Coronation Procession, Richard Lionheart |
Before that he was Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Lord of Ireland, Lord of Cyprus, Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Count of Nantes, Overlord of Brittany. Although he was born in England, Richard spent very little time in England, he actually spent little time there and spoke very little English.
Richard's coronation was an eventful episode in English history, not only for the usual reasons. He had barred women and Jews from attending, it was a superstition at the time that it was bad luck to have Jews present for the ceremony. When Jewish leaders attempted to present gifts to the new king, he had them stripped, flogged, and thrown out. This led to a rumor that Richard had issued an order for Jews to be killed, which in turn led to a massacre of London Jews. Some were robbed and beaten to death, some were burned alive when houses in the Jewish ghetto, and businesses were burned to the ground with people inside them. Those who tried to leave the burning buildings were killed. A few Jews were forcibly baptised. Jacob of Orleans, considered one of the most learned men of his era was among those killed, becoming a Jewish martyr. Richard punished some of the rioters, hanging those who accidentally burned down Christian houses by mistake. While romanticized historic novels have portrayed the medieval Jews of England as having willingly donated large sums to ransome Richard Lionheart back to England, coerced large donations were closer to the truth.
Burned out stone remains of Clifford's Tower, site of the March 1290 Jewish Massacre of York |
Mameluke Cavalry Training Manual Illustration |
1260 The Mamluks defeat the Mongols at the Battle of Ain Jalut in Palestine, marking their first decisive defeat and the point of maximum expansion of the Mongol Empire. Mamluks or Mameluks, were slaves who converted to Islam, usually white Christians. They became a prominent and powerful military caste within this period, seizing the Sultanate of Egypt and Syria from 1250 to 1517. They not only fought off the Mongols, they successfully fought on behalf of the Moslems in the crusades. Despite being slaves, many of the Mameluks held positions of trust and power greater than those of free Moslems. They were noted in particular for their excellence in horsemanship as well as their overall military prowess.
Sir Edward Coke |
The Petition of Right stipulated:
No Taxation without Parliament's consent
No Forced loansNo Arbitrary arrest
No Imprisonment contrary to Magna Carta
No Arbitrary interference with property rights
Enforcement of habeas corpus
No Forced billeting of troops
No Imposition of martial law in peace time
No Exemption of officials from due process
Coke also wrote an 11 volume Coke's Reports still used in English legal practice, and the 4 volume Institutes of the Lawes of England.
1651 Third English Civil War, in the Battle of Worcester, the Charles II of England is defeated in this final major battle.
1658 Death of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England from malaria (b. 1599) and possible septicemia from an infection secondary to kidney stones. Charles II returned to the throne of England in 1660, and in 1661 had the remains of Cromwell exhumed, and posthumously executed for having signed the warrant for the execution of Charles I, on the anniversary of the execution of Charles I. Cromwell's body was hanged in chains at Tyburn, and his decapitated head was displayed on a pole outside Westminster Hall until 1685. Cromwell's head had a series of owners, including a sale in 1814 to Josiah Wilkinson; it was eventually buried (without the rest of his body) at Sidney Suxxex College, Cambridge, in 1960. Also posthumously executed along with Cromwell were John Bradshaw and Henry Ireton who was Cromwell's son-in-law, another signatory to the execution of Charles I, and John Bradshaw, the chief presiding judge at Charles I's trial. Bradshaw and Ireton were, like Cromwell, also beheaded and their severed heads put on display outside Westminster Hall.
1783 The American Revolutionary War ends with the signing of the Treaty of Paris by the United States and the Kingdom of Great Britain.
1803 English scientist John Dalton begins using symbols to represent the atoms of different elements.
1811 Sin, Sex, Salvation, and Silverware - Birth of John Humphrey Noyes, American political and religious figure (d. 1886) He founded the Oneida Community in Oneida, New York in 1848. Noyes believed, by careful calculation, that the second coming of Christ had occurred already, back in 70 A.D. He coined the term 'free love', and was an American utopian socialist. At various times his beliefs, both religious and sexual caused him trouble with the local authorities, including an arrest for adultery, and pursuit for statutory rape. His religious community encompassed a number of successful businesses and industries, engaged in plural marriage, and believed that they could lead lives without sin, philosophy called perfectionism. They believed they could bring about Christ's millenial kingdom, along with a list of what might charitably be called unusual beliefs and practices in the communities.
The Oneida Community formally dissolved, and converted to a joint stock company in 1881. The communities' industries were consolidated under Noye's son Pierrepont, and became the largest producer of flatware for most of the 20th century.
1838 Dressed in a sailor's uniform and carrying identification papers provided by a Free Black seaman, future abolitionist Frederick Douglass boards a train in Maryland on his way to freedom from slavery.
1855 In Nebraska, 700 soldiers under United States General William S. Harney avenged the Grattan Massacre, attacking a Sioux village, killing 100 men, women, and children.
1861 Confederate General Leonidas Polk invades neutral Kentucky, prompting the state legislature to ask for Union assistance.
1875 Birth of Ferdinand Porsche, Austrian automotive engineer (d. 1951)
1929 The Dow Jones industrial average closed at 381.17, the pre-crash stock market high.
1935 Sir Malcolm Campbell reaches speed of 304.331 miles per hour on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, becoming the first person to drive an automobile over 300 mph
1941 Karl Fritzsch, deputy camp commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp, experiments with the use of Zyklon B in the gassing of Soviet POWs.
1942 In response to news of its coming liquidation, Dov Lopatyn leads an uprising in the Lakhva Ghetto.
1944 Holocaust: Diarist Anne Frank and her family are placed on the last transport train from Westerbork to Auschwitz, arriving three days later.
1962 Death of E. E. Cummings, American poet (b. 1894)
1967 Dagen H in Sweden: traffic changes from driving on the left to driving on the right overnight without major accidents.
1976 The Viking 2 spacecraft lands at Utopia Planitia on Mars.
1994 Russia and the People's Republic of China agree to de-target their nuclear weapons against each other.
2003 Death of Paul Jennings Hill, American anti-abortion murderer (b. 1954)
2005 Death of William Rehnquist, Chief Justice of the United States (b. 1924)
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