3-056-992 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Copy of letters confirming the truce between Henry III of England and Louis IX of France, 1258. The claim of Henry III to the French lands lost by his father John and his position as Duke of Aquitaine made for constant tensions with the French King during the first part of his reign. In 1258, Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, and four other envoys negotiated a truce between Henry III and the French ruler Louis IX. The large seal on the right is de Montfort's. The truce enabled de Montfort and his baronial allies to pursue their agenda of increasing their power at the expense of that of the King.