But neither Edward nor his successors could find the right means to step down from the platform that he constructed in Ghent in 1340. The consequences were appalling. The repeated invasions of France cost English lives and sucked up English resources. They disrupted and at times destroyed the trade with Flanders and France that had been so important to the English economy. The insatiable demand for taxation to pay for them very nearly destroyed the English state in the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381.
