John Balliol: Magnate, King Prisoner

this video is sponsored by Squarespace hello and welcome back to the channel if you're new here hi you are very welcome this is reading the past and I'm Dr Cat today I want us to travel back to the late 13th century to take a look at the life of an English magnate turned king of Scots turned French Ally and ultimately English prisoner his life and its key events were concurrent and intertwined with those that inspired the film Braveheart not that you would know it from the very limited screen time that his character gets in that particular film and so I think it's only fair that we make him the focus for today but before we jump into today's topic I want to say an absolutely massive thank you to Squarespace for sponsoring another video on this channel when it comes to building updating and managing my website Squarespace has really made all the difference squarespace's blueprint website design tool offers a massive variety of website templates all of which are super easy to customize 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take a look at John bail king of Scots [Music] John baleal was born between around 1248 and 1250 his parents were John he was the founder and namesake of bayal College Oxford additionally he was the Lord of Barnard castle and bayal inur in picy his mother was the fabulously named Dera Giller the lady of Galloway Jon was this couple's fourth son and it's very possible that Jon was raised and educated in such a way as to best prepare him for a monastic career with his Elder Brothers being expected to enter Royal Service to act as politicians diplomats courtiers and or soldiers however by 1278 so when John would have been in his late 20s his father and three Elder brothers were dead and thus Joel inherited the baile EST state which in England principally centered around Barnard Castle County dorham and its surrounding areas there would be however a delay of nearly a year before he actually succeeded to the full control of all of them there were it seems issues to sort out after all much of the lands were being used as doers for his mother and his sister-in-law John was also required to pay homage to both King Edward I and the bishop of Durham for these lands between his elder brother Alexander's death in 1278 and John's Assumption of control over his Bal inheritance the family lands in North umberland were held in Royal custody as was John if the Contemporary chronicler Thomas Wix is to be believed it is however unclear quite why John would be in Royal custody at this time wh suggests there was a connection with John's hoped for marriage to Isabella de waren she was the the second daughter of the Earl of su and the King's consent was apparently needed for this marriage to take place but that in and of itself does not explain why John would have been in Royal custody so if it's true I have to say it's a bit of a head scratcher either way presumably permission was granted because John and Isabella would marry within a year or two of John coming into the full possession of his paternal inheritance their eldest child Edward would be born in around 1283 this couple and indeed their entire families were all connected to the English Royal Court but JN did also have ties albeit more remote ones to the Scottish Throne as well because Jon's maternal great-grandfather was David Earl of Huntington David might have been named for his grandfather who was David the first king of Scots the younger David was also the brother of two other kings of Scots Malcolm IV and William I 1 this lineage might have been nothing more than an interesting side note to the life of a medieval English magnate that was at least until first the death of John's second cousin once removed he was Alexander III king of Scots and he died on the 19th of March 1286 complicating matters was the fact that Alexander had been predeceased by his children his wife wife was pregnant at the time of his death but this pregnancy would not result in a live birth thus Alexander's Heir was his three-year-old granddaughter Margaret known to history as the maid of Norway on account of the fact that she was the daughter of King Eric II of Norway and Alexander the third's daughter Margaret nearly four years later at the start of 1290 John Bao's mother died and he inherited a s of valuable lands in both England and Scotland as well as the right to be called The Lord of Galloway John was rich then just a few months later between the end of September and the beginning of October 1290 while the by then 7-year-old Margaret ma of Norway was traveling to be crowned as Queen of Scots prior to her then traveling for her planned marriage to Edward the First's son and Heir Edward of canaran this little girl fell ill and died numerous aspiring claimants began to assert their right to the now vacant Throne of Scots 14 competitors presented themselves among this number was Margaret made of Norway's father Eric he attempted to claim the Throne of Scots on the basis of being the formerly acknowledged Queen's father King Edward the of England pointed to his own descent from Malcolm III of Scots as evidence for his own claim Florence count of Holland highlighted his descent from William I and Malcolm IV's sister adah descendants of the illegitimate children of William the first threw their proverbial hats into the ring there was another distant claimant who descended from Donald III who is perhaps better known to fans of Shakespeare's Scottish play as Donald Bane perhaps though the best claims rested in the descendants of David Earl of Huntington that would be in John Lord Hastings Robert de Bruce and John bayel respectively it was widely considered that of all of them the best claims were those belonging to Robert de Bruce and John bayel neither of these men seemed prepared to back down in favor of the other and so War looked to be the likely conclusion and this was something that the Scottish Guardians and magnates wish to avoid King Edward the of England was therefore approached asked to intervene and to provide a ruling about whose claim should be recognized as being the superior one Edward the first was willing on the condition that he would henceforth be recognized as the overlord of Scotland I mean after all if his ruling was to hold any weight going forward then his power to make that ruling should arguably be recognized unsurprisingly the Guardians of Scotland did not view it this way and were reticent to agree to it they pointed out that agreeing to such terms was a decision for a monar alone to make and thus it would be up to whoever Edwards selected to provide their consent or otherwise the candidates were thus all duly approached for their provisional agreement which they reportedly all provided a court was convened to weigh the Rival claims which were presented to it in the approximately five months that followed the ruling eventually came down on the 17th of November 1292 John bayel was now king of Scots he was enthroned at scoon at the end of the month on the 30th of November Robert de Bruce although he had lost out on the throne still retained the bloodline and many of his Camp of supporters and so to keep the peace John was going to have to at least consider his rival's references this may be viewed as an internal challenge to his Royal Authority nevertheless as GP Stell asserts quote administratively John's Reign was distinguished it saw a significant assertion of Royal Authority through Parliament no less