As with Star Wars, we can look into a little bit of history ourselves, from “a long time ago, in a Britain far far away” … it’s Henry VI Part 2.

First, a brief description of what’s happened so far. (Now in the movies, the prologue would move across the screen as you read it. I’m afraid I don’t have George Lucas’ budget, so you’ll have to do it yourself with the scroll keys):

The Hundred Years’ War is going badly for England; lands which Henry V had conquered are falling back into French hands, and his son, Henry VI, is a perfectly good and kind person but an ineffective king. Since he was an infant when his father died, his uncle Gloucester was appointed as regent, but now Henry is more than old enough to make decisions himself. There is great jealousy between the members of the royal family, especially on the part of Winchester, who continually schemes against Gloucester to get more power for himself.

The different factions of the royal family meet in a rose garden to have their argument over who should really be king. Those on the side of Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York, show their support by plucking and wearing a white rose, while the Lancasters supporting the king, including the Duke of Somerset, wear red roses instead. This anecdote has no basis in historical fact, and may have been Shakespeare’s dramatic invention.

After so many years of war, England is almost bankrupt. It’s determined that Henry should marry a French princess, chiefly to bring peace between the French and English, but also for the huge dowry she would bring to the marriage. Suffolk convinces Henry to marry Margaret instead, even though he and Margaret are secretly lovers. Margaret is from Anjou, one of the few places in France that England still controls.

We’ll now see how the story plays out as we continue with Henry VI Part Two.

As any artist must, Shakespeare took liberties with the historical facts. Some of the incidents of Jack Cade’s Rebellion in 1450 are actually from the much earlier Peasant’s Revolt of 1381. The Duchess of Gloucester was accused of witchcraft and banished four years before Queen Margaret arrived in England. Perhaps the most significant departure from historical truth was the inclusion of York’s son Richard in the battle of St. Albans, when he would have been only three years old.

Ah yes, Richard with the hunchback (which itself is almost certainly an invention of Shakespeare), makes his first appearance in this play. By most accounts the three parts of Henry VI are among the earliest plays we can definitely credit to Shakespeare, dating from 1589 to 1592 at the latest, but it’s easy to imagine that he already had plans to continue the story of the War of the Roses with the tale of Richard III (1592), whom he was already imagining as a “heap of wrath, foul indigested lump, as crooked in thy manners as thy shape!” Further down the road he would go back in time to write the prequel Richard II (1595), then the two parts of Henry IV (1597-8), before finally linking the two halves together with Henry V (1598).

A recurring theme in this play is prophecies and predictions of violent death coming true. Gloucester dreams that his staff of office was broken, and that the heads of Suffolk and Somerset were placed on the broken ends. Later Gloucester was in fact removed from office by the deceit of his enemies, but as a result both Suffolk and Somerset came to a bloody end. When his wife presides over the séance, several prophecies are made, chiefly as regards the king:

“The Duke yet lives that Henry shall depose;/But him outlive, and die a violent death.“

Plantagenet, the Duke of York, will later depose the king, but die some ten years before the king does. As to Suffolk, it is foretold that

“By water shall he die and take his end.“

This comes doubly true; Suffolk is beheaded on a boat, and at the hand of a man named Walter. Somerset has a long history with York, going back to Part One of this trilogy: he was the chief opponent to York’s claim to be next in line for the throne during the scene in the rose garden; he got the job of Regent in France, a position that York desperately wanted. When Somerset dies at York’s hand at the end of the play, it is in the shadow of an alehouse named the Castle, thus fulfilling the prophecy that

“Safer shall he be upon the sandy plains/ Than where castles mounted stand.“

“Majesty? I am but Grace” – properly, the wife of a Duke would be called “Your Grace”. When Hume calls her “Your Majesty”, he is both flattering her and planting the false hope that she will one day be queen. Actually, this was a mistake on Shakespeare’s part: the title “Your Majesty” did not come into being until many years after the events in this play.

