Henry IV of England

Henry IV Of England

Henry IV (3 April 1367 – 20 March 1413) was King of England and Lord of Ireland (1399–1413). He was the ninth King of England of the House of Plantagenet and also asserted his grandfather's claim to the title King of France. He was born at Bolingbroke Castle in Lincolnshire, hence his other name, Henry (of) Bolingbroke ( /ˈbɒlɪŋbrʊk/). His father, John of Gaunt, was the third son of Edward III, and enjoyed a position of considerable influence during much of the reign of Henry's cousin Richard II, whom Henry eventually deposed. Henry's mother was Blanche, heiress to the considerable Lancaster estates, thus he became the first King of England from the Lancaster branch of the Plantagenets, one of the two family branches that were belligerents in the War of the Roses. The other one was the York branch, initiated by his uncle Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York (see section "Seniority in line from Edward III" below).