Louis VII (France)

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Louis VII , called the Younger ( French Louis VII le Jeune ; * 1120 ; † September 18, 1180 in Paris ) from the Capetian dynasty , was King of France from 1131 - from 1137 as sole ruler - until 1180 .

His reign was marked by his participation in the Second Crusade and the incipient conflict between the French kingship and the Plantagenet family (see: Angevin Empire ).

Louis VII, 14th century

Life

Origin and youth

Ludwig was the second son of King Ludwig VI. des Dicken and his second wife Adelheid von Maurienne . As a child he was entrusted to the cathedral school of Saint-Denis near Paris for education and training. After Ludwig's older brother, King Philip , died in a riding accident in Paris in October 1131, his father had him anointed and crowned king by Pope Innocent II in Reims on October 15, 1131 .

This was a precautionary measure taken by the father, who was concerned about an orderly succession, so that when Ludwig died in 1137 he could automatically move up to become the sole ruler.

Assumption of power and kingship

At this time, Ludwig was in Bordeaux , where he entered into the marriage decreed by his father to Eleonore , the heiress of the Duchy of Aquitaine . The king's immediate rule was limited to his crown domain , the extent of which at that time was no more than the Île-de-France . Through her marriage to Eleonore, the domain was suddenly expanded to include one of the largest and richest principalities in France. Ludwig continued to take over an orderly and efficient administration and devoted advisors from his father. In particular the Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis , who also held a prominent position in the royal council under Louis VII.

When Louis took over the government, political events in France were dominated by the War of Succession in the Anglo-Norman Empire, which consisted of the Duchy of Normandy (a fiefdom of France) and the Kingdom of England , which broke out after the death of King Henry I Beauclerc in 1135. The contending parties were the powerful houses of the Counts of Anjou and the Counts of Blois , with the French crown only able to take a passive position.

Conflict with the clergy and Count Theobald von Blois

Right at the beginning of his reign, Ludwig got into a dispute with the clergy of his kingdom, which had its cause over the different views on the occupation of dioceses. In 1138, for example, he refused the newly elected bishop of Laon his approval, in 1141 put up a rival candidate in the Archdiocese of Bourges and even sealed off Poitiers after he felt that the question of appointing a new bishop had been left out.

The divorce of Count Rudolf I from Vermandois , Ludwig's uncle and Seneschal, who wanted to remarry the queen's sister , turned into a more serious conflict . The brother of the outcast woman, however, was the powerful Count Theobald IV of Blois , who was already a dangerous enemy of Ludwig's father. Theobald sensed that the king was plotting against him and called on his confidante Bernhard von Clairvaux to the Pope for assistance. In fact, the count achieved the imposition of the interdict on Vermandois, whereupon the king declared war on him and went with an army to the Champagne belonging to the count . During the siege of Vitry , the king suffered a personal and reputational disaster when more than a thousand people were burned to death in a church that was set on fire by royal troops. Ludwig ended the campaign immediately and entered into a disadvantageous peace with the count in Vitry in 1143, which was also demanded by the Pope. In it the king also withdrew his ecclesiastical political decisions.

During this time there were significant changes that were decisive for the closer history of France when Count Gottfried V. Plantagenet of Anjou took Rouen in January 1144 and won Normandy for his house.

The second crusade

Louis VII followed the crusade sermon of Bernard von Clairvaux in Vezelay. Illumination by Jean Colombe , 15th century.

Under the impression of the events of Vitry, Ludwig decided at Christmas 1145 to want to commit a crusade on a court day in Bourges, whereupon the Bishop of Langres publicly called for an armed pilgrimage. A new enthusiasm for the crusade had spread in the West after the Christians lost most of the county of Edessa to the Muslims in 1144 . Pope Eugene III. declared itself to be the originator of this crusade in 1146 after another disagreement with it, since only the Holy See reserved the right to proclaim such an undertaking.

On March 31, 1146, Ludwig officially took the cross after attending a crusade sermon by Bernhard von Clairvaux in Vézelay . The second king participating in the crusade, Conrad III. , followed this example at Christmas 1146. Louis set out on the march through Hungary, leaving the Abbot of Saint-Denis and the Count of Vermandois as regents, and arrived on October 4, 1147 in Constantinople . After Ludwig had reached an agreement with the Byzantine emperor Manuel I about the fiefs of the Syrian cities in favor of Byzantium, the French army crossed to Asia Minor, where it united with the German army, which had already been defeated by the Seljuks . A little later the French were also defeated at Laodikeia .

Using Byzantine ships, Ludwig reached the Syrian coast in the spring of 1148, where he was received at the court of Prince Raymond of Antioch . There there were differences of opinion with the prince, which probably went back to Ludwig's jealousy. The prince got on very well with the queen, who also took part in the crusade and was a niece of Raymond. In any case, Raimund's plan to attack strong Aleppo was dropped and Ludwig moved on to Acre . There it was decided in June 1148 on a diet with King Baldwin III. and Konrad III. an attack on Damascus , which until then had been neutral towards Christians. The subsequent siege of the city ended in disaster after just four days, and the leaders then split up deeply.

