Chapter 3

PREPARATION FOR THE CROWN, 1297–1307

EDWARD'S PUBLIC CAREER

Edward's public career began in a sense with such events as meeting his father and mother at Dover on their return from Gascony in August 1289, the family gathering at Amesbury in April 1290 to settle the succession to the crown, and the plans in the same year for his marriage to Margaret, ‘the Maid of Norway’. This never took place but in July 1290 the wedding of Edward's sister Margaret to John de Brabant in Westminster Abbey was a splendid occasion attended, among many other leaders of society, by the six-year-old Edward who was reportedly accompanied by a train of eighty knights.¹ In November that year Edward acquired his first territorial possession when he succeeded to the county of Ponthieu and Montreuil on the Channel coast of France after his mother's death. This small but valuable territory, with its administrative centre in the cloth-making town of Abbeville, had been Eleanor's personal inheritance from her own mother, and provided a ready means of access to the continent. Ponthieu was efficiently administered on Edward's behalf until he came of age, but possession of the county gave him the beginnings of a status other than simply that of the ‘king's son’. In 1307 Ponthieu was also to be Piers Gaveston's place of exile when Edward and hi father fell out bitterly over him.²

Although he was still a child, from the mid-1290s Edward's life became increasingly affected by both national and international affairs. In 1294 England and France went to war when Philip IV confiscated the duchy of Aquitaine after years of friction.³ While peace negotiations were still continuing, Edward I had preferred a French marriage for his son, but now, as part of Edward's diplomatic offensive against France, a marriage was proposed between Edward of Caernarfon and a daughter of the count of Flanders, who was both a leading vassal and a political opponent of Philip IV of France. Under intense pressure from the French king, the count was forced in 1295 to send his daughter to Paris for safekeeping and for the moment the marriage plans lapsed.⁴ In 1296 England and Scotland also went to war and, while Edward I campaigned in the north, his son was given nominal command of the defence of the south coast of England against a possible French invasion in support of the Scots.⁵

In 1297 the Anglo-French conflict intensified. In January the plan for a Flemish marriage was revived and in February Edward I travelled to the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham to meet proctors of the count of Flanders to agree on an alliance against France and to announce formally the betrothal of the young Edward to the count's daughter Philippa or, if she were not available, to her sister Isabella. The prospective bridegroom in the meantime remained at Windsor.⁶ In August Edward I crossed to Flanders with a large army to conduct operations against the French, leaving his son Edward as his lieutenant in England. For the young Edward this should again have been an experience of nominal command, but events turned out very differently, since 1297 was a year of crisis in both England's internal affairs and international relations. The pressure of royal taxation for the wars with France and Scotland led to the refusal to pay further taxes by the English Church, with the support of the papacy, and by the laity, led by the earls of Hereford and Norfolk. The further refusal of these two magnates to join the royal army in Flanders on the eve of Edward I's departure brought matters to a head.⁷

This was the situation in which the young Edward now found himself. On 14 July and during the days immediately following, the prelates of the English Church and the leading members of the English nobility, including the earls of Hereford and Norfolk, had sworn fealty to Edward as his father's successor, in a solemn ceremony held at Westminster in the presence of Edward I. The occasion was emotionally as well as politically charged, since it also marked the public reconciliation between the king and the archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Winchelsey.⁸ During his father's absence in Flanders Edward was officially in charge of the affairs of the realm. Edward I left England on 22 August, and on 27 August the seal that Edward I had previously used during his absences in Gascony was formally handed over to his son at Tonbridge castle in Kent. Documents were consistently described as having been witnessed by ‘Edward the king's son’.⁹ The political tensions remained unresolved until on 10 October Edward and his advisers, without consulting Edward I, made concessions on taxation to the opposition earls and agreed to the confirmation of Magna Carta as a token of their sincerity. On the same date Edward issued letters patent offering a pardon to the earls. Edward I probably disapproved of these decisions but confirmed them at Ghent on 5 November.¹⁰ One of the reasons for the final compromise was the humiliating defeat of an English army at Stirling Bridge in Scotland on 11 September, which was followed by Scottish raids into northern England. On 21 October a new English army was summoned to be at Newcastle on 6 December to go to Scotland under the nominal command of the young Edward.¹¹ Edward was not however to gain his first taste of warfare on this occasion since the next English campaign in Scotland was led by Edward I in person after his return from Flanders in March 1298. His son's only encounter with things Scottish at this stage of his career was with the son of John Balliol, the king of Scots deposed by Edward I in 1296. Also named Edward, and like his namesake Edward of Caernarfon, also destined for a turbulent career, the younger Balliol was placed in Edward's household for safekeeping and was to remain there with intervals in the Tower of London until 1299.¹² One of his stays in the Tower was in September 1297 at the time when ‘Edward, the king's son’ was staying within the walls of the city of London for greater security.¹³

Although the thirteen-year-old Edward was formally in control of the government of England during the critical months between August 1297 and March 1298, he was still only his father's son and heir. His position was therefore not strictly comparable even with that of his son, Edward III, or of his great-grandson, Richard II, who each found themselves succeeding to the throne at a tender age. The letters patent which Edward issued on 10 October reveal the names of the councillors whom Edward I had left to advise his son during his absence: three bishops (Ely, London, and Coventry & Lichfield); the archbishop-elect of York; three earls (Cornwall, Surrey and Warwick); and three barons (John Giffard, Reginald Grey and Alan Plukenet); as well as other unnamed advisers. All were men of administrative experience or military reputation and above all loyal to the king.¹⁴ After the excitements of the autumn months, which Edward had spent at Westminster, London, or the nearby palace of Eltham, he passed much of the early weeks of 1298 at his favourite country retreat of Langley near St Albans. Although no longer at the centre of the routine of government, he did not lack advice here either: on 3 January a valuable grant of £7,000 worth of tin to the earl of Cornwall, in repayment of loans to the king, was read and approved there by the three bishops, Reginald Grey, and Guncelin Badlesmere (whose son Bartholomew was to play an important role in Edward II's reign) and William Blyborough (the keeper of Edward's household).¹⁵ Nonetheless Edward had lived through and been closely involved in a period of intense political crisis and of near civil war, which proved to be a prelude to a further crisis in 1300–1. In some respects these crises were also a prelude to the upheavals of Edward II's own reign after 1307, when similar issues concerning taxation and royal exactions of food and other supplies for war again came to the fore.¹⁶ It is impossible to say what effect the experience had on the young Edward, but it cannot have been a negligible one. At a personal level he had seen how magnates who had sworn loyalty could appear in opposition to the crown only a few weeks later. Although the leaders of 1297 were long dead by 1307, it is possible that their actions helped to instil a certain wariness towards the magnates in the future king and turn him towards a close circle of individuals whose loyalty was unquestioned and in whom he could put his trust.

A STEPMOTHER AND A BETROTHAL

After his father's return to England in March 1298 the young Edward reverted to his position simply as ‘the king's son’. He took no part in Edward I's campaign in Scotland in the summer of 1298 which culminated in the hard-fought victory over the Scots under William Wallace at Falkirk on 22 July.¹⁷ However, the fourteen-year-old Edward was about to make his entrance on a wider stage. In June 1299 English and French envoys meeting at Montreuil agreed on a treaty which in effect brought an end to the Anglo-French conflict in Gascony and Flanders. One of the terms of the treaty was that Edward I should marry Margaret, the sister of Philip IV, and the younger Edward should promise to marry Philip's daughter Isabella.¹⁸ The planned Flemish marriage was therefore abandoned¹⁹ and, although Edward and Isabella did not marry until 1308, their lives were now fatefully entwined.²⁰ Edward I and Margaret were married on 10 September 1299 at Canterbury and lost no time in further guaranteeing the succession to the English crown by producing children: two sons, Thomas, who was born at Brotherton in Yorkshire on 1 June 1300, and Edmund, born at the royal palace of Woodstock near Oxford on 5 August 1301.²¹ Both survived into manhood and as earls of Norfolk and Kent respectively were to play a political role in the later years of the reign of their elder brother Edward. Edmund of Woodstock was indeed to play an unwitting and tragic role in the vicious politics of the early years of Edward III's reign and met his death on the scaffold in 1330. In the meantime, had Edward of Caernarfon not outlived his father, Thomas or Edmund could have found himself king.

The new queen, Margaret of France, could never replace her predecessor Eleanor of Castile in Edward I's affections, but despite the forty years' difference in their ages the marriage appears to have been a happy one. She probably helped to soothe the temper of her increasingly irascible and ailing husband and, from the point of view of her stepson Edward, who was only a few years her junior, she provided a sense of family life and companionship which he had lacked since his mother's death in 1290. Margaret was also to mediate between father and son when they had their famous falling-out in 1305.²² Edward and his stepmother spent time together early in her stay in England. On 2 November 1299, very soon after his marriage, Edward I left Margaret and the ladies of her household with his son at Langley,²³ where they remained until 20 November. Edward's sister Mary, the nun of Amesbury, was also present and the young people would have had a good opportunity to get to know one another. Supplies of apples, pears, nuts and other fruit were brought from London for the young queen and her stepson; Master Peter the queen's apothecary supplied two dozen pomegranates and also medicines for the queen and her ladies, who were sick on various occasions (perhaps homesick as much as unaccustomed to the English food and way of life); and a London apothecary provided 12 pounds of sugar for Edward and Margaret and their households. Entertainment was provided by Henry, the ‘fool’ of the count of Savoy, while Edward borrowed 10 d from William Hertfield to play dice. Edward also made the acquaintance of Agnes de la Croix and other unnamed ladies of Queen Margaret's household.²⁴ Although there is no evidence to prove this supposition, it is possible that Edward had an affair with one of them then or later which led to the birth of his illegitimate son Adam. Edward had other opportunities to enjoy the company of Margaret and her ladies. They were at Windsor together from Christmas 1299 until February 1300 when they were rejoined by the king; towards the end of February, Edward, his father and stepmother visited the shrines at Canterbury, notably that of Thomas Becket, at which the young Edward made an offering on behalf of his yet unborn half-brother, Thomas. The family then returned to Westminster for the meeting of parliament. Edward probably remained in contact with both his father and his stepmother until early May when Margaret left for the birth of her baby. When Edward received the news of the birth on 2 June he rewarded the messenger handsomely and also sent a present to the infant's nurses.²⁵

FIRST EXPERIENCE OF WAR

In 1299 and the first part of 1300 Edward had, for the first time since his mother's death in 1290, enjoyed something very like a stable family life, in close contact with his father and also with a young stepmother whom he appears to have liked.²⁶ However, his life was about to change. By the time his stepbrother was born Edward was already on his way north to take part in his first campaign in Scotland. Altogether Edward was in Scotland on four occasions, 1300–1, 1302–3, 1303–4 and 1306, and was on the point of entering Scotland when his father died in July 1307. There is no obvious sign of any lack of military zeal or capacity on Edward's part before he became king. As king, he campaigned in Scotland on another four occasions, in 1310, 1314, 1319 and 1322, with, as we shall see, very different fortunes.

His early experiences in Scotland brought favourable comments from the herald who composed the Roll of Arms describing the siege of Caerlaverock in July 1300:

The fourth squadron with its train, Edward the king's son led, A youth of seventeen years of age (recte in his seventeenth year), and newly bearing arms. He was of a well-proportioned and handsome person, of a courteous disposition and well bred, and desirous of finding an occasion to make proof of his strength. He managed his steed wonderfully well, and bore with a blue label the arms of the good king his father. Now God give him grace that he be as valiant and no less so; then may fall into his hands those who never expect to do so.²⁷

This was hardly surprising but approval also came later from a writer who might be expected to be hostile, John Barbour, archdeacon of Aberdeen, the author in the 1370s of a poem on the career of Robert Bruce. In his account of Edward's part in the siege of Kildrummy castle in Scotland in September 1306 Barbour described Edward as ‘a fine young batchelor’ and ‘the strongest man of any that you could find in any country.’²⁸

In May 1300, on their way north, both Edward and his father stayed at the abbey of Bury St Edmunds. Edward remained for a week after his father and greatly enjoyed himself, becoming, as the abbey chronicler remarked, ‘our brother in chapter’. Edward I also took the precaution of having his banner touched by all the relics in the abbey.²⁹ The young Edward had reached Carlisle, where the army was gathering, before the end of June.³⁰ On 4 July the army advanced into Scotland with the intention of invading Galloway and in mid-July settled down to besiege the castle of Caerlaverock. Edward was placed by his father in a position of safety as the commander of the rearguard and with an experienced knight, John de St John, at his side to see that he could distinguish himself without too much danger. The castle duly fell after a few days, but through the work of engineers who undermined the walls rather than a frontal attack. Edward I took his revenge on the garrison by hanging a number of them, giving his son a first taste of the horrors of war to set alongside the splendours of banners, coats of arms³¹ and shining armour. Little was achieved by the campaign since thousands of the infantry deserted, food supplies ran short and the Scots did not allow themselves to be brought to battle.³² In September Edward I gave up and returned to Carlisle. His son had however taken part in a skirmish on the banks of the River Cree on 8 August. After the earl of Hereford had misunderstood the king's orders and crossed the river to attack a Scottish force, an engagement developed on swampy ground and in heavy rain. The divisions commanded by the king and by Edward then joined the fight and drove off the Scots. The fighting in the end achieved little, but it was an indication to the young Edward that war could be dangerous as well as exciting.³³ After the skirmish at Cree, Edward followed his father to Dumfries, but by early November both were back at Carlisle where the queen dined with her stepson on 6 November. Edward I was furious at the failure of his campaign and threatened to devastate Scotland from sea to sea.³⁴

PRINCE OF WALES

Edward's public role was now starting to grow. On 12 January 1301 he represented his father at the burial of the heart of his father's first cousin, Edmund, earl of Cornwall, at the Augustinian house at Ashridge in Buckinghamshire. Edmund, who had died without an heir the previous September while Edward and his father were in Scotland, was the last of the older members of the royal family, Edward I's brother Edmund, earl of Lancaster having died in 1296.³⁵ Although no one could have foreseen it, the eventual granting of the vacant earldom of Cornwall to Edward's favourite Piers Gaveston in August 1307 was to be the cause of many of the troubles of his reign as king.³⁶ From Ashridge he made his way to Lincoln, where a parliament was about to be held, and on 7 February 1301, Edward, now almost seventeen, was granted all the royal lands in Wales as well as the earldom of Chester.³⁷ The earldom alone was a substantial endowment, comprising the county of Chester and extensive lands in other parts of England.³⁸ Edward received all the lands under royal control in North Wales, as well as Anglesey and the Four Cantreds; in the south he was granted the counties of Carmarthen and Cardigan, the castles and lordships of Haverford and Builth, the lands which had been forfeited by Rhys ap Meredudd in 1287, and all other lands in royal hands except the castle and town of Montgomery which had been assigned to Queen Margaret as part of her dower. In return Edward was to perform for his father the same services as Edward I had performed for his father, Henry III, for the same lands. The title of Prince of Wales was not used in the documents dated 7 February, which refer to him simply as ‘the king's son’, but Edward was already being described as prince on 1 March, when orders were issued for a new campaign in Scotland. It is likely, although there is no specific evidence, that Edward was invested with the title and insignia of Prince of Wales at the same time as the grants of land.³⁹ The golden coronet belonging to Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, the first and last Welsh Prince of Wales, which had been seized in 1283 and presented to Westminster Abbey in 1284, could have been used for this purpose.⁴⁰

The question is why Edward I chose to endow his son at this particular time and with these particular lands. Nothing in the documents provides any answers and there is nothing to indicate what discussions Edward I and his advisers had held on the matter. At the time of the Lincoln parliament Edward I was heavily involved in several other major issues – resistance to his demands for taxation to fight the war in Scotland, the war itself, and problems with the papacy and with France – so there must have been pressing reasons for the attention paid to his son.⁴¹ There is an obvious analogy with Henry III's granting of royal possessions in Wales to the future Edward I in 1254, although their extent was then much less. Many of the lands that Edward of Caernarfon now acquired had been conquered from their native Welsh rulers since 1277. On the other hand in 1254 Edward had also been given the lordship of Ireland and the duchy of Aquitaine in south-western France, neither of which was given to his own son in 1301.⁴² After 1254 however Henry had retained the titles of Lord of Ireland and Duke of Aquitaine and his son remained ‘the Lord Edward’ as he had been before.⁴³

In 1301 Edward I was probably expressing his approval of his son's achievements to date, limited as they necessarily were at his age. But there was surely more to it than this. When Edward I had been endowed by his father in 1254 he was fifteen and on the verge both of marriage and of knighthood. The younger Edward was now almost seventeen, had seen service in war, and plans for his marriage to Isabella of France were in progress. It was therefore high time to provide him with an appropriate endowment. A grant of the Welsh lands was suitable in 1301, since they were substantial in extent and Edward I would not need even to consider whether to give up one of his own titles as Lord of Ireland or Duke of Aquitaine. In any case the duchy of Aquitaine was still effectively in French hands while negotiations continued for a final peace treaty.⁴⁴

The Welsh lands had other advantages. Although there is no evidence of any deeply laid plans by Edward I to create his son Prince of Wales, least of all any promise at his birth in 1284 to give the Welsh a prince who spoke no English,⁴⁵ Edward I probably saw it as an opportunity to ensure the future allegiance of the Welsh to English rule by binding them with ties of personal allegiance. The last major Welsh revolt against English rule had taken place as recently as 1294–5 and had caused Edward I serious problems when he was also fighting a war with France. Now that he was also heavily engaged in the war with Scotland, any measure that might help to prevent another outburst in Wales was to be welcomed. There was no precedent in English usage for calling any son of the king by the title of prince: only in Wales had it become an established usage in the course of the thirteenth century. Its adoption now by Edward ‘the king's son’ would not only enhance his own status but would provide the Welsh with ‘a focus of service and reward to fill the vacuum created by the extinction of their native dynasties’.⁴⁶

