John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster

John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster KG - German Johann von Gent, Duke of Lancaster , French Jean de Gand - (born March 6, 1340 in Gent , † February 3, 1399 in Leicester ) was Duke from 1362 until his death of Lancaster . He founded the House of Lancaster , which, with his son Heinrich, was the first to be king. He came from the originally French noble family of Anjou-Plantagenêt , who had been the English kings with Henry II since 1154 .

John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster

John of Gaunt was the third surviving son of King Edward III. of England (1312–1377) and his wife Philippa of Hainaut (1311–1369). His other titles were Knight of the Order of the Garter , Lord High Steward of England, Duke of Aquitaine or Duke of Guyenne , Earl of Derby , Earl of Lincoln , Earl of Richmond , Earl of Leicester , Lord of Bergerac & Roche-sur-Yon, Lord of Beaufort & Nogent and King of Castile . The name addition Gaunt (Gent) is derived from his place of birth Ghent in the county of Flanders .

Life

1340 to 1370

Although his childhood and youth were overshadowed by the Hundred Years War between England and France (1337-1453) and the devastating outbreak of the plague (in England 1348/49), John grew up in a harmonious family relationship. In the household of his older brother Edward of Woodstock (1330-1376), whom he admired , John received a knightly training as a child. He witnessed the Battle of Winchelsea at the age of ten, received his accolade at fifteen, and at the age of nineteen he commanded his own troop for the first time during a grueling winter campaign in Normandy .

According to his father's marriage policy, John married his relative Blanche of Lancaster (1341-1368) in Reading Abbey in 1359 . His bride was one of the two heirlooms of Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster (1306-1361), who in turn came from a on Henry III. (1207–1272) traceable branch line of the Plantagenets came. John received half of his father-in-law's lands after the death of his father-in-law, making most of the land in the north of England, including the titles of Earl of Lancaster and 14th Baron of Halton. Due to the death of Blanches , sister Maud (1339-1362) who was married to Wilhelm I of Bavaria but had no children , he also inherited the other half of his father-in-law's estate.

From Edward III. Raised Duke of Lancaster on November 13, 1362, John of Gaunt has since been considered the largest landowner after the Crown in England, who, as the richest of the English lords, finally owned 30 castles and extensive estates in England and France. He soon surpassed both his father and his brother in his predilection for pomp and splendor, his court was comparable in scale and organization to that of the king, and the beauty of his palaces became legendary. The Duke's passion for glass windows as well as for sculptures and reliefs made of alabaster was particularly pronounced . The most important poet of the English Middle Ages, Geoffrey Chaucer (1340–1400), was also one of Lancaster's clients and friends.

After the war between England and France temporarily ended with the Treaty of Brétigny in 1360, the English and French began their acts of war again in 1367, as both entered the civil war in Castile between the disempowered King Peter the Cruel (1334-1369) and his half-brother Heinrich von Trastamara (1334-1379) interfered. The English marched across the Pyrenees as an ally of Peters under the command of the Black Prince and his younger brother John and defeated the allied Castilian-French army on April 3, 1367 at the Battle of Nájera . In spite of his outstanding, particularly prominent services in this battle, the duke - in contrast to the king and the prince of Wales - never achieved the status of a war hero. Instead, he suffered frequent military defeats that damaged his reputation. However, for a long time the battle of Nájera was the last significant success of the English; it was not until the Battle of Azincourt in 1415 that they achieved the next important victory over the French under John's grandson Henry V.

Coat of arms of John of Ghent as heir to the Castilian throne

1370 to 1377

The victory of his English allies enabled Peter to return to the throne of Castile for just under two years. In addition, the Anglo-Castilian alliance with the marriage vows between Peter's younger daughter Isabella (1355-1392) and a younger son of Edward III, Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York (1341-1402), consolidated. After Peter was overthrown from the throne again in 1369 and then personally murdered by his half-brother , Isabella's older sister Konstanze (1354-1394) also came to the English court in the wake of Isabella . Because as early as 1369 an attempt by the now widowed Duke of Lancaster to marry the heiress Margaret of Flanders (1350-1405) was only based on the veto of Pope Urban V (1310-1370 ), who was allied with the French King Charles V (1338-1380) ) had failed, Lancaster decided in 1371 out of political calculation to marry Constanze and to take over her claim to the throne to the crown of Castile. Already at this time he led a permanent partnership with the widowed former lady-in-waiting of his first wife Blanche, Flemin Catherine Swynford , née de Rouet (1350-1403). Catherine was also the sister-in-law of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer, who was married to her sister Philippa de Rouet († 1387).

