Noble Blood - Henry V (with Dan Jones)

Episode Date: September 10, 2024

Was Henry V the greatest king in English history? Or was he a violent and vindictive monarch overrated by history? Historian Dan Jones joins us to talk about Henry V, the subject of his new biography, available in the United States October 1.Support Noble Blood:— Bonus episodes, stickers, and scripts on Patreon— Noble Blood merch— Order Dana's book, 'Anatomy: A Love Story' and its sequel 'Immortality: A Love Story'See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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I am so thrilled to be back with one of my all-time favorite writers and historians, Dan Jones, who just wrote an incredible book on Henry V, Subthead, The Astonishing Triumph of England's greatest warrior king. Dan, thank you so much for joining me. Well, all I can say is I'm so happy to be here again with one of my all-time favorite writers and historians, Dana. How about that? Oh, God, I'm blushing. Well, before we actually get into the details of Henry V's Life, which I confess, I did learn about mostly through Shakespeare when I was, you know, in high school. So that's sort of my earliest basis of understanding. I do want to ask you, you say he's England's greatest warrior king.

I've seen people just say he's the greatest king, full stop, full period. What do you think about Henry V in terms of his ranking as a king? Well, I think in the middle ages, there were, the later middle ages, certainly, there was like a real clear set of things you had to do. And it was quite a short set of things you had to do, if not an easy set of things you had to do to be like the ideal of kingship. And that of English kingship, and that was go and smash the French with a view to taking their crown away from them, your crown away from them, as you would have to put it, if you were the king. And make sure that your subjects are given justice and provided with good rule.

Those are the two that's represented on the Great Seal of England, king with a sword in hand on one side and scales of justice on the other. That's the job. But it's not that easy to do. Henry VIII manages to do it to perfection, maybe even beyond perfection on both counts. But then it becomes quite difficult to rank him in the overall scheme of English and British monarchy. Because is this the sort of king you would want to succeed, for example, Charles III? If we went Charles III and then you have Henry V, so a king who comes along, who's absolutely convinced that he is the embodiment of justice,

that his overriding mission is to project military might onto the kingdom's neighbors, that religion and piety are everything, that all heretics should be burned. I don't think it's the sort of king who would be successful in any age, but if we think about, so that's obviously being ridiculous, You can't just transport one king to a different age and he'll be good then. But what Henry was so brilliant at was understanding instinctively what is the job right now and how do I perform that job. So the only monarch I can really think of who does this with such a plomb is probably Elizabeth II,

who really understand this is what the monarchy is supposed to be and has this sort of in a way, self-denying approach to it, which is here is the job, and I will subsume my person into being this job. Trumbly, Elizabeth Second did it, a really boring time. The job is to be an effective modern monarch, is ready to do as little as possible while looking amazing. Just being a living mascot that people can project all of their ideals of the empire on to? Yes, a little bit. You know, trying not to make any trouble, doing your best to stop

your family from making any trouble, being super willing to open yet another shopping center or supermarket or hand out another medal. I mean, that's, so it's, I found it a bit harder to get excited about that kind of monarchy than I do about the late medieval monarchy. It's also less dramatic than Ajin'Core. Elizabeth the second for all of her many accomplishments, never, never led English troops into victory against the French. No, but I suppose if they swapped places, I suppose who would be more effective in the other one's age, would if we dropped Elizabeth II into the 15th century and gave her the sort of all the training and upbringing, you know, she was a pretty competent individual and

and Henry likewise. But you're right, it's more dramatic. I think it's more dramatic in the late 15th century. Well, I think most of what people know about Henry's personality. Obviously, they know that, you know, the highlights, possibly that he, you know, he led the charge against the French. Amazing victory at Agincourt, 100 years war. But most of what maybe I'm projecting here, people believe of his personality, I think, has been really shaped by Shakespeare. We see Henry V as a young man as sort of a man enjoying the folly of his youth. But how accurate sort of is that picture? Well, the trouble with, or maybe not the trouble, the thing you always have to price in when you're doing any kind of 15th century history in particular, English 15th century history in particular, is that you're always looking through the lens of Shakespeare.

