The man known to history as Richard the Lionheart
was born on the 8th of September 1157 in England, possibly at Beaumont Palace in Oxford, one
of the royal residences of the Angevin royal family during the twelfth century. His father was King Henry II of England who
was born in 1133. Henry had taken possession of the French territories
of the successors of William the Conqueror in the 1140s, including the duchy of Normandy
and the county of Maine in the north of France, but he had contested for years with his cousin,
King Stephen I, for possession of England and Wales. Then three years prior to Richard’s birth,
he finally ascended to these territories when Stephen died, bringing the extended civil
war to an end. Richard’s mother was Eleanor of Aquitaine,
a formidable woman herself, who had earlier been married to King Louis VII of France,
before divorcing him and marrying Henry in 1154. As the successor to the duchy of Aquitaine
in western France, she had brought this territory to the marriage, expanding the territory ruled
by Henry to cover much of northern and western France, in addition to England and Wales. And the dynasty which Richard was born into,
is known to posterity as the Plantagenets, after a flower of the order Planta Genista,
which Henry II’s father used to wear. This family now ruled extended territories
on either side of the English Channel and Richard’s life would be spent straddling
these two worlds, where the Plantagenets were the royal family of England as well as a major
noble family in France. Richard’s early life was typical of a family
which ruled over a very disparate dominion. King Henry II was the king of England and
lord of Wales, much as the modern day state of England has included a close connection
with Wales for centuries, but the Plantagenet dominions stretched much further still. As the descendant of William the Conqueror,
Henry ruled over the Duchy of Normandy in northern France, along with several other
territories in northern and western France such as the County of Maine. Moreover, as we have seen, his marriage to
Eleanor had brought the Duchy of Aquitaine into the Plantagenet sphere of control. As a consequence, Henry’s dominions were
nearly as extensive as those of the French monarchy in France, with the south and east
of the country ruled by the French kings from Paris. However, owing to the peculiarities of France’s
territorial divisions, the Kings of England, swore allegiance to the French kings as subjects,
as Dukes of Normandy, even while simultaneously challenging the French crown for political
and military predominance throughout France. As well as this, Henry II oversaw the establishment
of a new English lordship across the Irish Sea during Richard’s youth. Thus, what is known as the Angevin Empire,
stretched across, England, Wales, Ireland and most of northern and central France. It was this disparate territory which Richard
would one day come to rule over. During his youth, many would not have countenanced
the idea, that young Richard would one day succeed to the kingship, as he had an older
brother named Henry after the king himself, while he also had two younger brothers, Geoffrey
and John, and three sisters, Matilda, Eleanor and Joan, each of whom would play a consequential
part in Richard’s life at one time or another. As was typical for the age, the upbringing
of Richard and his siblings was the responsibility of his mother. Much of it was entrusted to a nurse named
Hodierna, to whom Richard later granted a substantial pension in recognition of her
service. And as is typical of the time, little concrete
evidence is available for Richard’s youth and education, but we know that he would have
received a conventional education for a royal son, in so far as it focused on the art of
war. Yet there was enough broader reading in there
also, that later in life, he was also able to read and speak Latin to a very high level,
while he also evidently had a keen interest in poems and music. Moreover, several Muslim writers would later
attest to him having an interest in Arab culture, although it is unclear if this evinces some
previous learning on his part or was cited by Muslim authors, as a way of suggesting
the English king was possessed of a considerable cultural tolerance. Richard’s adult life was overwhelmingly
connected with France rather than England, and this association began early. In June 1172, he was formally made the Duke
of Aquitaine when he was just fourteen years old. A year later, he was implicated in the first
of a series of internal wars within the Plantagenet family, as Eleanor and her sons allied with
King Louis VII of France against their father. During this rebellion, Richard was actually
knighted by King Louis and in the summer of 1173, he saw his first significant military
action in Normandy. Just weeks later, his father offered Richard
full possession of several major castles in France and half of the revenues of Aquitaine,
to which he had ascended largely just in name the previous year. This was initially rejected by Richard, however,
the nature of the rebellion changed in November 1173, when Eleanor was captured by Henry II. The fighting continued for months thereafter,
until Henry the younger. and King Louis elected to make peace with King Henry in 1174. And Richard, who was already showing a surprising
degree of independence for a teenager, finally submitted himself in September 1174. Terms were given to the sons, but Eleanor
would effectively remain her husband’s prisoner for years to come, as a means of offsetting
further unrest within the family. Henry II was evidently impressed by his second
eldest son’s performance during the war. This was a time when familial rivalry which
spilled over into actual rebellion, was not entirely uncommon and the king would not have
viewed his sons’ revolt as marking a fatal break with them. Accordingly, in the aftermath of the revolt,
Henry gave Richard full control of some of the armed forces of the Duchy of Aquitaine,
with orders to reduce any rebels who emerged there to peace. This was the first experience of genuine power
and rule which Richard would enjoy from 1175 onwards, through to the late 1180s. Much of this work focused on quelling any
independent streaks amongst the nobility of western and central France, notably Aimar,
the Viscount of Limoges, and Guillaume, the Count of Angouleme, both of whom were inclined
to challenge Plantagenet primacy in the region. In 1176 and 1177, this military campaigning
even extended as far south as the borders of Navarre, a small Basque kingdom straddling
the Pyrenees, in both France and Spain. Consequently Richard began to develop his
