Capetians 
Louis VII of France, "said Louis the Younger, born in 1120, died in 1180 in Melun, king of the Franks from 1137 to 1180. He is the son of Louis VI, known as Louis the Fat, king of the Franks, and Adele of Savoy (c. 1100-1154).
Sixth ruler of the Capetian dynasty direct, by its mother is also a bosonide. He successively marries Eleanor of Aquitaine, Constance of Castile, and Adele de Champagne. His son Philip Augustus succeeded him.
begins reign
He was consecrated and crowned king at Reims, from October 25, 1131, by Pope Innocent II, after the accidental death of his elder brother Philip of France (1116-1131) (not to be confused with Philip, his brother the same name), died from a riding accident October 13, 1131.
After the death of his father Louis the Fat came after an excess of good cheer, he was again crowned at Bourges, 25 December 1137.
Before dying, his father arranged his marriage to Eleanor of Aquitaine (1122-1204), daughter of Guillaume X de Poitiers, Duke of Aquitaine and AENOR Chatellerault. The marriage took place in Bordeaux, July 25, 1137. This allows the fabulous wedding of the royal domain almost tripled since the bride brings her dowry Guienne, Gascony, Poitou, Limousin, Angoumois, Saintonge and Perigord, is to say some the South and West of France, the equivalent of 19 current departments. The character of the king, pious, ascetic (he wanted to be a monk), naive and clumsy in its soft decisions, sits uneasily with the strong and sensual character of Eleanor, but the first ten years seem to happen with no real disagreement.
Louis VII rejects her mother to court, but keeps her father's advisers, including the abbot of Saint-Denis, Suger. It continues the policy of his father and continues to showcase the royal domain. That same year work began on construction of the Basilica of St. Denis. He made numerous concessions to rural communities, encourages and promotes clearing the emancipation of serfs. It builds on the city by granting charters bourgeoisie (Etampes, Bourges) and encouraging outside its domain (Reims, Sens, Compiegne, Auxerre). It finally supports the election of bishops dedicated to royal power.
In May 1141, Louis VII opposes Count Thibaud de Champagne II and Pope Innocent II on the nomination to the bishopric of Langres, for which he wanted to impose a monk of Cluny and Bernard of candidate Clairvaux. He opposes the new pope by attempting to impose its candidate for the seat of Bourges in 1141 against Peter the Chatre, supported by Pope Innocent II. The pope finally excommunicated Louis VII, and Pierre La Chatre finds refuge in Champagne. In December 1142, King County and invades at its advanced fire in January 1143 Vitry-en-Perthois and church which had taken refuge in the villagers, who found a horrible death.
To settle this history, he signed the Treaty of Vitry with Count Theobald II, in fall 1143, accepting the election of Pierre de La Chatre to lift the ban hanging over the kingdom. April 22, 1144, he participated in the conference in Saint-Denis to finally settle the conflict between the Holy See and him.
The Second Crusade:
To seal the settlement the conflict, he agreed to take part in the Second Crusade preached by St. Bernard, and around Christmas 1145, Louis VII announces his decision to go to rescue the Christian states of Palestine by the Turks threatened to invade the coming County of Edessa, where many Christians were massacred. Around Easter 1146, the king took the cross at the same time that many barons at the meeting of Vezelay.
Counter-seal of Louis VII Duke of Aquitaine
Counter-seal of Louis VII Duke of Aquitaine
June 11, 1147, King Louis VII and Eleanor go for the second crusade, the head of 300 knights and a great army, gradually followed by tens of thousands of pilgrims. Is by starting from Metz, they pass through the valley of the Danube, where they were joined by the army of Emperor Conrad III and plan to spend in Asia Minor from Constantinople, where they arrived October 4, 1147.
The expedition was marked by discord between the French and German clans, the inexperience of Louis VII, which proves indecisive, and the treachery of the Byzantines that affect Christians more than they help. Deceived by them, Louis VII was defeated by the Turks in Asia Minor and known several setbacks in Syria. He joined with great difficulty Antioch in March 1148, then in the hands of Raymond of Poitiers, uncle of Eleanor, who receives the Crusaders with a lot of ways.
