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  EDWARD I

  War, Politics and Finance

  Michael Prestwich

  © Michael Prestwich, 1972

  Michael Prestwich has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1972 by Faber and Faber Limited.

  This edition published in 2015 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  To M.P. and J.O.P.

  Table of Contents

  To M.P. and J.O.P.

  Preface

  I. Introduction

  II. Households and Retinues

  III. Cavalry Service

  IV. The Infantry

  V. Victualling

  VI. The Navy

  VII. The Administration and Costs of War

  VIII. The Crown Revenue

  IX. Credit Finance

  X. The Crown and the Magnates

  XI. The Crisis of 1297 and its Origins

  XII. Politics and the King, 1298-1307

  XIII. The Social Consequences of War

  Abbreviations

  List Of Sources

  Preface

  The reign of Edward I is notable for its many and varied achievements, the most familiar being the conquest of Wales and the series of campaigns in Scotland, the clarification and development of the law, and the growth of parliament. To the historian who wishes to go behind these achievements to discover the methods employed, the resources available, the difficulties encountered and the costs incurred, the period is also notable for the profusion of evidence which has survived. The chronicles are weaker than for the twelfth century, but the government records are far richer and fuller than for any previous period. Most striking is the volume of exchequer and household material, including writs, correspondence and accounts, and ranging from the most formal pipe rolls to the scrappiest of memoranda. There is a great deal to be learnt from such evidence about the detailed workings of Edward I’s administration and the society he sought to control.

  It is not the purpose of this book to do equal justice to all aspects of the period. Much of the surviving evidence was produced for the purpose of organizing and conducting war, and the aim is to consider how Edward I mobilized and directed his resources for the many campaigns in Wales, Gascony, Flanders and Scotland, how these campaigns were financed, and what the political and social consequences were of these expensive endeavours.

  The book has developed out of a more limited study submitted as a doctoral thesis to the University of Oxford in 1968, on ‘Edward I’s Wars and Their Financing, 1294-1307’. My thanks are due to Dr. G. A. Holmes of St. Catherine’s College who supervised that study, and to Mr. J. Campbell of Worcester College who read and criticized much of it, and also made very helpful suggestions about the present work. I am also very grateful to Dr. E. B. Fryde of the University of Aberystwyth for his kind help in the early stages of my research. The staff of the Public Record Office showed much kindness and patience towards me. I am deeply indebted to the Governing Body of Christ Church, Oxford, for electing me to a Research Lectureship and thus making me a member of a highly stimulating and exceptionally agreeable society. I am equally grateful to the members of the Department of Mediaeval History at St. Andrews for their help and encouragement, and I apologize to those of them who may feel affronted by my refusal to bow to the Caledonian insistence on the use of the word ‘Scottish’. In particular, I am extremely grateful to Professor Lionel Butler and to Miss Ann Kettle for reading the book in typescript, and for helpful advice and criticism. My thanks are also due to Douglas and Ann Johnson for their help with the proofs. By far my largest debt of gratitude is to my parents, especially to my father, for invaluable help, criticism and encouragement.

  I. Introduction

  The historical importance of war extends far beyond the realms of tactics and strategy, victories and defeats. Edward I fought against the Welsh, the French and the Scots: today the great castles of Harlech, Conway, Caernarvon and Beaumaris still stand as a permanent reminder of his conquest of Wales, while the presence of the Stone of Scone in Westminster Abbey symbolizes the humiliation of Scotland at his hands. But the importance and interest of the king’s wars do not lie only in such achievements. The country had to be organized on a massive scale to provide the armies, materials and money that were required for the many campaigns, and in this way war had a very powerful impact upon government, politics and society.

  The period is of course remembered for much more than its wars. It was under Edward I that parliament was established as a normal feature of English political life. Important administrative developments took place under the guidance of Edward’s civil servants, and in the history of English law his reign is of the greatest significance. The series of statutes that were enacted marked a new stage in the maturing of the legal system and provided an essential element if the common law was not to become hopelessly inflexible and antiquated. One major crisis and a series of subsequent disputes make the reign one of considerable constitutional interest. But this was above all a militaristic age, and war had its influence on all these developments. One of the major functions of parliament was the granting of war taxation, while the composition of the assembly was profoundly influenced by the king’s methods of summoning magnates to serve on campaigns. The administrative changes that took place were a response to the needs of wartime. The issue of military service was central to the constitutional disputes of the later years of the reign, along with the royal right to purvey foodstuffs for the army. War also affected legal developments, for the most part adversely, since the government’s single-minded concentration on war in the latter part of the reign brought to a virtual end the ambitious programme of the earlier years.

