay on hisdeathbed, he was grudginglyprepared to concede thatRobert should rule inNormandy, as he hadpromised more than twentyyearsearlier.ButinEngland,

he intended that the crownshouldpasstohissecondandfavouriteson,WilliamRufus,whowasdespatchedfromhisfather’s bedside at Rouenacross the Channel toWestminster. There Rufuswascrownedking littlemorethan two weeks after hisfather’sdeath.Theresultwaswar.Robert

could not accept that hisyounger brother shouldsupplant him in England,

whileRufus set his sightsonadding his elder brother’sduchy to his new kingdom.Sporadic fighting andtension-filled truces leftRufus – who was a bettersoldierandashrewderleaderthanhisunimpressivebrother–withtheupperhand,untilin1096 Robert abandoned thestruggle, pawning Normandyto Rufus for a cash paymentof ten thousand silver marksto fund his departure on

crusade.Robert was still away,

spending some time insouthern Italy on a leisurelyjourney back from the HolyLand, when on 2 August1100 William Rufus waskilled,spearedintheheartbyastrayarrowduringahuntingexpeditionintheNewForest.If Robert had hoped tosucceed him as king ofEngland – and he surely did,given that William had no

children,andthateachof thebrothershadnamed theotherhisheirinashort-livedtreatyof 1091 – he was to bebitterly disappointed. Theirclever, ambitious youngestbrother, Henry, was withRufus when he died in thedappledsunlightoftheforest.Henrytookonlyaninstanttoweigh up the opportunitywith which the rogue arrowhad unexpectedly presentedhim. Ruthlessly composed

amidthepanicandconfusion,he spurred his horse twentymilesnorthtoWinchester,theancient capital of Wessex,whereheseizedcontroloftheroyal treasury and persuadedthe barons who had reachedthe town in time for Rufus’shastily arranged burial thenext morning to nominatehim as their new king. Hethen rode full pelt forLondon, another sixty milesnorth-east, where he was

crowned in WestminsterAbbeyon5August,lessthanseventy-two hours after hisbrother’suntimelydeath.It was a brilliantly

successfulcoupd’état.WhenRobert arrived home inNormandy a month later, hewas unable to shakeHenry’shold on England. Six yearsafter that, when militarytension broke into openwarfare at Tinchebray insouth-western Normandy,

Robert was defeated andcaptured by Henry’s forces.The remaining three decadesof his life were lived incaptivity, where heabandoned any attempt torevitalise his cause in favourof a contemplative existencespent writing poetry and,fromhiscomfortablequartersin Cardiff Castle, learning tospeakWelsh.Henry was now master of

both England and Normandy

– and the victory of thisyoungest of the Conqueror’sthree sons seemed torepresent a conclusive defeatfor the principle that eldestsonsmightexpect tosucceedtheir royal fathers. ButHenry’s perspective as ayoungpretenderturnedouttobe very different from hisscruplesasanestablishedandundisputed monarch. Anarchetypal poacher turnedgamekeeper, Henry was

adamant that his ownoffspring should never beoustedfrompowerbyacoupof the kind that he hadmasterminded to secure thethroneforhimself.His campaign to establish

the legitimacy of his linebeyond all possible doubtbegan just threemonthsafterhe became king, with hismarriagetoEdith,daughterofKing Malcolm III ofScotland. Her father was

dead,andScotlandshakenbyconflict over the succession,but the orphaned and exiledprincess was a beautifulyoung woman whose‘perfection of character’,according to Orderic Vitalis,Henryhad‘longadored’.Herparticular political virtue asHenry’snewqueen,however,wasthat,throughhermother,she had Anglo-Saxon royalblood in her veins. Edithherself was not anÆtheling,

since only male heirs couldclaim that title. But anychildren of her marriage toHenrywouldhavetheuniquedistinction of tracing theirdescent from the house ofCerdic as well as from theConqueror, and their right torulewouldbeaffirmed twiceover.By the end of 1103, there

were tworoyal infants:agirlcalled Matilda (the sameNormannamethathermother

had now adopted in place oftheAnglo-SaxonEdith)andaboy named William. Despitethe length and strength oftheirparents’marriage,whichlasteduntil thequeen’sdeathin the spring of 1118, therewould be no more children.The young Matilda wastherefore despatched toGermany for a magnificentdiplomatic marriage to theHoly Roman Emperor,HeinrichV,andherbrother–

whom Orderic Vitalis calledWilliam Ætheling, inrecognition of his doublyroyalheritage–waseducatedas befitted a prince whowould cement his father’ssuccess in binding EnglandandNormandytogether.William was not, in fact,

Henry’sonlyson,sincewell-sownwildoatsmeantthatthekinghadagrowingfamilyofillegitimate children, morethan twenty in all, scattered

around his English andFrench domains. ‘All his lifehe was completely free fromfleshly lusts,’ the chroniclerWilliam of Malmesburywrote with an impressivelystraightface,‘indulgingintheembraces of the female sex,as I have heard from thosewho know, from love ofbegetting children and not togratify his passions …’ Butthere could be no doubt that,among this large family,

Williamwas the appleofhisfather’s eye, the boy onwhose shoulders all Henry’shopesnowrested.Williamwasonlytenwhen

he began to act as a formalwitness of his father’s royaledicts.By theageof sixteen,he was married to thedaughter of Count Foulquesof Anjou and Maine,territories immediately to thesouth of Normandy, and hadridden into battle with his

father against the forces ofthe French king Louis VI(known, thanks to hisexpandinggirth, asLouis theFat),ontheplainofBrémulein eastern Normandy. Bothhismarriageandwhat turnedouttobeastunningvictoryatBrémule were intended tosecure his place in thesuccession against the oneman who could challengehim: William Clito, onlylegitimate son of Henry’s

older brother, the imprisonedRobertCurthose.Like mirror images, these

first cousins faced oneanother:twograndsonsoftheConqueror, each namedWilliam in his honour, bornwithin a year of each other,and each designated as aroyal heir, ‘Clito’ being theLatin equivalent of theAnglo-Saxon ‘Æthe-ling’.But only one could succeed;and Henry’s implacable

determination that his sonshouldbekingmadeitcertainthat Louis the Fat wouldchampionhisrival.Bothboys– at barely sixteen andseventeen,theywerescarcelymore– took theirplaceamidthe heat and dust of thebattlefield at Brémule inAugust 1119, but it wasWilliam Ætheling whotriumphed.WilliamClitofledwithKingLouistothesafetyof the French stronghold at

Les Andelys where, the nextday, Henry returned theFrench king’s capturedwarhorse and all its splendidtrappings, while WilliamÆtheling sent back WilliamClito’s palfrey with aselection of rich gifts for hisdefeated cousin in anexquisitely judged gesture ofchivalric condescension. Oneyear later, in the summer of1120,Louis finally bowed tothe inevitable. He agreed to

acceptthehomageofWilliamÆtheling as lawful successorto the duchy of Normandy,thereby recognising thelegitimacyofHenry’sruleonbothsidesoftheChannelandof William’s claims as hisdesignated heir. WilliamClito’s cause was lost, andWilliam Ætheling’s futuresecure.Fresh from this triumph,

Henry and his magnatesgathered at Barfleur, the

harbourat thenorthern tipofthe Cotentin peninsula fromwhere the Conqueror hadlaunched his assault onEngland in 1066, and whichwasnow thegreatest port onthe Norman coast. By 25November 1120, Henry’sfleet was ready to sail. ThevoyagebetweenEnglandandNormandywasafamiliaroneto the king and his court –Henry’s father had crossedthe Anglo-Norman sea

seventeen times in thetwenty-one years he ruledEngland–butitwasnottobetaken lightly, especially inwinter, when the risk ofrough winds and toweringwaves made the journeyparticularlyhazardous.Henryhimself had never beforesailed later in the year thanSeptember, but there seemedno cause for concern as hesurveyed the glassy water,scarcely rippled by the

southerly breeze that wouldbillow gently in the ships’sails on theway north to theEnglishcoast.As the afternoon light

began to fade, he embarkedon the esnec-ca, the king’sgreat dragon-headedlongship, named ‘serpent’ inthe ancient language of theNorsemen who had become‘Normans’ when they settledin France two hundred yearsearlier. His son William,

however, was not with him.Instead, the seventeen-year-old prince had taken passageon a newly refitted vesselnamedtheWhiteShip,piloted–propitiously,itseemed–bythesonoftheshipmasterwhohad first brought theConqueror from Barfleur toEngland fifty-four yearsearlier.Astheroyalesneccaputto

sea in the twilight, aglamorous company of

ebullient young aristocratsassembled on the WhiteShip’s freshly-scrubbeddeck.Among them were two ofWilliam’s illegitimatesiblings: Richard, newlybetrothed to a rich Normanheiress, and anotherMatilda,wifeofthepowerfulcountofPerche. There too were theyoungearlofChesterandhiswife, along with the earl’sillegitimate brother Othuer,who was the prince’s tutor,

and the king’s favouritenephew, Stephen, count ofMortain. Altogether theprince’s entourage numberedmore than two hundredpeople,fromthecreamoftheAnglo-Normannobilitytothefiftyrowersgraspingthelongoars that stretched downbeneath the great square sailtothedarkseabelow.AndwhenatlasttheWhite

Ship slipped out into theblackness of the quiet water,

everyone on board wasroaringdrunk.Threecasksofwine had already beenemptied by the time the shipwasreadytosail.Asthepartygrew wilder and moreraucous, the boisterousbehaviour of the prince’scompanions had become soalarmingly reckless thatStephen, count of Mortain –who, alone, was still soberbecauseofastomachupset–asked to be put ashore. He

wassafelybackonlandwhenthe ship left the quayside, itsoarspullingviolentlythroughthe water as the inebriatedcrew raced to overtake theesnecca,somewhereaheadinthepitch-darknight,with theclamorous encouragement ofthedrunkenpassengers.Noonesawtherockatthe

mouth of the harbour. Therewas no warning: just theheart-stoppingjoltofabrutalimpact; the sickening crunch

of splintering wood; andsudden screaming panic asthe ship began to list. Withfreezing water pouring inthrough the shattered hull, ittook only minutes for theWhite Ship to go down. Thefrantic cries of hundreds ofterrifiedvoicescarriedfaintlyto the shore, but on amoonless night, in perishingtemperatures, there was nohopeofrescue.As the voices fell

gradually, chillingly silent,two men were left alone inthe darkness, clinging to aspar. One was a youngnobleman named GeoffreyFitzGilbert; the other, abutcher named Berold, anativeofRouen,whohadsetfootonboardonlytoreclaimsome debts he was owed bythe careless aristocrats of theprince’s court. They prayedtogether, trying to keep upeach other’s spirits despite

theshockandthebitingcold.Eventually FitzGilbert couldhold on no longer. Hisnumbed and stiffened fingerslost their grip on the wetwood, and he slipped quietlyaway into the depths of thesea.Butthebutcherclungon,his rough sheepskin jacket –so unlike the waterloggedsilks and furs that haddragged the drowningcourtiers down – stillpreserving the last traces of

hisbody’swarmth.Atdawn,he was found by threefishermen.Hewas theWhiteShip’sonlysurvivor.It was two days before

anyonedaredbreak thenewsto King Henry, waitinganxiously in England for hisson’s arrival. When astuttering boy was finallypushedforwardtotellhimofthewreck, thisbullofamancollapsedinanguish.Itwasapersonal tragedy: Henry had

lost kinsmen, friends andservants,and,mostterribleofall, three of his belovedchildren. But, for a king, thepersonalwasalwayspolitical,andallHenry’shopesforhiscountry’s future had beenswallowed by the sea alongwith his drowned son. ‘Noship that ever sailed broughtEngland such disaster,’William of Malmesburywrotegrimly.Overwhelming grief cast a

long shadow over the rest ofHenry’s life, but it did notincapacitatehimforlong.JusttwomonthsafterthehorroratBarfleur he married for asecond time, to Adeliza, abeautifulgirlthesameageashis dead son. Politically, itwas a promising alliance –Adeliza was the daughter ofGodfrey,countofLeuvenanddukeofLowerLorraine–buttheraisond’êtreofthematchwas the need to resolve the

sudden crisis over thesuccession. In that, however,it failed.Despite thefact thatHenry’s ability to fatherchildren had beenenergetically demonstratedover the course of thirtyyears,andthatAdelizawouldeventually go on to haveseven of her own when shemarried again after Henry’sdeath, this royal couplingproducednonewheirs.By 1125, it was already

becomingclear that thefifty-seven-year-oldkingcouldnotrely solely on the dwindlinglikelihoodthathisyoungwifemight give him another son.But Henry did have onesurvivinglegitimatechild:hisdaughter,Matilda.Hehadnotseen her for fifteen years,ever since she had leftEngland as an eight-year-oldgirl to travel to Germany tojoin the court of her futurehusband, the Holy Roman

Emperor Heinrich V. But inMay 1125 the emperorsuccumbed to cancer at theage of just thirty-eight, andhis young and childlesswidow was suddenly free torejoinherfather.Henry lost no time in

takingadvantageofMatilda’sabrupt liberation from herimperialduties.AtChristmas1126,hepresentedhisnewlyreturned daughter to hismagnatesatagreatgathering

of the court held atWindsorand Westminster. There thenobleswererequiredtoswearasolemnoaththattheywoulduphold her right, and that ofany sons she might one dayhave, to succeed to herfather’s throne. They did sowithout demur, in public atleast;butHenrycouldnotrestcontent with this formalacceptance of his daughter’stitle, and in 1131 hedemanded that his leading

subjects repeat their pledges,reiterating their commitmenttoMatildaasruler-in-waiting.By that time, Henry had

also sought to bolster herposition, as he had done thatof his dead son, through analliance with Anjou,Normandy’s southernneighbour. In 1128, Matildatherefore married Geoffroi,heir to the county of Anjou,whose sister had once beenthe wife of her drowned

brother. And by the timeHenry made his last, fatefuljourneytoLyons-la-Forêt,hisdaughter’s second marriagehad given him two healthygrandsons, two-year-oldHenry and one-year-oldGeoffrey, in whose chubbyhands lay the future of theAnglo-Normanrealm.The king had done all he

could, but he could not besurethatitwasenough.Earls,counts and bishops crowded

at his bedside as he rousedhimselftoinsistagain,withadying man’s desperateurgency, thatallofhis lands,on both sides of the sea,should pass to his daughter.At last, on the night of 1December 1135, Henry Idied. ‘He was a good man,and was held in great awe,’wrotetheauthoroftheAnglo-SaxonChronicle.‘Inhistimeno man dared do wrongagainst another; he made

peace for man and beast.’ Itwasamercy,perhaps,thatthesightless eyes of the Lion ofJustice would not see thedarkness that followed hispassing.

MathildaImperatrix

It is a measure of thepeculiarity of Matilda’s

position in 1135 that weknow so little about her.Hercontemporaries, whetherfriends, enemies or neutralobservers,struggledtodecidehowtohandleortojudgeher,how to place her within apolitical narrative thatexpected its chiefprotagonists tobemale.Asaresult,sheisaninsubstantial,inconsistent presence in thechronicles, rarely seen inmore than two dimensions,

often disconcertinglyportrayedasamarginalfigureinherownstory.We can only guess what

she looked like. Her fatherHenry, William ofMalmesbury tells us, was‘morethanshortandlessthantall’,avigorous,thicksetmanwith receding black hair, asteady gaze and anunfortunate tendency tosnore. Her mother, Edith-Matilda of Scotland,

meanwhile,was‘awomanofexceptional holiness, and byno means negligible beauty’.Although William puts nospecific features to theseroyalgoodlooks,heshowsusthe pious queen walkingbarefoot in church duringLent in penitential humility,andwearingahair-clothshiftunder her elaborate gowns.But,master of the thumbnailportrait though he was,William of Malmesbury’s

sketch of Matilda herself isuncharacteristicallyopaque,asomewhat impersonalcouplingofherparents’moststriking qualities: she‘displayed her father’scourage and her mother’spiety; holiness in her foundits equal in energy, and itwould be hard to say whichwasmoreadmirable’.In part, of course, this

arm’s-length treatment ofMatilda’s character stems

fromthefact thatshewasanunknownquantityinEnglandwhenshecrossedtheChannelat her father’s side inSeptember 1126 for the firsttime in more than sixteenyears. Shewas English-born,probably inFebruary1102atSutton Courtenay, a manorhouse near the ancient townand abbey of Abingdon inOxfordshire, and seems tohavelivedinEnglandfor thefirst eight years of her life,

although reliable informationabout her upbringing isalmost entirely lacking. Weknow that her intelligent,capable mother rarelyaccompanied the king toNormandy, instead spendingmost of her time at the royalpalaceofWestminster,amileand a half westwards alongthe Thames from London’scity walls, where Matilda’sflamboyant uncle, WilliamRufus, had built the largest

great hall England had everseen to house his marblethrone.Wecannot take it forgranted that Matilda lived atWestminsterwith hermother– royal children rarely spentallorevenmostoftheirtimein close proximity to theirparents – but it seems likelythat the queen’s culturedhousehold, with its profoundreligioussensibility,providedthe defining context forMatilda’seducation.

Matilda’s mother tongue,like that of her parents andher peers, was NormanFrench, but she learned toreadinLatin,thelanguageofthe Church, of internationaldiplomacy, and of literateculture in England after theConquesthadobliteratedOldEnglish literary traditions.Wemight also hope, for hersake, that she was wellprepared for her future as aroyalbride,sinceitwasarole

shewas expected to take up,in public at least, when shewasnomorethanachild.Shewasonlysixyearsold

when the most eminent kingin western Europe, HeinrichV of Germany, sought herhand in marriage. ThekingdomofGermanywasanagglomerationofstatesundertheruleofamonarchchosenbyaselectgroupof themostpowerful German noblemenand archbishops (albeit that,

as in England, the hereditaryprinciple proved hard toresist, so that Heinrich wasthe fourth heir of the Saliandynasty in direct successionto wear this supposedlyelectivecrown).TheGermanrulerwas known not only asRex Teutonicorum – king oftheGermans–butalsoasRexRomanorum – king of theRomans – in recognition ofthe fact that his powerextendedoverwhat remained

of the Western RomanEmpireafteritssplitfromtheByzantine East, lands whichincluded not only Germanybutnorthern Italy,Burgundy,Austria and Bohemia. Andthemanwhowaselectedkingof the Romans could claimtherighttobecrownedbythepope in a ceremony whichwould elevate him from amere king to the status ofemperor,atitleconferringonits holder a unique authority

withinwesternChristendom.ForMatilda’s father, King

Henry,whosefamilyhadheldthecrownofEnglandforlessthan fifty years and whoseown controversial claim tothe throne was not yetestablished beyond allchallenge,thisalliancewithamonarch who would followinCharlemagne’sfootstepsasruler of the Western RomanEmpire was an enticingprospect – one for which he

was more than prepared tosend his small daughteroverseas,andwithheralargeamountofmoney.AnditwasEngland’s wealth that madethe match so appealing forHeinrich, whose authorityoverlandsstretchingfromtheBaltictotheAdriaticwasnotmatchedbyhiscashflow.Thedealwasdoneinthesummerof 1109:seven-year-oldMatilda was betrothed to theGerman king by proxy at a

magnificent meeting of herfather’s court, and it wasagreed that, along with thehand of his child-bride,Heinrich would receive tenthousand silver marks, thesame immense amount forwhich Robert Curthose hadpawned the duchy ofNormandy to William Rufusjustthirteenyearsbefore.Matilda had only a few

months left to enjoy thefamiliarityoflifeinEngland.

Shehadjustpassedhereighthbirthday in February 1110whenshesaidgoodbyetoherparents, her brother and herhome, and set sail forBoulogne, accompanied by adistinguished retinue ofaristocrats and clergymen.Theyrodebesidehercarriage– its embroidered cushionsdoinglittletoeasethejoltingof thewoodenchassison thewheel-axles – two hundredmiles eastward, over the flat

plain of Flanders and acrossthe western borders of herfuture husband’s empire intotheduchyofLowerLorraine.There, in Liège, a great cityruled by a powerful prince-bishop, Matilda for the firsttime met the man to whomshe was promised inmarriage.Heinrich was twenty-four

years old. It was four yearssince he had becomeking ofGermanyinsuccessiontohis

father, Heinrich IV, whosereign had been blighted bybloody conflict over theextent of his royal authority,both with the nobility ofSaxonyandwiththepope.Hehad been excommunicated inthe course of this struggle,andasaresulthiscorpsestilllay unburied in anunconsecrated side-chapel ofthe imperial cathedral atSpeyer, awaitingreconciliation in death with

the papacy against which hehadfoughtsobitterlyinlife.But the start of his son’s

rule was notmarred by suchbattles. The new young kinghad allied himself with hisfather’s enemies two yearsbefore the old king’s death,and, with their support, hisaccession brought atemporary peace to theEmpire. The task thatHeinrich now faced was torebuild the power of his

crown. In theory, hisauthority reached fromHamburg in the north toRome in the south, fromLyons in the west to Viennain the east. In practice,however,heneededtoridetoRome at the head of anostentatiously imposingentourage – a retinue whichmight, as circumstancesdictated, take on the form ofan army – to stamp his ruleonhisItalianterritoriesandto

secure his coronation asemperor at the hands of thepope. For that, he neededmoney;andsohislittlebride,whowould bring him such agreat dowry, was graciouslyandwarmlyreceived.For the next few months

Matilda accompanied herfuture husband on imperialprogress, first of all to thegracefulcityofUtrechtintheNetherlands, more than ahundredmilesnorthofLiège.

There, at Easter, the royalcouple were formallybetrothed once again, inpersonthistime,andHeinrichendowed his wife-to-be withrichgiftsandlandsreflectingher statusashisconsort.Thecourt then moved along thevalley of the Rhine toCologne,SpeyerandWorms,before arriving atMainz, theforemost archiepiscopal seeof all Germany, wherepreparations were under way

for Matilda’s coronation. Ateight, she was too young tobecomeawife,butnot toberecognised as a queen: asolemn betrothal was asbinding in the sight of theChurchas themarriagevowsto which she had committedherself for the future, so thatcontemporaries saw noincongruity in the fact thatMatilda would receive hercrown some years before herweddingring.

Mainz, like Speyer andWorms, was home to one ofthe three great Kaiserdome,imperial churches built inmonumentalredsandstoneonan awe-inspiring scale. TheRomanesque cathedral atMainz had an inauspicioushistory: fire had gutted thebuilding on the day of itsinaugurationalmostexactlyacentury earlier, and in 1081anotherdevastatingblazehadundone the painstaking

repairs. But, thanks toHeinrichIV,anewoctagonaltower now soared over thenaveashissmalldaughter-in-law arrived in ceremonialprocession on 25 July – thefeast day of St James theApostle, whose mummifiedhand was preserved amongthe priceless relics in theroyalchapel– tobecrownedGermany’s queen. A newarchbishop had not yet beenappointedtotheseeofMainz

after the death of the lastincumbent in 1109, so that itwas the archbishop of Trierwho carried Matildadelicately in his arms whilethe archbishop of Cologneanointedherwithholychrismand placed a crown (whichwas almost certainly toolarge, as well as too heavy,for a child) on her younghead.The ritualwas designed to

impress all thosepresent, the

eight-year-old girl at itscentre as well as theassembledonlookers,withitspotentblendofthesacredandthemajestic. Itwas thereforewith a powerful sense of herroyal duty and dignity thatMatildaleftMainzforTrier,alittle less than a hundredmileswestward,tolearnwhatitwastobeaGermanqueen.Her education there wasoverseen by the prelate whohad held her during her

coronation, ArchbishopBruno, one of her futurehusband’s closest and mosttrusted counsellors, a mandescribed by the Frenchstatesman and chroniclerAbbot Suger of Saint-Denisas‘elegantandagreeable,fullof eloquence and wisdom’.Trier was a Roman city, theoldest in Germany, lying inthevalleyoftheMoselleriverbetween low wooded hills,and its cosmopolitan Franco-

German culture provided theideal setting for thisNormanprincess to learn thelanguage, laws and customsofhernewlyadoptedhome.While Matilda studied

under Archbishop Bruno’scareful guardianship,Heinrich put the treasure shehad brought as her dowry toimmediate and productiveuse. The royal couple’sbetrothal at Utrecht in Aprilhad doubled as an

opportunity for the king tobegin the process ofassembling forces for hisplanned expedition to Rome,and inAugusthecrossed theAlps at the head of a vastfollowing–AbbotSugerandOrderic Vitalis suggest afigure of thirty thousandknights,which,evenallowingfor evocative exaggeration,implies an exceptionallyintimidating host – that wasequipped and provisioned by

Matilda’ssilver.Relations between

HeinrichandPopePaschal IIhad deteriorated badly sincetheking’saccession,overthebitterly contested question ofinvestiture – the competitionbetweenChurchandstateforcontrol of the creation ofbishops, a runningbattle thatwas the focal point of abroaderwar over the relativepowers of spiritual andtemporal authority. Despite

Paschal’s initial hopes,Heinrichhadprovednomorewillingtoyieldtoclaimsofapapal monopoly oninvestiture than hisexcommunicated father, andthe pope therefore refused tocrownhimemperorunlesshechanged his mind. Heinrichhad a ready answer: hissoldiers seized Paschal andsixteen of his cardinals andheld them all in closeconfinement for two months

until they capitulated. Underthis peculiarly irresistibleform of persuasion, Paschalconfirmed his royal enemy’sright to invest bishops withthe ring and crozier ofepiscopal office; and on 13April 1111, in the echoingbasilica ofSt Peter inRome,the pope’s unwilling handsplaced the imperial crown –an octagonal diadem of goldstudded with jewels andcloisonné enamelwork,

enclosedbyagoldenarchandsurmounted by a jewelledcross–onthenewemperor’shead.The conflict was far from

over. Once Heinrich and hisarmy had returned toGermany, the papal councillostnotimeinrepudiatingtheconcessions he had extortedby force. The imperialcoronation was a sacred ritethatcouldnotbeundone,but,while hostilities continued, it

wasabundantlyclear that theemperor’s bride could nothope to be crowned in herturnashisempress.Shecould,however,expect

to become his wife. InJanuary1114, justbeforehertwelfth birthday – twelvebeing the canonical age atwhichgirlswerepermittedtoenter into the sacrament ofmarriage – Matilda andHeinrich finally took theirvows in the towering

cathedral at Worms on thewestern bank of the Rhine.The sheer grandeur of thecelebrations,themostopulentgathering of the Germancourt in a generation, defiedthe descriptive powers of thechroniclers.Fivearchbishops,thirty bishops and fivedukeswitnessedtheceremony,eachattended by an ostentatiousentourage; ‘as for the countsandabbotsandprovosts’,onewell-informed but

anonymous commentatorcontinued,

no one present couldtell their numbers,though many observantmen were there. Sonumerous were thewedding gifts whichvarious kings andprimates sent to theemperor, and the giftswhich the emperor fromhisownstoregavetothe

innumerable throngs ofjestersandjongleursandpeople of all kinds, thatnot one of hischamberlains whoreceived or distributedthemcouldcountthem.

Matilda’s performance on

this intimidatinglymagnificent occasion wasimmaculate. She was ‘a girlof noble character’, theanonymous chronicler

remarked, ‘distinguished andbeautiful, who was held tobring glory and honour toboth the Roman Empire andthe English realm’. It wasalso the beginning of herpublic life at her imperialhusband’s side. It seemed anunlikely partnership: a girlscarcely on the brink ofadulthood, married to a manof twenty-eight, a monarchwho was not only able andastute but ruthlessly and

relentlessly hard-headed. Butobserverswereinnodoubtofhow well the relationshipworked. ‘The emperor lovedhisnoblewifedeeply,’wroteOrderic Vitalis; and, even ifwechoose tobea littlemorecynical than the conventionsof courtesy allowed indescribing the emotionaldynamics of this dynasticalliance, it remains clear thatMatildawonthetrustandtherespect of her powerful

husband.Her own family supplied

thebestofmodelsforaroyalconsort. Her mother, Edith-Matilda, had been a devotedand skilful partner in HenryI’sregime,whilehermaternalgrandmother, Margaret ofScotland, was so widelyrevered forherpiety that shewaslaterdeclaredasaint.ButMatilda, who had neverknown her grandmother, hadnotseenhermothersinceshe

was eight years old, and hersuccess as Heinrich’s queenowedasmuchtotheresilientintelligence of her ownresponse to the role as it didtohergenesorthetrainingofherearliestyears.A complex task lay ahead

ofher.Tobetheconsortofaruler was not to be a mereappendage; she was notsimplyadecorativeornamentto his court, or the passiveembodiment of a political

treaty. A crowned queenshared in her husband’smajesty – she, too, had beenanointed by God, herauthority given divinesanction – and, if she wasnecessarily a satellite of hispower, she nevertheless hadan influential part to play inhis government. She mightemphasise the spiritualdimensions of his rule ratherthan the worldlypreoccupations that took the

lion’s share of a king’sattention:thesaintlyMargaretofScotland,forexample,wasunusual only in the extent,not the fact, of her religiousdevotion. Shemight serve ashis representative when hecould not be physicallypresent,asEdith-Matildahaddone with distinction inEngland during the yearsKing Henry spent across theChannel in Normandy. Andshe might temper his justice

with mercy, her intercessionenabling her husband tomoderatetheharshnessofthepunishments he inflictedwithout compromising therespect in which hisjudgementswereheld.This, in fact, was the first

formalqueenlyrolewhichtheeight-year-old Matilda hadbeen called upon to play, inritual form, on her arrivalfromEngland in 1110,whenshe was asked at Liège to

intercede for a disgracednobleman, Godfrey, count ofLeuven and duke of LowerLorraine (whose daughterAdeliza would become herstepmother ten years later).Andfrom1114,whenshelefther schoolbooks behind afterthe extravagant spectacle ofherweddingtotakeherplaceat her husband’s side, shefulfilled her duties as asponsor of petitions andsupplications with a dignity

and grace that would laterinspire her German subjectstorememberheras‘thegoodMatilda’.But she could not be

insulated for long from theEmpire’s dangerousinstability. Her husband, likehis father before him, facedarmed rebellion in Saxonyand the Rhineland, whileconflictwiththeChurchnowloomed menacingly onGerman soil. Archbishop

Friedrich of Cologne – theman who had touched holyoil to Matilda’s forehead ather coronation, and hithertoone of Heinrich’smost loyalecclesiastical supporters –finally abandoned theemperor in 1114, histheological consciencefinding common cause withhis territorial ambition. PopePaschal had alreadysanctioned the emperor’sexcommunication three years

earlier, but now, in April1115,thearchbishopformallypronounced the dreadsentence of anathema atCologne, where imperialforceshadbeendefeatedbyarebelarmyonlyafewmonthsbefore. A formidable factionwithin the German Churchnow held that their emperorhad been excluded from thecommunityofthefaithful.Allthosewhohadswornhomageand fealty to him, they

declared, were no longerboundbytheiroaths.If Heinrich had any doubt

about the need to return toItaly to tackle the poisonousconflict between the RomanEmpire and the Holy See atits source, it was dispelledthree months later, whennews came of the death ofMatildeofTuscany,countessofCanossa.Lagrancontessa,at almost seventy, hadbecome a legend, ‘the

daughter of Peter and thefaithful handmaid of Christ’,according to the greatreforming popeGregoryVII.Heir to vast estates innorthern Italy stretchingacross the Lombard plainfrom the Apennines to theAlps, the countess had beenthe pope’smost devoted allythroughfortyyearsofviolentstruggle between the papacyand the Empire. From herimpregnable fortress at

Canossa, perched high on aspur of the north face of theApennines looking over theplain to her nearby cities ofReggioandModena,sherodewith her troops against theEmperor Heinrich IV,standing in her stirrups withher father’s sword in herhand, the war-cry ‘For StPeter and Matilde!’ ringingaroundher.HeinrichVhadlearnedthe

lessonofhisfather’sinability

to defeat Matilde, opting forconciliation instead ofconfrontation. He visited herrespectfully at Bianello, thecastle in the foothills to thenorth-east of Canossa thatstoodsentinelforthefortress,and appointed her hislieutenant in Liguria,swearing that ‘in the wholeearththerecouldnotbefounda princess her equal’. Hisstrategy paid off in 1115when the dying countess –

who, though twice married,hadnochildren–namedhimher heir. This was anunprecedented opportunity toimpose imperial rule in Italy,butitwouldhavetobetakenswiftly, before the pope, towhomMatildehadpreviouslypromisedherlands,couldacttostophim.By the end of February

1116 the emperor’s forceswere ready. When he leftAugsburg at the head of his

army, his fourteen-year-oldwife was with him. Soldiers,horses,cartsloadedwitharmsand provisions, and carriagesfor Matilda and her ladiestravelled more than threehundred miles across theAlps,overtheBrennerPass,aprehistoric pathway that hadbecome a regularised roadwhen the Roman Empireexpanded inexorablynorthward through themountains. It was the lowest

andeasiestoftheeightmajorAlpine passes, and anexpedition that included themight of an imperial armyhad no need to fear thebanditswholayinwaitbytheroadside to relievemerchantsand pilgrims of theirpossessions.Butlowandeasywere relative terms in anAlpinecrossing, and strengthin numbers offered nocushion against theimplacable landscape. Even

swaddled in furs, Matildacouldnotescape the rawnessofthethinairasshegazedupat the massive snow-driftedpeaks that overshadowedtheirlabouringconvoy.There could have been no

greater contrast between thewildness of the mountainsand the comfort of theirreception in Italy: a forty-eight-hour stay amid thesumptuous luxury of thedoge’s palazzo in Venice,

behind crenellated walls andcolossal towers thatproclaimed La Serenissima’smastery of the sea. Fromthere, the emperor and hisqueen travelled south-west toPadua and Mantua beforearriving outside theforbidding ramparts ofCountessMatilde’sApenninefortress at Canossa. Heinrichwas shrewd enough torecognise that generosity andcompromise were the surest

ways to win support fromthosewhohadsufferedunderthe harsh inflexibility of thecountess’s rule, and he waswelcomed inside Canossa’sgates,hisyoungwifewarmlygreeted as a noble successortoherformidablenamesake.Itwasawholeyearbefore

the emperor felt confidentenough of his hold on theregions of Emilia-RomagnaandTuscanytomovetowardsRome.ButdespiteHeinrich’s

efforts at diplomacy, PopePaschal could notcontemplate a secondencounter with an imperialarmy with equilibrium. Hewithdrew the papal curiaeightymilestothesouth-east,to the magnificent abbey atMontecassino first foundedby St Benedict almost sixhundredyearsearlier,leavingHeinrichtotakecontroloftheholy city just before Easter1117.Itwasahollowvictory:

the emperor staged atriumphal procession throughthe Roman streets, but couldnotconvinceasinglecardinaltoparticipate in theelaborateceremoniesofcrown-wearingthat, by custom, marked theemperor’s presence in Romeon a great feast day of theChurch.Heinrich turned instead to

MauriceBourdin,theFrench-born archbishop of thePortuguese see of Braga,

whom Paschal had sent tohim as an envoy. Acontroversial and fiercelyambitious man, Bourdin lostno time in abandoning hisallegiance to the pope inorder to seize the chance ofbecoming indispensable tothe emperor.Despite the factthat the only bridge over theTiberwascontrolledbyPopePaschal’s supporters fromtheir vantage point in theimmense circular stronghold

oftheCastelSant’Angelo,theimperial entourage managedto cross the river by boat toreach St Peter’s basilica.There, perhaps on EasterSunday,andcertainlyagainatPentecost seven weeks later,Archbishop Bourdin placedanimperialcrownonfifteen-year-old Matilda’s head asshe sat in state at herhusband’sside.This was not an imperial

coronation. Bourdin was not

the pope – indeed, he hadbeen excommunicated beforethe Pentecost ceremony forhisabandonmentofthepapalcause – andMatildawas notanointed as an empress.Officially, she remainedRegina Romanorum, thequeen of the Romans; but,despite its irregularities, thisceremonial confirmation ofher imperial status left alasting mark. She had notbeen crowned by the pope,

but she had been given acrowninthepope’schurchatthe side of her husband theemperor; and for the rest ofher life shewould be knownto contemporaries as theEmpress Matilda, MathildaImperatrix.Her experiences in Italy

shaped not only her sense ofher own political standing,but her political educationtoo. In 1118, when Heinrichwas forced to return north to

deal with rebellion inGermany, he left Matilda, atjustsixteen,torulehisItalianterritories in his stead. Nowher task was not to mitigatethe terrible majesty of herhusband’s authority, but toembody it. Very few detailshave survived of her actionsasregent,saveforonecameoin a court at Castrocaro, setamidgentlyrollinghillsthirtymilessouthofRavenna,whenshesatinjudgementoverthe

conflicting claims to a localchurch of a bishop and anabbey from the neighbouringtowns of Forlì and Faenza.The climacticmoment of thecase came when the youngqueen rose to declare herdecision in favour of themonastery, and to pronouncean imperial prohibition onanyone who dared challengeherruling.Ifwecannotrecreatemore

details of her government in

Italy in 1118–19, we can atleastdecipheritsplaceamongthe formative influences ofMatilda’s young life. Sincecrossing the Alps, she hadhad the opportunity towitness at close quarters aviciouspoliticalgame,playedon a European stage for thehighestpossiblestakesinthisworld and the next. She hadalso, at Pentecost in StPeter’s, acquired a plausibleclaim to share in her

husband’s unique imperialstatus.And she had now, forthe first time, stood alone toexercisetheroyalauthorityinwhichshesharedthroughhermarriage. It was hardlysurprising if, in the process,she absorbed a deeply feltsense of her own regality,together with anunderstanding thatruthlessness andreconciliation could each bevital weapons in a ruler’s

armoury.Allwere,ofcourse,entirely proper to her role asconsort to the most exaltedruler in western Europe. Butit was only a year after herreturnfromItaly toGermanyintheautumnof1119thatthefirsthintcameofwhatwouldprove to be a dramaticallydifferentfuture.The drowning of her

brotherWilliam in thewreckof the White Ship inNovember 1120 can hardly

have been a devastatingemotional blow. EighteenmonthsyoungerthanMatilda,he had been only six whenshe left England, and,immersed in her new life intheEmpire, shehadnot seenhim or their parents for adecade. Nor did his deathprecipitate any immediatetransformation in herposition. Her father, KingHenry,marriedagainwithinamatterofweeks andkepthis

youngbride at his side as hetravelled through hisdomains,inthehopethatshewould give him a new heir.Even as the months went bywithout any sign that QueenAdeliza might haveconceived,thereremainedtheconstant possibility of animminent pregnancy. Andcertainly therewas no publicsuggestion thatMatilda,whowas already a queen in adistant land, might figure in

Henry’s plans for thesuccession.But there are signs that

Matilda’s husband and herfatherwerewellawareofherpotential importance inAnglo-Normanaffairs,shouldHenry’s hopes of a son bedisappointed. When thebitterly destructive conflictbetween the Empire and thepapacywasfinallyendedbyaconcordatagreedatWormsin1122 (which distinguished

between the spiritual andtemporal investiture ofbishops,assigning theformerto the pope and the latter tothe emperor), the settlementowed a great deal to theprecedent of the Englishagreement over the sameissue that King Henry hadreached with the papacy in1106. And in the years after1122, the priority whichHeinrich gave to thecloseness of his contact with

hisfather-in-lawisstriking.Matilda had hoped to visit

Henry in England thatsummer for the first time intwelve years, but, with theking waiting in Kent for herarrival, she had to abandonher journey when she wasrefused safe passage by thecountofFlanders,avassalofthe French king who hadevery reason to fear beingcaught in a vice by closercooperation between the

Anglo-Norman realm on oneside and the Empire on theother. Thereafter, despite theongoingthreatofunrestinthenorthern duchy of Saxony,the emperor threw himselfinto a hard-fought battle towrestcontrolofUtrechtfromits bishop – a city which hehad previously visited onlyonce, in 1110, for his formalbetrothal to his child-bride.Now, however, his repeatedpresence there – in 1123 at

the head of an army –indicated the strategicsignificance of its locationless than forty miles from apoint on theNorth Sea coastwhere neither the count ofFlanders nor the king ofFrancecouldimpedeimperialcommunications withEngland.Perhaps Heinrich

envisaged a future in whichEngland and Normandymight become the western

limits of an extended empireover which he and Matildawould rule together, beforeuniting their territorialclaimsinthepersonoftheirsonandheir. But no such child hadyet been born when thatdream was shattered. In thespring of 1125, visitingUtrecht for the third time inthree years, the emperorwasoverwhelmedbyanagonisingand desperate illness that hehad struggled to conceal.On

23May, at the age of thirty-eight–‘in theveryflowerofhis age and victories’, wroteWilliam of Malmesbury –Heinrich died. To thisenergetic,bold, ruthlessman,Matilda had been a devotedwifeandatrustedconsort;thelittle Norman princess hadbecome a German queen inquietly triumphant style.Now, at twenty-three, shewas his widow, trusted indeath,asshehadbeeninlife,

when he bequeathed into herkeeping the priceless crown,lanceandswordthatmadeuptheimperialinsignia.ButMatildahadnofurther

parttoplayinthegovernmentof the Empire. Successfulthoughhermarriagehadbeenin personal and politicalterms, it had failed as avehiclefordynasticambition.Hadshehadason,shemighthave ruled in his name untilhe came of age, as her

husband’s grandmother, theredoubtable Empress Agnes,haddoneforsixyearsduringthe minority of Heinrich IV.But when the body ofHeinrich V was solemnlyconveyedthreehundredmilesalong theRhine to be buriedbeside his father, grandfatherand great-grandfather atSpeyer Cathedral, it was asthelastemperoroftheSalianline.Matildahandedovertheimperial insignia to the

archbishop of Mainz, whowould preside over theelection of the next king ofGermany, andmade herwayto join her father inNormandy. In doing so, sheabandoned theGerman landswithwhichherdeadhusbandhad endowedher, and turnedher back on offers ofmarriage from among theranksof theGermanprinces.Instead, she returned, aGerman-speaking woman, to

the Anglo-Norman court shehadleftasaFrench-speakingchild a decade and a halfearlier. She broughtwith heran imperial title, as well asmoretangiblerichesfromtheimperial treasury, includingtwo jewelled crowns of solidgold–oneof them soheavythat it could only be wornwhensupportedbytwosilverrods – and the mummifiedhandof theapostleStJames,on whose feast day she had

been crowned at MainzCathedral.Some Anglo-Norman

observers,orbitingaroundthegravitational fields of RouenandWestminster,would laterremark that theadultMatildawho returned to herchildhoodhomewashaughtyand full of amour propre.Certainly – andunsurprisingly, given thenature of the survivingsources–theybetraynosign

of sympathy for a youngwoman who had lost herhusband, her guidinginfluence since childhood, ina bereavement that abruptlyuprootedher fromeverythingthat was familiar in her lifefor thesecond time in fifteenyears. Nor is there anyacknowledgement that theremight be other, lesscensoriouswaysofdescribingthe grandeur of a widowedqueen who had been the

consort of the greatestmonarchinEuropeforalmostas long as she couldremember, and had receivedan imperial crown in thepapal basilica along theway.Now, it seemed, she mightwearacrowninherownrightasherfather’sonlysurvivingheir. Whatever view hercountrymen might take ofMatilda’s deportment, thecrucial question was this:couldawomanrule?

The simple answer wasthat there was no formalprohibition to prevent herfromdoing so.The very factthat the principles governingroyal inheritance in theAnglo-Normanrealmweresofluid, that precedents hadscarcely had time oropportunitytotakerootsincetheviolentupheavalsof1066,and that realpolitik ratherthan theoretical right hadtriumphed in the contested

successions of 1087 and1100, meant that there werefew incontrovertible rules bywhich candidates for thethrone might be eitherselected or excluded. One ofthosefewrules,thankstotheChurch’s increasingly strictcontroloverthesacramentofmarriage, was thatillegitimate children nolonger stood alongside theirlegitimatehalf-siblings in theline of succession. Despite

the fact that King Henry’sfather, the great Conquerorhimself, had been bastard-born, neither Henry nor anyof his nobles seems to havegivenseriousconsiderationtothe possibility that the eldestof his large illegitimatebrood, Robert, earl ofGloucester, might claim thethrone, even though thecharismaticearlwasalreadyaproven leader on thebattlefield and at his father’s

court.Bastardy, then,wasaclear

disqualification; beingfemale, however, was not.Thereisnorecordofasingleword of protest from any ofthe Anglo-Norman nobleswhenHenryrequiredthemtoswearthattheywouldsupporthisdaughterashissuccessor,shouldhediewithoutamaleheir. The only controversythat erupted in January 1127was the result not of dissent

spillingoverbutofeagernesstodemonstrate loyalty, in theformofa squabbleoverwhoshouldbe first in line to taketheoath.ThathonourwenttoDavid, king of Scots, theyounger brother of Henry’sfirst queen and Matilda’smaternaluncle,whohadbeenbrought up at the Englishcourt andheld rich estates inEngland as well as theScottish throne. Once theScots king had sworn,

however, there was a tusslefor precedence betweenRobert of Gloucester,Henry’s illegitimate son, andthe king’s favourite nephew,StephenofMortain,whohadsonarrowlyescapedawaterygrave in the wreck of theWhite Ship – ‘a noteworthycontest’, William ofMalmesbury reported, fromwhich Stephen, the son ofHenry’s sister Adela,emergedvictorious.

But a pledge of futureallegiance imposed by apresent and irresistiblyformidable king did notguarantee that Matilda’s rulewouldultimatelybeaccepted.Within the unpredictablearena of European politics,where frontiersbetween rivalterritories were shaped andreshaped not only by thetreacherous currents ofinternational diplomacy butby the constant friction of

war, a monarch was bydefinition a soldier, a feudallord riding with swordunsheathed at the head ofsteel-cladknights.Despitetheextraordinary exploits ofMatildeofCanossa, thatwasa role for which no womanwastrained,orcouldhopetoinhabitwithout challenge.Atthe same time, a king’s dutyto protect his lands and hispeople also required that heshould be a judge and a

lawgiver–and,whilewomenmight appear in court aslitigants or witnesses, therewas no official, public placeforawomanintheprocessofmakingorenforcingthelaw.Though Matilda was not

explicitly barred frominheritingher father’s throne,then, the idea of what itmeant to be a monarchremained inescapably male.That assumption wasembedded even in the

language of regality: aqueen’s very title, from theAnglo-Saxon word cwén,meant thewifeofaking,nothis female equivalent. InLatin,meanwhile,areginaorimperatrix – a queen or anempress – was a femaleadjuncttoarexorimperator,derivativewordsrepresentingaderivativeformofauthority.Reality did not, of course,

always conform so neatly tolinguistic etymology or

political theory. Matilda’scontemporaries in Englandhardlyhadfar to looktofindinstances of women taking alead in government, whetherit was Queen Edith-Matildapresiding over meetings ofherabsenthusband’scouncil,Empress Agnes holding theGerman Empire together inthe name of her little son, orMatilda herself pronouncingjudgement in her husband’sstead in the court at

Castrocaro. True, womenmight be excluded fromformal, public office innormal circumstances, but aqueen was by definitionexceptional, sharing in herhusband’s unique authoritythrough the sacrament ofmarriageandtheconsecrationofhercrowning.But what made such

manifestations of female rulefundamentally unthreateningto the maleness of kingship

wasthefact that thisqueenlyauthoritywasexercisedinthename of a husband or son.And, for all that Matildastood centre stage as thenobles swore their oaths in1127, it was clear that thecapacity of royal women toact as vessels for thetransmission of kingly powerlay at the heart of Henry’splans for his daughter. Shemight still be supplanted inthe succession if he and his

young wife had a new son;but, if they did not, Matildastood ready, awoman youngand strong enough toreplenish Henry’s lineagewith sons of her own. Herdestiny might yet lie in herrole as the daughter andmother of kings, rather thanas a monarch in her ownright.For that, however, she

would need a new husband,and quickly – a requirement

that became acute in thespring of 1127 with aspectacular revival in thefortunes of Henry’s exilednephew William Clito, oncetherivalofWilliamÆtheling,now a threat to the drownedprince’s sister Matilda. InMarch, Count Charles ofFlanders – themanwho hadblocked Matilda’s pathbetween the Empire andEngland five years earlier –was brutally murdered while

heprayedbeforethealtarofaBruges church, and KingLouis of France seized uponthis unexpected chance toinstall William Clito in hisplace as ruler of the wealthyand strategically vitallowlands that lay betweenBoulogne and Antwerp.Matilda’s marriage was nowamatterofcriticalimportancedefensively as well asdynastically, and the identityof her prospective

bridegroom clear: Geoffroi,the son and heir of CountFoulques of Anjou whoselands, immediately to thesouth of Normandy, mighteither protect or threaten itsborders.Aweekbeforethewedding

in June 1128, Geoffroi wasknighted by his bride’s royalfather in Rouen. He cut agorgeousfigure: fifteenyearsold, and nicknamed ‘le Bel ’(‘the Fair’), hewas lithe and

athletic, his face ‘glowinglike theflowerofa lily,withrosy flush’, dressed in thefinest armour with goldenspurs and a sparkling gem-studded helmet, golden lionsrearingproudlyonhisshield.Matilda,however,washardlylikely to be dazzled by abeautiful boy. Eleven yearshis senior, and with fifteenyears’ experience of imperialpolitics under the belt of hersilken gown, she angrily

disdained the idea that sheshould marry an untestedteenagerwhosestatuswassovastly inferior toherown. If,as seems entirely possible,hergriefforthedeademperorwas heartfelt, then thecontrastbetweenthisarrogantadolescent and the father-figurethatHeinrichhadbeencan only have deepened herrevulsion at the match.Hildebert of Lavardin, thelearned and deeply pious

archbishopofTours,wrotetoher in sorrow soon after thealliancewasproposedtoseekreassurancethatshewouldnolongerdistressherfatherwithher disobedience. But in theend, as the archbishop hadforeseen, Henry wasimmovable, and, forMatilda,unhappydutyprevailed.The unwilling bride

endured three weeks ofextravagant celebrations,from the wedding ceremony

in thegloriousnewcathedralat LeMans on 17 June untilthe couple’s tumultuousarrival in Angers, the capitalof her new husband’s comté,where they were greeted bycheering crowds and acacophony of bells. By thattime it had at least beenarranged that Matilda’s newtitle would be that of acountess, rather than acountess-in-waiting. Herfather-in-law, Count

Foulques, left immediatelyafter the wedding to embarkon the long journey to theHoly Land, abandoningAnjoutohissoninfavourofacrownofhisown,acquiredthrough a new marriage toMelisende, heiress to therecently established Latinkingdom of Jerusalem.However, Matilda remainedunimpressed. Whenever shecould, she avoided callingherself ‘countess’, preferring

the overriding magnificenceof her personal style as‘empress,anddaughterofthekingoftheEnglish’.Vows, however reluctantly

taken,couldnotbeforsworn.Nevertheless,withinayear itseemed that the relationshipmight founder. Matilda’spersonal antipathy to thematchhadnotbeenenoughtooutweighthepoliticallogicofan Angevin alliance tocounter the threatofWilliam

Clito’smenacing presence inFlanders; but less than sixweeks after thewedding thatthreatabruptlyvanishedwhenClitowaskilledinaskirmishwith a Flemish rival. It ispossible that this welcomereversal of fortune promptedKingHenry to reconsider thecalculations he had madeabout his daughter’s futureandtheusefulnessofhernewhusband – and, if Matilda’sprospects as a female heir

remained profoundlyuncertain, her husband’sposition was more nebulousstill. Did Geoffroi expect intimetobecomeakinginrightofhiswife,ashis fatherwasabout to do far away inJerusalem? Certainly theyoung count, whose goldengood looks concealed a willand temper to matchMatilda’s own, wasantagonised by Henry’srefusal to elucidate his plans

for his new son-in-law. Bythe end of 1129 the couplewerelivingapart.Matildahadleft Anjou to return to herfather’s city of Rouen inNormandy, andGeoffroiwasloudly threatening to turnhisback on the whole fiasco bydeparting on pilgrimage tothe shrine of St James atCompostela in north-westernSpain.Still, reservations or no,

Henry decided that he could

not allow the marriage todisintegrate before it hadserved its purpose inproviding him with agrandson. In the late summerof 1131 he brokered – orperhaps imposed – areconciliation. A greatcouncil was held atNorthampton on 8September; there the Anglo-Normannoblesrenewedtheirsolemnoathsofallegiance toMatilda, who then returned

with all honour to herhusband in Anjou. Nothinghad been clarified, butpersonal discontent had beensuppressed, for the timebeing, under the pressure ofan irresistible politicalimperative. And to goodeffect: on 5 March 1133thirty-one-year-old Matildagavebirth atLeMans to herfirst child, a healthy boy,Henry, who inherited hisAngevin father’s red-gold

hair and the vigorouslystocky physique of the royalgrandfatherforwhomhewasnamed.Little more than a year

later, atRouen in June1134,thedifficultbirthofasecondson, Geoffrey, almost costMatilda her life.KingHenrywas at her bedside as sheprepared for death byarranging her bequests andburial. Characteristically, shefound the strength even in

this extremity of illness toinsist that her own wishesshould be respected in theplanningofhertomb,forcingher father to agree that sheshould be interred not, as hewanted, in theancestralvaultof thedukesofNormandyatRouen Cathedral, but at theabbeyofBec in the peacefulvalley of the Risle thirtymilessouth-westofthecity,aspiritual home to which shehad developed a particular

devotion. Slowly, however,she recovered; and thereaftershe and her husband found away to work together aspolitical partners united, ifnotbyaffection,thenbytheirshared interest in their sons’inheritance.While Henry delighted in

his sturdy grandsons, thedynastictriumphoftheirbirthencouragedanotherattemptatself-assertion by theirambitious father. Geoffroi

had succeeded in providingHenry’s daughter withlegitimate male heirs, but hehad received littleencouragement to hope thatthekingenvisagedhimrulingEngland and Normandy atMatilda’s side. He had beengranted no Anglo-Normanlands;hehadnotbeeninvitedto attendHenry’s court sincehis wedding; and he had notstoodbesidehisroyalwifeasshe received the oaths of the

Anglo-Norman magnates in1131.Fouryears later, itwasbeginning to grate heavilythathehadnotyeteventakenpossession of the castlesalong the border betweenNormandy and Anjou whichhe had been promised as adowry along with Matilda’shand. Henry, it seemed, hadnointentionofcedingcontroltheretohisson-in-lawbeforehis death. For Geoffroi,however, this royal refusal to

hand over the fortresses wasnotonlya slap in the face intermsofhisalreadyuncertainstanding as Matilda’shusband, but a strategicblunder that mightcompromise his ability tomake good her claim toNormandy and Englandwheneverthetimecametodoso.As relations deteriorated

between these twotenaciously wilful men,

Matilda found herself caughtin the middle. This time, asthemotheroftwoyoungsons– and perhaps with a sensethatherpowerfulfathermightevennowbekeepingopenhisplansforthesuccession–shestood shoulder to shoulderwith her once-despisedhusband. In the summer of1135, as politicaldisagreement escalated intothe flexing of militarymuscle, she remained with

Geoffroi in Anjou whileHenry prowled the southernfrontiers of Normandy,soldiers at his back. Fatherand daughter were stillestranged inNovemberwhenthekingretiredforafewdaystohislodgeatLyons-la-Forêtto enjoy the hunt. It wouldprovetobehislastjourney.The bitter conflict of his

last months had been rootedin Henry’s refusal tosurrender any of his

territories to hispresumptuous son-in-lawwhilehisgripongovernment,even at the age of sixty-seven, remained as strong asever. But that did not meanthat his commitment to thesuccession of his ownbloodlinehadwavered.Now,when he suddenly foundhimself facing theunanswerablerealityofdeath,he spent his final hoursinsisting on his daughter’s

right to his throne. But theunexpectedness of his illnessallowed no time for remorseorreconciliation,andMatildawas not at his side when hedied during the night of 1December.Thenextmorning,hisbody

was carried to Rouen, whereit was reverently receivedintothehushedcathedral.Anexpert embalmer set to workon the corpse (‘lest it shouldrot with lapse of time and

offend the nostrils of thosewho sat or stood by it’,William of Malmesburyexplained), removing theinternal organs, which wereplacedinanurnandburiedatthe nearby church of Notre-Dame-du-Pré, before fillingthe body with aromaticbalsam, covering it with saltand sewing it into layers ofox-hide. It was thentransportedwesttoCaen,justtwenty miles from the

Norman coast, to lie in statein the austerely beautifulabbey church of St Etiennewhichhadbeenfoundedsixtyyears earlier by Henry’sfather, the Conqueror, andnow housed his tomb. Therethebierrestedforfourweeks,until in January 1136favourable winds at lastallowed the monks of StEtienne to escort the bodyacrosstheChanneltoHenry’sown foundation, the great

CluniacabbeyatReading,forburialbeforethehighaltarofthestilluncompletedchurch.Matildawasnotamongthe

noblemournersatthefuneralwhomade precious offeringsand distributed alms for thegoodofherfather’ssoul.For,bythen,herclaimsashisheirhad already been dealt anunexpected and desperateblow.

LadyofEngland

The chroniclers whodescribed the events of the

winter of 1135–6 made littlementionofMatilda.Theyhaddutifullyreportedtheoathstosupport her taken by theAnglo-Norman nobility in1127 and again in 1131, andWilliamofMalmesbury–themost sympathetic toMatilda’s cause – recountedHenry’s deathbed declarationof her right to succeed him.Butsheisconspicuousbyherabsence from mostcontemporary narratives of

the aftermath of her father’slastillness.That historiographical

absence reflects a physicalone. Henry’s strategic planfor Matilda’s marriage lefther strandedon the sidelines,with her husband in Anjou,ratherthanatthecentreoftheaction precipitated by hissuddendeath. Itwas not thatshewas slow to react. In thefirst week of December, assoon as the shocking news

came from Lyons-la-Forêt,Matilda rode north to seizecontrolofthedisputedbordercastles of Domfront, Exmesand Argentan that she hadbeen promised as her dowry.Shewas so successful in hermission that her grip on thisfrontier territory was nevershaken,anditwasfromthesefortresses that her campaignto claim Normandy andEngland would be launched.For the moment, however,

she could reach no further.Geoffroi was detained byrebellion in Anjou, whileMatilda, it seems, wasimmobilised by a pregnancythat had begun only a fewweeks before her father’sdeath. She established herhousehold at Argentan, thefour-toweredcastle thatKingHenry had built forty milessouth of Caen to serve as agarrison, a treasury and afavourite lodge from which

he could hunt in the nearbyGouffern forest. She gavebirth there to her third son,William,on22July1136.By that time, however,

eventsinEnglandhadmoveddecisively beyond her grasp.Had Matilda stood at thecentre of the Anglo-Normanpolitical stage when herfatherdied,atLyons-la-Forêtor Rouen, Westminster orWinchester, she would havebeen poised to assert her

claimtohisthroneashisonlylegitimate child, born in thepurple (that is, born to areigning king just as herfather had been, acircumstanceofwhichHenryhimself had made much inpressing his own right to thethrone thirty-five yearsearlier),her titlevalidatedbyHenry’s designation and thebarons’oathsofloyalty.Asitwas, she was barely even inthe wings. At her dying

father’s side, shemight havemade a credible figureheadfor unity, taking on Henry’sweightymantle as bringer ofpeace to his people. Instead,inherabsence,thenobleshadmore than enough reason tolookelsewhereforleadership.ForallHenry’sattemptsto

bindthefuturetohiswill,theonly precedents so farestablishedforthesuccessionof the Norman kings ofEngland favouredmightover

right.WilliamRufus in 1087and Henry himself in 1100hadwonthethronebyactingswiftly to seize the crown,and then fighting to retain it.The legitimacy of their rulewas born of their hold onpower, not the other wayround. In theory, Matilda’sclaim to be her father’s heirwas unanswerable, but inpracticeshewashamperedbymultiple disadvantages: shewas female; her husband,

whosestatusinrelationtoherclaim to the crown remaineddeeply ambiguous, was adistrustedoutsideramong thepowerfulmenshenowsoughttorule;andshewasnottherein person to counterescalating doubts anduncertainties.Meanwhile, thebaronswhohadaccompaniedHenry’s corpse from Rouento Caen went into conclaveduring the uncertain weekswhile they waited for the

wind to change for the longChannel crossing, andemergedwithaproposal thatthe crown should go to analternative candidate:Thibaud, count of Blois, sonof Henry’s formidably ablesisterAdela.Plausible though Thibaud

might have been as a ruler –at forty-five, he was aseasoned soldier andexperiencedpoliticianaswellas a royal nephew – the

magnates had overlooked thefactthattheprecedentsofthehalf-century since theConquest offered no moreconvincing support to theidea of a king chosen byelection than they did to theprospect of the hereditaryprinciple handing the crownto a king’s daughter.Someone else, however, hadbeen paying much closerattention to the lessons ofrecent history. While the

Norman barons debated andMatilda settled into herstronghold at Argentan,Thibaud’s younger brotherStephen, count of Mortain,left his wife’s county ofBoulogne at speed with thesmallest of retinues and tookship across the shorteststretch of the Channel fromWissant, Boulogne’s mainport, to Dover. Withoutpausing to gather support orsupplies, he rode the eighty

milestoLondonashardashecould.Hewaswelcomedintothe city before turningseventy miles south-west toWinchester, the historiccapital of Anglo-SaxonEngland, where his youngestbrother Henry was bishop.ThereStephentookcontroloftheheapedsilverandgold inthe royal treasury; andon22December, just three weeksafter KingHenry’s death, hewascrownedkingofEngland

in the vast Romanesquecathedral by the hastilysummoned archbishop ofCanterbury.Itwas1100alloveragain.

TheblueprintofHenry’sowncoup d’état after his brotherRufus’s death in the NewForest could scarcely havebeen followed moreassiduously. Speed andimplacable resolve had wonHenry the throne; and nowStephen had taken the crown

for himself before the noblesat Caen or Matilda atArgentan had an inkling ofwhatwashappening.In principle, Stephen’s

credentialsasapotentialkingwere questionable. He wasnoteven theseniormaleheirwithin his own family – hiselder brother Thibaud hadinherited their father’s landsand title as count of Blois –and his royal blood came inthe female line from his

mother Adela, whichsuggested no hereditarygrounds on which Matilda’sclaim, or that of her youngsons, should be disbarred infavourofhisown.Moreover,hehadmadegreatplayofhisloyalsupportofKingHenry’swishes over the succession,vying with his illegitimatecousin Robert of Gloucesterto be first among themagnates to swear allegiancetoMatildaasHenry’sheir in

1127. His victory in thatprecedence dispute, and hisprominence among the nobleoath-takers, now left himvulnerable to dangerousaccusations of perjury,something of which hisapologists among thechroniclers were all too wellaware. (Chief among them,the anonymous author of theGesta Stephani – The Deedsof Stephen – put into themouth of the dying King

Henry a conscience-wrackedacknowledgement that theoath had been extorted fromhis barons, as a basis fromwhich to argue that ‘anyforcible exaction of an oathfrom anyone has made itimpossibleforthebreakingofthat oath to constitute aperjury’.)But, while legalistic

theorising might cast ashadow over Stephen’spretensions, they were much

more plausible in pragmaticandempiricalterms.Afterall,King Henry himself haddefied the hereditary claimsof an older brother; andStephen’s character andexperience suggested that hemight be capable ofemulating his royal uncle inmorewaysthanone.Bynowin his early forties, a decadeolderthanhiscousinMatilda,Stephen hadmade his careeratHenry’s court.His uncle’s

favour had made him a richman–thekinghadgivenhimthe Norman county ofMortain in the south-west oftheduchyaswellasvaluablelands in England that madehimoneofthegreatestoftheAnglo-Normannobility–butStephen had had towork forhis rewards. Mortain was afrontier lordship, while hisEnglish estates had beenseized from magnates whohad opposed Henry in the

nameofRobertCurthoseandhis son William Clito.Stephen’spersonalinterests–now inseparable from hisloyalty to his uncle –therefore threw him into thefight against Clito and hisfollowers.Years of campaigning in

Normandy and Flanders hadestablished Stephen’sreputationasanenergeticandeffective soldier, while hispresence at Henry’s court as

the king’s most favourednephew made his name as aman of courtesy, generosityand charming good nature.The possibility that hemightone day come closer still tothe throne may even havebeen inHenry’smind duringthe unsettling years betweenthewreckoftheWhiteShip–in which Stephen had sonearly died – and Matilda’sunforeseen return fromGermany as an imperial

widow. Certainly, in early1125 his power and wealthwere exponentially increasedwhen Henry arranged hismarriage toMathilde,heiresstothecountyofBoulogne,analliance which brought himcontrol of the vital cross-Channel trading route to theLow Countries, as well asvast estates in the south-eastofEngland.If the thought that his

nephew might succeed him

had indeed occurred toHenry, it was summarilydiscardedafterhisdaughter’sreturn. But Stephen had notbeen so quick to relinquishthe idea. Beyond that, wecannotknowforcertainwhathe was thinking on hislightningdashacrossice-coldwater and frozen roads tosnatch the crown for himself– what form his ambitiontook, or how he justified hisactions,beyondthelikelihood

that he sought to keep thecount of Anjou, a neighbourand bitter enemy of thecounts of Blois, from takingpower in his royal wife’sname. Nor can we be surewhyMatildamadenogreatereffort, no more expansivemove, to stake her claim.William of Malmesburyoffers only the maddeninglyopaque observation that shedelayedanyattempttoreturnto England ‘for certain

reasons’. Was her healthbadly compromised by herpregnancyeven in itsearlieststages? Did she think thenobles who had knelt beforeher to swear their loyaltywould simply rally to hercause, leaving her waiting atArgentanforacclamationthatnever came? Or was it thereverse, a belief that herposition could only be madegood bymoremilitarymightthan she so far had at her

disposal?What we do know is that,

amidtheparalysingconfusionthatfollowedHenry’sdeath–news, after all, could travelonly as fast as a horse couldgallop, andmight already bedangerously old when itarrived–itwasStephenwhoseized the moment. Thisapparently easy-going mantapped into a vein ofimplacablesingle-mindednesstoofferdecisiveleadershipat

amomentwhenEnglandandNormandy were teetering onthe brink of chaos. (Therewas‘nooneelseathand’,theGesta Stephani declared,‘who could take the king’splace and put an end to thegreat dangers threatening thekingdom’.) And fortunesmiled on a man who foundhimself in the right place atthe right time. His home inBoulognewaswithinstrikingdistanceoftheEnglishcoast;

itsstrategicimportancetotheEnglish wool trade, togetherwith Stephen’s ownexperience of the wealthycloth townsofFlanders,wonhim a warm welcome in thecity of London; and hisformidable brotherHenry, asbishopofWinchester,wasonhandtobrokerhisacceptanceby theChurchand tosmoothhis path into the ancient seatofroyalgovernment.Above all, the key to

Stephen’s coup was thesolemn ceremony that tookplace in the incense-cloudedcathedralatWinchesteron22December.A coronationwasnotmerely – or not at all, inStephen’s case – a pageantforpublicdisplay;theserviceat Winchester was a hurriedaffair in the presence ofscarcely any noblemen andonlythreeprelates.Instead,itwasasacramentalrite,whichchangedforeverthemanatits

centre. Stephen entered thecathedral a claimant to thethrone;heleftitaking.Somemight think him a wrongfulking, and oppose his rule onthose grounds – but theycould not deny his kingship,whichhad takeneffectat themomentwhen thearchbishophad touched his head, breast,shouldersandarmswithholyoil. At that instant, theinterregnum that had begunwhen Henry took his last

breath at Lyons-la-Forêt wasended.In that instant, too, lay the

seeds of civil war. Matildawas the only surviving childofher father’smarriage,whohadbeen namedhis heir andreceivedoathsofloyaltyfromhis nobles. Stephen,meanwhile, had beenanointed and crowned asHenry’s successor. Twodistinct forms of royallegitimacy now stood in

direct opposition to oneanother, embodied in twodifferent people. And it wasclear that these rival claimscould be reconciled only invictoryforone,anddefeatfortheother.By the spring of 1136, it

seemed as though Stephenhad already won the fightwith a single blow. Matilda,weighed down by herpregnancy at Argentan, herhusband entangled in home-

grown revolt in Anjou, wasan irrelevance. In January,her cousin had stood in herplaceaschiefmourneratherfather’s lavish burial. Laterthatmonth,hiscontrolof theriches of the royal treasury,combinedwithhiscontactsinthe fertile recruiting-groundof Flanders, enabled him tomobilise an army ofmercenaries with astonishingspeed against King David ofScotland, Matilda’s maternal

uncle, who had overrun theEnglishfrontierfromCarlisleto Newcastle as soon as heheardofStephen’scoup.Themenacing size of Stephen’sforces – ‘greater than any inlivingmemory’, according tothe chronicler Henry ofHuntingdon – rapidlypersuaded David to come toterms, and the new king’ssuccess in seeing off theScots helped to convince theAnglo-Norman nobility that

theyshouldrallytoStephen’sstandard.What the country needed,

in the words of the GestaStepha ni, was ‘a king who,withaviewtore-establishingpeace for the commonbenefit, would meet theinsurgents of the kingdom inarms and would justlyadminister the enactments ofthe laws’. The oath Stephenhad sworn at his coronationhad promised his new

subjects justice; now he hadtaken up arms against ahostile invasion to imposingeffect. There could be nodoubt that it was Stephen –not his cousin Matilda, norhis elder brother Thibaud,whose candidacy for thethrone had withered in thebud once word of Stephen’scoronation began to spread –who offered the best chanceofmaintaining ‘peace for thecommon benefit’ across

EnglandandNormandy.Hereperceptionandrealityblurredandmerged:themorepledgesof allegiance the new kingsecured from among thenobles, the moreunhesitatingly he could bringto heel those who resistedhim;andthemoreeffectivelyopposition was crushed, themore magnates would bedriven to pledge him theirsupport.At Easter, the irresistible

logic of this virtuous circlewasplayedoutwhenStephenstagedaspectaculargatheringof his court, ‘more splendidfor its throng and size, forgold, silver, jewels, robes,and every kind ofsumptuousness, thanany thathad ever been held inEngland’, Henry ofHuntingdon reportedadmiringly. This theatricaldemonstration of themagnificence of his kingship

and his mastery of thekingdom–nowreinforcedbya papal letter approving hiscoronation and excusing theviolation of his oath ofloyalty to Matilda – securedtheattendance,andwithittheservice, of all but a smallhandful of the bishops andnobles of England andNormandy. It was anoccasion which combinedpromise and threat tooverwhelming effect, and its

glittering success wasconfirmed by the belatedarrival of Robert ofGloucester, Matilda’sillegitimate half-brother,whohad so farheldhimself alooffrom Stephen’s nascentregime.Gloucester was one of the

greatest noblemen in thecountry, powerful,charismatic and intenselyproud. He had been at hisfather’s bedside when he

died, and received from himan extraordinary cash legacyof £60,000 from which todistributewages and rewardsto Henry’s troops andhousehold. He mighttherefore have hoped to be akingmaker, even if hisbastardymeant that he couldnot be a king, and certainlythe idea that he should nowbe compelled to swearallegiance to a man withwhomhehadoncecompeted

for influence at his father’scourt cannot have been easytoswallow.ButbytheendofApril it was clear that thealternative to accepting thenew King Stephen wasimpotent and ultimatelydangerous isolation. (‘If hewere to resist,’ William ofMalmesbury argued on hisbehalf, ‘it would bring noadvantage to his sister ornephews,andwouldcertainlydo enormous harm to

himself.’) Gloucester’shomage – which wasperformed in return forconfirmationofhistitletohislands, and ostentatiouslywarmdemonstrationsofroyalfavour – thereforeacknowledged Stephen’striumph, and, in doing so,madethattriumphcomplete.Or so it seemed. The

winter of 1136 was a bitterone for Matilda. She hadplayedherpartinherfather’s

plans, entering into adistasteful marriage so thatshe and her sons would beready to inherit his throne,only to discover that it wasthe precedent of Henry’sactions rather than thepronouncement of hisintentions which determinedthe identity of his successor.She, who had once presidedin majesty over the imperialcourt, now found herselfembattledwithherthreeboys

in the frontier fortresses thatremainedheronlyfootholdinher father’s lands. Perhaps itwas a relief, in personalterms, that her partnershipwith her unloved husbandcould now function at adistance, as the politicalalliance itwas, rather than inunwanted intimacy. But, forMatilda, thedemandsofdutyandtheexerciseofpowerhadalways come beforesentiment or personal

satisfaction.Theveryconceptof private happiness, in fact,canscarcelyhavemadesensetoawomanwhohad leftherhome as a child of eight toliveoutapublicdestiny.Anyrelief, therefore, at aseparationmadenecessarybytheir joint campaign to pressher claim – with Geoffroinow launching regular raidsintoNormandyfromhisbasein Anjou – can only havebeen overshadowed by

frustration at their failure tomake any meaningfulheadway.On the other hand, they

were not, at least, beingdrivenbackfromtheNormanfrontiers, and that in itselfmight cause Stephenproblems. Normandy hadbeendisintegratingintochaosever since King Henry’sdeath. The duchy wouldalways be more difficult tocontrol thanEngland,sinceit

lacked the centralisedadministration that allowedEnglish government toregulate itself in the king’sabsence. It was no accidentthat Henry had spent morethan half of his time on theNorman side of theChannel,and the wisdom of thatdecisionwas confirmed oncehis commanding presencewas removed, when disputesbetween belligerent rivallandowners sprang bloodily

into life; ‘… stubbornNormandy, an unhappymother country, sufferedwretchedly from her viperbrood’, Orderic VitalislamentedfromhiscloistersatSt Evroult. ‘For on the verysame day that the Normansheardthattheirfirmrulerhaddied … they rushed outhungrilylikeraveningwolvesto plunder and ravagemercilessly.’Suchlawlessnessdidnotin

itself help Matilda’s cause,since, if the Norman baronsloathed each other, theydespised the Angevins more.In one raid lasting onlythirteen days, Ordericreported, Geoffroi’s forces‘made themselves hatedforever by their brutality’,burning homes, crops andchurches, plundering andslaughtering as they went.And, for as longas thearmythat fought in her name was

led by her husband andrecruited in Anjou, Matildawould struggle to be seen asthe daughter of the king ofEngland rather than the wifeoftheAngevincount.But,atthesametime,thefirstcrackswere beginning to appear inthe facade of Stephen’svictory; and the longerNormandy was left toimplode into violence, thewider those cracks mightbecome.

Question marks were firstraised over Stephen’sjudgement in the summer of1136,whenhefacedthetaskof extinguishingwhat shouldhavebeenthelastfewembersof resistance in England. Alord named Baldwin deRevières, who had givendevoted service to KingHenryandhisfamily,refusedto recognise Stephen as kingand fortified Exeter Castleagainst him. With

characteristic energy andspeed, Stephen racedwestwardtopinBaldwinandhis small garrison within thelooming walls of the castle,built on the Conqueror’sorders three-quarters of acentury earlier. There couldhave been no betteropportunity to display themilitary muscle that laybehind the theatricalsplendouroftheEasterCourt,andStephen’sarmytherefore

included not only hisformidable Flemishmercenaries but an imposingshow of the baronial forcesthat were now at the king’scommand.As the siege tightened in

the stifling heat of anexceptionally hot summer’ssun,thecastle’swellrandry.Its defenders survived for awhile by eking out theirsupplies of wine, but whenthe wine-barrels too were

emptyBaldwinwasforcedtoplead for the lives of hisfollowers. The garrison’sdesperation was obvious andpitiful. Baldwin’s wife cameto Stephen as a supplicant,barefoot, her long hairhanging loose, weeping ingrief and fear; and thedreadful effects ofdehydration were shockinglyevident, according to theGesta Stephani, in hercompanions’ ‘sagging and

wasted skin, the look oftorpor on their faces, drainedof the normal supply ofblood, and their lips drawnbackfromgapingmouths’. Itwas a churchman, Stephen’sbrotherHenryofWinchester,who argued that kingshiprather than humanity shoulddictate his response to theirpleas. Baldwin was a rebeland a traitor, and hisdestruction was not onlywarranted but necessary to

demonstrate the terriblepowerofStephen’srule.Others within the royal

camp, however, led by EarlRobertofGloucester,pressedformercy. To the acute eyesofBishopHenry,itwasclearthat theearl’s enthusiasmforleniency was closely relatedto his reluctance to joinStepheninthefirstplace,andthathiscovertagendawas toundermine rather thanreinforcetheking’sauthority.

But, despite Stephen’sinstinctivetalentforrapidanddecisive action, his royaluncle’s ruthlessness did notcomesonaturallytohim.Allhis life, his easy,unpretentious charm andgenerous good nature hadinspired genuine affection inthosearoundhim;butnowhewas about to discover thedisadvantages, to a king, ofbeing loved rather thanfeared. At Gloucester’s

urging, Stephen allowedBaldwin and his garrison togo free.As a result, the verypublic moral of the siege ofExeter was that resistance toStephenneedbeneitherfutilenorfatal.It was a lesson reinforced

eight months later by theking’sbelatedattempttotakecontrol of the spreadinganarchy in Normandy.Stephen’s regime could nothope to endure without

challenge if he failed toestablishanunshakeablegripon Normandy as well asEngland. His most powerfulsubjects held lands on bothsidesoftheChannel,andtheylookedtotheirkingtoprotecttheir interests on French aswell as English soil. But ittook Stephen more than ayeareventotakeshipfortheNorman coast; and he wasstill twenty-five miles fromthewallsofMatilda’sfortress

at Argentan when his armysuddenly disintegrated.Simmering hostility betweenStephen’s Flemishmercenaries and his Normanbarons erupted into violence,while the deep mutualsuspicion between the kingandRobertofGloucesterwaslaid bare when Gloucesteraccused Stephen of plottingto ambush and kill him. Theking and his closestsupporters retreated to

England after nine fruitlessmonths, leaving Normandyneitheratpeacenorprotectedfrom Angevin assault, withGloucesternowensconced inhis Norman power basearound Caen and Bayeux.Seven months after that, inJune 1138, the disaffectedearl publicly renounced hisallegiance to Stephen, anddeclared for his sisterMatilda.Gloucester’sdecisiontoset

himself up as his sister’schampiontransformedMatilda’s position beyondrecognition.Untilthesummerof1138,hershadbeena lostcause, supported only by theforces of her Angevinhusband, who was a hatedoutsider in Normandy, whileEngland itself remainedcompletelybeyondherreach.Now,ata stroke, the supportofherhalf-brothergaveherafoothold, and potentially an

army, at the heart of hercousin’s kingdom. AndStephen’s regime – whichhad once seemed, in theabsence of any viableopposition, so tightly wovenas tobeunassailable–beganto fray so badly that it waspossible for the first time toimagine it unravellingaltogether.Initially, it appeared that

the king might be doingenough to contain the

damage. In Normandy, thejoint forces of Earl RobertandCountGeoffroiwereheldoff by Count Waleran ofMeulan, the elder of twonoblebrothers,theBeaumonttwins, who were fastbecoming Stephen’s right-hand men. Meanwhile,StephenhimselfspedthroughEngland at the head of histroops, seizing castles andterritory that belonged toGloucester andhis followers.

Onceagain,hefailedtopresshome a siege, this time atBristol, where Gloucester’ssupporters were holed upwithin the earl’s massivefortress, a bastion built ofcreamy-pale limestonequarried from his lands nearCaen. But, if the king’sdecision to turn away fromthis daunting stronghold infavour of softer targets gaverenewed suggestions of anunwillingness to strike the

killer blow, that hardlyseemed to matter once themen ofYorkshire had ralliedat Northallerton around thestandard of their archbishopto defend the kingdomagainstMatilda’suncleDavidofScotland,whoseforceshadoverrun the north once morein the spring and summer of1138. Mustered around aship’s mast hung with thebannersofthepatronsaintsofthe great Yorkshire

cathedrals, St Peter of York,St John of Beverley and StWilfred of Ripon, toppedwith a gleaming silver pyxcontaining the consecratedhost,theEnglisharmyroutedthe Scots in less than twohours.Itwasaterribleandbloody

triumph, with thousands ofScots cut down by Englisharrows that ‘buzzed likebeesand flew like rain’. And itwas a wounding blow for

Matilda, given that her causein England, as inNormandy,was now identified with aninvading enemy beaten backby forces loyal to KingStephen. There could be nomistaking, if there had beenany doubt before, thatMatildaherselfwouldhavetostand at the centre of thecampaign to secure herinheritance. She needed herhusband for the sons he hadgiven her and for the troops

he now led, and her half-brother as an Anglo-Normanmagnate who could take herfight into the heart ofStephen’s kingdom. But thelegitimacy of her causedepended on Matilda alone.Her uniquely royal blood –despite the female body inwhich it was housed –represented the only hope ofchallenging the sanctity ofStephen’scoronation.In the spring of 1139,

therefore, Matilda at lastdecided to stakeherclaimaspubliclyandexplicitlyasshecould in direct defiance ofStephen’sholdonherfather’scrown. Her first step was tosend to Rome, in the hopethatPopeInnocentIIcouldbeconvincedtothrowthemoraland political support of theHoly See behind hercampaign. In April, BishopUlger of Angers crossed theAlps, as Matilda herself had

donebeforehim,toattendthesecond Lateran Council, agreat gathering of almost athousandprelatesfromacrosswestern Christendom. There,he presented her case:Stephen,hesaid,hadusurpedthe throne of England whichwas Matilda’s by right,thanks to her hereditary titleandtheoathsofloyaltyswornto her by the spiritual andtemporal peers of thekingdom.

In response, Stephen’srepresentative, a smoothlyfluent lawyer named Arnulf,archdeacon of the Normandiocese of Sées, made noattempt to engage with thesubstanceofMatilda’sclaim,instead trying to sweep itaside in its entirety byarguing that she was not, infact, her father’s legitimateheir. Her mother, QueenEdith-Matilda, Arnulfdeclared,hadnotsimplybeen

educatedinaconventbuthadmadeprofessionasanun;hermarriage to King Henry hadtherefore been invalid, andMatilda was no more thanone of Henry’s manybastards. It was a speciousargument as well as aninsultingone,sinceEdithhadtaken no vows, and herfreedom to marry had beenconfirmed by the saintlyAnselm, then archbishop ofCanterbury, almost forty

years before. But it servedStephen’s purpose, for thetime being at least. PopeInnocent had only justreturnedtoRomeafternearlyadecadeofschismwithintheChurch caused by disputesoverhisownelection,andhehad more pressing problemsat hand than England’sdistanttroubles.Hehadheardenough. Refusing to engageany furtherwith the lawyers’bickering, he halted the

hearing by reiterating theposition he had taken threeyears earlier, recognising thefait accompli of Stephen’scoronation and therefore hisstatusasking.The edifice of Stephen’s

rulewasstillholding,despitepublic argument in the papalcuria and the threat of morenoble defections in the wakeofGloucester’sdefiance.Butthestrainwasmoreandmoreapparent, with Stephen

himself constantly on themove in the effort to stampout resistance before it couldspread out of control, whiledoling out ever more lavishrewards from the depletedroyal treasury tomagnates inwhose loyalty he could trustless and less. ‘The kinghastened, always armed,always accompanied by ahost, to deal with variousanxieties and tasks of manykinds which continually

dragged him hither andthither all overEngland,’ theauthor of theGesta Stephanireporteddespairingly. ‘Itwaslike what we read of thefabled hydra of Hercules;when one head was cut off,two or more grew in itsplace.’ And in June 1139,tensionswithin the regime atlastreachedbreakingpoint.Thebackingofhisyounger

brother Henry, bishop ofWinchester, had been crucial

to the success of Stephen’scoup, and Henry – whoseunwavering commitment tothe interests of the Churchcoincided happily with hisflamboyantpersonalambition– had expected that his owneminence in spiritual andtemporalaffairswouldinduecourse be recognised by hiselection as archbishop ofCanterbury after the death ofthe elderly William ofCorbeil in 1136. But in

December1138,Henryfoundhimselfpassedoverinfavourof a much more obscurecandidate,AbbotTheobaldofBec, whose principalqualification appeared to behis association with theBeaumont twins, Waleran ofMeulan and Robert ofLeicester, the youngnoblemen whose influenceover Stephen was obviousand growing. Having shovedaside the pretensions of the

king’s brother, theBeaumonts next turned theirsights on Bishop Roger ofSalisbury, King Henry’sformer chief minister, who,alongwithapairofepiscopalnephews, Bishop Alexanderof Lincoln and BishopNigelof Ely, still controlled thechancery and the exchequer,theadministrative institutionsthrough which England wasgoverned. The three bishopshadat theirdisposalnotonly

thesubstantialpowersofpenand parchment but knightsand castles strategicallyplacedacrosstheirdioceses–and,inthefear-filledsummerof1139,itwasnotdifficulttopersuade the increasinglyparanoid king of the threattheir power might nowrepresent.More difficult was the

questionofhowtobringthemdown. Mere suspicion wasinsufficient grounds for the

arrest of a peer of the realm,but suspicion was all therewas. In the absence of anyconcrete evidence that thebishops were engaged intreasonable conspiracy,Waleran ofMeulan came upwith a ploy by which theymightbedisarmed.Whenthecourt arrived in Oxford inJune, one of the Beaumonts’nobleallieswaspersuadedtopickafightwiththebishop’smenovertheroomstheyhad

been allocated, a domesticdispute which turnedviolently ugly, as happenedall too readily when steelblades were a part ofeveryday dress. Butbloodshed within the boundsof the royal court, contrivedthoughitwasinthisinstance,constituted a breach of theking’s peace, for whichBishop Roger and hisnephews were summarilyarrested. They were sacked

fromtheirofficesintheroyaladministration,tobereplacedby Beaumont nominees, andtheir castle strongholds wereseized into the king’s handsalong with the treasure andtheweaponsstockpiledthere.The ruse was clear and –

thought Stephen’s brotherHenry – outrageous. BishopHenry was a stalwartdefender of ecclesiasticalrights, with lavishlyappointed and massively

fortified castles of his own.Hehadalsospentthemonthssincehehadbeendenied thearchbishopric of Canterburyworking furiously behind thescenes to secure his ownnomination as the pope’slegate in England, a rolewhich gave him even greaterauthority thanhewouldhavehad as archbishop. Hethereforehadbothmotiveandmeans to strike back againsthis brother’s betrayal, and

against the Beaumontbrothers,hishatedrivalswhoseemednowtobepullingthestrings of royal policy. As aresult,on29August,Englandwitnessed the extraordinaryspectacle of a king beingsummoned by his ownbrother to appear before aspecially convenedecclesiastical council oncharges that he had riddenroughshod over Churchliberties. Although the

council broke up after threedays of argument andcounter-argument withoutformalconclusion,itwasnowabundantly clear that, withevery move the mistrustfulkingmade to tightenhisgripon power, more of thecountry would slip throughhisfingers.Twenty-ninedayslater,for

the first time in eight years,Matildaherselfatlastsetfooton English soil. It had been

apparent for some time thatshe would have to take thefight to Stephen, rather thaninching forward from thesafety of her base atArgentan. Normandymattered, but the crownbelongedtoEngland,andshecould not hope to succeed ifher claim was not made areality there. The difficultywashowtoachievethatgoal.Herbrother’sdefectionmeantthat she could now, for the

first time, reach the Normancoast – only fiftymiles fromArgentan, but fiftymiles toofariftheterrainwashostile–via his fortress at Caen. Butthe south coast of Englandofferednowelcominghaven,sinceitsharbourswereunderStephen’s control. One ofGloucester’smenhadtriedtohold a gateway open bysecuring the earl’s castle atDoveragainstthekingduringthe previous year, but had

soon been overwhelmed byan intimidating fleet sent byStephen’s queen Mathildefrom her port at Boulogne.Meanwhile, the voyagearound Land’s End toGloucester’s stronghold atBristol was too dangerouslyuncertain to provide arealisticalternative.But during the summer of

1139 it emerged that therewas a chink in Stephen’sapparently impenetrable

defences.Thetoweringcastleat Arundel, overlooking itsown port on the navigableriver Arun just five milesfromthesea,wasthehomeofthe dowager queen, KingHenry’s widow Adeliza. Shewas now remarried toWilliam d’Aubigny, whomshehadcometoknowasoneof Henry’s most trustedhousehold attendants, and,after the barren years of herfirst marriage, the happy

couple were on the way toamassing a brood of sevenchildren. Outwardly, she andher new husband were loyalsubjectsofKingStephen,but,privately, Adeliza’ssympathies lay with herstepdaughter.Respect forherdead husband’s chosen heirwas reinforced by a personalrelationship–thetwowomenwerealmostexactlythesameage, and had spent asignificantamountof time in

each other’s company afterMatilda’s return fromGermany – and by an olddebt of gratitude forMatilda’spart in thepoliticalrehabilitation of Adeliza’sfather almost thirty yearsearlier, when the eight-year-old princess had performedher first formal act ofintercession as the emperor’sbride-to-beatLiège.Olddebtswereabouttobe

repaid. On 30 September

1139, a ship slipped quietlyinto the port of Arundel. Ahandful of its passengers –Robert,earlofGloucesteranda small, heavily armedbodyguardof loyal knights –disappeared almostimmediately, hooded andcloaked, to ride 120miles tothe safety of the earl’sfortress at Bristol, movingunder cover of night andacross open country to avoidStephen’s troops and spies.

The rest of the party –Matilda, with a much largermilitary escort of her own –was spirited inside theimpregnablewallsofArundelCastle.At last, shehad takenthe decision that she shouldabandon the battle forNormandy to her husband,and leave her three sons insafety under his supervision.Now, she hoped that supportfor her cause in England,which had so far achieved

some piecemealdisintegration of Stephen’sholdontherealm,mighttakemore threatening shapearound the rallying point ofherpresence.That, at least, was the

theory. In practice, news ofher arrival spread quickly,andStephen–whowasonlyninety miles away, ruing hisdecision toallowBaldwindeRevières to go free, since hewas now having to besiege

him again at Corfe Castle inDorset – immediatelymarched east to surround theex-queen Adeliza and herroyal guest at Arundel.Matilda,itseemed,wasathercousin’s mercy. But herdecision to expose herself tothis danger was more finelycalibrated than it appeared.By arriving at the head of aknightlyescortratherthananarmy,sheandherbrotherhadused Stephen’s weapons of

speed and surprise againsthim to make landfall inEngland before the kingcouldbewarnedofwhatwashappening. It was Robert ofGloucester who had openlydefied Stephen’s authority,and against whom the kingmight legitimately takereprisals; but, by travellingfast with the bare minimumof protection, the earl wasable to reach his power baseat Bristol before Stephen

could cut him off, amanoeuvre that would havebeen impossible hadMatilda– who, however great herstrengthofcharacter,wasnotusedtothephysicaldemandsof a soldier’s life – riddenwithhim.Meanwhile,Matildaherself

was left vulnerable toStephen’s advancing troops;but here it suddenly becameclear that her sex could, foronce, be used to her benefit

rather than her disadvantage.Matildawasthedaughterofaking, the widow of anemperor, and Stephen’s owncousin, who had beenwelcomedintothehospitalityof his predecessor’s queen.WereStephentowagewarontwo women of such exaltedstatus, he risked not onlyopprobrium but openrebellion from a far greaternumber of his subjects thanhe had so far faced. Even if

he were to decide that thiswas a risk worth taking, themighty fortifications ofAdeliza’s castle could noteasily be overrun, and ifStephen were pinned downby another lengthy siege,Robert of Gloucester wouldbe free to strike against himat will. Meanwhile, evenshould he succeed in takingArundel,itwasfarfromclearthatitwouldbeeitherlegallyor politically tenable to hold

Matildacaptive.Much better, the king’s

brotherBishopHenryargued,to allow her to joinGloucester in Bristol, sinceStephenwouldthenbeabletofightwithout restraintagainstan enemy hemmed into asingle place,well away fromthecrucialadministrativeandeconomic centres of thesouth-east. Reluctantly,Stephen stood down hispreparations for a siege and

gave orders that Matildashould be delivered into herhalf-brother’s care at a pre-arranged place within reachof Bristol by the uneasypairing of Bishop HenryhimselfandhisrivalWaleranof Meulan – a noble escort‘whichitisnotthecustomofhonourable knights to refuseto anyone’, William ofMalmesbury pointed out,‘eventheirbitterestenemy’.BishopHenry’sadvicewas

strategically sound, althougha less transparent characterthan Stephen might perhapshave hesitated beforeallowing his disaffectedbrother to ride a hundredmiles in the company of thecousinwhowas claiming histhrone. The opportunity toparley in private with thebishop was an unexpectedbonus for Matilda, whoserisky tactics had paid offhandsomely. Despite

Stephen’s best attempts tosecure his kingdom againsther, she had slipped, wraith-like, through his defences toreach the safety of her half-brother’s citadel at Bristol.Her situation there could notbe said to be strong –especially given that Stephenand his soldiers were nowheading westward towardsthem with their usualmenacing speed – but it wasinfinitely better than it had

beenwhenshewascoopedupat Argentan, able to do littlemore thanworry awayat thefringesofhercousin’spower.Now she could begin to

exploit themomentumofheradvance, recruiting to hercause men who had beenwaitingtodeclarethemselvesuntil opposition to Stephenwas no longer a do-or-diemissionforprincipled loners,but an unmistakably viablepolitical movement. Chief

among them were BrienFitzcount and Miles ofGloucester, two of the ‘newmen’ who had risen high inthe service of her father.Fitzcount, as his namesuggested,wasanillegitimateson of the count of Brittany,andhisservicetoKingHenryhad been rewarded withgrants of land in Wales andthe strategically valuablelordshipofWallingfordintheThames Valley. Miles of

Gloucester, meanwhile, hadacquired his toponymic byfollowing in the footsteps ofhis father and grandfather assheriffofGloucestershireandkeeperof theking’s castle atGloucester itself. Four yearsearlier,in1135,bothmenhadconcludedthatdiscretionwasthe better part of valour andacknowledged Stephen asking, but both now lost notime in committingthemselves to the newly

arrivedMatilda.Fitzcount, who had been

brought up in King Henry’shousehold,knewMatildaandherhalf-brotherwell. Indeed,heandRobertofGloucester–two bastard-born magnates,onetheking’snaturalson,theotheralmostanadoptedone–had been at Matilda’s sidemore than a decade earlierwhen she travelled to Rouenfortheunhappybetrothalthatpreceded her second

marriage. As an illegitimatechildwithnooffspringofhisown, Fitzcount’s familyloyalties were exclusivelyfocused on the royal dynastythat had welcomed andnurtured him, and theallegiance he now offered toMatilda was heartfelt andunshakeable. Just as well,given that it was only amatter of days before hisresolvewasbrutallytestedbythe arrival of Stephen’s

troops outside the walls ofWallingfordCastle.Thekingwas making impressiveheadway as he pushedwestwardacrosscountryfromArundel towards Bristol,seizingcastlesashewent.Heset a siege in train atWallingfordashepassed,andFitzcount – though hisgarrisonwaswellprovisionedand protected behind thecastle’s walls and doublemoat – was left isolated and

exposed, cut off from hisalliesinthewestcountryandfacingtwohastilyconstructedforts on the opposite side oftheriverfullofsoldiersintentonstarvinghimout,howeverlongitmighttake.If Brien Fitzcount was

Matilda’schivalricchampion,her most passionately loyalsupporter, then Miles ofGloucester brought to hercause a razor-sharp militarybrain. As Stephen advanced

on Bristol, Miles led acontingent of troops aroundbehind the king’s army andmarched on Wallingford.Suddenly, the soldiersStephen had left there foundthe tables violently turned.Miles’s men smashed theirway into thebesiegers’ forts,killingthosewhoresistedandtaking prisoner anyonewillingtosurrender.Withthesiege successfully lifted andFitzcount liberated, Miles

was poised – potentially atleast – to march on London.When the news reached theking,Stephenturnedhisarmyabout and raced back toprotect his capital, whileMiles – to whom theadvantagesofguerrillastrikeswere becoming increasinglyapparent – wheeled north toattack Worcester, of whichWaleran of Meulan was thenewearl.BythetimeStephenandhisright-handmanheard

whathadhappened thereandcame to the aid of thedevastated city, three weekshad passed and Miles waslonggone.A pattern had been set.

Matilda’s supporters couldnot strike a decisive blowagainstStephen’smuchlargerarmy,buttheycouldkeeptheking on the back foot withfeints and lightning strikes,darting just out of his reachwhile exhausting him in the

pursuit.Andthisbrutaldancebought Matilda time toconsolidate her west-countrypowerbase.Shemovedfromher half-brother’s castle atBristoltotheroyalfortressatGloucester, where her mostgifted commander Miles(who, the Gesta Stephanisaid, ‘always behaved to herlike a father in deed andcounsel’)wasinchargeofhersafety. Here, she was a rulerat the head of her own royal

household,notaclient inherbrother’s establishment. Shedid not yet have much thatwas tangible to offer in theway of privilege andpatronage,butshecouldgiveroyal promises of futurepreferment to those nobleswhowerepreparedtocastofftheirallegiancetoherrival.There were increasing

numbers of such men as themonths wore on, but fewerwhowouldsupporthercause

with the unswerving ferocityofthetriumvirateofMilesofGloucester, Brien Fitzcountand her brother, Earl Robert.As the magnates hesitated –some of them confusing notonly the chroniclers butStephen and Matilda tooabout where their loyaltieslay–therewasaterriblepriceto pay for the country. Thenetwork of Norman castlesthat had been constructedwith intimidating speed little

more than half a centuryearlier to pin down thepopulation of a newlyconquered land was nowatomised, each fortification aclosely defended island amida sea of devastation, thesurrounding countrysideplundered to supply localgarrisons, or reduced toblackened earth by hostiletroops. It was ‘a dreadfulthing’, said William ofMalmesburyinquietanguish,

‘that England, once thenoblest nurse of peace, thepeculiar habitation oftranquillity,had sunk to suchwretchedness’.Matildahaddonewell– if

ataheavycost–tomakeherchallenge so potent a realityon English soil, and she hadundoubtedly damagedStephen’s kingship; but herown claim to rulewas still along way from universalacceptance.And the riskwas

that this increasing anarchymight become a form ofviolent stalemate. BishopHenry, who saw the dangerthat the future might holdlittle but mutually assureddestruction, threw himselfinto the search for peace,presiding over a meeting atBath between Matilda’sbrotherRobert andStephen’squeen Mathilde, beforesailing across theChannel toconsult both Louis VII of

France and his own andStephen’s elder brotherThibaud of Blois.Withwhatproposals he returned we donotknow,but,whatever theywere, Matilda – who wasschooled in the hard-headedpolitics of the Empire, andconscious that hers was stillthe weaker hand – waspreparedtoacceptthem.Stephen, however,

preferred to fight.Perhapshebelievedthatwargavehiman

unanswerable advantageoveran opponent who could notleadherowntroops,andthathis own presence on thebattlefield would serve toremind his kingdom that hewas not only a king but awarrior, something thatMatilda could never be. But,if Matilda’s sex denied herthe benefits of militaryleadership, it also protectedher from the dangers ofwar.However great Stephen’s

triumphs,thiswasoneenemywhowouldneverbekilledorcaptured in combat. Stephenhimself, meanwhile, wasabouttolearnatfirsthandtheperilsthatawaitedakingwhostoodinhisarmy’sfrontline.The man who brought the

cat-and-mouseconflictat lastto the point of openconfrontation was Ranulf,earl of Chester, Robert ofGloucester’s son-in-law,whohad until now, despite his

marriage, remained at leastsuperficially Stephen’s man.The polar opposite of theloyalists Brien Fitzcount andMiles of Gloucester, Ranulfmade a principle only of hisown territorial interests. In1140, however, that meantseizing the opportunity tograbLincolnCastle from theharried king. The earl tookthe fortress by bare-facedtrickery:hesenthiswifeonasocial call to the castellan’s

lady, and then arrivedhimself, all smiles, to escorther home – but, oncewelcomed inside, he and hisknightlyattendantsambushedtheguardandbarredthegatesto all but the detachment oftroops he had stationednearby. Stephen had lost thefortress to a sucker punch,and only a lengthy siegecouldnowretrieveit.Wearily, the king decided

to tolerate this provocation

rather than confront amagnate who had not yetexplicitly defected toMatilda’s side.Butwhen thecitizens sent a surreptitiousmessage complaining aboutthe earl’s cruel and unjustbehaviour, and pointing outthat Ranulf and his familywere spending Christmas atthe castle with onlyperfunctory protection,Stephen could not resistcommitting himself to

another of the lightningassaults that were hisspeciality. He marched astrike force from London toLincolnbeforeTwelfthNighthad marked the end of theChristmas festivities, andbesieged the castle with thehelp of the disgruntledtownspeople. But, despiteStephen’s speed, Earl Ranulfhadalreadyslippedaway.Ashemadeforhisestatesinthenorthwest, he sent

importunate messages toMatilda’s camp, offering hisallegiance and appealing forhelpfromhisfather-in-law.Robert of Gloucester had

so far been unimpressed byhis son-in-law’s self-interested manoeuvring, buthis daughter, Ranulf ’scountess, remained undersiegein thecastle,andithadto be said that her unlovelyhusband’s defection was agodsend to Matilda’s cause.

Gloucester did not hesitate –and, this time, it wasStephen’sturntobetakenbysurprise.EarlRobertandEarlRanulf were almost outsideLincoln’s walls when theking realised that his smallforce was about to beattacked by a much largerarmy.Hisadvisersurgedhimto retreat and regroup, butStephen was a brave man,and the prospect of runningaway was repugnant to him.

His father’s life had beenblighted by a humiliatingaccusationof cowardiceafterhe had fled from a siege atAntioch while on crusadeforty years earlier, andStephenwasadamant thathewouldnot risk the same fate.Instead,hereadiedhis troopsforbattle.The chroniclers laced their

accounts of his preparationswith portents of impendingdisaster. On the night before

the armies met, a stormhowled around the city,hailstones lashing down,thunder rolling around theblackness of the skies. Atdawn the next morning,Sunday 2 February, whenStephen went to Lincoln’simmense cathedral tocelebrate the feast ofCandlemas, the flame of hiselaborate candle suddenlyflickered and died, and thewaxbrokeinhishands.Mass

had not yet ended when thepyx containing theconsecratedhostfellfromthechain that supported it andplungedontothealtar.‘This’,Henry of Huntingdon wrotewith the implacable certaintyof hindsight, ‘was a sign oftheking’sdownfall.’Stephen was not so

convinced that he facedinevitable defeat as he drewup his soldiers outside thewestwalls of the city.But it

took only minutes, once themassed cavalry of Robert ofGloucester and Ranulf ofChester began to charge, forhishopes tobe trampled intothe freezing mud. The kingstood firm at the head of hisinfantry in the centre of thefield, but the earls who ledwhat little cavalry he hadquickly decided to savethemselves and their men,rather than stay to faceannihilation. Their receding

hoof-beats drummed underthe din of battle as Stephenlaid abouthimwithhisgreatsword, steel striking on steeland slicing into flesh. Whenthe weapon shattered in hisgrip, he fought on with abattle-axe, Matilda’s menpressing ever closer, until atlastarockstruckhisheadandhe fell to the ground. God,whohadblessedhiskingshipin the hush of WinchesterCathedral five years earlier,

had clearly now changed hismind.Divine protection had not,

however, abandoned himaltogether.Hewasnotdead–merely concussed, anddistraught at the desertion ofmagnateswhohadswornhimtheir fidelity. He was also aprisoner. Stephen was firsttaken under guard 140 milessouthwest to face Matilda atGloucester Castle, and thenon to her half-brother’s

fortress at Bristol. There hewas initially treated withhonour, until his tendency towander from his quarters –‘especially at night, outsidehis appointed place ofcustody, after deceiving orwinning over his guards’, asWilliam of Malmesburypointedly explained –persuaded Earl Robert tokeep the king humiliatinglyanduncomfortablychainedinirons.

