The Life and Reign of Edward I.

by Robert Benton Seeley

Soon after this, Edward, finding all things at peace at home, paid a short visit to the continent. The death of the queen of Castile transferred to her daughter Eleanor, Edward’s consort, the county of Ponthieu; and to obtain seizin of this territory, and to do homage for it, he visited the king of France at Amiens, where, however, his stay was but short. He brought back with him to England some fine jasper stones, which became part of the costly monument he was raising in the church of Westminster to the memory of the king his father. Not long after his return he found it necessary to repress some of the lofty pretensions of “holy Church.” John Peckham, who had succeeded Kilwardby in the see of Canterbury, had convened a synod at Reading, in which various canons were adopted, tending to separate ecclesiastics and ecclesiastical property from the laity and their possessions, and to exempt them from the operation of the statute and common law. These attempts, fostered by such churchmen as Dunstan and A’Becket, had long been perplexing all the governments of Christendom. We shall meet with them, again and again, throughout this king’s reign. But Edward was both clear‐sighted and resolute, and we cannot doubt that his chancellor, though himself a prelate, supported him. The archbishop was at once called before a council, and commanded to revoke and cancel all canons which assumed or pretended to set aside the laws and ordinances of the realm.

Ireland began now to claim a share in the king’s attention, and we may reasonably regret that the affairs of Wales soon drew his thoughts another way. The fame of the enlightened legislation now going on in England had probably reached Ireland; for a petition was sent over to the king that they might be allowed the benefit of the English laws. They tendered, as a customary fine, or ”benevolence,” the sum of 8000 marks for the enjoyment of this privilege. Edward’s disposition must have been, to comply at once with this request; but we shall find him, through his whole life, abstaining from all arbitrary or sudden decisions, and referring all public questions to his council or parliament. He wrote, therefore, to Robert de Clifford, chief justiciary of Ireland, desiring that steps might be taken to comply with the prayer of the petition. Some sort of an assembly or parliament was convened for the consideration of the question. But arbitrary power always finds some advocates, for there are never wanting persons who can turn it to their own advantage. The chief men in Ireland raised objections, and succeeded in postponing compliance with the king’s wishes. Edward wrote a second time, in displeasure, ordering another council or parliament to be convened. But Wales now began to claim his attention, and the opponents of a wise and just policy in Ireland succeeded in their policy of procrastination.

The Principality had now remained at peace for more than four years. But there were various reasons for Welsh discontent. The king had established his authority on the border, and had put an end to those plundering inroads which had troubled the English frontier for many preceding years. To be thus kept in check would naturally vex and annoy the half‐civilized tribes who had delighted, for half a century past, in burning and ravaging the farms and hamlets of the English frontier. “Edward,” says Carte, “had thrown his newly‐acquired territory into districts, had appointed sheriffs, and sent judges to administer justice. These things were not agreeable to the Welsh. They did not like counties or hundreds, courts or juries, or any institution, however beneficial, that was derived from England;—in fact, being used to a roving, disorderly, and plundering sort of life, they did not care to be kept in order.” Both Llewellyn and David had also private grievances. The elder brother had a suit against Griffith Gwenwynn for some lands, and he was summoned to the hearing of the cause at Montgomery, which he deemed a great indignity. David was sued by one Venables, before the chief justice of Chester, touching the villages of Hope and Eston. Irritated by these proceedings, the two brothers made up their quarrel, and on Palm Sunday in March, 1282, David surprised the castle of Hawarden, seizing Roger de Clifford in his bed, wounding him, and carrying him off a prisoner, while several of the English garrison were put to the sword. The news of this sudden outbreak was carried to the king, who was keeping Easter at Devizes. Other messengers soon followed with the intelligence that Llewellyn had joined his brother, that the castles of Flint and Rhuddlan were besieged, and that the Welsh were rising in every quarter. Edward sent off immediately all the force he had with him to the relief of the besieged castles, and issued orders for the rendezvous of his military tenants at Worcester on the 17th of May. Before that time he had himself moved forward, and finding the insurrection to be growing general, he gave orders for a larger levy than he had at first intended; ordering his tenants to meet him at Rhuddlan on the 2nd of August. Llewellyn and his brother retired on his approach, taking refuge in the fastnesses of Snowdon. The king took the same precaution as in 1277, by sending a fleet to occupy Anglesea, which island at once submitted, and the possession of which enclosed Llewellyn on every side. Meanwhile, the archbishop of Canterbury visited the Welsh prince and tried to bring him to submission, but all attempts of the kind were fruitless. Llewellyn handed in a list of grievances, which were just such as might have been anticipated. “The four cantreds” between Chester and Conway, formerly the scene of continual strife, had now been ceded, by the treaty of 1277, to Edward, and the English laws had been established there. These laws were distasteful to the Welsh. By their own laws, such offences as murder or arson might be withdrawn from the courts by a payment to the chief lord of a fine of five pounds; but the English judges hanged such offenders. No doubt, some provocation had been given, some injuries inflicted, on both sides. But Llewellyn, who had twice been Edward’s guest at Westminster, ought to have appealed to him for redress of any positive wrong. He might have known that it was not the king’s habit to justify ill‐doing. But the Welsh preferred to draw the sword, and now, when the archbishop strove to mediate, he found them obstinate and unbending.

