The HORRIFIC Death Of The WORST Medieval English King

The title of the worst Medieval King of England is one which could be hotly contested due to the fact there were a few terrible rulers who made a mess of their nations. For example Richard II had the peasants revolt inside of his lands, and he then was forced off the throne and deposed. But King John is one of the historian’s favourites for the title of the Worst King of England. He was a ruthless and violent man who came onto the throne under disputed circumstances, and many believed he should not have been the King. His power was even limited in what was known as the Great Charter, or Magna Carta however in 1216 inside of Newark Castle he died from a rather savage bout of dysentry. But there were a number of medieval rumours that the King’s demise was much more sinister and savage. But what is the true story behind the death of England’s worst medieval King?

[@gregwilliams386]

It's been said that John was a better King of England than Richard. Richard during his reign spent very little time in England, preferring Normandy and France.

[@robertkarp2070]

However, during King Richard's reign when we was managing his own kingdom, his territory was considered safe to travel in. Prince John dropped the ball on that. He was left as Prince Regent, and instead of managing the kingdom, he instead focused all his attention on Nottingham and victimized the people of Nottingham. So the only bad thing King Richard did was leaving the incompetent Prince John to manage things in his absence. Then return and forgive Prince John for his incompetence.

[@Diamondmine212]

Richard was King for ten years and in that time only spent about 10 months in the country,He hated the country. John certainly wasn’t ever expected to become king the main reason being he had FOUR older brothers. The odds certainly seemed stacked against any chance.

[@crownprincesebastianjohano7069]

It doesn't matter if he spent little time in England. During his reign England was well governed and safe. John wrecked the place.

[@gertyrood]

He was held in prison In Spain for decades

[@andreebesseau6995]

Or the holly land😮

[@ugetsu2093]

The lost territory was not an English possession; rather England was an Angevin possession. It took them another 200 years for them to even learn to speak English.

[@janiced9960]

John had the bad luck to follow a king who was highly regarded as a warrior. What people forget is that Richard spent only six months of his 10 year reign in England and cared nothing for the country except as a money box. First to pay for his Crusade and then to pay for his ransom. His continental possession, which were extensive and rich were not taxed to the same degree and definitely not at all for his ransom. John inherited a kingdom that was bankrupt and where the king had been away for most of 10 years and the barons had got used to not having a king who looked over their shoulders. His right to the throne was not contentious and the protocol of primogeniture had not been established. He was "acclaimed" as king by the nobles and that was sufficient. The Acclamation is still part of the coronation ceremony today.And don't forget that Arthur was a nasty piece of work who even attacked his own grandmother. John did care about England but was batting on a very sticky wicket. He was a very able administrator and did a lot to reorganise the country which had suffered because of Richard's financial demand and his indifference and some of John's reforms are still in use today. He may have been a brutal king, but I have news for you; they were ALL brutal back then and cannot be judged by today's standards. What about Henry the I who blinded and cur off the noses of his own grandchildren when they were little girls because his son-in-law had disobeyed him. Did you know, by the way that John was the only king to have opened the royal granaries so that poor people could by grain during a time of bad harvests. John was no saint but when the only criteria was being a good general he came off badly against Richard, ( who slaughtered 20.000 muslims because he had nowhere to keep them, men, women and children after the siege of Acre ) So do your homework and look at the bigger picture before condemning anyone, and as for the barons and Magna Carta, he was paranoid about the barons plotting against him because that is just what they were doing.

[@bigantplowright5711]

Richard 1 went off to the Holy Land with most of the country's money.....

[@robertkarp2070]

That wasn't the problem. The problem was that Prince John focused on gaining all taxes from the people of Nottingham, making Nottingham bear the burden alone and completely ignored the rest of the kingdom. The problem is King Richard left the wrong person in charge.

[@unclenogbad1509]

@@robertkarp2070 'Nottingham' is Robin Hood legend, not history. Richard inherited the richest and most powerful kingdom in Western Europe, and between his crusades and his ransom, left it bankrupt, crumbling and in chaos. All John's problems stemmed from that.

[@williamcurtin5692]

Not quite. The problem was when he idiotically put himself in a position of having to be ransomed. One of the two very bad kings, him and Edward the Confesser, who somehow carried forward a good reputation.

[@AshleyMartin-f3x]

Richard lll was bad

[@unclenogbad1509]

@@AshleyMartin-f3x Wrong Richard - unless you mean the rhyming slang.

