Blood Cries Afar (49 page)

Louis and his English allies had done surprisingly well. Up to May 1217 there is no telling indication that they would have to come to terms imposed upon them. But these very terms, by their very leniency, reveal what a force Louis had been. This is seen most of all in the money granted Louis. Huge as the sum was, it was still cheaper than the cost of continuing a war against a formidable foe who was the focus of the hopes of the opposition; who, even at the end, had the ability to absorb the painful and slow recovering finances of the crown in conflict at the expense of all else. William Marshal and his council also wanted Louis gone for another, overlooked, reason and were willing to pay the price to prevent this nightmare from becoming a reality. The longer that Louis was is in the country, and the longer he was in danger, the greater was the threat that his powerful and all-conquering father would intervene to help him, leading behind him the great wealth and might of France. The English, already weakened by war, did not want to provoke an even more fearful invasion.

Louis had one more main task to complete before he quit England. On Wednesday 20 September he met with his former enemies at Lambeth in a large gathering.
⁶²⁰
Here both sides reaffirmed the peace of Kingston which was now solemnly ratified as the treaty of Lambeth. It formally marked the end of the war and the beginning of peace. Louis and the greater part of his men left London and headed to the coast via Canterbury. He was escorted all the way by William Marshal, Guala and the leading barons of the country.
⁶²¹
On 28 September he was at Dover, a painful reminder of what might have been. He set sail for France, never to return, leaving behind him a kingdom he had half won but finally lost. Louis’s dream of emulating William the Conqueror’s spectacular success of 150 years earlier was over. Since 1066, no one had come closer than Louis and his forgotten campaign of 1216. England was never to suffer such a powerful foreign invasion again.

    
1
   C. von Clausewitz,
On War
, Harmondsworth, 1968 [original German edition 1832], 101, 402, 119. John Keegan, following J. J. Graham’s 1908 translation (used here in the Penguin Classics edition), discusses the interpretation of this famous quote on politics and war in J. Keegan,
A History of Warfare
, London, 1993, 3.

    
2
   A detailed analysis of this is presented in C. Allmand,
Henry V
, London, 1992, chs. 19 and 20, summarised, 435–8.

    
3
   Counter-factual history based on military events is hypothesised in R. Cowley (ed),
What If?
, London, 2000. See also idem (ed),
More What If?
, London, 2004; A. Roberts,
What Might Have Been
, 2004; N. Ferguson,
Virtual History: Alternatives and Counterfactuals
, London, 1997.

    
4
   The millennium saw a proliferation of studies on the battles of 1066: J. Bradbury,
The Battle of Hastings
, Gloucester, 1999; S. Morillo (ed),
The Battle of Hastings
, Woodbridge, 1996; F. McLynn,
1066: The Year of Three Battles
, London, 1999; K. de Vries,
The Norwegian Invasion of England in 1066
, Woodbridge, 2000; M. Lawson,
The Battle of Hastings 1066
, Gloucester, 2002. See also F. W. Brooks,
The Battle of Stamford Bridge
, York, 1963; I. Walker,
Harold: The Last Anglo-Saxon King
, Gloucester, 1997, 142–82.

    
5
   We shall see later how the Papacy, acting as a temporal and diplomatic institution, influenced events and bestowed crusading status upon the conflict; but this ‘crusade’ was always patently political, and not of the same nature as those perpetrated against the Muslims or even against heretics (the Albigensian crusade directed against the Cathars in southern France was launched in 1208).

    
6
   Kingship roles are discussed in R. Kaeuper,
War, Justice and Public Order: England and France in the Later Middle Ages
, Oxford, 1988, 1, 95–7, 342; R. Kaeuper,
Chivalry and Violence in Medieval Europe
, Oxford, 1999, 93–5 and passim; P. Maddern,
Violence and Social Order: East Anglia, 1422
–
1442
, Oxford, 1992, 12–14; W. Ullman,
Medieval Political Thought
, Harmondsworth, 1979 (originally 1965); idem.,
Principles of Government and Politics in the Middle Ages
, London, 1961; J. E. A. Joliffe,
Angevin Kingship
, 2nd edn., 1963, ch. 1; S. B Chrimes,
An Introduction to the Administrative History of Medieval England
, 2nd edn., Oxford, 1959, 1–27; W. L. Warren,
The Governance of Anglo-Norman and Angevin England, 1086
–
1272
, London, 1987, 15–19, 177–82; E. Kantorowicz,
The King’s Two Bodies: A Study in Medieval Political Theology
, Princeton, 1957; A. Duggan,
Kings and Kingship in Medieval Europe
, London, 1993; M. Clauss, ‘Kings as Military Leaders’,
OEMW
, Oxford, 2010, ii, 466; S. McGlynn,
By Sword and Fire: Cruelty and Atrocity in Medieval Warfare
, London, 2008, 36–61.

