Charles of Valois, Parts One, Two, and Three.

Download here: Part One, Two, and Three.

Charles of Valois, Part One:

*One quick note, I claim, in Part Two, that Edward III used Robert of Artios as his excuse for declaring war against France. Really, it was a more complicated progression of events. Please listen to The Hundred Years War of the Roses for Brittany for the precise details. I do apologise and I should have been more specific.

Welcome back. I hope you all had a lovely holiday period. I enjoyed some sunshine and beach time with my children and Phillip. I think they all loved visiting Sydney and spending some time with Phillip’s family. Before I start today just a quick reminder, please check out the show’s YouTube page, I will be posting videos on there very soon. Phillip has even built me a teleprompter for these and is helping me by making maps for better visuals. And a big note for Patrons, I have set up a Discord server. I’ll be completely honest, I have almost no idea what I’m doing. But if you’re a patron please join us there. It’s a small community at the moment, but I try to give regular prompts to get us chatting. If you’re a Patron and are having any issues on there please message me through Patreon, if it’s a technical question I’ll have Phillip help you, if it’s something else I’ll get on it right away. This will probably lead to me visiting the Rex Factor discord a bit more too. Patrons there is also an announcement up on Patreon regarding the YouTube channel, and you have until the end of February to let me know if you don’t want to be a part of this. And in the last bit of news, I have set up a website for the show, it should be live when this episode releases. www.passedpod.com, as always thank you to Phillip for helping with the technical side of things! You’ll be able to find sources, transcripts, and links to merchandise. I hope to also blog a bit about my history thoughts and to include guest posts in the future. 

Now, you were probably all expecting to hear about Isabella Clara Eugenia, as I said before the holidays. While starting my research for this subject I ran into two road blocks. When I search Isabella Clara Eugenia’s name there are two books that come up in relation to her: Isabel Clara Eugenia: Female Sovereignty in the Court of Madrid and Brussels by Dr. Cordula Van Wyhe and Albert and Isabella by Werner Thomas and Luc Duerloo. Here’s the problem, I can’t find them, well, I can, but the former would cost more than $250 US and the later is more than $100 US. While I really love this show and the research I feel do that is a bit much for me to be spending for a single subject. I would love to access these books, but sadly my local university library doesn’t have them, the closest for the more expensive book is Aukland, which I just can’t imagine them sending it to Australia for me. That’s really asking a library too much, especially since I only have outside borrower status, not student status. There is a copy of the other in Sydney, but it’s only available onsite. So, I will not be able to do this episode yet. I would need to go to the university in Sydney and contact the university in Aukland. I do plan to do this, but I will not have the time to do so until next year. It really is something I need to plan well. I will include the jstor links to the journal articles I found about Isabella Clara Eugenia for your reading. I highly recommend having a read of these, I found them interesting not just for the mentions of Isabella, but also for the discussions each had of the time she lived in and the culture she encouraged in her court. 

https://www.jstor.org/stable/26559647

https://www.jstor.org/stable/25643861?seq=15

https://www.jstor.org/stable/20476943

https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1163/j.ctvrxk3hp.10

https://www.jstor.org/stable/887395

https://www.jstor.org/stable/43921242

https://www.jstor.org/stable/1874287

https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv31xf66n.5

https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvbkjxzc.11

https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1kwxf5r.7

https://www.rct.uk/collection/407377/the-infanta-isabella-clara-eugenia-1566-1633-archduchess-of-austria

Instead, today we’ll be looking at Charles of Valois, who was Isabella Clara’s eight times great grandfather and the founder of the Valois dynasty. I will point out before I even start that I find it odd that we call this dynasty the Valois dynasty through Louis XI, Francis I, Henri II, etc. Because Louis, based on the change from Capet to Valois should be the Orleanist dynasty and Francis and his descendants should be Angouleme. But that’s just me thinking about grouping people too specifically. Remember, all of these men are Capet, just like everyone involved in the Wars of the Roses were Plantagenet until Henry VII, who was actually Tudor. Okay, moving on from my obsession with organisation.

What are my sources for this episode? Well, since I don’t speak French I initially thought I couldn’t use Charles of Valois, by Joseph Petit, since I can’t find the 2001 English translation, but then I asked Phillip for help. Well, let me tell you he came through. I had struggled since Google Translate won’t translate scanned documents. Phil was able to run the scanned PDF from the Internet Archive through PDF 24 to create a version that could be translated. He then edited things to make sure things were lining up correctly, split the 400 page document into smaller documents before running it through Google translate and giving me five documents that are ready for me to read. This is no where near as good as a properly done translation, but it will work for getting a few details of Charles’ life for all of you. It looks like he can do this with manuscripts as well. I’m just really happy he figured it out because I badly wanted to use Petit’s book for this episode. I will include the link the Internet Archive copy of the book if you’re interested (https://archive.org/details/charlesdevalois01petigoog). To be clear, this book is in the public domain and I would only recommend this process for books that are, because authors should be paid for their work. I haven’t face a translation issue like this for a book that is still in copyright, thankfully most newer books are translated into English, which is lucky for me. I’m also using Capetian France 987-1328 both the Second and Third Editions. These are both primarily written by Elizabeth M. Hallam and the second edition is co-written by Judith Everard and the third by Charles West and there are differences between the two editions. In addition I’m using a few journal articles, as well as book chapters and as always the jstor links to those will be in the description box. The book that I’ve pulled is Courting Sanctity: Holy Women and the Capetians. Because this time period is far enough back that there were still a few chroniclers I will be using a bit of Dino Compagni’s Chronicle of Florence. I have also pulled out She-Wolves, by Helen Castor, since Charles of Valois comes up a few times in his niece, Isabella of France’s story. 

I should let you know before I start that Charles of Valois surprised me in a few ways. I didn’t expect him to have been successful militarily, or that important to his brother, but it turns out he was. In addition I didn’t realised how pious he was, but, surprise, he really was respected by multiple popes. I think an important question is, how close to being king was Charles of Valois? Well, jumping ahead to the end he died on the 16th of December 1325 and his son, Philip VI became king on the 1st of February 1328, so pretty close compared to the other almost kings I’ve covered in this miniseries. What’s also rather interesting about Charles is that he had something even better than a kingdom, he had an empire, at least in name. Okay, I should probably go back to the beginning after these spoilers.

Charles of Valois was the fourth son of Philip III of France and his first wife, Isabella of Aragon. He was born sometime between the 27th of March to the 12th of April 1270. Yes, another one of those times the chroniclers forgot to write the date. In their defence the royal family was on Crusade and it’s likely they were busy thinking about other things. Oh, yes, little Charles was likely born in Tunis. We do know he was born during Lent, which ended on the 12th of April that year and that he was born after the 27th because he wasn’t 14 before that day in 1284, this will come up again soon. Charles had three older brothers, Louis, Philip, and Robert. You should be familiar with Philip, who would become Philip IV or Philip the fair in 1285. His mother would die in 1271 while pregnant with her youngest son who stillborn. She had been crossing a waterway on horseback and was thrown off. Louis IX, Saint Louis, Charles’ grandfather, also died on this Crusade, though prior to his daughter-in-laws death, she was queen for a short time.

