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Transcriber’s Note


Words in italics are marked with _underscores_.

Words in small capitals are shown in UPPER CASE.

Sidenotes showing the year have been moved to the start of paragraphs,
and kept only when they change. For some long paragraphs a range of
dates is shown.

Other sidenotes give the actual date of an event. These have been moved
next to the description of the date, and are shown in parentheses, e.g.
{30 May}. Others, which merely repeat a date, have been removed.

Footnotes have been renumbered and moved to the end of chapters.

All references to footnote numbers (i.e. page and note number) have
been changed to the footnote numbers used here.

The keys of the maps are shown in the descriptions of the
illustrations, additions by the transcriber are shown in pararenthes.

Some formatting and punctuation in citations, sidenotes and the index
have been standardized.

Variant spelling, inconsistent hyphenation and inconsistent spelling
of people’s names are retained, however a few palpable printing errors
have been corrected.

The errata list is in the note at the end of the book.




JOHN LACKLAND




[Illustration: MacMillan and Co.’s monogram]




  JOHN LACKLAND

  BY
  KATE NORGATE

  _WITH MAPS_

  London
  MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
  NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
  1902

  _All rights reserved_




CONTENTS


  CHAPTER I
                                                  PAGE
  JOHN LACKLAND, 1167–1189                           1


  CHAPTER II

  JOHN COUNT OF MORTAIN, 1189–1199                  24


  CHAPTER III

  JOHN “SOFTSWORD,” 1199–1206                       64


  CHAPTER IV

  KING JOHN, 1206–1210                             118


  CHAPTER V

  JOHN AND THE POPE, 1210–1214                     157


  CHAPTER VI

  JOHN AND THE BARONS, 1214–1215                   210


  CHAPTER VII

  JOHN LACKLAND, 1215–1216                         247


  NOTE I

  JOHN AND THE DE BRAOSES                          287


  NOTE II

  EUSTACE DE VESCI AND ROBERT FITZ-WALTER          289


  INDEX                                            295




LIST OF MAPS


    I. IRELAND ACCORDING TO THE TREATY OF 1175         _To face page_ 12

   II. IRELAND ACCORDING TO HENRY’S DISTRIBUTION,  1177      ”        14

  III. IRELAND, A.D. 1185                                    ”        17

   IV. ENGLAND, A.D. 1190                                    ”        27

    V. IRELAND, A.D. 1210                                    ”       151




“The closer study of John’s history clears away the charges of sloth
and incapacity with which men tried to explain the greatness of his
fall. The awful lesson of his life rests on the fact that the king
who lost Normandy, became the vassal of the Pope, and perished in a
struggle of despair against English freedom was no weak and indolent
voluptuary but the ablest and most ruthless of the Angevins.”

              JOHN RICHARD GREEN.




CHAPTER I

JOHN LACKLAND

1167–1189

               .... Johan sanz Terre,
    Por qui il[1] ot tant noise e guere.

              _Estoire de la Guerre Sainte_, vv. 101, 102.


[Sidenote: 1167]

The fifth son, the eighth and last child, of Henry II. of England and
Eleanor of Aquitaine was born at Oxford, in the “King’s manor”--that
is, the palace of Beaumont--on Christmas Eve 1167.[2] Of their six
other surviving children, the three younger were daughters; the last of
these, Joanna, was then two years old. The eldest living son, Henry,
was nearly thirteen; Richard was ten, and Geoffrey nine. The boy Henry
had, when an infant, been acknowledged by the barons of England as
heir to the crown,[