The Canterbury Rose

ITV Original Series

Set in 12th-century England during the turbulent reign of Henry II — the Plantagenet king whose conflict with Thomas Becket is reshaping the relationship between crown and church — The Canterbury Rose follows Edmund de Vere, 27, a Black man raised by the powerful Norman family of Vere, one of the most influential noble houses of the Anglo-Norman aristocracy. Edmund is entirely of the Anglo-Norman world: he speaks Norman French and English, has been educated in the ecclesiastical tradition, and has chosen a career in the emerging royal legal system rather than the sword-path his family expected. When Henry II begins his great legal reforms — the Assize of Clarendon — Edmund is among the young lawyers and scholars implementing the new royal justice in circuit courts. He is also betrothed to Mathilde de Clare, a noblewoman of the powerful Clare family, in a marriage that is political, mutually respectful, and gradually becomes the series' central love story as two people who chose their own paths discover that the paths converge. Episode 1 — The Circuit Edmund on the royal justice circuit in the English countryside, administering the new Assize of Clarendon. The marriage arrangement arrives by messenger. He reads it on horseback. Episode 5 — The Library at Clare Edmund and Mathilde reading the same legal text together without having planned to. The scene in which they realize they are the same kind of mind. Episode 10 — The Canterbury Road Series finale: The Becket crisis comes to a head. Edmund and Mathilde make a legal and moral choice that costs them their proximity to royal favor and earns something more valuable.

Story added by mr95 on July 26, 2026