The Franco-Papal Crusade Negotiations of 1322–3

Abstract

The first two years of the reign of Charles IV, the last Capetian king of France, witnessed detailed negotiations between the French court and the papalcuriaon the question of organising a crusade to the East. The negotiations are striking proof that on crusading matters the papacy still looked to the French crown to take the lead, attempting to continue a tradition of Franco-papal cooperation on the crusade which was rooted in the mid-thirteenth century. In the earlier period this policy of close cooperation was expressed in the expeditions and projects of St. Louis and Charles of Anjou, the aspirations of such popes as Urban IV and Clement IV, and the exemplary crusading zeal of French nobles like Geoffrey of Sergines, Oliver of Termes and Erard of Valéry. But was Franco-papal cooperation still fruitful in the first decades of the fourteenth century? To answer this question definitively would require an exhaustive survey of the achievements of this aspect of papal crusading policy, of the obstacles facing it and of the various alternative approaches which were open to the Roman church.