the population. This plague reached every part of England. Few than one of

ten who caught the plague could survive it. If in Europe 1/3 of population

died within a century , in England 1/3 of population died during two years.

The whole villages disappeared. This plague continued till it died out

itself. English military strength weakened considerably after the plague,

gradually lost so much ground that by 1375, Edward agreed to the Treaty of

Bruges, which only left England Calais, Bordeaux, and Bayonne.

Domestically, England saw many changes during Edward’s reign.

Parliament was divided into two Houses – Lords and Commons – and met

regularly to finance the war. Treason was defined by statute for the first

time (1352). In 1361 the office of Justice of the Peace was created.

Philippa died in 1369 and the last years of Edward’s reign mirrored the

first; he was once again dominated by a woman, his mistress, Alice Perrers.

Alice preferred one of Edward’s other sons, John of Gaunt, over the Black

Prince, which caused political conflict in Edward’s last years.

Edward the Black Prince died one year before his father. Rafael

Holinshed intimated that Edward spent his last year in grief and remorse,

believing the death of his son was a punishment for usurping his father’s

crown. In Chronicles of England, Holinshed wrote: “But finally the thing

that most grieved him, was the loss of that most noble gentleman, his dear

son Prince Edward…. But this and other mishaps that chanced to him now in

his old years, might seem to come to pass for a revenge of his disobedience

showed to his in usurping against him….” (25)

There is one more point about Edward’s reign, concerning the English

language. Edward had forbidden speaking French in his army, and by the end

of the 14th century English once again began being used instead of French

by ruling literate class.

Richard II (1377-99)

Richard II’s reign was fraught with crisis – economic , social,

political, and constitutional. He was 10 years old when his grandfather

died, and the first problem the country faced was having to deal with his

monitoring. A “constitutional council” was set up to “govern the king and

his kingdom”. Although John of Gaunt was still the dominant figure in the

royal family, neither he no his brothers were included.

The peasant’s revolt.

“(1381) Financing the increasingly expensive and unsuccessful war with

France was a major preoccupation. At the end of Edward III’s reign a new

device, a poll tax of four pence a head, had been introduced. A similar but

graduated tax followed in 1379, and in 1380 another set at one shilling a

head was granted. It proved inequitable and impractical, and when the

government tried to speed up collection in the spring of 1381 a popular

rebellion – the Peasants’ Revolt – ensued. Although the pool tax was the

spark that set it off, there were also deeper causes related to changes in

the economy and to political developments.”(26) The government in

practical, engendered hostility to the legal system by its policies of

expanding the power of the justices of the peace at the expense of local

and monorail courts. In addition, popular poor preachers spread subversive

ideas with slogans such as : “When Adam delved and Eve span/ Who was then

the gentleman?” (27) The Peasants’ revolt began in Essex and Kent.

Widespread outbreaks occurred the southeast of England, taking the form of

assault on tax collectors, attacks on landlords and their manor houses,

destruction of documentary evidence of villein status, and attacks on

lawyers. Attacks on religious houses, such as that at St. Albans, were

particularly severe, perhaps because they had been among the most

conservative of landlords in commuting labour services.

The men of Essex and Kent moved to London to attack the king’s

councilors. Admitted to the city by sympathizers, they attacked John of

Gaunt’s place of the Savoy as well as the Fleet prison. On June 14 the

young king made them various promises at Mile End; on the same day they

broke into the Tower and killed Sudbury, the chancellor, Hales, the

treasure and other officials. On the next day Richard met the rebels again

at Smithfield, and their main leader, Wat Tyler, presented their demands.

But during the negotiations Tyler was attacked and slain by the mayor of

London. The young king rode forward and reassured the rebels, asking them

to follow him to Clerkenwell. This proved to be a turning point, and the

rebels, their suppliers exhausted, began to make their way home. “Richard

went back on his promises he had made saying, “Villeins you are and

villeins you shall remain.”(28) In October Parliament confirmed the king’s

revocation of charters but demanded amnesty save for a few special

offenders.

“The events of the Peasants’ Revolt may have given Richard an exalted

idea of his own powers and prerogative as a result of his success at

Smithfield, but for the rebels the gains of the rising amounted to no more

than the abolition of the poll taxes.”(29) Improvement in the social

position of the peasantry did occur, but not so mach as a consequence of

the revolt as of changes in the economy that would have occurred anyhow.