Due to the centuries of simmering animosity between the French and the English, interspersed with moments of open warfare, many impolite references to France have evolved in English. As just one example, many an English speaker will follow up an outburst of obscene language with the apology “Pardon my French.” When in Act IV Cade refers to “Monsieur Basimecu“, he is employing an extremely rude epithet for Frenchmen. Very roughly, he is calling the Dauphin “Mr. Kiss-My-Buttocks”, which is not a nice thing to say in any language! We can only imagine what the French have been saying about us all this time.

Don’t be too confused by the men who answer to many different names. Especially in the case of royalty and nobility, it was common for individuals to be called by their given names, family names, official titles, or the geographical area they control. Here’s an easy guide:

• Duke of Buckingham – also called Humphrey
• Duke of Gloucester – also called Humphrey
• Earl of Salisbury – his family name was Nevil (or Neville)
• Sir Stafford – also called Humphrey (obviously a very popular name!)
• Duke of Somerset – also called Edmund
• Duke of Suffolk – his given name was William de la Pole
• Earl of Warwick – his family name was Nevil (or Neville). He’s the son of Salisbury.
• Bishop of Winchester – also called Cardinal, and Henry Beauford
• Duke of York – also called Richard Plantagenet

New vocabulary

• adsum – (Latin) I am here
• beldam – hag, witch
• besom – broom
• charneco – wine
• condign – appropriate, deserved
• doit – small coin
• fifteenth – 15 percent tax
• gallowglasses – Irish soldiers
• girt – strap on a sword
• groat – a small coin
• inprimis – (Latin) in the first place
• item – (Latin) in addition
• kerns – Irish soldiers
• lim’d – one way of catching birds is coating branches with birdlime, which makes the birds stick to the branch, unable to fly away.
• maidenhead – virginity
• prentice – apprentice
• puttock – kite (hawk-like bird)
• sack – a very popular Spanish wine
• sounds – swoons, faints
• yclad – dressed in

Historical and classical references

• adder – a poisonous snake falsely believed to be deaf
• “Aio, Aeacida, Romanos vincere posse” – (Latin) “I say that you, descendant of Aeacus, the Romans can conquer.” When Pyrrhus heard this prophecy, he believed it meant that he could conquer the Romans. Actually, it meant that the Romans could conquer him. This is a classic example of fortunetellers making predictions that can be interpreted to match any outcome.
• Ajax – a soldier in the Trojan War, he went mad and started slaughtering cattle, thinking they were enemy soldiers
• basilisk – monster that could kill just with a glance
• “bona terra, mala gens” – (Latin) “good land, bad people”
• Ceres – goddess of the harvest
• Dolphin – actually Dauphin, the heir apparent to the French crown
• “La fin couronne les oeuvres” – (French) “The end crowns the work”
• George – Order of the Garter, a distinguished medal
• mandrake – a root used in ancient medicine. It was falsely believed that when pulled out of the ground, it emitted a shriek that drove the listener mad.
• “Medice, teipsum” – (Latin) “Physician, heal thyself” a famous rejoinder
• “set my ten commandments in your face” – This is a reference to Moses, whom God gave Ten Commandments (for example, “Do not kill”). These rules were carved into two stone tablets. When Queen Margaret insults Eleanor, the Duchess of Gloucester, Eleanor threatens to retaliate by cutting ten gashes into Margaret’s face, one with each finger.
• “Tantaene animis caelestibus irae?” – (Latin) “Is there such anger in heavenly minds?” a quote from Virgil

Summary

ACT ONE

scene 1

Suffolk returns to England with Margaret, but shockingly, she brings no dowry, and in fact her father demands the return of control of his lands. Despite this affront, Henry willingly agrees to be married to the beautiful Margaret. Out of the king’s hearing, Gloucester laments that England’s fortunes have slid so far, losing the glory won earlier by heroes like Bedford and Henry V. Gloucester and the Bishop (now Cardinal) of Winchester continue their open enmity. Secretly, York resolves to bide his time until he can seize the crown for himself.

scene 2

Gloucester’s wife Eleanor keeps hinting that he should be king instead of Henry, but he won’t listen. Actually Eleanor has fallen under the influence of Hume, a priest hired by Winchester, who encourages her ambitions so that she will get her husband into trouble. On his advice Eleanor has been consulting a fortuneteller, who keeps taking her money while telling her exactly what she wants to hear.

