All language subtitles for BBC.The.Plantagenets.1of3.The.Devils.Brood.HDTV.x264.AAC.MVGroup.org

In early medieval France,
the Count of Anjou

became enthralled by a mysterious woman.

They married and had several children.

But the Count grew concerned

because his wife always left
church before Mass was celebrated.

One day he ordered his knights to stop her.

But she pulled free and
flew out through a window.

The Countess of Anjou was never seen again.

According to this legend, all
15 Plantagenet kings of England

were descended from the
demon Countess of Anjou.

Her blood flowed in their veins.

And over the centuries,

this provided an explanation
for the fierce temper,

the bloody family feuds and the
brutality of the Plantagenets.

Richard the Lionheart himself
once declared defiantly,

"From the Devil we came, and
to the Devil we will go."

In the medieval world, all
politics was family politics,

and the Plantagenet family dominated
England for more than 300 years

through some of the nation's
most famous and infamous kings.

King John. Henry V.

Richard III.

They were driven by dynastic ambition,

striving to expand their power
beyond their French homeland.

In the process, the culture

and politics of the British
Isles were transformed...

...England's distinctive system
of justice was established,

Parliament was born

and the great Gothic cathedrals
transformed the landscape.

The Plantagenets developed

a new style of warfare in their
attempt to claim Scotland.

They conquered Wales...

...and half of Ireland.

And their great royal castles
hammered home their power.

When the Plantagenets won
the kingdom of England,

it was shattered and lawless.

Under their rule,

it was transformed into one of the
best governed states in Christendom.

But their story is one of
intrigue, conflict and violence.

They fought their enemies but
also turned on each other -

sons made war on fathers,
brothers betrayed brothers,

powerful queens conspired.

The future of Western
Europe would be shaped by

this extraordinary dynasty,
this Devil's brood.

The story of England's longest
reigning dynasty begins here,

in Anjou, western France.

12th-century France was
dominated by its great barons

rather than by its nominal king.

And these fertile farmlands
of the Loire Valley

were the domain of the Count of Anjou.

In 1128, an enraged Princess arrived here.

Her name was Matilda and
she was the only surviving

legitimate child of King Henry I of
England, and his acknowledged heir.

Her father had commanded her
to marry a 15-year-old boy,

Geoffrey, the oldest son
of the Count of Anjou.

Matilda was outraged.

She was 26 years old,

she was the granddaughter
of William the Conqueror,

she was the widow of the
mighty Holy Roman Emperor.

She always called herself "Empress".

Geoffrey was the heir of a mere count.

Matilda was notoriously wilful.

But in the selection of a
husband, she had no say.

Princesses were a powerful tool
used by Europe's medieval dynasties

to expand their territories.

King Henry hoped that the arranged
marriage at Le Mans Cathedral

would produce a male heir,

who would ultimately become Count of Anjou,

Duke of Normandy

and King of England.

Things didn't go according to plan.

Both Geoffrey and Matilda were
proud and quarrelsome people,

and, after a tumultuous
year, they separated.

But this was, above all, a political union

and a reconciliation was soon imposed.

Matilda rejoined her teenage husband
and performed her royal duty,

giving him three sons in three years.

This ended any doubts about the succession

and also laid the foundations
of a powerful new dynasty.

Le Mans Museum contains

the only surviving image
of Geoffrey of Anjou.

It once adorned his tomb.

This plaque contains one of the
earliest examples of heraldry -

that system of vivid symbols
through which the ruling families

of Europe were beginning to
proclaim their dynastic pride.

The distinctive pattern of blue and white

on the inside of Geoffrey's
cloak is called "vair",

representing the winter pelt of squirrels.

And the golden lions on his shield

were adopted by his descendants
as the royal coat of arms

and, ultimately,

became one of the most familiar
national symbols of England.

Geoffrey was an energetic, intelligent man

with golden-red hair.

By all accounts he was handsome,

and known as "Geoffrey the Fair".

But he also had another name.

It comes from the Latin
for the broom plant.

Planta genista.

Plantagenet.

No-one knows for certain why
Geoffrey was called Plantagenet.

One theory is that it's because

he wore a sprig of the plant in his hat.

But in any case,

for over 300 years none of his
descendants bore the name.

