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Saturday, August 8, 2020

King Louis IX Capet & Queen Marguerite of Provence

 47281332. King Louis IX Capet & 47281333. Queen Marguerite of Provence

4/25/1214, Louis born in Poissy, France, s/o 47277624. King Louis VIII & 47277625. Blanche of Castile. [Louis liked to be called Louis of Poissy, because he was baptized there.]

10/28/1216, Henry III, age 9, crowned king of England.

1218, Louis’ older brother Philip died.

1221, Marguerite born in Provence, d/o 23638786. Count Raymond Berengar IV & 23638787. Beatrice of Savoia.

7/1223, Prince Louis was summoned to his ill father [King Philip II] at Pacy-sur-Eure. [He took his son Louis IX with him.]

7/14/1223, Louis VIII succeeded as King of France on the death of his father King Philip II.

1224, King Louis VIII captured southern Poitou, Perigord, Quercy, and Limousin from the English.

11/8/1226, Louis IX, age 12, succeeded his father as King of France; crowned at Reims by the Bishop of Soisson. Queen Blanche became regent of France during the minority of her son.

1226, King Henry III of England agreed to wed Yolanda, daughter of Peter Mauclerc, Count of Brittany. [Hoping the allicance would help him recover Normandy.] Queen Blanche of France stopped the marriage by capturing Mauclerc and forcing Yolanda to wed her son John.

1226-37, Louis, Count of Artois.

3/1227, King Louis IX received homage from his vassals.

4/1228, Queen Blanche, regent for Louis IX, assembled an army and marched on Bellesme, considered impregnable. After 2 assualts the fortress fell to Blanche, taking Pierre Mauclere, duke of Brittany hostage. (S) History of France, V1, 1856, P259.

4/30/1230 from Portsmouth, King Henry, with his brother Richard, Earl of Cornwall, and with the help of Peter Mauclerc, Count of Brittany, invaded Brittany in hopes of recovering Normandy. [They met with little success.]

1231, Queen Blanche sent Louis into Normandy on his 1st expedition where he was in command.

2/28/1232, King Louis offered 100 livres for the return of the Holy Nail, a relic of St. Denis. [It was recovered.]

1232, Queen Blanche sent her son Louis IX with a contingent to Beauvais to suppress a local distubance. 1500 citizens were banished and the bishop was required to reimburse the crown for expenses of the expedition.

1233, Queen Blanche sent Sir Giles of Flagy to Provence to investigate the possibility of Louis marring the eldest daughter of Count Raymond Berengar IV. [Count Raymond was also an enemy of her nemesis Raymond VII of Toulouse.]

[––Louis & Marguerite––]

5/27/1234 at Sens, Louis, age 20, married Marguerite, age 12, and assumed the role of King. The Archbishop of Sens performed the ceremony.  Salimbene de Adam who knew Louis described him as “slender and delicate, tall, … a very pleasing face and an angelic expression.” [Marguerite crowned Queen the next day at St Stephen’s Cathedral.]

1234, Louis’ natural half-uncle, Philip Hurepel died; ending his possible claims on the crown.

1235, King Louis prohibited his vassals from being judged in ecclesiastical courts for civil questions, and he threatened to seize the property of bishops who used excommunication as a weapon.

1236, King Louis, his mother Blanche, and his wife Margaret attended the wedding of Margaret’s sister Eleanor to King Henry III of England at Westminster in London. (S) Chronicles of the Age of Chivalry, 2000, P58.

1237, King Louis gave the title of Count of Artois to his younger brother Robert on his majority.

1238, King Louis received envoys from Saracens telling of a “monstrous and inhuman race of men”, with a leader called Khan [Buta, not Genghis who died in 1227], overunning far eastern Europe.

1239, Louis purchased a fragment of Jesus’ cross and his crown of thorns from Emperor Baldwin II of Constantinople for 135,000 livres. [The chapel to house the items only cost 60,000. Louis had also collected the spear head that was thrust in Jesus’ side, Jesus’ cloak, and the sponge used at the cross.]

8/1239, Blanche as Queen mother, daughter-in-law Queen Marguerite, and Ingebour of Denmark [step-mother of Louis] rode at the head of the procession to celebrate the arrival of the crown of thorns.