A little more than fiveyearsafterher father’sdeath,Matilda found herself at lastwithin reach of his throne.She had come face to facewith the cousin who hadusurped her crown – but thechroniclers remaintantalisingly silent about thedetails of this fraughtmeeting, as theydid sooftenwith climactic events in herlife. The author of theGestaStephani (possibly Robert of

Lewes, the bishop of Bath,but, whoever he was,certainly a partisan ofStephen’s with close ties tothe king’s brother BishopHenry) was so hostile toMatilda that he could barelybring himself to name her.Where he did so, it was as‘the countess of Anjou’, thedisparaging title she herselfspurned, while elsewhere inhistextsheappearsobliquelyas‘KingHenry’sdaughter’or

‘the earl of Gloucester’ssister’. William ofMalmesburywasmuchmoresympathetic to Matilda’scause, although the hero ofhis narrative is not Matildaherself but her half-brotherEarl Robert, ‘who’, Williamtells us admiringly, ‘for hissteadfast loyalty anddistinguished merit, has pre-eminently deserved that therecollection of him shall livefor all time’. Neither writer

was willing – or, probably,able – to give any sense ofMatilda’s own experience ofthis violent turn of fortune’swheel. It seems likely thatthis was the first time thecousins had met sinceStephen had knelt beforeMatilda ten years earlier torenew his oath to recogniseher as her father’s heir. Butwhether she greeted thecaptivekingwithcolddisdainorblazinganger–anythingin

between seems less easilyimaginable, given herforceful temperament – wecannotknow.What is clear is the chain

reaction triggered byMatilda’s triumph. Herhusband, Geoffroi of Anjou,advanced into Nor mandyand, through a well-judgedmix of negotiation andmilitary manoeuvring, beganan apparently inexorableannexation of the duchy on

her behalf. In England,meanwhile,Stephen’ssupportwas crumbling. Someloyalists were driven fromtheircastlesatswordpointbyMatilda’s resurgentsupporters, but more madethe calculated decision tothrow in their lot with hercause.Justasavirtuouscircleof pragmatic political logichad allowed Stephen toestablish his kingship in thewakeofhiscoup, soMatilda

now appeared to carry allbefore her. The battle ofLincoln had reversed thepolarity of politics; thereseemed no prospect thatStephen – like RobertCurthosebeforehim–wouldever emerge fromhis prison,and magnates with territorialand dynastic interests todefend on either side of theChannelthereforehadtofacetherealityofhervictory.Matilda herself proceeded

with deliberation. Stephenwas safely in chains, but hewas still an anointed king,and to vindicate thelegitimacy of her rule shewouldneedthebackingoftheChurch if her ownprospective coronation wereto supersede his. Above all,there was one man whosesupport she needed: BishopHenry of Winchester, herown cousin, Stephen’sbrotherand thepope’s legate

in England. The groundmayalreadyhavebeenlaidduringtheir long ride together fromArundel to the outskirts ofBristol afterMatilda’s arrivalin England sixteen monthsearlier. Certainly, agreementwasquicklyreachedwhenthetwomet again on 2March –exactly a month after thebattle at Lincoln – on opengroundnear thebishop’scityof Winchester. Matildapromised that she would

consult him on all importantmatters of government; inreturn, BishopHenry offeredherhisoathofallegiance,andsurrendered the much-depleted royal treasury atWinchester into her hands.Thenextday,hereceivedherinceremonialprocession intohis cathedral, where a dozenbishops and abbots hadgathered towelcomeher intothe sacred place whereStephenhadbeencrowned.

Four weeks later, whileMatilda waited behind thefifty-foot walls of OxfordCastle, her new ally BishopHenry rose to speakbefore aspeciallyconvenedcouncilofthe Church at Winchester.WilliamofMalmesbury,whowas there, gives a first-handaccount of the address. ThegreatKingHenry, thebishopdeclared, had left Englandand Normandy to hisdaughter Matilda. However,

when he died, ‘because itseemedtedioustowaitforthelady, who made delays incoming to England since herresidencewas inNormandy’,BishopHenrycontinued,inastartlingly smooth piece ofhistorical revisionism,‘provision was made for thepeace of the country andmybrotherallowedtoreign’.ButStephen, he explained, hadfailed in his office: ‘Nojustice was enforced upon

transgressors, and peace wasatoncebroughtentirelytoanend,almostinthatveryyear;bishops were arrested andcompelled to surrender theirproperty; abbacies were soldand churches despoiled oftheir treasure; the advice ofthewickedwashearkenedto,thatofthegoodeithernotputinto effect or altogetherdisregarded.’ As so often,Bishop Henry’s genuineconcernforpeaceandforthe

interests of the Churchdovetailed seamlessly withthe certainty that his owninfluence–‘theadviceofthegood’,ashemodestlyputit–shouldprevail.And that advice was now

clear. God had spoken, andStephenwasaprisoner.Aftersober consultationamong theranks of the assembledclergy, England’s Churchpronounced its judgement inthe voice of Bishop Henry

himself: ‘We choose as ladyof England and Normandythe daughter of a king whowasapeacemaker,agloriousking, awealthy king, a goodking, without peer in ourtime, and we promise herfaithandsupport.’‘Lady of England’ was a

nebulous,ambiguoustitle,butalso a telling one. To beEngland’s lady – domina, inthe Latin spoken by BishopHenry and his ecclesiastical

colleagues – was to exercisedominium, that is, power orlordship, of the kind that herroyal father had enjoyed.Allthatremainedwastoproceedto Westminster, to takecommand of her capital andtobeanointedas anewkindof queen – one who wouldrule in her own right, not asher husband’s helpmeet. Thecrown,itseemed,wasfinallyhers.

GreatestinHerOffspring

Now,atlast,Matildastoodatthe heart of politics, and the

chroniclers could no longerkeepheratthemarginsofthestoriestheytold.Buttheydidnot likewhat they saw. ‘Shewas lifted up into aninsufferable arrogance’,Henry of Huntingdondeclared censoriously, ‘…andshealienatedtheheartsofalmosteveryone.’Theauthorof the Gesta Stephani, whohaduntilnowtreatedherwithdisdain, also reacted withwithering disapproval: ‘she

had brought the greater partof the kingdom under hersway,andon thisaccount…she was mightily puffed upandexaltedinspirit’.Ithasbecome thedefining

account of the difficultiesMatilda faced at this, thecrucial moment when thekingdom lay within herhands. More than eighthundredyearslater,historianshave had no hesitation inendorsing the same damning

verdict.‘Allchroniclersagreethatinherhourofvictoryshedisplayedanintolerableprideand wilfulness,’ one of themost perceptive writers onthe period remarks; whileanother, more gently but noless categorically, explainsthat‘hereforthefirsttimeanaspectofhercharacter,whichhadnot so farbeenapparent,wastoletherdown’.Butitisstrikingthatnotall

thechroniclersdidinfactjoin

this critical chorus. WilliamofMalmesbury, for example,didnotchoosetocontrasthiseulogisingaccountoftheearlofGloucester’s ‘restraint andwisdom’ with any explicitcriticism of ‘that formidablelady’, his hero’s half-sister.And another source gives usanaltogetherdifferentportraitofMatilda’s approach to herroyal destiny. The abbot ofGloucester, a renownedscholarnamedGilbertFoliot,

suppliedBrienFitzcountwitha sophisticated legal andtheological defence ofMatilda’sclaim,inthecourseof which he penned anelegant sketch of the formerempress as a devoted royaldaughter.

…inaccordancewithher father’s wishes shecrossed the sea, passedover mountains,penetratedintounknown

regions,married thereather father’s command,and remained therecarryingoutthedutiesofimperial rule virtuouslyand piously until, afterherhusband’sdeath,notthrough any desperateneed or feminine levitybut in response to asummons from herfather, she returned tohim.Andthoughshehadattained such high rank

that, it is reported, shehadthetitleandstatusofqueen of the Romans,she was in no waypuffedupwithpride,butmeekly submitted in allthings to her father’swill…

Foliot’s approving

description of a modestlydutiful woman in the yearsbefore 1135 is, of course, apartisan portrayal in pursuit

of a political argument – butthe same is also true of thehostile Gesta Stephani, thechief witness for theprosecution in theyearsafterKing Henry’s death. Andcloser examination of theGesta’s account ofMatilda’sconduct after the battle ofLincoln demonstrates thatcriticism of the ‘intolerablepride’ with which sheresponded to her rival’sdefeat cannot for a moment

be taken as the product ofcoolly neutral observation.‘She at once put on anextremely arrogantdemeanour instead of themodest gait and bearingproper to the gentle sex,’ theGesta’s author complained,and‘begantowalkandspeakanddoall thingsmorestifflyand more haughtily than shehad been wont, to such apoint thatsoon, inthecapitalofthelandsubjecttoher,she

actually made herself queenof allEnglandandgloried inbeingsocalled’.The Gesta’s support for

Stephen’s cause isunmistakablehere–butsoistheextenttowhichthewriteristroubledbytheveryideaofa woman holding power inher own right. Matilda wasfacing the challenge ofbecoming queen of England(a title which, despite theGesta’s affronted protests,

shedidnotyethave)–notinthe conventional sense of aking’s partner, but in theunprecedented form of afemale king. And kings didnot deport themselveswith a‘modest gait and bearing’.Instead,theywere–andwererequired to be – supremelycommanding andauthoritative, as her fatherand her first husband hadbeen. William ofMalmesbury’s admiring

description of King Henryhad made the pointinsistently:

The standard of hisjusticewasinflexible;hekepthissubjectsinorderwithout disturbance andhis nobles without lossof dignity … If any ofthe more importantlords, forgetting theiroath of allegiance,swervedfromthenarrow

path of loyalty, he usedat once to recall thestrays by prudentcounsel and unremittingefforts, bringing therebelliousbacktotoeingthe line by the severityof the wounds heinflicted on them. Norcould I easily recountthe long-continuedlabours he expended onsuch people, leaving noactionunpunishedwhich

could not be committedby the disaffectedwithout someimpairment of his royaldignity.

Insuchcircumstances,itis

hard to imagine quite whatHenrywould have had to doto be accused of acting with‘insufferable arrogance’. Theexpectation of unquestioningobedience, and thepunishmentof thosewhodid

not comply with hiscommands,were indissolubleelements of his kingship. Hebelievedinhisownauthority,and there could be nosuggestionofunwontedpridein the fact that he requiredothers to acknowledge it.How, then, could Matildaachieve a ‘royal dignity’ tomatch her father’s if shecould employ only the‘modest gait and bearingproper to the gentle sex’ to

commandherkingdom?We could perhaps argue

that the context of violence,division and turmoil withinwhichMatilda was forced toassert herself meant that sheneeded to tread particularlycarefully, to avoid alienatingthose who did not yet sharetheunwaveringloyaltyofherinnermost coterie. But herfather had also had to fightfor his throne against thepressingclaimsofarival,and

for both Henry and Stephentoo, in equally troubledcircumstances, it was clearthat acting like a king –inhabiting the role withabsolute conviction – wasessentialifthekingdomwereto be convinced that thecrownwasontherightman’shead. In fact, those elementsof Stephen’s character thatwere less than imperiousserved to raise questionsabouthisauthorityratherthan

reinforcing it: his affablegenerosity, for example(‘such a kindly and gentledispositionthathecommonlyforgotaking’sexalted rank’,theGesta noted), or his lightvoice,sosoftthathehadhadto depute someone else torouse his troops with abattlefield speech before thefightingatLincoln.Thetruthofthematterwas

that Matilda found herselftrapped. She urgently needed

to show that she was acredible ruler. Her sex hadalready prevented her fromleading her own army intobattle, but this, at last, washerchancetoprovethatbeinga woman (and a womanstandingalone,giventhat theman to whom she wasmarried was neither presentin England nor a politicalasset there) need notconstrainhercommandinthecouncil chamber. But when

she sought to emulate herformidablefatherandherfirsthusband, the two great kingswhoserulesheknewbest,sheencountered not awestruckobedience, but resentment ofa ‘haughtinessand insolence’that was deemed unnaturalandunfeminine.Thatmuchisclearfromthe

Gesta’sspecificobjections toher conduct on what shouldhave been her triumphalapproach to London. First,

theGesta claimed, she failedtoshowduedeferenceto‘thechief men of the wholekingdom’, the chronicler’spatron Bishop Henry ofWinchesterprominentamongthem.

… she did not riserespectfully, as sheshould have, when theybowed before her, oragree to what theyasked, but repeatedly

sent them away withcontumely, rebuffingthem by an arrogantanswer and refusing tohearken to their words;and by this time she nolonger relied on theiradvice, as she shouldhave, and had promisedthem, but arrangedeverythingassheherselfthoughtfitandaccordingtoherownarbitrarywill.

What this boils down to,when issues of style andsubstancearedisentangled,isthat Matilda did not doexactlywhatheradviserstoldher–andonecanonlyguesswhatKingHenrywouldhavesaidtothesuggestionthathiscounsellors should have thelastwordinhisgovernment.Secondly, she summoned

the richest of London’scitizensandaskedthemforalarge sum of money as a

contribution to her royalexpenses,arequestmade‘notwith unassuming gentleness,butwithavoiceofauthority’,the Gesta explaineddisapprovingly. When theybegged to be excused,pleadingpoverty,‘she,withagrim look, her foreheadwrinkled into a frown, everytraceofawoman’sgentlenessremoved from her face,blazed into unbearable fury’,declaring that the Londoners

had lavished their wealth onStephen’s cause, ‘andtherefore it was not just tospare them in any respect ormake the smallest reductioninthemoneydemanded’.Thecitizens – here portrayed asinnocentsabashedbyherrage– returned in anxious gloomtotheirhomes.Bothoftheseincidentsalso

appear in William ofMalmesbury’s moresympathetic account – but in

strikingly different form.WilliamomitsanymentionofMatilda’s financial demandson the citizens of London,explaining instead that theinhabitants of the capital,‘who had always been undersuspicion and in a state ofsecret indignation, then gavevent to expressions ofunconcealed hatred’ towardsher. Meanwhile, Matilda’ssupposedly high-handedtreatmentofheradvisershere

becomes a specific disputewithBishopHenry, themostrecent convert to her cause,and one whose support waspredicated on his hopes ofimposing his own influenceon her rule. The bishopwanted Stephen’s personalestates, the rich andstrategically vital counties ofMortain and Boulogne (thelatter including vast tracts oflandinEssexandKent),tobecommitted to Stephen’s

twelve-year-old son Eustacefor as long as his fatherremained in prison. Matildaunderstandably refused,unwilling to hand over suchpower to a boy who wouldinevitably see her as theusurper of his royalinheritance – at which thebishop, ‘enraged by thisaffront’, left her court andbegan at once to plot againsther.Between claim and

counterclaim, it is clear thatMatilda faced two pressingand intractable problems: herrelationship with BishopHenry, without whom shewould not have beenrecognised as ‘lady ofEngland’, but who expectedas the price of his backing adegree of control over royalpolicythatnomonarchcouldtolerate; and the attitude ofthe Londoners, whoseoverwhelming economic

interest in the trade routethrough Boulognepredisposed them to supportStephen’sclaimtothecrown,an alliance which Stephenhimself had cemented withexpansive promises of royalfavour. But the minuteMatilda tried to tackle thoseproblemswithwhatherfatherwould have recognised askingly authority, she wasaccused of acting with aheadstrong arrogance

unbecomingtohersex.That is not to say that her

decisions and her behaviourwere beyond reproach. It isnot difficult to imagine thatthe daughter of thedomineeringKingHenry – awoman who had been raisedinimperialsplendourandwasnow for the first timewielding power that shebelievedhadbeenstolenfromher – might have been lessthansubtleinhertreatmentof

former opponents. At thesametime,itisnoteasy,evenwith hindsight, to decidewhether confrontation orconciliation was the betterwayof dealingwith those ofher subjects whoseprofessions of new-foundloyalty seemed likely to bethe thinnest of politicalveneers.Butwecanbemoreconfident in rejecting thesuggestion that ‘an aspect ofher character, which had not

so far been apparent … lether down’. Matilda’sfledgling regime was notcrippled by the suddenrevelation of previouslyundetected personal flaws.Instead, she was taking herfirststepsinthenewpersonaof a female monarch – andfound herself stumbling overthe implicit contradictionsbetween being a woman andbeingaking.Could any woman have

kept her footing? It seemsunlikely. As Matilda madepreparations at Westminsterfor the coronation she hopedwould transform her fromEngland’sladytoitsreigningqueen, she faced resistanceledbyanenemywhoshowedthat,intheexerciseoffemalepower, context waseverything. Stephen himselfwas doing little from hisprisoncellinBristolCastletostiffen the resolve of those

who still hesitated to acceptMatilda’s victory. (Hischaracteristic mildness wassuchthat,whenvisitedbythearchbishop of Canterbury, aconsummate politicalpragmatist who ‘thought itunbefittinghis reputationandposition’ to transfer hisallegiancetoMatilda‘withoutconsulting theking’,Stephengave him ‘a courteouspermission tochangeoverasthe times required’.) But his

cause was kept alive by hisqueen, Mathilde, a womanevery inch as formidable asMatilda herself, but onewho– acting as she was in thename of her incarceratedhusband – escaped any kindofcensure.Mathilde began by

adopting the classic pose ofthe queen consort asintercessor, begging BishopHenry’s council atWinchester not to recognise

Matilda’s claim, and, whenthat intervention failed,writing to Matilda herself toask‘forherhusband’sreleasefrom his filthy dungeon’.Once it became clear,however, that gracefulpleading would get hernowhere, shedidnothesitateto resort to brute force –uncompromisingly gritty andresolute behaviour for whichshe was not castigated butlauded. The author of the

Gesta Stephani had scarcelytaken a breath after beratingMatilda for abandoning ‘themodest gait and bearingproper to the gentle sex’when he launched into apaean of praise to Stephen’squeen: ‘… forgetting theweakness of her sex and awoman’s softness’, he wrotewithobviousadmiration,‘shebore herself with the valourof a man’. In thecircumstances,Matilda could

have been forgiven fordespairing at the doublestandard by which she wasdubbed an unnatural viragoand her opponent a paragonofAmazonianvirtue.Mathilde’s strategy was

one of violent confrontation.She mustered her husband’sFlemish mercenaries undertheir able commander,William of Ypres, andmarchedthemfromherlandsinKent to the south bank of

the Thames, separated onlyby a narrow stretch of riverfromLondon’scitywallsandfrom Matilda’s residence inthe palace of Westminster,which lay a mile and a halfoutside the capital to thewest. There Stephen’s queenorderedthatthis‘magnificentbody of troops’ should ‘ragemostfuriouslyaroundthecitywith plunder and arson,violenceand the sword’.TheLondoners looked on in

horror, the Gesta Stephanireported with a touch ofbathos, as ‘their land wasstrippedbeforetheireyesandreduced by the enemy’sravagestoahabitationforthehedgehog’.Queen Mathilde was

demonstrating with single-minded aggression that thewould-be Queen Matildacould not protect her capitalfrom the depredations of anarmy loyal to her rival.As a

result, Matilda’s triumphsuddenlybegantoseemmoreillusorythanreal.Andthatinturn undermined theLondoners’ reluctantrationale for deserting a kingwhose territorial powerdovetailed with their owntradinginterests,andwhohadwooedthemwithpromisesofprivileged self-government.While Matilda remainedpreoccupiedwithherplannedcoronation, the decisive

moment at which she wouldat last become England’sanointedruler, thecitizensofhercapitaldespatchedenvoysto parley in secret withStephen’s queen – and theresult, for Matilda, wasnothing shortof catastrophic.On24June1141, justas shewas about to sit down to abanquet designed as aprecursor to her ceremonialentry into London, the city’sbellsbegan to toll inhideous

cacophony, its western gatesswungopenandthousandsofLondoners swarmed acrossthe fields towardsWestminsterwithweaponsintheirhands.Inshock,Matildaand her attendants ran fortheir horses and fledwestwards, making for thesafetyofhercastleatOxford,while themob ransacked herlodgings and trampled theuneaten feast into the dirt.She had lost England’s

capital;andwithitherchanceto be crowned England’squeen.It was, said the Gesta

Stephani,asthoughStephen’ssupporters were ‘bathed inthe light of a new dawn’.Among those soaking up itsrays was Bishop Henry ofWinchester, who just twomonths earlier hadproclaimed Matilda Lady ofEngland,and‘cursedallwhocursedher,blessedthosewho

blessed her, excommunicatedthose who were against her,and absolved those whosupported her’. Now, havinglefthercourtandretreatedtohis episcopal palace atWinchester, he summarilyretracted this anathema andcomplained to anyone whowould listen about Matilda’sdisgracefully assertiveconduct – ‘that she hadwishedtoarresthim;thatshehad disregarded everything

shehadsworntohim;thatallthe barons of England hadkept their faith with her butshe had broken hers, beingunabletoshowrestraintintheenjoyment of what she hadgained’. Queen Mathilde, itturned out, had played herpart in encouraging herbrother-in-law’s defection aswellasthatoftheLondoners,although in thebishop’scaseshehadshrewdlytakenontheego-massaging persona of

humble petitioner rather thanavenging Amazon. (BishopHenry had been moved, theGes ta Stephani solemnlyexplained, ‘by the woman’stearful supplications, whichshepressedonhimwithgreatearnestness…’)Matildasoonlearnedofhis

betrayal, and, once she hadrallied her forces after herchaotic flight from London,she made for Winchester atthe head of her army,

intending to secure the cityand its treasury, anddemandingthatBishopHenryappear before her to explainhimself. But the bishopmanaged to slip away fromhis episcopal palace in thesouth-east of the city just asMatilda arrived at the royalcastleinthewest.Herforces,led by her brother Robert ofGloucesterandherright-handmenMilesofGloucesterandBrien Fitzcount, had to

content themselves withbesieging the garrison thebishop had left behind. Asthey settled into the city forwhatpromisedtobealengthyblockade,theyhadnoinklingthat Bishop Henry hadappealed for help to QueenMathilde,andthatWilliamofYpres’s mercenaries wereeven at that momentadvancing on the city andwouldsoonencircleit.It was Lincoln all over

again: a great nobleman hadslippedthenetofasiegelaidagainst him and summonedan army to besiege thebesiegers. But this time theroleswerereversed.Thistimeit was Matilda’s forces,laying siege to a smallgarrisonwithinacityfortress,whowere ambushed by theirenemy’s sudden arrival. Asthe violence intensified –with the city engulfed inflames after Bishop Henry’s

men threw burning brandsintothestreets,whileWilliamof Ypres tightened hisstranglehold on thesurroundingcountryside–theurgent need to secureMatilda’s safety becamestarkly apparent. On Sunday14 September, Robert andMiles of Gloucester ralliedtheir troops for a final stand,hoping against hope to fighttheirwayout,butintentatallcosts on winning time for

Matilda’sescape.Inthat,theysucceeded:Matilda fled fortymiles north-east to Devizes,ridingastrideherhorselikeaman for greater speed, thedevoted Brien Fitzcount atherside.Herprostrationaftertwo unrelenting days in thesaddlewas such that shehadto be carried the rest of theway toGloucester on a littertied between two horses (‘asthoughshewasacorpse’,onechronicler remarked – an

observation which wouldlaterspawnwildrumoursthatshehadbeensmuggledoutofWinchesterinacoffin).Butthepriceofherescape

washigh.Soonafter shehadreachedtherefugeofherownimpregnable castle, Miles ofGloucester arrived at itsgates, no longer the proudcastellan but a lone fugitive,exhausted, alone and half-naked, his armour discardedinhisflight.Andheborebad

news. Matilda’s brotherRobert had tried to hold outtoo long, and had beensurrounded and captured.With his imprisonment, thelast traces of Matilda’striumph at Lincoln werestripped away. Her brotherwas indispensable to hercause,becauseof themenhecommanded and the land hecontrolled – and now hisfreedom could only besecured by giving up the

biggest prize of all: Stephen,who was still languishing inconfinementatBristolCastle.Elaborate arrangements

were put in place for theexchange of prisoners.Stephen was set free on thearrival at Bristol of hiswife,Mathilde, and younger son,William,whoweretobeheldthere with all honour assurety for Earl Robert’ssafety. Two days later, onceStephen had ridden to

Winchester and beenwelcomed by his supportersthere, Earl Robert set out inthe opposite direction,leavinghisownsonbehindasa guarantee of the queen’swellbeing.Whentheearlhadbeen safely received withinthe walls of his fortress atBristol,Mathildeandhersonwere allowed to return toStephen’s side, and Robert’sson was then released in histurn. With this stately

diplomatic pavane along theroad between Bristol andWinchester, the two sidesonce again took up thepositions they had occupiedeight months earlier, andBishop Henry called yetanother Church council torubber-stamphislatestabout-turn (‘saying that he hadreceived the empress not ofhis own will but undercompulsion…however,Godinhismercyhadgivenaffairs

a different course from whatshe had hoped, so that hemight avoid destructionhimselfandrescuehisbrotherfrom bondage …’). It wasalmost as though Matilda’smomentoftriumphhadneverhappened.Butnotquite.Thedramatic

reverses that took placebetween February andNovember 1141 leftpermanent scars on the political landscape, the profound

significance of which onlygradually became apparent.While Stephen’s supportershadbeenoccupiedinthefightto secure his freedom inEngland, across the waterMatilda’s husband, Geoffroiof Anjou, had seized theopportunity to advancesteadily into centralNormandy, and his presencein the duchy was now sostrong that many magnateswhose estates lay principally

on the Norman side of theChannelsawnooptionbuttorecognisehisauthority.Therecould be no clearerdemonstration of the newreality of Geoffroi’s powerthan the defection fromStephen’scauseoftheking’sfavourite, Waleran ofMeulan, who had fought inStephen’sarmyin theroutatLincoln but came to termswith Geoffroi in Normandyonly six months later. From

thispointon,Waleranandhistwin brother, Robert ofLeicester, would play adelicate game in order tosafeguardtheirfamily’slandson both sides of the sea –Waleran in Normandy withMatilda’s husband, andRobert in England withStephen, each brother, fromsupposedly opposite sides,doinghisutmost tominimiserisk to the family’s interests.DespiteStephen’s resurgence

in England, therefore, it wasclear that, unless he couldfind some way to haltGeoffroi’s seeminglyunstoppable momentum inNormandy, ultimate victorywouldalwayseludehim.At the same time,Matilda

had discovered quite howdeepresistancerantotheideathat she might rule forherself. It was one thing forthemagnates toacknowledgethat the line of legitimate

succession might deposit thecrownonafemalehead;quiteanother, it turned out, forthem to accept that awomanshould exercise power likeanyotherking.Herhusband’smilitary successesundoubtedly meant thatStephen would struggle toobliterate Matilda’s claimscompletely;ontheotherhandshetoowouldhavenochanceofwinningadecisivevictoryif the greatest strength of

thoseclaims– the theoreticallegitimacy of her personalrule–couldnotinfactbeputintopractice.For themoment, however,

the implications of thisstalemate remainedunexamined,as the twosidesmanoeuvred for thebestnewfoothold in theold terrainonwhich they now foundthemselves. Stephen set outonyetanothermilitarysweepacross his kingdom, but was

halted at Northampton inMay by a bout of seriousillness. Matilda, meanwhile,tookadvantageof this lull inhostilitiestosendherbrother,Earl Robert, toNormandy tosolicitmilitary help fromherhusband; but Geoffroi –whose principal concern wasthe conquest of Normandyrather than the pursuit of hiswife’s royal title in distantEngland – found the earl’spresence so useful, as a

commander and as alegitimisingNormanpresencein hisAngevin army, that herepeatedly delayed Robert’sreturn.Matilda had no way of

knowing that Stephen’shealthwas already beginningto improve even as shedespatchedherbrother toherhusband’s side. As a result,Geoffroi’s ruthlessprioritisation of his owninterests placed his wife in

grave danger. While shewaited at Oxford for herbrother’s return, Stephengathered his troops andmarched to Wareham, theDorset port from which EarlRobert had sailed. There therejuvenated king seized thecastle and garrisoned it toblocktheearl’sgatewaybackinto England, beforemarchingnorthand theneasttowards Oxford. WhenStephen’s army forded the

deep waters of the river andstormedintothecity,Matildaandhersupportersweretakenby surprise, horror-struckwithin the castle’s massivewallstofindthemselvesonceagainundersiege.And this time, Stephen

would not be deflected. EarlRobert – who raced to hisshipswhennewsofMatilda’splight reached Normandy,incandescentwithfurythathehadbeendetainedtohelphis

brother-in-law at his sister’sexpense – hurled his knightsintoanattackonWarehamassoon as his fleet reached thecoast, taking theharbour andthetownandpressinghardtoforce his way into thefortress. But Stephen haddecidedtolettheportgoifitkept Robert out of the waywhilehetightenedhisgriponOxford, ‘thinking’, as theGesta Stephani put it, ‘hecouldeasilyputanendtothe

strife in the kingdom if heforcibly overcame herthroughwhom itbegan tobeatstrife’.By the middle of

December 1142, after threemonths trapped inside aburned and blackened city,Matilda and her smallgarrison were cold, starvingand almost bereft of hope.Just before Christmas, shedecided to riskeverythingonone last effort to escape. It

wasnotthefirsttimeshehadhadtocallonherreservesofphysical strength or herunbending will, and she hadtwice before succeeded inslipping through Stephen’soutstretched fingers, once inspiriting herself intoArundelCastle on her arrival inEngland,andtheninsecuringa perilous route out of thebesieged city of Winchester.This, though, was the mostdangerous challenge she had

yetfaced,andshemetitwithundaunted courage. In thestill of the night, with abodyguard of just threetrusted soldiers, she leftOxfordCastlebyasmallsidegate. The frozen terrain thatconfronted her seemedimpossibly forbidding: aheavy fall of snow shroudedthe ground stretching aheadinto the darkness, and theshouts of the watch Stephenhad set to encircle the castle

echoedonthecoldair.But the bitter winter

proved tobeawelcomeally.Wrapped in white cloaks ascamouflageagainstthesnowylandscape, Matilda and herknightswalkedsilentlyacrossthe river, its treacherouscurrent nowmuffled under alayer of ice thick enough tobear their weight with ease.No one saw them pass; noone challenged them as theytrudged seven miles through

the cold and dark, feet numband freezing in the driftingsnow.Fearandnecessitykeptexhaustion at bay until theyreached Abingdon, wherethey found horses to carrythemjustafewmilesmoretothe safe haven of BrienFitzcount’s castle atWallingford.When news of her daring

escape began to spread (‘amanifest miracle of God’,William of Malmesbury

called it), Stephen acceptedthe surrender of thebeleaguered garrison she hadleftbehindandallowed themto go free, his customarygenerosity of spirit perhapsreinforced by a ruefuladmiration of his rival’sbravery. Even the author oftheGestaStephani, whowassometimes venomous in hishostility to Matilda, seemedreluctantly impressed by thegoodfortunehercouragehad

brought: ‘I do not knowwhetheritwastoheightenthegreatnessofherfameintimeto come, or by God’sjudgement to increase morevehementlythedisturbanceofthekingdom,butneverhaveIread of another woman soluckilyrescuedfromsomanymortal foes and from thethreatofdangerssogreat,’hewrote.ButifMatilda’sescapehad

kept her cause alive – and

raiseddoubtsyetagainaboutGod’s verdict on Stephen’sclaims – it also marked theend of her hopes that shemight one day rule thekingdom her father hadbequeathed to her in person.England found itself oncemore carved up into rivalnetworks of fortresses(Matilda now making herbase at the bishop ofSalisbury’smassivecitadelofDevizes in Wiltshire), with

the countryside in betweenleftplunderedanddesolatebythe passing of troops fromone armoured island toanother. Given that herhusband had made itabundantlyclearthathecouldnot and would not pause inhisconquestofNormandy tosendanarmy thatmight turnthe tide decisively inEngland, it seemed that thekingdom was condemned toendure a war of attrition

between evenly matchedenemies,neitherofwhomhadthe strength to destroy theother. In the midst of thisdestructive deadlock,however, one small steppointed a way forward: forwhen Robert of Gloucesterhad returned fromNormandytoEngland,toolatetorescuehis sister from the siege ofOxford, Geoffroi of Anjousent with him Matilda’seldest son, nine-year-old

Henry.This visit to England,

Henry’s first, was relativelybrief – two years spent intraining with sword andschoolbooks in his uncle’shousehold atBristolCastle –but it was significantnonetheless. Henry was theaceinMatilda’shand,evenatthesametimeashispresencesounded the death-knell forher prospects of standingalone as England’s monarch.

Her sex had proved to be astumbling block which shesimply could not transcend.That shecouldnotcommandtroops on the battlefield hadserved to compromise herleadership – though it hadalso protected her fromdanger–but thefatalflawinher campaign for the thronewas not her own inability tofight, nor any theoreticallimitationtoherauthority,butthe inability of her most

powerful subjects to accepttherealityofawomanrulingby and for herself.Matilda’sson, as he grew towardsadulthood, was an entirelydifferentprospect:amaleheirwho embodied all thehereditary right of Matilda’sclaim, but who could alsopromise the uncomplicatedlypowerful kingship of hisgrandfatherandnamesake.Ensconced in her west-

country power base after all

the dramas and dangers of1142,Matildarecognisedthatthebattle shenow facedwastowinthecrownforherson,rather than towear itherself.The decision to fight for herson’s rights rather than herown was born of tough-minded political pragmatism,aswellasfiercematernalanddynastic ambition, and in itthere was no trace of theintolerable personal pride ofwhich she had been accused

during the months when thethronehadseemedtobehersfor the taking. Either thatarrogancehaddisappearedassuddenlyasithadsupposedlyappeared; or it had never infact existed in the form thatherenemiesalleged.OurviewofMatildaduring

these years of doggedstruggle isevenmoreelusivethan before because of theloss of the two greatestchroniclers among the ranks

of her contemporaries:Orderic Vitalis, who died in1142, lamenting thedisintegration of his Anglo-Norman homelands, andWilliam of Malmesbury,whose humane andinexhaustible curiosity wasfinally extinguished just afterhe had noted his intention todiscover more details ofMatilda’s audacious escapefromOxfordattheendofthatyear.(Thelastsentenceofhis

Historia Novella poignantlyreads, ‘I am disposed to gointo this more thoroughly ifeverbythegiftofGodIlearnthetruthfromthosewhowerepresent …’) As a result, wehavenowayofknowinghowMatilda copedwith six yearsof relentless attrition duringwhich she enduredbereavements of her own.Miles of Gloucester, herablestgeneral,waskilledbyamisdirected arrow on a

ChristmasEvehuntingtripinthe Forest of Dean in 1143.Four years later, her greatestlieutenant,herbrotherRobert,earl of Gloucester,succumbed to a fever at hiscastle at Bristol, and twoyears after that the staunchlyfaithfulBrienFitzcount died,havingalreadyretreatedfromthe politicalworld into a lifeofreligiouscontemplation.Despite these losses,

Matildacouldstillrelyonthe

west-country strongholds ofwhich her brother’s earldomof Gloucester formed theheart, while Stephendominated much largerswathesofterritoryacrossthemidlands and the east. Somelords offered loyalty to oneside or the other, whileothers, striving to protecttheir own interests, hoveredbetweenthetwo–thoughitisworthnotingthat, in thecaseof Robert of Gloucester’s

powerful son-in-law, Ranulfof Chester, it was Matilda’squietly steadfast treatment ofher supporters, rather thanStephen’s suspiciousunreliability, that won suchallegiance as this serialturncoat was ultimatelyprepared to offer. Still othermagnates,WaleranofMeulanamong them, abandonedaltogether the darkambiguities of internecineconflict to pursue a war that

offered instead the gloriouscertainties of faith andsalvation, joining thecrusadethat set out from Europe fortheHolyLandin1147.In 1148, Matilda herself

left England to return toNormandy. This was not asurrender, but a recognitionofwherethelong-termpowerof her position now lay.While she and Stephen hadbeen locked in violent stand-off in England, her husband

had advanced throughNormandy with methodicalruthlessness,finallysweepingintothecapital,Rouen,atthebeginning of 1144. Thatsummer, he was formallyinvested as duke ofNormandy– his claim to thetitle justified by his wife’sinheritance and his ownmilitary success – amid thesolemn grandeur of Rouen’sgreatcathedral.Bytheendofthe year he had secured

recognition as duke fromLouis VII of France, andcontrolled every castle in theduchy save one, the fortressof Arques, just outside theportofDieppe.Afewmonthslater, when Arques finallycapitulated, Geoffroi’sconquest was complete.Stephen no longer held asingle Norman stronghold,and all hope that he mightone day retrieve his positiontherewasextinguished.

Fromthatpointon, thoughStephen unquestionably hadtheupperhandinEngland, itwas increasingly apparentthat the foundations of hispowerwere crumbling away.No magnate with a claim toestates in Normandy couldnowaffordtocommithimselfirretrievably to Stephen,however great the short-termadvantageontheEnglishsideoftheChannel.Theking,too,wasgettingolder–heturned

fiftyprobably in1142– and,because the legitimacyofhisruledependedonthepersonalsanction of his coronationratherthanhereditaryright,itcouldnotbeassumedthathisteenageson,Eustace,hadanycertainclaimtosucceedhim.Stephenpressedhardinthe

attempt to persuadeArchbishop Theobald ofCanterbury to crown his sonduring his own lifetime, acustompreviouslyadoptedby

the kings of France in anattempt to reinforce thepractice of hereditarysuccession.Butthedaysweregone when his brother,Bishop Henry, stood readyandable to swing theweightof the Church behindStephen’s cause. The newreformist pope, Eugenius III,elected in 1145, refused torenew the worldly bishop’sstatusaspapallegate.(Onlyayear earlier, Eugenius’s

spiritual mentor, Bernard ofClairvaux, had vituperativelydenounced Bishop Henry as‘the man who walks beforeSatan, the son of perdition,the man who disrupts allrights and laws’.) AndStephen’s determination totake a stand on his royalauthority over episcopalappointments in EnglandantagonisedEugeniusenoughfor the pope to reject anysuggestion that Eustace

should be pre-emptivelycrowned.Matilda,meanwhile–who

knew from her years ofexperience in Germany andItaly just how destructiveconflict with the papacycould be – handled herrelations with the Churchwith skilful diplomacy,something which contributedto the growing perceptionthat, as the Gesta Stephaninowbegan to suggest, itwas

her son, not Stephen’s, whowas iustus regni Anglorumheres et appetitor – ‘thelawful heir and claimant tothe kingdom of England’.Strikingly,theGesta’sauthorspeaks of Stephen as ‘theking’ and Henry as ‘thelawful heir’ as if there wereno incompatibility betweenthe two. And, from oneincreasingly influential pointof view, there was none: itwas possible to accept that

StephenwaskingwithGod’sblessing as manifestedthrough his anointing, and atthe same time to argue thatthe hereditary right tosucceed to Henry I’s thronehad passed through Matildatohisgrandson.YoungHenryhad returned

to Normandy in 1144 in thewakeofhis father’sconquestof Rouen, to continue hispolitical education in theduchy where, as Geoffroi

soon astutely declared, hewould take over the reins ofgovernment once he reachedadulthood.Threeyearslater–nowalmostfourteen,withhisgrandfather’s restless energyandatemperamentasfieryashis flame-coloured hair –Henry made anotherimpromptu appearance inEngland.Herecruitedasmallcompany of mercenaries,hired on credit because hehadnoreadycash,andsailed

across the Channel in animpulsive attempt to relievehis mother’s hemmed-inmilitaryposition.Newsofhisunexpected arrival sparkedpanic among Stephen’ssupporters:rumourhaditthathe stood at the head of anarmyofthousands,withmoretroops to come. But soonmore accurate reports, of atiny band led by aninexperienced boy, began tospread, and, after a failed

attempttoseizePurtonCastlenear the Wiltshire town ofCricklade, Henry’s unpaidsoldiers began to desert him.NeitherMatildanorRobertofGloucester, hard pressed asthey were, had the funds tobail him out of the hole hehad dug for himself; so thechastened teenager appealedfor help instead to Stephenhimself, who – ‘ever full ofpity and compassion’, theGesta Stephani reported –

sent him the money for hisreturncrossingtoNormandy.Stephen’s magnanimity to

hisyoungcousinmightseemextraordinary – and itcertainly appeared so to theGesta’s author, who couldexplain it only in terms of a‘profoundandprudent’beliefthat ‘the more kindly andhumanely a man behaves toan enemy, the feebler hemakes him and the more heweakenshim’. Itwasnot the

first time that the king hadconducted himself withunusual mildness, a qualitythat might variously belauded as generosity orcondemned as weakness. Inthiscase,however,hislackofa killer instinct dovetailedneatly with the inescapablepolitical conclusion that itwas entirely in Stephen’sinterests forMatilda’s son toberemovedfromEnglishsoilas quickly as possible – an

achievement for which alimited amount of cashclearly seemed a small priceto pay. As for Henry, safelybackinNormandybytheendof May 1147, it had been ahot-headedandinsomewaysfoolish escapade; but it hadalsoputdownamarkerofhisutter determination to fightforhisinheritance.Ayearlater,whenMatilda

at last gave up her personalleadership of the struggle in

England to return toNormandy in the summer of1148, her decision seems tohavebeenprecipitatedbytheneed to tread carefully inrelation to the Church. Herstrategically vital strongholdatDevizesCastle,thirtymileseast of Bristol, had belongedtoBishopRogerofSalisburybefore Stephen hadconfiscated it when thebishop fell from power, andMatilda’s troops had then

captured it from Stephen’sforces. But the new bishop,Jocelin de Bohun, nowdemanded its return with thevigorous support of PopeEugenius, who threatenedexcommunication againstanyone unjustly withholdingthe fortress fromecclesiastical hands. Matildawas determined neither torisk the kind of bitterconfrontationwiththepapacythatwasdamagingherrival’s

cause,nor simply toabdicatecontrolofacastlethatformedone of the keys to herterritorial position. It madesense, therefore, to removeherself from the firing line,and in June 1148 shetravelled to Falaise, twentymilessouthofCaen,tomakeher personal peace withBishop Jocelin, while at thesametimeleavingthefortressitselfsafely in thehandsofaloyalgarrison.

But she was able to leaveEngland secure in theknowledge that her son waspoised to takeherplace.Thedeveloping partnershipbetweenmother and sonwasobvious from their seamlessmanoeuvring over Devizes:Matilda wrote to Henryexplainingherpiousdecisiontoobserve thedictatesof theChurch,andhandingovertheresponsibility forimplementingthatdecisionto

him; sixteen-year-old Henry,arriving at Devizes in thespringof1149,thendutifullyrestored the outlyingproperties to the bishop, butexplained that he needed toholdontothecastleforjustalittle longer, until God hadbrought victory to his cause.Between them, they hadsmoothly managed to pacifythe Church, while leavingtheir troops undisturbedbehind the walls of the

bishop’scastle.By the end of that year

Henry had been knighted atCarlisle by his great-uncleDavid, king of Scots, asolemn moment whichpublicly signalled hisemergenceintoadulthood.Hehad also demonstrated hisdeveloping credentials as amilitary leader not only byseizing theDorsetharbourofBridport, but, moreimportantly, by evading

Stephen’s best attempts tocapture him. And, on hisreturn to Normandy at thebeginning of 1150, Henry’sfather Geoffroi, true to hisword, handed over thegovernmentoftheduchyintothe hands of its new youngduke.Stephennowfoundhimself

in unfamiliar and deeplyunnerving territory. He hadsucceeded for years indefendinghiscrownagainsta

rival whose claim raised asmany questions as itanswered,simplybecauseshewas female. Whateverarguments Matilda mightmake on the grounds ofhereditary right or brokenoaths of fealty, Stephen hadon his side the fact of hiskingship, a role which – ashadbecomeclearatthegatesof London in 1141 – shecould not hope to inhabit inany straightforward way.

That fact, however, offeredStephen littledefenceagainstthe charismatic new duke ofNormandy, his reveredgrandfather’s namesake andevery inch his heir.Meanwhile, Stephen himselfcould no longer lean on themightyweightoftheChurch,which had done so much tounderpin his acceptance asking; and the magnates too,on both sides of the partisandivide, increasingly saw in

Henry the only hope ofreuniting the dismemberedAnglo-Normanrealm.Stephen’s powerlessness

was now exposed withmercilessclarity.Akingwhohadwonhis thronebytakinghis chances without fear orhesitationsuddenlyfoundthathehadnomoremomentsleftto seize. He could not forceHenry onto the battlefield,because his nobles did notwant to fight. The earls of

Chester and Leicester, theformer in Henry’s camp andthe latter in Stephen’s, wentso far as to agree a privatetreatyofmutualprotection:iftheywereforcedtogotowaragainst each other, theydeclared, theywould lead nomorethantwentyknightsintobattle, and anyproperty eachcaptured from the otherwouldbereturned.Theywerenot alone in seeking aninsurancepolicyof thiskind;

and the Gesta Stephanireported that, when Henryreturned to England in 1153,Stephen found to his despairthatanumberofthemagnatesinhiscamp‘hadalreadysentenvoysbystealthandmadeacompactwith the duke’. TheGesta’sauthorhad,ofcourse,come to exactly the samepolitical conclusion himself:hedescribesStephen (who isclearlybythispointnolongerthe hero of the narrative that

bears his name) as ‘gloomyanddepressed’ in the faceofthis betrayal, beforerecounting with breathlessadmiration how Henry‘attacked the king’s partywith determination and spiriteverywhere…Nordidhefailofsplendidsuccess,ratherdidit come to him moreabundantly the more eagerlyhestroveforloftieraims.’Henry was twenty years

old, already a proven leader,

who had spent the last threeyears consolidating his holdonNormandy, and onAnjoutoo after the sudden death in1151 of his father, Geoffroi,at theageof just thirty-eight.Remarkably, he hadsucceededindoingsodespiteincurring the wrath of LouisVII of France. The pope’smentorBernardofClairvaux,Stephen’s implacable enemy,had prevailed upon theFrench king to recognise

Henry as duke of Normandyin the summer of 1151, butthis uneasy alliance wasshattered inMay 1152 whenHenry shocked Europe bymarrying the king’s newlydivorced wife, Eleanor ofAquitaine. Louis wasincensedby thisprovocation,and declared war onNormandy, only for histroopstobebeatenbackwithhumiliatingly imperious easeby Henry’s forces. When

HenrysetfootontheEnglishcoastinJanuary1153,hedidso, therefore, as master oflands in France whichstretched, thanks to his newwife’sduchyofAquitaine,allthe way from Dieppe in thenorth to the Pyrenees in thesouth.Stephen, at last, had no

choice but to confront thereality of Henry’s triumph.He was past sixty; hisindomitable wife, Mathilde,

on whom he had relied soheavily, had died in thespring of 1152; his son,Eustace, could find nosupport from the Church oramong the Anglo-Normanlords; and his nobles,disillusioned by the conflictand desperate to defend theirown interests in a war-ravaged land, were in nomood to take up arms yetagainonhisbehalf.Hecouldno longer hold out against a

settlement that had becomeboth necessary andirresistible. If the king clungto any hope that God mightstill vindicate his possessionof the crown as a dynasticratherthanapersonalright,itwas crushed in August 1153when twenty-four-year-oldEustacediedsuddenly,onlyafewweeks afterwithdrawingfrom his father’s court infurious protest at his ownimminent disinheritance.

Stephen had a second son,William, but even thegrieving king himself nowrealised that any attempt toadvance William’s claim inhis brother’s place would bedoomedtoabjectfailure.Thepainstakingdiplomacy

that brought Stephen andHenrytotheconferencetablewasconductedbyArchbishopTheobald of Canterbury andthe king’s brother Henry,Bishop of Winchester.

Superficially, they were anoddcouple–thearchbishopaman of low-key subtlety,whilethebishopworehisegoon his richly embroideredsleeve – but they were bothskilful politicians, and bothnow convinced of thedesperate need for apermanent peace. The treatythey drafted was formallyratifiedon6November1153,when Stephen and Henrycame face to face – weary

resignation meeting restlessself-assurance – atWinchester, the ancient citywhere Stephen had firstbecome king eighteen yearsearlier. There, surrounded bythe lords and bishops ofEngland and Normandy,StephenrecognisedMatilda’sson as the lawful heir to hiskingdom;andinreturnHenry‘generously conceded’, aNorman chronicler wrote,‘thatthekingshouldholdthe

kingdom for the rest of hislife,ifhewished’.Inordertocement this accommodationbetween Stephen’s de factokingship and Henry’shereditary right, and tosmooth over the apparentcontradictions between thetwo, Stephen then ‘adopted’Henry, solemnly swearing tomaintainhim‘asmysonandheirinallthings’.Thewarwasover, and the

cause for whichMatilda had

foughtsohardwaswon.Thecost of that victory was herown eclipse. The author ofthe Gesta Stephani, everhostile, seized on theopportunity to write her outofhisstorycompletely,whilethecharterenactingthetermsof the treaty mentioned heronlyinpassingas‘themotheroftheduke’,who,alongwithHenry’swifeandhisyoungerbrothers, had committedthemselves to observe its

terms.Itwouldbelessthanayear,however,beforeMatildareapedtherewardofthisself-denial.Stephenhadspent thesummer of 1154 on progressin the north, masking thedestructionofallhishopesinthe trappings of royalsplendour. But on 25October, after conducting ameeting with the count ofFlanders, the king ‘wassuddenly seized with aviolent pain in his gut,

accompanied by a flow ofblood’. It had happenedbefore,butthistimehecouldnot be saved. He died laterthat night – if not a brokenman, then one reduced to ashadow of himself. He wasburied, as he had wished, athis own foundation ofFaversham Abbey in Kent,next to thenewgravesofhissteadfastwifeandhisill-fatedson.The death of an enemy

whowasalsoacousin,andagenerous man as well as anunremitting opponent, couldhardly be a cause forunalloyed jubilation.Matilda’s triumph layelsewhere:inthefactthat,forthe very first time since theConquest, the accession of anew king did not take theform of a race for thecoronation chair. Henry wasin Normandy when newscameofStephen’sdeath,and

remained there until 7December, putting his affairsin order and waiting forfavourable winds, before heset sail forhisnewkingdom.For six long weeks Englandpatiently awaited his arrival,with no sign of conflict orresistance: ‘by God’sprotecting grace she did notlack peace’, Henry ofHuntingdon incisivelyobserved,‘througheitherloveor fear of the king who was

onhisway’.Andthen,on19December 1154 – almostexactly nineteen years sinceHenry Ihadbreathedhis last– Henry II was crowned inmajesty at WestminsterAbbey.After two decades ofbitter conflict, the competingimperatives of hereditaryright, divine sanction andpolitical pragmatism wereunited at last in Matilda’sson, now the undisputedsuccessor to her father’s

throne.Matilda herself observed

these dramatic events from adistance. She had settled herhousehold atRouen – ‘a faircity set among murmuringstreams and smilingmeadows’, Orderic Vitalishadcalled it – in a residenceher father had built on thesouth side of the Seine amidthe green of his park atQuevilly,besidetheprioryofNotre-Dame-du-Pré, an

offshootofherbelovedabbeyofBec.Heresheestablishedaroutinereminiscentofthelifeled by her mother, Edith-Matilda, at Westminster.MatildawasinNormandynotinEngland,andthekingwashersonnotherhusband,but,likeEdith-Matildabeforeher,she acted as counsellor,confidante, and royal deputywhenHenrywasabsent,asheoften was, on his constanttravels around his vast

dominions. Like her mother,she became increasinglypreoccupied with spiritualconcerns, under the guidanceofthemonksalongsidewhomshe lived, but she did notretreat from the world. Herson’s trust in her judgement,and the authority sheexercised on his behalf, areunmistakable: ‘if you do notdo this’, declared one royalmandate despatched fromEngland to the justices of

Normandy in the later1150s,‘let my lady and mother theempressseethatitisdone’.Thesurvivingsourcesgive

usonlyafewglimpsesofherinfluenceatworkinherson’sgovernment, but it was therenonetheless.Intheautumnof1155, less than a year afterhis accession, Henry wascontemplating an attempt toconquerIreland,aterritoryheintended to bestow on hisyoungerbrotherWilliam,but

the overambitious plan wasshelved, according to theNorman chronicler Robert ofTorigni, when Matilda madeclear that she was notconvinced of its merits.However daring andimpulsivethenewkingmightbe, he recognised hismother’s acumen and thewisdom of listening to herwords of caution. WalterMap, a writer who knewHenry’s court well, thought

Matilda’s advice ill-foundedand deleterious, but thespecific examples he citesserve only to reinforce theimpression of tough lessonslearntbyan incisivepoliticalbrain, rather than his ownmore scathing assessment. ‘Ihave heard that his mother’steaching was to this effect,’Mapwrote,

thatheshouldspinoutthe affairs of everyone,

hold long in his ownhand all posts that fellin, take the revenues ofthem, and keep theaspirants to themhangingon inhope;andshesupportedthisadviceby an unkind analogy:an unruly hawk, ifmeatisoftenofferedtoitandthen snatched away orhid,becomeskeenerandmoreinclinablyobedientand attentive. He ought

also to be much in hisown chamber and littlein public: he shouldneverconferanythingonanyone at therecommendation of anyperson, unless he hadseenandlearntaboutit.

Henrywasnotone tohide

himself away or to disguisehimselfbehindan inscrutableroyalmask:hislifewaslivedinfullviewofhiscourtandat

breakneck speed. Nor,perhaps, was the capriciouswithholding of rewardsnecessarily the best way toinculcate unshakeable loyalty– understandable though anobsession with control mightbe for a woman who hadnever enjoyed unquestionedcommand. But Matilda’sinsistence on the vitalimportance of personalknowledge and personalexperience was recognisable

at the heart of Henry’s rule.The tireless energy of hisgovernment was founded onhis sharp intelligenceandhisextraordinary recall of factsand faces; ‘he had at hisfingertipsanalmostcompleteknowledge of history, and agreat store of practicalwisdom’, noted his chaplain,GeraldofWales.Andthekingalsoknewthe

value of his mother’sexperience, which came to

the fore in 1157 duringnegotiations with the HolyRoman Emperor, FriedrichBarbarossa, over the fate ofthe mummified hand of StJames, brought fromGermany to England thirty-two years earlier by Matildaherself. The emperor insistedthat this sacred relic shouldnow be restored to theimperial treasury, whileHenry was equallydetermined that it should

remain as the focus of adeveloping cult at ReadingAbbey, his royalgrandfather’s foundation andfinal resting-place.Theresultwas a tense exchange ofelaborate diplomaticcourtesies, at the end ofwhich the hand remainedsafely untouched within itsjewelledreliquaryatReadingwhile Friedrich receivedinstead a dazzling array ofmollifyinggifts,includingnot

only four great falcons but avast tent of extraordinaryworkmanship, so huge that amechanism was required toraise it. There is no directevidencetoputMatilda’srolein this delicate diplomacybeyond doubt, but it isimpossible to imagine thather long-ago experience ofcrossing the Alps with theGerman court was notbrought to bear on theselection of a gift which

combined exquisite luxurywith such practical goodsense.Theemperor spent thenext four years on campaignin Italy, just as Matilda andher first husband had donebeforehim,andanawestruckvisitor to his camp outsideMilan remarked admiringlyon the lavish imperialpavilion, which was bigenough, he said, to stage acoronation.Not all of Matilda’s

interventions were sosuccessful.In1156shehadtoendure the bitterest ofdivisionsamongherchildren,whenhersecondson,twenty-two-year-old Geoffrey, rosein rebellion against his elderbrother, complaining thattheir fatherhad intendedhimto rule Anjou if Henrysucceeded to the throne ofEngland. Matilda presidedover a strained familyconference that gathered at

RoueninFebruary,butHenrywas immovable, andGeoffreywithdrewtopreparefor war. He could not resisthis brother’s might for long,however;ittooklessthansixmonths under siege at hiscastles of Chinon, MirebeauandLoudun,justsouthoftheLoire river between Angersand Tours, before he wasforced to cede his claim toAnjou and settle for anannuity in lieu of the power

towhichhehadaspired.There is no sign that

Matildaheldanybriefforheryounger son’s demands; shehad fought too long and toohard for Henry’s inheritanceto see it put at risk in hismoment of triumph. But shecannot have relished thefragmentation of her family,nor the subsequent andunexpected loss of her twoyounger children: Geoffreydied, disappointed and

humiliated, in 1158, andWilliamather side inRouensix years later. By thenMatilda,atsixty-two,wasnolonger the political force shehadoncebeen.Shehadbeenseriously ill in 1160, and,though she recovered, herinfluence with Henry begantofalterafter1162,whenshecounselled fruitlessly againstthe appointment of his closefriend Thomas Becket as thenew archbishop of

Canterbury. Henry wouldhave plenty of time to regretthat he did not follow hershrewd advice, but Matildadidnotlivetoseethevolatilerelationshipbetweenkingandarchbishop reach its violentend.Aslateasthesummerof1167shewasstillplayinghernowaccustomedroleaselderstateswoman, writing toLouis VII of France in theattempt to defuse escalatinghostilities between him and

her son.Asshehadhoped,atruce was agreed in August,and Henry immediatelyavailed himself of theopportunity to launch aninvasion of the independentduchyofBrittany.Itwasonlya matter of weeks, however,beforehewas racingback toNormandy, recalled by thedevastating news of hismother’sdeath.Matilda died on 10

September 1167, surrounded

bythedevotedmonksofBecwhohadbecomeherspiritualfamily. She was buried intheir midst, her body sewninto an ox-hide and laid torest before the high altar inthe abbey church, her tombbathed in light from amagnificent seven-branchedcandlestick and a halo oflamps above. Her deep faithwas reflected not only in theluminous ceremonial of herfuneral rites, but in the

priceless treasures shebestowed on the abbey. Shehad already given into themonks’ keeping the twocrownsof solidgold shehadbrought from Germany (theheavier of which, supportedbyitssilverrods,hersonhadworn at his coronation), aswell as portable altars ofmarble and silver, preciousrelics housed in an ebonychest, rich plate andvestments, and her own

imperialcloak,spangledwithgold. Now she left them thecontents of her privatechapel: ornaments of goldand silver, chasubles andcopes,andtwosilverboxesintheshapeofeggsgrippedinagriffin’sclaws.They were the glittering

tracesofanextraordinarylife;sixdecadesthathadtakenherfrom the quiet of an Englishchildhood across Europe andbackagain,fromthebrutality

ofcivilwartothetranquillityof Bec’s echoing cloisters.And it was a life lived by aremarkable woman. Matildainherited her father’scommanding temperament,his ability to inspire loyaltyandhispoliticalintelligence–but the role she played andthe qualities she possessedhave been much obscured,then and now, by thepreconceptions of the lordsshe sought to lead and the

clerics who wrote her story.‘Haughty’ and ‘intolerablyproud’ are the adjectivesindelibly associated with hername,phrasescoinedinthosefewmonths of her life whenshetriedtoexercisepowerasa monarch in her own right,and repeated by historiansever since. Strikingly, theywere never used to describeany male member of herfearsomely domineeringfamily; and they do not fit

well with what we know ofMatildainthedecadesbeforeandafterthatbriefmomentin1141. Certainly, herdemeanourwasunflinchinglyregal,andshewasdrivenbyaresolute belief in her owncapacity to rule, but in theendthedefiningstampofherpolitical career was heracutelyjudgedpragmatisminsecuringthesuccessionofhersonattheexpenseofherownclaimtothecrown.

The implications of thatdecisionareclearintheLatinverses later inscribed on hergrave:‘Greatbybirth,greaterby marriage, greatest in heroffspring, here lies thedaughter,wife,andmotherofHenry.’ Her son’s triumphwas the vindication ofeverything she had done; butthe price to be paid for thatvictorywasherdisappearancebetween the linesofherownepitaph – a tacit acceptance

that a female heir toEngland’s throne, unlike hermale counterpart, could notexpecttoruleforherself.Thequestion would not ariseagain for fourhundredyears,until theagonisingdeathofafragileboyin1553,andinthemeantime any woman whoaspired to the exercise ofpower in England – mostimmediately Matilda’sformidable daughter-in-law,EleanorofAquitaine–could

hope to achieve it only bynegotiating the roles ofdaughter, wife and motherthat, etched into Matilda’stomb, came to define hercareerinretrospect.But, if Matilda’s last

resting-place framed herachievementsonly in relationto her father, husband andson, one of those men wasunwillingtodothesame.Hersonwouldbecomeoneofthemost exceptional rulers in

medieval Europe, andthroughout his turbulent lifethis volatile, powerfulmonarch acknowledged thepolitical legacy of hiscourageous and controversialmother by calling himself‘HenryFitzEmpress’.

ELEANOR

AnIncomparableWoman

1124–1204

AnIncomparable

Woman

A casual observer at HenryII’s court in September 1166mighthavebeenforgivenforthinking that Eleanor ofAquitaine was the mostconventional of queens. Agreat heiress, famed for herbeauty and her agile mind,she had brought her royalhusband a rich inheritancethat stretched from the greenvalleys of the Vienne river,where soft light danced onstately water as it flowed

toward the Loire, to thefoothills of the Pyrenees,where a stronger sun strucktoweringcragsofgraniteandlimestone.And, along with the

landscape and liegemen ofher vast duchy of Aquitaine,Eleanor had given herhusband a large brood ofheirs to inherit his growingempire. Seven monthspregnantnowwiththeking’seighth child, she had played

to perfection the role ofdutiful consort, spendingenough time with herhusband to ensure asuccession of pregnancies –she gave birth five times inthe first six years of theirmarriage alone – while also,so far as her repeatedconfinements allowed,providingafigureheadforhisgovernment in Englandduring his long and frequenttravels through his lands in

France.If her role as royal wife

and mother was utterlyconventional, so too is thefact that the chroniclersrecorded no pen-portrait ofEleanor to match theirdetailed descriptions of herhusband and king. Henryexerted a particularfascination on the men whorecorded the events of hisreign. In part at least, this isbecause a significant number

of the contemporary writerswhoseworkshavesurvived–Walter Map, Gerald ofWales, Herbert of Bosham,Roger of Howden and Peterof Blois – served in onecapacity or another as clerksat his court, and thereforeobserved his charisma, hisidiosyncrasies and hisextraordinary capabilities atclose range. It remains clear,however, that the sheermagnetic force of his

personality reached farbeyond the confines of hishousehold.Hehadinheritedthesturdy

physicality of his royalgrandfather and namesake,Henry I: he was neither tallnorunusuallyshort,butbroadand stockilymuscular, thick-necked and square-chested.The solidity of his powerfulframe blurred easily into fat,whichheheldatbaynotonlybythefrugalitywithwhichhe

ate and drank, but also byvirtueoftherelentlessenergythat had been so marked inhis grandfather, a qualitywhich, in the younger man,became an almostpathological restlessness. Hewas a ‘human chariotdraggingallafterhim’,wroteHerbert of Bosham, acultured dandy whosepersonal style had little incommon with that of hisstrenuous king. On his

frequent military campaignsHenry scarcely paused to eator sleep, his bowed legs andhoarse voice testifying to thehours he spent in the saddle.But times of truce did notbringpeace tohishousehold.Instead, he rose before dawnto satisfy his compulsiveobsession with hunting,returning dusty and blood-smeared from the kill tospendhiseveningsstillonhisfeet, reducing his courtiers –

whowerenotpermittedtositwhile their king remainedstanding – to a state ofexasperatedexhaustion.His leonine colouring –

red-gold hair and ruddy,freckled face, offset byexpressive blue-grey eyes –was a legacy from hisAngevin father, although hedid not share the physicalbeauty for which Geoffroihad been celebrated in hisyouth. Henry’s bulk, his

closely shorn hair and hisplain, practical clothes gavehim a physical appeal thatderivedfromhiscommandingvitality rather than any moreobvious glamour. He wasdrivenandambitious,likehisfather, but his quick,scholarly mind seems morelikely tohave come fromhisremarkable mother, Matilda.Like her, thismanof tirelessaction was entirely at homeamong intellectuals and

academics: ‘…with the kingof England’, wrote Peter ofBlois,‘itisschooleveryday,constant conversation withthe best scholars anddiscussion of intellectualproblems’. He readvoraciously,hismemorywasprodigious, and, though heexpressed himself only inFrench and Latin, he knewsomething, Walter Mapreported, of ‘all tonguesspoken from the coast of

FrancetotheriverJordan’.However, where Matilda’s

publiclifewasshapedbyherself-control and carefullyconsidered pragmatism,Henry was passionatelyemotional, a character ofextremes and contradictions.Hewasunpretentious,patientand approachable, andpossessed of unearthly calmin the face of crisis, yetcapable of the most violentfits of rage. Court gossip

(reported in 1166 toArchbishop Thomas Becket,oncetheking’sclosestfriend,now estranged and in exile)described one outburst offerocious temper that leftHenryscreamingonthefloor,thrashing wildly and tearingat the straw stuffing of hismattress with his teeth. Heloathedbetrayalinothers,butwas notorious for hiswillingness to break his ownword without a second

thought.Hecouldbefierceorgentle,harshorgenerous,andhe contrived (withoutapparent contrivance) to besimultaneouslyanimmovableobject and an irresistibleforce.The first hint that our

observer of Henry’s courtmight get that Eleanor ofAquitaine was noconventional queen was thefact that shewas amatch, inpersonal as well as political

terms,forthisoverwhelming,brilliant,bloody-mindedking.Before she ever took herplaceatHenry’sside,shehadhad another life full ofincident andexperience.Andthe eventful pre-history ofEngland’s queen was morethanenough to show that theserene, swollen-belliedmadonna of the autumn of1166 was only one personaamongmanyintherepertoireof an exceptional,

unpredictablewoman.Eleanorwasbornprobably

in 1124, the first daughter ofGuilhem, heir to the greatduchyofAquitaine.Thecourtover which her familypresided was dramaticallydifferent in style from thesober piety of the Anglo-Norman and German royalhouseholds in whichMatildahad spent her childhood. Atits head was Eleanor’sgrandfather, Duke Guilhem

IX, crusader, womaniser andpoet of love and lust – thefirst of the troubadours,writing in Aquitaine’s nativelangue d’oc, whose verseshave survived. William ofMalmesbury, hundreds ofmiles away in England,recounted scandalousrumours of the duke’sprovocative exploits and hissardonic wit: he ordered thathis mistress’s portrait shouldbe painted on his shield,

William reported with somerelish, declaring that ‘it washiswilltobearherinbattleasshehadbornehiminbed’.Such tales probably had

their roots in garbledelaborations of DukeGuilhem’s songs, fictionturning into breathlesslyreported fact as it travellednorthward. But the truthneeded little suchembellishment. The duke’slong-suffering duchess,

Philippa of Toulouse,eventually left him for areligious life at FontevraudAbbey – a new doublemonastery founded in 1101by the ascetic preacherRobert d’Arbrissel, whereboth monks and nuns livedunder the direction,unusually,ofanabbess–fiftymilesnorthoftheduke’scityof Poitiers. In Philippa’splace at his side, Guilheminstalled the woman whose

notoriety had reached as faras the cloisters atMalmesbury – she of thesupposed shield-portrait, thewife of the lord of nearbyChâtellerault, though hername is not known – andarranged a marriage betweenhis lover’s daughter and hisowneldestson.That son and heir, who

became Duke Guilhem Xwhenhisfatherdiedin1127,was a less flamboyantly

talentedcharacter,famousforhis insatiable love of foodrather than his poetry. Hespent ten turbulent years atthe helm of Aquitaine’saffairs before deciding, in1137, to invoke the spiritualsupport of St James theApostle by making apilgrimage to his Galicianshrine. (The saint’s hand,thanks to Matilda, was nowan object of veneration atReadingAbbey,buthisbody

was believed to lie beneaththe great granite cathedralnewly built in his honour atCompostela in north-westernSpain.)If thesaintrespondedto the duke’s prayers,however, itwastosecurethewelfareofhissoulratherthanhis duchy. Guilhem wasalready seriously ill when hearrivedatCompostela,andhedied there on Good Friday1137. His body was buriedbefore the cathedral’s high

altar, his pilgrimagetransmuted into a permanentresting-place.His death left his children

orphans. His wife, Anor ofChâtellerault, had diedseveral years earlier, alongwith their only son, anotherGuilhem. Two daughtersremained: Petronilla, theyounger, andherelder sister,Eleanor,whohadbeennamedafter their mother – henceAliénor, ‘another’ (in Latin,

alia) Anor. The girls hadbeen left at Aquitaine’s portcity of Bordeaux under thedistant guardianship of theFrench king, Louis the Fat,whowas the duke’s nominaloverlord. When reportsarrived from Spain of DukeGuilhem’s death, Louis laysick at his hunting lodge atBéthisy, north-east of Paris,exhaustedbyencroachingageand thephysical strainofhisobesity.Butill-healthhadnot

compromised his instincts asaking,andherespondedwithalacrity to the news that thefate of Aquitaine now restedon the slender shouldersof athirteen-year-oldgirl.Eleanorshould marry his son, theking declared, and heimmediately despatched theprospective bridegroom,seventeen-year-old Louis, toBordeaux with an imposingretinue which included thegreatest noblemen in France

as well as the king’s chiefminister, Abbot Suger ofSaint-Denis, and hundreds ofwell-armedknights.It was an abrupt and

forceful courtship, but thepolitical imperatives that laybehinditweretoocompellingtobe ignored.For150years,it had been the ambition ofthe Capetian kings to turntheir theoretical sovereigntyover thegreat feudal lordsofFrance – the dukes of

Aquitaine prominent amongthem – into the reality ofpower. But old freedomscould not be so easilycurtailed, and, despite threedecades of King Louis’sshrewd and commandingrule, the area under thecrown’s direct controlremained limited to the Île-de-France,the‘island’aroundParis bounded by the riversSeine, Marne, Oise andBeuvronne. Now, however,

marriage vows rather thanmilitary force promised todeliver Aquitaine into royalhands. And, for Eleanor andthose who advised her, theprospect of a husband whowould be king of France aswell as duke of Aquitaineoffered protection for herrights as the duchy’s heir,rightswhichwouldotherwisebe rendered acutelyvulnerable by her youth andhersex.

And so, just three monthsafter her father’s death,Eleanor married Louis, theheir to the French throne, inBordeaux’s magnificentcathedral. InaccordancewithCapetian custom, her younghusband had already beencrowned king at Reims sixyears earlier (by PopeInnocentII,noless,forwhomthe French court wastemporarily providing refugefrom the challenge of a

schismatic rival in Rome).This consecration inchildhood was designed tosafeguardtheprince’srighttosucceedhisfather,anditwastherefore for the second timethat Louis was crownedalongside his bride inBordeaux, in the course of aspecially devised coronationceremony which emphasisedthat the people of Aquitainewere now numbered amongthe subjects of the French

king.Onlydayslater,Eleanorbecamequeen in factaswellasinname.LouistheFatdiedon1August1137–killedbyan attack of dysentery in theintense heat of an oppressivesummer – and on 8 Augustthe young Louis VII and hisnew wife were crowned yetagain, definitively this time,amid cheering crowds inEleanor’scityofPoitiers.The repeated coronations

were intended, in part, to

counteract the fact that theyoung man Eleanor hadmarriedhadnotbeenborn tobe king. Louis the Fat’snamesake and successor washissecondson,whohadbeendestinedfromanearlyagefora life in the Church. But in1131 theboy’s elder brother,Philippe – a fifteen-year-oldwhose response to his owncoronation-in-advance hadbeen to defy his father withadolescent arrogance –

trippedoverastraypigwhileriding through a Parisianstreet. The sudden,catastrophic fallofhorseandrider left the young manbloodied and broken, in acoma fromwhich he did notrecover.Hewasburiedintheabbey church of Saint-Denis,theParisiannecropolisof theFrenchmonarchy;and itwasfrom the cloisters of Saint-Denis that eleven-year-oldLouisemerged,wide-eyed,to

findhisfuturetransformed.His gazewas scarcely less

innocent at seventeen, whenheacquiredhisqueenandhiskingdomatalmostexactlythesametime.Accordingtolatergossip, Eleanor would oneday remark that her husbandwasmoremonkthanking–ajudgement that capturesLouis’sassiduouspiety,andacertain unworldliness thatremained from his years inthe cloisters, but conveys

little of his enthusiasm foreither his bride or thebusinessofruling.Possessionof Eleanor’s vast domainsgave Louis more hope thanany of his predecessors ofextendinghisauthorityacrossthe length and breadth ofFrance,andsoonhesetaboutpressing her claim, inheritedfrom her grandmotherPhilippa, to the comté ofToulousebeyondAquitaine’ssouth-easternborders.Hewas

also,byallaccounts,besottedwithhiswife,offeringheraninfatuated, puppyishdevotion.Eleanor herself was much

less impressed. From thestart, this union between aboy raised by monks (evenmonksundertheacuteeyeofAbbot Suger) and thegranddaughter of a licentioustroubadourwasnotameetingof minds. We have onlyscraps of information with

which to piece together theroyal couple’s relationship,but the overwhelmingimpression is that the youngqueen had worldly,sophisticated tastes, a sharpwitandanappreciationofthesubtleambiguitiesofpolitics,while her gauche husbandconducted himself with anawkwardcombinationofself-denying religiosity andjudgemental inflexibility.Certainly, too, Eleanor in

Paris was a stranger in astrangeland:notasobviouslyandmanifestlyfarfromhomeaseight-year-oldMatildahadbeen in Germany, butnevertheless an orphanedteenager housed within aforbidding fortress in acrowded, jostling city whoseinhabitants spoke with theunfamiliarlyroundedtonesofthelanguedoïl,thelanguageof the French north, ratherthan in the hybrid frontier

dialect of Poitou or with thelively musicality of Occitanitself.Of course, this cultural

isolation was the eternalcondition of a royal bride,transported miles from herhomeland as the incarnationof an alliance or treaty, aweaverofpeaceoraconduitofpower.But theknowledgethatEleanorwasnotaloneinher fate offered little in thewayofcomfort.Thecontrast

in style between north andsouth in France was all tooapparent forty years later tothe troubadour Bertran deBorn,lordofHautefortintheLimousin, who professedhimself unimpressed by hisstay at the English king’scourt in Normandy: ‘a courtwherenoonelaughsorjokesis never complete; a courtwithout gifts is just apaddock-full of barons. Andtheboredomandvulgarityof

Argentannearlykilledme…’Paris was not Argentan, butneither was it Poitiers orBordeaux.AndifEleanorfeltany of the alienationexpressed in hercountryman’s song, it canonly have been compoundedbytheeffectsofherfailuretoperform the eternal functionofaroyalbride:theprovisionof a male heir to safeguardthesuccessionof thedynastyintowhichshehadmarried.

However much the faultlayatLouis’sdoor–and thesuspicion was that themonkish king was not afrequent visitor to his wife’sbed – the blame, incontemporary eyes, restedonlywiththequeen.By1144,aftersevenyearsofmarriage,itispossiblethatEleanorhadhadonemiscarriage,but it iscertainthatshehadproducedno livingheir.Shewasnotawoman to be cowed by

unhappy circumstance, andher position was protectedfromseriousthreatbyLouis’sdevotion,byheryouthandbythe power of the lands shebrought to theFrenchcrown.But something of herfrustration, as well as herfiery temperament, may beapparent in her fraughtrelationshipwithsomeofherhusband’s closest advisers.One in particular, a eunuchnamed Thierry Galeran, she

hated so much (according toJohn of Salisbury, the futurebishop of Chartres who wasthen a student in Paris) thatshe subjected him torelentless mockery andridicule.At least Eleanor had the

support of her sister,Petronilla, a companion whoshared her language, herculture and her memories oftheirformerlifeinAquitaine.But Petronilla’s presence at

hersideprecipitatedthemosthorrifyingincidentofLouis’skingship,onethatcastalongshadow and set in motion achain of events that wouldultimately leadEleanor awayfrom Paris for ever. It beganin1142,whenahusbandwasfound for Petronilla fromamongthegreatnoblemenofFrance. The king’s cousinRaoul, count of Vermandois,forty and one-eyed, was achampion of the French

crown, his battle-damagedsight a badge of the devotedservice he had given Louis’sfather. He was the perfectpolitical match for thequeen’s sister in every waybut one: he was alreadymarried.That,itseemed,wasa minor inconvenience, andhis wife of twenty years,EléonoreofChampagne,wasrapidlyputaside.Buttherepudiatedcountess

had two brothers,whomight

not be content to see her sopublicly humiliated. One,Stephen, was otherwiseengaged across the Channelin the battle to keep hold ofthe English crown; but theother, Thibaud of Blois andChampagne, was one of themost powerful magnates inFrance, who had riddenalongside Raoul ofVermandois in the youngking’s retinue on the road toBordeaux to meet his queen

five years earlier. Raoul’smatrimonial rearrangementsnow set him on a collisioncourse with his formerbrother-in-law, and massingominously in support of theinsulted Thibaud was thecollective might of theChurch. Despite hisostentatious piety, KingLouis, like many anothermonarch,hadalreadyclashedwith thepopeover thevexedquestion of the right to elect

andinvestbishops.Now–inspite of the fact that threetame French bishops hadbeen found to annul Raoul’sfirstweddingandsanctionhissecond – Pope Innocent IIdecided to act to defend thesacrament of marriage fromthe vagaries of royal whimandpoliticalconvenience.Bythe end of 1142, both Louisand his cousin Raoul hadbeen excommunicated andtheir lands placed under

interdict, and Innocent hadwitheringly denounced theyoungkingas‘aboyinneedofinstruction’.For Louis, the need to

demonstrate that he was nolonger the child whomInnocent had crowned atReimswonoutoverreligiousobedience or politicaljudgement.HeblamedCountThibaud for the reverses hehad suffered, and in January1143 he marched into

Champagneat theheadofanarmy,determinedtobringhisvassal to heel. At Vitry, apoorly defended town ahundred miles east of Paris,the king watched with grimsatisfactionas the inhabitantsfled in terror before theonslaught of his troops.Thirteen hundred men,women and childrenbarricaded themselves intotheir church while theirhomes were torched around

them. And then, as theyprayed desperately forsalvation, the flames spreadto the roof-timbers of theirsanctuary. Before Louis’sgaze, the building wasengulfed. Amid unbearableheatandthedeafeninguproarof fire and falling masonry,theairfilledwithacridsmokeand the nauseating, cloyingstenchofburningflesh.FromtheholocaustofVitry,nooneemergedalive.

It was a massacre ofinnocents, and visceral in itshorror. Even this, however,could not immediately checkLouis’s obstinacy, and hisarmy continued its advanceacross Thibaud’s lands. Butthe conflagration did plantseeds of doubt in the king’smind about the justice of hiscause, uncertainty that wasrapidly compounded by thestrictures of Bernard ofClairvaux,themostvenerated

and uncompromising ofEurope’s spiritual leaders.Atfifty-two,Bernard’sinfluencewas felt farbeyond thewallsof the abbey he had foundedin a densely wooded valleyonly fifty miles from Vitry.His example was the drivingforcebehind therapidspreadof the new Cistercian order,anausterere-imaginingoftheBenedictine rule, whichBernard embraced with suchsingle-minded asceticism

fromhistinycellintheangleof the roof at Clairvaux thathe pushed himself to thebrink of his physicalendurance, existing on thebarest minimum of food andsleep. But from his gauntframe issued a voice thatthunderedacrossEurope.His spiritual standing was

such that in 1130, whenInnocent II was driven intoFrench exile after thecontested election of a rival

pope,LouistheFathadgiventhe arbitration of Innocent’sclaims to the Holy See intoBernard’s hands. The sternjudgement of the abbot ofClairvaux not only decidedFrench support for Innocentbut, as he travelledindefatigably on a scrawnydonkey at the pope’s side,secured the backing ofGermany,SpainandEnglandfor Innocent’s eventualrestoration to Rome. Now

neither ranknorbirth,wealthnor power, offered a shieldagainst Abbot Bernard’scritical gaze. Kings andbishops, noblewomen andnuns – all could be judgedand found wanting, the curefor their errors contained inexcoriating lettersdespatchedfrom a pen that scarcelyseemedtorest.Abbot Suger, the king’s

greatest confidant andcounsellor, had felt

compelled to lay aside theluxurioustrappingsofpower,adopting a simple woollenhabitandtakingupresidencein a single small room inSaint-Denis’s cloister, after arebuke from Abbot Bernardsome years earlier. AfterVitry, it was Louis’s turn tofeel the stinging lash ofBernard’s tongue: ‘… fromwhombut thedevilcanIsaythatthiscounselcomeswhichaddsfiretofireandslaughter

to slaughter; which lifts thecry of the poor, the groaningof captives, the blood of theslaintotheearsoftheFatherof the fatherless and theJudgeofwidows?’Theabbot,as always, spoke with theassuranceofabsolutespiritualcertainty,andheleftthekingin no doubt of the reckoninghefaced:

… provoked by theconstant excesses you

commit almost daily, Iam beginning to regrethavingstupidlyfavouredyour youth more than Ishould have done, and Iam determined that infuture, to thebestofmylimited ability, I willexpose the whole truthabout you … I speakharshly, because I fearharsherthingsforyou.

Louis had no matching

certainty of his own, and hecrumbled before the abbot’sassault.By1144,thekinghadcollapsed into a state ofwretched penitence, and wasready to make terms withboth the pope and CountThibaud. The royal armywithdrew from Champagne,and the interdict was lifted.Meanwhile,AbbotSugersawanopportunitytocementthisfragilepeaceintheceremonyto consecrate the

extraordinary new choir hehad built for the basilica atSaint-Denis, a breathtakingconfection of soaring archesand gorgeously colouredlight. Abbot Bernard, for hispart, deplored lavishornament in churcharchitecture, as in everythingelse: a misuse of earthlyriches, he said, that couldbetter be used to succour thepoor, and a worldlydistraction from the

contemplative inwardness ofthesoul’squestforGod.But,in that at least, he had notpersuaded Abbot Suger tofollow him. For Suger, theoverwhelming beauty of hisbuildingwas apath tograce,a radiant, transcendent spacethat gave earth-mired sinnersaglimpseofheaven.On 11 June 1144,

therefore, a uniquelypowerful congregation ofsinners passed through the

gilded bronze doors ofSuger’s church to see thebones of St Denis, France’spatron saint, placed in agoldenshrineat thecentreofthe choir. King Louis wasthere,contriteandremorseful.Abbot Bernard hadswallowed his revulsion atthe opulence of hissurroundings tobepresent inthecauseofpeace.Andtheretoo,weigheddownbyheavilyembroidered robes amid the

press of the crowd, wasLouis’swife,Eleanor.It seems unlikely that

Bernardwasmuch impressedby this encounter withFrance’s queen. He hadknown her father – who hadbeen a supporter of theschismatic anti-pope in thedays when Abbot Bernardwas Pope Innocent’s chiefhope of regaining the throneofStPeter–andhadbroughtthe duke to his knees,

literally, it was said, in aconfrontation at Parthenay,just west of Poitiers. It wasfor the sake of Eleanor’ssister thatLouishadwatchedmore than a thousand soulsburn atVitry.And now hereshestood,awoman–hersexin itself a source of anxietyand repugnance from theperspective of the asceticCistercian ideal–deckedoutin the kind of superficialmagnificence that the abbot

deplored.But neither was Eleanor

overawed by the emaciatedfigure dressed in the coarsewhite wool of the Cistercianhabit.Throughoutherlifeshewould display a judiciouspiety, conventional in formand expression, but she wasnotabout tobowherhead toa spiritual philosophy bywhich she herself would bewrittenoffasanembodimentof worldly vanity. Instead,

this unlikely pair recognised,each in the other, aformidable will and animposing personality. Theresultwas a bargain.Eleanorwould do what she could tosteerherhusbandinthewaysof peace; in return, AbbotBernard would petition thequeenofheavenonbehalfofthe queen of France, in thehope that Eleanor mightconceive an heir to herhusband’sthrone.

Heaven, it seemed, waslistening to the saintly abbot,if not quite as carefully aswere the crowned heads ofEurope. In 1145, the yearafter the great and the goodhad gathered at Saint-Denis,Eleanoratlonglastgavebirthfor the first time. The babywas strong and healthy, andperfect in every way exceptfor its sex: it was not thelonged-for boy, but a girl,namedMarieinthankstothe

Virgin for this blessingbestowed and in hope ofbettertocome.Meanwhile,AbbotBernard

could have no cause forcomplaint about Eleanor’ssideof theirdeal.Bytheendof 1145 Louis was not onlypenitent, and reconciledwiththe Church in France and inRome, but committed to agreater goal even than peaceitself: he planned to wage aholy war, to defend

Christendom against theinfidel. That summer, newshad reached France that thecity of Edessa had fallen toMuslim forces commandedby the emir ofAleppo, Imadad-Din Zengi. For the Latinstates of theLevant, foundedhalf a century earlier in thewake of the victorious FirstCrusade, the loss of Edessarepresented both a spiritualaffront – the city housed thegraves of the apostles

Thomas and Thaddeus aswellasthousandsofChristianinhabitants – and a profoundstrategicthreat.Louis did not hesitate. At

Christmas 1145, with hiscourt gathered around him atBourges for the annual royalceremony of crown-wearing,he declared his intention toembark on a crusade. In thesame month, the new pope,Eugenius III – the firstCisterciantobeelectedtothe

Holy See, and himself adisciple of Bernard ofClairvaux – published a bullurgingthefaithfultocometothe aid of Edessa andconfirming the remission ofsins for all who joined thecampaign. Three monthslater, the crusade wasformally launched amidextraordinary scenes atVézelay in northernBurgundy.ManyroadsledtoVézelay:

lying between Paris and thegreat mother-houses of theCluniac and Cistercianorders,itwasoneofthechiefstaging-posts for pilgrimstravelling south to Santiagode Compostela. And it wasitself a place of pilgrimage,its newly rebuilt hill-topabbey dedicated to St MaryMagdalene, the patron ofpenitents, whose bones,contemporaries believed,restedthereinagildedshrine.

Little wonder that it seemedtheperfectplaceforakingtobegin a journey that was, inpart at least, one ofpilgrimageandexpiation.But even Vézelay, its

church freshly extended tocope with the throngingcrowds it regularly had toaccommodate,hadneverseenanythinglikethegatheringofEasterSunday1146.Somanypeople had packed into thetown that the church had to

beabandonedaltogether, anda makeshift stage hastilyconstructed on the hillsidebeyond. There Louis sat instate, wearing stitched to theshoulder of his mantle acrusader’s cross sentespeciallybyPopeEugenius,whohadbeenunabletoleaveItaly because of thedangerous uncertainty ofRoman politics. In his place,however, the pope haddespatched the frail but

luminouslycharismaticfigureof Abbot Bernard. Amid areverent hush, the great manspoke fervently, withindomitable energy andurgent rhetoric, exhorting theChristiansofthewesttohelptheirfellowsintheeast.ThenitwasLouis’sturnto

address his subjects, tellingthemofhis‘greatdevotiontothis war’, before kneeling intears at the abbot’s feet totake the cross for all to see.

Behind him pressed themagnates of France,including Henri, heir to theking’soldenemyThibaudofChampagne, along with somany others that the heap offabric crosses Bernard hadbrought with him to conferuponwould-becrusaderswasquickly exhausted, and theabbot was forced toimprovise replenishments bytearing strips from his ownwhite robe as the crowd

clamouredtoreachhim.Itwasaprofoundlystirring

spectacle, unprecedented insubstance as well as style.TheFirstCrusadehadbeenaspeculative, self-consciouslypioneering expedition, itslordly leaders venturing intothe unknown to seek newspheres of influence as wellas eternal salvation. But itstriumph in the face oftoweringodds–capturingtheholy city of Jerusalem, and

establishing Christian statesthere and further north atTripoli,AntiochandEdessa–meant that expectations, andthe stakes that went withthem, were now far higher.Never before had a crownedking undertaken to lead acrusadeinperson–amilitarycampaign that would takehimthousandsofmilesawayfrom the lands it was hissacred duty to rule, andwould keep him away for a

matter of years rather thanmonths, even supposing thathe returned at all. He wouldspend untold sums, prisedfrom the pockets of hissubjects left behind. Hewould face the manifolddangersoflandscape,climate,disease and a terrifyingenemy. And he would do itall, it emerged,withhiswifebyhisside.Eleanor too had sat,

dressed in a crusader’s robe,

on the platform at Vézelay,had knelt before AbbotBernard to receive the crossand had pledged her vassalsof Aquitaine to join thecampaign. She too receivedtheblessingofPopeEugeniushimself at Saint-Denis on 11June 1147, during anelaborately staged send-offfor the crusaders where thequeen, almost fainting on asuffocatingly hot day,watched her husband take

possession of the oriflamme,abannerof fire-red silkonagoldenlancethathungabovethe abbey’s altar until thekingshouldhaveneedofittoleadhis troops inbattle.Andshe too joined the Frencharmy when it assembled atMetzinthefareastofFrancetoembarkonthelongjourneyacross Europe to rendezvouswith the crusading forces oftheGermanking,ConradIII,inAsiaMinor.

ThepresenceoftheFrenchqueen and her attendantsalongsidethesoldiersandthewagonsfullofarmswasitselfan indication of theconfidence with which theexpedition set out. Eleanortravelled in style, despiteEugenius’s instruction to hiscrusaders to deportthemselves with sobersimplicity. (His papal bullforbade them to bring hawksand hounds, to employ

minstrels, or to wear ‘multi-coloured clothes or miniversor gilded and silver arms’.)But no silken pillow orupholstered saddle coulddisguisethefactthatthiswasa journey beside whichMatilda’s wintry crossing ofthe Alps thirty years earlierpaledintoinsignificance.From Metz the French

army, with the queen’selegantentourageinitsmidst,travelled a hundred miles

north-east to Worms, whereships were waiting to ferrythem all – nobles, ladies,bishops, troops, horses, armsand baggage – across theRhine.Theymovedatspeed,covering between ten andtwenty miles a day as theypressed on another twohundredmileseastwardtotheBavariancityofRegensburg,at the northernmost bend intheDanube,whereaGermanfleet had assembled to carry

them downriver through thelandsofthekingofHungary.When they reached Bulgariathey left their boats, insteadturningsouthwardsbyroad–and, despite beingsporadically held up by thefrustrating unwieldiness oftheir four-horse baggage-carts, they were still makinggoodtimeastheyenteredtheterritories of the Byzantineemperor,Manuel Komnenos.By 4 October, they had

reached Constantinople,capital of the eastern EmpireandthegreatestChristiancityintheworld.Relations between the

Christians of west and eastwere far from easy, and thearrival of the French king atthe head of his army, lessthan a month after theGermankinghadpassedbyatthe head of his, was hardlywelcome to the emperor.Indeed, having expressed

diplomaticjoyatnewsof thecrusaders’ plans a yearearlier, Manuel had nowconcludedthatthesecurityofhis empire was better servedby agreeing a twelve-yeartruce with the Turks. But hewas eager to see the Frenchleavehiscapitalaspeacefullyas they had come, and theroyal couple were receivedwith grace and extraordinarymagnificence into this mostbrilliantofcities.Eleanorwas

entertained by the EmpressEirene, formerly Bertha ofSulzbach, a Bavariannoblewoman turnedByzantine consort whosepious disdain for theelaborate clothes and paintedfaces of court fashioncontrasted sharply with thegilded intricacy of theimperialpalacesandchurchesinwhichthetwowomenmet.Wehavenowayofknowingwhether queen and empress

found commonground; therewas,atleast,asuggestionthatone of Eleanor’s ladiesshould consider taking aGreek husband. Either way,her stay was brief. Manuelmade rapid arrangements forthe French to cross theBosphorus in Byzantineships, and soon they wereonce again on themove, thistimetracingapatharoundthecoastofAsiaMinor.But they were about to

learn that grand plans and asenseofentitlementcouldnotguarantee the success of amilitary expedition on thiswildly ambitious scale so farfrom home. The firstunwelcomesurprisehadbeenthe sheer expense of keepingsuch a vast contingent in thefield, and Louis had beenwritinghometoAbbotSugerin Paris with instructions tosend more money(instructions that were far

easier, of course, to despatchthan to fulfil)eversince theyhadreachedHungary.Now, it began to be clear

that much worse was tocome. Any illusion thatdivine sanction wouldguarantee the crusaders’victory, irrespective ofunfamiliar terrain and hostileclimate, evaporated in aninstantwhen news arrived ofthe humiliating retreat of theGerman king’s forces, who

had taken a more direct butmuch more dangerous routeacross the Anatolian plateau.Inthatempty,aridlandscape,theGermancrusadershadrundesperatelyshortof foodandwater. Starving andincapacitated by thirst, theyfound themselves harried onall sides by Turkish raids.The Seljuk archers movedfast, their horses fresh andstrong, and let fly densevolleysofarrowswithdeadly

accuracybeforemeltingbackinto the barren hills. Underthis remorseless assault, thewretchedremainsofConrad’sonce proud army turned tailand struggled back to theByzantine city of Nicaea inthe far north-west ofAnatolia, carrying theirshaken and wounded kingwiththem.In the circumstances, their

rendezvous with the FrenchinNovember 1147was a far

cry from the moment oftriumph that either Louis orConrad had anticipated. Thecombined forces of thecrusade – the Germansnursing theirwoundsand theFrench discomfited by theirallies’ plight – made theirway down the coastal road,struggling through fords andover mountains, to spend anunhappy Christmas atEphesus.Conradandhismenthen limped back to

Constantinople, whereManuel had offered theservices of his imperialdoctors to nurse the injuredking back to health, whileLouis and his cavalcadeheadedonward,despiteheavyfallsofrainandsnow.But on the steep slopes of

Mount Cadmus, the Frencharmy became dangerouslyoverstretched. The vanguard–whichincludedEleanorandher ladies, and was

commanded by Geoffroi deRancon,anoblemanfromthequeen’s county of Poitou –made the ascent withunexpectedease,anddecided,withoutconsultation, topressontopitchcampontheplainbelow. In doing so, they leftthe forces behind themstrandedonthemountainside.Thefootsoldiersandbaggagetrain, whowere expecting tomeet them at the summit,foundnoonethere,whilethe

king and his bodyguard,bringing up the rear, had notyet even begun the climb.And while the baggage trainhesitated, strung out onnarrow rockypathsedgedbyfearful drops, the Turksseizedtheirmoment.The whine of an arrow in

flightwasthefirstsignoftheslaughter to come. As theSeljuksclosed in, firingfromall sides, terror and panicspread among the French

ranks. Therewas nowhere toturn: death rained from theskyinahailofTurkishsteel,while men and horsesstumbled and fell, theirbodies breaking on the rocksbelow.Messengersfledtotellthe king of the unfoldingmassacre, and Louis and hisknights rode as hard as theycould to the rescue.But theycould not strike a decisiveblow against an enemy thatwashiddenonthehillsideall

around them. All they coulddo–atthecostofmanymorelives–was to shepherdwhatremainedofthebaggagetraintothesafetyofcamp.Recriminations began at

once. Eleanor’s vassalGeoffroi de Rancon wasblamed for his impulsiveleadership of the van, andwas dismissed, to returnhome to Poitou. But Louis’scommand of his army hadbeen exposed, in this first

major military encounter, ascomplacent at best, and atworstdeeplyflawed.Itwasabruised, reduced anddispirited company thatstruggled onward to the portofAdalia to takeshipfor theChristian principality ofAntioch.We know nothing of

Eleanor’sexperienceof thesealarmingevents.Buttheveryfact that there is so littlemention of the queen in the

principalsourcesforthispartofthecrusade(whichincludeaneyewitnessaccountby theking’s chaplain, Odo ofDeuil) nevertheless suggestssome plausible, if limited,conclusions. Eleanor, itseems,wasphysicallystrong.It was an arduous journey,and, whatever the privilegedconditionsinwhichthequeentravelled,theycouldnothavebeen enough to shield hercompletely from the

privations of life with anarmythathadlostmuchofitsequipment in raids andskirmishes, and was runningdisastrously short ofprovisions. Yet there is nosuggestion of urgent concernabout the wellbeing of thequeenandherladies,noranyproposal that they – like thewounded king ofGermany –should turn back to takerefugeundertheprotectionofthe Byzantine emperor at

Constantinople. By the sametoken, it also seemsreasonable to conclude thatshe was undaunted by thedangers she faced. And,certainly, her behaviour onceshe reached the haven ofAntioch was anything butfearful.It rapidly became clear,

once the exhausted Frenchcontingent had landed atAntioch’s port of St Simeonon the easternMediterranean

shore, that the crusade hadwrought no greatertransformation on the royalcouple’smarriage than ithadon the king’s abilities as ageneral.EleanorandLouis,itappears, had spent little timetogethersinceleavingFrance.The queen seems to havebeen kept away from theking’s pavilion byconsiderations of proprietyand safety, and, in alllikelihood, by Louis’s

determination to undertaketheholyworkofacrusaderinthe chaste condition of apilgrim. But, aftermonths asa camp follower, in AntiochEleanor found herself onceagainaqueenatthecentreofacourt–andonethatofferedattractions of beguilingfamiliarity.The ruler of Antioch was

Eleanor’s uncle, Ramon ofPoitiers, her father’s youngerbrother,whohadacquiredhis

principality along with thehand in marriage of its ten-year-old heiress in 1136.Ramon was ‘the handsomestof the princes of the earth’,according to the laterchroniclerWilliam ofTyre –urbaneandcharming,andthemost attentive and generousof hosts. That generositycould not, however, bemistaken for disinterestedkindness.Antiochwascaughtbetween the twin threats of

Muslim and Byzantineexpansionism, and thecrusaders’ arrival seemed tooffer Ramon the chance tostrengthen his own hand inrelationtothosetwoloomingpredators. His plan was topersuade Louis to help himcapturethegreatMuslim-heldtrading city of Aleppo innorthern Syria, just beyondthe eastern border of hisprincipality–andheenlistedhis niece,Eleanor, as an ally

inhisdiplomaticoffensive.Louis, however, had other

priorities. The crusade hadoriginally been intended toliberate Edessa, which laynorth-east of both Antiochand Aleppo. But now –almost a year and twothousand miles after he hadfirst set out on hismission –Louis heard the devastatingnews that Edessa was nolonger there to be saved. AnArmenian-ledrevolthadbeen

crushedwithsuchvehemencebyitsMuslimcaptorsthatthecity lay deserted, itswalls inruins. As a result, analternative targetwould havetobefoundforacrusadethathad been intended as atriumph, but threatened nowto descend into farce. ForRamon of Antioch, whoconfidently presented hisplans to theFrenchking at acouncil convened for thepurposeinMay1148,Aleppo

was the obvious answer; butLouis declared his intentioninstead to ride three hundredmiles south to rendezvousonce more with the Germanking, Conrad, who was nowhealedofhiswoundsandhadjustarrivedintheholycityofJerusalem.Ramon was appalled and

incredulous.Having come sofar, how could Louis nowturnhisbackontheenemyhehad set out to confront?And

as the political relationshipbetween Antioch and itsFrenchvisitorscollapsed intorecrimination, so too didLouis and Eleanor’smarriage. The young queenhad revelled not only in thecomforts of her handsomeuncle’s court, but in thecharms of his company. Shesympathised with his plans,and had undertaken to presshis case with her husband.But the long, laughing

conversations between uncleand niece – their intimacycompounded by the fact thatthe French struggled tounderstand the Poitevin orOccitan dialect in whichRamon and Eleanor couldchoose to speak privately –sparked scandalisedwhispersthattherelationshiphadgonefurther than could beexplained away by thepolitics of queenlyintercession or the joy of a

familyreunion.Itwasadangerousmoment

for Eleanor. The wife of akingwasthemeansbywhichhis bloodline would bepropagated, and, if thelegitimacy of his heirs wereto go unquestioned, sheherself needed to be beyondreproach. But strikingly, andremarkably, Eleanor wasunabashed by the currents ofgossip and rumour thatswirled around Antioch and

soon raced across Europe.She knew her own strength,as heiress to the vast duchythat had transformed herhusband’s power within hisown kingdom, and sheshowednofear foreitherherposition or her reputation.There is nowayofknowing,now, whether her affectionfor her glamorous uncle hadgrownintoafull-blownaffair–arelationshipwhich, in theminds of shocked

contemporaries, wouldconstitute not only adulterybut incest. Almost ninecenturies later and withlimited and partial evidence,we cannot with anyconfidence sift fact fromspeculation and innuendo.Butspeculationandinnuendotherecertainlywere.Andnotonly did Eleanor do nothingto distance herself fromRamon and his court, butwhen Louis declared his

plans to leave Antioch forJerusalem, she –astonishingly– refused to gowithhim.It was an extraordinary

public breach betweenFrance’sroyalcouple,andanunexpected and damagingcrisisforamilitarycampaignthat already seemed destinedfor humiliation rather thanvictory. There could be nopossible doubt, now, of howindependent-minded Eleanor

was;howbrave–orperhapsreckless – in the face ofconvention;andhowunhappyshe had become with herhusband. And when Louistried to insist that sheremember her duty, sheshowed just how far shewaspreparedtogotoescapehim.‘Whenthekingmadehastetotearheraway’,wroteJohnofSalisbury, a well-informedsourcewhowas then a clerkat the papal curia, ‘she

mentioned their kinship,saying it was not lawful forthem to remain together asman and wife, since theywererelatedinthefourthandfifthdegrees.’It was true that Louis and

Eleanor were related withinthe degrees of consanguinityprohibited by the Church –that is, they shared anancestorwithintheirfamilies’last seven generations. Butthen, so did almost everyone

else within the royal andnoble houses of Europe. TheChurch–facedwiththeneedto choose between theextinction of the rulingclasses for want of suitablemarriage partners, and theprospect of turning a blindeye to the enforcement ofecclesiastical rules – hadopted for the latter, andconsanguinity had thereforebecome a prohibition to beinvoked at the convenience,

rather than for thediscipline,of thearistocracy.Usually, itwasaninstrumentwieldedbypowerful men to ridthemselves of wives whowere no longer politicallyconvenient, and Eleanor hadseen how useful it could bewhen Raoul of Vermandoishad discarded Eléonore ofBlois in order to marry hersister. But Eleanor also, itnowappeared,sawnoreasonwhy this escape route should

not be open to a troubledqueen just as well as to aninconveniencednobleman.What Louis thought of his

wife’s disaffection is muchless clear. ‘The king wasdeeply moved’, John ofSalisbury later remarked,‘and although he loved thequeen almost beyond reasonheconsentedtodivorceherifhis counsellors and theFrench nobility would allowit.’ There are profoundly

mixed messages here: Louis,by this account, was all butimmobilised by theconflicting impulsesofpiety,passion and politics. Andfurtherconfusionisaddedbythe only strictlycontemporaneous evidencewe have. ‘Concerning thequeen your wife,’ AbbotSuger wrote to Louis fromParis in1149, ‘weventure tocongratulate you, if wemay,upontheextent towhichyou

suppress your anger, if therebe anger, until with God’swill you return to your ownkingdom and see to thesemattersandothers.’IfLouiswasangry–andit

seems, at the very least, aplausible reaction to such adramatic affront–hedidnotexpress it publicly.What wecanbesureofisthatEleanorwanted a way out of hermarriage, and that herbehaviour was the talk of

Europe,while her husband –susceptible though he mightbe to suggestions that theirunion was sinful – did notwant to let her go, whetherbecausehelovedher,becausehe needed her lands, orbecausehecouldillaffordtheembarrassment of beingdeserted by his wife in thecourse of a crusade that wasalready shaping up to be ahumiliating failure. And,despite her uncle’s support,

Eleanor was unable to holdout in the face of herhusband’s insistence that shestay by his side. When theFrench army left Antioch bynight,atspeedandwithnoneofthefanfarethathadgreetedtheir arrival, the queen,howeverreluctantly,waswiththem.The rumours that sprang

from Eleanor’s self-assertioninAntiochpursuedherfortherest of her life. Later,

sympathetic chroniclerswouldfindthemselvesunableto resist alluding to thescandalwithanunmistakablefrissonofexcitement,evenasthey ostentatiously drew aveil over the episode. ‘ManyknowwhatIwouldthatnoneofusknew…’wroteRichardof Devizes forty years later.‘Let no one say any moreabout it; I too know it well.Keepsilent…’But, while the whispers

about Eleanor and her unclepersisted, silence descendedinstead over the queen’sexperiences for a year afterher enforced removal fromhis court. The Frenchmarchedsouth toTripoli andthensouthagaintoJerusalem,where Louis and his armywere welcomed with cheersand the singing of hymns.Afewweekslater,attheendofJune 1148, a magnificentgathering of the kings and

nobles of France, Germanyand Jerusalem took thedecision that their thwartedcrusade should now besiegeDamascus, the great Muslimcity almost 150 miles to thenorth-east; but only a monthlater,afterapromisingattackthrough the walled orchardsthatmade up the city’s outerdefences, their combinedforces were driven off byimpassableblockadesandtheimminent prospect of

starvation. Riven byargument about who was toblame for the fiasco, theytrailed disconsolately home.And of the French queen’swhereaboutsduringthisdampsquib of a campaign, thechroniclers recorded nothingatall.We do know that, when

Louis decided to remain inJerusalem while his noblesmade the long journey homein the autumn of 1148,

Eleanor stayed with him. Ifhe had fallen short as acrusader, he was determinedthat he would not fail as apilgrim, and the king andqueenmadeanelaboratetourof the Holy Land’s mostsacred sites, culminating inthe celebration of theChristian calendar’s holiestfeast at Easter 1149. Shortlyafterwards, the royal coupleatlastsetsailfromtheportofAcre on the kingdom of

Jerusalem’s Mediterraneanshore.Eleanor, it had to be said,

did not make as likely apilgrimasthemonkishLouis,and she had already made itclear that she no longerwelcomed his company.Whatever her mood aftertheirlongsojournintheeast,it was unlikely to have beenimproved by their voyagehome.They took ship in twoSicilian vessels, one carrying

the king and his household,theother thequeenandhers.But, by taking passage asguests of one ally, Roger II,the Norman king of Sicily,they fell foul of another.Roger was engaged inprotracted hostilitieswith theforces of Byzantium, sincethe Emperor ManuelKomnenos saw him as theusurper of lands in southernItaly that shouldby rightsbein Byzantine hands. And, as

Eleanor gazed out from thedeck of her Sicilian shipacross the brilliant bluewaters of the Mediterranean,a Byzantine fleet hovemenacinglyintoview.She had wished for a

separation fromher husband,but not in this frighteningform. As the little Sicilianconvoy scattered under theByzantine attack, enemyships closed round thequeen’s vessel to corner and

captureit.Eleanor’stimeasaprisoner of the Greeks wasbrief, since rescue was closeathandintheformofSicilianreinforcements; but by thenthe king’s galleywas far outof sight, while storms droveEleanor’s ship south towardsnorthAfrica.Itwastwolongmonths before either madelandfall again, Louis on theshoreofCalabria in southernItaly,andEleanoratPalermoin Sicily. There, finally, her

health gave way under thestrain of an already gruellingvoyage compounded by thedebilitating effects ofisolation and uncertainty. Ittook three weeks before shewaswellenoughtoleaveherbed and join her husband ontheItalianmainland.Andherconvalescence can hardlyhave been helped by thearrivalofthehorrifyingnewsthat Ramon of Antioch, towhom she had said goodbye

so unwillingly, had lost hislife a few weeks earlier inbattle with Nur ad-Din, thenew ruler of Aleppo.Ramon’s head was hackedfromhisbody,hisgoodlooksfinally obliterated by thisbutchery, and sent in a silverboxasatrophyforthecaliphofBaghdad.Weary, grieving and

despondent, Eleanor madeher way north at herhusband’s side to Tusculum,

a hill-town fifteen milessouth-eastofRome,toacceptthehospitalityof thepopeenroutehometoParis.EugeniusIIIhadlastseenthecoupleinthe glorious setting of Saint-Denis, at the ceremony tolaunch the crusade towardsinevitable and triumphantvictory. Now it seemed asthough their marriage, justlikethecrusaders’hopes,wasfractured beyond repair. Butthe pope was determined to

save this, if nothing else,from the ruins of thecampaign. He issued a sternprohibitiononanymentionofthe issue of consanguinity asa threat to the legitimacy oftheirmarriage,confirmingthevalidity of their union ‘byword and writing’, andthreatening anathema againstanyone who sought todissolveit.Andhesweetenedcompulsion withencouragement, ordering that

the bed prepared for EleanorandLouis to share shouldbeprotected from the autumnalair by some of his ownpricelesshangings.Louiswasdelightedbythis

papalblessing,since(JohnofSalisbury reported) ‘he lovedthe queen exceedingly, in analmost boyish fashion’. Thereaction of Eleanor – aboutwhom there was no longeranything girlish, and whoseaffectionforherhusbandhad

long since been exhausted –is not recorded. There couldbe no doubt, however, thatthe pope’s pronouncementhad closed the door on anyhope that she mightimminently escape hermarriage. And Eleanor didnot waste her energy bystruggling further. It seemsclear that she had resignedherself for the time being toher future in France: shebecame pregnant soon after

theirreturntoParis,andgavebirth in 1150 to a seconddaughter,Alice.For two years thereafter,

the chroniclers paid littleattention to France’s newlydomesticated queen. WhileLouis threwhimself intowaragainst Duke Henry ofNormandy, the seventeen-year-old son of the EmpressMatilda,Eleanor remained inthe background, and shestayed there when this fiery

young man arrived at theFrench court at the end ofAugust 1151 to confirm apeace brokered by thedoughty Bernard ofClairvaux.But only seven months

after Henry’s visit, EleanorfoundherselfagainthetalkofEurope when – despite thepope’s prohibition – hermarriage was once againdragged into the glare ofpublicscrutiny.On21March

1152,havinggiventhemattertheirformalconsideration,anaugust assembly of Frenchbishops declared that theimpediment of consanguinityrenderedthemarriageoftheirkingandqueennullandvoid.This was the same bloodrelationship that Eleanor hadfirst raised in Antioch as areason for separating fromher husband, and which thepope had so sweepinglydismissed in confirming the

legitimacy of theirrelationship. Something,clearly,hadchanged.Most contemporaries, and

historians since, have lookedfor the answer toLouis,whountil now had refused toacceptthathemightpartfromhiswife,whomheloved,andwho had brought him suchpowerful territories as herdowry.Theking,itisusuallyassumed, must have tired ofEleanor’s coldness towards

him, or suddenly becomeoverwhelmed by doubt aboutherabilitytobearhimamaleheir. But that conclusionperhaps underestimates thestrength of the cards Eleanorheld in her hand, or thewayshe chose to play them. Shehad been forced to acquiescein the rapprochementbrokeredbyPopeEugeniusin1149, but there is nomistaking that herdisenchantment with her

marriage endurednonetheless. Certainly, thebishops’ pronouncementcame as no surprise to her:sheutterednowordofprotestat the annulment, insteadriding immediately towardsher own city of Poitiers, andleaving forever her twodaughters, the younger ofwhomwasnotyettwo.In fact, Alice’s birth in

1150 had, in retrospect, beena lucky break for Eleanor.