A few years after her death Philip III married again, to Marie of Brabant. Charles and Philip also had one older brother Louis, who would sadly die in 1276, possibly poisoned on the orders of their step-mother, Marie. Sometime between 1270 and 76 Robert also died. Charles’ younger half-brother Louis was born in May 1276, sometime after the death of his older brother Louis. This younger Louis will be referred to as Louis of Evreux or Evreux. He also had two half sisters, Blanche and Margaret. Margaret has come up in Isabella of France’s episodes, she will eventually become the second wife of Edward I of England and the mother of Edmund of Woodstock, who was executed under the orders of Isabella and her lover Roger Mortimer during Edward III’s minority. This also makes Margaret the grandmother-in-law to the Black Prince since Edmund of Woodstock was Joan, the fair maid of Kent’s father. Oh yes, everyone is related, really, really related, rushed papal dispensation was received. 

Charles was rather close to both his surviving brothers, Philip the fair and Louis of Evreux. In fact, this is actually a noted trait of the Capetian royal family, brothers seemed to get along well. Their own father, Philip III, had named his younger brother, Peter, as regent should he die prior to Philip IV’s coming of age (yes, some kings planned well for the possibility of their death). There are only one or two instances of brothers who struggled politically with each other and no attempts to usurp each other since Robert I of Burgundy tried to overthrow Henry I in the 1020s, so not something kings were worried about at this point. I find this interesting due to the claims that Louis of Evreux’s mother, Marie of Brabant, may have planned to poisoning of the oldest son of Philip III, Louis, and it was known that she wanted her son, the younger Louis, to become king. Despite this Philip IV used his brother Louis of Evreux as a trusted aid once he became king, and of course he used Charles. And this will come up a few times throughout this episode, foreshadowing. 

This next bit is going to cover a bit of European history at the time, so hopefully it will make sense. Philip III was offered the chance to give his second son a throne in 1283, the crown of Aragon. The king of Aragon, Peter III, had ruled Aragon since 1276, but in 1282 he pushed a claim to Sicily through his wife, Constance. Sicily had been held by Charles’ great uncle, Charles of Anjou since 1266. In case you’re curious Charles of Anjou was the youngest brother of Louis IX, making him Philip III’s uncle. Peter III’s wife Constance was the daughter of Manfred, who had been king of Sicily from 1258 to 1266. After Manfred’s death Charles of Anjou had captured his widow, Helena, and their four children. Constance was the daughter of Manfred’s first wife and had been married to Peter III before her father’s death. Two of her brothers and her step-mother died in Anjou captivity, her sister and her youngest brother survived, but were not able to take back Sicily. So, how did any of this lead to Philip III being offer Aragon for his not-yet 13 year old son? Well, when Peter III decided to put his claim on the board in 1280 he received permission, via a diplomat, from the Pope, Nicholas III to go into Sicily and attack Anjou’s forces. All looks good, except, Nicholas died in August 1280 and was replaced by Martin IV. Martin did not approve of Peter III’s plans (full disclosure, he was a Frenchman). Without the pope’s permission Peter III was excommunicated at some point in 1282. I don’t want to go through the whole war, but there is a pretty funny story about Peter III and Anjou agreeing to meet to solve their problem by single combat. They arranged to meet on the 1st of June 1283, but apparently forgot to tell each other what time. Peter showed up in the morning and got bored waiting and Anjou showed up in the afternoon. They both called the other a coward and claimed they won. Due to Peter III’s excommunication his actual kingdom, Aragon, was up for grabs. Hence, Philip III being offered it for his younger son. Well, Anjou had a little to do with that (in that he suggested his great-nephew for the role) , as did Philip III’s first wife and Charles of Valois’ mother, Isabelle of Aragon. Through her Charles was the nephew of Peter III and one of his few relatives who hadn’t taken up arms after Anjou and angered the pope. In May 1284 Charles of Valois, at only 14, was actually invested as king of Aragon by the Pope. Oh, and this is where the being 14 after the 27th of March comes in, there is a letter discussing his investiture and it stated it needed to happen after that date. Charles also had to swear to never hold the thrones of France, England, Castile, or Leon, oh, and the pope would need some money, of course. Even with this okay from the pope he still needed to hold the kingdom. Due to both Peter III’s excommunication and his father making Aragon a papal fief this was actually a crusade, the Aragonese Crusade. 

To get this he and his father, Philip III took up plans for a military campaign. Things looked okay at the start. A note though, Philip the Fair was not supportive of his father or brother on this cause, but he marched south with them. He seemed to be close to his Aragonese family and he supported Peter III and his cousins. Further note, Peter III’s brother, James II of Majorca, came out in support of Charles, and as the Spanish equivalent of a Marcher lord, he held Roussillon on the border with France. Charles and his father reached Roussillon (near the Aragonese border, and previously part of Aragon), on the 15th of June 1284, he was crowned, with a cardinal’s hat, by a Cardinal, a few days later. Yes, he was crowned without a crown, awkward. He did get mocked for this in later life. This is where I think Philip the Fair remained while Charles and Philip III went into Aragon.

Before Charles and Philip III could even get into actual battles Anjou died in January 1285. And as they were getting ready to leave the Pope, Martin IV died in March. The pair, along with James II, were able to take Girona in September of 1285, but they were cut off from supplies by Peter III’s fleet. In the end, while they were able to hold the city it was a hollow victory. Dysentery, yes, everyone’s favourite disease, began to spread through the French forces. It appears that Philip III came down with this. The French forces withdrew, and Philip III made it to Perpignan, in Roussillon before he died on the 5th of October 1285. Philip III may have made Philip the Fair, soon to be Philip IV, swear to help Charles become king of Aragon, or he may not have, two different chronicles have different stories. Philip the Fair’s behaviours point towards that being something he wouldn’t agree to, at least in my humble opinion. As I’ve mentioned though he was supportive of his uncle and cousin’s claims. 

Through his father’s will Charles of Valois became, well, Charles of Valois. Yes, he received the countship of Valois, but he wouldn’t have control of the administration until 1291, when he reached 21, there were just multiple ages of majority, kind of like America. Due to the delay between his attempt at taking Aragon and him getting his funds from his county Charles was unable to gain Aragon, that and the ten years of negotiations that occurred after the Crusade. Yes, it took ten years to negotiate a settlement. Edward I of England, was even looked to at one point to help settle things. The pope, the Spanish kings, and the French were able to sort it out on their own. In the end Charles was paid well for renouncing his claim, financially. Plus, he contracted a wealthy marriage, with his second cousin, because everyone is related. 

Charles of Anjou had been succeeded as king of Sicily by his son, Charles II of Anjou, whom I’ll just call Anjou. Now, I should let you know that at the time of his accession the new Anjou was a prisoner of the Aragonese. His imprisonment, plus that changing of the Pope, was part of the reason the agreement took ten years to get settled, but back to Charles of Valois. The younger Anjou’s daughter, Marguerite, was a perfect age for marriage, really, she was about 18, which isn’t the worst we’ve seen. She was given Anjou and Maine as her dowry, and in their marriage contract Charles of Valois would receive these wealthy counties regardless of their marriage producing children and the counties would revert to the French throne if both members of the couple died without issue. The couple received papal dispensation in March 1290 and their marriage was celebrated in August of that year. Charles was 20, married to a wealthy heiress, sounds like the perfect life for a second son. He had to fully renounce his claim to Aragon to receive Anjou and Maine, which he did in 1295. Oh, and he had to help his cousin/father-in-law, Anjou, retake Sicily.