The importance of the young Edward's new position was indicated by the speed with which he went to Wales. On 6 April he left his father at Feckenham in Worcestershire⁴⁷ and arrived in Chester six days later where he lost no time in getting down to business. On 12 April he appointed William Trussell to the office of Justice of Chester as his general administrator and on 17 April William Melton as chamberlain with responsibility for the revenues.⁴⁸ Both men were to play an important role both now and in the future. Melton had already been a member of Edward's household since 1297; when Edward succeeded as king in 1307 Melton was appointed keeper of the privy seal and was elected archbishop of York in 1316 through royal influence; he remained loyal to Edward's memory after his deposition and death in 1327 and ordered prayers to be said for his soul.⁴⁹ In January 1327 William Trussell led the delegation to Kenilworth castle to inform Edward II of the withdrawal of the allegiance of his subjects.⁵⁰

On 13 April 1301 the new Prince of Wales received the homage and fealty of his English tenants of the earldom of Chester, and on 21 April he crossed the bridge over the River Dee at Chester and entered Wales.⁵¹ On the following day more than 200 Welshmen performed homage and fealty at Flint castle; twenty-five at Rhuthun (Ruthin) on 23 April; and on 26 April in the church of the Dominicans at Rhuddlan nearly sixty more came in. Conwy was the scene of the largest numbers: over seventy on 28 April; a similar number on the 29th; over sixty on 1 May; over fifty on 2 May; six on 3 May; and another twelve on the 5th of the month.⁵² Ironically, Edward did not visit his birthplace at Caernarfon: instead nearly sixty of the Welsh population of that area came to him at Flint and a few more at Conwy.⁵³ However, a very large number of native Welshmen, many of whom had travelled considerable distances for the purpose, had seen their new prince, had knelt before him and placed their hands between his in the ceremony of homage, and had sworn fealty to him on holy relics. There could be no doubt as to the nature of the allegiance of Wales to the new order. One of those who did homage and fealty at Flint on 22 April was a certain Sir Gruffydd Llwyd, who was destined to show a particular loyalty to his new lord.⁵⁴

SCOTLAND AGAIN

Edward rejoined his father at Kenilworth on 24 May,⁵⁵ and between then and 31 May he received the homage and fealty of a number of the Anglo-Norman lords of the Welsh March: his cousin Henry of Lancaster for the lordship of Monmouth, Reginald Grey for Rhuthun, William Martin for Cemaes in West Wales, and Roger Mortimer for Chirk.⁵⁶ While Edward was in Wales plans were being completed for a new campaign in Scotland. On 1 March, at Lincoln, orders were issued for two armies to assemble by 24 June, one at Berwick under the command of the king and the other at Carlisle under the Prince of Wales.⁵⁷ The advance into Scotland by east and west would start from these two bases. The orders which summoned the armies made it clear that the new prince was to be given the chance to distinguish himself.⁵⁸ Five earls were assigned to his force: Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, a man of great military experience who was to play an important political role in the early years of Edward II's reign; Richard Fitz Alan, earl of Arundel, another experienced soldier; Thomas, earl of Lancaster, Edward's first cousin, now his friend and collaborator but to become his bitter enemy after 1307; Ralph de Monthermer, titular earl of Gloucester and Edward's brother-in-law through marriage to his sister Joan of Acre, the widowed countess of Gloucester; and Humphrey de Bohun, hereditary constable of England, son of the opposition earl of 1297 and soon to marry Edward's sister Elizabeth, the widowed countess of Holland. Many of the other magnates who were to accompany Edward were men with interests in the Welsh March, some of them Edward's own vassals who were soon to perform their homage and fealty to him or had already done so. These included Henry of Lancaster, the younger brother of the earl of Lancaster, William Martin, Reginald Grey, and Roger and Edmund Mortimer; as well as John Hastings, lord of Abergavenny and Cilgerran; and Theobald de Verdon, lord of Weobley and Ewyas Lacy who was also lord of half the liberty of Meath in Ireland.⁵⁹

As a mark of his increased status Edward now had a substantial household of his own, numbering in 1300–1 one hundred and forty members, including Edward himself.⁶⁰ The senior members consisted of nine knights, several of whom have already been noted: John de St John, Reginald de Grey, and Guy Ferre, his master.⁶¹ There were ten boys or young men from noble or knightly families in custody as royal wards, nine of them accompanied by a master. These included Gilbert de Clare, lord of Thomond in the south-west of Ireland who had recently come of age but had been a ward since the death of his father Thomas in 1287.⁶² The tenth, the only one without a master, was Piers Gaveston. Much more would soon be heard of him.⁶³

The fourteen household clerks, who included Walter Reynolds, a future chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury under Edward II, were to be closely involved in the administration of the Scottish campaign, in the supply of money and stores of all kinds.⁶⁴ The rest of the household was made up of men described as ‘valets and serjeants’, some of whom were active in a military role while others performed a variety of services within the household: the latter included a fowler, named only as Papegay perdricator.⁶⁵

The knights and squires of Edward's household, like his clerks, played a prominent part in the 1301 campaign, but their numbers were supplemented by the nobles and their retainers who joined the army. Altogether the contingent directly under the command of the Prince of Wales amounted to a little over 300, consisting of ten bannerets (knights in command of other knights), about seventy knights, and over 200 squires.⁶⁶ In addition to the heavy cavalry, there were lightly armed horsemen known as hobelars and large numbers of foot soldiers. After he reached Newcastle-on-Ayr Edward was joined by a significant contingent of knights, hobelars and archers from Ireland, led by the head of the royal administration in Dublin, the justiciar John Wogan, and including two of the most important of the Anglo-Norman magnates of Ireland, John Fitz Thomas and Peter de Bermingham.⁶⁷ Among the knights under Edward's overall command were many whose careers would continue into his reign, but there were some who would be of special importance. Bartholomew de Badlesmere, who was a member of Robert de Monthaut's retinue, was to be a prominent supporter of Edward II until his rebellion and execution in 1321–2. Maurice de Berkeley was accompanied by Thomas Gurney, who later won notoriety as one of Edward II's jailers and murderers at Berkeley castle in 1327.⁶⁸

The king's army advanced from Berwick as far as Glasgow by 23 August. Edward I then prepared for the siege of Bothwell castle, which was captured by 24 September; after this he went into winter quarters at Linlithgow.⁶⁹ Despite all the surviving detail on Prince Edward's preparations for the campaign, little is really known about what happened once his army left Carlisle. His force probably headed for the Firth of Forth via Nithsdale and then besieged Turnberry castle, which had fallen by early September. Edward then returned to Carlisle⁷⁰ before joining his father at Linlithgow on 14 November for the winter.⁷¹ The Prince of Wales had not disgraced himself during the campaign but neither he nor his father had achieved anything very significant. The Scots had not been brought to battle; there had been serious shortages both of money and of supplies, which resulted in the desertion of many of the troops and the death of many of the horses. Extensive preparations were made for a renewal of the campaign in the spring of 1302 but came to nothing in January when Edward I, who was under intense diplomatic pressure both from the pope and from the king of France, agreed to a truce until November 1302.⁷²

BETROTHED AT LAST

On 20 May 1303 at Paris a peace treaty was finally agreed, bringing a formal end to the hostilities between England and France which had existed since 1294. Territory in Gascony which had been occupied by the French was to be restored to English control, Edward I abandoned his Flemish allies, and in return was given a free hand in Scotland. The two kings were to meet at Amiens by 8 September for Edward I to perform homage as duke of Aquitaine. If Edward were unable to go in person, the Prince of Wales should go in his place with full powers to act on his behalf.⁷³ The way was now open for the betrothal of the Prince of Wales and Isabella of France, which was also settled on 20 May by the English envoys, the bishop of Winchester, the count of Savoy, the earl of Lincoln, and Otto de Granson, Edward having given them full powers on 16 May to make an agreement on his behalf.⁷⁴ Their letters patent recorded that the pope had pronounced that there should be a marriage between the two as soon as Isabella reached the age for marriage or within four months of the king of France requesting it. A dispensation for the marriage had been received from the pope;⁷⁵ the terms of Isabella's dower had been agreed (18,000 livres tournois of annual revenues);⁷⁶ and the envoys had promised to carry out the terms of the marriage agreement. On 12 June 1303 the bishop of Winchester and earl of Lincoln, acting on behalf of Prince Edward, affianced him and Isabella in the hand of Giles, archbishop of Narbonne, in the presence of the king and queen of France.⁷⁷

SCOTLAND YET AGAIN

In the meantime Edward had been preparing himself for the planned renewal of the war in Scotland in May 1303.⁷⁸ His wardrobe book for 1302–3 contains many interesting details, showing the warlike equipment required by the well-dressed prince.⁷⁹ In March, Manekin the armourer of London supplied three bacinets (a light steel headpiece often worn under the great helm), two pairs of jambers (armour for the legs), an iron headpiece with crest, another round one, a helmet with visor, and another close one (the most expensive item at £15) at a total cost of nearly £36. In the same month another London armourer, Bernard of Devon, provided two more pairs of jambers, a pair of plate quisses (armour for the thigh), a pair of poleyns (protection for the knee) and two pairs ofsabaters (armoured covering for the foot), and a pair of gloves of plate, totalling 70 shillings; and Sir Guy Ferre and Walter Reynolds were sent to London to buy chargers and hackneys for Edward to ride in Scotland. In April twenty cart tilts (at 14d each) and thirty sacks (7d each) and other things for carrying the prince's armour and baggage were bought from a London merchant, Henry de Preston; and William Conrad, bowyer of the Tower of London, provided glue, sinews and other items for repairing crossbows and longbows (13s 2d).⁸⁰ Between January and March the prince's armourer, Hugh de Bungeye, had his hands full with a multitude of details: these included the making of banners and pennoncels (a small pennant for the head of a lance or for a helmet) for Edward and his squires; the provision of six ounces of silk in various colours for pointing two aketons (a quilted cotton jacket or leather jacket worn under chain mail); five pairs of gilt spurs; iron thread for mending the prince's two suits of mail; a pisan (a mail collar extending over the shoulders) for the prince's body; the embroidering of two gambesons (a thick cloth tunic worn under a sleeveless coat of mail) with the prince's arms; and much else including four war swords, and scabbards embroidered with the arms of Gloucester and Hereford. Hugh also saw to repairing and painting a shield with the prince's arms; the provision of four lances and pennoncels, a gilt copper crest and parchment and peacock feathers for decorating it; and making forty-two banners of sindon (a fine linen) with the prince's arms, together with thirty-six banners with the arms of St Edmund, St Edward and St George (twelve for each saint). The total cost for all the items came to over £31. Pennoncels were also specially made for Edward's trumpeters, a leather box bound with iron for holding his bacinet, and another for his crests, as well as boxes to hold his linen and his iron armour.⁸¹

The creature comforts of Edward and his immediate followers were not forgotten. A team of sixty-three tentmakers, led by John de Somerset, made twenty-eight tents and pavilions, including one to serve as a great hall, another as Edward's chamber, two more for stables, one as a chapel, one as a council chamber, and the remainder for various members of his household.⁸² Among other things provided were two leather coffers to carry Edward's urinals in Scotland, a brass cauldron for the prince's kitchen, and an iron oven (bought in London in June and forwarded to him at Dundee). On 27 April Edward's physician, Master Robert de Cisterne, was paid over £9 for syrups, powders, herbs, ointments and medicines for the care of the prince and his household during the campaign. Even the prince's lion was included in the preparations. It was fed at a cost of 4d a day by its keeper, Adam of Lichfield, had its own cart to carry it, and was provided with a chain and collar costing 2s 9d.⁸³

Edward left London for the north on 13 March 1303, was at Tickhill near Doncaster by 28 March, in Durham on 14 April, when he attended mass for the soul of his master, Sir Guy Ferre, and had reached Roxburgh in Scotland by 25 May.⁸⁴ By this time he had 180 men in his pay, compared with 450 under his father.⁸⁵ Edward also had a personal bodyguard of nine Spaniards: seven crossbowmen and two with lances.⁸⁶ Edward did not however exercise a separate command in this campaign. The whole army advanced into Scotland, crossing the Firth of Forth on a pontoon bridge, and then moved northwards, spreading devastation everywhere it went.⁸⁷ According to the English chronicler Peter Langtoft, Prince Edward played a full part in this.⁸⁸ The army then settled down to besiege Brechin castle, which duly fell in mid-August.⁸⁹ The young prince no doubt rode up and down before the castle at a safe distance and looking suitably splendid, but does not appear to have performed any personal feats of arms. He did however possess his own siege engine, which was in action against the castle on 8 August, the day before its garrison surrendered.⁹⁰ Despite his own exalted status Edward apparently showed concern for the welfare of his men: David Gough, one of his Welsh foot soldiers, who was wounded in the attack on Brechin, was sent home on 15 August with 6s 8d for his expenses.⁹¹ The English army then made an armed progress via Aberdeen as far north as Kinloss abbey, on the shores of the Moray Firth, which it reached on 14 September. This was the furthest north that any English army had been in Scotland. Edward I then turned south again, as much because of a lack of supplies as for the lack of an enemy to oppose him in the field. On 5 November 1303 he reached Dunfermline in Fife, where he went into winter quarters.⁹²

Prince Edward stayed with him until 24 November, when he moved to Perth, remaining there until 7 March 1304, after which he rejoined his father at Dunfermline.⁹³ On the great religious festivals, Christmas Day, the Feast of the Circumcision (1 January), the Epiphany (6 January), and the Purification (2 February) he entertained important English magnates, such as the earls of Lancaster (his first cousin) and Warwick, the earl of Ulster (the leader of the Irish contingent in the army), Scottish allies such as the earls of Atholl and Strathearn, and numerous other magnates, such as John of Brittany (the future earl of Richmond), and Hugh le Despenser (one of Edward I's leading advisers and soon to play a major part in Edward's own reign). The Christmas feast was especially lavish, including eight and a quarter oxen, forty lambs, twelve swans, two cranes and five casks of the king's wine.⁹⁴ Other notable gatherings took place on 4, 10, 11 and 21 February, 1 March and 14 April.⁹⁵ This entertaining was partly social, but also had a political dimension which was emphasized by the supplies for the dinners coming from the king's own stores and not from those of the prince.

Although there had been little serious fighting during the Scottish campaign, one of Edward I's purposes in making such an extensive military demonstration had been to try to force the submission of the leaders of Scottish resistance who had now effectively been abandoned by their former French ally.⁹⁶ Under his father's close supervision,⁹⁷ Prince Edward was to play a role in what followed. Edward was empowered to receive on the king's behalf any of the Scottish leaders who wished to submit by 2 February.⁹⁸His father then sent Aymer de Valence, Henry de Percy, Robert Fitz Payn and John Binstead from Dunfermline to perform the negotiations, and on 5 February 1304 the four envoys met John Comyn of Badenoch, the Guardian of Scotland, at Strathord near Perth. On 9 February a formal agreement was made by which Comyn and other Scottish magnates submitted to the authority of the English crown.⁹⁹ Edward I's terms were relatively generous, but there were significant exceptions to the general pardon offered to the Scots, the most important being William Wallace. This and the fact that a defiant Scottish garrison still held the strategically placed castle of Stirling in the Scottish Lowlands ensured that the war would continue.¹⁰⁰

Edward I made careful preparations for the siege of Stirling. Great supplies of crossbows, longbows and their ammunition were gathered, and siege engines brought from Brechin and Aberdeen. Prince Edward was ordered on 12 April to collect the lead from churches around Perth and Dunblane for use in the siege, sparing only the roofs over the altars.¹⁰¹ Edward had earlier won his father's approval for having sent out Sir Alexander de Abernethy and forty men-at-arms into the countryside around Perth where it was thought that Wallace might be hiding.¹⁰² The king pursued the siege with ruthless determination, employing an early form of gunpowder and refusing to let the garrison surrender until he had tried out a new war machine appropriately called Warwolf. Edward I's determination was no doubt only increased when he was struck but not injured by a crossbow bolt fired from the castle. The siege lasted until 24 July and with the surrender of Stirling it seemed as if at last the conquest of Scotland was complete, with the exception of Wallace who remained at large.¹⁰³ Prince Edward was present at the siege and presumably at the surrender, having joined his father at Cambuskenneth, very near Stirling, on 21 April, the day before the siege began. Even the queen and her ladies were present.¹⁰⁴The young Edward could not however have anticipated that ten years later Stirling would again be under siege and that on 24 June 1314 the marshy ground near the castle would be the scene of one of the greatest English defeats since 1066 and a turning-point in his own reign.

