Realm Divided

by Dan Jones

First published 2015

Amazon

4.2(1,258)

Realm Divided uses the year 1215 to create a broad portrait of Plantagenet England. King John’s military failures, heavy financial demands and conflict with the barons led to Magna Carta and civil war, but Dan Jones places that political crisis beside the lives of people who farmed, traded, worshipped, administered justice and served in aristocratic households.

The book moves between government and everyday experience, explaining forests, law, diet, clothing, religion, warfare and the obligations that tied local communities to lords and crown. It was later reissued in a substantially illustrated edition as In the Reign of King John: A Year in the Life of Plantagenet England. Both titles describe the same central project: understanding a divided kingdom through one of the most consequential years of the medieval English monarchy.