reputation for military prowess at a very young age, as he was still shy of his twentieth
birthday at this time, when he undertook these campaigns. It was this military ability which later earned
him the name of Richard ‘Couer de Lion’ or Richard the Lionheart, a name which was
entering into widespread use by the mid-to-late 1180s. We know a lot about the character of the individual
who was emerging at this time from several chronicles composed on him by contemporary
or near-contemporary historians and writers such as Ralph of Coggeshall and Benedict of
Peterborough. Richard was evidently exceptionally tall by
the standards of the twelfth century, standing well over six foot high. He was handsome, with reddish blond hair and
a pale complexion. He was known to have a character which favoured
military prowess and he cultivated an image of himself, as a great warrior, one who patronised
troubadours and poets, though somebody who was also prone to pride and greed and was
sometimes quick to anger. He married later in his life, after lengthy
negotiations to have him wedded to Berengaria, the eldest daughter of Sancho VI of Navarre,
although the union would never produce any children. This latter lack of children, combined with
some contemporary allusions to Richard’s sexuality, have led twentieth century historians
to query whether Richard was in fact gay and did not produce any children with Berengaria
for this reason. But this is still open to debate, with the
sources proving ambiguous, leading other historians to conclude that he might have actually been
bisexual. The late 1170s and early 1180s saw Richard’s
relationship with his father strengthening, despite the rebellion years earlier. In 1176 and 1177, he campaigned as far away
as northern Spain, in order to shore up the Angevin Empire’s southern boundaries in
Aquitaine. Simultaneously, his actions could often prove
overly heavy-handed and there are many instances of his crushing of local rebellions, and in
particular the pulling down of castles of those, whose loyalties were suspected, leading
to resentment and unrest. As one poet of the period, Bertrand de Born,
noted, “he besieges and pursues them, takes their castles, and smashes and burns in every
direction.” Even by the standards of an age which expected
warlike behaviour of its rulers, there is the inference here, that young Richard the
Lionheart’s tactics were excessive. Resentment at this brutal suppression of any
signs of revolt, culminated most notably in the outbreak of a major rebellion within Gascony
in south-western France, in the late 1170s and early 1180s, and in the Limousin region
towards central France. Richard continued to suppress these instances
of unrest, though the degree to which he was responsible for causing them, through his
own heavy-handed rule over Aquitaine, is debateable given the manner in which his actions were
often depicted in an overly positive light by later chroniclers. Underlying all of this activity in the late
1170s and into the early 1180s was continuing familial conflict amongst Richard, his brothers
and their father, aggravated by Henry II’s ongoing imprisonment of their mother Eleanor. And much of this increasingly focused on the
issue of the succession, as Henry II neared his fiftieth year, what would have been considered
the beginnings of old age in the twelfth century. Whilst Henry was his eldest son and heir designate
according to the principal of primogeniture, the disparate nature of the Angevin Empire
and the antagonistic relationship between Henry and his sons, ensured that there was
much confusion as to who would succeed, to which parts of Henry’s dominions and perennial
tension as a result. Richard, for instance, clearly hoped to secure
Aquitaine for himself over his elder brother. This all boiled over in the winter of 1182,
when King Henry asked Richard to pay homage to his elder brother Henry. This required Richard to acknowledge that
Henry would have some say over the Duchy of Aquitaine in time to come, whereas Richard
was clearly pressing to have the duchy separated from the wider Angevin Empire and made his
own fiefdom upon his father’s death. When this became clear, Henry sent the third
eldest son, Geoffrey, to Richard’s territories, to prepare a family conference. However, this backfired and instead Geoffrey
entered into a new rebellion with Henry the younger. 1183 witnessed a dramatic shift in the diplomatic
arrangements within the Angevin Empire. On the 11th of June that summer, Henry II’s
eldest surviving son and namesake, sometimes referred to as Henry the Young King, died
of dysentery while yet again in rebellion against his father in central France. Richard was now his father’s eldest surviving
son and the new heir of the Angevin territories in England, Wales, Ireland and much of France. On the surface, the reduced number of sons
should have made the family rivalries more stable, particularly so, when the king’s
third, Geoffrey, also died in 1186, in largely unclear circumstances surrounding a jousting
tournament. Yet, this did not bring an end to the Plantagenet
family squabbles and in the years that followed, the king began to increasingly favour his
younger son, John, particularly so, following Geoffrey’s death. Henry now wished for John to inherit the Duchy
of Aquitaine, while Richard would take the rest of his father’s lands. Conversely, Richard would not easily agree
to his father’s wishes in this respect, not least because his longstanding ties to
Aquitaine had created a personal attachment to the duchy for him. It was thus in an effort to force his father’s
hand in this respect, that Richard allied with the French King Philip II in 1187. It would be the last rebellion between Henry
and one of his sons. The rebellion of 1187 proceeded quickly. Philip II had succeeded to the throne of France
in 1180, when he was just fifteen years of age. He and Richard would have a long-lasting rivalry
for over a decade between when they first allied with each other and Richard’s own
death over a decade later. Yet during the late 1180s, it was a highly
amicable relationship. A combined military campaign by Richard and
Philip against Henry II in early 1189, culminated in a major military defeat of Henry in the
summer of 1189. At a final conference Henry was visibly ill
and is believed to have cursed Richard. He died days later, on the 6th of July 1189,
leaving Richard as his clear successor. And the new king moved quickly to secure his
patrimony. He was invested as the Duke of Normandy two
weeks later, on the 20th of July. Later that summer, he made one of the few,
very brief visits he ever made to England and was crowned as King there on the 3rd of