At the outset of the war Edward had stormed and taken Hope Castle, had relieved Flint and Rhuddlan, and had driven Llewellyn back into the recesses of Snowdon. In November the English met with a disaster at the Menai Straits. They had constructed a bridge of boats, and a sudden attack of the Welsh, who rushed down with loud cries, created a panic; a rush was made for the bridge, it gave way, and thirteen knights and about two hundred men were lost in the waters.

Elated at this success, Llewellyn thought that as the bridge was destroyed, Snowdon was now safe for the winter, and he moved down into Cardiganshire, intending to rally and succour his friends in South Wales. Here, on the 10th of December, near Builth in Radnorshire, he came in contact with a party of the English, and one of them, Adam Francton, ran him through with a spear, in ignorance of his person or quality. After lying in the field some time, his body was searched, and his private signet and certain papers made his person known. His head was cut off and sent to the king, who, according to the custom of the period, ordered it to be sent to London and set up over the gate of the Tower.

The death of their prince seems to have so discouraged the Welsh that all opposition ceased, and Edward took quiet possession of the forfeited principality. From that day forward, England and Wales became one;—subject to the same laws and ruled over by the same government. “This incorporation,” says Mr. Sharon Turner, “was an unquestionable blessing to Wales. That country ceased to be the theatre of homicide and distress, and began to imitate the English habits. It was at once divided into counties, placed under sheriffs, and admitted to a participation in the more important of the English institutions.”

The wretched beginner of this second Welsh controversy, David of Snowdon, contrived, for several months, to lead the life of an outlaw, and to evade the search of his pursuers. This unyielding contumacy completed his ruin. Had he frankly and immediately submitted to the conqueror, and besought mercy, all that we know of Edward assures us that his life, at least, would have been spared. But he remained an outlaw, and obdurate; until, after a concealment of several months, some of his own people seized and surrendered him. Then, when no choice remained, and when submission had no merit, he entreated to see the king. But Edward doubted the propriety of granting forgiveness, and therefore refused to allow him an interview.

No one who has read the history of the ten or twelve succeeding reigns can doubt that such an offender as this David would, at any time in the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries, been quickly taken before some convenient tribunal and sent to the scaffold. He was an English subject; he had accepted wealth and honour at Edward’s hands, and had then requited his benefactor by raising a rebellion and causing a civil war. At no period of our history, even in the gentle reign of Victoria, could such acts have escaped the highest degree of punishment.

But Edward, while he showed, throughout, his sense of the gravity of David’s offence, never inflicted punishment in haste or in a passionate spirit. It is also a remarkable feature of his character that, though a man of unusual firmness and decision, and fitted above most men to act on his own judgment, he never found himself in the presence of any question of gravity, without instantly desiring to have it discussed in a council or parliament, or by conference with others. David’s guilt and the gravity of his offence were abundantly evident, but the question of the extent of his punishment Edward desired to leave with some legal tribunal. He resolved to remit the whole subject to the decision of a parliament, and to summon that parliament to meet in Shrewsbury in October, 1283;—David having been given up to him in the course of June.

This “parliament of Shrewsbury” was one of a novel kind. It had two new features, and it seems to have held its sittings by adjournment, in two different places. Edward desired that the case of David should be considered and decided in a council. This was the first object of the assembling of that parliament. But his chancellor had seen the necessity of a new statute on commercial questions, and the framing of this statute formed the next matter for consideration.