  Edward I succeeded to the throne in 1272. What was there at that date to suggest that the resources of England could be successfully mobilized for wars of conquest, or that Edward was the man to do it? The English military record so far during the century had been a dismal one. Under John, Normandy had been lost, and despite immense and exhausting efforts he had failed to recover anything of what Philip Augustus had taken from him. John was not assisted in his attempt to maintain the English position on the continent by the lack of enthusiasm displayed by the English baronage for his policy. Opposition to military service abroad was a very important element in the crisis of the last years of his reign, and English dislike of foreign adventures continued throughout the century. No effective riposte was made to the loss of Poitou to the French in 1224. An elaborate and expensive military demonstration in Brittany in 1230 achieved virtually nothing, and Henry III’s next attempt to use force in France in 1242 ended in complete failure. His Poitevin allies deserted him at Taillebourg; a defeat at Saintes followed. The hostility of the English nobility to the expedition proved to be justified by events, but it was their refusal to co-operate that had paved the way for the failure. In 1259, under baronial pressure, Henry made peace with Louis IX, and the changing of the royal seal at about that time was considered significant. Whereas the king had been depicted on the old one bearing a sword, on the new he carried a sceptre.[1]

  Failure abroad was not matched by any triumphs nearer home. There was certainly no baronial hostility towards the wars in Wales, and lack of success here can be attributed to the leadership of Llywelyn the Great who provided Wales with a new unity, and was able to exploit to the full the weaknesses of John and Henry III. Both the Marcher lords and the crown suffered a series of defeats at Llywelyn’s hands, while the territory regained at considerable expense in the campaigns of 1223 and 1231 was hardly commensurate with the efforts that the government put into the war. After Llywelyn’s death in 1240 Welsh unity crumbled and the English did rather better. Henry III’s most successful campaign took pl
ace in 1245, but even then, in spite of massive preparations, the army went no further than Deganwy. At the peace of Montgomery in 1247 the Four Cantrefs, the region between Chester and the Conway, were ceded to the English.

  The crown lands in Wales, including those gained in 1247, were granted to the Lord Edward, the future Edward I, in 1254.[2] Two years later the men of the Four Cantrefs revolted and appealed to Llywelyn’s grandson, Llywelyn ap Gruffydd. The rising became general, and the English government failed to make any effective moves against Llywelyn. According to one account, Edward so despaired of the whole position that he suggested abandoning Wales altogether.[3] In the following years the Welsh leader was able to strengthen his position very considerably by taking full advantage of the political crises and civil wars of the period 1258-1267. With the re-establishment of royal authority in England after the battle of Evesham the extent of Llywelyn’s gains could be seen. The Four Cantrefs were recognized to be Welsh. Robert de Mohaut had to agree not to construct a castle at Harwarden for thirty years. In the south Llywelyn was allowed to keep his conquest of Brecon. The Welsh ruler’s main gain was not territorial, however, but lay in the recognition by the English of his title of prince of Wales, a title which carried with it the overlordship of all the chieftains of that country. It seemed that the whole series of English campaigns during the reign of Henry III had been in vain: in 1272 Llywelyn ap Gruffydd held a position of strength and dominance in the principality equivalent to that of Llywelyn the Great in 1216.

  The evidence does not suggest that the English armies under Henry III were militarily formidable. During the Barons’ Wars it was to the continent that Henry III and his son Edward looked for the men whom they hoped would win the war for them. Simon de Montfort, trained in the schools of continental warfare, had no great opinion of English troops, and when he saw the disciplined and regular advance of the royalist forces at Evesham is said to have remarked arrogantly that it was from him that they had learnt such techniques.[4] One chronicler noted that the methods of fortification and siege warfare used by de Montfort were far superior to anything that had been seen in England before.[5] The most successful operation of Henry III’s wars in Wales, a march in 1246 led by Nicholas de Molis from South Wales into Meirionydd, skirting Snowdonia, and up to Deganwy, was the achievement of a force largely composed of Welsh troops.[6]

  A far more important reason for the military failures of Henry III than the inadequacies of his armies was the political instability of England. In 1233 the opposition of the Earl Marshal led to a brief civil war, and the succeeding years witnessed a series of crises, which culminated in the setting up a committee of twenty-four to reform the state of the realm in 1258. The situation degenerated into civil war once more; Simon de Montfort’s victory at Lewes in 1264 was followed by the triumph of the royalist forces a year later. The grievances that led to this crisis were many. There were the excesses of the king’s foreign favourites, his Poitevin half-brothers and his wife’s Savoyard relations. The irresponsible plan to install Henry’s second son, Edmund, on the Sicilian throne, which involved the English in obligations to pay some 135,000 marks to the papacy, did much to discredit the government. Discontent was increased by the inadequacies and failings of local administration. After 1258 the political struggle between the royalists and the baronial partisans became increasingly bitter and complex as the issues of principle were confused by personal rivalries and jealousies which the arrogant and intolerant attitude of the self-appointed baronial leader, Simon de Montfort, did much to exacerbate.

