Louis VI of France
Louis VI | |
---|---|
Saint Denis Basilica , Paris, France | |
Spouses |
|
Issue | |
House | Capet |
Father | Philip I of France |
Mother | Bertha of Holland |
Louis VI (late 1081 – 1 August 1137), called the Fat
Louis was a warrior-king, but by his forties his weight had become so great that it was increasingly difficult for him to lead in the field (hence the epithet "le Gros"). Details about his life and person are preserved in the Vita Ludovici Grossi Regis, a panegyric composed by his loyal advisor, Suger, abbot of Saint Denis.
Early life
Louis was born around 1081 in Paris, the son of Philip I and Bertha of Holland.[a]
Abbot Suger of Saint Denis, who wrote a biography of Louis VI, tells us: "In his youth, growing courage matured his spirit with youthful vigour, making him bored with hunting and the boyish games with which others of his age used to enjoy themselves and forget the pursuit of arms." And "How valiant he was in youth, and with what energy he repelled the king of the English, William Rufus, when he attacked Louis' inherited kingdom."[6]
Louis married
On 3 August 1115 Louis married
Suger became Louis's adviser even before he succeeded his father as king at the age of 26 on 29 July 1108. Louis's half-brother prevented him from reaching
Challenges to royal authority
When Louis ascended the throne, the
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.
Struggles with the robber barons
From early in his reign (and during his father's reign) Louis faced the problem of the robber barons who resisted the King's authority and engaged in brigandry, making the area around Paris unsafe.
From their castles, such as
In 1108, soon after he ascended the throne, Louis engaged in war with Hugh of
Also in 1108,[9] a seigneur named Aymon Vaire-Vache seized the lordship of Bourbon from his nephew, Archambaud, a minor. Louis demanded the boy be restored to his rights but Aymon refused the summons. Louis raised his army and besieged Aymon at his castle at Germigny-l'Exempt,[10] forcing its surrender.
In early 1109, Louis besieged his half-brother, Philip, the son of
In 1121, Louis established the marchands de l'eau, to regulate trade along the Seine.[11]
In 1122, Aimeri,
Some of the outlaws became notorious for their cruelty, the most notable being Thomas, Lord of Coucy, who was reputed to indulge in torture of his victims, including hanging men by their testicles, cutting out eyes, and chopping off feet. Guibert of Nogent noted of him, "No one can imagine the number of those who perished in his dungeons, from starvation, from torture, from filth."[13]
Another notable brigand was Hugh, Lord of Le Puiset, who was ravaging the lands around Chartres. In March 1111,[13] Louis heard charges against Hugh at his court at Melun from Theobald II, Count of Champagne, the Archbishop of Sens, and also from bishops and abbots. Louis commanded Hugh to appear before him to answer these charges, but Hugh evaded the summons. Louis stripped him of his lands and titles and laid siege to Le Puiset. After a fierce struggle, Louis took the castle and burned it to the ground, taking Hugh prisoner.
Rashly, Louis released Hugh, and while Louis was engaged in war with Henry I of England and Theobald, Hugh raised another band of brigands and began ravaging the country again. When Louis returned his attention to Hugh, he found Le Puiset rebuilt and Hugh receiving aid from Theobald. Hugh held out against the King until Theobald abandoned him. Once again Louis razed Le Puiset and Hugh, who had sworn never to return to his brigandage, rebuilt the castle and resumed terrorizing his neighbours. At the third attempt, Louis finally defeated Hugh and stripped him of his possessions for the last time. Hugh later died on an expiatory pilgrimage to the Holy Land.[14]
These were just some of the recalcitrant nobles Louis contended with. There were many more, and Louis was in constant motion against them, leading his army from castle to castle, bringing law and order to his domains. The result was increased recognition of the King's authority and the Crown's ability to impose its will, so that all sectors of French society began to see the King as their protector.
War with Henry I over Gisors
After seizing the English Crown, Henry I of England deprived his brother, Robert Curthose, of the Duchy of Normandy and quickly took possession of the castle at Gisors, a fortress of strategic importance on the right bank of the Epte, commanding the road between Rouen and Paris. This violated an earlier agreement between Henry and the French King that Gisors should remain in the hands of a neutral castellan, or else be demolished.
