Dan Snow's History Hit - The Greatest Knight That Ever Lived: William the Marshal

Episode Date: September 14, 2025

William the Marshal’s story reads like a legend. Born a landless younger son, he rose through sheer skill and courage to become the greatest knight of his age.In this Explainer episode, Dan takes you through his extraordinary life - from tournament competitor to fearsome warrior, loyal servant and master of chivalry.Produced and written by Dan Snow, and edited by Dougal Patmore.We'd love to hear your feedback - you can take part in our podcast survey here: https://insights.historyhit.com/history-hit-podcast-always-on.You can also email the podcast directly at [e-mail]. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello folks, Dan Snow here. I am throwing a party to celebrate 10 years of Dan Snow's history hit. I'd love for you to be there. Join me for a very special live recording of the podcast in London, in England on the 12th of September to celebrate the 10 years. You can find out more about it and get tickets with the link in the show notes. Look forward to seeing you there. Hello, I'm Greg Jenner, host of your day. To Me, the comedy podcast from the BBC that takes history seriously. Each week, I'm joined by a comedian and an expert historian to learn and laugh about the past. In our all-new season, we cover unique areas of history that your school lessons may have missed,

from getting ready in the Renaissance era to the Kellogg Brothers. Listen to You're Dead to Me now, wherever you get your podcasts. He was the ultimate medical. evil warrior, the greatest knight in the world, according to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Kings begged him to save their realms, and he obliged. He won tournaments. He helped to save Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine from capture. He was entrusted with the most sensitive diplomatic missions. He prayed at Christ's tomb in Jerusalem. He served five kings, fought in more meleys and sieges, then we have time to even list.

He fought and won, one of the most decisive battles in English history, in his 70s. In the end, he held the fate of the Plantagenet family in his grip, and more, the fate of England itself. He was born, William Marshall. Although by his death,

his name had been adorned with a list of titles, Earl of Pembroke. Earl Marshall, Guardian of England. His life, as you're about to hear, is packed from start to finish. And thankfully, we know that from a wonderful, relatively newly discovered source. His son commissioned a biography of him. And that was lost until the 19th century. And so that's why the Marshall has not really been embanked.

bedded as much as he deserves in our national psyche. He doesn't appear that prominently in Shakespeare. He was unknown to those early writers of history like McCauley. But that is changing now, and I'm very grateful to Thomas Asperidge's excellent recent biography, and of course the OG biography, the original one, the first known, detailed biography of Medieval Knight. The Marshall's life tracks, and it's shaped, some of the most tumultuous and extraordinary years in English medieval history.

The late 12th, the early 13th century folks, those are years when you will see it all. They're the years of the best and worst of English royal sovereigns. They're years of triumph and disaster. He embodies the fascinating story of England's short-lived, massive European empire. When the Plantagenet family or the Angevans, as they would have called themselves, the Angevan dynasty ruled from Ireland to the Mediterranean, ruling over more of what is now France than the kings of France themselves. The Marshal was there at Zenith, he spent decades fighting to protect it, and he was there to pick up the pieces when it vanished as quickly as it had burst into

life. If you want to watch as well as listen to me telling this story, then you can do so on the new Dan Snow's history hit YouTube page. Please go and check it out. But in the meantime, let's get into it. A story of war, sacrifice, glory, and how one man saved a kingdom. T-minus 10. Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

God save the king. No black white unity till there is first than black unity. Never to go to war with one another again. And lift off, and the shuttle has cleared the power. The marshal was forged in war, conceived by a warlord, and a woman forced into his bed at the negotiating table. He was born into a violent, fractured kingdom. When King Henry I died, following an unwise banquet in which he consumed too many eels, His kingdom was thrown into anarchy.

His daughter Matilda fought her first cousin, Stephen, for the throne. Their grandfather, William the Conquer, had too many sons for a peaceful transition. Henry I had too few. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that the earth bore no corn, for the land itself was all laid waste, and people said openly that Christ and his saints slept. Fields went untended. You could apparently travel an entire day on horseback

and see only abandoned settlements and agricultural landscapes. People starve to death. The Chronicle also says that every rich man built his castles. They filled the land full of castles. They cruelly oppressed the wretched men of the land, and when the castles were made, they filled them with devils and evil men. And I have absolutely no doubt at all that one of those, rich and cruel, possibly evil men, was John Fitzgibbon, the Marshal, father of our subject today.

John had inherited the title of Marshall from his father. The name sprang from the office the person was responsible for the King's Horses, but it now denoted a more sort of general administrative role at court. John's father had come over with William the Concrete. He was one of 150 or so nobles to whom William had parceled out England. John, like his father, helped to run the court. He made sure chimneys were maintained and fireplaces swept. He made sure that the king's tents were stored in warm, dry conditions through the winter so they'd be ready for the next season's campaigns. So that's two generations of this family serving two generations of Norman Kings. But then Henry had died at the start of December 1135. And in a stunning lightning journey,

his nephew Stephen had travelled to England, secured the backing of London, dashed to Winchester, where his brother and Lee was Bishop of Winchester, secured the royal treasury and convinced the Archbishop of Canterbury to crown him, all within three weeks. Boom, it was job done. King Stephen was now on the throne, and John the Marshal rushed to welcome his new sovereign, and he was granted a juicy royal castle, Mulbra, to run in Stephen's name. But Henry the first daughter, Matilda was not having it. She landed in England, 1139, and it was the start of 14 years of civil war. A pretty grim time, hellish time for many in the kingdom, but a time for opportunity for men who were lords of war. And such a man was John Fitzgibbon. He killed, he intimidated, he stole.

One chronicle names him specifically as a siren of hell, the root of all evil. He switched sides from Stephen to Matilda. You can imagine the inducements he was offered. But the opportunism almost cost him his life. After one skirmish, he was left for dead, terribly wounded in a burning building. The lead roof tiles melted and that molten metal splashed on his face. He lost an eye and was terribly scarred. He dragged himself out and staggered the 25 miles back to his home.

Such was the grit of the men who rose to the top of the king. kingdom in this period of uncertainty. That great struggle for the kingdom provided cover for men like him, for the barons to fight a plethora of mini civil wars under its canopy. John took on the powerful Wiltshire Grandee, Patrick Earl of Salisbury, a bitter regional feud. An allegiance to either Matilda or Stephen, then switching back, it gave them the sort of top cover they needed to burn and steal. They besieged each other's castles. It was a hell of a time. But then they agreed a piece, and it was sealed with Patrick's sister, Sibylla, being sent across to John's bedchamber. John, having quickly ditched his first wife, Adelina.

We have no inkling for Sibylla's level of willingness. It's not something that Chronicle has thought worthy of recording. This is the world. This is the union that William was born into. But it was a world he would come to dominate. 1146, 1147, we think is when that birth took place. We're not sure either of the date or the location. He was one of seven children. He was a second son, and that's significant. We know nothing of his early years. They were a healthy brood. Unusually, they all survived

at childhood. They all grew to adulthood. But he almost didn't survive, and that's not because of disease. He rapidly got a robust schooling in the nature of the world and the part that great men were supposed to play in it. When he was about five years old, King Stephen came knocking. He assaulted John the Marshal's castle at Newbury, but his men were pushed back by determined defenders. John asked for a truce, and we assumed that he implied that he need to think about it before surrendering, and Stephen demanded a hostage, and John sent out his young son, William. The minute the Royal Army backed off, they had their hostage. John went into a frenzy of activity, He prepared for renewed resistance.

And Stephen came back. He demanded the castle. He demanded John surrender. But John spat defiance from the battlements. And Stephen dragged out young William, the five-year-old boy, and he dragged him out and paraded him in front of the castle, reminding John that he had his son hostage. And John simply laughed.

To quote from the later biography, John said he didn't care about the child, for he still had the anvils and the hammers to produce even finer sons. King Stephen was enraged, and he planned to hurl the boy, young William, into the castle by catapult, or perhaps squash him under a shield, or just hang him in front of the walls. And it was the boy. It was William himself, who seemed to wriggled out these nightmarish ends. By apparently winning over his captive, he displayed boyish charm. He complimented a spear there, or he giggled there, you know, that kind of thing.

And the frustrated king ordered, he said, take him away. Anyone who could ever allow him to die in such agony would certainly have a very cruel heart. He comes with such engaging childish remarks, abandoned by his father, condemned to die by his king. It was a rude education for the five-year-old boy. He remembered it well.

He loved to tell the story. He understood this world. We know nothing of the rest of his childhood. His forning, and yes, we have to give the health warning. It was written by the family. It is partial, but it is still a remarkable source. But still, health warning. His fording biography said he grew up into a tall and handsome young man. And we're told his limbs looked like they could have been shaped by a sculptor. And oddly, but he had a crotch so large that no noble could be his peer. Now, we think that refers to his hips, sitting astride a saddle,

but it is open to interpretation. But you can have the biggest. crotch in the kingdom and it won't help you that much because, well, he was a younger son. His brother was the heir. William was the spare. His older brother would get the land, the money, so the glory of the house of the marshal could endure. That was uppermost in people's minds. William had to make his own luck. And the first step on that journey came in what we think was around 1160 when he was packed off to a relative in Normandy. This was customary for men of good family. You sort of get rid of them in their teenage years, and they serve an apprenticeship in a relative's home, and with my children teetering on the verge of teenageness, I think I can

understand why. We need to remember here, but a context, since the Norman conquest, which began with the Battle of Hastings in 1066, the English elite considered themselves Norman. Their language, their customs were Norman. It was a natural choice to spread your family in your lands and your ambitions across the channel from Normandy to England. William de Tankerville was a prominent Norman lord, and it was to him that William was sent. It was with him that William would learn how to fight. He was not interest in becoming a priest, which meant there was only really one other option. It was the start of his knight's tale. His new patron was able to pay, thankfully, for the staggeringly expensive equipment that defined a knight, sword, lance, armour, horse.

He was able to provide the room and board, while that years of training took place. to become a master of the weapons and the animal, the horse, you needed thousands of hours of work. Someone had to pay for the roof over there and all that food the young man was going to eat in the meantime. And William was lucky in his patron. This was a time when a warrior ethos was coalescing around an idea of knighthood.

Young men were being trained in the martial arts, as they had for generations, but there was also now the genesis of a really interesting culture about how these men should conduct themselves well on, but also off the battlefield, they ought to be brave, and they ought to be loyal, decent, and straightforward. William was shaped by that ethos, and in time he would come to be both its most famous exemplar, and he would in turn, therefore, define and sharpen this paradigm of knighthood. Not straight away, though. It said that initially he ate too much and slept too much, a teenager, give the guy a break.

but he also trained. He honed his sword arm until, as his biographer said, he could hammer with the sword like a blacksmith on iron. And it would not be long before he got the chance to hammer his unfortunate adversary in battle. In 1166, Normandy was under attack. Like, well, Yoda and Luke Skywalker, William de Tankerville decided that William Marshall's training was complete. and he was knighted. He was given the gift of a cloak. You know, he wasn't tapped on the shoulder, and that's tradition that would come later. Instead, his lord strapped a sword and belt around his waist. He was dubbed a knight. He was ready. Some of the neighbouring states next door to Normandy did as they often did. They launched a cross-border raid. And in the streets

of the town of Nuff Chattel, William Marshall felt the keen delight of battle for the first time. According to the, remember, slightly biased source, he cut a swath through the enemy. A savage melee surged in the streets and the squares of the town. Marshall was almost unhorsed. He took a brutal hit which tore his armour and mortally wound his precious horse. That was a big deal because a good warhorse, a destriot, well, it could cost as much as a thousand sheep. But in return for his wound and the loss of his horse, he won a name for himself that day. He didn't win much else, though.