Raymond Louis VII hoped would help him fight the enemy who was stripped of some of its territories, but the king thought only of going to Jerusalem. Eleanor tried in vain to persuade her husband to help her uncle Raymond of Poitiers. The king preferred to take advice from Thierry Galeran Templar eunuch. Afterward, the chroniclers of the era were unleashed and accused of adultery: William of Tyre even accused of incest with his own uncle.
Louis VII to Eleanor forcing them to follow him, leaving Antioch and Jerusalem, where he earns doing the pilgrimage he had imposed. In June 1148, he attempted to take Damascus, before which his army was repulsed. The royal couple is staying another year in the Holy Land before returning separately to France by sea king is even taken prisoner by the Byzantines before being issued by the Norman Roger of Sicily.
Ultimately participation of Louis VII to the second crusade is heavily detrimental to the future the kingdom, because the expedition was a heavy defeat on all fronts: * Financial
because this expedition greatly impoverishes the royal treasury;
* Politics, because the king did not address directly the kingdom during his two-year absence, and consequently, has released its power over the feudal lords;
* Military, because the crusade is a succession of military failures and some of his knighthood and a great army were sacrificed;
* dynastic heritage, because this crusade will cause rupture of the king with Eleanor;
* Territorial, because during the separation, Eleanor will retrieve the fiefdoms that she brought in her dowry;
* Strategic, because Eleanor marrying the future king of England will bring vast territories to the crown of England, allowing presence on the continent with a formidable competitor to the king of France. By this marriage, King Henry II of England ruled over a territory stretching from Scotland to the Pyrenees, including England, Anjou, Maine, Normandy, Aquitaine and Brittany.
Separation with Eleanor:
From the journey Back in France in November 1149, Louis VII think to separate Eleanor. But Pope Eugenius III, during a stop in Monte Cassino, and Abbot Suger manage to reconcile, and in 1150, Alix of France (1150-1195), second daughter of the royal couple, was born.
However, after the death of Suger in 1151, the king always desiring separation, the council Beaugency finally found a loophole, arguing that the great-mother of Eleanor, Audéarde of Burgundy, was the small daughter of Robert the Pious, King's grandfather (cousins to the 9th civil degree, but the 5th degree canonical) and therefore annuls the marriage 18 March 1152. Eleanor takes her dowry, and May 18, 1152, she married her second husband the Earl of Anjou, Henry Plantagenet, who becomes king of England in 1154. He's 19 and she 30.
This political blunder is the beginning of an ongoing feud between the kingdom of France and the Kingdom of England, which will last until the middle of the thirteenth century. Louis VII of Britain supporting revolts and Poitou against England, and that of the son of Henry II against their father. He is assisted in this: *
by the despotism of Henry II that grows the revolt his great vassals,
* by the support of the clergy to the King of France, because of the piety of Louis VII and close historical ties between the bishops and royalty Capetian
* and by the revolt of the son of Henry II requiring appanages and find refuge and protection from Louis VII, and are supported by their mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine.
Remarriage:
In spring 1154, Louis VII married second wife Constance of Castile (1140-1160), who bore him two daughters, Margaret of France (1158-1197) and Adelaide or Alix, future Countess of Vexin
In 1158, Louis VII and Henry II Plantagenet reconcile and make a promise of marriage between Margaret of France and Henry the Younger. Appeasement of short duration, from March 1159, Henry II attacks the county of Toulouse, and during the summer, Louis VII King of England forced to lift the siege of Toulouse.
In 1160:
* Queen Constance of Castile died Oct. 4 in childbirth of a daughter, Adele Alix or not to be confused with Alix of France, born in 1150 from his first marriage.
* Henry II paid tribute to Louis VII in Normandy on behalf of his son Henry the Younger. *
Louis VII made an alliance with the counts Flanders and Champagne, and wife, Nov. 13, his third wife, Adele of Champagne (or Adela of Blois), mother: o
King Philippe Auguste (1165-1223);
od'Agnès or Anne of France (1171-1207 or after), Byzantine empress.
