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00:00.
00:11England, 1154, nearly a century after the Battle of Hastings.
00:17The country has been torn apart by a savage civil war.
00:25William the Conqueror was long dead.
00:28For 30 years, his grandchildren had been locked in a life-or-death struggle
00:32for the crown of England.
00:39The realm was in ruins.
00:53And then there appeared a young king, brave and charismatic, who stopped the anarchy.
01:00His name was Henry, and he would become the greatest of all our medieval kings.
01:08He should be as well known to us as Henry VIII, or Elizabeth I.
01:13But if he is remembered at all today, it is as the king who ordered the murder in the cathedral,
01:19or as the father of the much more famous, impossibly bad King John,
01:24and the impossibly glamorous Richard the Lionheart.
01:32Henry II has no great monument to his reign.
01:36No horseback statue of him stands outside Westminster.
01:40Yet he made an indelible mark on our country, the father of the common law,
01:45the godfather of the English state.
01:50But Henry was cursed, brought down by the church, his children, and most of all by his queen,
01:56the older, beautiful, all-powerful Eleanor of Aquitaine.
02:01This is the story of Henry II and his family.
02:05In all the pages of British history, there has never been anything quite like it.
02:12In all the pages of British history, there has never been anything quite like it.
02:56Henry II, his wife Eleanor, and their children Richard and John
03:00were the most astonishing of all the family firms
03:04to have run the enterprise of Britain.
03:06They did so with a furious energy
03:09that either entranced or appalled their subjects.
03:12And like many family firms,
03:14they had a capacity for both creation and self-destruction.
03:19What their intelligence built, their passions destroyed.
03:25They were called the Angevins,
03:28named after the French-speaking province of Anjou.
03:31At the height of their power,
03:33they were the masters of everything that counted in Christendom.
03:36Their England was the linchpin of an empire that stretched from the Scottish borders to the Pyrenees,
03:42much bigger than France itself.
03:45Not since the Romans, and never again, has England been quite so European.
03:53The dynasty had its roots in a civil war that was being fought between two cousins,
03:59Stephen and Matilda, the grandchildren of William the Conqueror.
04:03It was Stephen who seized the crown, but that wasn't the end of it.
04:07For if Matilda couldn't beat him with an army, she could beat him with a wedding,
04:12a wedding that would found a dynasty and reduce Stephen's ambitions to dust.
04:25In 1128, Matilda married Geoffrey of Anjou,
04:30nicknamed Plantagenet,
04:31because he wore a sprig of yellow broom or planta genesta in his hat.
04:36His family emblem was three lions.
04:41Along with his money, power and territory,
04:44Geoffrey gave Matilda something even more important,
04:48a son, Henry.
04:59As the boy Henry grew up,
05:02it became apparent that from his mother he'd inherited steely single-mindedness,
05:07lots of physical courage and a phenomenally foul temper.
05:12From his father, he'd got instinctive charm,
05:15and knife-sharp political and military intelligence.
05:20But the quality that anyone who ever met Henry
05:23most vividly remembered about him,
05:26the overflowing tank of energy
05:28that made him the most hyperactive king in British history,
05:32this was all his own.
05:38This was the age of chivalry,
05:40when the myth of Arthur and Camelot was at its most popular.
05:45Right from the start,
05:46Henry was being groomed by his ambitious parents
05:49to take England away from Stephen
05:51to become a new King Arthur.
05:54And to do this, of course,
05:56he would need a Guinevere.
05:58As it happened,
06:00the perfect candidate had just become available,
06:03Eleanor of Aquitaine.
06:12But the match was a gamble.
06:14He was 19,
06:15she was pushing 30.
06:17He was relatively inexperienced.
06:19Eleanor had seen as much of the ways of the world
06:22as it could possibly offer.
06:26And yet, something rather surprising happened
06:29between the teenage Arthur
06:31and the mercurial Guinevere,
06:33something that wasn't really supposed to happen
06:35in a marriage of political convenience.
06:38The parties actually fancied each other.
06:47Henry found himself at the altar in 1152
06:50beside an older woman,
06:52described as a graceful, dark-eyed beauty.
06:56Disconcertingly articulate,
06:58strong-minded and jocular,
07:00hardly the veiled damsel in the tower.
07:03And what likes to think that for her part,
07:05Eleanor saw not just the usual feudal spur-clanking bonehead,
07:08but beyond a stocky frame and barrel chest,
07:11someone who was an intriguing peculiarity.
07:15The rare prince who looked right
07:18with a falcon on one hand
07:20and a book in the other.
07:25But it was Eleanor's homeland, Aquitaine,
07:28that was the greatest prize,
07:30a vast stretch of land between Anjou and the Pyrenees,
07:33a place where wine-steeped Latin culture
07:36had been polished anew by Provençal sensuality.
07:42It's capital here in Poitiers,
07:44the home of troubadours and courtly love.
07:52No wonder, then, that Eleanor grew up,
07:55as her contemporaries put it,
07:57avayant, welcoming, vivacious,
08:01her handsome head perhaps turned
08:02by all those lovelorn lyrics of knights
08:04enslaved by beauties
08:06and bent on besieging their virtue.
08:11So this is what Eleanor brought to the match.
08:16Grandeur, territory, wealth, a lot of wealth,
08:19and the glamour of Aquitaine.
08:22No wonder Henry thought that with this marriage
08:24he got, well, pretty much everything.
08:27Everything, that is, except the Crown of England.
08:34In 1153, Henry Plantagenet crossed the Channel.
08:39His father, Geoffrey, had already taken Normandy from Stephen,
08:42so now it was up to Henry to take England.
08:48Faced with an exhausted nation
08:50and defecting baron Stephen caved in,
08:53a deal was struck.
08:54Stephen would be allowed to die on the throne
08:57on condition he named Henry as his heir.
09:02Within a year, Stephen was dead,
09:05and Eleanor and Henry were crowned together
09:07at Westminster Abbey,
09:09king and queen of England.
