Status Updates From 金雀花王朝：缔造英格兰的武士国王与王后们

"England, long numbed by mortal chill, now you grow warm, revived by the heat of a new sun. You raise the country’s bowed head, and with tears of sorrow wiped away, you weep for joy … With tears you utter these words to your foster child: ‘You are spirit, I am flesh: now as you enter, I am restored to life.’"

"Malmesbury, in Wiltshire...On a freezing January day in 1153, Henry Plantagenet stood outside it in belligerent mood. He had been blown ashore after a rough and dangerous winter crossing of the Channel within the octave of Epiphany... But Henry came not to adore, with bended knee and precious gifts. He arrived with an invading force of 140 knights and 3,000 infantry, armed to the teeth."

"As he watched his tenacious father grind his way through a conquest of Normandy, Henry learned that political survival was a game of forstalling shifts of power, managing volatile relations between one's friends and enemies, and appealing to the right allies at the right time in order to further territorial objectives. In such a bewildering business, only the most devious survived."