When matilda of anjou is dallying waiting to be acknowledged as queen in anjou, stephen hotfoots it from normandy and gets self crowned king. The english nobility generally seem to support him until there is a sort of collective intake of breath among certain of them. But he is the winner in this, because he effectively takes control, certainly, of eastern england, down to the tine. And witha slowly fading out level of influence down towards the s and on the west,. He occupies that wonderful city of carlisle, completes the castle, and continues to expand south through the lakes, ultimately into not lancashire.
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the impact of David I of Scotland (c1084-1153) on his kingdom and on neighbouring lands. The youngest son of Malcolm III, he was raised in exile in the Anglo-Norman court and became Earl of Huntingdon and Prince of Cumbria before claiming the throne in 1124. He introduced elements of what he had learned in England and, in the next decades, his kingdom saw new burghs, new monasteries, new ways of governing and the arrival of some very influential families, earning him the reputation of The Perfect King.
With
Richard Oram
Professor of Medieval and Environmental History at the University of Stirling
Alice Taylor
Professor of Medieval History at King’s College London
And
Alex Woolf
Senior Lecturer in History at the University of St Andrews
Producer: Simon Tillotson