MARKED USPER

A review of Ian Mortimer’s The Fears of Henry IV: The Life of England’s Self-Made King (2008)

(Rating 5 of 5)

Ian Mortimer tells the tale of a tragic prince who lead an incredible life but has been unappreciated throughout history. Some of the lack of appreciation is understandable because his warrior son had left such an incredible legacy that his own suffers from want. The rest of it is due to an unsuccessful reign and the judgments of his time period. It is a great book filled with excitement but told with historical professionalism.


(King Henry IV)

Henry is born the son of the Duke of Lancaster, John of Gaunt, his paternal grandfather is King, and his maternal grandfather was the great warrior, Duke Henry. Throughout his life Henry would try to live the life a prince was expected to. He was a knight, he jousted, he went crusade where he fought holy battles, and he had even traveled to the Holy Land setting foot in Jerusalem. Henry had the potential to be great asset for to his cousin, the King.


(John of Gaunt, Henry's father, the Duke of Lancaster)

Unfortunately, for both Henry and his country, they had King Richard II as their monarch. Many monarchs that have been overthrown were not themselves, bad people. More often than not they were just incapable of doing their jobs and suffered the consequences of it*. Richard, however, was a pure tyrant king who created a climate of fear for his people. King Richard who had come to the throne at the age of ten was often insecure, jealous, and paranoid. He always seemed to make enemies where he could have friends. The King never understood that the rebels in the peasant revolt were actually pro-monarchist, against noble power as much as he. He did not understand his uncle, the Duke of Lancaster, was actually trying to help him. Even his mother tried to get him to see reason but King Richard II really believed that his uncle was out to get him, even though he never acted against him.


(Richard II, a tyrant king)

Through no fault of his own Henry finds himself banished from England forced into exile, unable to attend his own father’s funeral, and is disinherited. Much like Julius Caesar, Henry finds himself forced into an impossible position and acts in a similar manner. He returns to England in head of an army that grows the further he gets into the country (showing clear dislike for the people to Richard) and easily captures his rival.

Henry quickly encounters a problem. He had promised not to take England by conquest only to fight against a perceived injustice. In later ages it would be accepted that rulers who are tyrants can be overthrown, but what Henry was going to do to Richard violated all morals of the day. He took the throne from his cousin and through Parliament had himself proclaimed King Henry IV.

The revolutionary act of disposing of a king and taking his place would condemn Henry to a difficult rule. When King Edward II (great-grandfather to both Henry and Richard) was overthrown he was replaced by his own lawful heir, King Edward III, who did not partake in his father's overthrow. Edward III would avenge his father by killing the man who deposed him, Roger Mortimer, the Earl of March. This allowed King Edward III to rule with legitimacy. Henry was the man who deposed King Richard and replaced him as king. Henry was not Richard’s lawful heir as had been Edward III to Edward II; there were multiple people who had better claims than Henry regardless of which method of succession was used**. Yet Henry deposes a king and becomes one at the same time, under the justification that Richard was a bad king. This makes the new King Henry IV vulnerable because the same standard could be used on him! In addition, as W. L. Warren pointed out in his book on King Henry II often times powerful nobles who become king, such as King Stephan, have a difficult time making the transition from nobleman to king. Henry learned the hard way that running a kingdom was not the same as running a duchy.


(Henry's famous son, King Henry V)

It has often been said that great leaders are judged by the circumstances that they faced. This is not true for King Henry IV, although he saved the kingdom from a tyrant and handled all crises that came to him rather well. His legacy was tarnished by what he had to do to become king. During his life he went unrecognized by his peers the Kings of Scotland and France. After death, he would unappreciated by his own successors, even his own son. He was Henry the Usurper and no king could glorify a usurper and remain safe on his own throne. Unlike his ancestor, William the Conqueror, he was never able to pull a show of legitimacy that the public could at some level accept.

Ian Mortimer did a great job telling the tale of a tragic figure not even the great William Shakespeare was able to give justice. I would highly recommend this book to anyone it is a great read.

*Henry's own grandson, King Henry VI, is a good example. Others were King Louis XVI of France, and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia.

**As Mortimer points out there were many entails but none of them could be used to create a successful argument that Henry had a hereditary right to be king.

