Philipp von Dreux

Philipp von Dreux , mostly called Philipp von Beauvais (* 1158 ; † November 2, 1217 ) was a bishop and count of Beauvais from the Dreux family . He was a son of Count Robert I von Dreux and his third wife, Agnes von Baudément.

Through his father he was a grandson of the French King Louis VI. the fat one and thus a member of the Capetian dynasty . King Philip II August was his first cousin. This family bond is an indicator of Philip's open hatred of the Plantagenet house , which was the greatest rival of the Capetian kingdom in the second half of the 12th century. Philip therefore led the fight against the Plantagenets and their " Angevin Empire " less as a preacher from the pulpit than as a knight in the saddle.

Life

He was elected Bishop of Beauvais on May 17, 1176, and took office the following year.

In 1179, Philip moved to the Holy Land for the first time with Count Heinrich I of Champagne and his uncle, Peter I of Courtenay . Their arrival moved the Sultan Saladin to abandon the offensive against the Kingdom of Jerusalem that he had planned after his victory on the Litani River the previous year. Instead, he attacked the castle at Jacob's ford and captured it. Philipp and his companions refused to ride against Saladin and traveled back home.

In 1182 Philip allowed the citizens of Beauvais to appoint a mayor , which the canons of the diocese complained about. King Philip II nevertheless confirmed this extension of the municipal constitution in the same year. In the war against Heinrich II Plantagenet , Philip was involved in devastating Upper Normandy and in 1188 attacked the castle of Aumale .

Third crusade

In 1189 Philip decided to take part in the third crusade . With his older brother, Count Robert II. Von Dreux , he belonged to an advance command of French knights with whom he landed in September 1189 at Acre . Even during the siege of Acon , Philip forced himself into the politics of the Christian barons Outremers. He supported the annulment of Princess Isabella's marriage to her first husband, Humfried IV of Toron . The princess was to be remarried to the Margrave Konrad von Montferrat , who was to be built up for the throne of Jerusalem as a counter-pretender to Guido von Lusignan . Lusignan was a protégé of the Plantagenet, Richard the Lionheart , and thus an enemy of Philip per se. After he had won the support of the papal legate, he himself married Conrad and Isabella on November 24, 1190 in Tire . The rivalry of the pretenders, intensified by the arrival of the kings in 1191, continued throughout the crusade, but time played out for Philip and Conrad.

After Richard the Lionheart urged to leave home in the spring of 1192, he decided to let the Franconian barons decide the power issue in Outremer. The election was a triumph for Konrad, who received all the votes. Guido von Lusignan had to retire to Cyprus . But only a few days after Count Henry II of Champagne had brought the news of the election success to Tire, King Conrad was murdered in the alleys of the city by two assassins after visiting Philip . Philip von Beauvais was among those who immediately accused Richard the Lionheart of instigating this act. Only two days later, at the urging of the townspeople, the widow Isabella married the Count of Champagne.

Fight against the Plantagenets

In his French homeland, Philip threw himself into the fight against the Plantagenets, supporting his royal cousin. First as a diplomat at the court of Emperor Heinrich VI. where he tried to delay Richard the Lionheart's captivity as long as possible. After Richard's release in 1194, Philip took part in the fighting against him, in which he distinguished himself through uncompromising severity. During a peace talks in Verneuil in 1195, he made verbal attacks against Richard for a failure of the negotiation. After King Philip II and Richard the Lionheart had agreed to a peace in Louviers in spring 1196 , Philip ignored this and, through his raids in Normandy in the summer of the same year, was jointly responsible for the renewed outbreak of war. On May 19, 1197, he was captured during a skirmish near Milly-sur-Thérain by Richard's mercenary leader, Mercadier, and brought to Rouen .

From his captivity Philip sent a request for help to Pope Celestine III. for a quick release. But the Pope stated in a sharp answer that Philip was responsible for his own fate, since he had exchanged the bishop's miter for a knight's helmet. In addition, he had criminally neglected his ecclesiastical office for a secular, warlike life. The Pope declared himself ready, out of old friendship as a private person, to seek a release from Richard the Lionheart, but not in his function as head of the church, since Philip had lost all church protection through his actions against a crusader. But Richard's death in 1199 brought him freedom again. After Johann Ohneland initially refused to release him, the Pope occupied Normandy with the interdict , whereupon Johann was satisfied with 2,000 marks as a ransom.

Philipp quickly resumed his warlike life. In 1209 he raised an army of northern French knights with Count Wilhelm von Ponthieu for the Albigensian Crusade . 1210 they reached the Languedoc , where they at the siege of the castle of Termes to Simon IV. De Montfort met.

On July 27, 1214 Philip fought in the decisive battle near Bouvines . He and his brother commanded the left wing of the French army against the ranks of Count Rainald I von Dammartin and William Longespée , both of whom could be captured. The archbishop of Reims and the bishops of Senlis and Laon also took part in the battle.

After his death, Philip was buried in Beauvais Cathedral.

literature

• Charles Delettre: Histoire du diocèse de Beauvais, depuis son établissement, au 3me siècle, jusqu'au 2 septembre 1792 (1843)
• Steven Runciman : History of the Crusades (1952)

predecessor	Office	successor
Barthélémi de Montcornet	Bishop of Beauvais 1176–1217	Milon de Nanteuil

Web links

Commons : Philipp von Dreux  - Collection of images, videos and audio files