Kings don't need surnames.

But it's proved a useful label
for historians to describe

that long line of monarchs
who descended from Matilda

and the young Geoffrey of Anjou.

15 Plantagenets would be
crowned kings of England,

but they had to fight to win the throne.

Henry I had named Matilda his heir.

But when he died in 1135,

the English throne was seized by Matilda's cousin.
Stephen.

The Plantagenets fought back.

Geoffrey led a successful
invasion of Normandy,

which had been part of Henry I's dominions,

while Matilda crossed the
Channel to claim her crown.

This started almost two
decades of civil war.

Government virtually collapsed
and England descended

into a period of bloody conflict,
often called simply "The Anarchy".

The Peterborough Chronicle
describes England's fate

as the Plantagenets fought
to secure their birthright.

"God and his saints slept.

"Every powerful man built his
castle and filled it with devils

"and evil men.

"They grievously oppressed the
wretched people of the land.

"They tortured them for their gold.

"And when the people had no more to
give, they plundered and burned."

In the winter of 1142, the
war turned against Matilda.

Her cousin Stephen besieged
her here in Oxford Castle.

Her garrison held out for three months,

but with their supplies running
low, they were close to surrender.

One wintry night, Matilda wrapped
herself in a white cloak.

Camouflaged against the heavy snow,
she slipped out of a side gate.

She crossed the frozen river
in front of the castle

and managed to pass unseen through
the ranks of Stephen's army.

Matilda trudged for seven miles
through the frigid night.

She eventually made it to the
safety of Wallingford Castle.

Now she was free to continue her struggle.

For another decade, civil
war ravaged England.

The fighting could only
be brought to a stop

when her eldest son came of age -

a mail heir, a direct
descendant of Henry I.

Matilda's son, Henry, was
a charismatic young man

who'd inherited Matilda's
determination and temper...

...along with Geoffrey
Plantagenet's red hair,

intelligence and boundless energy.

Henry also inherited his parents'
claims to the English throne

and much of northern France.

As a young man, he was granted Normandy.

Later, he inherited Anjou.

He then expanded Plantagenet
territory again,

through a profitable and
unexpected marriage.

This is the great hall of the
ducal palace in Poitiers,

home of the court of Aquitaine -
that vast and wealthy principality

that encompassed a quarter
of the French lands.

The Duke had an only child,

a beautiful and well-educated
daughter called Eleanor.

When she was about 15, her
father died unexpectedly.

Eleanor of Aquitaine was now
the greatest catch in Europe.

The King of France, Louis
VII, snatched the prize.

But Louis couldn't hold on
to Eleanor or Aquitaine.

The King was a pious man,

but his new queen was
ambitious and worldly.

Eleanor once said, "I've
married a monk not a monarch."

And there was another problem.

The French king needed a son

and Eleanor gave birth only to girls.

After 15 years and two daughters,

Louis persuaded the Church to
declare the marriage void.

The great heiress was once again available.

Suitors circled, eager to
obtain her hand and her lands.

But Eleanor was headstrong and independent.

She was determined to marry the man

who could help her fulfil her
own dynastic ambitions -

Henry Plantagenet.

Eleanor sent word to Henry
to meet her in Aquitaine.

As she made her way there from
Paris, Eleanor had to evade

kidnappers, who wanted to marry her
forcibly and lay claim to her lands.

Henry and Eleanor married in
a hastily arranged ceremony

in Poitiers Cathedral.

This was a scandalous marriage.

Henry was 19, Eleanor around 30.

And Eleanor's union with the king of France

had been annulled only two months earlier.

The French king had been
outmanoeuvred by his ex-queen

and Henry Plantagenet.

He was humiliated by the scandal and
he'd also lost half his territories.

By inheritance, by conquest,
and now by marriage,

Henry had built up an enormous
conglomeration of lands in France,

and soon he and Eleanor
would have four sons

to secure the future of the dynasty.

But the French king never forgave
the Plantagenet upstart.

The Plantagenets were still fighting
for their birthright in England,

but the dynasty was thriving.

A decade after Henry and Eleanor's wedding,

this cathedral was completely
rebuilt in the new Gothic style

sweeping across France.

