French King, Louis X

LOUIS X
Louis X (4 October 1289 – 5 June 1316), called the Quarreler, the Headstrong, or the Stubborn (French: le Hutin), was a monarch of the House of Capet who ruled as King of Navarre (as Louis I Basque: Luis I.a Nafarroakoa) and Count of Champagne from 1305 and as King of France from 1314 until his death. Louis was the eldest son of Philip IV of France and Joan I of Navarre. His short reign as king of France was marked by the hostility of the nobility against fiscal and centralization reforms initiated by Enguerrand de Marigny, the Grand Chamberlain of France, under the reign of his father. Louis' uncle—Charles of Valois, leader of the feudalist party—managed to convince the king to execute Enguerrand de Marigny.

Louis X being crowned with his second wife, Clementia of Hungary

Louis allowed serfs to buy their freedom (which was the first step towards the abolition of serfdom), abolished slavery, and readmitted French Jews into the kingdom. In 1305, Louis had married Margaret of Burgundy, with whom he had Joan II of Navarre. Margaret was later convicted of adultery and died in prison, possibly murdered by strangulation. In 1315, Louis married Clementia of Hungary, who gave birth to John I of France a few months after the king's death. John's untimely death led to a disputed succession.

In practical terms, Louis X effectively abolished slavery within the Kingdom of France in 1315. Louis continued to require revenues, however, and alighted on a reform of French serfdom as a way of achieving this. Arguing that all men are born free, Louis declared in 1315 that French serfs would therefore be freed, although each serf would have to purchase his freedom. A body of commissioners was established to undertake the reform, establishing the peculium, or value, of each serf. For serfs owned directly by the King, all of the peculium would be received by the Crown – 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 prepared to pay in this fashion and in due course Louis declared that the goods of these serfs would be seized anyway, with the proceeds going to pay for the war in Flanders. Louis was also responsible for a key shift in policy towards the Jews. In 1306, his father, Philip IV, had expelled the Jewish minority from across France, a "shattering" event for most of these communities. Louis began to reconsider this policy, motivated by the additional revenues that might be forthcoming to the Crown if the Jews were allowed to return. Accordingly, Louis issued a charter in 1315, readmitting the Jews subject to various conditions.

The Jews would only be admitted back into France for twelve years, after which the agreement might be terminated; Jews were to wear an armband at all times; Jews could only live in those areas where there had been Jewish communities previously; Jews were initially to be forbidden from usury. This was the first time that French Jews had been covered by such a charter, and Louis was careful to justify his decision with reference to the policies of his ancestor Saint Louis IX, the position of Pope Clement V and an argument that the people of France had demanded a return of the Jews. The result was a much weakened Jewish community that depended directly upon the King for their right of abode and protection.

Louis X receiving a diploma from the Jews, whom he readmitted to France under strict terms. 

Louis was a keen player of jeu de paume, or real tennis, and became notable as the first person to construct indoor tennis courts in the modern style. Louis was unhappy with playing tennis out of doors and accordingly had indoor, enclosed courts made in Paris "around the end of the 13th century."

In due course this design spread across royal palaces all over Europe. In June 1316 at Vincennes, following a particularly exhausting game, Louis drank a large quantity of cooled wine and subsequently died of either pneumonia or pleurisy, although there was also suspicion of poisoning. Because of the contemporary accounts of his death, Louis is history's first tennis player known by name. He and his second wife Clementia are interred in Saint Denis Basilica.

Louis' second wife Clementia was pregnant at the time of his death, leaving the succession in doubt. A son would have primacy over Louis' daughter, Joan. A daughter, however, would have a weaker claim to the throne, and would need to compete with Joan's own claims – although suspicions hung over Joan's parentage following the scandal in 1314. As a result, Louis' brother Philip was appointed regent for the five months remaining until the birth of his brother's child. The baby, who turned out to be male, lived only five days, until 20 November 1316—an extremely short reign for Louis's posthumous son, John I. Louis' brother Philip then succeeded in pressing his claims to the crowns of France and Navarre.

French King, Louis IX

LOUIS IX
Louis IX (25 April 1214 – 25 August 1270), commonly known as Saint Louis, was King of France from 1226 until his death. Louis was 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. During Louis's childhood, Blanche dealt with the opposition of rebellious vassals and put an end to the Albigensian crusade which had started 20 years earlier.

Pope Innocent IV with Louis IX at Cluny

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. To enforce the correct application of this new legal system, Louis IX created provosts and bailiffs.

According to his vow made after a serious illness, and confirmed after a miraculous cure, Louis IX took an active part in the Seventh and Eighth Crusade in which he died from dysentery. He was succeeded by his son Philip III. 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 for which he built the Sainte-Chapelle. He also expanded the scope of the Inquisition and ordered the burning of Talmuds. He is the only canonized king of France, and there are consequently many places named after him.