Charles and Marguerite would have six children, five of whom would survive to adulthood, including, most importantly Philip, the future Philip VI. Margaret will die in 1299, and her’s and Charles’ son Philip will become the count of Anjou and Maine at that point. I wish I could share more about her, but she sadly doesn’t come up a lot in history. Based on the date of her death and the date of her last child’s birth I would wager birth complications contributed to her death. She was survived by her five children, Isabella, Philip, Joan, Margaret, and Charles. With five children Charles really didn’t need to marry again, but he will. In fact while his first wife was still alive Catherine, the titular Latin Empress of Constantinople, was looking for a husband. She had planned three other betrothals prior to finally getting married. Her second betrothal actually came up around the time Charles and Marguerite married, she had agreed to marry Frederick of Aragon, Charles of Valois’ cousin and a rival for the Aragonese throne, plus the future king of Sicily. Fredrick would have had to renounce his claim to Sicily and assist in reconquering Constantinople, but Philip IV, Charles’ own brother, didn’t approve of this option. Obviously Charles couldn’t be on offer while his wife was alive, but once I get to the right point in this story Catherine will come up again (and I will explain a bit about the Latin empire of Constantinople). But first, back to Sicily. 

Now, without going through the entire history of Sicily and Naples, both were part of Charles I of Anjou’s kingdom, Sicily. Peter III, who was Peter I of Sicily, had taken the island portion, but the Angevins still held the mainland. Spoilers here, the Angevins will not retake the island, which will remain the kingdom of Sicily, they will maintain the mainland portion, which we call Naples, for a few more generations, after that Naples gets super confusing. While this mainland portion shouldn’t have been called Sicily, it still was in some cases. Which means, spoilers, in 1816, when Naples and Sicily were reunited the new country they formed was given the name the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. This has nothing to do with Charles, but it’s something I find rather fascinating. I will get to Charles’ attempts to retake Sicily for his father-in-law soon.

First though Charles needed to help his brother out. Jean d’Avesnes, the count of Hainaut had been plundering churches that were under Philip the Fair’s protection. Charles of Valois was active  militarily, as most sons and brothers of kings were, but unlike other kings his brother wasn’t. Philip the Fair really didn’t do much battle himself. Thankfully for Charles Jean capitulated quickly with only a minor show of force on France’s part. 

Not long after sorting this problem out Charles was given a few nice things from his brother, he was made godfather to his nephew, Charles. This younger Charles is the future Charles IV, but until he becomes such I’ll call him la Marche, since he was the Count of la Marche until he became king. Oddly, I also found out that Charles of Valois was also the god father to Charles IV’s future wife, Blanche of Burgundy. Which is a little awkward in the long run, with her being accused of adultery and everything, just think back to the Capetian Miracle Ends. Then Charles received a lovely gift from Philip the Fair, the county of Alencon in 1293. Which is how his descendant, that Alencon, became well, Alencon. For non-patrons, that Alencon came up in Joan of Arc’s special episode, he’s rather interesting. He is also Charles of Orlean’s son-in-law. Philip also awarded his brother the churches of Anjou and Maine with the exception of Angers and Le Mans, this means that Philip would get a portion of the revenues from these churches. 

And with that brotherly gift I will pause for the week. I’ll be back next week with part two. I’ll see you then.

Charles of Valois, Part Two

Welcome back. Last week ended with Philip the fair gifting Charles of Valois a rather nice county. This week I’ll start looking at Charles’ continuing military service to the kingdom of France and spend a bit of time discussing important events within the Capetian royal family. 

In 1294 Charles of Valois was needed for his military might again. Philip the Fair had declared the English holding of Gascony forfeit, due to Edward I not coming to him when he asked the English king to appear in French court to answer for ongoing issues between French, English, and Gascon sailors. Remember, Gascony was a French fief, it was held by the English crown in homage to the French crown. Charles was given the honour of leading Philip’s troops in Gascony. His tactics, were harsh, but effective. When he took a large town he released the English captives but kept the Gascons. He then had them hanged outside of the walls of Bordeaux, which he was besieging. The Gascon nobility in the city were enraged with their English leaders. Not long after the English commanders tried to sneak out of the city overnight, Bordeaux was taken soon after. There was also a 13 week siege of Saint-Sever that Charles successfully leas, but the city was quickly retaken. 

Edward I looked as though he was going to negotiate, but changed his mind. Now, Edward had been offered Charles’ sister, Margaret’s hand in marriage a few year earlier. She had been born in 1279, so 15 at this point. And like everyone in the family (except possibly Charles of Valois, at least based on his effigy), rather pretty. It appeared though that Edward I was willing to give up his French bride, so France played a great card. They offered Charles of Valois’ oldest daughter, Isabella of Valois, to Edward Balliol, the son of the Scottish king, Edward Balliol. Young Isabella was three and John Balliol was 12. With this Edward I requested a truce, but then went back on it. Charles doesn’t take a further part in Gascon theatre of the war. In the long-run Edward I will marry Margaret of France, as I mentioned in the introduction. Isabella of Valois will marry John III of Brittany, sadly she would die at 18. 

Charles of Valois had been requested by the pope, in 1296, Boniface VIII, to come to Rome to help negotiate between England, France, the Spanish kings, Scotland, and Flanders. Instead Philip the Fair sent him to Flanders to assist against English forces there. Now, I don’t have a lot of details about his actions there, don’t worry things went well, but it’s always hard to find out about those more minor characters in history. Petit though found a great little piece of history though while writing his book. In one of the Icelandic chronicles it was noted that Charles of Valois was captured by Edward I’s forces in Ghent, the chronicle even noted that Robert II of Artois was captured as well, this Robert of Artois is the grandfather of the Robert of Artois that Edward III uses as an excuse to have a problem with Philip VI, Charles’ son. To be clear this didn’t happen at all, but it shows the game of telephone that some parts of history can be. Had this been recorded in other chronicles or we had a record of his ransom this would be a serious thought, but a single note in a distant chronicle makes me think that someone had visited the court of Iceland from mainland Europe and carried information that they themselves hadn’t fact checked. Charles took a short leave from Flanders to be present in Paris for the promulgation of the canonisation of Louis IX. He would have know that his grandfather, now truly Saint Louis, had been declared a saint, but the promulgation would have been the public dissemination of this fact. Congratulations Louis, it only took 27 years, which is fast. I will point out that Anjou, Charles’ great uncle and the late king of Sicily, had been one of the major campaigners for Louis IX’s canonisation, and he sadly didn’t live long enough to see it. One further note, Louis’ sister, Isabelle, was canonised in 1696, it was a rather saintly family in that generation. Charles was back in Flanders in 1300 when the English forces were expelled. In their submission the people of Ghent were allowed to keep their privileges, and only a few hostages were given. Really, it’s likely that messing up the taxes that could be gathered from the area was not something the French crown wanted. 

