The Life and Campaigns of the Black Prince: from contemporary letters, diaries and chronicles, including Chandos Herald's Life of the Black Prince

by Richard Barber

Edward of Woodstock, eldest son of Edward III, known as the Black Prince, is one of those heroes of history books so impressive as to seem slightly unreal. At sixteen he played a leading part in the fighting at Crécy; at twenty-six he captured the king of France at Poitiers; and eleven years later he restored Pedro of Castile to histhrone at the battle of Najera. His exploits were chronicled by Jean Froissart, but Froissart was writing three or four decades after the events he describes. There are other sources much closer to events, and it is on these that the present volume draws.
Most immediate are the reports sent home by the prince's companions-in-arms and his own letters, which graphically convey the hardships and difficulties of campaigning, its dangers and sheer fatigue. These are followed by campaign diaries and the story of Crécy and other exploits of the prince's from Geoffrey le Baker's chronicle (c.1358-60), itself drawing on similar letters and diaries. Finally there is the chronicle of Chandos Herald, which shows the prince as he appeared to an English writer in the 1380s. Each of the sources is discussed in detail in the introductions to the extracts.
RICHARD BARBER's books on the age of chivalry include The Knight and Chivalry, Edward Prince of Wales and Aquitaine, King Hero and Legend and Arthurian Legends . He has also written the Companion Guide to Gascony and the Dordogne , the background to so many of the Black Prince's exploits, and the Penguin Guide to Medieval Europe .

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Medieval, Biography, British Literature, Medieval History

148 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.

Richard William Barber is a prominent British historian who has been writing and publishing in the field of medieval history and literature ever since his student days. He has specialised in the Arthurian legend, beginning with a general survey, Arthur of Albion, in 1961, which is still in print in a revised edition. His other major interest is historical biography; he has published on Henry Plantagenet (1964) and among his other books is the standard biography of Edward the Black Prince, Edward Prince of Wales and Aquitaine. The interplay between history and literature was the theme of The Knight and Chivalry, for which he won the Somerset Maugham Prize in 1971 and he returned to this in The Holy Grail: Imagination and Belief (2004); this was widely praised in the UK press, and had major reviews in The New York Times and The Washington Post.

His other career has been as a publisher. In 1969 he helped to found The Boydell Press, which later became Boydell & Brewer Ltd, one of the leading publishers in medieval studies, and he is currently group managing director. In 1989, Boydell & Brewer Ltd, in association with the University of Rochester, started the University of Rochester Press in upstate New York. The group currently publishes over 200 titles a year.

Reviews

[Blair Hodgkinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is basically a collection of primary sources edited down to spotlight mainly the military career aspects of the life of Edward, The Black Prince. These are the voices of the distant past: partisan and pious. It requires no modern historian to inform the reader of these medieval chronicles that chivalry, for all its glorious trappings, was a dark and destructive business and that horrors were perpetrated for the honour of kings and the glory of God. It's sometimes very useful to hear these echoes of another age. They remind us how far we've come and sometimes how far we still have to go.

[Brad Dunn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not overly fun, honestly. I found this at a second hand bookstore and thought it might be interesting. Its too chronological, too many facts, too many dates, nothing really painting a decent picture of whats going on. A technical historians book about someone I know nothing about. Probably just not the book for me.

[Ella Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful insight into the illustrious military campaign of Prince Edward of Woodstock. Although Chandos seems to glaze over some atrocities committed by the English, he portrays the emotion and lament of a bygone era of a golden age of chivalry and honour.

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a solid compendium of primary sources on the life of the Black Prince. The letters from the prince himself and Chandos' Herald's Life of the Black Prince are the standout offerings.

[Ton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully illustrated book about the life of Edward of Woodstock, known as the Black Prince, gleaned from contemporary sources.

[Ashley Mayer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great collection of translated primary sources!

[Nicole · Rating 2 out of 5]

I mainly read this for the translation of Chandos Herald's poem at the back. Barber does a good job with introducing and contextualising that.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

really helpful in regards to the battle of Nájera