Structurally stronger,

pointed arches allowed these
dramatic, soaring vaults

and vast windows.

Henry and Eleanor graced the new cathedral

with the gift of this
wonderful east window.

It's one of the oldest
stained-glass windows in France.

The royal couple are
themselves depicted on it,

along with their four sons,
presenting their gift to God.

It proclaims the piety of
the Plantagenet dynasty

and their family solidarity.

Henry now set his sights on winning
the greatest prize of all -

the English crown.

Crossing the Channel with a small army,

Henry found England devastated by
nearly two decades of the civil war

between Stephen and Matilda's supporters.

His arrival persuaded many barons
to join the Plantagenet cause.

Henry's and Stephen's armies
confronted one another

here at Wallingford Castle.

These few mounds and walls are all that

remain of one of the mightiest
fortresses of medieval England.

Stephen was besieging the castle

and Henry had come to relieve
Matilda's loyal forces.

The armies faced one
another across the river.

A contemporary chronicle
describes what happened next.

"It was a terrible thing to see so
many armed men with drawn swords,

"ready to kill their relatives
and fellow countrymen.

"And so the chief men on each side
shrank in horror from civil war...

"..and the destruction of their kingdom."

Because the two armies refused to fight,

Stephen and Henry were forced to talk.

According to the chronicles,
they met outside the castle,

one on either side of the stream.

And eventually they came to an agreement.

King Stephen would continue to rule,

but he recognised Henry as his lawful heir.

The very next year,

Stephen was seized by a terrible
pain in the gut and a flow of blood.

The King was dead.

The negotiations that began here
would lead to more than three

centuries of Plantagenet rule in England.

On 19th December, 1154,

Henry II became the first
Plantagenet King of England.

This French-speaking monarch
now ruled a vast empire that

stretched from the Scottish Borders...

...to the Pyrenees.

Henry's first priority was
to restore peace and order.

He tore down hundreds
of the barons' castles.

Then, to extend Plantagenet
power across the country,

Henry turned to the law.

This manuscript, which is
more than 800 years old,

is one of the treasures of
Balliol College, Oxford.

It contains a text known as Glanvill,

the earliest guide to the
workings of the English law.

It was written during the reign of Henry II

and is one of the foundations
of the English legal system.

These are its opening words.

"Royal power should not only be
adorned with arms to fight rebels

"and hostile peoples, but also with
laws to rule its subjects in peace."

Henry inherited a complex judicial system,

where cases could be heard in
a variety of local courts.

In order to concentrate
power in his own hands,

Henry introduced swift and
consistent royal justice,

as set out here in Glanvill.

Henry established central
courts at Westminster,

and sent newly-appointed
royal justices on a circuit

around the country.

These circuit judges would meet regularly

and agree to follow one
another's decisions,

thus ensuring common
practice throughout England.

A distinct method of law-making emerged.

Laws now evolved through precedent
as well as royal decree.

Disputes over land were important
in this agricultural society.

Traditionally, they'd been
determined by trial by battle,

in which opponents exchanged
blows to resolve the issue.

Only the King could summon a body
of men to give a verdict on oath,

so royal justice could offer a
new, non-violent, alternative,

something not available in the
baronial courts - trial by jury.

"Every free man can retain
his right in his tenement

"and avoid the doubtful outcome of a duel.

"When the 12 knights have been chosen,

"they are to be summoned to come to court

"to swear on oath which party
has the greater right."

This legal revolution was
motivated by Henry's royal

and dynastic ambitions,

but it laid the foundations
for the common law,

the system that still
governs legal practice

and procedure in England and in
the United States to this day.

Henry's imposition of Plantagenet control

alienated many English barons.

It also provoked a power struggle
between Crown and Church.

It came to a head in a bitter
conflict between Henry

and one of his most loyal friends -

Thomas Becket.

Becket was the son of a
London merchant who'd enjoyed

an extraordinary rise to power.

Henry had made him his chancellor,
in charge of the day-to-day running

of the government on the King's behalf,

and he'd acquired enormous wealth.

While Henry disdained luxury and pageantry,

his chancellor revelled in it.

But the two were close friends.

William Fitzstephen, who later
served as Becket's clerk,

says that the two of them hunted,
joked and played together like boys.