After receiving the submission from Flanders Charles was able to make it back to Paris in time for his sister, Blanche’s, wedding on the 24th of May 1300. And not long after it was time for Charles to plan his own wedding. Remember, his first wife, Marguerite, had died in 1299, and while he had five surviving children by her it’s always a good idea to be on the lookout for a wealthy or powerful heiress to marry. This is where Catherine of Courteny, the titular Latin Empress of Constantinople comes back into our story. Between the time we last saw her, becoming unbetrothed to Fredrick of Aragon and marry Charles on the 28th of January 1301, she had one further betrothal. This time to James of Majorca, the son of James III of Majorca who came up earlier in this episode. The younger James left Catherine to…become a monk. It’s a bit insulting. Charles was given permission to marry Catherine by the pope and his former father-in-law (awkward) on the requirement that he reconquer Sicily. His brother, Philip the Fair, also made him promise not to retake Constantinople without his permission. So romantic. 

Okay, so what was the Latin Empire of Constantinople. I’m going to guess you’ve heard of Byzantium, what we call the Eastern Roman Empire after the ‘fall’ of the Western Roman Empire. Well, the people of the time never called it that, they called it the Roman Empire. You may also remember that there had been a schism between the westerner church, which would eventually be called the Roman Catholic Church and the eastern church, which we now call the Greek Orthodox Church in 1054, the Great Schism. No one at the time knew it was a great schism and less than 50 years after the Byzantine Emperor, Alexios I, asked the western church for assistance from the European kingdoms to help with the invasions by Seljuk-Turks on his eastern and southern borders. As you may know the church did agree to help, but then expanded the brief to retaking Jerusalem from the muslims who had held it for at least a hundred years at that point. They agreed to help Alexios on their way. This, and geography, set a precedence for crusaders to go through Constantinople on their way to the holy land. All went well until 1204, when the crusaders of the fourth crusade, well, sacked Constantinople and Baldwin of Flanders had himself crowned Latin Emperor. Baldwin was Cathrine’s great-great-great uncle (I think I have those number correct). Her father, Philip I, never ruled due to the Byzantium crown being reclaimed by Palaiolgos dynasty in 1259. I hope that clears up the whole Latin Emperor of Constantinople thing. I will at some point cover the fourth crusades and those who would never rule in relation to that. 

Now, with this marriage Charles was finally required, not requested, to go to Rome as part of his promise to retake Sicily. If I’m reading my translation properly he took Catherine with him on this trip, at least for the first part. The pope at the point was still Boniface VIII (he was getting along well with the French throne at this point, yes, that’s foreshadowing). In addition to a lot of money, the pope ‘invested Charles of Valois with full powers to pacify Italy’ and gave him a handful of titles, including peacemaker of Tuscany, captain general of Romagna, vicar of the pope in all the lands of the holy see. These feel a bit like Barack Obama getting a Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, awards for things not yet done. Interestingly a not insignificant amount of what is known about Charles’ performance in Italy comes to historians from Dante. Yes, he of the Divine Comedy, in fact, his exile from Florence was partially due to Charles’ ‘performance’ in Italy. Dante had been sent to Rome as part of a Florentine negotiating team. 

You’re probably wondering why Charles was involved in Florence when he was meant to be retaking Sicily. Just in case your knowledge of the geography of Italy isn’t up to date Florence is land locked and more than 1000 kilometres from Sicily, which is an island. It’s also almost 500 kilometres away from Naples, the mainland portion of what was the kingdom of Sicily. It’s also north of Rome, so Charles had to backtrack to get there. Well, the pope was taking advantage of Charles’ military presence to deal with Italian political issues. In the pope’s defence, the Florentines were asking for his help, but I’m sure they really wanted him to sort it out himself and not to send a heavy to do it. I should mention that Florence and Tuscany in general had been struggling with a bit of a fall out from the 11th and 12th century investiture controversy, yes, I’m aware we’re into the 14th century at this point. The original struggle had been between two groups, the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, the former on the side of the papacy and the latter on the side of the HRE. The Ghibellines had been defeated in Italy in the late 1200s, but the Guelphs ended up fracturing into the White Guelphs and the Black Guelphs. The White Guelphs didn’t support the papacy and the Black Guelphs did. This was directed more at Boniface than the general idea of a pope, just to be clear. I should note that the merchants of Florence were unimpressed with either group of Guelphs. So, at this point you may know more about this ongoing political strife than Charles did when he arrived in Florence on the 5th of November 1301. He had left Catherine safely along the way

Instead of negotiating Bontiface sent Charles. The White and Black factions in the city had kept things at a stalemate, both sides following strict rules to keep from killing each other. Charles’ presence upset these rules and the balance they were keeping. He invited the city magistrates to dine with him, and due to his status they couldn’t really say no, even though it tipped the balance a bit. The leader of the Black Guelphs, Corso Donati, was travelling with Charles, but Charles had promised not to let him back into the city. Well, Charles lied a little and totally let him back in. Corso led a massacre of the White Guelphs, probably a lucky thing for Dante that he had remained in Rome since he was a White Guelph. For Charles this should have been embarrassing, but he was well paid by the Black Guelphs. If you’re curious Dante never returned to Florence, and he wasn’t a fan of Charles. Corso would be killed by an angry mob in 1308, which sounds painful. After ‘sorting things out’ in Florence Charles returned to Rome in February 1302, picking up his wife on the way. Bontiface was not impressed and actually sent Charles back to Florence, to keep sorting things out. Oh, and he gave him more funding. The White Guelphs who were in exile were convicted of treason in abstentia and had their property confiscated and burnt, ouch. The Florentine leadership got money from the confiscated property. If anyone is interested in a history of Florence let me know, I might do one for the YouTube channel.

After burning a bit of Florence Charles finally set off for Sicily. His army landed in May 1302, and very quickly lost half his men. I mean, they died, due to disease, dysentery anyone, and general warfare. Thankfully, for all who were still alive, Fredrick III and Charles II (remember, these are the heirs of Peter III of Aragon and Charles I for Sicily respectively) agreed to a peace treaty, the Peace of Caltabellotta. In it Fredrick agreed to marry Charles II’s daughter, Eleanor of Anjou, so Charles’ former sister-in-law, his kingdom was now to be called the kingdom of Trinacria and the kingdom was to return to Charles II or his descendants upon the death of Fredrick III.As you can probably guess from my earlier discussion on the Kingdom of Two Sicilies the last part of the peace was not honoured. For Charles this peace means he was promised galleys and horsemen by Fredrick when he finally went to re-conquer Constantinople, do remember that Fredrick is Charles’ maternal cousin. 

With things settled in Sicily, sorry Trinacria Charles returned to France in early February 1303, he did stop by Rome on his way. At some point while he had been at war his wife had given birth to their only son, John, who would sadly died in 1308. While they were traveling back to France she was heavily pregnant or travelling with a very young baby, their daughter Catherine, was born in early 1303, no one remembered to write down her date of birth. Remember how I had said earlier that in 1301 Boniface was getting along with the French throne? Well, that had changed just a bit. I can only imagine how awkward this next period of French and papal history was for Charles. 

