I was seen by many as a saint in the years following his death at the Battle of Evesham. In fact one could say that the gruesome desecration of his body at the battle in some ways served the burgeoning cult of Simon Montfort quite well because those body parts could then be seen as relics. Yeah I mean the posthumous cult was quite extraordinary and in the end Henry had to stamp it down and get the body move from the trunk and basically just thrown away. And that was a way of ending the cult once and for all. Well thank you very much.
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the years of bloody conflict that saw Simon de Montfort (1205-65) become the most powerful man in England, with Henry III as his prisoner. With others, he had toppled Henry in 1258 in a secret, bloodless coup and established provisions for more parliaments with broader representation, for which he was later known as the Father of the House of Commons. When Henry III regained power in 1261, Simon de Montfort rallied forces for war, with victory at Lewes in 1264 and defeat and dismemberment in Evesham the year after. Although praised for supporting parliaments, he also earned a reputation for unleashing dark, violent forces in English politics and, infamously, his supporters murdered hundreds of Jewish people in London and elsewhere.
With
David Carpenter
Professor of Medieval History at King’s College London
Louise Wilkinson
Professor of Medieval Studies at the University of Lincoln
And
Sophie Thérèse Ambler
Lecturer in Later Medieval British and European History at Lancaster University
Producer: Simon Tillotson