Helen Castor: evaluation

Transcript context

…When Charles I is executed in 1649, or there’s the Glorious Revolution a bit later, are people citing Henry IV as an example of how this can succeed as the right thing to do, so that stays a precedent? In the 1640s, it’s fascinating. There are repeated references to what are called by historians the Deposition Articles of 1399. Henry didn’t simply march in with a big sword and say, “Right, I’m in charge now.” In one sense, that is what he did, but in order then to be acknowledged as king and to be crowned in Richard’s place, he went to enormous lengths to make sure that this change was justified. He convened a committee, who went through every record they could find — historical precedents, all the things that Richard had done in his reign — to draw up 33 Articles of Deposition to show exactly what Richard had done and why he should be removed. These articles come back repeatedly to Richard’s perjury in breaking the oath he’d made at his coronation to uphold the law and do justice to his people. They say, for example, that he claimed that the law was in his own mouth or sometimes in his own breast and that the lives and property of his subjects were his and at his own will. They also made Richard abdicate. This was very much a both/and situation. “Let’s try and cover all possible bases.” Then Henry stands up in Parliament, or is it even a parliament now Richard’s been deposed? Because it was a parliament called by Richard, but he stands up in the assembly of the representatives of the realm and claims the throne through a complicated and slightly fudged series of assertions because he isn’t straightforwardly the legitimate male heir — Richard doesn’t have a straightforward heir. He’s trying to cover every possible base, but because he succeeds, he does take the throne. He is crowned. He does manage to hold onto it despite repeated rebellion and repeated challenge. He passes the throne on to his eldest son, who becomes Henry V. Those justifications in 1399 become a precedent in the sedimentary process of evolution of the English Constitution. So, by the 1640s, those Articles of Deposition are under active discussion by the men who are standing up against Charles I as a precedent on which they can draw. This is, really, how the English Constitution works. You try something, and if it takes, then it gets built in. When Shakespeare presents the play Richard II, in what, 1598? That’s a pretty stable time, right, under Elizabeth I? How was that received? Are people shocked or scandalized?…

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