Description
Are you curious about who were the Plantagenets and how they influenced the founding fathers of America? Join us for an exciting trip back to the Middle Ages where we will explore Dan Jones’ riveting narrative history The Plantagenets: The Warrior Kings and Queens Who Made England. Dan Jones entertains and educates us with stories about this powerful family of leaders and misfits. We will read about the murder of Thomas Becket; Richard’s battles against Saladin on the Third Crusade; the Barons’ war against John and the ratification of the Magna Carta; Edward II’s romance with Piers Gaveston and his dismal abdication in 1327; Edward III fighting alongside The Black Prince, capturing the King of France and creating the Order of the Garter. Let us not forget the Queens: Matilda, who plunged the country into a bloody civil war rather than give up her right to the throne; and Eleanor of Aquitaine, trumpeted as the most beautiful woman in Europe, who was first the Queen of France and later the Queen of England and the mother to two kings – only to be locked away for years by her husband, Henry II.
It all starts with Geoffrey, Count of Anjou a handsome, belligerent, redheaded Frenchman born in France in 1113. He customarily wore a sprig of yellow broom blossom (Planta genista) in his hat. He never made it to England but his descendants, known as the Plantagenets, ruled England for more than two centuries from his son Henry II, crowned in 1154, to Richard II, who lost the crown in 1399 to Henry Bolingbroke. England’s Henry I (fourth son of William the Conqueror) had twenty-two illegitimate children but his only son and heir died a tragic death. Henry I chose his daughter Matilda, the former Empress of the Holy Roman Empire to be his heir. He married her off to Geoffrey – she was 26 and he was 15. After becoming better acquainted, they had three sons – the eldest of whom was ultimately crowned King of England. Henry I died in France and his nephew Stephen of Blois raced across the Channel to crown himself King of England. Matilda, having none of this, enlisted the aid of her half-brother Robert Earl of Gloucester and started a civil war in England. The ensuing period has become known as The Anarchy when “It was as if Christ and his saints were asleep.”
The Plantagenets invented England as a political, administrative and military entity, and as a political force to be reckoned with on the European continent. They helped invent the very idea of the England we know today and gave it many of its laws and political habits, which American founders borrowed when it came time to create our own government.
Please join us as we discuss Henry II, Richard Lionheart, John (was he really so bad?), Henry III, Edward, Edward II , Edward III, the Black Plague, the Black Prince, Robert the Bruce, the Battles of Crecy and Poitiers and the commencement of the Hundred Years’ War, and Richard II, along with Matilda, Eleanor, Becket, de Montfort, the Magna Carta, the Peasants’ Revolt, and the reality behind Ivanhoe and Robin Hood. Gripping storytelling - The Plantagenets is a satisfying as well as an enjoyable read. There is no need for added goblins in this real life Game of Thrones. There will be crowns for all.
Weekly Topics
1 Preface; Age of Shipwreck (1120-1154)
The White Ship; Hunt for an Heir; Shipwreck; Ambition; A Scandalous Wife; Henry the Conqueror
2 Age of Empire, Part I (1154-1189)
Births & Rebirth; L'Espace Plantagenet; Unholy War; Succession Planning; The Eagle's Nest; Henry Triumphant; A World on Fire
3 Age of Empire, Part II (1189-1204)
King Richard; Hero of the East; Treachery; An Unexpected Detour; Return of the Lionheart; Lackland Supreme; John Softsword; Triumph & Catastrophe; Lackland Undone
4 Age of Opposition, Part I (1204-1246)
Salvaging the Wreck; A Cruel Master; Beginning of the End; To Bouvines; The Magna Carta
5 Age of Opposition, Part II & Age of Arthur, Part I (1246-1277)
Securing the Inheritance; Kingship at Last; Holy Kingship; The Provisions of Oxford; The Battle of Lewes; From Imprisonment to Evesham; The Leopard
6 Age of Arthur, Part II (1277-1307)
King at Last; A New Arthur; The Final Stand; The King's Castles; The Price of Conquest; The Expulsion of the Jews; The Great Cause & French Trickery; The C Conquest of Scotland; Crisis Point; Relapse
7 Age of Violence (1307-1330)
The King & His Brother; The King Restrained; Manhunt; Promise & Disaster; New Favorites; Civil War; The King's Tyranny; Mortimer, Isabella, & Prince Edward; Endgame; False Dawn
8 Age of Glory (1330-1360)
Royal Coup; Glorious King of a Beggared Kingdom; New Earls, New Enemies; The Hundred Years War Begins; Edward at Sea; Dominance; The Death of a Princess; The Order of the Garter; Decade of Triumph
9 Age of Revolution, Part I (1360-1386)
The Family Business; Unraveling Fortunes; The Good Parliament; New King, Old Problems; England in Uproar; Return to Crisis
10 Age of Revolution, Part II (1386-1399) & Epilogue
Treason & Trauma; The Reinvention of Kingship; Richard Revenged; Richard Undone; Richard Alone; Epilogue
Bibliography
Jones, Dan; The Plantagenets - The Warrior Kings & Queens Who Made England; Viking, 2012
