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Henry II PLANTAGENET
Name Prefix: King Of England
Henry II. Plantaganet, first Plantaganet King of England (1154-1189), known as Curt Mantel, was born at Le Mans,
France, on March 15, 1133. At eighteen in 1151 he was invested with the Duchy of Normandy, his mother's heritage, and
within a year became also, by his father's death, Count of Anjou; while in 1152 he married Eleanor of Aquitaine, the
daughterof William X, Duke of Aquitaine (see his ancestral lineage elsewhere in Vol. I.), and divorced wife of King Louis VII.
of France, added Poitou and Guienne to his dominions. In January 1153 he landed in England, and in November a treaty
was agreed to whereby Henry was declared successor to King Stephen; he was crowned in 1154 and ruled until his death in
1189. He confirmed the laws of his grandfather, King Henry I, reestablished the exchequer, banished the foreign
mercenaries, demolished the hundreds of castles erected in Stephen's reign, and recovered the royal estates. The whole of
1156 he spent in France, reducing his brother, Geoffrey of Nantes, who died in 1158, and having secured his territories, he
spent the next five years warring and organizing his possessions on the Continent. Henry's objective was that of all Norman
kings, to build up the royal power at the expense of the barons and the church. From the barons his reforms met with little
serious opposition; with the clergy he was less successful. To aid him in reducing the church to subjection, he appointed his
chancellor, Thomas a Becket to the see of Canterbury. Henry compelled him and the otherprelates to agree to the
'Constitution of Clarendon', but Bechet proved a sturdy churchman, and the struggle between him and the monarch
terminated only byhis murder. In 1174 Henry did penance at Bechet's tomb, but he ended by bringing the church to
subordination in civil matters. Meanwhile he organized an expedition to Ireland. The English Pope, Adrian IV, had in 1155
given Henry authority over the entire island of Ireland; and a number of Norman-Welsh knights had gained a footing in the
country, among them Richard de Clare, Earl of Pembroke, styled Strongbow, who in 1155 married the heiress of Leinster
and assumed rule as the Earl of Leinster. Henry was jealous at the rise of a powerful feudal baronage in Ireland, and during
his stay there (1171-1172) he broke the power of Richard Strongbow and the other nobles.
Henry was king from 1154 to 1189. He was best known to contemporaries as Henry Fitz-Empress because of his mothers title.
In 1150 he became Duke of Normandy and 1151 Count of Anjou, Touraine, and Maine.
FitzEmpress, Henry II Curtmantle, King of England
Born: 25 MAR 1133, Le Mans, Anjou
Acceded: 19 DEC 1154, Westminster Abbey, London,England
Died: 6 JUL 1189, Chinon Castle, France
Notes:
Reigned 1154-1189.He ruled an empire that stretched from the Tweed to the Pyrenees. In spite of frequent hostitilties with the French King his own family and rebellious Barons(culminating in the great revolt of 1173-74) and his quarrel with Thomas Becket, Henry maintained control over his possessions until shortly before his death. His judicial and administrative reforms which increased Royal control and influence at the expense of the Barons were of great constitutional importance. Introduced trial by Jury. Duke of Normandy
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William FITZPATRICK [EARL OF SALISBU