(Jody Gray) based on my family lineage.
30th GGF Hugh Capet the White, King of the Franks b. 941
29th GGF Robert II the Pious, King of the Franks
28th GGF Henry I, King of the Franks
27th GGF, Hugh Magnus de Crepi, became Count of Vermandois when he married Adelaide de Vermandois.
Henry I, King of the Franks was succeeded by his eldest son, Philip I as King of the Franks; as a sibling of our GGF, in relationship to me, I call him and his descendants, TWIGS (from the “father-to-son” Branch that eventually connects to my Piper Family Trunk)
Descendants of House of Capet *following their succession to the throne of France
28th great-uncle, Philip I the Amorous, King of the Franks b. 1052
1st cousin 28x removed, Louis VI the Fat, King of the Franks b. 1081
2nd cousin 27x removed, Louis VII the Younger, King of the Franks b. 1120
3rd cousin 26x removed, Philip II Augustus, King of France b. 1165
4th cousin 25x removed, Louis VIII the Lion, King of France b. 1187
5th cousin 24x removed, Louis IX, King of France b. 1214
6th cousin 23x removed, Philip III the Bold, King of France b. 1245
7th cousin 22x removed, Philip IV the Fair, King of France b. 1268
8th cousin 21x removed, Louis X the Quarreler, King of France b. 1289
*his son John I died (age 5 days); so Louis X was succeeded by his brother, Philip V
8th cousin 21x removed, Philip V the Tall, King of France b. 1293 (died age 29 without a male heir; succeeded by his brother, Charles IV)
8th cousin 21x removed, Charles IV the Fair, King of France b. 1294. He died in 1328 (age 34) without a male heir and was succeeded by Philip VI, the first King of France from the House of Valois.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_I_of_France Henry I of France. b. 5/4/1008 Reims, France d. 8/4/1060 Vitry-aux-Loges, France. Reign, Senior King (of the Franks) 1031-1060. Coronation, 5/14/1027, Cathedral of Reims. His first wife Matilda of Frisia died in 1044, following a Caesarean section. He married Anne of Kiev 5/19/1051; they had four children: Philip I, Emma, Robert (died about age 5), Hugh the Great.
The royal demesne of France reached its smallest size during his reign, and for this reason he is often seen as emblematic of the weakness of the early Capetians; other historians regard him as a strong but realistic king, who was forced to conduct a policy mindful of the limitations of the French monarchy… He was crowned King of France 5/14/1027, while his father still lived; he had little influence and power until he became sole ruler on his father’s death (1031)... The reign of Henry I, like those of his predecessors, was marked by territorial struggles…
In an early strategic move, Henry came to the rescue of his very young nephew-in-law, the newly appointed Duke William of Normandy (who would go on to become William the Conqueror), to suppress a revolt by William’s vassals. In 1047, Henry secured the dukedom for William in their decisive victory over the vassals at the Battle of Val-es-Dunes near Caen; however, Henry would later support the barons against William until the Henry’s death in 1060.
In 1051, William married Matilda, the daughter of the count of Flanders, which Henry saw as a threat to his throne. In 1054, and again in 1057, Henry invaded Normandy, but on both occasions he was defeated…
He died 8/4/1060 in Vitry-en-Brie, France; buried in Basilica of St Denis. He was succeeded by his son, Philip I of France.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_I_of_France Philip I of France. b. 5/23/1052 Champagne-et-Fontaine d. 7/29/1108. Reign 1060-1060. Coronation, 5/23/1059. He married 1st, Bertha of Holland; they had Constance, Louis VI of France, Henry (died young). He married 2nd, Bertrade de Montfort; they had Philip, Fleury, Cecile.
His mother, Anne of Kiev acted as regent until he reached the age of fourteen (1066) *the 1st queen of France to ever do so. Baldwin V of Flanders also acted as co-regent… Philip fell in love with Bertrade de Montfort, the wife of Fulk IV, Count of Anjou. He repudiated his first wife and married Bertrade 5/15/1092; in 1094 he was excommunicated by Hugh of Die… in 1104 Philip made a public penance and must have kept his involvement with Bertrade discreet… it was said that because of this passion he had for Bertrade he was an ineffective king… A great part of his reign was spent putting down revolts by his power-hungry vassals. In 1077, he made peace with William the Conqueror, who gave up attempting to conquest Brittany.
He died in the castle of Melun and was buried per request at the monastery of Saint-Benoit-sur-Loire and not in St Denis among his forefathers. He was succeeded by his son, Louis VI.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_VI_of_France Louis VI of France. b. 12/1/1081 Paris, France d. 8/1/1137 Bethisy-Saint-Pierre, France. Reign 1108-1137. 1st married (1104), Lucienne de Rochefort, a French crown princess, in 1104, but repudiated her three years later; they had no children. 2nd married (1115), Adelaide of Maurienne, daughter of Humbert II of Savoy and Gisela of Burgundy; they had eight children: Philip (died age 15), Louis VIII, King of France, Henry, Hugues (died young), Robert, Peter, Constance, Philip.
When Louis ascended the throne the Kingdom of France was a collection of feudal principalities. Beyond the Isle de France the French Kings had little authority over the great Dukes and Counts of the realm but slowly Louis began to change this and assert Capetian rights. The second great challenge facing Louis was to counter the rising power of the Anglo-Normans under their capable new King, Henry I of England.
Louis was the first member of the House of Capet to make a lasting contribution to the centralizing institutions of royal power. He spent almost all of his 29-year reign fighting either the “robber barons” who plagued Paris (from their castles, these barons would charge tolls, waylay merchants and pilgrims, terrorize the peasantry and loot churches and abbeys) or the Norman kings of England for their continental possession of Normandy. Nonetheless, Lois VI managed to reinforce his power considerably and became one of the first strong kings of France since the division of the Carolingian Empire in 843. In 1129, Louis had his son, Philip (age 12), crowned as co-ruler; 3 yrs later (1131) Philip died and Louis had his 2nd son, Louis (age 11), crowned as co-ruler (Junior King). Louis VI died in 1137; his son Louis VII, the Younger, succeeded him as King of the Franks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_VII_of_France Louis VII of France. b. 1120 d. 9/18/1180 Saint-Pont, Allier, France. Reign 1131-1180. 1st married, Eleanor of Aquitaine; they had Marie, Alix. 2nd married, Constance of Castile; they had, Margaret, Alys. 3rd married, Adele of Champagne; they had Philip II, Agnes. Note: Margaret was betrothed to Henry II, future King of England when she was 3,he was 5; they married in 1172, she was 15, he was 17.
Son and successor of King Louis VI of France; in 1137, he married Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of the wealthiest and most powerful women in western Europe; she came with the vast Duchy of Aquitaine as a dowry for Louis, thus temporarily extending the Capetian lands to the Pyrenees, but their marriage was annulled in 1152 after no male heir was produced. Immediately after the annulment of her marriage, Eleanor married Henry Plantagenet, Duke of Normandy and Count of Anjou, to whom she gave the Aquitaine. When Henry became King of England in 1154, as Henry II, he ruled over a large empire that spanned from Scotland to the Pyrenees. Henry’s efforts to preserve and expand on this patrimony for the Crown of England would mark the beginning of the long rivalry between France and England…. More direct and more frequent connections were made with distant vassals, a result largely due to an alliance between the clergy and the crown. His greater accomplishments lie in the development of agriculture, population, commerce, the building of stone fortresses, as well as an intellectual renaissance.
Louis died 9/18/1180 in Paris; buried at Barbeau Abbey; later moved to the Basilica of Saint-Denis in 1817. He was succeeded by his son, Philip II.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_II_of_France Philip II of France. b. 8/21/1165 Gonesse, France d. 7/14/1223 Mantes-la-Jolie, France. Reign 1179-1223. 1st married (4/28/1180), Isabelle of Hainaut, daughter of Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut and Margaret I, Countess of Flanders, who brought the County of Artois as her dowry; she died in childbirth in 1190; they had; Louis VIII, King of France, Robert, Philip. 2nd married, Ingeborg, daughter of King Valdemar I of Denmark. 3rd married, Agnes of Merania; they had Marie, Philip.
the 1st French monarch to style himself as king of France… After a 12-year struggle with the Plantagenet dynasty in the Anglo-French War of 1202-14, Philip broke up the large Angevin Empire presided over by the crown of England and defeated a coalition of his rivals (German, Flemish and English) at the Battle of Bouvines in 1214. This victory would have a lasting impact on western European politics: the authority of the French king became unchallenged, while the English King John was forced by his barons to sign Magna Carta and deal with a rebellion against him aided by Philip, the First Barons’ War.
