A History of England, Period I. Mediæval Monarchy

by J. Franck Bright

Having by such unjustifiable means procured money for his purposes, entirely regardless of the misery he could scarcely fail to leave behind him, Richard crossed over to France to join his forces with those of Philip Augustus. Such precautions as he did take against maladministration in England were not of the wisest. He put the whole power into the hands of William Longchamp, Bishop of Ely, whom he made at once Chancellor and Chief Justiciary, securing for him also the authority of Papal Legate. But Longchamp was a man who could not fail to have many enemies. Of low extraction, and regarded as merely the favourite of Richard, he was fond of exhibiting his grandeur in the most ostentatious manner; moreover, in making him justiciary Richard supplanted Hugh de Pudsey, to whom the office had already been given. Pudsey did not surrender without some opposition. He obtained from the King letters patent, naming him justiciary north of the Humber; when he exhibited these to Longchamp, the Chancellor contrived indeed to entrap him to London, and there made him surrender his claims, but he had made himself a powerful enemy for life. Richard also, as a second precaution, made his brother John, and his half-brother Geoffrey, who had got the Archbishopric of York in exchange for the chancellorship, promise not to enter England during his absence. But he afterwards unwisely absolved John from his vow. He thus left behind him in England a possible claimant to the succession, whose power as a baron was very great, for he was the possessor of Derbyshire, the inheritance of the Earl of Gloucester, which he had obtained by marriage, and of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, and Somerset, which Richard had himself given him.

Quarrels with Philip in Sicily.

The death of William II. of Sicily, and of the French Queen Isabella, delayed the Crusade till June 1190. But at the end of that month, the Kings set out towards their first point, which was Sicily, Philip by Genoa, Richard by Marseilles. At the same time, a fleet of more than a hundred sail left the harbours of Brittany and Guienne. On reaching Sicily the friendship of the two kings was at first most edifying, but it was not long before various causes of dispute arose between them. To the inhabitants of the island the Crusaders seemed a horde of new invaders. The overbearing character of Richard exasperated the feelings of jealousy thus aroused. The conciliatory manners of Philip, on the other hand, were such that he was known as the Lamb, in contradistinction to Richard, who was called the Lion. The difference of feeling with which they were regarded was plainly shown when, on the occasion of some quarrel, the town of Messina was closed against Richard, while Philip was admitted within its walls. The enemies of the French King suggested indeed that his mildness was a proof of treasonable lukewarmness towards his fellow Crusaders. These suspicions were afterwards confirmed. On the death of William II.,[30] Tancred, an illegitimate son of William’s brother Roger, had seized the throne, despoiling of her rights Constance, the daughter of Roger and the wife of Henry VI. of Germany, and keeping in some sort of confinement Richard’s sister Joanna, the widow of William the Good, and retaining the dowry secured her by her husband’s will. The enmity thus excited in Richard’s mind gave way, after a lengthened dispute, to the natural feeling of friendship between the two Norman houses. Joanna and her dowry were given back to Richard; and at one of the meetings between the two princes, Tancred informed him of a plot on the part of the French to fall treacherously on the English army. Philip does not seem to have denied the charge, and it was perhaps the consciousness of his guilt which prevented him from making any effectual opposition when Richard repudiated his sister Alice. Contrary to the national feelings, and on purely political grounds, Richard had been contracted to this princess by his father. He now, throwing over this unnatural match, sought for himself a wife from Spain, a country then and for long afterwards connected by close friendship with England. This wife was Berengaria, the daughter of Sancho I. of Navarre. Though unavenged, the insult was felt. From that time onwards Philip and Richard were enemies.

Conquers Cyprus. 1191.

Jerusalem taken by Saladin. 1187.

Acre besieged. 1189.

Arrival of the Crusaders.

Richard saves Acre.

Philip goes home.