than four sessions of which were held between February 1293 and may 1294 in one unprecedented session everyone with a complaint was summoned before King and Council to show the injuries and trespass done to them by whatsoever ill doers equally constructive was the ordinance of early 1293 creating three sheriffdom in the west Highlands King John had clearly grasped The crucial importance of establishing Royal Authority in the west and conducting government through Royal agents at strategic Regional centers pressing later Stewart policy I would AR arue that the thing that was inescapably damaging and disempowering for John was that requested name demanded overlordship of king Edward the of England one of the effects of this was that anybody who found themselves unhappy with a ruling in a Scottish Court could go to an English court and appeal the decision there indeed in 1293 John went before the English Parliament to protest against this dilution of his power of his nation's autonomy the English government's response was not warm and ultimately John seems to have felt compelled to back down to submit and to once more pay homage to Edward I think at this point John realized that he was going to need backup if he was going to defy the English king reclaim some control in Scotland and if he wanted to have any hope of success in this an opportunity came when King Edward I summoned his vassals to to fight with him against the French in the summer of 1294 this summon was promptly ignored by John and 26 of his magnates the following year 1295 saw the opening of negotiations between France and Scotland these negotiations would result in a treaty that would come to be known as the foundation of the famous old Alliance this agreement this old Alliance would in fact sered to make England pretty nervous at various points over the coming centuries there were plans to marry John's son and Heir Edward to the niece of the French King tension surrounding this would continue to simmer until the end of March 1296 at which point a war broke out between England and Scotland English forces would claim a decisive Victory within a month this happened at dunar on the 27th of April and these Victorious forces were led by John's former father-in-law John de waren Earl of Sur and I say former father-in-law because John's wife Isabella was We Believe by this point dead indeed it's believed that she passed away at some point before John became king of Scots after dunar John retreated North Edward I first reached Perth by the June because it was at Perth that Edward received John's Representatives who was seeking to make peace with him the bishop of Durham who was invested with the authority to ensure that King Edward the first interests were best served drove a hard bargain it was one that John would capitulate to John's repentance was a requirement as seemingly was his public humiliation and so he was made to confess his Rebellion renounce the treaty with France and abdicate the throne all of this was completed by the 10th of July 1296 it is possible that he was displayed even paraded before his people in clothing that had been visibly stripped of the royal heraldry of the king of Scots John's nickname tomb tabard meaning empty cirat was it is believed born out of this demotion Edward the first ordered that the stone of Destiny also known as the stone of scoon which was part of the crowning seene for Scottish monarchs should be removed to Westminster Abbey and that it should there be placed beneath a seat for English Monarch to be crowned upon then forth John was then escorted out of Scotland into England from the start of August 1296 he was imprisoned in the Tower of London John might have been a disgraced King forced to abdicate and now a prisoner but that certainly did not mean that he was kept in either meager or uncomfortable conditions quite the opposite in fact he was lodged in fine rooms wellfed surrounded by a large retinue of personal household servants he also kept at least a couple of horses two greyhounds and some 10 cent hounds you may be wondering what good all of these beasts were to an inmate particularly to an inmate of the tower well John did not remain at the Tower of London for his whole imprisonment there was for example a period of more relaxed house arrest at Hartford John was allowed hunting privileges in which Pursuit he would have put those animals to good use in June 1299 a truce was brokered between England and France one of the terms of this truce was the release of John bayel but if John had hopes that this meant his return to Scotland even to the throne he would be Al disappointed Edward the had consented to the Pope's demand for John to be transferred into his custody and so John and his escort landed on the French Coast on the 18th of July before long in around October 1301 news reached England that John rather than being in papal custody as agreed was instead Ins sconed at his family seat in picade it was said that he enjoyed the support of the French King King who was holding out hope of returning John to the Scottish Throne certainly John continued to be viewed as rightful king of Scots by many of the leaders he had been compelled to leave behind in Scotland they might have been dissatisfied by Jon's compromised status in regards to England and English Authority but he was for many still their King and those leaders were busy rising up against English control of Scotland with William Wallace being arguably the most famous of these even Ed the first recognized that Jon's return to Scotland was a very real possibility one that he may even have been willing to countenance however he would seemingly not have been willing to recognize Jon as king if this return should happen in any case these hoped for moves would not materialize John bael would never see Scotland or indeed England again he died in picy at the start of 1315 by which point he would have been in his mid-60s John's eldest son Edward then swore fty to the French King this allowed him to take possession of his ba inheritance in picade Edward would survive until 1364 when he would have been around 81 he did however have no children and thus the direct Bal line died with him as for the title of king of Scots the the grandson of Robert de Bruce who had been John's principal rival for the Scottish Throne after the events of 1290 was ultimately enthroned as Robert the first at scoon in 1306 so what do you think of John bael of his rise and fall of his kingship of its brevity of the challenges he faced within it of his imprisonment and his Exile as always I'm looking forward to reading your conversations in the comment section underneath this video I would also love it if you could pop an emoji or a social glyph in the comments too because that will boost the engagement and the more engagement video gets the more YouTube say they share it out and that should help us to grow our community as we've been talking about magnates castles Kings and battles perhaps an emoji that fits that whichever you think best I'm looking forward to seeing what you pick you can also find me Elsewhere on social media I will leave links to all the other places you can find me on the internet in my description box please do follow me over on some of all of those so we can continue this conversation and start some others I do hope that you enjoyed this video and found it useful if you did please do share with your friends and 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