6/1240, Louis and family hosted Richard, Earl of Cornwall, who had stopped on his way to the crusades to renew the 1230 peace agreement for his brother King Henry III.

1240, Blanche presided over the prosecution of 4 prominent Rabbis under the auspices of a papal order against the Talmud.

6/1241, Louis, at Samur in Anjou, announced his younger brother Alfonso as Count of Poitiers; which lowered the status of Isabella of Angouleme, Queen Mother of England, and her husband Hugh X de Lusignan, Count de la Marche.

12/1241, At the Christmas feast of King Louis in Poitou, Hugh X de Lusignan & Isabella of Angouleme denied allegiance to Count Alfonso, essentially a declaration of war.

1242, King Louis had Queen Margaret swear that she would always abide by royal policy instead of her own personal interests.

5/20/1242, Hugh X de Lusignan and his step-son King Henry III arrived at Royen, France with a small contingent; but with 30 tons of gold. They were soon joined by French nobles with Hugh as their leader against the forces of the Count of Poitou and King Louis IX.

7/1242, The 2 armies met at the battles of Taillebourgh and Saintes, with the superior sized French force winning. [Ironically, many of the French nights opposing King Henry had been rescued by King Richard I from prison in the crusades. Louis, like many other knights, came down with dysentery.]

1242, After the death of 2 royal inquisitors at Avignonet, Louis began an effort to eliminate the Cathars.

1/1243, Raymond VII of Toulouse, who had started an insurrection coincident with the war in Poitiers, lost support after Louis’ victory and submitted to Louis at Montargis by the Peace of Lorris.

1243, Louis, at the urging of Pope Gregory IX, had about 12,000 copies of the Talmud and other Jewish books burned.

12/1244, Louis, severly ill [and predicted to die], heard of the Turks defeat of Christian forces and capture of Jerusalem and decided to take the cross of a crusader. [Margaret soon after also decided to take the cross and travel to the crusades with Louis, which helped recruit knights who also took their wives.]

12/1245 at Cluny in Lyon, Louis, Margaret, the Queen mother, and Louis’ younger brother Charles of Anjou, met secretly with Pope Innocent and the brothers of Margaret’s mother Beatrice de Savoia. In exchange for Charles marrying Margaret’s sister Beatrice, King Louis promised to support the Pope against Emperor Frederick II ; and that all other aspects of Count Raymond’s will would be enforced. [This marginalized Margaret’s sister Eleanor’s claim on any inheritance.]

1246, King Louis, attempting to settle a civil war in Flanders, with the approval of the papal legate, gave Hainault to the Avesnes family, and Flanders to the Dampierres. [The Pope would reverse his decision in 1249. Louis would stick by his original decision in 1256, issuing the Dit of Peronne.]

1247, King Louis created special emmisaries, usually friars, to root out local corruption in the government.

1248, King Louis completed Ste-Chapelle as a repository for his collection of relics.

6/12/1248, After 3 years of preparation, Louis left Paris on the 7th crusade with his family and brothers, leaving his mother as regent of France.

8/25/1248, Louis and his forces set sail from Aigures-Mortes near Marsailles, where Louis had built his fleet of ships.

9/17/1248, The fleet of Louis, carrying 2500 knights, 10,000 men at arms, and 5000 cross-bow men, arrived at Cyprus. [Supplies had been sent ahead and were waiting when they arrived.]

5/13/1249, An estimated 1800 ships carrying the forces left Cyprus for Damietta in Egypt. A storm caused half the ships off course. These landed in Acre, where they were attacked while landing at the beaches by horse-mounted bowmen.

6/23/1249, Louis, with a force of 15,000 captured Damietta.

11/20/1249, Louis and his forces departed [leaving their wives behind, both Margaret and Beatrice would have children in Damietta]. They traveled along the right bank of the Nile towards Mansourah. A force of 500 under the command of the duke of Burgundy was left to defend the city.

1250, A letter to Blanche from her son Louis IX on crusade at Caesarea: “To his most excellent and dearest lady and mother Blanche, by the grace of God illustrious queen of the French, Louis, by that same grace king of the French, greetings and ready with sincere love, pleased to do her will.”

