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Historiography

Henry was widely criticised by his own contemporaries, even within his own court. Despite this, Gerald of Wales, usually unsympathetic to the Angevins, wrote somewhat flatteringly of Henry in Topographia Hibernica as "our Alexander of the West" who "extended your hand from the Pyrenees to the westernmost limits of the Ocean". William of Newburgh, writing in the next generation, commented that "the experience of present evils has revived the memory of his good deeds, and the man who in his own time was hated by all men, is now declared to have been an excellent and beneficent prince".

Henry and his reign have attracted historians for many years. In the 18th century the historian David Hume argued that Henry's reign was pivotal to creating a genuinely English monarchy and, ultimately, a unified Britain. Henry's role in the Becket controversy was considered relatively praiseworthy by Protestant historians of the 18th century, while his disputes with the French king also attracted positive patriotic comment. In the Victorian period there was a renewed interest in the personal morality of historical figures, and scholars began to express greater concern over aspects of Henry's behaviour, including his role as a parent and husband. The King's role in the death of Becket attracted particular criticism. Late-Victorian historians, with increasing access to the documentary records from the period, stressed Henry's contribution to the evolution of key English institutions, including the development of the law and the exchequer. William Stubbs ' analysis led him to label Henry as a "legislator king", responsible for major, long-lasting reforms in England. Influenced by the contemporary growth of the British Empire, historians such as Kate Norgate undertook detailed research into Henry's Continental possessions, creating the term "the Angevin Empire" in the 1880s.

Twentieth century historians challenged many of these conclusions. In the 1950s Jacques Boussard and John Jolliffe, among others, examined the nature of Henry's empire; French scholars in particular analysed the mechanics of how royal power functioned during this period. The Anglocentric aspects of many histories of Henry were challenged from the 1980s onwards, with efforts made to bring together British and French historical analysis of the period. More detailed study of the written records left by Henry has cast doubt on some earlier interpretations: Robert Eyton's ground-breaking 1878 work tracing Henry's itinerary through deductions from the pipe rolls, for example, has been criticised as being too uncertain a way of determining location or court attendance. Although many more of Henry's royal charters have been identified, the task of interpreting these records, the financial information in the pipe rolls and wider economic data from the reign is understood to be more challenging than once thought. Considerable gaps in historical analysis of Henry remain, especially the nature of his rule in Anjou and the south of France. Nevertheless, 20th-century historians have generally praised Henry. The Canadian-American historian and medievalist Norman Cantor called Henry a "remarkable man, undoubtedly the greatest of all Medieval English kings". An extensive biography by W. L. Warren attributes Henry with a genius for efficient, sound government.