Friday, October 13 1307

Because of Philip's constant financial problems, the relationship between Paris and Rome had degenerated. Philip had exhausted all the usual methods for balancing the books: he had stolen property, he had devalued his currency , and he had arrested all the Jews and the Lombards, thus destroying the money-lending infrastructure in the France. As a last resort, he even tried to tax the church.

In retaliation to this, Philip closed French borders to the exportation of gold bullion, cutting off Rome's transalpine money supply. Furthermore, he arrested the Bishop of Pamiers (1301), whom he had long sought to remove for political purposes. Leading the sortie was Guillaume de Nogaret, who proved to be a ruthless master of disinformation who could make even a bishop look sinful. His sinister talents were to be put to good use later. Guillaume de Nogaret was no lover of the church, since both his parents had been burned at the stake by the church in the Albigensian Crusade, an internecine struggle that had happened some years before, pitting northern France (Languedoeuil) against Southern France (Languedoc).

The Bishop of Pamiers was duly charged with blasphemy, sorcery, and fornication, in what would become a pattern.

The peasants were stirred by such threats and Philip quickly grasped that revolution was a better future to them than excommunication. He acted fast, dispatching a force under Guillaume de Nogaret to a villa just outside Rome where the Pope was staying. He placed the eighty-six-year-old pontiff under house arrest. The local nobility managed to save him, but a month later Boniface passed away (1303). Some allege he succumbed to shock at the outrage of being the first Vicar of Christ to be kidnapped; other sources say that he beat his head against a wall until he died.

Pope Benedict XI succeeded to the Papacy, accused Guillaume de Nogaret (but not the powerful Philip) of crimes against Benedict. Happily for Philip, the new Pope soon died. Afterwards, Philip succeeded in having Clement V elected, who annulled Boniface's bulls and took up residence in France (at Avignon). Philip, with the Papacy now in his pocket, returned to his economic problems. He applied for membership in the Order of the Knights Templar. The permanent knights of the Paris Temple may have suspected that his intentions were less than pious and did something almost unspeakable: they blackballed the King!

The following year, the the Pope ordered the Grand Master of the Knights Templar, Jacques de Molay, to Paris from their castle on Cyprus. He was accompanied by sixty knights and a baggage train of mules laden with gold and jewels. It was all too clear that the international order was far wealthier than the Crown. Around this time Philip was more desperate than ever to solve his ruinous state finances, so he devalued the currency. Open rebellion broke out in the streets. Rioters threatened to kill him. He fled to the Temple in Paris and begged the Knights for protection. It was all too humiliating.

In the fall of 1307, Philip arranged an impressive police action. On September 14 he sent a set of sealed orders to every bailiff, seneschal, deputy and officer in his kingdom. The functionaries were forbidden under penalty of death to open the papers before Thursday night, October 12.
The following morning, obeying their secret instructions, armies of officers went to work. By sundown nearly all the Knights Templar throughout France were in jails. One estimate puts the arrests at two thousand, another as high as five thousand. Only twenty escaped.

The initial charges brought against the Knights Templar were vague, but dire:
"A bitter thing, a lamentable thing, a thing horrible to think of and terrible to hear, a detestable crime, an execrable evil, an abominable act, a repulsive disgrace, a thing almost inhuman, indeed alien to all humanity, has, thanks to the reports of several trustworthy persons, reached our ear, smiting us grievously and causing us to tremble with the utmost horror."

What followed was so foul, according to folklore, that Templar sympathizers cursed the day itself, condemning it as evil. And thus Friday the Thirteenth has borne the mark of Cain ever since.

What of Philippe LeBel and The Templars?

Philip may have been completely ruthless, but he was a strong king who managed to put France on a firmer financial footing. His quarrels and wars with monarchs of surrounding countries (notably King Edward I of England) were normal for the age.

 Remember too, that by Philip's time France was still recovering from the civil strife of the Abigensian Crusade, when Northern France (Languedoeuil) fought Southern France (Languedoc) in the first half of the 1200s.
Philip may have been despicable and ruthless, but in the long range, history looks on him in a slightly kindlier light. In his troubles he can even be credited with a step towards democracy, when he called the nobles together in the country's first States-General.

What of Friday 13^th?

It is likely that the execration of the people for the events in France is responsible for the bad luck supposedly associated with Friday 13^th. It's not the only suggestion, however.

By the way, the 13^th October 2006 falls on a Friday, 699 years after Grand Master de Molay was captured. And again on 2017 (710 years later)