The unexpected reverse in the
friendship came in 1162,

following the death of the
Archbishop of Canterbury.

The King was convinced that Becket
would make an ideal replacement,

someone who would support him
in curtailing the judicial

powers of the Church.

Once Becket was in office,
he immediately resigned

as chancellor and devoted himself
to the interests of the Church.

The two of them soon clashed over the
proper limits of priestly power.

Becket supported the Church's view
that the clergy should not be

subject to King Henry's royal courts,

but should be tried in special
church courts where the worst

punishment, even for rape or murder,
was expulsion from the clergy.

Becket refused to compromise.

In fear of the King's wrath, he
spent six years exiled in France.

In 1170, he reached a form of
reconciliation with the King

and came home.

But from the pulpit in Canterbury,
he immediately began to

excommunicate all who had crossed him.

This news provoked an outburst
of demonic Plantagenet fury.

"I have brought up and raised some
feeble, wretched men in my kingdom

"who are not loyal to their Lord.

"Whom they allow to be mocked

"so shamefully by some low-born clergyman."

Legend has simplified
King Henry's words into,

"Who will rid me of this turbulent priest?"

Four knights decided they
understood the King's wish.

In Canterbury, they found Becket
eating in the Bishop's Palace.

Harsh words were exchanged.

The Archbishop then made his
way through these cloisters

and into the cathedral.

The four found Becket here,
in the north transept.

They attempted to drag him back outside,

but the Archbishop clung to a pillar,

calling them pimps and madmen.
They struck out.

The first blows felled Becket.

Then one of the knights hit him

with such force that he sliced
off the top of his head.

The sword itself shattered
on the paving stones.

The knights spread Becket's
brains on the floor and ran off,

one of them calling out,
"This one won't rise again."

Within days, stories began
to circulate that Becket's

blood had miraculous powers.

Soon people with fevers,
tumours, swollen legs,

were being cured by a single drop.

The Pope declared Becket a saint.

Pilgrims came here in their thousands.

They purchased little badges
or tokens, like this one,

and they would take these
home and wear them

on their clothes or on their hats.

Or they might acquire flasks, like this,

containing a tiny drop of
Becket's blood diluted in water.

And they would wear them around
their necks for protection or

even drink the water in the
hope of a miraculous cure.

These objects show that Becket was
more successful in death than

he had been in life.

Henry's expansion of Plantagenet
power had turned many

nobles against him,

and Becket's murder shattered
his reputation in France.

Henry struggled to hold his
sprawling empire together.

He had limitless energy and was
never in the same place for long.

King Louis of France once said of him,

"Now in England. Now in Normandy.

"He must fly rather than
travel by boat or horse."

The French king was always eager to stir up

dissension in the Plantagenet family.

He was still furious about
Eleanor's marriage to Henry.

Complicating matters was Eleanor herself.

She may have been Henry's queen,
but she was not always his ally.

In fact, the greatest threat to Henry

came from his own wife and children.

Henry and Eleanor had three
daughters and five sons together.

Four of the boys lived to adulthood.

Henry,

Richard,

Geoffrey,

and the youngest, and the
King's favourite, John.

After John's birth, Eleanor
moved back to Aquitaine.

She insisted her favourite
son, Richard, be made Duke.

Her scheme was to rule her
homeland in his name.

But Henry frustrated Eleanor
and his teenage son.

Plantagenet sons were impatient
to exercise real power.

They had been brought up to
command, trained in deadly warfare,

their political marriages
often arranged in infancy.

At the age of 20, Henry himself
ruled of half of France

and had been promised
the throne of England.

His sons were equally ambitious.

Henry and Eleanor's eldest
son, Henry the Younger,

sparked the first great
Plantagenet family implosion.

His father had agreed to let him
be crowned joint King of England,

but refused to trust him with any
authority or independent income.

Encouraged by Louis of France,

young Henry raised a rebellion
against his father.

His younger brothers, Richard and
Geoffrey, also joined the revolt.

They were supported by
disaffected French counts,

and some of England's most powerful barons.

Then Eleanor joined the fray.

Medieval kings often faced rebellious sons.

A rebellious queen was less
common and more shocking.