The military actions surrounding the Albigensian Crusade helped prepare the expansion of France southward. Philip did not participate directly in these actions, but allowed his vassals and knights to help carry it out.
Early Years.
Coronation, 11/1/1179, Rheims. m: 4/28/1180, Isabelle of Hainaut; daughter of Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut and Margaret I, Countess of Flanders; Isabelle brought the County of Artois as her dowry. The great nobles were discontented with Philip’s advantageous marriage, while his mother and four uncles, all of whom exercised enormous influence over Louis, were extremely unhappy with his attainment of the throne, which caused a diminution of their power.
April 1182, partially to enrich the French crown, Philip expelled all Jews from the demesne and confiscated their goods. Philip’s eldest son Louis inherited the County of Artois in 1190, when his mother Isabelle died. The main source of funding for Philip’s army was from the royal demesne. In times of conflict, he could immediately call up 250 knights, 250 horse sergeants, 100 mounted crossbowmen, 133 crossbowmen on foot, 2,000 foot sergeants, and 300 mercenaries. Towards the end of his reign, the king could must some 3,000 knights, 9,000 sergeants, 6,000 urban militiamen, and thousands of foot sergeants. Using his increased revenues, Philip was the first Capetian king to build a French navy actively. By 1215, his fleet could carry a total of 7,000 men. Within two years, his fleet included 10 large ships and many smaller ones.
Wars with his vassals.
In 1181, Philip began a war with Philip, Count of Flanders, over the Vermandois, which King Philip claimed was his wife’s dowry and the Count was unwilling to give up… In July 1185, the Treaty of Boves left the disputed territory partitioned, with Amienois, Artois, and numerous other places passing to the king, and the remainder, with the county of Vermandois proper, left provisionally to the Count of Flanders…
War with Henry II.
Philip also began to wage war with King Henry II of England, who was also Count of Anjou and Duke of Normandy and Aquitaine in France. The death of Henry’s eldest son, Henry the Young King, in June 1183, began a dispute over the dower of Philip's widowed sister Margaret. Philip insisted that the dower should be returned to France as the marriage did not produce any children, as per the betrothal agreement. The two kings would hold conferences at the foot of an elm tree near Gisors, which was so positioned that it would overshadow each monarch’s territory, but to no avail. Philip pushed the case further when King Bela III of Hungary asked for the widow’s hand in marriage, and thus her dowry had to be returned, to which Henry finally agreed.
The death in 1186 of Henry’s fourth son, Geoffrey II, Duke of Brittany, began a new round of disputes, as Henry insisted that he retain the guardianship of his unborn grandson Arthur I, Duke of Brittany. Philip, as Henry’s liege lord, objected, stating that he should be the rightful guardian until the birth of the child. Philip then raised the issue of his other sister, Alys, Countess of Vexin, and her delayed betrothal to Henry’s son Richard I of England, nicknamed Richard the Lionheart.
With these grievances, two years of combat followed (1186-1188), but the situation remained unchanged. Philip initially allied with Henry’s young sons Richard the Lionheart and John Lackland, who were in rebellion against their father…
In 1189, Richard openly joined forces with Philip to drive Henry into abject submission. They chased him from Le Mans to Saumur, losing Tours in the process, before forcing him to acknowledge Richard as his heir. Finally, by the Treaty of Azay-le-Rideau (7/4/1189), Henry was forced to renew his own homage, confirm the cession of Issoudun to Philip and renounce his claim to suzerainty over Auvergne. Henry died two days later. His death, and the news of the fall of Jerusalem to Saladin, diverted attention from the Franco-English war.
The Angevin Kings of England (the line of rulers to which Henry II belonged), were Philip’s most powerful and dangerous vassals as Dukes of Normandy and Aquitaine and Counts of Anjou. Philip made it his life’s work to destroy Angevin power in France. One of his most effective tools was to befriend all of Henry’s sons and use them to foment rebellion against their father. He maintained friendships with Henry the Young King and Geoffrey II until their deaths… He broke off his friendships with Henry’s younger sons Richard and John asa each acceded to the English throne.
Third Crusade.
Philip travelled to the Holy Land to participate in the Third Crusade of 1189-1192 with King Richard I of England and Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa… At first, the French and English crusaders travelled together, but the armies split at Lyon… reunited in Messina… On 3/30/1191, the French set sail for the Holy Land and Philip arrived on May 20… By the time Acre surrendered on July 21, Philip was severely ill with dysentery…
More importantly, the siege of Acre resulted in the death of Philip, Count of Flanders, who held the county of Vermandois proper. His death threatened to derail the Treaty of Gisors that Philip had orchestrated to isolate the powerful Blois-Champagne faction. Philip decided to return to France to settle the issue of succession in Flanders… 7/31/1191, the French army of 10,000 men remained in Outremer… The decision to return was also fueled by the realisation that with Richard campaigning in the Holy Land, English possessions in northern France would be open to attack. After Richard’s delayed return home, was between England and France would ensue over possession of English-controlled territories.
Conflict with England, Flanders and the Holy Roman Empire - Conflict with King Richard the Lionheart, 1192-1199.
The immediate cause of Philip’s conflict with Richard the Lionheart stemmed from Richard’s decision to break his betrothal with Phillip’s sister, Alys at Messina in 1191. Part of Alys’s dowry that had been given over to Richard during their engagement was the territory of Vexin, which included the strategic fortress of Gisors. This should have reverted to Philip upon the end of the betrothal, but Philip, to prevent the collapse of the Crusade, agreed that this territory was to remain in Richard’s hands and would be inherited by his male descendants. Should Richard die without an heir, the territory would return to Phlip, and if Philip died without an heir, those lands would be considered a part of Normandy.
Returning to France in late 1191, Philip began plotting to find a way to have those territories restored to him. He was in a difficult situation, as he had taken an oath not to attack Richard’s lands while he was away on crusade.
1/20/1192, Philip met with William FitzRalph, Richard’s seneschal of Normandy. Presenting some documents purporting to be from Richard, Philip claimed that the English king had agreed at Messina to hand disputed lands over to France. Not having heard anything directly from their sovereign, FitzRalph and the Norman barons rejected Philip’s claim to Vexin. Philip at this time also began spreading rumors about Richard’s action in the east to discredit the English king in the eyes of his subjects. Among the stories Philip invented included Richard involved in treacherous communication with Saladin, alleging he had conspired to cause the fall of Gaza, Jaffa, and Ashkelon, and that he had participated in the murder of Conrad of Montferrat. Finally, Philip made contact with Prince John, Richard’s brother, whom he convinced to join the conspiracy to overthrow the legitimate king of England.
At the start of 1193, Prince John visited Philip in Paris, where he paid homage for Richard’s continental lands. When word reached Philip that Richard had finished crusading and had been captured on his way back from the Holy Land, he promptly invaded Vexin. His first target was the fortress of Gisors, commanded by Gilbert de Vascoeuil, which surrendered without putting up a struggle… To keep the duplicitous John on his side, Philip entrusted him with the defense of the town of Evreux. Meanwhile, Philip was joined by Count Baldwin of Flanders, and together they laid siege to Rouen, the ducal capital of Normandy. Here, Philip’s advance was halted by a defence led by the Earl of Leicester…
At Mantes on 7/9/1193, Philip came to terms with Richard’s ministers, who agreed that Philip could keep his gains and would be given some extra territories if he ceased all further aggressive actions in Normandy, along with the condition that Philip would hand back the captured territory if Richard would pay homage… Richard was released from captivity on 2/4/1194… by May 12 Richard had set sail for Normandy with some 300 ships, eager to engage Philip in war.
Philip had consolidated his territorial gains and by now controlled much of Normandy east of the Seine… Throughout June, while Philip’s campaign ground to a halt in the north, Richard was taking a number of important fortresses to the south… Fleeing back to Normandy, Philip avenged himself on the English by attacking the forces of Prince John and the Earl of Arundel, seizing their baggage train. By now both sides were tiring, and they agreed to the temporary Truce of Tillieres.
