Europe's inner demons

In the main Philip’s policy faithfully continued that of his whole dynasty; but, precisely because he was a genuine fanatic who felt himself to be under God’s special protection, he could at times embark on projects of quite unrealistic scope. The situation that arose after the final collapse of the Christian venture in the Holy Land lured him on. From 1292 onwards the Catalan mystic Ramon Lull, who had long interested himself in the possibility of converting Islam to Christianity, propagated proposals for combined missionary and military action. Missionaries equipped with a sound knowledge of Arabic were to be supported by a new crusading army; the core of this army was to consist of the Temple and the Hospital, amalgamated, and the whole was to be commanded by a particular king, who would take the title of Bellator Rex and would in the end become king of Jerusalem. At first, it seems, Lull was thinking of inducing James II of Aragon to undertake a crusade against Moslem Granada; but he expounded his ideas in Paris, and found ready listeners at the French court.

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Philip the Fair fancied himself for the role of Bellator Rex

; and his interpretation of that role was grandiose. He outlined it in a programme of 80 points; and although only fragments survive, they are startling enough.⁽³⁾ They show that he thought of abdicating the French throne in favour of his eldest son, to become instead grand master of the combined military orders. The orders were to be renamed Knights of Jerusalem, and the grand master was to take the title of King of Jerusalem. After Philip’s death the eldest son of the king of France was always to be grand master. All prelates, including archbishops and bishops, were to surrender their incomes, above a small salary, to the grand master, for the conquest of the Holy Land; and the monastic orders were to do likewise with their revenues. Moreover the grand master, or

Bellator Rex, was to have a powerful say in papal elections. These aims were of course utterly unrealistic — yet we are told that they represented only a small part of Philip’s total ambitions. The lawyer and publicist Pierre Dubois, in his book De Recuperatione Terre Sancte

, gives some indication of what the king may really have had in mind.⁽⁴⁾ The king of France was to become Roman emperor and reconquer the Holy Land; thereafter, from Jerusalem, he was to rule over a vast federation of nations, and so establish the reign of universal peace.

Meanwhile Philip had to cope with the very real and urgent financial problems which he had inherited. On his succession he had found his realm almost bankrupt, and costly wars further weakened its finances. Philip resorted to a whole series of expedients. In 1294 and 1296 he imposed tithes on the Church in France, and in 1296 he also forbade the export of gold, including the customary contributions to the Holy See — moves that led to the first of his many conflicts with the papacy. He took gold and silver vessels from his richer subjects, against a fraction of their value, and had them melted down and recast as coins. He imposed levies on trade and property, such as had never been known before, and above all he repeatedly debased the currency. All this brought him into conflict with his own subjects. After a particularly heavy devaluation, in June 1306, the king had to flee from the enraged populace of the capital and take refuge (ironically enough) in the Paris Temple, for three whole days.

The following month Philip turned on the Jews: on one and the same day, 22 July 1306, Jews throughout France were arrested and imprisoned. The Jews’ money was seized by the royal exchequer, their goods auctioned for the benefit of the exchequer, their businesses transferred to the Italian banks which were deep in Philip’s confidence; while the Jews themselves (those who survived) were expelled from the kingdom. The royal publicists presented this last expedient as a great victory for Christ. They were to say the same, a couple of years later, of the destruction of the Temple.