Buckle up, because it gets intense. France was in a bit of a state when Charles returned. Not long after Charles’ return Philip the Fair’s senior advisor, Guillaume de Nogaret, laid charges against Boniface, you know, the pope. Why was de Nogaret going after the pope? Well, we need to go back a little ways. In 1297 Philip the Fair had been trying to tax clergy and churches within France, he was also trying to appoint his own bishops without papal approval, oh and he had arrested a bishop who had been appointed by the pope. Now this wasn’t the first time a king had tried to tax the church, nor was it the first time a king tried to appoint their own bishops without papal approval, the big thing this time was that Philip the Fair was not giving up his claim to these rights. Boniface, trying to bring Philip back to the fold sent a papal bull to Philip in 1301, we call this bull Ausculta Fili, Listen Son, or Listen My Son. Really quick papal bulls are just fancy letters from the pope intended for public consumption and registered, they’re often named after the first words in the letter. I haven’t found a translation from Latin, but google translate has helped me again (I’ll put the computer translation on the website at the end of this episode’s transcript). To say that it’s condescending would be an understatement, but the funny thing is Philip likely never read it. Why do I say that? Because Robert of Artois tossed it in a fire, seriously, the Catholic Encyclopaedia quotes ‘Artois stored it from the Archdeacon’s hands and cast it into the fire.’ I’m sure Philip read it, but he was able to suppress the public copy, for the moment. So yes, while Charles of Valois was over in Italy being a most good boy for the pope his older brother was causing a few problems. As you can imagine this is going to end poorly for either the pope or Philip. Fate decided to say why not both, Boniface threatened to excommunicated someone, who was implied to be Philip and Philip sent de Nogaret, along with 200 knights, to Rome to sort out his problem. de Nogaret turned the problem up to 11 and on the 7th of September 1303 de Nogaret and his men attacked the papal palace. At this point Boniface properly excommunicated Philip. In response de Nogaret kidnapped the pope, and had him beaten. Boniface didn’t die, right away, he lived until the 11th of October 1303, but the beating did him in. He was succeeded by Benedict XI less than two weeks after he died. Benedict was an Italian, but not hostile to Philip the Fair. One of his few acts, his papacy lasted less than a year, was to lift Philip the Fair’s excommunication. The pope who succeeded Benedict, after an almost year long papal conclave was Clement V, a Frenchman. He’ll come up again soon.

With his brother’s papal issues sorted out, at least for the moment, Charles of Valois had to get back to what he did best (or worst), battle. Philip the Fair had further military plans for Flanders, because honestly it just flares up every few years, as in if I bring up every single time it happened in Charles’ life I would just be doing an episode on Flanders. The king had been delaying because he wanted to lead things himself. I mentioned it earlier, but Philip was not one to lead campaigns, that’s what he had brothers for. I should probably also tell you that in 1302 French forces had lost a battle against the Flemish that we call the Battle of the Golden Spurs, so named because the Flemish took the spurs from the French whom they had decisively defeated. Robert of Artois, the grandfather of the Robert of Artois from the start of the Hundred Years War episode, died in this battle. I only note this because this Robert’s death will indirectly give Edward III one of his excuses to eventually attack France, oh and also indirectly to the Tour de Nesle affair. Robert’s county and other holdings went to his surviving child, his daughter Mahaut, instead of his grandson, Robert of Artois, the surviving son of the elder Robert’s only son. Funny little note, the younger Robert of Artois will become Charles’ son-in-law in 1320, which you may remember from the Hundred Year’s War, because everyone is related. Mahaut’s daughters Joan and Blanche would marry Philip and Charles, the younger two sons of Philip the Fair. For this campaign Charles was joined by Louis of Evreaux, his and Philip’s younger half-brother. At the Battle of Mons-en-Pevele, in August of 1304, the French were doing really well at first until they needed to take a rest, the Flemish rallied momentarily but with Charles and Philip leading the charge the French were victorious, or at least claimed to be. Both sides claimed they won and eventually they came to a treaty that allowed Flanders to remain free, at least for the moment. But we should get back to Charles.

He had a quick detour from court politics in May of 1305 when his third child and second daughter, Joan, married William of Hainaut. Joan was 11 at the most, William was 21. Their first child, also William, was born two years later, yes, I know. Their forth child, Philippa will play a huge role in the relationship between England and France. Now more politics. 

Remember how I mentioned that Pope Clement would come up again? Well, he’s pope now, it really took almost a year to elect him due to the makeup of the college of cardinals (half were French, half were Italian). Once Clement was finally selected he held his coronation, after some urging from Philip the Fair, in Lyon. The coronation itself, on the 14th of November 1305, went fine, but the parade after did not go so well. Clement was escorted by Charles of Valois and John, Duke of Brittany. As would be expected in a time without TV people were excited to see the new pope, and a large group of people climbed on a wall around the route. This wall collapsed, killing the Duke of Brittany and injuring Charles and Clement. Both would survive, but Charles was out of action for a while. Charles used his recovery time to plan his invasion of Constantinople. That’s one way to avoid being bored. There is one little historical moment I shouldn’t ignore, in 1306 the Jews of France were expelled. This something that has, sadly, happened the Jewish populations throughout history and often, but not always, occurred after a king or local leader had well, gotten all the funding he could from Jewish moneylenders. 

Clement, who will have a great relationship with Charles, and a difficult relationship with Philip, allowed this campaign to be considered a Crusade. Remember, a crusade is special in that it takes care of some of the sin that might make you wait in purgatory. It makes recruiting people a little easier. With Clement’s okay (and Philip’s okay and money) Charles began building a coalition. He asked for naval support from Genoa and Venice, Genoa said no thank you (they had already had their own problems in Constantinople), but Venice offered 12 galleys and told Charles he could buy a as many more as he needed. His plan was to depart at the end of March 1307, so he had almost a year and a half to get things ready. He corresponded with the king of Armenia, because if he won they would be his neighbours. In addition he needed soldiers, so he began negotiating with the Catalan Company, a Spanish mercenary group. Charles was hoping that due to the Catalan Company’s experience in Constantinople they would be helpful allies. Sadly for him he was unable to hire them. Charles was given a tenth from Sicily by Clement (a tenth is ten percent of church takings in the area awarded for a set amount of time). Despite having had a bit of time to plan Charles didn’t even leave France until mid-June 1307, after visiting the pope in Avignon first. He began making his way, rather slowly, to, well, that doesn’t really matter because he didn’t get there. On the 11th of October 1307 Catherine, Charles’ wife and reason for his claim to Constantinople, died at 32. She was survived by four children, her son John who would only live a year longer, and her daughter Catherine, Joan, and Isabelle (for those keeping track that means that Charles has two daughters named Isabell(a), and two names Joan). He didn’t seem too upset with his wife’s death, and probably would have  continued on his way, but Philip needed him. Catherine’s funeral, on the 12th of October, was well attended, she even had the grand master of the Knights Templar as one of her pallbearers, Jacques DeMolay. DeMolay’s presences in Paris was lucky for Philip, it made arresting him on the 13th of October rather easy for the French King. Charles gave up on his attempt to take Constantinople to stay in France and help his brother. In addition to Demolay Philip had the rest of the Knight’s Templars arrested. Since this isn’t Philip’s story, I’ll leave most of it for now, I do discuss this a bit more in the Capetian Miracle Ends, the first episode of miniseries two, so go listen there. You do need to know that Charles was supportive of his brother in most ways, but wasn’t active in prosecuting the Templars. It did slow down Charles’ attempts to go east. 

With this further delay in Charles’ attempts to claim a throne, any throne, I’ll be stopping for the week. I’ll be back next week to discussing the remainder of Charles’ life. 

Charles of Valois, Part Three:

Welcome back, last week Charles of Valois was delayed in his attempt to claim a throne, this week we start with a bit of a scandal. 