2/9/1250, At Mansourah, Robert of Artois, the king’s brother, had initial success against a small Egyptian force, even managing to kill their General Fakhr ad-Din. [Robert soon after was killed when he attacked the city.]

4/6/1250, Louis defeated and captured at the 6-hour battle of Fariskur by Egyptian forces [Even though the Sultan had died, the Sultan’s family had hidden the fact to keep their forces from faltering].

1250, While Louis was captive, Queen Marguerite, pregnant, ruled the French on crusade from Damietta. When Egyptian forces appeared and starting building siege devices, Margaret requested a trusted knight to kill her if the town fell back to the Saracens.

5/2/1250, The Mamluks killed their Egyptian Sultan leader, s/o the Sultan that had died. [They had done the brunt of the fighting and not been paid.] Unprecedented, the former slave and wife of the deceased sultan, Shajar al-Durr, who had come up with the idea of concealing the original Sultan’s death, was declared the new Sultan.

1250, An agreement was made that the French men of rank would be released with the return of Damietta, and allowed to travel to Christian-held Acre. The rest would be released when a ransom was paid. [The wounded were slaughtered once the French left in boats for Acre.] Louis and Margaret, traveling on separate ships, were reunited at Acre.

1250, Most of the French barons, including Charles and Alphonse, brothers of Louis, returned to France. Louis and a handful of knights remained at Acre awaiting money from France to free the remaining prisoners.

5/1250, Louis appealed to the Mamluks to release their prisoners as agreed in Damiettia, but they were in no hurry and only released a few hundred knights. About the same time an emissary from another region power, the Sultan of Aleppo, asked Louis to join him against the Mamluks, who had killed their leader, his possible heir, and had put a non-family member in place as Sultan. Louis used the offer of the Sultan of Aleppo to leverage the release of the remaining hostages and forgiveness of the remaining 200,000 livres ransom from the Sultan of Cairo, or he would join the Sultan against the Mamluks.

1251, Louis learned that a ship carrying some of the ransom money raised by his mother was lost in a storm.

1252, Louis and the Sultan of Cairo made peace. Louis even agreed to support the Sultan against the Sultan of Aleppo. Louis organized a small army and relocated to Jaffa to join up with an Egyptian force. The two Sultans made peace, and Aleppo attacked the Christian town of Sidon in retaliation for Louis’ support of Cairo.

11/26/1252, Louis’ mother, also acting as Regent in France, died. Count Alphonse acted as regent, but was ill and an alliance of bishops effectively ruled France.

1253, Louis left pregnant Margaret and their 2 children at Jaffa, which he had fortified, and marched on Sidon. [He only arrived in time to bury the dead.] Margaret traveled by sea and joined Louis in Sidon.

6/1253 at Sidon, Louis, learning of his mother’s death, refused to leave the crusade to return to France. He continued to fortify Christian towns. [Louis was also running out of money.]

4/25/1254, Louis and his forces, needing only 13 ships, returned from crusade. On the voyage they were shipwrecked in a storm on a small island where Margaret made a vow to Saint Nicholas.

7/3/1254, Louis and his ships put into port at Hyeres in Provence, about 30 miles east of Marsailles.

9/7/1254, Louis, arriving back in Paris, decided that the reason they lost was because his kingdom was sinful. Over a period of 6 months, while touring France, Louis created a “general ordinance” prohibiting acceptance of expensive gifts, neglecting duties, impeding justice, nepotism, bribery … “By such ordinances the kind did much to improve conditions in his kingdom” – Joinville. Louis also began recording the acts of Parliament, called the Olim.

12/1254, King Louis IX with his wife Queen Marguerite, her sister Queen Eleanor with her husband King Henry III, Marguerite and Eleanor’s sisters Sanchia married to Henry’s brother Richard, Beatrice married to Louis’ brother Charles, and the mother of all the females, Beatrice of Savoy gathered in Paris for a family reunion.

1255, King Henry III received the 1st elephant brought to England as a gift from King Louis IX.

1255, King Louis began acquiring land in the forest of Rouvray for a convent to be founded by his sister Isabel [later Saint Isabelle of France] of the Order of Poor Ladies of Saint Claire.

