be termed, their privileges. Their first meeting was at St. Edmundsbury in November, 1214. Advancing one by one to the high altar, they placed their hands on the symbol of sanctity, and swore to maintain their rights. They drew up a petition and presented it to John in London, and on its rejection both parties, assured that there was no other alternative, prepared for war. The barons took the field with their forces under the name of "the army of God and the holy church." In May, 1215, they assembled at Stamford with two thousand knights and their retainers. From thence they went to London, and in June they met the king at Runnymead. On the 15th of June, 1215, was signed the great charter (Magna Charta) which forms, if not the basis, at least the commencement of the secure constitutional liberties of England. Like the constitution of the United States, it does not mention slavery; but it speaks of "nullus liber homo," exactly as the American constitution might have spoken. The freedom of man was not the object of Magna Charta, but the constitutional liberties of the barons and upper classes of the kingdom. In August of the same year (1215), the great charter was annulled by the pope. The charter had been extorted from John, who was willing to grant only what he could not avoid. He therefore prepared for war with his barons, and at first was successful. The pope took his side, and by name excommunicated the leaders of the aristocratic party. London was laid under an interdict, and John marched northward to punish the king of Scotland, who had sided with his adversaries. He burnt and destroyed the towns on his way, and reached as far as Edinburgh. The barons in London seeing no hope of peace, offered the crown of England to Louis, dauphin of France. Louis sailed from Calais, and on the 30th May, 1216, landed at Sandwich in Kent. John fled to Bristol. Louis attempted to reduce the castles of England; but time was required for operations of that nature. John in October, 1216, marched into Lincolnshire, and in attempting to cross the Wash from Cross Keys to the Foss-Dyke, his baggage, treasures, regalia, and the stores of the army were swept away by the returning tide. Whether from anxiety or poison, as was sometimes supposed, John was taken ill, and on the 19th of October died at the castle of Newark in the forty-ninth year of his age. He was buried in Worcester cathedral, between the effigies of St. Oswald and St. Wulstan.
John has usually been characterized as a man without a redeeming virtue. Yet his reign was marked by an amazing extension of the liberties of Englishmen—perhaps not so much immediately as prospectively. Magna Charta was only the reduction to law of the liberties that were felt to be necessary, but it greatly aided in removing the arbitrary power of the monarch. John's issue were Henry III.; Richard, king of the Romans; Joan, queen of Scotland; Eleanor, wife of Simon de Montfort; and Isabel, wife of Frederick II. of Germany.—P. E. D.
KING OF FRANCE.
John II., surnamed the Good, succeeded to the crown on the death of his father, Philip VI., in 1350. He was scarcely seated on the throne when he gave great and just offence to his subjects by the illegal execution of Robert, count of Eu, constable of France. The tranquillity of the country at this period was greatly disturbed by the crimes and intrigues of John's son-in-law, Charles the Bad, king of Navarre. John somewhat treacherously arrested his troublesome relative and his principal friends at a banquet given to them by the dauphin, put the Count d'Harcourt and others of his associates to death, and confined the king of Navarre in the Chateau Gaillard. Enraged at these proceedings, the brother of Charles and the uncle of the Count d'Harcourt entered into a treaty with Edward III. of England, and invited him to invade France. The English monarch entered Normandy at the head of a formidable army, burning and laying waste the country, while his son, the heroic Black Prince, marched into Aquitaine with a force of eight thousand men. After ravaging the Agenois, Quercy, and the Limousin, he entered the province of Berry. John marched to intercept him with an army of sixty thousand men, and came up with him at a place called Maupertuis, near Poictiers. The Black Prince in this emergency was willing to treat; but the terms which John demanded were so exorbitant that he refused to listen to them, and in the conflict which ensued the French were totally defeated, and the king himself was taken prisoner, 19th September, 1356. John was conducted, first to Bordeaux, and then to London, and was treated throughout with the most chivalrous courtesy.—(See Edward III.) In consequence of this disaster, and the internal commotions to which it gave rise, France was brought to the brink of ruin. The English monarch again invaded France in 1359, but in the following year he consented to make peace, stipulating that the French king should pay for his ransom three millions of crowns of gold, or about a million and a half of our money. On the conclusion of the treaty John was allowed to return to his dominions, and with almost incredible folly immediately prepared for a crusade to the Holy Land. But the country was so exhausted by foreign invasion, intestine broils, and famine, that the people were even unable to pay the king's ransom. In this trying emergency the conduct of John was truly noble. "Though good faith," he said, "should be banished from the rest of the earth, yet she ought still to be found in the breasts of kings." He accordingly returned to his captivity in England, and terminated his long and unfortunate reign there, dying in the Savoy in the year 1364.—J. T.
JOHN II. of Poland. See Casimir V.
JOHN III. See Sobieski.
KINGS OF PORTUGAL.
John I. was an illegitimate son of Pedro I., born in 1358, and ascended the throne in 1385 to the prejudice of the claims of John I. of Castile, who had married Beatrix, daughter of the late King Ferdinand, and also of the Infanta Don John, son of Pedro by Inez de Castro. He thus became the founder of the dynasty of Aviz, so called from the order of which he had been, at seven years of age, named master. Having established his power by a victory over the king of Castile, the Portuguese monarch sought an alliance with England, and married Philippa, daughter of the duke of Lancaster, in 1387. Another daughter of the duke married Henry III., son of John I. of Castile; and by this means an alliance was concluded between the two kingdoms. The Portuguese monarch now turned his attention to foreign conquests, and the capture of Ceuta opened the series of maritime discoveries which subsequently distinguished the history of the Portuguese monarchy. The first regular treaty between Portugal and England was made in this reign (1386). The administration of John I. is also distinguished by the assembly of the cortes almost annually, and by the publication of a code of laws. He died 14th August, 1433.
John II., born in 1455, and acknowledged king on the abdication of his father, Alfonso V., in 1475. On the reassumption of power by the latter, he retained considerable influence in the direction of affairs, until the death of Alfonso in 1481. The first portion of his reign was consumed in struggles with the nobility. The duke of Braganza conspiring against him was publicly executed, and the duke of Vizeu, the queen's brother, was slain by the king's own hand, before the royal authority could be established. The king was not unmindful of the foreign enterprises bequeathed to him. The war against the Arabs was prosecuted with vigour; maritime discoveries were pushed southwards by Bartholomew Diaz and others; and the Cape of Good Hope was added to the dominions of Portugal. The Portuguese monarch missed indeed the glory of having aided Columbus in the discovery of the New World, but, on his return from his first voyage, received the great navigator with distinction, and concluded a treaty with Ferdinand and Isabella for the division of future additions to their dominions. His son, Alfonso, married at the age of sixteen to Isabella, daughter of the Castilian sovereigns, was killed a few months afterwards. John II. died in 1495, it was alleged by poison.
John III., born in 1502, son of Manoel I. and Maria, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, succeeded his father in 1521. He upheld the renown of Portugal in India and China, where Vasco da Gama and the poet Camoens served under his banner. His reign is distinguished likewise by the establishment of the inquisition in Portugal in 1536, and the encouragement given to the order of jesuits, whose missions at this time spread all over the world, under the guidance of Francisco Xavier. The great extension of the colonies of Portugal in this reign led indirectly to the decline of the monarchy. John III. died in 1557.
John IV., founder of the dynasty of Braganza, born in 1604, son of the seventh duke of Braganza, became king in 1640 by a popular insurrection, which put an end to the "sixty years' captivity" of Portugal to the Spanish Bourbons. He lost no time in forming alliances with England, France, Holland, and Sweden, and successfully maintained his throne against the
