Years of the life of Louis 9. Why is Louis IX a “Saint”? Persecution of the Jews

LOUIS IX or Saint Louis (Louis IX or Saint Louis) (1214–1270), king of France, son of Louis VIII and Blanche of Castile, was born in Poissy on April 25, 1214. After Louis VIII died in 1226, his widow, experienced in matters of government, became regent during the king's minority. From 1236, Louis ruled independently, but continued to consult with his mother until her death. However, in 1244 he - against the wishes of his mother and ministers - took a vow to go on a crusade. In 1248, Louis sailed from France with a 35,000-strong army and first arrived in Cyprus, from where, after hesitation, he headed to Egypt in order to defeat the Muslims and force them to ease pressure on the Christian areas in Palestine. At first, the crusaders managed to capture Damietta (modern Dumyat) in the Nile Delta, but attempts to advance into the interior of the country ended in 1250 with a crushing defeat at El Mansur, as a result of which the king and his army were captured. After long negotiations, the king and his entourage managed to ransom, and then Louis went to Palestine, where he spent another four years, strengthening the cities and trying to secure the position of Christians through diplomacy. Only in 1254 did Louis return to Paris; the return was partly accelerated by the death in 1252 of his mother, who remained regent during the king's absence. At the beginning of Louis's reign, his mother suppressed the rebellion of the nobility and extended royal power to the possessions of large feudal lords. The large county of Toulouse came under the direct authority of the crown. Under Louis, the internal governance system improved. Although not many new institutions were established, the old ones were developed and their powers expanded. In particular, royal proceedings and taxation developed rapidly, and the organization of military affairs was improved. The king's feudal court, or Curia Regis (assembly of vassals at the lord's court), was divided into groups, each of which performed its own functions. Local self-government developed, and royal officials were sent to local areas to inspect and consider complaints. Although Louis did a lot to strengthen royal power, he still failed to take advantage of the weakness of the English king Henry III to complete the reconquest of the so-called. Angevinskaya power (English possessions in France). Instead, he agreed to conclude the Peace of Paris (1259), under the terms of which Aquitaine and Gascony were recognized as fiefs of the English king in exchange for his renunciation of claims to Normandy, Anjou, Poitou and other possessions in northern France. Thanks to his pan-European fame, in the event of certain disagreements, Louis was often asked to act as an arbiter. However, his decision in favor of Henry III, when a conflict broke out between the English king and the barons in 1262, did not bring peace. In 1270, Louis, already ill, insisted on leading another crusade against the Muslims, this time to Tunisia. But soon after arriving in Africa, on August 25, 1270, Louis died from a plague epidemic that broke out in the Crusader camp. Louis was known for his piety, mercy, and strict morals. The 44 years of Louis's reign turned out to be quite peaceful for France. In 1297 he was canonized by Pope Boniface VIII.

Under the guidance of his mother, he received a varied education, especially in the field of theology. After the early death of his father, power passed into the hands of the Queen Mother, who not only ruled the kingdom wisely and decisively during the eight years of her regency, but also subsequently exercised influence over her son, who respected and loved her, and only from her, alone among the members family, took advice. Despite the fact that Blanca managed to crown his son almost immediately in November 1226, soon a coalition of feudal lords with the participation of the English king, headed by the powerful Count Raymond VII of Toulouse, came out against the king. In April 1229, the Treaty of Paris was imposed on the Count of Toulouse, which put an end to the Albigensian wars and introduced a new organization for governing the south of the country, Languedoc; Among the articles of this agreement was the count's consent to the marriage of his only heir with one of Louis' brothers, Alphonse Poitiers.
And although by 1235 the aggression of the English king was not only repelled, peace was established with both the English and the barons of the kingdom, the peace was disrupted by the Cathar uprising in Languedoc that began in 1240, which provoked a new conflict with Henry III and the Count of Toulouse. Already in 1243, the last agreement was signed at Lorris, which, confirming the terms of the treaty of 1229, marked the end of the last serious feudal disturbance under Saint Louis. The resistance of the south was finally broken with the fall in 1244 of the last two strongholds of the Cathars - Montsegur and Kerib.

