King John was widely regarded as a poor king, untrustworthy and inflexible - by some accounts even cowardly. Perhaps, though, he was not all bad. Perhaps his reputation owed more to the people who would stand to lose from his signing the Magna Carta into English Law.

King John's rule, and indeed England's claim to land in Northern France, was lost when French kings sized these territories. It must have served as a chilling reminder to the mainly French barons in England, who, using similar tactics decades earlier gained their ownership of English land.

These actions echoed their own supposed right over ownership to English soil, and lead them to oppose king John.

John's relationship with Rome, and the then pope Innocent III, was not good. King John, unlike Rome, was opposed to Langton becoming Bishop of Canterbury. This opinion would lead to the pope excommunicating king John, and in the process expediently hand the barons' the right to thus ascend over him. (or try at least)

The barons were to invite the French kings, and their armies, into England to occupy the land - already difficult times must have been made much worse.