And this is certainly true. I remember when I was writing my book about the Wars of the Roses years ago, that it's the same then. So Shakespeare, you would never wish away Shakespeare. Shakespeare was the sort of the greatest genius ever to use the English language. But his purposes in using the English language were not to tell accurate historical stories. They were to create great dramas riffing off the fabric of English history. And so he does that with, you know, extraordinary effectiveness in the case of Henry V. But it requires some distortion.

So if we take this of Shakespearean character of Henry VIII across the three, plays in which he appears, Henry 4th, 1, 2, and then Henry V, so we have Prince Hal for a long time, and then we have the King. And so Shakespeare's kind of dramatic arc for Henry the fifth is to go from sort of roisterer playboy surrounded by youthful intimates who are really inappropriate to the gravitas of office, who sort of sheds this like a snake skin at the moment is coronation and just in time, and immerse. as a completely different, much more serious character who's ready to assume the burden of kingship and yet still retains just enough of the common touch to bring his soldiers along with him.

That's a really brilliant, dramatic arc. But in order to create it out of the sort of malleable plato of history, you have to really squeeze away at Henry's youth. And you have to take a couple of fleeting references, really oblige. references from sources pertaining to Henry's younger years and you have to really, really lean into those to make the character Prince Howl. You know, the actual historical evidence for this sort of roistering youth, you know, womanizing, hard drinking, the sort of person I'd like to hang around with when I'm out in the pub, this is really at odds with most of what we know about the real young

Henry as Prince of Wales. Not that that story is uninteresting, but it's just not, it's not Prince Howe. Henry, in the play Henry V is drawn somewhat closer to life. There is the sort of the ruthlessness, the mastery of the vernacular, you know, the ability to communicate in English in a way that would touch high and low together, the sense of camaraderie in the face of battle. There's more to Henry and Henry V than there is, in historical terms, than there is in Prince Howe. But, you know, it's tempting as it is to judge Shakespeare's historical accuracy.

It is something of a category era. Shakespeare was never in the business of being judged on historical accuracy. It was about getting people into theatres to watch a great show, right? It's not the same thing. So then let's talk a little bit about historical accuracy. What was the real Prince Hal like as a young man, to the best of our understanding? He was born in the gatehouse of Monmouth Castle in 1886 as the firstborn son of the greatest noble house in the realm, the House of Lancaster. His grandfather was John of Gaunt.

His father was Henry Bollingbrook, who was at that time a paragon of chivalry, a generous, polite, good-looking, handsome, dashing nobleman, famous across Europe as a great jouster, famous as a crusader, famous as a pilgrim who'd actually been to Jerusalem, a great gift-giver. So Henry grows up, and he has his mother, Mary Dubon, artistic, literary, musical. So he grows up as a sort of quite sophisticated, extremely privileged young man. but his life is thrown into turmoil relatively young when his father, Bollingbrook, falls out with Bollingbrook's first cousin, the King, Richard II, and is banished.

That famous scene from, probably best known from Shakespeare's play, Richard the second. The duel at Coventry stopped dramatically by Richard, who then sends Bollingbrook off into exile. From this point on, Henry, as a youth, is somewhat tossed from Pillar to post. He falls briefly under the wing of Richard the second himself and has taken off to Ireland as part as hostage, but sort of part as apprentice really of Richard the second and is treated very kindly by Richard the second and I believe and I argue in my book that Henry is taught a lot or certainly gleaned a lot from his experience with Richard the second. He strikes me as a, and we can

only infer this really from his later action, but the young Henry strikes me as a spun. He's a great learner. He absorbs. You know, when he's when he's close to Richard II, both in his court and as a captive, he seems to just, he seems to sort of suck up the best things that Richard, Richard's kingship has to offer. There aren't many of them, but the one that Richard II has above, almost every other medieval king is a mastery of spectacle and a performance of majesty. And we can see later in Henry V's life and reign that he's just, he's, He's watched and he's learned and he's able to put that into action.

