Observations of all the Kings of England, Chapter 13
CHAP. XIII.
King Henry the first, sirnamed Beauclerke.
HE apprehending the opportunity of Duke Roberts absence, did forthwith seize upon the treasure of the King,Henricus ob singularem, quae pro regio fuit nomine, eruditionem Belloclericus dictus. Seldeni Ianu… Anglorum. Vide ejus dissert. ad c. …. Henricus Rex urbanitate, comitate, affabilitate, lenitate, justitia, & fortitudine, omnes sui temporis Principes anteire putabatur. and thereby also upon his State, and so was crowned at Westminster, by Maurice Bishop of London, because Anselme Archbishop of Canterbury was then in exile.
For his learning he was called Beauclerke, fair Clerk, or fine Scholar, brought up in the study of the liberall Arts at Cambridge.
He was sirnamed Leo justitiae in all Stories; one of the most noble Princes that ever raigned in this Realm. Sir Thomas Eliots Governour.
Cambden urgeth this against him,Huc etiam acces sit, quod o… ni literarum genere Cantabridgiae, Lutetiaeque instructus à pueritia ita profecit, …ut Wilielmus ejus pater eum Episcopali mu…ri aptum censuerit. Qui doct…nae praesidio & saluberrim…s multas leges ipse condidit, & Papales technas saepe offecit, & ca…è vitavit, ut si…cam opportunitatem, quam Henricus octavus nactus fuisset, & Papalem jurisdictionem exterminasset, & praefractum, ac à Papa concitatum in se clerum, in officio tenuisset. Josc…lini Antiq. Brit. p. 124. Infans cum omnium votis conspirantibus educatus egregie, qui solus omnium filiorum Wilielmi natus esset regi…, & …i regnum videretur competere. Itaque tyrocinium rudimentorum in scholis egi… liberalibus, & literarum mella adeo avidus medullis indidit, ut nihil postea bellorum tumultus, nulli curarum mot…s eas excutere illustri animo possent. Malmesb. de Henrico primo. l. 5. as if his▪ justice was by the common people deemed cruelty. Cambd. Rem.
He was excellent in wit, eloquent in speech, and fortunate in Battell, and for these three, he had three notable vices; covetousness, cruelty and lechery. Stowes Chron.
By his example, the young Nobility of the Realm, began to affect a praise for learning: insomuch as at a certain interview, between the King and Pope Innocent the second, the sons of Robert Earl of Mellent, maintained open disputations against divers Cardinals and Chaplains of the Pope. Sir Iohn Hayward.
To purchase the favour of the Clergy, he called Anselme out of exile, and restored him both to the dignity and revenues of the See of Canterbury.
He committed Radulph (alias Ranulph) Bishop of Durham to prison, who had been both author and agent to King William, in most of his distrustfull actions against the Clergy.
To make the Clergy the more assured, the King renounced the right which his Ancestours used in giving Investitures, and acknowledged the same to appertain to the Pope.
The Clergy did much favour him, by reason of his liberall leave, either to erect, or to enlarge, or else to enrich religious buildings. For to these works the King was so ready to give, not only way, but encouragement and help, that in no Princes time, they did more within this Realm either flourish or encrease.
Sir Iohn Hayward numbers twenty five religious buildings, either done, or helped forward, or permitted and allowed by the King.
This King being born in England, and the Queen of English bloud-royall, raised the depressed English Nation again unto honour and credit.
He restored them to the use of fire and candle,Nocturnas faces, quas primus Gulielmus vetuerat, restituit, quippe cui jam firmato regno minus formida… das. Seldeni Ianus Anglorum. l 2. after eight of the Clock at night, which his Father had most straitly forbidden.
He being a wise Prince, and well knowing that an Empire gotten by force, could no longer remain, then that force continued, sent into Scotland, and took to Wife Maud, the daughter of Queen Margaret, sister to Edgar Etheling, None of our Kings married with Scotland but he.(who was now dead, and left no issue) whereby this Maud was the heir of the Saxon line; and in her brought back again to us the ancient English blood-royall, before it had descended beyond one generation from the Conquerour,Flemings Stemma sacrum. in whose line it continueth unto this day.
She was adorned with all royall vertues, principally with piety and humility. These Verses were made in her commendation.
Prospera non laetam fecere, nec aspera tristem, Aspera risus ei, prospera terror erant.
Non decor effecit fragilem, non sceptra superbam, Sola potens humilis, sola pudica decens.
She being married against her will, seeing she must violate the vow of her virginity, she cursed her of-spring, if any came of her; which was not altogether vain saith Polyd. Virgil, in regard they were all afterward drowned.
He reduced Normandy to England.
He built therein many Castles, and planted Garrisons,Habitus est crudelis praes…r…im propter Robe… tum germanum fratrem, quem in carcero sinem vitae facere coegit. Polyd. Virg. Ang. hist. l. 11. and with no less wisdome assured that State, then with valour he had won it.
He brought with him his Brother Robert into England, and committed him to safe custody in the Castle of Cardiffe.
He striving to escape, was taken again, committed to close prison, his eyes put out, and a sure guard set upon him. Thus he remained in desolate darkness, neither reverenced by any for his former greatness, nor pitied for his present distress. Thus he continued about twenty seven years, in a life far more grievous then death, even untill the year before the death of King Henry. So long was he a suitor in wooing of death. So long did the one Brother overlive his good fortune, the other his good nature and disposition; esteeming it a fair favour, that the uttermost extremity was not inflicted.
