Thomas Becket. Father John S. Hogan

       11

       Henry

      The first thing to note about Henry II is that he was a restless man.¹ Never content to stay in one place, he had to be on the move, preferring his saddle to his throne; perhaps he saw the two as one and the same, given who was astride them both. This restlessness revealed his personality. Happiest on the back of a horse, he lived, like many a warrior, on the edge; he was a man who wanted to be in control, a man of action, a man for whom tolerance might be a sign of weakness. There is always the temptation, among Catholics in particular, to see Henry Angevin as a wicked man, a precursor to Henry VIII who sought to bring the Church under his control and was prepared to liquidate whoever he needed to — even the archbishop of Canterbury — in order to achieve that aim. That would not be the whole truth any more than is the narrative that, rough as he was, he was put upon by an ambitious and angry Catholic cleric and backed into a corner out of which he had to come fighting to preserve his kingdom and his just plans for renewal and stability.

      Henry was a complicated man with a lot of baggage, a king who knew what he wanted and was prepared to make tough decisions to achieve his aims. He had had to fight for his crown, a crown he should have inherited from his mother; and once he had it, he had to fight for his rights as monarch of England and Normandy. He inherited a worldview very different from ours; he failed to understand the developments in the Church as she sought to free herself from secular control. It is no offense to Thomas Becket to accept that Henry Angevin, king of England, seen by some as the founder of the House of Plantagenet, was indeed an extraordinary man and a notable king, and to see the ungodly row between him and Thomas as a tragedy born of the character not only of the archbishop but of the king himself. Henry’s inner turbulence would foster conflicts not only with his archbishop but with his wife, his sons, and any number of unfortunate souls who dared to cross him. As a contemporary historian who knew Henry, the archdeacon Gerald of Wales, once noted in his writings, because of his personality Henry “found strife instead of safety, ruin instead of repose, ingratitude instead of constancy, and the utmost confusion instead of peace and tranquility.”²

      Though he often described Thomas as a lowborn clerk, Henry’s own origins were not so exalted. He was the great-grandson of William the Conqueror, who was, in fact, illegitimate. William was born of a woman called Herleva, who was mistress to his father, Robert, Duke of Normandy. Herleva hailed from a family of leather workers in Falaise in Normandy, and it has been noted more than once that Henry’s rough ways may have been a throwback to his humble ancestry. Once, for example, as Henry was sewing a leather plaster onto his wounded finger with particular proficiency during a meeting with another bishop with whom he was in conflict, the bishop noted the skill he had inherited from his “cousins of Falaise.” To his credit, Henry roared with laughter; he was able to take a joke even at his own expense and let the bishop off the hook for his wit, to the surprise of the assembled courtiers.³

      Henry was born in Le Mans in the county of Maine, in what is now France, on March 5, 1133. Maine was disputed territory, as both Normandy and Anjou claimed it. The marriage of Geoffrey of Anjou and Empress Matilda of Normandy seemed to settle the dispute, as their joint heir, Henry, would claim Maine unopposed. Henry’s earliest years were spent with his mother at her court in Normandy, but when he was about seven years old, he went to live in Anjou at his father’s court while his mother tried to stake her claim to the throne of England. When he was nine, his father sent him to Bristol in England to live with his uncle Robert of Gloucester, Matilda’s half-brother, to be educated in his household.⁴ Sending children to be educated in the household of a relative was a common medieval practice, but Henry’s presence in Bristol, an important center of opposition to Stephen, was no accident; it was a political move to consolidate support for Matilda and put Stephen on edge. In about 1143, Henry returned to Anjou to continue his education, remaining there until he was about fourteen.

      Henry was a bright young man who loved reading, a passion he inherited from his father and maintained throughout his life.⁵ While he gave greater priority to hunting, reading came a close second in his affections. He was known to carry scrolls with him wherever he went and was often seen reading while astride his horse during sieges and other idle moments. He was educated by a number of reputable scholars who awakened in him an interest in many areas of learning. Adelard of Bath, for example, would dedicate his treatise On the Astrolabe to him, and it was not an empty gesture: Henry would have been inclined to read it, particularly as it dealt with a practical scientific instrument.⁶ His reading preference was, unsurprisingly, for works concerned with law and government. Linguistically, he was also proficient, developing an understanding of a number of languages, though he only spoke his native French, Latin, and occasionally a little English.⁷

      Physically, Henry developed into an athletic young man. He inherited his father’s red hair and freckles and had blue-gray eyes whose natural gaze was a piercing stare. His head was large and round, propped up on a short neck. He was short and inclined to be stocky; aware of this, he was careful of what he ate as he grew older and exercised, though it did not prevent him from developing a paunch in later life.⁸ His legs were at first strong and athletic, but over the years became bowlegged thanks to his continual riding. He wore his hair closely cropped, and he dressed shabbily — he never had an interest in sartorial elegance. As a child, he could be sullen, and this attitude often recurred in adulthood, particularly when he could not get his way. His father, Geoffrey, possessed a charm that his son did not inherit; Henry was more inclined to his mother’s temperament, for good or bad, though he was not as reserved as she could be. He wore his temper very close to his skin, and he had a natural inclination for bullying.⁹ It seems he was never taught table manners as a child, or at least the lessons were not reinforced in any meaningful way, because he never possessed them as an adult; his eating habits were rough and far from those expected of a king, usually scandalizing his more exalted dinner guests.

      Henry was religious in a conventional sense.¹⁰ He attended daily Mass, as was the custom for Catholic monarchs at the time, though he was often to be found conducting state business in the chapel during the liturgy. He lacked an authentic piety and was given to sacrilege in his casual approach to the sacred.¹¹ He is known to have been an oath breaker. The solemnity of taking an oath meant little to him; when required to do so, he happily agreed but really had little intention of honoring what he had promised — an attitude he refused to tolerate in others. His moral life was also problematic and did not reflect that expected of a Christian. Like many Catholics before and after him, Henry did not make faith the priority in his life; it came second to his role as king and statesman. Henry saw everything as subordinate to the state and government, and as he saw himself as the state, everything — even the Church — had to be subordinate to him. This was at the heart of his dispute with Thomas. In this clash, he encountered a man who was gradually realizing that Christ and the Christian faith took precedence over everything else, including the king and the state. Subordinating faith to politics affected both Henry’s worldview and his relationships, yet his faith was important to him. He was easily offended should anyone suggest that he was not Christian. He was, in his own view, a very Christian king; indeed, he saw himself as having an important governing role within the Church, and he was prepared to take that role very seriously.

      In terms of his