Her status as the mother ofgirlshasusuallybeenseenasapositionofweakness;itwasmothers of boys, so theassumption goes, who couldhope to assert their ownpower in their sons’ names.But, forEleanor in1152, theexactreversewastrue.Ifshestill wanted to escape herhusband – and there is noreason to suppose that papalblandishments had doneanything to change hermind

– it was essential that sheshouldnotgivebirthtoason.IfsheboreLouisaboy, thentheuncontested legitimacyofthe heir to the kingdom ofFrance would depend on thevalidity of his parents’marriage. Escape, at thatpoint, would be near-impossible (unlessperhaps toaconvent,whichEleanorhadso far shown no sign offinding an attractiveprospect). And, even if she

could find some acceptableway of extricating herselfwithout casting any hint of ashadow over her offspring,any son she had with LouiswouldbetheheirnotonlytoFrance but to Aquitaine aswell – a fact that wouldundermine her chances ofregaining control of her ownduchy, as well as radicallyreducing her appeal topotentialnewsuitorsonceshewasfree.

Without a son, however,Eleanor had an ace to play.Louis needed a legitimatemale heir to inherit hiskingdom (a necessitydemonstrated only tooconvincingly by the bitterconflict still festeringbetweenStephenandMatildaon the other side of theChannel). And if his wiferefusedhimaccesstoherbed,he stood no chance offatheringone.Theoddsmust

be that this is what Eleanordid, once their enforcedreunionbetweenpapal sheetswasover.Thekingandqueenwere still young – thirty-twoand twenty-eight respectively– and baby Alice providedvery recent proof of theirfertility. But less than twoyears after Alice’s birth,Louis was prepared to letEleanor go, and Aquitainewith her – a huge politicaland territorial sacrifice that

wasworthmakingonly if hesawnootherwayofsecuringthefutureofhisdynasty.Louis made a last-ditch

attempttoclingontowhathehad lost, politically if notpersonally, by continuing tostyle himself ‘duke of theAquitainians’ for two yearsafterEleanorhadleft.Butbythen,thesuccessofEleanor’sstrategy was clear for all tosee,since,whateverhemightcall himself, her former

husband no longer held anysemblance of power in herlands. And it also transpiredthat the timing of herdeparture from the Frenchcourt–sevenmonthsafterthevisit of the young duke ofNormandy – had not beenentirelycoincidental.Noone,inMarch1152,couldmistakethe fact that the newlydivorced duchess ofAquitaine was once again agreat catch for theunmarried

magnates ofEurope; she hadplenty of childbearing yearsstill ahead of her, andwhoever fathered her sonswould add Aquitaine to hisfamily’s lands in perpetuity.A chronicler from Toursreports thatEleanornarrowlyevaded two ambushes on herjourney to Poitiers as a freewoman, both laid byambitious young noblemenintentonwinningherhandbykidnapratherthandiplomacy:

one was Thibaud, the newcountofBloisafter thedeathof his father and namesake;theother,GeoffreyofAnjou,teenage son of the EmpressMatilda. But once Eleanoreludedtheirgrasp,itemergedthat her hand had already,secretly, been taken – andthat the man who wouldbecome her second husbandwasGeoffrey’solderbrother,Duke Henry of Normandy,whom she had met in Paris

theprevioussummer.That, at least, is the most

plausible conclusion to bedrawn from the speed withwhich Eleanor and Henrymarried. Only eight weeksand two days after thebishops had proclaimed herdivorce, Eleanor, at twenty-eight, made new vows to anineteen-year-old whoseboundless energy andcharisma as a soldier and aleader marked him out, in

personal terms, as the polaroppositeofher firsthusband.Politically, though, the twomen had more in common:each had stood to gainimmeasurably from theaddition of her lands to hisown;andHenry,nolessthanLouis, could offer her acrown. The diadem was notyet quite in his hands in thespring of 1152, since, acrosstheChannelinEngland,KingStephen still clung to the

hopethathisownsonEustacemight succeed him. AndHenry’s chance to press hisclaimtothethroneonEnglishsoil was further delayed bytheneedtodefendhisFrenchpossessions against Louis’sfurious reaction to the newsof this provocative wedding.A French army swarmedacross the Norman frontier;but Henry set in motion acounter-attack thatwasswift,violent and irresistible. In

little more than two months,Normandywassecure.Ayearlater, with Eustace dead andStephen’s resistance finallyextinguished, Henry wasformally recognised as theheir to the English throne.Onemore year after that, on19 December 1154, Eleanorsat by Henry’s side inWestminster Abbey as theywerecrownedkingandqueenofEngland.Eleanor had effected an

extraordinary transformation.ForfifteenyearsshehadbeenqueenofFrance– a focusofpersonal loyalty for herAquitainian vassals, butafforded no place in theformation of royal policy,dominated as her husband’sgovernment was by themonastic influence of AbbotSuger. Nor, on the otherhand, had she fulfilled theexpected role of a royalconsort. In fifteen years

perhapsthreepregnancieshadproducedonlytwodaughters,not the male heir Franceneeded, and when she hadaccompanied her husband oncrusade her incautiousbehaviour had scandalisedEurope.Now she had a second

chancetobeaqueen,besideavery differentman, in a verydifferent realm. And one ofthe most striking aspects ofthis transfiguration was how

much it owed to Eleanor’sown agency. Admittedly,Louis was following in thefootsteps of his father andgrandfather, who had bothseparated from their firstwives. (His father’s short-lived first marriage wasannulled on the predictablegroundsofconsanguinity,forpoliticalreasons,itseems;hisgrandfather, on the otherhand, repudiated the motherofhiseldestsontopursuean

outrageously irregular unionwith the wife of the thencount of Anjou, and wasexcommunicated for hispains.)Butneitherhadriskedlosing territory on theimmense scale of the duchyof Aquitaine as a result ofdivorce.And,crucially,itwasEleanor who had first raisedquestions about the validityof her marriage; Eleanor, inall likelihood, who hadbroughttheissuetoaheadin

1152; and Eleanor who,before she had even left theFrenchking’sside,hadfoundherselfanewhusbandwhosepower could rival Louis’sown.She had done so with

determination, fearlessnessand an utter lack of concernfortheworld’sverdictonherconduct. After the reversesshe had suffered at Antioch,shehadplayedherhandwithacuity and skill. In leaving

her first husband, andmarryinghersecond,shehaddecisivelyshifted thebalanceofpowerinFrance.Together,Eleanor of Aquitaine andHenry of Normandy andAnjou now ruled lands thatstretchedfromBarfleurinthenorth to the Pyrenees in thesouth – a territorialrealignment that relegatedLouisinParistothesidelines,and helped to overwhelmStephen’s resistance to

Henry’s claims in England.Henry could offer his bridethe prospect of a crown, butthere is no doubt that shehelped him to secure it forher.While he was doing so,

Eleanor immersed herself inthose elements of a royalwife’s role that she had sosignally failed to fulfil at herfirst attempt. Within sixmonths of marrying Henryshe was pregnant, and in

August 1153 – adding insulttoinjuryforherex-husband–she gave birth to a son,William, a name thatconveniently celebrated thedukes of Aquitaine and theNorman conqueror ofEngland simultaneously.Within a year she hadconceived again, and washeavily pregnant when shewasanointedandcrownedatWestminster in December1154, two weeks after

enduring a stormy Channelcrossingtosetfootinhernewkingdom for the first time.Hersecondson,namedHenriafter his father, was born inLondon in February 1155.Three more babies followedin the next three years:Matilda in 1156, Richard in1157 and Geoffrey in 1158.Thereafter the rate at whichshe produced more childrenslowed, but it did not stopaltogether. Eleanor, her own

namesake,wasborn in1161,and Joanna in 1165, and bythe autumn of 1166 she waspregnant again for what wastoprovethelasttime.Forthefirstfifteenyearsof

her second marriage, then,she was almost constantlyoccupied with the physicallydemanding business ofchildbearing. The royalhouseholdwaswellequippedwith wet-nurses, attendantsandtutorstowaitontheroyal

children’s every practicalneed; it was hardly thatEleanor’s days wereconsumedby theminutiaeofmotherhood. But repeatedpregnancies, combined withher formal responsibilities asthe consort of a king whoneverstoppedmovingaroundhisvastterritories,meantthatshe had little scope forpolitical initiative at thehighestlevel.SheappearedatHenry’s side at ceremonial

gatherings of the courtthroughout his empire, andsheembodiedonefacetofhisauthority, at the head of agovernment managed withincreasing administrativesophistication, when he wasabsent on campaign with hisarmy. But the main femaleinfluenceinHenry’scounselsduringtheseyearswasthatofhis mother, the EmpressMatilda, an experienced andastutepresenceatherhomein

Rouen. Eleanor, meanwhile,was absorbed in the vitallyimportant but altogether lesscerebral task of stocking theroyalnursery.All that was to change in

1167. In September of thatyear,Henry’smotherMatildadied. Nine months earlier,Eleanorhadgivenbirthtoherlastchild,aboynamedJohn.Heryearsasasilentmadonnawere over. Shewas ready tostep into hermother-in-law’s

placeasapoliticalforcetobereckoned with. And Henry,like Louis before him, wasabout todiscover that loyaltyto her spouse was not theforemost of his wife’s manyqualities.

TheWarWithoutLove

In 1167, the Normanconquest of England was a

century old. The widerempire of which Normandyand England were now part,ontheotherhand,hadbeeninexistence for less than adecadeandahalf.Henryhadwelded his disparateterritories together through acharacteristicallyoverwhelming combinationof brute force and sharppolitical judgement. He hadoverpowered a rebellion ledby his own brother Geoffrey

in Anjou, and extended hisinfluence westward into theindependent duchy ofBrittany, as well asconsolidating his power inEngland, Normandy andAquitaine. He had set hisgovernment in order, so thatin England, for example, thechaotic after-effects of civilwar, played out in disputesover landholding andinheritance, could finally beput to rest in his law courts

without the need for hisconstant presence. And hehad gathered around himselfa group of able advisers, ofwhom only one had provedanythingless thananasset tothe regime: Thomas Becket,oncehisclosestfriend,whomHenry had promoted to theseeofCanterburyonlytofindthat his new archbishop tookhis duties to the Church,rather than the crown, muchmore seriously than the king

hadanticipated.By 1167 his breach with

Becket over the relativepowers of ecclesiastical androyal authority had becomeovert and irretrievable. Thearchbishop had escaped intoexile in France where Louis,always delighted by anyopportunity to make troublefor Henry, gave himsanctuary. But, despite thisincreasingly bitter and, forHenry, profoundly irritating

dispute, there could be nomistaking that the king ofEngland was now the mostpowerful man in westernEurope.Heruledagreatdealmore land and commandedmoremenandmoneythanhisnearestrival,LouisofFrance.Louis hadgrown a little intohis own authority since hisdesertionbyhisfirstwifeandthe deaths of his mentors,Abbot Suger and thevenerated Bernard of

Clairvaux,intheearly1150s.Hehadalso, at last, after thebirths of twomore daughtersbyhissecondwife,fatheredason by his third. But, as helightheartedly remarked toHenry’s clerk Walter Map,‘Your lord the king ofEngland, who lacks nothing,has men, horses, gold, silk,jewels, fruits, game andeverythingelse.WeinFrancehave nothing but bread andwine and gaiety …’ And,

however much Louis’spolitical standing haddeveloped, the jokeremainedtoo close to the truth forFrenchcomfort.Having so

comprehensively masteredthe present, Henry was nowconfrontedwiththechallengeof the future. How was hisempire, bound together forthe moment by the sheerforce of his own dynamism,to be managed when he was

gone? And how was hisgrowing familyof sons tobeaccommodated within theterritories he had amassed?Henry sought to answerbothquestions at once in early1169 when he concluded acomprehensive peace treatywithLouisatthebordertownof Montmirail, between hisowncityofLeMansand theFrenchking’scapitalatParis.Henry’s lands would be

divided,hedeclared,between

three of his sons. The eldestof Henry and Eleanor’schildren, William, hadsurvivedforonlythreeyears,dyinginDecember1156.Butthe rest of their large broodhad proved as hardy as theirunstoppableparents,andtheirsecondson,Henri,wasnowastrapping fourteen-year-old,tall, blond, charming andcharismatic. In the usualmanner of internationaldiplomacy, the complex pre-

historyofthekingsofFranceand England and the queenwho had married each ofthem in turn had been sweptto one side when the youngprince’s marriage wasarranged: at the age of justsix, the son of Eleanor andHenry hadmade his vows toMarguerite, the toddlerdaughter of Louis of Franceby his second wife,Constanza of Castile.And atMontmirail,forthefirsttime,

King Henry confirmed whatinheritance the now teenagecouple would one day rule.YoungHenriwould shoulderhis father’s mantle, takingover the territories thatmadeup the king’s personalinheritance – the cross-Channel realm composed ofthe kingdom of England, theduchy of Normandy and thecountyofAnjou.His mother’s duchy of

Aquitaine,meanwhile,would

go to his eleven-year-oldbrotherRichard,who–asthejunior partner in this doublemarriage alliance – wasbetrothed to Marguerite’syounger sister Alix.Aquitaine would thereforeretain its independence fromthe kingdom of England, anarrangement explicitlyconfirmed by the fact thatRichardwoulddohomageforhis duchy to his Frenchfather-in-law Louis, rather

than to his own father orbrother.And for ten-year-oldGeoffrey, Henry andEleanor’sthirdson,therewasBrittany,wheretheexhaustedand browbeaten duke,ConanIV, finally abandoned allattempts to hold offAngevindomination. Conan’s onlydaughterandheir,Constance,hadalreadybeenbetrothedtoGeoffrey in yet anotherdynasticallianceforgedinthenursery. Now it was

confirmedthattheyoungmanwould one day rule Brittanyin the name of his wife, andthat the duchy would beformally subjected toAngevin overlordship, sinceGeoffrey, it was agreed,would perform homage asduke to his elder brotherHenri.Theterritorialsettlementat

Montmirail left manyquestions unanswered – notleast in making no provision

fortheyoungestofHenryandEleanor’s sons, John, whowas not yet three. Therewouldbetimeenoughlater,itseemed, to consider theclaims of the baby of thefamily, although the treatymeant that as he grew intoboyhood he was alreadyknown as Jean Sans Terre –JohnLackland–insympathyforhis limitedprospects.ButtheMontmirailagreementdidsketch out an understanding

ofwhatshareoftheirfather’sempire each of his elderbrothers should expect torule,andabasisonwhichthekings of France and Englandmightfindawaytoactinco-operative tandem rather thanatdestructiveloggerheads.The accord was given

ceremonial confirmation atWestminster Abbey eighteenmonths later, when youngHenri was crowned king ofEngland in his father’s

presence – a calculateddeployment of the samestratagem of coronation-in-advance with which theFrenchkingshadtraditionallysought to guarantee theirsons’ succession, and whichStephen had failed to securefor the ill-fated Eustacebefore Henry himself hadtaken the throne. Only thefact that the youngman wasanointedbythearchbishopofYork rather than the

archbishop of Canterbury(Thomas Becket’s rift withhiskingbeingoneofthefewissues left unresolved andfesteringby thediplomacyatMontmirail) cast a pall overthe lavish celebrations. Butpreceding all of thesecarefully calibrateddispositions – and laying thefoundationforthem,infact–had been a telling change inthe royal family’s politicaland domestic arrangements.

In 1168, Eleanor had comehometoAquitaine.It was not that, during the

previous fifteen years, shehad either been constantly ather husband’s side, or totallyestranged from her nativeland. Far from it: the hoursthatHenry regularly spent inthe saddle as he rode atpunishing speed around hisdomains meant that thecouple were frequentlyseparated. Meanwhile,

Eleanor’smorestatelytravelshad taken her to Aquitaine’scities of Poitiers andBordeaux as well as toLondon and Oxford,ArgentanandAngers.Buthermove in 1168 wasqualitatively different.Between1156–whenHenrydid homage to Louis VII forhis new wife’s duchy andreceived that of theAquitainianbaronsinhisturn– and 1167, not a single

survivingcharterproducedbythe ducal administration ofAquitaine had mentioned itsduchess. Eleanor, it seems,hadbeen toobusyproducingheirs,andtoofirmlysidelinedby a husband intent ondemonstrating the overridingforceofhisownwill, toplaymorethanadecorativeroleinthegovernmentofherpeople.Now that was changing.

Henry’s thoughts wereturning to the possibility that

thefutureofhisempiremightlie in delegation rather thancentralisation. And, in thecase of Aquitaine, his mindwas concentrated by theparticular challenges theduchy posed to its rulers –challenges that weremultipliedmanytimesoverifthose rulers came frombeyond its northern frontier.Aquitaine was huge in size,covering an area larger thanNormandy and Anjou put

together, and, for northernerstravellingsouth,itsterritoriesbecame ever more alien astheir journey progressed, notonly in language but inculture, customs and climate.It had to be said thatAnglo-Normans and Angevinsthemselves were not theeasiestofbedfellows,but thetensions between them wereborn of proximity and longexperience, of similarityrather than difference.

Aquitainewasanothermatter.For inhabitants ofNormandyandAnjou alike, the peoplesof the south could appeardisconcertingly foreign,whether foppishly refined tothe point of degeneracy, ordisgustingly uncivilised intheir habits and dress. Eitherway,clearly,theywerenottobetrusted.Henry’s countrymen,

therefore, whether inEngland, Normandy or

Anjou, were all too likely toassume that Aquitaine wasvirtually ungovernable. Thetruth, however, seen throughless prejudiced eyes, wasmore heartening. The duchywas a region not only ofextraordinary culturalsophistication–itspoetryandmusic matched by theexquisitely carved stoneworkof its churches – but ofextraordinarywealth.Besidesits agricultural riches, its

goldenfieldsanddarkforests,coiling rivers and opencoasts, Aquitaine plied aprofitableexport tradeintwoof twelfth-century Europe’smost valued commodities:salt, essential for foodpreservation, which wasdistilled from sea water allalong the duchy’s Atlanticshore, andwine, produced toa superb standard inBordeauxandSaintonge,andshipped to markets across

Europe. That trade filled theduke of Aquitaine’s cofferswith revenue from customsand tolls, and – althoughpower was in essence amatter more of land andloyalty than of commercialtransactions–readycashflowwouldmorethanhelptoraisean army or keep it in thefield.Fromhis cities ofPoitiers,

built on a great promontoryoverlooking streams

surrounding iton three sides,and Bordeaux, the bustlingport on thewest bank of theGaronne where the rivermeanderstothesea,theduketherefore stood every chanceof dominating vast tracts ofhis duchy. The regions fromPoitiers west and southwarddown the coast to LaRochelle, Saintes andBordeaux, and then east andsouth again to Agen, wereprosperous and peaceful.But

therewasnodenyingthatthelands of Poitou and theLimousin in the centre andeast of the duchy – andparticularlythecastle-studdedterritories south of Poitiersbelonging to the counts ofAngoulême and the greatLusignan family – had thepotential to be profoundlytroublesome. Either of thesevassalsof thedukecouldusethe strategically cruciallocation of their estates to

disrupt communicationsbetween the key cities thatowed allegiance to theiroverlord. The challenge ofmanaging ambitious andaggressive men with suchwidespread scope to causeconflict had been a familiarone to Eleanor’s father andgrandfather; and, if Henryneededaremindertokeephiseyeontheregion,hegotitin1168 when Geoffroi deLusignan rose in rebellion

againsthim.The threat was manifest:

the Lusignans were bullishand intransigent, and supportfrom Louis of France wouldalways be forthcoming forthose in Aquitaine whosoughttothrowoffhisrival’syoke. And the violence hadalarming consequences. Theearl of Salisbury, anexperienced soldierdespatched with QueenEleanor to hold Poitouwhile

Henrywasengagedinurgentdiplomacy with Louis, waskilled in action: anunfortunate casualty ofunlucky fate, said theLusignans; stabbed in theback while unarmed anddefenceless, protested theearl’s outraged men. Eitherway, thekilling– rather thanthemore usual imprisonmentand ransom – of a trustednoble lieutenant was, forHenry, both shocking and

sobering.The Lusignans’ revoltwas

suppressed by a combinationof the treaty agreed withLouis at Montmirail in thefollowingyearandavirulentcampaign of repressionwagedbyHenry in itswake.But the need to find a long-term strategy for the rule ofAquitaine, and Poitou inparticular, was left in starkrelief. And that circumstancelent a great weight of

significance to Eleanor’sreturntotheturretedpalaceatPoitiers in which she hadspent so much of herchildhood. She was thehereditary duchess ofAquitaine, freed now fromthelaboursofchildbearingtotake up the reins ofgovernment among hervassals, who had swornallegiance to her long beforethey had bowed the knee tothe second of her husbands.

For Henry, who had learnedmuchfromhisgiftedmother,thiswasadeliberatedecisionto deploy the skills andcharisma of his equally, ifverydifferently,giftedwife–Eleanor’s fearlessnessmarking a counterpoint toMatilda’sshrewdcaution.ForAquitaine, it was therestoration of a measure ofnative rule (which, howevertempestuous the politics ofthe duchy under Eleanor’s

father and grandfather,remainedinfinitelypreferableto domination from thenorth). And, for Eleanor, itwasnotonlyahome-comingbut, at the age of forty-four,her first clear chance atsustained political autonomyonapublicstage.Her new role as

Aquitaine’s duchess wasfounded on her ownhereditary rights, but it wasreinforced and amplified by

her functions as wife andmother. She was herhusband’s lieutenant in thispartofhisempire,evenifhisright to rule there originatedwith her. She was alsoserving as guardian of theduchyduringtheadolescenceof her sonRichard,who hadbeen named as Aquitaine’sfuture duke in the settlementof 1169. Richard was anexceptionallyableboyand,itemerged, his mother’s

favourite – a bond that wasestablisheddecisivelyintheseyearswhenhewasimmersed,with her, in the culture andlandscape of her owngirlhood. And, just as hisolderbrotherHenri’spositionas heir to England andNormandy had been rituallyconfirmed by his coronationat Westminster two yearsearlier,inJune1172fourteen-year-old Richard wasformallyenthronedasdukeof

Aquitaine.In the cool interior of the

Romanesque church of StHilaire at Poitiers, watchedby the painted gallery ofbishops,martyrsandsaintsonthe richly coloured walls,Richard sat in the abbot’schair – by tradition, anhonorific right of the countsofPoitou–totakepossessionof the sacred lance andbanner that symbolised theauthority of the dukes of

Aquitaine. Because thatauthorityreachedfurtherthanPoitou, the ceremony wasthen repeated seventy-fivemiles to the south-east atLimoges, chief city of theLimousin. There Richardreceived the ring of StValérie,avirginmartyroftheearly Church whose rapidlydeveloping twelfth-centurycult identified her as thesymbolic embodiment ofAquitaine itself. It was the

young duke who wore thesaint’s ring, but the ritualpersonification of the duchyas a woman could not helpbut focus attention on thewoman who ruled with andforhim.Wecannotnowreconstruct

many of the details ofEleanor’s government inAquitaine,but the factofherrole isunmistakable. In1168and 1171 she held greatChristmas courts of her own,

asshehadneverdonebefore,gathering her vassals aroundher in Aquitaine in theabsence of her husband, butwith her young son by herside. And, after a decade inwhich she had appeared innot a single extant ducalcharter,infiveyearsshenowissued fifteen survivingcharters inherown rightandon her own authority,sometimesinassociationwithher husband or son – ‘I and

Richard my son’, some actsbegan, while others wereaddressed by the queen-duchessto‘theking’sfaithfulfollowers and hers’ – butnever dependent on them.Meanwhile, Henry neitherissuedanychartersofhisownfor Aquitaine during theseyears, nor saw any need toconfirmorotherwisevalidatethoseofhiswife.It seemed, therefore, as

though the delegation of

powerwithinHenry’sempire,of which Eleanor’s rule inAquitaine formed a key part,was working. Certainly, itsurvivedtwomajorshocksin1170. That summer, theunthinkable happened whenHenry, the thirty-seven-year-old king whose superhumanvigour was the stuff oflegend, fell so seriously illthatrumoursofhisdeathflewaroundFrance.Herecovered,slowly, but the will he had

drawn up when he believedhe would not surviveconfirmedhiscommitmenttothe distribution of his landsbetween his sons (and, inpractice, his wife) that hadbeen agreed at Montmirail.And then, once restored tohealth, both Henry and hisregimeprovedabletorideoutthe international stormunleashed at the end of theyear by the murder ofThomas Becket, hacked to

deathinhisowncathedralbyknights who believed theywere acting on their king’sorders.Ittookalmosttwoyearsto

emerge from the tempest ofoutrage and recrimination,but by the summer of 1172Henry had done publicpenance for his part in thekilling and had at last beenfreed from the threat ofexcommunication. Theclouds, it seemed, were

lifting; and the division ofpoweramongHenry’s familyappeared not simply to befunctioningbuttobereachingmaturity,with the investitureof Richard as duke ofAquitaine in June and yetanother English coronationfor his brother Henri inAugust, this time atWinchester with his youngFrenchwifeathisside.Appearances, however,

could be deceptive. What

Henry had declared hisintention to do, and what hehad actually done, were twoverydifferentthings.Perhapsthe clerk Walter Map hadbeenrightafterall tosuggestthat the king set too muchstorebyhismotherMatilda’sadvice that an unruly hawkmightbebroughtunderclosecontrol by the proffer of ajuicy piece ofmeat, but onlyif it were snatched away atthe last moment. By the

beginning of 1173 Henry’seldest son, now seventeen,and Richard, fifteen, hadheard many fine wordsdescribingtheirrightsaskingand duke, spoken in reverenttones amid ahazeof incensein hushed cathedrals. Of thereality of royal and ducalauthority, theyhad seenverylittle. Perhaps it should nothave been surprising thattheir tirelessly controllingfather should find it difficult

to hand over thefundamentals, as opposed tothe accoutrements, of power.Conflict between fathers andsons had, after all, been aperennial side-effect for theCapetians toowhen they hadtried tosecure thesuccessionto the French throne by thissame method of preemptiveenthronement. But thethwarted hopes of Henry’ssons were mingled with thedriving ambition and fiery

temper they had inheritedfrom their implacable father.Itwasatoxicmixture.The situation began to

unravel in February 1173 atwhat had promised to be amoment of triumph forHenry.Hewasintheprocessof agreeing a peace intendedto secure the south-easternfrontier of his territories, ofwhich the centrepiece was aproposed marriage betweenhisyoungestson,six-year-old

John, and the daughter andheiress of Count Humbert ofMaurienne,aterritorythatlayeast of Provence in theSavoyard Alps. Thesettlementwas proclaimed ata magnificent meeting ofHenry’s court at Limoges,attended not only by thecount of Maurienne but alsoby the rival southern powersof the king of Aragon-Barcelona, the king ofNavarre,andCountRamonof

Toulouse, against whomHenry had undertaken animposing but largelyunsuccessful militarycampaign in 1159. On 25February,CountRamongaveceremonial expression to theconcord he had nowconcluded with his formerenemy by doing homage forToulouse first to Henry, andthentohiseldestson.YoungHenri, it seemed, whateverhis simmering resentments,

had been accorded all duerecognition in this gatheringofpotentates.But then Count Humbert

askedthekingwhatlandsthechildJohnwouldbringtothemarriage, tomatch the richesof his own daughter’sinheritance. Chinon, Loudunand Mirebeau, came thereply: the three castles inAnjouthathadbeenthefocusof Henry’s conflict with hisbrother Geoffrey nearly two

decades earlier. At this,young Henri exploded infury. He had been crownedkingofEngland–twice–andinvested as duke ofNormandy and count ofAnjou. He had just turnedeighteen, already two yearsolder than the age at whichhisfatherhadtakencommandof the duchy of Normandy.And yet his father had nothandedintohiscontrolanyofthelandsofhisinheritance,to

which his right had been sopublicly and repeatedlyproclaimed. Now, the finalinsult, three of his castleswere tobegivenaway tohisbaby brother. He did notagree. He would not agree.Andhisfatherwouldhavetodosomethingaboutit.The king was not minded

to capitulate in the face ofthis petulant outburst.Whatever the merits of hisson’s case, they were

outweighed not only byHenry’s own reluctance tocede control in anyfundamental sense, but alsoby the fact that young Henrihadsofarspectacularlyfailedtoprovethathewasreadyfortheresponsibility.Quiteapartfrom the questionablejudgement revealed by thispublic foot-stamping, theYoungKing,ashehadcometobeknown,wasengulfedindebt. Though he could, with

somemeasureofjustification,argue that this wasunavoidablegiventhathehadno lands with which tosupport his household, suchreasoning was badlycompromised by theprofligacyofhisspendingontournaments and banqueting.Two months earlier,according to the chroniclerRobert of Torigni, he hadheld a Christmas feast soextravagantinitsconceitand

lavish in its execution thatone room alone had beenfilled with 110 knights allnamedWilliam.But the bruised amour

propre of a vain adolescenttook on a more threateningslant in the light of theprobability that the YoungKing’sfather-in-law,LouisofFrance, had encouraged oreven instigated his demands,and the certainty that hewouldsupport them.And the

alarmoftheOldKing–‘old’only in relative terms, sinceHenry was still a few daysshort of his fortieth birthday,and as remorselesslyenergetic as ever – wasimmediately compounded bya private warning fromRamon of Toulouse thatHenry’s younger sons,Richard and Geoffrey, wereconspiring with their brotheragainsthim.Henry responded with

characteristic swiftness. Onthe plausible pretext that hewas going hunting, he leftLimoges at speed, givingcovert orders that his castlesinAquitaineshouldbeputona war footing. Richard andGeoffrey remained behind inthe custody of their mother,whileHenry decided that theYoung King should travelwith him, under closesupervision, on his journeynorth. But when the royal

party paused to spend thenight at the massive fortressofChinon, one of the castlesin the Loire that hadprecipitated the confrontationat Limoges, young Henrimade his escape silentlyundercoverofdarknessinthebrief hours while his fatherslept, and rode furiously forParis.It had been entirely

foreseeable that Henri wouldseektodefecttohisfather-in-

law’s court, and the OldKing’s immediate frustrationlay not in the fact of hisdesertion but in his ownfailure to pre-empt his son’sflight. It was a much morebrutal shock, however, tolearn a few days later thatHenri’syoungerbrothershadalsomadethehurriedjourneynorth to join him underLouis’s protection. Richardand Geoffrey, at fifteen andfourteen,werestilltooyoung

to be acting entirely on thebasisof independentpoliticalcalculation, and they hadbeen left in the apparentsecurity of their mother’skeeping. Therewas only oneconclusiontobedrawn,anditwasthemostshockingofall:Eleanortoowasnowinopenrevolt against her husbandandking.One Limousin chronicler,

Geoffroi of Vigeois, reportsthatEleanor’snamehadbeen

included with those of heryounger sons in Ramon ofToulouse’swarning toHenryabout the treachery he nowfaced. If Vigeois is correct,then – given that Henry hadleft Richard and Geoffrey inEleanor’s care – either theking had not believed thecount’s warning, or he hadcalculatedthatEleanorwouldnot risk pursuing theconspiracy once its existencehad been exposed. Either

way, he was profoundlymistaken.Henry’sdifficultyingiving

credence to his wife’sbetrayalismirroredbythatofhistorians in attempting toexplain it.Eleanorherself,ofcourse,leftnoaccountofherown motives, nor didcontemporary chroniclers,who tended to keepthemselves at arm’s lengtheven from their ownnarrativesofher involvement

in the rebellion, shieldingthemselves behind allusionsto hearsay from personsunknown with a constantrefrain of ‘so it is said …’.The vacuum of informationhasbeenfilled,assoofteninEleanor’s life, withspeculation focusing on heremotional experiences. Justas her personalincompatibility with Louisplayedapartintheendingofher first marriage, so it has

been argued that the privatedynamics of her second –which was, after all, a muchmore potent partnershipbetween two extraordinarilyforceful people – lay behindthe breach between Eleanorand Henry in 1173. And, asso often with Eleanor,centuries of conjecture haveborne fruit in legends ofremarkable complexity andpersistence.Shewasviolentlyincensed, so the story goes,

by Henry’s passion for abeautiful young womannamed Rosamund Clifford,‘FairRosamund’,the‘roseofthe world’. In her jealousyand anger, the queen rousedher sons to rebellion againsther unfaithful husband,before(inaplot-twistworthyof this granddaughter of atroubadour) procuring thedeath by poison of her hatedrivalfortheking’slove.The absence of a single

shred of evidence to supportthis tale–beyond the factofHenry’s liaison withRosamundClifford,whodiedin1176andwasburiedattheking’s command in amagnificent tomb at theOxfordshire abbey ofGodstow – need not preventusfromtakingitseriously,inessence if not in detail: it isnot the first or last event inEleanor’slifeofwhichthatistrue. But a lack of basic

plausibility might. Whateverthe reality of Eleanor’srelationshipwithherhusband–whichisimpossiblenowtorecover, any more than wecan know what reallyhappened between Eleanorand her uncle Ramon ofAntioch twenty-five yearsearlier–thereisabanalitytothe fact that kings hadmistresses, and Eleanor wascertainly worldly-wiseenough to know it. There is

no incontrovertible evidencethat she andHenry had evenseeneachotherfortwoyearsbetween 1170 and theChristmas court they heldtogether at Chinon in 1172.Instead, Eleanor had beenspendinghertimeengagedina project which offers muchmore fertile ground inexplaining her alienationfrom her husband in thespringof1173:theruleofherbelovedAquitaine.

There are indications –fleeting, but suggestivenonetheless – that Eleanorhadbeenseeking to intensifyher independence as de factorulerofherduchyintheyearbefore the crisis of 1173begantounfold.InJune1172she had received diplomaticvisits from the kings ofNavarre and of Aragon-Barcelona; the complexprocess of attempting tostabilise the geopolitics of

southern France, in otherwords,wasoneinwhichshe,as well as Henry, had beenpersonally involved. During1172 she had also addressedthree charters not ‘to theking’s faithful followers andhers’,asshehadalwaysdonepreviously, but ‘to her ownfaithful followers’ alone. Ininterpreting such faint tracesof political activity we arereading crumbling runesrather than a clearly incised

script, but even this tentativeimpression of Eleanor’sincreasing self-assertion issignificantinacontextwhere– for all her apparentauthority inherownduchy–her practical powers wereconstrained by the fact thatshe controlled neither thebulkofAquitaine’srevenues,whichclinkedinsteadintoherhusband’s coffers, nor themilitary resources needed toimpose order there. In 1171,

when the monks of StMartial’s Abbey in Limogesfaceda revolt at their nearbytown of La Souterraine, itwas to Henry – rather thanEleanor, theduchess on theirdoorstep–that theyappealedfor help; and it was Henry,notEleanor,whosentsoldierstotheiraid.The overriding political

circumstance, therefore, thatshaped Eleanor’s actions in1173wasthefactthatshe,no

less than her sons, had beenpromised power by herhusbandandthendenieditinpractice.Or,attheveryleast,she had achieved somemeasure of authority in herown duchy, only to find thatthe fundamentals of politicalcontrol still lay beyond hergrasp. If her son Henri wasbrimming with resentment athis father’s refusal torelinquish the rights hebelieved were his due, then

Eleanorhadnolesscauseforfrustration – and, in fact,much more, since theelaborate diplomacy atLimoges in February 1173,which for a brief instant hadseemed such a triumph forHenry,hadalsorepresentedadramatic affront to Eleanor’sterritorialambitions.Henry’s goals in tackling

the intractable rivalries ofsouthern French politics hadalways been to guarantee the

frontiers of his empire, toextend his influence beyondthem, and to protect accessfrom the Atlantic port ofBordeauxviaToulousetothelucrative trade routes of theMediterranean. In 1159, thathad meant waging war onCountRamonofToulouse;in1173, it meant receiving hishomage. ForHenry,with hissteely pragmatism and hisabsolute capacity to inhabitthe presentmoment, itwas a

political recalculation soobviousthatitdidnotwarranta second thought. Eleanor,however, did not find it soeasy to take this strategicabout-turninherstride.WhenHenryhadledhisformidablearmy against the city ofToulouse in the midsummerheatof1159,hehaddonesoin the name of his wife’sclaimtobetherightfulheirtothe comté. Eleanor’sgrandmother Philippa, the

long-suffering wife ofAquitaine’s troubadour duke,had been the only child ofGuilhem IV, count ofToulouse,but– ina scenariothat would have beeninstantly familiar to Henry’smotherMatilda–shehadnotbeen accepted as her father’ssuccessor. The Toulousaininheritance had passedinstead in the male line toGuilhem’s younger brother,Ramon IV, whose grandson,

RamonV,nowheld the title.But the dukes of Aquitainehad never conceded thelegitimacyof thissuccession,and Eleanor’s counterclaimhad been pressed at sword-pointfirstbyLouisofFrancein1141,andthenbyHenryin1159.Neithercampaignhadbeen

successful, andby theendof1172 Henry had concludedthat his interests were betterserved by cultivating

Ramon’s friendship than byrenewing the attempt tobludgeon the count intosubmission. In February1173, Eleanor was thereforeforcedtostandbyinimpotentsilencewhilethehusbandshehad scarcely seen for twoyears stormed at hiscustomaryspeedintohercityof Limoges in order tocontractapeacewiththemanwhohadusurpedher right toher grandmother’s territories.

Henry, meanwhile, gave nohint of doubt or hesitationabout the propriety of hisactions; he seems to havesuspected nothing awry asEleanor watched Ramonkneel before him amid thesplendour of his court to bepublicly confirmed inpossessionofToulouse.Theformofthatceremony

too,hadHenrybutrecognisedit, supplied yetmore grist tothe mill of his wife’s

grievances. Even if Eleanorcould have been persuadedthatRamonwasrightfullythecount of Toulouse, therecouldbenodoubtofthedukeof Aquitaine’s claim to theoverlordshipof thecomté. Inthat sense, at least, Ramon’shomage to Henry wasunexceptionable, since theking was also duke ofAquitaine in his role asEleanor’s husband. But thehomage that Ramon

performed that day to HenryandEleanor’sson,theYoungKing Henri, was a differentmatter. True,Henri had beennamed heir to England,NormandyandAnjou,buthehad no claim to Aquitaine,which had been apportionedas the inheritance of hisbrother Richard. For CountRamon to do homage toHenri, in other words,forcefully suggested thatAquitaine was no longer an

independent part of Henry’sempire but a dependent one,subsumed under theoverarching authority of theAnglo-Norman crown. ThatwouldhavebeenanathematoEleanor’s ancestors; it wasunacceptable to many of herAquitainianvassals;andthereis no reason to think that itwas any more tolerable toEleanorherself.Forall that thedevastating

rupture of 1173 was

precipitated by her sonHenri’s adolescent posturing,it was Eleanor’s grievancesthat constituted a coherentcritique of her husband’sstrategy over the previousfew years. It isunderstandable, perhaps, thatthe story of this mostcharismatic andunconventionalofqueenshasbeen clouded by anenveloping aura of romanceand myth, but if we jettison

the presupposition that herestrangement from herhusband must have beenrooted in emotion, we canfind ample grounds for thealienation of a focusedpoliticalmind.Henryhadnotdelivered the measure ofpolitical autonomy he hadpromisedEleanororhersons.He had abandoned her claimto Toulouse, a cause forwhich he, and her firsthusband before him, had

previously been willing tofight. And, in doing so, hehad appeared to threaten theautonomyofAquitaine itself.ThetriumphantceremonialatLimoges in February 1173 –an unwelcomepolitical ritualperformedat theheartofoneof Eleanor’s own cities –could not have been a morestark reminder of the gulfbetween her hopes for theduchy and her husband’sobliviousness to the

aspirations he himself haddonesomuchtofoster.That is not to say that

Eleanor’sresponsewaseitherpredictable or well-judged.Rebellion against one’s king– and particularly a king asnear-impossible to resist asHenry had proved himself tobe – was an intenselydangerous path. But Eleanorhad already shown herself tobe capable of the apparentlyunachievable: her almost

seamless translation from thecrownofFrancetothecrownof England wasdemonstrationenoughofthat.She had engineered her ownescapefromoneunacceptableroyal marriage, and she hadproved more than once thatshewouldnotbeconstrainedby fear of the consequencesof her actions. Itmight seemscarcely credible that sheshould sendher teenage sonsto conspire with her ex-

husband against their father,but it is clear neverthelessthat that is what she did.Neither Richard andGeoffrey, who were still tooyoung to act with anysignificant degree ofindependence,nor theYoungKing, more of a struttingpeacock than a politicalthinker, were capable of co-ordinating such a threateningcoalitionbetweentheheirstoHenry’s empire and the king

of France. Eleanor was. Andit soon became clear quitehowmuchshewasputtingatriskindoingso.Therecouldbenosurprise,

of course, that Louis ofFrance – never thewiliest ofpoliticians, but acquiringsomegreaterworldlinesswiththe advancing years – wouldtake any opportunity todiscomfit his rival anddestabilise Henry’s empire.But the spectacle of a ruling

family imploding intotreachery and recriminationcausedhorror,amongAnglo-Norman commentators atleast. It was a ‘deplorablebetrayal’,onechroniclersaid,anditservedonlytofeedthesinister (and deliciouslyscandalous) tale thatHenry’sAngevin dynasty was the‘Devil’s Brood’, descendedfrom Melusine, daughter ofSatanhimself.Whatever the outrage it

provoked, however, the storyof hot-headed young menresorting to violence andtreachery in their unseemlyhastetoseizetheirinheritancewas a familiar one tocontemporary observers. Itwasacauseforsorrow,regretandanger,butitwasfarfromunprecedented. Louis ofFrance’s ill-fated elderbrother Philippe had donelittle else but provoke theirfather with his insolence

between his coronation atthirteen and his death twoyears later. A closer parallelstill was provided by thetravails of Robert II, king ofFrance a century and a halfearlier,whohadspentthelastsixyearsofhislifeembroiledin a bitterwarwith his threesons, inwhich theeldest, theyoungkingHugues,haddiedat the age of just eighteen.And there was a readybiblical identification against

which clerical chroniclerscould measure Henry’smisfortune,intherebellionoftheunhappyAbsalomagainsthisfather,KingDavid.The monastic historian

William of Newburgh, forexample,wasinnodoubtthatyoung Henri was an‘ungrateful son’ whosedisobediencetohisfatherhad‘violated the law of nature’.Evenso,theveryfactthathisdisloyaltycouldbefittedinto

thearchetypeof‘theaccursedAbsalom’ meant that theimpulses behind it wereculturally understood; whilethe qualities that provoked it– ambition, aggression,unbridled self-assertion –were thosewhich,differentlydirected, could be seen aspropertoaking.Thesamecouldnotbesaid

of Eleanor. There were noobvious historical precedentsnor cultural archetypes to

frameherrebellion.Whenthecontemporary chroniclerRalph of Diceto, dean of StPaul’s Cathedral and alearnedhistorian,scoured theannals for past parallelsagainstwhichtocomparetherevolt,hecompiledmorethanthirty instances of sonsrebellingagainsttheirfathers,but not a single case of aqueen takinguparmsagainsther husband. Not only that,but the traits Eleanor

displayed in resisting Henrywere the antithesis of thoseunderstood as queenly. Aqueen was a consort, ahelpmeet, an intercessor inthe cause of peace andjustice. Above all, perhaps,she was doubly bound by asacred duty to obey herhusband – once as a subject,and again as his wife.Eleanor’ssonHenri,Williamof Newburgh believed, ‘hadsullied his early years by an

indeliblestain’,butEleanor’sbehaviourthreatenedtheveryfabric of society itself. ‘Manis the head of woman,’ thearchbishop of Rouenreminded her in some alarm,quoting St Paul, in a publiclettercomposedonhisbehalfby the scholar and stylistPeterofBlois.‘Weknowthatunless you return to yourhusbandyouwillbethecauseofageneralruin.’But Eleanor had not been

cowed by scurrilous rumourin Antioch; she had notacquiesced in the face of apapal prohibition ondivorcing her first husband;andshewouldnotbackdownnow.With her sons safely inParis under the wing of herjubilant ex-husband, she setabout mustering militarysupport in Aquitaine, whichwasreadilyforthcomingfromthoselords–Poitevinsforthemost part – who had always

resisted the imposition ofcentral control in the duchyand who had tangled withHenry before: the counts ofAngoulême, their allies theLusignan family and theLusignans’ cousin Geoffroide Rancon, at whose sideEleanor had braved the ill-fated ascent of MountCadmusaquarterofacenturyearlier. As she did so, Louiswas assembling anintimidatingcoalitionofallies

in support of her sons inParis. There was Mathieu,count of Boulogne, who hadacquiredhistitlebymarryingthedaughterofKingStephenand his queen Mathilde ofBoulogne; the count’s elderbrother Philippe, count ofFlanders; Stephen’s nephewThibaud of Blois; andWilliam, the king of Scots.All saw the unmissableopportunity – together withother defectors in England,

Normandy, Brittany andAnjou – to lay their eagerhands on lands they hadeither forfeited, or neverstood a chance of acquiring,under Henry’suncompromisingrule.As her sons prepared to

take up arms at the head ofthis great noble allianceagainst their father, Eleanormade ready to return for thefirst time in twenty years totheFrenchcourtinParis.Itis

impossible to know whethershe had made a calculateddecision to play the odds ofthisnerve-wrackinggame,orwhether her fearlessness wasborn of an inability tocontemplate the risk offailure. Either way, she wastofind that–yetagain–shehadmet hermatch inHenry.Foronce,thiswasachallengefrom which she would notemergeunscathed.Beforeshecould reach Paris, at some

place and time unknown onthe road north from Poitiers,she was captured by herhusband’sforces–andfoundto be disguised for herjourney in men’s clothing,according to the chronicle ofGervase of Canterbury. Thestory could well be thesensationalisedelaborationofa disapproving monk, but atthe very least it remainstantalisingly allusive, giventhat she had figuratively (if

not literally) adopted theguise of a man from themoment she rejected herhusband’sauthority.No tunic and hose,

however,couldnowsaveherfrom her fate. By the end of1173 it was apparent thatHenry’s military genius, hiscool head in a crisis and hishastily assembled army ofruthlessly professionalmercenaries were holdingfirm against the onslaught of

hissonsandtheirallies.Thatautumn, with the rebelcampaign faltering, Henryoffered them terms for peacethat were financiallyrewarding but concedednothing of the power theycraved.EncouragedbyLouis,the boys fought on, withsixteen-year-old Richardmounting an impressivelystubborn defence of hismother’s county of Poitou.By the autumn of 1174,

however, it was clear thattherewasnoalternativebuttothrow themselves on theirfather’s mercy. Henry lovedhis sons with ‘an inordinatelove’, William of Newburghbelieved, and certainly theking was generous in hisvictory. He exchanged thekiss of peace with hisprodigal offspring, and gavethem money and noble (ifdeliberately unfortified)residences in the territories

they had claimed, to salvetheir battered egos. Therewould be no concession ofjurisdiction,butthistimetheywere in no position to argue.Othersmight accuse them ofbreaking nature’s law, butHenry was prepared to bemagnanimous: the treatyagreed at the pretty town ofMontlouis in theLoire at theendofSeptemberofferednotsimply reconciliation, butreconciliation with honour.

Not,however,toEleanor.For Henry’s captured

queen there would be noforgiveness. Her name wasnot spoken atMontlouis. Bythen, she was far away inEngland, where she hadalreadyenduredmonthsofanimprisonment thatwould lastas longasherhusband lived.Revolt had brought her sonschastening experience, and afresh start with their father.For Eleanor, on the other

hand, the rest wasimpenetrablesilence.

BytheWrathofGod,QueenofEngland

Ever since she was thirteenyears old, Eleanor had stoodat the heart of westernEuropean politics. For adecade and a half she hadbeenqueenofFrance;fortwodecades more she had beenqueen of England.Throughout, she hadcherished her rights andresponsibilities as duchess ofAquitaine. She had travelledto Jerusalem and back, andthat dramatic voyage had

been only the mostextraordinaryepisodeinalifelived in constant motion.Above all, perhaps, she hadbelieved in her own agency.Though she could notcommand her husbands, shehadanindomitablewillandatoughpoliticalmind,and shehad always had a choiceabout how she reacted to thecircumstances, howeverdifficult, in which she foundherself.

Now,forthefirsttime,shehadnochoiceatall.Howcanwe begin to imagine herresponse as weeks ofcaptivitybecamemonths,andmonthsbecameyears,until itbecameclearthatinthis,asinsomanythings,Henrywouldbe relentless? Her isolationwas such that imagination isallwehave.Eventheplaceofherconfinementisnotknownforcertain,barthefactthatitwas in England, where

expenses for her keepingwere periodically allowed atthe exchequer. We knownothingofhowshespentherdays while the years of hermiddleage–thetimeshehadhoped to spend ruling herhomeland of Aquitaine –ebbed fruitlessly away. Norcanwebesurehowmuchsheknew about what washappening outside the wallsofherprison(forthatiswhatit was, however comfortable

her accommodation). It islikely thatHenrymadeeveryeffort to restrict her contactwith the outside world; it isequally likely that Eleanordid her utmost to subvert hisorders.We can only guess,

therefore, what news sheheard of her sons as theygrew into adulthood withouther. Was it a source ofdistress or consolation toknow that her favourite,

Richard,wasrulingAquitaineinherstead,andshowinghisworth as a soldier and astrategist? Her sons, at anyrate,didnotforgether.Henrymust have hoped that herincarceration would serve tocoerce their loyalty –although that was a happyside-effect of a policy rootedin his own rage at theperversion of his wife’sbetrayal and the intolerablepublic humiliation it

represented.If Eleanor was a hostage

for her sons’ co-operation,her plight did its work inharnessing Richard to herhusband’s cause. His firsttaskashis father’s lieutenantin Aquitaine, in commandnow of the troops andrevenues Eleanor had neverbeen granted for her owngovernmentthere,wastorazethe castles of his recentlyabandoned allies, those

Poitevin lords who hadbacked his rebellion. Thebiting irony of the campaigndid nothing to deter theeighteen-year-old duke fromexecuting his task with grimefficiency. His next eightyearswerespentinthesaddleat the head of his soldiers,suppressing a succession ofrevolts by Aquitainian lordsunhappy with Henry’simposing regime and itsincarnation in their midst in

the person of Richardhimself. There could havebeen no more rigorouspractical training in the artand science of militarycommand, and it forgedRichard intoa leaderof suchimplacable single-mindedness, such nervelesscourageandpitilessbrutality,that, despite his devotion tohis mother’s homeland, hewas loathed by many of hisvassalsthere.

His elder brother Henri,meanwhile, was putting hismilitary talents to morefrivolous use. The YoungKing’s passion was fortournaments – the wildexcitement and violentglamourofthemêlée–whichhepursuedacrossFranceandFlanders at the head of afollowing largely composedof landless knights, theyounger sons of youngerbrothers who reaped the

rewards of his carelessextravagance.He had neitherthe application nor thestamina to learn from hisfather’s attempts to schoolhiminstatecraftandtheharshlessons of real, rather thancounterfeit, warfare, butrepeated demonstrations ofthat fact did nothing to denthisconvictionthathewasthevictimofoutrageousinjusticein being kept from theexerciseofpower.Atfirsthis

father placated his tantrumsand threats–Henry renderedindulgent in this, as in noother area of his life, by hisloveforhissonandhisblinddetermination that Henriwould, in time, come toappreciate the scale of hisfutureresponsibilities.Butby1183 it had become starklyapparent that no moment ofself-realisation – nor anyconcern for his incarceratedmother – would restrain the

Young King from followingthe dictates of his bloatedego.By the spring of that year

Aquitainehademergedashischosen battleground. Havingfailed to persuade his fatherto hand Normandy or Anjouinto his control, Henri hadtoyedwiththeideaofleavingfor Jerusalem in a fit offlamboyant pique, beforedeciding instead to pick afight with his younger

brother. Richard, inAquitaine, already had theindependence Henri craved;and the hostility of thoseAquitainian lords whoresentedtheirimperiousdukeseemed to offer the YoungKing a chance to oust hisbrother from power, and tosupplant him. At anextraordinarygatheringoftheroyal court at Christmas1182, with more than athousand knights crowding

hishallatCaen,theOldKingsought,yetagain, tobrokeratrucebywhichhemightunitehisfracturedfamily.Butoncethe extent of Henri’sdisloyalty became known –once itwasclear thathewasmusteringforwarat theverymoment he pledged hiscommitment to peace – evenHenryhadtoconcedethathisheir could be indulged nofurther. The king summonedtroops to the Limousin to

fight alongside Richard andhisforces,whileHenriralliedthe rebels of Aquitaine todefy them.Onceagain– andthis time without Eleanor’shelp – her husband and sonsstood on the brink of theabyss.But this time there would

be no reconciliation. At theend of May, after aninconclusive siege of theYoungKing’sencampmentatLimoges by his father and

brother,Henri fell gravely illwith dysentery. When hisdoctors realised that he wasbeyondhelp,hesenturgentlyto his father, beggingforgiveness and the privilegeofa lastmeeting.Buthehadabused Henry’s trust toomany times, and the king,fearing some new treachery,would not go. Henri died on11 June 1183, at the age ofjust twenty-eight. Thecelebrity of this most

glamorous and shallow ofprinces was such that thepeopleofLeManskidnappedhis corpseen route to its lastresting-place at Rouen; onlyunderthreatofforcedidtheydisinter it from a new-madetomb in their cathedral andsend the cortège on its way.Andwithhisdeath,hisrevoltcollapsed, along with hisgrief-stricken father’s plansforthefutureofhisempire.Eleanor, hearing in

faraway England of the lossof the son she had not seenfor a decade, was now fifty-nine. It was said that thedying Henri, overwhelmedwith remorse and seekingabsolution from his absentfather, had entreated that hismother should be dealt withless severely for her part inhisfirstmutiny.Ifthereportswere true, his petition mayhelp to explain the shock ofEleanor’sappearanceatcourt

almosteighteenmonths later.Dressed in gowns of fur-trimmed samite for whichspecial funds were releasedfromtheexchequer,shespentChristmasof1184atWindsorwith her sons Richard andJohn and her daughterMatilda, newly returned toEngland with her husband,Duke Heinrich of Saxony,who had been exiled fromGermany by the EmperorFriedrichBarbarossa.Butthis

unexpected show of familyunitydidnotforeshadowanygreater liberation for thequeen, nor anymore generalpardon granted by herestranged husband. EleanorremainedinHenry’scustody,to be summoned when therewas advantage in doing so,and otherwise keptsequestered.The nature of that

advantage became clearlyapparent in the spring of

1185, when she was onceagaincalled toherhusband’sside, thistime–necessitatingher first cross-Channelvoyageinmorethantenyears–inNormandy.Theoccasionwas an unprecedented andstartling ceremony in whichRichard was required tosurrenderAquitainebackintohis mother’s hands as itsrightful duchess. The cause,however, was no suddenapotheosis for Eleanor, but a

symptomofnewtensionsthatwere wracking her family.Richard was now the king’seldestsurvivingson,andwasexpected – not least byhimself – to succeed hisbrother as heir to England,NormandyandAnjou.Henrydid not seek to deny his sonthis royal inheritance, but heassumed that Richard wouldin turn cedeAquitaine to hisyoungest brother John, whowould thereby be provided

with the lands he had untilnowsignallylacked.Richard,however, had not fought forhismother’sduchysimply tohand it over to a needysixteen-year-old – especiallyiftheprofferedexchangewasa status so insubstantial,while their father still lived,that it had provoked theirdead brother to repeatedrebellion.And by 1184 it was clear

that Richard was prepared,

yetagain,tofightforhisrighttoAquitaine. In an access offrustration at Richard’srecalcitrance, Henry declaredthat his youngest son shouldmeet fire with fire and takethe duchy by force – anoutburstof fury rather thanadeclaration of strategy, giventhat John had no army andHenry no intention ofsupplying himwith one. Butthat summer, the youngprince did indeed launch a

seriesofplunderingraidsintoRichard’scountyofPoitou.Itwas a provocative campaignmade possible by an allywhose intervention in thisconflict – like his previousparticipation in the YoungKing’s rebellions – waspoisonously damaging to thecauseoffamilyharmony.Geoffrey, the middle of

Henry and Eleanor’ssurviving sons, was, attwenty-five, the ruler of

Brittany, the inheritance ofhisyoungwifeConstance.Hewas an able soldier and, likethe dead Henri, a brillianttournament fighter, but hisrelentless and unprincipledambition won him as manycriticsashehadadmirers.Hewas‘overflowingwithwords,smooth as oil’, according tothe censorious observerGerald of Wales; a prince‘possessed,byhissyrupyandpersuasive eloquence, of the

power of dissolving theapparently indissoluble, abletocorrupttwokingdomswithhis tongue, of tirelessendeavourandahypocrite ineverything’. Geoffrey hadfoughtbyhiseldestbrother’sside against Henry andRichard at Limoges in 1183;now, with troops from hisBreton duchy at his back, heshepherded his youngestbrother into an assault onnorthern Aquitaine in the

hopeofwinningalargersliceof their father’s empire forhimself.In the circumstances,

Eleanor’s sudden emergencefrom her enforced seclusionjust a few months later, atChristmas 1184, becomes agreatdeallessshocking.Thatautumn, once news reachedtheOldKing inEngland thatGeoffrey and John wereravaging Poitou whileRichard attacked Brittany in

retaliation, Henry summonedallthreeofhisunrulysonstohis side and knocked theirheads together, imposing onthem a formal ritual ofreconciliation atWestminsterbefore the court moved toWindsorforChristmas.Therecould be no doubt that theirmother’s presence duringthese manoeuvres, and theauthority over Aquitaine thatshe still embodied, prisoneror no, was a significant

weapon to be deployed inHenry’s campaign to breakhis sons to hiswill and keepthem from destroying oneanother.Just how significant

becameapparentwhenwinterturned to spring. Afterrenewed snipingand snarlingbetween Richard andGeoffrey, over Normandythis time, Richard wasordered to relinquishAquitaine into his mother’s

keeping. And the mostextraordinary aspect of theceremony, which took placein Normandy in April 1185,was not Henry’s command,but Richard’s compliance.Without Eleanor, an end tothe wrangling had beennowhere in sight. Richardwouldnot concedeAquitainetoanyonewhothreatenedhisrightsasitsduke.AndHenrywould not brook anysubstantive challenge to his

lordship over his domains inthepresent,oranydiminutionof his entitlement todeterminetheirfuture.Inthatcontext, the position of acontroversial queen becameuniquely uncontroversial, anoasisofcalmamidastormofcontention. Richard couldresign his duchy into hismother’s hands because herauthority there had alwaysunderwrittenhis,andbecausethe closeness of their

relationship offeredreassurance for his rights asher heir. Meanwhile, therights that Henry derivedfrom Eleanor’s role as hiswife guaranteed his ownoverlordship of Aquitaine,andhisclaimsonitsfuture.For Eleanor, this was no

moment of politicalresurrection or practicalrestitution. She was allowedno initiative, no freedom ofmovementoraction;shewas

the static fulcrum aroundwhich her husband and sonscould reorder their unstablerelationships. But still, themeasured dignitywithwhichshe played her part –betraying no public sign ofbitterness at the confinementin which she had been keptfor ten years – told its ownstory. At sixty-one, she hadlost none of the instinctivepolitical understanding thathad always animated her

steps through her public life,buttherewasanewpatience,a new appreciation of risk toherself and her sons, behindheracquiescencewhengrantsin Aquitaine were made inhername‘withtheassentandwill of my lord Henry, kingof England, and of my sonsRichard,GeoffreyandJohn’.More patience would be

required of her yet. Herparticipation had helped tosuppress the nascent conflict

of1184,butherhusbandandsons could not be kept atpeace for long, and theirdivisions were lovinglyfostered by the new king ofFrance, Philippe II, the sonandheirforwhomLouishadwaitedsomanyyearsthattheboy had been nicknamed‘Dieudonné’, ‘God-given’.Young Philippe had suffereda life-threatening illness inthe autumn of 1179, andLouis, in desperation, had

crossedtheChanneltoprayatthe Canterbury shrine ofThomas Becket, whosemartyrdom had made him asaint little more than twoyears after hismurder. Louiswas accompanied on thispilgrimage by his ‘most dearbrother’, King Henry – thetwo kings finding unlikelycommongroundat lastwhilethe woman they had eachmarried was enduring herprotracted imprisonment. But

on his way home to FranceLouis suffered a debilitatingstroke. He clung to life foranother year, until inSeptember 1180 Philippefound himself in possessionof his father’s throne at theageofjustfifteen.The new French king had

met Henry’s sons Henri andGeoffreywhen they attendedhis coronation at Reims,whichhadtakenplace,aswascustomary,duringhisfather’s

lifetime. His closeness tothem was undoubtedlyinfused with the warmth ofpersonal affection, but itwasunderpinnedbythecoldsteelof Philippe’s implacableambition to pick apart theEnglish king’s empire andfashion the kingdom ofFrance into a great power inits place. Henri was nowdead, but when Geoffrey,chafingat thepeace imposedon him in 1185, rode into

Paris in 1186, Philippewelcomed him with openarms. Geoffrey’s capacity tomake trouble wasextinguished that summerwith sudden violence, whenhe was unhorsed andtrampled to death in atournamentmêlée; and at hisfuneraltheFrenchkingmadean extravagant show of hisgrief–byoneaccounthavingto be restrained from castinghimselfintotheopengravein

the choir of Paris’s newcathedral of Notre-Dame.However, Geoffrey’s abruptexit from the political stagepresentedPhilippewithanewopportunity to disturbHenry’s hold on histerritories, by claimingcustody, as overlord of theduchy of Brittany, ofGeoffrey’s two youngdaughters and the baby son,Arthur, to whom his widowgavebirthsevenmonthsafter

hisdeath.ByJune1187conflictover

Brittany and renewedtensions over the perenniallycontroversial lands of theVexin, the frontier betweenNormandy and France, hadintensified to the point ofopen confrontation. Henryand Philippe drew up theirarmies in battle array atChâteauroux,150milessouthof Paris, and for two weeksenvoys moved between the

enemy lines in search of asettlement. Neither the twokings,nor thenoblemen theycommanded, were eager toface the indiscriminatedangers of a pitched battle,accustomed as they were tothecontrolledrisksofwarfareby siege and raid, and afterintense negotiations a two-year truce was agreed. Butwhen Philippe retreatednorthwardtoParis,hecarriedaway an unexpected prize:

Henry’s son Richard rodewithhim.Richard could not have

made his disaffection moreplainly manifest. Philippe,already at twenty-two amaster of the telling politicalgesture, kept his royal guestconstantly at his side. ‘Everydaytheyateatthesametableand shared the same dish,’observedRogerofHowden,aclerkatHenry’scourt,‘andatnightthebeddidnotseparate

them’ – this last a strikingpublic demonstration ofpolitical, not sexual,intimacy. The cause of thisovert estrangement betweenthe king of England and hiseldest surviving son was afamiliar and familiarlyintractable one: Henry’srefusal to make a settlementof the succession that wasacceptabletohisheir,andhisheir’s refusal to accept thepossibility that his younger

brother John might have aclaim on their father’sterritories.Richard’s ostentatious

closeness to Philippe did notlast, and by the end of thesummer he was back inAnjouwithhisfather.Butthequestion of the successioncontinued to spread itsvenom. True, other concernsemerged tooccupyRichard’sattention: in the autumn of1187 he took the crusader’s

cross,ashismotherhaddonefortyyearsearlier, tocommithimselftothefuturerescueofJerusalem (which had justfallen – in a catastrophicreverse for the cause ofChristendom–totheMuslimforces of Al-Malik al-NasirSalah ed-Din Yusuf, knowntohis enemies in thewest asSaladin). But the fact thatRichardomittedtoconsulthisfather before promising tofight in the Holy Land only

served to emphasise thetensions between them, tosuch an extent that whenrevolt erupted yet again inAquitainein1188,Henrywassuspectedofhavingahandinencouraging the rebels.Withhis usual talent formanipulation, Philippe ofFrance worked tirelessly toexploit the divisions betweenfather and son, until at thebeginning of 1189, onceagain, the Angevin dynasty

wasatwarwithitself.Bythelatespring,Richard

andPhilippewereinthefieldtogether, attacking andoverrunning a chain ofHenry’scastlesinMaine.TheEnglish king, hamstrung byhis fear that Richard wouldbetray him, had succeededonly in alienating his heir tosuch an extent that Richardnow believed the rumoursthat Henry planned todisinherithiminfavourofhis

youngest and favourite son,John.AndHenry,atfifty-six,had at last exhausted theprodigious stores of energythat had kept him in almostconstantmotion sincehehadfirst begun to accumulate hisvast territories more thanthirtyyearsbefore.Hishealthhadbeenfalteringformonths,and, in the oppressivesummer heat, he could fightno longer. In his fortress ofChinon, he lay racked with

fever,agonisedby thefailureofhisplans.Hewasunabletoforgive the son who wouldsucceed him, and at the lasthis spirit was broken by thenews that even John, the sononwhomhehadlavishedhislove,haddesertedhim.On6July1189,HenryIIturnedhisfacetothewallanddied.When the news reached

Richard,herodeashardashecouldtomeetthecortègethatcarried his father’s corpse a

few miles westward fromChinon, across the riverVienne toFontevraud. Itwasdusk when the new kingsteppedintothesilenceoftheabbeychurchwheretheroyalbier lay. He stood for amoment, looking down forthe last time at his father’sface. Then he turned on hisheel and walked away; andsentwordtoEnglandthathismother was now a freewoman.

SurpassingAlmostAlltheQueensofThis

World

Eleanor was sixty-five yearsold.Fifteenyears hadpassedsinceshehadlastenjoyedanysignificant autonomy in herown life, beyond the day-to-day distractions permitted inher captivity. She was nolonger young, by anymeasure,andshehadlosttwoof her sonswhile shewaitedfor the liberation of herhusband’sdeath.Noonewho

had witnessed her earlierlivesasqueen firstofFranceand then of England couldhavebeeninanydoubtofheruncommoncalibre,butinthecircumstancesfewcouldhavepredicted that she would re-emerge into the politicalworld with an urgency andmomentum that would havebeen remarkable in someonehalf her age.And she did sowith a composure ofjudgement at which her

fortitude in enduring theindignities of herimprisonment had alreadyhinted. The monasticchronicler Gervase ofCanterbury, in recounting thetale of the rebellion that hadcost her freedom, describedthequeenas‘prudens feminavalde, nobilibus orta natalibus, sed instabilis’ – ‘anextremely astute woman,sprung fromnoble stock, butunsteady’. Unsteady she

mighthavebeen,once,inherlack of matrimonial loyaltyand her willingness to takespectacularrisks;butnowshebrought a judiciously calmcontrol to the business ofworkingtoestablishherson’sregime.Forweeksafterhisfather’s

death, Richard was occupiedin Normandy, stamping outthe disorder that he himselfhaddonesomuchtounleash.And so, alongwith the order

for his mother’s release, thenew king despatched toEngland a command thatEleanor (in the words of thehistorian Ralph of Diceto)should have ‘the power ofdoingwhatevershewishedinthe kingdom’. This was notonly a stunning reversal offortune, but a transformationunprecedented even in a lifemarkedoutbyoverwhelmingupheaval.Eleanor’syearsasaqueen in France and in

England had been spent as aconsort,herauthority,suchasitwas, acquired as a satelliteofherhusbandtheking.Evenin Aquitaine, which wasproperlyherown,shehadnotcontrolled the levers ofpower, in the formofmoneyandmen.Now,however, shewouldexercisethepowerofakinginEngland.Thiswasnotan official regency: her rolewas not defined orcircumscribed in any

technical form. Instead, herson had given her the samefreedom to command that hehimselfenjoyed.Thatmuchwas clear from

Eleanor’s rapid progressaround the country in themonth before Richard’sarrival in Portsmouth thatAugust. She travelled ‘fromcitytocityandcastletocastlejust as it pleased her’, thechronicler Roger of Howdenreported, at the head of her

‘queenlycourt’–theunusualLatin adjective reginalisemphasising the rarespectacleofawomanaloneatthe helm of Englishgovernment. And themeasures she tookdemonstrated the breadth ofherauthority.Sheorderedthedespatch, Howden wrote, of‘a body of trustworthy men,both clergy and laity …throughoutallthecountiesofEngland’toreformtheabuses

of local officials, to extractfrom all freemen an oath ofloyalty to Richard, and toempty the kingdom’s jails –the newly liberated Eleanorremarking with delicateunderstatement, according toHowden, that ‘she hadlearned by experience thatconfinement is distasteful tomankind,andthatitisamostdelightful refreshment to thespirits to be set freetherefrom’.

This was independentaction on a scale and of akindthattheEmpressMatildawould have viewed withincredulous envy. Yet –unusually forEleanor,whosecareer had hardly beenuncontroversial – it did notattract critical comment. Herauthority, unconstrainedthough it might be, was socompletely identified withthatofhersonthatthefactofher sex was barely noticed:

power in the hands of ananointed queen mother, itseems – as opposed to ananointed queen regnant –challenged no fundamentalpolitical preconceptions. Atsixty-five,moreover,shewasanelderstateswoman,nottheflightyforeignpresencethataqueen consort could all tooeasily appear. And,perversely, the longimprisonment that had beenher punishment for rebelling

against her husband hadturned her into a figureheadfor loyalty and unity. Theonly part she had played infifteenyearsofbitterconflictbetween her sons and theirfather was to make possiblethe transientpeacesettlementof1185.Asaresult,shenowstood above the fray,uncontaminatedbymorethana decade of treachery andwarfare, and unbendinglycommitted to the continued

existence of her husband’sempireunder thegovernmentofherson.ForaslongasRichardwas

absent from English soil,then, Eleanor ruled in hisname;andshehelpedplanthecoronation by which hebecame England’s king. InWestminster Abbey on 13September 1189, the queenmother stood draped in acostlynewfur-trimmedgowntowatchasher favourite son

was touched with holy oilupon the head, breast andhands in the rite thattransformed a man into amonarch. Then, newlydressed in the richest ofceremonial vestments,Richard was crowned with amassive diadem of goldencrusted with preciousstones,acrownsoheavythattwoearlsstoodby tosupportitsweight.But this formal

inauguration of Richard’sreign did not mean thatEleanor could step back intoretirement. Instead, sheremained by the king’s side,notedbythechroniclersasaninfluential presence in hiscouncils. She was closelyinvolved, forexample, inherson’s attempt to find asettlement to a viciouslyprotracted dispute betweenthe archbishop ofCanterburyand the monks of his

cathedralpriory.Foreighteenmonths the monasticcommunity had beenbarricadedwithinthepriory’swalls, kept alive only by thetownspeople’s gifts of food,while the cathedral itself fellsilentandempty.Richardwasdetermined not only toenforce a compromise (anunlikely outcome, it seemed,given how much vitriol hadalreadybeenexpended in thedebate, but one which he

achievedwithin threemonthsof his coronation) but,crucially, to do so withoutintervention fromRome; anditwas onEleanor’s authoritythat the pope’s legate,Giovanni da Anagni, wasdetainedwhenhesteppedoffhis ship at Dover in theautumn of 1189 to preventany possibility of papalmeddling.While Richard was in

England, then, his mother

was at his right hand, herpower unmistakable in thepolitics, as well as theceremonial, of his court. ButthekingremainedinEnglandforonlyseventeenweeks.On12 December 1189, he tookship for the continent,wherehebeganraisingthemenandmoney needed to launch thecrusade to which he hadcommitted himself two yearsearlier. The scale of his taskwas almost unimaginably

vast, butRichard set about itwith irresistible purpose andunprecedentedspeed.‘Heputup for sale everything hehad,’ Roger of Howdenreported; and by the summerof 1190 he was ready. Hisfather had taken the cross in1172, as part of his penancefor the death of ThomasBecket,buthadneversetoutfor theHoly Land. It was inhis mother’s footsteps,therefore, not his father’s,

that Richard rode toVézelayto undertake a perilousjourney that Eleanor hadcompleted more than fortyyears earlier. His starting-pointandhisdestinationwerethe same as hers, but, unlikeher, he eschewed theoverground route acrossEuropeinfavouroftravellingsouth toMarseille and on byship to rendezvous in Sicilywith his own huge fleet andthat of his crusading ally,

PhilippeofFrance.Once arrived in Sicily,

Richard stayed for sixmonths, delayed not only bythe closure of theMediterranean shipping lanesinwinter,butbytwopressingpolitical problems. The firstwas the status of his sisterJoanna,who had been queenofSicilyuntilthedeathofherhusband,WilliamII,in1189,and who was now theunwillinghostageof thenew

king, William’s illegitimatecousin Tancred of Lecce. Abriskly successful assault byRichard’s forces on the cityof Messina rapidly securednot only Joanna’s freedombut payment of her dower, astore of gold of a size togladden the heart of acrusading king who hadalready liquidated the assetsof the kingdom he had leftbehind.The second problem,

meanwhile, required politicalfinesse rather than theapplication of force. Richardhad been betrothed to Alix,half-sister of Philippe ofFrance, formore than twentyyears, but he had nevershownanyparticularurgencyabout the business ofmarrying her – not least,perhaps, because the twodecades she had spent as hiswife-in-waitingathisfather’scourt had given rise to

persistentrumoursthatHenryhimself had made her hismistress. Whatever herpersonal entanglements, theFrenchprincesshadbeen theplaything of Anglo-Frenchpolitics for the whole of heradult life – her betrothalsummarily cancelled orabruptlyrevivedbyeachnewsequence of negotiations –and Richard, it transpired,hadnowtiredofhisownpartin this diplomatic merry-go-

round. He saw a newopportunity to protect thesouthern frontier of histerritories throughanalliancewith the Pyrenean kingdomof Navarre, and had spentsome time in Aquitainelaying the groundwork for amarriage with Berengaria,daughter of the Navarreseking Sancho VI. Philippeinitially resisted this publicslight to his long-sufferingsister; but now – with the

crusade already under way,and Richard threatening toexpose Alix’s supposedliaison with his father – theFrenchkinghadnooptionbuttoabandonhercause.And while Richard

negotiated his escape fromhisformerfiancée,hismotherset off to bring him his newone. Eleanor, who had spentfifteen years all butimmobilisedasherhusband’scaptive, now seemed to have

limitlessreservesofenergytoexpend in the service of herson. In the autumn of 1190she was in Bordeaux,luxuriatinginthegreatcityofher childhood for the firsttime since she had regainedher freedom. From there shetravelled nearly two hundredmiles south across thePyrenees to the Navarresecapital of Pamplona, whereshe was welcomed in greatstate to the court of King

Sancho. There she met herprospective daughter-in-lawBerengaria, described fromafar as ‘more prudent thanpretty’ by the chroniclerRichardofDevizes,andmoreblandly as ‘awisemaiden, afine lady, both noble andbeautiful’ in the first-handaccount of Ambroise, aNorman poet in Richard’scrusadingcompany.From Pamplona the two

women, with a train of

bodyguards and attendants,rode north and east, crossingthe Pyrenees once again inorder to reach the greaterchallenge of the westernAlpine passes. As theEmpress Matilda haddiscovered before them, acrossing of the Alps in themiddle of winter was not tobe undertaken lightly. Morethan a hundred years earlier,when the Emperor HeinrichIV, Matilda’s father-in-law,

had crossed the Mont Cenispass in the freezingtemperatures of an especiallybitter December, his queenand her ladies had beenforced to make the descentsitting on sledges improvisedoutofox-skinsonwhichtheycould slide down the steeplytreacherous ice. Thechroniclers tell us nothing ofwhat Eleanor andBerengariaendured, which suggests thattheir journey, in lessextreme

weather, was lessdramatically dangerous. Still,itcanonlyhavebeenareliefto reach the foggy andmonotonous flatness of theplainofLombardy.At Lodi, twenty miles

south-eastofMilan, theonceand future queens met thenew German king, HeinrichVI, who had inherited hiscrown six months earlierwhen his father, FriedrichBarbarossa, died en route for

the Holy Land in thevanguardofthecrusade.Thisencounter necessitated adelicate diplomatic dance,since Heinrich had come toItaly not only for hiscoronation as emperor at thehands of the pope, but toclaim the throne of Sicily inthe name of his wife,Constance, legitimate sisterof the dead king William IIand aunt of the bastard-bornTancred. And, as both

Eleanorandtheemperorwerewell aware, her son wascurrentlyaguestandally–aforcefully imposing one, butan ally nonetheless – atTancred’s court. Eleanorherself, however, skirtedelegantly round thisimpromptumeeting–perhapsassuring Heinrich as shepassed that Richard had nointerest in staying to defendSicily when he could beleaving toattack Jerusalem–

androdeontoNaples,whereshe and Berengaria intendedto take ship for Messina.Instead,theywererequiredtowait for a few weeks atBrindisiwhile Richard brokethe news to Philippe that hewould not, after all, bemarryinghissister.Whenthetwo women finallydisembarked at Messinaharbouron30March1191,itwas todiscover that thekingof France had pointedly

sailed away a few hoursearlier, his former intimacywiththekingofEnglandnowturnedtobitterrancour.Despite the arrival of the

bride,therewasnoimmediateprospect of a royal wedding,since the Church did notallow marriages to becelebrated during thepenitential season of Lent.Berengaria therefore joinedthe travelling establishmentofRichard’ssisterJoanna,the

widowed Sicilian queen,when the immense crusadingfleet headed eastward toCypruson10April.Bythen,however, Eleanor was longgone.Atsixty-seven,shehadneeded only three days torecuperate from a journeythat had taken her over twomountain ranges and acrosshalf of Europe. WhileRichard set his sights on theHolyLand–avoyage in thecourse of which he married

Berengaria and conqueredCyprus–Eleanorreturned,asAmbroise noted, ‘to lookafterhislandthathehadleft’.And the king knew that itwould be in safe hands. Herstatus could not have beenclearer when, visiting Romeon her way northwardthrough Italy, she intervenedwiththenewlyinstalledPopeCelestine III to secureapproval for the consecrationof her dead husband’s

illegitimate son Geoffrey asarchbishop of York.Geoffrey’selectiontotheseehad been controversial, andEleanor’s involvement didnot damp down the furore,butthefactthatshecouldactwith such authority at thepapal curia spoke volumesabout the power she nowwielded.Quite how much that

power was needed hadalready become obvious in

England while Eleanorherselfwasaway.ArchbishopGeoffrey was not the onlyone of Henry II’s sonscausing trouble there. ForEleanor’s youngest child,John, the knowledge that hewashisfather’sfavouritehaddone nothing to counteractthebaleful effectsof the factthat hewas last in linewhenitcametothepartitionoftheAngevin territories. Thequestion of what political

provisionshouldbemadeforJohn had been a cause ofrepeatedfamilialconflicteversince the rebellion of 1173that had led to his mother’simprisonment, and hisinsubstantial title as ‘lord ofIreland’ had provided himwith predictably littlesatisfaction.RichardhadnowgivenhisbrothertheNormancounty of Mortain and agenerousportionoflandsandrevenues in England, to

which John’smarriage in thesummerof1189totheheiressIsabella of Gloucester addedstillmore.ButforJohn–whowas clever, insatiablygrasping and implacablynarcissistic – it was notenough.That Richard knew his

brother well was clear fromthe king’s insistence, beforehis departure from Vézelay,that John should swear anoath to stay away from

England for three yearsduringhisownabsenceintheHolyLand.Eleanor, too,wasunder no illusions aboutJohn’s ambitions, butdisagreed about the bestwayof containing them. At herurging,theoathwasmodifiedto allow Richard’s chiefminister in England, theNorman-born Guillaume deLongchamp, to decide whenand if John should beadmittedtothecountry.Inall

probability, neither planwould ever have kept him incheck,and inpractice it tookonly a matter of monthsbefore the cracks began toshow.The catalyst of the crisis

wasatwofoldthreattoJohn’shopes of inheriting hisbrother’s crown encapsulatedfirst in the treaty Richardagreed at Messina withTancred of Sicily – whichnamed the king’s three-year-

old nephew Arthur ofBrittany as his heirpresumptive, for thediplomatic purpose ofmarrying him to one ofTancred’s daughters – andsecond in Richard’s ownmarriage to Berengaria ofNavarre, which promised intime to give him sons of hisown. Simultaneously, Johnwas presented with anirresistible opportunity tomake his own bid for power

in England by theunpopularity of his brother’sjusticiar Longchamp, whowas fast alienating the greatEnglish lords with high-handed exactions that wereresented all the more forbeingimposedbyalow-bornNorman.By the summer of 1191,

both John and Longchampwere in the field at the headof armed troops. Longchamplaid siege to John’s

supporters in Lincoln Castle,whileJohnhimselfseizedtheroyal fortresses atNottingham and Tickhill inreprisal. But by that timeEleanor had arrived back inNormandy, accompanied bythe Cornish-born archbishopof Rouen, Walter ofCoutances, whom RichardhaddespatchedfromMessinawith the express task ofresolving the hostilities thathad erupted in the kingdom

he had left behind. Eleanorremained at her manor ofBonneville-sur-Touques, acouple of miles inland fromthe Norman coast betweenCaen and Rouen – a stationfromwhichshecouldhopetooverseeRichard’sdomainsonboth sides of the Channel –while the archbishop sailedfor England. There henegotiated a fragile peace,which was reinforced thatautumn when Coutances

himself took over thejusticiar’s duties from thediscredited Longchamp. InFebruary 1192, however,Eleanor herself took ship forPortsmouth. John’s uniquecapacity to undermine thestability of his brother’skingdom, it transpired, wassuch that it required hismother’s unique authority tocurbhisexcesses.Her intervention was

promptedby information that

John – having been thwartedin his attempt to installhimself as regent by thearrival of Walter ofCoutances – had appliedhimself instead to conspiringwithPhilippeofFrance,whohad returned from crusadeafter less than four monthsspent in the Holy Land.Philippe’s antagonismtowards Richard was nowunshakeable, and he saw inJohn’s amoral ambition the

perfect vehicle for thedestabilisationofhisenemy’skingdom. He made John atantalising offer: take thehandinmarriageofhissisterAlix, Richard’s humiliatinglyrepudiated bride, and receivewithhertheAngevinlandsinFranceofwhichPhilippewasoverlord. John did nothesitate;hisexistingmarriagewas convenientlyconsanguineous and easilycast aside for a prize of this

magnitude. He sent word toSouthampton that a shipshould be prepared for hisflighttoFrance.But he had reckoned

withouthismother.‘Andwhocould be so savage or cruel’,Richard of Devizesrhetorically inquired, ‘thatthis woman could not bendhim to her wishes?’ Crueltyand savagery were John’sstock-in-trade, but even hecould not override Eleanor.

She was an anointed queen,whospokewith theauthorityof the absent king. The rightto ruleAquitainewashersasmuch as it was Richard’s.AndJohnhimselfwouldneedher support to claim theinheritance of which hedreamed if his brother failedto return from the east. Self-interest pure and simple, ifnothing else, dictated that hecould not afford to defy hercompletely. And, while the

great men of Englandcontemplated the riskybusiness of treading anuncertain path between thedemands of loyalty toRichard and the reality that,given thedangersofcrusade,John might in fact becomeking at anymoment,Eleanoralone stood above the fray.Shewasmothertobothmen,and her insistence that theyoungershouldnotrulewhilethe elder still lived had the

compelling force not ofpolitical partisanship but ofunquestionable royallegitimacy.Eleanor’s actions were

reported to posterity inacceptably feminine terms.Shewas, after all, seeking topreserve power for her son,notforherself.‘Hermaternalheart was moved and pained…’, Richard of Devizeswrote, and she succeeded inpreventingJohnfromleaving

for Paris ‘through her owntears and the prayers of thenobles’. But it is clearnevertheless that herinterventionwas resolute anddecisively authoritative. Sheconvenedfourgreatmeetingsof England’s barons in rapidsuccession, at Windsor,Oxford, London andWinchester, tobringpressuretobearonheryoungestchild,that ‘light-minded youth’, asRichard of Devizes called

him.Whatever the emotionalresonance of any tears sheshedatthosegatherings,theyonly lightly veiled the steelythreat that John’s lands andcastles in England would beconfiscated if he defected toFrance. John’s ambitions, hisgreedandhisdisloyalty,werestill on open display; but,thanks to his mother, theywere at least temporarilycaged.The bars of that cage,

however, were soon to bebroken. In the autumn of1192Richardagreeda three-year truce with his enemySaladinandsetsailatlastforhome, two years and threemonths since he had turnedhis horse southward fromVézelay with suchexpectation. He had notreclaimed Jerusalem frominfidelhands,buthehadwonglory nonetheless, capturingAcre and Ascalon and

securingthecoastoftheHolyLand from Tyre to Jaffa. Hehad also made enemies.Philippe of France hadreturned to Europe a yearbeforehim,humiliatedbytherejection of his sister andsmarting at the extent towhich Richard hadovershadowed him on theirjoint campaign. And, lessobviously but no lesssignificantly,theEnglishkinghadearnedthehatredofDuke

Leopold ofAustria,who hadfought at the siege of Acrewith the tattered remnants ofthedeadEmperorFriedrich’sGerman forces. Leopold hadraised his banner next tothose of England and Francetoflyoverthedefeatedcity–and Richard’s soldiers hadtorn it down, their kingrefusing to contemplate theideathataninsignificantthirdparty might have a claim onthespoilsofhisvictory.

Acre was only the first ofRichard’s triumphs, and inthe burning heat of Palestinethe hostility of a departedGermandukeseemedoflittlemoment. A year later,however, itbecameclearthatthe incident had cast a longshadow. The returning kingreached Corfu in November1192–toolateintheyeartopursuehishomewardjourneyby sea even if he couldhavefound a safe port on the

western Mediterranean shorethat was beyond theconsiderable reach ofPhilippe of France and theEmperor Heinrich ofGermany. Richard can havebeen in little doubt of theconsequences of his breachwith Philippe, and Heinrichhad been alienated by theEnglishalliancewithTancredof Sicily even before theFrench king and Germanemperor met and made

common cause at Milan inlate 1191. Richard was avictorious crusader cominghome to an empire that hadheld firm in his absence,thanksinnosmallpart tohisremarkable mother. But theprofoundly uncomfortablefactofthematterwasthathisenemiesnowbarredhisway.One option remained.Heinrich of Saxony, husbandof his sister Matilda, heldnorth-eastern Germany in

defiance of the emperor, andRichard could hope to find asecure passage home via theBaltic if he made his waythrough his brother-in-law’slands and under hisprotection. To get there,however, he first had to passthrough the territories ofLeopoldofAustria.Compared to the might of

France and Germany, theresources of the Austrianduke were limited – which

meant that, in the absence ofaviablealternative, the routewas a risk worth taking.Richardtravelledundercoverintheguiseofalong-beardedpilgrim, attended by only asmallhandfulofservants.Butdisguise proved difficult tosustain for a king who wasaccustomed to unquestionedcommandandexpenditureonascalethatattractedattentionwherever he went. He wasstill fifty miles from safety

when he was arrested byDuke Leopold’s men at avillage outside Vienna. ByChristmas Day, he was aprisoner in the forbiddingfortressofDürnstein,perchedon a craggy rock above theragingwatersoftheDanube.This was extraordinary

news,andittravelledfast.By28DecemberLeopold’s lord,the Emperor Heinrich, wasdictatinga letter indelight toPhilippeofFrance.‘Weknow

thisnewswillbringyougreathappiness’, he wrote, ‘… inasmuch as he is now in ourpower who has always donehis utmost for yourannoyance and disturbance.’While England waitedexpectantly for Richard’sarrival, Philippe wrote in histurn to the one man amongthe English king’s subjectsfor whom the revelation thathewouldnotreturnwouldbea cause of unalloyed joy.

John immediately set off forParis, where he did homageto King Philippe forRichard’s French lands andpromised to marry poordiscarded Alix. Together,John and Philippe nowplanned to seize thisunexpected moment bylaunching an invasion ofEngland.Eleanor, at sixty-nine,

mighthavebeenforgivenforfeeling as tormented by the

activitiesofherlivingsonsasbygriefforherdeadones.Inthe prosecution of her publicresponsibilities, however, sheshowednosignoffrustrationor exhaustion. And althoughshe worked in close co-operation with the justiciarWalter of Coutances, themonastic chronicler Gervaseof Canterbury was in nodoubt that orders for thedefence of the coast againstthe threat of a French fleet

were given ‘by the mandateof Queen Eleanor, who’, hesaid, ‘ruled England at thattime’.While the king of France

gatheredhis ships at theportof Wissant in the county ofBoulogne, John returned toEngland to raise a revolt,justifying his insurrectionwith the spurious claim thatRichard was dead. But bothinvasion and rebellionsputtered into nothing in the

face of Eleanor’s composedresistance. She knew heryoungestsoneverybitaswellas did his elder brother: ‘mybrotherJohnisnotthemantowin lands by force’, Richardsupposedly remarked whentoldofhistreachery,‘ifthereis anyone at all to opposehim’. And Eleanor was notjust anyone. By the end ofApril John had met suchconcertedmilitary oppositionthat he was forced into a

truce:itstermspermittedhimto keep his castles atNottingham and Tickhill butrequired him to surrenderthree more – Windsor,WallingfordandthePeak–tohis mother. At Richard’srequest, meanwhile, Eleanorsecured the election asarchbishop of Canterbury ofHubert Walter, theformidably able bishop ofSalisbury who had been theking’s right-hand man on

crusade and the first of hissubjects to reach him in hisGerman prison. She thenaddressed herself to theurgent task of raising thestaggeringly large ransom –one hundred thousand silvermarks – which EmperorHeinrich and Duke Leopoldhad between them agreed todemand in return forRichard’sfreedom.Gold and silver began to

pourintoStPaul’sCathedral,

wheremoneyfromalevyofaquarter of the value of themovablegoodsofbothclergyand laity, and treasure andplate from England’schurches, was collected ingreatchestsunderthesealsofEleanorherselfandWalterofCoutances. Eleanor’sauthorityandthedepthofthetrust confided in her by herson were everywhereapparent in the letterconcerning this ransom that

Richard sent from theimperial palace atHaguenau,just north of Strasbourg,addressed to ‘Eleanor,by thegrace of God queen ofEngland, his much-lovedmother, and to his justicesand all his faithful servantsthroughout England’. Themoneygatheredwas,thekingordered, ‘to be delivered toourmother and such personsassheshallthinkproper’–aninstruction followed by the

backhandedly intimidatingrequest that Eleanor shouldsend him a note of theindividual sums contributedby his nobles, so that hemight know how great werethe ‘thanks’ (or somethingless palatable, reluctantdonors might surmise) heowedtoeach.Richard was not the only

one writing letters. Peter ofBlois, the scholar who hadonce, in the name of an

earlier archbishop of Rouen,berated Eleanor for herrebellionagainstherhusband,now took up his pen in theservice of his queen. Thelettershecomposedtobesentto Pope Celestine inEleanor’sname,appealingforthepontiff’shelpinsecuringRichard’s release, cannot beread as an intimateoutpouring ofmaternal grief.It is possible that they werenot even commissioned by

the queen; certainly, theywere exercises in rhetoric,laced with scripturalquotation, and designed togive the greatest possibleemotional and politicalweight to the argument theymade. But their intenselypassionatestyledoesserveasa demonstration of thestrength of Eleanor’sposition. The irreproachableand spiritually resonant roleof the afflicted mother now

underpinned her actions justas much as the culturallyunacceptable one of therebellious wife hadundermined her attempt atself-assertion twenty yearsearlier.One letterbegged thepope ‘to show himself afather toa sufferingmother’;the anguish of another draft,meanwhile, explicitly echoedthepsalmsofKingDavidandhis lament for the lostAbsalom: ‘I have lost the

staff of my old age and thelight of my eyes … Wouldthat I had died for you, myson.’The aged Pope Celestine

did not respond to thesemissives, if ever they weresent, but the diplomatic andmilitary manoeuvres acrossEurope continued withouthim. Richard worked hardfrom his prison quarters tokeep his chief captor, theEmperor Heinrich, at a safe

distance from Philippe ofFrance, who had failed toinstigate revolt in Englandbut had made alarminginroads into easternNormandy,sothattheFrenchflag now flew for the firsttime over the great frontierstronghold of Gisors.Knowing Philippe as he did,Richardrealisedthathishopeof freedom would beextinguished forever shouldhe one day find himself in a

French rather than aGermanprison. As a result, he waspreparedtoofferanotherfiftythousand marks of silver, ontop of the hundred thousandalready pledged, to agree asettlementwithHeinrich thatwouldkeeptheemperorawayfrom a conference withPhilippe that had beenplannedforJune1193.‘Lookto yourself; the devil isloosed,’ Philippe told Johnwhen he heard of this new

pact;andJohnfled toFrancein fear of his brother’simminentreturn.Inpractice, it tookRichard

several months more to freehimself of his bonds. It wasnot until 20 December 1193thatHeinrichreceivedadownpayment on the king’sransom collected by Eleanorand her advisers that wassubstantial enough topersuadehimtosetadateforRichard’s release. With the

approach of the appointedday – 17 January 1194 – theemperor found himselflobbied frantically byPhilippe and John with acounterbid: they would pay£1,000amonth into imperialcoffersforaslongasRichardremained inhiscustody,orahundred thousand silvermarks if Heinrich kept himcaptive until the followingautumn (giving them a fullcampaigningseasontofurther

theirplans),or150,000markseither to hand him over intotheir control or at least keephimprisonerforanotheryear.‘Behold, how they lovedhim!’ Roger of Howdenremarked with witheringsarcasm.While the emperor

contemplated this new offer,the ceremony planned for 17January was cancelled and anew gathering of Germanprincessummonedinsteadfor

2 February to consult on theincreasingly convolutedquestionofRichard’sfate.Tothat meeting, too, cameEleanor, ‘desirous’, said achronicler in Salzburg, ‘offreeingthesonsheespeciallyloved’. At almost seventy,she faced yet again therigoursoflong-distancetravelasshemovedeastwardacrossthe Low Countries withWalter of Coutances andGuillaume de Longchamp in

her train, andwith the chestscontainingthegoldandsilverof Richard’s ransom piledhigh on heavily guardedbaggage carts. She reachedCologne by 6 January, andten days later was reunitedwithhercaptivesonwhenshereached Speyer in time todiscovertheunwelcomenewsthat his formal liberation on17 January would not, afterall, take place. Anotherjourney layahead, takingher

fifty miles north along theRhine to Mainz, where theimperial court and theincreasingly fretful Englishdelegation assembled at thebeginningofFebruary.The negotiations were

‘anxious and difficult’,WalterofCoutancesreported.ButtheGermanprincesweredetermined that Heinrichshould honour his existingagreement with Richardratherthancommithimselfto

aduplicitousalliancewiththedangerously subtle PhilippeofFrance,andEleanorherselfclinched the deal bypersuading Richard tosurrender the kingdom ofEngland to the emperor inorder to receive it back fromhishands as an imperial fief.This was a finely calibratedgesture of pragmatic politics– a ritual acknowledgementof the emperor’s authoritythat would oil the wheels of

Richard’s liberation, butmakenegligibledifference totherealityofhispowersoncehewasfree(andeffortsweremade,infact,topreventnewsof the bargain even reachingEngland). At last, on 4February 1194, thearchbishops of Mainz andCologne escorted the king tobe delivered from captivity,RogerofHowdennoted,‘intothe hands of his motherEleanor’.

Before their reunion inGermany,motherandsonhadnotseenoneanotherforthreeyears. It had been four yearsin all since they had been ineach other’s company formorethanafewdays.‘Ontheking being set at liberty, allwho were present shed tearsof joy,’ Roger of Howdenreported;butitwasthepowerof Eleanor’s position duringRichard’s long absence ascrusader and captive rather

than any display of maternalsentiment thatwascelebratedduring his triumphal journeyback toEngland.Shewasbyhis side as he rode first toCologne,thentoLouvainandBrussels. She took ship withhimatAntwerp,andwithhimshelandedatSandwichon13March.Togetherthekingandhis mother travelled north togivethanksforhissafereturnat the shrine of St ThomasBecket at Canterbury, before

riding at the head of aglorious cavalcade intoLondon.Eleanor accompanied

Richard to Nottingham too,where the king flexed themilitary muscles that hadstiffened in the confines ofhis prison by leading anassault on the garrisonholding the town’s castle inthenameofhisbrotherJohn.It took only two days beforethe soldiers accepted the

reality that their sovereignwas back, and surrendered.WhenRichardthenconveneda great council to overhaulthe administration of hiskingdom, the chroniclersnamed Eleanor first amongthe great lords who sat withhim in the council chamber.AndwhenthekingprocessedintoWinchesterCathedralon17 April to consecrate hisreturn with a ceremony ofcrown-wearing, richly robed

and walking under a silkencanopyborneabovehisheadby four earls holding theirlances aloft, Eleanor sat instate opposite his throne,surroundedbyaconstellationofherladies.The prominence of the

queen mother in thisreassertion of kingly powerwas all themore striking forthe fact that Richard’s wife,Queen Berengaria, wasnowhere to be seen, staying

as she was in Poitou after aprotracted journey back fromAcre via Rome andMarseilles. But thatprominence made asignificantpoliticalpoint, forEleanor’s authority by nowwas far more than that of aconsort. Not only was itsanctioned by, but it hadcome to buttress Richard’sown. Eleanor, after all, hadhad a consort’s share in thesovereign power of the man

from whom Richard hadinherited his ownsovereignty, and the role shehad played in securing theintegrity of the realm whileRichard was detained,voluntarily and involuntarily,so farawayhadmadeheranessential focusofunity– themother of the kingdom aswellastheking.In that role, she had one

tasklefttoaccomplish.Ithadtowaituntil sheandRichard

had completed their progressaround England and hadtaken ship once more atPortsmouthon12MayfortheChannel crossing toNormandy. They landed, toscenesofwild excitement, atBarfleur,androdeviaBayeuxandCaen toLisieux,Richardmoving steadily toward thewar zone where his enemyPhilippe of France wasattempting to annex easternNormandytownbytownand

castle by castle. At Lisieux,however, one of Philippe’smost valued allies came tokneel at Richard’s feet andbeg forhisgrace.Theking’sbrother John had done all hecould to support the Frenchadvance into the Vexin; hisEnglish lands had alreadybeen declared forfeit inconsequence, and Richardhad set a date for judgementtobepasseduponhimforhistreachery.But now Johnwas

pleading for forgiveness, andRichard immediatelyembracedhim,dismissinghistwenty-seven-year-oldbrother’s repeated betrayalsas the actions of an ill-advisedchild.Thisunlikelyreconciliation

was achieved, Roger ofHowden said, ‘through themediationofQueenEleanor’.And although there waspragmatism at work on bothsides – John’s fright at his

brother’s return findingcommon ground withRichard’s determination todismantle Philippe’s positioninNormandy–itseemslikelythat Eleanor not onlyengineered her sons’ reunionbut ensured its success. Herunyieldingcommitmenttothefuture of their dynasty, asrepresented by both of hersons,allowedeachtotrusttheassurances of the other,however implausible they

mightotherwisehaveseemedinthelightofrecenthistory.Her work was done.