  The political situation made it hard for the government to raise troops. A successful campaign required both the support of the magnates and adequate financial backing. Henry III was not in a strong position financially.[7] The traditional revenues of the crown, from royal lands, escheats, wardships, profits of justice and similar sources, were quite inadequate for his needs. The prerogative right to levy the tax known as tallage on the royal demesnes and the towns was less profitable than might have been expected. The fines and scutages paid as an alternative to performing military service did not come near to raising the funds needed to pay troops. Some national taxes, collected on a valuation of people’s personal property, were levied, but the grant of such aids might be refused, as in 1254. On occasion the clergy might assist the king with grants. But no regular and reliable system of taxation had been established: there was, for example, no national levy of customs duties. Nor did the king have an effective way of obtaining funds on credit. He survived by means of a series of temporary and often unsatisfactory expedients.

  If the English military record between 1200 and 1272 was not a good one, nor was the career of the future king Edward in the years before his accession particularly inspiring.[8] Matthew Paris has some unappetizing stories of his behaviour as a youth. When the Welsh revolted in 1257, the young man’s first reaction was to flee to his uncle Richard of Cornwall to ask for money. When he and his household came to Wallingford his followers installed themselves in the priory without asking for permission. Food was seized, furniture and windows broken.[9] On another occasion, Edward is said to have met a young man going peaceably along a road, whom he ordered without provocation to be mutilated, entirely contrary to all justice.[10] This second story is without corroboration, but similar behaviour to that alleged at Wallingford was reported by the men of Southwark in 1258, when they complained that Edward had unjustly installed his men in Southwark and had taken food supplies contrary to all precedent and custom.[11] Matthew Paris felt that the prospects for the future were gloomy: if Edward was like this as a young man, how much worse would he be in maturity?[12]

  The causes of the crisis of 1258 were many and complex. Edward’s personal contribution resulted from his position as the lord of great estates in the Welsh Marches. While Henry III’s policy had been to rule the Welsh according to their own customs, his son’s officials did not take this attitude. Edward’s steward was Geoffrey of Langley, a former justice of the Forest, and a man who deserved all the odium that traditionally went with that office. In July 1256 Edward himself visited his lands in North Wales, reaching Dyserth and Deganwy on a brief tour from Chester. No attention was paid to such complaints against his officials as may have reached him, with the result that the men of the Four Cantrefs revolted in November of that year. It was pointed out at the time that the rising was specifically directed against the Lord Edward, rather than the English as a whole.[13] Edward was greatly hampered in his campaign by lack of funds and by his father’s failure to back him adequately until it was too late. He was conspicuously unsuccessful in dealing with the Welsh rebels, who derided the efforts that he made. The failure of English policy in Wales was one of the grievances that caused the barons to act as they did at the Oxford parliament in 1258.

  The author of the Song of Lewes, that famous panegyric of the baronial cause, condemned Edward for his inconstancy and changeableness, for the way in which he was prepared to break promises, and for his refusal to regard himself as bound by the law.[14] The young heir to the throne was certainly fickle in his political career between 1258 and 1265. Like his father, Edward was forced to issue letters patent agreeing to accept the decisions of the committee of twenty-four set up early in 1258. But when at the close of the Oxford parliament the king’s detested Poitevin half-brothers decided to resist, Edward followed their example in refusing to swear to the Provisions of Oxford. Provocatively, he appointed one of the alien group, Geoffrey de Lusignan, as Seneschal of his duchy of Gascony. However, the Poitevin stand failed dismally, and Edward was forced to swear to the Provisions and accept four barons as his councillors.

  The young Edward was not at this stage of his career a man of single-minded purpose. In the spring of 1259 he quarrelled with the earl of Gloucester, one of the baronial leaders, not about national politics, but over rival claims to land. By the autumn Edward’s initial hostility towards the reforms had turned into enthusiasm, as it became clear that the movement was a g
enuinely constructive political enterprise, not simply a vendetta against Henry III’s foreign favourites. The first indication of a change in attitude was his response to the much discussed protest of the Bachelors in October. A body of uncertain composition calling themselves the Community of the Bachelors of England presented to Edward, the earl of Gloucester and the others sworn as members of the council at Oxford a demand that they implement the reforms that had been promised. They threatened that if nothing was done, they would take matters into their own hands. Edward replied that although he had taken the oath unwillingly he was fully prepared to stand by it, and was ready to expose himself to death on behalf of the community of England. If the barons did not carry out their promises, Edward clearly stated that he was ready to join with the Bachelors in their threatened rebellion.[15]

  Edward’s answer to the Bachelors might be taken as a political move intended to embarrass the baronial leaders, whose intention of reaching a final peace with France threatened his position as duke of Gascony, a title first granted to him in 1249 and made effective in 1254. But Edward’s objections to the plan that Henry III should do homage to Louis IX for Gascony were evidently assuaged, and at the parliament of Westminster in October 1259, when important measures of reform were promulgated, he swore an oath to support Simon de Montfort against all men, and promised to uphold the baronial enterprise. By this time Simon had not emerged decisively as the leader of the baronial opposition to Henry III, though it must have been clear that he was one of the most extreme of the great barons. Edward’s adherence to him is not easy to explain save in terms of the impact of the earl’s powerful personality on an impressionable youth. It may also have seemed to Edward that the royalist cause was lost, and that the best chance of securing his inheritance was to attach himself to his father’s enemies.