A French petition calls for the return of the British Crown Jewels to Angers, in compensation for the execution of the last Plantagenet pretender to the throne in 1499:
Angers, in the Loire valley, was the capital of Anjou province and the geographical base of the Plantagenets, who ruled England from 1154 until 1485, providing some of the most celebrated monarchs in British history, including Richard the Lionheart and Henry V.
But when Edward Plantagenet, the Earl of Warwick, was executed for treason in the Tower of London in 1499, the house’s legitimate male line came to an end. “As redress for the execution of Edward, Angers today demands that the Crown Jewels of England be transferred to Angers,” reads a petition posted on the city’s official website.
Recalling 25-year-old Edward’s “unfair and horrible death” at the hands of henchmen working for Henry VII, England’s first Tudor king, the city believes it is owed an apology and 513 years’ worth of compensation.
Tim Worstall explains the one condition under which Her Majesty should accept the French claim:
Happily stick the Crown Jewels in Angers.
Immediately after the union of the Angevin Empire with the United Kingdom.
We’ll have the Duchy of Normandy back too if you don’t mind. And Brittany (they are Bretons after all).
Francois Hollande can keep the Ile de France, the bit we didn’t have back then.
This time around let’s do European integration properly eh?
