The original Succession, but with more chainmail and daddy issues you can actually inherit.
Season 1 • Episode 13
LatestAfter six years, John has yielded to the Pope. The Interdict is lifted but the English barons remain discontented; they want a charter of rights.
The Devil's Crown was a BBC limited series which dramatised the reigns of three medieval Kings of England: Henry II and his sons Richard the Lionheart and John. It was broadcast in thirteen 55-minute episodes between 30 April and 23 July 1978. Henry Plantagenet (latterly Henry II), sees his opportunity to seize the crown of England and create a kingdom of law and order. He cuts a deal with King Stephen in which Stephen will name him his heir, excluding his sons Eustace and William in exchange for a fragile truce. Stephen's sudden death elevates Henry to the throne. He may have been King of England, but the bulk of the Angevin Empire was in France, and it was this that Henry regarded as the Jewel in his Crown, maintained through a series of political marriages and complex allegiances. Henry pays homage to Louis VII, King of the Franks, for these lands, but it is clear that Henry is the shrewder and more ambitious of the two kings, having married Louis' ex-wife Eleanor of Aquitaine.
Production
BBC prestige: candlelit halls, authentic armor, zero dragons.
Writing
Shakespearean family feuds with actual historical receipts.
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Jane Howell later directed the famous hollow-crown BBC Shakespeare histories, cutting her teeth here.
This aired months before Lion in Winter's TV remake—1978 was peak Henry II obsession.
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