Now I get to our first poisoning accusation. In early August 1308 pope Clement ordered the archbishop of Sens and the bishops of Orleans and Auxerre to investigate Bishop Guichard of Troyes. Guichard was accused of murdering Queen Joan (Philip the Fair’s late wife and the queen of Navarre in her own right) and her mother, the dowager Queen of Navarre, Blanche, via sorcery as well trying to poison Charles of Valois and Louis, Philip the Fair’s oldest son. Guichard was tried throughout 1309 and eventually exiled. I do like that the first poisoning accusation I came to in my research of Charles is someone trying to poison him. Of note, a knight apparently drank to poison intended for Charles and Louis and died, so it might have been an actual attempt on his life. For more on this I do recommend Courting Sanctity, it can be found in full on Jstor and has a detailed rundown of this trial. 

In January of 1308 Philip needed Charles again, this time for a wedding! Charles of Valois and his younger brother, Louis of Evreax were in Boulogne to celebrate the wedding of Isabella of France to Edward II of England. Both he and Louis then travelled to England for her coronation in February. You may remember that they were unimpressed with their niece’s treatment, she was always going to be second best in Edward’s life and that was rather clear from the start. I’m sure this will end well for Edward, right? 

Not completely stymied in his attempts to conquer Constantinople Charles began negotiating with the king of Serbia. This bit was rather fun to figure out in my translation of Petit’s book. At the time Serbia had two kings, one ruling actively, and one hanging around still being king. They were brothers, so it’s not too odd. It appears that it was as actual ruling one, the younger one, Stefan Uros Il Milutin, who was negotiating with Charles. My translation had the name as Urosch, so I had to double check things. What also confused me is they agreed that Uros’ second daughter, Neda would marry Charles’ second son, Charles. This marriage never happened, and could have been planned to avoid giving Serbia a claim to Constantinople since the younger Charles had no claim to the crown. And Charles was about to be distracted from his hopes of Constantinople, by Germany. 

Albert of Austria, the king of the Germans, was assassinated on the 1st of May 1308. Albert had been a claimant for the position of Holy Roman Emperor. Now this bit is a little confusing. The last Holy Roman Emperor, Fredrick II had died in December 1250, which doing basic maths means it had been almost 58 years since there had been an Holy Roman emperor. Fredrick’s son, Conrad had attempted to become emperor, but due to issues with the pope at the time he was never elected (excommunication and death can do that). Another candidate didn’t live long enough to be elected. There were two Emperors elected in 1257, because no one had actually figured out rules for who got to vote. Neither is usually counted as an official Emperor. Once the Papacy and its bishops and the German princes had sorted themselves out it was time for an election. Albert likely would have been elected and crowned by the pope, but assassination put a stop to that. His oldest son had predeceased him and younger sons didn’t have to political or military pull to manage the election. So, what does this election have to do with Charles? Well, Charles was actually a candidate for the Holy Roman Emperor. Yeah, so he’s tried to be the king of Aragon, the Latin Emperor of Constantinople, and now he was in the running to be Holy Roman Emperor. In theory he had a great hand. Remember, he got along well with Pope Clement. In addition he had a few electors, in theory, the archbishop of Cologne would support whoever Philip the Fair named unless the Pope told him no, the archbishop of Mainz would do what the pope told him to do, and the archbishop of Trier was a vassal of Philip the Fair. That gave him the three ecclesiastical electors, in theory. Charles even went to visit Clement in Avignon to ask for help, he did take 6,000 men with him. It turns out Clement was not comfortable with the French having this level of influence, so he secretly reached out the ecclesiastical electors and told them to vote for someone who wasn’t Charles, while telling Charles he was doing all he could. Now, in Clement’s defence Charles probably would have lost Trier on his own, his original rival was Rudolf, the Count Palatine, but in the actual election his rival was Henry of Luxembourg, the archbishop of Trier. He, along with Clement convinced the archbishop of Cologne to support Henry. In the end every elector save the King of Bohemia supported Henry of Luxembourg who became Henry VII. Philip was none too pleased, he even asked Clement to not ratify the election. What’s interesting, at least to me, is that Charles didn’t take this loss poorly, he wasn’t upset with Clement and helped the pope get back on his brother’s good side. 

Around this time Charles married for the third time at 38. His new bride was 15 year old Mahaut of Chatillon. They would have four children, who all survive Charles, Marie, Isabella, Marguerite (who is also known as Blanche), and Louis. For those keeping track that means Charles has three daughters named Isabella, though the oldest will die in 1309, and two named Margaret, yes only one of his ten daughters, Marie, has a unique name. I promise there were other female names available, I do just assume that each was named after their godmother and that some shared a godmother. 

The papacy had been officially moved of Avignon by 1309. This put Clement out of the control of the Italian cardinals, but under the watchful eye of Philip the Fair. Now, Philip and Clement really didn’t get along well, Philip basically bullied Clement into suppressing the Templars and he wasn’t done yet. In 1309 Philip the Fair well, everything short of forced Clement to posthumously put Boniface VIII on trial for heresy. Yeah, Philip wanted the pope he had strong-armed to death to be declared a heretic. You can imagine what a scandal this was, I guess the good news is that they didn’t dig up Boniface’s body. The Spanish kings were outraged and let Clement know. Clement tried to convince Philip to drop things by granting Philip’s first minister, Nogaret, a pardon for the offence of kidnapping and beating Boniface. There were conditions attached, Nogaret had to do some penance, but at least he wasn’t excommunicated any longer. Instead, Charles worked on the pope’s behalf and by 1311 there was an agreement to end the trial, after some lovely play-acting where knights threw down and offered trial by combat to prove Boniface’s innocence. Clement did have to disband the Templars officially in May 1312, at Philip’s encouragement. The surviving Templars, those who hadn’t been forgiven, including Jacques de Molay were executed, in March 1314. I discussed this in The Capetian Miracle Ends, including de Molay’s curse. I should remind you that Pope Clement V died on the 20th of April 1314. After his death there would be a two year interregnum before John XXII was elected, this will be important soon. Charles benefited from the disbanding of the Templars, he received a not insignificant amount of funding from their treasury. Philip himself had his debts, at least to the Templars wiped, and got a pretty penny out of it. To emphasise, he was still in debt, France really struggled financially through this bit. Which probably would have been the biggest scandal of Charles and Philip’s life, but fate had a bit of a joke to play on them.

Around the same time as de Molly’s execution Philip the Fair became aware that his daughters-in-law may be having affairs. His daughter Isabella clued him in on one of her many visits to France. This is the Tour de Nesle affair. I should note that Charles of Valois was the god-father of both his nephew Charles, and Charle’s wife, Blanche of Burgundy, who was accused in this affair. Charles sat in the tribunal that found against Blanche and Louis’ wife Margaret. You may remember that Philip, the future Philip V’s wife Joan was found guilty of not telling people what her sister, Blanche, and Margaret were up to. Both Blanche and Margaret were kept imprisoned, Margaret until her death (possibly due to malnutrition and neglect or strangulation), and Blanche until Joan became queen consort. I’ll get there soon. 

