King John, France, and the Duke of Brittany: a few background notes for the WIP

1180: the King of England held the Duchies & Counties in red

My work-in-progress KNIGHTS TO QUEEN takes place in the year 1202. John is King of England and was invested as Duke of Normandy when he became king in 1199. He was also Count of Anjou, Maine, and Poitou.

Though I've been hanging out with the Plantagenets for close to 20 years, I still have to wrap my head around the vassal relationship of the King of England to the King of France.

How can the sovereign of one country be a vassal of another king?

Let's go back to the year 911: the duchy of Normandy was created that year in a treaty between the French King Charles and the Viking Rollo. As part of that agreement, Charles gave Rollo land around Rouen, which became Normandy, and for that, Rollo and subsequent dukes of Normandy (until 1204) swore fealty to France.

So... when William, Duke of Normandy, aka William the Conqueror, defeated Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings and became King of England in 1066, he maintained his dukedom, which meant he still owed allegiance to France as Duke of Normandy.

This vassal relationship with France has not been a peaceful one. John's father (Henry II, king 1154-1189) and his brother (Richard, king 1189-1199) fought on and off with the French, as did John.

John had offended the family of one of his own vassals, the de Lusignans, which turned into conflict. Among other incidents, John had 'stolen' Hugh IX's betrothed and attacked lands of Hugh's brother in Normandy. The Lusignans appealed to King Philip of France to call John on the carpet for his actions. 

As John's liege lord for Normandy, Philip demanded John appear at his court to address the Lusignan family grievances. Frustrated when John refused, Philip raided John's castles in eastern Normandy in the spring of 1202, while the Bretons, Lusignans, and other rebellious barons attacked areas south of the Loire.

Philip has knighted the Duke of Brittany, 15 year old Arthur, who is John's nephew and a claimant to the English throne. Philip tells Arthur to take what is, according to Philip and many of his contemporaries, rightfully his. 

"Towards the end of July Philip despatched Arthur, with a force of two hundred French knights, to join the Lusignans in an attack on Poitou. The barons of Britanny and of Berry had been summoned to meet him at Tours; but the only allies who did meet him there were three of the Lusignans and Savaric de Mauléon, with some three hundred knights."
--Norgate, Kate. John Lackland.

That little bit of history brings me to the events of Knights to Queen. 

SOURCES

--Church, Stephan. King John and the Road to Magna Carta.

--Morris, Marc. King John: Treachery and Tyranny in Medieval England.

--Norgate, Kate. John Lackland.

--Turner, Ralph V. King John: England's Evil King?

IMAGES 
France: 12th century / By Zigeuner - Own work, from Image:France 12thC.jpg, in William R. Shepherd, The Historical Atlas, 1911Data from the same and:Olivier Guyotjeannin, Atlas de l'histoire de France IXe-XVe siècle, Paris, 2005François Menant, H. Martin, B. Merdignac & M. Chauvin, Les Capétiens - Histoire et dictionnaire 987-1328, Robert Laffont, Paris, 1999, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=180996608

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Charlene Newcomb’s passion for historical fiction and Star Wars led to her writing a bit of both. She has multiple short stories in the Star Wars Adventure Journal, published a space opera Echoes of the Storm, and has written medieval historical fiction short stories and five novels: the Battle Scars trilogy, and Tales of Robin Hood.

Download her free medieval short story, A Boy’s Life – about 9 year old Allan A Dale – and dive into 12th century England.