Later, when Henry's father, Henry Bollingbrook, becomes King Henry IV, the young Henry is put to work. He's taken on military campaign to Scotland. He sees the logistics of a campaign and he seems to absorb them very effectively. He's sent off to Ireland as Prince of Wales to put down the rebellion of our England door. And he learns very quickly from his mentors there, people like Hotspur, the future rebel. but brilliant military commander. He learns how to deal with a siege. He learns how to deploy cannon.

He learns good ratios of men at arms to archers. We have a wonderful letter when he's about 15 years old, says Prince Henry, written back to his father, who's tasked him with sorting out the great Welsh rebel and would be Prince of Wales, Owen Glendor. And he says, I've heard, this is young Henry, he says, I've heard Glendor has been putting it around that he wants a fight. So, Dad, I went, I said, if you want to fight, I'm going to give you a fight.

So I went off into Wales and I looked for him, but he wasn't there and he couldn't find me. So I went round his house. I mean, he literally went round the guy's house. He wasn't in, so I burned his house down and sort of trashed all his lands. I went to his other house. He wasn't there either. One of his mates was. His mate said, oh, spare me, spare me.

I'll give you 500 quid. So I cut his head off. And now I'm back. Hope you're well. Lots of love, Henry. And he would have been, what, about 15 or 16 at this time? Precisely, yeah. By the time he's 16, he's regarded by his father as fit to lead the rearguard at the Battle

of Shrewsbury, you know, a massive battle fought against the rebellious Percy family in which Henry fights and is terribly wounded, in fact. So he is, I think he learns, he's intelligent, he has an instinctive taste for, combat and the knightly and military arts. So this is the kid that grows up and that's, you know, that's a pretty good set of skills if you're going to become a warrior king of England. So now just to back up a little bit for context for listeners who might be less familiar with this period of history, it doesn't sound quite as much like Henry VIII, his father was as invested in sort of reigniting the Hundred Years War War.

with France, but that's something that Henry VIII really takes on when he becomes king. Can you talk a little bit about that conflict and why Henry V was so motivated to fight in France? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, let's do a really quick hundred years war 101. So in the 13, late 1330s, Henry Vith's grandfather, King Edward III, had the opportunity to pitch. Great grandfather. Great grandfather, yeah. have the opportunity to pitch his claim to be the king of France as well as the king of England. Edward III, so he says, I'm the rightful king of France and he goes off to fight the French for this. Now, the central question, this becomes important, very vitally important, Henry Fiscerain,

so I'll delay us just briefly here. Does Edward III mean what he says or is claiming to be king of France just a negotiating tactic to get England a better deal in its existing French possessions in the southwest around Bordeaux, call it Gascany, it's the sort of the Dordaun area, it's where lots of English people today have second homes. Hmm, good question. Certainly, they never have to deal with it head on during Edward the Thirds reign. There are many great successes, the Battle of Cresi, the Battle of Poitiers, they take the French king prisoner,

they force this great deal in 1360, the Treaty of Breitini, where there's a settlement between English and French. Now this doesn't stop the Hundred Years War, it rumbles on because nobody's happy. The English want more territory. The French want them to have less territory. So at this point, the English have the hold on sort of the southwest of what is modern day France, but not the quote unquote kingdom of France, which was its own. Not the kingdom of France and not other lands that historically this English dynasty, the Plantagenets, had held. Normandy for one, the few others, enjou, main, terrain, partu, Brittany,

but critically Normandy in the north. So, there was still a reason to keep fighting if you wanted to fight. Now, under the reign of Richard the Second, that's Edward III's grandson and successor, England has a king who does not want to fight. Richard II has no