IT IS AS IT IS

A review of Ian Mortimer’s The Perfect King: The Life of Edward III, Father of the English Nation (2008)

(Rating 5 of 5)

The Perfect King is a very enjoyable to book to read, Mortimer seems to understand the importance of keeping the story part of history. In the telling of the life Edward III, Mortimer can be both funny and serious at the same time as any good history professor who has to lecture in front of students. His subject is a fascinating one, King Edward III came to throne after his father’s violent overthrow and for the first few years of his reign was under the thumb of the man who brought down his father, Roger Mortimer, the Earl of March. Edward would survive to dispose of Mortimer, and become one of the most successful kings in English history. He was a warrior prince who would humble France like none before him. His son, Prince Edward, would succeed in capturing France's King John II and bring to England a prisoner. One of the main themes of the book is how the King’s legacy would change through the ages. Although he was considered one of the greatest monarchs for five hundred years after his death, in the nineteenth century historians took a much more critical view emphasizing his faults and failings while ignoring his good traits and record of success. Mortimer tries to tell Edward’s story to be understood in the context of Edward’s own era.


(King Edward III the great warrior king)


(Mortimer pays for usurping the throne)

Probably the intriguing argument—if not the most famous—that Mortimer tries to advance in this book is the theory that Edward II did not die in Berkeley Castle but lived on into 1341. In the past I had never really questioned Edward II’s death not even the brutality of it. The hot poker story I had heard criticized on the grounds of it being too gruesome, but I always thought that a silly argument for it was brutal time period where people disemboweled as a form of execution. In such context the hot poker story seemed very probable to me. I still think he died at Berkeley, but this book did make me pause. The part that got me the most was the whole ‘William the Welshman’ royal pretender who is not only spared from any punishment but is also entertained at royal expense and gets to the meet the family! Maybe Edward II’s body should be exhumed to determine what age he was at before he died.


(Edward II, was he or was he not murdered)

Edward III is most famous for his war with France and his reputation is as a great warrior king. Mortimer shows in this story that Edward was an excellent and imaginative tactician who not only waged war but change the very way it was fought in the Western World. He would win victory after victory nearly reclaiming all the lands lost by his great-great-grandfather, King John.

“Until now gunpowder had only been used in sieges, with the sole exception of Mortimer’s use of ‘crakkis of war’ on the Stanhope campaign. Those had been dangerous exploding buckets by comparison with Edward’s refined guns. As well as small cannon with calibres of roughly four inches (the shot were still stone) he brought his newly developed ‘ribalds’—series of bound gun barrels designed to shoot metal bolts, like crossbow bolts. And Edward had not only developed them, he had thought of how to use them too.” (p.238)

Where Edward III does not get a lot of credit is in his abilities as a lawmaker. While his grandfather, King Edward I, had the first ‘Model Parliament’, it was actually King Edward III whose parliaments were ‘model’. It was under Edward III that the two chambers of House of Lords and House of Commons formed. It was also during Edward’s reign that the Commons had actually begun to have a real role in the making of law that was respected and consistent. Edward III had a strong relationship with the Parliament.

“Edward was a man who listened to his representatives, and held a dialogue with them, even if he did not or could not agree to their demands. Although it is the mass of legislation passed by his grandfather, Edward I, that caught the attention of early legal historians, prompting them to call that king ‘the English Justinian’ (referring to the great Byzantine Emperor who codified the Roman Law), Edward III was no less of a legislator. But his methods were different: he was a lawmaker not a lawgiver. He made laws responding to parliamentary demands. Sometimes these demands allowed him to promote his own agenda for legislation; at other times the measures were all but forced upon him as a result of his need to maintain a high level of taxation. Sometimes even he had his own wishes presented to him in the form of a petition from a magnate. But the parliaments of Edward III are remarkable for the breadth and depth of the parliamentary dialogue between king and people. So great was Edward’s contribution that one modern scholar has assigned him the title of ‘Second English Justinian’, putting him on a footing equal to that of Edward I, the codifier of the English Common Law.” (p.308)

One of King Edward III lasting achievements was the creation of the Order of the Garter. An association of twenty-six knights including the King and the Prince of Wales that continues to exist to this day.


(Prince Edward, the Prince of Wales, known as the Black Prince. He was the man who would have been king and one of the first Knights of the Garter.)

“It was at this point that Edward founded—or, to be exact—completed the foundation of the Order of the Garter. On St. George’s Day 1349, at the very height of the most horrific disease the kingdom had ever seen, Edward held a great tournament at Windsor during which he formally instituted his Order of twenty-six men who would joust and pray together once a year, and conduct themselves everywhere like proud Arthurian knights.” (p.263)

(King John II of France, captured by the Black Prince)

Edward tried in every way to be a good king although he was from perfect. Nevertheless, he was an amazing king. It is unfortunate that he outlived his glory, his sanity, and his own heir apparent.

{Video was posted by B29Productions on YouTube}