Richardadvancedattheheadofhisarmytodriveback theFrench king and his troopsfrom the walls of Verneuil.John set about serving hisbrother with all theconscientiousness he couldmuster. And Eleanor rodesouth to the abbey ofFontevraud, on the frontierbetween Anjou and her own

countyofPoitou.From thereshecouldkeepinclosetouchwith her sons and theirconcerns, and with herhomelandofAquitaine,whilebeginningatlasttosettleintoaluxuriousretirement.England no longer needed

her, despite the fact that itsking was once again absent,back in his military elementoncampaignagainstPhilippeand against his ownrebelliousvassalsinTouraine

and Aquitaine. HisadministrationinEnglandhadbeen left in the fiercely ablehands of Hubert Walter, thearchbishop of Canterbury,and Richard himself wascloseenoughtokeepasteadystream of missives anddirectives hurtling across theChannel. Both the kingdomand its justiciar knew thatthese royal letters wouldswiftly be followed by theking’s royal person should

urgent need arise. England’scentralised systems of lawand administration – whichhaddevelopedtonewheightsof sophistication because ofHenry II’s constant travelsaroundhiscontinentalempire–meantthatthekingdomwaswellsuited togovernmentbyroyaldeputyinthetemporaryabsence of the monarch, butits very tractabilitywaswhathad made it so vulnerablewhen the king was far away

and feared lost for good. Acentralisedgovernment,whensummarily decapitated, couldbe takenoverwholesale– asJohn had calculated inlaunchinghisbidforpowerinEngland – by contrast withthe piecemeal annexationrequired to seize control ofNormandy, Anjou orAquitaine. And thatcircumstance was what hadmade Eleanor’s role inEngland so vital and her

power so real. Only a royalruler of unquestionedlegitimacy – as Eleanor hadbeen, in embodying theauthority of one son againstthe pretensions of another –could hold together akingdom that relied for itssecurity on the universalguaranteesofroyallaw.Now, though, she could

rest. She made no move toreclaimtheruleofAquitaine,where Richard emphatically

reasserted his control in thesummer of 1194. (‘The cityandcitadelofAngoulêmewetook in a single evening’, hetold Hubert Walter, beforeadding, with a casualexaggerationbornofsupremeconfidence, that ‘in all wecaptured three hundredknights and forty thousandsoldiers’.) Eleanor had nodoubtthathiscommitmenttothe duchy was the equal ofher own; and shewas happy

instead to install herself atFontevraud, a residencereplete with material andspiritual comforts,strategically located at theheart of her son’s Frenchterritories.For thenext fiveyearsshe

remainedquietlyattheabbey,areveredpresenceinherownrich apartments within theconvent community. Sheraised no protest whenRichard decided, in the

autumnof1196,tosecurethesouth-eastern frontier of hislandsthroughanalliancewithRamon VI, count ofToulouse,sonofthatcountofToulouse whose treaty withher husband had helped tosparkherill-fatedrebellionin1173. Perhaps she wasprepared now to accept herson’s abdication of her owndynastic claim to Toulousebecause she identified moreclosely with his political

judgement thanshehaddonewith Henry’s; perhaps anyobjectionswereovercomebythe fact that the alliancewassealed by Ramon’s marriageto her daughter Joanna, thewidowed queen of Sicily,through whose offspringEleanor’s claimmight at lastbe made good, even if notquite in the way she hadhoped. Nor did she demurwhenRichardnamedascountofPoitouhis twenty-year-old

nephewOtto,sonofhissisterMatilda and Heinrich ofSaxony, a trusted lieutenanttokeepawatchfuleyeonhistreasuredmaternalinheritance(albeit that this delegation ofauthority was quicklysupersededbyOtto’selectionaskingofGermanyin1198).AlltheevidencesuggeststhatEleanor was adopting a roleakin to that played by hermother-in-lawMatildaduringher last years at Rouen – an

astute observer ofinternational affairs, retirednow from the political frontline, turning her thoughtsincreasingly to the needs ofher soul while still offeringthe benefits of heraccumulatedwisdomtoasonwhose exceptional abilitiesshe had done so much tofoster.Unlike the empress,

however, Eleanor was to bewrenched from the peace of

her retreat by sudden andviolent tragedy. In March1199, Richard was inAquitaine to suppress yetanother revolt led by thecount of Angoulême and theviscount of Limoges.Towardstheendofthemonthhe brought his troops tobesiege the viscount’s castleof Châlus-Chabrol, less thantwenty miles southwest ofLimoges. The small fortressheld agarrisonofonly forty,

of whom just two weretrained and armed knights,and Richard was in relaxedmood as he waited for thecastle’sinevitablefall.Ontheeveningof26March,herodeoutaftersuppertoinspecttheday’sprogress,protectedonlybyahelmetandshieldagainstthe shots of a solitarycrossbowman on theramparts, a bravely ludicrousfigurewieldingacookingpanto ward off missiles from

below. Richard appreciatedthe defiant courage of thislone enemy, and cheeredgood-humouredly as themanloosed his next bolt, but hewastoocarelessoftherealityof the threat. Hemiscalculated the arrow’sspeed and trajectory by afraction of a second, and feltthe iron barb tear into thefleshofhisleftshoulder.The king returned calmly

to his tent, giving no public

hintofhisinjury,andtriedtowrenchoutthearrowhimself.The wooden shaft broke offin his hand; a surgeonremoved the rest, but at animpossible cost. Thebutchered wound quicklyshowedsignsofinfection.Asthe gangrene spread,Richardknewthatdeathwouldfollowsurely and swiftly. By thetime the fortress of Châlusfell a few days later, thevictory had become an

irrelevance. A messengerarrived at Fontevraud,desperate and dishevelled;and Eleanor rode south towatchhersondie.She was at his side when

hetookhislastbreathasduskfell on 6 April. She wasseventy-five, and hadexpected her favourite childto attend her burial, not shehis.Richard’sheartwastakentoRouen, to be interred nextto his brother Henri, but his

body had less far to go: hiscortège retraced hismother’ssteps back to Fontevraud,where his corpse was laid torest at his father’s feet. ButEleanor would not be thereforlongtokeepvigiloverhistomb.Heroneremainingsonneededher,ashisbrotherhadbeforehim.For all the effort Richard

had expended on the presentsecurityofhisempire,hehadexerted himself remarkably

little to safeguard the futureofhisownbloodline.Hehadone illegitimate son,Philippeof Cognac, but no legitimateoffspringtoinherithisthrone.Not only had his wife,Berengaria, never set foot inthe kingdom of which shewasqueen,butshehadspentonly a few months of theireight-year marriage with herking; it had been four yearssinceRichardhadmade timeto see her. At forty-one,

Richard had been in goodhealth, despite the extraweight his stocky frame wascarrying, and perhaps, afterthe trials of crusade andimprisonment, thissuperlative soldier had cometo believe that he wasinvulnerable, that the futurewashistocommand.Instead,itnowseemedthat thefuturebelonged toJohn, thebrotherwhohadservedhimfaithfullysince their reconciliation at

Lisieux,butwhohadcovetedhis throne since before theirfather’sdeath.John’s inheritance,

however, was far fromcertain. Enemies within andwithout the Angevin landscould not believe their goodfortune as news of Richard’sdeath spread, and they had arival candidate immediatelyto hand, in the twelve-year-old form of Arthur ofBrittany, son of John’s long-

dead elder brother Geoffrey.Thisposedanicechallengetothe nascent principlesdeterminingthesuccessiontoEngland’s throne: did ayounger brother have agreater or lesser claim to thecrownthan thesonofadeadolder brother? Even ifagreement could have beenreached on this elusivetheoretical point in Englishlaw,theprecedentsatworkinNormandy, Anjou and

Aquitaine would notnecessarily support the sameconclusion. And, in anyevent,thepracticalfactofthematterwasthatthesuccessfulclaimant would be identifiedby the political support hecould muster, not simply bythe technical merits of hiscase.No one knew that better

than Eleanor, and there wasno question in her mind thatthe throne belonged to her

son rather thanhergrandson.Arthur’s very nameemphasised his Bretonidentity rather than hisAngevin heritage. He hadbeen brought up in Brittanyunder the careofhismother,the duchy’s heiress, until thetensions between the Bretonregime and Arthur’s royaluncleRichardhadresultedin1196 in the boy making alengthy stay at the court ofPhilippe of France. There

could be little doubt now ofhow the cards would fall.Philippe launched anotherinvasionofeasternNormandyas soon as he heard ofRichard’s death; therebellious lords of Anjou,Maine and Touraine, led byGuillaume des Roches,declaredthatArthurwastheirking; and the count ofAngoulême and the viscountof Limoges persisted in therevolt that had claimed

Richard’s life. Eleanor,meanwhile,madeitclearthatArthur,orhisadvisersonhisbehalf, had forfeited anyclaim on a grandmother’sloyalty.John arrived at the great

fortressofChinon threedaysafter his brother’s burial,where he took possession ofthe treasury of Anjou, andthen rodeon tenmiles to thewest along the banks of theVienne to take counsel with

his mother at Fontevraud.From there he turned hishorse northward toNormandy, narrowlyescaping capture en route bythe French king, who sweptintoLeManswithArthurandthe rebel lord Guillaume desRochesonlyhoursafterJohnhad left. At Rouen – wherethere was little sympathy forPhilippe or Arthur, enemiesto the east and west of theduchy – John was invested

withacircletofgoldenrosesas duke of Normandy on 25April.After a brief detour tosack LeMans in punishmentfor the city’s support for hisrival, he made for theNorman coast, and by 27May he had reachedWestminster,wherehe sat instate in the soaring space ofthe abbey for his coronationaskingofEngland.It made sense for John to

focushis immediateattention

on Normandy and England.There he was a knownquantity–oneviewedwithacertainambivalence,perhaps,after his repeated displays ofextravagant duplicity duringthe years of Richard’s longabsence,but thenagain thosefive years of treachery werenowbalancedbyfivemoreofredemption in his brother’sservice.InEngland,certainly,ArthurofBrittany’sclaimstobe Richard’s heir had little

purchase, and the solemnceremony at Westminster,which was well attended bythe great English lords, gavesacred sanction to John’srights.Aquitaine, however,was a

very different matter.Richard,English-bornthoughhe might have been, hadbecome a native Aquitainianduke: enthroned at Poitiersand Limoges at the age offourteen,hespentyearsofhis

lifeandmuchofhispoliticalenergyintheduchy.Hemadeenemies as well as friendsthere–hisdeathoncampaignat Châlus in the heart ofAquitaine was nogeographicalaberrationinhismilitary career – but the factof his power could not beignored. John, on the otherhand, had last set foot in theduchy fifteen years earlierwhen he and his brotherGeoffrey had plundered

Poitou in the attempt tosnatch it from Richard’sgrasp.Noless thanArthurofBrittany or Philippe ofFrance, Johnwas anoutsiderinAquitaine, and the risk heran was that he would fastbecomeanirrelevancethere.Not so his mother. Where

Richard had depended onEleanor to embody theauthority of the crown inEngland, John needed her toinhabit the role into which

she had been born – that oftheancestralrulerofherownduchy. She had expected toseeoutherdays in thepeaceofFontevraud;instead,withinthree weeks of Richard’sdeathshefoundherselfatthehead of an army,accompanyingMercadier – amercenary captain who hadbeentheking’sloyalmilitarylieutenant for adecade andahalf,andhadbeenathissideatChâlus–onacampaignto

devastate Anjou, beyond thenorthernborderofAquitaine,in retribution for the supportits lords had offered toArthur. Mercadier led thetroops, but Eleanor’spresence at his sidedemonstrated that theirravages were predicated onclaims of political legitimacyrather than indiscriminatelooting.Before the end of the

month she parted company

with Mercadier, leaving tohimthefurtherprosecutionofthe military campaign theyhad begun in Anjou, andbegan to move south intoAquitaine, charting a paththroughthegreattownsofherduchy – from Poitiers south-westwardtoNiort,thensouthto St-Jean-d’Angély,westward to the port of LaRochelle, inland again toSaintes, and finally, in theheatofJuly,southtohercity

ofBordeaux.Asshewentshedispensedfavourstothegreatmen of Poitou and theLimousin, and privileges tothe towns and religioushouses she passed along theway. Indoing so shemarkedthe duchy yet again as herterritory, and sought to binditspeopletoherside.That accomplished, she

turned north again, travellingtwohundredmilestoTourstomeet her son’s enemy,

Philippe of France. It was tobe an extraordinaryencounter, and not simplybecauseitbroughtherfacetofacewiththesonofherlong-ago husband Louis, a manwho had caused her ownfamily so much torment. AtTours, Eleanor knelt beforetheFrenchkingtodohomagefor her duchy of Aquitaine.Sixty-two years after herfather’sdeath, therecouldbeno conceivable doubt of her

right to her inheritance, butshe had never before swornfealty and done homage toherFrenchoverlord.Thiswasa ritual from which womenwere routinely excluded: thepolitical and military serviceowed by a vassal, it wasassumed, could not beperformedbyawomaninherownperson, and theplaceofan heiress would thereforenaturally be taken by herhusband or son. Henry and

Richard had both previouslyoffered their homage forAquitaine on Eleanor’sbehalf,andyoungArthurhadalready become Philippe’ssworn vassal for Brittany,despitethefactthattheduchywas the inheritance of hismotherConstance.Whynow,at seventy-five, did Eleanorchoosetobreakthemouldoffeudal ceremony and assertthe independence of herrightsinAquitaine?

The gesture was certainlynotintendedforpubliceffect.We only know that ithappened at all thanks to theFrench chronicler Rigord,since no mention of itsurvives in English sources.We must assume, therefore,that the meeting took placewiththeminimumoffanfare,Philippe presumablyaccepting the fealty of hisenemy’s mother as awelcome recognition of the

authority he was attemptingto extend throughout theFrenchkingdom.ForEleanor,however,thiswasamoveinacomplex chess game – astratagem designed to securetheintegrityofherduchyandthe inheritance of her son inthe face of her grandson’schallenge.After all, if she alone,

swearing an oath ofallegiance in person,was theFrench king’s vassal in

possessionofAquitaine, thenPhilippewouldhaveno righttosummonanyoneotherthanEleanorherself toanswer forthe rule of the duchy in hiscourt. Having accepted herhomage, he could have nostraightforwardlegalbasisforintervening in Aquitainehimself, or for promotingalternative claims to its rule,whether fromArthur or Johnoranyoneelse.Infeudallaw,Eleanor now stood as a

human shield between theking of France and herhomeland. And sheimmediately set to work tocapitalise on her position inordertoestablishJohn’sstakeinAquitaine’sfuture.In a document sealed

probably that summer,Eleanor formally recognisedhersonJohnashersuccessorin Aquitaine. She hadaccepted his homage, shedeclared,andnowtransferred

the allegiance of her vassalstohim, ‘theking their liege’,as her own ‘right heir’ andtheir lord. John, meanwhile,sealed a charter of his ownwhich again recorded hishomage to his mother, andwent on to acknowledge herauthorityoverhimasdomina– ‘lady’, the same title thatMatilda had once enjoyed,implying the exercise offemale lordship – ‘of us andof all our lands and

possessions’.Motherandsonwere now explicitly lockedintoapoliticalrelationshipofmutual support andinterdependence. Neitherpartner,John’scharteradded,was to give away lands orrights without the other’sconsent,unlessitshouldbetotheChurch ‘for the salvationof our souls’. Eleanor hadonce before exploited thepolitical possibilities offeudal homage, in helping to

secureherolderson’sreleasefrom his German prison bysuggesting he swear an oathof fealty to the emperor. Ifthathadbeenafeint,thiswasa master stroke – reciprocalrecognition between motherand youngest son thatsimultaneously guaranteedJohn’srightsinAquitaineanddeprived Philippe of theopportunity to assert himselfthere.Her duchy, for the

moment,wassafe,butJohn’sposition inAnjou andMainewas much less certain, andlikely to depend more onmight than on right. Here,however, fortune seemed tobe smiling on John. In theautumn of 1199 Guillaumedes Roches, Arthur’s chiefsupporter in the region, waspersuaded todefect toJohn’scause, forcingPhilippe to thenegotiating table; and inJanuary 1200 the two kings

came to uneasy terms, bywhich Philippe formallyrecognised John as hisbrother’sheir in theAngevindominions, in return forJohn’s homage and forcontinued French possessionof the parts of easternNormandy that had alreadybeen overrun. As so oftenbefore, the treaty was to beconcluded with a marriage:this time a union betweenPhilippe’s twelve-year-old

heir,Louis,andoneofJohn’sroyalnieces, thedaughtersofhis sister Eleanor and herhusband Alfonso VIII ofCastile.Whichniece,however,had

not yet been decided – andthetaskofselectingthebridefell to the girls’ apparentlyindefatigable grandmother.Eleanor had already coveredsomething approaching athousand miles in herwhistlestop political tour

around her domains in thesummer of 1199. Now, inJanuary1200,shetooktotheroad once again. In Poitoushewasforced tonegotiateapassage through the lands oftheLusignans,pacifyingtheiraggressionwithagrantofthecounty of La Marche. Thatpolitical challenge behindher, she then faced thephysical test of vertiginousmountain paths as hercavalcade gingerly picked its

way over the snow-driftedpasses of the Pyrenees andintoNavarre.Shehadbeentothatkingdombefore,adecadeearlier, to collect a wife forher beloved older son; butthat wife was now a widow,and Eleanor pressed onsouthwardintoCastile.At the elegant Castilian

court she was reunited withher daughter Eleanor, whohad lefthermotherbehindatBordeaux more than thirty

years earlier to embrace anew life in the country ofwhich she was now queen.This younger Eleanor sharedhermother’s shrewd intellectas well as her name, andperhaps theirmeetingofferedconsolation to both womenafter the losses of that year:Richard’s sudden death hadbeen followed in SeptemberbythatofhissisterJoannaofSicilyandToulouse,whodidnot survive the birth of her

second child at Rouen inSeptember 1199. The elderEleanor could also findcomfort in meeting herCastilian granddaughters forthe first time. Thirteen-year-old Urraca and eleven-year-old Blanca were bothaccomplished girls, butEleanor, to the surprise ofmany observers, chose theyounger as the future queenofFrance,seeinginhersomecombination of temperament

and talent that would equipherfortheParisiancourtoverwhich Eleanor herself hadpresidedatanalmostequallyearly age. Urraca waspromptlybetrothed instead toAfonso, heir to thePortuguese throne, whileBlanca prepared herself forthe long journey north withherformidablegrandmother.Thesteeplingroutethrough

the mountains was easier inthespringwarmth,butforthe

first time the exertion of hertravels began to take aperceptible toll on Eleanor.After spending Easter weekinBordeaux,sherodeonwithher granddaughter as far asthe valley of the Loire, butthereshegaveBlancaintothecare of the archbishop ofBordeauxforthelaststageoftheroutetoNormandy.Whenthe little Castilian princessmarried her French prince, awedding lavishly celebrated

with jousts and feasting, hergrandmother was not presenttoseeit.Instead,‘weariedbyoldageandthelaboursofherlong journey,’ Roger ofHowden reported, ‘QueenEleanor withdrew to theabbey of Fontevraud andremainedthere’.She was seventy-six years

old; shewas ill and shewastired. But still she could notrestcompletely.ThoughJohnhad settled one conflict, he

lost no time in precipitatinganother, this time in herduchy of Aquitaine. In thesummer of 1200 Johncelebrated a second wedding– his own, to Isabelle, theyoungdaughterandheiressofthecountofAngoulême.Thechroniclers came to believethat John was obsessed withlust for thisgirl,whowasnomore than twelve when theymarried,andtherewasfurtherscandal to be found in the

troublesome detail that Johnalready had a wife, althoughhe had taken care never toobtainapapaldispensationtoregularise his firstconsanguineous marriage toIsabella of Gloucester. But,whatever the gossip, thepolitical fact of the matterwas that there was soundstrategic sense in an allianceby which John would securecontrol of the unrulyterritories ofAngoulême that

separated Poitiers fromBordeaux.Or, at least, there would

have been, had Isabelle notalready been formallybetrothed to Hugues deLusignan,whose lands to thenorth of the Angoumois hadsorecentlybeenbolsteredbyEleanor’sgrantof thecountyofLaMarchetotheeast.Thisunion between two of themost insubordinate dynastiesamong his vassals was an

alarmingprospectforJohn,towhich his own impulsivemarriage to the child-brideIsabelleputaneffectivestop.But the cost of curbing thisexpansionofLusignanpowerwas the creation of aprofoundlydangerousenemy.Eleanorsawthethreatonly

too clearly, and madestrenuous efforts from hersickbed at Fontevraud tocounter it. Intheearlyspringof 1201 she achieved an

unlikely triumph in securingthe compromised allegianceof Aimery, viscount ofThouars, a powerful butdisaffected lord in the north-west of Poitou, whom Johnhad deprived of thestewardship of Anjou infavour of the defector desRoches, and whose brotherGuy had just married Arthurof Brittany’s mother,Constance.TheletterEleanorwrote to her son in thewake

of Aimery’s visit toFontevraud,advisingJohnonhow to handle the viscount’sprofferof renewed loyalty, isfull of the acute politicalinsight that hard-wonexperiencehadbroughttoherforceful intelligence. ‘I wanttotellyou,myverydearson’,shebegan,

that I summoned ourcousin Aimery ofThouars to visit me

during my illness, andthe pleasure of his visitdid me good, for healone of your Poitevinbarons has wrought usno injury nor seizedunjustly any of yourlands. I made him seehow wrong andshameful it was for himtostandbyandletotherbarons rend yourheritageasunder, andhehas promised to do

everything he can tobring back to yourobedience the lands andcastles that some of hisfriendshaveseized.

Johnwasnot a stupidman–nosonofEleanorandHenrywaslikelytobe–buthehadnot inherited his mother’sstrategic brain. Despite hismother’s subtle warnings, hetreated Hugues de Lusignanwith punitive contempt,

confiscating La Marche inorder to grant the countyinstead to his new father-in-law,thecountofAngoulême.Lusignan appealed toPhilippe as John’s overlord,andbythespringof1202therenewal of war wasinevitable. The French kingdeclared John’s lands forfeitand accepted Arthur’shomageinhisplaceforallhisFrench territories – includingAquitaine, Philippe

proclaimed, ‘if God grantsthat either we or he shallacquire it by any meanswhatsoever’. It could hardlyhavebeenclearer that John’sprovocation had dismantledthe legal protections Eleanorhad so carefully establishedto shield her homeland fromtheconflictovertheAngevininheritance.Yet again Aquitaine and

her son stood in need of herhelp. At seventy-eight, she

summoned what reserves ofenergy she could muster toleave her retreat atFontevraudoncemoreforthedefence of Poitou. She hadreached the castle ofMirebeau, fifteenmilesnorthofPoitiers,when themenacethat had been implicit inPhilippe’sedicttookconcreteform in the shape of herfifteen-year-old grandson,Arthur, marching withHugues de Lusignan at the

head of a force of Frenchsoldiers. Thirty years earlier,Mirebeauhadbeenoneofthefortresses over which hereldest sonHenri had gone towar with his father; now itwas the place where Eleanorfacedafutureasahostageasher family tore itself apartonce again. As Arthur’stroopsadvanced,Eleanorwastrapped. She did not panic;nor did she surrender. Shehad suffered the loss of her

freedom before: did she fearitmore or less, now that shehad so little time left?Whileher grandson’s forces seizedcontrol of the town, shedisposed what defences shehad behind the walls of thestone keep, and covertlydespatched a messenger whoslipped silently into thetwilight, heading north to LeMans, where John wasgathering an army ofmercenaries.

John had none of hisbrother’smilitarygenius,andfew decisive militarymanoeuvres tohisname.Butthis threat to his motheranimatedhimintosuddenandbrilliantly resolute action.With thehelpof theunlikelypairingofAimerydeThouarsandGuillaume des Roches –former rivals whose supporthewouldnothavehad,haditnot been for Eleanor – Johnled his troops on a forced

marchofeightymiles in lessthan forty-eight hours toarrive at Mirebeau,unheralded and utterlyunexpected, during the nightof 31 July. As dawn broketheystormedthetown,fallingupon Arthur’s soldiers whilethey slept, and seizingHugues de Lusignan as hebreakfasted on a dish ofpigeons.WithinhoursArthuranddeLusignanwereJohn’sprisoners,alongwithall their

men, and Eleanor was safe,andfree.It was the last time she

wouldwalkonapublicstage.Aftertheshockofhernarrowescape, age and exhaustioncaughtupwithheratlast.Shedid not press onward fromMirebeau into Poitou, butreturned to Fontevraud torest, and to contemplate theprospect of the brightness ofheavenratherthanthestorm-clouds that were gathering

overherson.Withthelossofhis mother’s active support,John lost too the speed ofpurpose and the maturity ofjudgementthathehadshownatMirebeau.Revelling in theglory of his success, herefused to allow des Rochesand the viscount of Thouarsany part in deciding the fateof the prisoners, many ofwhomwere theircountrymen– a mistake that served toconfirm John’s habit of

undermining and alienatingallieswhomheshouldinsteadhave nurtured and exploited.Just two months afterMirebeau, des Roches andThouars abandoned him; andwithin weeks they hadwrested Angers from hiscontrol. John tried to forge anew relationship with theLusignans in their stead, butit was hardly surprising thathis bitterest enemies met hisovertures with dissimulation

and disloyalty.At the end of1202 John once moreretreated to Normandy. AtMirebeau, he had held thekeys to Anjou, Maine,Touraine and Poitou – theheart of his father’s Frenchempire, and the gateway tohismother’s duchy – and hehadthrownthemaway.Worse was to come.

Rumours began to flyconcerning the fate of hisnephew and rival, Arthur,

who had disappeared as aprisoner into John’sforbidding network ofNorman fortresses. Whisperstold of a drunken John, in asotted rage, stoving in theboy’s skull before dumpingthe blood-soaked corpse intothe Seine. Support for Johnwas already haemorrhagingbecause of his paranoiacunreliability, but revulsion atthe murder now openedanother gushing vein.

Meanwhile, the harrying ofNormandy’s easternedge bythe French turned, in thesummer of 1203, into asteady advance. Philippe hadnever been a warrior in themode of his lionheartedenemy Richard; the Frenchking was a tense, physicallycautious figure, withoutchivalric glamour or easycamaraderie. But, warrior orno, what he achieved in thenext twelve months was

radical,evenrevolutionary,inits effect. On 6March 1204,ChâteauGaillard –Richard’s‘saucycastle’,new-builtonajutting crag overlooking theSeineatLesAndelys–felltothe French after a six-monthsiege. The loss of thissupposedly impregnablestrongholdservedtoopenthegates of towns and citadelsacrossNormandytoPhilippe,as the duchy’s inhabitantsrealised that John –whohad

ignominiously retreated toEnglandinDecember1203–would not or could notprotectthem.Theunthinkablehad happened: the Normandynasty which had soruthlessly seized the Englishcrown no longer ruled itsNormanhomeland.Twohundredmiles further

south, Eleanor retreated intosilence. For the first time inher life, the world thatmatteredmosttohernowwas

thenextone.But,beyondthefactthatshetookthehabitofthe nuns who had welcomedher to their midst atFontevraud,we know almostnothingabouther lastweeks.We cannot tell whether shewas aware, in her final days,of the collapse of herhusband’s empire in theunsteady hands of heryoungestson.Allweknowisthaton31March1204,attheage of eighty, Eleanor of

Aquitaineclosedhereyesforthe last time.Shewasburiedin the abbey which hadbecomeahometoher,besideher husband Henry, her sonRichard and her daughterJoanna.Thecalmwithwhichhergracefuleffigyheldinitshands anopenbook as it layalongside theirs marked acool counterpoint to theviolent passions which hadfracturedherfamilyinlife.And that contrast was a

fitting memorial to Eleanor.Always a political creature,she had begun as acharismatically unpredictableforce of instinct and will –qualities which the trials ofher long incarceration hadtemperedwithasophisticateddiplomatic sense and whatcame to be the surest ofpoliticaltouches.Thewomanwhose rebellion against herown husband had oncethreatened, it seemed, to

overturn the natural order ofcreation had in time becomethe mother of the Englishkingdom, and the watchfulguardian of her belovedAquitaine.Eleanor had stoodalonetoembodythecrowninEngland when its king wasfeared lost to a German jail;and she became the firstwomantokneelinhomagetoafeudaloverlord,tounderpinthesecurityofherduchyaftersixdecadesasitsduchess.

If John needed anyreminder of his mother’sextraordinary talents, it camein themonths after she died.Not only was the fall ofNormandy confirmedbeyondall possible doubt whenPhilipperodeintoRouenjustelevenweeksafterherdeath,but Poitou too began to slipthrough John’s fingers as itstowns and lords, bereft nowoftheprotectionoftheirlady,scrambled to offer their

allegiance instead to theFrench king. And in thesouth-western stretches ofAquitaine the troops ofAlfonso of Castile were onthe march to claim Gasconyasthesupposedinheritanceofhis wife, Eleanor’s daughterandnamesake.Jean Sans Terre, they

calledhim;bynow,itwasnoexpressionofsympathybutadamning verdict on John’scatastrophic military losses.

Yet this most unlovely kingofEnglanddidnotquite loseall his lands across the sea –andheretoowemightfindanecho of Eleanor’scapabilities. Normandy andAnjou, the homelands of thekingswhohadruledEnglandformorethanacentury,weregone. The historian Williamof Newburgh believed thatNormandyhadfallenpreytoFrenchaggressionwhileKingRichard was a prisoner

because ‘the courage of thatancient and most valiantpeoplenowlanguished,sincethey had neither duke, norhead, nor chief ’, and thesame could have been said(had William of Newburghlived to tell the tale) of bothNormandy and Anjou underthe suspicious and inconstantcommand of John. ButAquitainehadhadaheadanda chief – not a duke, but aduchess – for nearly seventy

years. And when the dustsettledonthedebrisofJohn’sempire, itwasEleanor’s landof Aquitaine – battered andbloody, but still standing –that remained to the Englishcrown.

ISABELLA

IronLady

1295–1358

OneManSoLovedAnother

It was a cold day inBoulogne, 25 January 1308,

when two of Eleanor’sdescendants met in thecathedralchurchofOurLadyto exchange their weddingvows.The bridegroom, King

Edward II ofEngland, great-grandson of Eleanor’s sonJohn, was a tall andhandsome figure, powerfullybuilt andgorgeouslydressed.Hewasayoungman,stillnotquite twenty-four; but hisbride, at half his age, was

littlemore than a child. LikeEleanor’s granddaughterBlanca,fromwhomshecouldtraceherdescent,thistwelve-year-oldprincessstoodbeforethe altar with her royalhusband as the livingembodiment of an Anglo-French alliance. Isabella ofFrancewastheonlydaughterof the French king PhilippeIV, known to his subjects as‘le Bel ’ – the Fair – for hisstatuesque good looks.

Despite her youth, it wasalreadyclearthatIsabellahadinherited her father’s beauty,and her slight frame wasmade luminous in thecandlelightbyajewelledrobeof blue and gold and acrimson mantle lined withyellow.Theywereagoldencouple,

young and strong enough, itseemed,tobearthehopesandexpectations thatweighed onthismarriage.Thematchhad

first been proposed a decadeearlier, when Isabella wasstillinthenursery,asameansof bringing peace to yetanotherconflictoverthekingof England’s rights toAquitaineandhisduty tohispredatory overlord, the kingofFrance.Edward’s father, the first

King Edward, had harbouredambitions for his role acrossthe Channel worthy of hisNorman and Angevin

forebears, but the territorieshe ruled there constitutedonly a fraction of the empireover which Eleanor’shusband and sons had oncefoughtsobitterly.John’slossof Normandy, Anjou andPoitou had never beenreversed, and King Edward,as duke of Aquitaine, foundhimself inpossessiononlyofthe duchy’s southwesternprovince of Gascony,stretching along the Atlantic

coast from the great city ofBordeaux to the southerlyportofBayonne.ThisfirstEdwardhadbeen

amightywarrior,but fortunehad cast military opportunityhis way to the west and thenorth of his kingdom ratherthansouthwardacrosstheseato France. When the nativeprinces of Wales tried tothrow off Englishoverlordship, he respondedwith a full-blown war of

conquest, pinning down theprincipality with a chain ofawe-inspiring castles, fromHarlech’s monolithicgrandeur to Caernarfon’spolygonaltowers,designedinhomage to the walls ofConstantinople. Meanwhile,in the independent kingdomof Scotland an unexpectedsuccession crisis gaveEdward – a wolf invitedthrough the door as arbiterbetween the rival claims of

Robert Bruce and JohnBalliol–thechancetodecidethat the Scots too deservedthe benefit of forciblyimposed English rule. Withhis energies fully occupiedelsewhere,Edward’srelationswith France remained civilanduncontroversial–untilin1294 Philippe IV seized hismoment to occupy Gasconyand declare the duchy ofAquitaine forfeit to theFrenchcrown.

For three years, Englandand France fought anunhappy war. The cost toboth sides was high in men,money, and, for Edward,political as well as financialcapital, since he wassimultaneouslyfightingatfullstretch to suppress rebellionin Wales and tenaciousresistance inScotland.Peace,when it came in1297,wasarelief;anditwasconfirmedin1299 with the celebration of

onewedding–whenEdward,at sixty, took Philippe’sseventeen-year-old sisterMargueriteashissecondwife–andthepromiseofanother,through the betrothal of littleIsabella to the young princewho was heir to the Englishthrone.Now,inJanuary1308,that

princewas aking.Edward I,indefatigable to the end, haddied five months earlier onhiswaytofightonceagainin

Scotland, leaving his son tosucceed him as Edward II.And Isabella was at last oldenoughtobecomeawifeandaqueen.Astheystoodinthehushed cathedral, it seemedthatanewdawnwasbreakingwith the accession of amonarch whom ‘God hadendowed’ (said the well-informed anonymous authorof theVitaEdwardi Secundi,acontemporaryLatinaccountofEdward’s life) ‘withevery

gift’ – including, now, thehand in marriage of theFrench king’s exquisitedaughter.All,however,wasnotasit

seemed.For thosewhocaredto look, there were signsaplenty that the dazzlingceremony at Boulogneglittered with empty artificerather than political promise.Edward shared his father’sname – an unusual Anglo-Saxon throwback, thanks to

his grandfather’s reverencefor the saintly eleventh-century king Edward theConfessor–butinotherwayshe resembled him little. Hewas the last-born of hisparents’ fourteen children,and three older brothers –John, Henry and Alfonso –had died in turn before theyhadhad a chance to try theirhandatthebusinessofruling.Edward alone was left toshoulder responsibility for

England’s future. Andalready, before his father’sdeath, he had begun todisappoint.At six, Edward had been

presented with a toy castle,lovinglymadeandpainted inintricate detail by a memberof his household. But thismilitary plaything did notshape his tastes as his fathermighthavehoped.Thoughhegrew tobephysically strong,a good horseman, and no

cowardinthefaceofcombat(as he proved in more thanone of his father’scampaigns), he did not liveand breathe the life of asoldierashisfatherhaddone.He preferred what the VitaEdwardiSecundidespairinglycalled ‘rustic pursuits’ –rowing, swimming, diggingditches and thatching houses– and the company of‘mechanicals’ such as the‘buffoons, singers, actors,

carters,ditchers,oarsmenandsailors’ with whom he wasaccusedoffraternisingbytheunimpressed monasticchronicler Ranulf Higden.Thesewerenotthehabitsofaking–or,at least,notakingwhohopedtowintherespectof his people and the heartsand minds of his war-andstatus-obsessednobility.Edward was not

completely averse to femalecompany, it seems, since he

had an illegitimate son,Adam, who was born beforehis marriage to Isabella. Buthis preference for theunpretentious camaraderie ofworkingmen, rather than thehierarchical formality ofaristocratic society, maynevertheless have beensymptomatic of a moreprofound inability to ‘fit’ therole into which he had beenborn. For it was abundantlyclear that the companionship

Edwardvaluedaboveallwasthatofonemaninparticular:ayoungGasconnamedPerrotde Gabaston, or, as he cametobeknowninEngland,PiersGaveston.Gaveston andEdward first

began to spend time togetherin 1300, when Gavestonjoined the sixteen-year-oldprince’s household afterserving for three years as asoldierunderthecommandofEdward’s father. By 1305

they were sufficiently closethat,whenEdwardquarrelledwithhisfather’streasurerthatsummer, the kingmanifestedhis displeasure not only bystopping his son’s allowancebut by banishing Gaveston(along with a few othermembers of the prince’shousehold) from Edward’sside. This separation wasbrief, however, and in May1306 Gaveston was knightedby his prince, along with

more than 250 other youngmen, just four days afterEdward himself had receivedthe swordbelt and spurs ofknighthoodfromhisfather.By then, the favour in

which Gaveston stood withyoungEdwardwasbeginningto attract attention. Andattention, to Gavestonhimself,waslikesunlight.Bynature – much more so thanEdward,theprincewholikednothing better than to spend

his days in thecompanionable anonymity ofphysical labour – Gavestonwas a peacock, his gracefulathleticism constantly ondisplay alongwith his brittlecharisma and his barbedwit.As a result, the deepening oftheir relationship could notescape public notice,especially since its intensitysuggested an affection thatwent beyond the platonic. ‘Ido not remember to have

heard that one man so lovedanother’,observed theauthorof theVita Edwardi Secundipointedly. Knights, it waswell known, might pledgeundying loyalty to oneanother as brothers in arms,andbothbiblicalandclassicaltradition offered familiarexamples of masculinedevotion:‘JonathancherishedDavid, Achilles lovedPatroclus,’ noted the Vita.‘Butwedonotreadthatthey

were immoderate.’ Edward,on the other hand, ‘waspassionately attached to oneparticular person, whom hecherished above all’, RanulfHigden wrote. And althoughthese chroniclers’ verdictswere delivered with theacuityofhindsight,Edward’sgrowing obsession withGavestondoesseemtobethemostplausibleexplanationofstepsthatweretakenin1307toseparatethem.

Gavestonhadnotendearedhimself to old King Edwardin the winter of 1306 when,with twenty-one other youngknights, he deserted theking’s campaign againstRobert Bruce to pursue hispassion for fighting in themore glamorous arena of thetournament field rather thanin the Scottishmud. For thatoffence he was formallypardoned in January 1307,butonlyamonthlaterhewas

banished from England andforbidden to return withoutthe king’s expresspermission. However, theroyal treasurywasordered topay him a generousallowance ‘for as long as heshall remain in parts beyondthe sea during the king’spleasureandwaitingrecall’–and the unmistakableimpressionisthatthiswasnotso much a punishment forGaveston as an attempt to

remove an overwhelmingdistractionfromthelifeoftheheirtothethrone.It was this – the all-

consuming nature ofEdward’s fascination withGaveston – that caused suchalarm about the prince’sconduct, rather than the barefactthatquestionsmightnowbe raised about his sexuality.Certainly,homosexualitywascondemned as sinful by theChurch, but so were all

sexual acts outside themarriage bed, and somewithin it, if they wereperformed forpleasure ratherthan procreation.Contemporaries might wellsee some forms of ‘sodomy’(awordwhichcouldbeusedasageneral termforallsuchsinful sex, as well as in itsmore specific sense) asmoreunnatural than others, butthen again Edward was notthefirstofEngland’srulersto

show signs of sexual interestin men as well as women.The Conqueror’s son andsuccessor, William Rufus,neither married nor fatheredany illegitimatechildren, andwas lambasted by monasticchroniclers for hisextravagantly foppish dress,his louche habits and hisirreligiosity.Buthisstatureasa king, in contemporaryopinion and that of posterity,was determined not by the

fact that his ‘intimatecompanions’ were male, norbywhatthemonkssawastheeffeminate fashions of hiscourt,butbyhisconsiderablejudgement as a soldier and aleader.The problem for Edward,

therefore, was a pattern thatemerged clearly for the firsttimewithGaveston’sexilein1307.Thefactwasthat,withGavestonbyhisside,Edwardwas incapable of sustained

concentration on governmentor on war, or on any of theweighty matters that shouldoccupy a king’s attention; itwas reported that he couldscarcely conduct aconversationwithanyoneelseifGavestonwas in the room.‘Our king’, the Vita laterlamented, ‘was incapable ofmoderate favour, and onaccount of Piers was said toforget himself …’ Thesolution, thought his father

and his magnates, wassimple: remove Gaveston,and all would be well. ButEdward’sobsessionwassuchthatseparationlefthiminthegrip of a single mania: tosecureGaveston’sreturn.Thatmuchwasclearwhen

EdwardIdiedon7July1307onhiswaynorthtoScotland.By the time the new kingarrived from London toreceive the homage of hismagnates at Carlisle Castle

on 20 July, messengers hadalready departed to recallGaveston fromhisexile (andhe was much nearer at handto receive them than mighthave been the case, since hehadtakenupresidencenotinGascony as the old king hadstipulated, but just across theChannel in the county ofPonthieu, which the youngerEdward had inherited fromhis mother in 1290). Whilethe old king’s bodymade its

stately way south toWestminsterAbbey, the newkingrodenorthintoScotlandto show his strength andappoint lieutenants therebefore his return to Londonfor his father’s funeral; andon this journey, at Dumfrieson 6 August, Edwarddeclared that Piers Gavestonwas to be elevated to thehighestrankofthepeerageasearl of Cornwall, a title andvast estate which had long

beenheldbymembersof theking’simmediatefamily.Notonlythat,butGavestonwouldmake a royal marriage:Edwardgavehimashisbridehisyoungniece, fifteen-year-old Margaret de Clare,daughter of his sister Joanand the late earl ofGloucester.This glamorous wedding

took place only five daysafter the old king’s burial –indecent haste, perhaps, but

then again the speed withwhich Edward had alreadydismissed his father’streasurer, and promotedothers with whom the oldkinghadbeenatloggerheads,suggests that defiance ratherthan deference wasuppermost in the new king’sattitude toward his father’smemory.Edwardhimselfwasguest of honour atBerkhamsted Castle towitness the ceremony, and

among his personal gifts tothecouplewerethehundredsof silver pennies with whichthe groom and his youngbride were glitteringlyshowered as they entered thechurch.Lessthantwomonthslater,

in the gloom of a BoulogneJanuary,itwasEdward’sturnto be married. His evenyounger bride, the daintyFrench princess Isabella, didnot have to contend with

Gaveston’s presence amongthe cathedral’s blue-bloodedcongregationasshemadehervows,sincethenewlycreatedearl had not sailed fromDover with the king. Buteven in absentia Gavestoncastalongshadow.Allthosemembers of the weddingparty, French and English,who concerned themselveswithpoliticsknewthathehadremained in London as‘keeper of the realm’ – in

effect, regent of England. Injust sixmonths, this youngerson of an obscure Gasconlord had come adisconcertinglylongway.If Isabella had been

shielded from any publicdisplay of her husband’sdevotion to Gaveston duringtheceremonythatmadeherawife, the same could not besaid of the ritual that madeher a queen. Amonth to theday after their wedding,

Edward and Isabella walkedin magnificent processionfrom the palace ofWestminster to theneighbouring abbey for theirjoint coronation. Beneaththeir feet was a woollencarpet strewn with flowers,and above their heads anembroidered canopy carriedaloft on decorated poles bythe barons of the CinquePorts. Before them pacedsome of the greatest men in

England, including the earlsof Lancaster, Warwick,Hereford and Lincoln,carrying the priceless regalia– swords, sceptres, spursandrobes – with which Edwardwould shortly be invested.Butoccupyingthepositionofgreatest honour immediatelyinfrontof theroyalcouple–in full view of a crowd sopressingly large that oneknight was crushed to deathwhenawallgaveway in the

abbey –was PiersGaveston,‘so decked out’, noted aneyewitness from nearby StPaul’s, ‘that he moreresembled thegodMars thananordinarymortal’.The symbolism of

Gaveston’s role in this mostsacred ceremony ofkingmaking was as plain toEdward’s young queen as itwas to every other spectator.It was Gaveston who carriedinto the church the golden

crown of St Edward theConfessor, a holy relic aswell as the physical emblemof the king’s authority.OnceEdwardandIsabellahadbeenanointed, enthroned andcrowned and the shouts ofacclamation had rung out, itwas Gaveston who held theConfessor’s Sword ofMercyas the royal couple re-emerged into the wintryafternoon light. At thecoronation feast, Gaveston

appeared ‘more splendidlydressedthanthekinghimself’, according to the St Paul’sannalist, in silk of imperialpurple embroidered withpearls (as opposed to themere cloth of gold worn byhisfellowearls).Andhe,notIsabella, sat atEdward’s sidebeneath hanging tapestriesthat had been speciallycommissioned for theoccasion to depict theheraldicblazonsofthehappy

couple: not the emblems ofEdwardandIsabella,but‘thearmsof thekingandofPiersGaveston,earlofCornwall’.There could be no

mistaking that the king didnot stand alone, in either hispublicorhisprivate life, andthat his inseparablecompanionwasnottheyoungwoman to whom he had sorecently made his vows. Noroyal bride, playing her partin international diplomacy,

would be so naïve as toexpect her marriage to befoundedon romantic love,orto assume that she would bethe only recipient of herhusband’s attentions. But theunique dignity of her role asthe king’s anointed consortwas a different matter. That,she would take for granted.And, even at twelve yearsold, Isabella was politicallyawareenoughtoobjecttoherpublic displacement by the

man to whom her husbandwassoslavishlydevoted.Certainly,thelittlequeen’s

royal uncles who hadescorted her to England forthe coronation, Louis ofEvreuxandCharlesofValois,were incensed at hertreatment. Offence was piledupon offence: Edward hadstill not made properprovision for the income andestatesIsabellashouldreceiveas queen in order that she

couldsupportherselfandherhousehold with appropriategrandeur; agreement had notbeen reached about theinheritances her futurechildrenwould receive;mostegregiously insulting of all,Edward had given theweddingpresents thatheandIsabella had received fromher father, including jewelsand great war horses, toGaveston. Louis and Charleswalked out of the coronation

banquet in disgust andreturned to France in a fury,‘seeing’, the St Paul’sannalist said archly, ‘that thekingfrequentedPiers’scouchmorethanthequeen’s’.They were not alone in

theirobjections.Bythespringof 1308, Gaveston’s place atEdward’s side was causinguproar inEngland aswell asat the court of the Frenchking. The nobles had beenprepared to tolerate his

elevationtotheirranksasearlof Cornwall, but since thentheir forbearance had beenseverely tested not only byhis place in the limelight atthe coronation, but also bythe breathtaking arrogancewith which he conductedhimselfamonghisnewpeers.At a tournament held atWallingford in December1307, Gaveston and hisknights had won the dayagainst a company including

theearlsofArundel,Herefordand Surrey. There was nograce in Gaveston’s victory,no magnanimity in hisphysicalprowess.Instead,hiscrowing and condescensionmadepersonalenemiesofthemen he had defeated. ‘Piers,nowearlofCornwall,didnotwishtorememberthathehadonce been Piers the humbleesquire,’notedtheperceptiveauthor of the Vita EdwardiSecundi.‘ForPiersaccounted

noonehisfellow,noonehispeer, save the king alone…Hisarrogancewasintolerableto the barons, and a primecauseofhatredandrancour.’It was not that Gaveston

wastryingtotakethereinsofgovernment from Edward’shands. His aims were nomore and no less than hisown wealth and glory. Theweekshe spent as ‘keeperofthe realm’ during Edward’sabsence in France, for

example,werenotmarkedbyany attempt to pursue apolitical agenda beyond thatof his own self-aggrandisement. That wasplenty irritating enough, ofcourse, to generate hugepersonal animus against thispretentious upstart. But whatunited the nobles in publicdefiance of Edward’s willwas the sense that their kingwas incapable of addressingthe needs of his realm with

clear-sighted consistencywhile his field of visionwasobscured by the presence ofhis favourite. In particular,the English position inScotland, on which so manylivesandsomuchmoneyhadbeenexpended,wasindangerofbeingabandonedwithoutafight: Edward was showingno signs of interest inpursuing his father’s waragainst Robert Bruce, whowas making good use of the

freehandhehadtherebybeengiven to establish himself asking of Scots in fact as wellasinname.When the English lords

assembled for a meeting ofparliament at WestminsterAbbey in April 1308, theirdissatisfaction took concreteform for the first time. Forseveralweeks, bothking andbarons had been makinghurried attempts to armthemselves ahead of the

coming storm. And nowHenry Lacy, earl of Lincoln,an old soldier of fifty-eightwhohadbeenoneofEdwardI’s right-hand men, steppedforwardonbehalfofhispeersto confront the king.‘Homage and the oath ofallegiancearemoreinrespectof the crown than in respectof the king’s person’, arguedthedocumenthepresentedtoEdward. ‘If ’, therefore, ‘itshould befall that the king is

not guided by reason,’ thenhissubjectshadaduty toact‘to reinstate the king in thedignity of the crown’ – byforce, if necessary. And inthis case, of course, thedignity of the crown couldonly be restored if Gavestonwereremoved.If Edward had believed he

could hold out against thecomplaints of his lords, hishopes were dashed whenenvoys arrived from his

wife’s father to demandGaveston’sbanishment,sincethe king of France nowconsidered him a mortalenemy.Facedwiththedoublethreatof rebellionamong theranks of the English nobilityand armed intervention fromFrance,Edwardwasforcedtocapitulate. On 14 May 1308he sought to mollify hisfather-in-lawbyendowinghisqueen, at last, with thenorthern French counties of

PonthieuandMontreuil.Andon18Mayheputhis seal toanorderthatGavestonshouldleave England within fiveweeks, on pain, thearchbishop of Canterburyannouncedthefollowingday,ofexcommunication.For Isabella, this moment

shone a rare shaft of lightacross a landscape ofwreckedexpectations.LifeasEngland’s queen had not, sofar,offeredmuchreassurance

to a girl raised in one ofEurope’s most sophisticatedcourtswith a profound senseof the dignity of her station.Like Matilda and Eleanorbefore her, Isabella had hadto embrace the prospect of anewlifeinanalienlandatanagewhenthecomfortsof thenursery were not far behindher. Unlike them, she hadrapidly discovered that shecould depend on her newhusband for neither love nor

respect. She had beensidelined at her owncoronation by a man withwhom her husband waspublicly and humiliatinglyinfatuated. Concern for heryouth might well have keptEdward away from her bedfor some time after theirwedding, whatever thecircumstances, but hisattentions were soostentatiously engagedelsewherethathecouldclaim

little credit for any suchconsideration. WhileGavestonpreenedinsilksandjewels lavished upon him bytheking,Isabellahadscarcelybeen able to maintain herentourage in the state towhich she had beenaccustomed as princess ofFrance, let alone as theanointed queen of England.Now, at last, it seemed asthough thewaywasclear forthis proud young woman to

takeher rightfulplacebesideher king – perhaps even toadvise and support him, asreveredroyalwiveshaddonebeforeher.There was hope, then, for

thequeen,evenas theking’sdesolation at the loss of hissoulmatewas plain for all tosee. Edward was withGavestonuntilthemomenthetook ship at Bristol forIreland,hisexilehavingbeenfinagled by the king into an

appointment as royallieutenantthere.ThelasttimeGaveston had been forced toleave England by Edward’sfather,Edwardhad showeredhim with gifts including twotourneying outfits in greenemblazoned with Gaveston’sarms, one in fine linen, theother in velvet embroideredwith pearls and piping ofsilverandgold.Thistime,hispresents were lessimmediately tangible but

infinitely more valuable.Under the terms of hisbanishmentGavestonhadlosthislandsasearlofCornwall,but Edward insisted that heshould keep the title at least,andbeforehesetsailthekinggranted him estates inEngland and Gascony on ascale to rival those of whichhehadbeendeprived.His departure left Edward

in misery that was equalledonlybythereliefofhislords

and his young queen. ButGaveston’s removal did notprove to be the panacea forwhich they had hoped. True,Edward did now turn hisenergies to building bridgeswithhisnoblesandtalkingoftheurgentneedtocountertheresurgent Scots – and theearls responded with alacrityto these overtures, desperateas they were for active andpurposefulleadership.Butbythe summer of 1309 it was

becoming apparent that theseweretacticsbornofEdward’smonomania, not thebeginnings of newly focusedkingship. Securing thecollaborationofhismagnateswas not the prelude to theScottish campaign for whichthey hoped, despite costlypreparationsnowputintrain.Instead, it served to lay thegroundwork for Gaveston’sreturn–atfirstinsecretwhenhe slipped quietly into

Chester in June, and then inAugustwhenhewaspublicly,if reluctantly, acknowledgedbythenoblesinparliament.Thatthelordswereuneasy

in their acquiescence wasobvious from the grievancesabout the financialoppressions of hisgovernment that they laidbeforethekingasthepriceofGaveston’s recall. Did thespeed with which Edwardwaved the reforms through

suggest that he and hisfavourite had learned lessonsfrom their separation? Thelordsmusthavehoped that itdid; but instead Gaveston’sreinstatement as earl ofCornwallprovedtobethecuefor yet another turn of themerry-go-round. Gavestonhimselfwasnotchastenedbuttriumphant at his politicalresurrection,andhismockeryof the serious-minded earlswho had tried to expel him

from their ranks became stillmore outrageously insolent.Laughingly, he gave themderisivenicknames– theearlof Warwick was ‘Warwickthe Dog’, the Vita reports,with later chroniclers adding‘Burst-Belly’ for the ageingearl of Lincoln, ‘Churl’ forthe earl of Lancaster, and‘Joseph the Jew’ for the earlof Pembroke, ‘because hewaspaleandtall’.Andallthewhile Edward’s officials

continued to exact moneyfromhispeopleforamilitarycampaign in Scotland thatshowed no sign of takingplace.InFebruary1310,thelords

once again came to aparliament armed and angry,to demand that action betakentodealwiththefailingsofEdward’sregime.Thekinghad already sent Gavestonaway fromcourt for his ownsafety while the earls

gathered in force, and nowEdwardhadnochoicebut togiveintotheirinsistencethatheappointabodyof twenty-one lords, temporal andspiritual, ‘to ordain andestablish the estate of ourhousehold andof our realm’.These ‘Ordainers’, as theycame to be known, were torule on Edward’s behalf forthe next eighteen months,and, although the documenttowhichEdward set his seal

asserted that he gave themauthority ‘of our free will’,theVita had no doubt of thenature of that freedom: thelords had made it clear that‘unless thekinggranted theirdemandstheywouldnothavehim for king, nor keep thefealty that they had sworn tohim’.As the Ordainers set to

work,Edwardembarkedonaboldstrategyofmisdirection.While his lords usurped his

government, he would showhisworth as king by dealingat last with the catastrophicmilitarysituationinScotland.This plan, it seemed to thebeleaguered king, hadmultiple advantages. He wasdoing what his subjects hadrepeatedlydemanded,therebydemonstrating that he wascapable of defending therealm and its interests as hewas required to do by thecrown hewore. Hewas also

extracting himself from theshackles the Ordainers hadplaced upon his authority inLondon; they might meddlewith his administration, butno one, surely, couldcountermand a king at theheadofhistroops.Lastly,andmostimportantlyforEdward,he was removing Gavestonfrom immediate danger.Extraordinarythoughitmightseem, a Scottish battlefieldwasnowa saferprospect for

thegracefulearlofCornwall,able fighter thathewas, thananassemblyofEnglishpeers.For Isabella – who was nowfifteen, and having to resignherself once more, with icyrestraint, to playing secondfiddle in her ownmarriage –Edward’s strategy meant thedubious pleasure of a firstvisit to the far north of heradopted country in thecompany of an army led byher husband and his

flamboyantlover.It was an ingenious tactic,

butitdidnotwork.Itwastoolate for the king to convincehis lords that he intended toemulate his father byhammering the Scots – and,even if he could havepersuaded them of hisseriousness of purpose,almost none of them werewilling to join an army withGaveston as well as Edwardat its head (the only

exceptions being the twenty-year-old earl of Gloucester,Gaveston’s brother-in-law,andJohndeWarenne,earlofSurrey).A campaignwithoutthemilitarymightoftheearlsatitsbackwasneverlikelytosucceed,anditsoonemergedthat Robert Bruce and hismen would not meetEdward’s troops on openground,butharriedthemwithraids and ambushes amid aravagedlandscape,laidwaste

by the Scots themselves inorder to threaten the Englishwithstarvation.After a fruitless eight

months based at the frontiertownofBerwickatthemouthof the river Tweed, Edwardand Isabella rode south inJuly 1311, leavingGaveston,newly named as the king’slieutenant in Scotland, holedup in the Northumbrianfortress of Bamburgh. BackinLondonatthebeginningof

August – as Bruce and hissoldiers launched devastatingraids into northern England,in brutal demonstration ofEdward’s military failure –the king was confronted bythe reforms that had beenpainstakingly drawn up bythe Lords Ordainer. Theseforty-one ordinancesprovided for the detailedsupervision of Edward’sgovernment – especially theways in which he raised

moneyfromhissubjects,andthewaysinwhichhechosetospend it – by his nobles, intheir capacity asrepresentatives of the realm.And among thesestipulations, to no one’ssurprise,wasthedemandthatPiers Gaveston should beexiled from England oncemore,thistimeforever.Edwardmaynothavebeen

surprised, but he was aghastand enraged at the corner in

whichhenowfoundhimself.He railed against theappalling presumption of hissubjects in seeking toconstrainhissovereignty.Butto no effect: and while theOrdainersstoodfirm,Edward–withtheutterlackofinsightthat had characterisedeverythinghehaddonesinceheinheritedhiscrown–gavetheclearestdemonstrationyetof why his lords had beendriven to oppose him. ‘To

satisfy the barons he offeredthese terms’, explained theVita:

whatever has beenordained or decidedupon, he said, howevermuch itmay redound tomyprivatedisadvantage,shall be established atyour request and remainin force for ever. Butyou shall stoppersecuting my brother

Piers, and allow him tohave the earldom ofCornwall. The kingsought this, time andagain,nowcoaxingthemwith flattery, nowhurlingthreats…

What Edward did not see,was incapable of seeing,wasthat all but one of theordinances were concernednot with his ‘privatedisadvantage’ but with his

public duty as king. Had heonlyrecognisedthatfact,hadhe shown any inkling of theresponsibilitiesaswellas therights of the crown, then thesingle provision that shouldhave been a privatematter –the one concerning hisrelationship with Gaveston –needneverhavebeendrafted.But there was no moment

of realisation. Instead,confrontedwiththerealityofcivilwaras theonlypossible

consequenceofhiscontinuedresistance, Edward had nooption but to concede. Theordinances were proclaimedthroughout England, andexcommunication institutedasthepenaltyforanyonewhoviolated them. And on 3November, Gaveston againsailedintoexile.This time, however, there

was nothing strategic aboutthe king’s response. He wasdrivenbyfury,declaring that

his nobles were treating himas though he were an idiotwhose household had to bemanagedbyothersbecauseofhisincapacity.Onceagainhemoved north as soon as hecould, to escape theconstraintsonhis freedomofactioninLondon,andassoonashewasfreehesentwordtoFlanders to summonGavestonbacktohisside.Bythe middle of January 1312they were together again at

York, where Edwardproclaimed Gaveston’srestoration to the earldom ofCornwall, and denounced hisexile as unlawful. Now, thekingwaspreparinginearnestforwar.And he was not the only

one. Here, the temperamentsandtheindividualjudgementsof Edward’s most powerfulsubjects – the men whosefoibles Gaveston had somercilessly mocked – came

into play in decisive fashion.Extraordinarily tense thoughthe political world had beenever since Edward’saccession, it had beenrelatively easy until now forthe earls to stand united intheir demand that the kingshouldexpelhisfavouriteandreform his government. Butonce it became clear thatEdwardwoulddefythem,thequestion was no longer whatthe magnates wanted, but

whether they were preparedto take arms against theiranointed king to get it. Oneamong the earls was sparedthis fateful decision. HenryLacy,earlofLincolnandtheregime’selderstatesman,haddied at his London home,Lincoln’s Inn inHolborn, on5February1311.His fidelitytothecrownandhiscultureddignity were a grievous lossin such troubled times; andhisdeathhelpedtobestowthe

mantle of leadership on theman who inherited hisearldom – his son-in-law,ThomasofLancaster.Lancaster, at thirty-four,

was a very differentproposition from hisrespected father-in-law. Hewas acutely conscious of hisown pre-eminent positionamong the English nobility,set apart as he was from hispeersbothbybirthandbythescale of his wealth and

power. He was the son ofEdmund of Lancaster,Edward I’s younger brother,andBlancheofArtois,widowof the king of Navarre andgranddaughter of Louis VIIIof France – a lineage whichmadehim,uniquely,boththecousin of Edward II and thematernal uncle of the youngqueen, Isabella. Alsouniquely, he held a grandtotal of five earldoms withlands stretching across

England: those of Lancaster,Leicester and Derby he hadinherited from his father, towhich his marriage to theheiressAliceLacynowaddedthe titles and estates ofLincolnandSalisbury.Buthedid not have the personalstature to match thisextraordinary politicalstanding. He was alwaysmoreawareofhisentitlementtodemandloyaltythanofthequalities needed to inspire it,

and his instincts as a loner,aloof and haughty, competedforsupremacywithhisfierceambitionasaleader.Fornow,however,thefact

thatopenconflictcouldfocuson the despised person ofGavestonwasenoughtoholda tensecoalitionofmagnatestogether.TheLordsOrdainer,with Lancaster now taking aprominent role among them,made arrangements for thesecurity of southern England

while despatching troopsnorthward under thecommand not only of theintransigent Lancasterhimself but also the earls ofPembrokeandSurrey,bothofwhom had previously shownthemselves willing tocontemplate a more politicengagementwiththekingandhislover.Itwasameasureofthe extreme caution madenecessary by this threateningsituation that the task of

arresting Gaveston wascommitted specifically totheircarefulhands.Edward and Gaveston,

meanwhile, remained forseveralweeksatYork,whereIsabella joined them in thesecondhalf ofFebruary.Thelength of their stay wasoccasioned not only by theneed to co-ordinate militarypreparations but also by thefact thatGaveston’swife, theearl of Gloucester’s sister

MargaretdeClare,hadgivenbirth to a daughter, Joan, on12 January. It was not until20 February that thecountess’s churching tookplace – the ritual ofpurification that marked herre-emergence into the worldafter her confinement – andwasfollowedafewdayslaterby the baby’s christening, asumptuous affair on whichthe king spent lavishly. Bythen,thoughshecouldnotyet

have known it, Isabella toowaspregnant.The timing may simply

have been fortuitous. Atsixteen, the queen was nowmature enough for theprospect of childbirth to bemerely commonly, ratherthan uncommonly,dangerous.If,asseemslikely,a decision had been taken atthe time of her wedding thatshe was too young toconsummate the marriage,

such restraint was no longerphysically necessary. But,given the specificcircumstances of Isabella’smarriedlife,itisalsopossiblethat the start of her sexualrelationshipwithEdward,andthe pregnancy that resulted,were politically inspired.Certainly,theimminentthreatof civilwar is likely to havefocused the minds of bothEdward and Gaveston, hisfellowfirst-timefather,onthe

advantages of acquiring alegitimateheir.Advantageous the news

may have been, but it didnothing to stop the conflict.As the earls rode north(claiming, andconvincingnoone, that the men they weremustering were gathering totake part in tournaments),Edward, Gaveston andIsabellamovedaheadofthemto the north-east, Isabellaoften travelling separately

from her husband, and moreslowly, perhaps impeded bythe early stages of herpregnancy as well as by theproprieties of queenly travelon rutted roads amid a largehousehold entourage.Certainly, though, thepressures of their unhappysituation were becomingmore intense. At the end ofApril Isabellacaughtupwithher husband andGaveston atthe fortress of Newcastle,

before pushing on anothereight miles without them tothe comforting security ofTynemouth Priory, aBenedictine communitynestled within a newly builtand massively fortifiedcurtain wall on a rockyheadland overlooking theNorth Sea. But both comfortand security vanished in aninstant on 4 May, whenEdwardandGavestonarrivedwith a small retinue at the

Priory’s gate, sweating andbreathless from their suddenflight.TheearlofLancaster’sarmy had appeared withterrifying speed outsideNewcastle’s walls, and theking had left almosteverythingbehind–weapons,horses, jewels – in hisdesperation to evade hiscousin’sgrasp.They could not rest for

long. The next day Edwardand Gaveston put to sea,

heading eighty miles downthecoasttoScarborough.ForGaveston, who had recentlybeen ill, this bleak five-dayvoyage was a necessary evilto escape the implacablehostility of his enemies. ForIsabella, however, thecalculation of risk was verydifferent: her sex, her stationand her pregnancy wouldprotect her from harm at thehands of the earls, while thedangerthatshemightbecome

their hostage weighed lessheavily than the threat to theking’s unborn heir posed bytheNorthSea’sunpredictablecurrents. She thereforehurried south by road,abandoning rich bundles ofbaggage under guard on theNorthumbrian coast to beretrievedatamorepropitiousmoment.At York she was reunited

with her husband, who hadleftGavestonsafebehind the

impregnable walls ofScarborough Castle andridden west to join her.Unassailable Scarborough’sfortifications certainly were,looming as they did from aclifftop three hundred feetabove the harbour. ButEdward’s hopes forGaveston’s safety were soonscattered to the winds. TheOrdainers’ army, under thecommand of Pembroke andSurrey, moved swiftly to

isolatetheheadlandonwhichthe castle stood, a cordonwhich in a matter of daysformed a stranglehold. True,thebesiegerscouldnot reachGaveston and hismen insidethe walls, but neither couldsupplies of food or arms orany other kind of help fromhis devoted king. In despair,Gavestonagreedtermsforhisown surrender on 19 May.Pembroke and Surreysolemnly swore that they

would guarantee theirprisoner’s safety until 1August. By then, theagreementstipulated,eitherapeace settlement would beagreed between the king andallhismagnates,orGavestonwould be returned toScarborough, a castle thatwould be neither re-garrisonednor re-provisionedin the meantime, to take hischances under renewed siegeas if the negotiations had

never happened. Edward,who was consulted at York,hadnooptionbut togivehisassent, and Gaveston beganhis journey south as aprisonerinthecustodyoftheearl of Pembroke, Aymer deValence.At almost forty, Pembroke

was a careful,measuredmanwho had proved a loyalservanttoEdwardIandtohisson, although his loyalty bynow was of a kind that

Edward II was too short-sighted to recognise. It hadbeenwith obvious reluctancethat he had been driven tostand against his king – hehad even been prepared toargue Edward’s case forGaveston’s recall from anearlierexile,inhiscapacityasan envoy to the pope in thespring of 1309 – but a yearlaterhisdisenchantmentwiththe failings of Edward’s ruleled him to take his place

amonghispeersasoneoftheLords Ordainer. But, asbefittedamanwhohadbeenintended for a career in theChurch until the early deathofhiselderbrother,hisnewlysworn pledge to ensureGaveston’s safety was forPembroke a matter of bothpersonal honour and sacredduty, and he treated hisprisoner with grace andrespect.On 9 June the two earls,

captorandcaptive, arrivedatthe village of Deddington inOxfordshire,wherePembrokefound Gaveston comfortablelodgings at the rectory andlefthimunderguardwhileherodeonanother twentymilestovisit hiswife athismanorof Bampton. But Pembrokewas not the only one of theLords Ordainer who knewGaveston’s whereabouts onthis stately progresssouthward, and not all of his

fellow earls sharedPembroke’s serene sense ofobligation about thehonourable treatment theirprisoner was currentlyenjoying.Forsome,Gavestonwas a renegade who hadalready made fools of themtoooften.Wasitnotobviousthat, in order to secureGaveston’sfreedom,thekingwouldagree toanything theyasked, and then go back onhis word as he had done so

many times before? Theordinances had alreadydecreed that, if Gavestonbreached the terms of hisexile,heshouldbetreated‘asan enemy of the king and ofthe kingdom and of hispeople’.Andapeaceprocessthatsetasidethisprescriptioncould mean only that themerry-go-round wouldcontinuetoturn.Among the earls unhappy

with the genteel handling of

their prisoner was GuyBeauchamp, the forty-year-old earl of Warwick. LikePembroke, he had servedEdward I faithfully; unlikePembroke,hehadbeenquickto voice his opposition toEdward II’s failings andGaveston’s role in fosteringthem. The old king hadgranted Warwick extensivelandsinScotlandasarewardfor hismilitary service there,which gave a particularly

sharp edge to Warwick’sresentment of Edward’sdisastrous neglect of theEnglish campaign north ofthe border.He had also beenat the old king’s bedsidewhen he died, andmay havebeen instructed to resistGaveston’s return from thatfirst, long-ago exile.Certainly,hehadbeenutterlyconsistent in hisdetermination to removeGavestonandtheprovocative

distraction he represented.Warwick was a cultured anddiscriminating man, butsomething of his tenaciousforcefulness is apparent inGaveston’s choice ofnickname for him: ‘Warwickthe Dog’, the Vita reports –anepithet elaboratedby latertradition into ‘the BlackHoundofArden’.In June 1312 Warwick

passionatelybelieved that thecritical state of English

politics demanded moreforceful action than thecautiousPembrokehadsofarshown any sign ofundertaking. Hearing thatGaveston had been left,lightly guarded, atDeddington, the earlassembled his retainers inforce and rode the twenty-five miles across countryfrom his castle at Warwick.Early in the morning ofSaturday 10 June, his men

surrounded the rectorywhereGaveston was staying, andwhen they saw howoverwhelmingly they wereoutnumbered, Pembroke’ssoldiers simply abandonedtheir arms. ‘Get up, traitor –you are taken!’ the Vita hasWarwick shout outsideGaveston’s window. AndGaveston had no choice buttocomply.‘Led forth not as an earl

butasathief’,Gavestonwas

escorted out of Deddington,at first on foot, and thenroughly bundled onto apackhorse quite unlike thefinepalfreystowhichhewasaccustomed. When theyreached Warwick Castle,towering over the town thatshared its name, he was castinto a prison cell within thewalls of the fortress.Pembroke had treated himwith the dignity of a peer;Warwickwithall theniceties

duetoatraitor.That did not, however,

mean that Warwick wasconfident of his next move.This was the moment atwhich the unity of the lordswould be tested todestruction.Theyhaddonesomuch in the name of thecrownagainstthewilloftheirking – forced reform on hisgovernment, issuedordinances in his name,expelled his favourite from

England’s shores. But couldthose ordinances now justifytheuseoflethalforceagainsta man who was not only apeer of the realm, but dearerto theking than thekingdomitself? Could such anexecutionbelawful,whentheking himself, the lawgiverwhoseresponsibilityitwastobring justice to his people,would never accept it?Edward had already declaredGaveston’s exile unlawful;

how then could hispunishment for breaching itsterms be justified?And if anearl could be killed withoutthesanctionofthelaw,wherethenlaysafetyforhiskillers?Pembrokewas clear in his

answer.His own honour andintegrity depended onfulfilling his guarantee thatGavestonwould be kept safefromharmwhileasettlementwasnegotiatedwiththeking,and he frantically sought to

recover his prisoner. ButWarwick, knowing full wellthe dangers of action, stillcouldnotbeartocontemplatethe risk of inaction: thatEdward would yet again putGaveston’s baneful influencebefore the needs of hiscountry. Collectiveresponsibility – the earls’claim to speak for the‘community of the realm’ –had so far provided a meansbywhichtorestraintheking.

Perhaps collectiveresponsibility could nowjustifyGaveston’sdeath.More earls on caparisoned

warhorses clattered throughWarwickCastle’s great gatesin the days that followed:thirty-six-year-old Humphreyde Bohun, earl of Herefordand Essex and husband ofEdward’s sister Elizabeth,twenty-seven-year-oldEdmund Fitzalan, earl ofArundel, and, most powerful

of all, Thomas of Lancaster,holder of five earldoms andarbiter, it now seemed, ofEngland’s destiny. For days,these lords deliberated whileGaveston waited in the coldand gloom of his cell. Theysealed documents promisingone another protection fromany repercussions that mightbefall them should Gavestonbe executed. Two judgeswere called in to sentencehimtodeathaccordingtothe

terms of the ordinances – alegal gloss which could notmask the facts of a case inwhichtheaccusedhadhadnoproperly constituted trial.And the death knell finallysounded when Lancaster atlast stepped forward to playout the role of leadership forwhichhis inheritanceandhisambition had fitted him. ‘Itwas necessary for him to begreatwhoshoulddefendsucha deed,’ explained the Vita

solemnly. ‘Hence Thomas,earl of Lancaster, being ofhigher birth and morepowerful than the rest, tookupon himself the peril of thebusiness…’On Monday 19 June

Gaveston was brought fromhis prison, blinking andbound in the early morninglight, and handed over to theearl of Lancaster’s men. His‘martial glory’ gone, he wasdragged two miles north to

Blacklow Hill, whichbelonged to the estates ofLancaster’s nearby castle ofKenilworth. While Warwickremainedwithin the walls ofhis own fortress, Lancaster,Hereford and Arundelfollowed some way behindthe procession, the earls’uneasemademanifestintheirphysical distance from anexecution that bore thehallmarks not of judicialprocess but of a lynching. A

messenger was on hand torelay Lancaster’s orders, andat hisword a soldiersteppedforward and drove his swordinto Gaveston’s abdomen.Gaveston fell, bleeding, asanother man unsheathed ablade to sever his head fromhis body. Lancaster waitedandwatcheduntilhesawthehead lifted into the air – notrophy, but proof of a jobdone. Then he turned hishorse,androdeaway.

Gaveston, the preeningpeacock,wasgoneatlast,hisglittering colours faded toblack, his mocking voicesilenced. But his capacity tomake trouble was far fromover. The earls had hopedthat his removal would freeEdward to turn his attentionto government, to thewar inScotlandandtotheadviceofhis lords about the needs ofhis people. Lancaster hadbeen prepared, in the end, to

removehimbyviolence,asadesperate resolution to anintractable problem. But theproblem had not gone away.Instead, it had changed inform.Death did not end

Edward’s devotion toGaveston. His mutilatedcorpsehadbeen left lyingonthebloodygrassatBlacklow,theembarrassingdetritusofadangerous political act, untilitwas rescued by a group of

DominicanfriarsandtakentoOxfordwhereitlayinstateatthe king’s command,embalmed and dressed incloth of gold, to await burial(since Gaveston,excommunicated by thearchbishop of Canterbury forhis breach of the ordinances,could not be interred inconsecrated ground until theanathema was revoked).Meanwhile, Edward’sresponse to his loss was as

cleartotheauthoroftheVitaasitwastotheperpetratorsofGaveston’sdeath:‘theyknewthatwhen themattercame totheking’snotice,hewould,ifhe could, proceed to takevengeance’.The earls had begun this

conflict united in search of aking who would takeresponsibility for his realmand offer them leadership.Their unity was nowirretrievably fractured:

Pembroke was back at theking’s side, raging at hisformer allies who had sweptasidehispersonalpromiseofsafeconducttoGaveston(nottomentionthepossessionshehadpledgedasaguaranteeofhis oath). And theconsequencesof thisdivisionran frighteningly deep. Thelords who had Gaveston’sblood on their hands –principally Lancaster, theking’scousinandthegreatest

magnate in England – couldnot now afford to see theirsovereign restored tountrammelled power,however magisterial his rulemightconceivablybewithoutthe distraction of Gaveston’spresence,becauseEdward,astheVitacoollyexplains, ‘hadalready decided to destroythose who killed Piers’. Andthe manner of that killing –notrial,nohearingbeforehispeers in open court, just a

brutal blow on a sunnyhillside–hadhandedthekingenough rope to hang themwith. No one knewwhat thefuturewould bring: but therecould be little doubt that thescene was set for moreturmoil, more violence andmorebloodshed.Onemore player remained

in the wings, watching andwaiting, while she enacted aprivatedramaofherown.OnSunday 12November, in her

brilliantlypaintedchamberatWindsorCastle–goldenstarsdancingongreenastheWiseand Foolish Virgins playedout theirparable in the finestpigments–Isabellawentintolabour.Shortlybeforesix thenextmorning, she gave birthtoaboy.Theseventeen-year-old queen had kept her owncounsel since the bittercomplaints her uncles hadrelayed to her father in thefirst unhappy months of her

marriage.Shehadmaintainedacooldignity throughout themonths and years offollowing Edward as hefollowed Gaveston in thefruitless search for sanctuaryin his own kingdom. But, inhersilence,shehadlearnedagreat deal: that her husbandhad much passion and littlejudgement; that hisunderstandingofpoliticswassometimes wilfully obtuse,sometimes hopelessly naïve;

andthathisnoblesweremento be reckonedwith. Isabellawasstillyoung,butshehadashrewd intellect and aforcefulwillofherown.Andnow, with her son in herarms, she held the key thatwouldtransformherpowerasqueen.

DearestandMostPowerful

‘Our King Edward has nowreigned six full years’, the

author of the Vita wrote in1313, ‘and has till nowachieved nothingpraiseworthy or memorable,except that by a royalmarriagehehasraisedupforhimself a handsome son andheir to the throne.’Amid thewreckageofEngland’shopes,then, Isabella and her babyson embodied Edward’s soleaccomplishmentasking.The arrival of the new

prince – who was named

Edward after his Englishfather and grandfather,despitetheeffortsofaFrenchdelegation headed byIsabella’seldestbrotherLouisto suggest Philippe as analternative–wasgreetedwithwild enthusiasm in thecapital. Londoners carousedin the streets, inebriated notonlybythefreewineflowingfrom barrels set up at theroadsides but by sheer reliefthat riotous celebration was

overtaking their city, ratherthan the riotousviolence thathadthreatenedtoeruptduringprevious weeks. Then, tensenegotiations had been takingplace in a desperate attemptto avert all-out war betweenthe king and the earlsresponsible for Gaveston’sdeath, whose fear for theirown safety had taken steel-clad form when they arrivedinLondonatthebeginningofSeptember at the head of a

formidablearmy.Now, at last, God had

shown thathewaswilling tosmile again on England andits unhappy monarch. Thebaby’sbirth, inproviding forthe future of the royal line,served to strengthenEdward’shand;hewasasyetin no position to impose thevengeance he craved, but a‘treaty of peace’ was finallypatched together on 20December 1312, under the

auspices of envoys from thepope and the French court.The earls of Warwick andLancaster were to submit tothe king’s grace, and restoreto him the jewels and horsesLancaster had seized whenEdward and Gaveston fledfromNewcastle.Inreturn,theagreementstipulated,Edwardwould lay aside all rancourarising from Gaveston’sdeath.Thedepthsofhostilityand

suspicion that lay behindthese ostensibly simpleprovisions were laid bare bythe protracted manoeuvringover their enactment thatoccupied the uneasy monthsafterthetreatywasdrawnup.It was hardly surprising thatWarwick andLancasterwerereluctant to accept thesettlement: Edward hadproved many times beforethat his word was not to betrusted where Gaveston was

concerned, and there wasample reason to believe thathis offer of forgiveness wasentirely disingenuous.Moreover, the treaty as itstood neither mentioned theordinances, on the authorityofwhich theearlsclaimed tohave acted, nor identifiedGavestonasatraitor–and,assuch, it gave Warwick andLancaster no protection inlaw beyond the offer of theking’s grace, fleetingly

insubstantial as it was likelyto be.Meanwhile, silence onthe matter of the ordinanceswas, for Edward, merely afirst step: he sought theirrevocation, and his ownabsolution from his oath tomaintainthem.By the end of February

1313 Lancaster had finallyagreed to return the king’sjewels,adazzlinghoardwitha value to Edward that wentbeyond the financial,

includingas itdidnotonlyagolden cup that had been agiftfromhismother,butfourgreatrubies,anemeraldandahuge diamond in anenamelled silver box thatGaveston had been carryingwhen he was captured. Butstill argument and counter-argumentcontinued,whileallthe time the Scots continuedto press home the advantagepresented to them by theimplosionofEnglishpolitics.

Bruce’s violent raids hadalready exacted thousands ofpounds in tribute from thepeople of Northumberlandand Westmorland, and histroops were now plunderingthecountrysideasfarsouthasYorkshire.Edward – whose inability

to focus on the issues thatmost exercised his earls hadnot disappeared withGaveston’sdeath–chosethismoment to announce his

departure forParis. Isabella’sfather, King Philippe, hadinvited his daughter and herroyal husband to attend theFrenchcourtfortheknightingof his three sons, Isabella’sbrothers Louis, Philippe andCharles.Thislavishstatevisit– undertaken in casualdefiance of the ordinances’prescription that the kingshould not leave the countrywithout the consent of hislords – presented Edward

with a characteristicallywelcome opportunity toabsenthimselffromthesceneofconflictathome.But it also marked the

emergence of his wife as apolitical player in her ownright.Newly amother to theheir to the English throne,seventeen-year-old Isabellawas returning to herhomeland as a queen takingher rightful place beside herhusband almost for the first

time. Without Gaveston’sdisturbing presence, Edwardand Isabella once againlookedevery inch thegoldencouple they had appeared attheir wedding five yearsearlier – and it now seemedpossible to hope that, thistime, appearances might bematchedbyreality.The royal entourage sailed

from Dover at dawn on 23May, andmade a ceremonialentry into Paris on 2 June,

beforediningwiththeFrenchking at an elaborately stagedbanquet that evening. Thenext day, on the feast ofPentecost, the solemn ritualofknighthoodwasenactedatthe great Gothic cathedral ofNotre-Dame (the foundationsofwhichhadbeenlaidunderthe aegis of Louis VII acentury and a half earlier, afew years after his divorcefrom Eleanor of Aquitaine).There Philippe and Edward

bestowed the belt and spursofaknightonLouis,theheirto the French throne – aprince who was already aking, since he had inheritedthe crown of Navarre fromhis mother Jeanne on herdeath in 1305. These threekings then made knights ofthe other young men beforethem, almost two hundred inall,includingLouis’syoungerbrothers, Philippe andCharles, and their cousins

PhilippeofValoisandRobertofArtois.Days and nights of

celebrationfollowed.Thecitywas a riot of colour, thehousesdeckedinhangingsofred, blue, white, black,yellow and green; there waseating, drinking and dancingin the streets, with wineflowingfromagreatfountainaround which coiledornamental mermaids, civet-cats,lions,leopardsandother

fabulous creatures; and thecitizens presented intricatetableauxof popular tales andbiblical scenes.Onone stagea hundred costumed devilsenthusiastically tormentedanguished sinners as pitch-blacksmokepouredfromthepitofhell,while,onanother,angels sang as souls troopedcheerfully into brightlypaintedparadise.Amid this revelry, kings,

queens and nobles faced a

punishingly continuousschedule of feasts andfunctions. On Tuesday 5June, it was Edward andIsabella’s turn to entertaintheir hosts at a banquet laidoutinrichlyhungtentsbesidetheirlodgingsattheabbeyofSt-Germain-des-Prés, withtorchesblazingostentatiouslyin the midday sun whileguestswereserved,inanothershowy conceit, by attendantson horseback. The following

day, Edward returned toNotre-Dame, walking withPhilippeandthefloweroftheFrencharistocracyonaforty-foot-wide pontoon bridgeacross the Seine to pledgethemselvesascrusaderstothefuture rescue of the HolyLand from the infidel. Thedayafterthat,Isabellamissedherturntotakethecrusaders’cross with the rest of theroyal ladies when, after yetanotherfeast,sheandEdward

overslept – a faux paswhichan eyewitness Parisianchronicler treated withamused indulgence, on thegrounds that the king couldhardlybeblamedfortarryinginthebedofsuchabeautifulwife. (Isabella’s failure towake her notoriously tardyhusband may, in fact, havebeen the result ofcircumspection rather thanthepreviousnight’sexcesses.Whenshedidfinallytakethe

cross two days later, sheproved a sceptical crusader-in-prospect, qualifying hercommitment by securing acardinal’s promise that sheneedonlysetoutfortheHolyLand if and when herhusband did so, and – acrucial proviso, this, for ayoungwomanwholuxuriatedin her lavish lifestyle – thatshe would be required tocontribute only such sumsofmoney as her own devotion

suggestedwerenecessary.)On 10 June the English

king and his queen followedher father to Pontoise,seventeenmilesnorth-westofParis, where the seriousbusiness of diplomacywouldtake place. There were theusual tensions over Gasconyto be tackled, but Philippewas generous in theprivileges he granted and theloansheprofferedtohisson-in-law. The French king’s

munificence was far fromselfless: the weeks ofceremonyandcelebrationhadconfirmedhisownpositionasthemostpowerfulmonarchinwestern Europe and thechampion of Christendom indefence of the Holy Land.ButforEdward,too,thevisithad been a welcomeinterruption to the challengesand confrontations he hadfaced in England,demonstratingthegrandeurof

his sovereignty and his placeamong the royal leaders ofEurope. And central to thatreaffirmation of his authoritywasIsabella.ThankstoIsabella,Edward

couldstandattheheartofthedynastic ritualsof theFrenchcrown.ThankstoIsabella,hehad a son to represent thefuture of his own dynasty.And, thanks to Isabella, thesupport he was offered inParis was unquestioning. No

word of criticism, no hint ofpast scandal or presentconflict, attaches itself to‘Odouart,roydesAnglois’intheaccountoftheeyewitnesschronicler, a Parisian clerkwithconnections to the royalchancery. Instead, praise isheaped upon Isabella, ‘thewiseandnobleladyIsabeau’,‘the beautiful Isabelot’, ‘thefairestofthefair,evenasthesunsurpassesthestars’.For Isabella herself, the

visit had been a hearteningopportunity to seeher father,her familyandherchildhoodhomeforthefirsttimeinfiveyears.Theomensoftheirstayhadnotallbeenauspicious:atPontoise, a fire broke out inthe English royal pavilionduring the night, destroyingmanyoftheirpossessionsandleaving Isabella with a burntothearmthatwastotroubleherformanymonths.Butshereturned to England ready to

play the part for which shehad been anointed andcrowned: to intercede withherhusbandintheinterestsofpeace and justice, and tosupporthiminhisdutytohispeople.Not that his people were

overlyimpressed,ithadtobesaid, with the length of timethat Edward had chosen todevote to his Parisianprogress. The lords hadassembled in London in the

second week of July inanticipationofaparliamenttobe held on the king’spromised return, but whenEdward failed to appear, oreven to send word, theydispersed, ‘weary’, the Vitasays, ‘of the trouble andexpense to which they hadbeen put’. It was throughgritted teeth that they agreedto reassemble in September.By then, the search for alastingsettlementhadbecome

desperate. More than a yearhad passed since Gaveston’sdeath,andexhaustionhadsetin among a politicalcommunityworndownbytheaccidentalstrategyofattritionthat had been forged out ofEdward’s stubbornness andhistalentforprocrastination.Now, Isabella and her

family helped make a finalpush for peace. Just as thethreat of French interventionhad securedGaveston’s exile

in 1308, so now the queen’suncle Louis of Evreux droveforward the negotiations toresolve the consequences ofhis death. And Isabellaherself (together with theyoung earl of Gloucester,Gaveston’s brother-in-law,who had stayed close toEdwardandservedaskeeperof the realm during hisabsence in France) steppedforward to mediate betweenher husband and his nobles.

Thepublicinterventionoftheyoungqueenmadeitpossiblefor both sides to enter withdignityintoaformalritualofreconciliation, and on 14October the great lords ofEngland at last knelt beforetheir king in WestminsterHall to submit themselves tohis grace and receive hispardon for their part inGaveston’s death. The nextday, Edward dined with hiscousin Thomas of Lancaster

as evidence of their new-foundharmony.But there could be no

mistakingthat thispeacewasbrittle and tenuous, itslimitations exposed by whatEdward did not say asmuchasbywhathedid.Therewasstill no royalacknowledgement thatGaveston had been a traitor,noroftheforceinlawoftheordinances by which, theearls claimed, his death had

been prescribed. Theimmediatedangerofpoliticalconflagration had beenaverted, but the safety ofEngland’s greatest men wasleft hanging by the slenderthread of the king’squestionable integrity. Andthemistrustbehindthepublicsmileswasmademanifestalltoosoon,whenEdwardbeganto prepare for a majormilitarycampaignagainsttheScots – amere six years too

late to halt the consolidationofBruce’spowerinitstracks.His army included

contingents ledbytheearlofGloucester, who had foughtin the abortive campaign ledby Edward and Gaveston in1311; by the earl ofPembroke, Edward’ssteadfast ally ever since hispromise of safeguard toGaveston had been sobrutally overridden; and bythe earl of Hereford,

Edward’sbrother-in-law,whohad followed Lancaster andWarwick in engineeringGaveston’sexecutionbuthadtakena lead in thesearchfora settlement, and appearednow to havemade his peacewith the king.Not present inEdward’s company as hemoved north in May 1314were the three other earlsresponsible for Gaveston’sdeath: Lancaster, WarwickandArundel.

These were men who, inother circumstances, wouldhave stood to gainimmeasurably from anEnglish triumph in Scotland.Now, however, they knewthatvictoryforEdwardnorthof the border would free hishand to deal with those whohad crossed him in England.Meanwhile, an armycommanded by Edwardseemed a dangerous place tobe for men who had every

reason to believe that hewantedthemdead.Theking’sforces were huge in numberastheymarchedforBerwick,but, given the absence ofthese lords from their ranks,thescarsoftherecentconflictwereclearuponthem.Isabella, meanwhile, was

immersingherself inhernewpublic role as her husband’sadviserandrepresentative.AttheendofFebruary1314,sheaccompanied the earl of

Gloucester on an embassy toher father in Paris to discussthe affairs of Gascony. Theeighteen-year-old queen didnot suffer any false modestyin her sense of her ownmajesty; in England shemaintained a household ofalmost twohundred servants,andspentmoneyas freelyasherextravaganthusband.Herentourage and equipment forthis, her first return to herFrench home without

Edward, were so extensivethat a fleet of twenty-sevenshipsandthirteenbargeswasrequisitioned to transport theexpedition across theChannel. All told, Isabellaspent eight weeks in France,leaving costly gifts at holyshrines along her route andhunting with her team offifteengreyhounds,aswellasapplyingherselftotheseriousbusiness of assistingGloucesterinhisnegotiations

through her personalintercessionwithherfather.This embassy meant that

she was also present towitness the eruption of ahumiliatingscandalbywhichthe French court wasoverwhelmedthatspring.Herthree sisters-in-law –Marguerite, daughter of theduke of Burgundy, andJeanne and Blanche, bothdescended from a collateralbranch of the Burgundian

house–hadbeendangerouslyindiscreet in dallying withsome handsome youngknights in their father-in-law’sservice.Thechastityofroyalwiveswas amatternotonlyofhonourandobediencebut of dynastic security, andanyshadowofsuspicioncaston the royal succession waslikely to provoke a violentand terrible reckoning. Andso it proved:Marguerite andBlanche were convicted of

adultery, and Jeanne foundguilty of having concealedtheir liaisons. All three wereimprisoned, Marguerite andBlanche in subterraneancellswithintheforbiddingNormanfortress of Château Gaillard,their heads shavedas amarkof their transgression, whiletheir supposed lovers died inexcruciating agony, publiclytortured to death for theircrimes.RumourhaditthatIsabella

had suspected her brothers’wives, and borne witnessagainst them.Whetherornotthat was so, her poisedhauteur certainly marked astark contrast between herown seriousness of purposeand the recklessness that hadprecipitated these foolishyoung women into suchappallingsuffering.And,asiftoemphasisethe

gravity of Isabella’s royalduties, she had no sooner

returned to London than shewaspreparingtosetoutonceagain, thistimefollowingtheking and his army toBerwick. Travellingsometimes on horseback,sometimes in a coveredwooden carriage filled withsilk cushions and drawn bythree black chargers, shereachedBerwick’sgreatwallson 14 June, ready towitnessfrom close at hand herhusband’sinevitabletriumph.

Robert Bruce had longavoided meeting an Englisharmy in pitched battle.Guerrilla warfare playedmuch more to the Scots’strengths – their intimateknowledgeoftheterrainoverwhich they moved, and thespeedwith which they couldstrike–thantheprospectofaset-piece confrontationinvolvingEnglishdivisionsofwell-equipped cavalry andskilled archers that the Scots

simply could not match. Butin the summer of 1313Bruce’s brother, who wasthen leading a siege of thestrategically vital strongholdof Stirling, had accepted thetermsofatrucebywhichthecastle’s English garrisonagreedtosurrenderifEnglishtroops failed to arrive withinthree leagues (nine miles orso) of Stirling by the nextmidsummer’s day, 24 June1314. While Edward

remained mired in conflictwith his own lords, thatproffer had seemed a goodbet, and any English armyunlikely to be more than amirage – until in February1314, with an uneasy peaceagreed at home, the kingsuddenly announced hisdetermination to take up thechallenge.By midsummer’s eve, 23

June, the English army wasadvancingrapidlyonStirling,

and Bruce could no longerevade the confrontation hehad feared. He drew up hisinfantry on the north side ofthe Bannock Burn, a streamflowing through marshyground into the Forth river acoupleofmiles fromStirlingCastle,whileEdward’stroopshalted to the south of it. TheEnglish forces outnumberedBruce’sbyafactorof twoorthreetoone.Theywerebetterequipped, more experienced

andmore highly trained thantheScotsfootsoldiers.But,bythe time battle was joined inearneston the followingday,they were also exhausted bytheirforcedmarch,strugglingwith the seeping mud anduncertain footholds of theboggy landscape, andunderminedbyindecisiveanddividedleadership.The earls of Hereford and

Gloucester,itemergedonthemorning of 24 June, were

locked in bitter argumentover their rivalclaimson thehonour of leading the attack.In the heat of the momentGloucester dashed forwardagainsttheScotslinetoprovehis mettle with a suddenassault.Ittookonlyaninstantfor the young earl to bethrownfromhiswarhorseandhackedtodeathwherehefellin the blood-churned mud.Hemmedinbytheterrainandparalysed by consternation

and confusion, the Englishranks collapsed under thesuddenonslaughtoftheScotsinto a scrambling, bloodymêlée.As Edward watched in

horror,his inevitable triumphturned into an inexorablerout. Panic overwhelmed hisdespairing troops as the kingfled, surrounded by abodyguard of knights led bythe earl ofPembroke, first toStirlingCastleandthen,when

he was refused entry to afortress that the laws of warnow ceded to the Scots,eastwardtoDunbar,thecoastandsafety.Behindhimheleftmen and horses spitted onpikes, speared with arrowsand dismembered by swordblows, while otherssuffocated in the mire ordrowned in the crimson-stained waters of the Forth.When Robert Bruce left thefield, he did so as the

unquestioned king of anindependent Scotland. ForEdward,defeatwastotal,andcatastrophic.Bythetimeherejoinedhis

wife at Berwick, theconsequences of thisannihilation were onlybeginning to becomeapparent. The earl ofGloucester was dead and theearl of Hereford a prisoner,taken by the victorious Scotsalong with the keeper of

Edward’s privy seal, hisclerks, his archive and theseal itself.Withinweeks, theScots were cutting a swathethrough northern England,their raids destroying livesand homes throughoutNorthumberland, Cumbriaand Durham and deep intoYorkshire and Lancashire,while Robert Bruce madepreparations to despatch hisbrother to invade English-ruled Ireland. And, if God’s

judgement on Edward’skingship were not alreadyclear, in the aftermath ofmilitary disaster the heavensopened: torrential rainsandabrutalwinter destroyed cropsin the ground, and Edward’speoplebegantostarve.Victory for Edward would

have meant a chance to freehimself from the shackles oftheordinancesandtorevengehimself upon the earls whohad killed his beloved

Gaveston. Defeat, in a realmharried from without anddecomposing from within,meant the exact opposite.When the king finally laidGaveston’s embalmed bodyto rest, on2 January1315 atEdward’s favourite manor ofLangley in Hertfordshire, hedidsointhebitterknowledgethat power effectively lay inthe hands of Gaveston’sexecutioner, Thomas ofLancaster, the great earl

without whom northernEngland could not now bedefended against thedepredations of the Scots.And Lancaster, it was clear,wouldinsistwitheveryounceofhisstrengthonkeepingtheking shackled, since it wastheordinancesthatvindicatedthekillingofGaveston.Isabella, at not quite

twenty, found herself facingthemostthanklessoftasks:tofunction as a queen within a

profoundly dysfunctionalkingdom. The king and hisgreatestmagnatewerelockedinto a mortal enmity thatmadethenormalworkingsofroyal government all butimpossible. Isabella mightgivebirthtomoreroyalheirs–asshedidtoason,John,inthe summer of 1316, and adaughter, Eleanor, two yearslater. And shemight use hersymbolic role as intercessorin an attempt to secure the

restoration of her husband’spower through anaccommodation with heruncle of Lancaster. She was,as she had not been duringGaveston’s lifetime, theking’s companion and histrusted confidante, a loyalspouseandashrewdpoliticaltactician. But, in practice,therewaslittlesheoranyoneelse could do to amelioratethe intractable divisions thatnowcrippledEnglishpolitics.

Lancaster was anincreasingly isolated figure,more estranged than everfromhispeersnotonlybyhisuncompromisinginstinctsandhis lack of political finessebut also by the unpredictablehand of fate. The earl ofWarwick, Lancaster’s closestally and themanwithwhomhe shared ultimateresponsibility for Gaveston’sdeath,hadsoughtaprominentrole in the direction of

Edward’s government afterthe defeat that came to beknown as ‘Bannockburn’after thestreamacrosswhichit was fought. In August1315,however,Warwickdiedat the age of just forty-three,leaving a baby son – namedThomas, after Lancasterhimself – as his heir. Somelords positioned themselvesmuch more closely to theking: the earl of Pembrokeremained unwavering in his

loyal service to Edward, andthe earl of Hereford (newlyretrieved from Scottishcustody in exchange forRobertBruce’swife,whohadbeencapturedby theEnglishin 1306) continued hiscampaign to efface allmemories of his presence atBlacklow Hill through hissteadfast support of theking.Others were more wary ofEdward, including theearlofArundel who, with Warwick

andLancaster,hadrefusedtofightatBannockburn.Butall,like the rest of the king’ssubjects, were caught in no-man’s-land, trying as bestthey could to protect theirown interests in a countrydebilitatednotonlyby flood,famineand theraidingScots,but by the perniciousstalemate between Lancasterandtheking.As always, the author of

theVitaEdwardiSecundiwas

an acute observer of thispoliticalparalysis.

… whatever pleasesthe lord king the earl’sservantstrytoupset;andwhateverpleasestheearlthe king’s servants calltreachery; and so at theDevil’s prompting thefamiliars of each startmeddling, and theirlords,bywhomthe landought to be defended,

arenotallowedtorestinharmony.

Political division wasmirroredinphysicaldistance:Lancaster increasingly kepthimself apart from thedangers that lurked in thedark corners of his cousin’scourt by retreating to hisnorthern strongholds, andsought instead to controlEdward from afar, at firstthrough the ordinances, and

then, after a treatyconcludedat Leake in Nottinghamshirein 1318, through a standingcouncil appointed to governwiththeking.But the inefficacy of these

measures, in attempting tobuild flimsy bridges acrosschasms of profoundmistrust,was obvious in the growingdisorder that was engulfingpubliclife.TheearlofSurreyhadbeenstrugglingforyearsto escape his loveless and

childless marriage to Jeanneof Bar, one of the king’snieces, in order to marry hismistress, the mother of histwo sons. Thomas ofLancaster had been amongthenobleswhosupportedtheChurch in rejecting Surrey’splans in1314, and in1317–with the king’s tacit butobvious support – Surreyretaliated by abductingLancaster’swife,AliceLacy.Their marriage had been no

more happy or productivethan Surrey’s, and it seemslikelythatshecolludedinherown kidnapping. But theresult of this publichumiliation was yet moreviolence, in the form of aprivate war betweenLancaster and Surrey thatraged unchecked across thealready disorderedcountryside ofYorkshire andnorthWales.More trouble, meanwhile,

was stirred up by the fate ofthe earldom of Gloucesterafter the death of its younglord amid the carnage atBannockburn. Once itbecame clear that his widowwas not pregnant and thattherewouldbenoheirofhisbody to inherit his title, theearl’srichestatesweresharedbetween his three sisters,Eleanor, Margaret andElizabeth, whose husbandswere precipitated to a

startling new eminence bythesesudden territorialgains.Margaret,whohadoncebeenthe unhappy wife of PiersGaveston, was married inApril 1317 to Hugh Audley,and Elizabeth in the samemonth to Roger Damory –neithermanbornintothefirstranksofthenobility,butbothtrustedmembersofEdward’sinnermost household coterie.Eleanor,theeldestsister,wasalready married, but her

husband too fitted this (forEdward) pleasing mould:HughDespenser the younger– who had entered Edward’shousehold when both menwere in their teens–was theson and namesake of acourtier and confidant of theking whose loyalty had notfaltered during the years ofGaveston’sdominance.NowAudley,Damory and

Despenser rose‘in theking’sshadow’, one chronicler

remarked bitterly. ForEdward,theseloyalistswithinhishouseholdofferedhimthepromise of an alternativepower base, the prospect ofside-stepping (and one day,perhaps,destroying)thelordswhohadconstrainedhisownauthority and killed the manhe loved beyond all others.For Audley, Damory andDespenser, meanwhile, theking’s favour presented thechance to enrich and

empower themselves toheights of which before theycould only have dreamed.This time, it seemed, therewould be no secondGaveston: no all-encompassing personaldevotion, no exclusiveintimacy. But, while hisdesperate country sufferedand starved, Edward spentmoney like water on menwho cared only to advancethemselves – and, as he did

so,addedfueltotheflamesofhis conflict with the earl ofLancaster.It was therefore adding

insult to self-inflicted injurywhen,inthesummerof1318,Edwardwaspubliclyaccusedofbeingnotonlya failureasking, but an impostor. ThatJune, a man named John ofPowderham walked into theKing’s Hall in Oxford andannounced that he was therightful kingofEngland.His

real father, he said, was notthe Exeter tanner who hadbrought himup but the greatwarrior Edward I.As a babyhehadbeen substituted for achangelinginhisroyalcradleby a terrified nurse aftersuffering an injury in hercare;andnowhehadcometoreclaim his inheritance.Edward’s first response wasto laugh. He welcomed thepretender, the chronicle ofLanercost records, with a

derisivecryof‘Welcome,mybrother!’ But for the queen,struggling to maintain herhusband’s dignity (and, withit, her own), and acutelyconscious of the threateningconsequences of Edward’smanifest failings, jokes didnot come so easily. ProudIsabella was ‘unspeakablyannoyed’, theVitanotes;andthischallengetoakingwhoseresemblance to his mightyfather had never been less

apparent ended withPowderham’s rotting corpseswinging slowly from agibbet.The fact that Isabella was

heavily pregnant whenPowderham’s claim exposedherhusbandtopublicridiculeand scurrilous rumour – herdaughterEleanorwasbornatWoodstock, eightmiles fromOxford,inJuly1318–cannothave helped her equilibrium.But it did add to thegravitas

ofanyinterventionshemightmake in the discussionsbetween the king and hismagnates – and, when thetreatyofLeakewasagreedon9August1318,thequeenwasfirstamong thosecreditedbythe Vita with the success ofthenegotiations.This settlement was so

successful, indeed, thatwhenEdward launched anothermilitary assault against theadvancing Scots in 1319 his

armypresentedamoreunitedfront than at any previoustime since his father’s death.The English position in theborders had deteriorated sodisastrously in the wake ofthe slaughter atBannockburnthateventhegreatwalledcityand castle of Berwick, thespearhead and safeguard ofnorth-eastern England, hadfallen into Scottish hands inApril 1318.Themagnates ofEngland who rallied to its

defence when Edwardmustered his army atNewcastle in June 1319included an improbablegathering of earls, includingboth Lancaster and Surrey(who had finally settled theirprivate war at the punishingcost to Surrey of handingover valuable lands to hisenemy), together withPembroke, Hereford andArundel, as well as HughDespenser, Roger Damory

and Hugh Audley, the threehouseholdmenwhohadnowshared the earldom ofGloucester between them.This was unity indeed, andIsabella settled herself at amanor house just outsideYorktowaitforgoodnews.It did not come. Instead,

thearchbishopofYorkcamegalloping to her gate at theheadof ahostof armedmenquickly gathered from thecity, breathless with alarm

and carrying a warning thatSir James Douglas – one ofthe most brilliant and brutalsoldiers in Scotland, knownas‘theBlackDouglas’forthefearheinspiredaswellasforhis dark colouring – wascloseathandandplanningtoseize the English queen as ahostage.Isabellawasbundledonto a horse and escorted atspeed to York, from whereshe fled downriver to safetybehind the massive walls of

NottinghamCastle.Meanwhile, Edward’s

forcesatthesiegeofBerwick– round whom Douglas andhis men had skirted on theirraid into Yorkshire – werefaringlittlebetter.Lancaster’sparticipation was turning outto be so half-hearted thatrumours were flying that hewasinleaguewiththeScots.Though sober assessmentsuggestedthatwasunlikely,itwas hardly surprising if the

earl remained unconvincedthat Bruce’s men were hisonly or even his mostdangerousenemy.AstheVitareported, it was painfullyobvious that Edward’sreconciliationwithhiscousinwasskin-deepatbest. ‘Peacebetween great men is to beregardedwithsuspicionwhenthe eminent princes havearrivedat it not through lovebut by force,’ the Vita’sauthor wrote, with an

evidentlyheavyheart.