So, when Eleanor was caught

attempting to cross
France to join her sons,

Henry regarded this as the
greatest betrayal of all.

Perhaps even more shocking was the fact

that she was disguised as a man.

This is the ancient
chapel of St Radegund...

...carved into the cliffs

below the Plantagenet
fortress of Chinon in Anjou.

It's been a place of
worship since Roman times.

In 1964, this 12th-century fresco

was discovered under centuries of grime.

It's widely agreed that
they are the Plantagenets,

and it could be significant
that their cloaks have

the same blue-and-white lining as we find

on Geoffrey Plantagenet's funerary plaque.

But it's not quite certain who they are.

It could be Henry II and his four sons.

The first crowned figure being Henry II

and the other crowned figure
being Henry, the young king,

who was the only son of an English king

to be crowned in his father's lifetime.

But one scholar claims to
see Eleanor of Aquitaine

being led off into captivity in England...

...where she was, in fact, held
a prisoner by her husband

for the next 16 years.

With his formidable wife
imprisoned in England,

Henry did battle with the
French king, the rebel barons

and his own sons for 18 months.

The rebels claimed that Thomas Becket,

the new martyr, was on their side,

and Henry sought to ward
off the martyr's anger

by a remarkable act of public
atonement for the murder.

At the height of the rebellion,

the proud Plantagenet
king came to Canterbury.

Here, at the Westgate, he
dismounted, removed his shoes

and walked barefoot through
the crowded streets.

Henry made his way to the
shrine of his murdered friend.

He removed his cloak to reveal a hair shirt

and submitted to being beaten
bloody by the bishops and monks.

He spent the night prostrate
on the bare stone floor.

Henry's salvation came quickly.

The very next day, his troops won a
stunning victory over his enemies

and soon they were all
brought to submission.

But Henry had been forced to
abase himself before the clergy

and recognise the authority of the Church.

Tension between monarchy and
church was never fully resolved.

But the Plantagenet
settlement with the Pope

held for the next 350 years.

There was no settlement
between the Plantagenets

and the French monarchy, despite a
new king, Philip, taking the throne.

He encouraged Henry the Younger
and his brother Geoffrey

to rebel again.

This time, they attacked their
brother Richard's Duchy of Aquitaine

and occupied the city of Limoges.

Henry II marched on the city

and rode up to the walls,
hoping to reason with his sons.

Henry the Younger ordered archers
to fire on his own father.

An arrow narrowly missed the King.

A few months later, young Henry
was struck down with dysentery.

To fight against your father,
and against the King, was a sin

and Henry believed that his
illness was divine retribution.

As an act of penance, he gave
away all his possessions.

He lay on a bed of ashes,
dressed in a hair shirt,

with a noose around his neck
like a common criminal.

Young King Henry died with
nothing but the sapphire ring

his father had sent him as
a token of forgiveness.

When he heard of the
death of his eldest son,

old King Henry said,

"He cost me much, but I wish
he lived to cost me more."

Now it was Richard's turn
to betray his father.

And once again, the French king
was the family traitor's ally.

The two spent the summer pursuing
the ageing Henry around France.

They eventually besieged him here,
in his birthplace, Le Mans.

In order to deny his assailant
supplies and a base,

Henry ordered that the suburbs
outside the city walls

should be put to the torch, but
the wind changed and the flames

leapt over these ancient Roman
walls into the city itself.

Henry was forced to abandon Le Mans.

Ill and exhausted, he had to
submit to his treacherous son.

But as he gave Richard the kiss of
peace, he whispered in his ear,

"God grant that I do not die until
I have avenged myself on you."

Too sick to walk, Henry was
carried here to Chinon Castle.

He was shown a list of those
who had rebelled against him.

At its head was the name of his
youngest and favourite son.

"Is it true," he said, "that
John, my heart, whom I've loved

"more than all my other
sons, has abandoned me?"

On 6th July, 1189, betrayed
by his wife and every son,

Henry, the first Plantagenet
King of England, died.

His last words are said to have been,

"Shame, shame on a conquered king."

The King of England's body was buried here

in the Abbey of Fontevraud in Anjou.

The Plantagenets' future now
lay in the hands of Richard...

...a dynamic and bloodthirsty warrior.