EDWARD AND GAVESTON

One of the squires in Edward's company at Stirling in 1304 was Piers Gaveston.¹⁰⁵ Although his spectacular career in the reign of Edward II certainly made it seem the case, he was not ‘raised up as if from nothing’, as one of the English chroniclers Walter of Guisborough remarked,¹⁰⁶ but was the son of Arnaud de Gabaston, one of the leading barons of the county of Béarn in south-western France, on the borders of the English dominions in Gascony.¹⁰⁷ Arnaud had been in the service of Edward I since 1282–3, when he fought in Wales and commanded a contingent of knights, archers and foot soldiers from his native Béarn. He was a hostage on behalf of the English crown in the hands of the king of France from 1294 until 1296 when he escaped and made his way to England. He served in Gascony in 1297–8, and in August 1300 returned to England, where he became a knight of the royal household and served in Scotland, before dying in May 1302.¹⁰⁸ Two of Arnaud's sons, Arnaud-Guillaume de Marsan and Guillaume-Arnaud de Gabaston, were with him in England, so that it was hardly surprising that a third son, Piers de Gabaston, or Gaveston as he became known, should also have entered royal service. Piers Gaveston probably first arrived in England in 1296–7, at the time of his father's escape from France. His first active service was not however in Gascony but in the Flemish campaign of 1297, where he first appears to have come to the king's attention. By November 1297 he was already a squire in the royal household, served in the Falkirk campaign in Scotland in this capacity in 1298 and was again in Scotland in 1300.¹⁰⁹ By the end of 1300 Gaveston had transferred to the household of Prince Edward, first as one of the boys in custody and then as one of Edward's squires. He was with Edward in Scotland in 1301–2 and again in 1303–4, so there was plenty of opportunity for the two young men to get to know one another.¹¹⁰ By 1303 he was no longer being referred to in household records as Edward's squire (scutifer), but as his socius, which can mean a servant but also carries the sense of a companion.¹¹¹ Too much should not be made of the choice of word, since it was common for a knight to be accompanied by a socius, but it does imply some degree of closeness.¹¹²

How close is of course the question. The initiative for bringing Gaveston into Edward's household appears to have come from Edward I who had clearly been impressed by the young Gascon's demeanour on campaign and as a member of his own household. Gaveston was a little older than Prince Edward,¹¹³ already had considerable experience in war, possessed good manners, and may have been seen as a potential role model for his royal master.¹¹⁴ It is also possible that Gaveston was in effect an assistant to or potentially even a substitute for Edward's own ‘magister’, another but much older Gascon, Sir Guy Ferre, who had been with Edward since before 1295 and remained until his death in April 1303.¹¹⁵ Edward and Gaveston clearly got on extremely well, so well indeed that on one occasion when they visited the abbey of Peterborough, possibly in 1302, Edward created a very embarrassing situation by refusing to accept a gift from the abbot of a cup worth £50 until one of comparable value (£40) was offered to Gaveston.¹¹⁶Writing in the 1320s, an anonymous chronicler of the civil wars of Edward's reign remarked that ‘upon looking on him the son of the king immediately felt such love for him that he entered into a covenant of constancy, and bound himself with him before all other mortals with a bond of indissoluble love, firmly drawn up and fastened with a knot’.¹¹⁷ Such comments¹¹⁸ have led to the modern assumption that their relationship was definitely sexual. The evidence for this is however far from clear. While some of the chroniclers' remarks about Edward II can be interpreted as implying homosexuality, too many of them are either much later in date or the product of hostility or a combination of the two to be accepted at face value.¹¹⁹ There is nothing overt or even implicit in any of the strictly contemporary criticism of Edward II that would suggest homosexual behaviour, until the very end of the reign, in October and December 1326, when Adam Orleton, bishop of Hereford, allegedly accused Edward in sermons preached at Oxford and Wallingford of being a tyrant and a sodomite, in order to detach Edward's subjects from their allegiance and so help to prepare the way for the act of deposition which followed.¹²⁰

Edward II was to have other favourites after the death of Gaveston in 1312, such as the household knights Roger Damory, Hugh Audley the Younger and William de Montacute, and most notable of all Hugh Despenser the Younger. Other than their perceived influence on royal patronage, there was no suggestion of any sexual relationship in the case of the first three.¹²¹ Nor is there any convincing evidence even in the case of Despenser, who had a major influence both on the flow of patronage and on the work of government in general during the final years of Edward II's reign.¹²² While the remark by the unknown author of the annals composed at the Cistercian abbey of Newenham in Devon that in 1326 rex et maritus eius fled to Wales to escape Mortimer and Isabella may be an indication of contemporary opinion on the nature of Edward II's relationship with Despenser, it should perhaps be understood ironically or satirically rather than literally.¹²³ On the contrary, any sexual relationship that existed¹²⁴ may instead have been between Edward II and Despenser's wife, Eleanor de Clare, who was also Edward's niece. A chronicler writing in Hainault in the Low Countries, who recorded events in England in the 1320s in great detail, claimed that she was Edward II's mistress and that after her husband was executed in 1326 she was even kept under surveillance in case she might be pregnant by the king.¹²⁵

It is significant that Edward I does not appear to have seen anything improper in the relationship of Edward and Gaveston, who continued to receive royal favours after 1303. In July 1304 Gaveston was given custody of the lands of Edmund Mortimer of Wigmore, during the minority of Edmund's heir. The grant was made at the request of Prince Edward and was a notable acquisition for a man who was still only a squire.¹²⁶ On 26 May 1306 Gaveston's social status was improved when he was knighted (together with a large number of other young men), four days after Edward himself.¹²⁷ If Edward I had disapproved of Gaveston he could at any stage have removed him from his son's household and even sent him home to his native Gascony.¹²⁸ The famous quarrel between Edward I and his son, which led to Edward's banishment from court between June and October 1305, had nothing directly to do with Edward's relationship with Gaveston.¹²⁹ Gaveston did leave Edward's household at this time, but this was really a consequence of the sharp reduction in the amount of money allocated to Edward by the king and in the number of household members who could be supported rather than an action directed against Gaveston himself.¹³⁰ Although in a letter written to his sister Elizabeth in August 1305 Edward expressed his eagerness for Gaveston's return, it was also clear that there were others whose company he particularly wanted.¹³¹ Even in February 1307, when Edward I ordered Gaveston to leave the realm, the real reason appears to have been Prince Edward's desire to grant Gaveston the county of Ponthieu (or more probably the earldom of Cornwall) rather than any specific offence committed by Gaveston himself. Gaveston was exiled but not permanently and was granted an annuity of 100 marks ‘for as long as he shall remain in parts beyond the sea during the king's pleasure and awaiting his recall’.¹³² The anger and anxieties of an ageing king at his son's extravagance and the knowledge that his task in Scotland was still unfinished probably explain the quarrels between Edward I and Prince Edward rather than any question of the relations between Edward and Gaveston.

It is possible that, initially at least, Edward saw Gaveston as the accomplished and experienced elder brother whom he had never had, but it has also been very plausibly, though not conclusively, argued by Pierre Chaplais that Edward and Gaveston entered into a compact of brotherhood, comparable with the relationship between David and Jonathan in the Old Testament, between Achilles and Patroclus in the Iliad, and between Roland and Oliver in The Song of Roland, or with the practice of brotherhood-in-arms between members of the nobility in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Europe.¹³³ Chaplais cites a number of chronicle sources in which Gaveston was reportedly described by Edward in terms of brotherhood, including the Vita Edwardi Secundi, the Lanercost chronicle, theAnnales Paulini, the chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, and the Polistorie of Christ Church, Canterbury,¹³⁴ and also a privy seal writ of July 1308 in which he is addressed as ‘our dear brother and faithful’, the same language Edward used to his true half-brothers, Thomas of Brotherton and Edmund of Woodstock.¹³⁵ In his account of the death of Gaveston in 1312 the author of the Vita remarks that the earls had ‘killed a great earl whom the king had adopted as brother’; the ‘Chronicle of the Civil Wars of Edward II’ refers specifically to Edward and Gaveston entering upon a compact of brotherhood (fraternitatis fedus); and the writer of the Annales Paulini records how in 1308 Edward could not bring himself to send into exile the person of Piers Gaveston, his adoptive brother (adoptivi fratris sui). Chaplais concludes that if any document was drawn up containing such a compact between the two men it was produced at some point between Gaveston's first entry into the royal household in 1297 and the death of Edward I in 1307, and that it was probably destroyed at Edward I's command on the occasion of the Lanercost oaths of 26 February 1307 when Gaveston swore to go into exile and Edward swore not to have him near him.¹³⁶ There is however another possible date at which a compact of brotherhood might have been drawn up. The reference to Gaveston as Edward II's adoptive brother in the Annales Paulini forms part of an account of the crisis in March and April 1308 when the opposition magnates were attempting to force Gaveston into exile once more. The political situation became so tense that there was a real danger of civil war. Edward II and Gaveston withdrew to Windsor castle at Easter and prepared its defences against a possible baronial attack. A compact of brotherhood might have been seen not only as giving formal recognition to a relationship that already existed between the two men, but also as a legal device to protect Gaveston from the expected baronial attempts to oust him.¹³⁷ This is of course speculation as is the further possibility that, if a compact of brotherhood was created either in 1308 or at any other time, it could have been among Edward II's private documents which were plundered and lost from Swansea castle in South Wales in November 1326.¹³⁸

Edward II and Gaveston were both to marry early in the new reign, at a time when the closeness of their relationship was much remarked upon. Although each of their marriages had a social and a political dimension, it is improbable that Philip IV of France, who had a strong aversion to homosexuality¹³⁹ and also hoped that the children of the union would bind the English possessions in France to both the French and the English crowns,¹⁴⁰ would have allowed the marriage with his daughter Isabella, which had been under negotiation since 1298, if her future husband's sexual proclivities had been clearly proclaimed over so long a period.¹⁴¹ Nor might the young Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester and Edward II's nephew, have agreed to the marriage between his sister Margaret and Gaveston. Both marriages produced children. Gaveston's daughter Joan was born at York on 12 January 1312, Gaveston having returned from exile at great risk to himself in order to be present.¹⁴² Gaveston also appears to have had a second daughter, Amy or Amie, probably illegitimate, whose date of birth is unknown but who was to serve as a lady of the bedchamber in the households of both Queen Isabella and Queen Philippa.¹⁴³ Edward's son, the future Edward III, was born at Windsor on 13 November 1312, a few months after Gaveston's death and must have been conceived while the latter was still alive. As is well known, Edward II's wife Isabella was only twelve years old at the time of their marriage and could not have been expected to bear children much earlier than she did. Edward II and Isabella also produced three more children: John, born at Eltham on c. 15 August 1316; Eleanor, born at Woodstock on 18 June 1318; and Joan, born in the Tower of London on 5 July 1321. There is nothing to suggest that Edward II was not the father of any of these children. He is also known to have had an illegitimate son Adam, who died during the 1322 Scottish campaign and was probably born before Edward's marriage in 1308 at a time when his relationship with Gaveston was already established.¹⁴⁴

It is impossible to be certain of the true nature of the relationship between Edward II and Gaveston, whether sexual, a formal bond of brotherhood,¹⁴⁵ or simply a very close friendship.¹⁴⁶ The contemporary evidence is often ambiguous or capable of different interpretations; the later traditions too contaminated by distortions or by deliberate propaganda.¹⁴⁷ But, whether or not an actual document containing a compact of brotherhood ever existed, the most likely explanation is that Edward really did regard Gaveston as if he were his brother by blood and that this goes to the heart of their relationship. As brothers, this would allow for a strong emotional tie but would also rule out a physical sexual relationship. Whatever the truth of the matter, Gaveston was perceived during his short career as wielding a degree of influence over Edward both as prince and as king which excluded others who considered they had a right of access to Edward or a right to be consulted. Both he and ultimately Edward II himself were to pay the penalty for their offence.

EDWARD'S QUARREL WITH HIS FATHER

After the conclusion of the siege of Stirling in July 1304 Edward became involved once more in England's relations with France. Under the terms of the Treaty of Paris in May 1303 either Edward I or his son was to go to France to perform homage for the duchy of Aquitaine. This was originally to have taken place at Amiens by 8September 1303. In the meantime the duchy was formally restored to English control at a solemn ceremony at St Emilion in June 1303.¹⁴⁸ French envoys had visited Edward I at St Andrews in Scotland in March 1304 asking that Prince Edward should go to France to perform homage. This was agreed and on 27 September Edward was appointed to be at Amiens on 1November. On 25 October Edward arrived at Dover, ready to cross to France for what would have been his first and also highly significant visit. Instead he was forced to abandon his plans after waiting in vain until 1 November to receive letters of safe conduct from Philip IV and for the arrival at Wissant of the king's brothers and the dukes of Burgundy and Brittany to escort him to Amiens.¹⁴⁹ There is no obvious explanation as to why the proposed ceremony failed to take place, but the answer probably lies somewhere in the tangle of Anglo-French relations over Aquitaine, which was constantly throwing up new problems. Even the possibility of a renewed war between England and France could not be ruled out at this time.¹⁵⁰

Until the spring of 1305 Edward's career seemed to be advancing steadily towards his succession to the crown, which could not now be long delayed. Although Edward I was never lavish with praise, he appears to have been generally satisfied with his son's progress. So far as we can now tell, the younger Edward had acquitted himself well on campaign in Scotland. He had not fought in any major battle but he had at least gained considerable experience both of the splendours and the horrors of war. While we should not exaggerate the role he had played in, for example, the events of 1297, when as a boy of thirteen he was nominally in charge of the government of the realm, he had gained a degree of experience of the affairs of state. On 16 March 1302 he had ‘held a “parliament” with the magnates of England at London on behalf of his father’.¹⁵¹ The purpose of this meeting is not apparent but Edward was clearly trusted at least to represent his father, if not actually to conduct business. The first parliament to meet since the Lincoln parliament of 1301, during which Edward had been created Prince of Wales, assembled at Westminster in July 1302. This was followed by another at Westminster in October. Edward was duly summoned to both.¹⁵² When parliament next met, at Westminster in late February and March 1305, Edward and his council were at Kennington busily dealing with and answering the petitions from his Welsh subjects which had accumulated since 1301.¹⁵³ As one modern commentator has remarked, in later years the Welsh were to regard the favourable replies they received in 1305 as if they were their Magna Carta.¹⁵⁴

The period of steady progress ended dramatically and with no apparent advance warning on 14 June 1305, at Midhurst in Sussex, where Edward exchanged bitter words with his father's treasurer, Walter Langton, the bishop of Coventry & Lichfield, after allegedly being accused of breaking into one of the latter's woods.¹⁵⁵ Whatever the truth of this particular story, events of this kind were often symptomatic of some deeper problem.¹⁵⁶ It is important to remember that even though Edward had access to some of the revenues of the principality of Wales and of the counties of Chester and Ponthieu, these did not cover his household expenses. He was therefore still dependent on the royal exchequer, and hence on Langton's co-operation, for much of his income.¹⁵⁷ Edward had just passed his twenty-first birthday and may have felt that this required a reduction in his financial dependence. There is also some evidence that Edward had been annoyed by his treatment at the hands of royal administrators during the Scottish campaign in 1304.¹⁵⁸Langton for his part was very conscious of the strains that the war in Scotland had been placing on the royal finances and was likely to resist any requests for more money and to complain to the king about the extravagance of Edward and his companions.¹⁵⁹Whatever the explanation, the outburst was probably the result of an accumulation of petty irritations rather than one single event.

Edward I, who was very sensitive about any criticism of his ministers and was heavily dependent upon Langton and his financial and administrative expertise, immediately came to Langton's aid and banished his son from court.¹⁶⁰ The possibility that Edward I's attitude to Edward was influenced more by a sense of duty than by enduring personal anger is hinted at in a statement by the council later that year that he had ‘removed his own eldest and dearest son, Edward, prince of Wales, from his household, … because he had uttered certain gross and harsh words to a certain minister of his’.¹⁶¹

Some sense of what occurred can be gleaned from the unique roll of Prince Edward's letters which survives for much of the year 1304–5.¹⁶² On the very day of the incident Edward wrote to Henry de Lacy, the earl of Lincoln, and an old and trusted friend, to tell him what had happened. Edward recounted that he had come to join his father at Midhurst on Sunday, 13 June, and that on the following day the king had become angry with him ‘on account of some words spoken between him and the bishop of Chester [Coventry & Lichfield]’. The king had then forbidden him or any of his followers to enter his presence, and had ordered his household and exchequer officials not to make any payments for the support of Edward and his household. Edward said that he was remaining at Midhurst while awaiting his father's ‘goodwill and grace’, and would follow behind him as best he could at a distance of ten or twelve leagues, until he was restored to his father's favour. Edward ended by asking the earl to come to him on his return from Canterbury, since he had great need of his help and counsel.¹⁶³ It is known that the young Edward did in fact follow his father around at a distance, although not so far away as ten or twelve leagues;¹⁶⁴ and that, despite the king's orders, small sums of money were forthcoming from the king's almoner, Henry Blunsdon, and with the assistance of Walter Reynolds, the treasurer of Edward's household.¹⁶⁵ Within little more than a month there were signs that Edward I's anger was beginning to diminish. On 16 July the constable of Windsor was ordered to place seven tuns of wine in the cellars of the king's houses in Windsor Park for his son's use; and on 22 July the mayor of London and all the sheriffs of England were told that they could now provide assistance to Edward and his household.¹⁶⁶ On the previous day Edward wrote to his sister, Joan, countess of Gloucester, from the archbishop of Canterbury's palace at Lambeth, telling her that the king's anger had abated and thanking her for giving him her goods and the use of her seal, which he now returned to her.¹⁶⁷ It is clear from this letter and also from the king's orders of 22 July, which had been issued at the request of Queen Margaret, that a great deal of activity on Edward's behalf had been going on behind the scenes on the part of his family and friends. By 24 July Edward was installed in Windsor Park, where he was to remain at his father's orders for most of the time until late September.¹⁶⁸ On 4 August he wrote to his sister Elizabeth, the former countess of Holland and now countess of Hereford, telling her that his father had allowed him the company of John de Haustede and John de Weston, two valets whom he especially valued, and asking his sister to talk to the queen in the hope she would persuade the king to let him have the company of two more valets, namely Gilbert de Clare and Piers Gaveston. This would go far towards relieving ‘the anguish which we have endured, and still suffer daily, through the ordinance and pleasure of our lord the king’.¹⁶⁹ The breach between father and son could not continue indefinitely without causing further public scandal and disrupting the necessary flow of official business. Already it seems that Edward, although summoned to the parliament which began at Westminster on 15 September, did not attend.¹⁷⁰

Edward I's temper gradually cooled, aided by family and friends and by Prince Edward's studied good behaviour, and no doubt helped further by the execution at Smithfield on 23 August, with all the gruesome accompaniments, of Edward I's old enemy William Wallace.¹⁷¹

There was no formal end to the estrangement but on 12 October Prince Edward moved to Westminster palace, where on 13 October (appropriately the feast of the Translation of St Edward the Confessor) he presided at a banquet on behalf of his father, but significantly did not occupy the high seat.¹⁷² Father and son were now apparently reconciled, but how far this was the reality and how far for public consumption we shall never know. The younger Edward certainly knew by now who his friends were and who his enemies. He had good friends and supporters within his own family; in his household he had Walter Reynolds, for example; outside it he had the help and sympathy of influential figures such as the earl of Lincoln, Hugh Despenser, and the bishop of Durham.¹⁷³ His one real enemy remained the king's treasurer, Walter Langton. One day there would be a settling of accounts between the two men and that day could not be long delayed.