Crusader King

The decision to organize a crusade, officially made by Louis in December 1244, had been long thought out. Already in the mid-1230s. the king helped the Byzantine emperor in the fight against the Muslims by purchasing relics of the Passion of Christ for a very significant price (the Holy Chapel, Sainte-Chapelle, was built in the royal palace to store these shrines). In the spring of 1248, he entrusted the regency to his mother and set out on the seventh Crusade.
By the middle of the 13th century, the peak of the crusader movement and the enthusiasm associated with it was far behind, and to a large extent some of the enthusiasm with which this expedition set off and the glorious, despite the defeats, memory of it should be attributed to the personal “charisma” of Louis, the influence of the image of the ideal Christian knight that he embodied. Military failures, illness, famine, the capture of the king by Muslims along with thousands of his knights, the death of many of them, the ransom of 4 million francs paid for the release of the royal brother Alphonse - all this did not prevent the French people from welcoming the king who returned in 1254 as a triumphant . For Louis himself, these trials, the idea that due to lack of strength and means he returned without ransoming all the Christian captives, turned into a decisive psychological turning point: before the Crusade, the king, although distinguished by sincere piety and high moral principles, was still not alien to worldly joys, but from the mid-1250s. became a real ascetic.
In his domestic policy, Saint Louis continued the administrative reforms of his grandfather and father. According to the dying will of Louis VIII, a significant part of the possessions of the royal domain went to the younger brothers of Saint Louis: Alphonse received Poitou, and Charles received Anjou, the two largest provinces. Royal incomes fell accordingly, so Louis IX was required to especially carefully organize and control abuses in the management structures created by Philip Augustus and supported by Louis VIII with the Ordinance. In 1254 the prevote system was improved: the country was now divided into twenty clearly defined districts headed by royal officials. These functionaries, passing on their positions by inheritance, now formed real dynasties. Strict and centralized control over their activities was established.
In 1263, the monetary system was streamlined: from now on, royal coins, unlike monetary units of local significance, were in circulation throughout France. The innovations of the reign of Saint Louis consisted in the fact that royal power was not just at the top of the pyramid of the feudal hierarchy, but above it, fundamentally outside it. In his domestic policy, the king sought to maintain balance and protect the interests of different segments of the population.
At the end of the 1250s. a number of controversial issues of foreign policy were clarified: firstly, by the treaty of 1258 with the Aragonese king Jaime, the border between the two states ran along the Pyrenees line, and secondly, in 1259 a final peace was concluded with Henry III. The latter renounced his claims to Normandy, Touraine, Anjou, Maine and Poitou, and Louis IX returned to him part of his possessions in Guienne and Gascony, the legal right to own which he was not sure of.
In 1267, Saint Louis again took up the cross and in the summer of 1270, overcoming the internal resistance of the knighthood and clergy, he began a new Crusade, which was extremely unsuccessful in its consequences and ended in August of the same year in Tunisia with a plague epidemic, from which the king himself died on August 25. Less than thirty years after his death on August 11, 1297, Louis IX was canonized by Pope Boniface VIII, which met the strategic plans of his grandson, Philip IV the Fair. Saint Louis became a kind of symbol of the spiritual traditions of the French monarchy, the embodiment of the image of the “most Christian king,” whose title his descendants bore for many centuries in a row.

(25.4.1214 Poissy - 25.8.1270 Tunisia)

The one who was Napoleon<...>After his apotheosis as Emperor of the French, he spent several years at the bottom, then in Gashsharva, where he was prepared for the third dark mission: the creation of one left-hand religion in Germany. If this had been successful, Hitler’s tasks would have been greatly facilitated, and Napoleon himself, having fallen to the Bottom for the third time, would have experienced a failure in Sufetkh and a fall from Shadanakar. Fortunately, he was rescued from Gashsharva; took part in this, among other things, Saint Louis and Joan of Arc herself.

