The "Angevin Empire" (1150-1204): A Twelfth-Century Union

The “Angevin empire” is one of the many great myths that Victorian Britain imposed on a receptive English-speaking public. Like the idea that parliament is a unique creation out of a natural English democratic feeling, or that Britain is the home of a greater level of toleration and understanding than anywhere else, the Victorian myth of the “Angevin empire” has had a wide currency which reaches down to the twenty-first century. In academic circles, the place of the “Angevin empire”, with Norgate’s distinction between England as a separate entity from the Plantagenet lands on the continent, should have become secure. The case of Richard’s successions in 1189 makes the point more compellingly still that the new ruler’s elevation in the lands of the Angevins was accomplished by distinct means. Richard had been in a long-lasting succession dispute that involved himself, his two brothers, Geoffrey of Brittany and John Lackland, their father, Henry, and the king of the French, Philip Augustus.