VENICE

Italy remained divided among city-states, German and French nobles, the Holy Roman Empire and the Pope (Papal States) until the 1800's. Germany also was usually divided among powerful dukes and barons until the 1800's. Christians and Moors fought for control of Spain until the 1500's. Only England and France developed into strong states resembling their modern form by the end of the Middle Ages. The difference was that monarchs came to control their vassals in centralized governments.

ENGLAND

Harold Earl Godwin was elected as the last Saxon king by the Anglo-Saxon nobles in 1066. He surprised and defeated a Norwegian invasion force in the north. Then William, duke of Normandy invaded in the south to take the throne he claimed had been promised to him. The Norman knights and archers quickly defeated the exhausted Anglo-Saxons at Hastings. King Harold fell in battle.

This Duke of Normandy now also became William the Conqueror, King of England. He was determined to establish a strong dynasty. He kept much of the best land as royal domain. The rest was divided as scattered fiefs among his Norman barons and some Angle-Saxon (lord of shires) earls, willing to swear allegiance. He forced all subject, however, to swear first allegiance to the king as liege lord.

Later monarchs gradually restricted the nobles' right to build castles and have private armies. Royal officials called sheriffs enforced royal laws and collected taxes and fines in each shire. Under Henry II, the Crown also took charge of criminal law with judges appointed by the king and a jury system of a dozen peers (equals).

There were occasional revolts but no widespread rebellion until the reign of King John. He was badly in need of money for warfare with France. His older brother, Richard I, had nearly bankrupted the kingdom by his participation in the Third Crusade and his ransom. Since the nobles would not give full support in feudal fees, John increased fines and taxes by royal decree. The Great Council had not been called together for approval. His later defeat by the French finally caused a general rebellion led by the barons (English nobles who held their lands in trust directly from the king.) who were upset with being "illegally" taxed for a losing cause.

PARLIAMENT

In 1215, the barons forced King John to sign the Magna Carta. This document gave no rights to the common people but it did establish the principle that even the English king had to obey the law. An essential foundation of Western democracy is this idea that no one is above the rule of the law. Also, the king could no longer raise any money without the consent of the Great Council. This later became the democratic principle - no taxation without consent. The meetings of the Great Council were called parliaments (from the Norman word parler). Representatives of the knights and the town merchants were added in 1265. By the 1300's, this expanded advisory body was itself called parliament.

During the Hundred Years War, the English kings always needed money. Parliament cleverly traded tax increases for increases in their own political powers such as:

1. consent for war

2. consent for all new laws and taxes

3. the right to private debate

4. the right to impeach ministers and royal officials (impeach - to remove from office and prosecute in courts)

The knights and the merchants began to meet separately as the House of Commons. The higher nobles and bishops became known as the House of Lords. There was a rough balance among the king, the lords and the commoners. The political power of the king or the lords was balanced by the economic power of the knights and towns men within this small country. This meant that a united Parliament (rare) could overpower the king. Monarchy by the king with the advice of Parliament was becoming government by Parliament with the king as supervisor.

Yet this gradual process was not without setbacks and conflicts. Henry Tudor (VII) ended the first English civil war, the Wars of the Roses, in 1485. He controlled Parliament by destroying much of the power of the nobles and avoiding expenses requiring approval. By 1500 his efforts had caused England's weak form of feudalism to disappear.

FRANCE

It took the French kings until 1500 just to unite all their country under their unchallenged rule. By 1200, the English monarchy had control of more than half of France, mainly through arranged marriages. It was King Philip Augustus who took back northern France from King John of England in 1214. By the Treaty of Paris (1250), the English finally gave up their territory in France (except Gascony), but they were determined to regain it later.

This led to the Hundred Years' War fought between England and France, with intermissions from 1337 to 1453. The English used hired men-at-arms and longbow men to slaughter the French knights and crossbowmen in the key battles of Cerci, Poitiers (1356) and Agincourt (1415). It began when King Edward III of England claimed the French throne.

Just when it seemed that the English had won this war, the French were rallied in 1424 by a peasant girl, Jeanne d'Arc. She believed that God had spoken to her through visions of saints. She felt her mission was to have the lazy and cowardly Dauphin (heir to the French throne) crowned and to drive the English out of France. Joan of Arc gave the French army the leadership and confidence to win (saved Orleans). Unfortunately, the king and his commanders came to resent taking orders from this young woman. This uncooperative attitude caused Joan to become reckless (taking foolish risks). She was first wounded, and then later captured by Burgundians. The ungrateful French King Charles VII, made no attempt to help her. The English were anxious to ruin her reputation for fear she become a martyr. They forced a French Church court to convict her as an agent of Satan - a witch. She was tricked into a confession but she later denied it. The English burned her at the stake anyway in 1431.

The ashamed and enraged French began to battle back and continued to win mainly due to disunity among the English. Finally, out of all France, only the port of Calais on the English Channel was left in English hands. English kings simply did not have the resources to permanently control large section of France. The major consequence was hostility between France and England, which lasted almost to World War I.