[@robertkarp2070]

They'd already had a taste of King John, when he was made Prince Regent in the absence of King Richard the Lion Heart, who'd gone off to the crusades. Prince John completely ignored his entire region and focused all his attention on victimizing Nottingham. Then when King Richard returned, instead of punishing Prince John, he forgave him. So yes, he was the worse. With King John, they knew what they were getting, I'd call his coronation a complete blunder in the History of England.

[@janiced9960]

You have been watching too much TV. Robin Hood was not a real character.

[@brushbros]

Whom we call kings and princes can just as correctly be described as "warlords."

[@josephvisnovsky1462]

Upper management

[@walrtbstudios5430]

Surely there are a few worse… in chronological order: William II, Richard I, Edward II, James I, Charles I, James II. John was simply crap at warfare and nan-management.

[@polocarthaigh893]

As stated, "But King John is one of the historian’s favourites for the title of the Worst King of England."

[@dg20120]

Add in that Henry VI wasn’t mentally competent to be king. Richard II seemed to have lost his shit at some point.

[@peterkay4477]

And, lest we forget... William the Bastard. Usurper and mass murderer.

[@jackpayne5101]

I for one am fed up with this constant bashing of King John he was not the worst by any means most stories about him are untrue or not founded and of course the sentence always starts ' It is said' ' It is rumoured' ' Legend says' etc he was by no means good King but he never seemed to get the breaks.

[@tricorvus2673]

History is written by the victors

[@kevinlutz5994]

Truth is stranger than fiction. English History wears a Hollow Crown. Way better than Game of Thrones.

[@DanBeech-ht7sw]

It's never easy for a monarch who starts their reign with an empty exchequer

[@Godwinson1066]

If I remember rightly Arthur of Brittany had a good claim to the throne of England because his own father, Geoffrey Duke of Brittany was actually the older brother of both richard and John but died before he could assume the title of King of England. So it makes sense that Richard may have supported Arthur's claim as Richard himself had no children to bequeath the throne, too. Anyway poor Arthir was captured by his uncle and imprisoned to then 'disappear'. It is rumoured that King John may have bumped him off to literally keep his grip on the throne. I actually feel sorry for Arthur and not John .

[@DJ-tt7tq]

Got to admit, John wasn't someone I would have liked to have met. Shocked and appalled when I read about the mother and son he imprisoned,and he just let them starve to death. An appalling, barbaric act,and was even more shocked when the mother's body was discovered that she tried to eat her own son's face in her desperation. The night he died may have been interesting to observe,as it was a wild stormy night. This terrified John, thinking he was going to Hell for all his sins.

[@dreamseer7]

About the death is interesting. But what were the atrocities he committed? More than just imposing taxes and ravaging lands. I'm going to look for a book about him. I think he's terrifying.

[@ronaldmessina4229]

Thank goodness for Jeanne d’Arc who, in effect, drove the inglish out of FRANCE, and then she tried to establish a peace ☮️ between ingland and FRANCE 🇫🇷, but the FRENCH king was UNGRATEFUL to her, and allowed her to be taken away by the inglish king 😢, and thus she was burned alive at the stake

[@michaeltroster9059]

If any English king was given an inappropriate name it was Richard the Lionhearted. He really was anything but, and a rather nasty man to boot, who really didn’t give a damn about England.

[@kerraptregolls4929]

I often wonder how history would have changed if these people had stayed on the throne. You cannot judge people by today’s standard. Richard was a shit king as well.

[@luisecawthorne1025]

Which one?

[@DennisHurst-f2q]

You’re absolutely correct ! ❤👍

[@markbriten6999]

​@@luisecawthorne1025certainly one and two. Three want really ther long enough but was reckoned to be okay

[@ugetsu2093]

He murdered his own nephew. He should never have been king.

[@alicewilloughby4318]

In all fairness, ther was a lot of that going on in those days.

[@spencersanderson1894]

Yeah I mean people believe Edward the second was actually just as bad, if not worse. I think people have their own heroes and villains and as soon as someone hears king John they immediately think Magna Carta.

[@unclenogbad1509]

It was purely politics, nothing personal. Richard had essentially let the Barons run riot, and John couldn't leave a rival claimant for them to gather around while he had the extreme necessity of bringing them under control. It was the Middle Ages for Christ's sake - a dead nephew here or there was of no big consequence. There are characters who achieved sainthood that did worse than that.