He took no booty, he stripped no enemy corpses, and he took no high-status prisoners to ransom. He'd learned, no doubt, several lessons. Tancarville returned to his base, the threat seen off, then came a thunderbolt. He downsized his retinue. He no longer required the services of William Marshall, nor would he replace his lost horse. William stared utter destitution in the face. He could return to England and beg his big brother for a judge. job, or he could set out on his own and make his fortune. He could become a free lancer. He chose

the latter. He chose wisely. He had to sell his cloak. He bought a knackard old horse. He strapped his gear and weapons to it. And he struck out across 12th century Europe in search of adventure, money and fame. There was a lifeline for William. Tournaments. Young knights, hungry for action, desperate for cash, they needed an arena where they could earn. The thought went that if they couldn't find an arena like this, then surely they would turn to theft and violence for their wine, their glory, their women and their vitals. So to allow wandering nights a little bit of steam in a controlled environment, a series of tournaments were established. William decided to head to one near Le Mans. In the end, de Tonkaville also decided to bring his knights to the tournament,

and so the marshal was allowed to rejoin for the tournament. And it was essentially a small simulated battle. Spread over a wide area, and the knights just, well, they just fought each other. Might last for hours, the teams might spread out, they might hide in cover, or they might hunt as a pack. And if you captured an enemy, they had to pay a ransom, and you might get their armour or their horse. And that day, William captured two knights.

One of them was the opposing team's commander, Philip Valloyne, who apparently is very handsome too. And William grabbed his bridle right up by the mouth of the horse and just dragged horse and rider off, dragging them into his captivity. And so he went into that tournament, a penniless freelancer. He came out with booty and money and the start of a reputation. And he nurtured that reputation in tournament after tournament.

He didn't always win. He was badly beaten by a group of knights at one melee who wanted to cut him down to size. He was captured another one, he had to cough up a horse. But word of this tall, athletic, competitive knight spread through France. By the late 1160s, he made a bit of money in his pocket, and he decided to ride his reputation and his luck and head back to England. Perhaps it was only now that he could afford the passage home aboard ship. His mother and father were now dead, and interestingly, he makes no effort to see his big brother. Instead, he went straight to his power. uncle, the Earl of Salisbury, and tried to join his crew. It worked. He was invited to become one of the Earl's household knights, and that immediately paid off because Salisbury took William along on the military campaign in 1168. He'd been summoned on that campaign by the King of England, the Duke of Normandy, the Lord of Aquitaine, Maine the Vexen-en-Jou, Lord of the mighty Angevan Empire, ruler of more than France, as I mentioned, than the King of France. Henry the second. It was time for William the Marshal to meet and charm his second king. They were headed for Aquitaine. It was a vast territory extending through a great swathe of western and central France.

From the borders of Brittany, down the coast through Bordeaux to the Pyrenees, across the limoge, really all the way up to the Alps. They spoke a different language here, Ocotin. They drank the best wine. They basked. in sunshine. The nobles here, well, they cared little for their grim Norman overlords in the rain-lash-north. Aquitaine was always a pain. It was always restive. William arrived with his uncle and was astonished to find that the writ of the Plantagenet Kings was challenged as soon as you passed outside the walls of its capital, Poitiers. Local nobles built castles, they fought each other. They didn't think that much about Con or Angerre or certainly London or Winchester. The Lusignan family, for example, their little castle only 15 miles away from Poitiers, and they acted as

as though they were kings of their own domain. They raided and looted as they pleased. But King Henry II, he was not one of Europe's greatest medieval monarchs for nothing. He ruled with his ass in his saddle and his sword in his hand. He moved across his empire like a wolf move through the forest, from Scotland to the Pyrenees, soon through Ireland, and then back to central France. William Marshall now got an opportunity to watch a master class in kingship at first hand. It was time for the house of Lusignan to be brought to heal, and their peers reminded of their obligations. William saw real, big war for the first time, and it was war that was waged on the poor, because Henry's force battered its way through the lands of the Lusignans. He burned, he murdered,

he stole. When farmers cannot pay taxes to their lords, when they cannot contribute agricultural goods, then those lords run out of money, they run out of steam. And that was Henry's plan. It was violence and hardship inflicted on those who could not escape or dodge in order to undermine their overlords. And it worked. This was no chivalric wrestle on the tournament field. This was pulling down barns and torching crops in fields. It was dragging teenage daughters. daughters out of haylofts and piling up next year's seeds into wagons that lumbered back into Poitiers. It was grim, but it worked. The Lusignogs begged to be allowed to repent within weeks. Henry, ever the whirlwind, marched north to meet the King of France. He left his wife

Eleanor, whose family had ruled over Aquitaine for generations, to govern the region. At her side, Patrick Earl of Salisbury, and in his retinue, William Marshall. And so it was. The a spring day in 1168, Queen Eleanor was returning from a loyal progress through the recently pacified lands of Poitieu, home of the Lucignan family. It was warm. There was peace. Her escorts, the Earl of Salisbury and his men, while they were not in armour, they were not expecting trouble, but they found trouble, or it found them. Out of nowhere, the Lucignan brothers launched and ambush. Patrick of Salisbury sent the queen ahead for the safety of a castle. You can imagine him slapping the rump of her horse and roaring her to flee with a small escort. He then rallied the bulk of

his men to bar the road and sell their lives for that of their queen. Men scrambled to strap on armour. Patrick Salisbury didn't bother. He charged his horse straight into the enemy, and it seems that he then returned to rally his men once more, at which point his body was pierced by a lance. held by a galloping enemy knight. It passed through his unarmoured back and crashed out through his sternum. William's uncle, his lord, was dead. But the Lusinians had just made a terrible mistake.

Had he been fully armoured, he'd have been knocked down, and then he'd been captured, treated with respect, and hopefully ransomed for lots of cash. But he'd been killed. This was against the code. The Lusignons later swore that it had been a terrible. an unfortunate accident. They regretted it in retrospect.

They also seemed to regret it at the time, because nephew William, William Marshall, went berserk. It was said he was like a starving lion tearing into prey. He set about those Lucienong knights with the rage of a man who's seen his lord struck down in dishonorable fashion. We can't be certain, but remember, this had been his uncle, but also his conduit to royalty, his ticket out of him. here. His life was now in the balance in more ways than one. He fought against terrible odds. At last he

was surrounded, like a bore by a pack of hounds, apparently. No one would come near him, though. He was only fell when someone sneaked round a hedge behind him and jabbed a spear through his thigh. He collapsed onto the ground slaked with his own and his opponent's blood. William Marshall, patronless, defeated, now terribly wounded. penniless was strapped across the back of a donkey, and the Lusignons made their escape. In Hollywood terms, I believe this is what we call the nadir of the narrative arc. William the Marshal? Well, he was close to death. He had to tear strips of his own clothing into bandages. He lost vast amounts of blood. He was treated roughly. It really is astonishing. It didn't get infected.

For months, though, he made a slow recovery as a prisoner, often on the move. His future looked grim. But then astonishing news, the Queen, Eleanor of Akritaine, she knew how to pay her debts. News arrived that he would be ransomed, probably because of his valiant, hopeless battle against the Lusignans. But on top of that, he would be rewarded. He would be given a place in her own retinue. William Marshall was back. He served his new mistress well. He fought the endless fight to pacify aquitaine. He never caught the Lusignan brothers, but he helped bring their lands back into the royal fold. Over months, he seemed to establish himself as one of her most valuable, brave, strong and smart knights, which is why she took him with her north to an important gathering in June 1170.

Henry II decided to have his oldest son, also called Henry, crowned king. It was unusual in England, but it was quite normal elsewhere. The succession of England, since the conquest, in fact, since Ethel read the Unready, had been a bit of a shambles. Every single king coming to the throne had been contested. William the Conqueror's sons had fought their dad and each other. The anarchy, the civil war between Stephen and Matilda,

was still fresh in the memory. Henry was attempting to solve this conundrum. He had his handsome, red-haired, tall, athletic son, crowned king of England. His other sons, Richard and Geoffrey, would get Aquitaine and Brittany respectively. They would all rule as one great, happy family. What could possibly go wrong? Henry Second wanted to ensure, obviously, that his son was surrounded by wise counsellors.

And he also needed a man of action, a tutor in arms, someone who could teach his son how to fight. Someone of his son's generation, maybe a smidjolder, with experience and scars. to show for it, and Henry II selected William Marshall. At 23, he was eight years older than the young king, but he had all the qualities needed. William had now really arrived at the heart of the Plantagenet Imperial Project. Predictably enough, though, Henry the young king soon became impatient. He was a king in name only. His dad kept all the real power to himself, all the land, all the patronage. And retainers around young Henry started to whisper that perhaps he should be more forceful. He should attempt to rule over some or all of the kingdom in more than just name.

We don't know if William Marshall was among those councillors. But it all came to a head in February 1173. There was another family meeting. All four sons were present. Henry and his dad had a stand-up row. Now that happens at all families. We've all been there. But what happens in the Plantagenet family? Well, men march. Castles lay in supplies for sieges. Arrowheads are forged on the blacksmith's anvil. Young Henry stole out of the royal fortress. He left the family meeting in the dead of night. William Marshall went with him. Young Henry headed north to meet the King of France. Henry II's most passionate adversary. Young Henry gave his household the choice. Stay with him. or return to his father, King Henry. William stayed, which is why Henry II, enraged by his son's treachery, published a list of enemies of the state, as he called them diabolical traitors.

William Marshall was on that list. A family squabble quickly escalated because the French can always be relied on to inflict maximum pain on their English rivals. When the French king welcomed young Henry, he provided a very sympathetic audience. He gave him a shoulder to cry on. He recognised him immediately as the rightful king. But then, shockingly, Henry II's other sons joined them in Paris. And then another conspirator came over, Henry II's wife. In a flash, the entire edifice of this mighty Angevin empire came crashing down. The specter of civil war was back.

Young Henry made a lot of promises. He promised the king of Scotland more lands and privileges if he invaded northern England. There were rebellions across the realm. Henry's sons, alongside the French and the Count of Flanders, invaded Normandy. Towns were burned, castles were stormed, screams pierced the night. The great lords had quarrelled, and normal people bore the brunt. We don't know much about William in this great rebellion, except that he stayed by young Henry's side. In fact, the course of the war went poorly. The French king proved inept. Count of Boulogne was killed. His brother, the Count of Flanders, retired from the fighting.

He was heartbroken. The King of Scotland led a great attack before the walls of Annette Castle and was quickly unhorsed and captured. It proved hard, as the saying went at the time, to wrestle the club from the hand of Heracles. So, in September 1174, there was a peace Congress. Another family meeting. Henry forgave his sons and their advisers. The only person Henry didn't forgive, interestingly, was his wife, Eleanor, who spent the next decade imprisoned in England. Young Henry, back in the royal fold, but still a king without a kingdom, pivoted. Perhaps guided by William, they turned their back on the real battlefield, and they turned their full attention to the fake battlefield, the world of tournaments.

William Marshall was 30. He was on peak form. He was experienced and now he was well financed. These next years of tournaments transformed him into a celebrity knight with a Europe-wide reputation. It was said that he captured 500 knights in these tournament years. Young King Henry grew into a dashing, charismatic warrior by his side. They obviously loved the life they were living, fighting, winning, growing rich, building reputation. William was declared MVP, most valuable player at a tournament, with many of Europe's finest nights there in the late 1170s. He made vast amounts of money. Young Henry in his retinue with the chevalric stars of Western Europe. Soft power won with a steel tip. Men

admired young Henry and his glamorous entourage. Lords welcomed them to their tables. Boys wanted to be them. They had the first choice of armour and the finest mounts. William Marshall was first among the servants of young Henry. Now a knight-bannarette, so that's a knight permitted to carry his own banner. He chose a red lion rampant against a green and gold background, and these were indeed golden years for the lion-like William Marshall. In 1179, the young French prince Philip was to be crowned. There was a huge tournament planned with every powerful lord west of the Rhine present. Henry the second decided that young Henry, young King Henry, would go and represent the Angevan Empire. His presence was intended to put on such a show that would stamp the greatness

of the Angevans, of the Plantagenet family, on the minds of the assembled masses. And it would serve to convince young Prince Philip of France that young Henry was a person. to emulate, a star to follow, an ally to cultivate. At vast expense, young Henry made his way across France. He was the star of the coronation. He bore the royal sword as Philip progressed into Rance Cathedral. After the religious element had been got out the way, they moved to a tournament ground outside Paris. Now, interestingly, the site of Disneyland Paris. It was the greatest tournament anyone could remember. Three thousand knights went at each other. It was chaos. Young Henry was almost captured, but the Marshal wrenched control of his horse from his enemies.