scene 3

Suffolk intercepts a complaint meant for the Lord Protector, and has the parties brought before the king. The accuser, Peter, claims that his master Horner believes that York should be king instead of Henry (even making this claim was an act of treason, punishable by death.) This comes at a bad time for York, who wanted to be appointed the king’s regent in France; since there is even a suggestion that the king can’t trust him, his ambitions are dead. Queen Margaret delivers a dreadful insult to Eleanor while Suffolk and others protest against Gloucester remaining as Protector even though Henry is now old enough to make his own decisions.

scene 4

In the middle of a fortunetelling ceremony, York and Buckingham arrest both the witches conducting the satanic ritual and Eleanor for taking part in it.

ACT TWO

scene 1

Gloucester does some detective work worthy of Sherlock Holmes: a swindler is brought before the King, claiming to have been miraculously cured of his lifelong blindness, perhaps with the expectation that the king would give him money. However, Gloucester traps him into identifying colors by name: had he really been blind, he wouldn’t have known the name of the colors.

However, Winchester continues his complaints about Gloucester, even challenging him to a duel, when word arrives that Eleanor has been arrested. Heartbroken, Gloucester disowns her.

scene 2

For the benefit of those who didn’t read my explanation for the War of the Roses (see below), York outlines why he should be king instead of Henry for the Nevil family, Salisbury and Warwick. They both agree to take his part against the Lancasters.

scene 3

At the witchcraft trial, Eleanor is banished. Adding insult to injury, Henry relieves Gloucester of his duties as Protector. Afterwards Peter and Horner fight a duel to determine who is telling the truth; even though Peter doesn’t know how to fight, Horner is drunk, so Peter wins.

scene 4

Gloucester tearfully watches Eleanor led away to her banishment, until he is summoned to appear again before the King.

ACT THREE

scene 1

Suffolk and the Queen slander Gloucester before he arrives, and when he does arrive, Suffolk arrests him for treason. Immediately York, Suffolk and Winchester begin plotting Gloucester’s death to remove him as a danger to the King. Word comes of a rebellion in Ireland, and York is sent to quell it. This fits perfectly with York’s ambitions; he has secretly been encouraging a peasant named Jack Cade to start a people’s rebellion in England. Now that York has been given an army to suppress the Irish, he will be in a perfect position to return to England, put down Cade’s rebellion by force and then seize power from Henry.

scene 2

Just before his trial Gloucester is found dead in his bed. This time it is Warwick who plays the detective, determining that he had been murdered, and blaming Suffolk. After exchanging insults, Suffolk and Warwick draw swords to fight. When the commoners also demand that Suffolk be punished for the murder of Gloucester, Henry banishes him, despite the pleas of Margaret (who is secretly Suffolk’s lover.)

scene 3

Perhaps driven mad for having engineered the death of his kinsman Gloucester, Winchester falls ill and dies.

ACT FOUR

scene 1

Suffolk is captured and executed, his head sent back to Queen Margaret.

scene 2

Jack Cade, believing himself to have royal blood, raises an army of peasants to seize the throne from Henry. He advocates a society with all property in common, no money, and no education.

scene 3

Cade’s followers are given a chance to surrender to the King’s troops, but instead fight them and win. Cade decides to march on London.

scene 4

Henry learns of Cade’s Rebellion. Margaret, mourning the death of her lover Suffolk, cradles his decapitated head in her husband’s presence.

scene 5

Cade wins the battle for London Bridge, and threatens to capture London Tower, both potent symbols of the city.

scene 6

Cade captures London Tower, and demands that all call him Mortimer (as per his false claim to be the legitimate heir to the throne.) Unfortunately, one of his men arrived too late to hear his demand, and pays for it with his life.

scene 7

Cade captures Lord Say, whom they blame for turning over control of French lands to the French, and beheads him.

scene 8

Buckingham and Clifford offer amnesty to Cade’s followers, and they immediately switch allegiance to the King. Then Cade rallies them again, and they switch back to Cade. Then back again to the King! Cade gives up and runs away.

scene 9

The King learns that Cade has retreated, but then immediately hears that York is coming from Ireland with his army to march on London.

scene 10

Overcome with hunger and fatigue, Cade hides in a garden. The owner fights and kills him, not knowing who he is.