EDWARD'S MARRIAGE AGAIN

The long-delayed marriage of Edward and Isabella once again became an issue at the end of 1305. This was probably one of the reasons for the visit to England in the summer of 1305 of Queen Marie of France, the mother of Queen Margaret, and Margaret's brother Louis, count of Évreux. Even after the beginning of the estrangement from his father, Edward had still expected to meet and escort them on their arrival and on 22 June wrote to Walter Reynolds asking him to buy two riding horses for his personal use and the finest cloth to be found in London to make two or three new outfits.¹⁷⁴ It must have been personally embarrassing for Edward not to be allowed to meet the royal visitors, who were also of course close relatives of his betrothed, Isabella,¹⁷⁵ and no doubt diplomatically embarrassing for Edward's father to have to explain what was happening at the English court.

A further stimulus to action was the election of the archbishop of Bordeaux, Bertrand de Got, as Pope Clement V in June 1305. The new pope was a subject of the English crown and a former royal clerk, and could be expected to be favourable to English interests and demands.¹⁷⁶ But he was also anxious to launch a new crusade to recover the territories in the Holy Land lost in 1291, an expedition for which the military resources of England and France would be essential.¹⁷⁷ To achieve this aim a resolution of the remaining disputes between England and France over the duchy of Aquitaine was needed and Clement hoped that the marriage of Edward and Isabella would be the necessary catalyst. On 25 August 1305 Clement wrote to Edward I proposing that the Prince of Wales should go to Lyons for the papal coronation in November and that while there he and Isabella should be married. To avoid a repeat of the fiasco of 1304 when Edward had waited in vain at Dover for permission to enter France, Clement took the precaution of ensuring that Philip IV issued a safe conduct in advance.¹⁷⁸ On 4 October Edward I replied, excusing both himself and his son from attending the coronation on the grounds of lack of time to make the necessary preparations but stating that he would soon be sending envoys of his own to the pope.¹⁷⁹ It is likely that Edward I was concerned that if he and his son were present in person he would be put under pressure by both the French representatives and the pope to make unacceptable concessions; the king was also, although he could scarcely admit this, ageing rapidly and ailing and in no condition to make such an arduous journey;¹⁸⁰ and above all, arrangements for the future government of Scotland were absorbing all his time and energy.¹⁸¹ Edward I however sent an impressive delegation, consisting of the bishops of Coventry & Lichfield and of Worcester, the earl of Lincoln, Hugh Despenser and other nobles and administrative experts, one of whose duties was to arrange a proxy marriage between the Prince of Wales and Isabella.¹⁸² On 11 November Philip IV gave Isabella authority to appoint proctors; on 28 November the pope issued a dispensation for Isabella to marry while still under the canonical age; and on 3 December she appointed her uncle, Count Louis of Évreux and two other nobles to act for her.¹⁸³

The coronation of Clement V had already taken place at Lyons amidst great splendour on 14 November 1305, attended by Philip IV of France, Charles of Valois, Louis of Evreux, John II, duke of Brittany, and count Henry of Luxemburg (soon to be the emperor Henry VII), and on the English side by the earl of Lincoln and the other members of the English delegation who brought presents valued at £1,343.¹⁸⁴ The proxy marriage was not however celebrated, probably because the French and English envoys could not agree on the terms of the marriage settlement.¹⁸⁵

SCOTLAND, FRANCE AND KNIGHTHOOD

The war in Scotland, which had appeared to be at an end with the capture and execution of William Wallace, was dramatically reignited in February 1306 when Robert Bruce, earl of Carrick murdered John Comyn of Badenoch before the high altar of the Greyfriars' church at Dumfries. This was followed in March by the inauguration at Scone of Bruce as Robert I, king of Scots.¹⁸⁶ Edward I responded by ordering his army to muster on 8 July. Edward himself initially intended to lead the army but in April it was decided that Prince Edward would be in overall command and that his father would join him later.¹⁸⁷ Meanwhile, on 5 April it was announced that Edward would be knighted at the feast of Pentecost, 22 May. The sheriffs were ordered to proclaim that anyone whose father was a knight and who wished himself to be knighted on that occasion should come to London beforehand and be provided with the necessary equipment from the royal wardrobe.¹⁸⁸ On 7 April Edward, who was now almost twenty-two, was granted the duchy of Aquitaine, the island of Oléron and the Agenais. This was done ostensibly to maintain Edward in his impending status of knighthood,¹⁸⁹ but it was certainly also a further stage in the developing relations with France. The young Edward would now have a higher status if his marriage with Isabella were to take place before his accession to the English throne, while at the same time ensuring that the necessary homage for Aquitaine would be performed by Edward for himself and not by or in the name of his father.¹⁹⁰

The future knights spent the night before in church, many of them in the Temple church but the more distinguished, including the Prince of Wales, in Westminster Abbey. Supposedly they were composing themselves in prayer for the chivalric duties they were about to assume: in fact there was so much noise and general excitement that the monks of Westminster were scarcely able to say their office in the choir of the abbey.¹⁹¹ On the following day, 22 May, Edward I knighted his son in the chapel of the palace of Westminster; the young Edward's spurs were attached to his heels by the two senior earls of the kingdom, the vastly experienced and statesmanlike Henry de Lacy of Lincoln and the constable of England, Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford.¹⁹² At the same time the king formally invested his son with the duchy of Aquitaine.¹⁹³ Afterwards Edward went to Westminster Abbey where he knighted all the other young men, amounting altogether to about three hundred.¹⁹⁴ The ceremony was marred by the great crowds of people within the abbey. Two knights were crushed to death, while other knights inside the abbey had to clear a way on horseback. The Prince of Wales meanwhile had to retreat to the high altar for safety.¹⁹⁵

The ceremonies were followed by a great feast in Westminster Hall,¹⁹⁶ during which the guests were entertained by over eighty minstrels drawn from the households of the king, queen and prince, and from the service of many other nobles and clergy.¹⁹⁷ The highlight of the feast, and the detail which most interested the chroniclers, was the oaths taken upon two swans by Edward I and the prince, followed by the other nobles and knights, that they would defeat Robert Bruce and so avenge ‘the injury done to Holy Church, the death of John Comyn and the broken faith of the Scots’.¹⁹⁸ Prince Edward allegedly also swore that he would not rest two nights in the same place until this was achieved.¹⁹⁹

The mass knighting and the subsequent feast were exciting social events, some of the most exciting that England had ever known, but there was far more to them than that. At one level they were intended by Edward I to raise support for yet another campaign in Scotland, this time to pull down Robert Bruce from the throne which he had obtained through an act of sacrilege. It is an exaggeration to place the occasion on the same level as Pope Urban II's sermon at Clermont in 1095 which launched the First Crusade, but in the combination of religious piety and military enthusiasm, the comparison does carry some weight. There was, too, an element of desperation in Edward I's strategy. He was now almost sixty-seven years of age and in failing health. The Scottish campaign was for him personally a last throw of the dice.²⁰⁰

The knightings could also be described as a bonding exercise. For the newly made knights the war would be a test of their individual prowess and of how they would support one another on campaign. But it might also give a foretaste of how they would behave under a new king when Edward I had passed from the scene. Many of those knighted with the Prince of Wales in May 1306 were to play a prominent role for good or ill in the new reign.²⁰¹ They included Piers Gaveston,²⁰² Edmund Fitz Alan, soon to become earl of Arundel; Humphrey de Bohun, son of the earl of Hereford; Hugh Despenser the Younger, son of Hugh Despenser one of Edward I's most trusted baronial advisers; Gilbert de Clare, Edward II's first cousin and heir to the earldom of Gloucester; John Maltravers, who was to be one of Edward II's jailers in 1327; Roger Mortimer of Wigmore, future lover of Edward II's queen and instigator of the king's murder; William Trussell, who was to give Edward II the news of his subjects' withdrawal of allegiance in 1327; and John de Warenne, earl of Surrey. The social bonding was further emphasized by the marriages in 1305/6 of Edmund Fitz Alan to the earl of Surrey's sister; of the earl of Surrey to Prince Edward's niece Joan, daughter of his deceased sister Eleanor, countess de Bar on 25 May 1306; and on the following day of Hugh Despenser the Younger and another of Prince Edward's nieces, Gilbert de Clare's sister Eleanor.²⁰³

SCOTLAND

On 8 June 1306 Prince Edward left London to visit his stepmother, Queen Margaret, at Winchester,²⁰⁴ and from there made his way north to join the army summoned to assemble at Carlisle on 8 July. Edward I also went north but at a slower pace, reaching the Carlisle area in late September and establishing himself in the nearby Augustinian priory at Lanercost. The 1306 campaign had begun well. Already, on 19 June, an English army led by Aymer de Valence, the future earl of Pembroke, had severely defeated Robert Bruce at Methven near Perth.²⁰⁵ In early July 1306 Prince Edward entered Scotland with the main force, receiving the surrender of the castle of Lochmaben in Annandale on 11 July.²⁰⁶ From there he moved in the direction of Perth which he reached on about 1 August.²⁰⁷ He was then present at the siege of Kildrummy castle north-west of Aberdeen, which fell before 13 September, yielding one of Robert Bruce's brothers, Neil, as a prisoner.²⁰⁸ Little is known in detail about the force commanded by the Prince of Wales, but it apparently included his cousins the earls of Lancaster and Gloucester and his brother-in-law the earl of Hereford, as well as many of the young men who had just been knighted.²⁰⁹

On Edward I's orders the campaign was conducted with great savagery since Robert Bruce and his supporters were regarded as rebels against their lawful king rather than the leaders of another nation.²¹⁰ Many of those taken prisoner were executed as traitors, including Neil Bruce. Two other brothers, Thomas and Alexander, were captured in Galloway in February 1307 and sent as prisoners to the Prince of Wales at Wetheral in Cumberland, together with the heads of some of their companions. The Bruce brothers were then sent to Edward I at Carlisle for execution.²¹¹

According to the chronicler William Rishanger, the prince took a full part in the punishment of the Scots: Edward, moving a day's march ahead of his father, ‘would spare neither sex nor age. Wherever he went, he set fire to villages and hamlets and laid them waste without mercy. This is said to have displeased the king his father, the more so as the hapless populace were paying the penalty for their betters, as the rich had taken to flight.’²¹² Hilda Johnstone also cited another apparently damning passage, this time from Barbour's Bruce, as evidence for the young Edward's cruelty and lack of human feeling.²¹³ ‘Barbour,’ she says, ‘writes of the vindictive spirit shown by the prince when he got the news of the rout of Methven’:

And to the king of England sone

Thai wrate haly as thai had done;

And he wes blyth of that tithing,

And for dispyte had draw and hing

All the prisoneris, thouct thai war ma,

Bot Schyr Amery did nocht sua.

There is indeed some evidence that Edward I became concerned that ordinary people who had not been directly involved in Robert Bruce's actions or who had been forced to join him against their will were suffering unduly, since in March 1307 he wrote to Aymer de Valence and his other officials in Scotland reminding them to spare such people from punishment.²¹⁴

But there are also some indications that the younger Edward was less brutal in his behaviour than would appear. In the first place, the passage from Barbour's Bruce has been misread. If the word ‘sone’ is understood as ‘son’, which was Johnstone's interpretation, then the passage is indeed highly critical of Edward's behaviour and character. If, on the other hand, ‘sone’ is translated as ‘soon’, which it is in the latest edition of Barbour's Bruce, then Edward I and not his son becomes the focus of attention and of criticism.²¹⁵ If Barbour's remarks really had been intended to refer to Prince Edward, they would sit very oddly with his strong approval of Edward in his account of the siege of Kildrummy only three months after the battle of Methven:

The eldest and apperande air

A yhoung bachiller, stark and fair,

Schyr Edward callit of Carnarvinane,

Thet was the starkest man off ane

That men fynd mycht in ony cuntre;

Prynce of Walys that tym wes he.²¹⁶

The quotation from Rishanger is also subject to some doubt. His claim that Edward I stayed one day's march behind his son is nonsense, since Edward I did not set foot in Scotland during the 1306–7 campaign. If Rishanger was wrong in this, one may question the reliability of his other statements. Some evidence of Edward's actual behaviour is contained in two letters he wrote to Aymer de Valence, the king's lieutenant in Scotland, on 13 July and 1 August 1306. In the first he reported that the garrison of Lochmaben castle had surrendered to him unconditionally and were to have a fair trial; in the second Edward thanked Aymer for the protection given to the abbot and convent of Coupar Angus, for which they had much commended him, as he esteemed them as his own. Edward also begged Aymer to see that no damage came to their crops and other goods and to befriend them in all matters.²¹⁷ It is also worth adding that after he became king Edward relaxed the terrifying conditions of imprisonment of Bruce's sister Mary and the countess of Buchan, who had been confined in specially built cages on the orders of Edward I.²¹⁸ This is not to argue that the Prince of Wales's behaviour in Scotland was exemplary, or that he did not participate in any of the destruction caused by the English armies; but the extreme charges against him cannot be supported. The prime responsibility for what happened in Scotland was and remained that of Edward I.²¹⁹

The Prince of Wales was still in Scotland in September when he supplied miners to assist in the siege of Dunaverty castle on the isle of Mull, where it was hoped that Robert Bruce himself might be.²²⁰ When the campaign ended for the winter shortly afterwards Edward returned to England, visiting Langley, Canterbury and Dover, and then spending Christmas with his half-brothers, Thomas and Edmund, at Northampton.²²¹ Edward I had already gone into winter quarters at Lanercost priory in Cumberland by 29 September 1306. This fact, combined with the prince's departure from Scotland, probably explains why twenty-two young knights, including Gaveston and others closely associated with Prince Edward, felt that their duty was performed for the time being and left the army in Scotland without permission, to take part in a tournament overseas.²²² Edward I was furious and on 18 October ordered the seizure of their lands.²²³ He eventually relented after mediation by Queen Margaret and on 23 January 1307 he pardoned most of the offenders.²²⁴ The episode had no real significance except to emphasize once again the growing gap between an ailing and increasingly frustrated king and an exuberant younger generation.

EDWARD's MARRIAGE YET AGAIN

The main reason for Edward's return to England at the end of the campaigning season in Scotland was that negotiations concerning Aquitaine and his marriage had been continuing between English and French envoys at the papal curia at Lyons. The unwillingness of the French to surrender the castle of Mauléon in advance of the marriage of Edward and Isabella had held up agreement in 1305. It appears that negotiations on this subject and on Edward I's demand that the marriage should take place in England rather than France had reached some sort of conclusion by the end of November 1306 when Clement V appointed Cardinal Peter of Spain to go to England to settle the final details of an agreement.²²⁵ The cardinal was expected to arrive in England in early December: Prince Edward was at Dover on 8 December, presumably to meet him but there is no evidence that he did so.²²⁶ Whenever the cardinal did arrive, he was still in the south of England in mid-February.²²⁷ Edward I was meanwhile anxiously awaiting him in Carlisle,²²⁸where he had been holding a parliament since 25 January. Although some of the parliament's business concerned the situation in Scotland, relations with France and the prince's marriage would seem to have been the major items. Until the cardinal put in an appearance, there was little to be done.²²⁹ Peter of Spain eventually joined Edward I at Carlisle on 12 March and dined with him on 13 and 14 March.²³⁰ On the 15th the cardinal announced the terms which had been agreed between the pope and Philip IV of France. They were apparently simple and straightforward: if Edward I gave final approval to the marriage between Edward and Isabella, then Philip would restore the whole of the duchy of Aquitaine, without reservation, saving only the homage due for these lands.²³¹ On the following day the archbishop of York announced Edward I's acceptance of the terms, despite continuing concerns about the castle of Mauléon.²³² On 22 March orders were given to the bishops of Worcester and Coventry & Lichfield, the earls of Lincoln, Warwick and Richmond, and seventeen others to join the Prince of Wales in London on 22 May and to accompany him to France to meet the French king and to bring the peace ‘lately treated under a certain form and not yet finally concluded … to a happy and prosperous ending’.²³³ Nothing further is stated about the purpose of the proposed visit, but it is clear that no binding promises had been made at Carlisle and that further, possibly tough, negotiations lay ahead.²³⁴ In the persons of the bishop of Coventry & Lichfield, the earl of Lincoln, and Hugh Despenser, amongst others, Edward would be accompanied by negotiators with long experience of Anglo-French relations, who would not give away anything of importance. While it is possible that, if the planned negotiations in France had been successful, they would then have been followed by his homage as duke of Aquitaine for the lands he held from the king of France, and perhaps even by his marriage, it is unwise to assume either of these outcomes. The surviving documents do not make any mention of an actual wedding or of any preparations for one. It is also unwise to assume that if there had been a wedding it would have been held at Poitiers in the presence of Philip IV and Clement V.²³⁵ The two rulers did meet at Poitiers in April but both had long departed the city before Edward and his companions could even have left England.²³⁶ It is also known that orders were given to the sheriffs of seven English counties to purvey supplies of wheat, some of it to be delivered to Le Crotoy in Ponthieu by 22 May and some to a place described as ‘Poyteres in Ponthieu’ by 25 June.²³⁷ Large quantities of poultry were bought by Ralph of Wendover, the yeoman of the prince's poultry for delivery in Ponthieu, amounting to 105 swans and twenty-eight herons,²³⁸ presumably in anticipation of feasting on a large scale. If alive, it is hard to imagine these birds being taken all the way to Poitiers; if dead, they would scarcely be edible after such a long journey.²³⁹ At a guess, it seems more likely that they were for consumption somewhere closer at hand and that Edward planned to perform his homage and perhaps even to be married at a place in French territory adjacent to Ponthieu, such as Boulogne, where his homage to Philip IV and marriage to Isabella were to take place in January 1308, or Amiens, where he did homage to Philip V in 1320.