09:13When they emerged from the vivats and the incense,
09:16they were the French-speaking sovereigns
09:18of an enormous realm,
09:19which stretched from the Pyrenees
09:21through the vineyards of Gascony,
09:23along the codfish-run coastal waters of Brittany,
09:26then over the Channel to England,
09:28along the length and breadth of the country
09:30to the Welsh borders
09:31and the windy moors of Cumbria and Northumbria.
09:37And it was a perfect time
09:39to come into this colossal inheritance.
09:41For the mid-12th century,
09:42it really was the springtime of the Middle Ages.
09:46Literacy and learning were spreading
09:47from the cathedral schools in Paris and Canterbury.
09:50Monasteries were being founded at a record pace,
09:54and although they were supposed to be purged of worldliness,
09:58before long they were the engines of economic power,
10:01producers of wool,
10:02masters of the mills and rivers.
10:05So if this was indeed springtime,
10:08Henry and Eleanor had just gotten themselves
10:10the fattest and the ripest fruit.
10:16Still, it's unlikely they ever thought of it
10:18as a true empire in the Roman sense of a single realm.
10:22Its many regions were all treated separately
10:24according to their customs.
10:26And while Westminster was increasingly
10:28at the heart of administration,
10:31Rouen in Normandy,
10:32Chinon in Anjou and Poitiers in Aquitaine
10:34were just as important.
10:38It was rather the greatest and grandest family estate
10:42in all Christendom,
10:44and that, surely, was enough to be going on with.
10:50After all, it was one thing to stand around
10:53counting off one's possessions.
10:55It's quite another thing to know
10:56what one was supposed to do about being king,
10:59especially king of a country so promising
11:02but so peculiar as England,
11:04with all its Anglo-Saxon names and institutions
11:07like shire courts, writs and sheriffs.
11:10After all, what did Henry Plantagenet
11:13know of Huntingdonshire?
11:15Or, for that matter,
11:15what did Huntingdonshire know of Henry Plantagenet?
11:21Henry, of course, spoke virtually no English at all.
11:24What he would have grasped, though,
11:26if only from his coronation oaths,
11:28was that kings of England
11:29were supposed to be both judge and warlord.
11:34In fact, the coronation oath,
11:37preserved intact from Ebba the Confessor,
11:39who was increasingly being held up
11:41as some sort of ideal monarch,
11:43pretty much spelled out the job description
11:45of the king of England.
11:47One was protect the church.
11:49Two was preserve intact
11:51the lands of your ancestors.
11:53Three, do justice.
11:55And four, and most sweeping of all,
11:58suppress evil laws and customs.
12:06Fulfilling one and two went without saying.
12:09But what was surprising about Henry
12:11was that he took vows three and four
12:13just as seriously.
12:16Before Henry, justice was,
12:18do what I want, I'm the king.
12:20By the end of Henry's reign,
12:22getting the king's justice
12:23didn't depend on the king being there in person.
12:27Henry had established permanent,
12:29professional courts,
12:30sitting at Westminster
12:31or touring the counties,
12:33acting reliably in his name.
12:37Now, law became,
12:39listen to what my judges have to say.
12:44And by 1180,
12:46those judges could consult
12:47England's first legal textbook,
12:49full of precedents
12:51on which to base their decisions.
12:53The law now had its own kind of majesty.
13:02It was vow number one, though,
13:05the protection of the church,
13:07which quite unpredictably
13:09would cause Henry II
13:10the greatest grief.
13:12It was to provoke
13:13a kind of spiritual civil war.
13:16In its way,
13:18every bit as unsettling
13:19as the feudal civil war,
13:21and which in its most dreadful hour
13:24would end with bloodshed
13:26in the cathedral.
13:30And this was especially ironic,
13:33since at the outset,
13:34it seemed to be the church
13:35that was the strongest pillar
13:36of Henry's administration.
13:37Its literate clerics
13:40initiated him
13:41into the mysteries
13:41of governing England.
13:44So when the Archbishop of Canterbury
13:46offered up
13:46one of his brightest protégés,
13:48Thomas Becket,
13:49for the office of Chancellor,
13:51Henry listened,
13:52looked,
13:52and gave him the job.
14:00So who exactly
14:01was this Becket then?
14:03Well, for a start,
14:05he was the first commoner
14:06of any kind
14:07to make a mark
14:08on British history.
14:09And the possibility
14:10that someone like Becket,
14:12a merchant's son,
14:14with an impoverished
14:14Norman knight
14:15clanking around
14:16somewhere in the family closet,
14:18could end up
14:19as the king's best friend,
14:21said something
14:22about the possibility
14:23of the great swarming city itself.
14:28At the heart of the emerging capital
14:30was the great church
14:31of St Paul,
14:32and around it upriver
14:33from the grim pile
14:35of the Conqueror's Tower
14:36were wharves,
14:37thick with ships
14:38loaded with wool going out,
14:40wine, furs,
14:41or silks coming in.
14:43In this teeming world,
14:44Becket's father strutted,
14:46owner of one of the grandest houses
14:48in Cheapside.
14:51The truth is,
14:52Becket was a real Londoner,
14:54with a natural flair
14:55for doing what Londoners
14:57like doing most,
14:58the getting and spending
14:59of money,
15:00spectacle,
15:02costume,
15:02and despite his notoriously
15:04delicate gut,
15:05Becket also seems
15:06to have enjoyed
15:07good food and drink.
15:09He was street smart,
15:10and he was book smart.
15:12In short,
15:13from the get-go,
15:14Becket was a big league performer.
15:16He was a player.
15:19There were, in a way,
15:21a match of opposites.
15:23Becket was older
15:24by a decade,
15:25and as chancellor,
15:26willing to deal
15:26with the administrative detail
15:28that bored the king.
15:30Becket was tall,
15:31self-contained,
15:32his forehead creased
15:34with frown lines.
15:36The king was square-shaped,
15:38packed with hectic passion,
15:40a real Plantagenet powerhouse.
15:48Above all,
15:49Becket was able
15:49to keep up
15:50with the relentless pace
15:52set by Henry himself.
15:55Medieval courts
15:56were itinerant affairs,
15:58travelling 20,
15:5930 miles a day,
16:01eating in a royal forest
16:02or by the roadside.
