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Oct 10, 2016 · He died during a fearsome thunderstorm on the night of October 18th and 19th, aged 48 or 49. Some of his few remaining supporters were with him, most notably the highly respected William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke. John’s body was taken for burial in Worcester Cathedral.
John (24 December 1166 – 19 October 1216) was the King of England from 1199 until his death in 1216. He lost the Duchy of Normandy and most of his other French lands to King Philip II of France, resulting in the collapse of the Angevin Empire and contributing to the subsequent growth in power of the French Capetian dynasty during the 13th century.
- 27 May 1199 – 19 October 1216
- Eleanor, Duchess of Aquitaine
Oct 18, 2016 · 19 October 2016. Simon Collison. The ruin of Newark Castle, where John died, possibly in the gatehouse on the far left. By Greig Watson. BBC News. It is 800 years since one of England's most...
- Overview
- Youth and rivalry for the crown
- Accession to the throne
- War with France
John (born c. 1166—died October 18/19, 1216, Newark, Nottinghamshire, England) king of England from 1199 to 1216. In a war with the French king Philip II, he lost Normandy and almost all his other possessions in France. In England, after a revolt of the barons, he was forced to seal the Magna Carta (1215).
John was the youngest son of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Henry’s plan (1173) to assign to John, his favourite son (whom he had nicknamed Lackland), extensive lands upon his marriage with the daughter of Humbert III, count of Maurienne (Savoy), was defeated by the rebellion the proposal provoked among John’s elder brothers. Various provisions were made for him in England (1174–76), including the succession to the earldom of Gloucester. He was also granted the lordship of Ireland (1177), which he visited from April to late 1185, committing youthful political indiscretions from which he acquired a reputation for reckless irresponsibility. Henry’s continued favour to him contributed to the rebellion of his eldest surviving son, Richard I (later called Coeur de Lion), in June 1189. For obscure reasons, John deserted Henry for Richard.
On Richard’s accession in July 1189, John was made count of Mortain (a title that became his usual style), was confirmed as lord of Ireland, was granted lands and revenues in England worth £6,000 a year, and was married to Isabella, heiress to the earldom of Gloucester. He also had to promise (March 1190) not to enter England during Richard’s absence on his Crusade. But John’s actions were now dominated by the problem of the succession, in which his nephew, the three-year-old Arthur I, duke of Brittany, the son of his deceased elder brother Geoffrey, was his only serious rival. When Richard recognized Arthur as his heir (October 1190), John immediately broke his oath and returned to England, where he led the opposition to Richard’s dictatorial chancellor, William Longchamp.
On receiving the news in January 1193 that Richard, on his way back from the Crusade, had been imprisoned in Germany, John allied himself with King Philip II Augustus of France and attempted unsuccessfully to seize control of England. In April 1193 he was forced to accept a truce but made further arrangements with Philip for the division of Richard’s possessions and for rebellion in England. On Richard’s return, early in 1194, John was banished and deprived of all his lands. He was reconciled to Richard in May and recovered some of his estates, including Mortain and Ireland, in 1195, but his full rehabilitation came only after the Bretons had surrendered Arthur to Philip II in 1196. This led Richard to recognize John as his heir.
Britannica Quiz
In 1199 the doctrine of representative succession, which would have given the throne to Arthur, was not yet generally accepted, and, following Richard’s death in April 1199, John was invested as duke of Normandy and in May was crowned king of England. Arthur, backed by Philip II, was recognized as Richard’s successor in Anjou and Maine, and it was ...
The renewal of war in France was triggered by John’s second marriage. His first wife, Isabella of Gloucester, was never crowned, and in 1199 the marriage was dissolved on grounds of consanguinity, both parties being great-grandchildren of Henry I. John then intervened in the stormy politics of his county of Poitou and, while trying to settle the differences between the rival families of Lusignan and Angoulême, himself married Isabella (August 1200), the heiress to Angoulême, who had been betrothed to Hugh IX de Lusignan. This politically conceived marriage provoked the Lusignans into rebellion the next year; they appealed to Philip II, who summoned John to appear before his court. In the general war that followed his failure to answer this summons, John had a temporary success at Mirebeau in August 1202, when Arthur of Brittany was captured, but Normandy was quickly lost (1204). By 1206, Anjou, Maine, and parts of Poitou had also gone over to King Philip.
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These failures, foreshadowed under Henry II and Richard, were brought about by the superiority of French resources and the increasing strain on those of England and Normandy. Nevertheless, they were a damaging blow to John’s prestige, and, equally important, they meant that John resided now almost permanently in England. This factor, coinciding with the death (1205) of the chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury, Hubert Walter, gave his government a much more personal stamp, which was accentuated by the promotion of members of his household to important office. His determination to reverse the Continental failure bore fruit in ruthlessly efficient financial administration, marked by taxation on revenues, investigations into the royal forests, taxation of the Jews, a great inquiry into feudal tenures, and the increasingly severe exploitation of his feudal prerogatives. These measures provided the material basis for the charges of tyranny later brought against him.
May 19, 2022 · King John: key dates & facts. Born: Around Christmas 1166, or possibly 1167. Died: 18/19 October 1216. Reigned: King of England for 17 years, from 27 May 1199 until his death. Coronation: 27 May 1199, Westminster Abbey. Parents: Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Spouses: Isabella of Gloucester and Isabella of Angoulême
- Dr Marc Morris
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Sep 25, 2018 · How John’s death saved his dynasty. Perversely, dying was probably the best thing John could have done to protect the Plantagenet’s position in England. The oldest of John’s two sons, Henry, was only nine when he died. Had he been 19 and involved in that civil war then he would likely have been tarred with the same brush and disposed of.
Dec 16, 2019 · The hapless John even managed to lose some of the Crown Jewels in a river as he fled with his baggage train from Lincoln in October. Catching a fever, the king died on 18 October 1216 CE at Newark Castle; he was just 48. The dead and unlamented king was buried in Worcester Cathedral, as requested in his will.