War continually raged during 1195… Richard won over a key ally, Baldwin of Flanders, in 1197. Then, in 1198, Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI died. His successor was to be Otto IV, Richard’s nephew, who put additional pressure on Philip. Finally, many Norman lords were switching sides and returning to Richard’s camp…
In mid-January 1199, the two kings met for a final meeting, Richard standing on the deck of a boat, Philip standing on the banks of the Seine River. Shouting terms at each other, they could not reach agreement on the terms of a permanent truce, but they did agree to further mediation, which resulted in a five-year truce that held. Later in 1199, Richard was killed during a siege involving one of his vassals.
Conflict with King John, 1200-1206.
In May 1200, Philip signed the Treaty of Le Goulet with Richard’s successor John Lackland. The treaty was meant to bring peace to Normandy by settling the issue of its much-reduced boundaries. The terms of John’s vassalage were not only for Normandy, but also for Anjou, Maine, and Touraine. John agreed to heavy terms, including the abandonment of all the English possessions in Berry and 20,000 marks of silver, while Philip in turn recognised John as king of England, formally abandoning Arthur of Brittany’s candidacy, whom he had hitherto supported, recognising instead John’s suzerainty over the Duchy of Brittany. To seal the treaty, a marriage between Blanche of Castile, John’s niece, and Louis the Lion, Philip’s son, was contracted. Note: both 12 years old, they were married 5/22/1200.
This agreement did not bring warfare to an end in France, however, since John’s mismanagement of Aquitaine led the province to erupt in rebellion later in 1200… Philip again took up Arthur of Brittany’s claims to the English throne and betrothed his six-year-old daughter Marie… John’s forces captured Arthur, and in 1203, the young man disappeared, with most people believing that John had had him murdered… by the end of 1204, most of Normandy and the Angevin lands, including much of Aquitaine, had fallen into Philip’s hands…
Alliances against Philip, 1208-1213.
In 1208, Philip of Swabia, the successful candidate to assume the throne of the Holy Roman Empire, was assassinated; the imperial crown was given to his rival Otto IV, the nephew of King John (Otto, had promised to help John recover his lost possessions in France)... By 1212, both John and Otto were engaged in power struggles against Pope Innocent III: John over his refusal to accept the papal nomination for the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Otto over his attempt to strip Frederick II, King of the Germans (and later Holy Roman Emperor), of his Sicilian crown… Philip saw his chance to launch a successful invasion of England; to secure cooperation of all his vassals, Philip denounced John as an enemy of the Church, thereby justifying his attack as motivated solely by religious scruples…. John was persuaded to abandon his opposition to papal investiture and agreed to accept the papal legate’s decision in any ecclesiastical disputes as final. In return, the pope agreed to accept the Kingdom of England and the Lordship of Ireland as papal fiefs, which John would rule as the pope’s vassal, and for which John would do homage to the pope…
Battle of Bouvines, 1214.
The French fleet, reportedly numbering some 1,700 ships, proceeded first to Gravelines and then to the port of Dam… the army marched… to lay siege to Ghent… Philip learned that the English had captured a number of his ships at Dam… After having obtained 30,000 marks as a ransom for the hostages he had taken from the Flemish cities he had captured, Philip quickly retraced his steps to reach Dam… he discovered he could not rescue his fleet. He ordered it to be burned to prevent it from falling into enemy hands, then he commanded the town of Dam to be burned to ground as well… in every district he passed through he ordered that all towns be razed and burned, and that the peasantry be either killed or sold as slaves.
The destruction of the French fleet raised John’s hopes and he prepared for an invasion of France and a reconquest of his lost provinces…
On 7/27/1214, the opposing armies were in close proximity, on the banks of the little tributary of the River Lys, near the Bridge of Bouvines. Philip’s army numbered some 15,000, while the allied forces possessed around 25,000 troops… Philip was unhorsed by the Flemish pikemen in the heat of battle… When Otto was carried off the field by his wounded and terrified horse, and the Count of Flanders was severely wounded and taken prisoner, the Flemish and Imperial troops saw that the battle was lost, turned, and fled the field… Philip ordered a recall…
Philip returned to Paris triumphant, marching his captive prisoners behind him in a long procession, as his grateful subjects came out to greet the victorious king… Otto retreated to his castle of Harzburg and was soon overthrown as Holy Roman Emperor, to be replaced by Frederick II. Count Ferdinand remained imprisoned following his defeat, while King John obtained a five-year truce…
Philip’s decisive victory was crucial in shaping Western European politics in both England and France. In England, the defeated John was so weakened that he was soon required to submit to the demands of his barons and sign Magna Carta, which limited the power of the crown and established the basis for common law. In France, the battle was instrumental in forming the strong central monarchy that would characterise its rule until the first French Revolution. It was also the first battle in the Middle Ages in which the full value of infantry was realised.
Marital problems.
After the early death of Isabella of Hainaut in childbirth in 1190, Philip decided to marry again. 8/15/1193, he married Ingeborg; daughter of King Valdemar I of Denmark. She was renamed Isambour, and Stephen of Tournai described her as “very kind, young of age but old of wisdom.” For some unknown reason, Philip was repelled by her, and he refused to allow her to be crowned queen. Ingeborg protested at this treatment; he confined her to a convent and asked Pope Celestine III for an annulment on the grounds of non-consummation. Isambour, insisted that the marriage had been consummated… In the meantime, Philip had sought a new bride. Initial agreement had been reached for him to marry Margaret of Geneva; daughter of William I, Count of Geneva, but the young bride’s journey to Paris was interrupted by Thomas I of Savoy, who kidnapped Philip’s intended new queen and married her instead… Philip married 5/7/1196, Agnes of Merania from Dalmatia… Pope Innocent III declared their marriage null and void, as he was still married to Isambour. When the King didn’t separate from Agnes the pope placed France under an interdict in 1199… Philip finally took Isambour back as his wife in 1213.
Legacy.
Philip transformed France from a small feudal state into the most prosperous and powerful country in Europe. He checked the power of the nobles and helped the towns to free themselves from seignorial authority, granting privileges and liberties to the emergent bourgeoisie. He built a great wall around Paris (“the Wall of Philip II Augustus”), reorganized the French government and brought financial stability to his country.
Philip II played a significant role in one of the greatest centuries of innovation in construction and education in France. With Paris as his capital, he had the main thoroughfares paved, built a central market, Les Halles, continued the construction begun in 1163 of Notre-Dame de Paris, constructed the Louvre as a fortress, and gave a charter to the University of Paris in 1200. Under his guidance, Paris became the first city of teachers the medieval world knew… he commissioned a great wine tasting competition…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade Albigensian Crusade or Cartha Crusade. At least 200,000 to at most 1,000,000 Cathars killed. Considered by many historians to be an act of genocide (from the rooted words genos (Greek for family, tribe or race) and -cide (Latin for killing).
Albigensian Crusade or Cathar Crusade (1209-1229) was a 20-year military campaign initiated by Pope Innocent III to eliminate Catharism in Languedoc in the south of France. The Crusade was prosecuted primarily by the French crown and promptly took on a political flavor, resulting in not only a significant reduction in the number of practicing Cathars, but also a realignment of the County of County of Toulouse, bringing it into the sphere of the French crown and diminishing the distinct regional culture and high level of influence of the Counts of Barcelona.
The medieval Christian radical sect of the Cathars, against whom the crusade was directed, originated from an anti-materialistic reform movement within the Bogomil churches of Dalmatia and Bulgaria calling for a return to the Christian message of perfection, poverty and preaching, combined with a rejection of the physical to the point of starvation. The reforms were a reaction against the often scandalous and dissolute lifestyles of the Catholic clergy in southern France. Their theology was basically dualist. Several of their practices, especially their belief in the inherent evil of the physical world, which conflicted with the doctrines of the Incarnation of Christ and transubstantiation [change of substance by which the bread and the wine offered in the sacrifice of the sacrament of the Eucharist during the mass, become, in reality, the body and blood of Jesus the Christ], brought them the ire of the Catholic establishment.
Between 1022 and 1163, they were condemned by eight local church councils, the last of which, held at Tours, declared that all Albigenses “should be imprisoned and their property confiscated,” and by the Third Lateran Council of 1179… After the murder of his legate, Pierre de Castelnau, in 1208, Innocent III declared a crusade against the Cathars. He offered the lands of the Cathar heretics to any French nobleman willing to take up arms. After initial successes, the French barons faced a general uprising in Languedoc which led to the intervention of the French royal army.