"Rose of the World", book. 10, ch. 1

Through the centuries, the glory of the 13th century French king Louis IX, the Saint, has reached our times. French historians of our time from the famous Annales school, restoring the image of the legendary king from surviving sources in all possible completeness and authenticity, as a result described a very mysterious socio-political and socio-psychological phenomenon.

The great king, it seems, was neither very smart nor very educated for his time, did not know how to choose the best advisers for himself, did not understand much about economics, was obsessed with the mythology of his time, and made some rather serious political and military miscalculations. Nevertheless, he was and remained in the memory of his people a great king.

History has offered this mysterious phenomenon to attentive analysts more than once and in times not so distant from us.

On the stained glass window of the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, the “holy king” Louis IX is shown in a humble form, in a blaze of light, next to the bishop. The Holy Chapel, a preserve of antiquity in bustling Paris, recalls significant events in the history of 13th-century Europe.

Behind, as J. Duby writes in his famous book “The Time of the Councils,” are centuries of debilitating poverty, constant malnutrition, a time of meager fields and narrow empty roads. A noticeable rise in agriculture and trade begins. In France, golden fields and green stripes of young vineyards stretched from Chartres to Saussons. On the warm days of autumn, ships on the Seine settled under the load of barrels of new wine, and merchants hurried to bring bales of fabrics and spices before the winter rains. France learned the joy of prosperity and confidence in the future.

Birth of the Gothic

At such times, the king ordered the foundation of the “Holy Chapel” in Paris. Construction began in 1242, lasted only six years and cost the king an incredibly large sum - 40 thousand livres. Huge windows with stained glass cut through the heaviness of the walls, a chapel made of light stone rushed to the sky; everyone recognized “her wondrous beauty.”

In France, the art that we call “Gothic” was created by the clergy, close to the royal power, rich and quite intellectually mature. When rebuilding the “royal tomb,” they decided to change the usual architectural forms in order to turn the temple into a visible semblance of the theological concept of “all-pervading divine light.” (“The world arose from a stream of light, cascading down like a waterfall.”) The heaviness of the walls was rejected, the inner darkness of Romanesque architecture disappeared, the “brightest windows” expanded and stretched upward, filled with living light, the colored pattern of stained glass windows, which gave the “scattered light of God” the glow of precious stones highly valued in that age. Following the example of enamels and jewelry, miniatures appeared in stained glass windows, and sculptural statues “emerged” from the heaviness of stone walls - Gothic sculpture appeared.

The Gothic art of France showed everything that existed implicitly in other areas of spiritual life. It presented the unity of crafts and engineering, geometry and religious ideas about the structure of the world.

In European culture, the idea of the world - a huge structure, where each part reflects, like a kind of symbolic mirror, the meaning of the universal plan of the Creator, has not yet been destroyed. Masters of the 13th century, they created a “model of the world” that became immeasurably brighter and more spacious than in the previous century.

Duby brings together various phenomena of the 13th century, explains the flourishing of the kingdom with a “spiritual impulse” that forced him to move forward, plow up arable lands and wastelands, plant vineyards, create new fairs, and preach to wandering monks. “Active joy is conveyed in the rhythm and structure of the cathedrals.” French historians remind: history should be considered as the result of human spiritual efforts, everything else - the successes of the economy or state construction - is nothing more than derivative phenomena that do not exist in themselves.

Boy King

“Louis IX was filled with holiness,” Duby writes sublimely about the king. “Much of his wealth was given to the glory of God.” “The king did not build castles, but temples.”

