The Prophecy of Peter of Pomfret
During this time John showed considerable vigour as a warrior. He forced homage and tribute from the King of Scotland, crossed to Ireland and reduced to obedience the English settlers who were already claiming independence, and brought Llewellyn of Wales to terms.
At last the Pope forged his final weapon. In 1212 he formally absolved John’s subjects from their allegiance, and invited Philip of France to seize England as he had already seized Normandy. John, with both a foreign foe and the nation, whose liberties he had outraged, against him, was seized with panic at the prophecy of a hermit, Peter of Pomfret, that within ten days he should cease to reign.* To yield to the Church seemed the easiest way to retain the crown, and he suddenly conceded every point, received Langton as archbishop, restored the Church’s property, arid did homage to the Pope for England as a vassal state.* No English king had ever before surrendered so much to the Church. When the fateful day passed, of which Peter prophesied, and John was still king, he took revenge for his terror by hanging the prophet.
* Peter of Wakefield or Peter of Pontefract (?-1213) was an unlettered hermit living near Pontefract (Pomfret is a short form of Pontefract), a town to the east of Wakefield in the West Riding of Yorkshire. Peter, his prophecy, and John’s ugly threat to hang him if his prophecy did not prove true, all appear in William Shakespeare’s history play King John.
They met at Ewell near Dover, on May 15th, 1213. John yielded up England and Ireland to the spiritual and temporal lordship of the Pope of Rome, which the Pope at once rented back to him, as a vassal ruler, for an annual tribute of 1000 marks, or £666. As Wrong indicates, John was not really King of England any longer, because neither he nor his lords (as yet there was no Parliament of Commons) had an absolute right to make or unmake laws for the English people.