The Albigensian Crusade also had a role in the creation and institutionalization of both the Dominican Order and the medieval inquisition.
Origin. By the 12th century, organized groups of dissidents, such as the Waldensians and Cathars, were beginning to appear in the towns and cities of newly urbanized areas. In western Mediterranean France, one of the most urbanized areas of Europe at the time, the Cathars grew to represent a popular mass movement…
The theology of the Cathars was dualistic, a belief in two equal and comparable transcendental principles: God, the force of good, and Satan, or the demiurge, the force of evil. They held that the physical world was evil and created by this demiurge, which they called Rex Mundi (Latin, “King of the World”). Rex Mundi encompassed all that was corporeal, chaotic and powerful. The Cathar understanding of God was entirely disincarnate: they viewed God as a being or principle of pure spirit and completely unsullied by the taint of matter. He was the God of love, order and peace. Jesus was an angel with only a phantom body, and the accounts of him in the New Testament were to be understood allegorically. As the physical world and the human body were the creation of the evil principle, sexual abstinence (even in marriage) was encouraged. Civil authority had no claim on a Cathar, since this was the rule of the physical world.
Before the crusade there was little fighting in the area and it had a fairly sophisticated polity. Western Mediterranean France itself was at that time divided between the Crown of Aragon and the county of Toulouse.
On becoming Pope in 1198, Innocent III resolved to deal with the Cathars and sent a delegation of friars to the province of Languedoc to assess the situation. The Cathars of Languedoc were seen as not showing proper respect for the authority of the French king of the local Catholic Church, and their leaders were being protected by powerful nobles, who had clear interest in independence from the king.
One of the most powerful, Count Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse, openly supported the Cathars and their independence movement. He was excommunicated in May 1207 and an interdict was placed on his lands. The senior papal legate, Pierre de Castelnau, seen as responsible for these actions, was killed and his death was attributed to the supporters of the count… King Philip II of France decided to act against those nobles who permitted Catharism within their lands and undermined secular authority.
Military campaigns.
The first, from 1209 to 1215, contained a series of great successes for the crusaders in Languedoc, with episodes of extreme violence such as the slaughter of the population of Beziers. The forces assembled mainly from the Ile de France and the north of France, led by Simon de Montfort, faced the nobility of Toulouse, led by Count Raymond VI of Toulouse and the Trencavel family that, as allies and vassals of the Crown of Aragon, sought help from King Peter II of Aragon. Peter II was killed in the course of the Battle of Muret in 1213.
The captured lands were largely lost between 1215 and 1225 in a series of revolts and military reverses. The death of Simon de Montford at Toulouse after the return of Count Raymond VII of Toulouse and the consolidation of Albigensian resistance supported by the forces of the Count of Foix and the Crown of Aragon, resulted in the military intervention of Louis VIII of France from 1226 with the support of Pope Honorius III.
The situation turned again following the intervention of the French king, Louis VIII, in 1226. He died in November of that year, but the struggle continued under King Louis IX, and the area was reconquered by 1229; the leading nobles made peace, culminating in the Treaty of Meaux-Paris in 1229, by the terms of which it was agreed that the County of Toulouse would be integrated into the French crown. After 1233, the Inquisition was central to crushing what remained of Catharism. Military action in ceased in 1255.
Beziers. 7/22/1209, the entire population was slaughtered and the city burned to the ground; estimates of the number of dead ranging from 15,000 to 20,000.
Carcassonne. Surrendered 8/15/1209; the people were not killed but were forced to leave town (accounts vary; naked or in their shifts and breeches).
Lastours and the castle of Cabaret. 7/22/1210, the city surrendered. Cathars were given the opportunity to convert to Catholicism; most did; the 140 who refused were burned at the stake.
Toulouse. In 1213, forces led by King Peter II of Aragon came to the aid of Toulouse. In Sept the Battle of Muet led to the death of King Peter, and his army fled... In 1214 Raymond was forced to flee to England, and his lands were given by the pope to the victorious Philip II… In 1215, Castelnaud was recaptured by Montfort; Toulouse was gifted to Montfort. April 1216 he ceded his lands to Philip.
Revolts and reverses 1216 to 12225. In Sept 1217, Raymond retook Toulouse… in 1218, Montfort was struck and killed by a stone hurled from defensive siege equipment, which allegedly was operated by some women and girls from the town.
Innocent III died in July 1216 and with Montfort now dead, the crusade was left in temporary disarray… In 1221, the success of Raymond and his son continued: Montreal and Fanjeaux were retaken and many Catholics were forced to flee. In 1222, Raymond died and was succeeded by his son, also named Raymond. In 1223, Philip II died and was succeeded by Louis VIII. In 1224, Amaury de Montfort abandoned Carcassonne… Montfort offered his claims to the lands of Languedoc to Louis VIII, who accepted.
French royal intervention. In Nov 1225, at a Council of Bourges, Raymond, like his father was excommunicated… Louis VIII headed the new crusade into the area in June 1226… Louis VIII died in November and was succeeded by the child king Louis IX. Queen-regent Blanche of Castile allowed the crusade to continue under Humbert V de Beaujeu… While besieging Toulouse, the crusaders systematically laid waste to the surrounding landscape: uprooting vineyards, burning fields and farms, slaughtering livestock… Eventually Queen Blanche offered Raymond a treaty recognizing him as ruler of Toulouse in exchange for his fighting the Cathars, returning all church property, turning over his castles and destroying the defenses of Toulouse. Moreover, Raymond had to marry his daughter Jeanne to Louis’ brother Alphonse, with the couple and their heirs obtaining Toulouse after Raymond’s death, and the inheritance reverting to the king in the event that they did not have issue, as eventually proved to be the case. Raymond agreed and signed the Treaty of Paris at Meaux 4/12/1229. He was then seized, whipped and briefly imprisoned.
After 1229. The Inquisition was established in 1234 to uproot the remaining Cathars. Operating in the south at Toulouse, Albi, Carcassonne and other towns during the whole of the 13th century, and a great part of the 14th, it succeeded in crushing Catharism as a popular movement and driving its remaining adherents underground… On 3/16/1244, a large and symbolically important massacre took place, where over 200 Cathar Perfects were burnt in an enormous pyre at the prat deis cremats (“field of the burned”) near the foot of the castle.
Genocide. Raphael Lemkin, referred to the Albigensian Crusade as “one of the most conclusive cases of genocide in religious history.” Mark Gregory Pegg writes that “The Albigensian Crusade ushered genocide into the West by linking divine salvation to mass murder, by making slaughter as loving an act as His sacrifice on the cross.” Kurt Jonassohn and Karin Solveig Bjornson describe the Albigensian Crusade as “the first ideological genocide.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catharism Catharism. The idea of two Gods or principles, one being good and the other being evil, was central to Cathar beliefs. The good God was the God of the New Testament and the creator of the spiritual realm, contracted with the evil Old Testament God - the creator of the physical world whom many Cathars, and particularly their prosecutors, identified as Satan. All visible matter, including the human body, was created by this evil god; matter was therefore tainted with sin. This was the antithesis to the monotheistic Catholic Church, whose fundamental principle was that there was only one God, who created all things visible and invisible. Cathars thought human spirits were the genderless spirits of angels trapped within the physical creation of the evil god, cursed to be reincarnated until the Cathar faithful achieved salvation through a ritual called the consolamentum. It is likely that we have only a partial view of their beliefs, because the writings of the Cathars were mostly destroyed because of the doctrinal threat perceived by the Papacy; much of our existing knowledge of the Cathars is derived from their opponents… Cathars, in general, formed an anti-sacerdotal party in opposition to the Catholic Church, protesting against what they perceived to be the moral, spiritual and political corruption of the Church. Of baptism, they assert that the water is material and corruptible and is therefore the creation of the evil power, and cannot sanctify the spirit, but that the churchmen sell this water out of avarice, just as they sell earth for the burial of the dead, and oil to the sick when they anoint them, and as they sell the confession of sins as made to the priests.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_VIII_of_France Louis VIII of France. b. 9/5/1187 Paris, France d. 11/8/1226 Château de Montpensier, France. Reign 1223-1226. Married 5/23/1200, age 12, Louis was married to Blanche of Castile (age 12), daughter of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Eleanor of England, the sister of King Richard I and King John of England.
