Before ending the story we may briefly recapitulate the chief events of these years, outside the Becket struggle. In the year 1165, that succeeding the archbishop’s flight from Northampton, Henry paid a short visit to Normandy, and received a proposal from Frederick I. for a couple of marriages, a close league of alliance, and a joint action against the Pope, who was supposed to be abetting Becket. The only result of this was the marriage of Henry’s eldest daughter, Matilda, with Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, at this moment Frederick’s most intimate friend and kinsman, later on his enemy and victim. Neither Henry nor England could be persuaded to accept the anti-Pope, but the temporizing action of the king’s agents in Germany gave Becket an opportunity of involving all alike in a charge of heresy and apostacy.
Third
Welsh war,
1165.
Assize of
Clarendon,
1166.
After his return to England, later in the year, Henry made his third Welsh expedition, which had no more permanent effect than the former ones, as an attempt either to subdue the country or to secure the peace of the borders. It was carried out with an amount of cruelty which shows Henry’s character to have already deteriorated. After his return he held, early in 1166, another council at Clarendon, also marked by an important act of legislation, the Assize of Clarendon, by which the criminal law was reformed, and the grand jury system established or reformed in every shire.
Long visit to
France.
Coronation of
the young
Henry, 1170.
As soon as this was done he went to Normandy, in March, 1166, and stayed away until March, 1170. During this time little or nothing but the ordinary business of justice and taxation is recorded in English authorities. The Becket quarrel was the all-engrossing subject, the sole question of public interest. Abroad the view is only diversified by negotiation and border warfare with Lewis VII., and by the carrying out of Henry’s plan for securing possession of Brittany by the marriage of his third son, Geoffrey, with the heiress of the count. Having spent nearly four years in this way he returned, in order to look after business at home, and in particular to see his eldest son, who was fifteen, crowned as his associate and successor in the kingdom. The importance of the former acts comes into prominence in the later history of the reign. The coronation was the first of a series of events which sealed Becket’s fate. It was solemnized the 14th of June, at Westminster. The Archbishop of York, Roger of Pont l’Eveque, an old rival of Thomas Becket, placed the crown on the boy’s head, in contravention of the right of Canterbury, and in the absence of the little Queen Margaret. Lewis was exasperated by this act of neglect or disrespect shown to his daughter; Becket was maddened by the contempt shown for his authority. The storm began to rage; Lewis went to war; Thomas, and the counts whom he made his friends, besieged the Pope with prayers, and at last he sent or promised to send a definitive legation to place Henry’s dominions under interdict, and compel him to recall the archbishop.
Reconciliation
of Henry and
Becket.
Becket’s
return.
Henry’s rash
words.