Whatever the original intentions, Edward was at Dover from 26 April to 5 May, after which he returned to London; also on 5 May, the bishop of Coventry & Lichfield, who would have played a leading part in the negotiations in France, left for Scotland; by 27 May preparations were already being made for his own return to Scotland, and on 6 June the expedition to France was cancelled altogether.²⁴⁰ The reasons for the change of plan are not known in any detail but it is clear from a letter which Edward I sent to Clement V in early July that once again the French failure to hand over the castle of Mauléon was at the heart of the problem.²⁴¹ There were so many twists and turns in Anglo-French relations, so many failures in communication, and so much mutual mistrust that no outcome was ever certain.²⁴² Edward and Isabella's eventual marriage at Boulogne-sur-Mer in January 1308, after Edward had become king, was achieved only after intensive and difficult last-minute negotiations which continued even as the marriage was celebrated.²⁴³

The plans for Edward's marriage had been the main reason for Cardinal Peter of Spain's visit to Carlisle. This was a duty he was performing on behalf of the pope, but there was an unexpected element in his mission, which suggests he may have been playing another game entirely. Peter was well aware of the connections between Prince Edward and Spain through his mother Eleanor of Castile. In a letter to the pope in early 1307 Edward I spoke of Peter of Spain as someone ‘who, we hear, should have a special affection for our dear son Edward, since he is of Spanish descent and from that land the cardinal also originated’.²⁴⁴ The young Edward was also conscious of the value of the connection, having sent the cardinal a cope embroidered with pearls and valued at £60 in 1302–3.²⁴⁵ According to a newsletter, the cardinal had brought with him to Carlisle an indenture to which the ‘counts and barons of the land of Spain’ were party, to the effect that in event of Ferdinand IV of Castile dying childless, then as his mother's son the next king of Castile should be Prince Edward of England.²⁴⁶ There was some plausibility in this story, since Fernando, though married, was still childless, and the kingdom of Castile was in a very disturbed state. On the other hand, whether Peter of Spain had really been authorized to make such a proposal by a group of Castilian nobles, or whether, as Peter Linehan suggests, Edward I had been fishing in troubled Spanish waters for his own possible advantage,²⁴⁷ there is no way of knowing. In any event the claim to the Castilian throne was not pursued, and Ferdinand IV of Castile died in 1312, having at last produced an heir, who succeeded him as Alfonso XI.²⁴⁸

THE FIRST EXILE OF GAVESTON

There was one further dramatic turn of events in 1307, which occurred at Lanercost in February and is known principally through the highly coloured but possibly suspect account of the chronicler Walter of Guisborough. According to Guisborough, the Prince of Wales persuaded the bishop of Chester (i.e. Coventry & Lichfield), against his better judgement, to go to the king and ask for the county of Ponthieu to be granted to Gaveston. Edward I was furious and summoned his son, whom he described as the son of a whore and abused roundly for wanting to give away royal lands, allegedly saying that but for the threat to the unity of the kingdom he would have disinherited him. The episode supposedly ended with the king seizing Edward's hair in both hands and tearing out as much as he could before throwing him out of the room. The king then summoned his barons and with their advice ordered that Gaveston should never receive any lands from his son, and decided to send Gaveston into perpetual exile, under pain of death. Edward was made to swear that he would never grant any lands to Gaveston.²⁴⁹

It seems extraordinary that Walter Langton, bishop of Coventry & Lichfield, the king's treasurer and most influential adviser, should have been prepared in any circumstances to convey such a request from Edward to his father. If however Edward was determined to promote Gaveston's career, he could not do so without his father's agreement and could not obtain that without first winning Langton's support. It would be a very risky strategy which put his fate in the hands of a man with whom he had quarrelled bitterly less than two years earlier. Edward I's anger at his son's wish to give away the county of Ponthieu, which had been the personal inheritance of Eleanor of Castile, would be all too predictable. By this stage in his life, Edward I's temper was on a knife edge. If the hair-pulling incident really did occur it was while Edward I was awaiting the arrival of Cardinal Peter of Spain with the latest proposals concerning the marriage of Edward and Isabella. One of the details to be agreed was the dower to be bestowed upon Isabella. This had not been settled in early 1307 but it is possible that Edward I considered using Ponthieu for this purpose and would therefore be even more angry if his son had tried to divert it to his friend Gaveston. It is probably no coincidence that on the day of their marriage, 24 January 1308, Edward II assigned dower to his new wife, Isabella, from the revenues of Ponthieu.²⁵⁰

The official record of the events of February 1307 confirms that Gaveston was to be sent into exile but differs from the picture given by Walter of Guisborough in every other significant detail. The memorandum entered on the Close Roll reports that at Lanercost on Sunday, 26 February, the king ordained and ordered ‘for certain reasons’ that three weeks after the next tournament, which would be held a fortnight after Easter (30 April), Sir Peter de Gaveston should be ready to cross the sea at Dover for Gascony, and to remain there without returning ‘until he shall be recalled by the king and by his permission’. On the same day, 26 February, Gaveston swore a solemn oath ‘upon God's body, the cross of Neit²⁵¹ and upon the other relics of the king’. The Prince of Wales swore on the same relics that ‘he would not receive or retain Sir Peter near him or with him contrary to the ordinance … unless he be recalled or granted leave by the king’. Gaveston was to receive 100 marks sterling (£66 13s 4d) per year from the revenues of Gascony to cover his expenses while he remained overseas ‘during the king's pleasure and awaiting his recall’. The first year was to commence the day after Gaveston had crossed from Dover to Wissant on the way to Gascony, and Gaveston would continue to receive this sum until the king had time to enquire into Gaveston's resources in England; after which the king would ‘increase or decrease the estate of Sir Peter according to his pleasure and as shall seem good to him’.²⁵² There is no mention of the specific reason for Gaveston's exile, so we are left to speculate on what precisely the Prince of Wales had sought to do. There is nothing to confirm Walter of Guisborough's claim that Gaveston was to go into permanent exile. Instead Gaveston would clearly be able to live in modest comfort, against the day when he would be recalled to England. Neither was Gaveston to leave the country immediately: he was to have over two months to prepare and evidently was to be allowed to attend the forthcoming tournament. Finally, there is no mention in the Lanercost oaths of 26 February of Gaveston being forbidden in the future to receive any lands from the Prince of Wales.

Edward I may well have hoped that once Gaveston had been sent to Gascony he would go home to his native Béarn and stay there. In the event Gaveston's exile proved to be comfortable and of short duration. Prince Edward lavished presents on him prior to his departure, including two outfits each bearing Gaveston's coat of arms, for wearing at tournaments, five horses and £260 in cash.²⁵³ He also gave Gaveston some of the swans and herons which had been bought in anticipation of Edward's own intended visit to France.²⁵⁴ Gaveston was accompanied to Dover by Prince Edward and two minstrels,²⁵⁵ but instead of going to Gascony, he went to Crécy in Ponthieu at the prince's orders and remained there or in its vicinity for the duration of his stay.²⁵⁶

The generous treatment of Gaveston strongly supports Hilda Johnstone's conclusion that ‘Edward, not Peter, was at this stage the prime offender’.²⁵⁷ However, in one of her early publications Johnstone made a half-suggestion which might go to the heart of the matter, when she remarked that Gaveston's stay in Ponthieu in 1307 ‘gave Hemingburgh [i.e. Walter of Guisborough] the ground for a highly-coloured story of the prince requesting his father to make Peter count of Ponthieu in his stead’.²⁵⁸ This raises the intriguing but unprovable possibility that the story was not true and that there was another reason for Edward I's anger with his son in 1307. If Ponthieu was not the territory which Edward proposed to give to Gaveston, could it not instead have been the earldom of Cornwall, which was closely associated with the crown,²⁵⁹ which Edward I intended to give to one of his sons, Thomas or Edmund, and which Gaveston did indeed receive only a few months later in August 1307?²⁶⁰ The fact that the charter granting the earldom to Gaveston was the very first one to be issued in the reign of Edward II strongly suggests that the grant had already been considered before Edward became king. It is likely that, just as Edward's own knighting had been accompanied by his investiture as duke of Aquitaine, so he felt that Gaveston's knighthood should be accompanied by an appropriate territorial endowment, whether Ponthieu, as is generally believed, or Cornwall, as seems more probable. If Edward really did consider Gaveston as his brother, this would also help to explain why he wished to grant him lands of such significance.

With Gaveston safely installed in Ponthieu and having abandoned his own planned visit to France, Prince Edward prepared to rejoin the war in Scotland. In May Robert Bruce defeated Aymer de Valence and the earl of Gloucester in separate encounters, forcing them to retreat to the castle of Ayr. The English position in Scotland was still apparently formidable in terms of strongpoints held,²⁶¹ but the balance of opinion was starting to shift against them. Everyone knew that Edward I would soon be dead and supporters of the English crown in Scotland feared for what might follow him. ‘False preachers’ were prophesying that after the death of ‘le Roi Coveytous’ the Scottish people and the Britons (i.e. the Welsh) would ally against the English and live together in accord until the end of the world.²⁶² Edward I was determined to lead one more campaign in Scotland. The army was summoned to gather at Carlisle in early July. On 6 July Edward I reached Burgh-on-Sands, ready to enter Scotland, and on the following day he died. For good or ill, his son, Edward of Caernarfon, Prince of Wales, Duke of Aquitaine, Earl of Chester and Count of Ponthieu, was now King of England.

Edward was also twenty-three years old, younger and less experienced than his father had been at his own succession in 1272, but considerably more mature than any other thirteenth- and fourteenth-century king of England: Edward's grandfather Henry III, for example, was only nine years old when he succeeded in 1216 and Edward's own son Edward III was fourteen in 1327. But like any other heir to the throne, his suitability for the task could not be fully tested in advance. As long as his father lived and remained physically capable of governing, the young Edward would have to wait. Inevitably some of his time was spent in leisure pursuits with close friends and companions, such as Gaveston and others; just as inevitably, leisure pursuits which were unaccompanied by major responsibility were bound to appear to an unsympathetic observer as frivolous and the money spent on them as extravagance. He had however gained some limited experience of government in his early years when he represented his father during the crisis of 1297, and later through the routine activities of his own household and council. The surviving roll of letters for 1304–5, for example, suggests that he was engaged with and active in business which concerned him. There is nothing to suggest either, as Hilda Johnstone argued, that ‘his childhood and early youth had entirely lacked that atmosphere of affection and security which had surrounded Edward I’.²⁶³ In fact he had abundant contacts within his own family and with the nobility, and appears to have possessed good social skills. When he made friends, he showed loyalty to them in times of difficulty, such as during the estrangement from his father in 1305. If anything he was too loyal, as his attachment to Gaveston showed all too clearly. His level of education was probably no more and no less than that of his father Edward I or of his son Edward III. By the time he succeeded to the throne he had gained substantial military experience. While there is nothing to suggest any special abilities as a commander in the field, neither is there anything to suggest ineptitude. He was always ready to go to war and remained so when king.

No ‘king-in-waiting’ could ever be completely ready for the task, but there is no reason to suppose that Edward ‘would feel the obligations of kingship to be uncongenial’ or that he might decline to accept them altogether.²⁶⁴ Although some of the personal weaknesses that were to dog his reign as king were already apparent, most notably his reliance on favourites, Edward's readiness for the throne in 1307 should not be judged in the knowledge of the disasters which lay ahead of him and which led to his deposition and death in 1327. In 1307 Edward was reasonably well prepared both in character and experience for the responsibilities he was about to undertake.²⁶⁵ What neither he nor his contemporaries fully understood or allowed for were the problems he inherited from his father: an almost empty treasury and administrative confusion; an intractable war with Scotland; difficult relations with France; growing problems of law and order; and a restless nobility.²⁶⁶ It would take very little for any of these problems to blow up into a major crisis early in the new reign.

¹ Parsons, ‘The year of Eleanor of Castile's birth’, 262. Edward's presence was noted by the chronicler, Bartholomew Cotton, Historia Anglicana, ed. H.R. Luard, Rolls ser. (London, 1859), 177.

² Prestwich, Edward I, 316–17; Johnstone, 65–7, 124–5; Johnstone, ‘The county of Ponthieu, 1279–1307’, EHR, xxix (1914), 435–52; Vale, 71–3, 286 (map).

³ For the background to the war see Vale, ch. 6, ‘Anglo-French conflict’.

⁴ Johnstone, 32; Prestwich, Edward I, 388. A Flemish marriage had been under discussion since 1292 and was part of a wider diplomatic scheme which saw the marriages of Edward I's daughters, Margaret, Elizabeth and Eleanor to the future duke of Brabant and to the counts of Holland and Bar respectively.

⁵ Johnstone, 33.

⁶ Ibid., 32; Prestwich, Edward I, 388–9. There are no household records for Edward of Caernarfon at this period but the chronicler Bartholomew Cotton reports that he was at Windsor with his sister Elizabeth, countess of Holland: Cotton, Historia Anglicana, 316–17 (cited in Johnstone, 35).

⁷ For the most recent survey of the events of 1297 see Prestwich, Plantagenet England, 165–72.

⁸ Documents Illustrating the Crisis of 1297–98 in England, ed. Prestwich, Camden, 4th ser., xxiv (London, 1980), 106–7 (no. 91); Johnstone, 35; J.H. Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, 1294–1313: a Study in the Defence of Ecclesiastical Liberty (Cambridge, 1980), 131–2.

⁹ CCR, 1296–1302, 58–9 and passim.

¹⁰ Prestwich, Plantagenet England, 170; idem, Edward I, 427–9; Documents, ed. Prestwich, 155–6 (no. 153), 158–60 (no. 155).

¹¹ Prestwich, Edward I, 427, 477–9.

¹² Article by Bruce Webster on Edward Balliol in Oxford DNB; CCR, 1296–1302, 142, 288.

¹³ CCR, 1296–1302, 142; Johnstone, 39. Writs issued at this time were dated at St Paul's. This may well be the occasion when Edward gave a cloth with a purple ground to St Paul's cathedral on the anniversary of its dedication; in 1299 a red altar cloth with images of St Peter holding the cross and the keys was presented to St Paul's by William Blyborough on behalf of Edward: O. Lehmann-Brockhaus, Lateinische Schriftquellen zur Kunst in England, Wales und Schottland vom Jahre 901 bis zum Jahre 1307, 5 vols (Munich, 1955–60), iii, 209–10 (no. 2932).

The two young men had already met as children, at Mortlake on Whit Sunday, 17 May 1293: E 101/353/18, m.5.

¹⁴ Documents, ed. Prestwich, 155–6 (no. 153); Johnstone, 36–7.

¹⁵ CCR, 1296–1302, 142; Johnstone, 37.

¹⁶ Prestwich, Edward I, 425, and Johnstone, 40–1, on the threat of civil war. On the aftermath of the crisis of 1297–8 see Prestwich, Plantagenet England, 172–7.

¹⁷ Prestwich, Edward I, 479–82; G.W.S. Barrow, Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland, 3rd edn (Edinburgh, 1988), 98–104.

¹⁸ Prestwich, Edward I, 396–7. The documents concerning the proposed marriages are preserved in AN, J 632, nos 33–36. The earl of Lincoln acted on behalf of the young Edward.

¹⁹ The marriage contract had already been annulled by Pope Boniface VIII in June 1298: Foedera, I, ii, 894.

²⁰ Their formal betrothal did not however take place until 20 May 1303: Doherty, Isabella, 13, 15–16, 18. There is some confusion about the age of Isabella. Her age is given in Doherty, 16, 18, as two in 1298 and nine in 1303, which is impossible. Elsewhere however he cites convincing evidence (AN,J 435, no. 18) that she was born in the winter of 1295–6, which would make her aged seven in 1303: P.C. Doherty, ‘The date of the birth of Isabella, queen of England (1308–58)’, BIHR, xlviii (London, 1975), 246–8. This date is accepted by J.C. Parsons, the author of the Oxford DNB article on Isabella.

²¹ Prestwich, Edward I, 129–31, 520–1; E.B. Fryde et al., Handbook of British Chronology, 3rd edn (London, 1986), 38–9.

²² Prestwich, Edward I, 129–31.

²³ Edward I had celebrated All Saints' Day at Langley before leaving for Berwick-upon-Tweed with the intention of mounting another invasion of Scotland, which did not take place because of magnate opposition: Johnstone, 44.

²⁴ E 101/355/17 (a single membrane of Edward's household expenses); E 101/ 355/30 (a single membrane of the queen's household expenses).

²⁵ Johnstone, 44–6.

