The Plantagenets (19 page)

Before Acre fell, a deal was hammered out between Saladin and the Christian kings which averted a bloody sack. The crusaders allowed Acre’s garrison to make an honourable submission and they raised the flags of Richard and Philip over the city with minimal further bloodshed. In return for this, Saladin agreed to pay a ransom of 200,000 dinars, to release nearly 2,000 prisoners and to restore the True Cross. The bulk of the Egyptian galley fleet that was moored in the city harbour was captured, extending Christian hegemony along the coasts of the Levant and virtually ending Muslim ambitions to spread their influence further west in the Mediterranean. Outside the royal palace, Christians flocked into Acre, singing and dancing with joy after their long, nerve-shredding ordeal, and indulged themselves
in the drinking dens and whorehouses of the city’s grubbier quarters. But in victory lay the seeds of a disaster that would have serious implications for the Plantagenet empire back in Europe. Although Acre fell to a joint attack, Richard, Berengaria and Joan moved into the royal palace, where Richard tore down the livery of his ally Duke Leopold of Austria, who had been in the Holy Land since April and was instrumental in the siege. The perceived arrogance of the Plantagenet crusading faction infuriated both Duke Leopold and Philip, whose numerous slights at Richard’s hands had made his entire crusade a catalogue of humiliation.

In the days after Acre, the crusading movement received both a fillip and a blow. Philip II, driven by a cocktail of emotions that included jealousy, homesickness and exasperation, announced that he considered his crusading oath to have been served by the conquest of Acre. He was going home.

This was generally seen to be an act of cowardice that undermined the dignity of the French Crown. In truth Philip was sick of being humiliated by Richard – over his marriage, his conquest of Messina, and latterly over a power struggle in which the two kings had backed opposite candidates for the kingdom of Jerusalem: Richard’s retainer Guy de Lusignan and Philip’s candidate, Conrad of Montferrat.

Furthermore, one of the French king’s most important retainers, Philip count of Flanders, had died at Acre. This was a major loss to the European aristocracy in the East, but it was far more important in Europe. Flanders was the wool and cloth capital of Europe, a vastly wealthy corner of the world, which would transform the French finances if it could be brought within the royal demesne. Serving the glory of God in the East was one thing, but Philip was a Capetian at heart. His claim to the rich territory that the count of Flanders had left behind was more pressing. Pushing the claims of the French Crown in north-west Europe appealed far more to the French king than did playing second fiddle to his own vassal in the baking cesspit of the East. Philip left Outremer from Tyre on 3 August and sailed for France.

Richard was now the indisputable commander of the Third Crusade. He had men, money, a vast fleet and burgeoning prestige. He
now also had almost full direction over military operations. According to the chronicler Richard of Devizes, Richard declared that having Philip around in the East was like being a cat with a hammer tied to its tail. With the hammer cut loose, the cat was free to run. Richard’s stay in the region would earn him plenty of further glory, which he now had no obligation to share with Philip. Yet for every month he spent on his crusade, problems loomed larger and larger for the Plantagenet empire back at home.

Treachery

Geoffrey, archbishop of York, stared up, like every other visitor to Dover, at the great castle being built above the harbour. By September 1191 work had progressed somewhat since the late King Louis VII had toured the building site. Now Geoffrey could look up at its imposing square keep and think of his father, who had spent a royal fortune building it into a statement of royal magnificence: a shrine to the secular power of the Plantagenet dynasty.

Geoffrey was a magnificent man himself. He was a military talent, a learned clerk, and half a Plantagenet prince. The illegitimate child of Henry II and a woman named Ykenai, he had built a career in the royal service and the Church. He had served as his father’s chancellor and risked his life fighting a brilliant campaign in the north during the Great War of 1173/4. Now he was his brother Richard’s second-highest ecclesiastic. But if he had been a Plantagenet loyalist in the past, a rich, powerful and ambitious Geoffrey was a dangerous man to have around the country with the king away and no direct heir yet produced. When Richard left for the Holy Land, he had made Geoffrey, like John, swear an oath to remain out of England for three years. Government had been left in the hands of William Longchamp, who combined the roles of bishop of Ely, papal legate, justiciar and chancellor – no king, but as close to a figure of universal authority over government and Church administration as it was possible to create.

