Henry I |
|
3 August 1100– 1 December 1135 |
Reign |
5 August 1100 |
Coronation |
c. 1068, Selby, Yorkshire |
Born |
1 December 1135, Saint-Denis-en- |
Died |
Lyons (now Lyons-la- |
|
Forêt), Normandy |
|
Reading Abbey, Reading, England |
Buried |
William II |
Predecessor |
Stephen (de facto), Empress |
Successor |
Matilda (de jure) |
|
Matilda of Scotland |
Consort |
(c. 1080– 1118) |
|
Adeliza of Louvain ( 1103– 1151) |
|
Robert, 1st Earl of Gloucester |
Issue |
(illeg., c. 1090– 1147) |
|
Empress Matilda (c. 1102– 1167) |
|
Norman |
Royal Hous |
|
e |
William II |
Father |
King
Henry I
Ruled from 1100 to 1135.
He was called Beauclerc for his scholarly interests and Lion of Justice for refinements which he brought about in the rudimentary administrative and legislative machinery of the time.
He granted the baronage a Charter of Liberties, which formed a basis for subsequent challenges to rights of kings and presaged the Magna Carta, which subjected the King to law.
Henry I
He established the biannual Exchequer to reform the treasury.
The differences between the Anglo-Saxon and Norman populations began to break down during his reign and he himself married a daughter of the old Saxon royal house “King Malcolm III” (Edith > Matilda of Scotland).
Matilda of Scotland
He made peace with the church after the disputes of his brother's reign.
Robert Curthose
In 1105, Henry led an expeditionary force across the English Channel towards Normandy to eliminate the constant threat from his brother Robert Curthose and to obviate the drain on his fiscal resources.
After Henry had defeated his brother's Norman army at Tinchebray , he imprisoned Robert, initially in the Tower of London, subsequently at Devizes Castle and later at Cardiff.
Legitimate children
He had two children by Matilda (Edith), who died in 1118: Matilda, born 1102 (Which would later become Empress Matilda), and William Adelin, born 1103.
Disaster struck when William, perished in the wreck of the White Ship on 25 November 1120 off the coast of Normandy. Also among the dead were two of Henry's illegitimate children, as well as a niece, Lucia-Mahaut de Blois.
The White |
Ship |
Second marriage
On 29 January 1121, he married Adeliza, daughter of Godfrey I of Leuven, Duke of Lower Lotharingia and Landgrave of Brabant, but there were no children from this marriage.
Henry I, Left without male heirs, he took the unprecedented step of making his barons swear to accept his daughter Empress Matilda, widow of Henry V, the Holy Roman Emperor, as his heir.
Henry died on 1 December 1135 of food poisoning from eating "a surfeit of lampreys" (of which he was excessively fond) at Saint-Denis-en-Lyons (now Lyons-la-Forêt) in Normandy.
His remains were sewn
into the hide of a bull to preserve them on the journey, and then taken back to England and were buried at Reading Abbey.The Abbey was destroyed during the Reformation and no trace
of his tomb has survived, the probable site being covered by St James' School.
Henry's royal seal
Silver pennies of Henry |
I |
Early 14th-century depiction of Henry
Early 14th-century depiction of Henry mourning the death of his son (William Adelin).