When siege had beenlaid to Berwick and itseemed that the matterwasbeingpursuedtonopurpose, the lordking issaid to have utteredsome such words asthese:

‘When thiswretched businessisover,wewillturnour hands to other

matters. For I havenot yet forgottenthe wrong that wasdone tomy brotherPiers…’

By the beginning of

October Lancaster hadwithdrawnfromthesiegeandtheEnglish army had brokenupindisarray:forEdward, itwas yet another opportunitysquandered. While Lancasterretreatedagaintothefastness

ofhiscastleatPontefract,theking was forced to agree atwo-yeartrucewiththeScots.Itwasan ignominiousretreat(‘What best to do, indeed hedidnot know,’ remarkedoneunimpressed northernchronicler)–butitdidatleastallow him a breathing spacein which to embark onceagain for France. Hispresence was required thereto offer his homage forGascony to the new king,

Philippe V, and for Isabellathe expedition offered achancetobereunitedwithherfamily after years of absenceandmultiplebereavement.Her father, Philippe the

Fair, had died in November1314at the ageof just forty-six, a few weeks aftersuffering a seizure whilehunting. Her brother Louis,already king of Navarre,succeededhimasLouisXofFrance. The new king’s

disgraced wife Margueritestill languished in ChâteauGaillard, and when she diedin August 1315 (an end soconvenient and obscure thatrumourimmediatelybegantocrymurder)Louisremainedawidower for a grand total offour days before marryingClémence, granddaughter ofthe king of Naples. By thesummerof1316hisnewwifewaspregnant,andallseemedwell in the French royal

householdatthebeginningofJuneastheyoungkingthrewhimself into his favouritepastime, a furiouslyexhausting game of jeu depaume (‘real’ tennis, playedon an enclosed court). Afterthe match, sweating anddehydrated, he drained cupaftercupofcooledwine–anunwisechoiceof refreshmentwhich either precipitated adangerouschillor(asthoseofamoresuspiciousnaturesoon

whispered) had been taintedwith poison. The result, atleast,wasincontrovertible:on5 June the twenty-six-year-old king died, leaving hiskingdom in the grip of asuddensuccessioncrisis.The government of France

was temporarily committedinto the hands of Louis’sbrother Philippe while thekingdomwaited for the birthof the baby the widowedqueen Clémence was

carrying. It was a boy, bornon 15 November 1316 andchristened Jean (‘thePosthumous’, his subjectscalled him). But the reign ofthis king who acquired hiscrown with his first breathlasted only five days. Whenthe baby died on 20November, the survivingcontenders for his thronewere his half-sister Jeanne,Louis’sdaughterbyhistragicfirst wife – a little girl who

was just four years old, anddamaged goods because ofher mother’s publiclyconfessed adultery – or hisuncle Philippe, the adultprince inwhosehandspoweralready lay. Realpolitikdictatedthattherecouldbenocontest between thesecompeting claims, and so, intheabsenceofanysupportforlittle Jeanne’s cause, thecoronation of Philippe Vexcluded female heirs from

theFrenchsuccessionwithanabsolute clarity that hadeluded Stephen on hissimilarlypragmaticaccessionto the English throne nearlytwohundredyearsearlier.Now Philippe was

demanding that his Englishbrother-in-law performhomage for the Frenchterritories he ruled, andIsabella was there in June1320 to watch her husbandkneel before her brother in

front of the high altar ofAmiens Cathedral, a Gothicmarvel of riotously paintedstonemasonry that layhalfway between BoulogneandParis.ThestalwartearlofPembroke had been left askeeper of England when theroyal couple took ship atDover, while Lancasterremained in stubbornisolation behind the massivewalls of his fortress atPontefract. An unsteady

peacewasholding.Edward’speople were still starving,their suffering nowcompoundedbytheeffectsofepidemicdiseaseamongtheirflocks and herds; but at leastthere were grounds for hopethat the king was applyinghimself to the business ofgovernmentwithalittlemorepurpose. The bishop ofWorcester, writing to thepope during the parliamentheld at Westminster on

Edward and Isabella’s returnfrom France, was moved toremark that the king ‘borehimself splendidly, withprudenceanddiscretion’,andthat, ‘contrary to his formerhabit’, he was now ‘risingearly,andpresentinganoblerand pleasant countenance tohis prelates and lords’. ‘Onthat account’, the bishopadded in another optimisticlettertoacardinalatthepapalcuria,‘…thereisconsiderable

hope of an improvement inhis behaviour and a greaterpossibility of unity andharmony.’But in Edward’s train on

hisvisittoFrance,andbyhisside when he returned toEngland,wasamanwhowasabout to precipitate the mostdestructive conflict Edward’sfractured rule had yet visitedonhiskingdom.TheyoungerHugh Despenser had beenappointed chamberlain of the

king’shouseholdin1318–anofficethathadoncebeenheldbyPiersGaveston,andwhichallowed Despenser to spendincreasing amounts of histime in Edward’s company.Thereislesssuggestioninthesurviving sources thatDespenser was the object ofthe king’s private passionthan there is of Despenser’sravening hunger for all thepublic power that access toEdward could provide. But

that meant merely that herepresentedadifferentsortofthreat toEdward’s subjects–a menacing predator, asopposed to Gaveston’sdistractingpeacock.Andthefirstpreyonwhich

histalonsfastenedwasoneofhis own brothers-in-law, hisco-heirs to the earldom ofGloucester.Thesettlementofthe Gloucester estates madeinNovember1317hadgivenDespenser vast tracts of land

insouthWales, including thelordshipofGlamorgan.Butithadalsoservedtospur,ratherthansatisfy,hisambition,andwithin weeks he had seizedmoreofthedeadearl’sWelshproperties from HughAudley, the husband of hiswife’s sister, Gaveston’swidow Margaret. DespiteAudley’s vociferous protests,EdwardallowedDespensertoimpose a territorial exchangewhich left Audley holding

less valuable lands in thesouth-east of England andDespenser in unchallengedcommand of southernmostWales and the BristolChannel.Soon, he set his sights

furtherafield,onthelordshipof Gower adjoiningGlamorgantothewest,whichbelonged to a cash-strappedbaron named William deBraose. By the time deBraosediedin1320withouta

sontosucceedhim,severalofthe most powerfullandowners in the regionwere already circlingacquisitively in the hope ofsnapping Gower up at abargain price, while hisdaughter’s husband, JohnMowbray, who wasdetermined to take over thelordshipashisfather-in-law’sheir, immediately tookpossession of the estates toward off these challengers.

Despenser, however, hadotherideas,andinNovember1320 he persuaded Edwardthat Gower should be seizedintoroyalhands.This was an unambiguous

demonstrationofDespenser’sinfluence over the king. Itwas also a mistake. Thecustomary law of the Welshmarches – the frontier landsbetween England and theprincipality of Wales – didnot, by long tradition, permit

this kind of intrusive royalintervention. And this threatto the legal basis ofmarcherlandholding,togetherwiththemanifest certainty thatDespenser was now thepower behind Edward’sthrone, was enough to bindtogether an extraordinaryconsortiumoflordswhowereprepared to resort to arms todefendthemselvesagainsttheking and his favourite. JohnMowbray, the prospective

heir toGower,wasjoinedbyhis local rivals for thatlordship:theearlofHereford,whose loyalty toEdwardhadbeen so painstakinglyreconstructedafter thekillingat Blacklow Hill, and anamesake uncle and nephew,RogerMortimerofChirkandRogerMortimerofWigmore,the latter a major landownerinIrelandaswellasinWales.Alsostandingalongsidethemto confront Despenser were

hisformerassociatesinroyalfavour,nowhisdeadlyrivals,Hugh Audley and RogerDamory.Andbehindthemallloomed a marcher lord withmore reason than any tomistrust Edward’s intentions:Thomas of Lancaster, whosehuge estates made him aneighbour of Despenser inWales as well as the keeperofthenorth.Themortalenmitybetween

Lancaster and the king had

been the fault-line inEnglishpolitics for the last tenyears.Edward had been unable totake decisive action againsthis cousin because of thepower of Lancaster’searldoms and their functionas a bulwark against theScots. Equally, Lancaster’sisolation,bothpolitically andtemperamentally,hadallowedhimtomakelittleheadwayinconsolidating formal checksontheking’sauthority.Now,

however, Edward’sincreasing indulgence ofDespenser’s aggression hadcreated a new constituencyforLancaster–onewherethecompeting interests of themarcher lords coalesced intoa collective determination torestore the rule of law andfree the king from thepernicious influence ofDespenser,whowasnow,theLanercost chronicler acidlyremarked,‘astheking’sright

eye’.WhileLancaster soughtto rally support in the north,hisalliesbegananassaultonDespenser’s lands in WalesandEngland, leaving in theirwakepanicanddevastation.By the end of July, the

forces of Hereford, Damory,Audley and the youngerMortimer – their troopsarrayed in liveries of greenwiththerightsleeveyellow–hadallconvergedonLondon.Once again itwas left to the

earl of Pembroke to serve asthe voice of loyal reason,pointing out to Edward thathe would condemn hiskingdomtothehorrorofcivilwarifhedidnotlistentothedemandsofhislordsandsendDespenser into exile. Andonce again, Edward’s queentook centre stage in her roleas intercessor in the causeofpeace. Isabella had givenbirth for the fourth timeonlyamonthearlier,toadaughter,

Joan, known as Joan of theTower because, with armiesadvancing on the capital, thequeen had retreated for herconfinement behind theprotective walls of London’sgreat fortress. Now, Isabellawent down on her kneesbefore her husband, playingout the public ritual ofqueenly intervention so thathe could accede to herentreaties in the name of hispeoplewithoutcompromising

his majesty as king. Herinvolvement had the desiredeffect, but it was with amarkedly ill grace thatEdward capitulated to theappeal of his queen and theadvice of his lords andexpelled Despenser and hisfatherfromEngland.TheyoungerDespenserdid

not go far, and while heprowled the waters of theChannel as a ‘sea-monster’(the Vita says), preying on

unsuspecting merchant shipsto add to his fleet and histreasure, Edward gave noconsideration tohisown roleinthechainofeventsthathadleft him once again corneredby a pack of enraged andfearful lords. Instead, as sooften before, his thoughtswere all of escape, andrevenge.AndthistimeitwasIsabella who provided themomentary diversion thatallowed him to spring the

trap.On 13 October, Isabella

rode to the gates of LeedsCastle – a stronghold withmightydefencesofstoneandwater,built onan island in alake thirtymiles fromDoverand the Kent coast. Herpublic purpose was apilgrimage to Canterbury,although Leeds lay off thebeaten track that pilgrimsusuallytrod,andherhusband,who was also in Kent, was

clearlypreoccupiednotat allwith spiritual concerns butentirelywithDespenser,whohad just made landfall onceagain, despite the injunctionsagainsthim,intheeastoftheshire on the Isle of Thanet.Nor, in fact, was Isabella’spresence at Leeds Castleentirely innocent. Its owner,Bartholomew Badlesmere,had a long history of loyalserviceatEdward’scourt,butjust three months earlier –

with his own alarm atDespenser’s belligerenceintensifiedbythefactthathiseight-year-old daughter wasmarriedtothesonandheirofRogerMortimer ofWigmore– he had suddenly thrown inhislotwiththemarcherlords.Badlesmere, Edwardbelieved, was not only atraitorous ingrate but a weaklinkintherebels’ranks,sincehis last-minute defection totheir cause had done nothing

toreconcilehimwithThomasof Lancaster, who hadfuriously objected toBadlesmere’s appointment in1318 as steward of the royalhousehold,anofficetowhichthe earl claimed a hereditaryright. It seemed possible,therefore, that Badlesmere’scastles in Kent could bepicked off withoutprecipitating a generalmobilisation of the marcherarmies, and that feat, should

Edward achieve it, wouldgivehimastrategicbasefromwhich to advance againstLancaster and hisconfederates.The appearance of the

queen as a pilgrim atBadlesmere’s gate – whichwould normally have been asignalhonour,andawelcomeopportunity to display thelargesse of his hospitality –was therefore laden withunspoken menace.

Badlesmere himself was notthere, having left the castlewith its treasureandgarrisonin the care of his wife withstrictinstructionsthatshewastoadmitnoone–instructionswhich she followed to theletter, leaving Isabellaincensed andwithout shelter.Hermoodwas not improvedby the knowledge that thecastle had been held by heraunt, Edward I’s queenMarguerite,untilherdeathin

1318, and should thereforehave passed into her ownhands as part of her queenlydower, had her husband notchosen instead to grant it toBadlesmere. Irritated andimperious, she ordered herescorttoforceanentry.LadyBadlesmere responded bygiving her archers the signalto shoot.Withinminutes, sixofthequeen’smenlaydead.Perhaps Isabella had been

following a script to which

shehadagreedinadvance,orperhapsshehadbeenusedasa pawn in a strategemplanned by her husband andhis favourite of which shewas not fully aware. Eitherway, her presence at LeedsCastle served to precipitate avertiginous descent frommilitary posturing into thestark reality of war.Badlesmere’s violentreception of Edward’sanointed queenwas not only

an unforgivable insult butout-and-out treason, the kinginsisted, and he immediatelydespatched troops and siegeengines to attack the castle.The Mortimers, uncle andnephew, and the earl ofHerefordmarchedsouthfromOxford with Badlesmerehimself, intending to relievethe small garrison at Leeds;but at Kingston-upon-Thames, southwest of thecapital, they halted, stopped

in their tracks by news thatLancasterwasrefusingtojointhem.Theearlsawnoreasontolifthisswordforamanhedespised, whose immediatecausehadnothing todowiththe campaign againstDespenser. And while themarcher lords hesitated inconsternation beforewheeling north to consulttheir more powerful ally,Lady Badlesmere and thesoldiers at Leeds opened the

castle gates to throwthemselves on the king’smercy.Ostensibly, Edward had

madehispoint;Badlesmere’scastles in thesouth-eastwerenowhisforthetaking.Butinthewideranddeeperconflictwithinwhichthiswasmerelyaskirmish, thekingnowhada choice. Lancaster was aunique and uniquelyintractable opponent, but thefragility of the coalition

gatheredaroundhimhad justbeen painfully exposed topublic view. If Edward nowchose to affirm hiscommitment to the rule oflaw,toreassurethelordswhohad felt the intense threat ofDespenser’s apparentlyunbridled self-aggrandisement, he mightdivide the rebels and re-establish his rule by offeringthe good government that allhis subjects, Lancaster apart,

had sought for the lastdecade.But Edward had acquired

no longer sight, no greaterunderstanding of his ownresponsibilities, in the yearssince Gaveston’s death. Stillhesoughtrevengeforthelossof his soulmate and for hisown inability to protect him.And now, in this moment, itseemed he had a chance toreplaythetraumaticeventsofadecadeearlier,butthistime

in defence of a differentfavourite and in hope of adifferentoutcome.Hedidnothesitate.When the defendersof Leeds Castle emergedbeforehim,asorrysightaftertwoweeksunderheavysiege,twelvemenwereimmediatelyseized and hanged from thewalls.Andwhile the corpseskicked and swung, LadyBadlesmere and her youngchildren were sent asprisonerstotheTower.

If execution without trialrepresented any kind ofjustice at all, it was thesummary justice offered bymartial law. Edward’ssubjects could be under noillusion that once again theyfaced a stark choice: eitherfight for the king, or take uparms against him. With aheavy heart, the earl ofPembroke – now nearingfifty, and wearied by theyearshehadspentseekingto

save theking fromhimself –summoned his men toEdward’s side. With himwere Lancaster’s old enemytheearlofSurrey; theearlofArundel, who had hitchedhimself to Despenser’s starby marrying his son toDespenser’s daughter earlierin the year; and the king’syoung half-brothers Thomasand Edmund, the sons ofEdward I’s second marriagetoIsabella’sauntMarguerite.

As this royal army marchednorth-westwardfromLondon,the rebel lords – who werestruggling now to maintaintheir brittle unity – fell backbeforeitsapproach.For once, momentum lay

with the king, and it seemedthat Edward might carry allbeforehim.AtShrewsburyinJanuary 1322 the Mortimerssurrendered. The faith theyhad placed in Lancaster’ssupport had been destroyed

bytheearl’sfailuretoemergefrom his fortresses in thenorth. But if they had hopedthatEdwardwould lookwithfavour on their submission,they were to be bitterlydisappointed.Both uncle andnephew were despatched inchainstoLondon,wheretheytoo were incarcerated in theTower. The king pressed onnorthwards, determined nowtoseizethischancetodestroythe man who had killed

Gaveston and dismemberedhis kingdom. Support forLancaster was ebbing awaywith every mile he retreatedbefore Edward’s advance,andIsabellasentwordonherhusband’s behalf to AndrewHarclay, a veteran of theScottish war and warden ofthe western frontier withScotland,thatheshouldmovesouth to cut off Lancaster’sescape. The earl was stillhoping to reach his newly

builtfortressatDunstanburghon the Northumbrian coast,but when his muchdiminished army arrived atBoroughbridge in Yorkshireon16Marchtheyfoundtheirway north across the riverUre blocked by Harclay andhis men. With Edward’sforces not far behind, theyhad no option but to fight.WhileLancaster tried to takethe ford across the swollenwater at the head of his

cavalry, the earl of Hereford–whohadjoinedLancasteratPontefract after theMortimers’surrender–ledanassaultonthenarrowwoodenbridge. But Harclay hadstationed soldiers in hidingunder the bridge, and one ofthem speared Hereford frombelow through a gap in theplanks as he tried to cross.Hisscreamsashediedingut-wrenching agony sowedpanicamongtroopswhowere

alreadybucklingunderheavyfire from Harclay’s archers.Lancaster was forced intoretreat, and at daybreak thenext morning Harclay’s menswarmed across the river tocompletetheirvictory.Lancaster had come to

believe that he wasuntouchable. Cousin to theking, uncle to the queen, anearlfivetimesover,hecouldstand alone in condemnationof Edward’s failings and

never fear the consequencesofhiswrath.Now,ashewasescortedsouthasaprisonertohis own castle at Pontefract,he had time to consider thefate that awaited him: royalrevenge, ten years in themaking. Hereford was dead;so too was Despenser’sbrother-in-law and Edward’sformer confidant RogerDamory, who had beenfatally wounded a few daysearlier. Despenser’s other

brother-in-law Hugh Audleywas a prisoner, taken inLancaster’s company atBoroughbridge, as was JohnMowbray, whose claim toGower had served to sparkthis conflagration; while theMortimers, kept close in theTower, awaited trial inLondon.Edward’s victory was

complete. That much wasclear to Lancaster on themorning of 22 March, when

he was brought intoPontefract’sgreathalltofacea hastily assembled tribunaloflords,includingtheearlsofPembroke, Surrey andArundelandEdward’syounghalf-brother the earl ofKent.An indictment of his crimeswas read, reaching backwardfrom the immediate fact ofhis armed defiance, throughcharges of treasonouscommunications with theScots, all the way to his

seizure of the king’s jewelsand horses at Newcastle in1312. The royal pardons hehad knelt to receive sincethen were now worthless, itwas obvious, and Lancasterwas not allowed to speak inhis own defence, beyond abitterly wry aside which theVita puts into his mouth:‘Thisisapowerfulcourt,andgreat in authority, where noanswer is heard nor anyexcuseadmitted…’

Only one verdict waspossibleaftersuchatrial.Theearl was sentenced, as atraitor,tobehangedandthen,whilestillalive,cutdownandbeheaded–althoughthekingconceded that he should bespared the gallows indeference to his royal blood(and, according to onechronicler, out of respect forhis niece, the queen). Thiswasmartiallawenactedawayfrom the battlefield, while

bannerswerefurledandarmssheathed, and, if it did notclosely resemble due judicialprocess, it was Lancasterhimself who had set theprecedent by which he wascondemned. As the Vitaobserved, ‘the earl ofLancaster once cut off PiersGaveston’shead,andnowbythe king’s command the earlhimself has lost his head.Thus, perhaps not unjustly,the earl receivedmeasure for

measure.’And there were

unmistakable echoes ofBlacklow Hill whenLancaster, dressed inpenitential rags,was bundledonto a scrawnymule and ledout from Pontefract’s greatgate, through a freezingdownpour of sleet, to anearby hill. There he wasmade to kneel with his faceturned towards Scotland, theenemy with whom he was

accused of conspiring. Hebenthishead,asifinprayer;andwithtwoorthreeclumsystrokes the executionerhacked it from his body. AsEdwardwatched, the severedheadwasliftedintotheairinpublic demonstration of itsowner’s fate, before themonks of Pontefract Priorygathered up the bloodstainedcorpse for burial before thealtaroftheirchurch.Unhappy precedent there

mayhavebeen,but,howevershattering the repercussionsof Gaveston’s death, theycould not compare with theshock to the political systemthat Lancaster’s executionrepresented. Gaveston hadbeen a peer of the realm inname, but not by hereditaryrightorterritorialreach.And,crucially, his death had notbeen ordered by the king.Now, for the first time sincetheConquest,alord–andnot

justanylord,but thegreatestof them all – had beenexecuted as a traitor. Thedreadful penalties that nowfaced anyone who dared toopposeEdwardwererammedhome in the minds of hissubjects in the days thatfollowed Lancaster’s death.Dozens of those who hadjoined the earl’s revolt, lordsand knights and squires, mettheir deaths on gallowserected for the purpose in

places where they had oncebeen powerful. JohnMowbray was hanged atYork on 23 March, and hisbodyleftsuspendedinchainsto rot under the spring skies.Three weeks laterBartholomew Badlesmerewas dragged by a horsethrough the city ofCanterbury and out to acrossroads where he washanged and then decapitated,his head speared on a pike

andsettostaredown,hollow-eyed, on the cowedtownspeople from the city’seast gate. Dozens more –including the sons ofMowbray and Badlesmere –now filled prison cells inroyal castles around thecountry, and rebels’ wivesand young children wereamong those who lost theirliberty. Even Lancaster’sestranged wife, theperennially unfortunateAlice

Lacy, and her elderlystepmother, the dowagercountess of Lincoln, weretakenintocustody.This was a new and

frightening incarnation of akingwhosefailingshadoncebeen those of omission anddistraction.Theviolencewasauthentically Edward’s, theemotional response of amanfor whom revenge was noless immediately visceral forhaving been delayed for a

decade. But thethoroughgoing ruthlessnesswas Despenser’s. Thefavourite and his father hadbeen back at Edward’s sidesincethebeginningofMarch.Two months later, afterBoroughbridge and thebloodletting that followed,the elder Despenser wascreated earl of Winchester.That titlewasjust thefirstofthe spoils of victory that thetwomennowbegantoamass,

using threats and force tosupplement the royal favourinwhichtheybasked.If Isabellawas glad to see

her husband restored to thefullnessofhispower,thatjoywas rapidly eroded by therealisation of the roleDespenser nowplayed in thedirectionofpolicy,andofthelatitude that Edward wasprepared to allow him. Shehadgone downon her kneesto beg for his banishment in

1321 – an intervention thatrepresented not personalenmity but her queenly dutyin the search for peace, nomoreandno less.Butnowitbecame clear that all thosewho had sought to broker asettlement between Edwardand the rebelswere regardedas potential enemies of thenewregime.InMay1322thelong-suffering earl ofPembroke was compelled toswear an extraordinary oath

of loyalty to the king ‘forcertain reasons he was givento understand’, the royalchancery tersely recorded;and Isabella found herselffrozen out of Edward’scounsels, while her ownproperties, it soon emerged,were not immune from theDespensers’ covetousglances.Edwardwasfarfrombeing

a simpleton,buthis favouredpastimes had always tended

towardtheobviousdiversionsof hunting, music, anddrinking into the night withthelowborncompanionswhoso disconcerted his subjects.Isabella, on the other hand,wasmoresophisticatedinhertastes. Among herpossessions was an exquisitechess set, its pieces carvedfrom crystal and jade, thathad once belonged toEdward’smother, Eleanor ofCastile. And Edward was

abouttodiscoverjusthowaptthat legacy to his wife hadbeen.

‘SomeoneHasComeBetweenMyHusbandandMyself’

Isabella had done everythingshe could to be the perfectroyalwife to a husbandwhohad now demonstratedhimself to be incorrigible.Shehadgivenhimheirs; shehad steered him towards theways of peace anddiplomacy;shehadsoughttoreconcile him with hisgreatest subjects. And herreward was to find herself

marginalised and intimidatedwithinherowncourt.Of course, as queen she

enjoyed protections notavailable to others who fellvictimtoDespenser’slustforwealth and power. (AliceLacy, Lancaster’s widow,was threatened in her prisonquarters that she would beburned to death unless shesurrendered the bulk of herestates into the possession ofthe favourite and his father,

while Despenser’s widowedsister-in-law ElizabethDamory was another victimof a brazen campaign ofbullying and blackmail thatwas as far-reachingas itwaslucrative.) Nor did Isabellasuffer any of the privationsendured by the mass ofEdward’s people after sixlong years of famine whileDespenserheapeduppilesofgold tobedepositedwithhisFlorentine bankers.

Nevertheless, England’squeen was a shrewdlyintelligentyoungwoman,stillonly twenty-seven, with avigorous sense of her owndignityandtheneedtosecurethe future of her royalchildren, and she wasprofoundly alarmed at theintensely vulnerable positionin which her husband’spliabilityhadnowplacedher.She was astute enough to

knowthattherewaslittleshe

could hope to achieve in theimmediate aftermath ofDespenser’s triumph in thespringof1322.Thekingandhis favourite were muchpreoccupied that summerwith a renewed campaignagainst the Scots, who hadseized the opportunitypresentedbytheexpiryofthelatestAnglo-Scottish truce tolaunch punishing raids intothe north-west of England.Edwardgatheredanarmyand

marched into Scotland,pushing northward into thehighlands. However, theinitiallybuoyantreportofthecampaignhesentback to thebishop of Winchester – ‘wehave found no resistance’ –proved not to be a harbingerof success but a reflectiononce again of the Scots’mastery of guerrilla warfareandscorched-earthtactics.Bylate August Edward’s troopswere starving and sick, and

he was forced to withdrawonto English soil with Bruceinmenacingpursuit.Thekingreached York and safety bythe skin of his teeth; but hisqueenwasnotquitesolucky.Isabella had waited once

again at Tynemouth Priory,just as she had when herhusband and Gaveston hadtried tomake a stand againstLancaster at Newcastle in1312.Then,shehadmadeherescape south by road. Now,

however, she was cut off onTynemouth’sheadlandbytheadvancingScots,whileouttosea Flemish ships patrolledthe coast in support ofBruce’s army.As thegravityof her situation began to hithome, Edward sent ascrawled order that some ofDespenser’s men shouldmarch to Tynemouth toprotect the queen. ButDespenser, for Isabella, wasanenemytobefearedjustas

much as the Scots, and sherefused point-blank to placeher life in the hands of histroopsevenasshesentpanic-stricken appeals for aid. Theking despatched instead adetachment of soldiers ‘moreagreeable than the others’ –but by then they foundthemselves unable to fighttheir way through the Scots’advance into Yorkshire.Isabella and her entouragewere faced with the dreadful

realisation that help was notcoming. Some of herhousehold squires did whatthey could to hold the Scotsat bay by shoring up thePriory’s defences beforebundling the queen and herattendants on board ship.Theymade a narrow escape,effected under extremepressure,whichcost thelivesof twoofher ladies,one lostin the chill waters of theNorth Sea, the other in

prematurelabour.Andbythetime the queen reached landand safety at Scarborough,her fear and distrust ofDespenser had become animplacableloathing.Isabella spent Christmas

1322 in the king’s companyat York, but as winter gaveway to spring her alienationfrom her husband and hiscourt became ever moreobvious. While Despenserconsolidated his hold on

Edward’s government,enriching both the royalcoffersandhisownthroughacombination of acuteadministrative efficiency anda limitless capacity forextortion, the queen keptquiet, waiting and watchingas the fabric of politics wasmercilessly shredded. In thespring of 1323 a truce wasconcludedwiththeScots,butnotbeforeEnglandhadbornethe heavy cost of the loss of

AndrewHarclay, the hero ofBoroughbridge, whomEdward had created earl ofCarlisle in the aftermath ofthebattle.Thedebacleof theEnglish campaign in thesummer of 1322 had finallyconvinced Harclay, alongwithmanyothersinthenorth,that the defences of hiscountrycouldonlybesecuredthrough negotiation withRobert Bruce, rather thanarmed confrontation. But

when Edward andDespenserfound out about Harclay’smeetings with Bruce he wasarrestedasatraitor,convictedwithout a hearing andsentenced to be hanged,drawn and quartered. By theend of March the pieces ofhis dismembered corpse hadbeen despatched around thekingdom, his decomposinghead set up on LondonBridge,hisbutcheredbodyonthe city walls of Carlisle,

Newcastle, Bristol andShrewsbury.With the execution of

Harclay Edward deprivedhimself of one ablelieutenant; the death of theearlofPembrokeayear laterrobbed him of another.Despite the suspicion withwhich he was regarded byDespenser, Pembroke hadcontinued to give his all inEdward’s service, and thecircumstances of his death

emphasised just how great aloss he was. Having led thesearch for a settlement withthe Scots in the summer of1323, the fifty-year-old earlcollapsedanddiedinPicardyin June 1324 en route forParis,wherehehadbeensentas an ambassador to theFrench court. His abortedmission was an urgent one:for, with war in the northtemporarily quietened,another conflict was on the

vergeoferupting.France by now had a new

king, since Philippe V haddied in January 1322 at theageofjustthirty,leavingonlydaughters to succeed him –who, thanks to the precedentestablished by his ownsuccession, were barred bytheir sex from wearing thecrown. The throne passedinstead to his and Isabella’syoungest brother, twenty-eight-year-old Charles, who

wascrownedandanointedasCharlesIV.Butthechangeofregime had done nothing tomitigate growing tensions inGascony between thecompetingjurisdictionsoftheFrench king and the Englishduke of Aquitaine. Charles,as was his right, demandedthat Edward appear beforehim in person to do homagefor the duchy. But Edward,who had accepted previousinvitations to attend the

Frenchcourt for thispurposewith such alacrity, this timerefusedtoleavehiskingdom,partly because of itsdangerously disordered state,andpartlybecauseDespenserwas reluctant to let go eitherofthereinsofgovernmentorof the king whose presenceallowed him to hold them.And as hostilities intensifiedat Saint-Sardos, sixty milessouth-east of Bordeaux, itbecame abundantly clear that

Charles was in no mood tocompromise. InAugust 1324he despatched an army toseizeGasconyfromEdward’spossession. The Englishking’s lieutenant there, histwenty-two-year-old half-brotherEdmund,earlofKent,made a poor fist of themilitary response, and inSeptember the desperateEnglish were forced to buythemselves breathing spacewith a six-month truce that

left huge territorial gains inthehandsoftheFrench.With Anglo-French

relationsindeepcrisisforthefirst time inageneration, theforeignness of England’sFrench-born queen wassuddenly exposed as neverbefore, and Despenser wasquicktotakeadvantageofhervulnerability. In twoextraordinary weeks thatSeptember, she wassystematicallystrippedofher

comforts and resources asqueen. First, her lands wereconfiscated, without warningorcompensation.Second,herhousehold was purged whenan order was given for theinternment of all Frenchsubjects in England. In all,Isabella lost the loyal serviceoftwenty-sevenofherclosestattendants, including herchaplainsandherdoctor.Andthird, her three youngerchildren – eight-year-old

John, six-year-old Eleanorand three-year-old Joan,whodid not yet, like their elderbrother Edward, havehouseholds of their own –were removed from hercustody and given into thekeeping of Despenser’s wifeandsister.Itwasadangerousaswell

as distressing moment.Despenser, it seemed,intended to leave Isabellastranded on the political

sidelines, bereft of influenceand support and renderedpowerless by her isolation,while he consolidated hishold over the king to theexclusion of all others. ButDespenser, it turnedout,wasno cool strategist, surveyingthe playing field with adispassionatelyjudiciouseye.Instead,asheclutchedtighterand tighter at the power hehad achieved, the panic andparanoia that drove his

relentless aggression wereevermoreapparent.Enemies, it seemed, were

everywhere. England’sfortresseswerefullnotjustofinterned Frenchmen but ofincarcerated rebels – andkeeping them safely underlock and key was provingharder than Edward andDespenser had anticipated.Lord Berkeley, aGloucestershire baron whohad fought at the earl of

Lancaster’s side in 1322,almost escaped fromWallingford Castle inOxfordshire in January1323.Eight months later anotherprisoner, Roger Mortimer ofWigmore, demonstrated withextraordinary daring that theregime had not succeeded intightening its defences whenhe escaped from closeconfinement in the Tower.With the collusion of thefortress’s second-in-

command, the garrison wasstupefied with drugged winewhileMortimerscrambledupa chimney onto the roof,downaropeladderflungoverthemassivecurtainwall, andacross the Thames in arowing boat before ridingheadlong for the coast andFrance. From the Frenchcourt, where he waswelcomed by a French kingwhose patience with Edwardwas rapidly running out,

Mortimer was suspected byDespenser of planningassassinationattemptsagainsthis own life and that of theking. Meanwhile, evidencethatdissidentswithinEnglandwereusingnecromancyinanattempt to bring down thegovernment promptedDespenser to complainurgently to the pope that hewas threatened by ‘magicalandsecretdealings’.The pope gave these

supernatural anxieties shortshrift – ‘the Holy Fatherrecommends him to turn toGodwith hiswhole heart…no other remedies arenecessary’,JohnXXIIrepliedsternly – but clearly loyaltywas an increasingly rare andfragile commodity in akingdom where thefunctioning of royal powerhad become so horriblydistorted by the toxiccombination of Edward’s

weakness and Despenser’sgreed and suspicion. But theobsessive concern of bothking and favourite to protectthemselves against the threatof internal sedition did offerIsabellaaglimmerofhope,aslender chance of finding anangle of attack on anotherflank from which theirattention was cruciallydiverted.ThewarinGasconywas a disaster Edward andDespensercouldnotaffordto

ignore,andyettheirabilitytoformulateastrategicresponseto English losses there wascompromised by the tensionsunder which the regime wasoperating at home. Furtherfighting to defend the duchywas not an option in theabsence of a competentgeneral of proven loyalty, orwhileDespensercontinuedtostockpile cash rather thanspending it on militaryoperations. But at the same

timeEdward could not go toFrancetomakepeaceanddohomage for Gascony, sinceDespenser was unwelcomethere and neither king norfavourite was prepared tocontemplate therisksof theirownseparation.Buttherewasasolutionto

hand.WasnotIsabella,queenof the English king, sister ofthe French, uniquely placedto resolve this unfortunatedispute?Thepopethoughtso;

Charles IV graciouslyindicated that he would beprepared to receive his sisteras Edward’s emissary; andIsabella modestly put herselfat her husband’s disposal.This proud queen hadsubmitted to the indignitiesheapeduponherwithpatientdissimulation,sosuccessfullythat both the king andDespenser believed that shecould be trusted to representtheir interests and to return

likealoyallapdog,nomatterhow harshly she hadpreviously been treated. Or,at least, they had convincedthemselves that the dangerthatshewouldnotdosowasthe least of the risks withwhich they found themselvesconfronted.On 9 March 1325,

therefore,IsabellacrossedtheChannel from Dover to theport of Wissant outsideBoulogne, with an entourage

ofthirty-oneattendantshand-picked for their allegiance tothe Despenser regime. Thequeen gave thanks for hersafe arrival at the churchwhere she had been marriedseventeen long years earlier,and then rode on viaPontoise,whereshehadoncestayed in such grandeurwithherhusband,toPoissy,onthebanks of the Seine fifteenmiles north-west of Paris.There she was reunited with

herbrother,KingCharles–awarmandemotionalmeeting,but one that did not presageanydramaticsofteningoftheFrench stance over Gascony.Everthepubliclydutifulwife,Isabella sent news home toEdward of her painstakingnegotiations, which wereconcluded by the end of themonth. In exchange forEdward’s homage, to beperformed on French soil byAugust, Charles would

confirm the English king’spossession of all his Frenchterritories save the Gasconlands of the Agenais aroundSaint-Sardos that Frenchtroopshadlatelyoverrun, thepossessionofwhichwouldbesubmitted to formaladjudication in due course.Meanwhile – because of hisaffection for his sister, theVita explained – the Frenchkingalsoagreedtorenewthetruce agreed the previous

September.Isabellahadplayedherpart

with aplomb. Itwas hardly adiplomatic breakthrough, butherpresencehadundoubtedlyoiled thewheelsofaprocessfromwhichEdwardcouldnotrealistically have hoped formore tangible gains. Withcareful formality,shemadeapublic entry into Paris at thebeginning of April, andremained there for theratification of the treaty in

May and her brother’s lavishwedding to their cousin, thedaughter ofLouis ofEvreux,in July. But then, as theweeks went by and Isabelladrifted between the royalpalacesandhuntinglodgestothe west and north of theFrench capital, makingofferings at local shrines andentertaining the great andgood of the French court todinner, it gradually becameclear thatshewasmakingno

movetoreturnhome.IfEdwardwasdiscomfited

by his wife’s prolongedabsence, his anxiety wasoffset both by hercircumspect demeanour andby the obvious limitations toherfreedomofaction.Ashisconsort, she could representhis wishes to her brother ofFrance; but, as his consort,the only power she couldexercise was an extension ofhisown.Whetherheknew it

or not, the legitimacy of hisown rule was leaching awayas he allowed Despenser tomisuse the power of hiscrown, but that fact did notmeanthatlegitimateauthoritywouldautomaticallyaccruetohiswifeinstead.Itisalsoentirelylikelythat

the attention thekingpaid toIsabella’s movements waslimited by his preoccupationwith much more obviouslypressing concerns. The

moment for the performanceof his homage for Aquitainewas at hand, and on thatceremony depended thesafety of the remainingEnglish possessions inGascony; but even aspreparationswere in train forEdward’s departure forFrance, Despenser and hisfather frantically sought todissuade him from leavingEngland – for, as the Vitasagely remarked, ‘in the

absence of the king theywouldnotknowwheretolivesafely’.Truetoform,Edwardsuccumbed to his favourite’sinfluence, announcing atDover on the eve of hisembarkation that he foundhimself indisposed andunabletotravel.Butthecirclestillhadtobe

squaredandGasconysecuredby the homage that Charlesdemanded.Itwasaseeminglyintractable dilemma, and a

perilous one – until amessengerarrived,freshfromcrossing the Channel, with aproposal for an elegantsolution. The French king, itappeared, would happilyreceive the homage ofEdward’s eldest son if hewereinvestedwiththeduchyof Aquitaine in his father’sstead.Twelve-year-oldPrinceEdward was already,conveniently, at Dover withhis father; on 10 September

he was created duke ofAquitaine in anticipation ofthe oath of allegiance hewould offer to his Frenchuncle, and two days later heset sail for France with animposing entourage ofbishopsandlords.And,alongwiththeiryoungson,thekingsent orders to his wife thatshe should returnimmediately to England,since her presence at herbrother’scourtwasnolonger

requiredbyEnglishpolicy.It was a doublemove that

made impeccable sense fromwithin the bunker thatEdward’s gilded palaces hadnow become: to bring aprincelypawnintoplaywhileretrievingthequeenfromherposition in the front line, allthewhileallowingDespenserto remain sheltered at theking’sside.But,intheirhasteand their paranoia, Edwardand Despenser made two

mistakes of monumentalproportions. They took forgranted Isabella’scompliance; and they failedtoseethesequenceofmovesthat openedup to her for thefirst time as a result of theirgambit.When Prince Edward

stepped onto the quay atWissant on 14 September tobe enfolded in his mother’sembrace, Isabella’s positionwas transformed at a stroke.

Withher sonather side, shewas no longer merely anadjunct to her husband’spower, a consort who couldbesilencedandisolatedifshefailed to co-operate. Instead,shestoodapartas themotherof the heir to the throne, ananointed queen who couldspeak and act for her youngsonandhispeopleinthefaceof the tyranny that herhusband’s rule had become.Thekinghadbeensofocused

onhisownneedtoremaininEngland,onaverting the lossof another favourite andanotherinternalassaultonhisownpower,thathehadfailedtorecognise the impossibilityof compelling the return ofhis wife and son once theywere beyond his borders.Isabella, however, had beenwaiting for her chance, andnowshetookit.When Edward’s envoy

relayedhiscommandthatshe

should return to England, hedid so in the presence of theFrench king and his court,perhaps in the belief that theEnglish queen would notopenlydefyherhusband.Buta public platform suitedIsabella’s purposes perfectly.‘I feel that marriage is ajoining together of man andwoman…’ the Vita has herdeclare, ‘and someone hascome between my husbandand myself trying to break

thisbond.IprotestthatIwillnotreturnuntilthisintruderisremoved, but, discarding mymarriage garment, shallassume the robes ofwidowhood and mourninguntil I am avenged of thisPharisee.’For Edward, her defiance

cameasapalpableshock.Hecouldnotbelievethatthiscallfor theremovalofDespenser– the man who had becomehis right hand, restoring his

power and securing hisrevenge for the death ofGaveston – had come fromhisloyalwife.Hisincredulityas he struggled tocomprehend the reality ofIsabella’s deception ismanifestintheVita’saccountof his address to hisassembledlordsinparliamentat Westminster thatNovember: ‘…on herdepartureshedidnotseemtoanyone to be offended’, the

kingremarked,withalackofpercipience entirelycharacteristic of his politicalcareer.

As she tookher leaveshe saluted all andwentaway joyfully. But nowsomeone has changedher attitude. Someonehas primed her withinventions. For I knowthat she has notfabricated any affront

outofherownhead.Yetshe says that HughDespenser is heradversary and hostile toher…

Shock, however, was not

the reaction of those whomEdward now suspected ofinvolvement in his wife’sinsubordination. Totallyinadequate though hisassessment of Isabella’sindependence of mind might

havebeen,hewasnotwrongto suppose that she wouldfind allies around her inFrance. There is noincontrovertible evidence toprove that Isabella and herbrother King Charles hadworked together behind thescenes to secure her son’spresence in France andsimultaneously prevent herown return toEngland,but itis by far the most likelyconclusioninthelightoftheir

wholly compatible interestsand the immediate supportCharles gave her once shehadmadeherfeelingsknown.(‘Thequeenhas comeofherown will, and may freelyreturnifshesowishes.Butifshepreferstoremainintheseparts, she ismy sister, and Irefusetoexpelher.’)Meanwhile Isabella’s self-

assertion also made her afigureheadforEnglishaswellasFrenchhostilitytoEdward.

And there was plenty of it.Therewerethoseevenamongthe hand-picked delegationthat had accompanied PrinceEdward to Paris whopreferred, it now transpired,to staywith the queen ratherthan return to the king –including not only thebishops of Winchester andNorwich but also Edward’sown half-brother, the earl ofKent, whose military failureinGascony had compounded

his owndisenchantmentwithDespenser’s role in hisbrother’sregime.They now joined forced

with the exiles who had fledEngland after the failure ofthe earl of Lancaster’srebellion, principal amongthem Roger Mortimer ofWigmore, the lord who hadmadesuchadramaticescapefrom the Tower two yearsearlier. Mortimer was thirty-eightyearsold, a soldier and

politician of hard-wonexperience gained first asEdward’s justiciar in Irelandand later as Despenser’senemy in the marches ofWales. Isabella hadencountered him at herhusband’s court many times,and in the wake of hisincarceration had petitionedEdward to treat Mortimer’simprisoned wife with greatercompassion. But he had notbeen in Paris to greet the

queen on her arrival inFrance, since Edward hadmade it a condition ofIsabella’s embassy that hisenemies should be expelledfrom Charles’s kingdombefore her arrival, andMortimerhad thereforemadehis way to the county ofHainaut, France’s neighbourin the Low Countries to thenorth.In December 1325,

however, Hainaut’s countess

Jeanne–aFrenchprincessbybirth, and first cousin toIsabella and her brother –travelled to Paris for thefuneral of her father,Charlesof Valois. With her cameRoger Mortimer. There isevery reason to suppose thatMortimer, just as much asKing Charles, had beencovertlyapprisedofIsabella’splans before her publicbreachwith her husband.Hewas an obvious ally, a man

with everything to gain andnothingtolosebysupportingthe queen’s revolt againstDespenser’s power. Withinweeks of their meeting,however, word reachedEnglandthat,whentheywereunitedatlastinParis,IsabellaandMortimer had begun notonly a political partnershipbutapassionateaffair.There is tantalisingly little

evidence to document theprivate dynamics of this

charged liaison, but itsemotional logic is instantlyrecognisable. Physicalattraction there clearly was:they were almost of an age,Isabella at thirty still afamous beauty, andMortimer, though his looksare unknown, an athletic andcompelling figure. Add tothat a combustiblecombination of forcefultemperaments, theaphrodisiac qualities of the

power play in which theywerecaughtup,andthedepthand breadth of their sharedpolitical interests, and it isclear that this was no idledalliance but an all-consumingpersonalbond.That conclusion can only

be reinforced by the dangersof the course to which theyhad now committedthemselves. Adultery, for aqueen, was sin and treasoncombined, and Isabella had

seen at close hand itsgrievouseffectsonheryoungsisters-in-law and theirlovers. Beyond the personalrisks were the political ones.Bycompromising thegroundon which she stood asEdward’s betrayed wife, shemight put in jeopardy thelegitimacyofherpositionasamother who could speak fortherightsofherson.Shenowchosetowearthebecominglysombregownsofawidow,in

ostentatiousexpressionofherclaim that Despenser haddestroyedhermarriage,butinpursuing a relationship withMortimer she risked theaccusation that she hadrevealed herself as a scarletwoman.On the other hand,

Mortimer’s totalidentification with her causealso brought her significantpracticalresources.Shecouldserve as a figurehead and a

rallying point for oppositiontoherhusband,buthewasasoldier, and could lead anarmy into battle shouldconfrontation develop intomilitary conflict (as it surelywould, forwhat other choiceremained?).He could call onsignificantlandsandloyaltiesat home. And if their liaisonbrought opprobrium uponher, it also emphasised the‘unnaturalness’, tocontemporary eyes, of the

closeness between Edwardand Despenser that haddriven her from the maritalbed.Certainly the affair

revealed that – greatertactician than her myopichusband though sheundoubtedly was – she wasalso capable of impulsivebehaviour that gaveprecedence to her immediateinclinationsovercautiousandfar-sighted policy. But her

sense of duty had alwaysbeen inextricably entangledwith a profound sense ofentitlement, and both wereunmistakably in play as shesought to seize her momentamid the political flood-tidethatsheherselfhadunleashed– fully aware, whatever elseshe thought she knew, thatthere were no safe optionsanymore.The question was what

movethequeenwouldmake,

with her knight at her sideand the most valuable pawnof all, her son, under hercontrol.Hereforthefirsttimewe miss the perceptivecommentary of the mostacute of contemporaryobservers, the author of theVita Edwardi Secundi. Thesingle surviving transcript ofhisnarrativestopsabruptlyattheendof1325withthenewsthat ‘mother and son refusedto return to England’. This

sudden silence, and theabsence from the text of anysign of foreknowledge ofwhat was to come, suggeststhat this wise and humaneobserver died early in 1326.Weareleftinthecompanyofother chroniclers – variouslyinterestingandwellinformed,but few as discerning – tocontemplate the choiceswithwhich Isabella was nowfaced.Her stand so far had been

taken against Despenser, hisintervention in her marriageand his improper influencewith Edward. On thosegrounds, itwasalreadyclear,she would find widespreadsupportinEngland,aswellasamong the exiled lords inFrance. But if she aimedmerely at the destruction ofDespenser, it had to be saidthattheprecedentsofthelasttwenty years were not good.Edward had shown time and

again that he would saywhatever his enemieswishedto hear, and go back on hiswordthemomenthewasabletodoso.Itwasthisdesperateknowledge that had pushedthe earl of Lancaster to thekilling of Gaveston, but thathad done no more thancondemn the kingdom to adecade of pathologicalpolitical conflict until thekingsecuredhisrevenge.Thelogic of the position that

Isabellahadadoptedsinceherson’s arrival in France,meanwhile, dictated that herchallenge was in practiceaimedasmuchatherhusbandasathisfavourite.Bystylingherself a widow, she hadthrown off Edward’sauthority in personal as wellas political terms; and if herhusbandwasnowdeadtoher,herdutylaywithherson,forwhose rights andresponsibilities she could

claim to speak.Tomake thatchallengerealonEnglishsoil,however, she would need anarmy. Her brother Charleshad furnished political andfinancialsupport,andIsabellacould also draw on theresources of her dower landsin Ponthieu and Montreuil.But the prospect of militarybacking became concrete forthe first time in the earlymonths of 1326 thanks toIsabella’s cousin Jeanne of

Valois and her husband,CountGuillaumeofHainaut.A marriage alliance

between Hainaut andEngland, in the youthfulshape of the count’s eldestdaughter and Isabella’s sonEdward, had first beenproposed six years earlier.Since then, the ebb and flowof European diplomacy hadswept the scheme aside, and,back in England, KingEdward was embroiled in

negotiations to secure anAragonese princess for hisheir.But the enormity of theking’s error in allowing theyoung prince to escape hisgraspmeantthatEdwardwasno longer in a position todictate his son’s future.NowIsabella and Mortimerrevived the plan that youngEdward shouldmarry one ofCountGuillaume’s daughters–thistimeoneofhisyoungergirls,Philippa–inanalliance

that would bring the queennot only a daughter-in-lawbuttroopswithwhichhersonmight claim his birthrightsooner than his father hadanticipated.Toolate,Edwardcouldsee

with horrifying clarity thenature of the threat thatconfronted him. In panic, hedespatched letter after letteracrosstheChannel,tohisson(‘we are not pleased withyou, and neither for your

mother nor for any otherought you to displease us…’), to Isabella’s brotherKingCharles (‘ifyouwishedherwell,dearestbrother,youwould chastise her for thismisconduct and make herdemean herself as she ought,for thehonourofall those towhom she belongs’), and tothe pope, who obliginglyresponded – after a doomedeffort to make peace – byweighing in on his behalf,

threatening Charles withexcommunication if theFrench court continued toshelter the adulterous queenandherlover.This was spiritual

instruction with whichCharleswashappytocomply,inpublicatleast.IsabellaandhersonwerehonouredguestsatthecoronationofCharles’snew wife in the jewel-likeSainteChapellewithintheÎlede la Cité’s royal palace in

May 1326,withMortimer inclose attendance upon them,but just twomonths later theEnglishqueenandprincelefther brother’s court, ridingnorth to her county ofPonthieu. This ‘expulsion’,however,wastimedperfectlyto enable Charles to deferdiplomatically to papalauthority while Isabella putthe next stage of their planinto action. From Ponthieushe rode eastward to join

Mortimer in Hainaut, wherehewas alreadyworkingwithCount Guillaume to musterand provision a fleet. By 21September everything wasready. The queen had signeda treaty with Hainaut,promisingthathersonwouldmarry the count’s daughterPhilippa, and the bride’sdowry had already beenassembled, in the form ofseven hundred soldiers underthe command of the count’s

brother Jean. With them,filling the hundred or soleasedshipsthathadgatheredin Dordrecht harbour, weremercenaries from the LowCountriesandGermany,theirwages paid out of therevenues of Ponthieu withfinancial guarantees providedby the king of France.Isabella was on board, withher ladies, her son and theEnglish exiles who hadrallied to her cause, Roger

Mortimer at their head. Andon the morning of 22September, with a fair windswelling the sails, they settheircourseforEngland.It was an extraordinary

journey. This adrenaline-fuelled moment marked thefinal unravelling of amarriage, just as Eleanor ofAquitaine’s revolt againstHenry II had done a centuryandahalfearlier.Eleanorhadbeen imprisoned for fifteen

years for her pains, anddenounced as a threat to theorder of all creation. Isabellawas – as Eleanor had notbeen – an adulteress as wellas a disloyal wife. And yet,remarkably, heroverwhelmingdefianceoftheparadigms of female virtuewas not met with the sameoutrage and vilification. Thiswas a battle over the verynatureoflegitimateauthority,andthegreaterandpreceding

sins of her husband meantthat Isabella’s self-presentation as a wrongedqueen and a royal mothertook precedence over herinfidelity, and vindicated herrebellion.That much was clear after

two days struggling againstthe hostile waters of theNorth Sea when the rebelfleet reached the Suffolkcoast on 24 September. OneofEdward’shalf-brothers,the

earlofKent,wasalreadywithIsabella,having joinedher inParis. The other, the earl ofNorfolk, had been entrustedwith the defence of EastAnglia in the name of theking – and he tooimmediately defected to thequeen’sside.Thesmallforceof invaders had not knownwhat to expect when theymade landfall, scarcelyknowing where they wereafter the disorientation of a

difficultcrossing.Butastheymade cautious progressinland, they discovered,wonderingly, that there wasnoonetoresistthem.The tyrannical regime that

Edwardandhisfavouritehadimposed on his frightenedpeople was suddenly andsilently disintegrating,undermined from within bythereignofterrorwithwhichDespenser had sought tomake the king’s power

impregnable. Edward hadturned a blind eye toDespenser’s bullying andextortion. Worse, muchworse, he had allowed hisown royal authority tobecomean instrumentof thatabuse.Andindoingsohehadfailed to understand that thestrength of his crown – theessence of the oath he hadswornathiscoronation– layinprotectinghispeople fromunchecked disorder and

injustice.Foraslongastherewas no alternative, it washard to see how an anointedkingwhohadmadehimselfaforce for division andoppression could in practicebe resisted. But as soon asIsabella appeared – a royalchampion acting in the nameof therealmandofherson’srole as its heir – support forEdwardsimplymeltedaway.At news of his wife’s

arrival, the king had issued

urgentordersforhispeopletomuster in defence of hiskingdom against an invasionwhich, unsurprisingly, hisproclamations characterisedentirely differently: ‘RogerMortimer and other traitorsand enemies of the king andhis realm have entered therealm in force’, he declared,‘and have broughtwith themalien strangers for thepurpose of taking the royalpower from theking…’But

the bankruptcy of his causewas everywhere apparent.The musters fizzled out, thesheriffs muttering excuses,sitting on their hands, orleading the men theyrecruited to join the rebels.The royal treasurywas filledwith thousands of extortedpounds in drifting heaps ofgold, but it was slowlydawning on Edward andDespenserthatgoldcouldnotsavethemifitscosthadbeen

countedinforfeitedloyalty.To Isabella, meanwhile,

gates were opened, giftsbrought and service pledged.She rode first to Ipswich,wherethecitizensprofferedawelcome and a loan tosupport her troops, and thento Bury St Edmund’s Abbeywhereshe tookpossessionofmore treasure. Twenty-fivemiles further west atCambridge,thesupportofthewider Church took concrete

form with the arrival of thebishopsofHereford,Lincoln,Ely and Durham. At eachstaging-post, she publiclyinsisted that fair prices bepaid for the supplies herforces needed; they hadcome, after all, to rescueEdward’s people, not topillage them. And all thewhile Mortimer, in publicdiscreetly maintaining anappropriatedistance from thequeen,wasmarshallingunder

his disciplined command thegrowing army of men whoralliedtoherside.When news of this

triumphal progress reachedLondon, unrest in the citybegan to accelerate out ofcontrol, andbehind thewallsof the Tower Edward andDespenser were gripped bypanic.Fromthestarttheyhadbeen bound together byobsessional mistrust, theconviction that they were

surroundedbyenemies intenton their destruction. Nowparanoia had created its ownreality. With gold packedheavily into saddlebags, theyfled westward on 2 October,seeking the safety ofDespenser’s strongholds insouthWales,hopingstill thattheforceofaroyalcommandmight bring soldiers to theirside. They had reachedGloucester on 10 Octoberwhennewscamethattheearl

of Lancaster’s brother Henry– who had stood aloof fromhisbrother’srevoltfouryearsearlier,andhadbeenallowedto inherit a portion of hisestates as reward for hisloyalty–had riddenwithhismen to offer his sword inIsabella’s service. This wasgrim certainty that the ranksof the army for which theking was waiting would befilledonlywithphantoms. Infearanddespair,Edwardand

Despenser and their handfulof guards turned their horseswestonceagain.IsabellaandMortimerwere

not farbehind.FromOxford,wheretheyweregreetedwithagiftofaprecioussilvercup,they rode to the queen’scastle at Wallingford. Theretheyissuedaproclamationinthe name of the queen andprince which trod the mostdelicateofpoliticallines:stillcovering their backs by

protesting public loyalty tothe king, they called hissubjects to arms againstDespenser, whom theydenounced as ‘a clear tyrantand enemy of God and theHolyChurch,andofourverydear said lord the king andthe whole kingdom’. Stillthey had not shed a drop ofblood, and as their armygrew, the order they broughtwas thrown into sharp reliefby the chaos that was

overwhelmingLondon.Oncethekinghadfled,the

capital had declared for hisqueen,but inherabsencethevacuum of power was filledwith violent anger at thefalling regime, and on 15Octobertheriotersinthecityclaimed a significant scalp.ThebishopofExeter,whoastreasurerofEnglandhadbeenone of Despenser’s chiefallies in turning Edward’sgovernmentintoamechanism

of financial extortion, rodeintothecitythatday,thinkingthat he could save hisbeautiful house, his jewelsand his books from themob.By the time he realised hismistakeitwastoolatetoturnback.HerodedesperatelyforSt Paul’s, hoping to findsanctuary there, but thejeering crowd closed in. Hewas pulled from his horse,stripped of his armour anddraggeddownLudgateHillto

the great cross in Cheapside,where his head was crudelyhacked from his shoulderswithabaker’sknife.The bishop’s severed head

wassentwestwardtoIsabella– a macabre trophy, and anunwelcome reminder of theanarchy that could too easilyresult from her challenge toher husband’s authority. Butthere was no time to turnback to quieten the capital.Edward and Despenser had

reached Wales, and found ashipatChepstowtotakethemto Ireland.But after six daysat sea, battling impotentlyagainst headwinds thatpenned them in the BristolChannel, theywere forced toadmitdefeatandlandagainatCardiff. Despenser’s father,meanwhile, had been left atBristoltoholdthecastlethereagainst the queen’simplacable advance. Eightdays into a siege by

Mortimer’s troops, and withno hope of rescue, thegarrison capitulated. Theelder Despenser was hauledin chains before a tribunalincluding Mortimer himself,Henry of Lancaster and theking’s half-brothers of KentandNorfolk.Like the earl ofLancaster before him, theaccusedwasnotpermitted tospeak in his own defence;unlike Lancaster, he wasspared none of the ugly

penalties for treason,butwasdrawnonahurdlethroughthestreets, hanged from the citygallows and cut down fordecapitation,hisheadsentona spear toWinchester wherehehadoncebeenearl,andhisbodyfedtothedogs.By then, the king and the

younger Despenser wereseven miles north of CardiffatCaerphilly, seeking shelterin a fortress on which thefavouritehadlavishedpartof

the extraordinary fortune hehad amassed. But now theyknew that walls would notsave them. At the beginningofNovembertheypressedontwenty-five miles westwardto Neath, but, like trappedanimals, they had nowhereleft to run. They had turnedback east when they werecaught at last on 16November, bedraggledfigures riding in driving rainacross open country near

Llantrisant, by Henry ofLancaster and his men.Despenserwas taken at onceto Isabella and Mortimer atHereford, tiedroughlyontoashambling nag to run thegauntlet of the howling,tauntingcrowdsthatlinedhisroute.His fate was clear. He

refused all food and drink,trying to starve himself intooblivion before a moreterribledeathcouldfindhim.

He succeeded only inbringing it closer. InHereford’s market-place on24 November he was half-carried, almost fainting,before the queen and herlords, who had broughtforward his trial for fear heshould die on the road toLondon.Theyheardalengthydenunciation of his crimes –to which Despenser wasallowed no reply – andwatched as he was pulled

throughthecitystreets to thewalls of the castle forexecution. Amid a bayingmob, he was stripped of hisclothes and hoisted, chokingandkicking, by a noose fiftyfeet into the air. Then therope was lowered andloosenedsothathecouldseethe approach of theexecutioner’s knife thatwoulddisemboweland–inatorture added specifically forthis intimate companion of

the king – castrate him.Beheading, when it came,was a mercy. And, as thecrowd sated itself on thisbloodyspectacle,IsabellaandMortimer knew that thesimple part of their taskwasover.

IronLady

Edward, to whom his wifeand her lover had professedsuch loyalty, was now aprisoner in the keeping of

Henry of Lancaster atMonmouth Castle. In hisperson the gulf between therhetoric and the reality oftheir invasion was madedangerously real. Thepractical fact of the matterwas that he could not beallowed to regain his liberty,let alone the power of hiscrown.Atthesametime,theyhad rallied the countryagainst Despenser as anenemy of both the kingdom

and its king – and the kinghad now been liberated fromhisdestructiveinfluence.But seeds had already,

carefully, been sown for aprocess by which Edward’sloss of legitimacy could bemade explicit. The fruitlessdays he and Despenser hadspent at sea betweenChepstow and Cardiff hadallowed Isabella andMortimer to proclaim thatEdward had abandoned his

realm, and that the youngPrinceEdwardhad, ‘with theassent of the wholecommunity of the realm’,been appointed keeper of thekingdominhisfather’splace.Meanwhile, the bishop ofHereford had preached asermon before the queen atWallingford, taking as histext a phrase from the BookofKings–‘myheadaches’–from which he extrapolatedanargumentforremovingthe

headofakingdomaltogetherif it were found to bediseased.Now, however, the time

had come for action, notargument. And there was noprecedent forwhat had to bedone. Never before had aking been unmade. The factof Stephen’s kingship – hisconsecration and anointing –had stood baldly in the wayof Matilda’s efforts to asserther own right to the throne,

and, though Stephen’s heirhad been pushed aside tomakeway for the successionof Matilda’s son, Stephen’skingshiphadbeenendedonlyby death. Now Isabellasought to achieve theopposite: toupholdthedirectline of succession, but to doso prematurely; to set asideanoldkingtomakewayforanew while the former stilllived.She already had the great

seal, which had been takenfrom Edward at Monmouthby thebishopofHerefordon20 November. While herhusband was a prisoner, ofcourse, she and Mortimercould control his publicpronouncements, and so itwas declared that the kinghad sent the seal of his ownfree will ‘to his consort andson’, with orders that theyshoulddo‘notonlywhatwasnecessaryforrightandpeace,

but also what should pleasethem’. This was the samefreedom of action thatEleanor of Aquitaine hadenjoyed when she ruledEnglandforhersonRichard–‘thepowerofdoingwhatevershe wished in the kingdom’.Then, it had been anexpression of trust; now, astepon the road todeprivingthekingofhiscrown.Thelanguageinwhichthat

extraordinary proposition

might be couched had, afterall, been spoken withinmonths of Edward’saccessionnearlytwentyyearsearlier:‘Homageandtheoathof allegiance are more inrespect of the crown than inrespectof theking’sperson,’his lords had told him in1308. And now, at aparliament called to meet atWestminsterinJanuary1327,the ways in which the kinghad forfeited that allegiance

were enumerated. Edward‘hadasgoodaslostthelandsof Gascony and Scotlandthrough bad counsel and badcustody’, reported onechronicler, ‘and likewisethrough bad counsel he hadcausedtobeslainagreatpartofthenoblebloodoftheland,to the dishonour and loss ofhimself, his realm and thewhole people, and had donemany other astonishingthings’. In a carefully stage-

managed piece of politicaltheatre,thebishops,lordsandselectedrepresentativesofthewider realm, with excitablecrowds of Londonersgathered outside, declaredthat they would haveEdward’ssonwearthecrowninstead of a king whosefailingsandoppressionsweremanifest and incorrigible.ThearchbishopofCanterburyspoke on the proverbial saw‘vox populi, vox Dei’ (‘the

voice of the people is thevoice of God’) – a text thatwould normally be acontentious proposition for aroyal administration, nowsuddenly rendered a valuablepolitical tool. And PrinceEdwardwasusheredforward,asombre-facedfourteen-year-old, to receive theacclamation of his newlyacquiredsubjects.Still this de facto

deposition needed more

legitimating ballast. Adeputation from parliamentled by the bullish bishop ofHereford rode toKenilworth,another of Henry ofLancaster’s castles, to whichthe imprisonedkinghadnowbeen moved. One lateraccount describes Edward,dressed all in black,weepingandfaintingwhenherealisedtheyhadcometodemandtherenunciation of his throne.But in truth we know very

little of Edward’s emotionalreactiontothestraitsinwhichhe found himself. Hisresponsibilities as king hadnever claimed his fullattention; this was themonarch, after all, who hadoffered to agree to anythinghis lords asked of him if itwould secure thepresenceofPiers Gaveston by his side.Now Gaveston was gone,along with Despenser, themanwhohadhelpedEdward

to avenge his death. He hadneither the resources nor themeans to fight on; itmay bethat he also lacked the will.We cannot know, but wemight guess that despairwashisoverwhelmingresponseashe listened to the bishop’sblandishmentsandthreats.Atlast, on 20 January, facedwiththeutterhopelessnessofhis cause, Edward wasbrought to agree that hewouldresignhiscrowntohis

son.Oncehehaddoneso,thedeputation formallyrenounced their homage, andthestewardofEdward’sroyalhouseholdsolemnlybrokehisstaffofoffice in two.By thedouble logic of depositionand abdication, then, thetransformation effected atEdward’s coronation wasundone. And at Westminsteron 1 February 1327 his sonwasanointedandcrowned inhissteadasKingEdwardIII,

aslightfigureinrichredsilkamid an abbey ablaze withgold.From this moment on the

decrees of governmentcarried the authenticatingmark ‘by the king’, ratherthan ‘by the queen’, ‘by thequeenandtheking’sfirstbornson’, or (with nice elision)‘by the queen and herfirstborn son’, as they haddone in themonths since theinvasion. But that did not

mean the young king wasnow ruling his kingdom forhimself. Around him stood aformal council, made up ofthegreatbishopsandlordsofthe realm, with Henry ofLancaster restored to hisbrother’s landsandnamedasthe ‘chief guardian of theking’. Behind the council,however, stood Isabella andMortimer. Formally, theirauthority had beensuperseded by the coronation

and the council; informally,they directed the entireadministration. That was notnecessarilyand inescapablyaproblem,giventhelegitimacyattachedtothequeen’sroleasmother of an underage king,andMortimer’s leadership ofthe army that had ended theoppressions of the previousregime. But much woulddependonwhattheydidnext.And whatever they chose

to do would be done under

uniquely intractable pressure.Never before had Englandhad to contend with theexistenceofanex-king,aliveandwell incaptivity,whileanew king attempted toestablish his rule. Isabella’sfailure to discharge hermatrimonial responsibilitiesbyreturningtoEdward’ssidenow that the ‘intruder’Despenserhadbeen removedhad been explained away bythebishopofHereford, chief

propagandist of the coup,who expatiated at length onthe violence with whichEdward had threatened hiswifeshouldheseeheragain.(He carried a knife withwhich to kill her, the bishopdeclared, and, if that failed,had announced his intentionto despatch her with histeeth.)Butwhatcouldnotbeso easily remedied was thethreat to the nascent regimeposed by the pre-existing

claim of the old king as ameans of justifyingopposition to the new. Unityhad been easy to establish inthe heady days of September1326, when Edward wasinseparable from the hatedDespenser, but much harderto maintain with Despenserdead and Edward deposedthroughaprocessofpoliticalimprovisation and outrightinvention.One plot to free Edward

had already been foiled byApril 1327, when he wasmovedfromKenilworthsixtymiles south-west to BerkeleyCastle, a stronghold a coupleof miles inland from theSevernestuarythatwas,initsmarshy remoteness, muchless easily accessible thanLancaster’s midland fortress.It was held by ThomasBerkeley, son of the LordBerkeley who had rebelledagainst Edward in 1322, and

husbandofoneofMortimer’sdaughters – a much morereassuring custodian, fromthepointofviewofthequeenand her lover, than theincreasingly powerful andindependent-mindedLancaster. There Edward’scaptivity became closer, toprevent further attempts atrescue, and perhaps lesscomfortable, in the hope thathisrobusthealthmighttakeaconvenientturnfortheworse

inthecoldanddampofalessthanroyallyfurnishedcell.Bytheendof thesummer,

however, it was clear thatneither expectation had beenfulfilled. Edward remainedunhelpfully alive; not onlythat, but in July a secondconspiracy to liberate himhad been thwarted, this timeby a much narrower margin.Like the first plot, itwas thebrainchild of a Dominicanfriar, an order to which

Edward had always shownparticular favour anddevotion – an attachmentreciprocated by the friarsyears earlier in the tendingand reverent burial ofGaveston’sbrokenbody, andnow in these demonstrationsof diehard loyalism to adiscredited king. This time itseems the conspiratorssucceeded in releasingEdward from his cell beforethe breakout was contained

and the former king wasreturned to his prisonquarters. But when a thirdplot was discovered in mid-September, it was obviousjusthowlittlehopetherewasthat his continued existencemight fade from publicconsciousness into politicalirrelevance.And so, with impeccable

and implacable politicallogic, covert arrangementswereputintrainthatresulted,

during the night of 21September1327, in thedeathof themanalreadyknown tohis former subjects as‘Edward,thelateking’.Byitsvery nature, his end was agrimbusiness that tookplacein shadows and secrecy.Officially, it was simplyreported that he had died –whether by unfortunateaccident or a suddenextremity of illness was leftdisconcertingly unspecified –

butthesuggestionthatnaturalcauseshadclaimedhislifeatforty-three in so abrupt amanner, and with suchextraordinarily opportunetiming, convinced no one.Thisimpulsiveandmisguidedman,who had understood solittle about the power he hadonce wielded, died in anobscurity quite at odds withthe royal spotlight in whichhe had lived – and thevacuumof information about

his fate was rapidly filledwith swirling dust-clouds ofrumour, innuendo andconjecture.Some of the myth-making

about this political murdertook the form of unsubtleallusion to the intimaterelationships with hisfavourites thathadprovedsodestructive. Edward waskilled,laterchroniclerswouldconfidently assert, by a red-hot iron thrust violently into

his anus, burning hisintestines from the insidewithout a mark left on hisbody. Other whispers deniedthat the killing had takenplace at all, and told insteadof another corpse buried inhis place, while the kinghimself escaped into exileunder an assumed identity.Though these rumoursacquiredalittletractionintheyears (and even centuries)that followed, the truth was

that such stories formed afamiliar accompaniment topoliticallychargeddeathsthattook place before their timeor in mysteriouscircumstances. Tales alreadylong in circulation includedthat of theEmperorHeinrichV, Matilda’s first husband,whohad–sothelegendwent– faked his own death,substituted another body forhis own at his magnificentfuneral, andmadehisway to

England to live inpenitentialpoverty as a hermit inChester.(Norwashetheonlyroyal refugee to do so,according to inventive localtradition; near to his cell, itwas said, lived a one-eyedanchorite namedHaroldwhohadmadehishomethereafterescaping from a battlefieldnear Hastings.) EnglishfolklorehadfoundroomforaGerman emperor: now theGerman Empire played host

to a lost king of England.Edward’s tale, as itdeveloped,wasHeinrich’s ingeographicalreverse,withtheking dodging a counterfeitfuneral to arrive in Colognein the guise of a wanderinghermit, before ending hisdays in religiouscontemplation near Pavia inLombardy.The alchemical quality of

Edward’s necessarilyshadowy death was evident

not only in this elaborateafterlife but in thetransmutation of hisreputation. Even the unlikelyfigure of Thomas ofLancaster had beentransfigured by the shock ofhis violent end into acandidate for popularsainthood: within weeks ofthe earl’s execution miracleshad been breathlesslyreported at his tomb atPontefract,wherehishat and

belt were reverently kept ashealing relics. Now Edwardtoohadhischancetobecomeapoliticalmartyr.Bythetimethe chronicler Geoffrey leBaker wrote his venomouslypartisan account of eventssome thirty years later, theformer king had become aChrist-like figure – thedescription of the lamenting,swooning Edward atKenilworth is Baker’s –whose noble spirit was

betrayed and destroyed bythose who owed him theirloyalty.ChiefamongtheseJudases,

of course, was Edward’swife.ForBaker,IsabellawasJezebel – a tyrannical andsexually corrupt queenmanipulatingherhusbandandson to impose evil on thekingdom – and a ferreavirago, awomanwhoapedaman, abandoning herfeminine virtues, to become

as cruel and unyielding asiron.Butthisvilificationofaqueen who had beenwelcomedwith open arms inthe autumn of 1326 – amother to England’s peopleaswellastoitsheir,cometorescuetherealmfromtyranny– was neither instant norinevitable in the immediateaftermathofEdward’sdeath.Given the clandestine

circumstances in which hedied,almostnothingcouldbe

knownforcertainaboutwhatexactly had happened orwhere responsibility lay.Norhasthepassageoftimemadeanswers any easier to find.WasIsabellatheinstigatorofher husband’smurder, or didMortimerdecidethathemustbe removed?Didone initiateand the other resist, or weretheypartners in this,as in somuch else? In public, theproprieties were carefullyobserved. The king’s corpse

was embalmed, andhis heartsent in a silver vase to hisroyalwidow.Thebodylayinstate,firstatBerkeley,theninthe abbey of St Peter atGloucester, the coffin drapedin cloth of gold embroideredwiththearmsofEngland.On20 December, Edward waslaidtorestinaceremonyfullof elaborate ritual. Isabellaand her son knelt before anexquisitely carvedandgildedhearse bearing not only the

coffin but a fine woodeneffigy of the king dressed inroyal robes and a copper-giltcrown. Mortimer too, cladrespectfullyinblack,tookhisplace among the mourners.Then, the following day, thecourtleftGloucestertospendChristmas at Worcester andto prepare for the youngking’smarriagetoPhilippaofHainaut. Newly arrived inEngland, she was welcomedinto London on Christmas

Eve with lavish civicfestivities, before travellingnorth to York for a weddingjoyfully celebrated amid asnowstorm in the half-builtminster.Whatever viewwe take of

Isabella’s role in herhusband’s murder, therefore,it has to be noted that hisdeath did not cause amoment’s disruption to thepartsheplayed in theregimeshe and Mortimer had

created,ortoherconductasaqueenandamother.Shehadalways evinced aconventionally observantpiety – but faith, howevergenuine, might also be asflexible andaccommodatinglycomplexasthe person who professed it.Isabella’s religiousbeliefhadso far proved able toencompass personal andpolitical rebellion against herhusband and king, to the

point of adultery anddeposition;andbySeptember1327itwasalreadytwoyearssince she had begun to styleherself a widow. It is hardlyunimaginable, therefore, thatIsabella might have broughtherself to contemplate theirresistible politicalimperative of her husband’sdeath, particularly given thedepths to which Edward’srulehad sunkand thedegreeof political legitimacy that

Isabella’s resistance to hisoppressions, and herpossession of theunquestioned heir to histhrone, had conferred on herclaimtopower.God,afterall,hadsmiledonheractionsandvindicatedhereverymovebygranting her overwhelmingvictory.Muchwould depend, then,

on whether the queen couldmaintain that legitimacy nowthat Edward had been

removed from the politicalstage. Whatever happened,the regime over which sheandMortimer presided couldnot last indefinitely. Theyoung king had just turnedfifteen,and,thoughhehadsofarbeennomorethanapawnin the political process, itcouldnotbeexpectedthathewould be content to remainforever in the shadow of hismother and her lover. Thepower that Isabella and

Mortimer now enjoyedtherefore depended on theircontinuing claim to beconscientious guardians ofthe realm until her son wasold enough to rule forhimself.But here the limitations of

Isabella’sworldview,andofher political understanding,were revealed for the firsttime. She was an intelligentwoman,andapoliticalanimalthrough and through, whose

acute tactical sense hadenabled her to play her handwith masterful skill in thecriticalmoment of 1326.Butnow it emerged that heroverwhelming sense ofentitlement – which haddriven her resistance to herhusbandfromthemomenthehad allowed Despenser todisplace her from her hard-wonpositionathisside–alsoprevented her fromunderstandingthatconstraints

on her freedom of actionremained, despite the powershehadachieved.Ofcoursearoyal daughter of France anda queen of England wouldexpect to command thereverence and enjoy theluxury appropriate to herexalted rank, but theacquisitive arrogance thatIsabella now displayedblunted her vision as a rulerin a manner that wasalarminglyreminiscentofher

fecklesshusband.Itwasindisputablethatthe

queen should retrieve thevaluable dower lands, worth£4,500 a year, that had beenstripped from her by therapacious regime she hadoverthrown. But the awardmadetoIsabellaonthedayofher son’s coronation tripledthat already generousendowment. With her newestates worth an astonishingannual sum of twenty

thousandmarks–or£13,333– she enjoyed an incomegreater even than that ofThomas of Lancaster in hispomp. Among the manyproperties of which she nowtook possession were herdead husband’s favouritemanor of Langley, whereGavestonlaybeneathagildedtomb;LeedsCastle, from thegates of which she had beenturnedawaywithsuchbloodyresults; Bristol Castle, where

theolderDespenserhaddied;and the earl of Lancaster’sfortress at Pontefract, whichthe younger Despenser hadseizedafterhisexecution,andIsabellanowappropriatedforherself despite the priorclaims of the earl’s brotherHenry. Meanwhile, with aseriesofcashgrants–neededto pay her army ofmercenaries as well as toestablish her glitteringsupremacy at her son’s new

court – she drained the goldthatDespenserhadstockpiledintheroyaltreasury.And she was not alone in

her acquisitions. Mortimer’sambition had been no lessapparentthanIsabella’sattheyoung king’s coronation,whenhisthreesonshadkneltto receive the order ofknighthood dressed in thecloth of gold and fursappropriate to theheirsofanearl. It was no surprise,

therefore, to find that titlesoon among the rewardsMortimer amassed. In thewinter of 1326 and during1327 he accumulated in hispossessionthegreatlordshipsthatDespenserhadpreviouslyheld inWales and theWelshmarches, together with theestates of his uncle, RogerMortimer of Chirk(disinheriting his cousin, theheirtoChirk,intheprocess),aswell as the royal office of

justiciaroftheprincipalityofWales, to give him powerthere on a scale of whicheven Despenser would havebeen envious. These grantswere mirrored by more inIreland,andintheautumnof1328 Mortimer was namedearl of March, a new titlecreated especially in hishonour, to reflect hisextraordinary dominance inthe western territories of theyoungking’srealm.

Liberation from theoppressions of Edward II, itwas becoming unnervinglyclear, had delivered Englandinto the hands of a queenmother determined to enrichherself beyond reason orprecedent,andadomineeringnoblemanwho aspired to thestatus of an uncrowned king,scarcely letting youngEdward out of his sight andtaking for granted his ownright to speak on his behalf.

The council, for Isabella andMortimer, was nomore thanwindow-dressing, anirrelevance to the reality oftheir political control. Butthey, no less than the deadking and his favourite beforethem, failed to understandthat the process by whichthey sought to consolidatetheirownpowerwasalsotheprocess by which, piece bypiece, they began to forfeitthe legitimacy of the

authoritytheyclaimed.With alarming speed,

cracksbegantoappearin thefragile facade of unity thatstillremainedasthelegacyoftheir invasion. Doubts wereraised about Isabella andMortimer’s capacity togovern not only by therewards they lavished uponthemselves, but also by theirhandling of the weightiestmattersofpolicy.Ithadneverbeen likely that the Scots

would stand by and watchsuch violent upheavals inEnglish politics from agentlemanly distance, and inthe summer of 1327 Scottishraids forced themuster ofanEnglisharmyandanadvanceagainst them into thenortheast. But the Englishforces were caughtponderously flat-footed bytypically agile and elusiveScots manoeuvres, and theteenage king – who had

accompanied Mortimer,Lancaster and his uncles ofKentandNorfolknorthonhisfirstmilitarycampaign–wasalmostcapturedinonedaringraidontheEnglishcamp.Asthe exhausted, dispiritedsoldiers and their bitterlyfrustrated king made theirway disconsolately south,Isabella and Mortimer madethe decision to pursue peacein the north, rather thanwar;and in the spring of 1328 a

treatywas agreed, to bring alasting settlement betweenEnglandandScotland.It was not, in itself, a

foolishormyopicplan,butitcame at a heavy price.Englandnowforthefirsttimeformally recognised Scotlandas an independent kingdom,and Robert Bruce as itsrightfulsovereign.Thedreamthat the Scots might bebrought under English rule –pursuedsoferociouslybythe

first Edward, and neverrelinquished by the second,no matter how hapless hisinterventionsthere–wasnowabandonedinthenameofthethird.Not, however,with hisconsent. When Isabella’sseven-year-old daughter Joantravelled north to Berwickwithhermother inJuly1328to marry Bruce’s son andheir, four-year-old David, infulfilment of the treaty,Edward was not with them.

Appalled and angry at thehumiliation of the campaignandthesubsequentjettisoningof what he saw as his rightsover Scotland, the fifteen-year-old king refused toattend the wedding andobstructed his mother’sattempt to deliver the Stoneof Scone – the sacredsandstone on which kings ofScots were traditionallycrowned, which had beencaptured by Edward I thirty

years earlier – back intoScottishhands.Angrythoughhemightbe,

the king was still too youngto free himself from theenveloping arms of thegovernment which Isabellaand Mortimer had createdaround him. But this breachbetween mother and sonbrought widespreadcondemnation for the firsttime upon the head of thequeen mother and her

unofficial consort. The king,it was clear, rejected thispolicymade in his name. Sodidhissubjects,whocalledita turpis pax, a ‘shamefulpeace’. Meanwhile, the£20,000 which the Scotsagreed to pay in reparationfor their raids did little tosoothesuchdiscontent,givenhow rapidly it disappearedinto the bottomless pit ofIsabella’s coffers. And mostimmediately disquieting for

Isabella and Mortimer wasthe fact that this growingresistance found public voicein the imposing person ofHenryofLancaster.Thewheel, it seemed,was

turning full circle. This wasnot, after all, the first timethat humiliation in Scotlandhad precipitated an earl ofLancaster into opposition.When parliament met atSalisbury in October 1328 –the same tame assembly that

ratified Mortimer’s elevationto the earldom of March –Lancaster refused to attend,complaining of the failure toprosecute theking’s rights inScotland,thesideliningoftheregency council which hehimselfhadbeenappointedtolead, and the plundering ofthe royal treasury to theprivatebenefitofIsabellaandMortimer. If this was thereign of the king’s fatherrevisited, it was abundantly

clearwho,thistime,mightbeaccused of usurping royalpower.In a process that had

become horrifyingly,wearyingly familiar over theprevious two decades,divisionspiralledquicklyintoarmed confrontation. Bywintertroopswereonceagainbeingmustered byEngland’sgreatnobles,whocircledoneanotherwarily, trying to finda means to peace while

preparing for war. InDecemberLancastermarchedintoLondonattheheadofanarmy,wherehewasjoinedbytheking’sunclesofKentandNorfolk, who shared hisanger at Isabella andMortimer’s appropriation oftheir nephew’s government.But while Lancaster and hisallies gathered in the capital,Mortimer’s army,accompanied by Isabella andEdward, outflanked them by

moving north into themidlandsandontotheattack.By 6 January, Lancaster’smanors inWarwickshire andLeicestershire had beensacked and burned, and hiscity of Leicester seized byMortimer in the name of theyoungking.In the face of this

devastating reprisal, andconfrontedyetagainwiththeimminent threat of civilwar,theearlsofNorfolkandKent

decided that discretion wasthe better part of principledresistance, and abandonedLancaster to rejoin the court.Realising now that he couldnothopetoprevail–andalso,at almost fifty, findinghimself progressivelydisabled by his failingeyesight – Lancastersurrendered to his king,kneeling in the mud of aJanuary morning to ask hisyoung cousin’s forgiveness.

Hissubmissionsavedhis lifeand his lands, albeit at thecost of crippling financialpenalties.Thereafter,hobbledby thesemonetarybondsandby his increasing infirmity,Lancaster was in no furtherpositiontoresist.Opposition had reared its

head,andithadbeencrushed.Like Edward II andDespenser before them,Isabella and Mortimer couldhave chosen to learn lessons

from the resistance theyfaced. Instead, like Edwardand Despenser before them,they clung tighter to thepowertheyhadachieved.Herson’s anger at the Scottishpeace might have givenIsabella pause for thought;she was an astute woman,after all, and her authorityfundamentally depended onhis – a fact which made hisapproach toward adulthood achallengingly complex

political phenomenon.Perhapsshehadablind faiththat her influence over herson could not be shaken;perhaps she was simplyunable to see theramifications of long-termstrategy when confrontedwith thepressing imperativesof short-termgain.Perhaps–and unknowably – thedynamics of her relationshipwith Mortimer obscured anyother consideration, political

orpersonal,althoughithastobesaidthatIsabellahadneverbeforeknowinglysetherowninterests aside. What iscertain, however, is that sheandMortimer now sought totighten their stranglehold onpower with a narcissism andparanoia to rival that of theregimetheyhaddestroyed.The web was drawn ever

closeraroundakingwhohadshown such unsettling signsof independent thought. Not

only had Edward beenparaded as the figurehead ofmilitary action againstLancaster’s revolt, but hishousehold was filled withplacemen loyal tohismotherandMortimer.Hecould trustonly a few of the servantsaround him, notably hissecretary Richard Bury andhis close friend WilliamMontagu, through whom hesmuggled a message to tellPope John XXII that only

letters bearing the wordspatersancte(‘holyfather’)inEdward’s own handwritingcould be read as genuinecommunicationfromthekingrather thandictationby thosewho controlled hisgovernment – clearly, now,againsthiswill.And Edward was right to

bewary.Inearly1330,ayearafterthefailureofLancaster’srebellion, Isabella andMortimer resolved to flush

out any last traces ofdisloyalty. The king’s uncleof Kent had recoveredenough of his position afterhis flirtation with Lancasterto be entrusted in February1330 with the task ofescorting Edward’s QueenPhilippa – a small, pregnantfiguredeckedoutinthefinestgold tissue – to hercoronation in WestminsterAbbey. But a month laterKent was arrested on

suspicionoftreason.Hedgingand vacillation were by thisstage second nature to Kent;while in Paris with Isabellabefore the invasion of 1326,theearlhadcoveredhisbackby sending covert, panic-tinged messages to Englandto reassure the king that,despiteallappearancestothecontrary,hehaddonenothingthat might damage his royalbrother’s interests. He mightnow have felt that he had

been lucky to escape hisentanglement with Lancasterwith his head and his estatesintact, and yet he chafed athis lossof influenceatcourt,and the dominance of thevauntingly arrogantMortimer.Sowhensecretinformation

reached him that the wildrumours were true – that thedead king Edward was stillalive, and a prisoner in theDorset castle of Corfe – he

had responded with alacrity,setting in train plans for hisbrother’s rescue and acounterrevolution to restorehim to the throne. But themessages came from agentsofMortimerandIsabella,sentto entrap him; and, havingenthusiastically demonstratedhis willingness to plot theirdownfall, Kent was broughtbefore parliament atWinchesterinMarch1330tobe condemned by letters

written in his own hand. On19 March, this son, brotheranduncleofkings,a foolish,vain man brought down bypolitical ambition unmatchedby political judgement, wasled,shiveringinhisshirt,outof the gate of WinchesterCastle to a scaffold erectedbeyond its walls. There hestood for long, agonisinghours, until the daylightbegan to fade. Disillusionwith the regime that had

condemned him was now sowidespread and so profoundthat no one could be foundwhowaswillingtospillsuchroyal blood. At last a felonheldinthecastle’sjailagreedtowield theaxe in return fora stay on his own execution;and when Kent’s severedhead was raised, the crowdstoodsilentandstony-faced.The circle was almost

complete. It seemed, now,that Isabella and Mortimer

were unassailable, theirlimitless power brutallydemonstratedinthekillingofthe king’s uncle. But, asEdwardIIandDespenserhadfound after the execution ofanother royal earl, powerbased on fear, suspicion andruthless self-enrichmentmight prove ephemeralwhenconfronted with a challengethat could call on deepwellsof legitimacy and loyalty.Edward II had been

overwhelmed by the force ofhis wife’s betrayal; now itwas Isabella’s turn toexperience the sudden shockof rejection by the son inwhosenameshehaddeposedhisfather.Bytheautumnof1330,the

earlofKent’slandshadbeenparcelledouttosupportersofthe regime – many of them,with damning predictability,to Mortimer’s son and heir.Watchesweresetontheports

in case of invasion by thosealliesoftheearlwhohadfledabroad, and everywhereMortimer’s spies multiplied.Bythetimeaparliamentwascalled tomeetatNottinghaminOctober thefogof rumourand suspicion curled sodensely about the court that,when Mortimer and Isabellatookupresidenceinthecastlethere,perchedonasandstoneoutcrop above the city, theydid sowithguards redoubled

around them. The seventeen-year-oldking,asalways,wasin their company, but thatwasnoreasontobeanythingless than watchful. On 18OctoberMortimersummoneda number of Edward’shouseholdknights, theyoungking’s friend WilliamMontagufirstamongthem,tobe interrogated oninformation that they wereplotting against the regime.Mortimer’s spies had served

him well, in all but onecrucial respect:Montagu andhis friends were not plottingagainst the king, but withhim.This time Mortimer,

though clearly suspicious,waspersuadedtoletthemgo,and once their questioningwas over they made muchplayof theirpublicdeparturefrom the city. The followingnight,however, theyreturnedwithout warning or fanfare,

silent this time in thedarkness. They gathered,Montagu and two dozenothers,atthefootofthecastlemound, well away from thetorchlit gates and armedguards who both protectedthekingandimprisonedhim.Montagu and his men felttheir way into a hiddenpassageway carved into therock,asecretwhichthey,butnot the garrison above, hadlearned from a sympathetic

townsman. Carefully, withweapons in hand, they madetheir way up the pitch-darktunnel, a steeply curvingslope punctuated with roughstairs,untiltheyemergedintothe heart of the castle. Asthey had arranged, Edwardwas waiting to meet them.Mortimer and Isabella weresurrounded before they knewwhat was happening, thequeen forced back into herbedchamber, Mortimer

struggling in shock and furytodrawhisswordagainsthisgrim-faced assailants, butquickly disarmed andoverpowered. After threeyears,theruleofIsabellaandherconsortwasover.Mortimer’s fatewasnot in

doubt. The scene had beenplayed out too many timesbefore in the bloodstainedyears that had been EdwardII’s legacy to his kingdom:therewastheproclamationof

evident guilt – in this case,the murder of the last kingand the usurpation of thepowerof thepresentone; thesentence of a traitor’s death;then, on 29 November, thescaffold at Tyburn. Just ayear earlier, Roger Mortimerhad styled himself KingArthur at a tournament ofextraordinary magnificencewhere he sat crowned at aRound Table with IsabellaplayingGuinevereathisside.

Now he was stripped of hisclothes and strung up fromthe gallows, a man hangedlike a common thief with alack of ceremony thatmocked the hollow vanity ofhisformerpretensions.For Isabella, Edward’s

coolly executed coup had avery different outcome. Shewas, after all, his honouredmother, who had beendeplorably diverted from herroyaldutytoherhusbandand

son byMortimer’s traitorousmachinations. For severalweeks she was kept underguard at Berkhamsted Castleuntil it became clearwhetheror not she would accept thisrevisionist account of heractions – butwhatever doubtthere might have been wasquickly dispelled. Isabellahadalwaysbeenarealist,andshehadlearnedatallcoststoprotectherowninterestseversincethedayshehadstoodat

the altar as an uncherishedbride twenty-two yearsearlier.Wemust assume thatshe mourned for Mortimer,given theevident intensityoftheirpartnership,butshetookcaretoleavenopublic tracesofhergrief.ByChristmasshehad rejoined her son’s courtatWindsorCastle,wheresheremained for the next twoyears under the mostluxurious house arrestEdward could provide. She

had formally surrendered hervastestates toher sonwithina week ofMortimer’s death,and a month later shereceived in return a grant of£3,000 a year to provide forwhatwouldbeasumptuouslyappointed retirement. From1332 her freedom ofmovement was graduallyrestored, and she spentmuchofhertimeatCastleRising–a formidable keep set on topof mighty earthworks a few

miles from the sea in north-westernNorfolk –where shemaintained a statelyhousehold and entertainedroyalvisits fromher sonandhisgrowingfamily.She had discovered, in

violent and painful fashion,that the will to power couldbe its own undoing. Butperhaps this royal retirementwasvindicationofadifferentkind. The deference andluxurythatwereherduewere

now hers without question,and she could claim – albeitby a tortuous route – anextraordinary legacy in theperson of her son. Edwardhad inherited his mother’sintelligence, but, more thanthat, whether by nature ortraumatic nurture, he haddeveloped the far-sightedpolitical vision that both hisparents had lacked. Heunderstood that the power ofhis crown lay in law, not

tyranny; in loyalty, not fear;and in commanding theconsent of his realm, notcowing it into compliance.And by the time Isabellacametofaceherlastillnessin1358, Edward was thirtyyears into a reign thatwouldearn him an epitaph as ‘theflower of kings past, thepatternforkingstocome’.By then, thebloodyevents

of her political life weredistant memories for the

sixty-three-year-old queen.That she had found someform of peace with that pastseemsa likely readingofherrequest that she should beburiedinthecrimson,yellow-linedmantleinwhichshehadbeen married half a centuryearlier, with the silver vasecontaining her husband’sheart interredaboveherown.And perhaps thatreconciliationhadmoretodowith the queenship her

marriage had brought herthan it did with theman shehad married. Isabella hadfought for her rights as ananointed queen of England.Shehad shown–albeit for abrief moment – that femaleleadershipcouldrepresentthelegitimacy of the crownforcefully enough to deposean anointed king. And herpoliticallegacytohersonlaymost powerfully in thelessons he learned about the

natureofthatlegitimacyashewatchedherdoso.Therewasonemorewayin

which Isabella continued toshape English politics evenafter she had accepted herenforced retreat into gildedretirement. Nearly twocenturiesearlier,HenryIIhadsucceeded to the throne ofEngland as the heir of hisremarkable mother Matilda.His descendant Edward III –who had now come into

premature possession of thesame crown through theintervention of anotherformidable woman – washardly likely, therefore, toaccept the wholesaleexclusion of the female linethat had been adopted acrossthe Channel as an expedientrationalisation for theaccession of Isabella’sbrothers as kings of France.When her last survivingbrother, Charles, who had

done somuch to support herrebellionagainstherhusband,diedin1328,hetooleftonlyinfant daughters, and thegreat lords of France hailedhis cousin Philippe ofValoisas their king. But Edwardmade it his life’s work topress theclaim to theFrenchthrone that he inheritedthroughhismother.Notonlyhad Isabella overthrown aking; she had chartedEngland’s course into a war

thatwould last forahundredyears.

MARGARET

AGreatandStrongLabouredWoman

1430–1482

OurLadySovereign

Margaret of Anjou was notborntobeaqueen.Itwasnot

that she lacked royal bloodflowing through her veins:she was directly descended,after all, from Philippe ofValois, the king who hadsucceeded to the Frenchthrone after the deaths ofIsabella’s brothers. LikeIsabella herself, she couldtraceherlinebacktoEleanorofAquitaineandtheEmpressMatilda, and, through herpaternal grandmother, shecounted the kings of Aragon

among her immediateforebears.But,while her fatherRené

was rich in grandly emptytitles,hewaspoorinpracticalpower. Second son of theduke of Anjou, he styledhimself duke of Lorrainethrough his marriage to theduchy’s heiress, and king ofSicily, Naples and Jerusalemthrough his ambitiousgrandfather’saccumulationofpaper claims to far-flung

crowns. But his wife’s rightto Lorraine was fiercelycontested by the next maleheir to the duchy, whoinflictedacrushingdefeatonRené and his army in thesummer of 1431. René spentthreeof thenext six years incaptivity, only securing hiseventual freedomthrough thepayment of a punishingransom.OnhisreleasehesetsailforNaples,hopingtowinthat kingdom in place of the

dukedom he had lost, but,fouryearsof fighting later, adisconsolateRenéwasdrivenout of Italy for good. Afterthedeathofhiselderbrother,he was now duke of Anjouand count of Provence, butthe resources he hadexpended in pursuit of hishollow crowns had left himscarcely able tomaintain thestateofthoseremainingtitles.Margaret, meanwhile, had

been left behind in France

along with the rest of theduke’s young family, at firstunderthesupervisionoftheirmother Isabelle of Lorraine,and then – from 1435, whenIsabelle made her way toNaples as an advance guardforher imprisonedhusband’sclaims there – of theirformidable grandmother,Yolanda of Aragon. By thetimeRenéeventuallyreturnedhome in 1442, twelve-year-old Margaret had learned an

extended lesson in howcapable a woman could bewhen called upon to wieldauthority for an absenthusbandorson.Shehadalsodiscoveredthatneitherpowernorwealthcouldbetakenforgranted. Rights, it seemed,had to be fought for,possession asserted ratherthanassumed.Still, the observation that

the wearing of a crown didnot automatically confer

controlofakingdomseemedunlikely to bear directly onMargaret’s own experiences.Her marriage was alreadymuch discussed, but none ofher prospective suitors – theson of the count of St Pol,and successively the son andthe nephew of the duke ofBurgundy, powerful thoughtheymightbe–offeredherathrone.Nor did the return ofher thwarted andimpoverishedfather,akingin

insubstantial name only,promise a radical shift inherdestiny. But it came all thesame, thanks to the warbetween England and Francethat had been precipitated byIsabella’sclaimtotheFrenchcrown a hundred yearsbefore.Before her death in 1358,

Isabella had had thesatisfactionofseeingherson,Edward III, win greatvictoriesatCrécyandPoitiers

in pursuit of the throne that,he believed, she hadbequeathed him. That claimwas fiercely disputed by theFrench, who now elaboratedthe pragmatic precedent bywhich Isabella’sbrothershadbecome kings of France inplace of their infant niecesinto a freshly minted‘ancient’ tradition, the ‘SalicLaw’, which formallyprohibited female heirs fromeither taking, or transmitting

rights to, the crown. ButdespitethisFrenchresistance,Edward’s military talentswereenoughtoregaincontrolof the great duchy ofAquitaine, restored almost tothe glories of its full extentunder its duchess Eleanorcenturiesearlier.Edward’s triumphs,

however, did not last. Lessthan thirty years after hisdeath, English politicsimploded spectacularly under

the strain of the paranoidmegalomaniaofhisgrandson,Richard II. Richard lost histhrone and his life to hiscousin, Henry of Lancaster,and the French were full ofscorn when Henry’s son,HenryV,soughttorenewtheEnglish claim to theirkingdom. But their jeers fellsilent when this stern youngman–scarredbyacrossbowbolt taken full in the faceamid themaelstrom of battle

at the age of just sixteen –crushed the flower of Frenchchivalry into the mud atAgincourt. He proceeded,town by town and castle bycastle, to conquer Normandyfor the first time since it hadslipped through King John’sfingers two hundred yearsearlier.By1420Henrywasina position to dictate terms tohis bruised and batteredopponents, and those termswerethatheshouldmarrythe

French king’s daughterCatherine and be recognisedasheirtotheFrenchthrone.WhileHenry entered Paris

in triumph, the heir he hadsupplanted–hisnewbrother-in-law,thedauphinCharles–wasforcedtowithdrawsouthto the Loire to shelter in thegreat castles of Anjou undertheprotectionofitswidowedduchess,Yolanda ofAragon,whose daughter Marie hemarriedin1422.ButHenry’s

brightly burning flame wassoon consumed by its ownferocity.Hediedofdysenteryat Vincennes, south-east ofParis,attheageofjustthirty-five, leaving as his successorababysonhehadneverseen.ForlongyearsafterhisdeaththenoblesofEnglandworkedtogether to defend his legacyin the name of this infantking, Henry VI, but duringthat time the Frenchregrouped, rearmed, and

renewed a war that theEnglishhadbelievedtheyhadalreadywon.In 1429 French military

resistance was givenoverwhelming moral forcewhen – thanks to theunearthly inspiration of apeasant girl named Jeanned’Arc – the dauphin CharleswasanointedandcrownedasKing Charles VII at ReimsCathedral, the site where, byhallowed tradition, the

monarchs of France wereinvested with their divinelysanctioned authority. Inresponse, the English lordsscrambled to arrangecoronations for the boy-kingHenryVIonbothsidesoftheChannel, but the improvisedceremonial with which hewas crowned king of Francein Paris only served toemphasise the solemnity ofhis rival’s consecration.Thereafter, the French began

to win territory andfortificationsaswellasheartsand minds. Paris itself wasrecaptured in 1436, and bytheearly1440sthetideofthewar was turning in theirfavour,whiletheEnglishdugin their heels in defence oftheir increasingly embattledhold on Normandy. And itwasinthiscontextthatyoungMargaretofAnjou’smarriagesuddenly became amatter ofurgent diplomatic

significance.At the beginning of 1444

theEnglishsoughtatruce,anhonourable breathing-spacein which theymight hope toconstruct a strategic responseto this alarming Frenchresurgence – and no betteropportunity to stop thefightingwas likely topresentitself than their young king’sneed for a wife. Charles VIIwas graciously amenable tothe unwontedly conciliatory

toneoftheEnglishapproach,but, though he himself haddaughters, their hands werenotoffered inmarriage–notbecause they were KingHenry’s first cousins (papaldispensation could set asidesuchentanglementsofblood,after all), but because Henrystill claimed their father’scrown.Abridewouldhavetobe foundwho could embodythe cause of peace withoutloss of face or the necessity

of concessions unacceptabletoeitherside.Soitwasthatalleyescame

to alight on Margaret, whoturned fourteen while theembassies were mustering inMarch that year. Her auntMarie was Charles VII’squeen; her grandmotherYolandahadbeenhisgreatestsupportinthedarkestdaysofhis disinheritance. And,although her impecuniousfamily could offer England

little by way of a dowry –only some cobbled-togethercash and her father’smeaningless titles to theislands of Mallorca andMinorca – her father Renéwas nevertheless a respectedfigure at the French court,and his duchy of Anjoupromised to provide a usefulbuffer immediately to thesouth of the beleagueredEnglish duchy ofNormandy.It was enough, and this

compromise bride served topatch together a compromisetreaty – not a permanentpeace, but a two-year truce,with the hope of furtherunderstandingtocome.On24May1444,Margaret

walkedinprocessionintothegreat church of St Martin atTours, her step made heavyby the richfur-trimmed stuffof her gown,watched by heruncle the king and her auntthe queen, her cousin the

dauphin and his Scottishdauphine, and all the greatnobles of France. There,before the altar, she met nother husband-to-be, but themanwhohadrepresentedhimonthismission:WilliamdelaPole,theforty-seven-year-oldearlofSuffolk,anintelligent,cultured man of longexperience in the war whohadrisentobecomethemostinfluential of Henry VI’snoble counsellors. It was

Suffolk who placed thegolden ring on her finger tosymbolise her betrothal(which was as binding as itwould have been had Henryhimselfspokenthevowswithher, and needed only theconsummation of themarriage to make itindissoluble). And it wasSuffolk who led her by thehand to receive theacclamationof theassembledcongregation as the new

queenofEngland.For six months after the

glittering celebrations thatfollowed the ceremony atTours, Margaret remainedwith her mother in Anjou,honoured as a queen but, foraslongassheremainedinherhomeland, required toshoulder none of a consort’sresponsibilities, eitherpolitical or personal. InNovember, however, Suffolk– now promoted to the rank

of marquis in recognition ofhis devoted service insecuringhiskingbothapeaceand a wife – returned toFrance at the head of a stillmore lavish delegation toescortheracrosstheChannel.It was five more monthsbefore they set sail: timeenough to attend themagnificent wedding of hersisterYolande to thesonandheir of Antoine deVaudemont,herfather’srival

for Lorraine, before takingleave of her parents for thelast time. By the timeMargaret and her attendantsreachedRouen, thecapitalofEnglish Normandy, she wastoo unwell – whether victimofanill-timedinfection,orofthe unfamiliar pressures ofpublic expectation – to takepart in the elaborateprocession planned for herentry into the city. It wentahead nonetheless, with her

place at its centre taken bySuffolk’s wife, AliceChaucer, in a strikingdemonstrationofthefactthattheyoungqueen’srolewasasyet formulaic rather thanfunctional, her powersymbolicratherthanreal.Alice Chaucer, at forty,

was every inch the equal ofhereminenthusband,withthequicksilverintelligenceofhergrandfather, the poetGeoffreyChaucer,andallthe

political sophistication of athree-times-married heiresswho had acquired her firstinfluentialhusbandattheageof just ten. She was also anew mother – her only son,John, had been born twoyears earlier – and shewelcomedMargaret, a queenyoung enough to be herdaughter,withakindnessthatquickly forged a deep-rootedfriendship between them.Such comfortwasmore than

welcome to a girl who wasnotfullyrestoredtohealthbythe time she braved aviolently storm-tossedChannelcrossing.Twoweekspassed after her arrival atSouthampton before she waswell enough to travel tenmiles to themodestlyaustereabbeyofTitchfieldtoembarkinearnestontherealityofherroyalmarriage.This time, themanplacing

the wedding ring on her

finger – a band set with agreatrubyfromaringhehadworn at his coronation inParis fourteen years earlier –wasnot thefatherlyfigureofthe marquis of Suffolk, buther husband, Henry VI ofEngland. At twenty-three,Henry was eight years hersenior; he stood five feetnine, with a physique strongenough to enjoy the hunt inhis many royal parks andchases, and inhisexquisitely

made cloth-of-gold robes hecutanattractivefigure.Inhisface, however, there wasnone of the grim purposewhich had marked out hisdriven,charismaticfather,norany of the battle scars theolder Henry had acquiredbefore he was out of histeens.This kingwas seven years

olderthanhisfatherhadbeenwhen he first led an army inthe field, six older than his

great-great-grandfatherEdward III when hemasterminded the coup thatoverthrewtheruleofIsabellaandMortimer;yetHenrystillapproached the world with awondering,abstractedairthatrecalled the simplicity ofchildhood. His nobles werestill – disconcertingly forthemselves,aswellasfortherestofhissubjects–minutelyinvolved in the direction ofhis government in much the

same way as they had beenwhen he was a boy. And,despite the fact that themostpressing of their concernswas the long-drawn-outstruggle to protect what wasleft of his father’s conquestsin France, the young kingshowed no flicker of interestin crossing the Channel totake command of his ownarmy–andhislordsmadenoeffort to persuade him,perhaps surmising that his

artless presence in themilitary or diplomatic frontlinewouldbemorehindrancethanhelptotheirefforts.Still,for Margaret at least he waskind and welcoming, not anintimidatingly experiencedoldermanbutan innocentsounworldly that he sometimesfound himself affronted bythesophisticatedmannersandsupple morals of his owncourt.In her husband’s

reassuringly gentle companythe young queen rode to hernewcapital.There,duringtheprevioussummer,ithadtakenthemayorandaldermenthreeweeks of heated debate todecide on the colour of theoutfits inwhich theyplannedto accord her a formalwelcome. Now, dressed intheir much-discussed bluegownswithscarlethoods,thisaugust deputation met her atBlackheath on the south side

of the Thames on 28 May1445, and escorted herthrough the city in anelaborate procession which,over the course of two days,took her past eight speciallydevised pageants performedon stages constructed alongher route. At London Bridgeshe was greeted by thelavishly gowned andgarlanded figure of ‘Plenty’,before ‘Peace’ steppedforward to expound with

laboured dignity on theexpectations that weighed soheavilyonthismarriage:

So trusteth yourpeople, withaffiance,

Through yourgraceandhighbenignity,’Twixt therealms two,England andFrance,

Peace shallapproach, restandunite,Marssetaside,with all hiscruelty,Which toolong hathtroubled therealmstwain,Biding yourcomfort in thisadversity,MostChristian

princess, ourladysovereign.