September 1189. Finally, after over fifteen years of internal
strife the political landscape of the Angevin Empire seemed to be settling down. Richard had only his brother John as a rival. He might have posed little threat, but now,
just at the moment of his final victory, Richard was preparing to head to a new challenge,
one very far away. A call had come from the Crusader States of
the Holy Land. The Crusades were an ongoing series of wars,
which European Christians had been engaged in, since the late eleventh century, to reclaim
the Holy Land around Palestine and Syria, especially Jerusalem, for the Christian powers. For centuries after the rise of Christianity
throughout the Roman Empire in the third and fourth centuries, the Holy Land had remained
in Christian hands, specifically as part of the Byzantine Empire. However, in the seventh century, these territories
were quickly overrun and conquered by the Arabs and assimilated into their Caliphate,
which was soon ruled from Baghdad. Yet, while the loss of the Holy Places associated
with Jesus and his followers was a blow for Christian Europe, it was mitigated by the
general tolerance of the Muslim powers, which allowed Christian pilgrims from Europe to
visit the Holy Land relatively unimpeded. But, in the course of the eleventh century
this equilibrium changed, as the Seljuk Turks, an aggressively expansionist people from Central
Asia, conquered most of the Middle East, threatening the Byzantine Empire’s capital at Constantinople
and reducing access for Christians to the Holy Land. In response, the Byzantine imperial government
appealed to the Christian powers of Western Europe to come to their aid against the Turks. The resulting response, led to two centuries
of crusading activity between the 1090s and the 1290s. In 1095, Pope Urban II first preached the
need for a Crusade to reclaim the Holy Land for Christianity. This met with a highly enthusiastic response
and tens of thousands took the Crusader Cross and headed eastwards, including numerous senior
nobles from France, England and Germany. And by 1099, this First Crusade had resulted
in the conquest of the Holy Land and the establishment of several crusader states, including a newly
established Kingdom of Jerusalem. These kingdoms and principalities flourished
for decades, until a Muslim force reconquered the city of Edessa in 1144, triggering a Second
Crusade between 1147 and 1150. Although King Louis VII of France and King
Conrad III of Germany went east on this occasion, the Second Crusade met with little success. And things were calm again for years afterwards,
but in the 1170s and early 1180s a new Muslim ruler from Kurdistan succeeded in uniting
the disparate Muslim kingdoms of Syria and Egypt, thus encircling the Crusader kingdoms. This warlord’s name was Yusuf Ibn Ayyub,
but he is more widely known by his honorific title, Saladin, meaning ‘the goodness of
faith’. In the summer of 1187, his forces won a great
victory at the Battle of Hattin and that autumn, Jerusalem was re-captured from the Christians. The call now went out from the remaining Crusader
states. Help was needed from Europe if they were to
survive and retake Jerusalem. Richard had already determined to head to
the Holy Land on Crusade as early as 1187, as news of Saladin’s victory at the Battle
of Hattin had trickled into Europe. And in the months that followed, King Philip
of France and indeed King Henry II, prior to his death, had committed to doing the same. These were not untypical acts for leading
European monarchs and lords, who wished to appear committed to the Crusading ideal, but
in this particular instance, the Western European monarchs were wholly committed to doing so
and Richard remained committed to undertaking his quest to the Middle East, following his
accession as king. And so, plans were underway to depart throughout
the summer and autumn of 1189 and into the winter. The primary goal here, was to raise sufficient
financing for the initiative, one which would require a considerable fleet to convey troops
across the Mediterranean, as well as massive logistical support over several years. A tithe or 10% tax was raised to that end,
to fund the Crusade, known as the ‘Saladin Tithe’, one which had been begun by Henry
II before his death. Simultaneously, the church hierarchy of England
and of the various Angevin territories in Wales, Ireland and France were coerced into
providing thousands of pounds of funding towards the Third Crusade, which Richard was now committed
to undertaking in 1190. There were some final preparations to be made
in England and France before Richard could depart. The goal here, was to put in place individuals
in the regions, particularly the various duchies and counties under his control in France,
who would prop up Richard’s rule, during what was sure to be a lengthy absence in the
Holy Land. Thus, William FitzRalph, a stalwart of Henry
II’s rule and one who had shown considerable support for Richard since his accession, was
confirmed as seneschal of the duchy of Normandy, effectively making him the governor of the
large territory of northern France. Payn de Rochefort was appointed as his counterpart
as seneschal of Anjou in western France. But, most significant was the appointment
of William de Longchamp, the lord chancellor of England, as the head of the government
there during Richard’s absence. It was a cutting rebuke of Richard’s brother
John, who might have hoped to be given a greater role in the governance of his brother’s
dominions during his absence. And his dissatisfaction at this development
would lead to several years of unrest while Richard was away, during which, John would
seek to continually undermine his brother, principally by attempting to usurp his position
as king in England, Normandy and elsewhere. After months of preparations the Crusade was
finally ready to depart by the summer of 1190. At this early stage, it would be effectively
co-led by Richard and the French King, Philip II. And the two kings left Vezelay in central
France together on the 4th of July 1190. They separated at Lyon, where Philip led his
contingents by land over the Alps through Italy, while Richard elected to make for Marseilles,
to sail along the Italian coastline to Sicily, from the southern French port. There were extensive delays during these passages,
as much of the fleet which had been sent from England and western France around the Iberian
Peninsula, had been delayed in entering the Mediterranean Sea. Notably, a drunken spree by the soldiers while
in Lisbon in Portugal, had particularly slowed proceedings and so Richard had to hire other
