Henry III

by David Carpenter

Book 17 in the English Monarchs series.

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In the first volume of his biography, David Carpenter follows Henry III from childhood through minority government and into the mature personal rule of the 1230s and 1240s. He explains how the settlement after Magna Carta, the regencies that defeated invasion and Henry’s ceremonial vision of monarchy rebuilt royal authority after King John’s collapse.

Carpenter examines court faction, patronage, piety, marriage and ambitious continental schemes, including the costly Sicilian project. The volume portrays a peace-loving and artistically engaged king whose generosity and political misjudgements gradually alienated magnates and prepared the constitutional crisis of 1258.