ACT FIVE

scene 1

York has brought his army to London to usurp the crown from Henry. In the presence of the court, York demands that Henry yield the crown to him. Everyone in the royal family divides into camps: Warwick, Salisbury, and York’s sons Richard and Edward on the side of the house of York; Clifford, Buckingham and Somerset on the side of the King and the house of Lancaster. The War of the Roses has well and truly begun.

scene 2

York slays Clifford. Richard kills Somerset. The King and Queen escape to London.

scene 3

Really a continuation of scene 2. York celebrates the victory, and makes plans to pursue the King to London.

(What follows is biographical information from Microsoft Encarta.)

Henry VI (of England) (1421-1471), king of England (1422-1461, 1470-1471), the last of the house of Lancaster.

The son of King Henry V and Queen Catherine of Valois, Henry was born at Windsor on December 6, 1421. He never showed any aptitude for government, and throughout his reign the English court was dominated by competing aristocratic factions. Like his father, he claimed the crown of France, but France gradually freed itself from English control between 1430 and 1453. In 1445 Henry married a French princess, Margaret of Anjou. During the 1450s a group of nobles sought to replace him with Richard, duke of York, the next in line of succession to the throne. The resulting civil conflict between the houses of Lancaster and York, known as the Wars of the Roses (see Roses, Wars of the), began in 1455. After intermittent fighting Henry was captured by the Yorkists at Northampton and was compelled to acknowledge Richard rather than his own infant son as successor. In 1460 Richard was killed by Henry’s forces at Wakefield. Richard’s son subsequently became leader of the Yorkists and proclaimed himself king as Edward IV.

Henry and his queen escaped to Scotland, where they remained until 1464. In that year he returned to take part in a rebellion against Edward but was captured (1465) and imprisoned in the Tower of London. He had suffered attacks of insanity all his life and was now completely incapacitated. Nevertheless, he became nominal ruler again in 1470. Dethroned the following year and returned to the tower by Edward, he died there on May 21, 1471, probably murdered on Edward’s order.

Henry, who founded Eton College and King’s College, University of Cambridge, was venerated by many as a saint because of his piety.

Cade, Jack (died 1450), English leader of a revolt in Kent, England, against King Henry VI. According to some accounts, Cade was of Irish birth, called himself John Mortimer, and fought for France against England during the Hundred Years’ War. The so-called Jack Cade’s Rebellion began in late May 1450 as a protest by peasants and small landowners against the seizure of land by nobles, corruption in the courts, heavy taxation, and enforced labor imposed by the Statute of Labourers of 1351. About June 18 Cade defeated a government force at Sevenoaks, Kent, and on July 2 or July 3 entered London, where he was favorably received by the municipality. The rebels forced the London authorities to condemn and execute the sheriff of Kent and his father-in-law, the lord chamberlain under Henry VI. Cade soon thereafter lost his support in London when he resorted to further violence. Most of his men accepted pardons and concessions offered by the king and dispersed. Cade himself received an invalid pardon in the name Mortimer. On July 12 he was hunted down and mortally wounded by the new sheriff of Kent near Heathfield, Sussex.

Hundred Years’ War, armed conflict between France and England during the years from 1337 to 1453. The Hundred Years’ War was a series of short conflicts, broken intermittently by a number of truces and peace treaties. It resulted from disputes between the ruling families of the two countries, the French Capetians and the English Plantagenets, over territories in France and the succession to the French throne.

In 1417 Henry V began the methodical conquest of Normandy and other parts of northwestern France. He met little resistance since many of the noblemen of Normandy had died in the massacre at Agincourt. Henry was aided by the forces of Philip the Good, the son of John the Fearless of Bourgogne. Philip sided with the advancing English after his father was murdered by forces loyal to the French king. In 1420 the French government was forced to sign the Treaty of Troyes, which disinherited the dauphin (the French heir to the throne), gave his sister Catherine to Henry V in marriage, and declared Henry the heir of Charles VI. Philip the Good accompanied the English king into Paris. In 1421 Henry and Catherine had a son, Henry VI. Like Edward III before him, he was the grandson of two kings but owed his French royal blood to his mother.

