Product Description

This biography provides a comprehensive reappraisal of Henry II, the man and king. W.L. Warren explores a whole range of contemporary sources to illuminate the king's policy and personality, as well as the events of his reign.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #195140 in Books
• Published on: 2000-09-19
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 730 pages

Customer Reviews

A powerful, compulsively readable portrait
The English Monarchs series has brought the highest standards of historical scholarship to the wide audience. Leading historians scrutinize the lives of the kings and queens of England and explore the cumulative impact of the longest permanent governing institution in Europe.

This outstanding biography is a revealing portrait of a complex and fascinating figure, the book is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the politics and culture of the English middle ages. Much learning, skillfully deployed as here, evokes pleasure as well as admiration.

A book to be recommended

Henry II: dysfunctional, and effective
"From the devil they came. To the devil they shall return." Abbé Bernard of Clairvaux (later Saint Bernard) pronounced that uncharitable verdict on the Angevin line. Legend has Bernard voicing his opinion after taking one look at the infant Henry of Anjou, child of Geoffrey, Count of Anjou and his consort, the Empress Matilda.

Nothing deterred, the infant Henry grew to inherit Anjou, as its count (1151). Then came his conquests by might or marriage: Normandy, Aquitaine and Poitou, before claiming England as King Henry II (1154-1189). After 1154, Henry II and his consort, Eleanor of Aquitaine, ruled a swathe of land stretching from the Scottish border to the Pyrenees, the Angevin Empire.

Perhaps Abbé Bernard was guided in his prognostication by the legend that the House of Anjou descended from the fairy Melusine, a malevolent sprite. There is no question that male members of the family, including Henry, were subject to incendiary fits of rage, one of which sent Eleanor into exile until Henry's death. People attached to the courts of alpha-male Angevins, especially Henry, could expect a turbulent life.

Henry II's place in history is burdened by bad headlines and his sometimes flawed judgment. Appointing his friend Chancellor Thomas Becket to be archbishop of Canterbury was an error from the start. ("Was it because you held him in too much liking, or in too slight respect?" Eleanor asks, elsewhere.) Becket's murder might have proved fatal to Henry's reputation had Henry not been blessed with twin powers of recovery: amazing decisiveness and speed of action. Then there were the extraordinary rebellions against their father by Henry's sons, conflagrations fanned, perhaps, by Eleanor, and again, perhaps on account of Henry's ceaseless whoring.

I write this pointed preamble to stress that W.L. Warren has not been misled by Henry's lurid press. Warren is even-handed, recognizing, and giving credit to, Henry's tireless labors in restoring an England ruined by nineteen years of civil war. Henry was a capable administrator and a fair-minded man. Henry, with Becket, established county courts in England and unified a code of laws to be evenly applied by competent judges. Henry was responsible for legislating 12-man juries (adopting the unit of commerce, the dozen), and employing juries in civil cases (Clarendon, 1166; Northampton, 1176). Henry's attention to property rights and contract law gave England a commercial edge that soon manifest itself in the growth and rising prosperity of new and expanding towns.

In short, W.L. Warren has captured Henry II to the life, the man and his reign, warts, triumphs and all. Warren's "Henry II" not only brings us the man as a whole: his "Henry II" is entertaining to read.

Robert Fripp, author of
"Power of a Woman: Memoirs of a Turbulent Life: Eleanor of Aquitaine"

An excelent and readable biography of the first Angevin king
W.L. Warren, who has also written about King John and Richard, writes with a lively style that often makes one forget that Henry II is a scholarly book of History. Anexcellent resourse for those interested in the formation of the Plantagenet dominions (commonly called the Angevin Empire).