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Henry I of England (c.Sep 1068 - 1 December 1135), called Henry Beauclerc because of his scholarly interests, was the fourth son of William the Conqueror. He reigned as King of England from 1100 to 1135, succeeding his brother, William II Rufus. Henry also was known by the nickname "Lion of Justice", due to the refinements which he brought about in the rudimentary administrative and legislative machinery of the time. He seized power after the death of William II, which occurred (conveniently) during the absence of his older brother Robert Curthose on the Crusades. His reign is noted for his opportunistic political skills, the aforementioned improvements in the machinery of government, the integration of the divided Anglo-Saxon and Normans within his kingdom, his reuniting of the dominions of his father, and his controversial (although well-founded) decision to name his daughter as his heir. Early life Henry was born between May 1068 and May 1069, probably in Selby, Yorkshire in England. His mother, Queen Matilda of Flanders, named him after her uncle, King Henry I of France. As the youngest son of the family, he was most likely expected to become a bishop and was given extensive schooling for a young nobleman of that time period. William of Malmesbury asserts that Henry once remarked that an illiterate king was a crowned ass. He was probably the first Norman ruler to be fluent in the English language. His father William, upon his death in 1087, bequeathed his dominions to his three remaining sons (third son Richard having died previously) in the following manner: Robert received the Duchy of Normandy William received the Kingdom of England Henry received 5,000 pounds of silver Orderic Vitalis reports that King William declared to Henry: "You in your own time will have all the dominions I have acquired and be greater than both your brothers in wealth and power." Henry played his brothers off against each other. Eventually, wary of his devious manouevering, they acted together and signed an accession treaty which effectively barred Henry from both thrones, stipulating that if either died without an heir, the two dominions of their father would be reunited under the surviving brother. Seizing the throne of England When William II was killed by an arrow whilst hunting on 2 August 1100, Robert was returning from the First Crusade. His absence, along with his poor reputation among the Norman nobles, allowed Henry to seize the keys of the royal hoard at Winchester. He was accepted as king by the leading barons and was crowned three days later on 5 August at Westminster. He secured his position among the nobles by an act of political appeasement, issuing the Charter of Liberties, which is considered a forerunner of the Magna Carta. First marriage On 11 November 1100 Henry married Edith, daughter of King Malcolm III of Scotland. Since Edith was also the niece of Edgar Atheling, the marriage united the Norman line with old English line of kings. The marriage greatly displeased the Norman barons, however, and as a concession to their sensibilities Edith changed her name to Matilda upon becoming queen. The obverse side of this coin, however, was that Henry, by dint of his marriage, became far more acceptable to the Anglo-Saxon populace. William of Malmesbury describes Henry thus: "He was of middle stature, greater than the small, but exceeded by the very tall; his hair was black and set back upon the forehead; his eyes mildly bright; his chest brawny; his body fleshy." Conquest of Normandy In 1101, the following year, Robert Curthose attempted to seize the crown by invading England. In the Treaty of Alton, Robert agreed to recognize Henry as King of England and return peacefully to Normandy, upon receipt of an annual sum of 2000 marks, which Henry proceeded to pay. In 1105, to eliminate the continuing threat from Robert and to obviate the drain on his fiscal resources, Henry led an expeditionary force across the English Channel. In 1106, he defeated his brother's Norman army decisively at Tinchebray in Normandy. He imprisoned his brother, initially in the Tower of London, subsequently at Devizes Castle and later at Cardiff. Henry appropriated the Duchy of Normandy as a possession of England, and reunited his father's dominions. He attempted to reduce difficulties in Normandy by marrying his eldest son, William, to the daughter of Fulk V, Count of Anjou, then a serious enemy. Eight years later, after William's untimely death, a much more momentous union was made between Henry's daughter Matilda and Fulk's son Geoffrey Plantagenet, which eventually resulted in the union of the two realms under the Plantagenet kings. Activities as a King Henry's need for finance to consolidate his position led to an increase in the activities of centralized government. As king, Henry carried out social and judicial reforms, including: issuing the Charter of Liberties restoring laws of King Edward the Confessor. Henry was also known for some brutal acts. He once threw a traitorous burgher named Conan Pilatus from the tower of Rouen; the tower