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Hello listeners. Now before I throw you over to the passions of a baying mob, I'd like to remind you of this is history's Royal Court on Patreon. That mob, we like to call them our Royal Favourites, is a wonderful community of passionate medieval history fans who help us all better understand the history behind each episode, which ranges from book recommendations to medieval themed events in your local area. So from Massachusetts to Melbourne, we've got you covered. And this season I'll be returning with another live Ask Me Anything just for My Favourites. Become a Royal Favourite to get ad free listening, bonus episodes and all that other Fun stuff on patreon.com thisishistory now on with the show.
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The wooden barrel bumps on the back of the cart as the horse pulls it out of London towards Smithfield, the large open space beyond the city walls. The crowd assembled to see it arrive have been waiting with bated breath. The Londoners part to let the cart through, then close ranks again, jostling to make sure everyone gets a good view. Royal heavies bark at rubberneckers, telling them to stay back. It's March 5, 1410 and wisps of smoke hang in the spring air. A platform has been erected here at Smithfield and on it sit several of the most senior men in the country. One of them is Thomas Arundel, Archbishop of Canterbury and until recently Chancellor of England. Another is 23 year old Henry, Prince of Wales, senior Prince of the Lancastrian dynasty and heir to the Plantagenet crown. But the eyes of the crowd aren't on Arundel or Henry. Everyone's looking at a guy tied to a wooden stake in in Front of them, dry wood is piled at his feet. And now that wooden barrel, open at both ends, is plonked over the top of him so that just his head and shoulders stick out. The guy's name is John Badby and he's a tailor from Evesham in the Midlands. He's a heretic condemned to death for holding scandalous religious opinions. Archbishop Arundel has interrogated Badby, who says he doesn't believe in some of the most basic tenets of Christian faith. So today at Smithfield, he's going to burn at the stake. And not just that. The barrel placed over him will ensure that the fire is as hot as it can be, incinerating his blasphemous body and. And sending his filthy soul by special delivery straight to hell. The crowd is getting restless for some action. Archbishop Arundel offers Badby one more chance to repent. The tailor shakes his head, so the executioner steps forward and lights the wood. The sticks flare and flames rush up, searing Badby's flesh. The people. But then, from the stage, something extraordinary happens. Someone runs forward, ordering the executioner to drag the barrel off Badby. Kick away the burning fuel. The onlookers are confused. Badby's not having the best time either. But the man who's run forward ignores them all. He holds Badby's head and whispers urgently in his blackened ear. Repent, he says, and you'll be under my protection for the rest of your life. A monthly pension, the whole works. There's only one man here with the power to go over the Archbishop's head and make that offer. It's Henry, Prince of Wales. The heir to the throne is offering to rescue Badby from the jaws of hell. He can save his life and his soul. The question is, does this heretic have the sense to be saved? I'm Dan Jones and from Sony Music Entertainment. This is history Season 8 of A Dynasty to Die For Episode 3 the Score One of my favourite tall stories from the Middle Ages is about the martyrdom of St. Lawrence. It originally dates from the third century AD, which was when St. Lawrence was doing his thing as a deacon in Rome. Now, in those days, Christians weren't very popular with Romans, and when the emperor of the day ordered a crackdown on the church, Lawrence was in trouble. But instead of keeping a low profile, he made fun of the emperor and as a result, he was condemned to die. The mode of execution picked for him was roasting over hot coals on a griddle. It was a nasty way to go, but all things considered St. Lawrence was kind of chill with it. It's said that about five minutes after his killers put him on the grill, he called out to say he was cooked on that side and ready to be flipped over. That's why today St. Lawrence is the patron saint of barbecue chefs and stand up comedians. I'm not kidding. Anyway, to return to where we started this episode, I remember St. Lawrence. Every time I think about March 1410 and the grisly fate of John Badby, the heretic tailor from Evesham, who found himself burning and then not burning in Smithfield. If there's one thing that's got to be worse than being burned at the stake, it's being half burned at the stake. But that's what happens to Badby. Just as he's at the point of being flombed all the way to Beelzebub's lair, Prince Henry comes rushing in and asks if heresy is his final answer or whether he wants to phone a friend. So what the literal blazes is going on here? Well, I'm glad you asked, because John Badby's tale of red hot Jesus doubting agony is crucial to understanding what's going