[@Martin-v3v9p]

As some of the other commentators have noted most serious academics regard John's predecessor as the worst Medieval monarch...most of John's problems were a direct result of Richards misadventures and utter disregard for the welfare of the nation..John acting as regent had to raise an economy wrecking sum of money from the English population to pay Richards ransom after Richard was caught trying to flee through Europe dressed as a girl after his cataclysmic military failures in the Holy Land.. Richard cared nothing of this country and preferred war and butchering the populations of other lands..alongside his sexual preference for men and boys and the spectacle of public executions so he really can't be seen in the standards of the time as anything other than a complete and utterl unmitigated disaster.. John's later civil war against his own Barons was a direct consequence of his brothers choices and actions..John was a hot headed impulsive man like his father but his inability to effectively win a civil war against his own Aristocracy cannot be considered worse than Richards utter disinterest and the effecive impoverishment of the entire country just to support his Glory seeking sadistic jollies in the Holy Land..Richard was a far more cruel and brutal man than John and the terrible of the civilian populations of cities and towns he attacked and the surrendered garrisons he gleefully butchered as a public spectacle is testament to his sadistic savagery.. John gave the world something positive..and that was Magna Carta..he also left a legitimate heir and made positive changes to the English legal system which stood the test of time..He was his father's favourite son.. He successfully negotiated a treaty with France and managed to survive his own reign and died a natural non violent death ( unlike Richard) John really must be seen in a better light than Richard..who had his own history rewritten by the victorians..mostly because he was an enthusiastic invader of exotic lands and the wholesale slaughter of johnny foreigners..and the victorians were pretty keen on that type of activity themselves..so they pretty much rewrote his history coined the lion heart nonsense..

[@DanBeech-ht7sw]

Is there any real evidence of Richard being gay?

[@BubuMarimba]

so they named the toilet seat "john" after this king?

[@ronaldmessina4229]

I do not believe that the toilet seat 💺 was named (John) because in the time of Prince John , there were no toilet s💺, nor toilet paper , so what the populace did was to dig out a hole in the ground, and then they could utilize it, but the nobles usually had a (chamber pot) and a chamber maid whose job was to empty the pot, and many times the feces was thrown out from a window 😢

[@christopherellis2663]

Henry VIII.

[@tomhirons7475]

the Lionheart was a worse king some would say ?

[@NicolaSparks-vs6xg]

He was never at home and left it all to his mother

[@carolmorton7213]

I don’t think he WAS king.

[@KarlaSalter]

Shame that we cannot travel in time.😢😊

[@stephanieyee9784]

Why the ?

[@janiced9960]

And the tooth fairy is coming tonight.

[@user-pt4ex2vn5l]

Not much different to today really just more advanced army’s +equipment ect

[@SubliminalLocks]

How have I heard this before today? The audio referring to human waste compost - the misspeaking “person-personally” by narrator- I’ve heard this recently, it’s a reupload?

[@DonnyHooterHoot]

You are hearing things, take a nap.

[@rncine]

Be nice, or into the compost, you go

[@Maltravers2011]

The Plantagenets were mostly inept or monsters

[@crownprincesebastianjohano7069]

"King Richard was a bad king because he spent little time in England, at least John ruled in England." That's besides the point. Under Richard, England was prosperous and well governed. And safe. Richard screwed up by being captured and having to be ransomed. John had to rule in England because he lost all their possessions in France, beggared the country trying to get them back and mismanagement caused even more damage. John pissed off the nobility with arbitrary cruelty and whims, taxed the poor and then refused to reform his behavior. The result was a ruinous civil war. John was emphatically not a better monarch because he spent time in England.

[@janiced9960]

No, England was not prosperous and well governed under Richard; he milked it dry to pay for his Crusade, his ransom and his French wars and would have " sold London if he could have found a buyer ". Ps , I have an honours degree in Mediaeval History (cum laudae )

[@johnkeviljr9625]

Restore Newark Castle!

[@tomhirons7475]

why ???

[@johnkeviljr9625]

@@tomhirons7475 It's historic.

[@stephanieyee9784]

No. The ruins are the product of hundreds of years of English history. Leave it be.

[@jayargonauts]

Being descended from king John I have nothing but the highest regard for him😂

[@DennisHurst-f2q]

That’s cool plus how is he worse then Henry Viii

[@jayargonauts]

@@DennisHurst-f2q Lol I think most people with British ancestry are related to him actually. If you go far enough back in time then you reach a point where you have more ancestors than there were people living. Just human breeding. I’m not really that interested

[@vegetariansuniteworldwide8091]

Ok English farmers! Start digging in that area where King John lost the crown 💎!😅

[@richardsuggs8108]

Bad king John.

[@elainedefreitas8106zw]

Who wrote this script? An alien? Complete tripe.

[@umbertotoni3021]

John was'nt the worst King.