While Louis VIII only briefly reigned as king of France, he was an active leader in his years of as crown prince. During the First Baron’s War of 1215-17 against King John of England, his military prowess earned him the epithet the Lion. After his victory at the Battle of Roche-au-Moine in 1214, he invaded southern England and was proclaimed “King of England” by rebellious barons in London on 6/2/1216. He was never crowned, however, and renounced his claim after being excommunicated and repelled. In 1217, Louis started the conquest of Guyenne, leaving only a small region around Bordeaux to Henry III of England.
11/1/1223, Louis issued an ordinance that prohibited his officials from recording debts owed to Jews, thus reversing the policies set up by his father Philip II. Usury (lending money with interest) was illegal for Christians to practice; according to Church law it was seen as a vice in which people profited from others’ misfortune (like gambling) and was punishable by excommunication. Since Jews were not Christian, they fell into a legal grey area that secular rulers would sometime exploit by allowing (or requesting) Jews to provide usury services, often for personal gain to the secular ruler and the discontent of the Church. Louis VIII’s prohibition was one attempt at resolving this legal problem, which was a constant source of friction in Church and State courts. 26 barons accepted, but Theobald IV, the powerful Count of Champagne, did not, since he had an agreement with the Jews that guaranteed him extra income through taxation.
Louis’s short reign was marked by an intervention using royal forces into the Albigensian Crusade in southern France that decisively moved the conflict towards a conclusion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Barons%27_War
First Baron’s War of 1215-17 against King John of England, a civil war in the Kingdom of England in which a group of rebellious major landowners (barons) led by Robert Fitzwalter and supported by a French army under the future Louis VIII of France made war on King John of England. The war resulted from the king’s refusal to accept and abide by the Magna Carta which he had sealed on 6/15/1215, and from the ambitions of the French prince, who dragged the war on after many of the rebels had made peace with John.
The Magna Carta of 1215 contained clauses which in theory noticeably reduced the power of the king, such as clause 61, the “security clause”. This clause allowed a group of 25 barons to override the king at any time by way of force, a medieval legal process called distraint that was normal in feudal relationships but had never been applied to a king… The war began over the Magna Carta but quickly turned into a dynastic war for the throne of England. The rebel barons, faced with a powerful king, turned to Louis, son and heir apparent of King Philip II of France and grandson-in-law of King Henry II of England.
(May 1216) John escaped to the Saxon capital of Winchester… Louis entered London with little resistance, was received by the rebel barons and citizens of London and proclaimed (though not crowned) king at St Paul’s Cathedral. Many nobles, including Alexander II of Scotland for his English possessions, gathered to give homage to him… 6/14/1216, Louis captured Winchester (John had already left) and soon conquered over half of the English kingdom… 10/18/1216, John contracted dysentery; he died at Newark Castle, Nottinghamshire… Louis now seemed much more of a threat to baronial interests than John’s nine-year-old son, Prince Henry… 11/12/1216 the Magna Carta was reissued in Henry’s name… sealed by the young king’s regent William Marshal… Marshal managed to get most barons to switch sides from Louis to Henry and attack Louis...
After a year and a half of war, most of the rebellious barons had defected. Louis VIII had to give up his claim to be the King of England by signing the Treaty of Lambeth, 9/11/1217. Louis accepted a symbolic sum to relinquish his English dominions and returned home. Louis VIII died in 1226 and was succeeded by his son Louis IX.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_IX_of_France Louis IX of France.
Louis IX of France. aka Saint Louis. b. 4/25/1214 Poissy, France d. 8/25/1270 Tunis, North Africa. Reign 1226-1270. Married, 5/27/1234, Margaret of Provence; daughter of Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence and Beatrice of Savoy (her sister Eleanor later became the wife of Henry III of England). b. 1221 Forcalquier, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence d. 12/20/1295, Paris.
Crowned in Reims at the age of 12, following the death of his father Louis VIII the Lion, although his mother, Blanche of Castile, ruled the kingdom until he reached maturity. She dealt with the opposition of rebellious vassals and put an end to the Albigensian crusade.
As an adult, Louis IX faced recurring conflicts with some of the most powerful nobles, such as Hugh X of Lusignan and Peter of Dreux. Simultaneously, Henry III of England tried to restore his continental possessions, but was defeated at the battle of Taillebourg. His reign saw the annexation of several provinces, notably Normandy, Maine and Provence.
Louis IX was a reformer and developed French royal justice, in which the king is the supreme judge to whom anyone is able to appeal to seek the amendment of a judgment. He banned trials by ordeal, tried to prevent the private wars that were plaguing the country and introduced the presumption of innocence in criminal procedure…
Louis’s actions were inspired by Christian values and Catholic devotion. He decided to punish blasphemy, gambling, interest-bearing loans and prostitution, and bought presumed relics of Christ (the Crown of Thorns and a fragment of the True Cross) for which he built the Sainte-Chapelle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_of_thorns and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/True_Cross He also expanded the scope of the Inquisition and ordered the burning of Talmuds [Rabbinic literature]. He is the only canonized king of France.
Louis IX commanded the largest army and ruled the largest and wealthiest kingdom, the European center of the arts and intellectual thought at the time.
Protector of the Church. Louis IX tried to fulfill the duty of France, which was seen as“the eldest daughter of the Church”, a tradition of protector of the Church going back to the Franks and Charlemagne, who had been crowned by the Pope Leo III in Rome in 800. Indeed, the official Latin title of the kings of France was Rex Francorum, i.e. “king of the Franks” (until Louis’ grandfather’s reign, Philip II whose seal reads Rex Franciae, i.e. “king of France”), and the kings of France were also known by the title “most Christian king” (Rex Christianissimus). The relationship with the papacy was at its peak in the 12th and 13th centuries, and most of the crusades were actually called by the popes from French soil.
Louis was renowned for his charity. Beggars were fed from his table, he ate their leavings, washed their feet, ministered to the wants of the lepers, and daily fed over one hundred poor. He founded many hospitals and houses…
Seventh Crusade.
In 1248 Louis decided that his obligations as a son of the Church outweighed those of his throne, and left his kingdom for a six-year adventure. Since the base of Muslim power had shifted to Egypt, Louis did not even march on the Holy Land; any war against Islam now fit the definition of a Crusade.
Louis and his followers landed in Egypt of 6/5/1249 and began his first crusade with the rapid capture of the port of Damietta… On 4/6/1250 Louis lost his army at the Battle of Al Mansurah and was captured by the Egyptians. His release was eventually negotiated in return for a ransom of 4000,000 livres tournois and the surrender of the city of Damietta… he spent four years years in Palestine, using his wealth to assist the Crusaders in rebuilding their defences and conducting diplomacy with the Islamic powers of Syria and Egypt. In the spring of 1254 he and his army returned to France.
Treaty of Paris (1259).
The Treaty of Paris was a treaty between Louis IX of France and Henry III of England, agreed to on 12/4/1259 ending 100 years of conflicts between the Capetian and Plantagenet dynasties. Henry III of England was confirmed in his possession of territories in southwestern France and Louis received the provinces of Anjou, Normandy, Poitou, Maine, and Touraine.
Eighth Crusade.
In a parliament held at Paris, 3/24/1267, Louis and his three sons took the cross. On hearing the reports of missionaries, Louis resolved to land at Tunis, and he ordered his younger brother, Charles of Anjou, to join him there. The crusaders, among whom was Prince Edward of England, landed at Carthage 7/17/1270, but disease broke out in the camp and Louis died 8/25/1270 of dysentery. He was succeeded by his son Philip III.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_III_of_France Philip III of France.
Philip III the Bold, King of France b. 4/30/1245, Poissy, France d. Perpignam, France. Reign 1270-1285.
Married 1st (5/28/1262): Isabella of Aragon; daughter of King James of Aragon and Yolande aka Violant of Hungary. They had; Louis, Philip IV of France, Robert (died young), Charles, stillborn son. *Isabella b. 1248 d. 1/28/1271.
Married 2nd (8/21/1274): Marie; daughter of the late Henry III, Duke of Brabant and Adelaide of Burgundy. They had; Louis, Blanche, Margaret who married Edward I of England, 9/8/1299.