Since the Black Prince fell seriously ill in the early 1370s and Edward III. After his wife's death , the Duke of Lancaster, as President of the Royal Council, had to assume military leadership and political responsibility in a difficult time for England. He could hardly cope with these extensive tasks.

In July 1373 he began a campaign of loot and devastation through France, trying to avoid direct combat operations with the army of the dreaded Connétables Bertrand du Guesclin (1320-1380). However, the English advancing to Aquitaine suffered enormous losses in their skirmishes with local French knights and in skirmishes with the army of Philip the Bold , Duke of Burgundy (1342-1405), the younger brother of the French king and husband of Margaret of Flanders . As early as 1374 the English had lost most of their territories in France; they controlled only Calais and small parts of Aquitaine, and their fleet could no longer maintain dominance in the English Channel . This meant that all the territories gained as a result of the military victories of Crécy (1346) and Maupertuis / Poitiers (1356) had been lost or all the regulations of the Treaty of Brétigny (1360) had become null and void.

The Duke of Lancaster was also unable to assert himself against the ruthless and power-hungry courtiers of his increasingly incapable of governing father. He did not succeed either, Edward III. to withdraw from the influence of his extravagant mistress Alice Perrers († after 1377), who - in addition to the high taxes - accelerated the financial ruin of England with her extravagant court. The fact that John of Gaunt was publicly held responsible for government failures and military setbacks in the 1370s did not simplify his situation. The political crisis was also made worse by the plague wave that raged in England in 1374/75 and the increasing incursions of the Scots into the north of England. Furthermore, large parts of the English population felt the early death of the faltering Black Prince (1376) and the death of his father (1377) soon afterwards as God's punishment for their politics. Lancaster rose to the central figure of the royal government in 1376/77. He had to deal with the "good parliament" , in which 60 deputies from the cities and 74 country gentlemen from the counties were united in the lower house , who energetically and with the help of the upper house demanded the punishment and reparation of 164 violations of the law.

1377 to 1386

When his nephew Richard II (1367-1400) was a minor, the Duke of Lancaster, who had enormous private income but was unpopular in large parts of the population, formed a following that was financially dependent on him, which in return helped him to secure his influence and so de facto to rise to the rulers of England. However, the duke, who had consistently defended the rights of the crown against demands of the parliament - especially against the "good parliament" of 1376 - was not appointed as the official regent of the minor king. Since he is the oldest living son of Edward III. could not be overlooked, he and Richard's mother Joan of Kent (1329-1385) were allowed to work in the background, while the day-to-day political business was left to a royal council (with changing members). Lancaster denied its own ambitions for power and essentially supported his nephew. The alleged intention to usurp the crown was a deliberate, so far unproven subordination of the suspiciously minded parliament.

The continuation of the deadlocked war, the defense of Calais and the remaining parts of Aquitaine, the debt policy of Edward III, the Scots invasions of the north of England and the consequences of the plague required ever higher taxes. Since the French King Charles V created a powerful fleet for himself with the help of the sea power Castile , many English feared an imminent French invasion. In 1380 Lancaster's attempts to conquer the port city of Saint-Malo failed. His poll tax, initiated in 1381 and enforced in parliament for all men and women over 14 years of age, proved to be particularly fatal. This general poll tax wanted and could since 1360 as a result of the restrictive laws of Edward III. impoverished farmers and artisans cannot afford it. The dissatisfied gathered under the leadership of the roofer and war veteran Wat Tyler , who called for the abolition of serfdom , compulsory labor and the judiciary of the lords. On June 13, 1381, the insurgents occupied London , they destroyed Lancaster's Savoy Palace and killed the servants. The young Henry of Bolingbroke (1367-1413), Lancaster's eldest son, was only able to escape the peasant lynching through the courageous use of a knight. The hated Duke, however, was not in London at the time of the Wat Tyler Uprising - also known as the Peasants' Revolt ; He stayed in the north of England and Scotland, where he negotiated border disputes with Scottish nobles.