16:04But Henry,
16:04who made a fetish
16:05of exercise
16:06out of a fear,
16:07some said,
16:07of growing fat,
16:09never seemed
16:09to slow down,
16:11barely arriving
16:12at one of his palaces
16:13before chasing off again.
16:18Clarendon Palace
16:19was the most
16:20magnificent hunting lodge
16:21in England.
16:23All that's left of it now
16:24is this raw,
16:25ivy-covered stump of stone.
16:28But in Henry's time,
16:29the place had been
16:30full of courtiers
16:32and dogs
16:32and hawks
16:33and horses.
16:35That's the way
16:36the king liked it,
16:37a kind of scruffy power
16:39to his entertainment.
16:45In fact,
16:47Beckett saw right through
16:48Henry's game
16:49of studied informality,
16:51the way he avoided
16:52wearing the crown,
16:53his preference
16:54for ordinary riding clothes.
16:56Beckett knew
16:57that when Henry
16:58extended the hand
16:59of friendship,
17:00he was capable
17:00of following it
17:01by frosty withdrawals
17:03of affection,
17:05unpredictable explosions
17:06of carpet-biting,
17:08incendiary fury.
17:15It was this
17:16pseudo-sibling relationship
17:18that gave Beckett
17:20the confidence
17:21later on
17:22to treat the king
17:23as a virtual equal
17:25with catastrophic results
17:27for all concerned.
17:29Time and again,
17:30he'd tell his dwindling
17:31band of followers,
17:32look,
17:32I know this looks bad,
17:34but trust me,
17:36I know the way
17:37this man operates.
17:48But even in the early days,
17:50beneath the jesting,
17:51there was,
17:52if Thomas looked for it,
17:53a kind of ominous tension.
17:55When, for example,
17:56the king and the chancellor
17:57rode through London,
17:59Henry pointed
18:00to the countless destitute,
18:02and eyeing Thomas's gorgeous
18:04scarlet and grey
18:05miniver-edged cloak,
18:06let it be known
18:07how charitable
18:08it would be
18:09to clothe
18:10the poor man's
18:11nakedness.
18:12Well, yes,
18:13said Beckett,
18:13you should attend
18:15to it right away.
18:16Oh, no, no, no,
18:17you should have the credit,
18:18insisted the king,
18:19pulling at Beckett's cape.
18:21An undignified tug of war
18:23then followed
18:24with both men
18:25trying to pull the capes
18:26off each other.
18:27At last,
18:29the chancellor
18:29had no alternative
18:30but to allow the king
18:32to overcome him
18:33and give his cape
18:34to the poor man.
18:49Yet if Henry
18:50suspected Thomas
18:51of getting above himself,
18:53and if he did,
18:54he wasn't alone,
18:55it didn't get in the way
18:56of Beckett
18:57coming to mind
18:58for the top job
18:59in the country,
19:00the newly vacated post
19:02of Archbishop
19:03of Canterbury.
19:05In fact,
19:06Beckett's worldliness
19:07must have made him
19:08seem precisely
19:08the right kind of man
19:10for the job
19:11Henry wanted to do,
19:12which was to put
19:13the church
19:14in its place.
19:18Monarchs had long
19:19taken it for granted
19:20that they were
19:21directly anointed
19:22by God,
19:24safely above
19:24the church,
19:26but the popes
19:26of this period
19:27begged to differ.
19:29Kings, they said,
19:30reported to popes,
19:31not the other way around.
19:33This wasn't just
19:34an academic quibble.
19:36This was a fight
19:37to the death.
19:42There were two
19:43flashpoints.
19:44The first was
19:46whether law-breaking
19:47clergymen could be judged
19:48in the king's courts
19:49like everyone else.
19:52The second was
19:54whether bishops
19:55had the power
19:56to excommunicate
19:57royal officials.
19:59By making Beckett
20:01archbishop of Canterbury,
20:02Henry believed
20:03he could depend
20:03on someone
20:04who would share
20:05his view
20:06of the subordinate
20:07relationship
20:08of church
20:09to state.
20:10The king
20:11was in
20:12for a shock.
20:17At the beginning,
20:18at least,
20:19there seemed to be
20:20a good deal
20:21of the old Beckett
20:21about the new Beckett.
20:23The array
20:24of fancy foods
20:25and company
20:26of young
20:27cosmopolitan scholars
20:28remained.
20:29But all
20:30was not
20:31how it appeared.
20:33Beckett
20:33ate none
20:34of the feast
20:35and beneath
20:35his grand garments
20:37he may well
20:37have begun
20:38to wear
20:38the hair shirt
20:39that was found
20:40later
20:41on his murdered body.
20:45When the king
20:46began to realise
20:47that a mysterious
20:48transformation
20:49had taken place
20:50in Beckett,
20:50when, for instance,
20:52the archbishop
20:53stood up in public
20:54and opposed
20:55in the most
20:56militant language
20:57the king's demand
20:58for a new tax
20:59on the church,
21:00Henry Plantagenet
21:01went altogether
21:03ballistic.
21:04Nothing made him
21:05more enraged
21:06than a friendship
21:07as he saw it
21:08betrayed.
21:14It all came to a head
21:16here at Clarendon
21:17early in 1164
21:18when Henry summoned
21:20a special council
21:21of the princes
21:22of the church
21:23and the most
21:23important nobles
21:25of the realm.
21:26There he asked,
21:28well, actually,
21:29he demanded
21:30that they assent
21:31unconditionally
21:32to what he chose
21:33to call
21:34the customs
21:35of the realm.
21:40Beckett
21:40was no idiot.
21:42He knew exactly
21:43what this meant,
21:44royal control
21:45over the clergy.
21:46He'd seen it
21:48coming for months
21:49and had been
21:49urging his bishops
21:50to resist it
21:51at all costs.
21:53After endless
21:54prevarication,
21:56in the end,
21:56Beckett refused
21:57the king's demands,
21:59ordering total resistance,
22:01a position
22:02from which he'd
22:03never budge.
22:08The king now moved
22:09the way he liked best,
22:11through the law.