²⁶ Ibid., 44, n. 9, cites William of Rishanger's remark that the family lived in ‘leisured security’. In Feb. 1303 Edward entertained the king and queen for a week at Langley and probably then visited them at Westminster in early March. As a New Year's present for Queen Margaret he had bought a gold ring mounted with a ruby: E 101/363/18, ff.4v, 20, 29; Johnstone, 85.

²⁷ Roll of Arms of the Princes, Barons and Knights who attended Edward I at the Siege of Caerlaverock, ed. T. Wright (London, 1864), 17–18. For the latest discussion of the roll see D.B. Tyson, ‘The Siege of Caerlaverock’, Nottingham Medieval Studies, xlvi (Nottingham, 2002), 45–69.

²⁸ Bruce, book 4, 154–5 (ll. 72–7); Johnstone, 114–15.

²⁹ Galbraith, ‘The St. Edmundsbury Chronicle’; Johnstone, 46.

³⁰ Edward's movements up to 9June can be followed in E 101/355/28.

³¹ This was the first occasion on which Edward bore a coat of arms. In c. 1295, when he was about eleven, Edward was listed simply as filius Regis on Collin's Roll of Arms. His brother Alfonso had been assigned a coat of arms as a child, in about 1280, though he did not live to be knighted, and his half-brother, Edmund of Woodstock, was given an armorial seal in 1303, when aged two: N. Denholm-Young, History and Heraldry, 1254–1310 (Oxford, 1965), 62, n. 4. For details of Collin's Roll see A.R. Wagner, Catalogue of English Medieval Rolls of Arms (Oxford, 1950), 24.

³² Whatever else may have been in short supply, there was evidently plenty of wine. Edward was provided with 59 casks of red wine at Ayr, Turnberry and Lochryan for his use and for that of his household: CDS, ii, no. 1233.

³³ I have drawn on the accounts of the campaign and of the events at the River Cree in Prestwich, Edward I, 487–90; Barrow, 113; Johnstone, 48–51.

³⁴ Prestwich, Edward I, 490; E 101/28/16.

³⁵ E 101/360/10, m.2. On 23 March Edmund's bones were interred in the presence of Edward I at the Cistercian abbey of Hailes in Gloucestershire, which the earl's father, Richard of Cornwall, had founded: Johnstone, 54. The young Edward was by this time on his way to Wales.

³⁶ See article on Edmund of Cornwall by Nicholas Vincent in the Oxford DNB.

³⁷ CChR 1300–1326, 6.

³⁸ See Johnstone, 59–60.

³⁹ Davies, Conquest, 386; Johnstone, 60. There are depictions of Edward I creating Edward Prince of Wales in the manuscript of a fourteenth-century Rochester chronicle (BL, Cotton Ms. Nero D.II, f. 191v.) and in a series of pictures of English kings from William the Conqueror to Edward I preceding a fourteenth-century text of Peter Langtoft's chronicle (BL, Royal Ms. 20.A.II, f. 10).

⁴⁰ Davies, Conquest, 252–4, 354–5; Johnstone, 60, n. 2. In 1343 the next English Prince of Wales, Edward the Black Prince, was invested ‘according to custom’ with ‘a circlet for the head, a ring for the finger, and a silver rod’, which implies but does not prove that this was also done in 1301: Johnstone, 60.

⁴¹ See the Introduction to the Hilary Parliament of 1290 in PROME.

⁴² Prestwich, Edward I, 11; Johnstone, 60.

⁴³ Prestwich, Edward I, 11–12.

⁴⁴ See Vale, 219–21.

⁴⁵ See above Ch. 2, ‘The nature of a king’.

⁴⁶ Davies, Conquest, 386; Johnstone, 60.

⁴⁷ BL, Add. Ms. 7966A, f. 155; E 101/360/16.

⁴⁸ Cheshire in the Pipe Rolls, 1158–1301, ed. Brown, 189–90.

⁴⁹ See the article on Melton by Hill in the Oxford DNB; and Letters from Northern Registers, ed. J. Raine, Rolls ser. (London, 1883), 355–6.

⁵⁰ There were, however, at least two men of this name.

⁵¹ E 101/360/16.

⁵² There is no surviving contemporary record of these proceedings at Chester and in Wales. The names are known because in 1343 Edward III inquired into precedents when he created his own son as Prince of Wales and had the results recorded on the Patent Roll: CPR, 1343–45, 227–34. Edward Owen used this material as the basis of his work, A List of those who did Homage and Fealty to the First English Prince of Wales in AD 1301 (privately printed, 1901), produced to mark the creation of the future George V as Prince of Wales in Nov. 1901. My calculations of the numbers of people involved differ slightly from those of Johnstone, who included Hope as a separate place at which homages and fealties were taken: Johnstone, 62. These were in fact taken at Flint.

⁵³ The incomplete castle and adjoining borough at Caernarfon had been seriously damaged in the Welsh revolt of 1294–5 and their reconstruction was far from complete in 1301. Some building work is recorded in 1301–2, possibly on the orders or with the encouragement of the new prince: Taylor, Caernarfon Castle, 13–15. In any case Welshmen would not have been allowed to live in the borough of Caernarfon: see Davies, Conquest, 370–3, and idem, ‘Colonial Wales’, Past & Present, 65 (Oxford, 1974), 3–23.

⁵⁴ Though even his loyalty was put under strain in the middle years of the reign of Edward II. See the article on him by J.B. Smith in the Oxford DNB.

⁵⁵ BL, Add. Ms. 7966A, f. 155; E 101/360/16.

⁵⁶ CPR, 1343–45, 228, 231. Others performed their homage later, sometimes much later. Henry de Lacy, the earl of Lincoln, did so on 19 July 1301 for his lands held from the earldom of Chester, and for Rhos and Rhufoniog in Wales on 6 Jan. 1303; John de Warenne, the earl of Surrey, did homage and fealty for the lordships of Bromfield and Yale in the Welsh March on 25 July 1301; on 6 Nov. Edmund de Mortimer for his lands of Ceri and Cydewain before the prince's council in London, and on the following day Sir Jean de Fiennes, one of Edward's tenants from across the Channel in the county of Ponthieu, also came in to do his duty: ibid., 228, 231.

⁵⁷ CCR, 1296–1302, 480.

⁵⁸ Prestwich, Edward I, 493; Johnstone, 73. The chief honour was to accrue to the king's son (quod proinde prefato filio nostro principalis honor armorum accrescat): PW, I, 357.

⁵⁹ For the magnates summoned to join Edward see PW, I, 357. Biographies of each of the five earls and several of the others mentioned can be found in the Oxford DNB.

⁶⁰ E 101/360/17: this is the first such list since 1289–90, so it is difficult to know whether the substantial size was the result of a recent increase in numbers, marking Edward's changed status, or of a more gradual process. See also Johnstone, 75–7.

⁶¹ The other knights were John Fitz Simon the elder, John de Wolverton, Robert de Haustede the younger, Giles Fineles, Bertram de Montboucher and Gilbert de Brideshale.

⁶² See the article on Thomas de Clare by Robin Frame in the Oxford DNB.

⁶³ The other pueri in custodia were Robert de Scales, John de Leyburn, John Fitz Waryn, Philip de Courtenay, Robert de Clavering, Thomas Botetourt, Robert Fitz Waryn and William de Munchensey.

⁶⁴ Johnstone, 75–6.

⁶⁵ E 101/360/17: one wonders if he had his Papagena tucked away somewhere. Papegay appears again in the prince's household roll for 1302–3 when he bought a net for catching partridges and also a setter dog in London for fowling and hunting: CDS, ii, no. 1413, pp. 366, 368, citing E 101/363/18, ff. 8d, 12.

⁶⁶ BL, Add. Ms. 7966A, ff. 84–7. My total comes to 308; Johnstone's to 314: Johnstone, 76–7.

⁶⁷ BL, Add. Ms. 7966A, ff. 89–91 (no date is given, but it was possibly towards the end of Aug.); Johnstone, 77–8.

⁶⁸ On all these men, except Gurney, see the relevant articles in the Oxford DNB. On Gurney see the article on Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke. Roger Mortimer of Chirk had another Roger Mortimer with him but the latter was probably too young to be the Roger Mortimer of Wigmore who instigated the murder of Edward II.

⁶⁹ Prestwich, Edward I, 493.

⁷⁰ Edward was at Carlisle on 5 Oct.: CDS, ii, no. 1239.

⁷¹ Prestwich, Edward I, 493–4. There is a more detailed account in Johnstone, 77–80. For a map showing the conjectured movements of the English armies and of their Scottish opponents and for another account of the 1301 campaign see Barrow, 111, 120–1.

⁷² Prestwich, Edward I, 494–5; Johnstone, 80–1. Prince Edward's health may also have suffered from the rigours of the campaign. Although he reported to his father from Carlisle on 5 Oct. that he was ‘in good estate and health’, on the 20th he sent his physician, Master Robert de Oydisterne, to London ‘for certain matters required for his [the Prince's] body’: CDS, ii, nos 1239, 1249.

⁷³ Prestwich, Edward I, 397; Johnstone, 88.

⁷⁴ Foedera, I, ii, 952, 955; AN, J 633, no. 17bis (20 May). Letters patent of the count of Évreux, duke of Burgundy and duke of Brittany, dated 20 May 1303, and rehearsing the same details concerning the proposed marriage as were contained in the document of 12 June, formerly displayed in the Royal Institution of South Wales, Swansea, are now preserved in the West Glamorgan archives, Swansea. The document seems to be the counterpart of the letters patent of the English envoys. See G.G. Francis, ‘Original contract of affiance between Edward Prince of Wales and Isabella of France’, Archaeologia Cambrensis, iii (Cardiff, 1848), 150–5.

⁷⁵ The dispensation was needed on the grounds of affinity.

⁷⁶ Around £4,500 sterling, a substantial sum.

⁷⁷ AN, J 633, no.17 (12 June). However, there is evidence as late as 10 April 1303 of an earlier attempt to arrange a marriage between Edward and another Isabella, sister of the reigning king of Castile, Ferdinand IV: CCR, 1302–1307, 83; Johnstone, 88. The initiative appears to have come from the Castilian side but it is also possible that Edward I had seen the proposal either as an alternative should the French marriage fall through or as a way of bringing Philip IV to the conference table. There was to be an echo of this plan as late as Jan. 1307: Linehan, ‘The English mission’, 618–19.

⁷⁸ The army was summoned to be at Berwick on 26 May: CPR, 1301–7, 98.

⁷⁹ E 101/363/18. Johnstone made extensive use of this source in her Edward of Carnarvon, 83–7. The sections dealing with military matters and with Scotland were also printed by Bain in CDS, ii, no. 1413 (pp. 364–70), where the source is wrongly described as a roll.

⁸⁰ CDS, ii, 365; E 101/363/18, ff. 5, 5d. Altogether a sum of just over £568 was spent on chargers and hackneys for the prince's household in 1302–3: CDS, ii, 368; E 101/363/18, f. 16. The most expensive horse cost 110 marks (£73 6s 8d), which suggests it was good enough to ride in battle. On the cost of warhorses see Andrew Ayton, Knights and Warhorses (Woodbridge, Suffolk & Rochester, NY, 1994), ch. 6, ‘The horse inventories’; Michael Prestwich, Armies and Warfare in the Middle Ages (London & New Haven, 1996), 34–5.

⁸¹ CDS, ii, 367; E 101/363/18, ff. 9d, 10.

⁸² E 101/363/18, f. 20.

⁸³ CDS, ii, 364–7; E 101/363/18, ff. 6d, 10, 5, 5d, 8d.

⁸⁴ E 101/363/18, ff. 2, 2d.

⁸⁵ Other magnates served in the army without pay, and there were about 7,500 foot soldiers: Prestwich, Edward I, 498.

⁸⁶ CDS, ii, no. 1599.

⁸⁷ For a map showing the path of the English army during 1303–4 see Barrow, 125.

⁸⁸ The Chronicle of Pierre de Langtoft, ed. T. Wright, Rolls ser. (London, 1886), ii, 348. Edward was at Perth on 7 July and it was probably from there that he and a small raiding party spent two weeks in the neighbouring district of Strathearn: E 101/363/18, ff. 2d, 8.

⁸⁹ Prestwich, Edward I, 498–9; Johnstone, 90.

⁹⁰ The slings of the machine, which was operated by the prince's engineer, Robert of Glasham, first had to be repaired, using a horsehide bought locally at a cost of 5s: CDS, ii, 366; E 101/363/18, f. 8.

⁹¹ CDS, ii, 369; E 101/363/18, f. 21. At the standard rate of 2d a day for a foot soldier, this would have represented 40 days' wages. See Prestwich, Armies and Warfare, 126.

⁹² Prestwich, Edward I, 498–9; Johnstone, 90–1.

⁹³ Prince Edward's movements from 20 Nov. 1303 until 18 April 1304 can be traced from his daily household roll: E 101/365/12, which is calendared in CDS, ii, no. 1516 (pp. 392–4). Edward was with his father briefly between 15 and 18 Feb. E 101/ 365/13 is a duplicate of the portion covering 17 Dec.–17 Jan.

⁹⁴ CDS, ii, 392–3; E 101/365/12, mm.1–3. Not all these magnates were present on every occasion.

⁹⁵ CDS, ii, 392–4; E 101/365/12, mm.3–5.

⁹⁶ Barrow, 127–8.

⁹⁷ The envoys were entertained by Edward on 4 Feb. and again on 10 and 11 Feb.: CDS, ii, 394; E 101/365/12, m.3.

⁹⁸ Documents and Records illustrating the History of Scotland, ed. F. Palgrave, i (London, 1837), 278–82.

⁹⁹ RP, i, 212–13; Documents, ed. Palgrave, 282–3. There is no evidence that Prince Edward was present, as stated in Johnstone, 92. On 22 Feb. Comyn and his knights dined with Edward in Perth: CDS, ii, 394; E 101/365/12, m.3.

¹⁰⁰ Prestwich, Edward I, 500; Johnstone, 92; Barrow, 127–8.

¹⁰¹ CDS, ii, no.1504; Prestwich, Edward I, 500–2; Johnstone, 93–4; Barrow, 128–9.

¹⁰² CDS, ii, no. 1462 (2 Mar.) and no. 1463 (3 Mar.).

¹⁰³ Prestwich, Edward I, 501–2; Johnstone, 93; Barrow, 129.

¹⁰⁴ CDS, ii, no. 1509; Prestwich, Edward I, 501. Edward was certainly at Stirling on 29 June: CDS, ii, no. 1550.

¹⁰⁵ On Gaveston's life and career see J.S. Hamilton's article in the Oxford DNB; Hamilton; and Chaplais. The evidence that Gaveston was at Stirling is to found in BL, Add. Ms. 35293, f. 79.

¹⁰⁶ Guisborough, 382.

¹⁰⁷ Hamilton, 19, 132. For a map showing the location of Gabaston and the other family possessions see ibid., 23.

¹⁰⁸ Ibid., 22–5, 134–5. Arnaud was buried in Winchester cathedral.

¹⁰⁹ Ibid., 28–31, 135–7.

¹¹⁰ E 101/360/17; Hamilton, 29–31, 136. He is first described as a squire in July 1301: BL, Add. Ms. 7966A, f. 101. Gaveston was closely involved in Edward's social life: at Christmas 1302 and again in early Jan. 1303 Gaveston delivered two separate sums of 100s for Edward to play at dice: E 101/363/18, f. 12; CDS, ii, 368.

¹¹¹ E 101/612/11, m. 5d; Hamilton, 30, 136, n. 20.

¹¹² E.g., in 1302 Gaveston's socius was William de Bourdon: E 101/357/28/ m.4.

¹¹³ Gaveston's date of birth is unknown but his service in Flanders in 1297 suggests he was at least a year or two older than Edward, who was then in his fourteenth year.

¹¹⁴ The unknown author of the unpublished Canterbury chronicle, the Polistorie del Eglise de Christ de Caunterbyre, contained in BL, Harley Ms. 636, explained the choice of Gaveston on the grounds that being from ‘the region of fine manners he was courteous’: Harley Ms. 636, f. 232; Hamilton, 30, 136, n. 12. Another chronicler, Geoffrey le Baker, writing after the reign of Edward II, described Gaveston as ‘graceful and agile in body, sharp witted, refined in manners, [and] sufficiently well versed in military matters’: Le Baker, 4; Hamilton, 13.

¹¹⁵ Johnstone, 17.

¹¹⁶ Historia Coenobii Burgensis auctore Waltero de Whitlesey, Historiae Coenobii Burgensis Scriptores, ed. J. Sparks (London, 1723), 171–2. The date of this incident is not clear, except that it evidently occurred before Edward became king. The king and queen visited Peterborough in 1302 and it may be that the younger Edward was there at about the same time. It is also interesting in the light of his later reputation that Gaveston appears to have played a tactful role in mediating between Edward and the abbot. The passage is also published in Lehmann-Brockhaus, Lateinische Schriftquellen, iii, 308 (no. 6270).

¹¹⁷ G.L. Haskins, ‘A chronicle of the civil wars of Edward II’, Speculum, xiv (1939), 75, trans. in Hamilton, 13.

¹¹⁸ Other examples are the reports by the St Albans chronicler, John Trokelowe, that when Edward returned to England on 7 Feb. 1308 after his wedding to Isabella, he ran to greet Gaveston: ‘giving him kisses and repeated embraces, he was adored with a singular familiarity’; and by the St Paul's chronicler of the outrage caused at the coronation banquet on 25 Feb. by Gaveston's behaviour and the king's preference for Gaveston's couch over Isabella's: Trokelowe, 65; Ann. Paul. 262; Hamilton, 46–8, 142, nn. 82, 90.