on in Plantagenet, England, at the end of the first decade of Lancastrian rule. Badby, as I've said, is a heretic. Specifically, he's down with the teachings of the radical Oxford preacher John Wycliffe, or Wycliffe, no 1990s hip hop heads, that's not Praz and Lauryn Hill's mate from the Fugees. John Wycliffe, who was active in the 1370s and 1380s, was an academic who, ready or not, questioned the fundamentals of church teaching and practice. He went in for English translation of the Bible and a proto socialist doctrine of massive wealth and land redistribution. Most outrageously, Wycliffe said there's no such thing as transubstantiation. By this he meant that during the Christian Mass, the bread doesn't turn into Christ's actual flesh. By 1410, Wycliffe is long dead. But his ideas live on. And folk like Badby are hopped up on all sorts of wackadoo heretical stuff. Mostly the government turns a deaf ear. But their patience has its limits. Which is partly how Badby finds himself cooked medium rare in Smithfield in 1410. He's been espousing all sorts of Wycliffite ideas and has refused multiple polite requests to abandon his errors. Archbishop Arundel has decided to make an example of him. But that's not all there is to it, because in 4. In 1410, Wycliffism is not just considered out of bounds for good Christians, it's also a politically sensitive issue. And its followers, who are pejoratively called Lollards, are beginning to be seen as a serious menace to public order and the Plantagenet state. What's happened is this. At a Parliament in Westminster that opened in January, a Lollard petition has been presented calling for a wholesale reorganisation of English Church and state. The petitioners, following ideas Wycliffe came up with back in the day, want the English Church to be stripped of huge swathes of land, property and income. They argue that the money raised will be enough to solve all the English Crown's financial woes, paying for a hugely expanded pool of earls and knights to help fight wars, while kickstarting a new revolution in English education by funding 15 new universities and a reformed priesthood. They're not just asking for the freedom to hold forbidden views on transubstantiation. Lollards seem to threaten to the entire established church and, by extension, the moral fabric of the realm. So that's another reason why Arundel is making an example of Badby. But it's also, in a roundabout way, why young Prince Henry is trying to steal the show by interrupting the burning. He happens to have a few mates who are inclined towards Lollard views. There's no suggestion that he's a Lollard himself, but there are whispers that he's sympathetic to the political side of Lollardy, which has been causing such a stink in Parliament. Even more than that, however, in 1410, Prince Henry is at a sensitive moment in his career. For the last four and a bit years, his father, King Henry iv, has been in a bad way. Since chopping off the head of the Archbishop of York. Oopsie. The King has been struggling with a whole smorgasbord of illnesses, which feel a lot like karma. Things are so bad that he's signed off work by his doctors for long stretches. In his place, Prince Henry has stepped up to take hold of English government, chairing meetings of the Council and digging into the detail of policy. As a teenager, Prince Henry was given command of the Welsh wars against the rebel Owain Glyndwr. Now in his early 20s, he's across the whole of government. Just four months ago, he controversially reshuffled the Royal Council, getting his dad to sack Archbishop Arundel as Chancellor and installing one of his own allies instead. Arundel isn't happy. So when a major public incident like Badby's burning is taking place, Henry needs to show the people that it's now him and not Archbishop Arundel who's in charge of matters. That's why right now he's got hold of the half burned and agonised Badby and is promising him a pension, royal protection and all sorts of good things if he'll repent his heresy not for the Archbishop's sake, but for his Henry's. The trouble is, Bad B is a stubborn bastard, and even with the young Prince of Wales promising him a nice time and no more trouble, he won't recant his views. So eventually Henry has to concede that Bad B genuinely wants to go out. Like a Roman candle, he shrugs, orders the barrel put back over Badby and the flames relit. As one later writer who admired Badby as a martyr describes it, Badby suffers his miserable fate like a man. Londoners report that Badby's ghost turns up in their bedrooms that night and haunts them. Meanwhile, Prince Henry's tussle with Archbishop Arundel is far from over the Never mind ghosts, Henry has more to worry about from the living than the dead. This podcast is supported by FX's English teacher. Last year's critically acclaimed series returns to follow Evan, Gwen and Markie as they vie for their students divided attention. See why Cosmopolitan called its premiere season a masterclass of comedy, while glamour raved. It's the year's funniest and most heartwarming new comedy series, FX's English Teacher. All new Thursdays on FX. All episodes now streaming on Hulu.
