ABSTRACT
The port of Bayonne has long enjoyed a reputation as the home of expert seamen who were also skilled and experienced shipwrights. Some always regarded the port as a lair of pirates but it might well be thought highly likely that, in the period of English rule, the seamen of Bayonne would employ their formidable talents in the service of their king-duke. The duchy of Aquitaine, including Gascony and its most prominent ports Bordeaux and Bayonne, came under the direct rule of the King of England as duke in 1204 on the death of Henry II's widow Eleanor of Aquitaine. It is certainly the case that when the Crown did demand the assistance of ships from Bayonne, the writ was frequently addressed to the mayor of the town in terms which might seem to presume the existence of an obligation of this sort.