John Wycliffe.

“Religious unrest was another subversive factor under Richard II. England

had been virtually free from heresy until John Wycliffe, a priest and an

Oxford scholar, began his career as a religious reformer with two treaties

in 1375 – 76. He argued that the exercise of lordship depended on grace

and that therefore, a sinful man had no right to authority. Priest had even

the pope himself , Wycliffe went on to argue, might not necessarily be in

state of grace and thus would lack authority. Such doctrines appealed to

anticlerical sentiments and brought Wycliffe into direct conflict with the

church hierarchy, although he received protection from John of Gaunt. The

beginning of the Great Schism in 1378 gave Wycliffe fresh opportunities to

attack the papacy, and in a treaties of 1379 on the Eucharist he openly

denied the doctrine of transubstantiation. He was ordered before the

church court at Lambeth in 1378. In 1380 his views were condemned by a

commission of theologians at Oxford, and he was forced to leave the

university. At Lutterworth he continued to write voluminously until his

death.”(30)

Political struggles and Richard’s desposition.

Soon after putting down the Peasants’ Revolt, Richard began to build up a

court party, partly in opposition to Gaunt. A crisis was precipitated in

1386 when the king asked Parliament for a grant to meet the French treat.

Parliament responded by demanding the dismissal of the king’s favorites,

but Richard insisted that he would not dismiss so much as a scullion in the

kitchen at the request of Parliament. In the end he was forced by the

impeachment of the chancellor, Michel de la Pole, to agree to the

appointment of a reforming commission. Richard withdrew from London and

went on a “gyration” of the country. He called his judges before him at

Shrewsbury and asked them to pronounce the actions of Parliament illegal.

An engagement at Radcot Bridge, at which Richard’s favorite, Robert de

Vere, 9th Earl of Oxford was defeated settled the matter of ascendancy. In

the Merciless Parliament of 1388 five lords accused the king’s friends of

treason under an expansive definition of the crime.

“Richard was chastened, but he began to recover his authority as

early as the autumn of 1388 at the Cambridge Parliament. Declaring himself

to be of age in 1389, Richard anounced that he was taking over the

government. He pardoned the Lords Appellant and ruled with some moderation

until 1394, when his queen Ann of Bohemia, died.”(31) After putting down a

rebellion in Ireland, he was , for a time, almost popular. He began to

implement his personal policy once more and rebuilt a royal party with the

help of a group of young nobles. He made a 28- years truce with France and

married the French king’s seven-year-old daughter. He built up a household

of faithful servants, including the notorious Sir John Bushy, Sir William

Bagot, and Sir Henry Green. “He enlisted household troops and built a wide

network of “king’s knight” in the counties, distributing to them his

personal budge, the White Hart.”(32)

The first sign of renewed crisis emerged in January 1397, when

complaints were put forward in Parliament and their author, Thomas Haxey,

was adjudged a traitor. “Richard’s rule, based on fear rather then consent,

became increasingly tyrannical.”(33) Three of the Lords Appellant of 1388

were arrested in July and tried in Parliament. The Earl of Arundel was

executed and Warwick exiled. Gloucester, whose death was reported to

Parliament, had probably been murdered. The act of the 1388 Parliament was

repealed. Richard was granted the customs of revenues for life, and the

power of parliament was delegated to a committee after the assembly was

dissolved. Richard also built up a power base in Cheshire.

Events leading to Richard’s downfall followed quickly. The Duke of

Norfolk and Henry Bolingbroke, John of Gaunt’s son, accused each other of

treason and were banished, the former for life, the latter for 10 years.

Hen Gaunt himself died early in 1399, Richard confiscated his estates

instead of allowing his son to claim them. Richard seemingly secure, went

off to Ireland. Henry, however landed at Ravenspur in Yorkshire to claim,

as he said, his father’s estate and the hereditary stewardship. The

Percys, the chief lord of the north, welcomed him. Popular support was

widespread, and when Richard returned from Ireland his cause was lost.