6/11/1256, the General Chapter of the Trinitarian Order formally affiliated Louis IX at the monastery of Cerfroid. Louis considered retiring to the monastery, but Margaret talked him out of it.

1257, King Louis supported King Henry’s brother Richard in his selection as King of the Romans [Germany].

1257-58, King Louis intoduced ordinances against ursury.

5/1258, King James of Aragon signed the Treaty of Corbeil with King Louis IX of France; ending his claims to Occitania [southern France] except for Montpellier. King Louis gave up his claims to counties of the Spanish March.

5/28/1258, Louis signed the Treaty of Paris with King Henry III, each side exchanging claims on lands.

5/24/1259, King Henry III gives Queen Margaret and others, including her uncle, power to negotiate a marriage for his daughter Beatrice.

12/1259, King Louis and Queen Margaret hosted a family Christmas gathering in Paris that included King Henry III and Queen Eleanor, Count Charles of Anjou and Countess Beatrice [and possibly the 4th sister Queen Sanchia, although King Richard did not attend.] Countess Beatrice was seated at an inferior table by Queen Margaret, because she was not a Queen. Henry and Louis would sign an official peace treaty whereby Henry, for money, would keep only Gascony in France as a fief, for which he would do homage.

1/1260, son Louis, age 15 and the heir, died of an illness.

3/16/1260, Queen Eleanor of England’s acknowledgment of the receipt from Louis, king of France, of 12,500 pounds of Tours in money. [Part of a peace agreement.]

1260, Louis commanded that town accounts be submitted for royal audit.

1261, Queen Marguerite was the negotiator accepted by both sides between her brother-in-law King Henry III and his brother-in-law, Simon de Montfort, who was well thought of in the French court.

11/6/1261, King Henry III sent a collection of royal jewels to Marguerite [his sister-in-law] to be deposited in the Templar house in Paris for safe keeping.

1262, Pope Urban offered Louis the Kingdom of Sicily, which Louis declined.

1262, By emmissaries to Paris, Mongol forces inquired of Louis as to whether he would like to join them in a crusade. [The Mongol forces were in need of ships.]

1262, Louis mandated that town councils be renewed every year.

1263, Daughters Marguerite and Eleanor, “illustrious queens of the French and of England”, named in the will of their mother.

1263, King Louis chosen as an arbitrator between King Henry III and his rebelling barons.

1263, Marguerite persuaded her son Philip to name her his guardian until he was 30. Louis found out and had the Pope absolve Philip of his promise to his mother. (S) Women in the Middle Ages, Gies, 1991.

1/24/1264 at Amiens, France, King Louis sided with King Henry III against the English barons.

1264, A long dispute between Renaud de Pons and his wife on one side and the English crown on the other, over the castle of Bergerac, had eventually been turned over to Marguerite to settle. Marguerite found for Renaud and his wife. Queen Eleanor accepted her sister's decision and acted on it, asking her senechal in Gascony to enforce the decision.

1265, Louis IX  gave his support to the acceptance of the Kingdom of Sicily by his brother, Charles of Anjou.

1266, King Louis introduced a new gold coin, the écu, and a new large silver shilling, the sol tournois; and reduced the coinage to 2 types: livres (parisis) and tournois. Baronial coinage could only be used with the region of the minting baron.

1267, King Louis sent 2 embassies to the Great Khan, hoping to get support for his next crusade.

3/25/1268 at Paris, King Louis, after his brother King Charles of Sicily had subdued the Italian peninsula, called a meeting of all his barons to announce another crusade.

1269, Louis extened the expulsion of Jews for usury to Lombards (Italians) and Cahorsins [named for a city in souther France].

3/14/1270, Louis accepted the pilgrim’s staff at St Denis in Paris. The next day he walked barefoot from the palace to Notre Dame. Then he set off on the crusade. [Queen Marguerite did not go with him.]

7/2/1270, Louis’ crusader ships left the coast of Provence heading for Tunis. The emir of Tunis was in arrears to King Charles of Sicily. He was supposed to send 34,300 gold coins annually.

7/21/1270, Louis’ crusader fleet arrived in Tunis. After easily taking the port, they attacked Carthage, 15 miles from Tunis, but did not enter the city. Very quickly, a plague [likely typhus] decimated the crusader forces. Louis son, Jean Tristan, born on the previous crusade died with 10 days of landing.