Richard II managed to outsmart the rebel leader, who was killed on June 15, 1381 under unclear circumstances during the joint negotiations. Deprived of its leader, the uprising soon collapsed. Richard II then began to gradually overcome his uncle's supremacy, and his favorites increasingly gained influence on English politics. John of Gaunt opposed their rule, he participated in the political rebellion of the magnates , but he was careful enough not to openly show himself as an opponent of the king and his favorites.

However, the reasons that led him to support the pre-Reformation movement of Oxford Professor John Wyclif († 1384) are unclear. One thing is certain: the protection of the powerful duke secured the life of the theologian and philosopher from attacks by the Catholic Church and enabled him to quickly spread his teaching, which ultimately also influenced the rebels around Wat Tyler. During the 14th century the followers of John Wyclif, the Lollards , lived safely in England, but only after 1400 did their situation deteriorate. In 1415, Wyclif was posthumously condemned to be a heretic at the Council of Constance and the exhumation of his bones was ordered, which was finally carried out in 1428. Whether the libertine John of Gaunt seriously advocated a reform of the Catholic Church, whether he only wanted to limit the secular influence of the Pope and the bishops or even only sought the lands of the clergy, has remained speculative so far.

1386 to 1399

Coat of arms of John of Gaunt when he asserted his claim to the throne of Castile and Leon.

In order to assert his claim to the successor to the "cruel" King Peter , John of Gaunt began a military expedition against Castile, an ally of France, at Easter 1386, which turned out to be unsuitable for English interests. After initial success - he succeeded in occupying Galicia - the campaign of conquest came to a standstill. After the Duke had recognized his rival John I of Castile (1358-1390) as king in June / July 1387 , he had to send the remnants of his army back to England with no tangible result. The conflict between the House of Burgundy-Ivrea , whose claim Lancaster represented, and the House of Trastámara was diplomatically ended in 1388 when the then Infante Heinrich (1379-1406) married John of Gaunt's daughter Katharina (1373-1418).

During the absence of Lancaster in 1387 an opposition of the Lords formed against the mismanagement of Richard II, which brought England to the brink of civil war. The king was therefore forced to share his power with five lords, the so-called appellants - engl. Lords Appellant - to which Richard's uncle Thomas of Woodstock , Duke of Gloucester (1355-1397), Richard's cousin and Lancaster's son Henry of Bolingbroke , Richard's childhood friend Thomas Mowbray , later 1st Duke of Norfolk (1366-1399), Thomas de Beauchamp , 12th Earl of Warwick (1339-1401) and Richard FitzAlan, 11th Earl of Arundel (1346-1397). After his return, which took place only in 1389, Lancaster succeeded in reconciling the king with all appellants hostile to him and in making peace with France. For this reason, John of Gaunt initiated the marriage between Richard II and Isabella of France (1389-1409) in 1396 . However, his commitment to peace with France was not only politically justified, he also pursued dynastic goals, as he wanted to protect the interests of his daughters Philippa , Queen of Portugal, and Katharina , Queen of Castile and Leon. In the 1390s, Lancaster's peace policy ushered in a period of relative stability. England recovered economically, the legal foundations of coexistence were reinstated and Lancaster, as the main responsible party, received the respect it deserved from his contemporaries.

After the death of his second wife Konstanze († 1394), John of Gaunt married his long-time mistress Catherine Swynford in January 1397 . This caused a social scandal, especially after the duke had the four children legitimized by the Pope in February 1397. Since then, these children have been called " Beaufort " ; they themselves and their descendants played an important role in English history in the 15th century.

