CIVIL WAR

Civil war occurred because subjects could not achieve their ends by constitutional means and rebellion had a chance of success. When one side was definitely the stronger, with the king in command or bereft of support, differences had to be resolved peacefully. The fifteenth century witnessed more than its share of civil war. Civil war made Henry IV into a king and repeatedly threatened to unseat him. Conflict in 1403-8 was largely confined to Wales and the north-east. The Wars of the Roses (c.1452-97) were brief and decisive campaigns separated by long tracts of peace. There were few sieges and little devastation: continuous hostilities were confined to the peripheries, to Northumbria, north Wales and Jersey. Popular insurrections occurred in every century until alternative modes of protest become effective. There were rebellions against every king. Yet civil war was always unnatural and unusual. Exceptional circumstances precipitated it.