It was a great success for Young Henry and William Marshall. And there was fighting to be had off the tournament field, too. Young Henry fought a brief, successful campaign against the Duke of Burgundy in the 1180s. He had thoroughly established himself as heir to the mighty Henry II of England. But he was impatient. He wanted to be more than just the heir. young Henry grew restive. He was still frustrated his father's refusal to hand over, at least control of Normandy. He began to plot once again against his father. But then a Thunderbolt threatened to tear his household apart. His wife, the queen, had apparently betrayed him. She had entered another man's bed. And that man was William Marshall. Now, if there's one thing I've learned from the present, let alone from the distance of 800 years,

is that it can be tricky to work out who is, well, kissing who. And on this occasion, William Marshall was ferocious in his denials. His later biographer, again, take with a pinch of salt, stated that it was an evil rumour put about by members of young Henry's entourage. Why? Because as your mum always says about bullies, they were. jealous. Perhaps William had got too close to the young king. Perhaps he'd got too big for his boots on the tournament circuit. Others wanted to bring him down. Courtly intrigue, hey, wouldn't be the first time. Who would be in a medieval royal entourage? Well, apart from them, the wealth, the women, the food, the wine, the soft furnishings, the proximity to power. Apart from that,

it so often ends badly. It ended badly, for example, 1172. Count Philippa Flanders reacted to rumors that one of his knights was sleeping with his wife, had him beaten nearly to death with cudgels, then stripped and strung over a latrine by his feet, his head in or very close to the urine feces, until he died of suffocation. Henry, thankfully, did not do this to William Marshall. And we need to state at this point that we have not one shred of evidence that William was having an affair with the Queen. It's interesting, isn't it, how courtly fiction and real life. They merged here. This was a world obsessed with stories of Arthur's Queen Gwynnevere betraying him with Lancelot, his greatest knight. This was a world obviously alive to these

possibilities. It was aware of the possibility of relationships blossoming in these royal settings. Henry, though, didn't react with Fury, so perhaps he didn't believe the rumours. Perhaps he was already getting jealous of William Marshall. Perhaps the rumours were the final straw. Either way, they parted ways. William went into exile. He had plenty of bidders for his service. He was offered money by the Duke of Burgundy, by the Count of Flanders. We don't know exactly what he did. But what we do know is that in the spring of 1183, a breathless messenger scoured northern France looking for William Marshall. Imagine how cool that is just go from place to place saying, where's William Marshall? And people know because you've heard of him. and that envoy found him and delivered a message. Young King Henry had decided to dismiss all accusations against him. He was to return at once, because once again, young King Henry was at war, and in war, you need the marshal by your side.

The Plantagenet family had fallen out again. Henry II had tried to keep the peace, but young Henry had announced that his brother Richard, little brother Richard, the Lionheart, was so disliked. in Aquitaine. He was ruling over Aquitaine. He was so disliked down there that young Henry was answering the desperate calls of local barons to help them remove his little brother. And by early 1183, he was in Limoges summoning an army. Now, Royal Brothers squabbling is not unusual. We've seen examples of it quite recently. But poor young King Henry had really picked one here.

He had quite the baby brother. Richard had not been showing off at tournaments. He'd been actually doing the work. He'd been ruling Akritaine. This was the man that you sent to ungovernable neighbourhoods to lock them down. This was the man who'd won the name Lionheart. Good luck, young Henry. You're going to need it.

No wonder he called on William the Marshal. The Lionheart moved fast. He smashed a force sent from. Brittany by his brother Geoffrey, who was also campaigning against him. Prisoners were murdered. He then made an astonishing 48-hour, 75-mile march to surprise a force of young Henry's men outside Limoges. They were put to the sword, blinded, drowned.

You get the idea. You've heard me say this on the podcast before, but really, the art of winning can be boiled down, it can be distilled. You get there first with the most. And Richard Lionheart had just given a master class. Henry II, the poor father arrived in February to try and sort it out. As he arrived at young Henry's camp, arrows were shot at him. One hit his horse in the head. So he galloped off to Richard's camp. He threw his lot in with his younger son. Father and son now moved to besiege young

Henry. It looked pretty hopeless. And that is when he called on William the Marshal. And it would not be the last time that a monarch in extremists would call upon William to save his cause. Marshall joined, and surprise, surprise, things started going better. Young Henry slipped out of the siege and was roaming around looting monasteries to try and pay his men, but he did manage to notch up some wins. I think we can see Marshall's advice and help at play here. But although he was an extraordinary warrior, he wasn't a miracle worker, and that's what young Henry would very soon need. On the 26th of May, young Henry fell ill.

It seems to have been dysentery, a disease which attended medieval war like a handmaid. It would take the lives of some of the finest warriors in his family over the centuries to come. Well, I'm one of the worst, his brother, John, but we're getting ahead of ourselves here. On June the 7th, his fate was certain. He prepared himself for death. He sent to his father asking for forgiveness. He turned to what he called his most intimate friend, William Marshall, and asked him to take his cloak on which he had the cross of crusade

and carry it to the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Minutes later, Henry the young king, died, age 28. William Marshall was now in his mid-thirties, again without a patron. He discharged his final obligation to his dead lord. With Henry II's blessing, William Marshall headed east. He headed to the Holy Land. It was a deeply religious decision. But there were also chances of advancement. There are also inducements as well. A warrior could rise there. After all, Guy of Lusignol, the man who'd attempted to snatch Queen Eleanor all those years ago, he'd escaped Aquitaine. He'd headed to the east, made a

name for himself, married a princess, and was now fancied for the throne of Jerusalem himself. it was a place where power was a little more fluid. Very little is known about William Marshall's time in the Holy Land. He arrived, he went Jerusalem, he deposited the cloak of Henry the Young King in the church the Holy Sepulchre, the spot where Jesus had died and was resurrected. He came across the order of warrior monks, the Templars. He visited their headquarters on Temple Mount, now part of the Al-Axa Mosque Complex. He was there at an odd time.

A Muslim warlord, Saladin, was threatened. threatening Christian kingdoms in the East. But for this two-year period, as it happened, Saladin was mostly preoccupied with bringing, what is today, Iraq, Syria and Egypt under his control. He was campaigning in the Iraqi city of Mosul, for example. So it was a time, a curious time of, well, relative peace. There was a bit of shadow boxing, move and countermoot, but no major combat operations. It was a lull before the storm, or before the regular hurricanes that swept across that benighted region. And William Marshall may have chafed at this. You know, if you're on crusade, you want to win some immortal glory on the battlefield. But there was not much of this

on offer at that point. There was also, though, a deeper sense that the Christian kingdoms in the Holy Land were doomed. There was infighting. There was lack of money. And critically, there were just lack of night, lack of men at arms to take on a giant coalescing military power in the East. The outlook was bad. In fact, while William Marshall was there, an embassy was sent to London, the head of the Latin Church of the Holy Land. He brought Henry II, the key to Jerusalem and the keys of the Holy Sepulca, and he laid them in front of Europe's greatest king, Henry II, in token submission to him. The message was clear. All this could be his if he would come out to the East and save Utremer, save the kingdoms of the Holy Land. But Henry would not.

He could not leave his sprawling kingdom, vulnerable to the King of France, and going campaign in the Holy Land. Henry II was wise. His son, Richard the Lionart, would have done well to follow his example. With not much action on offer, William Marshall returned to Europe by later the spring of 1186. As he left, the deluge fell upon the Christian states, which we will come back to. William would miss all that. He was headed back to the West. And he presented himself to Henry II. Henry must have looked to him. Here's a 40-year-old warrior who's rebelled against him twice.

But you realize he has an extraordinary reputation for martial valor. He has shown great loyalty to your son, to your family on two occasions. And Henry II hadn't got where he was by being a bad judge of men and their sword arms. Henry knew a man of ability when he saw one and Henry II gave him a job he brought him into the tent and that reminds me of a story I think it was Genghis Khan

he killed rebel leaders but then he promoted their subordinates saying that they showed admirable loyalty to their immediate superior the marshal in the same way was now giving the opportunity to show that he could demonstrate the same loyalty to Henry the second

as he had offered to his son Finally, William Marshall's opportunity had come to turn himself into a great lord of the realm. The time for playing at tournaments with the fake king, mock battles and Arthurian court life based on a lie was over. Now, William Marshall was at the very centre, the very pinnacle, of Western Europe's most important empire. William Marshall had arrived. More. Coming up after this, don't go anywhere. In the ancient world, disaster was always lurking.

Earthquakes and volcanoes flattened and buried mighty cities in an instant. Drought and plague wiped out civilizations without mercy. This month on the ancients from History Hit, the podcast that brings the distant past roaring back to life. We'll discover how disaster reshaped civilizations and the world itself. Listen now on Spotify or wherever you get to your podcast. Over the next few years, William Marshall proved as adept in the corridors of power as he had been when he was breaking skulls on the battlefield.

He developed courtesy, literally mastering the conventions and behaviours of court, courtesy. We know Henry II liked and valued him because he rewarded him. After decades of fighting and service and advice and toil and loyalty, He'd never achieved that which he and his noble peers, his class, depended on. Land. You needed land to be a great lord. You needed an estate because that in turn provided a reliable income. It also provided the opportunities to host, to hunt, to conduct yourself, to take part in noble pursuits. It was essential. And now, finally, Henry II, gave him an estate. He broke off a sliver of royal lands next to Lake Windermere in what was

North Lancashire. He also gave William two wardships, and these are important. So when noble children found themselves orphaned, which was quite a lot, the crown was allowed to settle their wardships upon royal favourites. So a royal servant, a royal mate, would become their guardian. William was given the wardship of a noble girl, Eloise of Lancaster, heir to vast northern estates. And the understanding was that William could then exploit, well, that person, their wealth, their lands. He could arrange a marriage for her, which of course hugely boosted his patronage power and his clout. And he could also enjoy the income of that estate while he was in that wardship. Another ward was a young man called John Eerley from a West Country family. And he became

like a son to William Marshall. He became his squire, and he would be at William's side for the rest of his life. John Ealy then formed part of this military household around William, a sign that he was becoming a lord in his own right. We actually have an interesting letter from Henry to William in 1888, saying, effectively, round up the lads, we're going to fight in France again. But he says fascinating, Henry says to William in that letter, you have frequently complained to me that I have bestowed on you only a small fee. So that's a bit of an insight. That's clear. Remember, this isn't from his biography. This is from a contemporary letter that survives. So it's clear that William Marshall has been nagging the king for rewards, possessions, riches, land. Love it. And the king on this

occasion says spring men going campaigning in France. The king promised him a fat French castle if they were successful. By this period, family politics had become a little more straightforward. Young Henry he was dead. Jeffrey of Brittany, who was the third son, he'd fallen off a horse at a tournament and been trampled by his own knights. He died shortly after this. His wife had a son just after he died. It was called Arthur. We'll put a pin in that one, because we're going to hear slightly more from him in a bit. Richard Lionheart was therefore the undisputed if a little restless and ambitious air. Well, of course, apart from little brother John, who was himself just hitting adulthood. But if things were a tiny bit more streamlined within the empire, the external threats,

unfortunately, had intensified. I mean, you can never rest on your throne in this period. Philip of France, who we met as a prince when he was being crowned alongside his father, he'd actually come to the throne in 1180, so he's now king of France. And he unfortunately had grown into manhood, and he was quite a good king. Wiley as a fox, he governed well, he built up a big war chest and he just waited for opportunities he ensured that he had the muscle he had the spears when the time came

he had decided that fate had decreed that he would be the man he would be the monarch to make his title king of the French more than just an empty boast because remember the enjavans Henry II the Plantagenet family as we call them they ruled over more of France than he did Philip was absolutely determined that that was all going to change on his watch.

