By making Becket Archbishop of Canterbury, Henry believed he could depend on someone who would share his view of the subordinate relationship of Church to State. The King was in for a shock. At the beginning at least, there seemed to be a good deal of the old Becket about the new Becket. The array of fancy foods and company of young cosmopolitan scholars remained. But all was not how it appeared. Becket ate none of the feast and beneath his grand garments he may well have begun to wear the hair shirt that was found later on his murdered body. When the King began to realise that a mysterious transformation had taken place in Becket, when, for instance, the Archbishop stood up in public and opposed in a most militant language, the King's demand for a new tax on the Church, Henry Plantagenet went altogether ballistic. Nothing made him more enraged than a friendship, as he saw it, betrayed.


亨利相信，他可以指望对方与其在宗教国家的从属关系方面达成一致，结果却令他大吃一惊。至少在一开始，贝克特看似并无多少变化，美食盛宴，同各国年轻学者为伍。这种生活依旧如故，但表面平静，暗波汹涌，贝克特不再享用盛宴。华服之下，他开始身着苦行衬衣。随后在他遇害的遗体上被发现，当国王开始意识到贝克特，身上的神秘转变。比如，大主教在公众面前，以最激进的言语，公然反对国王对教会征收新税项，亨利二世勃然大怒。在他看来，没什么比朋友的背叛，更令人愤怒的了。