I'm more inclined to accept the traditional definition as beginning with the signing of the Magna Carta in 1215 and ending with the death of Elizabeth I, the last Tudor monarch, in 1603.
During this 388 year period, there were a total of three monarchs who could be considered reasonable competent: Edward III (1327-77), Henry IV (1399-1413) and Elizabeth I (1558-1603). That's 109 years or 28% of the total. Edward III was, at best, mediocre and is makes the list of comparatively competent monarchs only because others in the same era (particularly his predecessor) were so bad. Take out his 50 year reign and you are left with only 15% or so of that era which has good leadership and even less considering a substantial part of their early reign was spent just cleaning up the messes left by their predecessors.
Many of the gains made by the average Englishman during the reign of Edward III were due to an abrupt rise in wages following the 1348-49 black plague which reduced the labor force by more than 30%. Supply and demand tends to do that!
Like modern Libtards, many historians defend the reigns of monarchs like Edward I and Henry VII and VIII because they maintained firm control on the country.
But said control was achieved at an extraordinarily high cost. Henry VIII, for instance, ruled a country of 2.5 million and sent 70,000 or so of them to the gallows or chopping block as a price of maintaining control. That's an execution rate of 2.8%! The United States would have to execute nine million Americans over 38 years to achieve a comparable scale of brutality!
In terms of international importance, from the death of Henry IV in 1413 until the Coronation of Elizabeth I in 1558, England went from a country having substantial holdings in modern-day France (Normandy, Burgundy, Picardy, Calais) to being a country flirting with extinction whom some saw the possibilities of survival dependent only by merging with France, Spain or some greater power.
Thanks for the history lesson.
Fascinating period in history
I think that it would be easier to visualize life in Medieval England if you imagined the population transported to Jamestowne, VA which was founded in 1607, after all, by members of the same population indigenous to Merrie Olde England. The Jamestowne Company included tradesmen (perfumers, glassmakers, etc.) and "gentlemen" who didn't seem to know much about anything. They brought body armor and other implements of war which quickly found themselves cast to the bottom of cisterns and wells because this equipment was impossible to use and not needed in frontier Virginia.
But, these Englishmen, although nearly perishing the first winter, were resourceful and within a few years had built a thriving colony from scratch. Women joined them (I forget now whether it was the 2nd or the 3rd crossing) and soon the huts were transformed into real homes. They built churches and factories, held the first Thanksgiving long before the Mass. Pilgrims had left Holland, and bore sons and daughters who became our Founders. They were wealthy beyond compare to anything stodgy old Europe and England produced.
It is important to point out that they nearly starved to death when they operated on a communal basis -- sharing everything. It was not until they divided the land and granted the means of production to INDIVIDUAL families that the colony prospered. This seems to be a lesson that some Congresscritters, as well as the White House, have forgotten, or never learned in school.
The stronger the monarch, the weaker the count. If the monarch is weak, the count is much more like a king in his own county. Earlier, it is my understanding that England had essentially regional and countywide kingdoms, and endless wars of succession.