For Charles this time would lead to a sad goodbye. At the end of November 1314 his older brother, Philip the Fair died at 46, Charles was 44 and I can imagine this made him face his own mortality a little. Philip appointed Charles one of his executors and gave him some funding for when he finally went on Crusades. Philip also told his sons, especially Louis his oldest, to take Charles’ advice. Louis did in fact do this and it may explain his soubriquet, the quarrelsome. Petit thinks that Charles was actually a good advisor, and I don’t disagree with him, let me explain.

Louis X as he was now known pushed for a more centralised state. Now, we’re not near the point of loyalty to the state versus just loyalty to the king, but he really was giving it a bit of a try. The regional leadership, the leagues, were not happy about this. Philip the Fair had been trying to do something similar to help shore up French finances. Charles helped Louis with this, and while it wasn’t a resounding success it makes sense from a long-term political perspective and most importantly explains Louis’ soubriquet, he was quarrelsome because he was doing things his magnates didn’t like. Louis needed a distraction for his leading men and Charles helped him with one. Enguerrand de Marigny had been Philip the Fair’s Chamberlain, one of the men who was literally physically closest to the king, he opened to door for those wishing to visit the king. de Marigny was also a minister for Philip. This had made him rich. And his power had lead him to offend a few powerful men, including Louis of Evreux and the Archbishop of Narbonne. And Philip the Fair hadn’t protected him. De Marigny was indicted on normal criminal charges, abusing his power and such. It looked like he was going to be exiled, due to having acting on the last king’s behalf, but Charles of Valois had something waiting in his pocket. Well or Margaret of Burgundy, Louis X’s wife, who was still imprisoned, sent him a letter. The encyclopaedia Brittanica says Charles did it, Petit says Margaret did it. The charges that were lain were that de Marigny helped his wife and sister with witchcraft against Louis and Charles. De Marigny was found guilty and hanged. Oddly, his wife and sister were released. I’m sure the hanging scared everyone who had been beginning to rise against Louis X. Charles benefited financially from de Marigny’s death, shockingly he was de Marigny’s son, Louis, god father. Over time Charles actually worked to rehabilitate the family’s name and properties. His son, Philip, the future Philip VI, continued this rehabilitation and Louis XI, Charles’ great-great-great grandson did as well. 

Charles had freed his own serfs in 1311 and he encouraged his nephew to do the same thing, which Louis started doing in 1315. Now Louis X is often given credit for freeing the serfs of France and he did, but he made them pay for it. He did this to raise funds, which is something that the crown desperately needed. I don’t want you to think that either of these men were humanist, serfs who couldn’t pay weren’t free and only serfs on royal domains were included, serfdom wasn’t completely abolished until 1789. One other thing I should quickly note is that Louis X reversed his father’s policy on Jews, he started allowing the return of some Jews to France. 

War with Flanders flared up in mid-1315, the Oriflame, the flag advertising that no quarter would be given, was taken by Louis X from Saint-Denis on the 24th of June. The French troops were ready to move and began marching in September only to be stopped by the weather. Extreme rain that year flooded roads and took out bridges. The land the troops tried to march through was bogged down and horses were getting stuck. The French were forced to retreat and Louis X wouldn’t get a chance to try again the next year. In June 1316 he died at 26. You should all remember that he left a pregnant wife and a four year old daughter, whom he claimed, from his scandalous first marriage. Charles of Valois had hoped he would be appointed regent, but Louis’ younger brother, Philip angled into the role. He was even asked to resign the regency to Charles by various magnates. Philip used his regency to manoeuvre his way into control, he was preparing for his sister-in-law to have a daughter. Something I didn’t know when I did Joan II of Navarre’s episode, her uncle agreed to support Philip at least as early as September of 1316, which is when Odo IV of Burgundy, Joan’s uncle, who was 21, married Philip’s daughter, Joan, who was 10. Yes, they had made a secret agreement well before the birth of the shortest serving French king to this point, John I. As you hopefully remember John I only lasted five days as king. Both Philip and his mother-in-law, Mauhut, were accused of poisoning by rumours at various courts. Charles of Valois’ god-son, Charles, the youngest son of Philip the Fair, actually accused, rightly, his brother of plotting to take the throne. Philip of course became Philip V with the support of very little of the nobility, at least at first. Only seven peers attended his coronation including Charles of Valois and Mauhut. Oddly Louis of Evreaux was there, but he wasn’t actually Louis of Evreaux yet, yes, Philip V would elevate him. Sadly for Charles and Philip, as well as Louis, Louis of Everaux died in mid-May 1319,  he was 43. His wife had died eight years before him, but he was survived by four children, including Philip who, in 1318, had married Joan II of Navarre, who was just Joan of France at this moment in time (her uncle, Philip V was king of Navarre at the moment). Patrons will remember Philip and Joan’s son, Charles the Bad. Charles of Valois became the guardian of both of Louis sons, the afore mentioned Philip and Charles. 

Charles of Valois was only peripherally involved with Philip’s rule. He did help to reconcile Philip and the younger Charles in spring of 1317. John XXII, the pope, congratulated Charles of Valois for reuniting the family in early June. And peace, for the moment, with Flanders was finally reached in January 1320. Charles, along with the other leading men of France needed to swear to not follow Philip V if he were to attack Flanders. Philip V’s daughter, Margaret, became a hostage married to her jailer as part of the peace when she married Louis of Flanders. She was approximately ten, thankfully her only son, also Louis, wouldn’t be born for another ten years. In good news for France this meant the count of Flanders wasn’t against them, not that this would stop almost everyone else in Flanders from being anti-French, but this isn’t Flanders’ story. 

Charles was again offered funds to travel to the Holy Land, this time by Philip V. Everyone seemed to want Charles of Valois to go on crusade, but at the same time everyone really needed him in France, Avignon, or Italy. In his defence he had been born on a Crusade, so I’m sure that counts for something. It looks like he was needed in France again in 1320 and into 1321. A Shepherd’s Crusade had started in Normandy, basically the poor of Normandy wanted to ‘convince’ Philip V to go on Crusade. This group ended up being rather anti-Semitic as they made their way through France and this is where Charles comes in. Pope John XXII condemned the shepherds and Charles, along with Philip V drove this group out of France into Spain, where I assume they were totally helpful for the Spanish, yup, totally helpful. 

Outside of the Shepherd’s Crusade Charles wasn’t deeply involved with the end of Philip’s reign. The last months of his rule saw a leprosy scare. Philip died on the 3rd of January 1322. Since he had disinherited all women in his family and didn’t have any sons he was succeeded by his brother, Charles la Marche as Charles IV. What I find interesting is that Philip V did have a son when he usurped the throne, his youngest child, Philip. Sadly the younger Philip would die about a month after his father was crowned. I will emphasise that this younger Philip’s parentage wasn’t questioned, Philip V had gotten his wife out of her imprisonment right away upon becoming king.