He accompanied his father to the Eighth Crusade in Tunis, 1270. Shortly before his departure, Louis IX had given the regency of the kingdom into the hands of Mathieu de Vendome and Simon II de Clermont-Nelse, Count of Clermont. After taking Carthage, the army was struck by an epidemic of dysentery; Philip’s brother John Tristan, Count of Valois died first, Aug 3, his father died Aug 25. Philip, was proclaimed king in Tunis. There was a truce of ten years and payment of tribute from the caliph of Tunis in exchange for the departure of the crusaders. Soon after, Philip’s sister Isabella died. 1/11/1271 his wife Isabella suffered a fall from her horse, gave birth to a premature stillborn son; she died seventeen days later (1/28).
Philip was crowned King of France in Reims 8/30/1271. When his uncle, Alphonse, Count of Poitiers died childless in Italy, 8/21/1271, Philip inherited his counties and united them to the Crown lands of France. In 1284, his brother Peter, Count of Perche and Alencon, died without surviving children, as his oldest living brother, Philip III inherited his domains.
In 1284, with his sons, Philip entered Roussillon at the head of a large army on the ultimately unsuccessful Aragonese Crusade. The war took the name “crusade” from its papal sanction; nevertheless, one historian labelled it “perhaps the most unjust, unnecessary and calamitous enterprise ever undertaken by the Capetian monarchy.” Philip III died of dysentery in Perpignan, 10/5/1285. Following the Mos Teutonicus custom, his body was divided in several parts buried in different places: the flesh was sent to Narbonne Cathedral, the entrails to La Noe abbey in Normandy, his heart to the now-demolished church of the Couvent des Jacobins in Paris and his bones to Basilica of St Denis. His son, Philip IV succeeded him as King of France.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_IV_of_France Philip IV of France.
Philip IV the Fair or the Iron King. b. 1268 Fontainebleau, France d. 11/29/1314 Fontainebleau, France. Reign 1285-1314. Married (8/16/1284): Joan I of Navarre; daughter of Henry I of Navarre and Blanche of Artois (she was 11).
Philipp and his advisors were instrumental in the transformation of France from a feudal country to a centralized state. Philip, who sought an uncontested monarchy, compelled his vassals by wars and restricted feudal usages. His ambitions made him highly influential in European affairs. His goal was to place his relatives on foreign thrones. Princes from his house ruled in Naples and Hungary. He began the long advance of France eastward by taking control of scattered fiefs.
War with the English.
Attempting to use their family connections to achieve what open politics had not, Edward sent his brother Edmund Crouchback (who was both Philip’s cousin and step-father-in-law) to negotiate with the French Royal family and avert war. Also, Edward was at the time betrothed by proxy to Philip’s sister Blanche, and Edmund was to escort her to England for the wedding in the event of the negotiations being successful.
An agreement was reached; it stated that Edward would voluntarily relinquish his continental lands to Philip as a sign of submission in his capacity as Duke of Aquitaine and in return Philip would forgive him and restore his land after a grace period. In the manner of the marriage, Philip drove a hard bargain based partially on the difference in age between Edward and Blanche; it was agreed that the province of Gascony would be retained by Philip in return for agreeing to the marriage. The date of the wedding was also put off until the formality of sequestering and re-granting his French lands to Edward was completed.
But Edward, Edmund and the English were deceived. The French had no intention of returning the land to the English monarch. Edward kept up his part of the deal and turned over his continental estates to the French but Philip used the pretext that the English king had refused his summons in order to strip Edward of all his possessions in France, thereby initiating hostilities with England.
The outbreak of hostilities with England in 1294 was in inevitable result of the competitive expansionist monarchies, triggered by a secret Franco-Scottish pact of mutual assistance against Edward I; inconclusive campaigns for the control of Gascony to the southwest of France were fought in 1294-98 and 1300-03… Pursuant to the terms of the Treaty of Paris (1303), the marriage of Philip’s daughter Isabella to the Prince of Wales, heir of Philip’s enemy, celebrated at Boulogne, 1/25/1308, was meant to seal a peace; instead it would produce an eventual English claimant to the French throne itself, and the Hundred Years’ War.
Drive for income.
In the shorter term, Philip arrested Jews so that he could seize their assets to accommodate the inflated costs of modern warfare, expelling them from his French territories 7/22/1306… His financial victims also included rich abbots and the Lombard merchants who had earlier made him extensive loans on the pledge of repayment from future taxation. Like the Jews, the Lombard bankers were expelled from France and their property expropriated. In addition to these measures Philip debased the French coinage which by 1306 had led to a two-third loss in the value of the livres, sous and deniers in circulation. This financial crisis led to rioting in Paris which forced Philip to briefly refuge in the Paris Temple, headquarters of the Knights Templar.
Relations with the Catholic Church.
Philip was condemned by his enemy, Pope Boniface VIII in the Catholic Church for his spendthrift lifestyle. When he also levied taxes on the French clergy of one half their annual income, he caused an uproar within the Roman Catholic Church and the papacy, prompting Pope Boniface VIII to issue the bull Clericis Laicos (1296), forbidding the transference of any church property to the French Crown… Philip convoked an assembly of bishops, nobles and grand bourgeois of Paris; they gave support to Philip. Boniface retaliated with the celebrated bull Unam Sanctam (1302), a declaration of papal supremacy.... Philip sent his agent William Nogaret to arrest Boniface at Anagni; the pope escaped by died soon afterward. The French archbishop Bertrand de Goth was elected pope Clement V and thus began the so-called Babylonian Captivity of the papacy (1309-77), during which the official seat of the papacy moved to Avignon, an enclave surrounded by French territories, and was subjected to French control.
In Flanders.
Philip’s forces were defeated in the Battle of the Golden Spurs, 7/11/1302… In 1305, Philip forced the Flemish to accept a harsh peace treaty which exacted heavy reparations and penalties… Bethune, first of the Flemish cities to yield, was granted to Mahaut, Countess of Artois, whose two daughters, to secure her fidelity, were married to Philip’s two sons.
Expulsion of the Jews.
While King Edward ordered the Jews to leave England in 1290, Philip the Fair expelled the Jews from France in 1306. With the Jews gone, Philip appointed royal guardian to collect the loans made by the Jews, and the money was passed to the Crown… The Jews were regarded to be good businessmen who satisfied their customers, while the king’s collectors were universally unpopular. In 1315, because of the “clamour of the people”, the Jews were invited back with an offer of 12 years of guaranteed residence, free from government interference.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tour_de_Nesle_Affair Tour de Nesle affair. A Scandal amongst the French royal family in 1314, during which the three daughters-in-law of King Philip IV of France were accused of adultery, the accusations apparently started by Philip’s only daughter, Isabella, Queen of England.The Tour de Nesle was a tower in Paris where much of the adultery was said to have occurred.
Philip IV had three sons, Louis, Philip and Charles. As was customary for the period, all three were married with an eye for political gain. Note (Jody Gray): refer to The Arranged Marriages of Philip IV’s children, following Aftermath and legacy. Margaret, the daughter of the Robert II, Duke of Burgundy for his son Louis; Joan, the daughter of Otto IV, Count of Burgundy for Philip; Blanche, another of Otto’s daughters, for Charles. He married his daughter, Isabella, to Edward II of England in 1308 in an attempt to resolve their conflict over the contested territories of Gascony and Flanders. Her marriage proved difficult, largely due to Edward’s intimate relationship with his close friend and possible love, Piers Gaveston and she frequently looked to her father for help. Louis, known as “the Quarreler” is said to have preferred playing real tennis to spending time with the “feisty and shapely” Margaret. Charles, a relatively conservative, “stiff-necked” individual, had an unexceptional marriage. Philip, in contrast, became noted for his unusual generosity to his wife Joan, the pair had a considerable number of children in a short space of time and Phlip wrote numerous love letters to his wife over the years.
Most accounts of the scandal began with the visit of the king and queen of England to the queen’s father in France during 1313. Isabella had given new embroidered purses both to her brothers and their wives. Later in the year, Isabella and Edward held a large dinner in London to celebrate their return and Isabella apparently noticed that the purses she had given to her sisters-in-law were now being carried by two Norman knights, Gautier and Phillipe d’Aunay. She concluded that the pair must have been carrying on an illicit affair, and appears to have informed her father; he placed the knights under surveillance. The accusations centered on suggestions that Blanche and Margaret had been drinking, eating and engaging in adultery with the men in the tower over a period. The third sister-in-law, Joan, was initially said to have known about the affair; later accusations were extended to have included suggestions that she had also been involved in adultery herself.