Richard II, who became increasingly unpredictable after the death of his first wife Anne of Bohemia (1366-1394), took revenge on the appellant in 1397 by first murdering his uncle Gloucester and the Earl of Arundel, and later banishing Mowbray and the Earl of Warwick for life. In 1398, Henry of Bolingbroke was expelled for six years. Lancaster's attempts to defuse the conflict and change the king's mind were unsuccessful, as he died on February 3, 1399 as a result of a heart attack in Leicester . He was buried at the side of his first wife Blanche in the nave of London's St Paul's Cathedral in an ivory tomb designed by Henry Yevele - similar to that of his son in Canterbury Cathedral . Unfortunately, this tomb was destroyed during the great fire of 1666 in London .

After the Duke's death, Richard II confiscated his fortune for the crown and banished his son Heinrich for life. However, he decided to return to England to claim his inheritance. Events then rolled over, the discontented joining Henry of Bolingbroke . Parliament decided in September 1399 to depose the king, and on October 13, Henry IV of the House of Lancaster was crowned the new king. The disempowered Richard II died under unknown circumstances in February 1400 at Pontefract Castle , Yorkshire . With him the main line of the Plantagenets died out .

genealogy

ancestors

Edward I of England (1239–1307)

Edward II of England (1284-1327)

Eleanor of Castile (1241-1290)

Edward III. of England (1312-1377)

Philip IV of France (1268-1314)

Isabelle de France (1292-1358)

Joan I of Navarre (1273–1305)

John of Gaunt (1340-1399)

John of Avesnes (1248–1304)

William III. of Holland (1286–1337)

Philippa of Luxembourg (1252-1311)

Philippa of Hainaut (1311-1369)

Charles I of Valois (1270-1325)

Joan of Valois (1294–1342)

Marguerite of Anjou-Sicily (1273-1299)

Marriages and offspring

See also : Family Tree of Houses Lancaster and York

• First marriage (1359) with Blanche of Lancaster (25 March 1341 - 12 September 1368)

1. Philippa (1360–1415), ⚭ 1387 John I of Portugal (1357–1433)

Her best-known sons were Eduard I (1391–1438) and Heinrich the Seafarer (1394–1460), who initiated the voyages of discovery along the West African coast and established the Portuguese maritime and colonial power.

2. John (1362–1364; † 1365)

3. Elizabeth (1364-1425) was married three times to English aristocrats, her second husband John Holland, 1st Duke of Exeter (1352-1400) a son of Joan of Kent and thus an older half-brother of Richard II . One of her sons - John Holland, 2nd Duke of Exeter (1395–1447) - was a military leader during the Hundred Years War , her grandson Henry Holland, 3rd Duke of Exeter (1430–1475) was a military leader during the Wars of the Roses .

4. Edward (* 1364/65; † 1368)

5. John (* before May 4, 1366; † 136x)

6. Henry IV (1367–1413), King of England ⚭ 1380 Mary de Bohun (1369–1394) ( House of Bohun )

He ascended the English throne in 1399 and founded the Lancaster dynasty. He was followed by his son Heinrich V , who resumed the war against France in 1415. In 1471, with the death of Henry VI, it went out. and Edward of Westminster (1453–1471) the House of Lancaster.

7. Isabelle (* 1368; † in infancy)

• Second marriage (1371) to Constance of Castile (1354-1394):

1. Katharina (Catalina) Plantagenet (* March 31, 1373; † June 2, 1418) ⚭ 1388 Heinrich III. of Castile (October 4, 1379 - December 25, 1406)

The marriage between Katharina - granddaughter of Peter the Cruel from the House of Burgundy-Ivrea - and Heinrich - grandson of Henry II from the House of Trastámara - ended the Castilian civil war. Catherine was crowned Queen of Castile and Leon in 1390 and had great influence on the politics of Castile while her son John II (1405-1454) was a minor . Her granddaughter was the important Isabella of Castile (1451–1504) who, together with her husband Ferdinand of Aragon (1452–1516), brought about the unification of Spain. Their daughter was Catherine of Aragon (1485–1536), who was the first wife of Henry VIII (1491–1547) to be Queen of England.

