ABSTRACT
The Norman and Angevin kings of England had some obnoxiousways of dealing with courtiers who had offended them. The Angevins were the more sophisticated. With two sensational exceptions (the disposal of Arthur of Brittany and the deliberate starvation of the Briouze family), the time of King John was not notable for political murder. John was not given to political executions amongst his barons. Indeed, on one occasion he even expressed dissatisfaction with a baron who had (legally) executed a treacherous dependent. He was not a particularly bloody tyrant, however unpleasant and insecure a man he was. The Normans had fewer scruples. John’s great-grandfather, Henry I, the Conqueror’s son and a man much praised of late for his sophistication as a ruler, had personally hurled a traitor to his death from a tower in Rouen. But as the ground approached, Henry’s victim at least had the consolation that his learned executioner had disposed of him in the same way as the Ancient Romans dealt with treason to the Republic: precipitation, from the Tarpeian rock in the Capitol.1