    
7
   P. Contamine,
War in the Middle Ages
, trans. M. Jones, Oxford, 1984, xii.

    
8
   An example of this line of thought is encapsulated in the title of a scholarly work: C. Kidd,
British Identities Before Nationalism: Ethnicity and Nationhood in the Atlantic World, 1600–1800
, Cambridge, 1999. I shall later endeavour to loosen the over-prescriptive semantic terminology and taxonomical divisions of nationalism, ethnicity and nationhood.

    
9
   For a fuller analysis of Wendover’s utuility in matters of warfare, see S. McGlynn, ‘Roger of Wendover and the Wars of Henry III, 1216–34’, in B. Weiler and I. Rowlands (eds),
Britain and Europe During the Reign of Henry III
, Aldershot, 2002.

  
10
   Wendover puts John’s army in 1213 at ‘60,000’ strong (RW, ii, 67). He also employs this figure for the Muslim enemy at Seville in 1189 (this figure is arrived at from ‘47,000’ casualties and ‘13,000’ survivors) (RW, i, 157). Jordan Fantosme, an otherwise excellent contemporary source for medieval warfare, uses the same figure of 60,000 in an even more implausible context at the town of Dol in 1173: ‘The knights in their battle array have come forth from the town: some sixty thousand of them …’ (R. C. Johnston, ed. and trans.,
Jordan Fantosme’s Chronicle
, Oxford, 1981, 15).

  
11
   Simeon of Durham,
Opera Omnia
, ed. T. Arnold, 2 vols., RS, London, 1882–85, ii, 191–2. Simeon (
fl
. 1100–1150) was not an eyewitness to these events, but was well informed. For the context of this episode, see J. Gillingham, ‘Conquering the Barbarians: War and Chivalry in Britain and Ireland’,
The English in the Twelfth Century: Imperialism, National Identity and Political Values
, Woodbridge, 2000, and McGlynn,
By Sword and Fire
, 202, 208–16.

  
12
   Clausewitz,
On War
, p. 163. Tolstoy captures this well in
War and Peace
, Harmondsworth, 1978 edn., 766.

  
13
   Dust was a problem at the summer Battle of Bouvines. Sleet hampered visibility at the Battle of Towton in March 1461: A. W. Boardman,
The Battle of Towton
, Gloucester, 1994, 107 ff.; P. A. Haigh,
The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses
, Gloucester, 1995, 60–3.

  
14
   J. Gillingham, ‘Richard I and the Science of War in the Middle Ages’,
Richard Couer de Lion
, 1994, 212. Verbruggen also makes the case for vernacular sources over Latin ones: J. F. Verbruggen,
The Art of Warfare in the Western Europe During the Middle Ages From the Eighth Century to 1340
, trans. S. Willard and R. W. Southern, 2nd edn., Woodbridge, 1997, 10–14. For studies of contemporary sources and their uses for medieval warfare, see: K. De Vries, ‘The Use of Chronicles in Recreating Medieval Military History’,
JMMH
, ii; C. Hanley,
War and Combat: The Evidence of Old French Literature, 1150–1270
, Woodbridge, 2003; C. Saunders, F. Le Sau and N. Thomas (eds),
Writing War: Medieval Literary Responses to Warfare
, Woodbridge, 2004.

  
15
   J. Beeler,
Warfare in Feudal Europe, 730–1200
, Ithaca, 1971, xii.

  
16
   For the priest at Le Puiset: Suger,
Vita Ludovici Grossi Regis
, ed. H. Waquet, Paris, 1964 edn., 138. For laws affecting the clergy: M. Keen,
The Laws of War in the Late Middle Ages
, London, 1965, 195; T. Meron,
Henry’s Wars and Shakespeare’s Laws: Perspectives on the Law of War in the Later Middle Ages
, Oxford, 1993, 96–101. Christopher Tyerman has observed ‘the clergy’s love of war in general’: C. Tyerman,
England and the Crusades, 1095
–
1588
, Chicago, 1988, 262. For aspects of the clergy and war in general: T. Reuter, ‘
Episcopi cum sua militia
: the Prelate as Warrior in the Early Staufer Era’, in T. Reuter (ed),
Warriors and Churchmen in the High Middle Ages
, London, 1992; the section on ‘Violence and the medieval clergy’ in D. J. Kagay and L. J Andrew Villalon (eds),
The Final Argument: The Imprint of Violence on Society in Medieval and Early Modern Europe
, Woodbridge, 1998, pp. 3–52; B. Arnold, ‘German Bishops and their Military Retinues in Medieval Europe’,
German History
, 7 (2), 1989, 161–83; M. Prestwich,
Armies and Warfare in the Middle Ages: The English Experience
, New Haven, 1996, 168–70; Kaeuper,
Chivalry and Violence
, 41–84; McGlynn,
By Sword and
Fire, 61–71; A. Murray, ‘Roles in Warfare of Clergy’,
OEMW
, i, 404–6. For a fuller discussion of what follows, see McGlynn, ‘Roger of Wendover’.