One of Richard's courtiers
said he was furious in arms,

rejoicing to travel only
on bloodstained roads.

But when he arrived here, to stand
vigil over his dead father's body,

he is said to have wept bitterly
over the king he had betrayed.

As he did so, blood began to pour
from the dead king's nostrils.

According to medieval beliefs,

this was sure sign of the
presence of a murderer.

The traitorous son would become

the great English hero
Richard the Lionheart.

But he could speak barely
a word of English.

He visited his kingdom only
briefly for his coronation

and, in the ten years of his reign,

spent only six months in the country.

The moment he became king,
Richard had his mother, Eleanor,

released from captivity and
made regent of England.

Richard, the favourite son,
bestowed on his mother

the power of doing whatever
she wished in the kingdom.

He himself regarded England
primarily as a source of money

to fund his wars to assert
Plantagenet power in France

or to win glory and
spiritual merit on crusade.

He once said, "I would sell
London if I could find a buyer."

Europe had been gripped by crusading fever

since Jerusalem had fallen
to Saladin's Muslim forces.

The prestige of reclaiming the holy city

was irresistibly appealing
to the warlike new king.

Philip of France also
vowed to go on crusade.

The two kings arranged to meet here,
at Vezelay Abbey in Burgundy.

The chronicle of the Third Crusade

describes how these hills and valleys

were filled with the tents and
pavilions of two vast armies.

It looked like a new city.

Richard and Philip spent two
days here planning the campaign.

They considered their crusade
an armed pilgrimage.

Their hardships would earn them
absolution for their sins.

They swore a sacred oath agreeing to
divide the spoils of war equally.

The two great pilgrim armies
then set out for the Holy Land.

But on the way, the grand
alliance forged here turned sour.

In Sicily, Richard caused
outrage by reneging

on a childhood betrothal to
the French king's sister.

The old feud between the Plantagenets

and the French monarchy was reignited.

The armies then made their way
separately to the Holy Land.

Philip arrived first and
joined a Christian siege

of the strategically crucial port of Acre.

The Plantagenet army
arrived seven weeks later.

Richard immediately assumed command

and re-energised the faltering assault.

Richard already had a
reputation for ferocity

and his name struck fear into the Muslims.

"The King of England was
a very powerful man,"

wrote one of Saladin's officials, "A
man of great spirit and courage."

He'd fought many great battles and
had a burning passion for war.

Muslim mothers told their children,

"Be good, or the King of
England will get you."

Within two months of his arrival,

the city that had held out
for two years surrendered.

Once again, a French king was
humiliated by a Plantagenet.

Announcing his crusade complete,
Philip returned to France.

Richard fought on.

But his arrogance turned
many allies into enemies.

After 18 months, Richard headed home,

but en route, was captured and
imprisoned by the Duke of Austria,

one of the enemies he had
made in the Holy Land.

The Plantagenet empire was left
in the hands of his mother

and his younger brother John.

It had always been difficult

to fit the youngest Plantagenet
son into the family plans.

There had been no territories
left to award John

and he'd been nicknamed Lackland.

Henry had finally managed to
make him Lord of Ireland.

But John wanted the English crown.

He began plotting with Philip of France.

In exchange for his backing,
John agreed to hand him

the strategically vital Vexin region,

guarded by this great
border fortress of Gisors.

Gisors protected the gateway

between the lands of the king
of France in that direction,

which began just beyond the castle walls,

and Plantagenet Normandy
with its capital at Rouen

just a day's ride away in that direction.

John was making a terrible mistake.

By agreeing to surrender the Vexin,

he was leaving Normandy defenceless.

John and Philip did their best

to make sure Richard stayed in his prison.

But Eleanor was doing all she
could to free her favourite son.

Eventually, Eleanor managed
to raise the enormous ransom,

34 tons of silver, a king's ransom indeed.

Philip sent John word -

"Beware! The devil is loosed!"

On Richard's return, John
was forced to submit.

Richard then set about
re-conquering what John had lost.

In 1197, Richard confronted Philip's army

before the walls of Gisors.

Richard is said to have
ridden at the French

just as a raving lion starved
of food runs on his prey.

As they fled, Philip and his knights
crowded onto the bridge at Gisors

in such numbers that it collapsed.
20 knights drowned.

