Geoffrey of Brittany

Geoffrey of Brittany, the fourth son of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, was born on 23rd September 1158. He was the younger brother of Eleanor's first children, William IX of Poitiers (17th August 1153), Henry the Young (28th February 1155), Matilda (6th January, 1156) and Richard the Lionheart (8th September 1157). Later his mother gave birth to Eleanor (13th October 1162), Joan (October 1165) and John (24th December 1166). (1)

Geoffrey was a traditional family name but it was also an attempt to link him to his uncle, Geoffrey, Count of Nantes, who was a strong supporter of Conan IV, duke of Brittany (1156–71). Conan did not have a son and in 1166 he agreed to Henry II's suggestion that his daughter, Constance of Brittany, should marry Geoffrey. Conan, exhausted by constant rebellions, transferred the duchy's administration to Henry. (2)

Geoffrey of Brittany

Geoffrey and his father went on an extended tour of the duchy. In August 1170 Conan IV died and Geoffrey became the duke of Brittany. Geoffrey was only 12 years-old and Henry sent William Fitzhamon, to help him rule the territory. His mother, Eleanor, also played a significant role in the administration of Brittany. (3)

Eleanor sent her son to be educated in Paris. According to Gerald of Wales he was the most intelligent of all the children but did not use it for good purposes. Geoffrey could have been one of the wisest of men, had he not been so ready to deceive others... his real nature had more of bitter aloes in it than honey; outwardly he had a ready flow of words, smoother than oil, and possessed by his syrupy and persuasive eloquence, was able to corrupt two kingdoms with his tongue." (4) Geoffrey, unlike his elder brothers, was dark-haired and not very tall. (5)

Rebellion

It was early in 1173 that Geoffrey first began to participate in the quarrels which notoriously split the Plantagenet family. Eleanor believed that Henry the Young should be given England, Anjou or Normandy to rule. Henry II refused and Eleanor began to develop plans to overthrow of her husband. On 5th March 1173, Henry left Chinon Castle and rode for Paris and went to stay with King Louis VII. Soon afterwards, Louis announced that he acknowledged that Henry was the new king of England. Henry II was furious and declared war on France. (6)

Eleanor sent her two teenage sons, Geoffrey and Richard the Lionheart from Aquitaine, to join Henry the Young in his revolt against his father in northern France. Ralph de Diceto recorded that Henry's sons "took up arms against their father at just the time when everywhere Christians were laying down their arms in reverence for Easter." (7) Geoffrey joined the siege of Driencourt in July and according to his biographer, Michael Jones, he "quickly gained a reputation for martial skill as well as for eloquence and duplicity". (8)

William of Newburgh reported that "the younger Henry, devising evil against his father from every side by the advice of the French King, went secretly into Aquitaine where his two youthful brothers, Richard and Geoffrey, were living with their mother, and with her connivance, so it is said, he incited them to join him". (9) One historian has pointed out that the brothers "were typical sprigs of the Angevin stock... they wanted power as well as titles". (10)

Andrea Hopkins has argued that Eleanor identified more with the interests of her sons rather than those of her husband. (11) Eleanor has been accused of being the ring-leader of the revolt against Henry: "It is clear that her sympathies lay wholeheartedly with her sons and that, like a lioness fighting to protect her cubs, she was prepared to resort to drastic measures to ensure that they received their just deserts... Henry and his brothers wanted autonomous power in the hands assigned to them, even if it meant the overthrow of their father; Eleanor wanted justice for her sons and, consequently, more power and influence for herself. This, she must have known, could only be achieved through the removal of her husband from the political scene." (12)

Eleanor of Aquitaine by Kinuko Craft
Eleanor of Aquitaine by Kinuko Craft

In a letter sent to Eleanor by Rotrou, Archbishop of Rouen, under the instructions of Henry II, he made it clear that he considered that his wife was behind the revolt as she had "made the fruits of your union with our Lord King rise up against their father". He added: "before events carry us to a dreadful conclusion, return with your sons to the husband whom you must obey and with whom it is your duty to live... Bid your sons, we beg you, to be obedient and devoted to their father." (13)

Eleanor's powerful lords from Aquitaine joined the rebellion. Henry the Young also did a deal with William the Lion, the King of Scotland, who promised him Northumbria if he helped defeat his father. However, before the fighting began, Eleanor was captured by the agents of Henry. According to Gervase of Canterbury, Eleanor, left Poitiers for Chartres, on a horse, dressed as a man. She was recognized and arrested and taken to Henry who was based in Rouen. (14)

In July 1173 Henry defeated his sons at Verneuil Castle. His soldiers also had success against the Scots in Northumbria. His loyal commander, Richard de Lucy, defeated hired bands of Flemish mercenaries at Fornham, near Bury St Edmunds. By the end of September 1174 it was all over. Henry was magnanimous in victory and said that "everyone who had rebelled might have their lands and possessions back in the same state as a fortnight before the rebellion began". (15)

After their surrender, Henry, Richard and Geoffrey all had their allowances increased. Henry was formally assigned two castles in Normandy, to be chosen by his father, and 15,000 Angevin pounds for his upkeep. (16) Richard received two mansions in Poitou and half its annual revenues, whereas Geoffrey received half of Brittany's revenues. However, all three sons had to promise never to "demand anything further from the Lord King, their father, beyond the agreed settlement... and withdrew neither themselves nor their service from him." (17)