In 1187, Philip lunged into Béry, sandwiched between his and Henry's domain. Henry marched to relieve Chateau Rue Fortress. We think almost definitely at William Marshall by his side. They were joined by Richard the Lionheart, bringing up the strength of Aquitaine, and King Philip facing that galaxy of Notables, well, King Philip backed off rather than fight a big juicy, set-piece battle. But then, the old cracks emerged. Richard, the Lionheart, went with him to Paris. Henry II sent begging messages to his son to return, and Richard eventually came back to the fold. But history had repeated. Henry's next son was playing footsie with the French king. He was

chafing at his father's rule. He wanted the big prize. Now, at this. tricky juncture at this moment, came the thunderbolt from the east. The dam had burst. That year, Guy of Lusignan, who we first met, remember, as an Aquitanian bandit, he'd become King of Jerusalem. And the following year, Saladin fell upon Galilee. Guy walked straight into the trap. He marched out at the head of a big army into a baking, waterless wasteland, and was annihilated. at the infamous battle the horns of Hattin. Saladin imprisoned guy. He stole the sacred relic,

the piece of the Holy Cross that they'd marched out with. He put any Templar that he could find to the sword, and later that year, he captured Jerusalem. It was the near total collapse of the Crusader States in the East. Would William the Marshal have prevented this? Now, I'm a big fan of William the Marshal, but probably not. What it did mean is that in Western Europe, rushed to take up the cross, become a crusader. Richard did so, Henry II and Philip of France too.

The German emperor, Frederick Barbarossa, he marched east in 1189 at the head of a huge host, although unfortunately for him drowned in a river in southern Turkey. Philip and Henry II didn't go straight away. In fact, Henry would never go at all. Neither of them would leave unless the other went as well, very sensibly. Richard Lionhart was keen to get away, although he noticed his little brother John had not volunteered to go. Might he try and usurp his big brother, while he fought for God and the true cross? Now, despite this sort of brief flurry of diplomatic amity, the grand alliance of the enjavan Empire and France, it never happened. Instead, in the early summer of 1188, not even a year after the disaster of Hattin, the French launched a lightning attack on Henry.

So, King Henry II and William the Marshal once again rushed to Normandy. William the Marshal was now sent on embassy to the King of the French to try to find a solution, but none was forthcoming. So he returned to Henry and then took on a role which he was probably slightly more suited. He fell like a lightning strike on French territory. Henry told him to spare nothing. On the 30th of August, the Marshal was unleashed. Like a virus entering the French body politic, he advanced, burning, looting, smash.

leaving a blackened, wasted landscape of bones. It was like a tornado of fire. Livestock stolen, every building torched. The French king was said to be full of grief at the news. Once again, a ruler plunges into war and is dismayed at the consequences. When will they learn? Williams' bargrapher working a little hard, possibly.

He makes the wild claim that this rampage, or as it was described as Cheve-O-Shei, was a great act of chivalry because if the enemy could be brought to his knees quickly well then there would be peace and everyone would be happy. And it is true that did lead to a peace conference as his peasants picked charred possessions out of the cinders and buried their loved ones, the king of France rode to Montmoulin in Normandy

to break bread with the King of England, drink wine and wrangle. William the Marshal was there and what he witnessed was yet more stunning manoeuvring that really by this stage of the story we should not be surprised by, but I still am. Richard, the Lionheart, arrived with the King of France. He knelt him, he paid homage to the King of France,

not just for Aquitaine, but for Normandy, for all his family's possessions in France. Now, poor old Henry II, he was ill by this stage, and he'd just been betrayed again. He sent William the Marshal to reason with Richard. Talk about a meeting of legends. It's like Nelson and William. to know, and then it'll chat in London when they met.

But on this occasion, William failed to come to an understanding with Richard. Richard had summoned an army. He was determined to march on his father. There is something utterly tragic about the demise of Henry II. Like the mighty lion who ages, starts to limp, is eventually chased off or ripped apart by the next generation. The young, swaggering, lusty, full-maned lions, some of them his own sons, so that in the same fashion, probably medieval England's greatest

king spent that winter, wracked by pain and illness, trying to conjure yet another comeback, once again facing his own son in a battle for the empire. He issued a summons. Many nobles ignored it. They sensed the waning of his power, the ebbing of the tide. They sensed the ebbing of life itself. All the pageantry of kneeling and oathswearing and homage and flags and poetry and words just jettisoned in an age old, far more raw, cold calculation of power. But I'll tell you did not leave. I'll tell you who took all those oaths and things seriously. William Marshall. He stood by the father as he had done the son. As the group were the king dwindled. People found excuses, slipped away. And as that happened, William status grew,

and so did the reward. Henry, in those last months, organised the most brilliant marriage he could muster, one that would propel William into the highest circles of the Anglo-Norman world. The beautiful 16-year-old daughter of Earl Richard Strongbow, conqueror of swathes of Wales and Ireland. She was called Isabel of Clare, daughter of Strongbone, in fact, an Irish princess, Ifa of Leinster. She brought with her the greatest estate on the Anglo-Welch border, the so-called March. William Marshall was now a marcher lord. He was one of the great barons of England and the Angevin Empire,

which was all fine and great, except if Henry II was toppled or killed or permanently retired, it could all be annulled by Rich the Lionheart's successor. The following summer, summer of 1189, Philip of France and Richard the Lionheart came again. One of the most powerful and effective combinations in medieval history. Henry II limped back to Le Mans. It was a special place for him. He'd been born there. His father was buried there.

This was a dying warlord returning to his roots. It was also, handily, a near-impregnable bastion protected by Roman walls two rivers and more recent fortifications. It was the obvious place to make a stand. It was for him, I think, a physical, but also a spiritual stronghold. The enemy fought their way into the outskirts of the city. They'd found a ford in the river. William Marshall held the Southgate. He led the resistance. He broke the arm of the Lionheart's champion, his greatest warrior, Andrew de Chauvigny. But then fires started to engulf the city, and Henry II convened a hurried council. and the men there convinced the king to abandon the city and ride north.

Henry fled from Le Mans, with a small group, William the Marshal, among them, alongside him, of course. His son's forces, the King of France forces, slaughtered the defenders of Lamont. They looted the houses and shops before they burned. But as William Marshall and the King galloped, they saw they were being followed. The Marshal, we could imagine the scene. The Marshal exchanged glances with the king. Words were spoken without their lips moving. the king continued north. The Marshal reigned in his horse. Of course he did. With a nod at the rest

of the escort, he swung around to personally delay the chasing force, to ride or die for his sovereign, just as he had as a young warrior that day so long ago in Aquitaine. Marshall charged at the pursuers. Soon he must have recognised them from their banners and their liveries, This was not any old opportunist band of knights. This was the Lord of Aquitaine, the son of the king, the man they called Lionheart. This was Richard. And so, here we are, folks. We've reached it.

The single greatest showdown in medieval history, the marshal against the Lionheart, at stake the kingdom. The Lionheart was no stranger to combat. and in that galloping metal-clad, giant figure bearing down on him, he saw death riding. The Marshal's horse, gleaming, no doubt from the escape, mouth flecked with white, eyes, staring, bulging. The Marshal's lance, horizontal, pointed at Richard's centre of mass, his torso, his chest, his heart. And Richard had made a mistake. To ride faster to pursue his father, he'd left his armour behind. He was undefended and carried only a sword.

And that is why, the lionheart, scourge of his enemies, the greatest warrior in the list of English kings, drop his horse and begged for his life. God's leg marshal, he roared, don't kill me. That would be a wicked thing to do, as you find me here completely unarmed. The marshal bellowed back. Indeed, I won't. Let the devil kill you.

I shall not be the one to do it. And with that, he lowered his lance slightly and drove it cleanly into the breast of Richard's horse, killing it instantly and sending the proud prince sprawling onto the ground. What a moment. Why do people need fiction or science fiction when this stuff actually happened? Thanks to the Marshal, Henry would escape his son's clutches. But had William the Marshal just made a bitter enemy of the next King of England? Henry had got away, but the writing was on the wall.

His power waned still further. Richard Lionhart captured his treasury, courtiers melted away. William Marshall was sent on a mission to try and recruit men and could have stayed away, saying, oh, I'm just a bit busy, thanks. But he returned to his sovereign. And it was William who accompanied but really half-carried, half-nursed the old king as he reluctantly met Philip and Richard near Tor in the summer of 1189. The king was racked with pain, but he refused the offer to sit. He held himself upright, and he humiliatingly agreed to pay the French king of vast sum of money

and agreed to anoint Richard officially as his successor. William Marshall stood by his side. As Richard came in for a kiss to seal the treaty, Henry whispered to his son. He begged God not to take him from this world before he had the opportunity to revenge himself upon him. Hours later, he was thrown into yet more confusion and fever by the news that his other son, his youngest son, John, had sided with Richard. He collapsed and he died two days after that peace treaty. God denying him his last prayer. Richard would rule in his place.

Henry's body was robbed by his servants. He was left splayed, blood drying from the final catastrophic hemorrhage from his nose and mouth on the bed around him. William Marshall came into the room, took back control, secured the corpse, covered it in dignity and carried it to a nearby abbey. There he waited for Richard,

his new king, to pay his respects, bury his father and decide upon the fate of his loyal followers. Once again, William Marshall would confront the Lionheart. When Richard arrived, he stared down at the corpse of the king, his father, his enemy, and we're told that his face was unreadable. Who knew what that mask disguised? Grief, happiness, guilt, victory. Then he turned his back on the king,

and he asked for William Marshall. They went for a ride together into the countryside. The new king, twisted in his saddle, looked at the marshal, apparently said, you would have killed me if I hadn't deflected that lance with my arm. William Marshall could have sucked up to him and said, yeah, sure, well done, that was a great deflection, sire, and you knew no such deflection had taken place. Instead, he said it was never my intention to kill you. I could have done, but I wasn't aiming for you, or worse that effect.

William Marshall's life now hung in the balance, but, like his father, Rich the Lionheart was a man who knew a valuable warrior, a valuable noble, when he saw one. He said, Marshall, you are forgiven. I shall never be angry with you over this matter. And with that, the Marshal was saved. Richard confirmed his father's gift of the marriage, the lands, the martial lordship, And the Marshal, at that moment, took his place in the highest echelons of the kingdom. Richard, like his father before him, wanted a man of the Marshal's quality to his side. And what's so interesting is William the Marshal had now been on the losing side of at least two royal civil wars,

and yet here he was ascendant. And fascinatingly, he was treated better than those who'd abandoned Henry II at the end and switched sides. Loyalty was a rare and sought-after commodity. kings were happy to find it, even among the followers of their former enemies. Richard sent him to England with dispatches. A secret message for Queen Eleanor, now finally a release from prison. We know nothing of what was said between the Marshal and Eleanor, but it must have been an interesting reunion, an interesting encounter.

