The Middle Ages

The Middle Ages, or medieval period, runs from the Norman Conquest until about 1485. Almost all of it was a time of war — at home and abroad.

Wars in Wales, Scotland and Ireland

In Wales the English succeeded. In 1284 King Edward I's Statute of Rhuddlan annexed Wales to the English Crown, and great castles such as Conwy and Caernarvon held it down. The last Welsh rebellions were crushed by the mid-15th century, and English law and language were introduced.

Scotland was different: in 1314 Robert the Bruce led the Scots to victory over the English at Bannockburn, and Scotland stayed unconquered. Ireland was independent at the start of the period. English troops first went there to help the Irish king and stayed; by 1200 they ruled the Pale, the area around Dublin, and some lords elsewhere accepted the English king's authority.

Wars abroad

Many knights joined the Crusades, in which European Christians fought for the Holy Land. England also fought the Hundred Years War with France — which actually lasted 116 years. Its most famous battle was Agincourt in 1415, when Henry V's greatly outnumbered army beat the French. The English had left France by the 1450s.

Feudalism and the Black Death

The Normans used feudalism: the king granted land to lords, who in return supplied men to fight. Most peasants were serfs who farmed a small plot of their lord's land, had to work for him and could not leave. Southern Scotland had a similar system, but in the north of Scotland and in Ireland land belonged to members of the clans.

In 1348 the Black Death — probably a type of plague — arrived. About a third of England's population died, and a similar share in Scotland and Wales. With fewer people, less cereal was grown, labour was scarce and peasants demanded higher wages. A new class of big landowners, later called the gentry, emerged; people moved into towns, where a strong middle class grew. In Ireland the Pale shrank for a time.

Magna Carta and Parliament

Until 1215 there were few formal limits on the king. That year King John's noblemen forced him to accept the Magna Carta ('Great Charter'). It set out the idea that even the king is subject to the law, protected the nobles' rights and restricted the king's power to tax and to make or change laws.

Parliament grew out of the king's council of advisers and was called especially when he needed money. It split into two Houses: the House of Lords (nobles, great landowners and bishops) and the House of Commons (knights and wealthy townspeople, elected by only a small part of the population). Scotland's Parliament had three Houses called Estates: the lords, the commons and the clergy.

The idea that judges are independent of the government began in this period. English judges built up 'common law' by following earlier decisions (precedence) and tradition, while in Scotland laws were codified — written down.

A distinct identity: language, books and buildings

After 1066 the rulers spoke Norman French and the peasants Anglo-Saxon. The two merged into English, which is why English often has two similar words, such as 'demand' (French) and 'ask' (Anglo-Saxon). By 1400 English was used for official documents and was the preferred language of the royal court and Parliament.

Shortly before 1400 Geoffrey Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales, poems about pilgrims telling stories on the road to Canterbury. It was among the first books printed by William Caxton, the first person in England to use a printing press. In Scotland, Gaelic and Scots were spoken; John Barbour wrote The Bruce, a Scots poem about Bannockburn.

Castles were built across Britain and Ireland; Windsor and Edinburgh are still in use. Great cathedrals such as Lincoln were built, many with stained glass — York Minster's is famous. England was a major trading nation, exporting wool, and skilled foreigners came to work: weavers from France, engineers from Germany, glass makers from Italy and canal builders from Holland.

The Wars of the Roses

From 1455 the House of Lancaster (red rose) and the House of York (white rose) fought a civil war for the crown. It ended at the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485: Richard III of York was killed and Henry Tudor of Lancaster became Henry VII. He married Richard's niece, Elizabeth of York, uniting the families. The Tudor rose — a red rose with a white rose inside — symbolised the alliance.

Exam tip: Lancaster = red rose, York = white rose. The winner at Bosworth was the Lancastrian Henry Tudor; Richard III (York) died there. Order of dates: 1215 Magna Carta → 1284 Rhuddlan → 1314 Bannockburn → 1348 Black Death → 1415 Agincourt → 1485 Bosworth.