Biography

Philip was born 23 May 1052 at Champagne-et-Fontaine, the son of Henry I and his wife Anne of Kiev.[3] Unusually for the time in Western Europe, his name was of Greek origin, being bestowed upon him by his mother. Although he was crowned king at the age of seven,[4] until age fourteen (1066) his mother acted as regent, the first queen of France ever to do so. Baldwin V of Flanders also acted as co-regent.

Following the death of Baldwin VI of Flanders, Robert the Frisian seized Flanders. Baldwin’s wife, Richilda requested aid from Philip, who was defeated by Robert at the battle of Cassel in 1071.[2]

Philip first married Bertha in 1072.  Although the marriage produced the necessary heir, Philip fell in love with Bertrade de Montfort, the wife of Fulk IV, Count of Anjou. He repudiated Bertha (claiming she was too fat) and married Bertrade on 15 May 1092.[6] In 1094, he was excommunicated by Hugh of Die, for the first time;[6] after a long silence, Pope Urban II repeated the excommunication at the Council of Clermont in November 1095.[7] Several times the ban was lifted as Philip promised to part with Bertrade, but he always returned to her, but in 1104 Philip made a public penance and must have kept his involvement with Bertrade discreet.[8] In France, the king was opposed by Bishop Ivo of Chartres, a famous jurist.

Philip appointed Alberic first Constable of France in 1060. A great part of his reign, like his father’s, was spent putting down revolts by his power-hungry vassals. In 1077, he made peace with William the Conqueror, who gave up attempting the conquest of Brittany.[10] In 1082, Philip I expanded his demesne with the annexation of the Vexin. Then in 1100, he took control of Bourges.

It was at the aforementioned Council of Clermont that the First Crusade was launched. Philip at first did not personally support it because of his conflict with Urban II. Philip’s brother Hugh of Vermandois, however, was a major participant.

Philip died in the castle of Melun and was buried per his request at the monastery of Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire[12] – and not in St Denis among his forefathers. He was succeeded by his son, Louis VI, whose succession was, however, not uncontested. According to Abbot Suger:

… King Philip daily grew feebler. For after he had abducted the Countess of Anjou, he could achieve nothing worthy of the royal dignity; consumed by desire for the lady he had seized, he gave himself up entirely to the satisfaction of his passion. So he lost interest in the affairs of state and, relaxing too much, took no care for his body, well-made and handsome though it was. The only thing that maintained the strength of the state was the fear and love felt for his son and successor. When he was almost sixty, he ceased to be king, breathing his last breath at the castle of Melun-sur-Seine, in the presence of the [future king] Louis… They carried the body in a great procession to the noble monastery of St-Benoît-sur-Loire, where King Philip wished to be buried; there are those who say they heard from his own mouth that he deliberately chose not to be buried among his royal ancestors in the church of St. Denis because he had not treated that church as well as they had, and because among those of so many noble kings, his own tomb would not have counted for much.

Issue

Philip‘s children with Bertha were:

Constance (1078 – 14 September 1126), married Hugh I of Champagne before 1097[13] and then, after her divorce, to Bohemund I of Antioch in 1106.[14] Louis VI of France (1 December 1081 – 1 August 1137).
Henry (1083 – died young).
Philip‘s children with Bertrade were:
Philip, Count of Mantes (1093 – fl. 1123),[15] married Elizabeth, daughter of Guy III of Montlhéry[16] Fleury, Seigneur of Nangis (1095 – July 1119)[17] Cecile (1097 – 1145), married Tancred, Prince of Galilee[18] and then, after his death, to Pons of Tripoli.[19]

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Geoffrey II Martel, son of Fulk III, pursued the policy of expansion begun by his father but left no sons as heirs. The countship went to his eldest nephew, Geoffrey III the Bearded. But the latter’s brother, Fulk, discontented over having inherited only a few small appanages, took advantage of the general discontent aroused by Geoffrey III’s inept rule, seized Saumur and Angers (1067), and cast Geoffrey first into prison at Sablé and later in the confines of Chinon castle (1068). Fulk’s reign then had to endure a series of conflicts against the several barons, Philip I of France, and the duke of Normandy. He lost some lands and was ridiculed when his wife, Bertrada of Montfort, took refuge with King Philip, but he secured, through battle and marriage, the countship of Maine for his son, Fulk V. An educated man, Fulk authored a unique chronicle of his family, derived largely from oral tradition and preserved only in fragments.