2. John Plantagenet (* 1372; † 1375)

• Third marriage (1397) with his long-time mistress Catherine Swynford (* around 1350; † May 10, 1403)

Their originally illegitimate children, legitimized in 1397 but excluded from the line of succession, founded the Beaufort family :

1. John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset (* 1373; † March 16, 1410) ⚭ Margaret Holland (1385–1429) is the progenitor of the current family of the Duke of Beaufort .

His daughter Joan Beaufort (1406–1445) was the wife of the Scottish King James I (1394–1437) and faced the demands of various aristocratic groups while her son James II (1430–1460) was a minor .

John's granddaughter Margaret Beaufort (1443–1509) married the son of Owen Tudor (1400–1461) and Katharina von Valois (1401–1437), the half-brother of Henry VI. - Edmund Tudor (1430-1456). Edmund and Margaret are the parents of the first Tudor king Henry VII (1457-1509), who founded the rule of the Tudor (1485-1603) in England.

2. Cardinal Henry Beaufort (* 1375; † April 11, 1447) was regent for the minor King Henry VI from 1422 to 1426. and from 1427 acted as papal legate for Germany, Bohemia and Hungary. He tried in vain to organize a campaign against the Hussites .

3. Thomas Beaufort, 1st Duke of Exeter (1377 - December 31, 1426) ⚭ Margaret Neville, Admiral of the English fleet

4. Joan Beaufort, Countess of Westmorland (* 1379 - 13 November 1440) ⚭ (1) Robert de Ferrers, 2nd Baron Ferrers of Wemme († 1396); ⚭ (2) Ralph Neville, 1st Earl of Westmorland (1364–1425)

On the one hand, she is the grandmother of the two York kings Edward IV (1442–1483) and Richard III. (1452–1485), on the other hand that of the influential kingmaker Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick (1428–1471). In addition, Joan was the great-grandmother of Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham (1455-1483), whom some historians consider to be the murderer of the sons of Edward IV, the so-called "little princes" . These - Edward V (1470-1483) and Richard of Shrewsbury, 1st Duke of York (1473-1483) - as well as their sister Elisabeth (1466-1503) were also great-grandchildren of Joan Beaufort and the last representatives of the House of York . In 1486 Elisabeth married the heir of the House of Lancaster , Henry VII , and with him founded the Tudor dynasty . Their son was Henry VIII (1491–1547).

• The daughter comes from the relationship with Marie de St. Hillaire :

1. Blanche Plantagenet (* 1359; † 1388) ⚭ Thomas Morieux

Claim to the throne of the House of Lancaster

Henry IV , the first king of the Lancaster dynasty, based his claim to the throne on two considerations:

1. His eldest uncle Lionel of Antwerp , Duke of Clarence (1338-1368) had only one daughter, Philippa Plantagenet, 5th Countess of Ulster (1355-1382), who lived with Edmund Mortimer, 3rd Earl of March (1352-1381 ) was married. Their son Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March (1374-1398), who was appointed heir to the throne by Richard II, was already dead, the claims to the throne of his underage son Edmund Mortimer, 5th Earl of March (1391-1425) were passed over by Henry IV as well as by parliament.

2. Since his father John of Gaunt was older than Edmund of Langley , Duke of York (1341-1402) and Thomas of Woodstock , Duke of Gloucester (1355-1397), Henry IV established his claim to the throne as a pretender of the older agnatic line. This was an astonishing change in political consciousness, the contradiction of which was not hidden from his contemporaries, especially after Henry V (1387–1422) decided to continue the Hundred Years War , which was ultimately based on the one woman, Isabella of France (1292–1358 ), mediated inheritance claim based on the crown of France.