Being a king at the age of 12, after the sudden death of his father, is an almost hopeless undertaking: “royal craft,” as they said in France, is a difficult matter. The king is a mediator between God and the people, these are not empty words, this is a burden of responsibility. The king is a warrior, a diplomat, a target for conspiracies and much more, depending on the circumstances. A heavy burden for a child. Even in the early Middle Ages, the age of maturity was counted from 14 years. (However, according to Le Goff’s observations, in the 13th century, in the upper strata of society, the threshold of adulthood approached the modern one, to 21 years.)

The boy king receives golden spurs, a large sword, he is dressed, bending the edges, in a piercing blue cloak, the archbishop puts a ring on his finger... The crown on the child's head is large and unstable, like the heavy scepter and the wand of justice, embedded into long but weak hands. “Such trials make you strong or break you forever,” notes Le Goff.

The young king discovered fortitude and willpower. With the active participation of the Queen Mother, he carried out the “royal work” consistently and with dignity. There were difficult negotiations with England. There was a revolt of the barons: they got together and decided that the king was too small, and they did not favor the queen, a “foreigner”. But the Parisians sent help to “their king”: on his route, the road was filled with commoners, armed and unarmed, “they cried out to the Lord to protect and protect the king from enemies.” (“The opinion of the people,” which Pushkin discerned in the events of Russian history during the Time of Troubles, was obviously present in France five centuries earlier.)

Louis IX is recognized as one of the most successful rulers of France, who annexed the south of the country, issued a full-fledged coin, and extended royal decrees and ordinances to the entire kingdom. France was not tested by famine and epidemics, the country's population increased to 10 million people; Paris became one of the most populous cities in Europe, and the king's subjects accounted for 1/6 of the population of Europe.

“Before the French Revolution, he was the embodiment of the best sides of the French monarchy,” writes the representative of the “Annals” J. Le Goff, who worked for 15 years on the biography of “The Holy King” and wrote a multifaceted historical narrative as a result.

Simple Faith

“From the moment he began to rule and know himself,” Le Goff cites the text of an ancient chronicle, “he began to build churches and monasteries.” His pious impulses were completely unnecessary for his position. When visiting monasteries, he carried a stretcher with stones for construction and was dissatisfied with his brothers, who did not sincerely want to help the monks. Sometimes the king’s piety went beyond all limits: he sought to wash the feet of strangers, “people of God.”

At the Abbey of Saint-Denis, a nail, one of those with which Christ was said to have been crucified, fell from a vessel when the monastery was filled with pilgrims, and was lost among the multitude. The king's grief was sincere, unfeigned, excessive even for that time. In despair, he screamed: “Let the best city in the kingdom be destroyed!” The king not only did not try to hide the event, which was unfavorable for public sentiment, but, on the contrary, inflated it beyond measure, and awarded 100 livres to anyone who found a relic or reported something important. The king's grief increased emotional excitement, driving passions to mass hysteria; people shed tears and crowded into churches. Conversations multiplied: is this a sign of impending trouble? The holy nail, however, was soon found and put in place.

The king and his people were united by a simple belief in miracles, in the effective power of magical objects.

In 1204, the crusading knights captured and sacked Constantinople. A bad event, but we're talking about something else. The Crusader warriors were stunned to see sacred relics among the treasures of Byzantium: a crown of thorns, nails - obvious and tangible traces of the Passion of the Lord in their simplicity. Today it is difficult to imagine how material objects convinced of the absolute reliability of the New Testament tradition. The truth about God, who descended to human nature, became close and obvious. People of that time constantly saw wounds and often experienced suffering, they knew how difficult it was to endure, how they screamed in pain; what they themselves endured was accepted and experienced by God. Emotional shock, authenticity through the visible, created a new religious environment: the “incarnation of God” - a phenomenon that Duby observes in the “new French”, Gothic art.