On 27 May 1234, Louis married Margaret of Provence (1221 – 21 December 1295), whose sister Eleanor later became the wife of Henry III of England.

Louis IX 

 The new queen's religious devotion made her a well suited partner for the king. He enjoyed her company, and was pleased to show her the many public works he was making in Paris, both for its defense and for its health. They enjoyed riding together, reading, and listening to music. This attention raised a certain amount of jealousy in his mother, who tried to keep them apart as much as she could.

In the 1230s, Nicholas Donin, a Jewish convert to Christianity, translated the Talmud and pressed 35 charges against it to Pope Gregory IX by quoting a series of blasphemous passages about Jesus, Mary or Christianity. There is a Talmudic passage, for example, where Jesus of Nazareth is sent to Hell to be boiled in excrement for eternity. Donin also selected an injunction of the Talmud that permits Jews to kill non-Jews. This led to the Disputation of Paris, which took place in 1240 at the court of Louis IX, where rabbi Yechiel of Paris defended the Talmud against the accusations of Nicholas Donin.

The translation of the Talmud from Hebrew to non-Jewish languages stripped Jewish discourse from its covering, something that was resented by Jews as a profound violation. The disputation led to the condemnation of the Talmud and the burning of thousands of copies. When Louis was 15, his mother brought an end to the Albigensian Crusade in 1229 after signing an agreement with Count Raymond VII of Toulouse that cleared the latter's father of wrongdoing. Raymond VI of Toulouse had been suspected of murdering a preacher on a mission to convert the Cathars.

Louis went on two crusades, in his mid-30s in 1248 (Seventh Crusade), and then again in his mid-50s in 1270 (Eighth Crusade). In 1248 Louis decided that his obligations as a son of the Church outweighed those of his throne, and he 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 on 5 June 1249 and began his first crusade with the rapid capture of the port of Damietta.

St Louis IX 

This attack caused some disruption in the Muslim Ayyubid empire, especially as the current sultan, Al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din Ayyub, was on his deathbed. However, the march from Damietta toward Cairo through the Nile River Delta went slowly. The rising of the Nile and the summer heat made it impossible for them to advance and follow up on their success.

During this time, the Ayyubid sultan died, and the sultan's wife Shajar al-Durr set in motion a sudden power shift that would make her Queen and eventually place the Egyptian army of the Mamluks in power.

On 6 April 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 400,000 livres tournois (at the time France's annual revenue was only about 1,250,000 livres tournois) and the surrender of the city of Damietta.

Following his release from Egyptian captivity, Louis spent four years in the Latin kingdoms of Acre, Caesarea, and Jaffa, 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. Louis exchanged multiple letters and emissaries with Mongol rulers of the period. During his first crusade in 1248, Louis was approached by envoys from Eljigidei, the Mongol military commander stationed in Armenia and Persia.

Eljigidei suggested that King Louis should land in Egypt, while Eljigidei attacked Baghdad, to prevent the Saracens of Egypt and those of Syria from joining forces. Louis sent André de Longjumeau, a Dominican priest, as an emissary to the Great Khan Güyük Khan (r. 1246-48) in Mongolia. Güyük died before the emissary arrived at his court, however, and nothing concrete occurred.

Louis IX wax

 Instead his queen and now regent, Oghul Qaimish, politely turned down the diplomatic offer.

Louis dispatched another envoy to the Mongol court, the Franciscan William of Rubruck, who went to visit the Great Khan Möngke (1251-1259) in Mongolia. He spent several years at the Mongol court. In 1259, Berke, the ruler of the Golden Horde, westernmost part of the Mongolian Empire, demanded the submission of Louis. On the contrary, Mongolian Emperors Möngke and Khubilai's brother, the Ilkhan Hulegu, sent a letter seeking military assistance from the king of France, but the letter did not reach France.

In a parliament held at Paris, 24 March 1267, Louis and his three sons took the cross. On hearing the reports of the 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 17 July 1270, but disease broke out in the camp. Many died of dysentery, and on 25 August, Louis himself died.

French King, Louis VIII

LOUIS VIII
Louis VIII the Lion (5 September 1187 – 8 November 1226) was King of France from 1223 to 1226. He also claimed the title King of England from 1216 to 1217. Louis VIII was born in Paris, the son of King Philip II of France and Isabelle of Hainaut, from whom he inherited the County of Artois.

Louis VIII and Blanche of Castile

While Louis VIII only briefly reigned as king of France, he was an active leader in his years as crown prince. During the First Barons' 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 the 2 June 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.

