It all came to a head here at Clarendon, early in 1164,
when Henry summoned a special council
of the princes of the Church
and the most important nobles of the realm.
There he asked,
well, actually, he demanded
that they assent unconditionally
to what he chose to call the "customs of the realm."
Becket was no idiot.
He knew exactly what this meant,
royal control over the clergy.
He'd seen it coming for months
and had been urging his bishops to resist it at all costs.
After endless prevarication,
in the end Becket refused the King's demands,
ordering total resistance,
a position from which he'd never budge.
The King now moved the way he liked best, through the law.
In October, 1164,
Becket was brought to trial at Northampton,
accused and this was the killer,
of improper use of funds when he'd been Chancellor.
So all those half-joking comments about fancy clothes that Henry had thrown Becket's way
now stopped being funny.
They'd become a deadly criminal accusation.