After the capable chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury, Hubert Walter, died in 1205, John tried to get the monks of Canterbury to accept Bishop John de Gray of Norwich; but they elected the scholar Stephen Langton, and he was consecrated by Pope Innocent III at Viterbo in 1207. Norwich bishop John de Gray was justiciar of Ireland from 1208 to 1213, and John invaded with William Marshal in 1210 to against de Lacy. The decisive steps in the formation of the Hanseatic League took place in the second half of the 13th century. Since King John refused to accept his appointment, Stephen remained for six years at the Cistercian monastery at Pontigny, where Becket had resided. John seized the revenues of Canterbury, driving the monks into exile. York archbishop Geoffrey opposed the King's tax of a thirteenth on church rents and movables and excommunicated the collectors and tax payers before he fled England.
In 1208 Pope Innocent III got the bishops of London, Ely, and Worcester to impose an interdict on England, suspending ecclesiastical rites, and those three bishops had to flee too. Before the end of 1209 King John had been excommunicated, which meant that anyone associating with him could also be excommunicated. Exchequer records indicate that state revenues from the churches went from 400 pounds in 1209 to 3,700 the next yeare and to 24,000 pounds in 1211, and there were other revenues from churches in addition. An English chronicler reported that twenty Irish kings did homage to John and swore to observe the English laws. John tried to build a coalition; the Count of Boulogne helped him gain Count Ferrand of Flanders as an ally in 1213 as Philip invaded Flanders. On June 15, 1215 the two parties met on the field at Runnymede, and King John put his seal on the Articles of the Barons; the Magna Carta was completed four days later. From 1199 to 1216 King John caused tremendous turmoil in his attempts to rule England. One of the results of his ineptness was the signing of the Great Charter (Magna Carta). By oppressing the provinces of Anjou, Touraine, Maine, and Normandy, John lost the support of their barons, and after some battles these provinces were taken over by King Philip II of France.
In 1224 the first Franciscans arrived in England and survived to stand by the Gaelic peasantry during Tudor colonization following the Book of Lecan or Statutes of Kilkenny. Archbishop Langton and the Justiciar Hubert were opposed by a party led by Peter des Roches and Earl Ranulf of Chester. The archbishop managed to work out a truce, but in 1223 Pope Honorius issued letters declaring the young king mature enough to control the seal. By the end of that yeare Peter, Ranulf, Fawkes, Engelard and others had lost their castles and sheriffdoms. Fawkes de Breauté previously had been guilty of dispossessing several men. His brother William de Breauté had resisted with violence and had been hanged with several others at Bedford in 1223. The Great Charter was issued with slight revisions once again in 1225 as a justification for taxation of a fifteenth on the movables of every householder. The king issued the Charter of his own free will, and the provision enforcing the charter by 25 barons was omitted. This tax was used to finance the war with France.
The Text of the Magna Charta
(51) As soon as peace is restored, we will remove from the kingdom all the foreign knights, bowmen, their attendants, and the mercenaries that have come to it, to its harm, with horses and arms.
(59) With regard to the return of the sisters and hostages of Alexander, king of Scotland, his liberties and his rights, we will treat him in the same way as our other barons of England, unless it appears from the charters that we hold from his father William, formerly king of Scotland, that he should be treated otherwise. This matter shall be resolved by the judgement of his equals in our court.
The hierarchy of bishops was set with Rome pre-eminent, and the first papal tithes were imposed on the clergy, which also had to consult the Pope before paying taxes to civil authorities. The Benedictine and Augustinian orders were reformed, and additional monastic orders were forbidden. All Christians should confess their sins to a priest at least once a year, and priests who revealed secrets of the confessional were to be relegated to a monastery for the rest of their lives. Clerics were forbidden to participate in any death sentences. The Church authorities in each province or diocese should be freely and lawfully elected as Gratian had codified. Pope Honorius III (1216-1227) sent Cardinal Ugolino as his legate, and he mediated a peace between Genoa and Pisa in 1218. The same yeare a papal interdict stimulated Milan and Pavia to submit to peace; but in Rome a restored commune drove the Pope out to Viterbo. After his son Heinrich VII was crowned king of the Romans, Friedrich promised not to incorporate the Sicilian kingdom into the constitutional law of the Roman empire and got Rome to recall Pope Honorius so that Friedrich could be crowned Emperor in 1220. After the Florentine and Pisan delegations clashed at his coronation, Pisa formed a Ghibelline alliance with Siena, while Florence, as the Guelf supporters of the Pope, turned to Siena's enemy Lucca. Because of the conflict with the Pope, Friedrich had to withdraw his central power from ecclesiastical territories.
Earl William Marshal of Pembroke invaded Wales in 1223. The truce with France had been renewed in 1220 for four years; but after Louis VIII became king, he invaded Poitou in 1224. Henry's mother Isabel had returned to Angouleme in 1217 and married Hugues de Lusignan in 1220. Her daughter Joan had been betrothed to Hugues but married Scot king Alexander II in 1221 after having been detained by her mother for her dowry. Before attacking, Louis had promised to recognize the lands of Hugues claimed as Isabel's dowry. In 1225 Henry made his 16-year-old brother Richard, earl of Cornwall and sent him to be count of Poitou with the earl of Salisbury; they lost Poitou but managed to defend Gascony. Louis died in 1226, but Queen Blanche of Castile gained Hugues and Isabel as vassals of France. Blanche of Castile raised some forces in France; but they and the fierce Eustace the Monk were defeated in a sea battle off Sandwich. Eustace was beheaded, and the booty was used to build the hospital of St. Bartholomew to commemorate the victory. Louis agreed to peace at Kingston in September 1217. William Marshal raised money by selling jewels and rich garments found in royal castles. His eldest son and the earl of Salisbury came back to Henry's side; but the turning point was a military victory at Lincoln that captured 46 barons and 300 knights, which was half of the rebel knights.
After De Courcy had been driven out of Ireland by his great rivals, the De Lacys, lords of Meath, the latter obtained possession of Ulidia, and were created earls of Ulster. The De Burgos next became possessors of Ulidia, and earls of Ulster; which title and possessions afterwards passed to the Mortimers, earls of March, in England. Munster families included both families. The chief settlers in Ulidia, under De Courcy and his successors, were those of MacDonnells, Audley, Bisset, Copeland, Fitzsimon, Chamberlain, Bagnall, Martell, Jordan, Mandeville, Riddle, Russell, Smith, Staunton, Logan, Savage, Walsh, and White. In the reign of Queen Mary, the Fitzgeralds, earls of Kildare, obtained Leath Chathail or "Lecale," a well-known barony in the county Down, anciently called Magh Inis or the Insular Plain. The MacDonalds of Dalriada akin to the kings of Uladh were of Ir and Heremon decent when in Roman times they were the Scotti.