desire to fight the Hundred Years World whatsoever, and he does everything he can to try and force a peace. This is not particularly popular in England because although there's a great war weariness, there's a sort of a bitterness towards the levels of taxation that have to be paid, there's still a sort of sense that the war is not finished, it hasn't been won, there are reasons to keep fighting, there are lots of hawks who think that the fighting should continue. Now, when you get to the reign of Henry

the 4th and Henry the 5th, circumstances in France have changed somewhat. The French are in the middle of what becomes their own wars of the roses. This owes its genesis to the madness of King Charles VI of France, who in 1392 has a sort of complete psychotic episode and the subsequent psychological breakdown. He drifts in and out of madness for the rest of his life. For listeners who just are trying to put these pieces together, we've done episodes on Charles the 6th, the France, who goes mad and stabs his men, his own men, well, sort of out on a hunt. So if that sounds familiar, that's who we're talking about now. Right.

This is the mad. And then he subsequently believes he's made of glass. He's on fire the whole time. He doesn't remember his name. He runs about his palaces, smearing his own feces on the walls and so on and so forth. I'm sure you've delved right into that detail in previous episodes, Dana. I can't imagine you skating over it. I did try to avoid the feces, but thank you for reminding me how important that was.

One of my rules in life is avoid the feces, but it's not always possible as, well, as parenthood has taught me. So, anyway, so by the time you get to Henry IV, France is dissolving into civil war between two factions, call it the French Wars, the Roses, Burgundians against Armagnac's. Henry V comes to the throne in 1413 with the constitution and the inclination. to go and fight this war. He believes that by rights the French crown should be his. He really buys into his great-grandfather, Edward III's claim. He has had a robust training as a warrior and as a leader of men fighting O'Anglinder in Wales. That war eventually turns out to be successful.

During his father's waning years when his own father, that's Henry IV, of England, descends into real physical. called decrepitude. Henry has run the council, so he's rolled up his sleeves and learned how to finance government, how to negotiate, how to lead politically. So he's ready for the challenge of going and pursuing this English claim in France. And he's also got the blessed circumstances, if you're the English king, of the French being murderously at one another's throats and hopelessly politically divided. And if you like, therefore, the taking. So that's the situation in 1413, 14 and Henry's sort of year of glory, 1415, when the Battle of Ashencore takes place. What's up everyone? I'm Ego Vodom. My next guest, you know from

Stepbrothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Ferrell. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with them one day and I was like, And dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up through, and I know it's a place that come look for up and coming talent. He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. Yeah. He goes, but there's so much luck involved.

And he's like, just give it a shot. He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck.

Listen to Thanks Dad on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Vodam. My next guest, you know from Step Brothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Farrell. Woo-woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with him one day.

And I was like, and Dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up through, and I know it's a place that come look for up-and-coming talent. He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. Yeah. He goes, but there's so much luck involved. And he's like, just give it a shot. He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit.

If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. And then the Battle of Apple.

Agencourt obviously is incredibly famous, especially famous because we get one of Shakespeare's best speeches. But can you actually talk about what the setup of that battle was and what Henry did to make it such a resounding and surprising English victory? Well, surprising is definitely the right word. This is Henry's first campaign to France. He's been king for roughly two years. He's decided he's going to go fight this because he's been taunted. by the Dauphin, one of the sons of Charles VI. And he decided he's going to go and fight.

So he raises an army. There is some doubt in England as to whether this is going to be a success. On the eve of campaign, there's a rebellion or attempted coup against him, which fails. So he sails to France with a lot riding on this. He lands near Arfleur and besieges the coastal city of Hafleur. And that's a long siege which heavily depletes his army, disease runs around his camp. But it's ultimately successful. He takes the city of Afleur, and this is in itself a great victory.

