Louis: The French Prince Who Invaded England (3 page)

6 Dover Castle. The stronghold was heavily fortified during the reign of Henry II, and was an imposing structure by the time of Louis’s attempt to besiege it in 1216.

7 The north wall of Dover Castle, at the place where Louis and his men made a breakthrough and breached the wall, only to be pushed back before they could force their way farther inside.

8 The opposite end of the castle spectrum: the remains of the small keep at Odiham Castle in Hampshire, where Louis’s army was held up for a week by a garrison of just thirteen men.

9 A charter issued by Louis in 1216 while he was in England, in which he grants the manor of Grimsby to William of Huntingfield. The first five words of the charter are the abbreviated Latin for
Ludovicus domini regis Francie primogenitus
, or ‘Louis, eldest son of the lord king of France’ – Louis was not at this point attempting to style himself as king of England.

10 Louis needed to effect repairs to many of the castles he captured. This image of Guédelon in France (where a castle is currently being constructed using only the tools and techniques of the thirteenth century) shows stone blocks and wooden scaffolding which match the descriptions of Louis’s repairs to Winchester in 1217.

11 The battle of Lincoln, 1217, from an image in Matthew Paris’s
Chronica Majora
. Note the crossbowman in the castle, the French fleeing from the city and the count of Perche being stabbed in the eye.

12 The battle of Sandwich, 1217, from an image in Matthew Paris’s
Chronica Majora
. The English archers shoot pots full of blinding lime across at the French, and (on the right) Eustace the Monk is beheaded. The scene is observed by those lords and prelates who remain on land.

13 Louis and Blanche are crowned king and queen of France, in an illustration dating from the mid-fourteenth century.

14 Louis’s seal as king of France shows him crowned, enthroned and holding a sceptre.

15 A French silver
denier
of Louis VIII. The inscriptions on the obverse and reverse read lvdovicvs rex (‘King Louis’) and tvronvs civi, indicating that the coin was minted in Tours.

16 The siege of La Rochelle, 1224, with the royal army’s counterweight trebuchets in action. A crowned Louis receives the submission of the town.