Family

Fulk may have married as many as five times; there is some doubt regarding the exact number or how many he repudiated.[13] His first wife was Hildegarde of Beaugency. Together they had a daughter:

Ermengarde, who married to Alan IV, Duke of Brittany.
After her death, before or by 1070, he married Ermengarde de Bourbon. Together they had a son before Fulk repudiated her in 1075, possibly on grounds of consanguinity:

Geoffrey IV Martel, ruled jointly with him for some time, but died in 1106.

Around 1076 he married Orengarde de Châtellailon.[2] He repudiated her in 1080, possibly on grounds of consanguinity.
He then married an unnamed daughter of Walter I of Brienne by 1080. This marriage also ended in divorce, in 1087.
Lastly, in 1089, he married Bertrade de Montfort, who was apparently “abducted” by King Philip I of France in or around 1092. They had a son:
Fulk V “le Jeune”, Count of Anjou and King of Jerusalem.

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Malcolm’s kingdom did not extend over the full territory of modern Scotland: the north and west of Scotland remained under Scandinavian rule following the Norse invasions. Malcolm III fought a series of wars against the Kingdom of England, which may have had as its objective the conquest of the English earldom of Northumbria. These wars did not result in any significant advances southward. Malcolm’s primary achievement was to continue a lineage that ruled Scotland for many years,[3] although his role as founder of a dynasty has more to do with the propaganda of his youngest son David I and his descendants than with history.

Malcolm’s second wife, St. Margaret of Scotland, is Scotland’s only royal saint. Malcolm himself had no reputation for piety; with the notable exception of Dunfermline Abbey in Fife he is not definitely associated with major religious establishments or ecclesiastical reforms.

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William was the son of the unmarried Robert I, Duke of Normandy, by Robert’s mistress Herleva. His illegitimate status and his youth caused some difficulties for him after he succeeded his father, as did the anarchy that plagued the first years of his rule. During his childhood and adolescence, members of the Norman aristocracy battled each other, both for control of the child duke and for their own ends. In 1047 William was able to quash a rebellion and begin to establish his authority over the duchy, a process that was not complete until about 1060. His marriage in the 1050s to Matilda of Flanders provided him with a powerful ally in the neighbouring county of Flanders. By the time of his marriage, William was able to arrange the appointment of his supporters as bishops and abbots in the Norman church. His consolidation of power allowed him to expand his horizons, and by 1062 William secured control of the neighbouring county of Maine.

In the 1050s and early 1060s William became a contender for the throne of England, then held by the childless Edward the Confessor, his first cousin once removed. There were other potential claimants, including the powerful English earl Harold Godwinson, who was named the next king by Edward on the latter’s deathbed in January 1066. William argued that Edward had previously promised the throne to him and that Harold had sworn to support William’s claim. William built a large fleet and invaded England in September 1066, decisively defeating and killing Harold at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066. After further military efforts William was crowned king on Christmas Day 1066, in London. He made arrangements for the governance of England in early 1067 before returning to Normandy. Several unsuccessful rebellions followed, but by 1075 William’s hold on England was mostly secure, allowing him to spend the majority of the rest of his reign on the continent.

William’s final years were marked by difficulties in his continental domains, troubles with his eldest son, and threatened invasions of England by the Danes. In 1086 William ordered the compilation of the Domesday Book, a survey listing all the landholdings in England along with their pre-Conquest and current holders. William died in September 1087 while leading a campaign in northern France, and was buried in Caen. His reign in England was marked by the construction of castles, the settling of a new Norman nobility on the land, and change in the composition of the English clergy. He did not try to integrate his various domains into one empire but instead continued to administer each part separately. William’s lands were divided after his death: Normandy went to his eldest son, Robert Curthose, and his second surviving son, William Rufus, received England.

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