ships at Marseilles to send much of his forces to the Holy Land ahead of him. And he then conducted a lengthy tour of the
Italian coastline, to visit locations in the region such as the medical school of Salerno,
a trip which evinced Richard’s interest in the new learning of the twelfth century
renaissance, which was underway in Italy. Finally, he arrived to Messina in Sicily on
the 23rd of September 1190. Here Richard conferred with Philip, before
the French monarch quickly headed away to the Holy Land. Richard, however, had matters to attend to
in Sicily before leaving himself. In 1177, Richard’s sister Joan had married
King William II of Sicily, known as William the Good. William died in November 1189 and the crown
was quickly usurped by an illegitimate contender named Tancred. This Tancred then imprisoned Joan, fearing
she would become a focus of resistance to his reign. Having arrived in Sicily, Richard quickly
secured her release, but there were serious issues to still be resolved concerning Joan’s
dowry and valuable household plate. Tensions quickly escalated in late September
and early October and by the 2nd of October, Richard had ordered his troops to disembark
fully from their ships and prepare for battle if necessary. When skirmishes broke out between Richard
and Tancred’s troops two days later, Richard ordered an attack on the city of Messina,
one which quickly proved successful. Peace terms were agreed on the 6th of October,
whereby Tancred paid a huge sum of money to Richard and a formal alliance was agreed between
the two. Simultaneously ships were sent to Spain to
bring Richard’s long-promised bride, Berengaria of Navarre, to Sicily, so that the pair could
have their long awaited marriage, during the winter of 1190, as they waited to set off
for the Holy Land. However, it would not happen here. When Richard finally left his base at Messina
it was several days more before Berengaria finally arrived to Sicily. Richard’s Crusader army finally left Italy
on the 10th of April 1191, consisting in total of over 200 ships and 17,000 soldiers and
mariners. It soon ran into difficulties, but in the
long run, these would prove highly fortuitous. On the third day out from Sicily, a severe
storm scattered the fleet and by the time the ships rendezvoused near the large Greek
island of Crete, it was clear that dozens of ships had either been lost or had gone
astray in their navigations. And these included one of the royal ships
transporting Richard’s would-be bride Berengaria and his sister Joan. This particular ship could not simply be abandoned
and a wide ranging search throughout the Eastern Mediterranean was now undertaken to locate
it. Eventually it was discovered to be at anchor
in the port of Limassol, on the island of Cyprus. Cyprus had long been a possession of the Eastern
Byzantine Empire and was governed by Isaac Ducas Komnenos. Komnenos had recently developed delusions
of grandeur and had proclaimed himself emperor of Cyprus, independently of Constantinople. Now in the summer of 1191, he seized several
of the scattered Crusader ships and was considering doing the same with the ship on which Joan
and Berengaria were travelling. It would prove a fateful mistake. In early May, Richard arrived in Cyprus. When the self-proclaimed Emperor Komnenos
refused to release the captured ships and prisoners, Richard decided on immediate military
intervention and attacked the city of Limassol. A surprise night attack quickly saw the capital
completely overrun. Although the emperor managed to escape, this
effectively robbed him of his treasury and military support. And in the weeks that followed, further resistance
was mopped up and Cyprus was brought under the control of the Crusaders. Much of this was achieved, by Richard linking
up with the leaders of the Crusader states in the Holy Land, one of their primary leaders,
Guy de Lusignan, having received word of events in Cyprus, arrived with several contingents
of hardened Crusader warriors. De Lusignan was the titular King of Jerusalem,
albeit he was a king without a city, since the fall of the Holy City to Saladin several
years earlier, and he was challenged amongst the nobles of the Crusader states for primacy,
notably by Conrad de Montferrat, a claimant to the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Guy and Conrad would prove to be the most
significant figures, other than Richard and Saladin, in the events which followed in the
Holy Land. By the beginning of June, Richard had seized
control over the entirety of Cyprus, a rich island nation with notable trade links and
one which would serve as a crucial base for the Crusaders in years to come. In the broader term, Cyprus became an independent
Christian kingdom, one which was ruled by the Lusignans for decades to come and as an
independent Christian kingdom down to the late fifteenth century, making its conquest
arguably the most tangible result of Richard’s entire Crusade. The conquest of Cyprus and the subsequent
sojourn there during the summer of 1191, also provided the opportunity for Richard to finally
wed Berengaria. The wedding ceremony was held at Limassol
on the 12th of May 1191, at the Chapel of St George there. The marriage was designed to potentially unite
Navarre and the Duchy of Aquitaine and thus make it part of the wider Angevin Empire in
the long run, but this plan would prove illusive. Richard and Berengaria never had any children,
they would remain distant from one another and it has even been questioned whether the
marriage was consummated at all. Nevertheless, the union was celebrated with
great fanfare and ceremony throughout Cyprus, in the early summer of 1191. Overall these events would foretell great
success for Richard when he finally reached the Holy Land. A great kingdom had already been won for the
Crusaders and the new leader arrived as a successful warrior, newly married. The reality though would prove more complex. Richard finally landed near the city of Acre
on the 8th of June 1191, over a year after he and King Philip had first left France on
the Crusade. The Crusader states had been sieging Acre,
one of the key cities of the Holy Land, in what today is northern Israel, since 1189. This siege was the first major counterattack
undertaken by the Crusaders, since their defeat by Saladin at the Battle of Hattin in 1187
and the fall of Jerusalem. The siege was largely driven in its early
stages by Guy de Lusignan, the King of Jerusalem, and his primary rival for power amongst the
Crusader noble households, Conrad de Montferrat. They had been joined in April by the King
of France. Now, with Richard’s additional strength
