This period between his first and second crusades (1254-1269) is the real age of Saint Louis in the history of France. He imposed peace between warring factions of his nobility by mere moral force, backed up by something like an awakened public opinion. His nobles often chafed under his unrelenting justice but never dared rebel. The most famous of his settlements was the treaty of Paris, drawn up in May 1258 and ratified in December 1259, by which the claims of Henry III. of England were adjusted. Henry renounced absolutely Normandy, Anjou, Touraine, Maine and Poitou, and received, on condition of recognizing Louis as liege suzerain, all the fiefs and domains of the king of France in the diocese of Limoges, Cahors and Perigueux, and the expecta tion of Saintonge south of the Charente, and Agenais, if they should fall to the crown of France by the death of Alphonse of Poitiers. This treaty was unpopular, since the king surrendered a large part of France that Henry had not won ; but Louis was satisfied that the absolute sovereignty over the northern provinces more than equalled the loss in the south.
Louis made a similar compromise with the king of Aragon in the treaty of Corbeil, 1258, whereby he gave up the claims of kings of France to Roussillon and Barcelona, which went back to the conquest of Charlemagne. The king of Aragon in his turn gave up his claims to part of Provence and Languedoc, with the exception of Narbonne. Louis's position was strikingly shown in 1264 when the English barons submitted their attempt to bind Henry III. by the Provisions of Oxford to his arbitration. His reply in the "Dit" or Mise of Amiens was a flat denial of all the claims of the barons and failed to avert the civil war. Upon the whole Louis maintained peace with his neighbours, although both Germany and England were torn with civil wars. He sanctioned the conquest of Naples by his brother, Charles, duke of Anjou.
On March 24, 1267, Louis proclaimed his purpose of going on a second crusade. Three years of preparation followed; then on July a, 127o they sailed from Aigues Mortes for Tunis, whither the expedition seems to have been directed by the machinations of Charles of Anjou, who, it is claimed, persuaded his brother that the key to Egypt and to Jerusalem was that part of Africa which was his own most dangerous neighbour. After seventeen
days' voyage to Carthage, one month of the summer's heat and plague decimated the army, and when Charles of Anjou arrived he found that Louis himself had died of the plague on Aug. 25, 127o.
Saint Louis stands in history as the ideal king of the middle ages. An accomplished knight, physically strong in spite of his ascetic practices, fearless in battle, heroic in adversity, of im perious temperament, unyielding when sure of the justness of his cause, energetic and firm, he was indeed "every inch a king." Joinville says that he was taller by a head than any of his knights. His devotions would have worn out a less robust saint. He fasted much, loved sermons, regularly heard two masses a day and all the offices, dressing at midnight for matins in his chapel, and sur rounded even when he travelled by priests on horseback chanting the hours. After his return from the first crusade, he wore only grey woollens in winter, dark silks in summer. He built hospitals, visited and tended the sick himself, gave charity to over a hundred beggars daily. Yet he safeguarded the royal dignity by bringing them in at the back door of the palace, and by a courtly display greater than ever before in France. His naturally cold tempera ment was somewhat relieved by a sense of humour, which, how ever, did not prevent his making presents of haircloth shirts to his friends. He had no favourite, nor prime minister. Louis was canonized in 5297.
The best contemporary accounts of Louis IX. are the Memoirs of the Sire Jean de Joinville (q.v.), published by N. de Wailly for the Soc. de l'Hist. de France, under the title Histoire de Saint Louis (Paris, 1868), and again with translation (1874) ; English translation by J. Hutton (1868). See also C. V. Langlois in E. Lavisse's Histoire de France, tome iii., with references to literature ; Frederick Perry, Saint Louis, the Most Christian King (New York, Igo') ; E. J. Davis, The Invasion of Egypt by Louis IX. of France (1898) ; H. A. Wallon, Saint Louis et son temps (1875) ; A. Lecoy de la Marche, Saint Louis (Tours, 1891) ; and E. Berger, Saint Louis et Innocent IV. (Paris, 1893), and Histoire de Blanche de Castille (1895). See also The Court of a Saint, by Winifred F. Knox (19o9). (J. T. S.; X.)