Persistently and consistently, King Louis collected the most worthy Christian relics; frankly speaking, he bought them. The “true crown of thorns of Christ” was transported from Venice to France with great precautions. (On the way, the rain poured incessantly, which caused some bewilderment among the simple-minded accompanying people.) The meeting of the relic in the kingdom aroused universal admiration: the procession was led by the king, accompanied by his brother - barefoot, in rough shirts. Soon the following were added to the crown of thorns: a piece of the True Cross, the tip of a spear with which a Roman pierced the crucified Christ, and a sponge on which the Romans offered vinegar. Sainte-Chapelle was erected to house the collected relics. The miraculous power of the relics, according to everyone, protected the king and the kingdom.

Obviously, the young king had found his place - he was not ahead of his time, not behind, but somewhere in the middle. It was this circumstance, said one of the successful modern political scientists, that was the key to the strength of his power and the basis of his legend.

Next to the Holy Chapel, and this is a sign of new times, the king ordered the construction of a room on the upper floors of which the royal archive, the Charters, and a library, a collection of pious religious works, were located.

Inner circle

Le Goff does not hide the fact that the intellectual environment of Louis IX leaves much to be desired. The 13th century was the heyday of the University of Paris and the emergence of true intellectuals. But the king communicated only with two not the most outstanding figures, with Robert de Sorbon and Vincent of Beauvais.

Robert de Sorbon was a kind and simple-minded man of low origin, he was called a “hillbilly.” He earned the title of Master of Theology through hard work. And in his treatise on the Last Judgment he compared it to an exam. Apparently, de Sorbon experienced the exam “torment” more than once. But the good canon, remembering his poverty, did a useful deed: his name remained in history at a height immeasurably higher than that of his wise colleagues. The Sorbon founded a college, a kind of academic boarding house for poor students. Louis IX showed worthy generosity, granted the simple-minded theologian many houses in Paris for his endeavor and provided for the maintenance of the students who lived there. Over time, the name of the large college changed to the University of Paris. We have to repeat the old truth: good deeds are more important than smart speeches.

The closest intellectual to the king was the Dominican monk Vincent of Beauvais, the author of a kind of encyclopedia, rather a compilation, “The Great Mirror”. Vincent did not address the heights of contemporary thought, but he was a good teacher and knew how to intelligently present significant information. The young king, who received an extremely superficial education, even by the standards of that time, attended classes at a monastery school: “He sat with the monks at the feet of the master and listened attentively, and this is what the holy king did more than once.” The king learned some of the techniques of the university environment: he liked to organize debates between the loyal courtier Joinville and Robert de Sorbon, similar to the debate between masters at the university. Not more. “Whatever you say,” admits Le Goff, “the king was distrustful of intellectuals.”

At the University of Paris during the time of Louis IX, a corpulent, benevolent Dominican monk, “Brother Thomas,” the famous Thomas Aquinas, lectured and analyzed interpretations of theological texts. The “Holy King” and his no less famous contemporary never met - to mutual benefit. The king had the greatest respect for the monks who observed the vow of “apostolic poverty,” the Franciscans and Dominicans, and imitated them in everyday life. But the statement of Thomas Aquinas: in addition to fiery faith, one must find evidence of the existence of God by the power of reason - was completely unnecessary for the owner of the “sacred nails” from Jerusalem.

"Holy King" and the new European culture

Duby writes about the spiritual changes of the 13th century: “A free man appears, responsible for his actions. The man of the Gothic cathedrals has become a personality.” It is difficult to say with certainty how effective the influence of annual confession was, but it is clear that this compulsory rule for the laity, established in 1215 by the Catholic Church, had certain consequences for many people who were not burdened with the abilities of Thomas Aquinas. The disciplinary measures of the church, regardless of the original intentions, forced the subordination of the “external” to the “internal”. A “culture of guilt” is being formed in society, a person’s preoccupation with his inner rightness. Skills of self-analysis appear, a distinctive feature of European spiritual culture.