added to their efforts, the siege finally proved too much to withstand for the Arab
holders. On the 4th of July, the defenders surrendered. Terms were negotiated in the days that followed,
which allowed much of the Arab garrison to leave unharmed, in return for a substantial
bounty and the provision of prisoners as sureties for payment of the same. The end of the siege also led quickly to Philip’s
decision to return to France. He had nearly died of dysentery outside Acre
and was willing to return to Western Europe ahead of Richard, where he could make major
efforts to undermine Richard, while his rival for power in France remained absent in the
Holy Land. Richard was now the undisputed leader of the
Third Crusade. But he had yet to meet Saladin openly on the
field of battle. This would come soon, as Richard continued
his efforts to secure the coastline of Palestine, in order to use it to solidify the Crusader
position and to use it for a fresh drive to retake Jerusalem. And as he prepared to move towards Jerusalem,
a notorious atrocity was committed near Acre in late August. By this time, Saladin had missed the payment
of the first instalment of the ransom which he had promised for the safe passage of the
Arab defenders from Acre, weeks earlier. And it was owing to this and the difficulties
of transporting large numbers of prisoners inland towards Jerusalem, that Richard and
his fellow Crusader leaders such as Guy de Lusignan and Conrad de Montferrat elected
in late August to summarily execute upwards of 3,000 Muslim prisoners before leaving Acre. Richard was evidently heavily involved in
this decision, although there is significant debate down to this day, as to what extent
the action violated the laws of war, as practiced in the late twelfth century. This done, Richard led his forces south towards
Jaffa on the 22nd of August with his army staying close to the coast, where they could
be reinforced by the Crusader fleet and its ample resources in the Eastern Mediterranean. This latter movement would finally lead to
Richard meeting Saladin in the field, in the foremost direct engagement between the two
leaders of the Third Crusade. The Battle of Arsuf was fought on the 7th
of September on the route to Jaffa. For days Saladin, with a force of some 25,000
men, largely light cavalry, had been harrying Richard’s numerically inferior, but better
equipped and trained, force of roughly 10,000 infantry and upwards of 1,500 heavy cavalry. The latter were the foremost fighting forces
in the Holy Land during the Crusades, but they lacked the manoeuvrability of Saladin’s
light cavalry, a fact exacerbated by Richard’s unwillingness to move far from his baggage
trains and risk losing their water supplies, a decisive factor in the routing of the Crusader
forces at the Battle of Hattin in 1187. When on the 7th of September, a full scale
battle was finally entered into, Saladin’s troops succeeded in breaking the Crusader’s
formation early on. However, a counter-attack in the afternoon
by Richard, roused the Christian lines, opening gaps in their infantry lines for the heavy
cavalry to strike forward, at the much more vulnerable light cavalry. After three charges of this kind, the Arab
armies were broken and fled into the adjoining hills and forests. Contemporary accounts of the casualties are
wildly exaggerated, but it is estimated that as many as five or six thousand of Saladin’s
men were killed, for under a thousand of Richard’s. Arsuf was the foremost victory in the field
for Richard during the Third Crusade. It opened the route to Jaffa, which the Crusaders
reached three days later. The walls had been dismantled on Saladin’s
orders, a decision which effectively surrendered the city to the Christians, but which also
ensured that Richard had to spend weeks here until makeshift walls were erected, to protect
the town for the Crusaders. It was while he was here that Richard began
envisaging, that the key to securing the Holy Land might lie in striking at Saladin’s
core dominions in Egypt and in particular by seizing Cairo. And this was a strategy which was eventually
widely accepted, as being the best available to the Crusaders many years later, during
the thirteenth century, but for now, Richard was overruled by Guy, Conrad and his fellow
Crusaders who wished to strike directly at Jerusalem. Thus, the early winter was spent seizing and
garrisoning several castles on the route inland from Jaffa to Jerusalem. Consequently, by the end of 1191, Richard’s
Crusade had succeeded in conquering Cyprus for the Christian cause, as well as re-taking
the Palestinian coast from Acre to Jaffa, with the route to Jerusalem bring prepared
for a strike at the Holy City. The latter campaign, though, would never be
undertaken by Richard. Early in 1192, Richard’s role in the Crusades
began to inexorably wind down. On the 20th of January 1192 he reached Ascalon,
where plans were initiated to begin refortifying the site as a base from which, the Muslim
powers’ caravans travelling across the Holy Land, between Syria and Egypt could be attacked. Yet when disputes broke out here, amongst
the leading Crusaders about how this should be funded, Richard withdrew to Acre. Here, further disputes arose between the Crusader
contingents, particularly the merchants representing the major trading powers of Italy, on whose
financing and supply, much of the Crusader states depended about how to proceed. Consequently, by the late spring, Richard
was increasingly faced with the futility, of trying to motivate the disparate leaders
and groups involved, to act in concord. Moreover, it was while at Acre that he received
disconcerting news from Western Europe, that fresh unrest had arisen back home in his dominions. His brother John was now openly plotting with
the French monarchy and Richard’s continued presence in the Holy Land on the Crusades,
threatened his position as King of the Angevin Empire back home. It was these combined factors, which in the
spring of 1192, led him to take the decision to return home without capturing the ultimate
prize of Jerusalem. There remained a number of things which needed
to be resolved in the Holy Land before Richard could leave. First and foremost amongst these, was the
issue of the leadership of the Crusade after the English king left. Would Guy of Lusignan, the acknowledged King
of Jerusalem, or Conrad de Montferrat, his would-be challenger, succeed Richard as the
head of affairs? In an effort to resolve this, Richard summoned
a council where he attempted to establish Conrad as the next head of the Crusader states. In return, Richard sold Cyprus to Guy for
a sum of 60,000 bezants. But no sooner had this arrangement been loosely
