Edward II: September 1313

1313 September

Introduction September 1313

Westminster

23 September - 15 November

For the writs of summons see PW, II, ii, 100-19

(There is no surviving roll for this parliament)

Following the unsuccessful Westminster parliament, which had terminated on 25 July without any useful contact between the king and his opponents, another parliament was immediately summoned on 26 July to meet at Westminster on 23 September. Little is known about the events of the following weeks until, on 28 August, the king wrote asking the earl of Pembroke to meet with other members of the Council at Chertsey on 17 September to discuss the business of the coming parliament. On the same date the king also requested Philip IV to send his chamberlain Enguerrand de Marigny and the French envoy of 1312, count Louis of Evreux, to assist in the impending negotiations with the barons. While on their way to parliament in mid-September the earls of Arundel, Lancaster, Gloucester, Hereford, and Warwick met at Brackley, ostensibly to hold a tournament, planned for 19 September, which the king tried to prohibit on 10 and 16 September. There can be little doubt however that before or after the tournament they met to concert a common baronial approach to the king when they reached Westminster. It is also possible that the king sent the earl of Pembroke to find out the magnates' intentions and report them to the Council at Chertsey on 17 September, since on 10 September Pembroke was at Witney, only twenty miles from Brackley. (fn. f1313sint-1)

The writs of summons were issued at Westminster on 26 July for a parliament to meet at Westminster on 23 September. The writs state that the king has ordained the holding of a parliament to have a 'colloquium and tractatum' with those present. A marginal note on the Close Roll also describes the meeting as a parliament.

Writs of summons were sent to the archbishop of York, the keeper of the archdiocese of Canterbury, 'sede vacante', sixteen bishops (including three Welsh bishops), forty-six abbots, and four priors; to ten earls (Norfolk, Lancaster, Gloucester, Surrey, Pembroke, Richmond, Hereford, Warwick, Arundel, Oxford) and one hundred barons; thirty-two royal judges and clerks; and for the election of representatives of the knights of the shire and burgesses, and of the lower clergy.

The writs of summons issued on 26 July gave the purpose of the parliament as 'various arduous affairs touching the king and the state of the kingdom' which the king had proposed to discuss at the Parliament held at Westminster on 8 July, but which 'for certain reasons' remained undiscussed.

According to the account in the Vita Edwardi Secundi , the magnates came to London on 23 September, the day that the parliament was due to begin, but for some time had no contact with the king, who was reluctant to meet them. They then demanded that he should fulfil his promises of pardon, and finally under pressure the king gave way. It is not known what demands the magnates made or if they differed in any way from their earlier ones in March 1313, but there was certainly a period of negotiation and mediation between the magnates' arrival and the king's issue of pardons. The mediation was carried out by the papal envoys, cardinal Arnold of St. Prisca and bishop Arnold of Poitiers, and by the earls of Gloucester and Richmond. Louis of Evreux is also said to have taken part, but this must have been at a late stage of the negotiations, since he and Enguerrand de Marigny were still awaited on 14 October. The first sign of impending agreement was on 4 October, when the sections of the Ordinances dealing with Henry de Beaumont and his sister Isabella de Vescy were abrogated as being to the king's prejudice. By 14 October the negotiations were sufficiently advanced for the magnates to make a formal submission to the king, and on this date the earls of Lancaster, Warwick, Hereford and Arundel, Henry Percy, Robert Clifford, and John Botetourt came before the king at Westminster Hall, where they asked for and received his pardon. To mark the settlement, the earls dined with the king that night and returned the honour the following night. The opposition magnates attended parliament for the first time on 15 October and on the next day the king's pardons to them were published. The list was headed by Lancaster, Hereford, and Warwick, by Percy, Botetourt and Clifford, and by two of Lancaster's chief retainers, Robert Holland and Gruffudd de la Pole. The earl of Surrey was also included, presumably because of his share in the pursuit of Gaveston in 1312. The earl of Pembroke, who was now in effect the king's chief councillor, did not seek pardon for his role in the events of 1312, but at least eleven of his retainers did so. (fn. f1313sint-2)

No further decisions emerged from parliament until the end of October, which suggests that hard bargaining was still in progress. On 30 October the prelates, earls and barons declared in parliament that it was the king's prerogative alone to bear arms. This was an important concession, which fulfilled the magnates' promise in the treaty of December 1312 that they would stop bringing their armed retainers to parliaments once they had received pardon. On 5 November the magnates were given a formal acquittance for their restoration of Gaveston's property, as they had demanded after the first acquittance in February 1313. On 6 November the king confirmed his earlier ordinance giving a full pardon to the earls for Gaveston's death, but in return they had to agree to a pardon to Gaveston's former adherents, which they had previously refused to concede. The dispute between Lancaster's two retainers, Gruffudd de la Pole and Fulk Lestrange, and the king's chamberlain, John Charlton, which had been a major problem in January and February 1313, was settled on 3 November by the appointment of new justices in place of those of December 1312, and by the pardoning of all three parties on 6 November. As in the treaty of December 1312, the Ordinances were not mentioned in the settlement, nor was the removal of any royal ministers required; and Gaveston and his supporters were not described as enemies of the king and the kingdom. With these problems at last removed from political debate, at least in public, the king had regained some of the freedom of action within his own kingdom for which he had been striving since the death of Gaveston in June 1312. By dint of persistence and the skilful use of both domestic and external political support Edward had achieved a great deal. The provision on 1 October 1313 of his old ally and friend, Walter Reynolds, bishop of Worcester and Chancellor, as archbishop of Canterbury in succession to Winchelsey was yet another indication of his success. Nonetheless, the peace between Edward and the barons was an uneasy one. It was unlikely for example that the last had been heard of the Ordinances. The mutual distrust was expressed by the authors of the Flores Historiarum and of the Lanercost chronicle who remarked that 'the king always kept his distance from the earls, as before, led on by false counsel' and that 'the king promised many things to them, which afterwards he did not fulfil'. (fn. f1313sint-3)

As in the case of the parliaments of March and July 1313, it is not clear what else, if anything, had been done during the parliament. If petitions were received and answered, there is no evidence to show this, although the long period between the formal opening of parliament on 23 September and the attendance of the magnates on 15 October might have allowed time for such business. On the other hand the king's council was probably fully occupied with negotiating with the opposition barons and unable to turn its attention to other matters. The absence of a Parliament Roll may again indicate that, despite the great political importance of the agreements reached, so far as the king was concerned, there had been nothing to record. As already noted, the king was given a grant of taxation during the parliament, in the form of a twentieth and a fifteenth on moveables This was to be collected by 25 June 1314, but on 12 April 1314 the king asked for all to be collected in some counties by 17 May and in others by 3 June. The money was to be used for a new campaign in Scotland, for which agreement had been obtained by 28 November, but which was certainly discussed before parliament ended on 12 November. On 26 November writs were issued summoning another parliament to meet at Westminster on 21 April 1314. In the event this did not meet because of the deteriorating military situation in Scotland. In the meantime Edward had further improved his finances when, on 12 December, he crossed to Boulogne for a meeting at Montreuil with Philip IV whose approval, as suzerain of Aquitaine, was required for a large papal loan to Edward secured by the revenues of the duchy. Edward returned to England on 20 December. The loan agreement was confirmed on 20 January 1314 in the king's chamber at Westminster, and the money amounting to 160,000 florins, equivalent to £25,000 sterling, was received on the king's behalf in March, just in time for the coming campaign in Scotland. (fn. f1313sint-4)