Following the period of surveillance, Philip IV broke the news of the accusations publicly and arrested all involved. Both knights were tortured by French officials and confessed. Blanche and Margaret were tried before the Paris Parlement and found guilty; they had their heads shaven and were sentenced to life imprisonment. Joan was also tried but found innocent, partially as a result of her husband Philip’s influence. The guilty knights were then killed; most historians agree that they were first castrated and then either drawn and quartered or flayed alive, broken on a wheel and then hanged. Isabella’s own marriage failed catastrophically in due course, with many historians believing that she was responsible for the murder of her husband Edward in 1327 after Isabella’s seizure of power in England with her lover Roger de Mortimer in 1326.
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| ruins of Chateau Gaillard castle |
Joan was placed under house arrest at Dourdan in the aftermath of the Parlement acquittal; he husband campaigned for her release, which came the next year and she returned to court.
Blanche remained in prison (eight years) until Charles assumed the throne in 1322; he annulled their marriage and had her consigned to a nunnery; he remarried immediately afterwards to Marie of Luxembourg.
Aftermath and legacy. The affair badly damaged the reputation of women in senior French circles, contributing to the way that the Salic Law was implemented during subsequent arguments over the succession to the throne. When Louis died unexpectedly in 1316, supporters of his eldest daughter Joan found that suspicious hung over her parentage following the scandal and that the French nobility were increasingly cautious over the concept of a woman inheriting the throne; Louis’ brother, Philip took power instead…
The Arranged Marriages of Philip IV’s children. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Castile Ferdinand IV, King of Castile and Leon 1295-1312 *Map, Kingdom of Castile, 1210
1294, Margaret (age 6) betrothed to Ferdinand of Castile; son of Sancho IV King of Castile. She died 1294, the same month of her betrothal.
1299, Isabella (age 4) betrothed to Edward II of England; son of Edward I King of England
1305, Louis X m: Margaret of Burgundy; daughter of Robert II, Duke of Burgundy (he was 16, she was 15; they were 1st cousins once removed)
1306, Robert (age 9) betrothed to Constance of Sicily; daughter of Frederick III of Sicily. He died 1308.
1307, Philip V m: Joan II of Burgundy; daughter of Otto IV, Count of Burgundy and Mahaut (he was 14, she was 15)
1308, Charles IV m: Blanche of Burgundy; daughter of Otto IV, Count of Burgundy and Mahaut, Countess of Artois (he was 14, she was 12)
1308, Isabella m: Edward II of England; son of Edward I King of England (he was 23, she was 12). Making Philip IV the maternal grandfather of Edward III of England and an ancestor of every English king after Edward II. Note (Jody Gray): the House of Capet, Kings of France connects to the House of Plantagenet, Kings of England.
Previous Marriage Alliances of French Monarchs, beginning with Louis VII m: Blanche of Castile; daughter of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Eleanor (daughter of Henry II, King of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine)... his son, Louis IX m: Margaret of Provence; daughter of Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence and Beatrice of Savoy *all four daughters married kings; Eleanor m: Henry III, King of England; Sanchia m: Richard, King of the Romans; Beatrice m: Charles I, King of Sicily... his son, Philip III m: Isabella of Aragon; daughter of King James I of Aragon and Violant of Hungary... his son, Philip IV m: Joan I of Navarre; daughter of Henry I of Navarre and Blanche of Artois...
Previous Marriage Alliances of French Monarchs, beginning with Louis VII m: Blanche of Castile; daughter of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Eleanor (daughter of Henry II, King of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine)... his son, Louis IX m: Margaret of Provence; daughter of Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence and Beatrice of Savoy *all four daughters married kings; Eleanor m: Henry III, King of England; Sanchia m: Richard, King of the Romans; Beatrice m: Charles I, King of Sicily... his son, Philip III m: Isabella of Aragon; daughter of King James I of Aragon and Violant of Hungary... his son, Philip IV m: Joan I of Navarre; daughter of Henry I of Navarre and Blanche of Artois...
Suppression of the Knights Templar.
Philip was substantially in debt to the Knights Templar, a monastic military order whose original role as protectors of Christian pilgrims in the Latin East had been largely replaced by banking and other commercial activities at the end of the 13th century. As the popularity of the Crusades had decreased, support for the military orders had waned… Philip used a complaint against the Knights Templar to move against the entire organization in France, in part to free himself from his debts… It seems that, with the “discovery” and repression of the “Templars’ heresy,” the Capetian monarchy claimed for itself the mystic foundations of the papal theocracy… Being the ultimate defender of the Catholic faith, the Capetian king was invested with a Christlike function that put him above the pope. What was at stake in the Templars’ trial, then, was the establishment of a “royal theocracy”.
10/13/1307, hundreds of Templars in France were arrested by agents of Philip the Fair, to be later tortured into admitting heresy in the Order… Philip used the confessions to have many Templars burned at the stake before they could mount a proper defense.
Pope Clement V died and Philip IV of France died by an accident while hunting. Within 14 years the throne passed rapidly through Philip’s sons, who died relatively young without producing male heirs. By 1328, his male line was extinguished, and the throne had passed to the line of his brother, the House of Valois.
Pope Clement V died and Philip IV of France died by an accident while hunting. Within 14 years the throne passed rapidly through Philip’s sons, who died relatively young without producing male heirs. By 1328, his male line was extinguished, and the throne had passed to the line of his brother, the House of Valois.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_X_of_France Louis of France. Louis X the Quarreler, King of France. b. 10/4/1289 Paris, France d. 6/5/1316 Vincennes, Val-de-Marne, France. Reign 1314-1316. M1 (1305): Margaret of Burgundy m2 (1315): Clementia of Hungary
Louis’s mother Joan I died in 1305, he inherited the kingdom of Narvarre; coronation 10/1/1307, Pamplona, Spain. On the death of his father in 1314 Louis X became King of France; coronation 8/24/1315, Reims, France.
1314, Scandal, Tour de Nesle Affair. His wife Margaret and her sister Blanche were accused of adultery; found guilty and imprisoned, their confessed lovers were executed. His father died and Louis X’s coronation as King of France was held on 8/24/1315. His short reign was marked by hostility of the nobility against fiscal and centralization reforms initiated by Enguerrand de Marigny. His uncle, Charles of Valois, leader of the feudalist party managed to convince Louis X to execute Enguerrand after Charles brought forward a charges of corruption and sorcery. Other former ministers were similarly prosecuted.
In the year 1315, Louis, arguing that all men are born free, allowed serfs to buy their freedom. A body of commissioners was established to establish the value of each serf; for serfs owned by subjects of the King, the amount would be divided between the Crown and the owner. In the event, not all serfs were not prepared to pay Louis declared that the goods of these serfs would be seized anyway, with the proceeds going to pay for the war in Flanders. He also published a decree, Ordonnances des Roi de France, proclaiming that “France signifies freedom” and that any slave setting foot on the French ground should be freed. This prompted subsequent governments to restrict slavery in the overseas colonies.
That same year, Louis issued a charter, readmitting the French Jews into the kingdom for 12 years; they had to wear an armband at all times and could only live in those areas where there had been Jewish communities previously.
Louis died 6/5/1316; his wife Clementia was pregnant, leaving the succession in doubt; his brother Philip was appointed regent. Louis’ son, John I, only lived five days, his brother Philip became King of France.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_V_of_France Philip V of France. Philip V the Tall, King of France b. 1293 Lyon, France d. 1/3/1322 Paris, France. Reign 1317-1322. m (1307): Joan II of Burgundy; daughter of Otto IV, Count of Burgundy and Mahaut, Countess of Artois (she was 15, he was 14).
1314, Scandal, Tour de Nesle Affair; Joan and her sisters-in-law were accused of adultery; Margaret and Blanche were found guilty and imprisoned, Joan was later acquitted.
The Crusades.