worked out, than Conrad was killed by a pair of assassins in late April. It is unclear to this day, who had hired these
assassins, with everyone from Richard to Saladin being suspected for varying reasons. What is clear, is that this cast affairs into
further chaos. Then, Saladin’s re-capture of the town of
Jaffa at the end of July, before Richard himself could relieve the siege, sealed his decision
to leave the Holy Land. On the 2nd of September, a three year truce
was agreed between Richard and his mortal foe. Richard would surrender Ascalon, but the entirety
of the coast from Jaffa to Acre was back in Christian hands, as well as Cyprus, and Christians
were guaranteed free access to Jerusalem. Hence it was, that Richard departed the Holy
Land on the 9th of October, having failed to achieve ultimate success by capturing Jerusalem,
but having achieved a great deal. Richard’s return to Europe was not straight-forward. By November 1192, he had reached the Greek
island of Corfu and at this point elected to travel back to Western Europe through Germany,
rather than westwards through Italy. Richard was conscious in all of this, that
he was passing through the territory of several princedoms which were opposed to him, notably
Leopold of Austria. Leopold was a staunch ally of Henry VI, the
Holy Roman Emperor, a would-be leader of any future Crusades and he consequently viewed
Richard as his enemy. Aware that to pass through Leopold’s territory,
would involve the threat of falling into Henry’s hands, Richard hired several galleys at Corfu
and headed north, accompanied by a relatively small retinue of his most trusted followers,
hoping to avoid detection, while pretending to be travelling pilgrims on their way back
from the Holy Land but the subterfuge did not work. Their ships crashed on the Istrian coastline
and while heading for Moravia in Austria, they aroused suspicion. As a result, they were finally apprehended
near Vienna, while passing through Leopold’s country in December 1192. Within days, news had been sent to the Emperor
Henry, that King Richard of England had been apprehended and was being held by Leopold
in the castle of Dürnstein, north-west of Vienna. The emperor had more than one reason to have
apprehended Richard, for Henry was also loosely allied with King Philip of France. Accordingly we find the emperor writing to
Philip within days, to inform the French king of the good news that he had apprehended the
English king. Back in England, John also became aware of
this and moved to pay homage to Philip, in an effort to bolster his claims to succeed
his brother. However, the church authorities, which maintained,
that all Crusaders were protected against attacks or seizure when travelling to or from
the Holy Land on Crusade, were less impressed and extensive pressure was now applied on
Leopold and Henry to release Richard. Hence it was, that weeks of protracted negotiations,
to see whether Richard would be released by his German captors and on what terms, were
entered into. Finally, in late February 1193, terms were
concluded in Speyer after Richard successfully defended himself against trumped up claims,
of having abandoned the Crusade. Nevertheless, Richard still had to pay a ransom
of 100,000 marks and promise to supply the emperor with 50 galleys and the service of
200 knights annually, resources which Henry utilised to launch his own Crusade in the
years that followed. Further negotiations on these terms ensued,
such that Richard was unable to depart Germany until early in 1194, well over a year after
first leaving the Holy Land. Richard now set off on the last leg of his
journey home. Not everything which had occurred during his
absence had disadvantaged his position with regards to John. In 1192, King Philip had stirred up a rebellion
in the Duchy of Aquitaine, but this event had demonstrated the strength of some of Richard’s
alliances. On this occasion, his wife Berengaria’s
brother, Sancho of Navarre to the south in the Basque region, intervened during Richard’s
absence, to suppress the revolt. Indeed Sancho went even further and launched
a punitive raid against Toulouse, to demonstrate that Richard’s French possessions were not
open targets, while he was in the Holy Land or making his way home. And back home in England, many senior officials
who had been loyal to Richard before he departed on the Crusade, remained so and did their
best to thwart John’s efforts to undermine his brother. Nevertheless, other developments did not bode
well for Richard. In April 1193, King Philip finally inflicted
a considerable defeat on Richard’s cause, when he seized Gisors in Normandy, perhaps
because the Castellan, a senior official there, had proved willing to surrender, in the belief
that John would soon succeed Richard as Duke of Normandy. All of this indicates, that there was fresh
unrest, as Richard arrived back to Western Europe in the early months of 1194. Richard left Germany in February 1194 and
reached England on the 13th of March. He passed through the Rhineland on his way,
on which journey, he renewed some alliances with the princes and lord of western Germany
and the Low Countries around modern-day Belgium. Having landed in England, resistance to his
resumption of the crown was strikingly limited, a result perhaps of John himself being overseas
in the Duchy of Normandy. Richard first visited the religious shrines
of Canterbury and Bury St Edmunds, before proceeding to the famous Nottingham Castle,
to confront the centre of John’s supposed rebellion. Fighting did occur before the castle surrendered
on the 28th of March. Thereafter, Richard resumed the full regalia
of his English kingship and presided over several meetings of the government at Winchester,
before departing for France in early May, to confront John head on in Normandy. He left the government of England to Hubert
Walter, who had accompanied Richard on crusade and who had been made archbishop of Canterbury
in 1193. Richard would never return to England, an
indication of the degree to which he viewed France, as the core component of his dominions,
much as his ancestors, as far back as William the Conqueror had. Where England had seen little resistance to
Richard’s return as king and had been quickly stabilised, the Crusader King’s return would
prove far less seamless in France. John had dug himself into Normandy, where
he relied on a close alliance with the French King to cement his position. Thus, by the time that Richard arrived in
northern France, in the early summer of 1194, John and King Philip had flooded the region
with French troops, holding a number of key strategic sites across Normandy as well as
