Edward IIL

eldest son of Edward II. and Isabella of France; born in 1312, succeeded to the throne on the deposition of his father, 1327. Though @ regency was appointed, the chief power was held by the queen and her aramour, Roger Mortimer, Earl of Beazer. In 1830, Edward a umed the government, had Mortimer seized and hanged, and imprisoned Queen Isabel- Ia. The chief events of his reign were the wars with Scotland, and the wars with France, the latter marked by, among others, the victory at Crécy, and that at Poitiers, when the Black Prince captured the French king and his sons. The commerce and manufacture of England grew with her foreign military prestige, and much of her religious and social reform dates from this reign. Edward died June 21, 1377. Edward IV., i; England; born in 1441; died 1483; claimed the throne by descent from the fourth son of Edward Iil., while the House of Gaunt laid claim by descent from the third son.