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. He died in 1226 and was succeeded by his son Louis IX. In summer 1195, a marriage between Louis and Eleanor of Brittany, niece of Richard I of England, was suggested for an alliance between Philip II and Richard, but it failed. It is said that the Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI opposed the marriage, and that its failure was a sign that Richard would name his brother John as heir to the English throne instead of Eleanor's younger brother Arthur of Brittany, whom Richard had designated earlier as heir presumptive.

This led to a sudden deterioration in relations between Richard and Philip. On 23 May 1200, at the age of 12, Louis was married to Blanche of Castile, daughter of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Eleanor of England, the sister of King Richard I and King John of England. The marriage could only be concluded after prolonged negotiations between King Philip II of France and Blanche's uncle John.

Louis VIII and Blanche of Castile

In 1214, King John of England began his final campaign to reclaim the Duchy of Normandy from Philip II. John was optimistic, as he had successfully built up alliances with Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV, Count Renaud of Boulogne and Count Ferdinand of Flanders. John's plan was to split Philip's forces by pushing north-east from Poitou towards Paris, while Otto, Renaud and Ferdinand, supported by the Earl of Salisbury, marched south-west from Flanders. Whereas Philip II took personal command of the northern front against the emperor and his allies, he gave his son Louis the command of the front against the Plantagenet possessions in middle France.

 The first part of the campaign went well for the English, with John outmanoeuvring the forces under the command of Prince Louis and retaking the county of Anjou by the end of June. John besieged the castle of Roche-au-Moine, a key stronghold, forcing Louis to give battle against John's larger army.

King John's Coin

The local Angevin nobles refused to advance with the king; left at something of a disadvantage, John retreated back to La Rochelle.

Shortly afterwards, Philip won the hard-fought Battle of Bouvines in the north against Otto and John's other allies, bringing an end to John's hopes of retaking Normandy.

In 1215, the English barons rebelled against the unpopular King John in the First Barons' War. The barons offered the throne to Prince Louis, who landed unopposed on the Isle of Thanet in eastern Kent, England, at the head of an army on 21 May 1216.

There was little resistance when the prince entered London, and Louis was proclaimed king at St Paul's Cathedral with great pomp and celebration in the presence of all of London. Even though he was not crowned, many nobles, as well as King Alexander II of Scotland on behalf of his English possessions, gathered to give homage.

On 14 June 1216, Louis captured Winchester and soon controlled over half of the English kingdom. But just when it seemed that England was his, King John's death in October 1216 caused many of the rebellious barons to desert Louis in favour of John's nine-year-old son, Henry III. With the Earl of Pembroke acting as regent, a call for the English "to defend our land" against the French led to a reversal of fortunes on the battlefield. After his army was beaten at the Battle of Lincoln on 20 May 1217 and his naval forces were defeated at the Battle of Sandwich on 24 August 1217, Louis was forced to make peace on English terms. In 1216 and 1217, Prince Louis also tried to conquer Dover Castle, but without success.

Louis VIII and Blanche of Castile

The principal provisions of the Treaty of Lambeth were an amnesty for English rebels, a pledge from Louis not to attack England again, and 10,000 marks to be given to Louis. In return for this payment, Louis agreed he had never been the legitimate king of England. The Albigensian Crusade had begun in 1209, ostensibly against the Cathar heretics of southern France and Languedoc in particular, though it soon became a contest between lords of northern France and those of Occitania in the south. The first phase from 1209 to 1215 was quite successful for the northern forces, but this was followed by a series of local rebellions from 1215 to 1225 that undid many of these earlier gains. There followed the seizure of Avignon and Languedoc.

Louis VIII

In 1225, the council of Bourges excommunicated the Count of Toulouse, Raymond VII, and declared a renewed crusade against the southern barons. Louis happily renewed the conflict in order to enforce his royal rights. Roger Bernard the Great, Count of Foix, tried to keep the peace, but the king rejected his embassy and the counts of Foix and Toulouse took up arms against him. The king was largely successful, taking Avignon after a three-month siege, but he did not complete the conquest before his death.

While returning to Paris, King Louis VIII became ill with dysentery, and died on 8 November 1226 in the Château de Montpensier, Auvergne. The Saint Denis Basilica houses the tomb of Louis VIII. His son, Louis IX (1226–70), succeeded him on the throne. Louis IX concluded the crusade in the south in 1229.

French King, Louis VII

LOUIS VII
Louis VII (called the Younger or the Young) (French: Louis le Jeune) (1120 – 18 September 1180) was King of the Franks from 1137 until his death.

Louis VII

 He was the son and successor of King Louis VI of France, hence his nickname, and married Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of the wealthiest and most powerful women in western Europe.

Eleanor 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. Louis VII's reign saw the founding of the University of Paris and the disastrous Second Crusade. Louis and his famous counsellor Abbot Suger pushed for a greater centralisation of the state and favoured the development French Gothic architecture, notably the construction of Notre-Dame de Paris.

