LOUIS VII. (c. II2I–I18o), king of France, son of Louis VI. the Fat, was associated with his father and anointed by Innocent II. in 1131. In 1137 he succeeded his father, and in the same year married at Bordeaux Eleanor, heiress of William II., duke of Aquitaine. In the first part of his reign he was vigorous and jealous of his prerogatives, but after his crusade his religiosity developed to such an extent as to make him utterly inefficient. His accession was marked by no serious disturbances, save the risings of the burgesses of Orleans and of Poitiers, but he came into violent conflict with Pope Innocent II. The archbishopric of Bourges became vacant, and the king supported as candidate the chancellor Cadurc, against the pope's nominee Pierre de la Chatre, swearing upon relics that so long as he lived Pierre should never enter Bourges. This brought the interdict upon the king's lands. He became involved in a war with Theobald, count of Champagne, which lasted two years (1142-44). The royal army occupied Champagne, and captured Vitry, where many persons perished in the burning of the church. Geoffrey the Handsome, count of Anjou, by his conquest of Normandy threatened the royal domains, and Louis VII. by a clever manoeuvre threw his army on the Norman frontier and gained Gisors, one of the keys of Normandy.
At his court which met in Bourges Louis declared on Christmas Day 1145 his intention of going on a crusade. St. Bernard preached the crusade at Vezelay (Easter 1146), and Louis set out from Metz in June 1147, on the overland route to Syria. The expedition was disastrous, and he regained France in 1149, over come by humiliation. He caused a council at Beaugency (on the 21st of March 1152) to annul his marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine, under pretext of kinship. Eleanor married Henry II.
of England in the following May, and brought him the duchy of Aquitaine. Louis VII. led a half-hearted war against Henry; but in August 1154 gave up his rights over Aquitaine, and con tented himself with an indemnity. In 1154 Louis married Con stance, daughter of the king of Castile, and their daughter Mar guerite he affianced imprudently by the treaty of Gisors (1158) to Henry, eldest son of the king of England, promising as dowry the Vexin and Gisors. After the death of Constance (I 16o), Louis VII. married Adele of Champagne. Louis VII. gave little sign of understanding the danger of the growing Angevin power, though in 1159 he aided Raymond V., count of Toulouse, against Henry II. At the same time the emperor Frederick I. in the east was making good the imperial claims on Arles. When the schism broke out, Louis took the part of the pope Alexander III. He sup ported Henry's rebellious sons, but acted slowly and feebly, and so contributed to the break up of the coalition (1173-1174).
Finally in 1177 the pope intervened to bring the two kings to terms at Vitry. By his third wife, Adele, Louis had an heir, the future Philip Augustus, born on the 21st of August 1165. He had him crowned at Reims in 1179, and died on the 18th of September ii80.
See R. Hirsch, Studien zur Geschichte Konig Ludwigs VII. von Frankreich (1892) ; A. Cartellieri, Philipp II. August vo,s Frankreich bis zum Tode seines Vaters, 1165-1180 (1891) ; A. Luchaire, Etudes sur les actes de Louis VII. (1885), and section in E. Lavisse's Histoire de France, tome iii. 1st part, pp. 1--81.