Where exactly is the “contact” between Louis IX and new phenomena in European culture discovered by French historians? Not in children's disputes and not even in architecture: he did not conceive and build. A good king, who had common sense in everyday affairs, he did not interfere, did not spoil, and spent what was necessary. When preparing the crusade, he showed reasonable frugality and did not ruin the country for the sake of pious deeds, as his predecessors did. But the meeting between the king and the world of economics did not take place; everyone remained within their own limits.

The Church provided the king with an unwise set of economic rules: moneylenders, all without exception, will go to hell, “good money” is determined “by eye and tooth.” The king, in his ordinances, periodically crushed moneylenders, to the joy of debtors, and with a certain amount of xenophobia. However, everything returned to the original situation, and only loans became more expensive, moneylenders charged higher fees for risk.

But this was a time of intense debate that laid the foundation for European economic theory: about the value of labor, about the admissibility of accumulation. The desire to determine the basis of a “fair price” was the first attempt to find patterns of market pricing.

Nevertheless, “a king focused exclusively on intangible values,” Le Goff admitted, “turned into the Saint Louis of economic prosperity.” Any traditional society turns into a fairy tale a time of moderate stability, a time without changes in the monetary sphere, without wild price jumps.

Louis IX came into contact with new phenomena in European culture of the 13th century in the world of everyday life. In his daily activities, he presented something new: the image of a person who checks his actions against inner motivations.

The king once said to de Sorbon: “I wanted to be an impeccable person - beautiful words, when you say them, you feel their taste.” The “impeccable man” is a new model of personality: the “fearless” knight, the hero of the feudal era, lived according to the custom of his ancestors in accordance with his “professional function”, with a shield and sword; “an impeccable man” - in everyday affairs he showed restraint, wisdom and a sense of proportion.

A loyal ally of Louis IX, Joinville, among the king’s virtues, put restraint in first place. “I never heard,” Joinville wrote, “that he ordered himself any dish, as many rich people did, but he ate with pleasure what was put in front of him.”

The ritual of food and the number of dishes were the main indicator of the social status of that era - feasts and clothing determined a person’s position in society. Each appearance of the king at the table was surrounded by many unwritten rules. First of all - religious requirements, abstaining from certain types of food during fasting; The king observed these rules in abundance. Secondly, a special ritual of food: a place at the table, the number of dishes, rare treats. In this sense, the king’s behavior was unusual and provocative: he chose worse food (small fish instead of large pike, simple food with peas), ate in moderation, spoiled the food in front of those present, added water to the soup, diluted the sauce with water, turning the gravy into an unpleasant slime .

He diluted the wine three-quarters with water in a country where good quality wine was not uncommon in the 13th century. Just as diligently, the king diluted his married life with abstinence during Lent, which did not prevent him from having numerous offspring; seven children survived their father.

The Church convinced that monarchs, through anointing to the kingdom, became co-rulers of Christ. (On one of the portals of the cathedral in Reims, the scene of the Last Judgment is depicted in the presence of the king, transferred with the throne to heaven.) The “royal miracle,” the healing of scrofulous patients by the laying on of the king’s hands, proved to his subjects the miraculous power of the monarch. Louis knew the power of power and his destiny, but tried to separate power and personality. In his dreams, he strove for the simplicity and unpretentious wisdom of the apostles, disciples of Christ. Sometimes it worked.

He was tormented by the thought that war was still a “sinful thing.” Joinville recalled: “The king was reproached for why he did not allow France’s neighbors to fight each other and weaken themselves for the benefit of the kingdom, and he seriously replied: “Blessed are the peacemakers.” Not empty words: from 1242 to 1270 there was peace in the country. If you start a war, he instructed his son, do not devastate the enemy’s land (the king did not use the word “enemy”), beware of harming “poor people.” Try to convince the enemy, “warn him”; declaring war should be a last resort. The king rejected hunting, worldly amusements, and swear words; got rid of outward signs of wealth and wore simple clothes. “A king should be a model for those under him.” This worthy thought appears in the writings of those years.

