EDWARD II 1307 - 1327 (E2) Life 1284

EDWARD II 1307 - 1327 (E2) Lived 1284 - 1327

xxxxxUnlike his father, Edward II proved to be a worthless, incompetent monarch. He depended entirely upon the advice of frivolous or ambitious favourites, and this brought him into almost constant conflict with his discontented barons. It is perhaps fitting that his reign is best remembered for the enormous beating his army received at the hands of the Scots in the famous Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. In fact, however, this was but one failure among many.

xxxxxHe was born at Caernarvon Castle in 1284, and it was there in 1301 that he became the first heir to the throne to be created Prince of Wales. At the very beginning of his reign, the appointment as his chief advisor of the arrogant Piers Gaveston, one of his favourites and a possible lover, at once alienated most of his barons. In 1311 they formed a committee bent on ridding the realm of Gaveston and righting a number of grievances, some of them dating back to the previous reign. Known as the Ordainers, twenty-one in number, they took all power unto themselves and, having twice failed to exile Gaveston, had him executed in 1312.

xxxxxIt was soon after this that Edward was obliged to muster a large army to quell the rebellion of the Scottish king, Robert Bruce. Having returned from his hideout on the Isle of Rathlin in 1307, Bruce had mustered a great deal of support and, after capturing most of the English strongholds in Scotland, was organising raids across the border. Edward made for Stirling, where one of his few remaining garrisons was under siege, but he was met by the Scottish army just south of this city at the site of a stream called Bannockburn. Here, Bruce had taken up a good defensive position, and despite being outnumbered by three to one, his army inflicted a crushing defeat upon the English force, and virtually ensured Scottish independence.

xxxxxFollowing this military disaster, Edward took little part in government. For the next seven years the administration of the realm was in the none-too-capable hands of his cousin, Thomas, Earl of Lancaster. Meanwhile the king had found two new favourites, the Hugh Despensers, father and son. Ambitious for power they supported Edward in a bid to oust Lancaster and managed to defeat him at the Battle of Boroughbridge, Yorkshire in 1322. He was executed and many of his followers slaughtered. Then the Despensers, having summoned Parliament and abolished the Ordainers, virtually took over the running of the country

xxxxxFortunately, this unhappy reign was brought to an end five years later by Edward's estranged wife, the redoubtable Isabella. She joined up with the king’s enemies on the continent and, with her lover and leader of the force, Roger Mortimer, invaded her own country in 1326! The Despensers were caught and executed, and the king was deposed in favour of his son, crowned Edward III in January 1327, aged fifteen. Now stripped of his authority, Edward was imprisoned in Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire, where he was murdered the following year, probably brutally and presumably on the orders of Roger Mortimer.

xxxxxIncidentally, when Edward II was crowned, the barons added a new clause to the king’s oath. He swore to observe the just laws and customs that “the community of your realm shall determine”. And again, after the execution of Thomas, the Earl of Lancaster, the Despensers dismissed the Ordainers on the grounds that they had not been elected by “the community of the realm”. This term could be interpreted as meaning not merely the barons and upper clergy, but also representatives of the towns and shires, and, as such, it was a welcome if but small nudge forward in the long, uphill struggle towards democratic reform.

1307	Edward II becomes king and is at once faced with a serious rising in Scotland. The Italian painter and architect Giotto di Bondone, the founder of modern painting, completes one of his major works, a series of frescoes in the Arena Chapel at Padua.
1309	The start of the Babylonian Captivity. Because of the political intrigues in Italy, Pope Clement V, a Frenchman, moves the papal court to Avignon in southern France. About this time sees the emergence of the Kingdom of Benin. Situated in the southern area of modern Nigeria, in West Africa, it was to grow in strength over the next century.
1311	The Italian painter Duccio completes one of his major works the Maestà, the altarpiece in Siena Cathedral. His work had a profound influence on the development of painting.
1312	The Order of Knights Templar, founded to protect pilgrims in the Holy Land during the early Crusades, is suppressed by the Avignon pope Clement V on the grounds of heresy.
1314	At the Battle of Bannockburn, Robert Bruce soundly defeats Edward II, expels the English from Scotland, and declares his country's independence, not officially recognised until 1328. The Italian poet Alighieri Dante continues work on his masterpiece, The Divine Comedy. Regarded as one of the greatest epic poems of all time, it describes a journey through helI, purgatory and paradise.
1318	Pope John XXII expands missionary work overseas, assigning Greater Armenia, Persia and India to the Dominican friars and northern Asia, including China, to the Franciscans.
1324	The Mali leader Mansa Musa makes a pilgrimage to Mecca and demonstrates the wealth and power of his kingdom. The Mali Empire in West Africa is now at the height of its power.
1325	Ibn Battuta, a Moroccan geographer, leaves Tangier on a pilgrimage to Mecca and then begins a series of travels across the world. As we shall see, he returns in 1353 (E3). The Aztecs, an American Indian race, settle on Tenochtitlan (today's Mexico City), a marshy island which is destined to become the centre of a thriving civilisation.
1326	The Ottomans, still on the march, capture the city of Bursa in western Anatolia. This enables them to prepare for an attack upon the Byzantine Empire across the Bosphorus.
1327	A parliament forces Edward to abdicate in favour of his son, Edward III. He is murdered some eight months later, probably on the orders of Roger Mortimer.

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Acknowledgements

Edward II: date and artist unknown – National Portrait Gallery, London. Coat of Arms: licensed under Creative Commons. Author: Sodacan – https://commons.wikimedia.org.

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