8/25/1270, Louis died on the 8th crusade at Carthage. Prior to dying Louis called his eldest son to his side and gave him advice about being a King.

[––Marguerite––]

11/11/1270, The crusader fleet left to return to France. There was a storm and 40 ships were lost and they were forced into the port of Trapani. They decided to return by land rather risk another storm at sea. On the return trip, King Philip and his entourage were detained at Sicily because of illness [possibly the plague.]

1271, Margaret was given extensive lands in her dower. The Regents of France tried to seize Marguerite’s dower lands.

5/21/1271, King Philip III, son of Louis, returned to Paris, France with the bodies of his wife Isabel [buried at Saint-Denis], his father, his sister Isabelle and her husband Thibaut V, his uncle Count Alfonso of Toulouse and his wife Jeanne, and his brother Jean Tristan.

8/12/1271, Marguerite witnessed her son Philip being crowned King of France.

1272, Queen Marguerite sent the jewels of King Henry III back to him.

Aft. 10/1273, Marguerite wrote to the newly crowned King of the Romans, Rudolph of Habsurg, asking they he rule on her inheritance in Provence, as Provence had always been a fief of the empire [at least that was her current position]. Rudolph promised Marguerite he would invest her with Provence.

1274-5, Marguerite, with the help of her sister Queen Eleanor, arranged for Eleanor’s granddaughter Joanna to marry Rudolph’s son Hartman [died 1281 before the marriage]. King Charles of Sicily counter-proposed his grandson marry a d/o Rudolph.

3/1275, Queen Margaret was with Eleanor, widow of Simon de Montfort and sister of King Henry III, when she died in exile in France. [Likely at the nunnery of Montargis.]

1279, Queen Eleanor of England and her sister Marguerite attempt to enlist King Edward’s support for their claims in Provence against their brother-in-law, Charles of Anjou. [Charles’ wife, Marguerite’s youngest sister, Beatrice, died in 1267 – Marguerite and Eleanor wanter their quarter share of Provence.]

1281, Queen Marguerite convened a meeting of loyal noblemen opposed to King Charles of Sicily at Troyes. This group agreed that the marriage proposed by King Charles with the Habsburg family would be opposed by force if necessary. [Charles’ plan succeeded without opposition because Maruerite’s candidate, Hartmann, d/o Rudolph, died suddenly.]

6/1282, Queen Marguerite writes to accept King Edward’s excuses for not sending aid he had promised her in raising an army to press her claims in Provence, understanding that his need to put down a rebellion in Wales must come first.

1/7/1285, King Charles of Naples died; the last of the husbands of the four Queens sisters.

10/5/1285, Marguerite’s son King Philip died in the Aragonese Crusade.

6/26/1291, Queen Eleanor died, leaving Marguerite the last of the four Queen sisters.

8/12/1295, King Edward I wrote to his aunt: “To the most serene lady and his dearest friend, lady Marguerite, by the grace of God illustrious queen of the French, Edward, by the same grace, etc., [sends] greetings with sincere love, [and] ready desire to please. Desiring to hear good news about your state, may the Lord always keep it healthy, …”

12/21/1295, Marguerite died in the convent of the Cordeliers de Saint Claire, which she had founded; buried in the royal sepulcher of Saint Denis.

(S) Epistolæ. (S) Memoires of the Queens of France, V1, Bush, 1843. (S) Four Queens, Goldstone, 2007. (S) History of France, V1, Wright, 1856. (S) The Capetians, Bradbury, 2007. (S) Lives of the Kings and Queens of France, 1979, Dobell.

Family notes:

·         King Louis wrote, by his own hand in French, Enseignements, instructions for his children on how to behave.

·         1297, Louis cannonized by Pope Boniface VIII. Louis’ piety and kindness towards the poor were renouned.

Children of Louis and Marguerite: [11 children]

i. Blanche, born 1239 in France.

4/29/1243, Balnche died.

ii. Isabella, born 1242 in France.

Isabella married Theobald II of Navarre.

iii. Louis, born 1244 in France.

1/1260, Louis died of an illness.

iv. Philip III of France (23640666), born 4/30/1245 in France.

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