So too must have been his first meeting with his fiancé. The 16-year-old was in the Tower of London. At first, her keeper did not want to let William in. Richard Lionheart was not yet crowned. Her hand was not yet his to give away. surprisingly the marshal dealt with that quite quickly and briskly and he was admitted into her presence with that young woman came what is now chepstow castle that mighty bastion on the banks through of a while you can still go and see today but also estates in long krendon oxfordshire

estates in normandy and elsewhere and he made plans to get a ring on that woman as quickly as possible while he was in the tower he no doubt marvelled at the major construction project the first new stone Bridge to be built across the Thames at London for a thousand years. It was started by Henry, London Bridge in 1176. And that London Bridge, interestingly, would stand until after the first steam train made its first passenger carrying intercity journey. It survived into the 19th century. We think they married in late July 1189, only weeks after the death of Henry the 2nd, so things are moving fast. A son would be born to them within a year, the first of 10 children. Despite their more than 20 year age difference. The marriage, we think, was a success. And now we really get a snapshot of

William Marshall's ascendancy at the coronation of Richard Lionheart. The great lords of the kingdom all processed into Westminster Abbey, each of them carrying some piece of royal regalia that was somehow symbolic. William Marshall carried the sceptre. That was honour enough, but check this out. Such was his importance that his family had sort of slipstreamed along. They'd been swept up with him. They've been swept up on the rising tide. His big brother carried a huge pair of golden spurs, spurs obviously being the key bit of equipment for Plantagenet kings. You've got to wear them and dig them into horses' flanks to gallop from one crisis to the next. William Marshall's cousin was given a rod of gold to carry. Alongside them, we get Prince John carrying a sword,

which is ironic because he would become famous for his inability to wield one with any effectiveness at all. Rich the line-up, now Richard the first king of England, ruler of the Angevan Empire. He really only had one priority, and that was to go to the Holy Land, join the crusade, take up the cross and the sword, and spill Muslim blood. He dreamt of taking back Jerusalem, securing the holy sites, winning absolution for his sins, and a place in the pantheon of the Greats. The problem is while he's away, he's going to protect his lands in France, and he did secure an agreement with Philip the French king that they were true. travel together. Interesting, though, someone who he did not want with him was William Marshall.

And it's possible that Richard was a bit nervous about not being the best warrior, or maybe he wanted him back home. Either way, Marshall would not travel east with his sovereign. Richard also did not want his brother Jordan scheming in England, in the family tradition, and so he was given lands in France, and he had to swear an oath not to go to England for three years. Richard's mum, Eleanor, a far more reliable person, would govern England, alongside the so-called Justicia and four co-justicias, a sort of council. And one of those four men was, of course, William Marshall. In July 1190, Lionheart and Marshall bid each other farewell. The former off to capture a kingdom, the latter charged with safeguarding one.

One of William's first jobs was to greatly strengthen Chepstow Castle, his Newcastle. The mighty wooden gates that are still on display there today date, we think, from this refurbishment. So it's exciting. You can go and touch something that the Marshal himself would have touched. And as befitted the Great Lord, he assembled his own train, his own coterie of knights, perhaps 20 lads. But there were also among his entourage, priests, men of learning, because he had to run a business as well. The team had to get wool off the backs of his fat sheet. that grazed on the rich grass of the Y Valley. That needs to be exported through London to the

low countries. And business was good. His team was good. He became rich. Predictably enough, all the co-justicias, they all fell out with the chief justiciah, William Longchamp. And then that gave the excuse to little brother John to break his oath and come sniffing around England, trying to get rid of the chief justiciah and replace him with someone, probably himself, ideally. We now see Marshall as a real politician. He'd learned from bitter experience that he did not want to be on John's wrong side.

The problem was that John was Lord of Ireland. So William the Marshal now had lands in Ireland that he wanted to exploit, and so he needed John. Also, John was the obvious heir to the kingdom. The Lionheart was out fighting in the War of the Century and the Holy Land, hacking his way through enemy armies as his men bled out and emptied their dysentery-ridden bowels, hacking up blood and phlegm, shivering with fevering all

around him, right? He's out there. The siege of the city of Acre was like a medieval Paschondale. It's where Europe's warrior elite went to die. There was a reasonable chance that Richard would not be coming home. Don't forget, Frederick Barbarossa, the emperor, he died on the way out there. The Archbishop of Canterbury died there. The Count of Flanders died there. Perhaps the lionheart would follow. And so we see William Marshall being sort of neutral at best, as John got the Chief Justicia deposed. And then John got himself declared Supreme Governor of the Realm, Supreme Muppet more like, but we'll get on to that later.

So William the Marshal is sort of going along with John's power grab at this point. Meanwhile, back in the Holy Land, Kings Richard and Philip of France, they did enjoy a pretty quick win, actually, in the Holy Land. Within weeks arriving, they had captured this city of Acre, that it endured such a long siege. Richard was gearing up. He had more cities to capture. But then Philip, King Philip, delivered the hammer blow. He was going to take the win. He'd came, he'd saw, he'd conquered. He was going to go back to Western Europe. His time in the Holy Land was short. He swore a holy oath, though. Don't

worry about it. Hand on Bible. That he absolutely definitely wasn't even going to think about invading Richard's lands while Richard was still out here fighting for God in the Holy Land. and then Philip went home, and as soon as he arrived home, he started planning the invasion of Richard's lands. That French king knew had to play the Plantagenet. First, young King, Henry, then Richard, now John. Philip invited John to Paris. He was flattered by him. He was promised the world. It was the same playbook. But thankfully, these idiot, plantagenet princes had a mother who knew what was up and how to hold an empire together. Eleanor of Aquitaine did seem to get a grip on John, he would not marry a French princess, and he would not

cough up a region of their French possessions to the French king as a wedding gift. That would be folly, he was an idiot, and she got her way. But then we get yet another plot twist. Richard had decided to come home without capturing Jerusalem. He'd fallen just short of capture in Jerusalem, but he came home partly because he's worried about Philip and John hanging out together. So despite winning a string of victories that turned him into a legend, he left the Holy Land frustrated, promising to come back. But on that generally, home, well, he was taken prisoner. Not of Saladin, but of a fellow Christian. The Lionheart was caged in Austria. You can find out more about that, what, Richard in general, about the

Third Crusade and about his journey home in a podcast I released a few weeks ago, focusing particularly on Rich the Lionheart. But that's just a pricey for this episode. The reason that Richard was taken prisoner in Austria is reasonably embarrassing. The man-babies that ran the world, well, they'd all fallen out in the Holy Land. King Richard had torn down the standard of Duke Leopold of Austria, and he'd trampled it into the mud during the capture of Acre. So he didn't want Duke Leopold of Austria taking any credit for the capture of the city. He said it was all thanks to him.

So when Richard travelled across Duke Leopold's territory, the Duke took his revenge and had him imprisoned. And it was said that John did not express much sorrow. And as for King Philip of France, well, he was obviously thrilled. John, that treacherous little weasel, he went back to Paris before he could batten eyelid. He paid homage to the French king in return for his help on getting him on the English throne. An invasion fleet was assembled in Boulogne. Meanwhile, John returned to England, said Richard was dead and ced vital castles.

He was preparing to fight for the throne and invite the French invaders over. Total lunatic. William Marshall now faced terrible choice. He can no longer back both brothers. And what did he do? He did what he always did. He stepped up for his liege lord. Philip of France might break oaths, John might break oaths, but William Marshall did not. When he was born, he stayed bored. Working alongside Queen Eleanor,

he moved to fortify the coast. He secured castles for Richard. He committed to negotiating for Richard's release. And this resolution, this swift action, that dissuaded Philip from launching a cross-channel invasion. Instead, he invaded Normandy on the continent. He did make some progress. progress, but Eleanor worked hard to get Richard back, and in 1193, a vast ransom were sent to Austria. Richard the Lionheart was released, Philip of France was furious. Look to yourself, he famously messaged John. The devil is loose. And as Richard made his way home, well, Eleanor and William Marshall were working in his cause. His mum captured two of John's castles in England, and the Marshall captured Bristol. There is a strong

sense from this story that if you want a job done properly, you get Eleanor of Aquitaine and William the Marshall to do it. Now, King John inexplicably just gave King Philip a France vast swathes of land and castles. He was just setting fire to his own empire for reasons that I actually don't really fully understand. But by the spring of 1194, King Richard was back and he was not amused. What did John do at the approach of his brother? Well, he fled, obviously. He left his followers with an absolute hospital pass of facing Europe's greatest warrior king, who was in the mood for revenge. And Europe's greatest warrior king had Europe's greatest warrior as his sidekick. Only one of John's castles remained in England. Pity the garrison of Nottingham Castle. They gambled and they

lost. Richard marched north. He smashed the walls with catapults. He stormed the breach wearing only a light shirt of mail so he could really set about himself unencumbered. His body body guards carried great shields to protect him from the arrows and crossbow bolts, while he lunged, stabbed, and clubbed unfortunate defenders. At the end of day one, Richard offered them the chance to surrender, which they should have taken. But apparently they didn't really believe that Richard had returned. They didn't believe it was him. So he helped convince them by hanging lots of captured defenders

and then lining up his siege engines for another day of bombardment, at which point the castle surrendered. John's leading supporters were killed, obviously. One of them were skinned alive. Having sorted things out in England, in May 1194, Richard the Lionheart and William Marshall went to France, with a hundred ships. They were going to war. Shortly after he arrived, there's yet another one of these wild family meetings. John sought his brother out and prostrated himself before him. He apparently trembled as he awaited Richard's. verdict. Did his big brother Richard smite him such a blow that he would never raise his head ever again? No, he didn't. Mors the pity. He kissed him. He kissed his brother. He said he'd been

badly advised. And with that, John was welcomed back to the firm. But John had caused so much damage that the French king was in possession of much of the Angevan Empire, and that would not be solved as quickly. Richard would have to take it back castle by castle, and he set about it. He launched himself at the French. He struck deep into their rear. King Philip panicked and retreated. We know in this campaign that Lionheart and Marshall were working side by side. Meanwhile, surprisingly, Prince John fighting now for his big brother. He actually scored a victory, which is very rare. He captured the castle of Evera, but the devil's in the detail here, because that had been a castle that John had been holding for King Philip of France.

And so there's a clue there. One chronicler said that John simply pretended that he was still on their side. He was still on their side of the French. He was re-admitted. He threw a big feast and then butchered them all. Butch all his former comrades, all the defenders, and he put all their heads on spikes. Richard had a more straightforward approach to making war. He moved like a tornado through his former empire.

Some towns just admitted their error and they switched back to him. Others stupidly resisted. The Marshal and the Lionheart smashed walls or hacked their way over them. It was a lightning campaign of reconquest. On July 3rd, 1194, the Lionheart dashed to defend the town of Vendom, which the French king was threatening. King Phillips sent a message saying they better surrender or retreat. He was about to attack. Richard simply replied that he would happily await their arrival.

And, by the way, if they didn't show up, he would come looking for them. King Philip ordered an immediate withdrawal. The following day, Richard did go looking for them. He set out to crush the French. But he gave the marshal a very interesting job, the essential job of keeping a disciplined reserve of men under his command. They would shadow the king's force, and they would provide a visible deterrent. They would stop the French trying to launch a flanking attack or a counterattack.

and Richard crashed into the French rearguard. He captured much of the baggage. He killed hundreds and wounded and captured more. The French king himself very narrowly avoided capture by hiding a little church. History was really balanced on a knife edge at that point. That was Richard's, I think, greatest victory against the French. And William had played his part to perfection. He'd been an intimidating force lurking on the flank, always visible,

but he'd held his men in the iron grip. The French had known that William Marshall was there with that. force, they had massively undermined their morale. He'd scored a victory without raising a blade. On other occasions, although he was now in his 50s, he was very happy to raise that blade. In May 1197, he set out to take the castle of Millie-sur-terrain. His men were being picked off by longbowmen. They were being crushed by projectiles, were being hurled down from the battlements. A few of his men had climbed ladders. They were isolated on the enemy battlements, and William sprang into action. Full army, he climbed the ladder, and he set about

himself left and right with his sword. The defenders fell back, obviously. Although one young man, as young men do, thought he spotted his opportunity, well, to win himself eternal fame. He ran at the marshal, who simply raised his sword and brought it crashing down on the Frenchman's helmet. It pierced metal and male and punched into the man's skull. It was later said that King Richard told the marshal off after this siege for exposing himself to such danger, but I reckon he was bit jealous. In January 1199, the French agreed to a five-year truce. Richard was confirmed in his possession of all the lands in northern France he'd recovered. All that blood and treasure and masonry and trauma for a good old fine, let's return to how it was before the war.