After an obligatory visit to the holy places in Jerusalem , Ludwig left for his homeland at Easter 1149.

Annulment of the marriage with Eleanor

During the return journey from Palestine, the break between the royal couple became apparent, which the Pope was only able to resolve briefly during a stopover in Rome. After his return to France, Ludwig made the decision to separate from his wife. The differences between the rather pious character of the king and the easy-going personality Eleanor, who had made herself unpopular at the northern French court with her self-confident demeanor, were too great. The fact that she had only given birth to two daughters by then worried the king, who saw a smooth succession in danger.

After the death of Abbot Suger in January 1151, the most determined opponent of a divorce, nothing stood in his way. On March 21, 1152, in a council in Beaugency, the marriage between the king and Eleanor of Aquitaine was annulled because they were allegedly too closely related. Most of the prelates and greats of the empire agreed to this resolution, as did the Pope. Eleanor will also have welcomed this separation, because the saying "I married a monk, not a man" is ascribed to her.

The separation was nevertheless a heavy loss for the king, and Aquitaine fell out of his hands again, and the crown was thrown back on its property in Île-de-France. It was to have an even more bitter effect when Eleanor married Count Heinrich von Anjou that same year . The year before, he and his father had taken the feudal oath of Normandy before the king, now Aquitaine should also go to the Plantagenet. Ludwig himself only married the Castilian princess Konstanze the following year .

Rise of the Plantagenets and the Alexandrian Schism

Henry of Anjou united through his marriage to Eleonore a rulership that stretched from the Pyrenees in the south to the canal in the north. In his hands were Normandy , Aquitaine , Poitou and Anjou , as well as Maine and Touraine , and Brittany was also under his influence. In 1154 he was finally put on the English royal crown, with which his arm now extended to Scotland .

France around 1180: French crown domain in blue, territories of the Plantegenets in red

Compared to this overwhelming superiority, Ludwig had only the trump card of being the nominal overlord of all continental possessions of the Plantagenet. In fact, Heinrich paid homage to the areas concerned again in 1156 after tensions had arisen between Ludwig and him because of the marriage to Eleanor - the king was not asked for permission as a liege lord of Aquitaine. Afterwards Ludwig went on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela . After his return he met Heinrich again in Gisors in August 1158 , where the peace between them was strengthened by a marriage project between Prince Heinrich the Younger and Princess Margarethe .

Nevertheless, Ludwig was anxious to strengthen his own position in relation to the Plantagenet. When the latter marched with a huge army against the Count of Toulouse in 1159 to enforce his wife's inheritance claims, Ludwig traveled with a small retinue to besieged Toulouse . When he revealed himself there on the wall of the city, Heinrich had to abandon his plan, because he could not have been responsible for endangering his liege lord in front of his own French vassals. For Ludwig, this episode turned out to be a first success against Heinrich, and it also made him the first French king to return to the Languedoc since the days of Charles the Bald . Ludwig's second wife died the following year, and he married Adele von Champagne , thus taking over their powerful family.

In the same year (1160), Louis strengthened the ties between the French crown and the papacy by introducing Pope Alexander III. his support against Emperor Friedrich I Barbarossa and his antipope promised. A mediation attempt made by Count Heinrich I of Champagne with the emperor failed in August 1162 in Saint-Jean-de-Losne , mainly because the emperor required a commitment to the antipope Viktor IV for this meeting. The conflict with the emperor led to a council held in Tours in 1163 to a merger of Ludwig with Heinrich Plantagenet, who also supported Alexander III. had pronounced. Another connection between Duke Richard of Aquitaine and Princess Adele (Alix) was agreed in 1174.

The Alexandrian schism led the French kingship to the moral top of the West, as a loyal ally of the elected Pope - especially after the assassination of Thomas Becket in December 1170 by allegiance to the English king. Furthermore, it brought to light early national differences after relatives from the emperor's environment had expressed their disdain for the "little kings". This provoked a protest on their side from the Bishop of Chartres, John of Salisbury , who raised the question of why the predominance of the Roman Empire was manifested in the people of the Germans: “Who made the Germans judges over the nations? Who gave these dull and aggressive people the right to set a master over the heads of the human children according to their will? ”Only after Alexander III. in Italy began to prevail over the emperor, Ludwig was also ready to approach him again. In a meeting at Vaucouleurs in 1171, an understanding was reached between the king and emperor, which in the following years was expanded to a closer cooperation between France and the Hohenstaufen, which was not least directed against the Plantagenets.

The uprising of young Heinrich

In 1173, Ludwig received his son-in-law, the young Crown Prince Heinrich , in Paris, who had previously fallen out with his father after he was not ready to let his son rule. The young Heinrich, like his brothers, had been a vassal of Ludwig in France since 1169, but Heinrich II Plantagenet also had the last word on his family's lands on the mainland. In this situation, Ludwig reinforced the decision of his son-in-law and his brothers to lead an uprising against their father. Ironically, Ludwig was supposed to go along with his ex-wife, who also promoted the revolt of her sons.