was known from then on as "Conan's Leap". In another instance that took place in 1119, King Henry's son-in-law, Eustace de Pacy, and Ralph Harnec, the constable of Ivry, exchanged their children as hostages. When Eustace blinded Harnec's son, Harnec demanded vengeance. King Henry allowed Harnec to blind and mutiliate Eustace's two daughters, who were also Henry's own grandchildren. Eustace and his wife, Juliane, were outraged and threatened to rebel. Henry arranged to meet his daughter at a parlay at Breteuil, only for Juliane to draw a crossbow and attempt to assassinate her father. She was captured and confined to the castle, but escaped by leaping from a window into the moat below. Some years later Henry was reconciled with his daughter and son-in-law. Legitimate children He had two children by Edith-Matilda, who died in 1118: Matilda, born February 1102, and William Adelin, born November 1103. Disaster struck when William, his only legitimate son, perished in the wreck of the White Ship on 25 November 1120 off the coast of Normandy. Also among the dead were two of Henry's illegitimate children, as well as a niece, Lucia-Mahaut de Blois. Henry's grieving was intense, and the succession was in crisis. Second marriage On 29 January 1121, he married Adeliza, daughter of Godfrey I of Leuven, Duke of Lower Lotharingia (Lorraine) and Landgrave of Brabant, but there were no children from this marriage. Left without male heirs, Henry took the unprecedented step of making his barons swear to accept his daughter Empress Matilda, widow of Henry V, the Holy Roman Emperor, as his heir. Death and legacy Henry visited Normandy in 1135 to see his young grandsons, the children of Matilda and Geoffrey. He took great delight in his grandchildren, but soon quarreled with his daughter and son-in-law and these disputes led him to tarry in Normandy far longer than he originally planned. Henry died of food poisoning from eating foul lampreys in December 1135 at St. Denis le Fermont in Normandy and was buried at Reading Abbey, which he had founded 14 years before. Although Henry's barons had sworn allegiance to his daughter as their queen, her sex and her remarriage into the House of Anjou, an enemy of the Normans, allowed Henry's nephew Stephen of Blois to come to England and claim the throne with popular support. The struggle between the Empress and Stephen resulted in a long civil war known as the Anarchy. The dispute was eventually settled by Stephen's naming of Matilda's son, Henry, as his heir in 1153. Illegitimate Children King Henry is famed for holding the record for the largest number of acknowledged illegitimate children born to any English king, with the number being around 20 or 25. He had many mistresses, and identifying which mistress is the mother of which child is difficult. His illegitimate offspring for whom there is documentation are: Robert FitzRoy. His mother was probably a member of the Gai family. Sibylla FitzRoy, married King Alexander I of Scotland. Probably the daughter of Sibyl Corbet. Reginald FitzRoy. His mother was Sibyl Corbet. Maud FitzRoy, married Conan III, Duke of Brittany Richard FitzRoy, perished in the wreck of the White Ship. His mother was Ansfride. Fulk FitzRoy, a monk at Abingdon. His mother may have been Ansfride. Juliane FitzRoy, married Eustace de Pacy. She tried to shoot her father with a crossbow after King Henry allowed her two young daughters to be blinded. Her mother may have been Ansfride. Matilda FitzRoy, married Count Rotrou II of Perche, perished in the wreck of the White Ship. Her mother was Edith. Constance FitzRoy, married Roscelin de Beaumont Henry FitzRoy, died 1157. His mother was Princess Nest. Mabel FitzRoy, married William III Gouet Aline FitzRoy, married Matthieu I of Montmorency Isabel FitzRoy. Her mother was Isabel de Beaumont, sister of Robert de Beaumont, 2nd Earl of Leicester. Matilda FitzRoy, abbess of Montvilliers. Her mother was Isabel de Beaumont, sister of Robert de Beaumont, 2nd Earl of Leicester. Adeliza FitzRoy. Appears in charters with her brother Robert (below), she was probably daughter of Eda FitzForne. Robert FitzRoy, died 1172. His mother was Eda FitzForne. William de Tracy, died shortly after King Henry. Gilbert FitzRoy, died after 1142. His mother may have been a sister of Walter de Gand. http://en.wikipedia.org Another version: Henry was crowned at Westminster, on Aug. 5, 1100, three days after his brother, King William II, William the Conqueror's second son, had been killed in a hunting accident. Duke Robert Curthose, the eldest of the three brothers, who by feudal custom had succeeded to his father's inheritance, Normandy, was returning from the First Crusade and could not assert his own claim to the English throne until the following year. The succession was precarious, however, because a number of wealthy Anglo-Norman barons supported Duke Robert, and Henry moved quickly to gain all the backing he could. He issued an ingenious Charter of Liberties, which purported to end capricious taxes, confiscations of church revenues, and other abuses of his predecessor. By his marriage with Matilda, a