King Philip was dragged out alive,

but was said to have "drunk of the river".

Richard had Philip on the run.

Richard had survived many
savage campaigns far from home.

But in the spring of
1199, his luck ran out.

While laying siege to the castle of
a rebellious baron in Aquitaine,

he was struck by a crossbow bolt.

Returning to his tent,
he broke off the shaft,

but the head was too deeply embedded
in his shoulder. The wound festered.

Richard wrote a last letter
to his mother Eleanor

asking her to come to
him, but it was too late.

His body was buried alongside his
father in the abbey of Fontevraud.

The heart of the lion, said
to be "of great size",

was interred in the Norman capital, Rouen.

John was now the only surviving
son of Henry and Eleanor.

His older brother Geoffrey
had died in 1186.

But just as the English
crown seemed in his grasp,

he faced another contender for the throne,

Geoffrey's teenage son Arthur.

John quickly secured his
coronation at Westminster.

But yet again, the French king
provoked a Plantagenet family feud

by supporting Arthur's claim
to the English crown.

Wicked uncles are a common feature
of medieval dynastic politics.

Like John, they're usually
younger brothers.

They watch from the sidelines

as an older brother attains
the exalted position of king.

But if that brother dies,

it's understandable that they might think,

"I could tolerate being
subordinate to my older brother,

"but not to my snotty-nosed nephew."

And in this violent world,
it's not surprising

if the uncle sometimes decides that
the nephew must be eliminated.

In 1202, Arthur led an army into Anjou,

hoping to capture his grandmother Eleanor.

The great Plantagenet matriarch was now 80.

John rushed to Anjou to free her

and young Arthur was captured.

No-one is certain what
happened to Arthur after that.

But a contemporary chronicler
claims that Arthur's own jailer

told him of the boy's fate.

According to him,

John at first kept his
16-year-old nephew a prisoner,

but then one night, after dinner,

when John was "drunk and
full of the devil",

he went to Arthur's cell and
killed him with his own hands,

then tied a huge stone around the corpse

and tossed it into the River Seine.

Philip of France refused
to make peace with John

until Arthur was handed over alive.

He probably knew this was impossible.

One by one, John lost the
Plantagenets' French domains.

In 1204, Philip conquered
Plantagenet Normandy.

After 300 years, it was now fully
part of France once again.

Soon, all that remained of the
Plantagenets' continental empire

was Gascony, a fragment of Eleanor's
great Duchy of Aquitaine.

Eleanor spent her final years
here in Fontevraud Abbey.

She lived to see her only
surviving son, John,

lose the great European empire
she had founded and fought for.

She died as the French king

was closing in for his
final assault on Normandy.

She was buried here, alongside Henry,

the husband she had betrayed,

and Richard, the son she loved the most.

With France lost,

John was determined to
tighten his grip on England.

He dispossessed barons who opposed him,

and exploited his royal powers to
accumulate vast personal wealth.

Like his father, John also resented
Rome's power in his realm,

and in 1206,

he refused to accept the Pope's
latest choice of Archbishop.

In retaliation, the Pope deployed
his most fearsome weapon.

The kingdom of England was
placed under an interdict.

This meant that all church services
in England were suspended.

The churches and cathedrals stood empty.

No baptisms or marriages
could take place in church,

the dead could not be
buried in churchyards.

No church bells were heard in England.

And this lasted six years.

For believers in a
so-called "age of faith",

this must have been deeply disturbing.

But it made John rich.

John hit back by confiscating
the clergy's possessions.

Here at Lincoln Cathedral,
the Bishop received

a letter from John, informing
him that royal custodians would

seize everything owned by clergy
refusing to perform their duties.

John had a malicious sense of humour.

He ordered that all the priests'
mistresses should be locked up

and held to ransom.

The King and the Pope
eventually came to terms.

John would accept the Pope's
nominee as Archbishop -

but he would keep all the money that
he'd squeezed out of the Church.

But John wanted MORE money.

He was determined to fund an army

to win back his Plantagenet birthright -

the territories he had lost in France.

His English barons didn't
share his dynastic ambition,

and were not enthusiastic.

But John began to squeeze them dry,

extracting what he needed
through draconian taxes,

and by exploiting the royal courts
his father had established.