¹¹⁹ See ch. 1 of this book and Ormrod, ‘The sexualities of Edward II’, and Mortimer, ‘Sermons of sodomy’. Charges of homosexuality were often used as a way of blackening the reputations of individuals or groups. Other examples, of which Orleton was certainly aware in 1326, were the charges laid against Pope Boniface VIII in 1303 and those against the Templars in 1308, in both cases in France and by agents of the French crown: Mortimer, 51–2.

¹²⁰ See Mortimer, ‘Sermons of sodomy’, 50–6, 58–60. However, the articles of his deposition in 1327 accuse him, among other things, of devoting himself to unsuitable work and occupations but do not suggest any sexual failings; nor was Edward accused of tyranny.

¹²¹ See Phillips, 131–3.

¹²² Ibid., 132–3, 177, 227, 273, 280; and Fryde, Tyranny, esp. chs 3 and 8.

¹²³ These short annals, which have valuable information on the events between 1326 and 1330, appear in BL, Arundel Ms. 17, ff. 40–4, under the title Memorabilia facta tempore Regis Edwardi secundi in Anglia.

¹²⁴ The chronicler Jean Froissart implied a sexual relationship between Edward and Despenser, but he was writing many years later when the literary tradition surrounding Edward II's character was already developing: Chroniques de Jean Froissart, ed. S. Luce, i, Société de l'Histoire de France (Paris, 1869), 34.

¹²⁵ Willelmi Capellani in Brederode postea Monachi et Procuratoris Egmondensis Chronicon, ed. C. Pijnacker Hordijk, Werken uitgegeven door het Historisch Genootschap, 3^rd ser., xx (Amsterdam, 1904), 177.

¹²⁶ CPR, 1301–07, 244. It is deeply ironic that the heir in question was the same Roger Mortimer who was to play a leading part in the deposition and murder of Edward II and was himself to become a royal favourite on a scale far exceeding Gaveston and even Despenser.

¹²⁷ Chaplais, 21 and n. 77 (which make it clear that the knighting of Edward and Gaveston did not take place on the same day, as is often assumed); Hamilton, 32–3, 137; Johnstone, 107–9.

¹²⁸ Gascony was supposed to be Gaveston's destination when he was exiled in Feb. 1307, although in fact he went to Ponthieu instead: Hamilton, 34–5.

¹²⁹ See Johnstone, 97–101; Hamilton, 31–2, 137. It seems more likely that the growing cost of maintaining his household and the refusal of the treasurer, Walter Langton, to give Edward extra money at a time of great financial difficulty were the real causes: Prestwich, Edward I, 549.

¹³⁰ On Edward's household expenses at this time see Johnstone, 99–100.

¹³¹ Letters of Edward Prince of Wales, 70; Johnstone, 100. The others were two yeomen, John de Haustede and John de Weston who had already been permitted to return, and Edward's cousin, Gilbert de Clare, son of Thomas de Clare.

¹³² Hamilton, 34–7, 138–9; Johnstone, 122–5; Prestwich, Edward I, 552 (who considers that Edward's relationship with Gaveston was homosexual in nature but that this was not the issue in 1307). Gaveston was also permitted to stay in England until after a forthcoming tournament on 30 April, and Edward I was prepared, at his pleasure, to increase Gaveston's income from the revenues of his lands in England or abroad: Johnstone, 122. Gaveston had earlier (in Oct. 1306) fallen into disfavour because he had left the army in Scotland without permission to take part in a tournament, but he was only one of a group of 22 young knights, many of whom were closely associated with Prince Edward, who had done so: Hamilton, 33–4, 137; Johnstone, 115–17; Prestwich, 509–10.

¹³³ Chaplais, esp. 3, 6–22, 109–14. See also E.A.R. Brown, ‘Introduction’ and ‘Ritual brotherhood in western medieval Europe’, in Ritual Brotherhood in Ancient and Medieval Europe: A Symposium, Traditio, lii (New York, 1997), 261–83, 357–81, esp. 359–60; M. Keen, ‘Brotherhood in arms’, History, xlvii (London, 1983), repr. in Keen,Nobles, Knights and Men-at-arms in the Middle Ages (London & Rio Grande, 1996), 43–62. Prestwich also accepts the likelihood that Edward and Gaveston made a brotherhood agreement: Armies and Warfare, 45.

¹³⁴ Chaplais, 10–11.

¹³⁵ Ibid., 11. The text of the writ is given ibid, n. 33, citing E 159/81, m.34d, and is also cited in Davies, Baronial Opposition, 84, n. 14.

¹³⁶ Chaplais, 12–13.

¹³⁷ Ann. Paul., 263; Introductions to the parliaments of March and April 1308in PROME.

¹³⁸ The document of 20 May 1303 relating to Edward's betrothal which is now in the Swansea Museum is probably a chance survival of many more important documents now lost. See Francis, ‘Original contract’, 150–5.

¹³⁹ See J.R. Strayer, The Reign of Philip the Fair (Princeton, 1980), 288–9; and Brown, ‘The prince is father of the king’, 290–1. Philip IV's actions against the Templars had started only a few weeks before Edward II and Isabella were finally married in Jan. 1308 so that possible charges of immorality were very much on Philip's mind. See Barber, ‘World picture’, 14–16.

¹⁴⁰ E.A.R. Brown, ‘The political repercussions of family ties in the early fourteenth century’, Speculum, lxiii (Cambridge, Mass., 1988), 574, 576, 584.

¹⁴¹ Chaplais, 9–10.

¹⁴² Hamilton, 93–4, 101–2, 167; Chaplais, 78–9.

¹⁴³ Hamilton, 102; idem, ‘Another daughter for Piers Gaveston? Amie de Gaveston, damsel of the Queen's Chamber’, Medieval Prosopography, xix (Kalamazoo, 1998), 177–86.

¹⁴⁴ F.D. Blackley, ‘Adam, the bastard son of Edward II’, BIHR, xxxvii (London, 1964), 76–7, citing BL, Stowe Ms. 553, f. 27. In 1322 Edward II openly recognized Adam as his bastard son, although it is surprising that there is no mention of Adam in any earlier records. Assuming he was as at least as old as Edward II when he had first gone to war (i.e. in his seventeenth year in 1300), Adam would have been born in about 1305 or 1306. This seems to me more likely than the date of about 1310 suggested by Given-Wilson and Curteis in The Royal Bastards of Medieval England (London, 1984), 136. Although I have speculated above as to the possible identity of Adam's mother, there is no positive evidence.

¹⁴⁵ At a symposium entitled ‘History in the Comic Mode’, in honour of Professor Charles T. Wood in May 1998 Jeffrey Hamilton argued, entertainingly and with tongue very firmly in cheek, that Gaveston was not Edward II's brother by adoption but was in fact his illegitimate older brother.

¹⁴⁶ See Ch. 1 of this book and the papers referred to above by Ormrod, ‘The sexualities of Edward II’, and Mortimer, ‘Sermons of sodomy’. Accusations of sodomy were closely akin to accusations of heresy and were widely used in the fourteenth century as a way of blackening the reputations of individuals or vulnerable groups, while the term ‘sodomy’ could cover a range of sexual practices, not just homosexuality. See, for example, V.L. Bullough, Sexual Variance in Society and History (New York & London, 1976), ch. 14, ‘The later middle ages’; idem, ‘The sin against nature and homosexuality’, in Sexual Practices and the Medieval Church, ed. V.L. Bullough & J. Brundage (Buffalo, NY, 1982), 55–71, 239–44; W. Johansson and W.A. Percy, ‘Homosexuality’, in Handbook of Medieval Sexuality, ed. V.L. Bullough & J.A. Brundage (New York & London, 1996), 155–89. One of the leading scholars of homosexuality in the medieval period was certain that Edward II was homosexual: J. Boswell, Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality (Chicago, 1980), 298–300. Another writer on the same theme is just as certain that he was not: A. Lumsden, ‘The fairy tale of Edward II’, Gay and Lesbian Review, xi, no. 2 (London, March–April 2004), 27–9.

¹⁴⁷ If the analogy of David and Jonathan seemed appropriate to the author of the Vita Edwardi Secundi as a way of describing the relationship between Edward and Gaveston, we should not forget David's other famous relationship, that with Bathsheba.

¹⁴⁸ Vale, 224; Prestwich, Edward I, 397; Johnstone, 88.

¹⁴⁹ Foedera, I, ii, 966–7, and C 47/27/5; Johnstone, 94–5. See also C. Johnson, ‘The homage for Guienne in 1304’, EHR, liii (1938), 728–9; P. Chaplais, ‘Le Duché-Pairie de Guyenne’, Annales du Midi, lxix (Toulouse, 1957), 104–5.

¹⁵⁰ See, for example, Vale, 224–5; Elizabeth Lalou, ‘Les Négociations diplomatiques avec l'Angleterre sous le règne de Philippe le Bel’, in La ‘France Anglaise’ au Moyen Age (Poitiers, 1986), Section d'histoire médiévale et de philologie (Paris, 1988), 343–4. On another occasion, in Oct. 1306, an English commissioner arrived in Paris to meet his French counterparts, but failed to make any contact with them: Prestwich, Edward I, 397.

¹⁵¹ Johnstone, 82. The meeting is referred to in Ann. Lond., 127. The nature of the business is not stated.

¹⁵² PW, i, 112, 116. For a discussion of the business of these two parliaments see PROME. Petitions were only a small part of the business of this parliament: see PROME, Lent Parliament 1305.

¹⁵³ The petitions are printed in The Record of Carnarvon, ed. H. Ellis, Record Commission (London, 1838), 212–25. For a discussion of the business of this parliament see PROME.

¹⁵⁴ Calendar of Ancient Petitions relating to Wales, ed. W. Rees (Cardiff, 1975), 17. However, the petitions of 1305 and those submitted by the communities of North and West Wales in 1316 showed that there were many grievances and considerable potential for unrest: Davies, Conquest, 387.

¹⁵⁵ Johnstone, 97; Prestwich, Edward I, 549–50; Ann. Lond., 138.

¹⁵⁶ Another good example is the breaking into and plundering of the earl of Pembroke's manor of Painswick in Gloucestershire in 1318 by disaffected members of Pembroke's retinue: Phillips, 261–6.

¹⁵⁷ See the very valuable discussions of Edward's revenues in Johnstone, 67–71; and in Tout, Chapters, ii, 174–7. Tout shows that the earldom of Chester provided the greater part of the revenue received from Edward's personal domains: £1,007 in 1301–2, £1,696 in 1302–3, and £1,514 in 1303–4; Wales provided much less, while from 1299 Ponthieu was under the receivership of the Florentine bankers, the Frescobaldi: Tout, ii, 174–6.

¹⁵⁸ On 4 May 1304 John Droxford, the keeper of the wardrobe, wrote to his colleague, Richard de Bremesgrave, that Prince Edward was ‘much annoyed’ at Richard's refusal to deliver wine for the use of his household and at other acts ‘done against him since he came to Scotland’: CDS, ii, 397 (no. 1527).

¹⁵⁹ Prestwich, Edward I, 549. Edward I was certainly very conscious of the costs of his family at this time. In April he had paid £200 in debts owed by his daughter, Mary, the nun of Amesbury, and in May he had added revenues worth £433 6s 8d to the dower of £2,000 livres tournois (£500) assigned to his wife, Queen Margaret: CCR, 1302–07, 262, 276. It is very hard to know whether Edward was spending excessively at this time. In any case extravagance can be very much in the eye of the beholder. In 1301–2 and 1302–3 Edward's household expenditure amounted to £10,199 and £5,653 respectively, admittedly at a time of war when there were many exceptional costs: CDS, ii, 370 (E 101/363/18); Tout, Chapters, ii, 173 (citing E 101/360/16). He is likely to have spent less in 1305–6, when there was no campaign in Scotland. On the other hand, as Edward grew older and became increasingly involved in public events, his financial needs probably also grew.

¹⁶⁰ Johnstone, 97–8; Prestwich, Edward I, 549; Abbrevatio Placitorum, Record Commission (London, 1811), 256–7. In a letter to Pope Boniface VIII in 1303 Edward I had strongly defended Langton against various charges: CCR, 1302–7, 81–2; Prestwich, 549.

¹⁶¹ The occasion of the statement was the punishment of a leading baron, William de Braose, who had ‘uttered gross and contumelious words’ at the exchequer, with Langton presumably once again the target: Abbrevatio Placitorum, 256–7. Edward I was to refer to Edward as ‘our dear son’ in a letter to the pope early in 1307: Foedera, I, ii, 1007. There is of course a formality about such language, especially since this latter example occurred at the time of Edward I's violent anger over Edward and Gaveston, but there is probably also an underlying truth in the words.

¹⁶² Letters of Edward Prince of Wales. See the discussion in ch. 2 of this book.

¹⁶³ Ibid., 30.

¹⁶⁴ Edward's movements can be traced from his daily household roll, E 101/368/4, covering the period 20 Nov. 1304 to 9 Oct. 1305. The reality of Edward's following of his father was later transmuted into the story told by Bishop Ringstead of Bangor which made Edward appear a Christlike figure. See ch. 1 and B. Smalley, English Friars, 211–15, 219, 338.

¹⁶⁵ Letters of Edward Prince of Wales, 31–2; Johnstone, 98–9.

¹⁶⁶ CCR, 1302–7, 279, 342.

¹⁶⁷ Letters of Edward Prince of Wales, 60–1.

¹⁶⁸ Ibid., 63–130.

¹⁶⁹ Ibid., 70; the translation is that in Johnstone, 100.

¹⁷⁰ Johnstone, 100–1.

¹⁷¹ A. Fisher, William Wallace (Edinburgh, 1986 & 2002), 123–30; Prestwich, Edward I, 503.

¹⁷² Ann. Lond., 143; Johnstone, 101; Prestwich, Edward I, 549.

¹⁷³ Letters of Edward Prince of Wales, 62, 133–4; Johnstone, 101–2.

¹⁷⁴ Letters of Edward Prince of Wales, 34; Johnstone, 99.

¹⁷⁵ They were Isabella's stepmother and half-brother respectively.

¹⁷⁶ On Clement V's family background and his connections with the English crown see S. Menache, Clement V (Cambridge, 1998), 7–8, 247–8.

¹⁷⁷ Ibid., 17–18; Schein, ‘Fideles Crucis’, 181–3.

¹⁷⁸ SC 6/44/16; The Gascon Calendar of 1322, ed. G.P. Cuttino, Camden, 3rd ser., lxx (London, 1949), 30, nos 270, 274, 275; Doherty (D.Phil.), 14–15.

¹⁷⁹ CCR, 1302–07, 348.

¹⁸⁰ On Edward I's health in the latter stages of his reign see Prestwich, Edward I, 506–7.

¹⁸¹ Ibid., 503–5.

¹⁸² On 15 Oct. Prince Edward gave his father's envoys authority to agree to this: Letters of Edward Prince of Wales, 144–5; Johnstone, 104.

¹⁸³ AN, J 408, no. 11; and Doherty (D.Phil.), 15, citing Bibliothèque Nationale, Collection Brienne, 7007, f. 1.

¹⁸⁴ Menache, Clement V, 16–17; Johnstone, 104–5.

¹⁸⁵ The English envoys demanded the return of the castle of Mauléon before they would agree on the terms of the marriage settlement and this the French refused. Clement V's dispensation is endorsed with the words dispensatio matrimonii reginae Angliae non valeat, which indicates that it was not used: Doherty (D.Phil.), 15.

¹⁸⁶ Prestwich, Edward I, 505–6; Barrow, 145–9.

¹⁸⁷ CCR, 1302–07, 438; CPR, 1301–07, 428; Johnstone, 106.

¹⁸⁸ PW, i, 164; CCR, 1302–07, 434, 438; Flores, 131; Johnstone, 106–7. In 1254 Henry III had originally planned to knight the future Edward I and a large number of other young men in Westminster Abbey. In the event Edward was knighted by his father-in-law, Alfonso X of Castile, in the abbey of Las Huelgas at Burgos: Prestwich, Edward I, 9–10. Although Edward I's attempt to levy the traditional aid to cover the costs of knighting his son was not approved by the parliament which assembled at Westminster on 30 May 1306, he nonetheless obtained a grant of taxation: Prestwich, 455; PROME, Lent Parliament, 1306. Edward I had also in effect abandoned his previous attempts to force those with land of sufficient value to take up the responsibilities of knighthood at their own expense and was now trying to persuade them to do so at his own expense: cf. Prestwich, War, Politics and Finance, 83–91.

¹⁸⁹ CPR, 1301–07, 424; Johnstone, 107.

¹⁹⁰ There was a parallel with the early career of Edward I. He too had been granted Aquitaine on the eve of his knighting and marriage in 1254: Powicke, Henry III and the Lord Edward (Oxford, 1947; repr. 1966), 232–3; Prestwich, Edward I, 10–11. Cf. Johnstone, 109.

¹⁹¹ Flores, 131–2; Johnstone, 108; Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xxvi. For the proper preparation of a young man for knighting see M. Keen, Chivalry (New Haven & London, 1984), 64–82; R. Barber, The Knight and Chivalry (Woodbridge, Suffolk & Rochester, NY, revised edn, 1995), 23–37.

¹⁹² Flores, 132; Ann. Lond., 146; Johnstone, 108; Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xxvi. The ceremony presumably occurred in the palace rather than in the abbey because Edward I was now too infirm to attend: ibid., xviii. The daily account roll of Prince Edward says laconically: ‘on this Sunday the Prince was knighted and therefore the expenses were great for the following week’: Bod., Ms. Latin Hist. c.4, m.5.

¹⁹³ Control of the duchy was not however handed over to the prince's own officials until the early months of 1307: see Trabut-Cussac, L'administration anglaise, 132–4. In Aug. 1306 Edward I also made provision for Edward's young half-brothers, Thomas and Edmund, whom he endowed with lands worth 10,000 and 7,000 marks a year respectively: Foedera, I, ii, 998; Maddicott, 23.