The English had, in previous generations, taken Calais, so that was an English possession. This is going to be another Calais, a great mercantile city, a very useful sort of beachhead, bridgehead, if they want to launch more campaigns. it's a real achievement. But at the time that the siege of our fleur is won, Henry seems to think that it's not enough. Everybody in his high command says, we've lost too many men, high ranking and low ranking. That's too late in the season. Let's just cut our loss. Well, not to cut our losses. Let's be happy with what we've got and go home and regroup. And Henry says no. He says, we need to do one more thing. Now, it's too late in the season to go besiege another city. He hasn't got enough men, money, morale is.

is running low because of disease. So he goes for the sort of cheapest, most effective option. He says, I'm going to take men with provisions for about a week. And we're going to run. We're going to run north from our Fleur through the Norman countryside as fast as we can. And we're going to get to Calais, the other English possession, and we're going to go home from there. Now, why do that? That's mad, or so it seems.

but part of the the one of the the most important tactics in war in this age in foreign war in this age is to prove to the people of the realm on which you're making war that their own king can't protect them and so what henry's doing in running north from arfleur to calais is saying look at this i can go wherever i want in this kingdom which by the way is my kingdom and your king can't do anything to stop me. It's the equivalent of just running down the street, knocking on everyone's door and sort of flicking them the bird as you run. So it was more of a propaganda campaign than a military campaign. Yeah, and it's going to be cheap and it's going to be fast. He reckons he can do it. And they only take provisions for a week. He thinks he's going to be there in a week. And at a fast

march, he should have been. But the problem is they get stuck. They get stuck trying to cross, you've got across a lot of rivers as well and get around a lot of times. And get around a lot of towns to make this journey. And they make it sort of half of the way. And then the French, who have really not got their act together at Ha'er, finally do get their act semi-together, raise a big army and they enter into a foot race. They start chasing the English. And the two armies collide at the end of October, 1415, near Agenko, the little village. And Henry is forced to fight. He doesn't want to fight, but he's. ready to fight if he has to. This wasn't the plan, but it's, you know, this is always going to be a

gamble and now it's upon him, he's got to do it. So, Asuncourt is a great test. It's a great test militarily because the English have fewer men, they have arches rather than men at knights dominating their army. The French have more men. They have knights dominating their army. That's not so weird. I mean, both sides know what to expect to Ajancourt, because they've seen this before, in very similar circumstances and a different generation at the Battle of Cresi under Edward the third, you'd had a similar disparity of numbers, the French had been chasing the English, there were different compositions of the armies, and Edwards the third had won, Howardie won, because he'd used longbows to massacre the French and cause chaos and then cut them to pieces.

Everybody knew on both sides what the other side's tactics were going to be. None of this was a surprise. It was just who could deploy their tactics the best. Is it going to be the French fresh, lots of, you know, experienced men among the leadership, including Marshall Boussico, the most famous night of the day, or is it going to be the English, exhausted, disease, depleted, virtually on their knees, this is their last chance and there are a load of archers. So. And France has the numbers at this point, right?

They've got the numbers. They've got the more, you know, the ostensibly more dangerous types of, you know, the mostensibly more dangerous types of troops and cavalry instead of archers. So this is a real sort of general's victory because victory at Agencourt comes down to who's going to pull off their tactics the best. And so it's Henry's victory. And I'm not trying to downplay in saying that the individual heroism and bravery of everybody who fights in a battle.

