Death of King Henry II

Death of King Henry II is in 1175-1189 Abergavenny Massacre.

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On 6th July 1189 King Henry "Curtmantle" II of England (age 56) died at Chinon Castle [Map]. William Mandeville 3rd Earl Essex Count Aumale was present. He was buried at Fontevraud Abbey [Map]. His son Richard (age 31) succeeded I King of England.

The History of William Marshal 1189 Death of King Henry II.

Li reis Henriz a Chinon vint,	King Henry came to Chinon [Map],
Mais tels damages i avint	But such misfortunes happened there	9040
Que puis n'i out bien ne delit	That afterwards there was neither good nor pleasure there
Ne puis ne leva de son lit.	Nor did he rise from his bed again.
Malades jut el lit mortal:	Ill he lay in mortal bed:
Si'n soufrirent ennui e mal	So they suffered distress and pain
E grant dolor cil qui I'amérent,	And great sorrow those who loved him,	9045
& qui ovecques lui i érent.	And those who were with him there.
E nequedent molt volt saveir	And nevertheless he greatly wanted to know
& molt volt en escrit aveir	And greatly wanted to have in writing
Cels qui érent ses contrempris,	Those who were his adversaries,
E qu'en eüst les nons apris.	And that he might have found out their names.	9050
A mestre Rog. Malchael,	To master Roger Malchael,
Qui lores portout son seel,	Who then carried his seal,
Dist k'il alast sanz demorance	He said that he should go without delay
A Tors de si qu'al rei de France,	To Tours to the king of France,
Que li feist en escrit metre,	That he should have written down,	9055
Si comme li plout a prametre,	As it pleased him to promise,
Toz cels qui érent ses empris,	All those who were his adversaries,
Tant que lor nons eüst apris.	So that he might have learned their names.
Maistre Roger issi le fist:	Master Roger did it so:
A Tors ala e si escrist	He went to Tours and thus listed	9060
Trestoz cels qui empris esteient	All those who were committed
Al rei de France e li aveient	To the king of France and had
Pramis a aidier de sa guerre	Promised to help in his war
Encontre le rei d'Engletere.	Against the king of England.
Maistre Roger issi le fist	Master Roger did it thus	9065
Com li rei commanda e dist.	The king commanded and said.
Ci ne deit aveir demorance:	Here there should be no delay:
Revenuz fu del rei de France	He returned from the king of France
Maistre Roger devant le rei;	Master Roger before the king;
E il li dist ke en segrei	And he told him that in secret	9070
Li recontast qui cil esteient	He recounted who those were
Qui chartres bailliées aveient	Who had given charters
En lor seels al rei de France	With their seals to the king of France
Contre lui e en sa nuisance.	Against him and to his detriment.
E cil en suspirant li dist:	And he sighing said to him:	9075
"Sire, si m'ait Jhesu Crist,	"Sire, so help me if Jesus Christ,
"Li premiers qui est ci escriz,	"The first one who is written here,
"C'est li quens Johan vostre fiz."	"It is count John (age 22) your son."

Chronicle of Roger de Hoveden. [6th July 1189] Surprised at this beyond measure, he [King Henry "Curtmantle" II of England (age 56)] came to Chinon [Map], and, touched with grief at heart, cursed the day on which he was born, and pronounced upon his sons the curse of God and of himself, which he would never withdraw, although bishops and other religious men frequently admonished him so to do. Being sick even unto death, he ordered himself to be carried into the church, before the altar, and there devoutly received the communion of the body and blood of Christ; and after confessing his sins, and being absolved by the bishop and clergy, he departed this life in the thirty-fifth year of his reign, on the octave of the Apostles Saint Peter and Saint Paul, being the fifth day of the week; after a reign of thirty-four years, seven months, and four days.

After his death, having plundered him of all his riches, all forsook him, so true it is that just as flies seek honey, wolves the carcass, and ants corn, this crew followed not the man, but his spoils. At last however, his servants returned, and buried him with royal pomp. On the day after his death, when he was being carried out for burial in the Church of the Nuns at Fontevraud [Map], earl Richard, his son and heir, came to meet him, and, smitten with compunction, wept bitterly; immediately on which the blood flowed in streams from the nostrils of the body at the approach of his son. His son, however, proceeded with the body of his father to the abbey of Fontevraud [Map], and there buried him in the choir of the Nuns, and thus it was that he was "among the veiled women as one wearing the veil."