This move threatened the
The first years of the war went well for Louis until the influential Theobald II, Count of Champagne, switched to Henry's side. By early 1112[15] Theobald had succeeded in bringing together a coalition of barons
with grievances against Louis: Lancelin of Bulles,
Louis defeated Theobald's coalition but the additional effort meant he could not defeat the English monarch as well
or force him to abandon Gisors, and in March 1113
By 1119, buoyed by several successes and the capture (through treachery) of Les Andelys, Louis felt ready for a final encounter to end the war. In the fierce
He appealed to Pope
Intervention in Flanders
On 2 March 1127, the
Louis then moved decisively to secure Flanders, apprehending the murderers of Charles the Good and ousting the rival claimants. On 2 April he took Ghent, on 5 April Bruges, on 26 April he took Ypres, capturing William of Ypres and imprisoning him at Lille. He then quickly took Aire, Cassel and all the towns still loyal to William of Ypres.[16] Louis's final act before leaving for France was to witness the execution of Charles the Good's murderers. They were hurled from the roof of the church of Saint Donatian where they had committed their crime.[16]
Louis had his own candidate in mind and marched into Flanders with an army and urged the barons to elect
Invasion of Henry V
On 25 November 1120, Louis' fortunes against Henry I of England were raised when Henry's heir, William Ætheling, drunkenly perished aboard the White Ship en route from Normandy to England, putting the future of Henry's dynasty and his position in doubt.
By 1123 Louis was involved with a coalition of Norman and French
Henry V had married the Empress Matilda, the English King's daughter and the future mother of Henry II of England, 9 years earlier, in hopes of creating an Anglo-German empire, though the couple remained childless. Like Louis, Henry V had designs on the Low Countries and an invasion of Northern France would enable him to strengthen his ambitions in Flanders, as well as support his father-in-law.
Thus in 1124, Henry V assembled an army to march on
Henry V died a year after the aborted campaign.
Alliance of the Anglo-Normans and Anjou
In 1128 Henry I married his sole surviving legitimate child, the dowager Empress Matilda, to Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou. This would prove to be a dangerous alliance for the French monarchy during the reign of his successor, Louis VII of France.
Final years
As Louis VI approached his end, there seemed to be reasons for optimism. Henry I of England had died on 1 December 1135 and
Louis had also made great strides in exercising his royal authority over his barons, and even Theobald II had finally rallied to the Capetian cause.[19]
Finally, on 9 April 1137, a dying William X, Duke of Aquitaine appointed Louis VI guardian of his fifteen-year-old daughter and heiress, Eleanor of Aquitaine.[20] Eleanor was suddenly the most eligible heiress in Europe, and Louis wasted no time in marrying her to his own heir, the future Louis VII, at the Cathedral of Saint-André in Bordeaux on 25 July 1137.[20] At a stroke Louis had added one of the most powerful duchies in France to the Capetian domains.
Louis died of dysentery 7 days later, on 1 August 1137.[21] Despite his achievements, it would be the growing power of the soon to be Angevin Empire that would come to overshadow his successor, its seeds sown in the marriage between the Empress Matilda and Geoffrey Plantagenet and realised through their son, Henry II of England.
Louis VI was interred in the
Marriages and children
He married in 1104: 1)
Louis married in 1115: 2)
- Their children:
- Philip (29 August 1116 – 13 October 1131), King of the Franks (1129–31); died due to falling from a horse; not to be confused with his younger brother of the same name.
- Louis VII (1120 – 18 September 1180), King of the Franks
- Archbishop of Reims[23]
- Hugh (ca 1122 – died young).
- count of Dreux[24]
- Peter[25] (September 1126 – 10 April 1183), married Elizabeth, Lady of Courtenay[26]
- Raymond V of Toulouse
- Philip (c.1132 -1160), Archdeacon of Paris[27]
With Marie de Breuillet, daughter of Renaud de Breuillet de Dourdan,[28] Louis VI was the father of a daughter:
- Isabelle (ca 1105 – before 1175), married (ca. 1119) William of Chaumont in 1117[29]
Notes
- ^ "Probably in 1072, Philip married Bertha, daughter of the late count of Holland, Florent I, and stepdaughter of Robert of Frisia, count of Flanders. [...] For some years Philip and Bertha were troubled by their failure to have a son. The birth of the future Louis VI in 1081 was striking enough for a miracle story to grow up around the event [...]."[5]
References
- ^ Bradbury 2007, p. 131.