John soon became richer than
any English king before him.

The hostility this provoked was compounded

by John's reputation for lechery.

He was accused of sleeping
with the wives and daughters

of his barons.

He certainly fathered at least half
a dozen illegitimate children.

"He was too covetous of pretty
women," wrote one contemporary,

"and brought terrible shame
to the great men of the land.

"For this, he was much hated."

John trusted no-one

and made his barons hand
over family members

as hostages to guarantee their compliance.

When one of his nobles, William de Braose,

prepared to give up his sons,

his wife remembered how the King
had treated his own nephew.

William de Braose was the baron who
had served as Arthur's jailer.

His wife shouted at him, "I
will not hand over my boys

"to your lord, King John,

"because he foully murdered
his nephew, Arthur,

"when he should have kept him
in honourable captivity."

The King's reaction was savage.

De Braose managed to
escape to France but John

captured his wife and son
and imprisoned them.

He commanded that their food be stopped.

After 11 days, they were
found, starved to death.

The son's cheeks had been eaten away

by his ravenous mother.

Plantagenet cruelty had sunk to new depths.

John's invasion of France failed.

In May 1215, many English barons

renounced their allegiance
to him and occupied London.

They demanded a settlement,
liberating the nobility

from absolute royal power.

In desperation, John agreed to
accept the demands they made.

The agreement was issued in a charter

sealed at Runnymede.

Magna Carta - the great charter -

is one of the most famous
documents in English history.

Only four copies of the original issue

are known to survive...

...including this one,
held at Lincoln Castle.

To secure the Plantagenets on the throne,

Henry II had concentrated power
in the hands of the monarch.

John's abuse of that power showed the
dangers of leaving it unchecked.

Magna Carta was the barons' response.

Some of its clauses seem quite mundane,

like the one fixing the
level of death duties.

But this was a royal power
that John had exploited

for financial gain.

Other clauses have a more ringing tone.

"No free man shall be seized or
imprisoned, except by the lawful

"judgment of his peers and
by the law of the land.

"To no-one will we sell,
to no-one deny or delay

"right and justice."

All the clauses are based on the idea that

there is a right way of doing things,

enshrined in Magna Carta
as the law of the land.

The most important thing was
that it bound both king

and subject.

Plantagenet dynastic ambition

had provoked a new settlement
between the monarchs

and those they ruled.

Magna Carta has become
an emblem of liberty.

But at the time it was a complete failure.

The Pope called it, "Not
only shameful and demeaning

"but also illegal and unjust."

At John's request, he annulled it.

Once again, the Plantagenets
plunged England

into civil war.

Many barons decided they
would rather be ruled by

the French than by John.

The rebels offered the English throne

to Prince Louis, son of the
Plantagenets' perennial enemy -

King Philip of France.

In 1216, Louis landed on the English coast

and was warmly welcomed by the rebels.

Some celebrated his arrival

as liberation from Plantagenet tyranny.

The madness of slavery is over.

Days of liberty have arrived.

Happy days at last, after so many evils.

In his 17-year reign, John had lost
most of the Plantagenet empire.

Now, the English crown was at stake.

John led his mercenary army on a rampage,

attacking rebel-held areas
across southern England.

In King's Lynn, he contracted dysentery

but refused to rest.

In October, John took a short cut here

across the marshes of the Wash.

The wagons carrying his
vast accumulated treasures

were cut off by the incoming tide.

As the King looked on helplessly,

men, horses and the treasure
he'd acquired so ruthlessly

were swallowed up by the quicksands.

Exhausted and broken, John
died three days later.

In medieval Europe, the
destinies of nations

were determined by the lives and the deaths

of their ruling dynasties.

John's death plunged the
Plantagenets into crisis.

His son and heir, Henry,
was a nine-year-old boy.

Half the kingdom that he'd
inherited was in the hands

of the French prince, who was
holding court in London.

The future of the Plantagenet dynasty

had never looked so bleak.

In the next programme, The English Empire,

the resurgent Plantagenets
fight to expand their dominion

across Wales and Scotland...

...they attempt to win back France...

...and Parliament is born in
a Plantagenet golden age

of pageants and chivalry.