Chronicum Anglicanum by Ralph Coggeshall. Year 1189. After King Philip of France and King Henry of England, together with their princes and counts, archbishops and bishops, had violently exacted tithes from the possessions of both clergy and laity, as well as from church revenues and the money of individuals, to make ready the journey to Jerusalem, by the just judgment of God (who hates robbery offered as a scrifice), a great quarrel arose between the aforesaid kings and princes; and so all that money gathered by violence was entirely consumed in gifts to knights and the wages of armies. For the armies of both sides, called out to battle three times, wrought a vast slaughter of men, plunderings of livestock, burnings and desolations of churches, towns, and villages, and the overthrow of castles. Ralph's castle, with the county that Baldwin de Rivers held, and Issoudun, and five counties in Quercy, as well as Le Mans and Tours, were captured by King Philip. Whereupon King Henry of the English, who by arms and strength, by wealth and wisdom, had always been accustomed to triumph over his enemies, being smitten with deep sorrow and inward grief of heart, fell into a sudden sickness, by which he was taken from this life at his own castle of Chinon, in the month of July, on the second day before the Nones of July [6th July 1189]. He was buried with the nuns of Fontevraud. He had ruled the kingdom of the English for thirty-four years, seven months, and three days, together with the duchy of Normandy and the counties of Aquitaine and Anjou, with the utmost vigour, always striving for the peace of citizens, of the poor and the middling, while powerfully restraining the arrogance and tyranny of nobles and magnates, and punishing thieves, the guilty, and criminals without mercy. The Welsh, too, always rebellious against the kings of England, he subdued, not without great loss of their princes and destruction of their armies, and at last, though unwilling and resisting, he compelled them to submit. Furthermore, the greater part of Ireland he brought under his dominion, partly by himself and partly through his princes.

Anno MCLXXXIX. Postquam rex Philippus Galliæ et Henricus rex Angliæ, eorumque principes et comites, archiepiscopi et episcopi, possessiones tam clericorum quam laicorum, et redditus ecclesiasticos et pecuniam singulorum violenta manu decimaverant ad conficiendum iter Hierosolymitanum, justo Dei judicio, (qui odio habet rapinam in holocaustum,) orta est magna dissensio inter prædictos reges et principes, unde tota illa pecunia violenter collecta, in donativis militum et stipendiis exercituum penitus consumpta est. Nam utrorumque exercitus ad pugnam ter evocatus, maximam stragem hominum deprædationesque animalium, incendia desolationesque ecclesiarum, urbium, villarum, subversiones castellorum operatus est. Castellum Radulfi, cum comitatu quem Baldewinus de Riveres tenuit, et Ysoudun, et quinque comitatus in Caorzin, Cinomannis etiam atque Turonis, a rege Philippo capta sunt. Unde rex Henricus Anglorum, qui armis et potentia, seu divitiis atque prudentia, de hostibus suis semper triumphare consueverat, vehementi tristitia affectus et tactus dolore cordis intrinsecus, decidit in subitaneam ægritudinem, qua etiam ex hac luce subtractus est apud Chinun castellum suum, mense Julio, secundo nonas Julii, et apud sanctimoniales FontisEbraldi sepultus; qui regnum Anglorum per triginta et quatuor annos et septem mensibus et diebus tribus, cum ducatu Normanniæ et comitatu Aquitaniæ et Andegaviæ, strenuissime rexerat, semper paci civium, pauperum atque mediocrum studens, nobilium ac potentum arrogantiam atque tyrannidem potenter reprimens, fures, reos atque criminosos immisericorditer puniens. Gualenses etiam regibus Angliæ semper rebelles, non sine magna suorum principum amissione et exercitus sui dispendio, debellaverat, ac tandem invitos nolentes que subjugaverat. Insuper et maximam partem Hiberniæ, tum per se, tum per suos principes, suo dominio subegerat.

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Instruction for a Ruler Book 3 Chapter 26. 6th July 1189 Therefore, with these things having been completed in this manner, the king (age 56) had himself carried to the castle of Chinon [Map]; where, his health worsening on Thursday, and having taken to his bed on the seventh day, on that day which physicians call critical, he was lethally struck down, repeating, indeed multiplying, these words, which the intensity of his thoughts, both of the illness and of the pain as well as indignation, extorted from him, because the mouth speaks from the abundance of the heart, 'Oh, the shame of a defeated king! Oh, the shame!' he struggled in his final moments. And thus, finally, among such wretched cries, the very herald of his own disgrace, he expired, overwhelmed and oppressed more than ended by natural death. From this, it is clear that the higher one is elevated by prosperity, the more forcefully they are cast down; and the more the bow is bent back, the more powerfully the arrow is propelled forward.