It was an onerous

responsibility to rest on theslight shoulders of a fifteen-year-old girl, but perhaps agranddaughter schooled bythe formidable Yolanda ofAragon expected no less aduty than tobe themeans ofpeacebetween twokingdoms

thathadfoughtforahundredyears.CertainlyMargaretdidnot falter as she was carriedin a litter to WestminsterAbbey for her coronation,dressed in white damaskpowdered with gold and apearl-encrustedcirclet restingon her loosened hair, whileher subjects cheered, theirhearts warmed and theirhopesraisedbythewinethatflowed for this celebratorymoment in the city’s

conduits.But – as the hangovers

faded,thecapitalsettledbackinto hustling, jostlingnormality, and the queen setaboutthetaskoffulfillinghernew role – it graduallybecame clear that there wasnothing simple about whatshe was required to do.Comforting though it mightbe to a young bride, KingHenry’s benevolentvaguenessposedan insidious

threat to the entire edifice ofthe government that wasconducted in his name.Onlythe king, after all, had theGod-given authority toadjudicate between thecompeting concerns andopinions of his subjects inorder to rule in the interestsof the realm as a whole. AkingsuchasEdwardII–whohad ruled in the interests ofHugh Despenser rather thanany approximation of the

common good – had foundthat he might forfeit thatauthority, with catastrophicconsequences.ButHenrywasnot a tyrant. Instead, hesimply smiled and noddedand expressed mildamazementattheworkingsofthe world – ‘St John, grantmercy!’ was a favouriteexclamation – beforeagreeingtowhateverproposalwas presently placed beforehim.

The individual authors ofsuch proposals might feel aglow of satisfaction that theking had shown suchexcellent judgement inendorsing their petitions.Cumulatively, however, thiswas not judgement; it wasfailuretorule.Thatwasmoreobviousatsometimesthanatothers.Henry’s‘decision’,forexample, to grant thestewardship of his duchy ofCornwall twice over to two

lords who were bitter localrivals could hardly bemistaken for consideredpolicy, resulting as it did inthe ravages of a privatewar.But the resultsofhispassivemalleability were mostperniciously evident on abigger stage than theincreasingly disorderedEnglish regions: themonumental theatre of warwithFrance.While Henry was a child,

his nobles had workedtogether to preserve hisfather’sconquests,theirunityof purpose underpinned bothbythestrengthoftheEnglishmilitary machine during the1420s and by the obviousneed for collective ruleduring the king’s longminority. It was with somerelief that the lords hadsoughtatlasttohandoverthereins of government whenHenryapproachedadulthood,

and precedent encouragedthemtoassumethathewouldbe waiting impatiently toseize them from their grasp.Instead, to their puzzledconsternation, they found thereins dangling limply in hisfingers. If a matter hung onthe king’s personal initiative,nothing happened; if itdepended on the petition ofan interested party – as wasoften the case with grants ofroyal office and revenue –

then royal policy lurchedindiscriminately, pulled thiswayandthataccordingtothedemands of the latestpetitioner to secure access tothe apparently infinitelypliableking.Clearly, he was too

‘young’ to rule without wiseadvice. (‘A saint’, wrote hishagiographer;‘anaturalfool’,his subjectsmuttered in theircups.) Into the breach hadstepped the earl of Suffolk.

As steward of the king’shousehold, he could hope toshieldthekingfromthemorehaphazardly importunate ofhis subjects, and as a greatnoble and member of theroyal council, he might beable tomaintain enoughof aconsensus among themagnates to keep the ship ofstateonitscourse.ThewarinFrance had dominatedSuffolk’s entire life. Hisfather and brother had died

fighting under Henry V’scommand, his father at thesiege of Harfleur and hisbrother as one of the fewEnglish casualties atAgincourt. Suffolk himselfhad fought in France forthirteen years, during whichtime he had been capturedand forced topayacripplingransomtosecurehisfreedom;and his wife Alice was thewidow of his formercommander, the earl of

Salisbury, who had beenkilled by a rogue artilleryblast at the siege ofOrléans.Suffolk, if anyone,understood by 1445 that, intheabsenceofawarriorking,a lasting peace was the onlyway to secure England’spossessionofNormandy.What was less clear was

how peace should beachieved. The treaty thatbroughtMargaret to Englandhad bought time to consider

thatquestion–butnotmuch.By 1445 it was obvious thatthe Frenchwould have to beoffered some concreteconcessionif theyweretobeinducedtocometoterms.So,behind closed doors, Suffolkandhiscolleaguesbrokeredadeal: England would cede toFrancethecountyofMaine–which lay between English-held Normandy and FrenchAnjou, and was still,precariously, under English

control – in return for atwenty-year extension of thetruce.Itwasnotperfect,butitwouldhave todo; and it hadthe manifest advantages ofallowing England time tosecure Normandy’s borderswhile at the same timerefillingroyalcoffersthathadbeen emptied by thirty yearsofconstantwarfare.Behind closed doors too,

Margaretlenthervoicetothenegotiations through which

this dealwas concluded.Themakingofpeacebetweenherown country and herhusband’swasafterall,asthecity of London’s pageantshad so ponderouslyemphasised,herraisondêtreas England’s queen. She hadno direct role in the shapingof policy; but the idea thatMaine should be a bridgebetween her husband’s landsinNormandyandherfather’sin Anjou, its surrender into

French hands bringingadvantage to both sides,cannothavebeenunwelcometo her. And so she did whatshe could, as a dutiful queenshould, to facilitate anunderstanding between heradopted home and thekingdomofherbirth.There were profound

tensions in this role, tensionsevident even in thediplomaticlanguageinwhichherintercessionwascouched.

When shewrote to her ‘verydear uncle of France’ tosolicit his ‘good dispositionand inclination … for thegood of this peace’, she didso using her formal title as‘queen of France andEngland’ – words whichprovocatively encapsulatedtheessenceoftheconflictshewas trying to end. But therewas at least hope that thetruce for which she andSuffolk were working so

assiduously would serve tomitigate the potentiallydisastrous effects of herhusband’s inability tocommandhisownkingdom.Thathopedidnotlast.The

difficulty of enforcing asingle, clear policy in thename of an inert king meantthatthetrucewasfollowedbyno effective retrenchment inNormandy’s defences, whileat the same time the Englishforces occupying Maine

refused to obey the order tosurrender it into Frenchhands. Charles VII wasalready well aware thatmilitaryaswellasdiplomaticcardswerestackedhighinhisfavour, and this Englishfailure to abide by the termsof a treaty they had been sodesperate to secure gave himlegitimate reason to sweepthe agreement aside. InFebruary 1448 his armiesmarched into Maine to take

byforcewhattheEnglishhadpromised him. The countywashiswithinweeks;and inthe summer of 1449 Charlesturned his attentions toNormandy. It took only twomonthsforRouen,thecapitalof English government inFrance, to fall. The Englishretreatbecamearout,andbythe summer of 1450 not afoot of land in Normandyremained inEnglishhands toshow that Henry V’s

spectacular conquests hadevertakenplace.As this disaster unfolded,

across the Channel the newswas met with first disbelief,then horror, then finallyvitriolic recrimination. Ascapegoat was needed: afterall, only evil counselwhispered into the ear of theinnocent king could haveengendered such acatastrophe.Whiletherestofthe nobles backed away as

surreptitiously as they couldfromanysuggestionthattheyhad played a part informulating the failed treaty,Suffolkstoodalone,unabletoexplainawayhisleadingrolein its inception. As recentlyas June 1448 he had beenpromotedtotherankofdukeasrewardforhisloyalserviceto the king. Now, on 22January1450,hestoodbeforeHenry and the lords inparliament to answer for his

treason.This gifted man defended

himselfwithpassionandwit,but he was unable to findshelter from the stormwhichthe loss of Normandy hadunleashed. InMarch1450heformally submitted to theking’s grace and accepted asentence of five years’banishment from England.For his accusers inparliament, this compromiseneatlyavoided the risk thata

full trial would expose theinconvenient truth thatSuffolkhadnot,infact,actedalone. But for the king’ssubjects beyond parliament’swalls–furiousthatthousandsof pounds in taxation hadbeen drained from theirpockets to pay for aprotracted military fiasco –Suffolk’s exile was notenough.The rage of the mob had

already claimed the life of

anotherofHenry’sministers,thebishopofChichester,whohad been butchered bymutinous soldiers inPortsmouth a few monthsearlier. Suffolk was stillunscathed when he set sailacrosstheChannelattheendofApril,andbelievedthathehadescapedtheworst;buthissmallshipwasinterceptedbyanother, aprivateeringvesselnamed the Nicholas of theTower. Its crew staged a

mock trial on the deck,declaringthat‘asthekingdidnot wish to punish thesetraitorsofhisownwill,nortogovern the aforesaid realmbetter,theythemselveswoulddo it’. Then they hacked offthe duke’s head with a rustysword, and abandoned hismutilated corpse on the sandatDover.It was the beginning of a

bloody summer.King, queenandnobleshadgatheredfora

parliament at Leicester whennews came of Suffolk’sshocking death, and it wasless than a month later thatmore messengers arrived,breathlessandsweatingintheheat, to report that Henry’sdiscredited government wasunder attack. Across south-easternEngland,thousandsofhis subjects were rising inrevolt, spontaneous protestbecoming concertedinsurrection under the

charismatic leadership of aKentishman known as JackCade.Margaret foundherselftravelling south amid a tenseand armed convoy as herhapless husband rode to hiscapital, accompanied by animposing company of hismagnates, to issue his royalcommand that the rebelsshoulddisperse.Andshewasat his sidewhen he retreatedbacktothesafetyofhiscastleat Kenilworth two weeks

later, having utterly failed inhispurpose.The rebels swarmed to the

south bank of the Thames,and then across LondonBridge into the city itself,rallying support as theywentwith a manifesto that railedagainst the ‘false counsel’that had brought KingHenry’srealmtothebrinkofruin: ‘for his lands are lost,his merchandise is lost, hiscommons destroyed, the sea

islost,Franceislost,himselfso poor that hemay not payforhismeatnordrink’.Itwasapowerfulmessage, andonethat spoke eloquently to theinhabitants of a region thatnow looked with dreadtoward the coast, where thetriumphant French wereseizing their new-foundopportunity to raid andplunderwithimpunity.But itwas the rebels’ own

violence that proved their

undoing. Though Cade heldhis own judicial hearings inthe capital, seeking todemonstratethelegitimacyofhis cause, the courtiers androyalofficialsconvictedtherewhowereunluckyenough tofall into the rebels’ handswere slaughtered, theirsevered heads paraded onpikes to the delight of themob, while houses andworkshops were looted andburned. Sympathetic though

theLondonersmightbetotherebels’ demands for reform,theywouldnotstandbywhiletheirgreatcitywasdestroyed.On the night of 5 July, abattlewas fought on LondonBridge between Cade’s men,whowere expecting tomovefreely between the city andtheircommandeered lodgingsacross the Thames inSouthwark, and a cadre ofLondoners and loyalistsgrimly determined to keep

them out. After hours offighting, with deatheverywhereathandbywater,fire and sharpened steel, thesun rose on a scene not onlyof devastation, but ofresolution. The revolt wasover.Margarethadaroletoplay

in the long process ofrestoring order to the chaos-ravaged south-east, since theroyal pardon dangled as acarrot to induce the rebels to

dispersewasoffered–aswastraditional – ‘by the mosthumble and persistentsupplications, prayers andrequests of our most sereneandbelovedwifeandconsortthe queen’. Not that thepardon was enough to saveCade, who died from theinjurieshesufferedduringhiseventual arrest on 12 July.This inconvenientdemisedidnot prevent the authoritiesfrom inflicting the proper

penalties on such anegregious traitor: his nakedcorpsewaspubliclybeheadedoutside Newgate prison fourdays later, and his head thenleft to rot on a spikeoverlooking London Bridge,while the pieces of hisquartered body weredespatched for macabredisplay on city walls aroundthecountry.‘Normality’ had returned.

The king’s authority was

once more unchallenged; itsjusticewasproperlytemperedby his queen’s mercy; andtraitors – as Cade’sdecomposing skull remindedthose Londoners who raisedtheir eyes to see it – wouldmeet their just deserts. Still,allwasnotquite as it shouldbe. The shock of revolt haddone nothing to jolt thealmost thirty-year-old kinginto any more activeengagement with his

responsibilities. The duke ofSuffolk had been taken fromhisside,butthatmerelyleftavacancy–andone forwhichthere were now, alarmingly,competing candidates. Twoof Henry’s cousins began toassert theirclaims to leadhisgovernment, and the conflictbetween them exposed moreexplicitly than ever the factthat the mild-mannered kingwas incapable of ruling forhimself.

Richard Plantagenet, dukeofYork,wasbybirthandbyinheritance the greatest ofHenry’s magnates. Directlydescended in the male linefrom Edward III, he was thelord of estates that sprawledacross England and Wales,and the confidence that thisgreatness gave him inspeaking for the realm wascompounded in the specificcircumstancesof1450bythefact that he had left the

country in thesummerof theprevious year to take up anappointment as the king’slieutenant in Ireland. Putsimply, responsibility forcatastrophe in France andconvulsionsinEnglandcouldnotbepinnedonhimbecausehe had not been there whentheytookplace.Andthewaywasthereforeclearforhimtoadopt the people’s call forjustice, denouncing the ‘evilcounsel’thathadledEngland

to disaster, and identifyingthe remedy for the country’sills in the truecounselof theblood royal, as embodied inhimself, rather than in thecorruptionandself-interestofthecourt.EdmundBeaufort, duke of

Somerset, meanwhile, wasalsodirectlydescendedinthemale line from Edward III(albeit via the controversialmarriage of Henry’s great-grandfather John ofGaunt to

his mistress KatherineSwynford, by which theirchildren, the Beauforts, wereretrospectively legitimised).This narrow escape from thewrong side of the blanketmeantthatBeaufortinfluencewas based not on any vastancestral inheritance but ontheir proximity of blood tothe ruling Lancastrian lineand their presence at theLancastriancourt.Bycontrastwith York, Somerset could

not have been moreintimately involved in theloss of France; he had beenthe commander who hadexperienced the abjecthumiliation of surrenderingRouen in return for aFrenchsafe-conduct as English-heldNormandy collapsed aroundhim. But he had thereforealso been a key agent ofpolicy formulated in theking’s name throughout the1440s, and in 1450 he

stepped unhesitatingly intothebreachtoofferleadershipagainst the turmoil thatrebellion was unleashingacrossthecountry.It was this closeness to

Henry – personal, physicaland political – that enabledSomersettowinthebattleforcontrol of government as1450 turned into 1451.Devastating though York’scriticisms of ‘court’ policymightbe(andhowevermuch

they drew a convenient veilover his own role in theregime before 1449), theintractable fact remained thatthis ‘good duke’was not theking. And the king – vague,benign and blameless –remained the only source oflegitimate royal authority.Gradually, then, Somersetpiecedbacktogetherthekindofconsensusamongthelordsand control of the king’shousehold that had allowed

Suffolk to rule before him.But this time York’sestrangement from the innercircle of noble counsellorsand his explicit criticism ofthe regime rendered Henry’sgovernmentmore brittle thaneverbefore.Henry’s queen, too, found

herplaceathissidesuddenlymore uncomfortable than ithad been since her arrival inEngland five years earlier.England’s possessions in

France were now reduced totwo unsteady footholds, onetheportofCalais innorthernPicardy,theotherthetatteredremnants in south-westernGascony of the once greatduchy of Aquitaine. ThepeaceMargarethadembodiedwas a distant, devastatedmemory. For her Englishsubjects,thelandofherbirthwas now a mockinglytriumphant enemy, and shehadnochildtobindhertoher

newnation.Nor, it appeared,was there any prospect ofone.Thekingandqueenwereadevotedcouple:he,modestand monkish as he was,showednosignofturninghisattentions elsewhere, and shetook care to design her lifearound his, her householdtravelling with his betweenthe royal palaces atWestminster, Windsor,Sheen, Greenwich andEltham.Despite this constant

company,byChristmas1452the twenty-two-year-oldqueen had not yet conceivedafter seven years of marriedlife.But the early months of

1453offerednewgroundsforoptimism, both for Margaretand for her adopted country.The duke of York had beenforced to withdraw to hisestates after a dangerouslytenseconfrontationwithroyalforcesunderthecommandof

the duke of Somerset atDartford in 1452. Somersetwas now consolidating hiscontrol of government bydespatching Henry on ajudicial progress around histroubled realm, a display ofroyal authority that wentsomewaytowardcalmingthejittery nerves of his subjects.Newswas beginning to filterthrough that a militaryexpedition sent to Gasconyunder the command of the

earl of Shrewsbury – agrizzled hero of earliercampaigns in France, knownadmiringly as the ‘EnglishAchilles’ – was findingunexpected success not onlyin defending the Englishposition there but inrecapturing lost territory,including the rich andstrategically crucial port ofBordeaux. When parliamentmet at Reading in March1453 therewasanunfamiliar

outpouring of bothenthusiasm for Henry’s ruleand taxes for his treasury.And by then,Margaret knewthatshewaspregnant.God seemed, at last, to be

smiling on a beleagueredqueen and a beleagueredcountry. In April sunshine,she travelled – carefully,given the early stage of herpregnancy – to Norfolk togive thanks atWalsingham’sfamous shrine to the Virgin

Mary. Her fellow pilgrimslooked on in awe andexcitement as a queen tookherplaceintheirmidsttopayher respects at the HolyHouse, a replicaof thehomein Nazareth where the queenof heaven had first heard thenews of her own miraculouspregnancy from theArchangel Gabriel, and toveneraterelicsthatincludedaphial of the Virgin’sbreastmilk. Margaret

bestowedon the shrineagiftof a pax – a gold tabletworkedwith the imageof anangel and encrusted withsapphires, rubies and pearls,for use during mass – toexpress her gratitude for thechildshewasnowcarrying.Her gift was apparently

rich enough to secure thefuture of her baby, since herpregnancy continued withoutincidentinthesummer’sheat,and her health remained

reassuringlyrobust.Butinallother respects God’s favourproved agonisingly transient.On17 July 1453 theEnglishforces in Gascony, who haddone so much to revive thepolitical as well as militaryprospects of Henry’sgovernment, met a FrencharmyatCastillon,twenty-fivemiles east of Bordeaux.Within hours they had beenoverwhelmed. Theirtalismanic commander, the

sixty-six-year-old earl ofShrewsbury,waskilled,alongwith thousands of his men,and, almost exactly threehundred years after EleanorofAquitainehadfirstbroughther duchy to the Englishcrown,Gasconywaslost.When the dreadful news

reached England at thebeginningofAugust,militarydisaster precipitated politicalcataclysm. King Henry’salways fragile mental

faculties suddenlydisintegrated. He was ‘takenandsmittenwithafrenzyandhis wit and reasonwithdrawn’, onecontemporary accountrecords with palpable shock.Wit and reason had neverbeen among Henry’s mostnotable attributes, but thenewly stark totality of theirabsence could not now bedisguised as the king satblank and unresponsive,

recognising no one,understanding nothing,unable to speak, or even toeat or move without theministrations of the servantswho attended him day andnight.Thiswasnot the first time

in Henry’s reign that he hadbeenincapableofanykindofcommunication;hehad, afterall, inherited his throne as anine-month-old baby. Butthat incapacityhadbeenboth

explicable and explicitlytemporary. This wasdifferent, and it wasfrightening. Who should –who could? – rule when theking was lost in a catatonicstupor, whether permanentlyornotnooneknew,with therealm reeling from militarydefeat and a nobility dividedagainstitself?Theanswerwasnoclearer

ten weeks into the king’sillness, when Margaret gave

birthon13October,thefeastdayofEdwardtheConfessor,to a healthy boy who wasnamed Edward in the royalsaint’shonour.Herhusband’spitiful state rendered himoblivious to thearrivalofhisson, just as he was toeverythingelse.ButMargarethad good reason to feelelated.Amidchaosandcrisis,shehadfulfilledherprincipaldutyasEngland’squeen.Shehadgiventherealmanheir,a

hope for the future and ananchoramiditspresentseaoftroubles.She had also presented

herself with a dilemma. Theinfant she held in her armsgave her – as Isabella haddiscovered before her – adirectstakeinthepowerplaythatsurroundedher.Whatshehad to decide now was howfarshewouldgoinusingit.

AGreatandStrong

LabouredWoman

This was the moment atwhichMargarettookherfirststep out of her husband’sdiminishing shadow to standon the political stage as aplayer in her own right,acting under her ownindependentagency–butthesurviving contemporarysources allow us onlyfragmentary glimpses of herasshedidso.

The great tradition ofannalistic writing in England– of monastic authorsrecording the unfolding ofGod’spurposeintheworldasit happened, year by year –was stuttering and faltering,to be supplanted eventually,as the fifteenth century gaveway to the sixteenth, by thegreat political propagandists,writing historyretrospectively to record theunfolding of God’s purpose

as their present politicalmasterswished it to be seen.TheirdepictionofMargaretisso powerful – culminatingwith lacerating virtuosity inShakespeare’s portrait of the‘She-wolfofFrance’–thatithas become almostimpossible not to see herthroughthewrongendof thehistoricaltelescope.Such contemporaneous

evidence as we have,however, offers less

caricature and morecomplexity.Whatiscertainisthat Margaret’s response toherhusband’sprostrationandher son’s birth was animmediate decision toadvance her own claim toexercise authority on theirbehalf. In January 1454,when her son was just threemonths old, a well-informedobserver in London reportedthat ‘the queen has made abill of five articles, desiring

those articles to be granted;whereof the first is that shedesirestohavethewholeruleof this land’ – including, theletter went on, the right toappoint ‘the chancellor, thetreasurer, the privy seal, andallotherofficersof this land,with sheriffs and all otherofficers that the king shouldmake’, together with thepower to ‘give all thebishopricsofthisland,andallother benefices belonging to

theking’sgift’.This was a dramatic piece

of self-assertion – and onewhich caused politicalshockwaves. Immediateprecedent in England offeredno support for Margaret’sclaims to power, since KingHenry’smother,CatherinedeValois, had taken no part inthe minority government setup to rule during the longyears of his childhood.Instead,QueenCatherinehad

been content to retire frompolitical life after herhusband’s early death,entertaining herself first bydallying behind closed doorswithEdmundBeaufort–thena dashing nineteen-year-old,nowthemiddle-ageddukeofSomerset – and later bymarrying an equally gallantbut much more obscureWelsh squire named OwenTudor.In part, the fact that

Margaretwasseekingtotreada different path from herroyal mother-in-lawundoubtedly reflected thedifference in the twowomen’s temperaments.Catherine was wilful,waywardandhighlystrung;itwas through her that theunhappygeneticlegacyofherfather’s mental frailty hadbeenpassedon toher son. Itwas just becoming apparent,meanwhile,thatMargarethad

inherited the determinationand political commitment ofthe formidable mother andgrandmother who hadbroughtherup.But it was not simply

Margaret’s character thatimpelledhertotrytotakethereinsofgovernment. In1422the accession of an infantking had been dramatic, butuncontroversial. Withouthesitation, all his nobles hadunited to defend his father’s

extraordinary militaryachievements in France andtomaintainthesecurityofhisEnglish kingdomuntilHenryshould come of age – a taskfor which Queen Catherine,thesisterofHenry’srivalfortheFrenchthrone,wasclearlyunsuited. In 1453, however,therewasnosuchconsensus,and no such clarity. Thesuppurating damage to thebody politic caused by thelong-term inadequacies of

Henry’s rule and theconsequent rivalry betweenthe dukes of York andSomerset was laid open topublic view by the king’sdramatic collapse. Thequestion of who should rulewhile Henry wasincapacitated was so fraughtwith tension that civil warseemednotonlyarealbutanimminentpossibility.The duke of York –

claimingstilltospeakforthe

realm as the greatest of itsmagnates–arrivedinLondonin November to assert hisright to govern on the king’sbehalf. Now that Henry’scatastrophic indispositioncould not be concealed, thiswasadifficultclaimtoresist.Within weeks, as York tookcontrol of the royal council,the duke of Somerset wasarrestedandcommittedtotheTower on the grounds of hisallegedly treasonable

involvement in the loss ofFrance.Hisimprisonmentdidnot, however, render himpolitically impotent:hisspieswere reported to haveinfiltrated ‘every lord’shouse’, and his men wereoccupying all availablelodgingsinthestreetsaroundthe Tower. The rest of thenobility, meanwhile, weregatheringarmsandmen–‘allthe puissance they can andmay’ – for the kind of self-

protection that mightprecipitate the collapse intochaos of the entire edifice ofgovernment.In this atmosphere of fear

and tension, Margaret’sattempt to insist that sheshould have ‘the whole ruleof this land’ need notnecessarily be seen as theclaim of a damagingly over-assertive woman. She hadonly to look to her ownpolitical education in her

native France for thesuggestion that she was theobvious candidate tosafeguard her husband’skingdom. Positive precedentexisted on the southern sideof the Channel: Blanca ofCastile, the littlegranddaughterwhomEleanorof Aquitaine had chosen asthe bride of Louis VIII ofFrance, had acquitted herselfwith distinction as regentduringtheminorityofherson

Louis IX, and again for thelast four years of her lifeduring his later absence oncrusade.And this process bywhich royal women mightserve as deputies for theirmen had been echoed closerto Margaret’s home in thecommandingroleshermotherandgrandmotherhadtakeninAnjou and Naples in theabsence of her imprisonedfather. No doubt the claritywithwhichwomenwerenow

excluded from the line ofroyal succession in Franceserved to simplify thisacceptance of female powerin a form that was explicitlyprovisional and temporary,but the idea that an anointedqueen–consorttoaking,andan embodiment of some ofthe more restorative andcollaborative elements of hisGod-givenauthority–might,in timeofneed,wieldpoweron his behalf had political

logic to commend it in anEnglishcontexttoo.But the potentialities of

political logic wereoverwhelmed by theparticularities of the politicalnightmare inwhichMargaretand her husband’sincreasingly unnervedsubjects found themselves atthe end of 1453. She, ofcourse, was not simply aqueenbutaFrenchwoman,atatimewhenEngland–newly

redefined in its Englishnessbythelossofallitsterritoriesin France save the port ofCalais – was reeling from abloodybatteringat thehandsof its French enemies. Thebirth of her son had rootedher as never before in thepolitical landscape of herhusband’s kingdom, but theshortweeksofhisyoung lifehad not yet been enough toallow her new persona as anEnglish queen mother to

growtofruition.Even had her French

heritage not made her anobject of suspicion, it alsohad to be said that the veryconcept of a formal regencywas foreign to the recentcourse of English history.During Henry’s childhood,when the authority of thecrowncouldnotbeexercisedby the king in person,government had beenconductedinsteadthroughthe

collective responsibility of anoble council under thenominal leadership of theking’s uncle, Henry V’syoungest brother Humphrey,duke of Gloucester, whoseofficial title as ‘protector,defender and principalcouncillor’ of Englandnotably omitted anysuggestion that he might actindependently as a regent onbehalf of his nephew. Andtwo generations earlier,

suspicion about therepercussions of committingauthority into the hands of asingle powerful individualhad similarly circumscribedthe formal role of the greatJohnofGauntintheminoritygovernment of his nephewRichardII.ForMargaret,thesealready

prohibitive circumstanceswerecompoundedin1453bythefact that thenatureofherhusband’s illness made it

difficultforher toobtainanysignificant hold on theexercise of legitimate royalauthority in his stead. In anearlier century, Eleanor ofAquitaine had enjoyed wide-ranging informal powersduring her son Richard’sabsence from England whenhewasdetainedelsewherebythe demands of crusade andthe bars of a German jail.Isabella of France,meanwhile,haddemonstrated

aqueen’scapacitytoembodythe legitimating power ofroyaljusticeandthecommongood against a king fatallycompromised by his owntyranny.But Henry was not

physicallyabsent,norwashea tyrant. He had neveroverstepped his powers;instead,hehadneverproperlyinhabited them. Margaret’sabilitytotakedecisiveactionwas therefore compromised

by the fact that her husbandwas both present andblameless: he had not doneanything wrong, even if itwas by dint of having notdone anything at all. Henrywas – technically, at least –anadult, and itwas fromhissupreme authority as kingthat she derived hercomplementary capacity ashis queen. If she steppedforward into the breach leftby his hapless inertia, the

identification between herauthorityandhiswouldserveonly to emphasise the‘unnaturalness’ – and henceillegitimacy – of her self-assertion.As a result, the one thing

on which Henry’s noblescould agree, amid thisthreatening uncertainty, wasthat the queen’s offer to ruleover them should berespectfully but firmlydeclined. Instead, an

alternativemodel–collectivenoble responsibility for theinterests of the realm, theprinciple that had sustainedgovernment during the longyearsofHenry’schildhood–offered both precedent andmeans by which royal rulecould be temporarilyapproximated.InMarch1454a deputation of lords rode toWindsor and confirmed yetagain that, despite threeattemptsusing‘all themeans

and ways that they couldthink’, theycouldextract ‘noanswer, word nor sign’ fromtheir pitifully blank-eyedking. In the absence of anyindication that he mightimminently recover, it wasdecided that the best of ahandfulofbadoptionswouldbe toallowthedukeofYork– who, like Humphrey ofGloucester before him, couldclaim to be the closest adultmaleinthelineofsuccession

– to lead the newlyreconstitutedconciliarregimeas protector of the realm.And, twoweeksbeforeYorkwas formally named to thatoffice, Margaret’s five-month-old son was createdprince of Wales and earl ofChester – a publicconfirmation of the baby’srights as heir to the thronethat served (it seemed fromher silent acquiescence, inpublicatleast)toreassurethe

queenoftheregime’sloyalty.York wasted no time in

setting about the business ofgovernment. At forty-three,encumberedwithachequeredpolitical past in this mostchequered of politicalenvironments, he showedsubstantial maturity ofjudgement in realising thatpowerwononthegroundsofa claim to speak for the‘common weal’ of the realmwouldhavetobeexercisedin

explicitly impartial, non-partisan fashion. Theprotracted strain thatHenry’sfailings had placed onpolitical life at all levels ofthe political hierarchy wasmanifestingitselfinspirallingdisorder across the country.In the north of England inparticular, violent rivalrybetween the two greatestnoblefamilies,thePercysandthe Nevilles, had all butbecome a private war. Here

York shouldered his newlyacquired powers with theutmost seriousness ofpurpose,workinghardontheone hand as a collaborativecolleagueamonghispeers inthe council chamber, and onthe other as the champion oforderwhen, steel inhand,herodeattheheadofhistroopsto quell resistance andrecalcitrance in the regions.There was no wholesalepurgeoftheroyalhousehold,

and those lords who werepolitically close to the dukesoon learned that they couldnot expect his indiscriminatesupport in their privatevendettas.But there were limits to

what York could do. Hecould actwith self-consciouseven-handedness, but hewasstill a subject, a privateindividual with privateinterests, not the anointedking. And any suspension of

disbelief about the duke’sabilitytoturntheshipofstatefromtherockstowardswhichitwasdriftingunderHenry’smotionless hand wasundermined by theinconvenient presence of theduke of Somerset – theglaring exception to York’spolicyofinclusion–whowaswaiting and watching frombehind theTower’swalls fora chance to strike backagainsthisenemy.

It came with startlingsuddenness. On ChristmasDay 1454, sixteen monthsafter he had last shown anysign of knowing who orwherehewas,thekingbeganat last to respond to thosearound him. His recoveryproved to be as rapid as hiscollapse. Five days later,Margaret brought theirfourteen-month-oldsontoseehisfather.Henrygazedatthetoddlingprinceinwonderand

askedhisname;‘thenhehelduphishandsandthankedGodthereof’, a well-informedcorrespondent reported fromthecourtatGreenwich. ‘Andhesaidheneverknewhimtillthat time,norknewnotwhatwassaidtohim,norknewnotwhere he had been while hehasbeensicktillnow.’The king’s return to his

senses provoked euphoriabothamonghissubjects–thebishopofWinchesterandthe

prior of Clerkenwell weresaid to have ‘wept for joy’after speaking to him for thefirst time – and in Henryhimself: ‘He says he is incharitywithalltheworld,andso he would all the lordswere.’ But, as this artlessoptimismmade all too clear,the king’s senses had neverincluded any comprehensionof the reality of politics, acircumstance which hisrestoration to health did

nothing to change. Nor, ofcourse, did it give all ofHenry’s subjects reason tocelebrate.Withthekingoncemore able to walk and talk,theprincipleofconciliar rulethat underpinned the duke ofYork’s protectorate abruptlyevaporated. The reassertionof Henry’s personal rulemeant the re-emergence ofthe royal household as thecentre of political gravity, aswellastherenewedinfluence

oftheroyalkinsmanwhohadled the king’s governmentuntil the onset of Henry’sillness. Somerset was freedfromtheTowerat theendofJanuary and declared to benot a traitor but a ‘faithfuland true liegeman andsubject’,andYorkcouldonlywatch with disillusion anddread as the noble consensushe had so painstakinglynurturedasthebedrockofhispower fell away beneath his

feet. On 9 February he wasremoved from office asprotector, and shortlyafterwards the duke and hismenrodeawayfromthecourtfor thegreatersecurityofhisownestates.Thistime,however,York’s

exclusion from governmentdid not, as it had done in1451, mean politicalisolation. The great Nevillefamily,ledbyYork’sbrother-in-law Richard Neville, earl

of Salisbury, and Neville’seldest son, another Richard,earlofWarwick,hadbynowconcluded that their bestchance of protection in theirviciousregion-widefeudwiththe Percys lay in solidaritywith York. The Percys,meanwhile, in a tangledamalgam of cause andconsequence, had identifiedtheir own best interests withSomerset and the renaissanceofthehouseholdregime.Asa

result,York’srenewedstand-off with the court could nolongerbesoeasilydismissedas the tantrum of a dissidentmagnate whose privateinterests had been thwarted.Instead, the duke’s positionwasbolsteredbythepoliticaland practical force of theNevilles’support,whileatthesame time the court regimewas compromised by itsincreasingly closeidentification with a partisan

faction.Andthistime,thestand-off

wasquicklybroken.Somersetsummoned the nobility to agreat council meeting atLeicester in May – anominous development forYork and the Nevilles, whosaw in this move thebeginningsofamanoeuvretodestroy them, even beforeSomerset left London forLeicesterwiththekingridinghappilyathissideatthehead

of an intimidatingly largebodyoftroops.Counterattackappeared to York to be thebest–perhaps last–hopeofdefence, andhemovedsouthat speed with his Nevilleallies and the biggest armythey could muster. On 22May, they intercepted theheavily armed royal party atSt Albans, twenty milesnorth-west of the capital.Thereitrapidlybecameclearthat the irresistible logic by

which division had becomeconfrontation now dictatedthat confrontation wouldbecomecivilwar.York, Salisbury and

Warwick, believing now thatonly Somerset’s permanentremoval from Henry’s sidecouldsecuretheirownsafety,demanded the surrender of‘our enemies of approvedexperience,suchasabideandkeep themselves under thewingofyourMajestyRoyal’.

It was a point on whichSomersetandthePercyswerehardly likely to capitulate,andfortheothernoblesintheking’s train, whatever theirprivate relationship withSomerset, the horrifyingspectacle of three greatmagnates marching in armsagainst their monarch wasenough to convince them todraw their own swords inHenry’sdefence.Thefirstblowswerestruck

ataroundteninthemorning,when York’s troops forcedtheir way into the town.Fightingcontinuedforseveralhours, with soldiersskirmishing in the narrowstreets, tramplingbloodstained feet throughbyres and kitchen gardens,and hacking through wattle-and-daub walls for thepurposes of ambush orescape. This was physicallyconfined combat, lacking the

unconstrainedbrutalityof thebattlefield,anditproducednowholesaleslaughter:probablyfewer than a hundred menhadbeenkilledbythetimeitbecame clear that York andthe Nevilles had achieved adecisive advantage. Butamong the dead – almostcertainly the victims of adeliberate manhunt ratherthan the vagaries of war –were the Nevilles’ principalenemy, Henry Percy, earl of

Northumberland, and thedukeofSomersethimself.Thekinghadtakennopart

in either the abortive attemptat negotiation that hadpreceded the battle, or thefighting itself, instead sittinghaplesslyunderhisbanner inthe market square while hisgreatest nobles fought to thedeath in the streets aroundhim.Hehadstillcontrivedtobewoundedinthemêlée,theunsuspecting victim of an

arrow that grazed his neck.But,walkand talk thoughhemight, it was now apparentwith unprecedented claritythatHenrywasnomore thana pawn who, with goodintentions and uttermalleability, would endorseany views that his currentcustodians might espouse.For now, that meantextending his royal grace toYorkandtheNevillesastheyknelt before him, and

expressing the magnificentlyvague hope, it was reported,that ‘there should no moreharmbedone’.Thenthekingobedientlymountedhishorseand rode in procession backto London with the duke hehad left the city to oppose.There, on Sunday 25 May,surroundedbyYork’sguards,he sat in state in the Gothicsplendour of St Paul’sCathedral to receive hiscrownfromtheduke’shands.

It was an imposingdemonstration of York’smastery, but also a pointedandverypublicexhibitionofhisloyalty.Theduke–whoseoptions, like everyone else’s,were narrowing as thefamiliar certainties of thepolitical world began todisintegrate–wasstakinghisfuture on an attempt torecreate the protectorate thathad allowed him to governEnglandasa loyalservantof

therightfulking.Buttherewasonepersonat

least who no longerrecognised this brand ofloyalty. Margaret had notaccompanied her husbandnorth toward Leicester, andso had been spared thehorrifying spectacle of thebloodlettingatStAlbans.Buther disquiet at theimplications of York’svictorywasmanifest. By thetime her husband re-entered

London’s gates in the duke’scompany, his queen hadretreated with their sonbehind the reassuringlyimmensewallsoftheTower.Margarethadnohistoryof

irreconcilable personalantipathy to York: she hadknownhimsince1445,whenhe escorted her throughNormandy as a fifteen-year-oldbrideonherway tomeetherhusbandforthefirsttime.Since then she had regularly

included the duke, his wifeand servants among therecipients of the gifts thequeentraditionallydistributedeach new year, and duringYork’s earlier estrangementfrom the court in 1453 hisduchess, Cecily Neville, hadwritten toMargaret toappealfor her help in healing abreach that was, sheexplained, causing the duke‘infinite sorrow, unrest ofheart and of worldly

comfort’.ButMargarethadalsobeen

closetothedukeofSomerset,whose youthful talent forsecuring the friendship ofFrenchqueenshadclearlynotdeserted him. In the autumnof 1451 Margaret hadbestowed on him the largeannual sum of £100 as asignal (and costly) mark ofher favour, and two yearslater, only amatter ofweeksbefore the duke was

incarcerated in theTower,hehad stood godfather to theyoung Prince Edward.Margaret had acquiesced,then, in York’s appointmentas protector – at the cost ofboth Somerset’simprisonment and the failureof her own attempt to rule –but it was evidently not herpreferred choice for thedisposition of her debilitatedhusband’s government. Still,she was a queen, by

venerable tradition anadvocate for politicalharmony, and York’s publiccommitment to her son’srights as prince of Walespersuaded her to bow to theforce of majority opinionamongthenobility.However, Margaret’s

political compass wasradically reset by the eventsof the earlymonths of 1455.Somerset, newly releasedfromhis prison quarters, had

come out fighting as thechampion of her husband’spersonalauthority.AndYork,in response, had taken uparms against his king. Therecould be no doubtwhere thequeen’ssympathieslayasshewaited for news from StAlbans, orof thehorrorwithwhich she received word ofSomerset’s violent death andher husband’s capture by theduke of York. York mightprotest his fidelity to Henry,

but faithful subjects, inMargaret’s view, did noteither kill the king’s chiefcounsellor or attempt tosubjecttheirsovereignlordtotheirownwill.Henrywasnolonger immobilised byillness,whichsurelyrenderedYork’s efforts to renew hisprotectorate whollyillegitimate. Not only that,butYork’svery identityonlyservedtocompoundthedeepdistrustwithwhichthequeen

nowregardedhim.Thebloodrelationshipwith

the royal line of successiononwhich thedukehaddweltsoofteninclaimingastakeinHenry’s government also, inMargaret’s eyes, now madehim a threat. The king wasdescended in the male linefromthethirdsonofEdwardIII; York in the male linefrom the fourth. Through hismother, however, the dukecould trace his ancestry back

to the second son of EdwardIII. Until now, it had beenunthinkable that this seniorclaimthroughthefemalelinecould ever be used tochallenge the authority of ananointedking.Butthenagain,it had also been unthinkablethat two royal dukes shouldfight to thedeathat theheadof their armies in the streetsofaprosperousEnglishtownwhile the king looked on indazed bewilderment. And it

might easily be noted that aclaimthroughthefemalelinehad been the basis on whichHenryhimselfhadoncebeencrownedkingofFrance.York,sofar,hadutteredno

public word that was notscrupulously loyal. But if hewas prepared to impose hiswill at sword-point on anadult and sentient king, howmuch – or how little –restraint might he show if itwereaquestionofbowingthe

knee to Margaret’s eighteen-month-old son? The queen’sown family history washardly reassuring. Her fatherRené, his loyal daughterbelieved, had been rightfullyking of Sicily, Naples andJerusalem, but had beenunable toclaimwhatwashisbecause of the challenge ofdynastic rivals. Now herson’sfuturewasatstake,and,if herhusbandwasunable torally his own cause, then it

was up to Margaret, hisdevotedconsort, to act inhisplace.Hermovewouldhavetobe

made carefully. Treadingdelicately across thisuncertain and unfamiliarground, Margaret emergedfrom theTower to rejoin herhusband. A week after thecrown-wearing at St Paul’s,king, queen and princetravelled first to WindsorCastle, and then on to

Hertford,whileYork andhisallies set about the awkwardtask of underpinning theirrenewed power. Whenparliament met at the palaceofWestminsteramonthlater,surrounded by heavily armedmen wearing the colours ofYorkandtheNevilles,publicblame for the battle at StAlbans was placed squarelyon the shoulders of the deadduke of Somerset, who wasconvenientlyunabletoobject;

‘andnothingdonethereneverafterthistimetobespokenof’, reported a nervouscorrespondent in the capital.(‘After this is read andunderstood, I pray you burnor break it’, he told therecipient of his letter, ‘for Iamloathtowriteanythingofany lord. But I must needs;there is nothing else towrite.’)His anxiety was

understandable; itwashardly

likelythatStAlbanscouldbeexpunged from the collectivememory of the politicalclasses at a stroke of theparliamentary pen. Only aday before the bill waspassed, the earl ofWarwick,the younger of the twoNeville earls, had openlyquarrelled with anothernobleman, Lord Cromwell,overwhere responsibility layfor‘thesteeringormovingofthe evil day of St Albans’.

And,eventhoughSomerset’sdeathhadremovedonebitterpersonal rivalry from thepoliticalequation,ithaddoneso at a terrible cost.Noblemen were accustomedto the risks of war, but warfought overseas, with theoddsstacked in favourof therichandpowerful:whykillalordly enemy, after all, if alarge ransom could besecured by keeping himalive? Now noble English

blood had been spilled byEnglish hands on Englishsoil. There could be nomistaking the stakes forwhich this dangerous gamewas being played, and theheirs of those who had diedmight seek revenge, notreconciliation,astheirprize.That York’s de facto

ascendancy required someformal validation to makeeffective governmentpossible, meanwhile, was all

too evident: violent disordercontinued unchecked acrosslarge parts of England andWales while the nobilitycircled one anotherwarily inthecapital.Lessclearwasthemeans by which thatvalidation should beachieved. After months offraught negotiation, thesolution onwhich parliamentsettled in November 1455wasthatthedukeshouldonceagainbeinstalledasprotector

of the realm, exactly as hehad been in the spring of1454. But this time theporousedificeofhisauthoritybegan to crumble from themoment it was established.Despite reports that ‘somemen are afeared that he issick again’, Henry was noless capable of ruling forhimself that November thanhe usually was – which wasnot saying much, but did,nevertheless, go a long way

towards undermining York’sclaimtoact inhisplace.Norwas there any viableconsensus among the lordsthatmightserveasballastforthe duke’s rule. Instead,York’s attempt to impose acontroversial financialretrenchment – a wide-ranging act of resumption,intended to cut royalexpenditure and re-establishcrown finances on a soundfooting – precipitated his

protectorate into crisis afterjustthreemonths.And observers were in no

doubtofwhowasleadingtheopposition to theduke’s rule.‘The resumption, men trust,shall forth, if my lord ofYork’s first power ofprotectorship stand, and elsenot, etc.,’ wrote JohnBocking, a servant of thewealthy Norfolk knight SirJohnFastolf, tohismaster inearly February 1456. ‘The

queen is a great and stronglaboured woman, for shespares no pain to sue herthings to an intent andconclusion to her power.’Bocking did not explicitlyarticulate the link betweenthesetwoobservations,butinsuch tense times his letter –which might, one neverknew, fall into unfriendlyhands between London andEast Anglia – was alreadyremarkably outspoken.

Margaret was not onlyresisting the implementationof the act of resumption inher own right, but offeringher leadership to others atcourt whose interests werenot served by York and hisproposals–Bocking’sphrase‘strong laboured’ meaning‘much solicited’ by thosearoundher.In other words, having

oncefailedtosecureaformalappointmentasherhusband’s

regent, Margaret – who wasnever less than resourceful –had now decided that shealready wielded enoughauthority to take actionagainst the threat that Yorkrepresented. Her husbandworethecrown,andhertwo-year-old son would do so infuture. If both temporarilyneededherhelp indefendingtheirrights–Edwardbecausehe was a baby, and Henrybecausehewasscarcelymore

capable than his son – thenshe, as Henry’s anointedqueen,wasreadyandwillingto shoulder the burden. Hersuccess in championingresistance to York’s agendawas already evident by 25February,justafortnightafterBocking’s letter, when theduke, faced with rapidlydisintegrating support amongthe nobility for his fledglingregime,resignedasprotector.The immediate result was a

fraught political impasse:while York did not haveenough authority to maintainformal command of Henry’sgovernment, neither didanyone else have enoughauthoritytosupplanthim.Margaret’swork,however,

had only just begun. Twomonths after York’sresignation, she left Londonfor her castle at Tutbury inStaffordshire, taking heryoung sonwith her. But this

was no retreat from theforefront of politics. Instead,Margaret was redrafting therules of engagement. With aregency out of the question,she could acquire no formalstake in council sessions atWestminster;butgovernmentrestedtoo–intheabsenceofa standing army orprofessionalised police forceunderthedirectcontrolofthecrown – on the practicalitiesof landed power, and it was

these that Margaret nowsoughttoharnessforthefirsttime. As she did so, no onecouldmistaketheintensityofpurpose or the focusedaggression with which herhusband’s authority wouldnowbedefended.

MightandPower

Margaret’s fortress ofTutbury belonged to the

duchy of Lancaster, whichhad been the greatest nobleestate in the country until1399whenitsowner,Henry’sgrandfather, swapped hisducal coronet for the royalcrown as King Henry IV.AmongtheusestowhichtheLancastrian kings had puttheirprivateestatessincethenhad been the endowment oftheir queens, and as a resultMargaret now held greatswathes of the duchy of

Lancaster’s lands in themidlands and the north.Togetherwiththeestatesheldbyher sonas earlofChesterand prince of Wales, thequeen could potentially callon the financial and militaryresources of a substantialterritorialpowerbasewithitscentreofgravity in thenorthmidlands and the north-west.If the duke ofYork chose touse his landed power tooverawehispeersandimpose

hiswill on government, thenhemightnowfindthatotherscoulddothesame.That, at least, was the

implication of the tension-filled stalemate that heldduring the longhotweeksofthesummerof1456,withtheprincipal protagonists ofEnglish politics scatteredaround the kingdom likepieces on a chessboard. ThedukeofYorkhadretreatedtohis impregnable castle at

SandalinwestYorkshire,andthe earl of Warwick to hisfortress at Warwick, whileMargaret and her son stayedfirstatTutburyandthenrodenorth-west to the prince’scastleatChester.KingHenry,meanwhile, tended by themembers of his household,moved between the city ofLondonandtheneighbouringroyal palaces ofWestminsterandSheenwhileacounciloflords attempted to maintain

government in his name, asJohn Bocking reported inJune. But it was clear wherethe fulcrum of power nowlay: ‘My lord of York is atSandal still, andwaitson thequeen,andsheuponhim.’And by the end of the

summer the balance wastipping in Margaret’sdirection. In late August itwas decided – tacitly, butimplicitly, at the queen’ssuggestion – that Henry

should join her and their sonin the midlands. The king,escorted by his householdentourage, arrived in earlySeptember at Coventry, thegreatest city among theprince’s estates, which layonly a few miles from thequeen’s own imposing castleat Kenilworth inWarwickshire. On 14September, his wife and soncame to Coventry to meethim – and there was no

mistaking, from the carefullyplanned pageantswithwhichtheir triumphal entry into thecity was greeted, whatMargaret intended herhusband’s subjects tounderstand: that royalauthority was now vested inthetriumvirateofking,queenandprince,withherselfat itscentre.Prophets and evangelists,

withStEdwardtheConfessorintheirmidstinagownofthe

royallest stuff the city guildscould provide, crowded ontothe stage to compareMargaret to the queen ofheaven (‘Like as mankindwas gladded by the birth ofJesus,soshallthisempirejoythe birth of your body …’).But it was a model of morethanqueenlymotherhoodthatthis august assemblage oftheatrical personages hadgatheredtoprovide.ThefourCardinal Virtues –

Righteousness, Temperance,Strength and Prudence, thechief qualities of rightfulkingship–nowpledged theircounsel to Margaret in thelaborious metre of hastilycomposedcivicverse,andtheNine Worthies then steppedforward to promise her theirservice(‘princessmost royal,as to the highest lady that Ican imagine’), before thequeen’s namesake, StMargaret,tookcentrestageto

slayadragonintriumphantlyheroicstyle.Initiallyatleast,theomens,

aswellastheoratory,seemedpromising. At the end of thefirstweek inOctober a greatcouncil gathered in the city.All the leadingmagnateshadbeen summoned to attend,and most of them complied,including,with some unease,thedukeofYork.Mostofthenobles still, and withincreasingdesperation,hoped

to find an escape from thehorrors of civil war to someformof stability;perhaps thequeen’s presentation of theroyal family as a vehicle forherhusband’sauthoritymightoffer a means to pull backfrom the precipice that StAlbanshadopenedupbeforethem. They therefore agreedto the appointment of a newset of officers of state, menwho gave Margaret muchgreater influence over the

administration of herhusband’s government, butwere simultaneouslyacceptable to themajority ofhis lords. The queen’s ownchancellor, Laurence Booth,became keeper of the privyseal; the earl of Shrewsbury,son of the ‘EnglishAchilles’who had died at Castillon,became treasurerofEngland;and the king’s confessorWilliam Wainfleet, thescholarly and conscientious

bishop of Winchester,becamechancellor.All the same, the lords

would not comply with anyattempttopursuethepartisandivision that had been sobloodily apparent at StAlbans. If, in Margaret’seyes, the duke of York’sactions that day had provedbeyond doubt that he was atraitor, it was not aconclusion that the duke’speers were yet prepared to

endorse. The duke wasrequired to swear a publicoathdeclaringhisloyaltyandobedience, but no furtheractionwastakenagainsthim;andwhenheleftCoventryhewas said tobe ‘in rightgoodconceit with the king’ –Henry’s benevolence being,as always, indiscriminate –‘butnot ingreatconceitwiththe queen’, an associate ofJohnBockingreported.Nevertheless, the practical

possibilities afforded toMargaret by her newinfluence over themachineryof government quicklybecame apparent in the earlymonthsof1457.AttheendofJanuaryaformalcouncilwasappointed to oversee herthree-year-old son’s affairs,along with new officials forhis household and theadministration of his estates.Theprince’scouncilincludedLaurence Booth, the new

keeper of the privy seal;Booth’s predecessor asMargaret’s chancellor, hishalf-brother William,archbishop of York; the newtreasurer, the earl ofShrewsbury; and Margaret’schiefsteward,John,ViscountBeaumont – all of whomweretoactascouncillors(thepatent endorsed in Henry’sname declared) ‘with theapproval and agreement ofour best-beloved consort the

queen’. Beaumont was alsoappointed steward of theprince’s lands, while twogentlemen of the king’shousehold, both of themmarried to ladies-in-waitingin Margaret’s ownestablishment, took over themanagement of youngEdward’s finances as hisreceiver-general and keeperofhisgreatwardrobe.Piece by piece, Margaret

was building a political

network that extended herreach within governmentwhile reinforcing theterritorial power at herdisposalthroughherownandher son’s estates. She wasmaking such strides, itseemed, in creating acomposite authority to serveasasubstituteforhervacuoushusband that, when she leftCoventryafterasecondgreatcouncil meeting that spring,herhorsewasprecededbythe

mayorandsheriffsofthecitycarrying their insignia ofoffice ‘like as they beforetimedidbeforetheking’,themayor’s register noted withsome surprise: ‘and so theydidneverbeforethequeentillthen,fortheyborebeforethattime always their servants’macesbeforethequeen’.Margaret might ride with

all the trappings of majesty,but therewerealsosignsthatthe efficacy of her new

authority would still belimited. The duke of Yorkwouldnotsimplybowbeforethe queen’s influence, asbecameclearwhenherefusedto attend the second councilheld at Coventry in March1457 – and for good reason,given that the queen wouldnot accept the need toconciliate a nobleman whohadriddeninarmsagainstherhusband and might pose athreattotheinheritanceofher

son. The difficulty forMargaret, meanwhile, wasthat the unique authority ofher husband’s crown reliedon his ability to provideuniversal law andrepresentativejusticetoallofhis subjects. If shewerenowto construct a new form ofroyal government intendednot only to exclude but todestroy the greatest magnatein the country, then she ranthe risk that she might

undermine the power of thecrownitself.It is not clear, however,

that Margaret fullyunderstood the pitfalls of theposition she was taking upwith such drive anddetermination.At twenty-six,she was revealing herself tobe a political force ofrelentless energy andunbending will, but sheshowed less obvious sign ofeither the tactical shrewdness

ofhercountrywomanIsabellaor the fierce intelligence oftheirmutualancestorEleanor.Moreover, her politicaleducationhadbeenconductedin France, where kings hadacquired their sovereignpowerbyagradual,attritionalprocess of subjugating greatnobledomainstotheforceoftheir authority (the English-held duchies of Normandyand Aquitaine among them).For Margaret, therefore,

steeped as she was in thepolitical traditions of adifferentkingdom’shistory,itmade perfect sense that thecrown might be required tocrushan‘overmighty’subject– a perspectivewhich servedto obscure the fact that, inEngland, the crown itselfmightbefatallycompromisedintheattempt.But, if thereweremissteps

along the political path shehad chosen, it also had to be

saidthat therewasquicksandshifting dangerously beneathher feet. The verycircumstancethatenabledhertoact– the fact that shewasthe king’s wife –simultaneously underminedher actions. The more sheasserted herself in Henry’sstead, the more he appearedan emasculated puppet, hisauthorityebbingaway;andasthe reserves of legitimacy onwhich she could draw

gradually diminished, thequeen herself became thesubject of whisperedcaricatureandcontempt.It was hardly surprising,

perhaps, that when her sonhad been born ‘people spokestrangely’, as one Londonchronicler reported. Aftereight childless years ofmarriage to an unworldlynaïf,Margaret’ssafedeliveryof an heir to the throne hadbeenasunexpected as itwas

convenient. Now, however,more elaborate rumoursbegan to circulate. LittleEdward was not the queen’sson,somesaid;othersthathewasnottheking’s,orthathehad been ‘changed in thecradle’ and was related byblood to neither king norqueen. Gossip about royalchangelingswasnothingnew(as Edward II haddiscovered), and the fact thatthe duke of York had been

heir presumptive to Henry’sthronebeforethebaby’sbirthmade the young prince anobvious focus for scurrilousspeculationamongthosewhosympathised with York’spoliticalagenda.But the language of

illegitimacy carried aparticular burden ofsignificance amid the powerplay of 1457. Margaret’spolitical leadership waspredicatedonherroleaswife

to thekingandmother tohisheir–butloyalwivesdidnotcustomarily supplant theirhusbands at the head ofgovernment. The implicationwas that unnatural impulseswereatwork,bothinsideandoutsidetheroyalbedchamber.Margaret might seek toassociate herself with thevirtuous queen of heaven inher attempt to rule through aroyal trinity of king, queenand prince, but the evident

fact that she was the primemoverofthethreethreatenedtowreckthewholeenterpriseon the rocks of her aberrantbehaviour as a wife and awoman.Despite thestridesshehad

made in building a powerbase at Coventry, theconstraints on her ability torulewerepubliclyexposedatthe end of August 1457 bythe threat of a Frenchinvasion.Dangertotherealm

required the mostauthoritative responsepossible, and that, it becameclear, was not the commandof the queen. Instead, whenking, queen and lordsconverged on Westminster,the traditional seat ofgovernment, the noblesmovedonceagaintoconvenea council under Henry’sbenignlyvacantpurview.Themagnates who were chargedby this council with

mustering sailors, soldiersand archers to defend thesouth coast and the ScottishborderincludedYorkandtheNevilles, aswell as the lordswhoenjoyedMargaret’s trustandthosestilltryingtosteeracourse between them. And,once this collectivemobilisationhad seenoff theimminentmenaceofaFrenchmilitaryoffensive,anattemptwas made to use the sameprinciple of united action to

secure internal as well asexternalpeace.Under the auspices of this

council – a fragilesimulacrum of the conciliarregimes that had safeguardedEngland during Henry’schildhood and illness – a‘loveday’ was proposed as ameansof settling theconflictwithintherealm.Theholdingof a loveday was a familiarelement within the grammarof local disputes – a

ceremony to enact anarbitratedsettlementbasedonthe principles of restorativejustice, rather than thewinner-takes-all approach ofthe law courts. Such appealsto mutual interest throughmutual concession played avital part in containinghostilities within localcommunities.Couldthesameprocess now protect thecommunity of the wholerealm?

Itwas a riskybusiness.Atthe end of January 1458, thelords began to assemble attheir lodgings in London,ready to make peace butprepared – just in case – forwar, each with hundreds ofarmed men wearing theirbadgesandliveries.Amidtheconfined spaces of the cityand its suburbs, in anatmosphere that crackled andjumpedwith tension, frictionbetween these rival bands of

soldiers threatened tosparkapolitical conflagration. Themayor and sheriffs nervouslyset their sentries to watchround the clock, despatchedpatrols to walk the mainarteries of the city, andoutlawed the carrying ofweapons inside the gates ofthecapital.And well they might. The

duke of York had taken upresidence within the gracefulwallsofBaynard’sCastle,his

London residence, whichnestlednearBlackfriarsQuayat the south-west corner ofthecitywhere theFleet rivergave into the Thames, whilethe young duke of Somerset,whohadbeenwoundedatStAlbans at his dying father’sside when he was justnineteen, had found lodgingsbeyondLudgate,whereFleetStreet and the Strand ledwestwardtotheking’spalaceat Westminster. The Neville

earls,SalisburyandWarwick,were, with York, at theirtownhouses inside the city;the new earl ofNorthumberland with theduke of Somerset outsideLondon’s walls. Those whowere charged by the councilto forge a peace among thelords therefore had to moveuncomfortably between whatamounted to two armedencampments, within andwithout the city gates, and

amid swirling rumours ofambushes and plots, adangerous confrontationbetween the hot-headed dukeof Somerset and the brashearl of Warwick was onlynarrowlyavoided.By the middle of March,

however, a settlement hadbeenhammeredoutunderthewatchful eye of thearchbishop of Canterbury.YorkandtheNevillesweretopay some notional financial

compensation and offermasses for the souls of thelords killed at St Albans; inreturn, they were to berecognised, along with thosewho had died, as the king’sloyal subjects. The lovedayitself, which would giveceremonial force to thisreconciliation,was set for 25March. That morning thecrowdsbegantogatherearly,lining the streets that led tothe great cathedral of St

Paul’s, its soaring spirereaching into the spring sky.Theywere rewardedwith anextraordinarysight.A stately procession made

its way through Ludgatetowards the cathedral, itsparticipants glittering withgemsandclothofgoldratherthan the flashes of steel thathad caused such alarm onLondon’s streets for weeksbeforehand.At itsheadcamethe youthful figure of the

dukeofSomerset,hisglovedhand reluctantly clasped inthat of Richard Neville, theearl of Salisbury. Nextwalked Salisbury’s son, theearlofWarwick,grippingthefingers of Henry Holland,dukeofExeter,acloseallyofSomerset and the Percy earlofNorthumberland,andmostrecently Warwick’s bitterrival for the captaincy ofCalais. Then came KingHenryinsolitarymajesty,his

face beneath the heavygolden crown almost as fullofwondermentasthoseofhissubjects who had come towatch thisunlikelyspectacle.And behind the king, mostimprobable of all, came thestern-faced duke of York,hand in hand with Henry’squeen.For Margaret, it seemed,

thiswasamomenttosavour.Here,onLadyDay–thefeastof thequeenof heaven– the

power of the queen ofEngland was given fullrecognition.Under her aegis,the duke of York and hisallies had been brought toadmit culpability for thebloodshed at St Albans. Noformal role had beenavailabletoher,astheking’swife, in the negotiations thatpreceded the loveday or thedocuments in which thesettlement was inscribed,other than the traditional one

of intercessor in the causeofpeace. The final text of theconcord painted an utterlyconventionalpictureofakingmovedtomercyby‘thegreatrequest, cordial desire andentreaties made to us by ourdearest and most belovedwife the queen’ out of herwishtorestore‘unity,charityandharmony’.Buttherealityofthelovedaytoldadifferentstory. Behind the inanebenevolenceofthekingstood

the unyielding will of hisqueen, and Margaret, it wasclear, was the force withwhom York would have toreckonifhemadeanyfurtherattempt to take control ofgovernment.Nevertheless,acloser look

at the rictus smiles andstrainedbodylanguageoftheprocession to St Paul’ssuggestedthat thiswaslikelytobetheopeninggambitofanewphaseofhostilitiesrather

than any kind of resolution.Thepeacenegotiationsledbythe archbishop ofCanterburyhad been well-intentioned,and York and the Nevilleshad conceded a great deal intheir search for securitythrough noble unity. But theformofthesettlementtackledsymptoms, not causes, ofconflict, and in doing so ithad entrenched divisionrather than ameliorating it.No attention had been given

to the grievances that haddrivenYork and his allies todraw their weapons at StAlbans – principally, thedifficulty of securing justiceand good government whenthe king was incapable ofruling. That problem, ofcourse, was profoundlyintractable, given that thekingremainedasincapableasever, and so mediation hadfocused on the fighting itselfand the deaths that had been

its result. But the unhappyeffectwas to predicate peaceon a public demonstrationthat there were still, threeyears after the battle, twowarring factions among thelords, whose enmity wasthereby cast in entirelypersonal terms. One was ledbythedukeofYork.Andtheother – as their symbolicpairing at the loveday madeunmistakablyclear–was ledbythequeen.

Margaret was never likelyto be satisfiedwith a gestureof reconciliation that leftYorkinfullpossessionoftheresources which had allowedhimtochallengethepowerofher husband’s crown in thefirst place. She knew how tobe pragmatic: she took theduke’s handoutside thedoorof St Paul’s with royalcondescension, just as shehad accepted her failure tosecureregencypowersduring

Henry’s illness four yearsearlier.Buthergoals,andherimplacable determination toreach them, did not change,and there is every sign thatshewelcomedthedrawingupof battle lines that the tensepolitical choreography of theloveday quickly came torepresent. That summer sheretreated to her citadel atCoventry– leavingYorkandthe Nevilles to see how farthey could pull the levers of

government in London for afew short months – beforeriding back to the capital inthe autumn to sweep themaside.As theanimatingspiritof the royal trinity of king,queen and prince, she tookcontrolofroyalrevenuesandappointmentstoroyaloffice–and began to use both toexclude her enemies frompower.Howfarshemighthaveto

gotoachievethatendbecame

apparent a few weeks afterher return. The need toneutralisetheearlofWarwick– who, as captain of Calais,commanded the onlypermanent armed forcemaintained by the Englishcrown–wasespeciallyacute,but the very fact of hiscommand in Calais (whichhad provided him, amongother things,with a lucrativesideline in freebooting raidsonChannelshipping)madeit

especiallydifficult to removehimfromoffice ifhedidnotwish to be replaced. Therewas more than one way,however, to eliminate anofficerof thecrown.Perhapsit was coincidence when, inNovember 1458, the earlbecame embroiled in adangerouslyviolentscuffleatcourt with men of the royalhousehold, but Warwickhimself did not think so. Heescaped with his life, but

clearly had no intention ofexposing himself to theongoing threat that he mightencounter a stiletto in theribs.Togetherwithhis fatherand the duke of York, heabandoned the capital to thequeenshortlythereafter.How far Margaret was

prepared to go was alsorapidly becoming clear. InMay 1459 she too decampedfromLondon to return toherbase at Coventry, taking the

kingandprincewithher andsummoning the nobles toassemble for a great councilin the city in the followingmonth.WhenYork,SalisburyandWarwickfailedtoappear– which was hardlysurprising, given thatCoventry was a much morethreateningly partisan placethan the capital they hadalready left – charges oftreason were laid againstthem. And any doubt of the

danger in which they nowfound themselves wasdispelled by the steps thequeen was taking to realisethe military potential of herestates by distributing hersmall son’s livery badge – aswan wearing a crown as acollar around its elegantlycurledneck–tothosemenofthe midlands and north-westwhocommittedthemselvestoserveherinpeaceandinwar.Itwasastrategythatwould

have been familiar to herFrench forebears. The duchyof Normandy, after all, wasnowanindivisiblepartofthekingdom of France becausePhilippe II had swept intoRouenattheheadofanarmy,andthathadnotbeenthelasttime a sword had beenunsheathed in the Frenchcrown’sattempttoimposeitsauthority throughout itskingdom. But in England,where the universal force of

royalauthorityand royal lawwas alreadywell established,thisraisingofaregionalarmycould only represent anarrowingofroyalpowerintoapartialandpartisaninterest,withallthelossoflegitimacythat implied. It was noaccident that the only twokings of England who hadlost their crowns had alsoforfeited their subjects’ trustintheirabilitytorepresentthecommon good of the whole

realm: first Edward II, in hisblinkered dependence onHughDespenser,andthentheparanoidRichardII,whohad,likeMargaret,soughttoraiseanarmyinCheshiretodefenda pale of royal authority inthe north-west against theenemies he saw everywhereinhisownkingdom.And Margaret was not

evenaking.Instead,shewasaqueenseekingtodefendtherights of her cipher of a

husband by any meansnecessary. But her refusal,now, to acknowledge thepossibility of any middleground in this conflict – herinsistence that those whowould not stand with heragainstYorktherebyrevealedthemselvesasenemiesof thecrown–putsuchstrainonthecomposite authority throughwhich she was trying to rulethat it began to disintegrate.What she was demanding of

herhusband’ssubjectswassopartisan, so divisive, that thedisjuncture between hercommanding self and theking and prince from whomshedrewherpowerwasevermoreexposed.This fraught relationship

between the vestigial powerof her husband’s royalpersona and the female willbywhichitwasnowdirectedbecame obvious that autumnwhen political tension

ratchetedupintooutbreaksofsickening violence. InSeptember the Nevilles setout across country toconverge on a rendezvouswith York at his fortress ofLudlowintheWelshmarches– the earl of Warwick freshfromaChannelcrossingwithadetachmentfromtheCalaisgarrison riding at his back,and his father Salisburyheading south with troopsfrom his Yorkshire

stronghold at Middleham.They knew they would haveto fight – but not how soon.At Blore Heath inStaffordshire on 23September, Salisbury onlynarrowly escaped an attemptto intercept him by an armyone chronicler described asthe ‘queen’s gallants’. Afterfourhoursofbloodyfighting,two thousand men lay deadon the field, among them thegallants’ venerable

commander, the sixty-one-year-oldLordAudley.For Margaret, waiting for

news five miles away, thiswasthefirstexperienceofthefrustrations of femalecommand when politicalskirmishing became openwarfare. Matilda, threecenturies before her, hadknown what it was to be aleaderwho could not lead inbattle, but at least that hadmeant that her cause,

depending as it did on herown claim to the crown,could not be summarilydecapitatedbyasword-thrustorastrayarrow.Margaret,ontheotherhand,wassecureinthe knowledge that herhusband and son wereprotectedfromthedangersofthe mêlée by inanity andinfancy respectively – butshe, who gave direction andpurpose to their cause, couldoffer their troops neither

strategy nor encouragementoncetheenemywasinsight.The crown that rested on

herhusband’shead,however,still counted for something.When their forces, regroupedand reinforced after theslaughteratBloreHeath,rodeafterSalisbury’smentowardsLudlow, they did so withroyal banners flying high.And when they camped atLudford Bridge, just belowthe looming hill on which

York’s castle stood, theCalais soldiers began todesert Warwick’s command,refusing to fight if it meanttaking the field against theking’s standard. Salisburyhad escaped defeat once, butYork could not be confidentofdoingsoagainifhisforceswere melting away. Duringthe night of 12 October, hetook thedecisionnot to fightbuttoflee.Yorkhimselfrodewestundercoverofdarkness

and took ship for Ireland,accompanied by his sixteen-year-oldsonEdmund,earlofRutland,while Salisbury andWarwick set sail for Calais,taking with them York’seldestson,seventeen-year-oldEdward,earlofMarch.It was the opportunity for

which Margaret had so longbeen working and waiting.Shehadmusteredanarmytodefend her husband’s crownandherson’sinheritance,and

her enemies had scatteredbeforeher.Allthatremained,it seemed, was to proclaimthem the traitors they were.York’s wife Cecily and theiryoungerchildrenwereplacedin the custody of theduchess’s sister, the duchessof Buckingham, whosehusband was now emergingasoneofMargaret’sprincipalsupporters. York’s lands andtenants were harried andplundered. And in early

December,attheprioryofStMaryinCoventry,aspeciallysummoned parliamentdeclared the duke of Yorkand his sons, together withthe earl of Salisbury and theearlofWarwick, tobeguiltyoftreason,andtheirlandsandlivesforfeittothecrown.By this act of attainder,

York and his allies weredestroyed in law; yet theunpalatablefactwasthattheywerenottheretobedestroyed

inperson.Nor,now,didtheyhave anything left to lose bychallenging the veryexistence of the regime overwhichMargaretpresided.Thecentrifugal forceof spirallingconflict was now so intensethat nothing could be takenfor granted, other than thecertainty that England’sfuturewouldbedecidedonabattlefield–andtheterrifyingtruth was that, on abattlefield, anything could

happen.That grim knowledge was

etched on the faces of threegenerations of the duke ofYork’s family – his sixty-year-old brother-in-lawSalisbury,histhirty-one-year-oldnephewWarwickandhisown son Edward of March,who had just turned eighteen–asthethreeearlssetsail toreturn to the south coast ofEngland in June 1460, theirshipsfullofsoldiersrecruited

once again from the Calaisgarrison.This time,however,the earls found themselveswelcomed as champions, notresisted as traitors. Margarethadbuiltherselfapowerbaseinthemidlandsandthenorth-west; the heavy cost of thatmilitarisation, it nowtranspired, was ahaemorrhagingofsupport forher cause in the south-east.The people of Kent, Surreyand Sussex, and the citizens

of London – who, thoughnervousattheapproachofanarmy,openedthegatesofthecapitaltotheYorkistlordson2 July – no longer trusted agovernment ledby thequeenfromher citadel atCoventry.Instead,theywerepreparedtogive a sympathetic hearing,and practical support, toYorkist declarations that thecrownhadbeenhijackedandroyal justice perverted forpartisanends.

That the city of Londonshouldendorsethisviewofaregime led by the queen inthe name of the king andprince was a startlingrejection both of Margaret’sclaim to exercise power onher husband’s behalf, and ofher confrontational strategy.But there would be noreconsideration of tactics orgoals; only an unyieldingresolve to defend the crownagainsttreasonableresistance.

When Warwick and MarchleftLondon tomovenorthatthe head of an army on 5July, therefore, Margaret’sforces marched south fromCoventry tomeet them. Andonceagain, the limitationsofher position and of thecomposite authority shewielded were obvious andinescapable.Sheandher six-year-oldsonremainedbehindCoventry’s city walls, safe,buthelplesstoinspireorlead

her troops, who werecommanded instead by herloyal supporters the duke ofBuckingham, the earl ofShrewsbury and ViscountBeaumont, while the kingrodealongsidethem,adocilemascot rather than a royalgeneral.At Ludford Bridge York’s

soldiers had refused to takeup arms against theirsovereign.Butnow,justninemonths later, when the two

armies met outsideNorthampton on 10 July,Henry’s insubstantialpresence provedinconsequential rather thantalismanic. The king satmeekly in his tent, shelteringfrom the pouring rain thatturned the field into atreacherous bog into whichhis army’s artillery sank,immobilised and useless inthe enveloping mud.Warwick and March seized

the advantage, and theirsoldiers overran the field inlittlemorethananhour.Theyhad ordered their troops tosafeguard the king and sparethe rank and file, so far aswas possible, whileconcentrating their assaultonthelordswhocommandedtheenemy lines. It was ashrewdly judged tactic foranarmyclaimingtofightforthecommon good, and itssuccess was startling. By

sundown, the bloodied,mud-spattered corpses ofBuckingham,ShrewsburyandBeaumont had been removedfor burial, other casualtieswere few, and King Henrywas riding biddably besidehis cousin of March and theearl ofWarwick on the roadsouth to the Yorkist-heldcapital.Pope Pius II was later

moved by this passivecompliancetodescribeHenry

as ‘more timorous than awoman,utterlydevoidofwitorspirit’.Theessenceof thispapal observation was acuteenough, but its expressionmuch less well considered.With Henry installed underYorkistguardinthebishopofLondon’spalace,andYorkistnomineesnewlyappointed tothe great offices of state, itwas apparentmore than everthat thecauseof thispuppet-king now depended on his

wife–and therewasnothingtimorous,witlessor spiritlessaboutMargaret.The situation she now

faced demanded physicalendurance and a moreresolute will than ever.Northampton had been acatastrophe:herhusbandwaslost to her, her chief noblelieutenants slaughtered, andher base at Coventry underthreat as the duke of Yorkmade preparations to sail

fromDublintoChesteratthehead of another army. But areliably steadfast ally, herhusband’s half-brother JasperTudor, earl of Pembroke –oneofthetwosonsofQueenCatherine’s second marriage–remainedincontrolofsouthand west Wales; the earl ofNorthumberland wasmusteringmen to defend thenorth of England against theYorkists; and the energeticyoungdukeofSomersetwas

preparing to return fromFrance, where he had takenrefuge after a bold butunsuccessful attempt to seizeCalais from Warwick’scontrol, in order to raise thesouth-westerncountiesforthequeen.Allwasnotlost,ifshecould co-ordinate a rapidcounterstrike.Bundling her son onto

horsebacktoridepillionwitha trusted bodyguard, andtaking the saddle with a

servantofherown,Margaretheaded west from Coventrywith a small escort. Herguards were not heavilyarmed enough to prevent theloss of valuable baggage tothieves along the way, butsome time in September thedishevelled and exhaustedparty arrived at the gates ofHarlech Castle, a massivefortress overlooking the seafrom a clifftop on the northWelshcoast.Theywerethere

still, safe behind itsformidablewalls,whennewscame that was worse thananything Margaret had yetfaced.On10October,thedukeof

YorkhadriddenintoLondon.Ringing trumpets announcedhis arrival before hiscompanycameintosight.Alldressedinliveryofwhiteandblue marked with his deviceof a fetterlock, the duke’smen made an imposing

spectacle as they escortedtheir lord through the streetsof the capital and out ofLudgatetowardsthepalaceofWestminster. But it was notthis show of force that hadstopped the breath of thosewho watched them pass;instead, it was theextraordinary message thatcouldbereadinthetrappingsoftheprocession.Theduke’sgreat sword was carriedupright before his horse, just

as the king was traditionallyattendedwhenherodeamonghispeople.Bannersflutteringin the autumn air displayedthe arms of Lionel ofClarence, the second son ofEdward III fromwhomYorkcould claim a senior line ofroyal inheritance to that ofHenry himself. And, mostunmistakablyofall, theroyalstandard itself now flewaboveYork’shead.After ten years of

escalating conflict, ten yearsin which it had becomeappallingly clear that therecould be no lasting securityfor York – or peace forEngland – while Margaretchampioned the cause of herhusbandandsonagainsthim,the duke had at last come tothe frightening conclusionfromwhichhehadshrunkforso long. Henry VI, thatamiable innocentwhose veryharmlessness had had such

devastating effects, wouldhave to be removed. Amidthe echoing magnificence ofthegreathallatWestminster,where the lords had gatheredfor a meeting of parliament,York strode to the dais andplacedhishandonthemarblethrone, turning to theassembledpeerstoawaittheirshoutofacclamation.It did not come.The faces

of the nobles before himshowed confusion,

consternation and horror.Desperate though they weretofindawayoutofthewar,acrown on York’s headpromisedonlymoredarknessand bloodshed. After tenyears of conflict inwhich hehad taken such a prominentpart,thedukehimselfwastootarnishedafiguretoofferanycredible hope ofreconciliation or renewal ingovernment. And, even aftereverythingthathadhappened,

Henry’s kingship was notdivisive enough to vindicateYork’sactions.Hewasnotatyrant like Edward II andRichardII,thekingswhohadpreviously been pushed fromtheir thrones because of thethreat they posed to theinterests of the subjects theyhadsworntoprotect;instead,he was an empty vessel, towhose unassuming mildnessstill clung a faint aura of thesanctity of his anointing, and

ofthedivinesanctionthathisfather’s great victories hadconferredonhisdynasty.In shock and alarm, the

lords retreated into urgentconclave. Three weeks oftensenegotiationfollowed,inwhich the earl of March,York’seighteen-year-oldson,acted as go-between, ridingsombrely between his fatheratWestminsterPalaceandthelords in session at the BlackFriars, amonasterybuilt into

the south-west corner of thecity walls. Those who werelooking for guidance fromGod were scarcely reassuredwhen the ornamental crownthat hung in the room atWestminster Abbey wherethe parliamentary commonssat in debate crashedsuddenly to the floor. By 31October, however, asettlement had at last beenagreed, which waspromulgated with oaths,

solemnceremonialandpublicproclamations. By its termsKing Henry VI would keephis throne; butwhen he diedhe would be succeeded, notbyhissonEdward,butbyhiscousinofYork.This settlement – a

diplomatic homage to thetreaty by which Henry’sfather had, long ago, beennamed heir to his defeatedenemy, the French kingCharles VI – served its

immediate purpose. It was acompromise which gave dueacknowledgement to York’sclaims, while allowing hisregime to retain the supportof the wider politicalcommunity by functioning inKingHenry’sname.Likethatearlier treaty, however, itsfailure was an in escapablepart of its very formulation.Acknowledgement of York’sclaims meant thedisinheritanceofHenry’sson

–and thatmeant, inpractice,itwasnosettlementatall.For Margaret it was proof

ofwhatshehadbelievedeversinceYorkhadfirstriddeninarms to St Albans five longyearsearlier:thatthisconflictcouldberesolvedonlybythetotal destruction of herenemies. Her husband, asusual, was a pawn in thehands of whoever currentlyhadhimintheirkeeping,andhe participated with meek

submissiveness in theceremonies by which theaccord was sealed. Thedifficulty with which thesettlement presentedMargaret therefore lay notsimply in its direct attack onherson’sposition,butalsoinits assault on what remainedof the composite authorityshe had struggled so hard toconstruct. Henry’sincreasingly fragile but stillextant claim to legitimacy

was now appropriated, alongwith his person, by theYorkist regime, leaving thequeen and prince cut adriftfrom the crown that hadanchoredMargaret’sclaimtorule.It was no accident that

rumoursabouttheirregularityof the prince’s birth now re-emergedwith renewed force.For Yorkist partisans, thesewhispers served the happydouble purpose of justifying

York’s claim to be Henry’sheir and undermining thequeen’s public standingthrough insinuations –damning to awomanas theywould never be to a man –about her private conduct.Margaret responded with aforceful restatement of herson’s rights: a letter to thecityofLondonwritten in theseven-year-oldprince’s name– a habit of ventriloquism towhichshehadhadtobecome

accustomedduringthefifteenyears of her married life –declaredhimtobe‘rightfullyand lineally born by descentof the blood royal to inheritthe pre-eminence of thisrealm’.Shealsoattempted toreclaim her husband’sauthority by emphasisingHenry’s plight as a prisonerin need of rescue, whoseacquiescence in the namingof York as his heir was theresult of coercion, not

genuineconcession.Butsheknew,too,thather

casedependedonthepointofa sword, not legal argument.At the end of November shesetsailfromHarlech,headingnorth across iron-grey watertoScotland,toappealforhelpagainst her enemies inEngland. Scottish kingswerealwayseagertomaketroublefortheirsouthernneighbours,in whatever form theopportunity presented itself.

But the king of Scots inNovember 1460 was eightyearsold,hisfather,JamesII,having been killed threemonths earlierwhen his owncannonblewupwhilehewastrying to wrest RoxburghCastle from its Englishoccupants. In the matter ofroyal minorities, as in somuchelse,theScotsfollowedtheleadoftheirFrenchallies,anditwasthereforethenewlywidowedqueenmother,Mary

of Guelders, who wasappointedregentonbehalfofher young son. If Margaretenvied the clarity of theScottish queen regent’sposition, she strove not toshow it as she petitioned formen and money while theirtwoboysplayed.InEnglandmeanwhile,her

loyal lords, led by JasperTudorinthewestandtheearlof Northumberland in thenorth, were massing the

militaryforcesalreadyattheirdisposal. York knew that heurgently needed to counterthis threat before Margarethad the chance to securereinforcements from beyondEngland’s borders. Despitethe difficulty of movingarmies across country inwinterwhen theweatherwasharsh and provisions scarce,thedukethereforesethisownforces inmotion.The earl ofWarwick remained in the

capital;EdwardofMarchledhistroopswestwardtoWales;York himselfmarched north,inthecompanyofhisoldallySalisbury.What they did notknowas theysetouton icilyrutted roads, their breathhanging in great cloudsaroundthem,wasthatagainstall the odds the duke ofSomerset had succeeded inforgingapathfromthesouth-west – where York hadbelieved he was about to

launchanassaultonBristol–to rendezvous withNorthumberland in thenorth.Andwhen the duke emergedfromhiscastleatSandalnearthe town of Wakefield inYorkshireon30Decembertoencounter his enemy, it wasto face the horrifyingrealisation that he was bothoutmanoeuvred andmassivelyoutnumbered.The result was a rout.

When the fighting was over,

the corpses that lay piled onthe cold earth included thedukeofYorkhimself, unitedindeathwithhis teenagesonEdmund, earl of Rutland.Salisbury too lost a son,Thomas, but he had no timeto grieve for his lost boy orfor York, his brother-in-lawand brother in arms; instead,he was taken in chains toPontefract, where he waskilled the following day.Then their four heads were

taken to York and set onspikes on the city gates as aterriblewarningofthefateoftraitors,theduke’smockinglyfestoonedwithapapercrown,his pretensions of majestynowashollowas thesocketsofhissightlesseyes.Thenews,when it reached

Margaret more than ahundred miles north inScotland,wasoverwhelming.Hergreatestenemywasdead.Shewas no longer a fugitive

and a supplicant, driven intoexile to beg for help from afellow queen. Instead, herarmy held the north ofEngland,andthekingdomlayopen to their advance. Assoon as she and her sonrejoined Somerset andNorthumberland and thetroops they commanded inearly January 1461, theybegan the long march south,pressing hard for the capital.But still the final victory

remainedtobewon–andthejourney itselfbegan to revealthefullcomplexityofthetaskaheadofthem.Filling the stomachs on

whichherarmymarchedwasno easy task in the dead ofwinter – and this winter wasworse than any England hadexperienced in decades.Torrential rain all summerlong had turned pastures tomud and rotted crops in theground, so that stores could

notbelaiddownasusualforthecoldseason,andbeltshadbeen tightened even beforeMargaret’s army faced itsjourney southward. Alreadyby 12 January the soldiershad begun to pillage andplunder the villages andtowns through which theypassed – violence which thequeen and her commandersdid little or nothing torestrain,partlybecauseofthepressing need for the troops

to eat, and partly becausesomeofthelandswhichtheyleft ravaged in their wakebelonged to thedeaddukeofYork.Margaretcouldsee thevalue in such a potentdemonstrationofthepenaltiesfor resistance, as well as theevident necessity for hersoldierstobefed,butshedidnot foresee the devastatingeffect of the rumours andreportsthatflewaheadontheroad toLondon.Her strategy

had always been to buildterritorialpower intomilitarymight, but the unease thatalready existed in the south-east about her identificationwith the midlands and thenorth had now crystallisedintoalienationandfear.When a young gentleman

namedClementPastonwrotefrom London to his elderbrother in Norfolk on 23January, itwasclearhow farthepeopleoftheYorkist-held

capital now saw the conflictas a war between north andsouth. ‘In this country everymaniswillingtogowithmylords here’, he wrote, ‘and IhopeGodshallhelpthem,forthe people in the north robandstealandareappointedtopillage all this country, andgive away men’s goods andlivelihoods in all the southcountry, and that will ask amischief.’ And the earl ofWarwick, raising men and

munitions in London andacross the south-east, wasdoing what he could toexploit those fears,demanding aid against the‘misruled and outrageouspeopleinthenorthparts’whowere ‘coming toward theseparts to the destructionthereof’.His preparations were

givenamuch-neededfillipinearly February when newsbroke thatEdwardofMarch,

now the new duke of Yorkafter his father’s death, hadwon a crushing victory atMortimer’s Cross in theWelsh borders over an armycommandedbyJasperTudor,earl of Pembroke. Tudorhimself had escaped, but hisfather Owen – secondhusband of the late QueenCatherine, and King Henry’sstepfather – had beencaptured and executed afterthe battle. (At sixty, he had

not lost the charms that hadwonhimthehandofaqueen:a ‘mad woman’ tenderlywashed his severed head andcombed his hair, onechronicler reported, and lit ahundredcandlestoilluminateits resting place onHereford’smarketcross.)Heartened by the

knowledge that Edward washeadingeastwardtojoinhim,Warwick led his troopstwenty miles north from

London to St Albans,intending to halt the queen’sarmyinitstracksandholdoffany assault on the capital.WithhimrodeKingHenry–a token of legitimacy souncomprehending that hiscapacity to strike awe intosoldiers who stood againsthimwasnow,itseemed,longgone. So it proved on 17February when Margaret’stroops,undertheaggressivelyskilful command of the duke

of Somerset, swarmed intothetown.Forthesecondtimein six years, swords clashedin the streetsand thecobblesofthemarketsquarewereleftsticky with blood. But thistime Somerset secured hisrevenge for the defeat thathad cost his father his life;this time it was the Yorkistswho lost both the battle andthepersonoftheking.Henrywas found sitting obedientlyunder a tree, and taken to St

AlbansAbbeywherehiswifeandsonwerewaitingtogreethim.Still Margaret had not

destroyed her enemies.Warwick survived theencounter at St Albans butwas forced to retreatnorthward–thepiratecaptainofCalais feeling the sting ofhis first military defeat – tojoin forces with his cousinEdward in the Cotswolds on22 February. But Yorkist

hopesnowhungbya thread.If Edward and Warwickcould get to London beforethe queen’s army theymightstillsavethemselvesandtheircause, but the capital wasfour days’ forced marchaway, and Margaret’s troopshad already advanced toBarnet, just ten miles fromthe city gates. Theymarchedin any case, in defiance anddesperation, placing theirfaithintheirownskillandthe

support they knew theycommanded among theLondoners.Margaret, meanwhile,

seemed to have her piecespoised on the chessboard forone final, inexorable assault.Her husband, feeble thoughhemightbe,wasbackatherside. Her army, in whichevery soldierwore the badgeof her young son, had wontwofamousvictories,andthecapital lay before her. And

herleadershipinthenameofthe king and prince wasamply acknowledged by thedeputationtheLondonerssenttotreatwithherarmy,whichwas ledby threewomen: thedowagerduchessofBedford,who had accompaniedMargaretonher first journeyto England fifteen yearsearlier; Emma, Lady Scales,who had been a lady-in-waiting in Margaret’shousehold as queen; and the

widowed duchess ofBuckingham,whowasPrinceEdward’sgodmother.In the fact of that

deputation, however, layMargaret’s problem. Herarmydesperatelyneededfoodand provisions, but theLondoners were not willingsimplytoopentheirgatesandtheir stores. The Yorkistsympathies of many of thecapital’s inhabitants werenow compounded by their

terror of the rabble ofnorthernerstheyhadheardsomuch about; they had ampleevidence of the devastationMargaret’s army had left inits wake on its march south,and of the queen’simplacability in pursuit ofthose who opposed her. Thequestion was whether thequeen’s wrath could now bestaved off by promptcompliance, or whether thecity was already doomed by

its previous resistance. Anexchange of letters betweenthe mayor and the queenproduced the unsettlinglyvague promise that ‘the kingand queen had no mind topillagethechiefcity…butatthe same time they did notmean that they would notpunishtheevildoers’.ClearlyMargaret was not, after fiveyears of fighting, about toofferanamnestytothosewhohadstoodagainsther.

As the city councilwrestled with this alarmingdilemma, its officers werestrugglingeventokeeporderwithin the city walls. Anattempt was made to sendcartspiledhighwithfoodasaplacatory offering to thequeen’s encampment atBarnet, but hostile crowds,enraged by fear and panic,gathered to stop the convoybefore it could pass throughCripplegateonthenorthroad

outofthecity.‘Thatdaythisplace was in an uproar’, anItalian observer in Londonreported – pandemoniumwhich was fuelled by therumours that had begun toreach the city that theYorkistswereontheirway.Time was running out.

Confrontedwiththisviolenceand disarray,with the urgentneedtofeedhersoldiers,andwith the impossibility offorcing her way into a city

whose support she neededand whose defences wereimpregnable, Margaret foronce decided that discretionwas thebetterpart ofvalour.Retreating and regroupinghad worked for her before,andnowshehadlittlechoicebuttobelievethatitcoulddosoagain.Shepulledherarmyback twenty miles north-westward to Dunstable; andthen,knowingthatthearrivalof the Yorkist army was

imminent and that, withoutprovisions and supplies, hertroopswere innoposition tofight, she gave the order tomarch north. Her armywheeled away from thecapital,stilllootingasitwent.As Margaret retreated,

Edward of York and hiscousin of Warwick wereadvancing at speed – andwhentheyreachedthecapitalthey could scarcely believewhat they found.

Overwhelmed with relief attheir release from the threatofthequeen’svengeance,theLondoners threw open theirgates to welcome theYorkists. Edward, whosecausehadseemed lostonhisfrantic chase across country,now rode into the cityunopposed and triumphant.And, extraordinarily, he didsoasaking-in-waiting.York had beenMargaret’s

greatest enemy but not, it

turnedout,hergreatestthreat.At eighteen, Edward waseverythingherineffectualanddistracted husband was not.Unusually tall, strongly builtand jaw-droppinglyhandsome, he had irresistiblecharisma, combining easybonhomie with an imperiouswill and a shrewd politicalbrain thathadbeenhonedbyearly experience as hisfather’s trusted lieutenant.Amid the devastation of the

Yorkists’ military hopes, hisprecocious skill as a generalhadbeendemonstrated inhisvictory over Jasper Tudor’sarmyatMortimer’sCross.Hewas neither the treason-taintedpoliticalmaverickthathis father had been, nor thelimp puppet that Henry nowwas. He looked more like akingthananyonehadseeninyears, and he could claimtechnical justification for thesudden suggestion that the

crown might in fact be his,sinceHenry,so theargumentwent, in ‘deciding’ to rejoinMargaret at St Albans hadreneged on his oath torecognise York as his heirand in effect resigned histhrone.But the strength of

Edward’s position went waybeyond the theoretical.Margaret’s aggressiveterritorialism had turnedsouthernEngland into enemy

country,and the fact that shehad been forced toimpersonatetheauthorityofahusband and son who wereunable to act for themselveshadendedupexposing,ratherthan concealing, Henry’swretched failure as king. Inthe eyes of the Londoners atleast, Edward offered a freshstart, hope amid a landscapeofdevastationandchaos;andwhen on 4 March heprocessed in state from St

Paul’s to the palace ofWestminster to take his seaton the throne that his fatherhad never won, he wasfollowedbythrongingcrowdswho hollered and bellowedtheirapproval.Nine days later, therefore,

when Edward left London atthe head of his troops, theground-rules of the conflicthad changed dramatically.Bothsides–Margaret’sarmyinthenorth,andEdward’sin

thesouth–nowhadakingtofight for. The uniqueauthorityofthecrownwassocompromised that these tworival monarchs would meetfor the first time on equalterms, the last king standingtoclaimtheprize.AndsoonPalmSunday,29March,aftera deliberately measured andorderlymarch north, Edwardand Warwick took upposition outside Towton, aYorkshire village only a few

miles from the battlefieldwhere the duke of York andtheearlofSalisburyhaddiedjust three months earlier.There they faced an armycommanded by the duke ofSomerset and the earl ofNorthumberland who, likeEdward and Warwick, hadlost their fathers in thesewars. Whatever happened atTowton,itpromisedtobethelast act in a political conflictthathadbecomeinfusedwith

all the emotional resonanceand murderous violence of abloodfeud.Margaret, meanwhile, had

no choice but to wait,powerless as she was tointervene while her soldiersdid theirwork.This timeherhusband and son were withher, safe within York’s citywalls:ifHenrynowservednopurposeinrallyinghistroops,therewasnosense in riskinghis presence on the

battlefield. As she pacedrestlessly, intent and silent,she had noway of knowing,ashourgavewaytohour,thatthe fighting ten miles awaywas still relentless. On bothsides the order had beengiven that therewould be noquarter,nomercy;andneitherside would give way, whilethe corpses heaped upbetween them, entanglingliving feet in the twisted andbrokenlimbsofthedead.For

eight hours the slaughtercontinued, in driving snowthatblindedstingingeyesandnumbed clumsy fingers, thebitter cold catching eachragged,gaspingbreath.Whensome at last turned to run inexhaustionandfear,itwastofindtheirpathblockedbytheriver Wharfe and their finalrest in its freezing waters.And all the while, newrivulets of melting snowstained red with blood were

snaking through the frozenfurrows of the road that ledtowardsYorkandMargaret.Bloodcouldnotspeak,but

messengers could, sobbingfrom their exertions in thecold and the dreadful burdenof the news they brought.Thousands upon thousandshad died at Towton. And, inthe end, it was Margaret’sarmy that had shattered. Asthe light began to fade,Edward of York stood

unchallenged in command ofthe field, king of England infact aswell as in name.Andthree muffled figures with ahandful of guards rode hardon the route north towardScotland: a grim-facedwoman, a bewildered manand a frightened seven-year-oldboy,no longerEngland’sroyal family but huntedfugitives.

TheQueenSustainsUs

Identityhadbeenat theheartof Margaret’s difficulties in

the longyearsofstruggle forher husband’s throne.Henry’sinadequacieshadleftthe mantle of kingshiphanging limpandempty,andalthough Margaret hadsuppliedthewillandpurposeto animate his cause, shecouldnot, as awomanandawife, simply inhabit the rolehe had left so damaginglyvacant.Now Margaret had no

choice but to watch as those

same questions of identityunderpinnedthecreationofanew regime that promised todestroy everything she hadever worked for. Themantleofkingshiprestedsquarelyonthe broad shoulders ofEdward of York. He wasforceful, decisive, energetic,magnetic; he promisedleadership of a kind Englandhadnotexperiencedsincethedeath ofHenry’s father fortyyears earlier. ‘Words failme

to relate how well thecommonsloveandadorehim,as if he were their god,’reportedanItalianresidentinLondon a fortnight afterEdward’s victory at Towton.‘Thus far,he appears tobeajust prince who intends toamend and organise mattersotherwisethanhasbeendonehitherto …’ And when thisnew king was anointed inWestminster Abbey on 28June – a golden boy in a

goldencrown–itseemedthatGod was merely confirmingwhat was already evident inhistalents,hisactionsandthefactofhisvictory.Itwasnot,ofcourse,quite

that simple. Although thesouth of England was agogwithexpectationandreliefatEdward’saccession,hisnew-found authority was muchmore precarious in the northand west, in the parts ofWales and northern England

thatMargarethadcountedherheartlands.And,crucially,hisenemies – Margaret, Henryandtheirson,theking’shalf-brotherJasperTudor,andthedukesofSomersetandExeterwho had fled for their livesfromtheslaughteratTowton– were still at large, despitestrenuous efforts to convinceobserversathomeandabroadthat they were safely incustody. ‘I do not believethat, since vain flowers

always grow in good news,’Prospero di Camulio, theMilanese ambassador at theFrench court, wrote withsome asperity to his duke,Francesco Sforza; ‘… if theking and queen of Englandwith the other fugitives arenot taken,’ he added,circumspectly slipping intocipher, ‘it seems certain thatin time fresh disturbanceswillarise.’Fresh disturbances were

certainly Margaret’sintention. Unhappy thoughthe comparison might be inthe eyes of her adoptedcountrymen, had not heruncleCharlesVIIejected theEnglish fromhis kingdomofFranceevenafterherhusbandhad been crowned in Paris?The accession of a Yorkistking was an illegitimate andtherefore temporaryinterruption to her husband’srights and her son’s future

inheritance,which shewouldreclaim with the help of heruncle of France and that ofhis steadfast allies, herpresenthostsinEdinburgh.The price, however, was

high. The Scots and theFrenchwere fierce guardiansof their own interests, notpartisansofMargaret’scause.ThecostofScotssupportwasthe immediate surrender ofthe contested border town ofBerwick and the promise of

Carlisle, if it could becaptured. Her hopes forsupport from her uncle ofFrance were dashed whennews reached Scotland ofCharles’s death on 22 July –the very day on which shehadwrittentoaskforhishelp– and the succession of hisson,LouisXI, a strategist sosubtle he was dubbed ‘thespiderking’,whohadalreadyas dauphin offered assistanceto the Yorkists’ cause.

Nevertheless, a visit byMargaret to the French courtin the spring and summer of1462produceda treatyandaloan, albeit on the alarming(and prudently hidden)condition that Calais shouldbeputupassecurity.Margaretwasworkinghard

andhopingformuch,but thelonger this intricatediplomatic dance continued,the more uncertain becamethe ground beneath her feet.

The passage of time servedonly to reinforce Edward’sstature as king, and to chipawayatwhatremainedofthefragmented authority towhich she herself could layclaim.At the first parliamentof the new reign, held atWestminster in November1461, the queen and prince(‘Edward her son’, as theparliamentary proceedingspointedly called him) wereattainted of treason on the

grounds of offences‘committed against her faithand allegiance to oursovereignandliegelordKingEdward’. Such a descriptionof her actions against a manwhose sovereignty she hadnever acknowledged andwould never recognisemightwell have raised a hollowlaughfromMargaret;butthisformaldenunciationservedtogive public sanction to whatwas now an unstoppable

flood of venomous innuendoandpropaganda.All the old rumours about

the queen’s aberrantbehaviour had sprung intonewly elaborate life in thenerve-wrackingweeksbeforeTowton. Gossip in Brusselshad it that Margaret hadpersuaded Henry to abdicatein favour of their son,Prospero di Camulioreported, and that the queenhad then poisoned her

husband (‘at least he hasknown how to die, if he didnotknowwhattodoelse’)inorder to marry the duke ofSomerset. Di Camulio wasnot convinced by thisornatelymelodramatictale,orby Henry’s alleged remarkthat the prince ‘must be theson of the Holy Spirit’ – anobservation that was, in anycase, altogether too sharp tobe plausibly the king’s – buthe thought them worth

recountingnonetheless.Meanwhile, propagandists

for the new regime inEnglandwereofferingamoredirect political commentaryonMargaret’sactivities.‘Itisright a great abusion’, onepoem in circulation in 1462argued,

A woman of alandtoberegent–

QueenMargaret I

mean, thatever hathmeantTo govern allEngland withmight andpowerAndtodestroythe right linewas her intent…She and herwickedaffinitycertain

Intend utterlyto destroy thisregion;For with themis but deathanddestruction,Robbery andvengeancewithallrigour.