- ^ Luchaire 1890, pp. xi, 285, 288.
- ^ Cantor 1993, p. 410.
- ^ van Caenegem 1988, p. 188.
- ^ Bouchard 2004, p. 126.
- ^ Suger 1999, ch. 1.
- ^ a b Naus 2014, p. 112.
- ^ a b c Halphen 1926, p. 596.
- ^ Devailly 1973, p. 399.
- ^ Legeard 2021, p. 388.
- ^ Diffie 1960, p. 12.
- ^ Halphen 1926, p. 598.
- ^ a b Halphen 1926, p. 594.
- ^ Halphen 1926, p. 595.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Halphen 1926, p. 601.
- ^ a b c d e f Halphen 1926, p. 599.
- ^ Hollister 2003, p. 320.
- ^ Hollister 2003, p. 321.
- ^ a b c Halphen 1926, p. 604.
- ^ a b Fawtier 1989, p. 21.
- ^ Bradbury 2007, p. 147.
- ^ a b Bradbury 2007, p. 132.
- ^ Gilbert of Mons 2005, p. 68, n288.
- ^ Lewis 1985, p. 145.
- ^ Rasmussen 1997, p. 9.
- ^ Vincent 1999, p. 202.
- ^ Lewis 1995, pp. 111, 113, 116.
- ^ Dufour 1986, p. 46.
- ^ Fawtier 1989, p. 19.
Sources
- Bouchard, Constance Brittain (2004), "The Kingdom of the Frank to 1108", in David Luscombe; Jonathan Riley-Smith (eds.), The New Cambridge Medieval History, vol. 4, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 9781139054034
- Bradbury, Jim (2007). The Capetians: Kings of France, 987-1328. Hambledon Continuum.
- Cantor, Norman F. (1993), The Civilization of the Middle Ages, Harper Collins, ISBN 978-0060925536
- Devailly, Guy (1973), Le Berry du Xe siècle au milieu du XIIIe, Mouton, p. 399, ISBN 9783111631066
- Diffie, Bailey W. (1960), Prelude to Empire: Portugal Overseas before Henry the Navigator, The University of Nebraska Press, ISBN 9780803250499
- Dufour, Jean (January–June 1986), "Un Faux de Louis VI Relatif a Liancourt (Oise)", Bibliothèque de l'École des Chartes (in French), 144 (1): 39–67, .
- Fawtier, Robert (1989), The Capetian Kings of France, translated by Lionel Butler; R.J. Adam, Macmillan, ISBN 9780333087213
- ISBN 9781843831204
- Halphen, Louis (1926), "France: Louis VI and Louis VII (1108–1180)", in J.R. Tanner; C.W. Previté-Orton; Z.N. Brooke (eds.), The Cambridge Medieval History: Contest of Empire and Papacy, vol. V, Macmillan, pp. 592–623
- Hollister, C. Warren (2003), Henry I, Yale University Press
- Legeard, Emmanuel (September 2021), "Le Siège de Germigny en Bourbonnais", Bulletin de la Société d'Emulation du Bourbonnais (in French), vol. 80, no. 3, pp. 388–404
- S2CID 152130766
- Lewis, Andrew W. (1995), "The Career of Philip the Cleric, younger Brother of Louis VII: Apropos of an Unpublished Charter", Traditio, 50, Cambridge University Press: 111–127, S2CID 161370401
- Luchaire, Achille (1890), Louis VI le Gros: annales de sa vie et de son règne (1081-1137) (in French), Paris: Libraire des Archives Nationales et de la Société de l'École des Chartes
- Naus, James (2014), "The Historia Iherosolimitana of Robert the Monk and the Coronation of Louis VI", in Marcus Bull; Damien Kempf (eds.), Writing the Early Crusades: Text, Transmission and Memory, Boydell Press, pp. 105–115, ISBN 9781843839200
- Rasmussen, Ann Marie (1997), Mothers and Daughters in Medieval German Literature, Syracuse University Press, ISBN 0815603894
- Suger (1999), The Deeds of Louis the Fat, translated by Jean Dunbabin
- Vincent, Nicholas (1999), "Isabella of Angouleme: John's Jezebel", in S. D. Church (ed.), King John: New Interpretations, The Boydell Press, ISBN 9780851157368
- ISBN 9781139055390