King John -A Martime King?
King John and the Growth of a Navy This post came about from reading 'King John -An Underrated King' by Graham E. Seel, A worthy book and very much the case for the defence as far as King John's reputation is concerned. The author credits John with establishing a 'standing navy' and Ithought that the notion of King John as a maritime king needed further consideration. In 1204 Normandy, Anjou and Maine fell to the French king, Philip Augustus . The Anglo-Norman hegemony, the range of territory that was later to be called the Angevin empire, with King John as its overlord since 1199, was breached. No longer stretching from Carlisle to The Pyrenees, taking in most of the western seaboard of what is now France .Historians have stressed that the rulers of England were used to the Channel being under their control, cr