Now Geoffrey, allied with his half-brother John, was breaking his oath. While Richard was in Sicily, he had given an indication that his nephew Arthur of Brittany should be heir to England in the event of
the king dying on crusade. Arthur of Brittany was Richard’s elder brother’s son – the offspring of the Geoffrey Plantagenet who had been killed in a Paris tournament in 1186. When Richard left for Outremer he was around four years old. John, meanwhile, was twenty-four and had reacted violently towards his brother’s choice of heir. Forcing support from Eleanor of Aquitaine, he had returned to England, seized the great castles of Nottingham and Tickhill and raised men against the chancellor. In doing so, John relied on Longchamp’s meagre popularity in England. A Norman by birth and background, the chancellor’s grand style set him at odds with many of the men whom he was attempting to govern. In talks aimed at resolving the dispute John had bullied Longchamp into abandoning young Arthur of Brittany’s cause and recognizing him as England’s heir presumptive. Geoffrey’s arrival in the country was another step in John’s campaign to turn his potential power into reality.

When Geoffrey landed beneath the glowering castle, he received a message from John warning him of impending danger. Word had leaked of his arrival and Longchamp’s agents were on their way to Dover intending to arrest him. He would be charged with entering the realm illegally and might well find himself imprisoned at the hands of the chancellor. In haste, the archbishop fled through the town to take refuge at St Martin’s Priory, Longchamp’s men hot on his heels.

Geoffrey reached St Martin’s shortly before his pursuers and took sanctuary with the holy community there. Longchamp’s agents laid a siege outside the grounds of the priory, but after four days they lost patience and battered their way in to fetch their quarry. They found the archbishop by the altar. It was a safe place – a holy place. It was also, in the context of recent events, a highly symbolic place. In scenes disturbingly reminiscent of the Becket murder two decades previously, the chancellor’s men laid hands on Archbishop Geoffrey, and bundled him out of the priory. He was dragged by his arms and legs through the streets of Dover, his head banging on the ground as he went.

This was no doubt an uncomfortable experience for Geoffrey, but it was a political disaster for William Longchamp. Having held England’s government together for eighteen months of the king’s
absence, and despite his loyalist motivations, he was now turned upon by virtually every churchman in England.

John leapt at the opportunity presented by the fracas. His propagandists went into overdrive. Writers like Hugh of Nonant, who were loyal to John, derided Longchamp as an ape, a midget, a pervert and a paedophile. He was accused of every vice and abomination that the medieval imagination could conjure. Meanwhile, the count prepared to take control of London. When Longchamp attempted to prevent him from entering the city, the citizens barred the gates and denounced the chancellor as a traitor.

A triumphant John hauled Longchamp before the regency council, where Geoffrey of York made a series of accusations concerning the chancellor’s involvement in his arrest and financial impropriety. His authority was all but destroyed. Longchamp was stripped of his office by the council, forced to hand over hostages for his castles, and thrown into Dover prison for a week. When he was released, he was ruined, and made his way as quickly as he could to Flanders. The council named John supreme governor of the realm. It was precisely the sort of situation that Richard had hoped to avoid.

Back in the Holy Land, Richard’s crusade was going rather well. Despite difficult conditions and his own illness, he had secured Acre and was managing to discomfit Saladin, albeit by some highly unpleasant tactics. In August 1191 he massacred 2,600 Muslim prisoners on a plain outside Acre. Shortly afterwards, the Christians had marched south and taken Jaffa, Jerusalem’s port-town. There were constant lines of communication open with Saladin, and the two leaders were beginning to test one another with diplomatic offers for a peace settlement. These included, most mischievously, an offer from Richard to marry his sister Joan to Saladin’s brother, on the condition that the brother converted to Christianity.

Amid all this, news filtered through regularly from England. Rumours of John’s plots and sharp practice did not take long to fly east. In early April 1192, at Ascalon, Richard heard that Longchamp had been deposed. This was disturbing, but Richard had already made contingency plans, sending Walter of Coutances, bishop of Lincoln,
back to mediate between John and Longchamp, and to play an active role in government as justiciar.

