Edward I. and Philip IV.
The "model parliament" of 1295.
Philip III. of France, who had always pursued a friendly policy with his
cousin of England, had died in 1285, and had been succeeded by his son
Philip IV., a prince of a very different type, the most able and
unscrupulous of all the dynasty of Capet. In 1294 he played a most
dishonourable trick upon King Edward. There had been some irregular and
piratical fighting at sea between English and Norman sailors, in which
the latter had been worsted. When called to account for the doings of
his subjects, as well as for certain disputes in Gascony, the English
king promised redress, and, on the suggestion of Philip, surrendered, as
a formal act of apology, the six chief fortresses of Guienne, which were
to be restored when reparation had been made. Having garrisoned the
places, Philip suddenly changed his line, refused to continue the
negotiations, and declared the whole duchy forfeited. Edward was forced
into war, after having been tricked out of his strongholds. Just after
his first succours had sailed for the Gironde, the great Welsh rebellion
of 1294 broke out, and the king was compelled to turn aside to repress
it. This he accomplished in the next spring, but meanwhile hardly a
foothold remained to him in Gascony. He was then preparing to cross the
Channel in person, when Scottish affairs began to become threatening.
King John declared himself unable to restrain the indignation of his
subjects at the attempt to enforce English suzerainty over Scotland, and
in July 1295 leagued himself with Philip of France, and expelled from
his realm the chief supporters of the English alliance. Finding himself
involved in two wars at once, Edward made an earnest appeal to his
subjects to rise to the occasion and "because that which touches all
should be approved of all" summoned the celebrated "model parliament" of
November 1295, which exactly copied in its constitution Montfort's
parliament of 1265, members from all cities and boroughs being summoned
along with the knights of the shires, and the inferior clergy being also
represented by their proctors. This system henceforth became the normal
one, and the English parliament assumed its regular form, though the
differentiation of the two houses was not fully completed till the next
century. Edward was voted liberal grants by the laity, though the clergy
gave less than he had hoped; but enough money was obtained to fit out
two armies, one destined for the invasion of Scotland, the other for
that of Gascony.
Invasion of Scotland.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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