Edward II of England, Historical Figures
Standing
Concerns Description
Currently States Edward II was king of England from 1307 to 1327, the fourth son but only surviving son of Edward I. He inherited a treasury deficit of some 200,000 pounds and an unfinished Scottish war, and none of his father's strengths for handling either. He rejected the company of his own class for that of Piers Gaveston, a Gascon knight's son with whom he probably had a homosexual relationship; Gaveston's recall from exile and his elevation to the earldom of Cornwall provoked baronial fury that culminated in the Ordinances of 1311, a program of reform that curtailed royal patronage and exiled Gaveston again, and in Gaveston's capture and execution by the barons in 1312. Edward's catastrophic defeat by Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn in 1314 further weakened his authority, and the middle years of the reign were dominated by his cousin Thomas of Lancaster until Edward crushed him in the brief civil war of 1321 to 1322 and had him executed. New royal favourites, the two Hugh Despensers, father and son, then dominated the final years of the reign, presiding over real administrative reforms alongside blatant corruption. In 1326 Edward's estranged queen, Isabella of France, invaded with her ally Roger Mortimer; the Despensers were captured and executed, and Edward himself was captured, imprisoned, and in January 1327 deposed by Parliament in favour of his fourteen-year-old son, Edward III, the first time an anointed king of England had been removed from power by his own subjects since Aethelred II in 1013. He was almost certainly killed at Berkeley Castle later that year, though the manner and even the fact of his death were disputed within a decade (see the recorded dissent).
Source United Kingdom: Edward I and Edward II (Britannica)