He gave his daughter Maud the Empress, in second marriage to the Earl of Anjou, and his Sister Elix (as some Chronicles call her) to Steven, Stubb… his discovery of a gaping gulf whereinto England is like to be swallowed, by another French marriage. He shews there also in Henry the second, Richard the first, King Iohn, Henry the third, Edward the second, Richard the second, the inconveniences to this Nation, by their marriages with the French. Hinc cognoscere licet, pri…s Aethiopem posse mutare pellem, uti dicitur, quàm qui terram incolunt Galliam, valde multum diligere Anglos. Polyd. Virg. Ang hist. l. 23. p. 483.Earl of Bloys. Thence sprang the loss of this Kingdome to Maud, during her life, by being so far out of the land in another Countrey, when she should have accepted it here. Therof sprang the perjuries of Steven King of England, enticed to a Kingdome through the commodity of his near place. And thence came the Civill miseries to the people, who through the incertainty of a Governour, were in field and Arms one against another.
His daughter Maud, It was said of Charles Earl of Valois, that he was the son of a King, brother to a King, uncle to a King, father to a King, and yet no King.as well as that Lacedemonian Lady Lampedo, whom Pliny maketh mention of, was a Kings daughter*Cambdens Brittannia in Barkshire., a Kings wife, and a Kings mother. Daughter of this Henry the first, King of England; wife of Henry the fourth, Emperour of Germany; and mother to Henry the second, King of England. Concerning which matter, there is this Distick engraven on her Tomb.
Magna ortu, majórque viro, sed maxima partu, Hîc jacet Henrici filia, sponsa, parens.
The daughter, wife, the mother eke, of Henry lieth here;
Much blest by birth, by marriage more, but most by issue dear.
He was a great administrer of justice,Mi…ses. Henrico adscribunt nonnulli legem, quam curtoise d' Angleterre dicunt I. C. ti. Hac vir suscepta prole co…jugis demortuae baered…s sruitur, in humanis dum …g…rit. Seldeni Ianus Anglorum. l. 2. and the first that ordained that theeves should be hanged.
He ordained that counterfeiters of money, should lose both their eyes,Hayward. and be deprived of their privy parts,
He took away the deceit which had been occasioned by variety of measures, and made measure by the length of his own arm,The antiquity of a yard. which hath been commonly used ever since, by the name of a yard.
He is yet alive in his Laws.
See his Laws in Lambard de priscis Anglorum legibus.
His expences were chiefly in his Warres, and his many and great fortifications in Normandy. His buildings were the Abbey of Reading, the Castle of Warwicke, of Bristoll, the Mannour of Woodstocke, …anicls Hist… ry, and Hayward.and the great inclosure of that Park, with a stone Wall seven miles about.
There was a singular and most remarkable example of Gods justice upon his children. For when the King both by force, crast, and cruelty,Sir Walter Rawleigh his Preface to his History of the world. had dispossest, overreacht, and lastly made blind, and destroyed his elder Brother, Duke of Normandy, to make his own sons Lords of his Land; God cast them all, male and female, Nephews and Neeces (Maud excepted) into the bottome of the Sea,See Sir Iohn Hayward in the life of King Henry the first p. 267, 2…8, 269, 270. with above a hundred and fifty others that attended them, whereof a great many were noble, and of the King dearly beloved.
Evasit unus & ille agrestis, qui tota nocte malo supernatans, mane totius tragediae actum expressit. Malmesb. de Henrico primo. l. 5. Vide Polyd. Virg. Ang. hist. l. 11. p. 191.
Nulla unquam navis fuit Angl…ae tantae miseriae, nulla toto orbi tam patulae famae.
His usuall Oath was By our Lords death; and so was Queen Elizabeths.
He first instituted the form of the High-Court of Parliament,Prudentum congressus in Anglia vocatur & magna comitia. Mutuato denium à Gallis Parliamentorum nomine quae ante Henricum perraro scribit Polydorus l. 11. habita. Seldeni Ianus Anglorum. l. 2. as now it is in use. The first Parliament was held at Salisbury, upon the nineteenth day of April, in the sixteenth year of his Raign. See Lamberts Archeion. p. 240, 241, 242, 243.
When Matilde his daughter was given in marriage,A Hide of land contains 20. Acres, saith Hayward in the life of William the first. p. 99. A 100. Acres saith Lambert. to Henry the fifth Emperour, he took three shillings of every Hide of land throughout the Realm: which being followed by succeeding Kings, did grow to a custome of receiving aid, whensoever they gave their daughters in marriage.
About this time the marriage of Priests was forbidden in England; but the King for money permitted them to retain their wives, and in the end set an imposition in that respect upon every Church throughout the Realm. It availed not any man to say, that he had no purpose to keep a wife; he must pay for a faculty to keep a wife, if he would.
Quymund his Chaplain (observing that unworthy men for the most part were advanced to the best dignities of the Church) as he celebrated divine service before him, and was to read these words out of St Iames 5. 17. (It rained not upon the earth three years and six moneths) he did read it thus, (It rained not upon the earth one, one years, and five, one, moneths.) The King observed this reading, and afterwards rebuked his Chaplain for it. But Quymund answered, that he did it of purpose, because such readers were soonest preferred by the King. The King smiled, and in short time after preferred him to the government of St. Frideswides in Oxford.
He died in the sixty seventh year of his age, when he had raigned thirty five years, and four moneths, wanting one day. He was buried at Reading, which he had founded.
In him ended the line of the Norman Kings, as concerning their heirs males, after whom came in the French men, by the title of the heirs generall.