Anne Mortimer (1390-1411), the sister of the last Mortimer Edmund, married in 1406 Richard of Conisburgh, 1st Earl of Cambridge (1375-1415), the younger son of the Duke of York. With their son Richard (1411–1460), 3rd Duke of York since 1425, the English King Henry VI was born. (1421–1471) a political opponent who made his claims to the throne both over Lionel of Antwerp and over his direct agnatic descent from Edward III. could justify. After the end of the Hundred Years War (1453), the smoldering conflict of the high nobility sparked into open acts of war in 1455. These Wars of the Roses , which owe their name to the coats of arms of the opponents, ended in 1485 with Henry VII's accession to the throne (1457–1509) from the House of Tudor . The well-known Tudor rose symbolized the union of the red rose of the House of Lancaster with the white rose of the House of York .

Culture

• It is speculated that the poet Geoffrey Chaucer , friend and client of John of Gaunt, wrote and dedicated his "Book of the Duchess" - the Duchess's book - for his late wife Blanche of Lancaster , because this poem was not just one "Black knight" , but also a "white lady" includes, which can be interpreted as an allegory of Blanche. At the end of the poem there is a reference back to the marriage between John and Blanche, as the sound of their titles Lancaster and Richmond as "long castle" (line 1318) and "riche hil" (line 1319). As an alternative interpretation, “long castel” could allude to Constance of Castile and the heraldic arms of Castile.

• In William Shakespeare's play Richard II , the famous English speech is dedicated to the dying John of Gaunt.

This royal throne of kings, this scepter'd isle,

This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,

This other Eden, demi-paradise,

This fortress built by Nature for herself

Against infection and the hand of war,

This happy breed of men, this little world,

This precious stone set in the silver sea,

Which serves it in the office of a wall,

Or as a moat defensive to a house,

Against the envy of less happier lands,

This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England,

This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings,

Fear'd by their breed and famous by their birth.

-Act II, scene i, 42-54

The Tragedy of King Richard II

• Rebecca Gablé gives the Duke of Lancaster a central role in her historical novel " The Smile of Fortuna " , in which he is portrayed with great sympathy but historically correct.
• In the center of Lancaster there is a pub called The John O'Gaunt, known for its live jazz and wide selection of Wiskeys . Furthermore, an administrative district of the city bears the name.

See also

• Family tree of the Kings of Scotland

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Herbert Eiden: You will remain in bondage - causes and course of the English peasant uprising of 1381 . Trier: Verlag Trierer Historische Forschungen 1995. pp. 258–261.

literature

• Sydney Armitage-Smith: John of Gaunt, King of Castile and Leon, Duke of Lancaster . Barnes and Noble, 1964.
• Norman F. Cantor: The Last Knight: The Twilight of the Middle Ages and the Birth of the Modern Era . Free Press, 2004.
• Anthony Goodman: John of Gaunt: The Exercise of Princely Power in Fourteenth-Century Europe . St. Martin, 1992.
• Simon Walker: The Lancastrian Affinity, 1361-1399 . Clarendon Press, 1990.
• Natalie Fryde, Hanna Vollrath : The English kings in the Middle Ages: From Wilhelm the Conqueror to Richard III. Publishing house CH Beck oHG, Munich 2004
• Barbara Tuchman : The distant mirror: The dramatic 14th century. Licensed edition of the SPIEGEL publishing house Rudolf Augstein GmbH & Co. KG. Hamburg. SPIEGEL edition 2006/2007
• Rebecca Gablé : Of perplexed people and lions hearts. An entertaining but useful story of the English Middle Ages. Ehrenwirth and Bastei Lübbe Taschenbuch in the Bastei Lübbe Taschenbuch GmbH & Co. KG. 1st edition: October 2010
• H. Grote: Family Tables. Central antiquariat of the GDR. Leipzig 1990. 7th reprint of the original edition from 1877

Web links

Commons : John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Wikisource: The Tragedy of King Richard the Second  - Sources and full texts (English)

• Tudor Place's John of Gaunt page

predecessor	Office	successor
Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster	Lord High Steward 1362-1399	Henry IV of England
Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster	Duke of Lancaster 1362-1399	Henry IV of England
Richard II of England	Duke of Guyenne 1390-1399	Henry IV of England
Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster	Earl of Derby 1361-1399	Henry IV of England