EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY

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[Illustration: WINDSOR CASTLE
The town of Windsor lies on the west bank of the Thames about twenty-one
miles from London. Its famous castle has been the chief residence of
English sovereigns from the time of William the Conqueror. The massive
round tower which forms the most conspicuous feature of the castle was
built by Henry III about 1272 A.D. but Edward III wholly reconstructed it
about 1344 A.D. The state apartments of the castle include the throne
room, a guard room with medieval armor a reception room adorned with
tapestries picture galleries and the royal library.]

ACCUSATION BY THE "GRAND JURY"

Another of Henry's innovations developed into the "grand jury." Before his
time many offenders went unpunished, especially if they were so powerful
that no private individual dared accuse them. Henry provided that when the
king's justices came to a county court a number of selected men should be
put upon their oath and required to give the names of any persons whom
they knew or believed to be guilty of crimes. Such persons were then to be
arrested and tried. This "grand jury," as it came to be called, thus had
the public duty of making accusations, whether its members felt any
personal interest in the matter or not.

THE COMMON LAW

The decisions handed down by the legal experts who composed the royal
court formed the basis of the English system of jurisprudence. It received
the name Common law because it grew out of such customs as were common to
the realm, as distinguished from those which were merely local. This law,
from Henry's II's time, became so widespread and so firmly established
that it could not be supplanted by the Roman law followed on the
Continent. Carried by English colonists across the seas, it has now come
to prevail throughout a great part of the world.

184. THE GREAT CHARTER, 1215 A.D.

RICHARD I AND JOHN, 1189-1216 A.D.

The great Henry, from whose legal reforms English-speaking peoples receive
benefit even to-day, was followed by his son, Richard, the Lion-hearted
crusader. [6] After a short reign Richard was succeeded by his brother,
John, a man so cruel, tyrannical, and wicked that he is usually regarded
as the worst of English kings. In a war with the French ruler, Philip
Augustus, John lost Normandy and some of the other English possessions on
the Continent. [7] In a dispute with Innocent III he ended by making an
abject submission to the Papacy. [8] Finally, John's oppressive government
provoked a revolt, and he was forced to grant the charter of privileges
known as Magna Carta.

[Illustration: Map, DOMINIONS OF THE PLANTAGENETS IN ENGLAND AND FRANCE]

WINNING OF MAGNA CARTA, 1215 A.D.

The Norman Conquest had made the king so strong that his authority could
be resisted only by a union of all classes of the people. The feudal lords
were obliged to unite with the clergy and the commons, [9] in order to
save their honor, their estates, and their heads. Matters came to a crisis
in 1215 A.D., when the nobles, supported by the archbishop of Canterbury,
placed their demands for reform in writing before the king. John swore
furiously that they were "idle dreams without a shadow of reason" and
refused to make any concessions. Thereupon the nobles formed the "army of
God and the Holy Church," as it was called, and occupied London, thus
ranging the townspeople on their side. Deserted by all except the hired
troops which he had brought from the Continent, John was compelled to
yield. At Runnimede on the Thames, not far from Windsor, he set his seal
to the Great Charter.

[Illustration: EXTRACT FROM THE GREAT CHARTER
Facsimile of the opening lines. Four copies of Magna Carta, sealed with
the great seal of King John, as well as several unsealed copies, are in
existence. The British Museum possesses two of the sealed copies; the
other two belong to the cathedrals of Lincoln and Salisbury,
respectively.]

CHARACTER OF MAGNA CARTA

Magna Carta does not profess to be a charter of liberties for all
Englishmen. Most of its sixty-three clauses merely guarantee to each
member of the coalition against John--nobles, clergy, and commons--those
special privileges which the Norman rulers had tried to take away. Very
little is said in this long document about the serfs, who composed
probably five-sixths of the population of England in the thirteenth
century.

SIGNIFICANCE OF MAGNA CARTA

But there are three clauses of Magna Carta which came to have a most
important part in the history of English freedom. The first declared that
no taxes were to be levied on the nobles--besides the three recognized
feudal aids [10]--except by consent of the Great Council of the realm.
[11] By this clause the nobles compelled the king to secure their consent
before imposing any taxation. The second set forth that no one was to be
arrested, imprisoned, or punished in any way, except after a trial by his
equals and in accordance with the law of the land. The third said simply
that to no one should justice be sold, denied, or delayed. These last two
clauses contained the germ of great legal principles on which the English
people relied for protection against despotic kings. They form a part of
our American inheritance from England and have passed into the laws of all
our states.