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There'S a fearful hammering on the door of St Mary's Church in Oxford. The man doing the knocking is Archbishop Arundel. He's come to Oxford expecting to set up in this church and use it as his office for the week. But he's wasting his time. The church door is locked and the key has been very conveniently lost. Arundel can batter with his fists until the cows come home. This door isn't opening for anyone. What's more, there's a hooting crowd making fun of him. It's a little over a year since the burning of John Badby in London. But Arundel hasn't given up on his quest to root out heresy in England, with a sidebar of making life difficult for young Prince Henry. That's why he's come to Oxford, England's premier university town, where John Wycliffe made his name. Darren. Decades after his first heretical lectures, Oxford is still considered a hotbed of radical teaching, where woke academics delight in promoting crazy ideas and illegal books are traded and read with apparent impunity. Since Arundel has been sidelined from his government duties, he's leaning into his prerogatives as archbishop. These include, as he sees it, the right to carry out an official inspection of Oxford University and kick some heretic ass. The trouble is, the university doesn't take kindly to outside interference. The Chancellor, Richard Courtney, who happens to be a good pal of Prince Henry, is no fan of heresy. But he's even less of a fan of being told what to do. So he's given the order for the key to be lost and Arundel to be left standing in the street with his archiepiscopal dick in his hand. Needless to say, Arundel doesn't like this one bit, but he gets the message. He's locked out of his own office. There's no chance of any of the Oxford colleges opening their doors to him. He needs to chalk this one up to experience and go off and plot his next move. So off he stomps with as much dignity as he can muster, the church bells of Oxford mocking him as he goes. The dean of the college Arundel studied at when he was younger shouts that he hopes the devil breaks Arundel's neck. If we stop the tape here, this looks like Prince Henry and his ally, Richard Courtney of Oxford University, have just levelled the score at 11 last year, John Badby got char grilled. This year, Archbishop Arundel has been given a bloody nose. But the tape doesn't stop here, because there's someone who's been mostly missing from this story until this point. That's Prince Henry's father, King Henry iv. The old King is ill and increasingly convinced God hates him, but he's still the man with the crown, and that means he's the ultimate power in the realm. So when Archbishop Arundel leaves Oxford, he goes to have a pow wow with the King, and presumably he lays it on thick. Oxford, full of demented academics, soul of the realm in peril. Your son seems to be getting a bit too big for his boots. Whatever he says, and however he says it, the King now comes down on his side. Not so long ago, Henry IV had acquiesced when Prince Henry wanted Arundel removed from the Royal Council. But now he seems to want to issue a reminder that there's life in the old dog yet. The upshot is that within weeks, Arundel is back in Oxford, and this time he has direct orders from the King, confirming that it is entirely his right as archbishop to be let in. His orders state that he has the right to inspect Oxford as he chooses. Anyone who questions Arundel's right to determine what counts as forbidden doctrine is threatened with arrest and incarceration in the Tower of London. All of which does the trick. Courtney proves somewhat keener to rescue his own academic career than he is today, defend his university's academic freedom. He folds. No keys are lost. This time, Arendelle carries out a full inspection of Oxford, burning and banning books and commanding that defiant scholars can be whipped in public. There's nothing that anyone, neither Courtney nor Prince Henry, can do to overrule the King. They have to suck this one up. If the score between the Archbishop and Prince Henry was 1:1, it's now 2:1. And as they say so often in soccer commentary, it feels like the next goal is going to decide the match. Will it go the way of the ambitious young Prince Henry? Or has he been out, thought out, fought and overwhelmed? By the end of 1411, the answer to that question is going to be devastatingly clear.