Scottish princess of the old Anglo-Saxon royal line, he established the foundations for peaceable relations with the Scots and support from the English. And he recalled St. Anselm, the scholarly archbishop of Canterbury whom his brother, William II, had banished. When Robert Curthose finally invaded England in 1101, several of the greatest barons defected to him. But Henry, supported by a number of his barons, most of the Anglo-Saxons, and St. Anselm, worked out an amicable settlement with the invaders. Robert relinquished his claim to England, receiving in return Henry's own territories in Normandy and a large annuity. Although a crusading hero, Robert was a self-indulgent, vacillating ruler who allowed Normandy to slip into chaos. Norman churchmen who fled to England urged Henry to conquer and pacify the duchy and thus provided moral grounds for Henry's ambition to reunify his father's realm at his brother's expense. Paving his way with bribes to Norman barons and agreements with neighbouring princes, in 1106 Henry routed Robert's army at Tinchebrai in southwestern Normandy and captured Robert, holding him prisoner for life. Between 1104 and 1106 Henry had been in the uncomfortable position of posing, in Normandy, as a champion of the church while fighting with his own archbishop of Canterbury. St. Anselm had returned from exile in 1100 dedicated to reforms of Pope Paschal II, which were designed to make the church independent of secular sovereigns. Following papal bans against lay lords investing churchmen with their lands and against churchmen rendering homage to laymen, Anselm refused to consecrate bishops whom Henry had invested and declined to do homage to Henry himself. Henry regarded bishoprics and abbeys not only as spiritual offices but as great sources of wealth. Since in many cases they owed the crown military services, he was anxious to maintain the feudal bond between the bishops and the crown. Ultimately, the issues of ecclesiastical homage and lay investiture forced Anselm into a second exile. After numerous letters and threats between king, pope, and archbishop, a compromise was concluded shortly before the Battle of Tinchebrai and was ratified in London in 1107. Henry relinquished his right to invest churchmen while Anselm submitted on the question of homage. With the London settlement and the English victory at Tinchebrai, the Anglo-Norman state was reunified and at peace. In the years following, Henry married his daughter Matilda (also called Maud) to Emperor Henry V of Germany and groomed his only legitimate son, William, as his successor. Henry's right to Normandy was challenged by William Clito, son of the captive Robert Curthose, and Henry was obliged to repel two major assaults against eastern Normandy by William Clito's supporters: Louis VI of France, Count Fulk of Anjou, and the restless Norman barons who detested Henry's ubiquitous officials and high taxes. By 1120, however, the barons had submitted, Henry's son had married into the Angevin house, and Louis VI-defeated in battle-had concluded a definitive peace. The settlement was shattered in November 1120, when Henry's son perished in a shipwreck of the “White Ship,” destroying Henry's succession plans. After Queen Matilda's death in 1118, he married Adelaide of Leuven (Louvain) in 1121, but this union proved childless. On Emperor Henry V's death in 1125, Henry summoned the empress Matilda back to England and made his barons do homage to her as his heir. In 1128 Matilda married Geoffrey Plantagenet, heir to the county of Anjou, and in 1133 she bore him her first son, the future king Henry II. When Henry I died at Lyons-la-Forêt in eastern Normandy, his favourite nephew, Stephen of Blois, disregarding Matilda's right of succession, seized the English throne. Matilda's subsequent invasion of England unleashed a bitter civil war that ended with King Stephen's death and Henry II's unopposed accession in 1154. Henry I was a skillful, intelligent monarch who achieved peace in England, relative stability in Normandy, and notable administrative advances on both sides of the Channel. Under Henry, the Anglo-Norman state his father had created was reunited. Royal justices began making systematic tours of the English shires, but, although his administrative policies were highly efficient, they were not infrequently regarded as oppressive. His reign marked a significant advance from the informal, personal monarchy of former times toward the bureaucratized state that lay in the future. It also marked a shift from the wide-ranging imperialism of earlier Norman leaders to consolidation and internal development. In the generations before Henry's accession, Norman dukes, magnates, and adventurers had conquered southern Italy, Sicily, Antioch, and England. Henry won his major battles but preferred diplomacy or bribery to the risks of the battlefield. Subduing Normandy in 1106, he contented himself with keeping domestic peace, defending his Anglo-Norman state against rebellion and invasion, and making alliances with neighbouring princes. Encyclopædia Britannica 2006 Ultimate Reference Suite.
William B.