22:12In October 1164,
22:15Beckett was brought
22:15to trial
22:16at Northampton,
22:17accused,
22:18and this was the killer,
22:19of improper use
22:20of funds
22:21when he'd been
22:21chancellor.
22:22So all his
22:23half-joking comments
22:25about fancy clothes
22:26that Henry had
22:27thrown Beckett's way
22:28now stopped
22:29being funny.
22:30They'd become
22:31a deadly
22:32criminal accusation.
22:39When Thomas decided
22:40to dress up
22:41for the trial
22:41in his full
22:42archbishop's rig
22:43and carry a huge
22:45silver cross,
22:46Jesus-like,
22:47his greatest rival,
22:48the Bishop of London,
22:49tried to seize it
22:50from him.
22:51But Beckett's grip
22:52was like iron.
22:53A fool he was,
22:55a fool he'll always be,
22:57was the bishop's comment
22:58on this performance.
23:08The trial broke up
23:09with Beckett
23:10storming out.
23:12Perjurer!
23:13Traitor!
23:14yelled Henry's barons.
23:15Whoremongers!
23:16Bastards!
23:17replied the archbishop.
23:19Convicted on the charges,
23:21Beckett knew
23:21he was in dire peril
23:23and fled
23:24on the nearest horse.
23:25He must have thought
23:26he was running
23:27for his life.
23:39Becket and a small group
23:41of die-hard followers
23:42landed on the Flemish coast.
23:45They were broke,
23:47demoralised,
23:48prostrate with exhaustion
23:49and flooded
23:50with the grim realisation
23:52of what they'd done.
23:54They'd made themselves
23:55outlaws for Christ.
24:00This is where Beckett's
24:02little family of God
24:03ended up.
24:04The Cistercian Abbey
24:06of Pontigny,
24:07about a hundred miles
24:08southeast of Paris.
24:10Built in sparkling
24:11white limestone,
24:13it seemed a stunning
24:14advertisement for purity.
24:16A perfect match
24:17for Thomas' temperament.
24:31But this was no
24:32monkish retreat.
24:34It pretty soon
24:35became apparent
24:35that what Beckett
24:36had established here
24:38was a real government
24:39in exile.
24:41He had his own
24:42pan-European
24:43intelligence network.
24:44He had his own
24:45letter smugglers
24:46with the know-how
24:47power to get through
24:48the blockade
24:49that Henry had imposed
24:50on communication.
24:51And he had his own
24:52versatile propaganda
24:54department.
24:55But most of all,
24:57Beckett had his own
24:59unwavering sense
25:00of self-righteousness.
25:10pretty soon, though,
25:12Henry began to use
25:13his own formidable power
25:14to turn the screws
25:15on Beckett's supporters.
25:17There were arraignments
25:19and arrests,
25:21terrifyingly sudden
25:22summary evictions,
25:24the seizure of land
25:25and property.
25:27Anyone,
25:27anyone who so much
25:29has thought about
25:29saying a good word
25:30for the traitor archbishop,
25:32risked, at the very least,
25:34deportation.
25:36Messengers caught
25:37carrying his mail
25:38were thrown into prison.
25:39Innocent relatives,
25:41incriminated by family
25:42association,
25:43were turned
25:44into exiles
25:45themselves.
25:54It took two painful years
25:57of back-and-forth diplomacy
25:58and increasingly impatient
26:00signals from the Pope
26:01to arrange even talks
26:03about talks.
26:06After a series of abortive
26:08reconciliations in 1170,
26:11it looked as though peace
26:13might finally break out.
26:16The location was to be a meadow
26:18surrounded by woods
26:19near the village of Freteval.
26:21A beautiful place,
26:23remarked one observer.
26:24Only later did he find out
26:26that the locals called it
26:28Traitor's Meadow.
26:35Henry and Thomas
26:36rode out to each other
26:38and the king took off his hat
26:40in salutation.
26:42The two of them then embraced
26:43and sat for hours talking,
26:46the archbishop's posterior
26:48mortified by the chafing
26:49of his secret
26:50goat-hair underwear.
26:53For once,
26:54the king was in no mood
26:55to quarrel
26:56and agreed not only
26:57to restore Thomas
26:59to all his powers
26:59and authority,
27:00but also to treat those
27:02who were Beckett's enemies
27:03as his own.
27:08When it was all over
27:10and Beckett had got
27:11everything he wanted,
27:13a dam broke
27:14and a tearful wave
27:16of emotion swept through him.
27:18Beckett dismounted
27:19and flung himself
27:21in front of the king's horse.
27:22The king got off
27:24his own mount
27:24and walked over
27:26to his old friend
27:27who'd become
27:27his bitterest enemy
27:29and bodily lifted him up,
27:32put one foot in the stirrup
27:34and hoisted Beckett
27:35back into the saddle.
27:37They then rode over together
27:39to the end of the field,
27:40to the royal tent
27:42where the king announced
27:43that henceforth
27:44they were finally reconciled
27:47and that he would now be
27:48a most kind
27:49and most generous lord.
27:55After the peace
27:56was publicly announced,
27:58Henry asked Thomas
27:59to ride with the court a while,
28:00but Beckett declined.
28:03This turned out
28:04to be mistake number one.
28:06The king had wanted
28:07to catch the moment,
28:09hold it a little longer.
28:10his good mood
28:12could vanish
28:12as quickly
28:13as his bad temper
28:15could reappear.
28:20Mistake number two
28:21was much worse.
28:24As the king
28:25had pardoned
28:26Beckett's closest followers,
28:27someone suggested
28:28that likewise
28:29Thomas might like
28:30to forgive those
28:31who had stayed loyal
28:32to the king.
28:34It's not the same,
28:36said Beckett.
28:37And it was this fanatical
28:39inability to meet halfway,
28:41to let bygones
28:42be bygones,
28:43that would prove
28:44to be Beckett's
28:45fatal error.
28:54The last meeting
28:55between the king
28:56and Beckett
28:56took place
28:57on the banks
28:58of the river Loire.
29:00And in a mood
29:02of sad friendliness,
29:03the king says
29:04to Beckett,
29:04you know,
29:05if only you could do
29:06what I tell you to do,
29:08I'd entrust you
29:09with everything.
