704 



RICHARD I.-II. 



purpose in a brief space of time by Belling 

 whatever he could get a purchaser for. Almut 

 midsummer 1190 lie met Philip of France at the 

 rendezvous, Vezelai in France ; but from Lyons he 

 made his way by a different route from Philip to 

 Messina in Sicily. Both kings spent the winter at ! 

 that city, and their mutual jealousy came within a 

 hair's lueadth of a rupture. The throne of Sicily 

 had just been seized by the Norman Tancred. an 

 illegitimate son of King Roger, though the lawful j 

 heir was Henry of Hohenstaufen, son of Frederick 

 Barbarossa, and afterwards the Emperor Henry VI. j 

 Moieover, Tancred detained in custody Johanna, 

 willow of the late king ( William the Good) and 

 sister of Richard I., together with her very large 

 dowry. But he made his peace with Richard by 

 giving up to him his sister and her possessions, and 

 by betrothing his little daughter to the boy Arthur 

 (son of Richard's dead brother Geoffrey), whom 

 Kichard now declared to be his heir. On his way 

 t<> Palestine in the spring of 1191, part of the fleet 

 of the English king was driven on to the island of 

 Cyprus, and the crews were most inhospitably 

 treated by the reigning sovereign, Isaac Comnenus, 

 a nephew of the emperor of Byzantium, who hail 

 revolted from his liege lord. Richard sailed back 

 from Rhodes, routed Isaac in battle, deposed him, 

 and gave his crown to Guy of Lusiguan. In Cyprus, 

 too, he married Berengaria of Navarre, whom his 

 mother had brought to him at Messina. At last, 

 on 8th June, the English king landed near Acre, 

 and shortly afterwards that stronghold surren- 

 dered, the siege having lasted two years. Richard 

 took his full share of the jealousies, animosities, 

 and disagreements, though not of the treacheries, 

 that made the Christian crusading host a hot lied 

 of commotion. The glorious exploits of Richard 

 the Lion-hearted his march to Joppa along the 

 seashore, his approach upon Jerusalem at Christ- 

 mas, his capture of the fortresses in the south of 

 Palestine, his second advance in the summer of 

 111)2 on Jerusalem (the city he never beheld), 

 and his relief of Joppa made his name ring 

 throughout the East and excited the wonder 

 and admiration of Christendom, but brought no 

 real advantage to the crusading cause. Richard 

 in September concluded a peace with Saladin for 

 three years, three months, and three days, and in 

 his impulsive, impatient way started off home 

 alone, without waiting for his army and fleet. A 

 -Mini shipwrecked him near the north end of the 

 Adriatic. In disguise he began to make his way 

 through the dominions of his bitter enemy, the 

 Archduke of Austria. He was recognised, seized, 

 and handed over to the Emperor Henry VI. ( March 

 1193). The emperor demanded a heavy ransom 

 for his release, but promised to give him the king- 

 dom of Aries in addition to his lilx-rl \ . Richard s 

 loyal subjects raised the money ; and greatly to the 

 chagrin of Philip of France and Richard's brother 

 John, the captive king returned home ( l.'tth 

 March 1194). In England in the meantime Long- 

 champ (q.v.) hail made himself so unpopular that 

 Richard had IKIMI obliged to supersede him, appoint- 

 ing in his place Walter of Coutances, Archbishop of 

 Rouen. It was John, however, who exercised the 

 greatest |x>wer in the realm. And although he used 

 his utmost endeavours to prevent Richard's return 

 from his captivity, yet Richard generously forgave 

 him. After distributing judicious rewards and 

 punishments, raising what money he could, making 

 arrangements for the governance of the kingdom, 

 and l*ing crowned again the emperor is said to 

 have forced his captive to resign his crown and 

 take it bark ax a fief of the empire Richard pro- 

 ceeded to France, and spent the rest of his life 

 tin-re, warring against Philip. England WHS 

 governed in his absence by Hulx-rt Walter, Arch- 



bishop of Canterbury, who by the measures he 

 took to raise the vast sums demanded by his 

 master trained the English people in habits of 

 self-government. The most mi|Hirtant constitu- 

 tional advances made under Hubert's rule were 

 the formulation of the methods for electing the 

 county grand juries and an arrangement for keep- 

 ing the pleas of the crown by oiliieeis who may be 

 regarded as the forerunners of the modern coroner. 