Charles IV also had a son at the time of his ascension, Philip, this Philip though probably wouldn’t have been king due to his parentage. His mother was Blanche of Burgundy, who as you’ll remember had been found guilty of adultery. The timing of the birth of their two children, Philip and Joan was questionable. Joan had died the year before her father became king, and the younger Philip would die two months after. Charles IV needed an annulment though, since his wife was still imprisoned (and may have had an illegitimate child while there). Okay, before I get the Charles IV’s annulment I’ll share the gossip about his imprisoned wife, Blanche, since it has a bit to do with Charles of Valois. So, I have only found this in Petit’s book and he references the Unpublished Historical Documents from the 14th Century, compiled by M. Boudet. In the show notes I’ve copied the name in French if you want to look this up. So, Petit claims that Thomas de la Marche, a French knight born between 1315 and 1318, was the son of Blanche, and possibly the son of Philip of Valois, Charles of Valois’ oldest son. Now, the online sources I could find, which are all open source or blogs name Charles IV or Philip of Valois as Thomas’ potential fathers and don’t name a mother. As I mentioned earlier, before becoming king Charles IV was known as Charles de la Marche. So, it could be his, or Philip’s, or Blanche’s. I thought you would enjoy a little bit of historical gossip. 

Okay, back to Charles of Valois’ story. Unlike his brother Charles IV didn’t starve his wife to death or have her strangled, instead he was able to secure an annulment. He had two grounds, that didn’t include adultery. Charles of Valois took control of the annulment proceedings and communicated with the pope on his nephew’s behalf. He testified to the pope that his nephew, who was his godson, and Blanche, who was his goddaughter were both too young at the time of their marriage, 12 for girls and 14 for boys. In addition the mother of Blanche, Mahaut, was the godmother of Charles IV, which brings the problem of consanguinity, remember, there were some interesting rules when it came to godparents. John XXII granted the annulment on the 19th of May 1322, and Blanche was moved to a convent for the remainder of her life. Her date of death isn’t recorded but she likely predeceased her former husband. 

With his nephew’s marriage annulled and a new queen found Charles of Valois was looking to go on Crusades, it really was something he kept trying to go on. While he was still in France though he sat on his nephew’s council meetings and was active in his reign. Charles IV decided that he wanted in on this Crusade and plans were made to try to reunite the Latin and Greek churches and lead a combined group to the Holy Land. John XXII even agreed to the plans and congratulated Charles of Valois for his zeal. He was even given a tenth from both France and Navarre is preparations for this Crusade. Due to his strong influence over his nephew he was basically the key to the king’s door throughout Charles IV’s early reign. Their plans for Crusade were stopped by an old problem, England. 

Many of you know what’s coming next, mainly because I covered a lot of this in Isabella of France’s episodes. Edward II of England had refused to leave England to swear homage to Charles IV. He had sworn to Louis X, but since then things in England had become, well, messy. Charles of Valois’ military skill was needed because a lack of homage means the property attached to said homage is forfeit. Charles and his son-in-law, Robert of Artois were sent to Gascony to retake the territory. Edward II’s half brother, Edmund of Woodstock, was leading the English forces in Gascony. Charles and Robert first attacked at La Reole. This attack was driven back effectively, and the Marshall of France died (I’m starting to feel like this is an unsafe job). Instead Charles and Robert blockaded the city. Getting hungry makes men give up a little when stuck in a castle, so Edmund of Woodstock did surrender and signed a truce on the 22nd of September 1324. He was allowed to retreat to Bordeaux. Edward II folded on the 28th of December. As part of their treaty negotiations Louis of Valois, Charles’ third surviving son and youngest child was betrothed to Joan of the Tower, Edward II of England and Isabella of France’s youngest child. This wedding never happened, Joan eventually married David II of Scotland as a hostage married to her jailer and Louis died in November of 1328 at about ten years old. 

And this is where Charles’ story ends. He saw his niece for a time during her visit to France to negotiate peace between the two countries. It’s unlikely he saw his great nephew, Edward, the future Edward III of England when he came to pay homage. Edward arrived in September of 1325 and Charles of Valois had been either partially paralysed by illness or bedridden with gout by August of 1325. He was rather unwell at the end of his life. He had written his will that he be buried between his first two wive and had been given papal permission to have his heart buried with his third wife. I guess she couldn’t cuddle with the three of them in death. He died on the 16th of December 1325 at the age of 55. His funeral was attended by the king, Charles’ sons, and his daughter Isabella, the Countess of Hainaut. As you should know since you’re listening to Passed Charles never ruled France, his son Philip though would become Philip VI on the 1st of February 1328 when Charles IV died at 33 or 34. This actually made Charles IV the longest living of Philip the Fair’s sons. It actually means that Charles of Valois only needed to live two years, one month, and 16 days to be king of France. Remember, our first subject, Charles of Orleans, needed to live 33 more years (at which point he would have been 103), our second, Charles of angouleme needed to live 19 more years when he would have been in his late fifties, Antoine of Bourbon needed to live 27 more years, at which point he would have been 71. Charles of Valois really was the only one of the fathers in this series that really could have been king and he seemed to want it more than anyone else, well, or to be king of anything. 

Before I get to my final thoughts I want to discuss Les Rois maudits (roi mo-di), the Accursed Kings is probably one of the most influential fictional account of France and the French court during the period that Charles of Valois lived in. It is a six part novel published between 1955 and 1977. Now, I haven’t read this series, yet, but it apparently does not present Charles of Valois in a flattering light. As I think you can see from his episodes, he was a nuanced man, like us all he did though cause the downfall of at least one of his brother’s leading men and go along with the disinheriting of his great-niece. At the same time he was a successful military leader and a trusted advisor to his nephews.

Conclusion:

So, would Charles of Valois have been a better king than the king who ruled in his stead? Well, it depends on which rule we’re looking at. Let us assume that Philip IV never had any children, then I think Charles of Valois would have been a great choice for king, he lived eleven years after his brother’s death and would have been a stabilising influence compared to three kings in what turned out to be 13 years. But let’s say history is what it was and Philip the Fair’s three sons lived. I think Charles of Valois probably would have been a better king than Louis X, politically they were well aligned, but I think Charles being an older man who had shown military strength and skill would have stopped the internal dissent that Louis X dealt with. I think Philip V was a usually good king and Charles probably couldn’t have done better than him. With Charles IV I think it wouldn’t have made much of a difference either way, both the Charleses seemed to work together well. Now finally, as compared to his son Philip VI. I think Charles’ reign wouldn’t have much different for France in general. I think Edward III of England still would have tried to claim the French throne. There is a chance that Charles of Valois military experience may have convinced Edward to wait a little while longer, but I think Edward III really wanted to be the king of two kingdoms. 

I’m really glad I’ve done these episodes about Charles. I didn’t expect to find him this interesting. I thought he’d just feel like a schemer, but he seems like a nuanced human. I don’t agree with the assessment on his Wikipedia that he agreed with his nephew Philip V to usurp Joan II of Navarra to make his path to the throne easier (yes, I always read through each subject Wikipedia while I’m researching because it’s good to see what others are saying about these subjects). I think he knew the political situation of France and realised that a four year old girl, who was an orphan, could not handle the situation. And I don’t think he’s wrong, I think a four year old without a surviving parent would have been in a bad position regardless of their sex, Louis X had left things a little messy having struggled with his magnates and then, right before he died, failing at an invasion of Flanders. I think it’s important to note that each country gets to decide how they choose their leadership and France choosing to exclude women is something we should question today, but made sense at the time. 

With that I will be back in two weeks to start discussing the sons of Suleiman the Magnificent. Patrons you will have a special episode about Catherine de’Medic coming up on Wednesday and a special episode about William Adelin the following Wednesday. I also apparently forgot to release a This Too Should Passed on Wardships, so I’ll be releasing that tomorrow. I will see you all then.