29:11No reply.
29:12And one imagines
29:14a long pause,
29:16a sigh,
29:16a shrug of the shoulders,
29:17and the king goes on,
29:19well,
29:19go in peace,
29:20and we shall meet
29:22either in Rouen
29:23or in England.
29:25And then another pause,
29:27and Beckett
29:28comes out
29:28with something
29:29absolutely amazing.
29:31He says,
29:32my lord,
29:33if we part
29:34on these terms,
29:36we shall not meet
29:36again in this life.
29:39And the royal temper
29:40flares up,
29:41and Henry says,
29:42why,
29:42do you take me
29:43for a traitor?
29:44Meaning,
29:45do you suppose
29:46that I will
29:47abandon you
29:48when I've given you
29:49my protection?
29:50And Beckett
29:50looks at the king
29:51and says,
29:53heaven forbid.
29:58And I think,
29:59as he allowed
30:00that parting shot,
30:02so full of pain,
30:03sincerity,
30:04and wise guy irony,
30:06Beckett
30:06must have made
30:07the sign of the cross.
30:17Thomas Beckett's ship
30:18came into the harbour
30:19at Sandwich,
30:20probably on the morning
30:21of December 1st,
30:231170.
30:23and was greeted
30:25not only by a throng
30:26of poor people,
30:27but by three royal officials
30:29armed to the teeth.
30:35As the stones
30:36of Canterbury
30:37came into sight,
30:38he got off his horse,
30:40took off his boots,
30:41and walked barefoot
30:42the rest of the way
30:43through anthem-singing
30:45in crowds of devotees.
30:49And when he arrived home,
30:51Thomas Beckett did
30:52what he said
30:53he would do
30:53to all those
30:54who had opposed him
30:55during his six years
30:56of exile.
30:59Shouting the dreaded curse,
31:01may they be damned
31:02by Jesus Christ,
31:04he excommunicated them.
31:09But the bishops
31:10were not in hell.
31:12They were at Henry's court
31:13nearby Ur,
31:14busy pouring venomous reports
31:16in the king's ear
31:17about Beckett's impossible,
31:20virtually treasonous arrogance.
31:22And Henry,
31:23who typically seemed
31:24to have forgotten
31:25about the promises
31:26at Fréteval,
31:27raised his head
31:28from his pillow
31:29and let out
31:30a roar
31:31of Plantagenet
31:32anathema.
31:39And it was not
31:40will no one rid me
31:42of this turbulent priest
31:43but a much more
31:45alarming outcry.
31:47What miserable drones
31:48and traitors
31:49have I nourished
31:50and brought up
31:51in my household
31:52who let their lord
31:53be treated
31:54with such shameful contempt
31:56by a low-born cleric.
32:05To anyone who'd
32:07witnessed Henry's
32:08terrible meltdown
32:10or had even
32:10heard about it,
32:11his words could only
32:13mean one thing,
32:14that he wanted
32:15the interminable,
32:17insufferable
32:18Beckett problem
32:19to go away.
32:20Not go away
32:22as in six feet
32:23under perhaps,
32:24but then,
32:25if that's what it took,
32:26so be it.
32:28He was,
32:29after all,
32:29a traitor.
32:30And, well,
32:32what happens?
32:42The four knights
32:43who would kill
32:44Beckett
32:45had no doubt
32:46about what Henry
32:47had in mind
32:47and rushed to Normandy
32:49to take a ship
32:50to Kent.
32:56Dawn the next day,
32:58December 29th,
32:591170,
33:00Beckett's last.
33:02Reginald Fitzhurst,
33:03William de Tracey,
33:04Robert Labray
33:05and Hugh de Moorville
33:06arrived in England
33:07and set off
33:09for Canterbury.
33:15At around three,
33:16they burst into
33:17the archbishop's palace
33:19where they found Thomas
33:20with his advisers.
33:21When the knights came in,
33:23he studiously
33:24ignored them.
33:25Reginald Fitzhurst
33:26broke the silence
33:27by saying
33:28he had an important
33:29message from the king
33:30which was that
33:31Beckett should go
33:32to Winchester
33:32and give an account
33:33of his conduct.
33:35Beckett said
33:36he had no intention
33:37of being treated
33:37like a criminal.
33:39Things rapidly
33:40got ugly.
33:42Fitzhurst ominously
33:43declaring that
33:44Beckett was no longer
33:45under the king's peace.
33:51Ought Beckett
33:52to have temporised,
33:54to have made an escape
33:55while there was still time?
33:57My mind is made up,
33:59he told his follower
34:00John of Salisbury.
34:02I know exactly
34:03what I have to do.
34:05Please, God,
34:06you have chosen well,
34:08replied John.
34:12And instead of bolting,
34:14Thomas proceeded
34:15to the cathedral
34:16for vespers.
34:17He made sure
34:18the door was open
34:19to receive the congregation.
34:20He had chosen his place.
34:23He had written in his mind
34:24his last
34:25and greatest performance.
34:37They caught up
34:38with him here.
34:39in the north transept
34:40of the cathedral.
34:42And Beckett must have seen
34:43right away
34:44that they meant business
34:45because they had got up
34:46in the standard kit
34:47of terrorist thugs,
34:49face and head covered.
34:51Chainmail, of course.
34:53They were carrying
34:54naked swords
34:55and shouting,
34:56where is the traitor?
34:58And Beckett replied,
34:59here I am,
35:00no traitor to the king,
35:02but a priest of God.
35:06The archbishop seemed calm,
35:08but no one else was.
35:10His attendants,
35:11all except two,
35:12disappeared
35:13into the shadows
35:14of the church.
35:17But the 52-year-old Beckett
35:19was, remember,
35:21a cockney,
35:22a street fighter,
35:23tough as old boots
35:24under the cowl.
35:25And when he stood
35:26rooted to the spot,
35:28he became physically,
35:29as well as theologically,
35:30the immovable object.
35:32At such times,
35:34the kind of talk
35:35he'd picked up
35:36in his cheap-sized childhood
35:37came back to him,
35:38ripe and abusive.