But at the end of May 1192 Richard received word that was far more disturbing than tales of coups among the regency powers in England. He learned that John was plotting with Philip II. The envoy who brought the news warned of ‘abominable treachery’ and the potential loss of England. Only Eleanor of Aquitaine was holding her son in check. Richard knew from personal experience the damage that could be wrought against the Plantagenet Crown when a prince of the blood allied with the Capetians. After all, he had done just that to his own father.

From the spring of 1192, Richard realized that time was finally running against his crusade. The kingdom of Jerusalem was only part-won, but the longer he stayed attempting to complete the mission, the greater would be the chance of him returning to find the kingdom of England reduced to rubble by his brother, half-brother, and Philip II. One last campaign season was about to begin. It would have to be his last in Outremer. One last opportunity for glory, one last chance to put Saladin back in his place, and then home, to Aquitaine and Anjou, Normandy and England.

In the middle of April 1192, the Italian nobleman Conrad of Montferrat received some wonderful news. After a long career spent at war in the Holy Land he was to become king of Jerusalem. His long-running struggle against his chief rival, Guy of Lusignan, was over. Guy was relinquishing the kingdom in exchange for the lordship of Cyprus. Conrad was to be placed at the permanent head of the Christian community in Outremer. When the Western nobles left, he would bear responsibility for pushing on with the war against Saladin. It was a great honour, for which he had long hankered.

On the night of 28 April, Conrad, still in a celebratory mood, went to supper in Tyre at the home of Philip, bishop of Beauvais. After a convivial evening, Conrad rode home through the city, flanked by a pair of guards. As he turned down a narrow street, he saw two men sitting on either side of the road. As Conrad approached, they stood
up and walked to meet him. One of them was holding a letter. Conrad was intrigued but did not dismount. Rather, he stretched down from his horse and reached out to take the letter. As he did so, the man holding the letter drew a knife and stabbed upwards, plunging the blade deep into Conrad’s body. At the same time, the other man leaped onto the back of Conrad’s horse and stabbed him in the side. Conrad slumped dead from his horse. He had been nominal king for less than a fortnight.

Conrad was murdered by two Assassins sent by the mysterious Rashid ad-Din Sinan, the Old Man of the Mountain – the leader of a violent sect in Syria, who had allied with Saladin against the Christians. The assassination began the end of Richard’s crusade. Richard was immediately rumoured to have sponsored the attack, since he had previously supported Guy of Lusignan. And the politics of kingship in Outremer slumped once more into crisis. Events were moving against Richard, and his military position was deteriorating. A summer march on Jerusalem ended in failure and in fighting. When Saladin destroyed and poisoned all the wells in Judea strategic disagreement raged about whether an attack on Jerusalem was preferable to concentrating on southern Palestine, in order to disrupt Saladin’s links with Egypt. Stalemate beckoned, with Saladin controlling Jerusalem and the Christians the coastal ports. The war was becoming unsupportable on both sides. As Richard wrote to Saladin: ‘you and we together are ruined.’

There would be one last hurrah. At the end of July, Richard attempted a feint around Acre, hoping to convince Saladin that he had designs on Beirut, in order to relieve military pressure being applied by Saladin in the south. Saladin did not rise to the bait. In Richard’s absence he launched a fierce attack on Jaffa. It was a brilliant success. The walls were mined and sapped with lethal skill, and on 31 July huge sections collapsed in a juddering landslide of stone and dust. The city was sacked by rampaging Saracens. It was a disaster: Jaffa was Jerusalem’s port, and an essential strategic stronghold for Christian maritime superiority.

But on the night of 31 July, Richard appeared with a small fleet. He had sailed against the wind and in utter desperation. His little flotilla sailed to land, a beacon of knightly crimson. A red awning covered the
royal boat. From it waded ashore the red-headed king, his red banner above his party. He led his men towards the town where Muslim flags flew over every quarter, and the streets rang with shouts of ‘Allahu Akbar’. As some of his crew built a beachhead from scavenged wood, Richard led a charge against the town.