I thought that should go without saying. But this is a general's victory. You've got Henry on the one side who is unquestionably the leader of his men and who's got them into this mess in the first place. And you've got on the French side a divided leadership. Nobody quite knows who's in charge. There are people who don't turn up in time to actually fight the battle. There's a sort of certain arrogance that comes with being the favourites in the contest. And although they put their tactics into effect as planned, they just don't do it as well.

well as the English, and the English anticipate better what the French are going to do. They line their arches up with sharpened stakes in front of them. They put archers on the wings. They manage to funnel the French exactly where they want them, and they cut them down with longbow shot, just as intended. There's no sort of special, like, incredible Napoleon-grade, like, doozy tactic that Henry kind of comes up with on the hop in the middle of the battle. Everybody does what they're supposed to do and they don't run away while they're doing it. So that is a sign of extremely competent leadership, even when everyone's backs to the walls and they're at a loss. Now, at the end of Agincourt, of course, comes the most notorious episode, possibly in Henry's career, which is dramatized by Shakespeare, which is the order to kill the prisoners. And that's something that historians have argued about a great deal.

whether it actually happened or not you mean not whether it actually happened but whether it was the right thing to do oh well what what do you think so because it is an incredibly brutal move on on henry the fifth's part but maybe brutality was what was called for in the era Dana I think instinctively you are a medieval warrior I think uh from the just from the from the uh the implication of your question yes so there's this moment where uh the battle of azicur has sort of It seems like it's finished in the English have won. French have been routed, many prisoners have been taken. And the English ordinary soldiers are very happy about this because they've taken high-ranking, high-value prisoners. These guys are going to be worth their weight in gold as ransoms.

Everybody's happy. And then there's this moment where something, it's still not totally clear because the accounts vary. Something happens where it looks like another contingent of French troops who weren't involved in the original engagement, but who were supposed to be turn up. They're turning up late. Perhaps they've rounded up everyone who kind of scattered and ran away

on the French side, and they're coming back to have another go. That looks like what's about to happen. So Henry, who's having to deal with this in real time, has to make a very quick decision, which is, what are we going to do? We might actually have to stand here and fight again. we can't do that whilst every other one of my troops is sort of clinging on to a French prisoner because this means we're going to try and fight with a bunch of French troops in our midst. And so he gives the order to kill them.

Kill them. And actually the people, the English, a lot of them are very unhappy about this. No, I'm not killing this guy. He's worth his weight in gold. He's going to be a ransom. And he has to send around a hit squad of his sort of hardcore ultras saying kill, kill, kill. kill, kill. So it is brutal, but it's the middle of a battle. They think it's, you know, this isn't the end of a battle as far as Henry could see. It's the middle because they're about

to face another wave of French attack. Now, as it happens, the French don't engage. But in the first write-ups, the sort of the first reports of what happens at Agincourt, nobody writes, that Henry was completely, you know, unaccountably brutal, he breached the Geneva Convention, and this was such a terrible, you know, what a meany. They say, what idiots the French coming towards the battlefield were to try and to do this, because they provoked the massacre of the prisoners. They lay all the blame on the French side. And this includes French chroniclers.

So it's, I think it's, today this would be illegal. it would be a war crime. In the middle of a medieval battle, it's absolutely fair game. Because how could you be expected to fight off another wave of French troops if you have French people in your midst who could be attacking from within? It's unschivalrous, it's bad manners, it's absolutely necessary. And as I say, I think today it is often leveled as evidence for the prosecution when people are trying to say, Henry the 5th, super overrated king, actually cruel, callous, mean, warmonger, nasty piece of work. All that's really saying is to sort of return to an earlier part of our conversation,

you wouldn't want him to be king today. Well, duh, obviously. I mean, it's so stupid as to barely be worth saying. It's pragmatic and it's very unpleasant, but guess what? It's the early 15th century. And one piece of evidence that in my understanding shows that contemporary people were still excited by everything that he was doing is when Henry does return back to England, he gets a full hero's welcome. Of course, there's a triumph, you know, and I mean that in the old-fashioned sense, Henry is welcome back to this rapturous reception, this sort of pageants, people, incredible displays in the streets. of London, the likes of which we haven't seen in my lifetime except maybe when we had the 2012