other sites. And the French king proved the more loyal
and reliable of Richard’s opponents. Conversely, no sooner had the English king
landed in Normandy, than his brother and would-be rival quickly rushed to beg forgiveness from
his brother. This Richard agreed to, claiming John had
been ill advised by his counsellors. For his part, John would remain loyal to Richard,
for the remainder of his reign thereafter. Thus, within just days of his arrival, the
conflict switched from a pseudo-civil war between Richard and John, to a more traditional
war between the King of England and the King of France. And in this, Richard was quickly aided by
his familial allies from Navarre and by mid-June, Tours in central France had been retaken by
Richard. The campaign then moved into the Loire River
Valley and after a swift campaign here, he moved south into Aquitaine. By late July he had captured Taillebourg and
Marcillac, the city of Angoulême, Montignac and Lachaise, thus, largely completing Richard’s
reconquest of his western French territories, three months after sailing to France from
England. Richard’s conquest of his French territories,
though, would prove more ephemeral than first appeared. In particular his hold over Normandy was tenuous
and his efforts to fully re-establish his control over the duchy, would dominate much
of his subsequent reign. In his drive southwards to restore control
of Aquitaine, in the summer of 1194, Richard had left several castles in the hands of King
Philip. Several of these were major strongholds, that
had been heavily garrisoned, in such a way, which would require extensive and costly sieges
to remove the French. Accordingly, in the late summer of 1194, a
truce was agreed, whereby these sites would be allowed to remain in the French king’s
hands, until the winter of 1195, but there would be no fighting between Richard and Philip’s
troops. On the surface, this arrangement provided
both monarchs with advantages. It gave Philip time to rethink his strategic
stance, now that the chances of replacing Richard with John altogether seemed implausible,
while for Richard, this new arrangement would give him a period of 15 months to cement his
newly resumed rule and deal effectively with those who had supported John, in his attempt
to usurp Richard. The truce of 1194, between Richard and the
French king proved short-lived. Within weeks of it being agreed, border tensions
and skirmishes were breaking out in places throughout France, while by the summer of
1195, full scale war had effectively recommenced. Richard’s approach to this resumed conflict,
was to concentrate his forces on seizing control of the Auvergne and Berry towards Central
France, in the border region between Richard’s French territories and those of the French
monarchy, an approach which quickly bore fruit. By the early autumn of 1195, Philip had indicated
that he would relinquish control of any of Richard’s territories, which he had seized
during the king’s absence on Crusade, in return for a marriage alliance between Richard’s
niece Eleanor and Philip’s son and heir, Louis. This proposal, though, proved abortive and
as fighting continued to rage, Richard made further conquests, ensuring that Philip had
to agree to a treaty in January 1196. Then, under the terms of this Treaty of Louviers
Philip relinquished all of his major gains from Richard’s period of absence, except
the Vexin in north-western France, and a handful of border castles. This ended the conflict in Central France
to an extent, but fresh tensions would continue elsewhere in the country, in the years ahead. As 1196 progressed, the war between Richard
and Philip changed dramatically, as Philip built up a new alliance of powers to combat
Richard’s rapid ascendancy, on either side of the English Channel. These included several major lords from the
Low Countries, notably the Counts of Flanders, Ponthieu and Boulogne, who were joined in
the North Atlantic by the Duchy of Brittany in north-western France. And this new confederacy was now able to apply
extensive pressure on Richard’s shipping lines and logistical supplies in the English
Channel. In order to offset this threat, Richard needed
to divert much of his land forces to an invasion of Brittany in mid-1196. Yet even this setback was only temporary. Eventually Richard was able to force Count
Baldwin of Flanders to change sides, firstly by launching a massive embargo on trade and
the supply of goods, and then by offering a favourable alliance of his own. Thus, Baldwin went from blockading Angevin
shipping in the Channel, to invading Artois in north-eastern France on Richard’s behalf
and seizing the considerable French town of Douai. Then, in a remarkable course of events, an
alliance of German princes petitioned Richard, that they would put forward Richard’s nephew,
Otto, son of Richard’s sister, Matilda, and her husband, Henry of Bavaria and Saxony,
as a potential successor for the office of Holy Roman Emperor, an astonishing diplomatic
coup for Richard. While 1197 and 1198 had seen these further
successes for Richard, he would not be alive long enough to enjoy their fruits. In the autumn of 1198, Richard elected to
complete the final reduction of the Vexin, a small county near Paris itself, from Philip,
following the expiration of a new truce with the French King. Pressured by the Count of Flanders in the
north-east and by Richard in the west, Philip twice came perilously close to being captured
in the campaign which followed, including nearly drowning on one occasion. This virtually completed the conquest of the
Vexin, bringing Richard back into possession of all the lands he had previously held, before
heading to the Holy Land and placing him in the strongest position any English monarch
had held, with respect to the French monarchy for decades. This conquest also initiated a major building
programme in the region, notably the Château Gaillard, 95 kilometres northwest of Paris
and one of the most impressive medieval castles ever built in northern France. Along with major work to develop the port
of Portsmouth, it constitutes one of the only major acts of administration and government,
which can be associated with Richard’s kingship, a reign which was ultimately characterised
almost entirely by war, whether in the Holy Land or back in Western Europe. In January 1199, King Richard met with his
French counterpart, King Philip, in a meeting brokered by Pope Innocent III. A five year truce was now agreed to, one which
would see Richard’s dominions entering into an unprecedented period of peace and stability. It is entirely peculiar, that it was during
this period of harmony, that Richard would be killed, while still in his early forties. On the 26th of March 1199, he was shot by