35:44Whoremonger,
35:44he yelled at Fitzers.
35:46He must suddenly
35:47have felt ridiculous,
35:48clanking around
35:49in all that armor.
35:50What do you do
35:51when you can't stand
35:52feeling ridiculous
35:53any longer?
35:54Whoosh,
35:55goes the adrenaline,
35:56bang goes the gun,
35:57or in this case,
35:58the sword,
35:59down through
35:59Beckett's attendant's arm
36:00then slicing through
36:01the top of the archbishop's head.
36:03The crown hung
36:05by a thread of flesh
36:06as Beckett sank to the floor,
36:08murmuring,
36:09according to his chroniclers,
36:11for the name of Jesus
36:12and the protection
36:13of the church,
36:14I am ready
36:15to embrace death.
36:19Then, thank God,
36:21came a coup de grace.
36:22Another mailed arm,
36:24another downward slash
36:25to the head,
36:26so hard
36:27that the sword blade
36:28broke in two
36:29on the stones.
36:32To finish the job,
36:34a third warrior
36:35stood on the archbishop's neck,
36:37stuck the end of his sword
36:39into the open cavity
36:40of his skull,
36:41scooped out the brains
36:43and spread them
36:44on the floor.
36:45Let's be off,
36:47he said.
36:47This fellow
36:48won't be getting up again.
36:50The Eagle
36:51won't be getting up again.
36:51The Eagle
36:59won't be getting up again.
37:13The Eagle
37:18won't be getting up again.
37:37It was around 4.30 in the afternoon.
37:40The door was open.
37:42Frightened people who had come for the service gathered round the body.
37:46But it was by no means a flock who thought Beckett was a saint.
37:50He wanted to be a king, said one.
37:53Now let him be one.
37:57But then it all changed.
38:00Beckett's chamberlain reattached the bleeding scalp to his head
38:04with a strip of material torn from his own shirt.
38:07And the monks began to prepare Beckett's body for burial.
38:13And then they discovered what no one until that moment had known.
38:18The hair shirt with lice crawling busily in it.
38:23Thomas the immovable had been Thomas the self-mortifier.
38:27Thomas the humble.
38:34They let him lie, washed in his own blood,
38:38and over the clotting body laid the arch episcopal garments.
38:43By chance, there was a marble sarcophagus,
38:46ready for someone else's burial here in the crypt,
38:49and a space to lower it into.
38:53So down went Beckett, arrayed in the full rig.
38:57The dalmatic, the pallium, the cope, the chasuble, the orb, and the ring.
39:03He'd always thought Kit mattered, had Thomas Beckett.
39:12And for just what, exactly, had Beckett laid down,
39:16some would say thrown away, his life?
39:19Some fantastic notion, already out of date,
39:22that the church could lay down the law to the state?
39:29All our modern instincts seem to say,
39:32oh, come on, look at Henry and you find reality,
39:37the guardian of the common law,
39:39the engineer of government,
39:42the smasher of anarchy.
39:44And you'd be quite wrong.
39:47Beckett, headstrong, infuriating,
39:50over-the-top theatrical Beckett,
39:52made a huge difference.
39:54His view of the church lasted.
39:57The Angevin Empire did not.
40:07The actual murderers got off pretty lightly,
40:10hiding out in Yorkshire,
40:12excommunicated, told to go on crusade.
40:15But the real judgment, Henry reserved for himself,
40:19and the verdict was guilty as charged.
40:21In 1174, he made a pilgrimage to Canterbury,
40:26where Beckett's blood was said to work miracles.
40:28Over the last miles, Henry walked barefoot in a hair shirt,
40:32as Beckett had done four years earlier.
40:35At the tomb, he confessed his sins and was whipped by the monks.
40:41However tough his punishment, though,
40:43the blood would never wash away.
40:46Henry, the hero of the common law,
40:48will always be remembered as the biggest of England's crowned criminals,
40:53the murderer in the cathedral.
41:05Henry II would rule for another 20 years,
41:08long enough to see his embryonic legal system
41:11grow into a thriving network of courts.
41:14Up and down the land,
41:16these new courts were to settle
41:17not just the usual disputes of blood and mayhem,
41:20but all manner of painful rows
41:22over inheritances, estates and properties.
41:26How ironic, then,
41:28that the only family that would not accept the king's justice
41:31was his own.
41:33Because if there was one person
41:35who was likely to think of the king
41:37not as judge, but as transgressor,
41:40it was his wife.
41:46It had been 20 years
41:48since Henry and Eleanor
41:49had been partners,
41:50in bed and in government.
41:53Since then,
41:54Eleanor had had to suffer the humiliation
41:56of a string of mistresses.
41:58What tormented her was not Beckett's shrine.
42:01It was the shrine Henry had built
42:03to his favourite mistress,
42:05Rosamund Clifford.
42:08Betrayed and alienated,
42:10Eleanor turned her formidable energy
42:12and intellect
42:13to the business
42:14of getting her just desserts
42:15through her children.
42:17She was now determined
42:19to do everything she could
42:20to make them feel
42:21their father was robbing them
42:23of their rightful power and dignity.
42:26The sons rose to the bait,
42:28and what a bunch they were,
42:30Henry and Eleanor's four sons.
42:34There was young Henry,
42:36officially the next king of England,
42:38but in reality
42:39still having to apply
42:40to his father
42:41for pocket money.
42:42He rebelled,
42:43only to end up
42:44dying of dysentery.
42:46And then there was Geoffrey,
42:48as bright and devious
42:49as his namesake grandfather,
42:51given Brittany,
42:52but then trampled to death
42:53by a horse.
42:55This left Richard,
42:57Coeur de Lyon,
42:58the Lionheart,
42:59physically brave,
43:00chivalrous,
43:01and brutally ambitious.
43:03And the youngest,
43:05John,
43:05vindictive,
43:06self-serving,
43:07but undoubtedly clever.
43:09Henry saw in him
43:10perhaps the only prince
43:12who could properly
43:13inherit the government.
43:16Between them,
43:18Richard and John
43:18managed to undo,
43:20in their own spectacular ways,
43:22not only the prospects
43:23of the kingdom,
43:24but in the space of 15 years,
43:26the entire empire
43:27their father
43:28had so skilfully constructed.