London Olympics. It's that sort of scale of extraordinary procession. And Henry is at the midst of it. But it's very interesting because at this point, Henry isn't kind of Prince Charming standing amid the ticker tape parade sort of bowing and showing off and smiling and grinning and high-fiving everybody, far from it. In fact, quite the opposite. He puts on the most remarkable performance. He's dressed somberly, has a grave and severe expression on his face. He refuses to show the crown that was attached to his helmet at Agincourt, which had been badly damaged by a blow that could well have killed him. Wow, which seems like a great PR move. None of that. Although he allows the spectacle, the cheering, the triumph, the pageantry on the part of his people,

he says, and he accepts that it will be directed towards him as the victor of the battle. He says, that this can only be permitted if the glory is seen to be coming through him to God, that this thanks must be given to God, and that Henry himself is only the instrument of God. He's doing God's will. He's just one sort of, he says this actually before he even gets back to London. He puts his arm around the Duke of Ollion, the young man who's been captured at the battle, and luckily for him, not killed, who's moping about, oh dear, to such bad news.

Henry says, well, look, it's very obvious what's happened here. I mean, you French are totally decadent, and God has punished you. And I am God's scourge. That's who I am. That's what I am. And you need to understand that. And I don't know, Charles Duke of Orleans feels much better about things. That's not what I would want to hear after.

No, not quite, but it does tell you exactly. And I think Henry means it. And he's certainly, when he comes back through London, he wants to pray. yes, he wants to give thanks to God, and he wants his people to give thanks to God themselves, because a godly realm is an ordered realm. And this is a way of showing that all of this that they paid for, the realm has paid for, and has been ordered by him, is more than just a sort of vanity project of a warmonger king. This is really what God wants for the realm of England, and he is merely God's instrument.

and that this is a victory that is to God and therefore is to be thanks to be given by the entire realm to God for what they together have achieved. So in that sense it's a far, far more effective and subtle piece of politicking than simply showing off your dented crown and going, yeah, look, it'll take more than that to put me down, you bastards. It's like it's deep, it's deep understanding of what the job of kingship is and what it entails. and that's why he's so great. And fast-forwarding just a few more years, if we're talking about the legacy of a king, I do think it's important to take into account the legacy for the monarchy that he sets up.

And obviously, Henry V will die in his mid-30s. He'll die young, so I don't know how much responsibility we can give to him. But immediately after his death, England will sort of fall into the devastating wars of the roses. is there anything Henry VIII could have done differently or anything he did wrong that created those circumstances? Well, I'll correct you on one point, if I may, which is that it's not immediate, and that's very important. So Henry VIII has achieved something remarkable. In 1420, the Treaty of Troyes, he becomes the heir and regent of the Crown of France.

He sort of completes the video game, if you like, that Edward III is set up. He's done it. Marries the Princess of France. He's the princess. Rescues her from the dragon. So exactly. So now what? Well, now what is a bit of a problem because now this is no longer Henry trying to win back

what was taken from the Plantagenets or England trying to win back what was taken from the Plantagenets. This is, on the one hand, you're king of England and the other you're a belligerent in a French civil war. And English parliaments don't want to pay for a French civil war. So now the whole game is different. Henry, within two years at the age of 35, Henry's dead from dysentery. But it doesn't all collapse.

That's what's amazing about it is it doesn't all collapse. And one of the reasons it doesn't all collapse is because Henry has some remarkable lieutenants, his brothers, the most astonishingly accomplished of which is John Duke of Bedford. The third, Henry, Henry, Thomas Duke of Clarence, John Duke of Bedford, Humphrey Duke of Gloucester. John Duke of Bedford is a very underappreciated figure in English history. He holds together the English kingdom of Northern France as regent to what becomes the young Henry the 6th or Henry I, the 1st of France, if you prefer, until 1435. So that's 13 years this thing survives until the Burgundians, their allies, the French allies, make peace with the Armagnacs and settle the French Civil War.

So it doesn't all fall apart immediately. the problem is the deep like structural political problem is not so much that Henry dies, it's that he leaves such a young heir. I don't believe there's much he could have done about that because he saved his marriage, if you like. He gets married very late compared to his father who's married in his teens and has had Henry when he's still into his teens. Henry marries late.