¹⁹⁴ The best estimate of the numbers knighted is 297–300, derived from a variety of chronicle sources and from the official record of the men who received robes in aid of their knighting: E 101/362/20; E 101/369/4 (fragmentary); there was also another roll, now lost: see Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xix–xxi.

¹⁹⁵ Flores, 132; Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xxvii; Johnstone, 108; Hamilton, 32.

¹⁹⁶ There is no detailed record of the arrangements for the feast or of the food served, apart from the four lengths of gold-threaded cloth which were hung on the wall behind the king and the prince during the banquet: Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xxvii–xxviii.

¹⁹⁷ The names of the minstrels, the instruments on which they performed and the people in whose service they were are recorded in E 101/369/6 and E 101/370/21. The details are given in Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, 1–13. Her book contains a detailed examination of the personal histories and connections of the individual minstrels and a description of their instruments.

¹⁹⁸ Flores, 132; Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xxx.

¹⁹⁹ Nicholas Trevet, Annales Sex Regum Angliae, ed. Th. Hog, English Historical Soc. Publications, ix (London, 1845), 408–9; Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, xxix–xxx; Johnstone, 108–9. For a discussion of the available information on the oaths taken and on whether the swans were decorated roasted birds or (more probably) ornamental objects see Bullock-Davies, xxix–xxxviii. On oaths in general and more specifically those taken on birds (such as a peacock, a heron or a sparrowhawk), see Bullock-Davies, xxxv–xxxvi; Prestwich, Edward I, 121. Despite the remarks of the chronicler Peter Langtoft that no more splendid occasion had occurred since the crowning of King Arthur at Caerleon, there is no evidence that on this occasion Edward I was trying to follow Arthurian traditions: Bullock-Davies, xxxvii–xxxviii; Prestwich, 121.

²⁰⁰ Malcolm Vale has suggested that Edward I's choice of swans should be seen as symbolic of Edward I's ‘swan song’ since he knew that he was nearing death: Vale, The Princely Court, 218–20; see also M. Strickland, ‘Treason, feud and the growth of state violence: Edward I and the “War of the Earl of Carrick, 1306–7”’, in War, Government and Aristocracy in the British Isles, c.1150–1500, ed. C. Given-Wilson, A. Kettle & L. Scales (Woodbridge, Suffolk & Rochester, NY, 2008), 104–8.

²⁰¹ For a list of their names see Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, 185–7.

²⁰² Who was apparently not knighted on 22 May with Edward but four days later: Bod., Ms. Latin Hist. c.4, m.5; Chaplais, 21. It is not clear why this delay should have occurred but the source is very clear on the point.

²⁰³ For further details on each of these see the Oxford DNB. Among those knighted with the Prince of Wales were John Comyn, son of the murdered John Comyn, and Edward Balliol, son of the deposed John Balliol king of Scots and briefly king of Scots himself after 1332. Comyn, who was also the nephew of the earl of Pembroke, was killed fighting against his father's murderer at the battle of Bannockburn in 1314. Balliol was held in honourable custody in England until he went to his family lands in France after his father's death in 1314.

²⁰⁴ Ann. Lond., 146.

²⁰⁵ Phillips, 24; Prestwich, Edward I, 507; Barrow, 153–4. The events of 1306 can be followed on the map in Barrow, 147.

²⁰⁶ CDS, ii, no. 1803.

²⁰⁷ CDS, ii, no. 1809: dated at Forteviot near Perth on 1 Aug.

²⁰⁸ CDS, ii, no. 1829; Barrow, 160–1.

²⁰⁹ Bruce, book 4, 154–5 (ll. 75–9); Scalacronica of Thomas Gray of Heton, ed. J. Stevenson, Maitland Club (Edinburgh, 1836), 131; Prestwich, Edward I, 506.

²¹⁰ Edward I's intentions were made very clear in the ‘Ordinances by the King and Council for better assuring the peace of Scotland’ which were issued at some point between Nov. 1306 and March 1307. ‘The king and Council order that all present at the death of Sir John Comyn, or of counsel and assent thereto, shall be drawn and hanged. Those … found in Scotland without the King's permission, shall be hanged or their heads cut off.’: CDS, ii, no. 1908. See also Strickland, ‘A law of arms or a law of treason?’ in Violence in Medieval Society, ed. R. W. Kaeuper (Woodbridge, Suffolk & Rochester, NY, 2000), 39–41, 76–7.

²¹¹ Prestwich, Edward I, 508–10; Barrow, 161–2, 169–71; CDS, iv, 489 (no. 6), citing BL, Add. Ms. 22923, f. 14.

²¹² William of Rishanger, Chronica et Annales, ed. H.T. Riley, Rolls ser. (London, 1865), 230: cited and trans. in Johnstone, 114. See also Bullock-Davies, ‘Multitudo’, 179, and Strickland, ‘A law of arms’, 57–8.

²¹³ Johnstone, 113–14, citing an earlier edition of Barbour, The Bruce, ed. W.W. Skeat, 2 vols, Scottish Text Soc., 31–3 (Edinburgh, 1894), ii, book 2, ll. 452–7.

²¹⁴ CDS, ii, 508 (no. 1909).

²¹⁵ Bruce, book 2, 102–3 (ll. 455–60).

²¹⁶ Bruce, book 4, 154–5 (ll. 72–7).

²¹⁷ CDS, ii, 483, 485 (nos 1803, 1809). The close working relationship between Aymer de Valence and Edward in 1306–7 was probably the foundation of their relations when Edward became king: cf. Phillips, and the article on Aymer in the Oxford DNB. In August 1307 he gave compensation to two brothers of Melrose abbey and to a ‘poor Scot’ for damage his army had inflicted on their property: E 101/373/17, f. 19. Edward was however in a particularly good mood at the time, having just become king.

²¹⁸ Barrow, 162, 360; Prestwich, Edward I, 508–9. Whether Edward II's actions were taken on compassionate grounds or for reasons of political convenience is however debatable. See the discussion of the behaviour of Edward I and Edward II in Prestwich, 509, n. 164, and in the 2nd edition of Barrow (Edinburgh, 1976), 230, 233. Ironically, Bruce's queen, who was the daughter of the earl of Ulster, a close ally of Edward I, was not subjected to the same treatment. She was initially confined in the manor house of Burstwick in Holderness in Yorkshire, with two elderly women as companions, and under Edward II was sent to the convent of Barking in Essex: Barrow, 162; Foedera, II, i, 244.

²¹⁹ It is likely that as his temper cooled Edward I became shocked at the devastation he had unleashed in Scotland. Edward II did however show a capacity for the ruthless pursuit of his enemies at the time of the civil war of 1321–2. Here his opponents were executed as traitors or imprisoned in much the same way as Edward I's Scottish enemies in 1306.

²²⁰ A letter of 22 Sept. from the king to Sir John Botetourt refers to Edward and the miners: CDS, ii, 491 (no. 1833). On the siege and Bruce's movements see Barrow, 163–4. In Oct. 1306 Edward was in Kintyre when he sent crossbowmen, miners and masons to aid the defence of the castle of Ayr: CDS, iv, 391 (no. 11).

²²¹ Johnstone, 115, citing BL, Add. Ms. 22923, Edward's wardrobe book for 1306–7.

²²² Hamilton, 33–4, 137; Johnstone, 115–17; Prestwich, Edward I, 509–10. The knights connected with Edward included Gaveston, Gilbert de Clare (son of Thomas de Clare, lord of Thomond in Ireland), John Chandos, John Haudlo and Giles of Argentein. Robert of Kendal and Henry Leyburn were members of Gaveston's own household: Hamilton, 138, n. 52. The group also included Henry and Humphrey de Bohun, and Roger Mortimer of Wigmore; and two more knights with an Irish connection, Walter de Bermingham and Thomas de Verdon.

²²³ CFR, 1272–1307, 543–4: there is no suggestion however that the Prince of Wales should not have left Scotland since the young knights were accused of ‘deserting the king and his son in those parts, in contempt of the king and to the retarding of the king's business there’.

²²⁴ CCR, 1302–07, 481–2.

²²⁵ Doherty (D.Phil.), 15–16, citing C 47/29/5/25; Vitae Paparum Avenionensium, ed. E. Baluze, iii (Paris, 1921), 43–4, 46, 54–5.

²²⁶ CCR, 1302–07, 521; BL, Add. Ms. 22923, f. 14v.

²²⁷ Registrum Simonis de Gandavo, ed. C.T. Flower & M.C.B. Dawes (London, 1934), 243; Johnstone, 118.

²²⁸ CCR, 1302–07, 525.

²²⁹ The parliament was due to meet on 20 Jan. but its start was delayed because of poor attendance: Johnstone, 117. For the business of the parliament see Prestwich, Edward I, 551–2; PROME, Hilary Parliament, 1307.

²³⁰ Foedera, I, ii, 1009; E 101/684/11, no. 7; E 101/370/15, m.3; Doherty (D.Phil.), 16.

²³¹ H.G. Richardson, ‘The Parliament of Carlisle, 1307’, EHR, liii (1938), 430, 436. The details of the cardinal's message are contained in a newsletter, headed Noveles du Parlement, preserved in C 49/3/18. See also Lanercost, 206.

²³² Guisborough, 370–1; Richardson, ‘Parliament of Carlisle’, 436; Prestwich, Edward I, 551; Johnstone, 120.

²³³ CCR, 1302–07, 530–1.

²³⁴ This explains why Johnstone could find no trace of the tripartite indenture she supposed was drawn up to embody the terms of an agreement made at Carlisle (one part for each of the three interested parties (England, France and the papacy) in the National Archives in England: Johnstone, 119–20. There is also no trace of such a document in the AN in France, or in the ASV in the Vatican City. This surely implies that since Prince Edward did not in the end go to France in 1307 the agreement was never completed.

²³⁵ Doherty (D.Phil.), 16.

²³⁶ Menache, Clement V, 26, 178. Clement V left Poitiers on 15 May 1307. Doherty (D.Phil.), 16, and Johnstone, 122, both assume that the prince's intended destination was Poitiers. Doherty argues that the marriage was to take place there but does not cite any specific evidence for this.

²³⁷ Johnstone, 122, n. 2. She suggests that ‘Poyteres in Ponthieu’ is a slip in place of ‘Poitiers’, due either to the chancery scribe or to the editor of CPR, 1301–07, 509, which might after all indicate that Edward had planned to go to Poitiers. However, the text in the original roll, C 66/128, m.23, clearly reads ‘Poyteres in Pontivio’. It is also noticeable that Crotoy, although mentioned several times in the same set of entries on the roll, is not specified as being in Ponthieu, whereas ‘Poyteres’ is. This suggests that there was a danger of its being confused with Poitiers and that the location was therefore described carefully. It has not however been possible to find a place in Ponthieu with a name like ‘Poyteres’.

²³⁸ BL, Add. Ms. 22923, f. 4; Johnstone, 124.

²³⁹ Two of the swans died in a murrain, so the birds were previously alive: BL, Add. Ms. 22923, f. 4; Johnstone, 124.

²⁴⁰ BL, Add. Ms. 22923, ff. 3v, 15v; E 101/370/15, m.4; E 101/370/16, f. 66; CCR, 1302–7, 506; Doherty (D.Phil.), 18.

²⁴¹ C 47/29/5/25, reproduced in Doherty (D.Phil.), App. 3. The letter was sent only days before Edward I's death on 7 July.

²⁴² The process conducted by English and French commissioners at the town of Montreuil-sur-Mer in May and June of 1306 was a recent example of another unsuccessful attempt to resolve Anglo-French differences: see G.P. Cuttino, English Diplomatic Administration, 1259–1339, 2nd edn (Oxford, 1971), 13–14, 62–84. The final outcome of these unresolved problems, together with other new ones, was to be the Hundred Years War.

²⁴³ See Brown, ‘Repercussions’, 573–95; and idem, ‘The marriage of Edward II of England and Isabelle of France: a postscript’, Speculum, lxiv (1989), 373–9.

²⁴⁴ Foedera, I, ii, 1007; Johnstone, 128 (cited in trans.).

²⁴⁵ E 101/363/18, f. 21v and CDS, ii, 369; Johnstone, 128.

²⁴⁶ Johnstone, 120–1. Richardson, ‘Parliament of Carlisle’, 436; Linehan, ‘The English mission’, 615–16. There was no accompanying suggestion that Edward should marry Ferdinand's sister, Isabella, as had been proposed in 1303: Johnstone, 88–9.

²⁴⁷ Linehan, ‘The English mission’, 618. Linehan also suggests that the chronicle of Archbishop Roderick of Toledo which was found in the exchequer in 1320 had been used by Edward I to support a possible claim: Linehan, 618, n. 62. It is more likely however that it had belonged to Eleanor of Castile. As Linehan remarks, Pedro Rodriguez, the cardinal bishop of Sabina, better known as Peter of Spain was ‘an operator on the grand scale’ and ‘everyone's friend’, so there is no knowing what personal motives he may have had: Linehan, 612–13.

²⁴⁸ Wendy Childs has shown that in the early 14th century the English government was well informed about Spanish affairs and maintained close relations with the kingdoms of the Iberian peninsula. See W.R. Childs, ‘England in Europe in the reign of Edward II’, in The Reign of Edward II, ed. G. Dodd & A. Musson (Woodbridge, Suffolk & Rochester, NY, 2006), 104–10.

²⁴⁹ Guisborough, 382–3. For a translation of Guisborough's account see Hamilton, 35. I have deliberately not quoted Guisborough's words directly since, as we shall see, they are exaggerated and in most major respects inaccurate or cannot be confirmed. No other chronicler speaks of the incident with the same amount of circumstantial detail: Johnstone, 123. Another chronicler claims that the king knocked his son down and kicked him: Haskins, ‘A chronicle’, 75.

²⁵⁰ Brown, ‘Repercussions’, 588, 592–3 (printing the text of AN, JJ 44, f. 67, no. 103).

²⁵¹ Y Groes Naid, the relic of the True Cross seized from the Welsh in 1283 and presented to Westminster Abbey in 1284: Davies, The First English Empire, 27. The relic was in the king's chapel in 1300 and was evidently taken around with the king: Liber Quotidianus Garderobae, 27.

²⁵² CCR, 1302–07, 526–7; the original French text is printed in Foedera, I, ii, 1010.

²⁵³ BL, Add. Ms. 22923, ff. 12v, 17v; E 101/369/16, f. 12v.; Hamilton, 35–6, 138.

²⁵⁴ BL, Add. Ms. 22923, f. 4.; Johnstone, 124. Gaveston was given 13 of the 105 swans bought for Edward's stay in France; six more were given to the patriarch of Jerusalem, the bishop of Durham, when he passed through Ponthieu on his way to England, and 84 were handed over to the receiver of Ponthieu; Gaveston got 22 of the 28 herons, and the patriarch the remaining six: Johnstone, 124.

²⁵⁵ Edward was at Dover on 5 May, but whether this was the actual day of Gaveston's departure or whether Edward was still waiting there to know if he was to go to France himself to settle the final terms of his marriage is not clear: BL, Add. Ms. 22923, ff. 7v, 15v; Hamilton, 35, 138.

²⁵⁶ BL, Add. Ms. 22923, ff. 5, 12v; Hamilton, 36, 139. He attended two tournaments while he was in Ponthieu and also entertained Anthony Bek, bishop of Durham and patriarch of Jerusalem. Gaveston's household while in exile consisted of two knights, seven yeomen, and seven other servants, as well as one of Prince Edward's yeomen, John de Baldwin, and six of his grooms: Hamilton, 36, 139. See also Johnstone, ‘The county of Ponthieu’, 452.

²⁵⁷ Johnstone, 122–5; her opinion is followed in Hamilton, 34–6.

²⁵⁸ Johnstone, ‘The county of Ponthieu’, 452, n. 108.

²⁵⁹ The previous holder of the earldom was Edward's cousin, Edmund of Cornwall, who had died in 1301. If Edward had wanted to give this to Gaveston, his father's anger would have been even more certain than over Ponthieu.

²⁶⁰ The nominal date of the charter was 6 Aug. but it could have been sealed as late as 17 Aug.: see Chaplais, 27–9. On Edward I's plans for the earldom see ibid., 30–1, n. 49; Maddicott, 71. The statement by the anonymous author of a chronicle composed in the 1320s that Prince Edward had wanted to give Cornwall and not Ponthieu to Gaveston in Feb. 1307 has been discounted, but perhaps the writer was correct: Haskins, ‘A chronicle’, 75; Johnstone, 124, n. 1.

²⁶¹ For the situation in 1307–8 see the map in Barrow, 167.

²⁶² CDS, ii, 513 (no. 1926), 536–7: this is a letter written from Forfar on 15 May 1307 by an unknown author to a high official, which gives a vivid impression of the situation in Scotland. The ‘false preachers’ were probably mendicant friars spreading anti-English propaganda. This pattern can be observed in both Scotland and Ireland at this period: Phillips, ‘Edward II and the prophets’, 191; idem, ‘The Remonstrance revisited’, in Men, Women and War, Historical Studies, 18, ed. T.G. Fraser & K. Jeffrey (Dublin, 1993), 19, 26–7.

²⁶³ Johnstone, 128.

²⁶⁴ Ibid., 127.

²⁶⁵ My assessment of Edward's personal qualities and experience is more positive than, for example, those of Johnstone, 127–31, and Prestwich, Plantagenet England, 178.

²⁶⁶ See the discussion of the legacy of problems left by his father in Prestwich, Edward I, 565–6; idem, War, Politics and Finance, 221–3; R.W. Kaeuper, War, Justice and Public Order (Oxford, 1988), 139–40, 174–6.