Following the death of William X, Duke of Aquitaine, Louis VI moved quickly to have Prince Louis married to Eleanor, Duchess of Aquitaine, heiress of the late duke, on 25 July 1137. In this way, Louis VI sought to add the large, sprawling territory of the Aquitaine to his family's holdings in France. On 1 August 1137, shortly after the marriage, Louis VI died, and Prince Louis became king of France, reigning as Louis VII.

Louis VII

 The pairing of the monkish Louis and the high-spirited Eleanor was doomed to failure; she reportedly once declared that she had thought to marry a king, only to find she had married a monk.

There was a marked difference between the frosty, reserved culture of the northern court in the Íle de France, where Louis had been raised, and the rich, free-wheeling court life of the Aquitaine with which Eleanor was familiar. Louis and Eleanor had two daughters, Marie and Alix.

In the first part of his reign, Louis VII was vigorous and zealous in his prerogatives. His accession was marked by no disturbances other than uprisings by the burgesses of Orléans and Poitiers, who wished to organise communes.

He soon came into violent conflict with Pope Innocent II, however, when the archbishopric of Bourges became vacant. The king supported the chancellor Cadurc as a candidate to fill the vacancy against the pope's nominee Pierre de la Chatre, swearing upon relics that so long as he lived, Pierre should never enter Bourges. The pope thus imposed an interdict upon the king.

Géza II of Hungary and Louis VII of France. Image from the Hungarian Chronicon Pictum (14th century)

Louis VII then became involved in a war with Theobald II of Champagne by permitting Raoul I of Vermandois, the seneschal of France, to repudiate his wife, Theobald II's niece, and to marry Petronilla of Aquitaine, sister of the queen of France. As a result, Champagne decided to side with the pope in the dispute over Bourges. The war lasted two years (1142–1144) and ended with the occupation of Champagne by the royal army. Louis VII was personally involved in the assault and burning of the town of Vitry-le-François.

More than a thousand people who had sought refuge in the church died in the flames. Overcome with guilt and humiliated by ecclesiastical reproach, Louis admitted defeat, removed his armies from Champagne and returned them to Theobald. He accepted Pierre de la Chatre as archbishop of Bourges and shunned Raoul and Petronilla. Desiring to atone for his sins, he declared his intention of mounting a crusade on Christmas Day 1145 at Bourges. Bernard of Clairvaux assured its popularity by his preaching at Vezelay on Easter 1146.

Louis VII receiving clergymen, from a late medieval manuscript

Louis VII and his army finally reached the Holy Land in 1148. His queen Eleanor supported her uncle, Raymond of Antioch, and prevailed upon Louis to help Antioch against Aleppo. But Louis VII's interest lay in Jerusalem, and so he slipped out of Antioch in secret. He united with King Conrad III of Germany and King Baldwin III of Jerusalem to lay siege to Damascus; this ended in disaster and the project was abandoned. Louis VII decided to leave the Holy Land, despite the protests of Eleanor, who still wanted to help her doomed uncle Raymond. Louis VII and the French army returned home in 1149.

At the same time, Emperor Frederick I of Germany in the east was making good the imperial claims on Arles in the east. When a papal schism broke out in 1159, Louis VII took the part of Pope Alexander III, the enemy of Frederick I, and after two comical failures of Frederick I to meet Louis VII at Saint Jean de Losne (on 29 August and 22 September 1162), Louis VII definitely gave himself up to the cause of Alexander III, who lived at Sens from 1163 to 1165. In return for his loyal support, Alexander III gave Louis the golden rose.

Raymond of Poitiers welcoming Louis VII in Antioch.

More importantly for French – and English – history would be Louis's support for Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, whom he tried to reconcile with Henry II. Louis sided with Becket as much to damage Henry as out of piousness – yet even he grew irritated with the stubbornness of the archbishop, asking when Becket refused Henry's conciliation, "Do you wish to be more than a Saint?"

Louis also supported Henry's rebellious sons, and encouraged Plantagenet disunity by making Henry's sons, rather than Henry himself, the feudal overlords of the Angevin territories in France. But the rivalry among Henry's sons and Louis's own indecisiveness broke up the coalition (1173–1174) between them. Finally, in 1177, the pope intervened to bring the two kings to terms at Vitry-le-François.

In 1165, Louis' third wife bore him a son and heir, Philip II Augustus. Louis had him crowned at Reims in 1179, in the Capetian tradition (Philip would in fact be the last king so crowned). Already stricken with paralysis, Louis himself could not be present at the ceremony. He died on 18 September 1180 in Paris and was buried the next day at Barbeau Abbey, which he had founded. His remains were moved to the Basilica of Saint-Denis in 1817.