Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 26.djvu/61

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Henry V
55
Henry V

than the throne of France (Fœdera, vol. ix. 762–3). The reality of Henry's intention, after restoring peace in France, to undertake a new crusade, is beyond doubt. A short time before his death he despatched Gilbert de Lannoy, a Burgundian knight, to inquire into the state of the East and the practicability of a war for the recovery of the Holy Land (Lannoy's report is printed in Archæologia, xxi. 221–444; cf. Cott. MS. Claud. A. viii. f. 11). Such a crusade could only have been attempted by Henry as the head of the united west, and to effect such a union seems to have been the object of his system of alliances. The termination of the schism formed an essential feature in such a policy (cf. his letter ap. Rel. de St.-Denys, xxxvi. 2). Later on in 1418 he writes of his wars with France, Spain, and Scotland, the three powers which had supported the schism, as undertaken in the interest of the pope (Goodwin, pp. 209–10). With the other states of Western Europe Henry established friendly relations, and when he died it appeared as if these three also were on the point of passing under his influence. But whatever Henry's ultimate designs may have been, the conception and the power of execution alike perished with him.

Henry's personal appearance was comely; his face was oval, with a long straight nose, ruddy complexion, dark smooth hair, and bright eyes, mild as a dove's when unprovoked, but lionlike in wrath. His frame was slender, but his limbs well proportioned and stoutly knit, so that he was very active, and took a keen pleasure in all manly sports (Versus Rhythmici, pp. 69–88; Elmham, Vita, p. 12). There are portraits of Henry V in the hall at Queen's College, Oxford, in the National Portrait Gallery, at Eton College, and at Windsor. The last is engraved as a frontispiece to the first volume of Tyler's ‘Memorials of Henry V.’ A portrait contained in a contemporary missal, now at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, is described in ‘Archæologia,’ ii. 194. Another portrait, which dates from 1430, is in Cotton. MS. Julius E. iv. f. 8 b.

[Of the early lives of Henry V, by far the most important is the Gesta Henrici Quinti (Engl. Hist. Soc.), written by a French chaplain—probably Jean de Bordin—who accompanied Henry in his first campaign; it only extends to 1416, but so far as it goes is perhaps the most valuable authority; the Life which passes under the name of Thomas Elmham (ed. Hearne) is full, but grandiloquent, and sometimes ambiguous; it is, however, strictly contemporary; a metrical form exists in the Liber Metricus (Cole, Memorials of Henry V, Rolls Ser.); the Life by Titus Livius Forojuliensis, an Italian in the service of Humphrey of Gloucester, is largely derived from the same sources as Elmham's, but is much more concise; Capgrave's Life in the De Illustribus Henricis (Rolls Ser.) is of no great value; Redman's (Cole, Memorials, &c.) has some interest as giving the view held a century later. None of these lives treat more than very briefly on Henry's early years, for the authorities on which period see under Henry IV. Of other English authorities we have Walsingham's Historia Anglicana, and Ypodigma Neustriæ in the Rolls Ser.—meagre; John Hardyng's Chronicle; with the English Chronicle edited by the Rev. J. S. Davies for the Camd. Soc., which is a form of the ‘Brut’ (extant in many manuscripts, e.g. Harl. 753, 2248, 2256), should be joined the interesting History of Henry V in Cott. MS. Claud. A. viii.; the Chronicle of London (ed. Nicolas, 1827); Page's poem, The Siege of Rouen, and Gregory's Chronicle in Collections of a London Citizen (Camden Soc.); and Wright's Political Songs (Rolls Ser.). Of French authorities the chief are Monstrelet (ed. Douët-d'Arcq, Soc. de l'Hist. de France); Waurin's Chroniques (Rolls Ser.); the Chroniques des Religieux de St. Denys (Documents inédits sur l'histoire de France, vols. v. vi.); the account of Jean le Fevre de St.-Remy (Soc. de l'Hist. de France), which avowedly owes much to Monstrelet, but is very valuable for the campaign of Agincourt, in which the writer accompanied the English army; Pierre de Fenin, ib., and Juyénal des Ursins (Michaud et Poujoulat's Collection des Mémoires, 1st ser. vol. ii.). Most of these will also be found in the Panthéon Littéraire. The Journal d'un Bourgeois de Paris, (Michaud et Poujoulat, u.s.), and the Cronique de Normandie (printed at the end of the Gesta) are occasionally useful. The later writers, Fabyan, Hall, and Holinshed, are of some value, as occasionally preserving popular tradition. In documentary evidence the period is especially rich; see Rymer's Fœdera, vols. viii–x. orig. ed.; Nicolas's Proceedings and Ordinances of the Privy Council, vols. i. and ii.; Ellis's Original Letters; Delpit's Collection des Documents Français en Angleterre; Rolls of Parliament, vols. iii. and iv.; Calendar of Patent Rolls; Rolls of France and Normandy in the Deputy-Keeper's 41st, 42nd, and 44th Reports. Of modern authorities Goodwin's Hist. of the Reign of Henry V (a valuable compilation) and Tyler's Memorials of Henry V (useful for the earlier years) deserve the first place; good summaries are in Pauli's Geschichte von England, vol. v., and Stubbs's Constitutional Hist. iii. 1–94. For the Welsh campaigns to 1404 see Wylie's Hist. of Henry IV, vol. i., and for the French war Nicolas's Battle of Agincourt, and M. Léon Puiseux's valuable Siège et Prise de Caen, Siège et Prise de Rouen, and L'Emigration Normande et la Colonisation Anglaise; Barante's Hist. des Ducs de Bourgogne, 6th edit. vols. iii. and iv. may also be consulted. The negotiations with Sigismund are treated by Lenz in König