His igitur in hunc modum exactis, ad Chinonense castrum se rex deferri fecit; ubi invalescente valetudine feria quinta, et a qua decubuit septima, die videlicet quem physici criticum vocant, letaliter correptus, hæc ingeminando immo multiplicando verba, quae de reliquiis cogitationum vehementia tam morbi quam doloris pariter et indignationis extorsit, quoniam ex abundantia cordis os loqui solet, "Proh pudor de rege victo! proh pudor!" in extremis laboravit. Et sic demum inter aerumnosas hujusmodi voces, propria praco confusionis, exspiravit, obrutusque magis et oppressus quam naturali morte finitus occubuit. Ex quo patet quod, quanto [quis] secundis altius elevatur, tanto impetuosius ad imum demittitur; quantoque arcus magis retro curvatur, tanto sagitta fortius in anteriora propellitur.

                    Life of Archbishop Geoffrey of York Chapter 5. [6th July 1189] Having done that, because, "Pale death strikes the shacks of paupers and the towers of kings with the same foot," [Horace, Odes 1.4.13] the king [King Henry "Curtmantle" II of England (age 56)], finally succumbing to the sickness, breathed forth his spirit.
                
                    And just as a poor man stands out among such great wealth, just so at the end he was without ring, scepter, crown and nearly everything which is fitting for royal funeral rites; and many other things, which could be introduced as an example for all, the book "On the Instruction of a Prince", which this studious soul had proposed to write for a later age and precaution alike, describes diligently.
                
                    And then the body of the king was carried to Fontevrault [Map], the son attending the funeral procession along the way on foot, sometimes ahead and sometimes behind, when the body was placed in the church, behold Count Richard of Poitou, the oldest of the legitimate sons still living and the heir, at once came in. And when he entered the church and approached the body, the face of his father, having been denuded of the napkin with which it had been covered, was plainly visible. Which, when it appeared to all, just as if colored and with its usual fierceness, the count, not without growling of flesh and horror before the body, dropping to his knees in prayer for a little while, remained for scarcely an hour of Sunday prayer. But as soon as he had entered the church, just as those who were present maintain, both of the king’s nostrils emitted drops of blood; so much that those seated nearby and the attendants of the body had to wipe clean its mouth and face and wash them several times.

                    Gesta Regis Henrici by Benedict of Peterborough. [6th July 1189] Now the king of England, Henry, died in the year from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ 1289, in the month of July, on the day before the Nones of that same month, in the octave of the apostles Peter and Paul, on the 19th day of the moon, on a Thursday, at Chinon. And he was buried at Fontevraud, in the abbey there of nuns serving God.
                
                    On the day after his death, as he was being carried to burial dressed in royal attire, wearing a golden crown on his head, gloves on his hands, a golden ring on his finger, a scepter in his hand, shoes woven with gold, and spurs on his feet, girded with a sword, he lay with his face uncovered. When this was reported to his son, Count Richard, he came quickly to meet him. And as he arrived, immediately blood flowed from the nostrils of the dead king, as if his spirit were angered at his coming. Then the said count, weeping and wailing, accompanied the body of his father as far as Fontevraud [Map], and there had it buried.
                
                    Obiit autem rex Angliæ Henricus, anno ab Incarna- tione Domini nostri Jesu Christi MCLXXXIX, mense Julii, pridie nonas ejusdem mensis, in octavis apostolorum Petri et Pauli, Luna xix, feria quinta, apud Chinonem. Et sepultus est apud Fontem Eboraudi, in abbatia ibidem Deo servientium monialium.
                
                    In crastino autem obitus illius, cum portaretur ad sepeliendum vestitus regio apparatu, gestans coronam auream in capite, et habens chirothecas [in] manus et annulum aureum in digito, et sceptrum in manu, et calceamenta auro texta, et calcaria in pedibus, cinctus gladio, jacebat habens vultum discoopertum. Quod cum nunciatum esset Ricardo comiti filio suo, festinanter venit obviam ei. Et illo superveniente, statim ma- navit sanguis de naribus regis defuncti, ac si indignaretur spiritus ejus de adventu illius. Tum prædictus comes flens et ejulans, processit cum corpore patris sui usque ad Fontem Eboraudi, et ibi illud sepeliri fecit.

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