185. PARLIAMENT DURING THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY

HENRY III, 1216-1272 A.D.

The thirteenth century, which opened so auspiciously with the winning of
the Great Charter, is also memorable as the time when England developed
her Parliament [12] into something like its present form. The first steps
in parliamentary government were taken during the reign of John's son,
Henry III.

THE WITENAGEMOT AND THE GREAT COUNCIL

It had long been the custom in England that in all important matters a
ruler ought not to act without the advice and consent of his leading men.
The Anglo-Saxon kings sought the advice and consent of their Witenagemot,
[13] a body of nobles, royal officers, bishops, and abbots. It approved
laws, served as a court of final appeal, elected a new monarch, and at
times deposed him. The Witenagemot did not disappear after the Norman
Conquest. Under the name of the Great Council it continued to meet from
time to time for consultation with the king. This assembly was now to be
transformed from a feudal body into a parliament representing the entire
nation.

SIMON DE MONTFORT'S PARLIAMENT, 1265 A.D.

The Great Council, which by one of the provisions of Magna Carta had been
required to give its consent to the levying of feudal dues, met quite
frequently during Henry III's reign. On one occasion, when Henry was in
urgent need of money and the bishops and lords refused to grant it, the
king took the significant step of calling to the council two knights from
each county to declare what aid they would give him. These knights, so ran
Henry's summons, were to come "in the stead of each and all," in other
words, they were to act as representatives of the counties. Then in 1265
A.D., when the nobles were at war with the king, a second and even more
significant step was taken. Their leader, Simon de Montfort, summoned to
the council not only two knights from each county, but also two citizens
from each of the more important towns.

THE REPRESENTATIVE SYSTEM

The custom of selecting certain men to act in the name and on the behalf
of the community had existed during Anglo-Saxon times in local government.
Representatives of the counties had been employed by the Norman kings to
act as assessors in levying taxes. As we have just learned, the "juries"
of Henry II also consisted of such representatives. The English people, in
fact, were quite familiar with the idea of representation long before it
was applied on a larger scale to Parliament.

"MODEL PARLIAMENT" OF EDWARD I, 1295 A.D.

Simon de Montfort's Parliament included only his own supporters, and hence
was not a truly national body. But it made a precedent for the future.
Thirty years later Edward I called together at Westminster, now a part of
London, a Parliament which included all classes of the people. Here were
present archbishops, bishops, and abbots, earls and barons, two knights
from every county, and two townsmen to represent each town in that county.
After this time all these classes were regularly summoned to meet in
assembly at Westminster.

HOUSE OF LORDS AND HOUSE OF COMMONS

The separation of Parliament into two chambers came in the fourteenth
century. The House of Lords included the nobles and higher clergy, the
House of Commons, the representatives from counties and cities. This
bicameral arrangement, as it is called, has been followed in the
parliaments of most modern countries.

POWERS OF PARLIAMENT

The early English Parliament was not a law-making but a tax-voting body.
The king would call the two houses in session only when he needed their
sanction for raising money. Parliament in its turn would refuse to grant
supplies until the king had corrected abuses in the administration or had
removed unpopular officials. This control of the public purse in time
enabled Parliament to grasp other powers. It became an accepted principle
that royal officials were responsible to Parliament for their actions,
that the king himself might be deposed for good cause, and that bills,
when passed by Parliament and signed by the king, were the law of the
land. England thus worked out in the Middle Ages a system of parliamentary
government which nearly all civilized nations have held worthy of
imitation.

186. EXPANSION OF ENGLAND UNDER EDWARD I, 1272-1307 A.D.

THE BRITISH ISLES

Our narrative has been confined until now to England, which forms,
together with Wales and Scotland, the island known as Great Britain.
Ireland is the only other important division of the United Kingdom. It was
almost inevitable that in process of time the British Isles should have
come under a single government, but political unity has not yet fused
English, Scotch, Welsh, and Irish into a single people.

WALES

The conquest of Britain by the Anglo-Saxons drove many of the Welsh, [14]
as the invaders called the Britons, into the western part of the island.
This district, henceforth known as Wales, was one of the last strongholds
of the Celts. Even to-day a variety of the old Celtic language, called
Cymric, is still spoken by the Welsh people.

