68_ Hugh Capet [Audio only]

Episode 68 Hugh Capet On the 3rd of July, 1987, Hugh Capet, known in English as Hugh Capet, was elected King of the Franks at Noyons. The Carolingian House had failed in the West. The only remaining Carolingian was Charles, Duke of Lower Lorraine, who committed treason by betraying the Franks in favor of the Germans in a bid to usurp the crown from King Lothair. Charles was universally hated, while Hugh was well-loved for his defense of West Francia against the Germans and Normans. Moreover, Hugh was the head of the House of Robert le Fort, making him the most powerful man in the kingdom. His brother Otto Henry I was Duke of Burgundy and added his considerable might to Hugh's bid for the throne. The Counts of Blois and Anjou were vassals of the Robertians, while the Normans were by that time his allies. Finally, Baldwin IV of Flanders supported Hugh in exchange for receiving the title of Count. Of the roughly fifteen great noble lords, all supported Hugh's election to the throne, save for Charles, who ruled Lower Lorraine, and the Count of Vermandois, whose family were the perpetual rivals of the Robertians. Aside from his many noble allies, the Catholic Church also supported Hugh. The Robertians were great patrons of the Church and had a reputation for godly behavior. Their name, Capet, probably refers to their regular practice of wearing a monastic hood called a kappa. Hugh regularly prayed for the poor, favored holy men, went on pilgrimages, and participated in holy rites, such as carrying reliquaries. During his coronation, he borrowed a ceremony for biblical Hebrew kings and prophets and began the practice of French kings being anointed with oil by the Archbishop at Reims. What separated Hugh from Pepin the Short, the first Carolingian to usurp the throne, is that Hugh was directly related to two kings. His grandfather was Robert I, while his great uncle was Odo I. On his mother's side, he was related to the Ottonians, who were then the emperors of the Germans. This pedigree helped to legitimize Hugh, though for the rest of his life he carried the stink of usurpation. At this point, there really was no good time to come to the throne of France, and yes we're going to call it France from now on. By 987, France was divided into fifteen great realms. The crown lands were a pathetic series of small blots on a large map, though what little land belonged to the king included heavily populated areas such as the territory that stretched from Paris to Orléans. Regional lords were remarkably powerful and posed a challenge if not an outright threat to the king. Yet, if there was any time to take the throne, this was probably the best. First, France's greatest threat, the Holy Roman Empire, was in the midst of civil strife. Between 983 to 996, there was no Holy Roman Emperor, as Odo III was a child and various factions fought for power. Second, the major outside invasions had largely ended. After centuries of raiding, the Vikings were no longer raiders but conquerors who established themselves in Bretagne and Normandy. The Magyars were settling in Hungary, while the Iberian Muslims contended with Christians in the north and rival Muslims in North Africa. Hugh Capet was a farsighted king. In some respects. We'll get to that later. Hugh could not read or write in Latin, but he made sure that his son received a top-tier education by entrusting him to the cathedral school at Reims in 983 where he was under Gerbert of Aurillac's tutelage. He knew that his reign would always be contested, but he did everything to ensure his son would not face the same challenges he did. On Christmas Day 987, Hugh had his son Robert II crowned co-king so that, when he died, Robert would already be the rightful king of France. Hugh even had the papacy accept Robert's kingship, claiming that if Muslims attacked the kingdom, he would have to leave his realm to defend Christendom while Robert maintained peace within the kingdom. Spoiler alert, Hugh never actually fought against Muslims, but he was able to use anti-Muslim fears to get the pope on his side. The final way in which Hugh cemented his son's accession was through marriage alliances. As any good medieval king knows, marriage is an important political tool to shore up one's reign and not something silly like a bond of love between two people. In 988, Hugh immediately aimed as high as he could and had Attleboro, Archbishop of Reims, write letters to Basil II and Constantine VIII, the joint emperors of Byzantium, asking for a bride for his son. The Byzantines had previously sealed marriage alliances with the Ottonians, but with the Holy Roman Empire in chaos and its ruler five years old, the French monarch became Europe's hottest bachelor. In the letter, Hugh proposed a marriage alliance uniting France and Byzantium against German incursions into Italy, something which probably appealed to the Byzantines, who had to contend with both Islamic naval raiders in the south, invading Germans in the north, and rebellious Italian lords, well, everywhere. Historians are unsure how informed Hugh was about the Byzantine family, and whether he was asking for a specific bride or would settle for any old Greek princess. If he did know about Byzantine royal women, then he was probably asking for Anna, daughter of Romanus II and Theophano, who was about the same age as Robert. However, that year, Anna would not go west but north, and she married Vladimir I, the Grand Prince of Kiev. Together, they Christianized the pagan people of Kievan Rus', a political entity which eventually became Russia. While Hugh's advisors drafted the letter, they never actually sent it, and instead, Hugh married his son to Rotzala, Countess of Flanders and daughter of Berengar II of Italy. Charles of Lower Lorraine was that special kind of privileged person who believed it was his right to lead a country, even if everyone loathed him. In 988, he assembled an army and stealthily marched on Laos. His allies in the fortified city opened the gates, and his men stormed inside where they captured the bishop, Ascalon. In response, Hugh first turned to the church to put down his rival. He held a synod which excommunicated Charles. Hugh then marched on the city, but the fortifications held, and Charles repulsed the king. Shortly thereafter, Bishop Ascalon escaped by descending from a tower via rope, at which point he joined Hugh. Hugh returned the following year and led another siege, but was repulsed a second time. Meanwhile, Hugh faced a crisis of a different sort when Archbishop Attleboro died in 989. Hugh sped to Reims to select Attleboro's successor. Gerbert of Aralacque waited for Hugh with full expectations that the king would make him the