The Treaty of Troyes did not end the Lancastrian War, for much of central and southern France did not accept it; they supported the dauphin, who became Charles VII in 1422. Though still young, Henry V of England died in 1422, and Charles VI followed a few months later. The infant Henry VI was officially the king of both countries, and his uncle John, duke of Bedford, continued the English war effort in France, with the much-needed support of Philip the Good of Bourgogne. In 1424 the duke of Bedford defeated the French in battle at Verneuil, and in 1428 he besieged Orléans, an important city in central France.

THE END OF THE WAR In 1435, after lengthy peace negotiations with Charles VII, Philip the Good of Bourgogne abandoned his support of the English. Without the support of Philip’s forces, the English were unable to adequately hold their territory, and the tide of the war turned in favor of France, and the French regained Paris in 1436.

In addition, the French revived the stable coinage, regular taxes, and the standing army that had originated under Charles V but had disappeared during his son’s insanity. France also acquired superiority in the use of firearms, especially field artillery.These large, mobile cannons were capable of inflicting heavy damage, and they gave the French the same sort of military advantage that the longbow had given the English in the previous century.

In 1444 French conquests forced the English to agree to a truce. When that truce expired five years later, the remaining English possessions in France quickly fell into French hands. Artillery decided both the battle of Formigny (1450), which determined the fate of Normandy, and the battle of Castillon (1453), which ended English rule in Aquitaine. The battle of Castillon marked the end of the Hundred Years’ War. The English retained Calais in the far north until 1558, but were never again able to mount a serious threat to France.

The end of the Hundred Years’ War was also the end of a long period of economic trouble and declining population in both countries, to which the war had contributed. In France, the war encouraged the emergence of centralized governing institutions. In England, the loss of French territory forced the government to focus on domestic issues. By the end of the war both the French and English peoples began to view themselves as separate and distinctive nationalities, and not merely as members of a feudal empire.

Contributed By:
John Bell Henneman

Roses, Wars of the, series of dynastic civil wars in England fought by the rival houses of Lancaster and York between 1455 and 1485 (see Lancaster, House of; York, House of). The struggle was so named because the badge of the house of Lancaster was a red rose and that of the house of York a white rose. The initial opponents were the Lancastrian king of England Henry VI, aided by his queen, Margaret of Anjou, and Richard Plantagenet, 3rd duke of York. Because of the insanity of the king and military losses in France during the last phase of the Hundred Years’ War, the authority of the house of Lancaster was badly shaken. York asserted his claim to the throne in 1460, after having defeated the Lancastrian armies at St. Albans in 1455 and at Northampton in 1460. In the latter year York was defeated and killed at Wakefield. In 1461, however, his son was proclaimed king as Edward IV and shortly thereafter he decisively defeated Henry and Margaret, who then fled from England. In 1465 Henry was captured and imprisoned in the Tower of London.

The war was revived because of division within the Yorkist faction. Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, aided by George Plantagenet, duke of Clarence, younger brother of Edward, made an alliance with Margaret and led an invasion from France in 1470. Edward was driven into exile and Henry restored to the throne. In 1471, however, Edward returned and, aided by Clarence, defeated and killed Warwick at the Battle of Barnet. Shortly thereafter, the Lancastrians were totally defeated at the Battle of Tewkesbury, and Henry was murdered in the Tower.

After the death of Edward in 1483, his brother Richard usurped the throne, becoming king as Richard III, and the Lancastrians turned for leadership to Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, who later became King Henry VII, founder of the Tudor dynasty. In 1485 the forces of Richard and Henry fought the decisive Battle of Bosworth Field, the last major encounter of the war. After Richard’s death in battle, Henry ascended the throne and married Edward’s daughter, thus uniting the houses. The chief result of the war was an increase in the power of the Crown. Battle and execution all but destroyed the old nobility, and the financial resources of the monarchy were strengthened by the confiscation of estates.