Long-standing insinuationsabout the queen’s conduct

couldnowbespokenopenly.Margaret’s self-assertionwasillegitimateandreprehensiblebecause shewas female, andher intentions toward heradopted country were hostileanddestructive.Thisforeign-born queen was damnedtwice over, by her birth andby her sex; and her plightnow, as a refugee draggingherhusbandandsonbetweenthe courts of England’s oldenemies, dependent on their

charity and seeking their aid,only served to emphasisethosetwodangerousfailings.Nor was the new Yorkist

regime slow to underline thepoint. In March 1462 KingEdward wrote to thealdermen of London andother sympathiserswith deeppursestoaskfortheirhelpinresisting a fearsome Frenchinvasion by which ‘thepeople, the name, the tongueandthebloodEnglish’would

be wiped out – a scheme towhich his ‘adversary Henry’had been moved ‘by themalicious and subtlesuggestionandenticingofthesaid malicious womanMargaret, his wife’. Andrumour fed thirstily onrumour until it was reportedthat Margaret and Henrywouldreturnattheheadofanarmymadeup,hydra-like,ofcontingents from Brittany,Burgundy, Scotland and

Spain, with fresh waves ofhundreds of thousands moretroops sent by the kings ofFrance, Aragon, Denmark,Sicily, Navarre and Portugalwaiting to overwhelmEngland’sshores.Despite all the wild

speculation and Margaret’sunrelenting diplomaticefforts, her invasion fleet,when it finally landedon theNorthumbrian coast inOctober1462,numberedonly

forty-two ships carryingscarcely more than eighthundred men, the meagrereward of her agreement thatsummer with Louis XI.Northumberlandwas friendlycountry, a stronghold ofPercy influence where thenew king’s authority wastenuous in the extreme, andthe great fortresses ofBamburgh,DunstanburghandAlnwickquicklyopenedtheirgates to the queen’s soldiers.

But news came that Edwardwas marching north at thehead of amassive army, andMargaret, knowing that herresources were desperatelylimited, leftgarrisons toholdthecastlesasbest theycouldagainst Yorkist siege andtookshipforastorm-batteredretreat toScotland.A furtheradvance fromBerwick in thesummer of 1463 –Margaret,Henry and their son at thehead of troops provided by

thequeenmotherofScotland– was also quickly rebuffedby forceful Yorkistresistance.It was devastatingly clear

now that, however great theostensible insecurities ofKing Edward’s regime andhowever certain Margaretwas of the justice of hercause, England was notwaiting breathlessly for thechance to rise up in supportof Henry VI. His

shortcomings, after all, werethe same as they had everbeen, and the sight of hisqueen in the company ofFrench or Scottish soldierswashardlylikelytoconvincethe apprehensive inhabitantsofnorthernEnglandthattheirbest interests lay in hisrestoration.Bytheautumnof1463 it was also unhappilyapparent that Margaret wasnot orchestrating thediplomacy in which she was

so intenselyengaged. Instead– and unsurprisingly, givenhow few moves she had lefttomake–shefoundherselfapawninothers’schemes.Shehad sailed again to Francethat summer, after the dampsquib of the Scottishcampaign, in a determinedattempt to shore up thesupport she had beenpromised by the slipperyLouis XI, but during theautumn and winter her

understandings with bothFrance and Scotlandcollapsed as both kingdomsfound themselves persuadedof the superior benefits ofdealingwithYorkistEngland.Pawn or no, Margaret

would never give in. Sheestablished herself at herfather’s castle of Koeur nearSt Mihiel-en-Bar, 150 mileseast of Paris, with her ten-year-oldsonasalwaysatherside, at the head of a small

and impoverished court ofloyalists. There theycontinued their efforts, evensubmerged as they were inthe powerful currents ofEuropeanpolitics,anddespitethedesperatepaucityof theirresources, both financial anddiplomatic; one ill-fatedattempt to solicit help fromPortugal was hampered bythe fact that no one amongthelittlebandatKoeurcouldquite remember the name of

thePortugueseking. ‘Yet thequeensustainsusinmeatanddrink,’Margaret’s chancellorJohn Fortescue reported inDecember 1464 – and inpurpose, too, he might haveadded. ‘Herhighnessmaydonomoretousthanshedoes.’But by then, it seemed,

they were lost in politicaldarkness. Back in 1463,Margaret had left Henry inthe safekeeping of the Scots,but their treaty with Edward

attheendofthatyearhadlefther husband a fugitive, apitiful, lost figure movingfrom refuge to refuge innorthernEngland.Thereweregrounds for hope thatsympathyforhiscausemightrun deep enough in thenortherncountiestokeephimsafe, and by the spring of1464 he was still at liberty.Then, however, such loyalistforces as remained under thecommand of the duke of

Somerset – who had himselfdespaired of their chances somuch thathehadflirtedwithdefection to King Edward’scourt in 1463 – sought toambushtheearlofWarwick’sbrother John Neville, LordMontagu,atHedgeleyMoorafew miles from Alnwick inNorthumberland. ButSomerset’s men were caughtin their own trap, and put toflight after damaging losses;and at Hexham on 14 May

Montagu inflicted the finalblow.Theduke lost hisheadthe day after the battle, andwith this forceful, mercurialman – who was still onlytwenty-eight, and had spenthisentireadultlifefightingtodefend Henry’s crown –militaryresistanceonEnglishsoilwasfinallyspent.Montagu found Henry’s

jewelled and gold-embroidered hat at nearbyBywellCastle,butoftheking

himself there was no sign.For twelve more monthsHenry eked out a wretchedexistence, constantly movingfromplace toplacewith twoor three devoted attendants.But at last in July 1465 hewas captured near a fordacross the river Ribble inLancashire, and taken underguardtoLondonwithhisfeettied to the stirrups of hishorse.Hewas treatedgently,andhislifewasinnodanger,

since therewasnoadvantageto Edward in Henry’s deathwhile his wife and sonremained at liberty. Muchbetter, thekingknew, forhisrival for the throne to be animprisoned fool than a boygrowing to manhood inFrance in the care of hisindefatigable mother. And,with Henry under lock andkey in the Tower andMargaret and their son inimpoverished exile, there

seemedlittleneedforseriousconcernaboutarevivalinthefortunes of this Lancastriandynasty. ‘No man living canseefaraheadatpresentintheaffairs of England,’ Prosperodi Camulio had written in1461; but four years later itappeared that somepredictions,at least,couldbemadewithconfidence.That, however, was to

reckon without the Yorkistregimeitself,andthecapacity

for self-destruction it wasalready beginning to exhibit.Forged in adversity, thealliance between the youngking and his Neville cousinswas close and intense, butEdward’s relationship withhis oldest cousin Warwickwas beginning to show signsof profound strain.Warwick’spivotalroleintheYorkistcampaignsthatledtoEdward’s accessionhadbeenrewarded with wide-ranging

powers:aswell ascaptainofCalais, he was now greatchamberlain and admiral ofEngland, warden of theCinque Ports (the keyharbours for trade anddefence on the south-easterncoast)and–togetherwithhisbrotherMontagu–wardenoftheborderlandswithScotlandin the north. The king hadleanedheavilyonWarwickintheestablishmentanddefenceof his new regime, but

Warwick had arrogance andambition exceeding even hisundoubted ability andspectacularwealth,anditwasbecomingly ominouslyapparent that he saw himselfas the power behind theYorkistthronebyrightratherthanroyalcommand.It was a view of his

importance that was sharedbymanyobservers.‘Theysaythat every day favours theearl ofWarwick, who seems

tometobeeverythinginthiskingdom,’ the duke ofMilanwastoldin1461.Threeyearslater, a similar assessment,more archly expressed, wasdespatched to Louis XI: inEngland, wrote the governorof Abbeville, ‘they have buttwo rulers – Monsieur deWarwick,andanother,whosename I have forgotten’. ButEdward himself could notafford to accommodate hiscousin’s pretensions if he

were ever to exercise theuntrammelled authority of alegitimateking.Thefirstindicationofarift

between the two men hadcome in the spring of 1464,when Edward was ridingnorth to meet ambassadorsfromScotlandinthewakeofthe defeat of the duke ofSomerset at Hedgeley Moor.Onhisway,hestoppedforanight at Stony Stratford inBuckinghamshire and, early

the next morning, went outalone for several hours. Onhisreturn,hetoldhisservantsthathehadbeenhunting,andretired to bed again to sleep.It was not until four monthslaterthatEdwardrevealedtheextraordinary truth: on thatMaymorninghehadmarriedin secret, without eitherconsulting or informing hislordsandadvisers.Still more astonishing was

the identity of his bride. The

twenty-two-year-oldkinghadtaken as his wife ElizabethWoodville, a widow fiveyears his senior and alreadythe mother of two youngsons, whose first husband, aknight namedSir JohnGrey,had been killed fighting inMargaret’s army against theearlofWarwickatStAlbansin 1461. It seems likely thatthis match – not so muchpolitically inappropriate aspolitically inconceivable –

was an impetuous choiceprecipitated by personal, notpolitical, impulses.Elizabeth,it was rapidly noted, had asteely intelligence to matchherexquisitebeauty,andhadallegedly refused the king’sadvances unless he marriedher. But when Edwardsomewhat sheepishly brokethe news of his wedding tohiscouncilfourmonthslater,the announcement had thesupplementary effect of

manifesting the king’sindependencefromhiscousinof Warwick, who was leftembarrassingly marooned inthe midst of negotiating amatch for Edward with theFrenchking’ssister-in-law.Watching hawkishly from

herimpecuniouslittlecourtatKoeur,Margaretwasquicktosee the significance of thisenjoyable humiliation for along-loathed adversary. ‘Thequeen, wife of King Henry,

has written to the king herethat she is advised that KingEdward and the earl ofWarwick have come to verygreat division and wartogether,’ the Milaneseambassador reported fromFrance in February 1465.‘Shebegsthekingheretobepleased to give her help sothat she may be able torecover her kingdom, or atleast allow her to receiveassistance from the lords of

thiskingdomwhoarewillingtoaffordthis…’(‘Lookhowproudly she writes,’ KingLouis observed, with amixture of amusement andadmiration.)She was right that the

disintegrating relationshipbetween Edward andWarwick was a disasterwaiting to happen for theYorkist regime, but theopportunity it afforded herwas more complex, more

costly and much slower tomaterialise than she hadhoped in the spring of 1465.Warwick would not lightlyloosenhisgriponpower,andEdward had no wish toalienate his cousincompletely.Theearlthereforeputabraveandgraceful faceon a marriage he had nochoicebut to accept as a faitaccompli, standing godfatherin February 1466 to theking’s first child, a daughter

named Elizabeth after hermother, and presiding at themagnificent feast held tocelebratetheemergencefromherconfinementofthelovelyandunsuitablenewqueen.By the summer of 1467,

however, Edward’sincreasingly obdurate refusaltofollowWarwick’sdirectionin the conduct of hiskingdom’s diplomacy wasplayed out on anunforgivingly public stage.

Warwick, who had beenpressing hard for an alliancewithFrance, leftEngland forRoueninMaytotaketheleadinnegotiationswithLouisXI.Edward, meanwhile, wasinclining increasinglyexplicitly towards a treatywith France’s bitter enemyPhilippe of Burgundy, rulerofnotonlythegreatduchyofBurgundyonFrance’seasternborder but also the richterritoriesofFlandersandthe

Netherlands. And whileWarwick was away, Edwardremained in London toentertain Duke Philippe’sillegitimate son at asumptuoustournament.WhenWarwick returned home atthe end of June with adeputation of Frenchambassadors swelling histrain, it was to find thatEdward was alreadycommitted to a Burgundianalliance, and that his own

brother George Neville, thearchbishopofYork,hadbeensummarily dismissed asEngland’s chancellor.Warwick’spointedandpublicresponse was to leave court,riding at the head of hisentourage for his estates inthenorth.For Margaret, this breach

between her two chiefenemies represented a chinkintheYorkistarmourthroughwhich she might hope to

strike a fatal blow. That herdreams were not entirelymisconceived was evident intheFrenchking’swillingnessfor the first time in years tolend support to an attemptedinvasion. In June 1468 asmallLancastrianforcemadelandfall innorthWalesunderthe command of JasperTudor, who was not only atireless supporter of his half-brother’s cause but hadbecome, in exile, a trusted

servant of Louis himself.Only a few weeks passedbefore Tudor’s efforts wererepelled and Margaret’shopesdashed;butalready, inthe alienation betweenWarwickandEdwardandtheincreasinglyunsettledstateofYorkist England, Louis’sincisive intelligencehad seenthepossibilityofadifferent–and an entirely extraordinary–wayforward.Morethanayearearlier,in

February 1467, Louis hadbeen involved in a sharpexchange at dinner withMargaret’sbrotherJean,whoheld the title of duke ofCalabria as heir to theirfather, Duke René. TheFrench king had beengenerous in hiscommendation of the earl ofWarwick as a friend toFrance, which had provokedDuke Jean to vituperativeanger, the Milanese

ambassadorreported:

…hewasatraitor;hewould not suffer anygood to be said of him;he only studied todeceive; he was theenemy and the cause ofthe fall of King Henryand his sister the queenofEngland.HisMajestywould do better to helphis sister to recover herkingdom than to favour

theearlofWarwick;andmany other inflated andopprobriouswords…

Louis, however, persisted inhis praise of Warwick, andthe conversation becamemore heated: ‘the duke saidthat, as he was so fond ofhim, he ought to try andrestore his sister in thatkingdom, when he wouldmakesureofitasmuchashewas sure at present and even

moreso’.These were barbed words

spoken on impulse, renderedindistinct in the retelling bythe repeated, undifferentiatedpronouns, but the apparentsuggestionthatFrenchfavourto the earl of Warwick andsupport for the restoration ofKing Henry and QueenMargaret might not, in spiteof everything, be mutuallyincompatiblewas a seed thatbegantogerminate.Warwick,

after all, had the men andmoney within England tolaunch a coup from the veryheart of the Yorkistestablishment, therebyobviating the need for anyFrench commitment towholesale militaryintervention across theChannel; and Henry – asrepresented by Margaret andher son – had the claim toroyal authority that wouldallow the overthrow of

Edward and, with him, thedestruction of England’sthreatening alliance withBurgundy. Three monthslater, this dinner-table banterhad made its way onto thediplomatic agenda, withinFrench counsels at least.When another report wasdespatchedacrosstheAlpstoMilan on 19 May, the newsfromtheFrenchcourtcentredon the impending arrival ofWarwick’sembassyatRouen

andthesimultaneousrumoursof Edward’s intention toagreeatreatywithBurgundy.‘If this takes place’, theMilanese informantsobserved,‘theyhavetalkedoftreating with the earl ofWarwick to restore KingHenry in England, and theambassador of the old queenofEnglandisalreadyhere.’What is certain, however,

is that – eager thoughWarwick and Margaret both

were to cultivate Louis’ssupport – neither was yetprepared to countenance thisbizarre proposal. Yes,Warwickwasestranged fromhis king, and disposed, itseemedincreasinglylikely,todo something about hisgrowing disaffection.But hisplans did not involve thewoman responsible for thedeaths of his father andbrother, whom for fifteenyears he had regarded as a

mortal enemy. And forMargaret the feeling wasentirelymutual.When Warwick finally

made his move, therefore, itwas on his own terms,whileMargaret and her little bandofloyalistsatKoeurcoulddono more than follow thebulletins that reached themviasympatheticeyesandearsinEnglandandat theFrenchking’scourt.Theearlhadlaidhis plans well, convincing

Edward that, after a winterspentbroodinginhisnorthernstrongholds,hewaswillingtoaccept a role in royalgovernment that was one ofinfluence rather than control,attheking’srighthandratherthan pulling his strings. Sowhen Edward made hisleisurely way north fromLondon in June 1469, hebelievedhewas facedwithalittle local difficulty, aneruption of discontent in

Yorkshire over taxes he haddemanded to pay for aninvasionofFrancewhichhadfailed tomaterialise once themoneylaysafelyintheroyalcoffers. He had reached themidlands when he heard thechilling news that he facednot a peasant rabble but themight of the earl ofWarwick’sarmy.The shockwaves of this

Yorkist rising against theYorkist king rippled across

Europe. It seemed scarcelycredible that the two greatarchitects of King Henry’sfall might now face eachother across the field ofbattle. And shock, itappeared, might seal KingEdward’s fate, since hishurried, urgent attempt tomuster troops in his owndefence was outmanoeuvredby the carefully planneddeployment of Warwick’sforces. On 29 July the king

set out to meetreinforcements who hadalready, though he did notknow it, been defeated. Hewascapturedontheroadandtakenunderarmedguard, icybut impotent inhisrage,firstto his cousin’s castle atWarwick, and then north tothe Neville fortress atMiddleham.The initial stage of

Warwick’s plan – to takecontrol of government by

seizing control of the king –hadworked,sofarasitwent.What to do next, however,was less straightforward.EffortstoruleinthenameofHenry VI, a king manifestlyincompetent to govern forhimself, had proved self-defeating and unsustainable,as Warwick well knew.Ruling in the name of KingEdward, who was all tooobviously neither incapableofmaking his own decisions

nor content to be kept underlockandkey,turnedouttobeimpossible. As the countryeruptedintodisorder–whichWarwick proved unable tocontain on the authority of aking whom the earl himselfwas holding captive – hisoptionsappearedunnervinglylimited.One of his less likely

supporters probably had amore creative solution inmind. Extraordinarily,

Edward’s younger brotherGeorge, duke of Clarence,had joined Warwick inrebellion against the king,apparently in pique atEdward’s refusal to allowhimtomarryIsabel,theelderofWarwick’s two daughters,whowouldonedayinheritalltheir father’s vast territorialriches.On 11 July, in an actof open defiance, ClarencehadtakenIsabelashiswifeathis new father-in-law’s

strongholdofCalais, but thiswas only the first of thebenefits he hoped to receivefrom thenewdispensation inEnglish politics. The twenty-year-old duke was KingEdward’s next male heir,Queen Elizabeth havingpresented her husband withthree daughters in the fiveyearsoftheirmarriagesofar,and it seems likely thatClarence – who was vain,vaultingly ambitious and

profoundlyimmature–hopedthat Warwick’s coup wouldsweephimtothethroneinhisbrother’splace.The duke’s shallow

narcissism, however, wasreasonenough–especiallyinthe absence of any arguablecaseforhisrighttothecrown–toleaveClarencehimselfashis scheme’s only supporter.And when at the end ofAugust Lancastriansympathisers in the far north

seized this unanticipatedchance to raise the standardof revolt in King Henry’sname,Warwickfoundthathehad no choice but to releasethe other imprisoned king ofEngland, sincenoonewouldansweracallfortroopsonhisown questionable authoritywhile Edward remained incustody. At that point, withEdward free and the rebels’heads safely on spikes atYork, Warwick discovered

that, having taken the royalgenie out of the bottle, hecouldnoteasilyputitback.By mid-October the king

had made a triumphal entryintoLondon,tobegreetedbythe aldermen and guilds ofthe city decked out in theirbest scarlet and blue.Observers on the continenthadnoideawhattothink;‘…things there are in the airwithout it being possible toformasoundjudgementasto

what the end will be’, theMilanese ambassadorreported from Orléans.‘Indeed, His Majesty ispuzzled as well as everyoneelse.’ But Louis XI was nomore or less confused thanEdward’ssubjectsinLondon.‘I know notwhat to supposetherein,’ wrote Sir JohnPaston from his lodgings inthecapital.‘Thekinghimselfhas good language of thelords of Clarence, of

Warwick … saying they arehis best friends. But hishousehold men have otherlanguage, so what shallhastilyfallIcannotsay.’For five months the

cousins circled one another,Edward realising, with epicself-restraint, that he couldnot bring Warwick to heeluntil he could be sure ofmilitary support tomatch theearl’s own, and Warwicktrying to gauge the

ramifications of his owninadvertent demonstrationthat, while Edward remainedking, he could not governwithout him. The truth wasthat the earl had few optionslefttoconsider.HecouldtakeEdward’s publicmagnanimityatfacevalue;orhecouldtakethelogicofhisown self-assertion to itsobviousconclusion.Hechosethelatter.Whenthekingtookthe field in March 1470 to

quash a ‘popular’ revolt inLincolnshire, it was todiscover that the rebels werewearing the liveries ofWarwick and Clarence, andinterrogations carried outafter the battle revealed thatWarwick was now preparedto depose Edward and makeClarenceEngland’sking.Unfortunately for these

rebel lords, however, no oneelseamongEdward’ssubjectswas inclined to agree.

Warwick’s determination tosecure his ‘rightful’ place ingovernment and Clarence’svapid self-aggrandisementhad taken them far beyondanysustainableconceptionoflegitimate authority. Whenthey found that they couldcommand no support againstEdward’s advancing army,they fled across theChannel,only to discover thatWarwickhadtriedtheloyaltyofhisfaithfulCalaisgarrison

one step too far. With theharbour at Calais closed tothem,hissmallpartywasleftadrift at sea.The first son ofClarence and his eighteen-year-old duchess was born,anddied,onboardshipwhiletheycontemplatedtheirfate.It lay in France. Now, at

last, was the moment forKingLouis’s impossibleplanto come to fruition. Edwardmust be removed from thethrone, on that Warwick

could finally agree. And theonly credible contender toreplacehim–credible,thatis,simply by virtue of the factthat he had alreadyworn thecrown for forty years – wasthe man Warwick’s fatherand brother had died todepose.Still,timehadpassed,andneedsmust.Therewasnoway for Warwick butforward. And before himstood his oldest and mostdeterminedenemy.

LessthantwomonthsafterWarwick’s small flotillalanded at Honfleur inNormandy, Margaret arrivedat the royal palace ofAmboise in the company ofher son who, at sixteen, hadgrown to manhood in exile.He (it had been reported inMilanthreeyearsbefore)wasas obsessed with militarymatters as his father wasoblivious to them, talking‘ofnothing but of cutting off

headsormakingwar,asifhehadeverythinginhishandsorwas the god of battle or thepeaceful possessor of thatthrone’.ButMargaretstill,asshe had always done, madestrategyinhisname.Andshefacedanunwelcomechoice.For years her tirelessness

in pursuing the rights of herhusband and son had beenmatched only by thehopelessness of her task.Now,suddenly,realhelpand

real hope were within herreach.But to grasp them shehadtotakethehandofamanshe hated, despised andmistrusted. The morecynically political among herentourage, her chancellorJohn Fortescue among them,were quick to press theunanswerable logic of thecase, but Margaret had beensustained through long yearsof conflict and isolation byher confidence in the justice

of her cause and theimpiousness of her enemies,andthatwasnotsoeasilysetaside.KingLouisdevotedallhis attention to this newlyhonoured but frustratinglyuncooperative guest,spending long days patientlyclosetedwith thequeen,who‘until now’, the Milaneseenvoynotedon29June,‘hasshown herself very hard anddifficult’.The point on which she

would not concede was thesecurity of her son. He wascrucial to this enterprise, thephysical embodiment of theLancastrian claim and theLancastrian future, butMargaret had not kept himsafe all these years tosurrenderhimintoWarwick’sdubious clutches. Still,Louis’sweb,drawnaboutherin the silken surroundings ofAmboise, was irresistible.Without Warwick, the

Lancastrian future wasnothing but a chimera. Andso on 22 July in the greatchâteau ofAngers beside theriverLoire,thequeenandtheearlcameface to face.WhenWarwick knelt before her topledge his renewedallegiance, Margaret’srevulsion was such that shekept him on his knees formore than fifteen minutes.But the deal was done. Herson,theprinceofWales,was

to marry Anne, the youngerofWarwick’s two daughters.Warwick was to take shipimmediately for England torestore King Henry to histhrone. Only then, once thecountry was secure, wouldthe queen and prince follow;and the prince would thenrule as regent on his father’sbehalf,with his father-in-lawWarwick at his right hand inthis new Lancastriangovernment.

With autumn approaching,andLouiskeentosethisplaninmotionandseethebackofhisEnglishvisitors,therewasno time to lose. Warwicklandedinthewestcountryon13 September, declaring thathe had come with theauthority of ‘the most nobleprincess Margaret, queen ofEngland’ and that of her sonthe prince, to rescue ‘ourmost dread sovereign lord,King Henry the Sixth’ from

the hands of ‘his great rebelandenemy,Edward, lateearlofMarch, usurper, oppressorand destroyer of our saidsovereign lord and of thenoble blood of all the realmof England and of the good,true commons of the same’.Themanwhohaddonemorethan anyone else to put this‘usurper’on the thronecouldhardly have taken a morebreathtakingly brazen stand,butWarwickdidnothesitate.

Whiletheearlmarchednorth,Margaretandhersonandhisnew young wife remained atAmboisetowaitforthegoodnews.It was startlingly quick to

come. Edward was aperceptive politician and acommanding leader, but hecouldnotfreehishandsfromthethecoilsinwhichhenowlaboured. Six months earlierhehaddecided to restore theearldom of Northumberland

tothePercyfamily,believingthat only the Percys had thedepth of support in the farnorthofEnglandtosecuretheregion against Warwick’snowhostile influence.But indoing so he had to take theearldom away fromWarwick’s brother, LordMontagu, whose reward ithad been for his role insuppressing Lancastrianresistance in the early 1460s,andwhoseimpeccableloyalty

hadnotfalteredevenovertheprevioustwelvemonthswhenit meant taking up armsagainsthisownbrother.Now,however, despite Edward’sbest efforts to compensatehim, Montagu was bitterlydisillusioned.Howmuch, theking discovered only whenMontagu’s advancing troopswere within ten miles of hisencampment at Doncaster.Shakenmessengers deliveredthe devastating news that

Montagu had declared forEdward’s enemies, andintended not to help but tocapturehim.The king’s forces were

scattered and unprepared,caughtbetweenthearmiesofWarwick and Montagu, andEdward knew that this timehe would not have long tolive if he were captured. Hedecided to run, making atspeedfor theNorfolkcoast–narrowly escaping the

treacheroustidesoftheWashashedidso–andfromtherefoundshipstotakehimtotheNetherlands to seek asylumand support in the territoriesof the duke of Burgundy.AmidriotsinLondon,QueenElizabeth, who was heavilypregnant, fled into sanctuaryat Westminster Abbey withher threesmalldaughters.AsWarwick and his armyapproached the capital,anotheroftheearl’sbrothers,

the archbishop of York,seized control of the Towerandconveyed thedishevelledfigure of Henry VI from hisprison quarters to the lavishapartments the queen had sofrantically vacated. And on13October,Warwickhimselfcarried Henry’s train whenthe crown was ceremoniallyrestored to the bemused kingin the magnificentsurroundingsofStPaul’s.When the news reached

Paris, Louis ordered threedays of celebration andthanksgiving at whichMargaret and her son – nowonce again accorded the fullestateandmajestyofaqueenand prince – were guests ofhonour. The speed ofEdward’s fall had beengreater than Margaret couldpossiblyhavehoped, andyetshedidnothastentothecoasttotakeshipforEngland.Thequeen herself was in no

hurry. After all the reverses,all the bloodshed of the lastfifteen years, she would notlet her son’s feet touchEnglishsoiluntilhissecuritywasassured.And security, in England,

wasstillhardtocomeby.Forall the sumptuous ceremonyon the streets ofLondon andParis, the suddenly restoredLancastrianregimewasmorepatchwork and motley thanever. It rested on paper-thin

foundations: returningLancastrian exiles had toswallow their distaste anddistrusttofollowtheleadofaYorkist renegade, andWarwick found himselfunable to restore their titlesandestateswithoutdeprivingthose – himself included –whohadbenefitedfromtheirforfeitures. The position ofthe duke of Clarence, theother conspicuous Yorkistcuckoo in this supposedly

Lancastrian nest, wasbecoming particularlyinvidious. Thwarted andpurposeless now thatWarwick’s conversion to theLancastrian cause hadremoved all hope that hemight wear the crownhimself, he was said to be‘held in great suspicion,despite, disdain and hatredwith all the lords, noblemen,andother,thatwereadherentsand full partakers with

Henry’. Henry himself wasmoreconfused thanever; theabsent prince was still anunknown quantity, hisunenviable position asWarwick’s new protégéscarcely reassuring for hiskingdom’sfuture;andnooneyet knew how Margaret’sforcefulwillmight sitwithina government that wasalreadyacutelyunstable.King Louis, meanwhile,

was equally reluctant to

despatchthequeenandprinceintoWarwick’scareuntilhisownconditionsweremet–inhis case, the fulfilment ofWarwick’s promise thatEnglandwouldjoinFranceinwaragainstBurgundy.Ittooksometime,givenhowfulltheearl’s hands already were,and the difficulties, politicalandpractical,ofimposingthepressures and costs offightingoverseasonadeeplytroubled country. But at last,

in February 1471, Warwickput his seal to a treaty withFranceandorderedtheCalaisgarrison to move onto theoffensive against Burgundy.Margaret and her son werealreadyattheNormanportofHonfleur, andbegan tomakepreparations for their finaljourney to their recapturedkingdom. Still they weredelayed.Every time they puttosea,headwindsdrovethemback to harbour; and it was

not until Easter Sunday, 14April, that the weary royalparty stepped ashore atWeymouth in Dorset, wherehorses were waiting to takethem fifteen miles north torest at theBenedictine abbeyatCerne.Theretheirworldfellapart.

The same moment that hadconvinced them to take shipfor England – Warwick’sdeclaration of war onBurgundy – had precipitated

a chain of events that hadundone everything theythoughttheyknewwhentheyleft the coast of Normandy.Back in September, DukeCharlesofBurgundyhadnotgivenaneffusivewelcometothe bedraggled figure of thefugitive King Edward on hisarrival inHolland.Thanks tothe treaty the two men hadsealed in happier days,Edward was the duke’sbrother-in-law, but the duke

hadnowishtobedrawnintoall-outwaronhisbehalf,andsent conciliatorymessages tothe new regime in EnglandthroughthedukeofExeter,aLancastrian loyalistwhomhehad welcomed to his courtafter finding him begging inthe street as a poverty-stricken exile. But thisstudied neutrality was nolonger an option onceWarwick had rebuffed hisadvances and announced

England’ssupportforLouis’swar. In February 1471Edward suddenly found thathe had Burgundian moneyandshipsathisdisposal,andon 11March, after the sameagonisingwait for favourablewinds that was confiningMargaret to the harbour atHonfleur, he set sail forEngland.His position – at the head

ofasmallbandoffewerthanathousandsoldiersdrivenby

storms and by Warwick’sdefences to land not inNorfolk,ashehadhoped,butat Ravenspur in Yorkshire –was intensely dangerous. ‘Itisadifficultmatter togooutby thedoor and thenwish toenter by thewindows,’ camethe laconic comment of theMilanese ambassador atBeauvais.‘Theythinkhewillleave his skin there.’But thefragilityofWarwick’sregimewas equally apparent. The

two greatest northern lords,Warwick’s brother Montaguand Henry Percy, Montagu’srival for the earldom ofNorthumberland, made nomove to intercept Edward ashe marched south into themidlands. At Coventry, theduke of Clarence threwhimself on his brother’smercy, hoping to save hisown skin and salvage hispolitical future from thebonfire of his hopes that his

alliance with Warwick hadnow become. The panic-stricken inhabitants ofLondon, terrified by thesebewildering reverses, offeredno resistance when Edwardrode through their city gateson 11 April, to reclaim hiscrown and meet for the firsttime his baby son, the newheirtotheYorkistthronewhohad been born in the abbeysanctuaryatWestminsterfivemonthsearlier.

Two days later, Edward’smen were once again on themarch, moving ten milesnorth to Barnet to confrontthe Lancastrian forcescommanded by his cousin ofWarwick.Adecadeearlier,ithad been Margaret’sunexpected retreat fromBarnet that had allowedEdward and Warwick, giddywith euphoria, to sweep intothe capital together andunopposedtoclaimthecrown

fortheYorkistcause.Nowallthose old certainties weregone. Next morning, in theearly hours ofEaster Sunday– just as Margaret’sshipmaster was setting hiscourse for the approach toWeymouthharbour–Edwardgave the order to attack.Thetwo armies fell on oneanother in the semi-darkness,shrouded by fog as dense astheconfusionofenmitiesandloyalties at play on the field.

Four hours later, fifteenhundredmenlayslaughtered.Among them were LordMontagu, his struggle withhisconsciencelaidbareintheYorkist badge found on hiscorpse under his Lancastrianarmour, and beside him hisbrother Warwick, the self-appointed arbiter ofEngland’s destiny finallybrought to earth by a daggerthrustthroughhisopenvisor.Margaret, who had made

the safety of her son thetouchstone of her politicalstrategy for a decade and ahalf, had brought him toEngland on the very day,almostattheveryhour,whenten months of intricatepreparation to secure hisfuture collapsed into dust.She would not weep forWarwick, but she could notcontemplate the ruin of theirplanswithout exhaustion andfear.Butallwasnotlost.Her

sonwas still unharmed; theirforces were massing in thesouth-west; and there mightyet be great advantage, onceEdward was defeated, in theopportunity to rule withoutWarwick’s oppressive anddemanding presence. Thequeen, the prince and theirmilitary lieutenant, yetanother faithful duke ofSomerset – EdmundBeaufort, younger brother oftheSomersetwhohaddiedat

Hexham – pressed onnorthwardtowardstheSevernestuary, intending to crossinto Wales to rendezvouswith forces under thecommand of Jasper Tudor.King Edward, meanwhile,mustered fresh troops of hisown and set out to interceptthem,proclaimingashewentthat death would be thepenalty for anyone offeringhelpto‘Margaret,callingherqueen, which is a

Frenchwoman born’ or herson.Confusion and panic

reigned. ‘The world is rightqueasy,’ wrote Sir JohnPaston with impressiveunderstatement, havingescaped with his life fromWarwick’s defeated army atBarnet. Sforza de’ Bettini,contemplating from hisambassadorial post in Francethe difficulty of procuringreliable information to send

to his master in Milan, wasmore forthright. ‘I wish thecountry and the people wereplunged deep in the seabecause of their lack ofstability,’ he said feelingly,‘for I feel like one going tothetorturewhenIwriteaboutthem, and no one ever hearstwice alike about Englishaffairs.’AnItalianresidentinBruges had more patiencewith the unfolding drama:‘King Edward has set out

withhispowertolookforthequeen and prince, who hadlanded and gone to the partsofWales,’ he told his father.‘We have heard nothingsince,althoughwearegreedyfor news. There are manywho consider the queen’sprospects favourable, chieflybecause of the death ofWarwick, because it isreckoned she ought to havemanylordsinherfavourwhointendedtoresistherbecause

they were enemies ofWarwick.’ The truth,whicheverwayonelookedatit, was that everything nowdepended on this pell-mellchaseacrosscountry.The queen and her army

pressed on as hard as theycould, but Edward had sentmessages ahead to warn thekeeper of Gloucester Castletobarthegatesagainstthem.Unable to gain access thatway to the bridge across the

Severn, they had no choicebut to push on to the nextcrossing-place, a ford atTewkesbury. Edward’sforces, meanwhile, werebearing down on them, aforced march of thirty-sixmiles on 3 May bringingthem within three miles ofMargaret’s troops. Early thenextmorning,itbecameclearthat the queen and princecould not reach theirreinforcements in Wales

withoutfirstconfrontingtheirenemy. Yet again, Margaretwaslefttohurrytothesafetyof a nearby monastery whileher army mustered in battlearray. For the first time,however, her beloved son’sfatewasoutofherhands.Theseventeen-year-old princecommanded thecentreof theLancastrian army; at last hecould put to use the years ofmilitary training at Koeur.Today, he would either win

hisfather’scrown,orlosehislife.The end, when it came,

was quick. First Edward’ssoldiersbroketheLancastrianvanguard under the duke ofSomerset, who turned andfled to Tewkesbury’s greatabbey, though sanctuary, inthe end, could not save him.And then, amid the carnageof that rout, Edward himselfledanassaulton theprince’sposition.Margaret’s sondied

where he fell. Thewhereabouts of the queenherself were not discoveredfor three more days, but shedid not try to run. She hadnowhere to go, and no oneleft to fight for. She wasbrought to Edward atCoventry, once her citadel,now a place of humiliationand grief. And when thevictorious king made histriumphant entry intoLondon, with trumpets

sounding and his loyal lordsabouthim,therewasachariotat the back of the processionin which the queen sat,straight-backed and blank-faced,staringatnothing.The day after their arrival

in the capital, the body ofHenryVIwasbroughtoutofthe Tower. The Londonerswere told that their formerking had died of ‘puredispleasure and melancholy’atnewsofhisson’sdeathand

the destruction of his cause,but few doubted that his lifehad been ended on KingEdward’s orders. There wasno advantage, now, inkeeping alive a Lancastrianpuppet when the wholeLancastrian line could beextinguished. For one night,his corpse was displayed topublic view on a bier at StPaul’s, its face uncovered, toforestall seditious rumoursofhis survival.The next day, it

was placed on a barge androwed twenty miles upriverforburialattheancientabbeyof Chertsey. ‘And so no onefrom that stock remainedamong the living who couldclaim the crown,’ onecontemporary solemnlynoted.Margaret was forty-one

years old, and her life wasover. For Edward, and forLouis of France and Charlesof Burgundy, manoeuvring

furiouslyforadvantageinthischanged political world, shewas an irrelevance. In Junerumours reached France thatMargaret too had beenassassinated,butEdwardwasby nature magnanimousrather thanvindictive,andhehad no need to pay her thepolitical compliment of aviolent death. Instead sheremainedaprisoner,atfirstinapartmentsatWindsorCastleand the Tower of London,

andlater–thekingextendinghis easy generosity even tothis bitterest of enemies – atWallingford Castle fortymileswest ofLondon, in thegentler custody of her oldfriend Alice Chaucer, thedowager duchess of Suffolk,who had been kind to herwhen she had first left herfamily behind to embark onher future as England’squeen.Shehadbeenacaptivefor

fouryearswhen,in1475,herfate constituted one of thedetailedprovisionsofapeacetreaty agreed at Picquignybetween Edward and Louis.By its terms she renouncedany claim she mightnotionally still have to rightsorproperties inEngland,andthe French king agreed toransomher person for a sumof £10,000. Free, butpenniless and purposeless,shewenttolivequietlyinher

father’s lands of Anjou. Shewas at the château ofDampierre, overlooking thebroad meanderings of theSeine,whenshefellillinthesummer heat of 1482. Shedied on 25 August, her endscarcely noticed by thecrowned heads of Europe,and was buried beside herfather beneath the soaringarches of the cathedral atAngers.Margaret was a woman of

will and wit – ‘more wittierthan the king’, noted onechronicler, although thatwasa backhanded tribute giventhemanifestlimitationsofherfoolish, fragile husband.Denied the formal regencythat she might have enjoyedin her French homeland, allherfierceenergywasdevotedto the task of impersonating,of reconstituting by othermeans,theroyalwillthatherhusband was incapable of

providing. The magnitude ofher rolewas evident to thosewhowatchedheratwork:forProsperodiCamulioin1461,for example, the battle ofWakefield was simply ‘thebattle which the queen ofEngland fought against thelate duke of York’ – adescription remarkable in itsdirectness given thatMargaret could not, and didnot, set foot on the field ofwar.

But the magnitude of herrolewas its own undoing. Insteppingforwardtochampionher husband’s cause, sheexposed the compositeauthority shehadconstructedin his name to public view,and herself to vitriolicdisapproval. The harder shefought – and fight hard shedid, with an implacable andpartisan tenacity – the moreobvious were the tensionscreated by a French queen

acting in the place of anincompetent English king.And,littlebylittle,thepowershe could commandfragmented and crumbledaway. As an Italian inLondon noted as the conflictcame to its height in 1461,‘whoever conquers, thecrown of England loses,whichisaverygreatpity…’Thatmuchbecameevident

just eight months after herdeath. Edward’s conquering

regime was carefullyconstructed andauthoritatively led, but itsroots were not yet deep. InApril 1483, shockingly andsuddenly, he succumbed to astrokeattheageofjustforty,a golden boy bloated intodissolution; and hisgovernment collapsed intochaos. The twelve-year-oldheir to the throne – the babyboy born to Edward andElizabeth in theWestminster

sanctuary–wasdeposedandmurdered by Edward’syoungest brother and mosttrusted lieutenant,Richard ofGloucester. And theusurpation of Richard III, asthe new king called himself,opened the door to apenniless exile named HenryTudor, Jasper Tudor’snephew, whose motherMargaret was the last ofHenry VI’s Beaufort cousins–atenuousconnectiontothe

royal line, but enough, amidthe trauma of 1485, to rallyan army. That summerRichardIIIlosthiscrownandhis life at Bosworth Field,and Henry Tudor took hisplace as King Henry VII. Itwas the last actof thedramawhich had consumedMargaret’slife.

NEWBEGINNINGS

6July1553:LongLivethe

Queen

The boy in the bed lay atpeace, his breathing stilled,his struggle finished at last.But the men who lookeddown at the disfigured bodyknew that theirs had justbegun. Now, they faced thebattletocontroltheaccessionof England’s first reigningqueen.Their initial task was to

stop the news of what hadhappened from spreadingbeyond the walls of the

bedchamber until the leversof power had beencomprehensively secured.The same tactic had beenadopted six years earlierwhenEdwardVI’sfatherhaddied;then,deliveriesofroyalmealshadcontinuedforthreedays to the heavily guardeddoorbehindwhichlayHenryVIII’s monumental corpse,until the person of the newkingcouldbeunitedwithhisprincipal councillors and the

governmental machine attheirdisposal toproclaimthestart of the new reign as aseamlessfaitaccompli.In 1553, just as in 1547,

the councillors were thestrategic architects of thechange of regime. Thedifference now was that thenew monarch was theirpuppet not because hewas achild, but because she was awoman: Jane Grey, thechosen vessel through whom

Edward’s plan for alegitimate, Protestant andmale succession wouldultimately be achieved, andthrough whom the duke ofNorthumberland’s control ofgovernment wouldmeanwhile be upheld. OnSunday 9 July, with thecordon of secrecy still inplace around the dead king’sdarkened chamber atGreenwich, Jane received anenigmatic summons to Syon

House, Northumberland’slavishhometenmileswestofthe capital, ‘to receive thatwhich had been ordered bythe king’. On her arrival thebewildered girl was met bythe duke and other membersof the Privy Council whoknelt before her, offeringtheir allegiance and theirservice to the new queen ofEngland.The next day, brightly

dressed heralds at last

appearedonLondon’s streetsto inform Edward’s subjectsthat their king was dead andto proclaim the accession ofQueenJane.Astheydidso,aflotilla of barges carried theyoung queen and her hastilyassembled royal entouragedownriver to the Tower,whereshemadeaceremonialentry into the monarch’sapartments. England’s newrulerwas a short and slenderfifteen-year-old, with auburn

hair and freckles powderingher pale complexion, but onthis summer afternoon herslight frame wasoverwhelmed by thetrappingsofherroyaldestiny– a heavy gown of greenvelvetembroideredwithgold,a white headdress weightedwithjewels,andcumbersomewooden platforms strappedonto her small feet to makehermoreeasilyvisibletohernewsubjects.

So began the reign ofQueen Jane. Already,however, there were signsthat this female repository ofroyal power might be lesspassively accommodatingthan Northumberland hadhoped.Jane’sdiscomfortwithher new role was more thansuperficial. She was sharplyintelligent and stubbornlyprincipled, and if the dukehad assumed that she wouldbe a malleable tool of her

cousin’s design for thesuccession, he had begun tobe disabused of thatpresumption from themomenttheplanwasputintoaction. At Syon the previousday, her first reaction to thenews of Edward’s death andher own elevation to histhrone had been a storm ofgrief for her cousin; hersecond was horror. ‘Thecrown is not my right andpleases me not,’ one of the

councillors reported hersaying. ‘The Lady Mary’ –the elder of Edward’s twosisters–‘is therightfulheir.’It took all the pressure thatNorthumberland, her parentsand her new husband, theduke’s son Guildford, couldmuster before she wasinduced to accept heraccession as the will of herProtestantGod.But acquiescence in this

didnotmeanacquiescencein

everything. The royaltreasures held in the Towerincluded the crown itself,which the Lord Treasurerattempted to persuade her totry on, saying as he did so,Jane later recounted, that‘anotheralsoshouldbemade,to crown my husband’. Thestatus of a reigning queen’shusbandwasanissuewithoutprecedent in England, butspecial envoys sent by theHoly Roman Emperor

CharlesV, forexample, tookit for granted that theaccessionofQueenJaneGreymeant the simultaneouselevation of King GuildfordDudley. (‘The new king andqueen are to be proclaimedthis very day,’ they reportedon 10 July, before seekingadvice from their imperialmaster about what theyshoulddoiftheywereofferedan audience by the counciland ‘the new king’.) Jane,

however,hadotherideas.Shehad been prevailed upon toaccept, reluctantly, that thecrownmightbehers,but shewascertainthatitwasnotherhusband’s. She would makehim a duke, she told hercouncillors, but not king – astand which precipitated afuriousrowwiththedukeandduchess of Northumberlandand with eighteen-year-oldGuildford himself, whopersisted in conducting

himself with elaborateceremonial of a kind thatsuggested he too wasEngland’smonarch.Northumberland had

expected a puppet, and wasfinding instead that Janewasprepared to flex her royalmuscles. Jane herself,meanwhile, was wrestling(she later wrote) with ‘atroubled mind … infinitegrief and displeasure ofheart’, as she struggled to

cope with the shock of asituation inwhichher father-in-law, her parents and herhusband were foisting royalpower upon her, andsimultaneously seeking toprevent her from exercisingit.Clearly, therewere battlesahead. For the moment,however, theywouldhave towait, overtaken as theyrapidly were by battles athand, since theimplementation of Edward’s

‘device for the succession’was not proceeding assmoothly as it might haveseemed from within theTower’sroyalapartments.Thefirst indication thatall

was notwellwas the silenceon London’s streets whenJane’s queenship wasdeclared.Nobellswererung,nobonfires lit, no caps flungintotheair.Instead,thenewswas met with a mixture ofpuzzlement and resentment

under a muffling blanket offear. The proclamation readout by the heralds that dayhad detained its listeners foran unusually long time, inpart because of the need toexplain exactly who the newqueenwas.Iftheideathatshemight inherit the throne hadcome as a shock to Janeherself,itwasaboltfromtheblueforthepeoplewhowerenowrequiredtoacceptherastheir monarch. The Emperor

Charles V had to ask hisenvoys to compile a familytree to explain the merits orotherwise of Jane’s claim;howmuch more at sea wereher new subjects as theywatched their young queenenter the Tower, her longtrain carried, confusingly, bythemotherthroughwhomherrighttothecrownwassaidtohavecome.Puzzlement, then, at who

Jane was, and resentment at

whoshewasnot–thisbeingthesecondissueonwhichtheheralds found themselvesexpounding at length. Thecircumstances which hadpersuaded Edward of hervirtues as a candidate for histhrone had much lesspurchase on the hearts andminds of his subjects. Jane’scommitment to theevangelical faith whichEdward was so desperate toseenurturedandprotected in

his realm could not bedoubted, but few ofEngland’s people were asdeeply convinced as theirking of the doctrinalreformation over which hehad presided, and inEngland’s parishes thereremained much support stillfortheoldwaysofprayerandworship that had been sosuddenly prohibited. Notmany were prepared toemulate the rebels who had

takenuparmsfortheirbeliefsin the west country in 1549,but few would see thereformed religion as reasonenough to overturn thelegitimate line of the royalsuccession.What, though, was that

legitimate line?ThebirthsofEdward’s half-sisters Maryand Elizabeth had been amatter of public controversyfor twodecades.Therecouldbe no doubt, however, that

they were the only survivingchildren of Henry VIII, andthey had been named as hisheirs, along with Edwardhimself, both byparliamentary statute and inthe old king’s will. Jane’sclaim, by comparison,seemed a work of invention.No grounds, after all, hadbeen advanced to justify thedecision thather rightshouldprecede that of her mother.AndifthetermsoftheActof

Succession and Henry’s willwere to be abandoned inorder to disinherit Mary andElizabeth, then – as theimperial envoys noted insomealarm–thereweregoodgrounds for arguing that thenext heir was not Jane Greybut Mary Stuart, queen ofScotsanddauphineofFrance,thegranddaughterofHenry’selder sister rather than hisyounger.Nevertheless, it was Mary

Tudor, daughter of HenryVIII and his first, rejectedwife Katherine of Aragon,who was popularlyunderstood to stand next inline to her brother’s throne.Mary had been publiclyaccepted as heir presumptivetoherfatherduringthehappyyears of her childhood andadolescence, before thecatastrophic collapse of herparents’ marriage; and, onceherbrotherhadbecomeking,

she was recognised bypoliticiansandpeoplealikeashisheirunlessoruntilhehadoffspringofhisown.Justfivemonths before his death shehad been received at courtwith deferentialmagnificence,andasrecentlyas April the duke ofNorthumberland had offeredheraldic recognition of herstatus as ‘the second personin the realm’ when he ‘senther her full arms as Princess

of England’, the imperialambassador Jehan Scheyfvereported,‘assheusedtobearthem in the lifetime of herfatherthelateking’.It hadbeenMary’s sex, of

course,thathadcompromisedherstandingashisheirinherfather’s eyes, but, given thenatureoftheimprovisationtowhich Edward had had tocommit himself in order toestablishhislineofProtestantkings, the fact that she was

female could hardly be usedagainst her by supporters ofQueen Jane. Great play was,however, made of thepossibility that Mary mightmarry ‘any stranger born outof this realm’, as theproclamation of Jane’saccession declared, whomightthenseek

… to have the lawsand customs of his ortheirownnativecountry

or countries to bepractised and put in usewithin this realm, ratherthan the laws, statutesandcustomshereoflongtime used, whereuponthetitleofinheritanceofall and singular thesubjectsofthisrealmdodepend, to the peril ofconscience and the uttersubversion of thecommon weal of thisrealm.

(Or, as the imperial envoysmore laconically put it, ‘itwasstatedthattheLadyMarymight marry a foreigner andthus stir up trouble in thekingdom and introduce aforeign government’.) But itwasanargumentthatseemedunlikely to deal a fatal blowtoMary’s claims in the eyesof her prospective subjects.Which, after all, was worse:this hypothetical apocalypse,

orthealarmingfact thatJanewas already married toGuildford Dudley? Dudleywas an Englishman, but onethroughwhomtheruleofhisfather Northumberland – aman much feared and not atall loved by the Englishpeople–would,disturbingly,become dynastic rather thanmerelyministerial.Neither religion, nor birth,

nor the probable direction ofgovernment policy therefore

provided conclusive reasonforthesubjectsoftheEnglishcrown to repudiate Mary’sright to wear it as herbrother’s heir. And, as aresult, the process of puttinghis ‘device’ into effect wasfraught with tension anddanger. Thatmuchwas clearfrom the fact that, despiteNorthumberland’s franticefforts, it proved impossibleto contain the seeping ofinformation from inside the

royal household aboutEdward’s intentions and hisstate of health. Jane herselfwasnotawareofhercousin’splans for her future until 9July, three days after hisdeath – although she latersaid that she had beenforewarnedbyhermother-in-law and dismissed theinformation as fantasticalnonsense – but AmbassadorScheyfve, a watchfulpresence on the margins of

thecourt,hadalreadylearnedthe details of Edward’s‘device’ five days earlier.When three more imperialenvoys arrived to joinScheyfve in London on 6July, they immediately heardthe embargoed news thatEdward had died that day,despitethecouncil’sattemptsto persuade them otherwise.(‘Sire, the king of England’sdeath is certain’, they wroteurgently to the emperor the

following morning, addingthat, ‘in answer to ourdemand for audience, thecouncil have sent to tell usthat they will speak to theking about it, fix a timeaccording to his majesty’scondition, and let us knowsometimetomorrow’.)And by then, most

damagingly of all forNorthumberland and hiscolleagues, too muchinformation had already

reached Mary, the heir theywere trying to displace. Atense game of brinkmanshipbetweencouncil andprincesshad been in play in the lastweeks of Edward’s illness.MaryhadmovedtoHunsdon,the Hertfordshire manor thatwas her closest home toLondon, in the effort tokeepabreast of the rumoursemanating fromherbrother’sbedside. She needed to bepoised to assert herself as

England’s queen themomentconfirmation came that theking was dead – but not aninstant sooner, for fear thatshemightbedenouncedas atraitor should she claim thethrone before it was vacant.Meanwhile,timingwasoftheessence, too, forNorthumberland: he neededMarysecurelyunderlockandkey, but that had to beachieved quietly and calmly,without protest or incident

that might precipitate anygeneral convulsion in hiscurrent control or his futureplans. Much depended onexactly how long the dyingboy in the Greenwich bedmight cling to life, but theprognostications of hisdoctors were more art thanscience,andthiscalculation–like all the othersNorthumberland was making–wasafinelycalibratedrisk.Atlast,inthefirstweekof

July, thedukesummoned theprincess to her brother’sdeathbed, a message lacedwith duplicitous reassurance,it seems, thatherpresence inLondonwasrequiredbecauseshe was his heir. By then,however, the sinisterwhispers escaping fromGreenwich’s walls hadalertedMarytothedanger inwhich she stood. ‘She waswarnedbya friendyesterdaythat shehadbettergo further

away into the country’, ranScheyfve’s encrypted reporton 4 July; and three dayslater,onthemorningaftertheking’s death, whenNorthumberland finally senthis son Robert Dudley withthree hundred armed men toseize Mary at Hunsdon, itwas to find the great houseempty and his quarry longgone on the dusty road intoNorfolk.At the first hurdle, then,

Northumberland’s coup hadfaltered.Butthedukesawnoreason yet for serious alarm.Mary,afterall,wasawomanalone. Certainly, she hadservants and counsellorswithin her household andtenantsonherestates,buttheformidable mechanisms ofthe Tudor state – the greatbureaucracy of governmentdirectedbythepowerfulmenof thePrivyCouncil, and theconsequent capacity to

mobilise strong arms holdingstrongerweapons–layunderthe duke’s command. EvenMary’sretreatinthedirectionof the East Anglian coastseemed, in the light of herrecent history, to offerNorthumberlandencouragement as much asdisquiet. The princess hadlived her entire adult lifeunder intense pressure, bothpolitical and emotional, andjustthreeyearsearlier,asher

brother’sattempttoforceherto give up theCatholicmassbegan to intensify, she hadshown signs of bucklingunderthestrain.Inthespringof 1550, exhausted by theconfrontation in which shewas currently embroiled andfrightened by the uncertaintyof her future as the Catholicheir to a Protestant king, shehad sent secretly to hercousin, the emperor, askingfor rescue. Imperialwarships

appeared off the coast ofEssex, waiting to spirit heraway; but Mary havered infranticindecision–accordingto the imperial secretary,repeatedly asking theagonisedquestion ‘Whatwillbecome of me?’ – beforebaulkingat the lastminuteatthetantalisingbutirreversibleprospectofescape.For Northumberland, it

was a heartening precedent:either vacillation or flight on

Mary’s part would serve hispurposes well. And he wasnotaloneinhisassessmentofthe weakness of theprincess’s position. TheFrench ambassador, AntoinedeNoailles,hadnohesitationin passing on to his royalmaster the duke’s privateassurance ‘that they hadprovided so well against theLady Mary’s ever attainingthe succession, and that allthelordsof theCouncilwere

sowellunited,thatthereisnoneed for you, Sire, to enterintoanydoubtonthisscore’.That was, of course, exactlywhatHenriIIwantedtohear,givenhowlittlehewished tosee the English throne takenby the cousin of his enemyCharlesV,andgiven,too,theenticing prospect that hemightpresstherivalclaimofhis daughter-in-law MaryStuart onceMary Tudor wasoutoftheway.

More disturbing for Maryherself was the fact that herown allies were equallyunconvinced of her chancesofupholdingherrightsasherbrother’s heir. ‘We see smalllikelihood of being able towithstand the duke’sdesigns,’ reported theimperial envoys on themorning after Edward’sdeath;

… it now seems that

the LadyMary’s personwill be in danger, andher promotion to thecrown so difficult as tobe well-nigh impossibleintheabsenceofaforcelarge enough tocounterbalance that ofher enemies … All theforcesofthecountryarein theduke’shands,andmy lady has no hope ofraising enough men toface him, nor means of

assisting thosewhomayespousehercause.

Mary, then, was being

writtenoff.Asawoman,shecould not fight for her rightsattheheadofherowntroops.Shewasalso–inapatternofpolitical interaction that herforebearMatilda would haverecognised only too well –declining to follow advicethat was offered to her, andfinding that her judgement

was questioned as a result.Mary had come to theconclusion, Scheyfve and hiscolleagues told the emperor,that she should proclaimherself queen as soon asEdward’s death wasconfirmed. This wasnecessary, she believed,partlytostakeherclaiminsoimmediate and public amanner that it could not besuppressedwithoutchallenge,andpartly to raisea standard

around which all those whosupported her or opposedNorthumberland could rally.‘Myladyhasfirmlymadeuphermindthatshemustact inthis manner, and thatotherwise she will fall intostill greater danger and loseall hope of coming to thethrone,’ the envoys wrotewith regretful disapproval,and more than a hint ofcondescension. ‘We considerthisresolutionstrange,fullof

difficulties and danger …’Not only were the militarycards stacked high againsther, but her plan washopelessly misconceivedbecause the English wouldnotofferspontaneoussupportfor the claim of a Catholic;‘and to proclaim herselfwithout hope of immediatesuccess would onlyjeopardise those chances thatremaintoher…’On this if on nothing else,

had they but known it, thegovernments of England,France and the Empire wereagreed.Mary could not hopetoprevailwithoutthebackingof imperial troops. Foreignintervention of that kindwould compromise hersupport within England, andin any case (as imperialpoliticians, but notFrenchorEnglish,wereaware)itwouldnot come, because CharlesV’s military machine was

alreadyover-committedinhiscontinentalcampaignsagainstHenriII.(‘Ourhandsarefullwith France,’ he wrotewearily.) His envoys inEngland were therefore toldto do what they could tosafeguard the princess’spersonratherthantopressherclaim at all costs. Theconsensus of heavyweightopinion was overwhelming:the first woman to test theboundsoffemalesovereignty

in England would be thereluctant fifteen-year-old in agildedcageattheTower,notthe thirty-seven-year-oldprincess contemplating herlimited options from themidst of the East Angliancountryside.That this was a

misjudgement on anextravagant scale began tobecome apparent on the veryday Jane was proclaimedqueen. That afternoon, an

elderlyservantofMary’swasushered into the councilchamber, grey with tirednessafter the long ride fromNorfolk, to present a letterfrom his lady declaring thatthe crown was hers anddemanding that the councilacknowledge her as queen.Northumberland, it wassuddenly clear, had failed toremember that the frightenedprincess who had almostabandoned her country in

1550 was also the resolutewoman who had ridden intoLondon eight months laterwithatrainof130velvet-cladgentlemen and ladies, everyone of them holding a set ofrosary beads in ostentatiousdefiance of her brother’sreligious laws. And theimperial ambassadors – soconfidentinthesuperiorityoftheirdiplomaticinsight–hadutterly misread the dynamicsof English politics, of which

Mary now showed hermastery. She was thedaughter of Henry VIII, thefathersheidoliseddespitetheabuseandhumiliationhehadheapeduponher,andshewasthe rightful heir to herbrother’sthrone.Shewasnotseeking, as the council hadassumedshewould,‘eithertoflee the realm or to abidethere some foreign power’.Instead,withtheablesupportofherhouseholdofficers,she

sent letters and messengersflying along the roads ofNorfolk and Suffolk andwestward into the midlandsand the Thames valley tosummon her subjects to theirqueen’sdefence.They answered her call in

their thousands. Support forher cause was by no meansunanimous, but in easternEngland there were manylandowners whosesympathies lay with the old

religion,whowereconvincedofherclaimtothethrone,andwho had looked to Mary asthe greatest magnate of theirregion ever since she hadbeengrantedestates forfeitedby the disgraced duke ofNorfolk six years earlier. Asthese gentlemen gatheredtheir armed tenants in thedeer park of Mary’s greatmoatedcastleatFramlinghamin Suffolk – to which shemovedforhermusterbecause

its defences were still asformidable as when it wasbuilt four hundred yearsearlier – their confidence inthe justice of their missionwaspalpable.Thesamecouldnotbesaid

of their opponents. The dukeof Northumberland was anableman,ashrewdpoliticianand an experienced soldier,but he was hated by many,and loved by no one otherthan his wife. Meanwhile,

Queen Jane had had nochance to inspire anypersonal loyalty in thehandfulofdayssinceshehadbeen so dramatically pluckedfrom aristocratic obscurity.Supporters of the reformedreligion, who might havebacked thenewregime,weretorn between fear of Mary’sallegiance to Rome and theirown loyalty to the lineageofHenry VIII. And in thesecircumstances – where one

side was sustained by deepconvictions, both politicaland religious, and propelledby spontaneous momentum,while the other relied on theconduct of business as usualin the service of radicalchangeimposedentirelyfromabove – the structures ofgovernmental control onwhich Northumberland’spower depended began todisintegrate.The duke’s son, Robert

Dudley, was already in thefieldwiththreehundredmen,pursuing Mary into EastAnglia; magistrates andcounty lieutenants had beenwarned by Privy Councilletterstoresistherattemptsto‘stirandprovokethecommonpeople of this realm torebellion’; and six warshipshadmovedoutoftheThamestolieofftheSuffolkcoast,topreempt any attempt atescape by the princess or

invasion by the Empire. ButMary’sunexpectedresistancemeant that more concertedaction was needed. Men,horses and artillery werehastilymusteredintoanarmythat marched out of Londonon Friday 12 July under thecommand of the duke ofNorthumberland himself,England’s finest general,confidentstillthathissoldiersand cannon, backed by theunanimous will of the

council, would see off achallenge for which not asingle one of the kingdom’smost powerful men haddeclaredhissupport.Six days later, as

Northumberland approachedat last within twenty-fivemiles of Framlingham, helearned with increduloushorrorwhatlayaheadofhim.Mary’s forces now countedten thousandmen and rising,more than three times the

number of the duke’s troops.Still worse was the news ofhiswarships.Contrarywindshad forced them into thecoast, where Mary’s agentshad made contact and thecrews had defected, puttingashore great guns that werenowrangedindefenceofherfortressatFramlingham.Andwhen Northumberlandretreated to Cambridge inshock at the overwhelmingstrength of his enemy’s

position, it was to discoverthat inhisabsencehis fellowcouncillors in London hadcollapsed into panic andrecrimination.Faced with news of the

princess’s growing power inEast Anglia, and increasingresistance too in theshires tothe west of the capital, thegreatlordsofthecouncilhadfaced an unpalatable choice:risk everything by followingNorthumberland onto the

battlefield,orattempt tosavetheir skins by declaring forMary.IntheearlymorningofWednesday 19 July theirallegiance to Jane was stillholding, overwrought anddesperately brittle though itnowclearlywas.Bymidday,it had broken. A deputationwas despatched to tell theemperor’s envoys that,althoughithadbeenreportedthat the whole council hadendorsed King Edward’s

plans for the succession, infact ‘only three or four ofthem had given their willingassent and the rest had beencompelledand treatedalmostas if theywere prisoners…’These mistreatedunfortunates, now liberatedfrom Northumberland’sbaleful influence – a goodstory if they could make itstick–thengatheredwiththemayor and aldermen atCheapside in theheart of the

capital to proclaim Maryqueen.Jane’s proclamation had

been greeted with silence. Alone voice daring to speak‘certain words of QueenMary, that she had the righttitle’, had been quicklysuppressed, its wretchedowner set in the pillory thenext morning with his earsslicedoff.Butnowthestreetswere packed with peoplebrought running by the

rumours that were racingthrough the city. The newproclamation began; andwhen they heard the name‘Mary’, the crowd erupted,drowning out everything thatfollowed in a wild explosionof joy and overwhelmingrelief. ‘And there was TeDeumLaudamus’– thegreathymn of thanks fordeliverance from danger –‘with song and the organsplaying and all the bells

ringing …’ a Londonernamed Henry Machyn notedinhisdiary,‘andbonfiresandtables in every street, andwine and beer and all, andevery street full of bonfires.’‘Men ran hither and thither,’anItalianeyewitnessreportedin amazement, ‘bonnets flewinto the air, shouts rosehigher than the stars, fireswere lit on all sides, and allthe bellswere set to pealing,andfromadistance theearth

musthavelookedlikeMountEtna.’ And while thecelebrations raged, nervousmessengers from the councilrode through the night toFramlingham to offer theirallegianceandtheircontritiontoQueenMary.JustasEdwardIIandHugh

Despenser had discoveredmore than two centuriesearlier, the imposing edificeof royal government couldprove utterly, shockingly

insubstantialiftheauthorityitembodied lost its claim tolegitimacy. And the issue oflegitimacy on this delirioussummer night was summedup in Henry Machyn’sdescription of its royalprotagonists. Jane, heexplained, was ‘daughter ofthe duke of Suffolk’, butMary was ‘sister of the latekingEdwardVIanddaughterunto the noble king HenryVIII’. The duke of Suffolk

himself – as desperate nowfor his own salvation as hehad once been for hisdaughter’s advancement –tore down the cloth of estatethat signalled Jane’s regalstatus from above her chairwhereshesatatdinnerintheTower, saying (the imperialambassadors were told) ‘thatitwasnotforhertouseit,forherpositionpermittedhernotto do so’. It was withgratitudethatthegirlwhohad

reigned for just thirteen days– or nine since her publicproclamation–relinquishedacrown that she had alwaysbelievedwasMary’sbyright.When the news reachedCambridge, the duke ofNorthumberland stood in themarketsquareandproclaimedMary’s accession, throwinghis hat in the air and, one ofhiscompanionslaterrecalled,‘so laughed that the tears randownhischeeksforgrief’.

Mary’s triumph wascomplete.On3August,atthehead of an imposinglymagnificent cavalcade, sherode at last into her cheeringcapital,asmall figure regallydressed in purple velvet andsatin ‘all thick set withgoldsmith’s work and greatpearls’. Three weeks latergreat crowds again throngedthe streets of the city, thistime to watchNorthumberlandlosehishead

onTowerHill.Ontheeveofhis execution, the duke hadrenounced the Protestantismfor which he had fought,apparently in a vain bid toprovehisloyaltyandsavehislife. (‘I pray God I, nor nofriend of mine, die so,’ wasJane Grey’s shockedresponse.) Jane herself –‘cette pauvre reine’, as theFrench ambassador calledher, ‘that poor queen’ – hadreturned with relief to her

books and the muted clothesrecommended by her ownunbending faith. Sheremained in the Tower,condemned as a traitor foraccepting the crown, butMary saw her as a wrongedinnocent and, as the newimperial ambassador, SimonRenard, reported infrustration, ‘could not beinduced to consent that sheshoulddie’.Herenemiesthusdefeated,

itwasMaryTudorwhofacedthe reality – rather thansimply, as Northumberlandhad planned for Jane, therhetoric – of governingEngland as its queen. Janehad reigned, fleetingly andpowerlessly, her crownacquired only by reluctantsubmission to the will ofothers.Mary,meanwhile,hadstoodalonetoresisttheplansof the greatest men in therealm. Now, she would rule.

Her right to wear the crownas her father’s daughter andheirhadbeenacclaimedwithdeep and genuine convictionafter the trauma of that Julyfortnight. But in the exerciseof her royal power, thechallenges she faced hadbarelybegun.

NotofLadies’Capacity

UnlikeMatilda four hundredyears earlier, the legitimacy

of Mary’s cause had wonoverwhelming recognition,confrontedas shewaswitharival who had no advantageof sex or consecration tocompetewithherlinealright.LikeMatilda, however – andEleanor, Isabella andMargaret after her – Marywas faced with assumptionsembedded deep within thepolitical culture over whichshe now presided about theconditional nature of female

authority and the limitationsoffemalecapabilities.The queen was ‘of a sex

which cannot becominglytake more than a moderatepart’ in government andpublicbusiness, theVenetianambassador to England,Giovanni Michieli, remarkedin passing to the doge andsenate in 1557. Four yearsearlier, before he learned ofthe ‘device’ by whichNorthumberland’s regime

plannedtoplaceJaneGreyonthe throne, ‘the inferiority ofthe female sex’ had alsooccurred to AmbassadorScheyfveasoneofthe‘otherpointswhich theymay raise’to discount Mary as herbrother’sheir.Evenonceshehad proved the emperor’senvoys profoundly wrong intheirreadingofthecrisisandthe potential of herleadership,CharlesVhimselfhadnodoubt,whenhewrote

to proffer advice three daysinto her reign, of theconstraints which her sexwouldimposeonherrule.

Letherbeinallthingswhat she ought to be: agood Englishwoman,and avoid giving theimpression that shedesirestoactonherownauthority, letting it beseen that she wishes tohave the assistance and

consent of the foremostmenof the land…Youwillalsopointouttoherthat itwillbenecessary,in order to be supportedin the labour ofgoverning and assistedinmattersthatarenotofladies’capacity,thatshesooncontractmatrimonywith the person whoshall appear to hermostfit from the above pointofview.

Just as in 1141 when

Matildastoodonthebrinkofpower, the contradictionsimplicit in the prospect of afemale monarch wereprecipitated into the open byMary’s extraordinary andunfamiliar situation.No kingcould have tolerated thepropositionthatheshouldnot‘act on his own authority’.ForMary’sfatherHenryVIIIjust as much as Matilda’s

fatherHenryI,thatfunction–which was simultaneously aright and a responsibility –wastheessenceofhispower.Just a century earlier, theintractable challenges withwhichMargaretofAnjouhadwrestledonbehalfofherinerthusband had demonstratedhowprofoundlydestructiveakingwho failed to actonhisown authority could be. YetMarywas being told that forher to do so as queenwould

be incompatiblewithbeinga‘good Englishwoman’. Here,thereareirresistibleechoesofthe chronicler’s outrage thatMatilda should dare,with an‘arrogant demeanour insteadof the modest gait andbearing proper to the gentlesex’, to arrange ‘everythingas sheherself thought fit andaccording to her ownarbitrarywill’.Mary’s situation, however,

was significantly different

fromthatofherforebear,andit made possible asignificantly differentresponse. Matilda’s victoryoverherrivalhadbeenpartialand provisional; Mary’s wascomplete.Matildahadhad toattempt to call her authorityinto being through theprocessofexercisingit;Marycould bide her time beforeshe revealedherhand.Mary,then, had no immediate needto challenge assumptions on

thepartoftheemperororherown subjects that she wouldneed assistance in ‘mattersthat are not of ladies’capacity’. She offered noresistance to the suggestionthat her rulewould require ahusband’s help, and threedays before her coronation,shemadearemarkableappealto the members of hercouncil.Sinking toherkneesbefore the astonishedassembly,shespokeatlength

of the providentialcircumstances of heraccession, thedutiesofkingsand queens, and herdetermination to fulfil herresponsibilitiestothegloryofGod and the benefit of herpeople. Then she addressedher councillors directly. ‘Shehad entrusted her affairs andperson,shesaid,tothem,andwished to adjure them to dotheirdutyastheywereboundby their oaths …’ ‘Her

councillors were so deeplymoved that not a single onerefrained from tears,’ theimperial ambassadorsreported. ‘No one knew howtoanswer,amazedastheyallwere by this humble andlowly discourse, so unlikeanythingeverheardbeforeinEngland, and by the queen’sgreatgoodnessandintegrity.’It ishardtoknow,without

access toMary’s thoughts aswellasherwords,howmuch

of this public performancewas impelled by convictionand how much by strategy.Certainly, shewas intelligentandhighlyeducated,fluentinfourlanguagesandcompetentinafifth,witha‘facilityandquickness of understanding’,the Venetian ambassadornoted with generouscondescension, ‘whichcomprehends whatever isintelligible to others, even tothosewhoarenotofherown

sex – amarvellous gift for awoman’. At the same time,she was by temperamentprofoundly orthodox inwaysthat went further than herdeeply felt faith, sustainedasshe had been through twentyyears of uncertainty andsuffering by her mother’sexampleofthefemalevirtuesof constancy, piety, duty andpatience.But whether or not Mary

genuinely believed that, as a

woman, she would requirehelp in governing herkingdom, it was unarguablytrue, first, that she needed tofind a way of managing acouncil composed of adangerously unstable mix ofher own loyal Catholicservants and thoseexperienced Protestantpoliticians who had sonarrowly extricatedthemselves from JaneGrey’sshort-lived regime. As the

emperor’s ambassadorsshrewdly noted, theunaccustomed sight of theirqueenonherkneesappealingfor their assistance and theirloyalty might well haveencouragedsomeofherlordsandministerstoconcludethatshe was acting out of‘timidity and fear’; ‘but,however that may be’, theywent on, ‘it has certainlysoftened several hearts andturned them away from

thoughts of an evil andsuspicious nature’. In theabsence of a male rivalembodying a moreconventionally commandingmodelofkingship,Marywasdiscovering that female‘frailties’ could on occasionbe deployed to politicallydisarmingeffect.The second inescapable

truth was that the queen didrequire a husband – andquickly– if shewere togive

birth to an heir. As thingsstood,byherfather’swillandtheactofparliamentthathadvindicatedherownaccessionto the throne, her next heirwas her half-sister Elizabeth.In Mary’s eyes, however,Elizabeth was illegitimate,born to Anne Boleyn beforethe death of Katherine ofAragon, Mary’s adoredmother and Henry VIII’srightful wife. Elizabeth wasalso a Protestant, whose

current gestures towardsCatholicism bore theunmistakable stamp of theprincess’s political agilityrather than any spiritualrevelation. For the momentthe queen was prepared totreat her sister with graciousmagnanimity, but it was anintolerable prospect that herown death should deliverEngland into heresy and thecrown to Anne Boleyn’sbastard.Ahusband,therefore,

was a necessity, if not quitefor the reasons the emperorhad adduced, and, at thirty-seven, Mary had no time tolose.Withhercouncilinharness

and the search for a husbandin train, the queen’s rule hadbegun – and despite herimperial cousin’s advice, thesubstance, rather than thedecorously feminine style, ofher decision-making revealedMary’sdeterminationthatshe

wouldindeed‘actonherownauthority’. The first stepwasher coronation, the momentwhen God’s vindication ofher sovereignty was givensacramental form. It was amatter for regret that theparliamentary statute bywhichherfatherhaddeclaredMary illegitimate could notberepealedbeforethissacredritual took place, but shecould allow no suggestionthat her title to the throne

depended on parliamentarysanction. Kings, after all,calledparliaments,ratherthanthe other way around. Twodays before the opening ofherfirstparliament,therefore,Mary was crowned amid thesplendour of WestminsterAbbey.For those fluent in the

language of royaliconography, the processionin which she made her wayfromtheTower to thepalace

ofWestminsteron theeveofthe ceremony reflected thecomplex novelty of politicalcircumstance in October1553. Through streets filledwith painstakingly rehearsedpageants, fluttering streamersand crowds cheering untilthey were hoarse, the queenwasattendedbythegreatandthegood,servants,noblesanddiplomats, just as a kingwould be. But Mary herselfadopted the visual style of

queenspast,allofwhomhadacquired their crowns not byright but by marriage. Herslightfigurewascarriedinanopen litter lined with thesame dazzlingwhite cloth ofgold ofwhich her gownwasmade, her auburn hairhanging loose around hershoulders like that of a brideonherweddingday,intokenofthepurityandfertility thatwere the chief attributes of aroyalconsort.

Purity and fertilitymattered to Mary too, as avirtuous woman who hopedforanheir.Butforher,unlikethekings’wiveswhohadsettheceremonialprecedentsforqueenly coronations, thosequalitieswerejusttwoamongmany she was required toembody as a femalesovereign.And itwas a verydifferent example that shefollowed the next day in thehushof the abbey.Then, she

wasrobedincrimsonlikehermale predecessors as shereceived the orb, sceptre,ring, spurs and sword thatrepresented the powers of aking.Shewasanointed,likeaking,ontheshoulders,breast,forehead and temples (withholy oil specially sent fromthe continent, to avoid anypossible contamination fromtheProtestantpracticesofherbrother’s reign). Finally, theimperial crown of England,

not a consort’s coronet, wasplaceduponherhead.Now that she was a

monarch by every measureand every ceremony that herforefathers had enjoyed,Marycouldturnherattentionto the question of hermarriage. But while thequeen, her subjects and herallies were agreed that sheneededahusband, itwasnotso easy to arrive at anacceptable consensus about

which particular husband sheshould take. In retrospect, itwas becoming increasinglyapparent that being awomanalonehadhelpedhercauseinthe crisis of the summer: ithad been possible for hersupporters to unite in hopethatshewouldmaketheright(asyetunspecified)choiceofspouse, rather than findingthemselves divided bydifferences of opinion aboutoneshealreadyhad.Butnow

thenettlehadtobegrasped–and at the heart of theproblem was the unresolvedquestion of the balance ofauthority between husbandandwifewhenthewifeworea crown. If Mary took ahusband, would Englandacquireaking?That unsettling possibility

persuaded many of hersubjects that their queenshouldmarryanEnglishman,for fear, as the late duke of

Northumberland had warnedandtheemperorhimselfnowruminated, that ‘foreigners,whom theEnglishmore thananyothernationabhor,wouldinterfere with thegovernment’. The leadingcandidate was EdwardCourtenay, earl of Devon,one of the last remainingrepresentatives of thePlantagenet line through hisgrandmother, a daughter ofEdward IV. The threatening

combination of hisdangerously royal blood andhis parents’ closeness toKatherine of Aragon hadpersuaded Henry VIII toincarcerate Courtenay in theTower from the age oftwelve, but now, at twenty-seven, he re-emerged fromconfinement into thepoliticallimelight, hailed as ‘theflower of the Englishnobility’ and the great whitehopeofthosewhohopedthat

Marywouldmarrywithintherealm.The extensive support for

Courtenay’s suit among thequeen’s household andcouncil was given publicvoiceon16Novemberbyanextraordinary parliamentarydelegation includingmanyofher greatest nobles andchurchmen. On their behalf,theSpeakerof theCommonslectured Mary at length on‘all the disadvantages,

dangers and difficulties thatcould be imagined or dreamtofinthecaseofherchoosinga foreign husband’,AmbassadorRenardreported.These ranged from theweighty to the relativelysuperficial (‘the foreignerswouldwishtolorditovertheEnglish; the kingdom wouldbe put to expense inentertaining them’), but inessence boiled down to thethreatthatEnglandmightlose

its independence if its queenwere subjected to ‘husbandlytyranny’fromabroad.Mary’s response was

immediate and unequivocal.Convention had it that theLord Chancellor shouldrespond to parliament on thesovereign’s behalf, butMary’s Lord Chancellor wasBishop Gardiner ofWinchester, who was notonly her most loyal prelatebut Courtenay’s most

committed advocate. Thequeen – who had beenprofoundly irritated by bothtone andcontentof ahomily‘so confused, so longwindedand prolific of irrelevantarguments that she wasobliged to sit down’, shecomplained to Renard –therefore chose to speak forherself. ‘Parliament was notaccustomed to use suchlanguage to the kings ofEngland,’ she told the

unfortunate Speakertrenchantly, ‘nor was itsuitable or respectful that itshoulddoso.’Whathadrousedheranger

morethananythinginhis ill-judged address was theproposition that she shouldmarry one of her ownsubjects.Mary’sviewsonthesacrament of marriage wereas traditional andconservativeastherestofherfaith:‘shewouldwhollylove

and obey him to whom shehad given herself, followingthe divine commandment,andwoulddonothingagainsthiswill’,shehadtoldRenarda month earlier. But herviews on the majesty of herownsovereignauthoritywereequally traditional andconservative. How could sheloveandobeyamanwhowasalreadyboundinobediencetoher? Only outside her realmwould she find a husband

whose status wascommensuratewith her own.And in that case, too, herprivatedutiesasawifecouldbe distinguished clearly fromher public responsibilities asEngland’s queen. She wouldwholly love and obey herhusband, she had informedRenard; ‘but if he wished toencroach in the governmentof thekingdomshewouldbeunabletopermitit’.For twenty years, ever

sinceshehadbeendeclaredabastard at the age ofseventeen, it had beenimpossible, in practice, forMarytomarrybecauseofthetoxic combination of herpotentialpoliticalsignificanceand her profoundly uncertainstatus. Now, she foundherself suddenly transformedinto themosteligiblewomanin Europe, albeit one whoseexalted rank meant that fewsuitorswerequalifiedtoseek

her hand. Faced with thisdisconcerting reversal offortune,her first thoughtwastolooktothecousinwhohaddone so much to sustain herduring her long years ofinternal exile: the widowedEmperor Charles V himself,who had first been proposedasherhusbandwhenhewasayoungmanoftwenty-twoandsheachildofsix.Butatfifty-three, Charleswas exhaustedand ailing, immobilised by

gout, catarrh andhaemorrhoids, andhehadnoappetiteforanothermarriage.In his place, however, heproposed his son and heirPhilip, who was alreadyruling Spain on his father’sbehalf.AndbythetimeMaryresponded so angrily to hersubjects’ representations infavourofanEnglishhusband,she had already committedherselftothisSpanishmatch.Herdecisionhasbeenseen,

by English contemporariesandmanyhistorianssince,asthe defining mistake of herreign. By this account shewas,inAmbassadorRenard’swords, ‘easily influenced,inexpert in worldly mattersand a novice all round’, aqueen who, in relying tooheavilyon the support of theemperor and his envoys,badly underestimated thedepth of her subjects’objections to a marriage

alliance in which she wasemotionally over-involved.Evidence to support thisanalysis is not difficult tofind: Renard’s encrypteddespatches repeatedlyemphasised how much thequeen was ‘inexperienced intheconductofpublicaffairs’,andMary herself maintainedin her dealings with theemperor the tone ofsubmissive gratitude that shehad adopted in the difficult

years before her accession tothethrone.Inhindsight,certainly,itis

clearthatherdeterminationtomarry Philip had profoundand destructive drawbacks.But a similarly retrospectivelook at the spectacularlydisastrous marriages latermade by her royal cousinMary, queen of Scots, to herlords Darnley and Bothwellmight also suggest that, inrefusing to marry one of her

own subjects, Mary Tudorwas prescient rather thanmyopic. In fact, given theurgency of her need in theautumn of 1553 to findsomeone who would passmuster as a royal husband,there were compellingreasons for Mary to lookfavourably on Philip as asuitor.Not leastof thesewasthetraditionalconvergenceofgeopolitical and economicinterestsbetweenEnglandon

the one hand and, on theother, Spain and theNetherlands (both of whichterritories, thanks to themarriage of Charles V’sparents, now formed part ofhis sprawling empire) – along-standing alignmentdisturbed in recent years byreligious upheaval inEngland, but given renewedsignificance by the imminentunion between the queen ofScotland and the heir to

France.Mary herself was the

incarnation of an earlierAnglo-Spanishalliance–andthe dynastic heritage sheshared with Philip alsosuggested thepossibilityofashared understanding abouthow the marriage of twomonarchsmightwork.Whilethe history of France hadexcluded women from theroyal succession completely,and that of England had left

the issueundecideduntil thatvery summer, in the Spanishkingdom of Castile aprecedentinfavouroffemalerule had been set by thetwelfth-century QueenUrraca,whohadsucceededtoher father’s throne twodecades before Matildaattempted to do the same inEngland.Fourcenturieslater,that precedent had helped toenable Mary’s maternalgrandmother (and Philip’s

great-grandmother) Isabellato wear the crown of Castilein her own right, and tomaintain her independentsovereignty throughout hermarriage to Ferdinand, thekingofneighbouringAragon.Could Mary and Philip notemulate their illustriousforebears, to the benefit ofboththeirrealms?Thequeen’sresolutionthat

Philip shouldbeherhusbandneednot,therefore,beseenas

the emotional choice of anaïve and inexperiencedwomaninthralltothelandofher mother’s birth, nor evensimply as a mistake. Therewere good grounds forthinking that hewas the bestof the limited choicesavailable to her, all ofwhichwereproblematic inonewayor another. That was not theassessmentofhercouncillors,but theyhadagendasof theirown,manyof themmutually

incompatible, and concernstooabouttheprospectthatthequeen might take tooindependent a view of herown authority. (As theimperial envoys hadremarked of the convolutedstate of the English court in1553, Mary had ‘foundmatters in such a conditionwhen she came to the thronethat she cannot possibly puteverythingstraight,orpunishall who have been guilty of

something, otherwise shewould be left without anyvassalsatall’.)Meanwhile, Ambassador

Renard had every reason toaccentuate the queen’sdependence on his ownjudicious advice when hereportedeventsinEnglandtohismasterinBrussels.AndifMary was happy at times topresent herself as avulnerably innocent woman,there was often advantage in

doing so. Her chasteinsistence that she had nopersonal taste for marriage(‘she had never felt thatwhich was called love, norharboured thoughts ofvoluptuousness’) fulfilledvaluable political purposeswithin England. She wasmarried to her kingdom, shewas wont to observe with agesturetohercoronationring,and the accession to thethrone of a virgin named

Mary had not gone publiclyunremarked.Emphasisonherlack of worldly experiencealso served to justify herresolve that she would onlyconsider a suitor who waspersonally acceptable toherself. (Courtenay, shemaintained, was not – andalthough she sustained thepurity of that verdict byrefusing to spend any timewith him, she was alsoproved right very rapidly as

his new-found freedom wentto his head, revealingalarming deficiencies in hischaracter and judgement.)When, after extensivebackstagediplomacy,Philip’sproposal was eventuallypresented at court inNovember, Mary acted asthoughthequestionwerenewto her, and consulted hercouncil with ‘becomingmodesty,atimidcountenanceand trembling gestures’. But,

however convincing herperformance, it was her ownplansheputtothem,andherownplanthatprevailed.It was noticeable too that

the general insistence on herneed for a husband to carryout ‘theofficeswhichdonotproperly belong to woman’sestate’ (‘la profession desdames’, in Renard’s elegantcipher) did not include anyfurther specification of whatthose offices actually were.

Ambassador Michieli, forexample, in suggesting thather sex requiredher ‘to refermany matters to hercouncillors and ministers’,noted without apparent ironythatthiswasalso‘thecustomof other sovereigns’.Outsidethe council chamber,leadership in war was oneobvious example of a rolethat a queen could not easilyfulfil; and this division oflabour was vividly depicted

inthegreatsealthatwascastin 1554 showing the royalcouple on horseback, Maryaheadholdingthesceptreandlooking back at Philip whorode on her left, thetraditional position for aconsort, with a great swordunsheathed in his hand. Buteven this apparentlystraightforward distinction offunction between Mary as asovereign wife and Philip asher royal husband was

fraught with politicaldifficulty, given that thepotential benefits of imperialassistanceagainstFranceandScotland had to be weighedagainst the disturbingpossibilitythatEnglandmightbe drawn into Spain’smilitary quarrels or madesubjecttoitsforces.In fact, the treaty

hammered out to give effectto a marriage that wassupposedly made necessary

by the limitations of thequeen’s sex went to greatlengths to prevent herhusband from intervening inthe government of herkingdom at all. Here theadvantages to Mary of aforeign match were onceagain apparent: if hercouncillors believed that shecould not govern without ahusband’s help, it was aprinciple they were eager towaive if the husband in

questionwereSpanish.PhilipwouldhavethetitleofkinginEngland, but none of theauthority.He could assist hiswife in the administration ofher realm, but only so far asestablished ‘laws, privilegesandcustoms’allowed,andhecould appoint no officersthere.Englandwouldtakenopart in his wars; his wifewouldnotleaveherkingdom;and he would have no claimon the throneafterherdeath.

Meanwhile, although Philipalreadyhadasonbyhisfirst,short-lived wife, who wouldinherit Spain after him, therich territories of theNetherlandswouldpasstohisfuture offspring with MaryalongwiththeEnglishcrown.These provisions protected

English interests – and theindependence of Mary’ssovereignty – so effectivelythat Philip privately vowedthatheheldhimselfboundby

none of them. Isabella ofCastile’s example was lesswelcome, it seemed, to herSpanish great-grandson thanit was to her Englishgranddaughter. But whileprivate dissent might salvePhilip’s pride, it did nothingto prevent the terms of thetreaty from passing intoEnglish law in parliament inApril 1554, along withexplicit confirmation thatMary,as‘solequeen’,should

‘have and enjoy the crownand sovereignty’ in ‘as largeandamplemannerand form’after she was married toPhilipasshehadbefore.Nordidhisobjectionsdoanythingto compromise the carefullydesigned ceremonial thatattended this momentousroyal wedding after his rain-sodden arrival atSouthamptonon20July.Fivedayslater,theweather

had not improved when the

wedding party assembled atWinchester’s ancientcathedral, but the absence ofsunwasoffsetbytheshiningcloth of gold inwhich bride,groom and the church’s vastinterior were all lavishlydecked. Philip, at twenty-seven, was a languidlyinscrutable figure, large ofjawandelegantofdress,whohad resigned himself to hisfather’splansforthisEnglishmarriage despite his own

profound reservations, bothpolitical and personal. Hisgracefulmannersbetrayednohint of ungallant thoughts,however, as his bride wasescorted to his side, a short,sparewomanelevenyearshissenior, who had once been‘more thanmiddling fair’, inthe Venetian ambassador’sforensic assessment, butwhose pale face was nowlined‘morebyanxieties thanby age’. On the eve of the

ceremony, the emperor hadmadehissonakingbygivinghim the kingdom of Naples,to ensure the parity of theeclectically mingled titles bywhich the couple wereproclaimed once their vowshad been made: ‘Philip andMary, by the grace of GodKing andQueen of England,France, Naples, JerusalemandIreland,Defendersof theFaith, Princes of Spain andSicily,Archdukes ofAustria,

Dukes of Milan, Burgundyand Brabant, Counts ofHabsburg, Flanders andTyrol’. Their marriage hadtherefore bestowed on Marythe title of prince of Spain,just asherhusbandwaskingof England; but on Englishsoil, as on their great seal,Philip’splacewasonherleft,not her right, in subtleceremonial demonstrationthat he was her consort, nothersovereignlord.

Maryshowedeverysignofsatisfaction in the marriageshe had made. Privately, shewas delighted with thecourteouslyattentivehusbandwho would make it possibleforhertogivehercountryanheir. Publicly, she had foundaspousewhosestatusoutsideEngland was worthy of herown, but whose authoritywithin her realm had beencircumscribed almost tonothing.Butevenasshetook

her vows, it had alreadybecome unsettlingly clearquite how many of hersubjects did not share thishappyviewofherpositionasamarriedqueen.For all the

uncompromising drafting ofher marriage treaty and thelegislation that ratified it, forallMary’s careful distinctionbetweenherprivatedutyasawife and her publicresponsibility as a monarch,

everything that her subjectsknew about the relativeauthorityofhusbandandwifeserved to fuel fears that hermarriage to Philip wouldsubject England to Spanishrule. He was now king ofEngland, and kings, theyknew, ruled. Queens, ingeneral, did not. Had thatbeentheonlyissue,hadMaryhad time to demonstrate thather own sovereignty wasEnglish sovereignty, perhaps

those anxieties could havebeen allayed. But from themoment the Spanish matchwasfirstpubliclybroached,itwasconflatedinthemindsofher subjects with anotherissue that, for Mary, was amatter not of policy but ofdivinely ordained truth: therestoration of Catholicism inEngland.For the last twenty years,

successivewavesof religiousreform had swept over

England, leaving in theirwake unpredictable, eddyingcurrentsofchangeinthefaithof the English people.England was notstraightforwardlyaProtestantcountry; the collapse ofEdward VI’s design for aProtestant succession attestedto that, and many ofMary’ssubjects welcomed hercommitment to traditionalforms of religious practice.Altars were restored, images

were retrieved from theirhiding-places, and the notesof theLatinmass oncemorehung on incense-scented air.Conservative bishops werereleased from custody,swapping places with theevangelical prelates who hadhelped to imprison them,andthe statutes that hadestablished the reformedEdwardian Church wererolled back one by one inparliament. However, the

deepest roots of the Englishreformation lay not indoctrinal controversy, but inHenry VIII’s insistence thatthe English Church shouldhave an English head – amatterofjurisdictionthatwasgiven extra political ballastby the determination of thegreat landowners tomaintaintheir property rights underEnglish law over the richestates they had acquiredwhen England’s monasteries

weredissolved.Andnow thequeen’s intention to restoretheauthorityofRomeandherdecision to take a Spanishhusband were too easilyelided into a double-headedspectre of foreigndomination.As early as the winter of

1553, when news of thequeen’sproposedmarriagetoPhilip of Spain began tospread among her subjects, aconspiracy was under way –

encouraged with partisanenthusiasm by the Frenchambassador – to defendEngland’s autonomy byremoving Mary from thethrone. Beyond that, its aimswere sketchy. She might bereplacedbyJaneGrey,stillaprisoner in the Tower, orperhaps by the queen’srejected suitor EdwardCourtenay, better yet if heweretobemarriedtoMary’ssister Elizabeth. Jane Grey’s

father, the duke of Suffolk,and Courtenay himself werebothinvolvedintheplot,butit was entirely characteristicof both men that lack ofcompetenceandlossofnerverendered them liabilitiesrather than leaders ofresistance. That left SirThomas Wyatt, a gentlemanof Kent, who, alone amongthe conspirators, hadsucceeded in raising threethousand men in his home

county. And at the end ofJanuary1554,thescaleofthethreat that Wyatt’s menrepresented becameunnervingly clear when aLondon militia sent toconfront them at Rochesterwasrouted,withmanytroopsdeserting the militia’s rankstojointherebels.Suddenly, the capital itself

was in danger. Once again,Mary was required to showthat a queen could lead her

people in time of crisis, andonce again she demonstratedher mastery of her role. Shewould not leave London(unlike the imperialambassadors,whowrotewithanunmistakablenoteofpanictoasktheemperorif‘thereisanything tobegainedbyourstayingherelonger’),andshewould not ask Charles V tosend soldiers onto Englishsoil, provocatively counter-productive as that would be.

Instead, she rode with hercouncillorstotheGuildhallintheheart of the city to speaktoLondon’scitizens.Sixmonthsearlier,shehad

rallied her supporters againstQueen Jane with an address,one eulogising eyewitnesssaid, ‘of Herculean ratherthan of womanly daring’.Now she combined Tudorcharisma with the surest ofpolitical touches to denounceWyatt and to declare her

dedication to her realm,playing as she did so on herdoubleidentityasasovereignand a woman. She showedthe people her coronationring, the ‘spousal ring’signifyinghermarriagetoherkingdom, which never, shetoldthem,leftherfinger.Andshewasnotonlya sovereignwife: ‘On the word of aprince,’shewenton,

I cannot tell how

naturally the motherlovesthechild,forIwasneverthemotherofany.Butcertainly, ifaprinceand governor may asnaturally and earnestlylove her subjects as themother does love thechild, then assureyourselves that I, beingyour lady and mistress,do as earnestly andtenderly loveandfavouryou.

WhenWyatt’s assault finallycame, in the night of 6February, the queen stoodfirm as arrows rattled thewindows of the palace ofWestminster.Bymorning,therevolthadcollapsed.The conspiracy sealed the

fate of those who posed adirect threat to Mary’sregime.On12February,JaneGrey was led to the scaffoldwithin the precincts of the

Tower, the fortress fromwhich she had not emergedafter her proclamation asqueen seven months earlier.With extraordinarycomposure, she admitted herfault in accepting the crown,but ‘touching theprocurement and desirethereof by me or on mybehalf,’ she said, ‘I do washmyhands in innocency’.Herwomen tied a blindfold overher eyes to shield her from

the sightof theaxe, and inamomentofterriblepathosshegroped for the block, crying,‘Where is it? What shall Ido?’ They guided her gentlyforward, and, with one finalprayer, she knelt tomeet herdeath. It caused little stiramongthepeoplewhohadsobriefly – and unexpectedly,on both sides – been hersubjects. Edward Courtenayre-entered the Tower on thesamedaythatJaneGreydied.

He remainedaprisoner for ayear, before being sent intoan exile from which he wasnever allowed to return.Princess Elizabeth had hadthe characteristic wit to donothing other than wait andwatch when she learned ofWyatt’s plans, but thatsuspicious inactivity wasenough topersuadehersisterthat she too should now beaccommodated, temporarilyat least, within the Tower’s

walls.The events of February

1554 were an emphaticdemonstration of both thevulnerabilities and thestrengthsofMary’sauthority.Wyatthimself insistedbeforehe lost his head that he hadacted to prevent the queen’smarriage from deliveringEngland into ‘bondage andservitude by aliens andstrangers’. But the queenherself – plausibly enough,

given the identity of theplottersandWyatt’spreviousservice to her brother’sregime – interpreted therebellion as the work oftraitorousProtestants,therebyreinforcing the identificationbetween religious andpolitical anxieties about hergovernment. How complexthose anxieties were wasindicated by a further statuteenacted by the parliament ofApril 1554, to accompany

those concerning the queen’sforthcoming marriage: ‘Anact’, the rolls of parliamentrecorded, ‘declaring that theregalpowerofthisrealmisinthe queen’s majesty as fullyandabsolutely as ever itwasin any her most nobleprogenitors, kings of thisrealm’. The perceived needforalawtospelloutthefactthat a female monarch ruledby the same authority as amalemightappeartosuggest

weakness inMary’sposition;but there are indications thatthe act was framed inresponsetoeffortsbysomeofher more fervent Catholicsupporters to argue over-zealously for the strength ofher powers. She was notbound, they said, by any ofEngland’s laws made sincethe Conquest – and couldtherefore choose to sweepaway the entire apparatus ofthe reformation at will –

because all previous statuteshadbeenmadeinthenameofEngland’s king, while itsqueen was nowherementioned.Her marriage to Philip

therefore exposed her rule topersistent charges that shewashandingEnglandintothecontrol of Rome and Spain.Philip’s Spanish entourage,who complained of theceremonial ‘slights’ thatindicated his subordinate

status as her consort, werepresumably unconvinced ofthelatter,butMary’sconcernto honour her husband byassociating his name withhers in all her publicpronouncements fed sinistersuspicionsamongherEnglishsubjects about the extent ofhis control over their queen.FortheSpanish,thelackofacoronation for King Philipwas a cause of bitterresentment; for the English,

rumours that his coronationwasimminent,alongwiththeenhanced authority it wasassumed to confer, became amainstay of propagandadisseminated by those whoopposed Mary’s policies –and their number wasincreasing, once thereinstatement of the oldheresy laws meant thatobdurateProtestantsbegan todieinCatholicflames.Meanwhile, the queen’s

decisionthatshecouldmarryonly a man of an equivalentdignity toherown inevitablymeantthatthehusbandwhomher subjects feared wasdominating her governmentcouldnotbeconstantlyatherside. Philip had royalresponsibilities outsideEngland,notleasthisfather’swars against France, andalthoughhe stayedatMary’scourtforthirteenmonthsaftertheir sumptuous wedding, it

was another nineteenmonthsafter that before he returned.For all the talk of femaleincapacity, the overridingcompulsion behind Mary’smarriage had not been thedeficienciesofhersexbutherneed for an heir. Time wasalready against her, andPhilip’s absence did nothingto improve her chances ofbearingachild.There was still hope,

however, despite the toll

takenonherhealthaswellasher looks by the strain underwhich she had lived for solong. Contemporaries werequick to ascribe the apparentdelicacyofherconstitutiontoclassically‘hysterical’causes:she suffered from‘menstruous retention andsuffocation of the womb’,Ambassador Michielireported, a condition forwhichshewasregularlybled– resulting, he said, in her

characteristic pallor andthinness – and whichrendered her vulnerable tobouts of melancholy andweeping. But it is clear thatthis, likeother aspectsofherfeminine ‘weakness’, couldbe useful to Mary when shechose. The queen ‘hadpretendedtobeillforthelasttwodays’,shetoldRenardinthe autumnof 1553, ‘but herillness was really the travailthat this decision’ – her

resolution to marry Philip –‘had cost her’. And she wasrobust enough to enjoydancing and hunting, and tostand strong against herenemieswhenherrightswerechallenged(‘Sheisbraveandvaliant’, observed Michieligenerously, ‘unlike othertimid and spiritlesswomen…’).Within fourmonths of her

wedding,itseemedasthoughher prayers had been

answered. It was not easy tobe confident of the earlysymptoms of pregnancy, andthe difficulty wascompoundedmanytimesoverfor a woman who hadexperienced menstrualproblems, but by 28November 1554 the queenhad allowed herself to beconvinced by her doctors’diagnosis that God hadblessed hermarriage and herrealm.Thatwasthedaywhen

papal authority was restoredat last in England (hersubjects having insisted onprior confirmation that thepope would not disturb theirpossession of formerlymonastic estates) – and, toMary’sjoy,itwasproclaimedin providential conjunctionwiththefutureoftheCatholicsuccession. The queen was‘quick with child’, the royalletters said, while bells wererung and Te Deums sung.

Meanwhile, hastily arrangednegotiations produced afraught parliamentaryagreement that, in thegrudgingly acknowledgedinterests of stability, Philipwould become regent onbehalf of the infant heirshould Mary not survive thebirthoftheirbaby.By Easter 1555 England

expectedthearrivalofitsheirwith anxious anticipation.The queen, slowed now by

her growing girth, hadwithdrawn into confinementat Hampton Court, attendedby her devoted ladies-in-waiting in warm roomsmuffledwithrichcarpetsandtapestries, where anexquisitely carved cradlestood ready beside her bed.On 30 April, when wordreached London of the birthof a healthy prince, the cityerupted in celebration. But itwas rumour, running wilder

than the bonfires in thestreets, and it was quicklydenied.May came andwent,dates were recalculated. Inearly July,without fanfareorcomment, the queen beganreceiving visits from malecouncillors and ambassadorsonceagain,andbytheendofthe month little doubtremained that she was not,after all, pregnant. God’sblessing, it seemed,hadbeendeferred.

Marywasbynomeanstheonlywoman tohaveendureda phantom pregnancy.Twentyyearsearlier thewifeof the governor of Calais,whoalsohadacradlewaitingempty, was consolinglyreminded that ‘your ladyshipis not the first woman ofhonour that has overshot ormistaken your time andreckoning’. But the politicalconsequences of the queen’sfailuretoproduceachild,and

the public humiliation towhichshewasexposed,weremuch greater than any otherwomanhadtoendure.Philip,whohadwaitedinEnglandtobe by Mary’s side after thedelivery that never was,sailed away from Greenwichon29August,wavinghishatin salute to his wife until hewas out of view. TheVenetian ambassador gavethedogeafulsomeaccountofthe ‘flood of tears’ to which

thequeengavewayonceshewas alone; how he knew ofthis emotional collapseremained unexplained,especially since he lateradmitted that many monthshadpassedsincehehadbeengrantedthehonourofaroyalaudience. Publicly, it waswith a regal grandeur moreunfathomable than ever thatthe queen returned to thehours she spent at her dutiesandherdevotions.