In the summer, the king went out into the garden, sat on the carpet, and people came to him with complaints and petitions. Joinville recalled how, after church services, the king went to the Bois de Vincennes and sat down, leaning against an oak tree. “Everyone who had business came to him, for there were no guards around.” The reputation of a king depends on established order and good justice, this is the commonplace of the instructions of those years; the difference is that Louis IX wanted to implement abstract rules in concrete matters. The “dear king” addressed everyone as “you”, did not insult anyone, but did not tolerate blasphemy, and wanted to eradicate “city vices”: corrupt love, gambling, damage to money.

The “holy king,” despite all his efforts, was unable to create a world of righteous people. He was distracted by other matters - the crusades.

Crusade Follies

The Crusades of Louis IX, the last campaigns to the East of the European world, are one of the strangest mysteries of the history of the 13th century. “Will the border of the Catholic world run along the Jordan or along the Dnieper” - this is how Le Goff defines “the great geopolitical problem of the 13th century.” But this is a mistaken opinion. Western Europe did not have the strength or desire to fight the Mongols; its own problems prevailed. The Pope was hiding in peaceful France from the troops of the German Emperor. His call for a new crusade against the Egyptian sultan, who had captured Jerusalem and massacred Christians in Palestine, was inferior in strength to his denunciation of the “breed of serpents,” Emperor Frederick II. Those around the pope directly said: the Christian world must go on a campaign against the wicked emperor.

Only Frederick II could solve the problem of “holy places” in those years. He knew the Arab world well, was indifferent to matters of faith, and is called “Europe’s first atheist.” At the end of the 20s of the 13th century, Frederick II found a peaceful solution to the “holy places”: Jerusalem, in addition to Islamic shrines, was transferred to Christians. Frederick may have restored peace to the Middle East, but his bold plans to create a new power that would unite Central Europe, Italy and the Mediterranean angered Rome.

In such a situation, the French king decided to take the place of the German emperor.

The crusade was well prepared, huge supplies of food were collected; The French clergy, without much joy, contributed over 1 million livres. The king and 30 thousand warriors (2500 of them knights) were placed on the ships. The French attacked the possessions of the Egyptian Sultan, where they were defeated. Epidemics, unusual climate, and projectiles with “Greek fire” were terrifying. Louis IX was captured and had to collect money for a ransom. The king was exhausted by stomach diseases, could barely stand on his feet, while in captivity he debated with Muslims, and was delighted with the Sultan’s library. After his release from captivity, he did not return home, but went to Acre, one of the few surviving crusader fortresses, where he spent three years, waiting in vain for reinforcements.

Meanwhile, the possessions of the crusaders were melting, the Egyptian sultan captured the last coastal fortresses in Palestine. In 1267, at Sainte-Chapelle, Louis IX announced a new crusade to his amazed courtiers. The king was pale and sick, his thin hair and small soft beard were almost gray; in 1270 he accepted the staff from the hands of the papal ambassador. Peacefulness and impeccable modesty disappeared outside of “their own world”, leaving an aggressive and self-confident fanatic.

Louis IX had the unenviable historical role of closing the era of the Crusades in the Mediterranean. The crusaders of France besieged the ancient fortress of Carthage, but the offensive was stopped and a cholera epidemic began. Louis IX died in August 1270. Contemporaries tried to explain the actions of the pious king, who almost dragged his sons into the abyss (they accompanied Louis, and only a happy accident saved the heir, the future king) with “holy simplicity,” gullibility: he believed that the emir of Tunisia “was ready to accept Christianity " (Le Goff says something similar about his hero - the French did not suspect how far Tunisia was from Egypt, “The King sailed without a map.”) But it should be added: the personality model that arose in the dreams of Louis IX was superficial, shallow.

“The Holy King” has taken its place in reference books and textbooks. The research of French historians defined new boundaries of historical science. And yet, if fate is favorable to you, look into Sainte-Chapelle on an early autumn day, when the cool sun illuminates the radiant stained-glass windows with ingenuous figures - maybe you will discover something new.