The Shepherd’s Crusade, emerged from Normandy in 1320; the emerging peace in Flanders and the north of France had left a large number of displaced peasants and soldiers. The result was a large and violent anti-Semitic movement threatening local Jews, royal castles, the wealthier clergy, and Paris itself. The movement was ultimately condemned by Pope John; Philip was forced to move against it, crushing the movement militarily and driving the remnants south across the Pyrenees and into Aragon.
The “leper scare”. In 1321, the accusation was that lepers had been poisoning the wells of various towns and that it was orchestrated by the Jewish minority, secretly commissioned by foreign Muslims. Philip issued an edict demanding that any leper found guilty was to be burnt and their goods would be forfeit to the crown.
He died from dysentery in 1322 without a male heir and was succeeded by his younger brother Charles IV.
Legacy. Philip V created the Court of Finances, the standardization of weights and measures, and the establishment of a single currency.
Legacy. Philip V created the Court of Finances, the standardization of weights and measures, and the establishment of a single currency.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_IV_of_France Charles IV of France. Charles IV the Fair, King of France b. 1294 Clermont, Oise, France d. 2/1/1328 Vincennes, France. Reign 1322-1328. m1 (1308): Blanche of Burgundy, daughter of Otto IV, Count of Burgundy and Mahaut, Countess of Artois (she was 12, he was 14). m2 (9/21/1322): Marie of Luxembourg; daughter of Henry VII, the Holy Roman Emperor and Margaret of Brabant; she died following a premature birth. m3 (1325): Jeanne d’Evreux; (she was his first cousin, requiring approval from Pope John XXII).
1314, Scandal, Tour de Nesle Affair; Blanche and her sister-in-law Margaret were accused of adultery; found guilty and imprisoned, their confessed lovers were executed.
1322, crowned King of France at the cathedral in Reims.
1323, Charles was confronted with a peasant revolt in Flanders. As duke of Guyenne, Edward II of England was a vassal of Charles, but he was reluctant to pay homage to another king. 1324, War of Saint-Sardos, Charles conquered the Duchy of Guyenne; in a peace agreement, Edward II accepted to swear allegiance to Charles and pay a fine. Guyenne was returned to Edward but with a much-reduced territory.
Domestic policy. Charles IV debased the coinage to his own benefit, sold offices, increased taxation, exacted burdensome duties, and confiscated estates from enemies or those he disliked.
Charles IV died in 1328 without a surviving male heir, thus ending the direct line of the Capetian dynasty. Twelve years earlier, a rule against succession by females, arguably derived from the Salic Law, had been recognized as controlling succession to the French throne. Charles’ wife Jeanne was pregnant at the time of his death thus a regency was set up under the heir presumptive Philip of Valois, the next most senior branch of the Capetian dynasty. Jeanne gave birth to a daughter; Philip of Valois became the king of France. Edward III of England argued that he should have inherited the throne because although the Salic law should forbid inheritance by a woman, it did not forbid inheritance through a female line (leading to the Hundred Years War, 1337-1453). *Charles IV was the last direct Capetian King of France…
When Charles IV died without a male heir in 1328, the nearest male relative was his nephew Edward III of England, who inherited his claim through his mother Isabella of France, the sister of the dead king. It was held in France, however, that Edward was ineligible to inherit the French throne through the female line according to the ancient Salic Law. At first, Edward seemed to accept Philip’s accession as the nearest male relative of Charles IV descended through the male line, however he pressed his claim to the throne of France after a series of disagreements with Philip. The result was the beginning of the Hundred Years’ War in 1337.
House of Valois.
Philip VI the Fortunate (of Valois), King of France. His father Charles, Count of Valois was the son of Philip III the Bold, King of France.
Other Resources:
House of Capet - YouTube - Documentary Clips
http://www.robertsewell.ca/capet.htmlhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Style_of_the_French_sovereign#List_of_changes_to_the_royal_style Style of the French sovereign. Legitimist: “Most high, most potent and most excellent Prince (name), by the Grace of God, King of France and of Navarre, Most Christian Majesty. Orleanist: (name), by the Grace of God, and by the constitutional law of the State, King of France. Bonapartist: (name), By the Grace of God and the Constitutions of the Republic, Emperor of the French.
Historical (romance) novel, The Talisman by Sir Walter Scott; depicts the deceit and disunity among the leaders of the Third Crusade: Richard I of England, Philip II of France and Leopold V of Austria.
Architectural Type: Gothic *the sketch (left) is of the West facade before the dismantling of the north tower c. 1844-1845. The site originated as a Gallo-Roman cemetery in late Roman times. The archaeological remains still lie beneath the cathedral. Around 475 St. Genevieve purchased some land and built Saint-Denys de la Chapelle. In 636 on the orders of Dagobert I the relics of Saint Denis, a patron saint of France, were re-interred in the basilica.
The basilica became a place of pilgrimage and the burial place of French kings with nearly every king from the 10th to the 18th centuries being buried there, as well as many from previous centuries.
Saint Denis, a patron saint of France, became the first bishop of Paris. He was decapitated on the hill of Montmartre in the mid-third century with two of his followers, and is said to have subsequently carried his head to the site of the current church, indicating where he wanted to be buried. The martyrium was erected on the site of his grave, which became a famous place of pilgrimage during the fifth and sixth centuries.
Dagobert, the king of the Franks (628-637), re-founded the church as the Abbey of Saint Denis, a Benedictine monastery.
The first church mentioned in the chronicles was begun in 754 under Pepin the Short and completed under Charlemagne, who was present at its consecration in 775... According to one of the Abbey's many foundation myths a leper, who was sleeping in the nearly completed church the night before its planned consecration, witnessed a blaze of light from which Christ, accompanied by St Denis and a host of angels, emerged to conduct the consecration ceremony himself. Before leaving, Christ healed the leper, tearing off his diseased skin to reveal a perfect complexion underneath. A misshapen patch on a marble column was said to be the leper's former skin, which stuck there when Christ discarded it. Fantastical though they seem now, the popularity of such myths in medieval accounts go some way to explaining why any redevelopment of the original church was a sensitive matter and why Suger found it necessary to go to such lengths to justify his changes. Having been consecrated by Christ, the fabric of the building was itself regarded as sacred... The new structure was finished and dedicated on 6/11/1144, in the presence of the King (Louis VII of France). In 1231, Abbot Odo Clement began working on the rebuilding of the Carolingian nave, with the approval of the Regent Blanche of Castile and her son, the young King Louis IX, planned to have a much clearer focus as the French 'royal necropolis'; fulfilled in 1264 when the bones of 16 former kings and queens were relocated to new tombs arranged around the crossings, 8 Carolingian monarchs to the south and 8 Capetian to the north. These tombs, featuring lifelike carved recumbent effigies lying on raised bases, were badly damaged during the French revolution though all but two were subsequently restored by Viollet le Duc in 1860.
The abbey church became a cathedral in 1966.
The first church mentioned in the chronicles was begun in 754 under Pepin the Short and completed under Charlemagne, who was present at its consecration in 775... According to one of the Abbey's many foundation myths a leper, who was sleeping in the nearly completed church the night before its planned consecration, witnessed a blaze of light from which Christ, accompanied by St Denis and a host of angels, emerged to conduct the consecration ceremony himself. Before leaving, Christ healed the leper, tearing off his diseased skin to reveal a perfect complexion underneath. A misshapen patch on a marble column was said to be the leper's former skin, which stuck there when Christ discarded it. Fantastical though they seem now, the popularity of such myths in medieval accounts go some way to explaining why any redevelopment of the original church was a sensitive matter and why Suger found it necessary to go to such lengths to justify his changes. Having been consecrated by Christ, the fabric of the building was itself regarded as sacred... The new structure was finished and dedicated on 6/11/1144, in the presence of the King (Louis VII of France). In 1231, Abbot Odo Clement began working on the rebuilding of the Carolingian nave, with the approval of the Regent Blanche of Castile and her son, the young King Louis IX, planned to have a much clearer focus as the French 'royal necropolis'; fulfilled in 1264 when the bones of 16 former kings and queens were relocated to new tombs arranged around the crossings, 8 Carolingian monarchs to the south and 8 Capetian to the north. These tombs, featuring lifelike carved recumbent effigies lying on raised bases, were badly damaged during the French revolution though all but two were subsequently restored by Viollet le Duc in 1860.
The abbey church became a cathedral in 1966.
Blog Post: Timeline, earliest Dynasties in Europe (687-ca. 987) end of Carolingian Dynasty.
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