Philip eventually returnedto his wife’s kingdom for athree-month visit in March1557, and in January of thefollowing year Maryannounced the good newsthat she was seven monthspregnant – ‘which has givenme greater joy than I canexpress’, her husband wrotewithformalcourtesy,‘asitisthe one thing in the world Ihavemostdesiredandwhichis of the greatest importance

for the cause of religion andthewelfareofourrealm’.Thequeen had waited so longbefore speaking of hercondition, she explained, tobesurethatthistimeshewasindeed carrying a baby. Butno elaborate preparationswere made for herconfinement, and althoughshemadeawillat theendofMarch 1558 – ‘thinkingmyself tobewith child’, and‘foreseeing the great danger

which by God’s ordinanceremain to allwomen in theirtravail of children’ – she didnot go into labour. By Maythe subject was no longermentioned.Despite all her hopes, her

marriage had not emulatedthe success of the union ofhergrandparents Isabella andFerdinand. Married ateighteen, Isabella had givenbirth to six children, whileMary, a bride at thirty-eight,

had none. The Catholicmonarchs of Aragon andCastile had united theirrealms to drive out the hea-then Moors, but in Mary’skingdom the stench ofburning Protestant flesh nowserved to deepen religiousdivision. And England couldlook only with envy at thegeographical strengthachieved by the alliance oftheSpanishkingdoms.Bythesummer of 1557, despite

Mary’s attempts to act as apeacemaker, England had –as Wyatt and others hadfeared – been drawn into theEmpire’s war with France.And in January 1558 theunthinkable news had comethat Calais, the garrisonedport that had been the lastEnglish foothold on thecontinentforthepasthundredyears, had fallen to theFrench.By the spring of that year,

a queen alone at the age offorty-two,Marywasresignedtotheabsenceofherhusbandand facing the certainty thatshe would not carry an heir.That prospect, Renard hadwarned after the debacle ofher first pregnancy, meant‘trouble on so great a scalethat the pen can hardly set itdown. Certain it is that theorder of succession has beenso badly decided that theLady Elizabeth comes next,

and thatmeans heresy again,and the true religionoverthrown.’ The queen didnot want Elizabeth to inherither crown, but nor could shebringherselftodisposeofherhalf-sister. Mary’s ownfavouredheirwasherreliablyCatholic cousin MargaretDouglas, the handsomedaughter of Henry VIII’selder sister Margaret by herstormy second marriage, towhom she had been close

since girlhood. But it couldhardly have escaped thequeen’s attention that, by theprecedent of her own victoryover Jane Grey, Elizabeth’sclaim would in turn beirresistible. Mary herselfdrew an absolute distinctionbetweenthelegitimacyofherownbirthandthebastardyofhersister,butshewasenoughherfather’sdaughtertoknowthat the power of hisbloodline was likely to

prevail. All she could hopewas that shewould live longenough to prevent Elizabethfrom uprooting theCatholicism she had sofaithfully and forcefullyreplantedinherkingdom.In that, too, she would be

disappointed. During thesummer of 1558, a lethalepidemic of influenza tookhold of England. The newdiseasedidnotstrikequickly,like the plague or the sweat.

Instead, protracted, repeatedfevers laid thousands low,and many did not rise againfromtheirbeds.Thatautumn,the queen was among them.In the first week ofNovember, knowing by thenthat she was not expected tosurvive, she sent toacknowledgeElizabethasherheir, asking only that hersister should fulfil the termsof herwill andmaintain ‘theold religion as the queen has

restored it’. She held on fortenmoredays,driftinginandout of consciousness,consoled by visions, she toldher closest friend among herladies, of angelic childrensinging and playing aroundher. In the early morning of17 November, mass wascelebrated at her bedsidebefore she finally slippedaway.Soon the road north from

London to Hatfield, where

Mary’s sister waited fornews, was crowded with thegreat men of the realmhastening to offer theirallegiance to England’s newqueen.

AQueenandBytheSameTitleaKing

Also

‘She was a king’s daughter,she was a king’s sister, shewas aking’swife.’Thus far,the bishop of Winchester’soration at Mary Tudor’sfuneral a month after herdeathisstrikinglyreminiscentoftheepitaphofherforebearMatilda,whowaslaudedfourhundred years earlier as the‘daughter, wife and mother’of kings. But Mary, unlike

Matilda, was not ‘greatest inheroffspring’.Instead,asthebishop went on, ‘she was aqueen,andbythesametitleakingalso’.That somewhat ungainly

formulation grasped at theheart of the challenge bothwomenfaced: to rule in theirown right, when everyassumptionabouttheexerciseof power took it for grantedthat thecrownwasshaped tofitamalehead.Matildatried

to overcome thatpresupposition, and failed –not because female rule wasexpressly prohibited by lawor custom in twelfth-centuryEngland, but because itproved impossible for her tosecure a decisive hold onpower when faced with arival who embodied theconventionallycomprehensible authority ofmale kingship. Mary, thedaughter of another powerful

King Henry, succeeded inasserting her right to herfather’s crown, not leastbecause her subjects did nothavetheoptionofaplausiblemalecandidateforthethrone.But Mary also faced manychallengesthatMatildawouldhaverecognisedasshesoughttodefendtheindependenceofher own sovereignty, to ruleaswellasreign.The explicit denunciation

ofwomen’s right to rule that

wasarticulatedatthispointinthe mid-1550s, mostfamously and heatedly byJohn Knox, was precipitatedby the intersection betweenreligious traumaandpoliticalcircumstance. Knox, ananglicisedScotsmanwhohadbeen a royal chaplain atEdwardVI’sProtestantcourt,looked on in horror from hisGenevan exile as three royalCatholic women worked tohold back the tide of the

reformed faith in which hebelieved so passionately. Inthe Netherlands, Charles V’ssister Mary, dowager queenofHungary, served as regenton her imperial brother’sbehalf. In Scotland, thedowager queen Marie deGuise governed Knox’snative land while her youngdaughter Mary, queen ofScots, prepared for herFrench wedding in Paris.Most egregious of all, Mary

Tudor ruled England in herown right, and was settingabout the utter destruction ofher brother’s godly work inKnox’sadoptedcountry.The obvious answer was

that this papist tyrannyreflected the unholy andunnaturalqualityofwomen’s‘monstrous regiment’,‘which, amongall enormitiesthat thisdaydoabounduponthefaceofthewholeearth,ismost detestable and

damnable’.Nowomanshouldbe allowed to abrogate thelaws of God and nature bywielding power, and thosewhodid– likeMaryandhertwo namesakes, the dowagerqueens in Scotland and theNetherlands – were ‘cursedJezebels’. Not even MaryTudor’s worst enemy couldseriouslyaccuseherofsexualtransgression,but thebiblicalJezebel had imposed theidolatrousworshipofBaalon

God’skingdomofIsrael,andit was therefore the Englishqueen’s spiritual ‘fornicationandwhoredom’thatmadeher‘the uttermost of [God’] splagues’.But, however specific the

context in which Knox waswriting, it was the deeperresonance of his argumentthat allowed his trumpet tosound. Edward II’s queenIsabella, after all, had beennamed a Jezebel in England

long beforeChristendomhadsplit between Catholics andProtestants. And, as Eleanorof Aquitaine had beenreminded when she rebelledagainst her husband, ‘man istheheadofwoman’, and shewouldthereforebe‘thecauseof a general ruin’. It wasnotable, in fact, how limitedwere the attempts to refuteKnox’s position. JohnAylmer, an evangelicalscholar who had been Jane

Grey’s tutor, answeredKnoxin1559withAnHarbourforFaithful and True SubjectsAgainst theLateBlownBlastConcerning the GovernmentofWomen, but his reasoningdiffered fromKnox’sonly inextrapolation, rather thanfoundation. Yes, he agreed,womenwere‘weakinnature,feeble in body, soft incourage, unskilful inpractice’, and they weresubject, as wives, to their

husbands; yet an exceptionalwoman might be appointedby God’s providence to theoffice of kingship, just asDeborah had been a lonefemale Judge in OldTestamentIsrael.Inanycase,Aylmer added, thanks to therole of parliament,government would beconductednotsomuchbythequeen in person as by hermale councillors and judgesin her name, so ‘it is not in

England so dangerous amattertohaveawomanrulerasmentakeittobe’.The occasion of this

somewhat limp rebuttal wasthe accession of a new,Protestant queen in England,which necessitated aProtestant about-turn,executed with undignifiedhaste, on the subject offemale rule. Knox himselftried tomakeup for his owndisastrous timing – his

fulminations having beenpublished littlemore thansixmonths before Elizabethinheritedhersister’scrown–by writing to the new andclearly affronted queen toexplainthathehadnotmeantto include her authority,providentially ordained byGod as it was, in histhundering condemnation ofall women rulers. Typically,however,headoptedatoneofinjured innocence (‘I cannot

deny the writing of a bookagainst the usurped authorityand unjust regiment ofwomen … but why that …your grace … should beoffendedattheauthorofsuchaworkIcanperceivenojustoccasion’), and could notresist theopportunitytoofferthe queen the benefit of hisunsolicitedadvice(‘if thusinGod’s presence you humbleyourself, as in my heart Iglorify God for that rest

granted to his afflicted flockwithin England under you, aweak instrument, so will Iwith tongue and pen justifyyour authority and regimentas the Holy Ghost hasjustifiedthesameinDeborah…’).Elizabeth was not

impressed. When KnoxsoughttoreturnfromGenevato Scotland in 1559, shewouldnot lethimsetfootonEnglish soil, forcing him to

brave the longer and moredangerousNorthSearoutetoLeith. She was happy,however, to adopt theprofferedmantleofabiblicalDeborah – a providentialexception to the common lotof women, depicted as aqueeninparliamentrobesinaFleet Street pageant atElizabeth’s coronation –knowing as she did that thealternative was the familiartag of Jezebel, which would

soon be enthusiasticallyredeployed against thisProtestant queen by herCatholic enemies. Thisprocessof exceptionalism,ofDeborah-fication,bywhichawoman who exercisedauthority in ways perceivedby an approving observer tobe desirable or legitimatecould be excused, or raisedabove, the limitations of hersex, was familiar as well asuseful.MaryTudor’sbravery

in1553hadbeenanexample,her supporters declared, ‘ofHerculean rather than ofwomanly daring’, and fourcenturies earlier KingStephen’s wife Mathilde,‘forgetting the weakness ofher sex and a woman’ssoftness’, had borne herself‘withthevalourofaman’.But the converse of this

exceptionalism–thefateofawoman who exercisedauthority in ways perceived

byadisapprovingobservertobe undesirable or illegitimate– was more pervasive andmuch more damaging, aninfinitely regressive double-bind in which female rulerswere all too easily trapped.Womenwere soft and weak,hence unfit to rule; but awoman who showed herselfto be strong was not theequivalent of a man, but amonster, a crime againstnature. This was the essence

ofthechroniclers’vilificationof Matilda who, with ‘everytraceofawoman’sgentlenessremoved from her face’,conducted herself with‘insufferable arrogance’rather than the ‘modest gaitand bearing proper to thegentle sex’. It offeredammunition against herdescendant Isabella as an‘ironvirago’whoaped,ratherthan emulated, a man. Itprovided Shakespeare with

his portrait of Margaret ofAnjou as a ‘she-wolf’, a‘tiger’s heart wrapp’d in awoman’shide’:

Women are soft,mild, pitiful, andflexible;

Thou stern,indurate,flinty, rough,remorseless.

And it stood at the heart ofKnox’s portrayal of ‘thatcruelmonsterMary’,when–with gloriouslyunacknowledged irony, amidhisargumentthatherrulewasmonstrous precisely becauseshewasfemale–hedeclaredthat she was ‘unworthy, byreasonofherbloodytyranny,ofthenameofwoman’.How, then, was a woman

torule,toexercisepowerthatwas made for male hands,

withoutbeingsuckedintothequicksand? The traditionalanswer has been thatElizabeth learned from hersister’s devastating mistakesto develop a new anduniquely imposing form ofqueenship.Certainly,shehada cool and capriciousintelligence, a silver-tonguedcapacity to say everythingandnothingatthesametime,that was very different fromthe deeply felt, dogmatic

certaintiesbywhichhersisterlivedandruled.Certainlytoo,the very English brand ofpragmatic Protestantism atwhich Elizabeth eventuallyarrived–famouslymakingnowindows into men’s souls –sought to unite as many ofherpeopleaspossiblearoundher sovereignty, rather thanenforcing divisive spiritualtruthswithstillmoredivisiveviolence.Buthindsight–thewriting

of history in lastinglyProtestant England, and thecomparison between onequeen who ruled for fiveyears and another who ruledfor forty-five, not tomentionthe dazzling effect ofElizabeth’s own propaganda– has tended to obscure theextenttowhichElizabethandMaryusedthesamestrategiesin representing the force oftheirfemalesovereignty.‘Shewasaqueen,andbythesame

title a king also,’ the bishopof Winchester said of Mary.‘She was a sister to her thatby the like title and right isboth king and queen at thispresent of this realm.’ Andboth women did speak ofthemselves as English kings.‘Parliament was notaccustomed to use suchlanguage to the kings ofEngland’, Mary admonishedher Speaker. PrincessElizabeth,indesperateappeal

afterWyatt’s rebellion tohersister’sroyalpromisethatsheshould not be condemnedwithout trial, remindedMarythat ‘theking’sword ismorethan another man’s oath’.Most famously of all,Elizabeth as queen declaredthat, though she had ‘thebody of a weak and feeblewoman’ (a gesture towardsthe frailties of her sex thatshe, like Mary, regularlymade, although with rather

lessconviction), shehad ‘theheart and stomach of a king,andofakingofEnglandtoo’.But these female kings,

unlike their malecounterparts, were also wifeandmother to theirkingdom.Elizabeth’sreportedspeechtoher parliament in February1559echoedMary’srallying-cry to the Londoners at theGuildhall. ‘I am alreadybounduntoahusband,whichis the kingdom of England,’

Elizabeth told her subjects,and,likehersisterbeforeher,showedthe‘spousalring’thatshe had received at hercoronation.‘Andreproachmeno more that I have nochildren; for every one ofyou, and as many as areEnglish, aremy children…’Fouryearslater,shedeclaredtotheCommonsthat‘thoughaftermydeathyoumayhavemany stepdames, yet shallyou never have any a more

naturalmotherthanImeantobeuntoyouall’.Thedifferencebetweenthe

two queens – and a hugedifference itwas– lay in thefact that Elizabeth’scoronation ring was notjostling for room on herfingers with a plain goldweddingbandsuchastheoneMary wore. Elizabeth hadtimeandspacetoconsiderthemarriage that her subjectsassumed shewouldmake, in

a way that Mary never had.Attwenty-five,shehadyearsof potential childbearingahead of her, and in themeantime she – unlikeMary– had no obvious heir of anunhelpfully different faithhovering unsupportively ontheoutskirtsofhercourt.Thelackofanobviousheirwasacause of anxious unease toher councillors, and hermarriage the subject ofrepeated petitions from her

parliaments; Elizabeth wasstaking a great deal on herown survival, as her subjectsfretfully reminded her aftershehad sufferedadangerousattack of smallpox in 1562.But while she lived, theuncertainty of the successionreinforced her own status asthe source of all security forherrealm,andsheseizedthischance to rule as a virginqueen, putting off until aperpetual tomorrow the

urgent dilemmas that hadbeen Mary’s from themomentofheraccession.And it was as the Virgin

Queen that Elizabethconstructed her own answerto those dilemmas. She hadwitnessed the desperatedisadvantages of her sister’sSpanish marriage at closehand.Nowsheobservedfroma distance the horrifyingconsequences of thesuccessive marriages of her

cousinMary,queenofScots,to her lords Darnley andBothwell, which set in trainthe events that led toMary’sdeposition, exile, andincarceration in an Englishprison.SuitorsforElizabeth’shandcameandwent,andshedallied, diplomatically orotherwise,butwouldcommitto none. Meanwhile, hersubjects couldenthusiasticallyagreethatthequeen should choose a

husband,butanycandidateinparticularalwaysprovokedasmuchdissentasapplause.Bythe late 1570s time had runout. Where Mary’s marriageto her kingdom had beencompromisedbythetroublingimplications of the fact thatshe was also wife to a king,for Elizabeth, it was nowclear, the union betweenmonarch and realm wouldtranscend metaphor to bebothenduringandexclusive.

The courtly complimentscontinued, but now toGloriana, a sovereign queenat the centre of a secularisedcult replacing the Mariolatrythat was forbidden inProtestantEngland.Elizabethhad begun her reign byclutching the cloak ofDeboraharoundher;nowherauthority was armoured withavoraciouslyeclecticarrayofimages,myths,allegoriesandsymbols. She was king,

queen, virgin, wife, motherand goddess;Diana,Astraea,Phoebe, Juno, Cynthia; thephoenix,eternallyrisingfromtheflames,andthepelican,amystical mother to herpeople;notonlyDeborahbutalsothebiblicalJudith,whosedaring and courage savedIsrael from the Assyrians.Elizabeth had used herprovidential destiny to turnKnox on his head: the factthatamerewomancouldrule

in such glory demonstratedhow special an instrument ofGod’s will this queen reallywas.But the power of

Elizabeth’simagewasnotanempty shell. The foundationofherauthority–likethatforwhichMatilda had fought sohard four centuries before,and succeeded at last inestablishing for her son andthe generations that followed– was her lineal right,

inherited from her imposingfather.Ifshewaskingaswellas queen, a woman with amaleheartandmalecourage,there was one man inparticular from whom herpower derived: ‘we hope torule,governandkeepthisourrealm’, she told herparliament in 1559, ‘in asgood justice, peace and rest,in like wise as the king myfatherheldyouin’.‘Good justice’ mattered

too. As Isabella had foundtwo hundred years earlier,legitimacy of action – thereponsibilities as well as therights of kingship – couldconsolidatepowerinunlikelyfemale hands. A Frenchqueen consort with her loverbyherside,shesucceeded inbringing downher husband’styranny–onlytodiscover,inimposing a tyranny of herown, that the sword she hadwieldedcouldturnonhertoo.

Elizabeth,mindfulofKnox’scharge that her rule was atyranny by simple virtue (ordefect) of her sex, tookconstant care that hergovernment, howevercontentious or intractable thematters with which it had tograpple, should plausibly beperceived to represent the‘commonweal’–andthatsheherself should be seen as thechampionofherpeople,with,as she declared in 1588, ‘my

chiefest strength andsafeguard in the loyal heartsandgoodwillofmysubjects’.That legitimacycouldonly

bemaintained,asMargaretofAnjou had so agonisinglydiscovered, if governmentwere animated by the royalwill of the sovereign.However skilled Elizabethwas at procrastination,however little she liked tonarrow down the options infrontofher,therecouldbeno

mistaking that the queen’sauthority was the animatingforce by which decisionswere made or (often)deferred. ‘Little man, littleman,’ the almost seventy-year-old queen reproved acouncillor who dared tosuggest that she must go tobedduringwhatwouldproveto be her final illness, ‘theword“must”isnottobeusedtoprinces!’AndshedrewonwhatCharlesVhadcalledthe

‘assistanceandconsentoftheforemost men of the land’with consummate skill,choosinghercouncillorswell,delegating wisely, andblaming them roundly fordecisions – such as theexecutionofhercousinMary,queenofScots– fromwhichshewishedtoplaceherselfatanexculpatorydistance.Perhaps more than

anything,Elizabeth–likeherremarkable ancestor Eleanor

ofAquitaine–governedwithacumen gained throughadversity, albeit thatElizabeth’s adversity camemuch earlier, and moreprofoundly formatively, thanthe reverses in Eleanor’sextraordinary life. Elizabethlearned watchfulness in thenursery, and only laterlearned to inhabit thesovereignty to which shemight never have come,whereas the lengthy loss of

Eleanor’s freedom came as atraumatic jolt to a womanwho had been a queen sinceshe was thirteen and a greatheiress before that. But inboth women a quicksilverintelligence and a steely willwereskilfullychannelledintoa public authority ofremarkableforce.The glittering carapace of

Elizabeth’s image owedsomething, too, to Eleanor.The troubadours of twelfth-

century Aquitaine followedEleanor’sroutenorthtoParis,Normandy and England,bringing with them songs offin’amor,anewformoflyricpoetry in which knightspledged themselves to theserviceoftheladytheyloved,a figureof remoteandwilfulallure who wassimultaneously idealised anderoticised in their breathlessverse. In fact, there is noevidence that Eleanor

participated directly in thiscult of courtly love, beyondthe fact that the poets wrotein lands over which shepresided as queen andduchess, but four centurieslater Elizabeth was wellaware of its politicalpotential. Where her sisterMary had constructed herauthorityasafemaleruleronthe foundation of herirreproachable virtue, pietyand sense of duty, Elizabeth

was a very different kind ofvirgin queen.Virtuous, piousand dutiful, certainly, asoccasion demanded; but alsoworshipped by the devotedknights of her court, whowere bound to her by theirelaborately declared love,along with their loyalty.(‘While your majesty givesme leave to say I love you,’the twenty-five-year-old earlofEssex told the fifty-seven-year-old queen in 1591, ‘my

fortune is, as my affection,unmatchable. If ever youdenymethatliberty,youmayendmy life, but never shakemy constancy, for were thesweetness of your natureturned into the greatestbitterness that could be, it isnot inyourpower,asgreataqueenasyouare,tomakemeloveyouless.’)This Virgin Queen could

do much. She was seductiveVenus as well as chaste

Diana. She was both a kingandaqueen,aman’sheartina woman’s breast. WhatKnox had denounced as her‘monstrous regiment’ hadgivenEnglandthegoldenageofGloriana.Buttheonethingshecouldnotdowastheonething every king saw as thesinequanonofhiskingship:toensurethecontinuityofhisbloodline and the security ofhis realm by handing on thecrown to an heir of his own

body. Elizabeth’s formidablecontrol of her country’spresent had been bought atthe cost of abdicating herstakeinitsfuture.We are left to wonder:

would Matilda – who was,unlike Elizabeth, the motheras well as the daughter of agreat King Henry – haveexchanged her son’sinheritancefor thecrownsheneverwore?

NoteonSourcesandFurtherReading

This is the first time I havebegun a bibliographic notewith a reference to sourcesonline: in the years it hastaken to write this book theextent and quality ofhistoricalmaterialsonthenethas transformed theexperience of research. TheOxford Dictionary ofNational Biography(http://www.oxforddnb.com)

is a treasure trove ofscholarship and insight,available through personalsubscription and to membersof academic and publiclibraries; almost everyindividualmentionedinthesepageswhowaseitherborninthe British Isles orcontributed significantly totheir history has an entry oftheir own, complete withextensive bibliographicalreferences. And British

History Online(http://www.british-history.ac.uk)isaremarkabledigital library created by theInstitute of HistoricalResearch and the History ofParliament Trust, whichmakes available animpressive range of printedprimary and secondarysources for thehistoryof theBritish Isles, most free toview, some by personalsubscription.

Both sites are an excellentstarting-point for‘Beginnings’,thefirstsectionof this book. Thepersonalities and politics ofthe Tudor court can betracked through the pages ofthe ODNB, while BritishHistory Online offers accessto many important primarysources for the reign ofEdwardVI–especially,here,the reports of the imperialambassador Jehan Scheyfve

for1553,whichareavailableintranslationintheCalendarof State Papers, Spain, vol.11,ed.R.Tyler(1916).The historiography of the

Tudorperiodisvastandeverexpanding. As a starting-point, see JohnGuy’s classicTudorEngland(1988),SusanBrigden’s New Worlds, LostWorlds (2001), and HenryVIII:Man andMonarch, ed.Susan Doran (2009). For thelife of Edward VI, see

Jennifer Loach’sposthumously publishedEdward VI, ed. G. Bernardand P. Williams (1999);Hester Chapman’s The LastTudor King: A Study ofEdward VI (1961); W. K.Jordan’s two volumesEdward VI: The Young King(1968) and Edward VI: TheThreshold of Power (1970);and Chris Skidmore’sbiography Edward VI: TheLostKingofEngland(2007).

For the politics of the reign,seeStephenAlford,Kingshipand Politics in the Reign ofEdward VI (2002), and, onreligion, DiarmaidMacCulloch, Tudor ChurchMilitant: Edward VI and theProtestant Reformation(1999), and Eamon Duffy,The Stripping of the Altars:Traditional Religion inEngland, 1400–1580 (1992).For Edward’s own politicaljournal,seeLiteraryRemains

ofKingEdwardtheSixth,ed.J.G.Nichols(1857),andTheChronicle and PoliticalPapers of King Edward VI,ed.W.K.Jordan(1966).Formasques at Edward’s court,seeSydneyAnglo,Spectacle,Pageantry and Early TudorPolicy (1969), and for hisillness, G. Holmes, F.Holmes,andJ.McMorrough,‘The death of young KingEdward VI’, New EnglandJournal of Medicine, 345

(2001), 60–2. For discussionof Henry VIII’s will andEdwardVI’s ‘device’ for thesuccession, see Eric Ives,‘Tudor Dynastic ProblemsRevisited’, HistoricalResearch,81(2008),255–79,and his Lady Jane Grey: ATudorMystery(2009);Ihopeit will be clear how much IowetoProfessorIves’swork,even while my conclusionsdifferfromhis.‘Beginnings 2: Long live

the queen?’ draws on awidevariety of sources, includingthose used in the rest of thebook. ItopenswithMargaretPaston, forwhomseePastonLetters and Papers of theFifteenth Century, ed. N.Davis, R. Beadle and C.Richmond, 3 vols (2004–5),andmyBlood& Roses: ThePaston Family in theFifteenthCentury(2004).Forthe history of women in themiddle ages, invaluable

starting-points are HenriettaLeyser,Medieval Women: ASocial History of Women inEngland, 450–1500 (1995)and Mavis Mate, Women inMedieval English Society(2000). On the power of thecrown in medieval England,see Christine Carpenter, TheWars of the Roses (1997),chapter2,andGeraldHarriss,ShapingtheNation:England,1360–1461(2005),PartI.Forthe Bayeux Tapestry, see D.

M. Wilson, The BayeuxTapestry(1985).JohnKnox’sFirst Blast of the TrumpetAgainst the MonstrousRegiment of Women,publishedinGenevain1558,can be read in facsimile viaparticipatinglibrariesatEarlyEnglish Books Online(http://eebo.chadwyck.com),or in The Works of JohnKnox, ed. D. Laing, 6 vols(1846–64). For ThomasBecon’s An Humble

SupplicationuntoGodfortheRestoring of His Holy Wordunto the Church of England,published at Strasbourg in1554, see Early EnglishBooks Online(http://eebo.chadwyck.com)orPrayers and Other PiecesofThomasBecon,ed.J.Ayre(1844).For Matilda the chronicle

sources are voluminous andfascinating. For OrdericVitalis,seeTheEcclesiastical

HistoryofOrdericVitalis,ed.andtrans.M.Chibnall,6vols(1968–90). The GestaStephani is edited andtranslated by K. R. Potter,with introduction and notesby R. H. C. Davis (1976).William of Malmesbury’sHistoriaNovella is translatedbyK.R.PotterandeditedbyEdmundKing(1998),andhisGesta Regum Anglorum isedited and translated in twovolumesbyR.A.B.Mynors

(1998–9). Henry ofHuntingdon’s HistoriaAnglorum is edited andtranslated by DianaGreenway(1996;seealsoherOxford World’s Classicsedition, 2002). The GestaNormannorum Ducum ofWilliamofJumièges,OrdericVitalisandRobertofTorigniiseditedandtranslatedintwovolumes by E. M. C. vanHouts (1992–5), and theAnglo-SaxonChroniclebyM.

J. Swanton (1996). See alsothe Chronicle of John ofWorcester, ed. and trans. P.McGurk, vol. 3 (1998).English Histori calDocuments, 1042–1189, ed.D. C. Douglas and G. W.Greenaway (1968), hasextracts from many of theseand other contemporarysources, including thewritings of Walter Map andGeraldofWales.Theessentialmodernwork

on Matilda is MarjorieChibnall’s The EmpressMatilda (1991); see also C.Beem, The Lioness Roared:TheProblemsofFemaleRulein English History (2006),chapter 1, and AntoniaFraser, Boadicea’s Chariot:The Warrior Queens (1988),chapter 10. For Henry I, seeJudith Green,Henry I: Kingof Eng land and Duke ofNormandy (2006). For theNorman Conquest and its

effects(anothersubjectwithavast historiography), seeespecially George Garnett,Conquered England:Kingship, Succession andTenure, 1066–1166 (2007).Forthecivilwar,seeR.H.C.Davis’s lucid King Stephen(3rd edition, 1990), which isalso thesourceof the firstofthe modern quotations givenat the beginning of ‘Matilda4: Greatest in her offspring’;theotherisfromJ.Bradbury,

Stephen and Matilda: TheCivilWarof1139–53(1996).SeealsoTheAnarchyofKingStephen’sReign, ed. E.King(1994),D.Crouch,TheReignof King Stephen (1999), andD. Matthew, King Stephen(2002).Onqueenship–inthesense of the rights, powersand roles of kings’ wives,ratherthanfemalekings–seePauline Stafford, QueenEmma and Queen Edith:Queenship and Women’s

Power in Eleventh-CenturyEngland (1997), and forMatilda’s mother see L.Huneycutt, Matilda ofScotland: A Study inMedievalQueen ship (2003).ForMatilda inGermany, seethe work of Karl Leyser:‘England and the Empire inthe Early Twelfth Century’and ‘Frederick Barbarossa,Henry II and theHand of StJames’, in his MedievalGermanyanditsNeighbours,

900–1250 (1982), and ‘TheAnglo-Norman Succession,1120–5’, in Anglo-NormanStudies, 13 (1990), ed. M.Chibnall, 225–41. On theritual and significance ofcoronation, see P. E.Schramm, A History of theEnglishCoronation,transl.L.G. Wickham Legg (1937).For Matilde of Canossa, seeD. Hay, The MilitaryLeadership of Matilda ofCanossa,1046–1115(2008).

A thorough and helpfullysober overview of Eleanor isprovided by R. V. Turner,Eleanor of Aquitaine: QueenofFrance,QueenofEngland(2009). Not at all sober, butinspiringly lyrical (ifrequiring of carefultreatment) is Amy Kelly,EleanorofAquitaineand theFourKings(1952).Importantessays,especiallythosebyE.A. R. Brown, MarieHivergneaux, R. V. Turner,

James Brundage, ConstanceBouchard, PeggyMcCrackenandJaneMartindale,aretobefound in Eleanor ofAquitaine: Lord and Lady,ed. B. Wheeler and J. C.Parsons(2003).MoreofJaneMartindale’s insights arepublished in her owncollection of essays, Status,Authority and RegionalPower: Aquitaine andFrance, Ninth to TwelfthCenturies (1997), and in her

contribution to King John:NewInterpretations,ed.S.D.Church (1999); and see theessays by Daniel Callahan,John Gillingham and RuthHarvey in The World ofEleanor of Aqui taine:Literature and Society inSouthernFrancebetween theEleventh and ThirteenthCenturies, ed. C. Léglu andM. Bull (2005). See also H.G.Richardson, ‘TheChartersand Letters of Eleanor of

Aquitaine’, EnglishHistoricalReview,74(1959),193–213. For Eleanor’ssecond husband, see W. L.Warren,HenryII (1973),andHenry II: NewInterpretations, ed. C.Harper-Bill and N. Vincent(2007); and for her sons, J.Gillingham,RichardI(1999),andW.L.Warren,KingJohn(1978). For Eleanor oncrusade, see JonathanPhillips, The Second

Crusade: Extending theFrontiers of Christendom(2007). For Bernard ofClairvaux, seeThe Letters ofSt Bernard of Clairvaux,trans. Bruno Scott James(1953).There is anextensiveliterature in French onEleanor’slifeandcareer;hereI would mention particularlyJ.Holt,‘Aliénord’Aquitaine,Jean Sans Terre et laSuccessionde1199’,CahiersdeCivilisationMédiévale,29

(1986),95–100.Many of the chronicle

sources forEleanor’s life areless easily accessible thanthose for her mother-in-lawMatilda. Lengthy extractsfromWilliamofNewburgh’sHistoria Rerum Anglicarum,and shorter ones from theGesta Regis Henrici Secundiand thewritingsofGeraldofWales and Walter Map areprinted in translation inEnglish Historical

Documents, 1042–1189, ed.D. C. Douglas and G. W.Greenaway (1968). TheChronicle of Richard ofDevizes is edited andtranslated by J. T. Appleby(1963), and John ofSalisbury’s HistoriaPontificalis by MarjorieChibnall (1956). Roger ofHowden’s chronicle waspublished in Englishtranslation (asThe Annals ofRogerdeHoveden) byH. T.

Riley in 1853, and in theoriginal Latin (as ChronicaRogeri deHovedene) in fourvolumes by W. Stubbsbetween 1868 and 1871.Stubbs also published theoriginal texts of Ralph ofDiceto’s works in twovolumes asRadulfide DicetoDecani Lundoniensis OperaHistorica(1876).The essential narrative

source for the reign ofEdward II and Isabella as

queen of England is theVitaEdwardi Secundi: I havemainly followed thetranslation by N. Denholm-Young (1957), but see alsothe new edition by WendyChilds (2005). Translatedextracts from othercontemporary chronicles areincluded in Eng lishHistoricalDocuments, 1189–1327,ed.H.Rothwell(1975).The untranslated text ofGeoffreyleBaker’schronicle

is published in an edition byE. M. Thompson asChronicon Galfridi le Bakerde Swynbroke (1889); I havealso used the ChroniqueMétrique de Godefroy deParis, ed. J.-A. Buchon(1827).Forthepoliticsofthereign,seeR.M.Haines,KingEdward II (2003); M.McKisack, The FourteenthCentury (1959); J. R.Maddicott,ThomasofLancaster, 1307–22 (1970); and N.

Fryde,TheTyranny andFallof Edward II, 1321–1326(1979); also J. S. Hamilton,Piers Gaveston, Earl ofCornwall (1988), and TheReign of Edward II: NewPerspectives, ed. G. Doddand A. Musson (2006). Forthefamine,seeW.C.Jordan,TheGreat Famine: NorthernEurope in the EarlyFourteenthCentury(1996).ForIsabellaherself,seeH.

Johnstone, ‘Isabella, theShe-

Wolf of France’, History,newseries21(1936–7),208–18, and articles by E. A. R.Brown: ‘The PoliticalRepercussionsofFamilyTiesin the Early FourteenthCentury: The Marriage ofEdward II of England andIsabelle of France’,Speculum,63(1988),573–95;‘Diplomacy, Adultery andDomesticPoliticsattheCourtof Philip the Fair: QueenIsabelle’s Mission to France

in1314’,inDocumentingthePast: Essays in MedievalHistory Presented to G. P.Cuttino, ed. J. S. HamiltonandP.J.Bradley(1989),53–83;and(withN.F.Regalado)‘La Grant Feste: Philip theFair’s Celebration of theKnightingofhisSonsinParisatPentecostof1313’,inCityand Spectacle in MedievalEurope, ed.B.Hanawalt andK.Reyerson(1994),56–85.ArgumentsforEdwardII’s

survival after 1327 haverecently been revived andvariously updated by PaulDoherty in Isabella and theStrange Death of Edward II(2003), Alison Weir inIsabella,She-WolfofFrance,Queen of England (2005),and Ian Mortimer in TheGreatest Traitor: The Life ofSirRogerMortimer,RulerofEngland 1327–1330 (2003),‘The Death of Edward II inBerkeley Castle’, English

Historical Review, 120(2005),1,175–1,214,andThePerfect King: The Life ofEdward III, Father of theEnglishNation(2006).Itwillbe clear that I remainunconvinced; see, fortraditions of ‘undead’ kings,M. Evans, The Death ofKings: Royal Deaths inMedieval England (2003).Apart from Edward himselfand theEmperorHeinrichV,other alleged royal survivors

connected to the subjects ofthis book include Isabella’sshort-lived nephew Jean thePosthumous, who was‘revealed’ in 1356 to havebeen exchanged in his cradlefor a baby who died in hisplace while he grew tomanhood as GianninoBaglioni, a merchant bankerofSiena; and theTudorkingEdwardVI,whowas sightedalive andwell after 1553, orsorumourhadit,inGermany,

the Netherlands, Spain orpossibly Denmark: see C. T.Wood, ‘Where is John thePosthumous? Or Mahaut ofArtois Settles Her RoyalDebts’, in Documenting thePast: Essays in MedievalHistory Presented to G. P.Cuttino, ed. J. S. HamiltonandP.J.Bradley(1989),99–117; and C. Skidmore,EdwardVI:TheLostKingofEngland(2007).ForMargaretseeespecially

Helen Maurer’sMargaret ofAnjou:QueenshipandPowerin Late Medieval England(2003),andJ.L.Laynesmith,The Last Medieval Queens:English Queenship, 1445–1503 (2004). For the politicsoftheperiod,seeJ.L.Watts,Henry VI and the Politics ofKingship (1996); R. A.Griffiths, The Reign of KingHenry VI (1981); C.Carpenter, The Wars of theRoses (1997); C. D. Ross,

Edward IV (1974); C. L.Scofield,The Life and ReignofEdwardIV, 2 vols (1923);andmyBlood& Roses: ThePaston Fam ily in theFifteenth Century (2004).Useful essays include B.Cron, ‘The Duke of Suffolk,theAngevinMarriageandtheCeding of Maine, 1445’,Journal ofMedievalHistory,20 (1994), 77–99; D. Dunn,‘Margaret of Anjou, QueenConsort of Henry VI: A

Reassessment of her Role,1445–53’, in Crown,Government and People inthe FifteenthCentury, ed. R.E. Archer (1995), 107–43;and J. L. Laynesmith,‘Constructing Queenship atCoventry: Pageantry andPolitics at Margaret ofAnjou’s“SecretHarbour”’,inThe Fif teenth Century III:AuthorityandSubversion,ed.L.Clark(2003),139–49.Theprincipal contemporary

sources quoted here are thePastonLettersandPapersofthe FifteenthCentury, ed.N.Davis, R. Beadle and C.Richmond, 3 vols (2004–5),and the Calendar of StatePapers, Milan, ed. A. B.Hinds (1912), available atBrit ish History Online(http://www.british-history.ac.uk). See also theParliamentRollsofMedievalEngland (an invaluable newscholarly resource, offering

transcriptions of all thesurvivingrollsofparliamentsheldbetween1275and1504,with parallel translation intomodernEnglish),availablebysubscriptionatBritishHistoryOnline (http://www.british-history.ac.uk).Among the primary

sources quoted in ‘NewBeginnings’aretheCalendarof State Papers, Spain, vols11–13, ed. R. Tyler (1916–54),whichincludetheItalian

eyewitnessaccountofMary’sproclamation, as well as thedespatches of the imperialambassadors and letters fromPhilip of Spain and hisentourageinEngland;andtheCalendar of State Papers,Venice, vols 5–6, ed. R.Brown (1873–7), forGiovanni Michieli’sremarkable pen-portrait ofMary in 1557, as well asanotherbyhispredecessorasambassador, Giacomo

Soranzo, in 1554. Bothsources are available atBritish History Online(http://www.british-history.ac.uk),asistheDiaryofHenryMachyn,CitizenandMerchant-Taylor of London,ed. J. G. Nichols, CamdenSociety, 42 (1848). See also‘The Vita Mar iae AngliaeReginae of RobertWingfieldof Brantham’, ed. and trans.D. MacCulloch, CamdenMiscellany, 28, Camden

Society,4thseries,29(1984),181–301; The Chronicle ofQueen Jane, and of TwoYears of Queen Mary, ed. J.G.Nichols,CamdenSociety,48 (1850); and Tudor RoyalProclamations, ed. P. L.Hughes and J. F. Larkin, 3vols (1964–9). For JohnKnox’s First Blast of theTrum pet, see above, under‘Beginnings’; John Aylmer’sAnHarbour for Faithful andTrue Subjects Against the

LateBlownBlastConcerningthe Government of Women,published in 1559, can beread at Early English BooksOnline(http://eebo.chadwyck.com).For Jane Grey and the

crisis of 1553, see E. Ives,Lady Jane Grey: A TudorMystery (2009). For Mary,see the work of J. M.Richards: Mary Tudor(2008);‘MaryTudoras“SoleQuene”?: Gendering Tudor

Monarchy’, HistoricalJournal,40(1997),895–924;and ‘Mary Tudor:Renaissance Queen ofEngland’, in ‘High andMighty Queens’ of EarlyModern England: Realitiesand Represen tations, ed. C.Levin,D.Barrett-Graves andJ. Eldridge Carney (2003),27–44.Also importantareC.Beem, The Lioness Roared:TheProblemsofFemaleRulein English History (2006),

chapter 2; G. Redworth,‘“Matters Impertinent toWomen”: Male and FemaleMonarchy under Philip andMary’, English HistoricalReview,112(1997),593–613;and E. Russell, ‘Mary Tudorand Mr Jorkins’, HistoricalResearch,63(1990),263–76.Useful articles on specificmoments are A. WhitelockandD.MacCulloch,‘PrincessMary’s Household and theSuccessionCrisis,July1553’,

HistoricalJournal,50(2007),265–87; A. Hunt, ‘TheMonarchical Republic ofMary I’, Historical Journal,52 (2009), 557–72; and J.D.Alsop, ‘The Act for theQueen’sRegalPower,1554’,Parliamentary History, 13(1994),261–76.More generally, see D.

Loades,Mary Tudor: A Life(1989), and hisMary Tudor:The Tragical History of theFirst Queen of England

(2006); E. Duffy, Fires ofFaith: Catholic EnglandUnder Mary Tudor (2009);and recent biographies byAnna Whitelock, MaryTudor: England’s FirstQueen (2009), and LindaPorter,MaryTudor:TheFirstQueen (2007). For thetwelfth-century queenUrracaof Castile, see B. F. Reilly,The Kingdom of León-CastillaunderQueenUrraca(1982); and for Isabella of

Castile,seeJ.Edwards,FerdinandandIsabella(2005).ForEleanor of Aquitaine andcourtly love, seeR.V.Turner,Eleanor of Aquitaine, QueenofFrance,QueenofEngland(2009), and Ruth Harvey,‘EleanorofAquitaineandtheTroubadours’, in The Worldof Eleanor of Aquitaine:Literature and Society inSouthernFranceBetweentheEleventh and ThirteenthCenturies, ed. C. Léglu and

M.Bull(2005),101–14.Asastarting-point for theextensive literature onElizabeth I, see C. Haigh,Elizabeth I (2nd edition,1998); and for the queen’sspeeches see Elizabeth I:Collected Works, ed.L.S.Marcus, J. Mueller andM.B.Rose(2000).

Index

Subentries are inchronologicalorder.

Acre,siege,1,2

Adam,sonofEdwardII,1Adela,sisterofHenryI,1,2,3Adeliza, second wife ofHenryI,1,2,3,4,5,6Æthelstan,king,1AfonsoII,kingofPortugal,1Agincourt,battleof(1415),1,2Agnes,empress,1Ahab,king,1Aimery,viscountofThouars,1,2Aleppo,1

Alexander,bishopofLincoln,1AlfonsoVIII,kingofCastile,1,2Alfred,king,1Alice of France, wife ofThibaudVofBlois,1,2,3AlixofFrance,1,2,3,4,5,6AlnwickCastle,1Alps,1,2,3,4,5Amboise,1Ambroise,Normanpoet,1,2Angevindynasty,1,2Anglo-SaxonChronicle,1

Angus, Archibald Douglas,earlof,1Anjou:countyof,1,2,3;

Matilda’smarriage,1,2,3;bordercastles,1;rebellion,1,2;Geoffroi’s raids intoNormandy,1;Henry’sposition,1,2,3;Geoffrey’sclaim,1,2,3;young Henri’s position,1,2,3,4;Richard’sposition,1,2;

Eleanor’sretirement,1;inheritance,1;treasury,1;Eleanor’scampaign,1;John’sposition,1,2,3;stewardship,1;lossof,1,2;René’sduchy,1,2,3,4,5

AnorofChâtellerault,1Anselm, archbishop ofCanterbury,1Antioch,1,2,3,4AntoinedeVaudemont,1

Aquitaine:territories,1;cultureandcustoms,1;Frenchsovereignty,1,2,3,4;courtofduchy,1,2;Guilhem’sdeath,1;Eleanor’sinheritance,1;Eleanor’s marriage toLouisVII,1;coronation ceremony inBordeaux,1;countyofToulouse,1,2,3;controlofduchy,1;

Eleanor’s marriage toHenryII,1,2,3;Lusignanrevolt,1;Richard’s inheritance, 1,2,3;Eleanor’srule1,2,3,4;Richard’s enthronementasduke,1,2;autonomythreatened,1;Eleanor’sforces,1;Richard’ssuppressionofrevolts,1;Henry’s plan for John’spossession,1;

John’sraids,1;duchy resigned toEleanor,1,2;revolt(1188),1;Eleanor’sretirement,1;Richard’srule,1;Richard’sdeath,1;Eleanor’stour,1,2;Eleanor’shomagefor,1;John’sposition,1,2,3;Arthur’shomagefor,1;Eleanor’sdeath,1;extent of Englishpossession,1,2,3,4,5;

EdwardII’shomagefor,1;Edward’scontrolof,1;HenryVI’sposition,1,2

Aragon–Barcelona, kingdomof,1,2Argentan: Matilda’s controlof,1;

Matilda at, 1,2,3, 4, 5,6;Stephen’sadvanceon,1;Normancourt,1,2

Arnulf,archdeaconofSées,1Arthur,PrinceofWales,1,2

ArthurofBrittany,1,2,3,4Arundel, Edmund Fitzalan,earlof:tournamentdefeat,1;

killingofGaveston,1,2;refusal to fight atBannockburn,1;Berwickdefence,1;marchagainstrebels,1;trialofLancaster,1

ArundelCastle,1,2,3Audley,Hugh,1.2,3,4,5,6Audley,Lord,1Aylmer,John,1Aymer, countofAngoulême,

1

Badlesmere,Bartholomew,1,2Badlesmere, Margaret deClare,Lady,1,BaldwindeRevières,1,2Balliol,John,1Bannockburn, battle of(1314),1,2,3Barnet: encampment (1461),1,2;battle(1471),1Beaufortfamily,1,2,

seealsoMargaret,SomersetBeaumont, John, viscount, 1,2Beaumontfamily,1,2Bec,abbeyof,1,2,3Becket, Thomas, archbishopof Canterbury: appointmentasarchbishop,1;

disputewithHenryII,1,2,3;exile,1;murder,1,2;shrine,1,2

Becon,Thomas,1

Bedford,dowagerduchessof,1Berengaria of Navarre, wifeofRichardI,1,2,3,4,5Berkeley,Lord,1,2Berkeley,Thomas,1BerkeleyCastle,1,2BerkhamstedCastle,1,2BernardofClairvaux,1,2,3,4,5Berold,Rouenbutcher,1BertrandeBorn,1Berwick,1,2,3,4,5,6BerwickCastle,1

Bettini,Sforzade’,1Blanca of Castile, wife ofLouisVIIIofFrance,1,2,3BlancheofArtois,1BlancheofBurgundy,1,2BloreHeath,battleof(1459),1Bocking,John,1,2Boleyn,Anne,1,2,3Booth,Laurence,1Booth, William, archbishopofYork,1Bordeaux,1,2,3,4,5,6Boroughbridge,battle(1322),

1,2Bosworth Field, battle of(1485),1Bothwell, James Hepburn,earlof,1,2Bourdin,Maurice,archbishopofBraga,1Brandon,Charles,1,2,3Brandon,Eleanor,1Brandon, Frances, wife ofHenryGreyofSuffolk,1,2,3Brémule,battleof(1119),1Bridport,1BrienFitzcount,1,2,3,4,5

BristolCastle,1,2,3,4,5,6Brittany,1,2,3,4,5Bruce, Robert: claim toScottishthrone,1;

Edward I’s campaignagainst,1;established as king ofScots,1;raids,1,2;Edward II’s campaignagainst,1;strategy against English,1;Bannockburnvictory,1;

wife’srelease,1;pursuit of Englishforces,1;Harclay’s negotiations,1;son’smarriage,1

Bruno,archbishopofTrier,1Buckingham, HumphreyStafford,dukeof,1,2Burgundy,1,2,3Bury,Richard,1

Cabot,Sebastian,1Cade,Jack,1

Cadmus,mount,1,2Caen,1,2,3,4,5Calais:Englishpossession,1,2;

captaincy of, 1, 2, 3, 4,5;garrison,1,2,3,4,5;Somerset’sassaulton,1;securityforFrenchloan,1;lossof,1

Camulio,Prosperodi,1,2,3,4Canossa,1

Castile,1Castillon, battle of (1453), 1,2CastleRising,1Castrocaro,court,1,2Catherine of Valois, wife ofHenryV,1,2,3,4CelestineIII,pope,1,2Châlus–Chabrol,siege,1,2Chancellor,Richard,1Charles,countofFlanders,1,2Charles,dukeofBurgundy,1,2,3

Charles V, Holy RomanEmperor:empire,1;

sackofRome,1;reports fromEngland,1,2,3,4;supportforcousinMary,1;Frenchconflict,1,2;advicetoMary,1,2;question of Mary’smarriage,1;sonPhilip’smarriage,1,2

Charles IV, king of France:

knighted,1;accession andcoronation,1;sister Isabella’sembassy,1;supportforIsabella,1,2,3;coronationofwife,1;expulsionofIsabella,1;death,1

CharlesVI,kingofFrance,1Charles VII, king of France,1,2,3,4CharlesofValois,1,2,3

ChâteauGaillard,1,2,3Châteauroux,truce(1187),1Chaucer,Alice,1,2,3Chaucer,Geoffrey,1Cheke,John,1ChesterCastle,1Chinon,1,2,3,4,5Clarence,George,dukeof,1,2,3Clarence,Lionel,dukeof,1Clémence of Hungary, wifeofLouisXofFrance,1ClementVII,pope,1Clifford,Margaret,1

Clifford,Rosamund,1Cnut,king,1Compostela,1,2ConanIV,dukeofBrittany,1ConradIII,kingofGermany,1,2,3ConstanceofBrittany,1,2,3,4,5ConstanceofSicily,1Constantinople,1,2ConstanzaofCastile,1CorfeCastle,1,2Cornwall,duchyof,1Courtenay, Edward, see

DevonCoventry,1,2,3,4,5,6Cranmer,Thomas,1,2Cromwell, Lord, 1 crusades:first(1096),2,3,4,5;

second(1147),1,2,3,4;third(1187),1,2,3,4,5,6;eighth(1270),1;crusaders’ pledges(1313),1

Cyprus,1

Damascus,1

Damory,Roger,1,2,3,4,5Darnley,Henry,Lord,1,2DavidI,kingofScots,1,2,3,4DavidII,kingofScots,1Deborah,1,2Deddington,1,2Despenser, Hugh, earl ofWinchester,1,2,3,4,5Despenser, Hugh (theyounger): relationship withking,1,2,3,4,5;

earldom of Gloucester,1,2,3;

lands,1,2;exile,1,2;daughter’smarriage,1;rapacity,1,2,3;failure to rescue queen,1;removalofqueen’slandsandchildren,1;view of queen’sembassy,1;keepingkinginEngland,1;queen’s call for hisremoval,1;

flightwithking,1,2;execution,1,2

DevizesCastle,1,2Devon, Edward Courtenay,earlof,1,2,3,4Douglas,SirJames,1Douglas,Margaret,1Dudley,Guildford,1,2,3Dudley, John, seeNorthumberlandDudley,Robert,1,2DunstanburghCastle,1,2

Edessa,1,2,3

Edith, wife of Edward theConfessor,1Edith (Matilda), wife ofHenryI:ancestry,1,2;

appearance,1,2;piety,1,2;marriage,1,2;household,1;roleasconsort,1,2,3

EdwardI:territories,1;wars,1;banishmentofGaveston,1,2;capture of Stone of

Scone,1;gift of Scottish lands toWarwick,1;secondmarriage,1;death,1,2;funeral,1;Powderham’sclaims,1

EdwardII:appearance,1;character,1,2,3;relationship withGaveston,1;accession,1,2,3;marriage,1,2,3,4;coronation,1;

banishmentofGaveston,1;returnofGaveston,1;appointment ofOrdainers,1;Scottishcampaign,1;Ordainers’demands,1;banishmentofGaveston,1;returnofGaveston,1;Isabella’spregnancy,1;rebellion of Ordainers,1;Gaveston’s surrender

anddeath,1;birthofson,1,2;treatyofpeace(1312),1;visittoFrance,1;pardonoflords,1;Scottishcampaign,1,2;Bannockburndefeat,1;riseoffavourites,1;accused of being animpostor,1,2;birthofdaughter,1;Berwicksiege,1;trucewithScots,1;homagetoPhilippeV,1,

2;relationship withDespenser,1,2,3,4;expulsionofDespensers,1;LeedsCastleaffair,1;rebellionoflords,1;Boroughbridge victory,1;trial and execution ofLancaster,1;revengeonrebels,1;Despenser’s triumph, 1,2,3,4;

Scottishcampaign,1,2;refuses homage toCharlesIV,1;lossestoFrance,1;wife Isabella stripped oflandsandchildren,1;Isabella’s embassy toCharlesIV,1;homage demanded byCharlesIV,1,2;sonsenttoFrance,1;Isabella’s challenge, 1,2,3,4;son’s marriage plans, 1,

2;rebelinvasion,1;flightfromLondon,1;capture,1;imprisonment,1;resignationofcrown,1;death,1;funeral,1

EdwardIII:birth,1,2;dukeofAquitaine,1;arrivalinFrance,1,2;mother’s championshipof,1,2,3;marriageplans,1;

keeper of the kingdom,1;acclaimedasking,1;coronation,1,2;father’sfuneral,1;marriage,1;Scottishcampaign,1;Scottishpolicy,1,2;coup,1;reign,1;victoriesinFrance,1;descendants,1,2,3

Edward IV (Edward ofMarch, duke of York):

appearance,1,2;character,1;earlofMarch,1;flighttoCalais,1;invasion,1;Northamptonbattle,1;captureofking,1;Westminsternegotiations(1460),1;marchtoWales,1;father’sdeath,1;Mortimer’s Crossvictory,1;marchtoLondon,1;

welcomedinLondon,1;enthroned,1;Towtonvictory,1,2;coronation,1;marchnorth,1;relationship withWarwick,1;marriage,1;Frenchnegotiations,1;Burgundianalliance,1;Warwick’srebellion,1;capture,1;release,1;entryintoLondon,1;

Montagu’srebellion,1;flighttoBurgundy,1,2;invasion,1;Barnetvictory,1;Tewkesburyvictory,1;triumphal entry intoLondon,1;death,1;descendants,1,2,3

EdwardV,1,2EdwardVI:ancestry,1,2;

birth,1;appearance,1;childhood,1,2,3;

health,1;betrothal,1;accession,1;relationship with sisters,1,2;religion,1,2;succession question, 1,2;‘device for thesuccession’,1,2,3,4,5,6;deathbed,1,2,3;death,1,2

Edward,princeofWales(son

of Margaret and Henry VI):birth,1,2;

infancy,1,2,3,4;princeofWales,1;heirtoHenryVI,1,2;father’srecovery,1;estates,1,2;inCoventry,1,2;paternity questioned, 1,2;liverybadge,1;disinherited byWestminster settlement(1460),1,2;

inScotland,1;marchsouth,1;godmother,1;inYork,1;flight,1;atKoeur,1;characteratthirteen,1;atAmboise,1,2;marriage,1;journeytoEngland,1;Barnetdefeat,1;Tewkesburybattle,1;death,1

Edward the Confessor, 1, 2,

3,4,5,6Eirene,Byzantineempress,1Eleanor of Aquitaine:ancestry,1;

birth,1;appearance,1,2,3;character,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9;father’sdeath,1;inheritance,1,2;marriagetoLouisVIIofFrance,1;coronation,1;children by Louis, 1, 2,

3,4;sister’smarriage,1;meetingwithBernardofClairvaux,1;crusading,1,2;inAntioch,1;relationship with uncleRamon,1;divorcequestion,1;prisoner of the Greeks,1;meetingwithpope,1;meeting with Henry II,1;

divorce,1;marriagetoHenry,1,2;coronation,1;children byHenry, 1, 2,3;government ofAquitaine,1,2,3;rebellion againsthusband Henry, 1, 2, 3,4;imprisonment,1,2,3,4,5;Christmas at Windsor(1184),1,2;

duchy of Aquitainereturnedtoher,1,2;deathofhusbandHenry,1,2;release fromimprisonment,1;government of England,1,2,3,4,5;authority,1;travelsacrossEurope,1;John’soath,1;inNormandy,1;returntoEngland,1;authorityoverJohn,1;

defenceofEngland,1,2;raising Richard’sransom,1;negotiations forRichard’srelease,1;return to England withRichard,1;Richard’s forgiveness ofJohn,1;retirement atFontevraud,1;Richard’sdeath,1;John’saccession,1;tourofAquitaine,1,2;

homage to Philippe forAquitaine,1,2;John’shomagetoher,1;journeytoCastile,1,2;retirement toFontevraud,1;negotiations withAimeryofThouars,1;trappedatMirebeau,1;death,1;tomb,1

Eleanor of Castile, wife ofEdwardI,1EleanordeClare,1

Eleanor of England, wife ofAlfonsoVIIIofCastile,1, 2,3EleanorofWoodstock,1,2,3EléonoreofChampagne,1,2ElisabethofValois,1Elizabeth, queen: birth, 1, 2,3;

character,1,2,3;appearance,1,2;religion,1,2,3;declared illegitimate, 1,2,3,4;claimtothrone,1,2,3;

brother Edward’s‘device’ for thesuccession’,1;heirtosisterMary,1,2;marriagequestion,1,2;inTower,1;accession,1,2;coronation,1;speeches,1;image,1;attitudetoKnox,1;execution of Mary,queenofScots,1;on Shakespeare’s

RichardII,1ElizabethdeClare,1,2Elizabeth Plantagenet,countessofHereford,1ElizabethWoodville,wife ofEdwardIV,1,2,3,4ElizabethofYork,1,2Essex,RobertDevereux, earlof,1EugeniusIII,pope,1,2,3,4,5Eustace,sonofStephen,1,2,3,4,5,6ExeterCastle,1

Exeter, Henry Holland, dukeof,1,2,3Exeter,siege(1136),1

Fastolf,SirJohn,1Ferdinand,kingofAragon,1,2FitzGilbert,Geoffrey,1Fitzpatrick, Barnaby, 1, 2, 3,4Foliot, Gilbert, abbot ofGloucester,1Fontevraud,abbeyof,1,2,3,4

Foulques,countofAnjouandMaine,1,2,3Fortescue,John,1,2FramlinghamCastle,1,2,3FrançoisI,kingofFrance,1Friedrich, archbishop ofCologne,1Friedrich Barbarossa, HolyRomanEmperor,1,2,3,4

Gardiner, Stephen, bishop ofWinchester,1Gascony:Castilianclaim,1;

Edward’spossession,1;

Frenchoccupation,1;Gaveston’sexile,1;Gaveston’sestates,1;Frenchposition,1,2;Edward’shomagefor,1;Anglo–French relations,1;war,1,2,3;Isabella’smission,1;Edward’shomagefor,1;Henry’spossession,1;Englishexpedition,1;lossof,1

Gaveston, Piers (Perrot de

Gabaston):appearance,1,2;relationship withEdward,1,2,3;Scottish campaign(1306),1;banishment(1307),1,2;earlofCornwall,1,2,3,4;marriage,1,2;role at Edward’scoronation,1;exile(1308),1,2;return,1;mockeryofearls,1;

Scottish campaign(1311),1,2;exile(1311),1;return,1;birthofdaughter,1;flightwithEdward,1;surrendertoearls,1;captivity,1;death,1,2,3,4,5,6,7;tomb,1,2,3

Geoffrey, archbishop ofYork,1Geoffrey, sonofEleanorandHenryII:birth,1;

betrothal,1;duchyofBrittany,1,2;character,1;rebellion against father,1,2,3,4;assaultonAquitaine,1;relationship withPhilippeII,1;death,1;sonArthur,1,2

Geoffrey of Anjou, son ofMatilda:birth,1;

childhood,1,2;Winchestertreaty,1;

rebellion against brotherHenry,1,2,3;marriageplans,1;death,1

GeoffreyleBaker,1GeoffroideLusignan,1GeoffroideRancon,1,2GeoffroiofVigeois,1GeraldofWales,1,2Gervase of Canterbury, 1, 2,3GestaStephani:author,1;

on oath of allegiance toMatilda,1;

onStephen’scoup,1,2;onExetersiege,1;onresistancetoStephen,1;on Miles of Gloucester,1;hostilitytoMatilda,1,2,3,4,5,6;on Stephen’s character,1,2;onMathilde,1;onplunderofLondon,1;onHenryofWinchester,1;

onOxfordsiege,1;onMatilda’scourage,1;on Henry’s claim tothrone,1;on magnates’ desertionofStephen,1

GiovannidaAnagni,1Gloucester,1,2,3,4Gloucester, Gilbert de Clare,seventhearlof,1,2,3,4,5Gloucester, Humphrey, dukeof,1,2Godfrey,countofLeuvenanddukeofLowerLorraine,1,2,

3Gower,lordshipof,1,2Gray,Thomas,1GreenwichPalace,1,2, 3, 4,5,6GregoryVII,pope,1Grey, Jane, see Jane Grey,queenGrey,SirJohn,1Grey,Katherine,1,2,3Grey,Mary,1,2,3,4Guilhem IV, count ofToulouse,1Guilhem IX, duke of

Aquitaine,1,2,3Guilhem X, duke ofAquitaine,1,2,3,4,5Guillaume, count ofHainaut,1,2GuillaumedeLongchamp, 1,2Guillaume des Roches, 1, 2,3,4GuyofThouars,1

Harclay,Andrew,1,2HarlechCastle,1,2HaroldGodwinson,1,2

Hastings,battleof(1066),1Hatfield,1,2Heinrich, duke of Saxony, 1,2,3Heinrich IV, Holy RomanEmperor,1,2,3,4Heinrich V, Holy RomanEmperor:accession,1;

betrothal to Matilda, 1,2,3,4,5;titles,1;territories,1,2;finances,1,2;investituredispute,1;

Italiancampaigns,1,2;wedding,1;Matilda’scoronation,1;German rebellionagainst,1;relationshipwith father–law,1;death,1,2;tomb,1;storiesof,1

Heinrich VI, Holy RomanEmperor,1,2,3,4HenriII,kingofFrance,1,2,3,4,5

Henri (the Young King):birth,1;

inheritance,1,2,3;marriage,1,2;coronation,1,2,3;authority,1,2;character,1,2,3,4;disputewithfather,1,2;rebellion against father,1,2,3,4;death,1,2

HenriofChampagne,1HenryI:birth,1;

appearance,1;

education,1;accession,1,2;authority,1;government,1;territories,1,2,3,4;marriage,1,2,3,4;children,1,2;daughter Matilda’smarriage,1,2;succession question, 1,2,3,4,5,6,7;Brémulevictory,1;WhiteShipdisaster,1;secondmarriage,1,2;

nobles’ oath ofallegiance to daughterMatilda,1,2,3,4,5;daughter Matilda’ssecondmarriage,1;grandsons,1;disputewithson–law,1;deathbed declaration onsuccession,1,2;death,1,2,3,4,5,6;succession,1,2

HenryII:birth,1;childhood,1,2,3;appearance,1,2;

character,1,2;firstvisittoEngland,1;claim to English throne,1,2,3,4;inNormandy,1;second appearance inEngland,1;Stephen’s policytowards,1;relationshipwithmother,1,2,3;thirdvisittoEngland,1;knighted,1;dukeofNormandy,1,2;

father’sdeath,1;warwithFrance,1;marriage,1,2,3;children,1,2,3;recognised as heir toStephen,1,2;accession,1,2,3;coronation,1,2,3;government,1,2,3;mother’sadvice,1,2,3,4;brother Geoffrey’srebellion(1156),1,2;campaign against

Ramon of Toulouse, 1,2;mother’sdeath,1;Becketdispute,1,2,3;territorial settlement atMontmirail(1169),1,2;coronationsofsonHenri(the Young King), 1, 2,3;Lusignanrevolt,1;son Richard as duke ofAquitaine,1,2;love affair withRosamundClifford,1;

illness,1;murder of Becket(1170),1;territorial disputes withsons,1,2,3;rebellions of sons, 1, 2,3,4,5;Eleanor’srebellion,1,2;imprisonment ofEleanor,1,2,3;deathofsonHenri,1;relationshipwithAlixofFrance,1;Vexindispute,1;

successionissues,1;death,1–2;tomb,1,2

Henry IV (Henry ofLancaster),1,2HenryV,1,2,3,4HenryVI:accession,1;

coronations,1,2;childhood,1,2;betrothal,1;appearance,1;character,1,2,3,4,5;marriage,1,2;government,1,2;

lossofNormandy,1;Caderebellion,1;Somerset’sinfluence,1;wife Margaret’spregnancy,1;lossofGascony,1;mental breakdown, 1, 2,3;birth of son Edward, 1,2;wifeMargaret’sclaimtorule,1,2;duke of York’s role asprotectoroftherealm,1;

son created prince ofWales,1;returntohissenses,1;reassertion of personalrule,1;firstStAlbansbattle,1;return to London withdukeofYork,1;York’sprotectorate,1;York’s resignation asprotector,1;wifeMargaret’s defenceof,1,2,3,4,5;moves with household

between royal palaces,1;arrivalinCoventry,1;wife Margaret’sinfluence overgovernment,1;son’s paternityquestioned,1,2;loveday at St Paul’s(1458),1;atCoventry,1;Northamptonbattle,1;capturedbyYorkists,1;Westminster settlement

(1460),1,2;secondStAlbans battle,1;rebywife andSomerset,1,2;encampment at Barnet,1;Towtonbattle,1;flight,1,2;defeatbyYorkists,1;lifeasafugitive,1;capture andimprisonment,1;release and restoration,

1;death,1

HenryVII,1,2,3,4HenryVIII:ancestry,1;

appearance,1;authority,1;aswarrior,1;children,1,2,3;divorce from Katherine,1,2;religious policies, 1, 2,3;imprisonment ofCourtenay,1;

Act of Succession, 1, 2,3,4,5;death,1,2,3,4Henry, bishop ofWinchester: support forbrotherStephen,1,2,3;advicetoStephen,1;churchcareer,1,2;disputewithStephen,1;relationship withMatilda,1,2,3;effortsforpeace,1;supportforMatilda,1;betrayalofMatilda,1;

peacetreaty,1HenryFitzroy,1HenryofHuntingdon,1,2,3HerbertofBosham,1,2Hereford, bishop of, 1, 2, 3,4,5Hereford, Humphrey deBohun,earlof: coronationofEdwardandIsabella,1;

tournamentdefeat,1;killingofGaveston,1,2;peacewithking,1;Scottishcampaign,1;Bannockburndefeat,1;

prisonerofScots,1,2;Berwickdefence,1;confrontation ofDespenser,1,2,3;death,1

Hertford, Edward Seymour,earlof,1Higden,Ranulf,1,2Hildebert of Lavardin,archbishopofTours,1HubertWalter, archbishopofCanterbury,1,2Hugues,kingofFrance,1HuguesdeLusignan,1

Humbert, count ofMaurienne,1Hunsdon,1,2

InnocentII,pope,1,2,3,4,5Ireland,1Isabella, queen of Castile, 1,2,3Isabella of France, wife ofEdwardII:ancestry,1,2;

appearance,1,2,3,4,5;character,1,2,3;marriage,1,2,3,4,5,6,7;

coronation,1,2;lands,1,2,3,4;lifestyle,1,2,3;Scottishcampaign,1;pregnancy,1;birth of son Edward, 1,2;visittoFrance,1;mediation betweenhusbandandlords,1;embassytofather,1;scandalofsisters–law,1;inBerwick,1,2;father’sdeath,1;

children,1,2,3,4;negotiationsfortreatyofLeake,1;visittoFrance,1;expulsion of Despenser,1,2;LeedsCastleaffair,1;treatment by husbandand Despenser, 1, 2, 3,4;escapefromScots,1;embassy to brotherCharlesIV,1;challenge to husband

Edward,1,2,3,4,5,6;affairwithMortimer,1;son’s marriage plans, 1,2;preparations forinvasion,1;invasion,1;welcomed,1;execution of Despenser,1;husband Edwardimprisoned,1,2;possessionofseal,1;son Edward’s

coronation,1;husbandEdward’sdeath,1;namedasJezebel,1,2;government withMortimer,1;finances,1,2,3;treaty with Scotland, 1,2;daughter’smarriage,1;rejectionbysonEdward,1;Mortimer’sdeath,1;imprisonment,1;

retirement,1;death,1;tomb,1

IsabellaofGloucester,1,2IsabelleofAngoulême,1IsabelleofLorraine,1,2,3IvanIV(theTerrible),tsarofRussia,1

JamesII,kingofScots,1JamesIII,kingofScots,1JamestheApostle,saint,1,2,3,4,5Jane Grey, queen: claim to

throne,1,2,3;religion,1;tutor,1;marriage,1;named as heir byEdward,1,2,3,4,5;appearance,1;accession,1;public response toaccession,1,2,3;Mary proclaimed queeninstead,1,2;imprisonment,1,2;Wyattrebellion,1;

execution,1JeanI(thePosthumous),kingofFrance,1JeanofHainaut,1Jean of Lorraine, duke ofCalabria,1JeanneI,queenofNavarre,1JeanneII,queenofNavarre,1Jeanned’Arc,1JeanneofBar,1JeanneofBurgundy,1,2Jeanne of Evreux, wife ofCharlesIVofFrance,1Jeanne of Valois, wife of

GuillaumeofHainaut,1,2Jerusalem,1,2,3,4Jezebel,queen,1,2,3,4Joan,daughterofMargaretdeClareandGaveston,1Joan of Acre, sister ofEdwardII,1Joan of the Tower, wife ofDavidIIofScots,1,2,3Joanna of England, wife ofWilliam II of Sicily, thenwife of Ramon VI ofToulouse,1,2,3,4,5Jocelin de Bohun, bishop of

Salisbury,1John,king:birth,1;

character,1,2,3;territories,1,2,3;1,2;marriages,1,2,3,4;assaultonAquitaine,1;Christmas at Windsor(1184),1,2;father’sdeath,1;campaigninEngland,1;relationship withPhilippeII,1,2,3;mother’s influence over,

1;response to brotherRichard’s imprisonment,1,2;forgivenbyRichard,1;accession,1;coronation,1;Aquitainerights,1;diplomaticerrors,1;murderofArthur,1;lossofNormandy,1,2;militarylosses,1,2

JohnXXII,pope,1,2,3John of Eltham, earl of

Cornwall,1,2John of Gaunt, duke ofLancaster,1,2,3JohnofPowderham,1JohnofSalisbury,1,2

KatherineofAragon,1,2, 3,4KenilworthCastle,1,2,3, 4,5,6Kent, Edmund, earl of: withroyalarmy,1;

trialofLancaster,1;Gasconycampaign,1,2;

supportforqueen,1,2;

death of elderDespenser,1;Lancasterrebellion,1;death,1

Knox,John,1,2,3,4,5Koeur,castleof,1,2,3,4

LaMarche,1,2Lacy,Alice,1,2,3,4Lancaster,duchyof,1Lancaster, John of Gaunt,dukeof,1,2,3Lancaster, Edmund, first earl

of,1Lancaster, Henry, third earlof:supportforIsabella,1;

trial of elderDespenser,1;capture of youngerDespenser,1;imprisonment ofEdward,1,2,3;PontefractCastle,1;resistancetoIsabellaandMortimer,1;surrender,1

Lancaster, Thomas, second

earlof:ancestry,1,2;character,1;finances,1;coronation of EdwardandIsabella,1;nicknamedbyGaveston,1;leadershipofearls,1;pursuit of Gaveston, 1,2,3;killingofGaveston,1,2,3,4;treaty of peace withking,1,2;

positionofpower,1;dispute with Surrey, 1,2;defenceofBerwick,1;retreat to Pontefract, 1,2;supporters,1,2,3;Badlesmereaffair,1;Boroughbridgedefeat,1,2,3;imprisonment,1;trial,1,2;death,1,2,3,4;tomb,1;

widow,1Lanercostchronicle,1Lateran Council, second(1139),1LeMans,1,2,3,4,5,6Leake,treatyof(1318),1,2LeedsCastle,1,2Leopold,dukeofAustria,1Limoges: coronation ofRichard,1;

territorial settlement(1173),1,2,3,4;revolt,1;conflict(1183),1,2;

death of Henri (theYoungKing),1

Limousin,1,2,3,4Lincoln:castle,1,2;

battle(1141),1,2,3,4Lincoln,dowagercountessof,1Lincoln,HenryLacy,earlof,1,2,3,4Lisieux,1,2London: Matilda’s demands,1;

Matilda’s flight from, 1,2;

celebrations for birth ofprinceEdward,1;riots(1326),1;Caderebellion,1;welcome to Yorkistforces,1;arrival of duke ofYork,1;viewsofconflict,1,2;negotiations withMargaretatBarnet,1;welcome to Edward IV,1,2;Edward’s appeal for

help,1;Edward’sentry,1;proclamation of JaneGreyasqueen,1;proclamationofMary,1;Mary’sspeech,1

Louis VI (the Fat), king ofFrance,1,2,3,4,5Louis VII, king of France:character,1;

education,1,2;brother’sdeath,1,2;coronations,1;marriage to Eleanor, 1,

2;children,1,2,3,4,5,6;meeting with bishopHenry,1;Aquitaineclaim,1;excommunication,1;invasion of Champagne,1;massacreofVitry,1,2;penitence,1,2;recognition of GeoffroiasdukeofNormandy,1;crusading,1,2;inAntioch,1;

Eleanor’s relationshipwithRamonofAntioch,1;divorcequestion,1;returnjourney,1;meetingwithpope,1;divorce,1;Eleanor’sre,1,2;war with Normandy, 1,2,3;Henry’s homage forAquitaine,1;kingdom compared toHenry’s,1;

Montmirail treaty(1169),1,2;Lusignanrevolt,1;relationship withHenry’ssons,1,2,3,4;death,1

LouisVIII,kingofFrance,1,2,3LouisIX,kingofFrance,1LouisX,kingofFrance,1,2,3Louis XI, king of France:character,1;

accession,1;

agreement with sisterMargaret,1,2,3;information on Englishsituation,1,2;sister’sappeal,1;Warwicknegotiations,1,2;sister’s agreement withWarwick,1,2;sister’sfate,1

LouisofEvreux,1,2,3,4LudfordBridge,1,2Ludlow,1,2Lusignanfamily,1,2,3,4,5

Machyn,Henry,1Maine,1,2,3,4,5Malcolm III, king ofScotland,1Manuel Komnenos,Byzantineemperor,1,2,3Map,Walter,1,2,3,4,5Margaret ofAnjou: ancestry,1,2,3;

childhood,1,2;character,1,2,3,4;dowry,1;betrothal,1;journeytoEngland,1;

marriage,1;coronation,1;trucenegotiations,1;Caderebellion,1;lifestyle,1;pregnancy,1;husband’s mentalbreakdown,1,2;birth of son Edward, 1,2,3,4,5;claimtorule,1;husband’srecovery,1;afterStAlbansbattle,1,2;

attitudetodukeofYork,1,2,3,4,5,6;defence of husband andson,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10;entryintoCoventry,1;influence overgovernment,1;reputation,1,2,3,4,5;loveday at St Paul’s(1458),1;summoning council inCoventry,1;forces,1,2;

regime,1;Northamptondefeat,1;flighttoHarlech,1;inScotland,1;march on London, 1, 2,3;StAlbansvictory,1;reunited with husband,1;London negotiations, 1,2;marchnorth,1;inYork,1;Towtondefeat,1;

flightnorth,1,2;diplomatic efforts, 1, 2,3;attaintedoftreason,1;invasion attempt (1462),1;baseatKoeur,1,2,3;husband’scapture,1;appeal for French help,1,2;invasion attempt (1468),1;Frenchnegotiations,1;alliance with Warwick,

1;husbandre,1;arrivalinEngland,1,2;Warwick’sdeath,1;journeynorth,1;Tewkesburydefeat,1;son’sdeath,1;captured,1;husband’sdeath,1;imprisonment,1;death,1

Margaret Beaufort, wife ofEdmundTudor,1,2MargaretdeClare,1,2,3,4

MargaretDouglas,1MargaretofScotland,saint,1MargaretofScotland,wifeofLouisXIofFrance,1Margaret Tudor, wife ofJames IVofScots, thenwifeofearlofAngus,1,2,3,4MargueriteofBurgundy,1,2,3MargueriteofFrance,wifeofEdwardI,1,2,3MargueriteofFrance,wifeofHenri(theYoungKing),1,2Marie of Anjou, wife of

CharlesVIIofFrance,1,2,3Marie of France, wife ofHenriIofChampagne,1Marie de Guise, wife ofJamesVofScots,1Mary,queen:birth,1,2;

character,1,2,3,4;religion,1,2;appearance,1,2;declared illegitimate, 1,2,3;claim to throne, 1, 2, 3,4,5;relationship with

brother,1;brother’sdeathbed,1;flighttoNorfolk,1,2;brother’sdeath,1,2;allies not hopeful of herinheritance,1;callforsupport,1;forces,1;proclamation ofaccession,1;entryintoLondon,1;speeches,1,2,3;advice from Charles V,1;

appealtocouncil,1;coronation,1;marriage question, 1, 2,3;marriagetoPhilip,1,2;Wyattrebellion,1;execution of Jane Grey,1;phantompregnancies,1;successionquestion,1;death,1;funeral,1

Mary of Guelders, wife ofJamesIIofScots,1,2

Mary of Hungary, regent oftheNetherlands,1Mary Stuart, queen of Scots:betrothaltoEdward,1;

betrothaltodauphin,1;religion,1;claim to English throne,1,2,3,4;marriages,1,2,3;imprisonment andexecution,1

Mary Tudor, wife of LouisXII of France, then wife ofCharles Brandon, duke of

Suffolk,1,2,3,4Mathieu, count of Boulogne,1Mathilde of Boulogne, wifeofStephen:marriage,1;

fleet,1;meeting with Robert ofGloucester,1;support for imprisonedhusband,1;praisedforvalour,1,2;attackonLondon,1;persuasion of Henry ofWinchester,1;

husband’srelease,1;death,1;tomb,1;daughter’smarriage,1

Matilda,empress:ancestry,1;birth,1;character,1,2,3,4,5;childhood,1;education,1;betrothal to Heinrich V,1,2;dowry,1,2;coronationatMainz,1;weddingtoHeinrich,1;

role as consort ofHeinrich,1campaigning withHeinrich,1,2,3;coronationinRome,1;titleofempress,1;government as regent inItaly,1;death of brotherWilliam,1;deathofHeinrich,1,2;journeytoNormandy,1;returntoEngland,1;question of succession,

1,2,3,4,5;nobles swear allegiancetoher,1,2,3;marriage to Geoffroi ofAnjou,1,2,3,4;birthofsons,1,2,3;deathoffather,1,2;delayed return toEngland,1,2;Stephen’scoup,1;Robert of Gloucester’schampionship,1–2;appealtopope,1;arrivalatArundel,1;

escapetoBristol,1;recruitment ofsupporters,1,2;Gloucesterbase,1;captureofStephen,1;atWinchester,1;named as ‘Lady ofEngland’,1,2;chroniclers’accountsof,1,2,3;attempt to ruleEngland,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8;inLondon,1;coronation preparations,

1,2;flightfromLondon,1;Winchestersiege,1;escape to Gloucester, 1,2;releaseofStephen,1;besiegedatOxford,1;escape to Wallingford,1;relationship with sonHenry,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9;deathsofsupporters,1;relationship with

supporters,1;return to Normandy, 1,2;negotiations with pope,1;son Henry’s accession,1;lifeinRouen,1,2;religiousconcerns,1,2;advice to son Henry, 1,2,3,4,5;deaths of younger sons,1;death,1;

tomb,1,2;epitaph,1,2

Matilda of England, duchessofSaxony,1,2,3,4MatildeofTuscany,countessofCanossa,1,2MelisendeofJerusalem,1Mercadier (mercenarycaptain),1Michieli,Giovanni,1,2,3Milan,dukeof,1,2Miles of Gloucester, 1, 2, 3,4,5Mirebeau,castleof,1,2,3

MonmouthCastle,1Montagu,SirEdward,1Montagu,JohnNeville,Lord,1,2,3,4,5Montagu,William,1,2Montlouis,treatyof(1174),1Montmirail, peace treaty(1169),1,2,3,4Montreuil,1,2Mortimer, Roger (of Chirk),earlofMarch,1,2,3,4Mortimer, Roger (ofWigmore):career,1;

confrontation with king

overDespenser,1,2;son’smarriage,1;LeedsCastleaffair,1,2;surrender andimprisonment,1;wife’simprisonment,1;escapefromTower,1,2;inexile,1;arrivalinParis,1;affairwithIsabella,1;planforyoungEdward’smarriage,1;inHainaut,1;invasion,1;

proclamationdenouncing Despenser,1;execution of elderDespenser,1;captureofking,1;execution of youngerDespenser,1;imprisonmentofking,1,2,3;government,1,2;proclamation of youngEdward as keeper ofkingdom,1;

coronation of EdwardIII,1,2;deathofEdwardII,1;funeralofEdwardII,1;enrichment,1;Scottishtreaty,1;Lancasterrebellion,1;executionofKent,1;capture,1;death,1

Mortimer’s Cross, battle of(1461),1,2Mowbray,John,1,2,3

Navarre,kingdomof,1,2,3Neville, Anne, wife ofEdward,princeofWales,1Neville, Anne, wife ofHumphrey Stafford, duke ofBuckingham,1,2Neville, Cecily, wife ofRichardofYork,1,2Neville, George, archbishopofYork,1,2Neville, Isabel, wife ofGeorgeofClarence,1Neville family: rivalry withPercyfamily,1,2,3;

support for duke ofYork,1,2;troops,1;Scottishborderdefences,1;loveday(1458),1,2;alliancewithEdwardIV,1;see also Montagu,Salisbury,WarwickNewcastle,fortress,1,2Nicholas of the Tower(ship),1Nigel,bishopofEly,1

Noailles,Antoinede,1Norfolk, ThomasHoward,dukeof,1Norfolk, Thomas, earlof,1,2,3,4Normandy: duchy of, 1,2,3;Frenchsovereignty,1;borders,1,2;Robert Curthose’sinheritance,1;Robert’ssaleof,1;Henry’s rule, 1, 2, 3, 4,5;

William Ætheling heirto,1,2;Matilda’sreturn,1;Matilda’sclaim,1,2,3;Stephen’scampaigns,1;Stephen’scoup,1,2;violence,1;Angevinwarfare,1,2;Stephen’sretreat,1;Geoffroi’s militarysuccesses,1,2,3,4;Geoffroi invested asduke,1;Matilda’s return (1148),

1,2;Henry’spresence,1;Henrydukeof,1,2;Matilda’sdeath,1;court,1;French invasionrepelled,1;Henri (the YoungKing)’sinheritance,1;Richard’s inheritance,1;Richard’scampaigns,1;Frenchadvances,1,2,3;French conquest (1204),1,2,3,4;

Henry V’s conquest, 1,2;Englishdefenceof,1,2;French conquest (1450),1

Northallerton, battle of(1138),1Northampton, battle of(1460),1Northumberland, JohnDudley,dukeof:character,1;

navalcareer,1;chief minister onremoval of Somerset, 1,

2;announcement onEdward’shealth,1;religiouspolicies,1;son’smarriage,1,2,3;Edward’s ‘device’ forLady Jane’s succession,1,2;plansforMary,1,2;accession of Jane Grey,1;Mary’sresistance,1;proclamation of Mary’saccession,1;

death,1Northumberland, HenryPercy,secondearlof,1Northumberland, HenryPercy,thirdearlof,1,2,3,4,5NottinghamCastle1,2,3, 4,5Nurad–Din,1

OdoofDeuil,1Ordainers (Lords Ordainer),1,2,3,4Orderic Vitalis: background,

1;onHenryI,1;onEdith,1;onWilliamÆtheling,1;onHeinrichV’sarmy,1;on Heinrich’s marriage,1;onNormandy,1;onRouen,1;death,1

Otto IV, Holy RomanEmperor,1Owen,George,1Oxford,1,2,3,4

Pamplona,1Paris,1,2,3,4,5,6Parr,Katherine,1PaschalII,pope,1,2,3Paston,Clement,1Paston,SirJohn,1,2Paston,Margaret,1Pembroke, Aymer deValence, earl of: nicknamedbyGaveston,1;

plans for Gaveston’sarrest,1;Gaveston’s captivity, 1,2;

return to king’s side, 1,Scottishcampaign,2;flight afterBannockburn,1;loyaltytoking,1,2;Berwickdefence,1;keeperofEngland,1;exileofDespenser,1;trialofLancaster,1;oathofloyalty,1;death,1

Pembroke, JasperTudor, earlof,seeTudorPercy family, 1, 2, 3, 4, see

alsoNorthumberlandPeterofBlois,1,2,3,4Petronilla of Aquitaine, 1, 2,3PhilipIIofSpain,1,2Philippa of Hainaut, wife ofEdwardIII,1,2,3,4PhilippaofToulouse,1,2Philippe,countofFlanders,1Philippe III, duke ofBurgundy,1Philippe I, kingofFrance, 1,2Philippe II (‘Dieudonné’),

kingofFrance:birth,1;illness,1;character,1;accession,1;relationship withGeoffreyofBrittany,1;relationship withRichard,1,2,3,4;crusading,1,2,3;sisterAlix’smarriage,1,2,3;planned invasion ofEngland,1;Normandycampaigns,1,

2,3,4,5;relationship with ArthurofBrittany,1,2,3;Eleanor’s homage forAquitaine,1;treatywithJohn,1;declares John’s landsforfeit,1;conquest of Normandy,1,2

PhilippeIV(‘leBel’),kingofFrance,1,2,3,4,5Philippe V (Philippe ofValois),kingofFrance,1,2,

3,4Philippe VI, king of France,1,2Philippe,sonofLouistheFat,1,2PhilippeofCognac,1Plantagenetdynasty,1Poitiers,1,2,3,4,5Poitou:dialect,1;

countyof,1,2,3,4,5;problemterritory,1;Eleanor’s position, 1, 2,3,4;Richard’sposition,1,2;

Geoffrey and John’sattacks,1,2;Berengariain1;John’slossof,1,2

PontefractCastle,1,2,3,4,5Ponthieu,1,2,3,4Pontoise,1,2PurtonCastle,1

RalphofDiceto,1,2Ramon IV, count ofToulouse,1RamonV,countofToulouse,1,2,3,4

Ramon VI, count ofToulouse,1Ramon of Poitiers, ruler ofAntioch,1,2,3,4Ranulf, earl ofChester, 1, 2,3,4Raoul, count of Vermandois,1,2Renard,Simon,1,2,3,4,5,6René,dukeofAnjou,1,2,3,4,5Richard I (the Lionheart):birth,1;

betrothal,1,2,3;

duchyofAquitaine,1,2,3;enthroned as duke ofAquitaine,1,2;relationshipwithmother,1,2,3,4,5,6;rebellion against father,1,2,3;peacewithfather,1;Aquitaine campaigns, 1,2;proposed surrender ofAquitaine,1;Brittanycampaign,1;

surrenderofAquitainetomother,1;relationship withPhilippeII,1;takescrusader’scross,1;father’sdeath,1–2;accession,1;mother’s government ofEngland,1,2,3,4;coronation,1;crusading,1,2,3;marriage,1,2,3,4;inSicily,1,2;relationshipwithbrother

John,1,2,3;return from Holy Land,1;capture andimprisonment,1,2,3;ransom,1;release,1;returntoEngland,1;forgivesJohn,1;Aquitaine campaigns, 1,2,3;death,1,2;tomb,1,2

RichardII,1,2,3,4

RichardIII,1RichardofDevizes,1,2,3,4Rigord,(Frenchchronicler),1Robert (Curthose), duke ofNormandy,1,2,3Robert, earl of Gloucester:status,1,2;

oath of allegiance toMatilda,1,2;sister’sbetrothal,1;homagetoStephen,1;renounces allegiance toStephen,1,2,3;championship of

Matilda,1,2,3;castles,1,2;Arundellanding,1;peacenegotiations,1;son–law,1,2;Lincolnvictory,1;reputation,1,2;Winchestersiege,1;captureandrelease,1;inNormandy,1;return from Normandy,1,2;death,1

RobertII,kingofFrance,1

Robertd’Arbrissel,1RobertofArtois,1Robert de Beaumont, earl ofLeicester,1,2,3,4Robert of Lewes, bishop ofBath,1RobertofTorigni,1,2Rochester,battleof(1554),1Roger,bishopofSalisbury,1,2,3RogerII,kingofSicily,1Roger of Howden: on HenryII,1;

onPhilippeandRichard,

1;on Eleanor’s authority,1;onRichard’scrusade,1;onRichard’srelease,1;on reconciliation ofRichardandJohn,1;on Eleanor’s retirement,1

Rouen:Anglo–Normancourt,1,2;

cathedral,1,2,3;knighthood of Geoffroi,1;

Matilda’sreturnto,1;Geoffroi’s advance on,1;Henry’sconquest,1;Matilda’s household, 1,2,3,4;Henri (the YoungKing)’stomb,1,2;John’s investment asdukeofNormandy,1;Philippe’sentry,1,2;Margaret’sarrival,1;fallof,1,2;Warwick’sembassy,1,2

Rutland, Edmund, earl of, 1,2

St Albans, first battle of(1455),1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8St Albans, second battle of(1461),1,2,3Salah ed–Din Yusuf, Al–Malikal–Nasir(Saladin),1,2SalicLaw,1Salisbury,Patrick,earlof,1Salisbury, Richard Neville,earl of: support for duke ofYork,1;

loveday(1458),1,2;treason charges against,1;BloreHeathbattle,1;flighttoCalais,1;actofattainder,1;returntoEngland,1;son’sdeath,1;death,1,2

Salisbury, Thomas Montagu,earlof,1Salmon,Christopher,1SanchoVI,kingofNavarre,1SandalCastle,1,2

Scales,Emma,Lady,1ScarboroughCastle,1Scheyfve,Jehan,1,2,3,4,5,6Scotland: conflict oversuccession,1;

Stephen’s campaigns, 1,2;successioncrisis,1;Edward I’s campaigns,1,2,3,4,5;Edward II’s policies, 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9;borderraids,1,2,3;

Edward II’s campaigns,1,2,3;invasions of northernEngland,1,2,3;borderdefences,1;borderraids,1,2,3;Harclay’s negotiations,1;Isabella and Mortimer’spolicy,1;recognition asindependentkingdom,1;Edward III’s policy, 1,2;

borderdefences,1;Margaret’s appeal forsupport,1;Margaret and Henry’sflightto,1;support forMargaret, 1,2;HenryVIin,1;treaty with Edward IV,1;Knox’sposition,1,2;see also Bruce, MaryStuart

Seymour,Jane,1

Seymour,Mary,1Seymour,Thomas,1,2Sforza,Francesco,1Shakespeare,William,1,2,3,4Shrewsbury, John Talbot,firstearlof,1,2Shrewsbury, John Talbot,secondearlof,1,2Sicily,1,2Sidney,Henry,1,2Somerset, Edmund Beaufort,seconddukeof:ancestry,1;

Normandydefeat,1,2;

rivalry with duke ofYork,1,2,3,4;control of government,1;arrestandimprisonment,1,2;release from Tower, 1,2;StAlbansbattle,1,2;death,1,2,3

Somerset, Edmund Beaufort,fourthdukeof,1,2Somerset, Edward Seymour,dukeof,1,2,3

Somerset, Henry Beaufort,thirddukeof: firstStAlbansbattle,1;

loveday(1458),1,2;returnfromFrance,1;Wakefieldbattle,1,2;secondStAlbans battle,1;Towtonbattle,1;flightfromTowton,1;death,1

Stephen,king:ancestry,1,2;character,1,2,3,4,5,6;WhiteShipdisaster,1,2,

3;career,1;marriage,1,2;oath of allegiance toMatilda,1,2,3,4;coup,1,2;relationshipwithbrotherHenry,1,2,3,4,5,6;coronation,1,2,3,4;armyagainstScots,1;court,1;relationship with RobertofGloucester,1,2;Exetersiege,1;

retreat from Normandycampaign,1;victoryoverScots,1;papalsupport,1;influence of Beaumonttwins,1,2;Matilda’s arrival atArundel,1;military gains andlosses,1,2;defeatatLincoln,1;imprisonment,1,2,3,4;meetingwithMatilda,1;releasefromprison,1;

sister’sdivorce,1;illness,1;Oxfordsiege,1;Matilda’sescape,1;Normandylosses,1;succession question, 1,2,3,4,5,6;supportdwindles,1;deathofsonEustace,1;adoption of Henry asheir,1;death,1,2

Suffolk, Charles Brandon,dukeof,1,2,3

Suffolk, Henry Brandon,dukeof,1,2,3Suffolk,HenryGrey,dukeof,1,2,3Suffolk,JohndelaPole,dukeof,1Suffolk, William de la Pole,dukeof,1,2,3Suger, abbot of Saint–Denis:abbotofSaint–Denis,1,2;

onArchbishopBruno,1;onHeinrich’sforces,1;rebuked by Bernard ofClairvaux,1;

chiefminister,1,2,3;consecration of Saint–Denischoir,1;Louis’ demands forcrusadefunds,1;onLouis’marriage,1;death,1

Surrey, John de Warenne,earlof:tournamentdefeat,1;

relationship withGaveston,1,2;plans for Gaveston’sarrest,1;Gaveston’sarrest,1;

dispute with Lancaster,1,2,3;Berwickdefence,1;marchagainstrebels,1;trialofLancaster,1

Swynford,Katherine,1

Tancred of Lecce, king ofSicily,1,2,3,4Tewkesbury,battleof(1471),1Theobald of Bec, archbishopofCanterbury,1,2,3,4Thibaud IV, count of Blois

andChampagne,1,2,3,4,5ThibaudV,countofBlois,1,2ThierryGaleran,1Toulouse,1,2,3Touraine,1,2,3TowerofLondon,1,2, 3, 4,5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25Towton,battleof(1461),1,2Tudor, Jasper, earl ofPembroke:ancestry,1;

allyofMargaret,1;

controlofWales,1;forces,1,2;Mortimer’sCrossdefeat,1,2;father’sdeath,1;flightfromTowton,1;exile,1;landinginWales,1;nephew,1

Tudor,Owen,1,2Tudordynasty,1,2,3TutburyCastle,1,2TynemouthPriory,1,2

Ulger,bishopofAngers,1Urraca,queenofCastile,1Urraca of Castile, wife ofAfonsoIIofPortugal,1Utrecht,1,2

Vexin,1,2Vézelay,1,2Vita Edwardi Secundi:author,1;

on Edward’s favouriteactivities,1;on Edward andGaveston,1,2;

onaccessionofEdward,1;on Gaveston’sarrogance,1;onOrdainers,1,2;onGaveston’sfate,1,2,3;on Edward’sachievements,1;on promised parliament,1;on Edward andLancaster,1,2;on Lancaster’s trial and

death,1;onFrenchtruce,1;onDespensers,1;on Isabella’s challenge,1;lastentry,1

Vitry,massacre,1,2

Wainfleet,William,1Wakefield, battle of (1460),1,2Waleran deBeaumont, countofMeulan,1,2,3,4,5,6Wales: Edward I’s conquest,

1;Lancaster– Surrey war,1;Despenser’sestates,1,2,3;lawofthemarches,1;flight of Edward II andDespenser,1;Mortimer’sestates,1,2;duke of York’s estates,1;Jasper Tudor’s position,1,2,3,4;EdwardIV’sposition,1

Wallingford,1,2,3,4,5,6Walsingham,1Walter of Coutances,archbishopofRouen,1,2,3Wareham,1Warwick, Guy Beauchamp,earlof,1,2,3,4,5,6Warwick, Richard Neville,earl of: support for duke ofYork,1;

viewofStAlbansbattle,1;atWarwick,1;captaincyofCalais,1,2,

3,4;loveday(1458),1;departure from London,1;Calaisforces,1,2;flighttoCalais,1;invasion(1460),1;Northamptonvictory,1;inLondon,1;StAlbansdefeat,1;arrivalinLondon,1;Towtonbattle,1;relationship withEdwardIV,1;

Frenchnegotiations,1;Frenchfavour,1,2;rebellion,1;captureofEdwardIV,1;releaseofEdwardIV,1;alliance with Margaret,1;invasion,1;Edward’sflight,1;restoration ofHenryVI,1;treatywithFrance,1;Edward’sreturn,1;Barnetbattle,1;

death,1Warwick, ThomasBeauchamp,earlof,1WarwickCastle,1,2Westminster: coronation ofRufus,1;

coronationofHenryI,1;court,1,2,3,4;Matilda’s childhood, 1,2;coronation of Henry IIandEleanor,1;coronation ofHenri (theYoungKing),1,2;

reconciliation of HenryII’ssons(1184),1;coronationofRichard,1;coronationofJohn,1;parliament(1308),1,2;pardon of Gaveston’skillers,1;parliament(1320),1;parliament(1323),1;parliament(1327),1;HenryVI’scourt,1,2;parliament(1455),1;council(1457),1;York’s claim to throne,

1;settlement(1460),1;Edward IV’senthronement,1;parliament(1461),1;Elizabeth Woodville’ssanctuaryinabbey,1;EdwardVIinabbey,1;courtpageant(1553),1;coronationofMary,1

Westminster, palace of, 1, 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9WhiteShip,1,2,3WilliamI(theConqueror),1,

2,3,4WilliamII(Rufus),1,2,3,4,5,6,7William,kingofScots,1William II, king of Sicily, 1,2William, son of Eleanor andHenryII,1,2William,sonofMatilda,1,2,3,4William,sonofStephen,1,2William Ætheling, son ofHenryI,1,2,3Williamd’Aubigny,1

WilliamdeBraose,1WilliamClito, son of RobertCurthose,1,2,3William of Corbeil,archbishopofCanterbury,1William of Malmesbury:background,1;

onHenryI,1,2,3,4,5;onWhiteShip,1,2;on Guilhem ofAquitaine,1;on Matilda’s character,1;onHeinrich,1;

attitude toMatilda,1,2,3;onMatilda’sresponsetofather’sdeath,1;onStephen’scoup,1;onMatilda’sescort,1;on devastation inEngland,1;on Stephen’simprisonment,1;onRobertofGloucester,1,2;on bishop Henry’saddress,1;

on Matilda and theLondoners,1;on Matilda’s escapefromOxford,1,2;death,1

WilliamofNewburgh,1,2,3WilliamofTyre,1WilliamofYpres,1,2Willoughby,SirHugh,1Winchester: nomination ofHenryI,1;

royaltreasury,1,2,3,4;coronationofStephen,1,2,3;

council(1141),1,2;Matilda named as LadyofEngland,1;siege,1;peacetreaty(1153),1;coronation ofHenri (theYoungKing),1;returnofRichard,1;parliament(1330),1;wedding of Mary andPhilip,1

Windsor:court(1126),1;Christmas court (1184),1,2;

meetingofbarons,1;castle surrendered byJohn,1;birthofEdwardIII,1;Isabellaat,1;Henry VI’s household,1,2,3;Margaret’simprisonment,1

Worcester,1Wroth,SirThomas,1Wyatt,SirThomas,1,2,3

YolandaofAragon,1,2,3,4,

5YolandeofAnjou,1York, Edward Plantagenet,dukeof,seeEdwardIVYork, Richard Plantagenet,dukeof:ancestry,1,2,3;

career,1;claim to leadgovernment of HenryVI,1;rivalrywithSomerset,1,2;heirpresumptive,1;control of royal council,

1;imprisonment ofSomerset,1,2;protectoroftherealm,1;government,1;king’srecovery,1;exclusion fromgovernment,1;St Albans victory, 1, 2,3;HenryVIreceivescrownfromhishands,1;Margaret’sattitudeto,1,2,3,4,5,6;

ascendancy,1;resignation as protector,1;atSandal,1;Coventrycouncil,1;oathofloyalty,1;refusal to attend secondCoventrycouncil,1;defence of Scottishborder,1;loveday(1458),1,2;failure to attendCoventrycouncil(1459),1;

BloreHeath,1;LudfordBridge,1,2;flighttoIreland,1;declared guilty oftreason,1;invasionpreparations,1;arrivalinLondon,1;claimsthrone,1;Westminster settlement(1460),1;Wakefieldbattle,1;death,1,2

Zengi,Imadad–Din,1

AbouttheAuthor

HelenCastorisahistorianofmedieval England, and aFellow of Sidney SussexCollege,Cambridge.Her last

book, Blood & Roses, abiography of the fifteenth-century Paston family, waslonglisted for the SamuelJohnson Prize in 2005 andwon the EnglishAssociation’s BeatriceWhitePrize in 2006. She lives inLondonwithherhusbandandson.

BytheSameAuthor

BLOOD&ROSES

Copyright

Firstpublishedin2010byFaberandFaberLtdBloomsburyHouse

74–77GreatRussellStreetLondonWC1B3DA

Thisebookeditionfirstpublishedin2010

Allrightsreserved

©HelenCastor,2010TherightofHelenCastortobeidentifiedasauthorofthisworkhasbeenassertedinaccordancewithSection77oftheCopyright,DesignsandPatentsAct1988Thisebookiscopyrightmaterial

andmustnotbecopied,reproduced,transferred,

distributed,leased,licensedorpubliclyperformedorusedinanywayexceptasspecifically

permittedinwritingbythepublishers,asallowedunderthetermsandconditionsunderwhichitwaspurchasedorasstrictlypermittedbyapplicablecopyrightlaw.Anyunauthoriseddistributionoruseofthistextmaybeadirectinfringementoftheauthor’sandpublisher’s

rights,andthoseresponsiblemaybeliableinlawaccordingly

ISBN978–0–571–27172–6

A thirteenth-centuryillustration of the first fourNorman kings: William theConqueror(topleft),hissonsWilliamRufus(topright)andHenry I (bottom left), andHenry’s nephew Stephen(bottomright).Stephenholdsa sword to show that hewasforced to fight for his throneagainst the claim of Henry’sdaughterMatilda.

Eleven-year-old Matilda(secondfromrightbehindthetable) sits beside her firsthusband, the GermanEmperorHeinrichV, at theirweddingfeastin1114.Itwaseleven years before shereturned to England as thewidowed ‘Empress Matilda’tobenamedherfather’sheir.

The effigy of Eleanor ofAquitaine lies beside that ofher second husband,Matilda’s son Henry II ofEngland, in the calm ofFontevraud Abbey – astriking contrast to theturbulenceoftheirmarriage.

Images of power: the two

sides of royal seals show theking with sceptre and swordas judge and warrior – keyfunctions of kingship that awomancouldnoteasilyfulfil.On the left is Philippe II ofFrance, sonofEleanor’s firsthusband Louis VII; on theright, John, youngest son ofEleanorandHenry.

EdwardII’squeen,IsabellaofFrance,inarmourattheheadof her troops at Hereford in1326 – a fourteenth-centuryimage that echoescontemporary depictions ofthe Amazonian queens ofclassical myth. In thebackground her husband’sfavourite, Hugh Despenserthe younger, meets a grislyendonthescaffold.

The effigy of Edward II,

carved in English alabaster,on his tomb in GloucesterCathedral.

A conventional image ofvirtuous queenship at oddswith Margaret of Anjou’slater reputation asShakespeare’s ‘She-wolf ofFrance’: Margaret sits in aconsort’s place on the left ofher husband, Henry VI, toreceivefromJohnTalbot,earlof Shrewsbury, a gift of thebook in which thisilluminationappears.

King Edward VI, a slightlybuilt teenager trying toemulatetheimposingstyleofhis father Henry VIII; and aposthumous portrait ofEdward’s cousin Lady JaneGrey.

Edward’s ‘device for the

succession’, drafted in hisown hand, which specifiedthat England’s futuremonarchs should beProtestant and male. Duringhis final illness in 1553,Edward named Jane his heirby changing his bequest ofthe crown: ‘to the L’ Janesheiresmasles’became‘totheL’ Janes and her heiresmasles’.

Mary Tudor in 1554, when,according to the outgoingVenetian ambassadorGiacomo Soranzo, the queenwas ‘of low stature, with ared and white complexion,andverythin;…werenotherage on the decline shemightbe called handsome ratherthanthecontrary’.

An improvised division ofroyallabourontheGreatSealofEngland,1554:Maryridesahead, holding the sceptreand looking back at herhusband, King Philip, whotakes the consort’s positionon her left with a swordunsheathedinhishand.

From human being to icon.Top, Elizabeth at thirteen, astudy in charismatic self-possession.Below, thequeenat forty-two,a stylised figuredecked about with symbols:flanked by the Tudor rose,representing the crown ofEngland, and the fleur-de-lysfor her claim to France,Elizabethwearspinnedtoherbodice an enamelled pelican,a symbol of mystical andselfless motherhood – and

therefore of the queen asmother of her people –because it was believed tofeed its young with bloodpeckedfromitsownbreast.

Apotheosis of an icon:Elizabeth at sixty-six.Goddess-like in her eternalyouth, she has a serpent onher sleeve forwisdom, andarainbow in her hand for thepeace and prosperity broughtby the sunlight of hermajesty, while the eyes andears on her cloak show thatshe sees and hears all. Theknotted pearls that representher virginity both emphasiseanddefendhersexualpower.

Thelessonofthiseclecticanddensely woven imagery wasthat, if women were lesserbeings and unfit to rule,England’s queen was aunique and gloriousexception.