43:37It was on Richard
43:38that Eleanor
43:39pinned her hopes.
43:41She was even prepared
43:42to go as far
43:43as to encourage
43:43an alliance
43:44between Richard
43:45and her husband's
43:46bitterest enemy,
43:47the King of France.
43:51So in 1189,
43:53Richard declared war
43:55on his father.
44:01This time,
44:02Henry faced defeat,
44:03forced to watch
44:04as his barons
44:05defected to Richard.
44:07The beleaguered Henry
44:08had no choice
44:09but to negotiate
44:10and agree terms
44:11which humbled him
44:12before his own son.
44:19To onlookers,
44:20he appeared to embrace
44:22Richard in a kiss of peace.
44:23What he really said was,
44:25God spare me
44:26long enough
44:27to take revenge on you.
44:32And when the King
44:33asked to see the names
44:35of all those
44:35who had joined Richard,
44:37to his horror,
44:38the first on the list
44:39was his beloved son,
44:41John.
44:42Faced with this
44:44ultimate treachery,
44:45Henry read no more.
44:50He died two days later
44:52in his castle at Chinon,
44:54some chroniclers say
44:55of a broken heart.
44:57The only child
44:58at his deathbed
44:59was one of his
44:59illegitimate sons.
45:01The others,
45:02he said,
45:02with leer-like bitterness
45:04are the real bastards.
45:12A barge took his body
45:14downriver
45:15to Fontevraux Abbey.
45:16When Richard finally
45:18viewed the tomb,
45:19it said that blood
45:20poured from the nostrils
45:21of the corpse.
45:36In fact,
45:37when Henry II died
45:38here at Chinon
45:40in 1189,
45:41hardly anyone mourned.
45:43It seems that most people
45:44were off breaking open bottles
45:46to celebrate the accession
45:47of his son,
45:48Richard,
45:49the darling
45:50of popular folklore
45:51and legend.
45:52From the very beginning,
45:54then,
45:55Coeur de Lyon
45:55had won the public relations
45:57battle with his father.
45:58He was already
45:59the superstar
46:00of the dynasty.
46:05To prove it,
46:07to show that the old regime
46:08had passed,
46:09that a new glamour
46:10had arrived,
46:11Richard put on
46:12a show-stopping coronation.
46:14As if in a reverie
46:16of Camelot,
46:16he had himself
46:17dripping in gold,
46:19golden sword,
46:20golden spurs,
46:22a golden canopy
46:23over his head.
46:24To celebrate
46:25the new reign,
46:26the Jews of London
46:27presented Richard
46:28with a special gift,
46:29a gesture
46:31that was immediately
46:32interpreted by the populace
46:34as a sinister plot
46:35and which triggered
46:37a general massacre.
46:41Richard of Devizes
46:42in his chronicle
46:43was the first
46:44to use the word
46:45holocaustum
46:46to describe
46:47the mass murder
46:48of England's Jews.
46:53To his credit,
46:55King Richard
46:55made strong efforts
46:56to forbid
46:57this first wave
46:58of pogroms.
46:59The problem was
47:00that he was never
47:01around to enforce things.
47:02It was an irony, really.
47:04The king,
47:05whose statue
47:05stands outside Parliament
47:07and who is therefore
47:08supposed to personify
47:09some sort of
47:10elemental Englishness,
47:12spent less time
47:13in this country
47:13than any other monarch.
47:15The three lions
47:16on his coat of arms
47:17were Plantagenet lions.
47:19The cross of St George
47:21stood for Aquitaine,
47:23not England.
47:31Eager to do God's work,
47:33Richard vanished
47:33to the Holy Land.
47:35John immediately
47:36set himself up
47:37as a rival,
47:38creating a virtual state
47:40within a state,
47:41complete with his own
47:42court and mercenary army.
47:46In 1192,
47:47when news arrived
47:49of Richard's capture
47:50on his way back
47:50from the Crusade,
47:51John quickly declared
47:53his brother dead
47:54and himself king.
47:58Eleanor was torn to pieces
48:00by this fratricidal struggle.
48:02She'd been bred
48:03to do what Angevins
48:04do best,
48:05to preside over government,
48:07to manipulate politics.
48:09But now she was paralysed
48:11by the tragedy
48:12of her own family.
48:14In desperation,
48:15she turned to the Holy Father,
48:17to whom she wrote
48:18an extraordinary letter.
48:22I, Eleanor,
48:24Queen of England,
48:25unhappy mother,
48:27pitied by no one,
48:29have arrived
48:30at this miserable old age.
48:34Two sons lie in dust
48:37and their unhappy mother
48:38is tortured
48:39by their memory.
48:41King Richard
48:43is in irons.
48:44His brother John
48:46ravages the kingdom
48:47with fire and sword.
48:49I know not
48:51which side to take.
48:52If I leave England,
48:54I abandon the kingdom
48:56of my son John,
48:57torn by civil war.
48:59If I stay,
49:00I may never see
49:01the dearly beloved face
49:03of my son Richard again.
49:10There was nothing
49:11the Pope could do
49:12about her plight.
49:14Money, however,
49:16could do the trick.
49:17Two years
49:18and 34 tons of gold later,
49:21Richard was ransomed
49:22into freedom,
49:23but his kingdom
49:24was bankrupt.
49:28The cost of acting out
49:30heroic war games
49:31was measured in blood
49:33as well as money.
49:35Showing contempt
49:36for the defenders
49:36of a besieged castle
49:38by standing in front of them
49:39without armour,
49:40a lone archer's bolt
49:42found the join
49:43between Richard's neck
49:44and his shoulder.
49:46The wound
49:47turned gangrenous.
49:49Within ten days,
49:50the Lionheart was dead.
49:51A triumph
49:52of daredevil romance
49:54over common sense.
50:00His body
50:01was laid in a tomb
50:02at the foot
50:03of his father's
50:04in Anjou.
