Philip Augustus: ‘King of Lesser-land’

The son of pious Louis VII, Philip inherited the Capetian kingdom in 1180 while his father’s health deteriorated. The kingdom was little more than the Ile de Paris and with its young 14-year-old king seemingly weak.

Many chroniclers sneered at Philip’s lack of experience and power, Betran de Born labelled him ‘the little king of Lesser-land’. But this king had a grand vision: to restore the power of the French monarchy to that of Charlmagne’s day, although to do this he would need to crush the mighty power of the Angevin Empire, which dominated most of France.

Philip, like his father he was considered deeply religious – he wore simple clothes at court and even introduced rules against foul language in his presence. After a brush with death from illness in 1179, Philip was obsessively concerned with his health and, as an extension of this, somewhat paranoid over self-perceived threats to his life.

The king of France also had a mean streak and was noted for his avarice: his expulsion of the Jews from royal lands in 1182 and the confiscation of their wealth being an early example of this.

Returning to France after the Crusade it was noted that Philip’s health was not once what it was – campaigning seems to have aged him somewhat early, although it had far from dimmed his burning ambition. The Tours chronicle describes him at this time as ‘a fine man, well-proportioned in stature, with a smiling countenance, bald, a ruddy complexion, inclined to eat and drink well, and sensual.’

In diplomacy he was great practitioner of realpolitik and was a master of assessing the situation before making his move.