A knight's view of the Angevin succession: the council at Vaudreuil in April 1199 where the Marshal and Hubert Walter argued for John over Arthur, the Marshal's crossing to secure England, John's coronation, and the Marshal's part in Normandy in 1199 and 1200 as holder of Longueville and Orbec and a go-between with Philip. It is sparing on Le Goulet itself and silent on much of 1200, but it shows how the baronage judged John from the first and what the Marshal held in England, Wales, Normandy and Ireland. Written for his sons, so the hero is never wrong.
About this source
- Title
- L'Histoire de Guillaume le Marechal
- Author
- Anonymous (a poet called John, writing for the Marshal family)
- Written
- about 1224 to 1226
- Language
- Anglo-Norman French verse
- Covers
- about 1146 to 1219
- Kind
- Biography
The only full English translation (Gregory, in the Anglo-Norman Text Society edition) is under copyright. Composed a quarter century after 1200 from the memories of the Marshal's household.
Where to read it
Editions
- P. Meyer (ed.), L'Histoire de Guillaume le Marechal, Societe de l'histoire de France, 3 vols (1891 to 1901); vol. 2 holds the second half of the poem, including 1199 and 1200
- Meyer vol. 3, introduction, modern French summary and notes
- A. J. Holden, S. Gregory and D. Crouch (eds), History of William Marshal, Anglo-Norman Text Society, 3 vols (2002 to 2006), with English translation, not free (not freely online)