A variety of circumstances were favourable to the power of Henry II. at his accession. He united in his own person the rights of both the Saxon and Norman dynasties. He possessed immense dominions on the Continent; he was Count of Anjou, Duke of Normandy, Duke of Guienne, Maine, Saintonge, Poitou, Auvergne, Périgord, Augoumois and Limousin. He married his third son, Geoffrey, while still a child, to the infant heiress of the duchy of Brittany. He soon became engaged in war with the nobility and the clergy. He revoked all the gifts of the royal domains which had been granted by Stephen and Matilda, and regained by arms all that was not restored to him peaceably. He demolished a large number of the feudal fortresses. No coalition of the barons had as yet been formed, and their individual power was utterly unable to compete with that of Henry; they therefore submitted. The king also rallied around him a great number of interests by the maintenance of strict order, and by the appointment of itinerant justices to secure a more equitable administration of the laws. His struggle with the clergy was more stormy, and its success less complete; for the clergy, who were already constituted into a most powerful corporation, and were sustained from without by the Holy See, had found within their own body a chieftain capable of resisting even the greatest monarch. Thomas Becket, born in London in 1119, had advanced so far in the favour of Henry as to be appointed his Lord High Chancellor. His services, his devotedness, the magnificence of his mode of life, all combined to persuade Henry that, by elevating Becket to the highest ecclesiastical dignities, he would gain a powerful supporter in the church; he, therefore, had him appointed Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of the kingdom. {276} Constitutions Of Clarendon. But no sooner was Becket appointed to this office than he devoted himself to the interests of his order, and boldly undertook to exercise, and even to extend the rights of his position. A clerk had committed a murder; Becket punished him according to the laws of the clergy: Henry desired to have him judged by the civil law; Becket resisted; and Henry seized this opportunity for attacking openly and systematically the ecclesiastical power. He assembled the bishops, and inquired of them whether they would submit to the ancient laws of the realm, or not; and they were forced to consent to do so. The famous Council of Clarendon was convoked in 1164 to define these laws, and fix the limits of the two powers. The king had conciliated the support of the lay barons. Sixteen articles resulted from the deliberations of this assembly; they are to the following effect: 1. All suits concerning the advowson and presentation of churches shall be determined in the civil courts.