In this year, after the Feast of S. Hilary, when an assembly of all the prelates and other magnates of the kingdom had been summoned to Westminster, after the death of the illustrious King Henry, there gathered together the Archbishops and Bishops, Earls and Barons, Abbots and Priors, and from every county four knights and from every borough four, all of whom, in the presence of the lords Walter, Archbishop of York, Roger Mortimer, and Robert Burnell, clerk, who presided in the place of the lord Edward, King of England, took an oath to the said lord Edward as ruler of the land, and undertook to carry out the commands of the King for the faithful and strict keeping of the peace in the kingdom. Lord Walter of Merton was appointed Chancellor, to remain at Westminster, as a place of public resort, until the arrival of the King. It was further provided that there be no justices itinerant before the King's arrival, but only justices "de Banco."
PERSONAL APPEARANCE AND CHARACTER OF EDWARD I.
Source.—Nicholas Trivet's Annals, pp. 281-283. (English Historical Society Publications.)
Edward, King of England, eldest son of Henry the Third by Eleanor, daughter of the Count of Provence, had completed thirty-three years and five months of his life on the day when he succeeded his deceased father on the throne. He was a man of experience and prudence in affairs, devoted from boyhood to the exercise of arms, in which in different parts he had gained such fame as a warrior that he easily excelled the Princes of his time throughout the whole Christian world. In build he was elegant and of commanding stature, towering head and shoulders above the people; his hair, which in boyhood turned from a colour wellnigh silver to yellow, and in youth became black, beautified his old age with its snowy whiteness. His forehead, like the rest of his face, was broad, though the drooping of the left eyelid recalled his father's expression. He spoke with a lisp, but yet did not lack a ready power of persuasion in argument. His arms were supple, in proportion to his body, and supremely fitted in the strength of their sinews for the use of the sword. His girth was greatest round the chest. The length of his lower limbs enabled him to keep a firm seat in riding and leaping with spirited horses. When not engaged in feats of arms, Edward indulged in hawking and hunting, especially the hunting of deer, which he used to pursue on a fleet racehorse, and when he had come up with them, to pierce with a sword instead of a hunting-spear....
In spirit he was magnanimous, intolerant of insult, and apt to forget the presence of danger in his desire for revenge, though his passions cooled easily on the culprit showing sorrow at his presumption. For example, when on one occasion he was engaged in the sport of falconry near a riverbank, he reproved one of his companions for carelessness regarding a falcon which had caught a duck amidst the willows; but the other, seeing that there was neither bridge nor ford near, lightly replied "that it was sufficient for him to have the river between them"; whereat the King's son, exasperated, entered the water on his horse, though he knew not the depth, forced the animal to swim across, and, ascending with difficulty the steep opposite bank, hollowed out by the rush of the waters, drew his sword and pursued his companion, who had now mounted and ridden off. Finally, the latter, giving up all hope of escape, wheeled his horse round, bared his head, and offered his neck to Edward's will. The King's son, however, softened by this surrender, replaced his sword in its sheath, and the two returned together peacefully, to attend to the needs of the abandoned falcon.
THE ACQUISITION OF WALES (1277).
Source.—Matthew of Westminster, vol. ii., pp. 471-472. (Bohn's Libraries.)
In the fortnight after Easter the King withdrew from Westminster, and hastened towards Wales with all the military force of the kingdom of England, taking with him, as far as Shrewsbury, his Barons of the Exchequer and his justices of the King's Bench, who remained there some time, hearing suits according to the customs of the kingdom of England. The Welsh, fearing the arrival of the King and his army, fled to their accustomed refuge of Snowdon, and the King, relying on the assistance of the Cinque Ports, occupied their territories as far as the mountain of Snowdon in every direction. Therefore Llewellyn, Prince of Wales, understanding that his manors and castles were being given to the flames and destroyed, took to himself the most powerful chiefs of his country, and about the Feast of the Nativity of the Lord in the aforesaid year, went to the King, entreating him to show mercy and not justice. Accordingly, King Edward received homage and fealty from the most powerful chiefs of the Welsh, and took with him to Westminster their Prince Llewellyn, from whom he received fifty thousand marks in hand; and with whom he made a covenant to receive a thousand marks every year, to be paid into the Exchequer at Westminster for the Isle of Anglesey and the district of Snowdon; and then he permitted the aforesaid Prince to return to those parts, after having been carefully instructed in his duty. Further, by a formal sentence, he deprived Llewellyn's successors for ever of the title of Prince, and reserved all the rest of the territories of Wales of which he had lately made himself master for himself and his successors, the Kings of England.
WRIT FOR DISTRAINT OF KNIGHTHOOD (1278).
Source.—Parliamentary Writs, vol. i., p. 214.