It's December 29th, 1170 in Canterbury, England.

Reginald Fitzhurst, a knight of King Henry II, leads three fellow knights on horseback to Canterbury Cathedral.

They are on their way to assassinate the highest-ranking religious official in England, the Archbishop to Canterbury Cathedral. They are on their way to assassinate the highest

ranking religious official in England, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Beckett.

When they arrive, Reginald dismounts and draws his sword. He tells his companions he wants to drag

Beckett outside. He says they must not kill the man on holy ground.

Reginald pushes open the door of the Great Cathedral. Priests cower behind stone columns,

as Reginald and his men stride into the building. Reginald spots Beckett at the high altar.

But the archbishop surprises the knights. He lunges forward, knocking one of them to the ground.

Reginald and the other two knights, grab Archbishop Beckett and drag him to the door.

But Beckett clings to a column and refuses to let go.

Defiantly, Beckett screams, if Reginald wants to kill him, he'll have to do it in the church.

So Reginald obliges.

Beckett's body falls to the ground, and Reginald steps back, his sword sluicing blood.

Another one of the knights draws his sword and strikes Beckett's head, cleaving through the skull.

Reginald and the others stand over Beckett's brutalized body, dip their swords in the

archbishop's pooling blood, and fling it onto the stones of Canterbury Cathedral.

Thomas Beckett was a close friend of England's monarch, King Henry II, but over time the two became engaged in a bitter dispute for power, one that climax with Beckett's murder at the hands of several of the king's knights.

The question of King Henry's complicity in the crime remains unanswered. Many believe the knights acted on their own to curry favor with the king,

while others believe the king ordered the killing. Either way, many of King Henry II subjects,

and many in the Catholic Church, hold him responsible for the Archbishop's shocking murder in the

cathedral. So the king takes steps to atone. He walks barefoot through the streets of Canterbury,

...