In 1163:
* Laying the foundation stone of the cathedral Notre-Dame de Paris by Pope Alexander III. Louis VII provides the sum of two hundred pounds for the building led by Maurice de Sully, bishop of Paris.
* Confrontation between Henry II and Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, supported by Louis VII. Finally faithful four knights of Henry II killed the archbishop.
August 21, 1165, birth of Philip Augustus, the only male heir of Louis VII.
In 1169: Treaty of marriage of Adele and Richard the Lion Heart.
In 1172 and 1173, Louis VII and Henry shoot Richard, children of Henry II, in conflict with their father. Late 1173, Louis VII and Henry II in Caen conclude a temporary truce and to reaffirm the spring of 1174 the intention to marry their children Richard and Adele.
In 1177, Pope Henry II requires the conclusion of the Treaty of Ivry, signed on September 21, and by which the two kings swore friendship treaty monitoring, 22 June 1180 by signing a nonaggression pact.
November 1st 1179, he anointed his son Philip Augustus, and exhausted by illness, he gave up power a year later.
In 1180: *
engagement of Agnes Alexius II Comnenus and
* The Treaty of Gisors of June 28, 1180 marked the end of this series of continual wars between France and England.
* On 18 September 1180, Louis VII died at Melun wasting palsy. The next day he was buried at the royal abbey Port St. Barbeau he founded near Fontaine-le-Port, along the Seine between Melun and Fontainebleau. His son Philip Augustus succeeded him. The latter in fact exercised the power since June 28, 1180, the day his father gave him power.
Review's reign: While educating
to be cleric or monk rather than a king, Louis VII has played an important role in the history of France:
* It strengthens the royal power in the provinces that were under his influence and fought the feudal power;
* He surrounded himself with advisers of high quality and important issues orders for the management of the kingdom;
* The kingdom of France is enriched during his reign, agriculture is changing and becoming more productive, population increases, trade and industry develop a genuine intellectual revival appears, and territory is brooding castles built of stone.
However, the Second Crusade was calamitous, and separation from Eleanor of Aquitaine is a serious error, which provides a vassal minor way to win, putting the King of France for nearly territorial inferiority a half-century. It took the action of three great kings, Philippe Auguste, Louis VIII the Lion Louis IX to redress the situation and ultimately reduce the consequences of this heavy decision.
monarchy, hitherto traveling, settled in Paris for the king's presence throughout its area is no longer necessary. An embryo of central and local government was formed. Around him, the familiar gave political advice, and will form the King's Council, the central services of the monarchy together the heads of palace servants. In the provinces, provosts have been asked by the king to collect revenues, levy troops and to make justice. Like his father, the king has supported the movement for emancipation of Commons, will grant privileges to empower rural communities and serfs.
Children:
* With Eleanor of Aquitaine:
o Marie de France (1145 - March 11, 1198), married in 1164 Henry I of Champagne, Count of Troyes, said "The Liberal". Regent of the County of Champagne from 1190 to 1197.
o Alix of France (1150 - 1195) She married Thibaud V de Blois said, "The Good" (1129 - 1191), Count of Blois from 1152 to 1191. With
* Constance of Castile (1140 - 1160) daughter of Alfonso VII of Castile.
o Margaret de France (1158 - 1197), married in 1172 Prince Henry of England Court - Mantel, Duke of Normandy (died 1183), and in 1186 the Hungarian king Bela III.
o Adele of France (1160-1221) (or Alix, Countess of Vexin) (from 1160 to 1218 or 1221, married in 1195, William III of Ponthieu (or of Montgomery).
* With Adele of Champagne (or Adela of Blois ): o
Philippe Auguste (1165 - 1223), King of France.
o Agnes or Anne of France (1171 - 1240, Byzantine empress by his marriage with Alexis II Comnenus in 1180, emperor of Constantinople (1169-1183). Then by another marriage in 1183 with Andronicus I Comnenus, emperor of Constantinople (1110-1185). Around 1204 she married Theodore Branas, lord of Adrianople.
* Philip of France (1161), illegitimate.