However, the sons continued to rebel against their father. Gerald of Wales quotes Geoffrey of Brittany as saying: "It is our proper nature, planted in us by inheritance from our ancestors, that none of us should love the other, but that always, brother against brother and son against father, we try our utmost to injure one another?" (18)

However, he was unwilling to forgive Eleanor and she spent the next fourteen years in captivity. The records suggest that she was permitted two chamberlains and a maid named Amaria. Lisa Hilton, the author of Queens Consort: England's Medieval Queens (2008) claims that although "Eleanor's living conditions were reasonable, they were not commensurate with her status, as her clothes were no finer than a servant girl's and apparently she and Amaria had to share the same bed." (19)

Henry II and Philip II

Henry II sent Geoffrey to Normandy in April 1179, to deal with Guihomar de Léon, who was leading a rebellion against the king of England. He inflicted on him a crushing defeat, dispossessing him of virtually all his estates. (20) Geoffrey developed a reputation as a robber baron: "Ruthless in warfare, he plundered at will, not hesitating to sack abbeys and shrines. He had few scruples, and confronted his critics with devious and shameless excuses." (21)

On 1st November, 1179, Geoffrey attended the coronation of Philip II at Rheims. He struck up a personal friendship with the French king which caused problems with his father. In 1181, Geoffrey, along with his brothers, Henry and Richard, gave Philip support in his military campaigns "against the counts of Sancerre and Flanders, the duke of Burgundy, and the countess of Champagne". (22)

Geoffrey of Brittany died aged twenty-seven on 19th August, 1186. Roger of Howden said he succumbed to fever. (23) However, Ralph de Diceto, claims he took part in a tournament and fell off his horse and was trampled to death. (24) A son and heir, Arthur of Brittany, was born six months after his death. (25)

Primary Sources

(1) Gerald of Wales, Concerning the Instruction of a Prince (c. 1190)

Geoffrey could have been one of the wisest of men, had he not been so ready to deceive others... his real nature had more of bitter aloes in it than honey; outwardly he had a ready flow of words, smoother than oil, and possessed by his syrupy and persuasive eloquence, was able to corrupt two kingdoms with his tongue. He was of tireless endeavour, but a hypocrite in everything, who could never be trusted and who had a marvellous gift for pretence and dissimulation.

(2) Michael Jones, Geoffrey of Brittany : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

In May 1169 he received at Rennes the homage of some Breton barons reconciled to the proposed match with Constance. He spent the following Christmas at Nantes with his father, whom he then accompanied on an extended tour of the duchy in January 1170 during which further homages were received from barons absent in the previous May. Real power in the duchy remained, however, in the hands of the king and his nominees, many of them non-Bretons appointed to high civil and ecclesiastical positions. In August 1170, while on his sickbed at Domfront, Henry planned to divide his lands among his sons: as already arranged Geoffrey was to marry Constance and receive Brittany, though it was now recognized that the duchy might be held of Louis VII. The death of Conan on 20 February 1171 did not signal any weakening of Henry's control—indeed his grip strengthened since he now had custody of Constance. At Pontorson in May 1171 Henry accepted the submission of one of the most unruly Breton barons, Guihomar de Léon, and in 1172 he paid a further visit to the duchy. Geoffrey himself spent most of the period from April 1170 to March 1171 at Northampton, although he attended the young Henry's coronation at London in June 1170, and was probably later present at a celebrated feast held at Bur near Bayeux in 1171 when, according to Robert de Torigni, over a hundred knights named William were entertained by the Young King as a tribute to William Fitzhamon, Henry II's chief representative in Brittany, who accompanied Geoffrey to the festivities.

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References

(1) Jane Martindale, Eleanor of Aquitaine : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

(2) Michael Jones, Geoffrey of Brittany : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

(3) Alison Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine (1999) page 185

(4) Gerald of Wales, Concerning the Instruction of a Prince (c. 1190)

(5) Alison Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine (1999) page 207

(6) Lisa Hilton, Queens Consort: England's Medieval Queens (2008) page 133

(7) Ralph de Diceto, Pictures of History (c. 1180)

(8) Michael Jones, Geoffrey of Brittany : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

(9) William of Newburgh, History of English Affairs (c. 1200)

(10) Winston Churchill, The Island Race (1964) page 44

(11) Andrea Hopkins, Most Wise and Valliant Ladies (1997) page 53

(12) Alison Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine (1999) page 202

(13) Rotrou, Archbishop of Rouen, letter to Eleanor of Aquitaine (March, 1173)

(14) Gervase of Canterbury, The Deeds of the Kings (c.1210)

(15) Dan Jones, The Plantagenets (2013) page 91

(16) Elizabeth Hallam, Henry the Young : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

(17) Andrea Hopkins, Most Wise and Valliant Ladies (1997) page 54

(18) Gerald of Wales, Concerning the Instruction of a Prince (c. 1190)

(19) Lisa Hilton, Queens Consort: England's Medieval Queens (2008) pages 137-138

(20) Michael Jones, Geoffrey of Brittany : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

(21) Alison Weir, Eleanor of Aquitaine (1999) page 207

(22) Michael Jones, Geoffrey of Brittany : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)

(23) Roger of Howden, King Henry the Second , and the Acts of King Richard (c. 1200)

(24) Ralph de Diceto, Pictures of History (c. 1180)

(25) Michael Jones, Geoffrey of Brittany : Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014)