a crossbow bolt while campaigning to put down a small regional revolt by Viscount Aimar
V of Limoges. In the days that followed, without the benefits
of modern medicine, the wound turned gangrenous, and on the 6th of April, he died from the
illness. He was subsequently buried at Fontevrault. Richard was succeeded by John, whom Richard
named as his successor during his final illness. The would-be usurper’s accession, would
spell the end of the conflict with Philip, when in 1200, the Treaty of Le Goulet saw
John confirmed in his French territories, in return for acknowledging Philip as his
liege lord in France itself. However, it would prove a short-lived peace
and in the years that followed, the French crown would begin to reconquer several key
parts of the Angevin Empire from the English monarchy, the beginning of a long process
which ultimately would take until the 1550s to complete. Overseas, Richard’s efforts proved just
as transiently successful. Further crusades followed in the years and
indeed, decades to come, into the late thirteenth century. Some of these produced variable levels of
success, in places other than the Holy Land. For instance, in 1204, a Christian army seized
the Byzantine capital of Constantinople and established a Western Roman Catholic Christian
state in the Balkans for decades to come. Others attempted to seize Egypt as the strategic
key to the Holy Land, much as Richard had envisaged in 1191. The Sixth Crusade in the late 1220s, finally
succeeded in capturing Jerusalem, Richard’s ultimate goal which he had been unable to
achieve. Nevertheless this was a fleeting success and
within fifteen years, the Holy City was back in Muslim hands. Thereafter, the fate of the Crusader States
dwindled, despite efforts by major European monarchs to undertake fresh efforts to reclaim
the holy places for the Christian cause. With the fall of the city of Tripoli in 1289
and the siege of Acre in 1291, one hundred years after Richard had landed there in 1191,
the Crusader cause was extinguished in the Holy Land. It was due in some considerable way to Richard’s
efforts, though, that these Christian kingdoms lasted here for as long as they did. Richard the Lionheart is one of England’s
most acclaimed kings, a somewhat strange development given the shortness of his reign. He ruled for just ten years, half of which
period was spent far overseas in Sicily, Cyprus, the Holy Land and Germany. Yet, it is this period which has also gained
him his reputation and made him most famous. For two years in the Mediterranean world,
Richard led the Crusader effort and rejuvenated it, in the wake of years of losses for the
Christian states there, as well as successive defeats to Saladin. It is unsurprising that Richard has captured
the imagination in this way, not least because he finally offered a counterpoint to the seemingly
invincible Muslim warlord. After the stalemate of the Second Crusade,
in the middle of the twelfth century, Richard was depicted as the first major Crusader leader
to have made significant conquests and territorial gains in the Holy Land since the First Crusade,
over 90 years earlier. For successive generations of chroniclers
and historians since the late twelfth century itself, this appearance of the valorous Crusader
warrior, named the ‘Lionheart’ for his courage, was made all the starker when contrasted
with the supposedly scheming spectre of his brother John, who back in Western Europe,
conspired with the French, to usurp Richard, while his brave brother was away. But while this is the idealised version of
Richard and the basis for so much of his legacy, there is also much to criticise about ‘the
Lionheart’, criticisms which have dominated studies of the king by historians in recent
decades. First and foremost, his reign was dominated
by warfare. This had started long before his own accession,
with the conflicts with his father in the 1170s and 1180s, it continued through his
involvement in the Crusades and eased after returning from the Holy Land. While much of the latter conflict can certainly
be blamed on others, for having usurped some of his territory while he was absent in the
East, the reality is that Richard could have negotiated a peace settlement with King Philip
long before 1199, if he had been willing to compromise slightly, on how many castles in
France he wanted to hold. By way of contrast, there is little else of
interest within Richard’s reign, other than his wars. He did build some castles, which again had
a military purpose, and left plans when he left England in 1194, for some work to be
carried out in his name, but his reign is remarkably bereft of any signature efforts
to reform the judiciary, introduce new taxation systems, other than those designed to fund
his military endeavours, or offer any form of civil government policy which might have
substantially improved the administration of his dominions or the lives of his subjects. But perhaps the most balanced appraisal of
Richard the Lionheart is one which takes stock of both extremities of his reign. Richard can certainly be criticised for having
done little other than make war throughout his life, but that was after all, substantially
perceived to be the duty and responsibility of a European monarch during the High Middle
Ages. Moreover, while it is fair to suggest that
he could have established peace with France more quickly in the mid-1190s and moved on
from there, to working on taxation and issues of noble rights which plagued John’s subsequent
reign, it is also only fair to note, that Richard was responding to aggression which
was committed by others. The Third Crusade was launched in response
to Saladin’s conquests in the Holy Land and Richard’s wars in France were the result
of Philip and John’s conspiracies, while Richard was away on crusade. Finally, while there is no doubting that Richard
was over lionised by historians and chronicles, for centuries after his death, it is also
true to say, that he was the most successful leader of the Crusades in over ninety years. When he arrived, the Crusader states were
facing extinction in the Holy Lands, but when he left in 1192, the Christian cause had been
rejuvenated and expanded, ensuring its survival for another century. Perhaps in this respect, his most exaggerated
legacy is also paradoxically his most genuine. What do you think of Richard the Lionheart? Does his brief reign constitute one of the
great missed opportunities of English kingship, or are his abilities as a king exaggerated? Please let us know in the comment section,
and in the meantime, thank you very much for watching.