 Kichard was shot, on 7th April 1199, by an archer 

 of the Viscount of Limoges, whilst besieging that 

 nobleman's castle of Cnalus-Chabrol, and was 

 buried in the abbey church of Fontevraud. 



Richard cannot lie called a good king; his only 

 thought of bis subjects was how to get money from 

 them. He was not a faithful husband ; he was an 

 undutifiil son. Yet, on the other hand, he treated 

 his perfidious brother John in the most forgiving 

 spirit, and was not incapable of noble and generous 

 acts. His impulsive, hot-headed temjH-rament 

 made him at times cruel, but never vindii '. 

 He was an adventurer, with a passionate love for 

 contention and strife ; he fought for warlike glory, 

 not for victory or real advantage ; he had all the 

 pei -onal courage and self-confidence of the liorn 

 warrior ; and a very large share of that carele-s 

 indifference or magnanimity that is frei|Ufnily 

 associated with a bold and self-reliant character. 

 In matters of dress and ceremony he loved mag- 

 nificence, and was both ostentatious and extrava- 

 gant. In person he was tall and ruddy, very skilful 

 in the use of his w capons, and possessed of gn at 

 personal strength. A fair scholar, he also ban the 

 knack of writing verses, and has been called a 

 poet. 



See BI.ONDEL ; Stubbs* Constitutional Hittory ( voL i.) 

 and The Early Plantaijnutt (1876). Kichard in the hero 

 of Scott's Talisman, and figures also largely in Jranhoe. 



Rirbard II.. king of England, the son of the 

 Black Prince and Joanna of Kent, was born at 

 Bordeaux on 6th January 1367, was acknowledged 

 by parliament heir to the crown on the death of 

 bis father in 1376, and succeeded his grandfather, 

 Edward III., on 21st June 1377. The government 

 was entrusted to a council of twelve, from which 

 the king's uncles, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lan- 

 caster. Edmund. Earl of Cambridge, and Thomas, 

 Earl of Buckingham (afterwards Duke of Glou- 

 cester), were excluded. Nevertheless the central 

 figure during the early years of this reign, as he 

 had been during the last years of the preceding 

 reign, was John of Gaunt, whose overreaching 

 animtion and inability were a fruitful source of 

 disquietude. He was on bad terms with the clergv 

 and with the Londoners, and was viewed with 

 great suspicion by the king and the commons : \ct 

 lie was tne most powerful man in the kingdom, 

 having at his back the nobles and to some extent 

 the Lollards. War was going on with France , lmt 

 in a very weak and desultory fashion ; the I icnch 

 ravaged the south coast at "the time of Edward 

 III.'s death, and truces were constantly Ix-ing 

 made for short durations. I'm this war cost 

 money ; so too did the extravagance of the court ; 

 and more was absorlM-d or wasted by the govern- 

 ment, for which John of Gaunt was held by the 

 nation at large to be mainly rrsjmnsibh'. Conse- 

 <|iientlv taxation was heavy. The ImpnMoa of 

 a graduate! [mil-tax in 1380 provoked popular 

 risings, directed principally against the gentry and 

 landholders, in nearly all parts of the kingdom, at 

 Whitsuntide in the following year. The insurgents 

 destroyed the parks, attacked the manor hm 

 burned the court-rolls, ami massacred the lawxcis 

 who had charge of them. The men of Essex and 

 Kent, to the numlier of 100,000, marched upon 

 London. The former Ixxly, whom the king met at 

 Mile End on 14th June, consented to return home 