  
17
   For Guérin’s career, see J. Baldwin,
The Government of Philip Augustus
, Berkeley, 1986, 115–22.

  
18
   Quoted in Contamine,
War
, 211.

  
19
   Barbara English, ‘Towns, Mottes and Ring-works of the Conquest’, in A. Ayton and J. L. Price (eds),
The Medieval Military Revolution: State, Society and Military Change in Medieval and Early Modern Europe
, London, 1995, 45.

  
20
   F. Paxton, ‘Power and the Power to Heal: The Cult of St Sigismund of Burgundy’,
Early Medieval Europe
, 2 (2), 1993, 101.

  
21
   H. Cowdrey, ‘Pope Gregory VII’,
Medieval History
, 1 (1), 1991, 28.

  
22
   Quoted by Timothy Reuter in Reuter, ‘
Episcopi cum sua militia
’, 93.

  
23
   St Bernard, himself a son of a knight, was originally destined for the knighthood. There is a large literature on the military orders: M. Barber,
The New Knighthood: A History of the Order of the Temple
, Cambridge, 1994; A. Forey,
The Military Orders: From the Twelfth to the Early Fourteenth Centuries
, London, 1992; D. Selwood,
Knights of the Cloister: Templars and Hospitallers in Central-Southern Occitania, 1100–1300
, Woodbridge, 1999; J. M. Upton-Ward, ed. and trans.,
The Rule of the Templars
, Woodbridge, 1992; H. Nicholson,
Templars, Hospitallers and Teutonic Knights: Images of the Military Orders, 1128–1291
, Leicester, 1995; idem.,
The Knights Templar: A New History
, Gloucester, 2001; J. Upton-Ward,
The Military Orders: Volume IV
, Ashgate, 2008; L. Marvin, ‘Monastic Military Orders’,
RGMH
, 383–4; J. Porter, S. Cerrini and C. Jensen, ‘Military Orders’,
OEMW
, iii, 76–85. Brother Guérin was a Knight Templar (see n. 17 above).

  
24
   C. Oman,
The Art of War in the Middle Ages
, Oxford, 1885; idem., revised and expanded 3rd edn., 2 vols., London, 1924.

  
25
   H. Delbrück,
Medieval Warfare
, trans. W. J. Renfroe, Lincoln, 1982 (original German edn. 1924). For a very interesting but ultimately unconvincing reassessment of Delbrück and army sizes, see B. Bachrach, ‘Early Medieval Military Demography: Some Observations on the Methods of Hans Delbrück’, in D. J. Kagay and L. J. Andrew Villalon (eds),
The Circle of War in the Middle Ages
, Woodbridge, 1999.

  
26
   R. C. Smail,
Crusading Warfare, 1097–1193
, Cambridge, 1956.

  
27
   Note the reminisces of M. Keen,
Nobles, Knights and Men-at-Arms in the Middle Ages
, London, 1996, ix.

  
28
   J. F. Verbruggen,
The Art of Warfare in Western Europe During the Middle Ages From the Eighth Century to 1340
.

  
29
   Ibid., 16.

  
30
   See ns. 7 and 14.

  
31
   Critical evaluations of this expansive literature are to be found in: S. McGlynn, ‘Land Warfare, 1000–1500’, in C. Messenger (ed),
Reader’s Guide to Military History
, London, 2002; J. France, ‘Recent Writing on Medieval Warfare: From the Fall of Rome to c. 1300’,
Journal of Military History
, 65 (2), 2001 (my thanks to Prof France for forwarding an early copy of this comprehensive article). The literature on medieval warfare is also discussed in: M. Strickland, ‘Introduction’, in M. Strickland (ed),
Anglo-Norman Warfare: Studies in Late Anglo-Saxon an Anglo-Norman Military Organization and Warfare
, Woodbridge, 1992 (itself an invaluable collection of revisionist papers chiefly from the 1980s); A. Curry, ‘Medieval Warfare: England and Her Continental Neighbours, Eleventh to the Fourteenth Centuries’,
JMH
, 21 (3), 1997; S. McGlynn, ‘The Myths of Medieval Warfare’,
History Today
, 44 (1), 1994; idem., ‘Battle Honours’,
Medieval World
, no.7, 1992; idem., ‘Medieval Warfare’,
European Review of History-Revue Européene d’Histoire
, 4 (2), 1997.