At length the armies broke up from Sicily and sailed for Acre. With the three leading ships of the English fleet were Berengaria and the King’s sister Joanna. Richard brought up the rear. Two of the Queen’s vessels were wrecked upon the Isle of Cyprus, and their crew imprisoned by Isaac, the ruler of that island. This monarch, a descendant of the Emperor John Comnenus, banished from Byzantium, had established himself with the title of Emperor in the Isle of Cyprus. He was an inhuman tyrant, the dread of pilgrims and of shipwrecked sailors. He tried to entice the two queens to land, but luckily Richard’s fleet arrived. The Cyprians were driven from Lymesol, where the King established his court. He there received Guy of Lusignan, the nominal King of Jerusalem, completed his marriage with Berengaria, and made a treaty with Isaac. But when the Emperor sought to evade his engagements, Richard conquered the rest of the island, and organized it in the feudal fashion. On the 8th of July he reached Acre. The arrival of this warlike prince raised the spirit of the besiegers, who were in a very depressed condition. The siege had lasted since 1189, having been undertaken by Guy of Lusignan, who saw the importance of the place, if he was to continue to hold his kingdom. This was indeed a doubtful question. The Christian fortunes had sunk very low. Among the Mahomedans power after power had arisen with rapid success, and sunk as rapidly under the attacks of its own slaves or vassals. As the Abbassid Caliphs yielded to the Seljukian Turks, the Seljukians in their turn yielded to the Atabeks. The power of this race was brought to its height by Noureddin, who established his rule at Damascus, and extended it even into Egypt. Saladin, the son of Ayub, had attended his uncle Shiracouh, when he destroyed the rule of the Fatimite Caliphs in Egypt, and brought that province under the power of Noureddin. On Noureddin’s death, Saladin acquired possession of Egypt, to which he subsequently added the provinces of Damascus and Aleppo, and raised an empire which reached from Tripoli in Africa to the Tigris. It was this new warlike power which had overwhelmed the kingdom of Jerusalem. Baldwin IV.,[31] King of Jerusalem, became a leper. His sister Sybilla married Guy of Lusignan, a French prince of weak character, who succeeded to the throne. His elevation excited the jealousy of Raymond, Count of Tripoli, the greatest of his vassals. By his treacherous advice, Saladin attacked Tiberias. To complete his treachery, Raymond persuaded the Christians to take up a position in a camp destitute of water, and withdrew with his forces at the moment of attack. The destruction of the Christians was complete. In a few months Jerusalem itself was taken, and Tyre and Tripoli the only places left in Christian hands. Tyre was defended with success by the bravery of Conrad of Montferrat, who, in consequence of this success, was regarded as the great champion of the Christians. He had married a young sister of Sybilla of Lusignan, and upon the death of Sybilla, holding that the right went to the living princess, his wife, rather than to Lusignan, the husband of the dead princess, he demanded the throne. Meanwhile Guy besieged Acre, thirty miles south of Tyre, and was there surrounded by an army under the command of Saladin, and cut off from all assistance except by sea. It was under these circumstances, in the midst of the disputed succession to the throne, that the third crusade had begun. Frederick Barbarossa, who had marched with the Germans by land, perished on the road, and the Duke of Swabia reached the camp with only five thousand wearied men. The arrival of the hosts of England and France by sea changed the aspect of affairs; and the kingdom might have regained had it not been for the bad feeling which existed between Richard and Philip, which found new food in the rivalry of the two claimants for the crown of Jerusalem. Conrad of Montferrat at once allied himself with the French monarch; Guy of Lusignan, whose family in Languedoc were English vassals, attached himself to Richard. Directed by the enthusiasm of Richard, who, whenever mere fighting was the question, came prominently forward, the arms of the besiegers were successful, and Acre fell. The superiority which Richard acquired in actual warfare added fresh fuel to Philip’s anger. There were besides certain circumstances in his own kingdom, where he had lately acquired Flanders, which seemed to require his presence. He therefore withdrew from the crusade, leaving the Duke of Burgundy with a part of his army under Richard’s command. Had Richard been a general as well as a soldier, he had still forces enough to have brought this crusade to a successful issue. As it was, it consisted but of a series of brilliant but useless skirmishes. Even the great battle of Arsouf, which Richard won in September on his way to Joppa, brought him no nearer his object.