CONQUEST OF WALES

In their wild and mountainous country the Welsh long resisted all attempts
to subjugate them. Harold exerted some authority over Wales, William the
Conqueror entered part of it, and Henry II induced the local rulers to
acknowledge him as overlord, but it was Edward I who first brought all
Wales under English sway. Edward fostered the building of towns in his new
possession, divided it into counties or shires, after the system that
prevailed in England, and introduced the Common law. He called his son,
Edward II, who was born in the country, the "Prince of Wales," and this
title has ever since been borne by the heir apparent to the English
throne. The work of uniting Wales to England went on slowly, and two
centuries elapsed before Wales was granted representation in the House of
Commons.

[Illustration: CORONATION CHAIR, WESTMINSTER ABBEY
Every English ruler since Edward I has been crowned in this oak chair.
Under the seat is the "Stone of Scone," said to have been once used by the
patriarch Jacob. Edward I brought it to London in 1291 A.D., as a token of
the subjection of Scotland.]

SCOTLAND

Scotland derives its name from the Scots, who came over from Ireland early
in the fifth century. [15] The northern Highlands, a nest of rugged
mountains washed by cold and stormy seas, have always been occupied in
historic times by a Celtic-speaking people, whose language, called Gaelic,
is not yet extinct there. This part of Scotland, like Wales, was a home of
freedom. The Romans did not attempt to annex the Highlands, and the Anglo-
Saxons and Danes never penetrated their fastnesses. On the other hand the
southern Lowlands, which include only about one-third of Scotland, were
subdued by the Teutonic invaders, and so this district became thoroughly
English in language and culture. [16]

[Illustration: Map, SCOTLAND in the 13th Century]

THE SCOTTOSH KINGDOM

One might suppose that the Lowlands, geographically only an extension of
northern England and inhabited by an English-speaking people, would have
early united with the southern kingdom. But matters turned out otherwise.
The Lowlands and the Highlands came together under a line of Celtic kings,
who fixed their residence at Edinburgh and long maintained their
independence.

SCOTLAND ANNEXED BY EDWARD I

Edward I, having conquered Wales, took advantage of the disturbed
conditions which prevailed in Scotland to interfere in the affairs of that
country. The Scotch offered a brave but futile resistance under William
Wallace. This heroic leader, who held out after most of his countrymen
submitted, was finally captured and executed. His head, according to the
barbarous practice of the time, was set upon a pole on London Bridge. The
English king now annexed Scotland without further opposition.

[Illustration: A QUEEN ELEANOR CROSS
After the death of his wife Eleanor, Edward I caused a memorial cross to
be set up at each place where her funeral procession had stopped on its
way to London. There were originally seven crosses. Of the three that
still exist, the Geddington cross is the best preserved. It consists of
three stories and stands on a platform of eight steps.]

ROBERT BRUCE AND BANNOCKBURN, 1314 A.D.

But William Wallace by his life and still more by his death had lit a fire
which might never be quenched. Soon the Scotch found another champion in
the person of Robert Bruce. Edward I, now old and broken, marched against
him, but died before reaching the border. The weakness of his son, Edward
II, permitted the Scotch, ably led by Bruce, to win the signal victory of
Bannockburn, near Stirling Castle. Here the Scottish spearmen drove the
English knighthood into ignominious flight and freed their country from
its foreign overlords.

SCOTTISH INDEPENDENCE

The battle of Bannockburn made a nation. A few years afterwards the
English formally recognized the independence of the northern kingdom. So
the great design of Edward I to unite all the peoples of Britain under one
government had to be postponed for centuries. [17]

IRELAND

No one kingdom ever arose in Ireland out of the numerous tribes into which
the Celtic-speaking inhabitants were divided. The island was not troubled,
however, by foreign invaders till the coming of the Northmen in the ninth
century. [18] The English, who first entered Ireland during the reign of
Henry II, did not complete its conquest till the seventeenth century.
Ireland by its situation could scarcely fail to become an appanage of
Great Britain, but the dividing sea has combined with differences in race,
language, and religion, and with English misgovernment, to prevent
anything like a genuine union of the conquerors and the conquered.

