Henry IV's claim to the throne

Having received the Ricardian Bulletin this morning I find there is an interesting article therein by Ian Mortimer on the subject of Henry IV's claim to the throne.

If I understand him correctly, Mortimer argues that Henry's claim was based on his descent from Henry III via both his father and his mother. He chose Henry III because Edward I, Edward III and Richard II had all purported to settle the crown in a way that didn't suit Henry's book. Notably, in the case of Richard II, by leaving the crown to Edmund of Langley. He says it has nowt to do with the legend that Edmund Crouchback was the elder brother of Edward I.

Well, we have it from Adam of Usk that the Crouchback legend was discussed, as he was one of the team of lawyers who examined and debunked it. So I don't think it can be wholly discounted.

I also can't imagine that Bolingbroke was overly bothered by what Edward I, Edward III and Richard II had or hadn't decreed about the succession, given that in late 1399 he was in a position to pretty much do as he liked.

Maybe the truth is that it was all left deliberately vague, with just a cloak of spurious legality over a very dubious claim. Though I still don't understand why Henry didn't just claim as Richard II's heir male - he was that beyond doubt. Even if we think of him as being under attainder (which he sort of was) that status would have been automatically reversed by his coronation.

Book of the Month

My book of the month is The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England by Ian Mortimer.

This book covers just about every imaginable aspect of life in fourteenth century England, and indeed some that are pretty unimaginable. To quote from the blurb: 'How do you greet people in the street? What should you use for toilet paper? How fast - and how safely - can you travel? Why might a physician want to taste your blood? And how do you test to see if you are going down with the plague?' It's all this and a lot, lot more.

For anyone newly aspiring to write novels about late medieval England it's an invaluable source that will save you days and weeks of research. For those of us who thought we had done that research, it's a reminder that we didn't know everything, and a useful insurance against future bloops. Sharon K. Penman would never have put that famous grey squirrel in Sunne In Splendour if she had had this book.

Don't mess about - just buy it!

The Fears of Henry IV

Now I have stopped looking for it and don't need it I've found The Fears of Henry IV. Predictably it was within three feet of where I am sitting to write this, in a location where my eyes should fall at least once a day. Yesterday, mysteriously, it was there. I am sure it was not there before and yet logic tells me that it must have been. Spooky!

I haven't got the time or the inclination to do a full review at this time, but if you're at all interested in Henry Bolingbroke it's certainly worth buying. Frankly, it doesn't have much competition as decent books about him are rare. When I was working on Fetterlock my principal source for Henry's reign was History of England under Henry IV by J.H.Wylie. This was written in the late 19th century, and although it contains many details you're unlikely to find anywhere else it gives the impression it was hurriedly thrown together from sheafs of rough notes and chucked straight at the printer without benefit of editor. Ian Mortimer's book is much more suited to the needs of the 21st century reader, or indeed anyone who isn't a total history obsessive.

What I will say about Fears of Henry IV is it does come over as a bit of a hagiography. Mortimer makes no bones about the fact he is telling the tale from Henry's POV, and that's fair enough - probably a lot better than the pretended impartiality of so many historians. But do not open it with the expectation that Richard II will be cut any slack whatsoever, because he isn't. Mortimer clearly thinks he was worse than a thousand Hitlers.

Claims to the Throne

On the subject of claims to the throne, it has to be said that in the late 14th century the rules had not been fully worked out. It was fairly clear that a king would normally be succeeded by his eldest son, but what would happen in the event of a king dying without a son was far less clear.

It appears that towards the end of his reign Edward III purported to entail the crown on John of Gaunt in the event of Richard II dying without heirs. Rather illogical, since Edward had been loudly laying claim to France since 1340 on the basis of inheritance through his mother. However, logic is not always a strength of the world of politics, and the reality was that the king was senile and under the thumb of John of Gaunt, so that may have had something to do with it.

Richard II apparently decided that his successor should be Roger Mortimer Earl of March, who was the grandson of Lionel of Clarence, Gaunt's elder brother. This is faithfully recorded by the Westminster Chronicle, but the issue does not appear to have been entirely settled, and one suspects that Gaunt, his son Henry Bolingbroke, and maybe Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, the king's youngest uncle, had other ideas.

Towards the end of his reign the question became even more open. Gaunt was dead, Bolingbroke was banished and declared a traitor, and Roger Mortimer, killed in Ireland in 1398, had fallen from favour and been recalled before his death, probably to face the music. Though Roger had a son (the same Earl of March involved in the Southampton Conspiracy) it seems Richard at this point made Edmund of Langley his heir. This is certainly the belief of Ian Mortimer in Fears of Henry IV and if he is correct it the House of York opened the Fetterlock rather more completely than I thought!

More on Mortimer's book, and Henry's rather dodgy claim, at another time. Suffice it to say that Henry IV entailed the succession on his heirs by parliamentary statute, the first sovereign to do so. (The practice later became quite fashionable!) When Edward IV succeeded, however, he did not enact a succession statute, because he believed he was the legitimate heir of Richard II, through his Mortimer grandmother. By modern succession arrangements, at least, he was correct.