new archbishop, given his former support during Hugh's election to kingship, his reputation as one of France's greatest scholars, and the fact that he taught Robert. Gerbert was quickly disappointed, as Hugh decided to sideline him in favor of Arnolf, the illegitimate son of the former king Lothair. Hugh hoped that by getting a Carolingian on his side, albeit an illegitimate one, he could put an end to Charles' rebellion. Arnolf swore on the Eucharist that he would remain loyal to Hugh, then proved it by immediately betraying him and handing over the city to Charles. Whoops. To make matters worse, Gerbert also joined Charles as an act of vengeance, because at this point it looked like Hugh's reign might end very quickly. Ascalon joined the party, appealing to Charles and Arnolf, who restored him as bishop of Laon. Following the treacherous bishops were the treacherous lords. Conrad of Burgundy, Herbert of Troyes, and Odo of Blois sided with Charles, the last of which seized Melon, thanks to the treachery of Viscount Gautier. In one move, Hugh had delivered much of France to his enemy. But Hugh wasn't without allies. His brother, Otto Henry of Burgundy, remained loyal, as did Fulcnera of Anjou, who sided with Hugh against his rival in Blois. Hugh also gained the support of Richard of Normandy, Guillaume IV of Aquitaine, and Baldwin of Flanders, who joined him in retaking Melon. When the king captured Melon, he had Gautier and his wife hanged by their feet until death. Charles had benefited greatly from perfidy amongst his enemies, but treachery goes both ways. On the 29th of March, 991, on Palm Sunday, Charles and Archbishop Arnolf visited Laon. There, Bishop Ascalon's men captured the two and turned them over to Hugh. Charles was sent to Orleans, where he died shortly thereafter. Meanwhile, Hugh led a church council of the bishops of France who deposed Arnolf in favor of Gerbert. This caused a row with the papacy, which declared that only his holiness had the right to depose bishops, something which Hugh and the French clergy finally acquiesced to in 997. Arnolf was again the Archbishop of France, though with no living legitimate Carolingian left, he abandoned his scheming ways. As for Gerbert of Aralac, he went on to become Pope Sylvester II in 999, just two years after being deposed, which is one of the most incredible medieval examples of failing upward. With his only rival for the throne dead, Hugh was secure in his power, so secure that his son felt he could finally separate from his wife. While Robert had gone along with the wedding to Rotzalla on his father's orders, he was unhappy with the arrangement. He was a mere 16 years old when he married, while she was in her 30s or 40s, leading him to dub her the old Italian widow. With the kingdom at relative peace, Robert dismissed her, though he kept her dowry. This outraged the Count of Flanders, but without a major anti-Hugh coalition to join, he could not openly challenge the king. For the next five years, Hugh fought an on-and-off war with Odo, Count of Blois, until the rebellious noble died of a heart attack in 996. Divine favor appeared to be on Hugh's side, as in the years between 994 to 996, the leaders of Aquitaine, Maine, Burgundy, and Normandy all died, leaving their titles to young sons, none of which challenged Hugh. By 996, Odo III became the Holy Roman Emperor and could have caused trouble for France, but Hugh gave him Verdun, pacifying the German whose attention turned to Burgundy and Italy. In 996, Hugh went on a pilgrimage to the tomb of Samael when he fell ill. Pustules began breaking out all across his body, as he was probably afflicted by smallpox. As the king suffered, his son decided to give him one last grievance and announced his intention to marry Odo of Blois' widow, Bertha of Burgundy. Hugh opposed the marriage with what little strength was left to him because the House of Blois was their enemy and because Bertha was Robert's third cousin, meaning the marriage would be considered incest by the church. Despite his condemnations, Robert married her. On the 24th of October, 996, Hugh died at Melon, around the age of 55, having ruled just over nine years. His body was buried at Saint-Denis, as would many of his successors. Hugh's reign has generally been regarded as a great moment in the history of France, while he is often seen as a weak and ineffectual king. Since Hugh made no claims to the entire Carolingian Empire and only sought to rule over the Franks, West Francia became France. Moreover, Hugh became the first of the Capetian dynasty, whose descendants ruled until the Revolution, then again briefly during the Restoration. It's no coincidence that when the revolutionary government stripped Louis XVI of his titles, they renamed him Louis Capet. Yet, while the name Capet carried on for 800 years, there was no Hugh II. No future French monarch styled themselves after the founder of their dynasty. This is because Hugh's role was short and inglorious. Unlike the great Merovingians and nearly all the Carolingians who cowed their nobility and ruled over the entirety of their countries, Hugh only directly ruled the northlands he inherited from his father and the small crown lands remaining. He took up the kingship at a time when kings possessed hardly any more political power than the great counts and dukes of France. He was not a powerful ruler, nor was he a great theologian or lawgiver. He led no great church councils or passed any new set of laws. He really couldn't since he was poorly educated and could not even read Latin. Hugh's greatest accomplishment was seizing power, holding on to it, and securing the succession of his son. In retrospect, those are pretty major accomplishments. Before his reign, the realm had descended into a 99-year conflict during which three separate houses each seized the crown. Hugh was wise enough to navigate three tumultuous decades under King Lothair, remaining mostly loyal throughout that period. He was wise enough not to take the throne in 986 and instead deferred to Louis V. When Louis V died in 987, Hugh had a reputation for faithfulness, intelligence, and honor, all things which Charlotte did not. Upon ascending to the kingship, he used his political savvy to divide his enemies, form valuable alliances, and satiate his rivals, namely the Holy Roman Emperor. He acted like a rightful monarch from day one, established ties with Byzantium, the papacy, and other major powers, and made allies with the church. He did make mistakes, most notably uplifting Arnulf to the position of archbishop, but his flaws were understandable and not enough to sink his reign. In just nine years, Hugh laid the foundation for a dynasty that lasted eight centuries.