“The precise course of events is hard to reconstruct., in view of

subsequent alteration to the records. A Parliament was called in Richard’s

name, but before it was fully assembled at the end of September, its

members were presented with Richard’s alleged abdication and Henry’s claim

to the throne as legitimate descendant of Henry III as well as by right of

conquest.”(34) Thirty-tree articles of deposition were set forth against

Richard, and his abdication and deposition were duly accepted. Richard died

at Pontefract Castle, either of self-starvation or by smothering. Thus

ended the last attempt of a medieval king to exercise arbitrary power.

“Whether or not Richard had been motivated by new theories about the nature

of monarchy, as some have claimed, he had failed in the practical measures

necessary to sustain his power. He had tried to rule through fear and

mistrust in his final years, but he had neither gained sufficient support

among the magnates by means of patronage nor created a popular basis of

support in the shires and in 1399 Richard was disposed and he abdicated to

theу favour of Henry Lancaster and so the dynasty of Plantagenets

ended.”(35)

CONCLUSION.

Summing up the events of Plantagenets rule and their role in the history of

England, we should mark the following.

11th - 12th centuries (the first Plantagenets) were the years of

constitutional progress and territorial expansion.

“The 13th century is described as a “Plantagenet spring after a grim

Norman winter”. The symbol of this spring is the century of new Gothic

Style. One of the best example of Gothic architecture is Salisbury

Cathedral. Also it is a century of growing literacy which is closely

connected with 12th century cultural movement, which is called Renaissance.

In England Renaissance was a revolution in thoughts, ideas and learning,

foundation of universities, the development of the Common Law and the

Parliament, and emergence of English as the language of the nation.”(36)

The 14th century brought the disasters of the Hundred Years' War

(1337 -–1453), the Peasants’ revolt (1381), the extermination of the

population by the Black Death (1348 – 1349). Although the outbreak of the

Black Death in 1348 dominated the economy of the 14th century, a member of

adversities had already occurred in the preceding decades. Severe rains in

1315 and 1316 caused famine, which lead to the spread of disease. Animal

epidemic in succeeding of currency in the 1330s. Economic expansion, which

had been characteristic of the 13th century, had slowed to a halt. The

Black Death, possibly a combination of bubonic and pneumonic plagues,

carried off from one-third to one half of the population. In some respects

it took time for its effects to become detrimental to the economy, but with

subsequent outbreaks, as in 1361 and 1369, the population declined further,

causing a severe labor shortage. By the 1370 wages had risen dramatically

and prices of foodstuffs fallen. Hired laborers, being fewer, asked for

higher wages and better food, and peasant tenants, also fewer, asked for

better conditions of tenure when they took up land. Some landlords

responded by trying to reassert labor services where they had been

commuted. “ The Ordinance(1349) and Statute (1351) of Laborers tried to set

maximum wages at the levels of the pre-Black Death years, but strict

enforcement proved impossible. The Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 was one result

of the social tension caused by the adjustment needed after the epidemic.

Great landlords saw their revenues fall as a result of the Black Death,

although probably by only about 10 percent, whereas for the lower orders of

society real wages rose sharply by the last quarter of the 14th century

because of low grain prices and high wages.”(37)

Edward III ruined the major Italian banking companies in England by

failing to repay loans early in the Hundred Years’ War. This provided

opening for English Merchants, who were given monopolies of wool exports

by the crown in return for their support. The most notable was William de

la Pole of Hull, whose family rose to noble status. Heavy taxation of wool

exports was one reason for the growth of the cloth industry and cloth

exports in the 14th century. The wine trade from Gascony was also

important. In contrast to the 13th century, no new towns were founded, but

London is particular continued to prosper despite the ravage of plague.

“In cultural terms, a striking change in the 14th century was the

increasing use of English. Although an attempt to make the use of English

mandatory in the law courts failed because lawyers claimed that they could

not plead accurately in the language, the vernacular began to creep into

public documents and records. Henry of Lancaster even used English when he

claimed the throne in 1399. Chaucer wrote in both French and English, but

his important poetry is in the latter. The early 14th century was an

impressive age for manuscript illumination in England, with the so-called

East Anglian school, of which the celebrated Luttrell Psalter represents a

late example. In ecclesiastical architecture the development of the

Perpendicular style, largely in the second half of the 14th century, was

particularly notable.”(38)

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Geoffrey Plantagenet

Henry II

Richard I

John Lackland

Edward I

Henry III

Edward II

Edward III

Richard II

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