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In early November 1411, three of Prince Henry's closest friends are marching on the outskirts of Paris with an army of Frenchmen. Dawn has yet to break their breath mists on the dark air as they move, but they and all the troops with them are marching with deadly purpose. This column of men is led by one of the most charismatic and controversial characters in French history. His name is John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, and he's a troublemaker par excellence. He leads a faction in French politics seeking to control the mad king of France, Charles vi, who you can learn all about in our last miniseries, the Glass King. French politics has turned murderous lately, and the country is on the brink of open civil war. Right now, John the Fearless is taking aim at his enemies in the faction known as the Armagnacs, and he's planning to attack them in a stronghold near Paris called Saint Cloud. Henry's mates are here to help. They are three noblemen of about his age. The young Earl of Warwick, an aristocrat with Lollard tendencies called John Oldcastle, and the Earl of Arundel, who's the nephew of the ornery archbishop with whom Prince Henry has an ongoing beef. They're energetic guys, all loyal to Henry, and the fact that they're in France is a demonstration of just how much influence the Prince has over England right now. Supporting John the Fearless is a controversial move, but Prince Henry thinks it's a way to sow maximum chaos in France in the hope that the English can benefit. As the column of troops that the three nobles have joined nears the fortified town of Saint Cloud, the signal for attack goes up. And now they're running along with hundreds of Burgundian troops who smash their way through makeshift barricades on the edge of town. They tear down roadblocks, kick down doors and haul out terrified citizens to be butchered in the streets. A barrage of stones shot from catapults backs them up. Great flying boulders punching holes in the sides of buildings. The young Earl of Arendelle leads an assault on a church where Armagnacs are cowering in fear of the Burgundian assault. He wants to take prisoners, but the Burgundians at his back are having none of it. They're all for slaughtering every person they come across. Fighting in Saint Cloud goes on from morning until midday, and by the end of it, the place is a scene of carnage. The timber bridge across the river has collapsed and dozens of men who are trying to flee across it have drowned. There are bloodied bodies lying all over the streets. Buildings are burned out shells. It's a huge victory for John the Fearless, which basically gives him control of the mad King Charles VI and earns the English who've taken part in it plenty of kudos, although not as much money as they were hoping for. The Burgundians aren't interested in ransoming the prisoners who have been taken at Saint Cloud. They seem to like executing them, chopping their bodies into little bits and carrying them around the streets of Paris on sticks. Well, whatever floats your boat. The English nobles stay a while to watch the meat puppet show, tend their wounds, then head on back to Albion's Shore to tell Prince Henry how well they've done. They figure he's going to be delighted with them, and since he's the power behind, or indeed in front of his sickly father's throne, they're going to get big, fat pats on the back. And that's exactly what you would have thought if, like them, you'd left England a few months ago. But when the lads get home, they get a nasty shock. Prince Henry is no longer the political force he was at the end of the summer. He's not even in charge of the Royal Council anymore. And not just that, it looks like his father has decided to cut him off completely from the royal succession and declare one of his other sons his heir. It's a political bombshell which threatens to push England to the brink of its own civil war. Find out exactly what's happened next time on this is History. As ever, thanks for listening. Now the royal favourites know the score. It's time to help me out with a question. When I was writing this episode, I couldn't help but bring St Lawrence, the patron saint of barbecues and stand up comedians, to mind. Now, you keen purveyors of all things medieval, will, I'm sure, know of another patron saint of something niche. So go forth and please find me a patron saint who looks after something equally, if not more funny than St. Lawrence. The best answers will go in the running to win a copy of my book Henry V. Look out for producer Al's question on patreon@patreon.com thisishistory.