187. UNIFICATION OF FRANCE, 987-1328 A.D.

PHYSICAL FRANCE

Nature seems to have intended that France should play a leading part in
European affairs. The geographical unity of the country is obvious.
Mountains and seas form its permanent boundaries, except on the north-east
where the frontier is not well defined. The western coast of France opens
on the Atlantic, now the greatest highway of the world's commerce, while
on the southeast France touches the Mediterranean, the home of classical
civilization. This intermediate position between two seas helps us to
understand why French history should form, as it were, a connecting link
between ancient and modern times.

RACIAL FRANCE

But the greatness of France has been due, also, to the qualities of the
French people. Many racial elements have contributed to the population.
The blood of prehistoric tribes, whose monuments and grave mounds are
scattered over the land, still flows in the veins of Frenchmen. At the
opening of historic times France was chiefly occupied by the Celts, whom
Julius Caesar found there and subdued. The Celts, or Gauls, have formed in
later ages the main stock of the French nation, but their language gave
place to Latin after the Roman conquest. In the course of five hundred
years the Gauls were so thoroughly Romanized that they may best be
described as Gallo-Romans. The Burgundians, Franks, and Northmen
afterwards added a Teutonic element to the population, as well as some
infusion of Teutonic laws and customs.

THE CAPETIAN DYNASTY

France, again, became a great nation because of the greatness of its
rulers. Hugh Capet, who became the French king in 987 A.D., [19] was
fortunate in his descendants. The Capetian dynasty was long lived, and for
more than three centuries son followed father on the throne without a
break in the succession. [20] During this time the French sovereigns
worked steadily to exalt the royal power and to unite the feudal states of
medieval France into a real nation under a common government. Their
success in this task made them, at the close of the Middle Ages, the
strongest monarchs in Europe.

FRANCE AND ITS FIEFS

Hugh Capet's duchy--the original France--included only a small stretch of
inland country centering about Paris on the Seine and Orleans on the
Loire. His election to the kingship did not increase his power over the
great lords who ruled in Normandy, Brittany, Aquitaine, Burgundy, and
other parts of the country. They did homage to the king for their fiefs
and performed the usual feudal services, but otherwise regarded themselves
as independent in their own territories.

[Illustration: Map, UNIFICATION OF FRANCE DURING THE MIDDLE AGES]

PHILIP II, AUGUSTUS, 1180-1223 A.D.

The most considerable additions to the royal domains were made by Philip
II, called Augustus. We have already referred to his contest with Pope
Innocent III and to his participation in the Third Crusade. [21] The
English king, John, was Philip's vassal for Normandy and other provinces
in France. A quarrel between the two rulers gave Philip an opportunity to
declare John's fiefs forfeited by feudal law. Philip then seized all the
English possessions north of the river Loire. The loss of these
possessions abroad had the result of separating England almost completely
from Continental interests; for France it meant a great increase in
territory and population. Philip made Paris his chief residence, and that
city henceforth became the capital of France.

LOUIS IX, THE SAINT, 1226-1276 A.D.

During the long reign of Philip's grandson, Louis IX, rich districts to
the west of the Rhone were added to the royal domains. This king, whose
Christian virtues led to his canonization, distinguished himself as an
administrator. His work in unifying France may be compared with that of
Henry II in England. He decreed that only the king's money was to
circulate in the provinces owned directly by himself, thus limiting the
right of coinage enjoyed by feudal lords. He restricted very greatly the
right of private war and forbade the use of judicial duels. Louis also
provided that important cases could be appealed from feudal courts to the
king's judges, who sat in Paris and followed in their decisions the
principles of Roman law. In these and other ways he laid the foundations
of absolute monarchy in France.

PHILIP IV, THE FAIR, 1265-1314 A.D.

The grandson of St. Louis, Philip IV, did much to organize a financial
system for France. Now that the kingdom had become so large and powerful,
the old feudal dues were insufficient to pay the salaries of the royal
officials and support a standing army. Philip resorted to new methods of
raising revenue by imposing various taxes and by requiring the feudal
lords to substitute payments in money for the military service due from
them.

THE ESTATES-GENERAL

Philip also called into existence the Estates-General, an assembly in
which the clergy, the nobles, and representatives from the commons (the
"third estate") met as separate bodies and voted grants of money. The
Estates-General arose almost at the same time as the English Parliament,
to which it corresponded, but it never secured the extensive authority of
that body. After a time the kings of France became so powerful that they
managed to reign without once summoning the nation in council. The French
did not succeed, as the English had done, in founding political liberty
upon the vote and control of taxation.

188. THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR BETWEEN FRANCE AND ENGLAND, 1337-1453 A.D.

PRETEXT FOR THE WAR

The task of unifying France was interrupted by a deplorable war between
that country and England. It continued, including periods of truce, for
over a century. The pretext for the war was found in a disputed
succession. In 1328 A.D. the last of the three sons of Philip IV passed
away, and the direct line of the house of Capet, which had reigned over
France for more than three hundred years, came to an end. The English
ruler, Edward III, whose mother was the daughter of Philip IV, considered
himself the next lineal heir. The French nobles were naturally unwilling
to receive a foreigner as king, and gave the throne, instead, to a nephew
of Philip IV. This decision was afterwards justified on the ground that,
by the old law of the Salian Franks, women could neither inherit estates
nor transmit them to a son. [22]

[Illustration: ROYAL ARMS OF EDWARD III
Edward III, having in 1340 A.D. set up a claim to the throne of France,
proceeded to add the French lilies (_fleurs-de-lis_) to his coat of arms.
He also took as his motto _Dieu et mon Droit_ ("God and my Right"). The
lilies of France remained in the royal arms till 1801 A.D.; the motto is
still retained.]

REASONS FOR THE WAR

Edward III at first accepted the situation. Philip VI, however, irritated
Edward by constant encroachments on the territories which the English
still kept in France. Philip also allied himself with the Scotch and
interfered with English trade interests in the county of Flanders. [23]
This attitude of hostility provoked retaliation. Edward now reasserted his
claim to the crown of France and prepared by force of arms to make it
good.

[Illustration: ENGLISH ARCHER
From an old manuscript.]

BATTLES OF CRECY, 1346 A.D., AND POITIERS, 1356 A.D.

In 1346 A.D. Edward led his troops across the Channel and at Crecy gained
a complete victory over the knighthood of France. Ten years later the
English at Poitiers almost annihilated another French force much superior
in numbers. These two battles were mainly won by foot soldiers armed with
the long bow, in the use of which the English excelled. Ordinary iron mail
could not resist the heavy, yard-long arrows, which fell with murderous
effect upon the bodies of men and horses alike. Henceforth infantry, when
properly armed and led, were to prove themselves on many a bloody field
more than a match for feudal cavalry. The long bow, followed later by the
musket, struck a deadly blow at feudalism.

THE "BLACK PRINCE"

Edward's son, the Prince of Wales, when only sixteen years of age, won his
spurs by distinguished conduct at Crecy. It was the "Black Prince," [24]
also, who gained the day at Poitiers, where he took prisoner the French
king, John. Toward his royal captive he behaved in chivalrous fashion. At
supper, on the evening of the battle, he stood behind John's chair and
waited on him, praising the king's brave deeds. But this "flower of
knighthood," who regarded warfare as only a tournament on a larger scale,
could be ruthless in his treatment of the common people. On one occasion
he caused three thousand inhabitants of a captured town--men, women and
children--to be butchered before his eyes. The incident shows how far
apart in the Middle Ages were chivalry and humanity.

RENEWAL OF THE WAR

The English, in spite of their victories, could not conquer France. The
French refused to fight more pitched battles and retired to their castles
and fortified towns. The war almost ceased for many years after the death
of Edward III. It began again early in the fifteenth century, and the
English this time met with more success. They gained possession of almost
all France north of the Loire, except the important city of Orleans. Had
the English taken it, French resistance must have collapsed. That they did
not take it was due to one of the most remarkable women in history--Joan
of Arc. [25]

THE "MAID OF ORLEANS," 1429 A.D.

Joan was a peasant girl, a native of the little village of Domremy. Always
a devout and imaginative child, she early began to see visions of saints
and angels and to hear mysterious voices. At the time of the siege of
Orleans the archangel Michael appeared to her, so she declared, and bade
her go forth and save France. Joan obeyed, and though barely seventeen
years of age made her way to the court of the French king. There her
piety, simplicity, and evident faith in her mission overcame all doubts.
Clad in armor, girt with an ancient sword, and with a white banner borne
before her, Joan was allowed to accompany an army for the relief of
Orleans. She inspired the French with such enthusiasm that they quickly
compelled the English to raise the siege. Then Joan led her king to Reims
and stood beside him at his coronation in the cathedral.