FILIPPO II, Augustus, king of FRANCIA. — Having succeeded his father, Luigi VII, in 1180, at a very young age (he had been born in Paris on 21 August 1165), his entire life was spent in the defense of the monarchical institution and in the struggle against the excessive power of the great feudal lords. At the beginning of this struggle, he had the support of the count of Flanders, Filippo d'Alsezia, against whom he was later to turn, with the aid of Enrico II of England, against whom, in turn, he was also to fight, in an attempt to weaken English power in France, where it was predominant. And, with the unexpected support of Enrico II’s own son, Riccardo Cuor di Leone, he was to strike the first blows against the English king. Meanwhile, the emotion aroused by the fall of Constantinople renewed throughout Christendom the expectation of a crusade.
F. A., together with Federico Barbarossa and Riccardo Cuor di Leone, who had meanwhile succeeded Enrico II, took part in II. After the first indications of a clash at Messina, the events surrounding the siege of S. Giovanni d'Acri made F. A. and Riccardo enemies. The former hastily returned to France: the capture of his rival, first at the hands of the duke of Austria and then of Enrico VI, delaying his presence on the disputed soil, gave F. A. the opportunity to seize the English fiefs in France. The attempt, however, failed, first because of the ransom and then because of the fortunes of Riccardo Cuor di Leone in war. Only the intervention of Innocenzo III saved the Capetian monarchy. Riccardo’s sudden death and the lesser ability of his successor, Giovanni senza Avere, reopened the way for F. A.’s unifying enterprise. The English king’s rivalry with Arturo, count of Brittany, further favored French ambitions: at the beginning of the new century, Normandy, Brittany, Poitou, and Academia became part of the French monarchy. Once again, it was the intervention of Innocenzo III, weary of the vexations suffered by the English clergy, that decisively favored F. A.’s cause. In 1215 the invasion of England was on the point of being carried out when, to halt it, Giovanni’s submission to the Pope took place. Meanwhile, a matrimonial question had deeply divided F. A. and Innocenzo: the divorce from his second wife, Ingeborg of Denmark, and his new marriage to Agnese di Merano. There followed a series of papal acts (among them an interdict on France), a Council at Soissons, a feigned reconciliation, followed by the actual imprisonment of the unfortunate Ingeborg. Then,
photo A. de la Monarcas, A. Hegana, S. d'Argenti, Virema de Pile, de France. Paris 1918, p. 31