50:05The heart
50:06of the Lionheart
50:06was taken
50:07to the great cathedral
50:08at Rouen
50:09in Normandy,
50:10which seems fitting
50:11since this city
50:13was always more
50:14of a capital
50:14to Richard
50:15than London.
50:18His brother John,
50:20who succeeded him,
50:21was buried
50:21in England,
50:22mostly in Worcester Cathedral,
50:24because the monks
50:25of Craxton Abbey
50:26had taken care
50:27to steal away
50:28his entrails,
50:29making John in death,
50:31as he'd been in life,
50:32one is tempted to say,
50:33gutless.
50:37It was as a politician
50:39that John was most obviously
50:41a wretched failure.
50:44under his father,
50:45under his father,
50:45the empire
50:45had been sustained
50:46by a shrewd combination
50:48of charisma
50:49and feudal loyalty.
50:51John's problem
50:53was his difficulty
50:54in believing
50:54that anyone
50:55would ever be more
50:56than a fair-weather friend.
50:58So he relied
50:59on blackmail
51:00and extortion,
51:02threats to the barons
51:03rather than promises.
51:05Assuming disloyalty,
51:07he ended up
51:07guaranteeing it.
51:12So when John
51:13needed the barons
51:14most,
51:15when Normandy
51:16was threatened
51:16by the French king,
51:17they weren't there
51:18for him.
51:19The result
51:19was a catastrophic
51:21defeat.
51:23The loss of Normandy
51:25ripped the heart
51:26out of Andriven power.
51:32Whether or not
51:34there was a secret meeting
51:35at Bury St Edmunds
51:36with all the major nobles
51:38in England
51:38sworn to force John
51:40to accept reform,
51:41it's certainly true
51:42that from defeat
51:43sprang rebellion.
51:51At some point,
51:52the barons
51:53drafted a document
51:54that went well beyond
51:56forcing John
51:57to stop being vindictive,
51:59proposing instead
52:00a catalogue of things
52:01the king would not
52:02be allowed to do.
52:04It was called
52:06Magna Carta.
52:12Anyone expecting
52:14to find in it
52:15some sort of
52:15primitive constitution
52:16is going to be in
52:17for a bit of a shock
52:18when they read
52:19the details
52:19because the liberties
52:21enumerated here
52:22boil down largely
52:24to tax relief
52:25for the armoured
52:26and landed classes.
52:30But even if
52:32the Magna Carta
52:32is filled with
52:33the moans
52:34and bellyaching
52:35at the barons,
52:36that bellyaching
52:37turned out
52:38to have profound
52:39consequences
52:40for the future
52:41of England.
52:42For by putting
52:44so much weight
52:44on the authority
52:45of a common law,
52:47the Angemans
52:47had stirred
52:48in the nobility
52:49a dawning realisation
52:51that this was
52:51their law too.
52:53A generation before,
52:55the barons
52:56couldn't have cared
52:56less about
52:57the rights of men
52:58held in prison
52:59for unstated causes.
53:01That was what
53:02happened to commoners.
53:03But under John,
53:04bad things
53:05had happened to them.
53:07Land stolen,
53:08widows hounded,
53:09heirs made to disappear.
53:14So now is the time
53:15to use the weapons
53:16Henry II's revolution
53:18in justice
53:18had put into their hands.
53:20And by an amazing irony,
53:23the Angevins
53:23became the schoolmasters
53:25of their own correction.
53:28Henry II's transformation
53:30of royal justice
53:31had come back
53:33to bite his own dynasty.
53:37So if it isn't exactly
53:39the birth certificate
53:41of democracy,
53:42it is the death certificate
53:44of despotism.
53:45It spells out
53:46for the first time
53:48the fundamental principle
53:49that the law
53:50is not simply
53:52the will
53:52or the whim
53:53of the king.
53:55The law is
53:56an independent power
53:57unto itself
53:58and the king
53:59and the king
54:00could be brought
54:01to book
54:01for violating it.
54:07None of this
54:08was apparent
54:09right away.
54:10Ten weeks
54:11after Magna Carta
54:12had been signed,
54:13it was annulled
54:14by the Pope
54:14and John went back
54:16to fighting his battles
54:17by the sword
54:18against the rebel barons
54:20and against the first
54:21successful invasion
54:23by a king of France.
54:24For a few months
54:26in 1216,
54:27much of England
54:28was ruled
54:29by the Dauphin.
54:35John died
54:36on campaign
54:37in Norfolk
54:38facing the windswept
54:40waters of the Wash.
54:41Fighting
54:42had quickened
54:43his appetite
54:43and he ate
54:44a meal so hearty
54:45it paid him back
54:46with a fatal spasm
54:48of dysentery.
54:49As for the barons
54:50of England,
54:51they had had
54:52no appetite
54:52for civil war,
54:54much less rule
54:55from France.
54:56So when John's
54:57nine-year-old son
54:58was proclaimed
54:59Henry III
55:00at Gloucester Cathedral,
55:01they rallied
55:02to him.
55:05But what they
55:06were rallying to
55:07was not so much
55:08a person now
55:09as a contract.
55:10The understanding
55:11guaranteed
55:12by the reissue
55:13of the Charter
55:14that from now on
55:15the government
55:16of England
55:17had to be accountable
55:18to the sovereignty
55:19of the law.
55:25The ramshackle
55:27conglomerate
55:27of the Angevin Empire
55:28had fallen apart
55:30almost as quickly
55:31as it had risen.
55:32But in the England
55:33to which it was reduced,
55:35something solid
55:36was left.
55:37Something that's
55:38best measured
55:39not in masonry
55:40or mileage,
55:41but in magistrates.
55:43So the best thing
55:44that can be said
55:45for the Angevins
55:46was that they
55:47left behind
55:48a country
55:48that didn't need
55:49them anymore.
55:51Why hunt
55:52for Excalibur
55:52when you had
55:53something
55:54much more potent,
55:56Magna Carta?
55:59was that they
56:01said,etzener,
56:01hell is that
56:07you ? He
56:10said,
56:12I don't
56:13want it into you.
56:17It's the
56:18Football for another day,
56:20it could live in
56:26some way,
56:26and you ULT,
56:27and as it
56:27Bring faithful women with blessed her home.