Annals of Kings Richard II and Henry IV. Once the sorrowful sentence had been pronounced [on 8th June 1405], they were immediately hurried away to execution, lest the King revoke the judgement through anyone’s intercession. They were placed upon wretched beasts, without saddles or coverings, and led with a great crowd beyond the city to a field sown with barley, which was then green. The Earl Marshal [aged 19], being younger and more delicately brought up, was terrified at the prospect of death. The Archbishop [aged 55] comforted him and urged him to be of good courage, since he had been unjustly condemned, and willingly to endure the momentary death that he was about to suffer for the sake of justice. He promised him, upon the peril of his own soul, that as soon as he was freed from the burden of the flesh, his spirit would fly to the joys of heaven. Thus encouraged, the young man became more cheerful and resolute, and was beheaded by the executioner. The torturers then dragged the Archbishop into the field of green barley, surrounded by what seemed an innumerable host of horsemen and men on foot, who had gathered from many places to witness the spectacle. The husbandman who owned the field and the barley, seeing his entire crop crushed and trampled beneath the feet of both horses and men, approached the Archbishop in tears. He complained that, because of him, he had lost all hope of providing for himself in the coming year. He therefore begged the Archbishop to ask the officers charged with his execution to take him back to the king’s highway nearby, which was sufficiently broad and spacious, so that he might be beheaded there and the man might not lose his livelihood. The Archbishop, filled with compassion and grieving for the unfortunate man, asked his guards to take him back to the public road and there do to him whatever they had resolved. On hearing the prelate’s request, however, they became still more enraged and dragged him farther into the field, declaring that a traitor would not be permitted to choose either the place of his death or that of his burial. When the Archbishop saw that his pleas were of no avail, he blessed the field and prayed that Almighty God, the giver of all good things, would grant an abundant increase to the grieving man. In accordance with the prelate’s prayer, and contrary to all expectation, the field, which had appeared to be entirely trampled down, yielded more produce that year than it had done for many years before. The owner saw seven full and beautiful ears of barley growing from a single stalk, as was attested by many witnesses.
Accepta tristi sententia, mox urgebatur ad mortem, ne, mediante prece cujusquam, Rex sententiam revocaret. Impositique jumentis vilibus, et sine stramentis, cum turba multa ducti sunt extra civitatem, in campum satum hordeo tune virenti: cumque Comes Marescallus, utpote junior ætate ekb delicatior, mortem expavesceret, Archiepiscopus, confortans eum, monuit ut esset forti animo, cum damnatus esset inique, et libenter sufferret mortem momentaneam quam obiturus erat pro justitia: promittens sibi, sub periculo animæ suæ, quod mox, soluto carnis onere, spiritus ad gaudia transvolaret. Et sic quidem juvenis lætior effectus, et constantior, a spiculatore decollatus est. Archiepiscopum vero tortores trahebant in campum virentem hordeo, stipatum equitibus et peditibus, velut innumeris, qui ad hoc spectaculum convenerant ex multis locis. Vir autem paterfamilias, cujus erat campus et hordeum, cernens bladum suum omnino conteri et conculcari pedibus, tam equorum quam hominum, lacrymabiliter accessit ad Archiepiscopum, conquerens quod causa sui perdidisset spem totius victus sui pro anno futuro. Unde rogavit ut moneret ministros mortis suæ, ut eum in viam reducerent regiam, quæ prope fuit, satis spatiosa et lata; ut illie decapitaretur, et non perderet victum suum. Archiepiscopus, compassione plenus, condolens misero homini, rogavit custodes suos, ut reducerent eum ad viam publicam, et illie facerent ei quæcunque concepissent. At illi, audita voce Pontificis, magis furibundi trahebant eum in campum, asserentes proditorem non electurum sibi nec mortis nec sepulturæ locum. Tunc Antistes, videns quod nihil prævalerent preces suæ, benedixit campum, fusa prece ut largitor omnium bonorum, Deus Omnipotens, incrementum daret viro gementi. Evenitque juxta precem Pontificis, ut, contra spem, campus qui omnino conculcatus videbatur, redderet fructum eo anno quantum antea non reddiderat in multis annis, ita ut possessor cerneret crevisse septem spicas de culmo uno, plenas atque formosas; ut proditum est testimonio plurimorum.
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