#No fear shakespeare henry iv part 1 series#

#No fear shakespeare henry iv part 1 series#

Starting in 1453, Henry had a series of mental breakdowns, and tensions mounted between Margaret and Richard of York over control of the incapacitated King's government and over the question of succession to the English throne.

Queen Margaret did not remain unpartisan and took advantage of the situation to make herself an effective power behind the throne.ДЄmidst military disasters in France and a collapse of law and order in England, the Queen and her clique came under accusations, especially from Henry VI's increasingly popular cousin Richard, Duke of York, of misconduct of the war in France and misrule of the country. Regional magnates and soldiers returning from France formed and maintained increasing numbers of private armed retainers, with whom they fought one another, terrorised their neighbours, paralysed the courts, and dominated the government. With Henry effectively unfit to rule, power was exercised by quarrelsome nobles, while factions and favourites encouraged the rise of disorder in the country. The peace policy failed, leading to the murder of one of Henry's key advisers, William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, and the war recommenced, with France taking the upper hand by 1453, Calais was Henry's only remaining territory on the continent.ДЄs the situation in France worsened, there was a related increase in political instability in England. Partially in the hope of achieving peace, in 1445 Henry married Charles VII's niece, the ambitious and strong-willed Margaret of Anjou. His ineffective reign saw the gradual loss of the English lands in France. Unlike his father, Henry is described as timid, shy, passive, well intentioned and averse to warfare and violence he was also at times mentally unstable.

He found his realm in a difficult position, faced with setbacks in France and divisions among the nobility at home. His early reign, when several people were ruling for him, saw the pinnacle of English power in France, but subsequent military, diplomatic, and economic problems had seriously endangered the English cause by the time Henry was declared fit to rule in 1437.

He is the only English monarch to have been also crowned King of France, in 1431. Henry inherited the long-running Hundred Years' War (1337вЂ“1453), in which his uncle Charles VII contested his claim to the French throne. The only child of Henry V, he succeeded to the English throne at the age of nine months upon his father's death, and succeeded to the French throne on the death of his maternal grandfather, Charles VI, shortly afterwards. Henry VI (6 December 1421 вЂ“ ) was King of England from 1422 to 1461 and again from 1470 to 1471, and disputed King of France from 1422 to 1453.