Great. It also meant that Richard was then free to go and sort out the situation in good old Aquitaine, his old stomping grounds, that southern fastness filled with rebellious idiots. And the marshal, while Richard headed south, the marshal was left in charge of Normandy. Richard marched and rebel lords saw their lands ravaged, crops burned. You know, the normal. You should be used to it by now. In late March of 1199, he stopped to besiege an insignificant little castle, chalue, a bit of low-hanging fruit. It should hardly have been mentioned in the chronicles.

But while he was there, a long bowman on the walls shot off a hopeful bolt at a knight that he saw that strayed a bit too close strayed into range that bolt smashed into the shoulder of not just any old knight the greatest knight

the greatest king in Christendom Richard I was rushed to his tent his surgeon removed the bolt but gangrene set in there was nothing anyone could do in unimaginable pain as his body was taken over by the malignant gangrene he tried to set his affairs straight he called his mother to his bedside he announced

that john would be his successor and he wrote to william marshall telling him to take control of ruon the capital of normandy after ten days of agony richard died lamented as the lord of warriors the glory of kings. It was said the lion by the ant was slain. And with him, the only chance of that glorious enjavan empire, which listeners know I have a great affection for, the only chance at holding that empire together was gone. It was gone. One glorious realm, Carlisle to the Pyrenees and to the Alps, gone. It's too painful. Marshall, well, he certainly felt that pain. He received dying Richard's instructions

and he seized the keep at Rouen and it was there that he received the news of the king's death and it was said that he was gripped by a violent grief. William Marshall really himself now held the fate of the kingdom in his hands and that wouldn't be for the last time. Would it be Richard's brother John as the new king or his child nephew, Arthur. I remember Geoffrey's son, Arthur. William, well, William wanted John. That week in Normandy, William spent time with the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the two of them thrashed it out.

William convinced the Archbishop that it had to be John. The Archbishop agreed, but he said to William apparently, let it be, but you will never come to regret anything you did as much as what you are doing now. William had to make a terrible choice between a child and a loser. Either could be terminal for the empire. Neither would make it into the top hundred potential picks in a rational world. But we humans, we do not follow reason. Blood Trump's talent. That empire had roared into being.

It had roared to greatness through the chance collision of hereditary descent. It was inseparable from the Angevan family, the Plantagenet family. and that iron attachment, that rigid culture of inheritance, well, that would now send it on the road to hell. My dad always told me, he said, once you make a decision, it's the right one. So now William acted as he knew how, with strength and decision. He sent his most trusted knight to England with news of Richard's death.

He carried the message that the archbishop and the marshal had decided upon John. He urged others to do so. He then travelled to England, held a council of nobles, smoothed the way for John, received assurances from key figures like the Earl of Chester, the King of Scotland, that they would take the knee to John, and then he travelled back to Normandy to escort John back across the Channel in May 1199. On the 27th of May, John was crowned, and straight away Marshall got his reward. He was handed a symbolic sword

He was dubbed Earl of Pembroke Earl was the highest rank of the English nobility He had put this king on the throne And he was now an Earl in return He could travel no higher The earldom of Pembroke meant that he was not only in charge of South Wales And an area that was still contested With the independent of very warlike Welsh principalities

But it also controlled chunks of South East Island Don't remember that only a couple of decades before the Anglo-Norman lords had jumped the Irish Sea and ignited the centuries-long and lamented conquest and settlement of Ireland. So William Marshall was now, effectively, the most important subject of the new king. And how did he repay those favours? Well, as you will hear, he repaid them in spades. Don't go away. More on William Marshall coming up after this.

In the ancient world, disaster was always lurking. Earthquakes and volcanoes flattened and buried mighty cities in an instant. Drought and plague wiped out civilizations without mercy. This month on The Ancients from History Hit, the podcast that brings the distant past roaring back to life. We'll discover how disaster reshaped civilizations and the world itself. Listen now on Spotify Or wherever you get to your podcast I am not a king John fan

He was a world-class loser And it is possible It may be true that he's not quite as bad as the cliche suggests but he's just, you can't argue. He's a bottom five English king. Literally the best thing he did for his country and his royal line was dying. I'm not joking, as you will see. He was cruel. He was incompetent. He was lecturers grasping bad at politics, nearly always very bad at fighting. He was scheming, jealous, inconsistent. To be fair to him, he definitely faced challenges that would have stretched a very good king as they had stretched his father Henry the second.

who was one of the best, as they'd stretch his big brother Richard, who was certainly one of the most warlike, one of the most effective military commanders ever to sit on the throne. Their empire was unwieldy. They were very unlucky in their neighbours, their enemies. King Philip of France was very effective. That man went to bed at night. He dreamt about. He woke up thinking about and spent all day plotting to smash the Angevan Empire, to humble the kings of England and increase the lands and the power of the Kingdom of France. He was single-minded. Philip invaded straight away naturally. John agreed to a shocking peace treaty. He gave land to the French. He agreed to pay homage to King Philip for his lands in France. He sent him an annual subsidy or agreed to. And this all

went much further than his predecessors, his forebears. He might have thought this was sort of a formality, seal it, put it on a piece of paper, and Philip would leave him alone, but he would soon discover that was not the case. A new nickname began to circulate for John. Younger brother of the Lionheart, that nickname was Soft Sword. We should bring that back, by the way. If we're going to call Ethelred, Ethelred the Unready, John should be soft sword for eternity. Never forget. So a year or two after his disastrous treaty, Philip did the inevitable and he found an opportunity to enforce the agreement that had been made in that peace treaty. He summoned John to Paris as his sworn subordinate so that Philip could adjudicate a dispute between John and some

typically disputatious southern baron. If you take anything away from this podcast, you get a sense how in nightmares it was ruling over Aquitaine. And John obviously just refused to go. He goes, no, I don't recognise your right to settle this dispute. And Philip said, well, ah, you're now breaking the obligation that you signed up to me. I'm your sovereign. And Philip confiscated all of his continental lands. He announced that John's nephew, Arthur, the son of John's brother, Geoffrey, was now heir to the Angevin Empire, except those bits that he as King of France would invade and take for himself. Having made that announcement, Philip marched. He invaded. The Marshal was in charge in Normandy, the most important core part of that Angevan Empire.

He launched counterattacks on French forces. They besieged key strongholds. Now, to be absolutely fair to John, we have to include this bit. He scored the only notable military victory of his reign as he led a lightning march to relieve his mother, who was in her 70s, who was being besieged in Mirabeau. And she was directing the defence against the forces of her grandson, Arthur of Brittany. That is a grandson besieging his nan, his grandma. But John, amazingly, actually managed to score a success here. He lifted the siege, and indeed he captured his nephew Arthur.

This was rather stunning. King Philippa France halted his offensive. And this was a great moment for John. And, of course, he absolutely blew it. Rather than treating his nephew and other noble prisoners with dignity, he appears to have mistreated them savagely and indeed starved most of them to death. Now, it's a strange thing to me, as you will know,

everyone in the world is obsessed of Richard III, possibly, probably killing his nephews in the Tower of London, the sons of his big brother. Well, here we have a much better attested example of exactly this, and no one ever talks about it. I blame Shakespeare, personally. He wrote an absolute blockbuster about Richard, and his work on King John is forgotten.

But contemporary sources claim that John killed. killed his nephew by his own hand. We will never know, of course, but we do know that Arthur disappears from the historical record at this point. He was in John's custody and is never seen or heard from again. Open and shut. And this appears to have absolutely destroyed whatever reputation he had in the eyes of the Empire's nobility. You can treat peasants however you like. But if you treat nobles badly, you've crossed a line. Many of those nobles now in John's kingdom simply renounced their oaths and switched to Philip of France. John's empire disintegrated. In 1203, Philip launched another invasion, like a thunderbolt. He came along the send from Paris

into the heart of Normandy. He besieged Richard the Lionheart's mighty castle that he'd built Chateau Gaillard. The Marshal and John teamed up and tried to strike back. One force would sail on the river, while the marshal would march overland. It would be a pincar assault, which, are always brilliant on paper, except when they don't arrive at the same time, you've just halved your force and fed both halves into the wood chipper. So the river-borne force didn't arrive in time. The marshal did attack, but he met the full might of the French enemy, and he was beaten off. It was a rare setback for the marshal, but it was understandable.

If Nelson had the odd failure, the marshals allowed them too. In late 1203, Chateaillard fell, and in late 1203, John, fled Normandy. He was apparently worried that treacherous lords would just hand him over to Philip. Now, naturally, if your king flees back across the channel, any loyal barons that are holding out in the fortress till the last man and the last arrow are going to decide that this is a lost cause and submit to Philip of France. After decades of trying, after unimaginable blood and misery and treasure had been spent, the French king was back in Rouen, the capital of of Normandy. The duchy and its surrounding lands were finally under the control of the French

King. At this point, even William the Marshall seems to have wobbled, or at least sort of seized upon a bit of a technicality. He made a misstep. He sailed to France and agreed to pay homage to King Philip for the lands that he'd once owned in France. Now, this is technically excusable. There was lots of precedence, but John understandably saw this as disloyalty, and he and William Marshall fell out. And that came to head in June 1205. King John gathered a fleet in Portsmouth with the intention of invading France and trying to regain his former lands. But at a great meeting of the nobility, it seems that William Marshall refused to join the expedition. John lost his temper at him. William called for a trial by

combat to protest that he was no traitor, and no one stepped up to fight him, weirdly. The assembled barons were spooked. Here was the king falling out with the greatest of his nobles, and it's a sign of the Marshal's influence that the entire expedition was then cancelled. It seems, because of William the Marshal's reservations about it. That's a man with influence. But it was also a man who obviously John now looked upon as well, not a friend, and he was frozen out. He had to hand over his son as a hostage to John. And for the next few years, William the Marshal is not present at any court proceedings. So when John is signing charters, William the Marshal's name is not mentioned,

as other aristocrats' names will be mentioned. And we think William Marshall headed back to Wales, and for the next few years he focused his ambitions and his time on building his lands in the West. William the Marshal administered his lands in Wales, an island, and he fought to expand them. But even though he must have hoped that he was on the periphery, out of sight of King John.

In fact, this also led to a series of dangerous run-ins with John, who was, understandably, quite keen to keep an arm what his greatest subject was up to, and nervous about him, nervous about William the Marshal, carving out his own mini empire in Ireland. At one point, John ordered William Marshall not to set sail to Ireland, and the Marshal ignored him. Another time, John summoned him back,

and the Marshal did return home, but then John sprang a trap and Baron's Lord to the Crown invaded the Marshal's possessions in Ireland. William the Marshal's wife was still there, now under siege in Kilkenny Castle. And John then, in a sort of cruel and twisted way, broke the news that his wife was under siege to William the Marshal himself. Now, thankfully for the Marshal, probably predictably, William the Marshal's wife and his loyal knights he'd left in Ireland, defeated King John's force, because obviously, and William behaves sort of diplomatically enough at court to diffuse the situation. He swore a fresh oath of obedience for his lands in Ireland. He gave John a few

concessions, and he sent another one of his sons as a hostage. But effectively he merged with everything he wanted from this little scuffle. You get the impression, I think, that King John keeps stepping back from the brink of really properly falling out with the great William the Marshal. Even so, all good things come to an end. William the Marshall, as they say in movies, was getting too old for this. He was now in his late 60s. At this point, he largely withdraws from high politics. He really focuses on his estates, on looking after his estate,

seeing his sons, raising his sons, getting them wives, getting them set up, and thinking about his legacy. What practical help he could leave them to build this great dynasty, the House of Marshall, once he was gone. But history had not done. with William the Marshal, nor had England. In the summer of 1212, King John uncovered a plot to kill him. The Marshal took the opportunity to offer his services.