He marries when he's in his 30s. So although he has a child straight away, basically as soon as possible, Henry the 6th, the young Henry the 6th is still less than a year old when his father dies. And that means it's not so much that you're lacking leadership because as it turns out, John Duke of Bedford and in England, Humphrey Duke of Gloucester and several others proved to be pretty adequate regions. And Henry Ville sets up some structures that or less work during a long, the longest minority England ever has. But the real problem is in France, until Henry the 6 comes of age, there is nobody who is authorized to make a settlement, a lasting settlement in France.

They've got to sort of keep fighting. Had Henry V lived a bit longer, I believe, or I suspect, he probably would have settled with the French and not tried to fight this out until he'd conquered the whole of France, but would have settled for some form of partition where he kept Normandy, maybe the French crown, maybe partitioned France above the Loire, and then he wanted to go off on crusades. He wanted to go off and seize back Jerusalem and who would have bet against him. Of course, he was God's scourge. Exactly. And what does God want more than Jerusalem to fall into the hands of the crusaders? I mean, in the Middle Ages, this is what, I mean, not my belief, but this is what they believed. So, but look, that's not how it turns out.

So the big problem is you have to wait until Henry the 6 comes of age in order for somebody to have the right to make that decision. because anybody who makes a decision to settle with the French in the meantime is going to be accused of Les Majester and is likely to have their head chopped off for approaching the powers of kingship. So it's a big problem. To what extent can we blame Henry V for that? Well, as I say, it's hard to because he could have got married earlier, but then he'd lost a key bargaining chip in his dealings with the French. He had a kid as soon as possible, and you can't blame a man for dying of dysentery. That's an honest death, if you ask me. So what we're really saying is either that, well, he should never have done any of this at all,

that the aim of conquering France was preposterous, and this is just the act of a warmonger. But in living memory in Henry Vist's life, everybody knew what happened if you didn't go and fight the French. That was called being Richard the Second. And Richard the Second, not wanting to fight the French at all. the opposite, had ended up being deposed and murdered and his entire realm had fallen apart, not only because of that, but that was a big part of it. So there's no question that you have to do this as a king. This is how to be a king in the early 15th century. It's just that maybe the, well, nobody quite expected to see the consequences of incredible success played out.

I think that's well said. At a very nuanced portrayal, I think, of a man who lends himself to people saying very hyperbolic things about him. You know, terrible king, amazing king. I think what you've found is a very nuanced and accurate portrayal, maybe even England's greatest warrior king. Well, thank you, Dana. That's what I try to do. It's the first time I've ever written a biography,

let alone a medieval biography, which is an interesting literary task, as well as a historical task. and finding psychological subtlety within the bounds of medieval sources is not always easy. But I think it's been an incredibly rewarding thing to write. And I'm delighted to be talking to such a subtle-minded historian as you about it. Oh, stop. I will never stop.

If you're listening in the United States, Henry V comes out October 1st, pre-order, pick it up at your local bookstore. But also, on my recommendation, you should absolutely get Dan's previous books. I love The Wars of the Roses, if you want to know what's happening after Henry V. He wrote an incredible book on the Plantagenet that I think is the book that anyone who's interested in that period of history should read. It's just such a smart, readable overview. You do such incredible work. I'm so happy to know you.

Now you stop it. No, it's a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. And I always love talking to you. Noble Blood is a production of IHeart Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky. Noble Blood is hosted by me, Dana Schwarz, with additional writing and researching by Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Courtney Sender, Julia Melani, and Armand Kasam. The show is edited and produced by Noami Griffin and Rima Il K. Ali, with supervising producer Josh Thane and executive producers Aaron Manky,

Alex Williams and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from IHeart Radio, visit the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and IHeart Podcasts presents soccer moms. So I'm Leanne.

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