Alexander Savinov, "Holy Nails"
Publ. in the magazine "Knowledge is power" No. 12, 2003

Brief biographical information

French king since 1226, from the Capetian dynasty. Until 1236, his mother Blanca of Castile was regent. Conducted reforms to centralize state power. The significance of seigneurial courts was narrowed; A special judicial chamber was created in Paris (later called the parliament), which became the highest appellate court in the state; important administrative functions were also transferred to it. Under Louis IX, full-fledged silver and gold coins began to be minted, which began to supplant the numerous types of coins minted by individual feudal lords and cities. The foreign policy of Louis IX was unsuccessful. In 1248 he led the 7th (1248) Crusade. In 1250 he was captured by the Egyptian Sultan and released for a huge ransom. He concluded the Treaty of Paris in 1259, according to which he ceded Guienne to the British. He died of the plague during the 8th (1270) Crusade he undertook (in Tunisia). In 1297 he was canonized.

Links (sources)

Images of Sainte-Chapelle:
http://www.herodote.net/Images/SainteChapelle.jpg,
http://vandyck.anu.edu.au/introduction/add/med.gothic/AH243-410.jpg,
http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~jmgriggs/photo/chapelle.jpg

20.02.2018

There is probably nothing worse for a state than having an overly religious ruler on the throne. Take Louis IX, for example! On the one hand, he tried to strengthen the prestige of France, contributed to the development of the judicial system and compliance with the law, on the other, he spent a lot of money from the treasury on the Crusades. This is not to mention the human sacrifices - in those years, human life was not considered inviolable, and humanism was unheard of then. Why was Louis called the Saint? What did he do? Maybe he helped the church spread Christian values among its (and not only its) people?

Religiosity

Louis grew up in an environment that shaped and “fused” together such seemingly incompatible character traits as a convinced, almost fanatical faith in God and a love of rich feasts.

The mother of Louis IX enjoyed the joys of life while she was in power (until Louis’s 12th birthday), but at the same time skillfully portrayed humility and a penchant for asceticism when necessary. So Louis became like her, only with him, it seemed, everything was sincere - he either organized festivities, or organized Crusades, in which he himself participated.

The king prayed a lot and often attended church. They say he even wore a hair shirt. At the same time, he did not refuse the joys given in marriage - he and his wife (by the way, he lived with her all his life and did not have mistresses, like other great-power personalities) had 11 children! It is interesting that the wife accompanied her husband on his first campaign against the Gentiles.

Crusades

It seemed to the king not enough to simply pray himself - he wanted to spread Christian teaching wherever possible. The result of this desire was the continuation of the Crusades against the Gentiles. Louis IX led the 7th and 8th Crusades, which, however, did not bring him success.

During the Seventh Crusade, the king was captured in Cairo. His associates were also captured. To help out the monarch, considerable sums had to be paid. The Eighth Crusade became completely disastrous. A pestilence spread throughout the army, which, of course, they did not know how to treat. Hundreds of people died. The king himself also died.

Canonization

It is difficult to name any benefit from both campaigns of the crusader king. They brought nothing but sacrifices and ruin to anyone. However, in 1297 Louis IX was canonized. But if the monarch had not shown such ardent religious zeal, perhaps he would have been able to ensure the prosperity of France and significantly improve the living conditions of his subjects.

Louis IX was known among the people as a good king. Every day at a certain hour he listened to the complaints of people coming to him. And it doesn’t matter what class they belonged to. He really helped a lot of people.

Louis IX considered it necessary to know the life of his own people, to take into account their needs and interests. But he turned out to be very devout...

Under Louis, the internal governance system improved. Although not many new institutions were established, the old ones were developed and their powers expanded. In particular, royal proceedings and taxation developed rapidly, and the organization of military affairs was improved.