He made a strong show of support. King John was increasingly friendless. He'd by now spectacularly fallen out with the Pope as well. We tell this story in a couple of recent documentaries on history at TV. Please go and check them out. And this weakened King John was very grateful for the public support of William the Marshall. He wrote warmly to him. he released his sons from captivity. They'd been hostage as a court. They returned to William

the Marshal. And over the next year, John shows the Marshal signs of his favour. Castles were made over to him in South Wales. William the Marshall was back in the monarch's good books. And that could be because even John realised the storm clouds that were gathering on the horizon. In 1213, the French king Philip, not satisfied with finally conquering all of what is now France. He had amassed an invasion fleet, with the Pope's backing, and he was going to invade England and put his son, Louis, on the throne of England. Prince Louis had married John's niece, so he had a sort of smidge of a claim to the throne. He was part of the family now, so why not have a pop? And John was a man who needed help, and he knew where to find it.

He ran to William the Marshal. As always, the Marshal answered the call. He came from Ireland with a large force to man the coast of Kent, but he also didn't just bring spears. He brought advice, make peace with the Pope. And in fact, William the Marshall helped to broker that piece. John agreed. He swore obedience to the Pope. He promised an annual payment. England was actually to become a papal state, whatever that actually meant in practice. The Pope immediately called off the dogs, and Philip of France was furious. He pulled his army back from the invasion ports. But before he could disperse the ships that he'd gathered, on William the Marshall's advice, the English launched a naval strike. Philip's fleet was burned in its harbour. A chronicler wrote that it was

as if the very sea was on fire, and that would not be the last time a French fleet would be torched by a British naval force. I just want to point that out. The marshal had been called in a moment of crisis, and he had delivered. But it felt like a reprieve rather than a lasting result. King John, as ever, managed to utterly squander the fruits of that victory. Using the last of his money and his credit and the loyalty of his nobles and his reputation, just staking everything, like a gambler, putting it all on red, John launched a grandiose attempt to reconquer his father and mother's empire in France. To be fair to him, he built an impressive coalition,

the emperor, so the ruler of the Holy Roman Empire, the counts of the low countries, it would be another pincer attack, folks, and they would crush the French between them all. it all kicked off in 1214. John invaded from the south. He sent William Longsword, who is his half-brother. He was one of the bastard sons of Henry II. He sent him to meet up with the Germans who would advance on Paris from the sort of north and east. And unfortunately the Germans were a little bit slow to move out. And more importantly, John obviously panicked in the south. And he retreated from a very small detached force, the French army. And that left the other pincer of John's allies to deal with the full might of King Philip. It all came together just south of Lille in northern France, a place called Bouvine. It was the end of July, and the French annihilated the Allied army. It was one of the most decisive battles in English history. The German Emperor Otto narrowly escaped, but it was the end of his reign. The counts of Boulogne and Flanders were captured. William Longsword

was smashed off his horse by a mace-wielding bishop. and he was captured too. It was a catastrophe. John was still lackland, still soft sword, and he was now utterly bankrupt as well. He was humiliated. He was broke. He was deeply unpopular, and he's now deeply vulnerable, a lethal combination. And what followed one of the greatest crises of English medieval history, it would lead to Magna Carta, the great charter, but also war, invasion, and a very real threat to the existence of the English state itself. Essentially, John's nobles, his barons, they were angry and they smelt blood. In response, John, who'd obviously toyed with the idea of bringing the marshal down over the years, and had definitely clipped

his wings, well, now he'd turned to him in desperation. And the marshal responded to his sovereign, as he always had done, loyally. He took the lead in negotiating on John. John's path with the rebel lords, so these barons. There were five months of back and forth, and in the end there was a deal, a peace agreement to stave off war. It would be called the Great Charter or Magna Carta. The Marshal had met with the rebels. It's thought that he may well have been the one who carried them the news that John was ready to compromise, and he invited them to neutral ground of Runnymede, halfway between the Rebel Stronghold of London and the Royal Headquarters at Windsor Castle. On June the 15th, 1215, John affixed his seal to Magna Cate.

Carter. There's a preamble of this great charter, and it lists the bishops and nobles upon whose advice John was acting. William the Marshal is the first noble mentioned. Magna Carta, so this charter essentially is a set of terms which John agreed to for the better ordering of the kingdom. He agreed to kick out some of the least popular of his mercenaries out of the country. Most of the clauses are about the fines that nobles had to pay the king or payments they had to make, for example, to get permission to marry or inherit property. One famous clause says that to no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice. Another clause assures the barons that no free men will be imprisoned except by the lawful judgment of his peers. So here is the king agreeing to

rule according to the law, to be bound by law, and also be bound by accepted traditional customary practice. It's been seen as a big step towards our modern systems of government, in which no one is above the law, in which kings and governments can't just do whatever they want. They're confined by the rules. But at the time, it was mostly about concessions to the barons. No one at the time, I don't think, thought this was going to be a world historic document. And it's particularly surprising that we attach so much importance to it to this particular moment, because within weeks, John had repudiated it.

He had bended it. He had condemned it. It was not worth the parchment it was written on. I should say the reason we do remember it and celebrate Magna Carta is because of what happened to it and what was done in its name in the years and centuries that followed, starting with the actions of one William the Marshal, but more on that in a bit. In the short term, it was relevant. It was cast aside. The peace process had failed, and John went to war with his barons.

King John rampaged across his own troubled realm. pillaging, robbing, burning like it was France. His men hacked their way into Rochester Castle in one of the epic set-piece sieges of English medieval history. That campaign was supposed to terrify his barons into submission, but like everything else he did, it didn't work. It simply radicalised them further. They now sent a delegation to John's bitterest enemy, Philip, King of France. they invited him to send his son Louis to take the crown. The Marshall seems to have been on point against the Welsh over these months. The Welsh obviously regarded trouble in England as Christmas come early.

In fact, it was Christmas roughly at Christmas, because by now we're at the end of 1215, going in 1216. And the Welsh, obviously, hastened to deepen the misery of their Saxon-Norman juteish neighbours, The English. This was William the Marshal playing Marcher Lord, putting out fires as the Welsh surged across the border. They were hoping to gorge on the corpse of Plantagenet England. But the Marshal would soon be dragged back to the heart of the national crisis. French Prince Lou was only too glad to be able to respond to the pleas of the English barons. It was very altruistic of and very generous. His advance party landed in January 1216. Louis himself arrived like Julius Caesar.

in Sandwich, Kent, in May. John had by this time sent William the Marshal to reason with the King of France to try and negotiate. And you can imagine a meeting of those two, now the wise, older statesman of Western Europe. On this occasion, though, it was just going through the motions. William asked the King to call off the invasion, Philip refused, and that was that. John, you'll be surprised to learn, did not perform well at this moment of extraordinary crisis. he appears to have retreated to his beloved Corth Castle in Dorset and buried his head in the sand. Prince Louis's forces spread throughout the kingdom, Dover's mighty castle, rebuilt by John's father, Henry II,

did the job it had been intended for, and it held out against the invaders. Hubert DeBurr, another heroic figure in his period, Hewitt DeBur would fight Louis' men in the breach, in the chalk tunnels below the castle, determinedly holding on to the key of England. Windsor held out too, but that was it in the south. And really, it was Lincoln after that. You go up right through the Midlands until you get to another bastion of support for John. The garrison was under command of Nicola de la Hay after the death of her husband and son. Pretty much everywhere else in southern England in particular, it was all Louis. He was acclaimed king in St Paul's Cathedral. Not crowned, but acclaimed king in St Paul's Cathedral. About two-thirds of nobility joined him. The king of Scotland travelled south to pay homage. to Prince or King Louis, even John's half-brother, William Longsort. Shockingly, even he went over to Louis, but not the Marshal. He did not.

He knew the value of his word, and he had sworn his oath to John. Now, even a man of the Marshal's stature needs a bit of luck, and William the Marshal got some luck. Well, got some luck and some useful microbes. King John's farewell tour was a horror show. He attempted to move north to support the beleaguered garrison at Lincoln. As he crossed the wash from Norfolk into Lincolnshire, he appears to have lost some or all of the crown jewels.

The tide came in, his carts got stuck in the mud, and they were swept away. They're still out there, folks. Put a pin in that one. Then John got dysentery, and by October he was confined to Newark Castle. As he declined, he ordered his son, Henry, to be delivered into the protection of William the Marshal. Now, the Marshal's admittedly biased biography has John saying that without the Marshal, his son would never rule this kingdom. Now, that's a bit biased, but it's objectively true. the marshal was now the only man in england who could save henry's throne it was a final decent decision by one of history's most terrible decision makers hugging the toilet or whatever passed for one

racked by agonizing pain as a thunderstorm raged outside john breathed his last His empire that had once spread from the Pyrenees to Ireland was now just scraps of England. At the time, it was said the violence of the storm was a symbol of the prising open of the gates of hell in expectation of the wicked king. One chronicler in particular was certain that that's exactly where John was going.

Foul as it is, hell itself is made fowler by the presence of John. William the Marshal? He rushed to Worcester Cathedral to give the king a suitable burial, another royal sovereign that William the Marshal had put in the ground. At the funeral, he presided over a strategy meeting. What now? He could submit to Prince Louis,

or he could put a nine-year-old kid on the throne at a time of a profound national emergency. The situation? It looked hopeless. If he pursued a futile fight against Louis in the name of Little Henry, where he could be stripped of all his lands. A lifetime of building his legacy, of building his wealth for his sons and their sons to carry his titles and lands

would all come to nothing. But, on the other hand, he was the Marshal. And he'd sworn an oath. And so the Marshall would fight. Next comes one of the most dramatic meetings in English history. Marshall ordered young Henry the prince brought to him. He gallops out to meet him on the road near Malmesbury. When they meet

this nine-year-old boy and the old war horse and statesman six decades his senior, the boy said, I give myself over to God and you, at which William said, I will be yours in good faith, and there is nothing I will not do to serve you while I have the strength. Man and boy then wept. the marshal holed himself back into the saddle and ordered the prince to make haste for Gloucester. First, he would have the crown, then the kingdom. And so, Henry III was crowned in Gloucester Cathedral on the 28th of October. The only time in the last, well, thousand or so years, that a coronation has not occurred at Westminster Abbey. Tradition demanded that only someone dubbed a knight could be crowned king.

So, before the crowning, the Marshal performed the dubbing ceremony on the nine-year-old, strapping a sword to his belt. The following day, William the Marshal was appointed regent and guardian of the realm. His role was really unprecedented in English medieval history for someone who was not a member of the royal family. He was now the de facto ruler of England, albeit an England that was much reduced. Men warned him of the dangers, but he retorted that he cared not.

One of my favourite lines in his biography. It says that he declared, If everyone abandons the boy but me, do you know what I shall do? I shall carry him on my back, and if I can hold him up, I will hop from island to island, from country to country, even if I have to beg for my bread. So the Marshal had reached Churchillian heights of race, He was a phenomenal warrior, but he's also a great politician. He's very astute. One of the first things

he did was to reissue Magna Carta on the 12th of November 1216. And this, friends, is the reason that you have heard of Magna Carta. It's thanks to this reissue that it became something of importance in England. Something that would then be reissued again and again. It was a manifesto. It was a promise of good, just government. Magna Carta now, thanks to William the Marshall, meant something beyond just the words, the clauses in the text. It was now an idea, it was an aspiration. At the bottom of the 1216 document was the king's seal and alongside it that of the papal envoy.

