History of England 1-6

The concept of sanctuary was clearer. A felon who fled to one of a number of specified churches might remain inviolate for forty days; no person might hinder anyone bringing food and drink to him. The church was watched closely during this period, in case the man tried secretly to escape. After forty days the thief or murderer could formally be expelled by the archdeacon, but he could be permitted to stay. He could choose to abjure the realm, however, in which case he was taken to the church porch and assigned a port from which to sail. He was obliged to walk along the king’s highway, deviating neither to the left nor the right, carrying a cross in his hand. When he reached the port he would seek passage within the time of one tide and one ebb; if that were not possible he was to walk every day into the sea, up to his knees, until he found a ship.

Violent crime was of course closely associated with the incidence of drunkenness. The English were well known throughout Europe for their addiction to ale and wine and cider. The French were proud, the Germans were obscene, and the English were drunkards. In English monasteries the daily allowance was a gallon (4.5 litres) of strong ale and a gallon (4.5 litres) of weak ale. Every village had its alehouse. Twelfth-century London was castigated by the chronicler William Fitzstephen for ‘the immoderate drinking of fools’. There was private, as well as public, drinking. The most flourishing trade among the women of an English village was that of brewing. It is one of the essential continuities of national life. ‘The whole land’, Roger of Hoveden wrote, ‘is filled with drink and drinkers.’

The court rolls contain many stories of people who fell out of windows, slipped into cauldrons, tumbled from horses, or plunged into rivers, as a consequence of drink. In 1250 Benedict Lithere had been drinking in a tavern in Henstead in Suffolk, and by the end of the session ‘he could neither walk nor ride, nor barely even stand up’. His brother, Roger, put him on his horse; he fell off. Roger hauled him up a second time, and again Benedict fell off. Then Roger decided on a more drastic measure. He put him back on the horse, and tied him onto the animal. Benedict slipped and fell off once more, killing himself in the process.

John de Markeby, goldsmith, ‘was drunk and leaping about’ in the house of a friend when he wounded himself fatally with his own knife. Alice Quernbetere, extremely drunk, called two workmen by the insulting name of ‘tredekeiles’; she was then murdered by them. Richard le Brewer, carrying a bag of malt home while drunk, stumbled and ruptured himself. William Bonefaunte, skinner, stood ‘drunk, naked and alone at the top of a stair … for the purpose of relieving nature, when by accident he fell head-down to the ground and died’.

The records of madness evince some of the general qualities of the medieval mind. Robert de Bramwyk took his sister, deformed and hunchbacked from the time of her birth, and plunged her into a cauldron of hot water; then he took her out and began stamping on her limbs in order to straighten them. When Agnes Fuller refused to have sex with Geoffrey Riche, he cut off her head with a sword; he informed his neighbours that he was a pig, and hid beneath a trough. Eventually he went home, found a needle and thread, and tried to sew Agnes’s severed head back to the body.

17

A simple king

With the death of King John, the civil war was suspended. Prince Louis was still in England, pursuing his claim to the throne, but his progress met an impediment. John’s nine-year-old son, Henry, was in the southwest. The young boy’s supporters quickly declared him to be king, and he was crowned as Henry III at Gloucester Abbey in the autumn of 1216; Westminster Abbey was not available, because Louis was in control of London. Another unfortunate circumstance was reported. Since the royal crown had been ‘lost’ in the Wash, the young king wore a circlet of gold borrowed from his mother. Henry swore an oath of allegiance to the papacy, and the pope duly extended his blessing. Prince Louis and the rebel barons were no longer opposed to a ruthless and violent king; they were the enemies of a young boy in the protection of the see of Peter. They were not liberators, but irreligious usurpers. Even the prince’s father urged him to desist. He fought on, for a time, since the instinct for power is a strong one. He held London and much of the southeast, but the sentiment of the realm was against him; he also had a fair share of misfortune, his supporters being overwhelmed at Lincoln and a French fleet sending reinforcements beaten back at Sandwich. Finally he agreed to a truce, and was given £7,000 to leave England.