Grave of Louis VII of France

The fighting began in the spring of 1173. Together with the young Henry, Ludwig besieged the castle of Verneuil in April , while Count Philip I of Flanders also included Rouen . Richard rose in Poitou , and in the north of England the Scottish King William I crossed the border. Heinrich Plantagenet fought back, took the Scottish king prisoner and landed with 20,000 Brabant Zones in Normandy. After ending the siege of Rouen in August, he moved to the Poitou to subdue Richard.

This forced Ludwig to sign an armistice with Heinrich Plantagenet in Paris at the end of 1173, which, under pressure from the Pope , led to a formal peace in Ivry on September 21, 1177 .

Last years and death

The failed uprising was Ludwig's last measure against Heinrich Plantagenet and his "Angevin Empire". After that, he increasingly left the business of government to his advisers and above all to his wife Adele von Champagne. In the autumn of 1179 he suffered a stroke that paralyzed him on one side. Just in time he determined the coronation of his only legitimate son on November 1, 1179 in the Cathedral of Reims .

On September 18, 1180, Louis VII died in Paris and, according to his last will, was buried in the Notre-Dame-de-Barbeau monastery near Fontainebleau, which he had founded . During the Restoration (19th century) his body was transferred to the Abbey of Saint-Denis .

Modern assessment

For a long time, King Ludwig VII was in the shadow of his rival Heinrich II Plantagenet and that of his own son Philip II August . It was only in more recent research that his rule received a friendlier assessment, especially the second half, after Eleanor's divorce. He made a profit in the administrative field by achieving a separation between political influence and the administration of his state, he had also centralized the financial administration, which he handed over into the hands of a camberlani ( Grand Chamberlain of France ). His policy towards the Plantagenets, to use their family conflicts to their disadvantage, was taken up by his son and ultimately led to triumph in the battle of Bouvines in 1214.

Marriages and offspring

On July 22, 1137, Louis VII married the Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine († 1204), heir to Duke William X of Aquitaine and the Aenòr of Châtellerault, in the Saint-André Cathedral of Bordeaux . The marriage was annulled in 1152 and had two daughters:

In his second marriage he was married to Constance of Castile († October 6, 1160). She was a daughter of King Alfonso VII of Castile and the Berenguela of Barcelona. The wedding took place in 1154 in the Cathedral of Saint-Croix in Orléans , the children were:

In his third marriage, Louis VII was married to Adele von Champagne († 1206) from November 13, 1160 . The marriage took place in the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, the children were:

In addition, Louis VII had an illegitimate son Philip († 1161), who became dean of Saint-Martin de Tours .

sources

There is no complete account of the facts of King Ludwig VII. The biographies begun by Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis († 1151) and Bishop Stephan of Paris († 1141) remained unfinished or have only survived in fragments. The future abbot of Saint-Denis, Odo von Deuil , took part in the second crusade and recorded his impressions about it in his report De profectione Ludovici VII in Orientem to Abbot Suger . As a supplement to these writings, the correspondence of the king and his clerical environment should be mentioned.

literature

Web links

Commons : Louis VII (France)  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Jane Marindale: An Unfinished Business. Angevin Politics and the Siege of Toulouse, 1159 , in: Anglo-Norman Studies 23 (2000), pp. 115-154
  2. ↑ John of Salisbury in a letter to the master Ralf von Sarre from the year 1160. Ed. and edited by WJ Miller and HE Butler in The Letters of John of Salisbury. Volume I: The Early Letters (1153-1161) , London 1955
  3. ^ Suger von Saint-Denis, Historia gloriosi regis Ludovici VII , ed. by Léopold Delisle in: Recueil des Historiens des Gaules et de la France (RHGF) 12 (1877), pp. 124-133
  4. ↑ Stephan von Paris, Fragmentum Historicum de Ludovico VII , ed. by Léopold Delisle in: RHGF 12 (1877), pp. 89-91
  5. ↑ Ex Odonis de Diogilo de Ludovici VII , ed. by Léopold Delisle in: RHGF 12 (1877), pp. 91-94
  6. ↑ Eudes de Deuil, La Croisade de Louis VII, roi de France , ed. by H. Waquet in: Documents relatifs à l'histoire des croisades 3 (1949)
  7. ↑ The king's letters and the correspondence addressed to him can be viewed in the Recueil des Historiens des Gaules et de la France Vol. 15 and 16, ed. by Michel-Jean-Joseph Brial (1878).
predecessor Office successor
Louis VI. the thick King of France 1137–1180
Blason pays for FranceAncien.svg
Philip II August
Wilhelm X. Duke of Aquitaine
(de iure uxoris )
1137–1152 		Henry II of England
(de iure uxoris)
personal data
SURNAME Louis VII
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ludwig the Younger
BRIEF DESCRIPTION King of France (1137–1180)
DATE OF BIRTH 1120
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris
DATE OF DEATH September 18, 1180
Place of death Paris