This Magna Carta had the Pope's approval, and lastly it had the seal of the Marshal. The barons could trust it. With John gone, the Marshal promising good government, a harmless boy on the throne? Well, the rebel barons now faced an interesting choice. William the Marshal's boy king, who probably wasn't going to assault their wives and carry off their daughters and invade France, or Prince Louis, son of Philip of France, whom their Norman cousins were right now whining about us, he squeezed them for tax or curbed their power. It made you think.

It turned out that old bad King John had in the end finally done something right. He had died. He had removed himself. John's dysentery saved his dynasty. The Marshal made sure that any returning rebels would not be punished. He was lenient. William Longsort took advantage of his statesmanship to switch back to supporting his nephew's claim. In May 1217, thanks to the Marshal, the Plantagenet family, Henry III, He was still in the game, and England was now on the verge of a decision. Prince Louis was going to renew his offensive. He was going to stamp out the remaining resistance and complete the conquest.

But he had to split his forces. Some went back to Dover to finish off the extremely obstinate defenders of Dover Castle. The other half, they marched north for that other stronghold. Lincoln. The Marshal saw his chance. Even though the French and rebel army numbered about 600 knights and several thousand less heavily armed infantry, which definitely outnumbered the Marshal's forces, William the Marshal decided to attack. In desperate times, the boldest plans can be the safest. William marched on Lincoln.

On the way, he gave a rousing speech to his men. He called on them to defend themselves, their families and loved ones, to fight for their land and honour, to banish cowardice, defeat those who would destroy everything and take our land. He urged them to shape their destiny with blades of iron and steel. He was approaching from south of Lincoln, but he made the bold decision to march around in a huge arc and attack from the north-west. Louis' troops were inside the city.

They were besieging the castle that sits in the corner of the town. They were trying to batter it into submission. So William the Marshal was hoping that he could attack downhill into the mass of Louis' troops inside the city walls. At 6 a.m. on Saturday the 20th of May, the Marshal led his men towards the walls of Lincoln. A source said the sun flashed off their armour. He roared at his men that this was their chance to free their land to win eternal glory. If they fell, he assured them, paradise awaited. God knew his faithful. As for the enemy he declared, well, it was time to send those Frenchmen to hell.

His men raced up to the walls of Lincoln. Now, they could have entered the castle at this point. Nicola de la Hay's stronghold was in the middle of the west side of the Roman walls, a bit like the way the Tower of London is incorporated into London's Roman wall. But William didn't just want to march his army in to reinforce Nicola and make sure they're all cooped up in the castle. He wanted to break the French and rebel army. He had no siege engines, he had little time.

He was outnumbered. So he sent out trusted subordinates to find a... unguarded stretches of the city wall or gates, and one came back and said there was a gate in the northwest of the walls, which had been back filled with rubble and junk. William saw his chance. He ordered his crossbowman to enter the castle. They would reinforce their garrison, they would line the battlements to provide what we now call fire support. It's a bit anachronistic, but they would shoot their bolts into the enemy to cover the advance of William's army. Then he ordered the Earl of Chester to attack the Northgate as a diversion.

Meanwhile, other men would clear the rubble from the little gate in the northwest of the wall. By midday on the 20th of May, 1217, a date, by the way, I want to mention in passing, that for some reason is not seared into every Englishman's psyche. William the Marshal, at 70 years of age, mounted his muscle-bound destriere, his warhorse, banners flapping in the breeze, household knights around him like a pack of wolves, and he bellowed, ride on, and he led the way through the gates which had now been cleared of rubble into the heart of Lincoln, into the more of battle, and into the history books.

They clattered through the narrow streets, his son on one side, William Longsword, Henry II's bastard on the other. They and their elite followers riding and dying to put a boy on the throne because they'd given their word, because they thirsted for renown in this life, and paradise in the next. They wanted glory for as long as stories are told. Out came William the Marshal, guardian of the kingdom, into the open space in front of the castle gates, into a kind of town square. His horses hooves echoing off the stone walls, his battle cry filling the air. One of his followers roared, This way, God is with the Marshal, and who could doubt it that day. He drove his horse into

the mass of Frenchmen and rebels. They'd been scrambling to take cover from the swarm of crossbowmen that had suddenly lined the castle walls. The French engineers working their catapults and siege engines had been peppered with bolts. Knights were looking for shelter. Now, this lightning bolt struck them. Europe's greatest warrior burst like Hades on his chariot springing from the earth itself. There was shock and terror, and then there was death. The English knights scattered the men at the siege engines. One we hear was beheld. headed as he attempted to reload. They charged at the rebel knights. There was no order here. There were no lines. There was no command and control now. This was a savage urban battle of

alleys and streets, horses slipping on blood-soaked cobbles. This was a melee. The layout of central Lincoln hasn't changed a lot actually over the years, so go there and imagine the horror of battle in those streets. One former knight of King John almost drove William Longsort from his saddle. His lance shattered on longsword's armour. The marshal, though, gave him such a blow between his shoulders that he in turn was sent sprawling. We hear that he crawled off and hid for the rest of the battle. Bested by a 70-year-old. Still, there's no shame in joining that long list of men whom the marshal had cured of ambition.

The French commander desperately tried to rally his men there in the heart of the town between the castle and the cathedral. But he was killed instantly when a blade passed through the slit in his visor and straight into the his brain. You can imagine the marshal for one last time, giving himself over entirely to the ecstasy, the thrill, the diabolical energy of battle. But he wouldn't have that long to enjoy it. As so often, the death of a charismatic leader infected their followers, and the French and the rebels began to give ground. Down the steep hill they went, to the south, out of Lincoln, the tide had turned. The spot where that French commander died was the high watermark of the French invasion of 1216, 1217, and now those waters would recede. As so often, withdrawal

metastasized into retreat and collapse in short order. The bottleneck of that south gate turned the French and rebel force into a panicked fleeing mass. And the marshal's men did a bloody slaughter there. You can imagine the French and rebel knights mounted, hacking their way through their own infantry in the press to escape. Every man for himself promises to Prince or King Louis, now forgotten. Two hundred enemy knights made it out and thrashed their horses' flanks until they reached London. Their mounts blown, exhausted, their riders humiliated. The infantry that could not escape as easily, was beaten down in the streets or drowned in the river south of town. These men were worthless to the victors. They could not fetch a ransom, and so they were

dealt with by the sword's edge. High status knights and lords were rounded up to be sold back to their loved ones. Before William the Marshal allowed himself arrest or food to pass his lips. He galloped for Northampton, a journey of a hundred miles, to kneel before his child sovereign and bring him news of his victory. His kingdom secured. The Marshal displayed wisdom after this victory, and rather than fight again immediately against Louis, he offered him generous terms, leave the country, release his prisoners. In turn, he announced that any rebels returning to their true king would be treated fairly. Magna Carta would guide that king in his actions. Louis refused his offer. And in August he made one more attempt to fight his way out of his problems.

A French fleet carrying reinforcements set sail from Calais. In command was Eustace the monk. It was, in fact, a pirate. On the 24th of August, the English fleet set sail to intercepted in Sandwich Bay. William the Marshal stood on the shore. In command, a The float was the equally legendary Hubert de Burr, the iron-hard defender of Dover Castle. The English threw lime downwind at the French ships, blinding their crews, then they rammed and boarded them. If you thought the fighting was at close quarters in the alleys of Lincoln, well, that was like a football pitch compared to the companionways and decks of a 13th century vessel.

I can't imagine it. The press of men on swaying, rocking ships, any mistake and you plunge into the sea weighed down by your armour. We know that in this savage fight, French heroes were captured. Eustace the monk was dragged up from the hole where he was hiding and beheaded on deck. Another French invasion fleet

had been routed in the narrow sea. I've lost count of them. Louis had no hope now. English barons deserted him. The Marshal had encircled London, and Louis agreed to leave. The Marshal showed him the door. He rode with him alongside him to do,

over. He put him on a ship and watched the Frenchman's wake, a white ribbon in the sea, heading home to France. The Marshal had won back the kingdom, but it was shattered. He set to work restoring royal government. He issued Magna Carta again in late 1217, trying to convince the ruling elite that he and young King Henry meant business. He settled disputes, he rebuilt. He forced the Scots to relinquish The swathes of Northern England, they'd seized him the crisis. He sent men to try and hold the line against the Welsh. Even William the Marshal, though, was human. The enormous task eventually took its toll. In January 1219, he fell ill. He struggled on, but by mid-March it was clear that this was his last battle, one that no human can win. He decided he'd like to die at home. He travelled by boat. up the Thames from London to Cavisham, near Windsor, where he had a manor. He retired to bed, but he still ran the state. The great men, the king even crowded into his bedroom to listen to his final pronouncements, racked with pain though he was. Young Henry III took up residence nearby in

Reading so William could guide and protect him until his breath left his body. There was a disputes over the guardianship of the monarch. William settled it. He sent his son to watch the swearing-in of the new guardian to ensure that it happened. He summoned the king to his bedside and gave him one last tutorial. He must grow up to be a worthy man. Don't repeat the errors of some of his evil ancestors. God would grant him a long life.

His sons and daughters stayed with him, night and day to the end. His wife, unflagging. as did members of his retinue, knights that have followed him no matter what. If we had judged by our death, well then the marshal was loved and respected by those who knew him best, and none of us could ask for more. He made arrangements for his wife, his children, his knights. As death approached, he announced that he'd always intended to become a knight Templar just before his passing. The head of the order of the Templars in England came to his bedside and carried out the right of initiation.

The Marshal had, he said, known higher honour in this world than ever any other knight had, both in respect of your valour, your wisdom and loyalty. On the 14th of May, 1219, the Marshal told his son, I cannot fight against death. His bargrapher then says that he lent against his son. The son was very distressed for his father, who could say no more words, having lost the faculty of speech. It is not the right time now to ask whether there was ever any greater reason to shed tears

for any prince on earth than there was in the Marshal's household. My lords, it is the very truth that in this world the Marshal experienced many fine and splendid adventures. His dying was the best among them. Days after he died, the streets were packed as a glittering escort of barons accompanied his coffin to Westminster Straby for a candlelit service. Then, on the 20th of May, he was buried in Temple Church. The Archbishop officiated. He called the Marshal the greatest knight to be found in all the world.

His effigy survived the bombs of Hitler's Lefalfa, of course, and can still be seen in the church today. Well, that was a big podcast. That could be a record, folks. That could be my longest ever podcasts. So thank you very much to you, hardcore fans of The Marshall for listening all the way to the end. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed learning about The Marshall, reading up, writing and delivering this podcast. It's truly a subject like no other.

For more podcasts like this, please subscribe in the feed wherever you get your podcast and the new ones will drop automatically into them. If you leave a review, apparently that really helps. So I'm always very grateful for you doing that. Sorry to ask. And don't forget, we have a new YouTube podcast you can watch for free that drops every Friday. Go and check out Dan Snow's History on YouTube. But in the meantime, folks, you want to again recover my voice. See you next time.

Thanks very much for listening, everyone. Before you go, I'll tell you that ever at the cutting edge, the bleeding edge of what's new and exciting, after 10 years of the podcast, you can finally watch it on YouTube. We are moving fast and breaking things here, folks. Our Friday episodes each week will be available to watch on YouTube. and you can see me. You can see what we're talking about. I'd love it if you could subscribe to that channel over there.

Just click the link in the show notes below and you can watch it on your phone, your tablet, or even a TV or even a giant cinema movie screen if you have one in your underground layer. See you next time, folks. Hello, I'm Greg Jenner, host of Your Dead to Me, the comedy podcast from the BBC that takes history seriously. Each week, I'm joined by a comedian and an expert historian to learn and laugh about the past. In our all-new season, we cover unique areas of history that your school lessons may have missed,

from getting ready in the Renaissance era to the Kellogg Brothers. Listen to You're Dead to Me now, wherever you get your podcasts.