The French King Louis XII

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Louis XII was King of France in the late 15th and early 16th Centuries. He was known as a warrior and a reformer.

King Louis XII of France

He was born on June 27, 1462, at the Royal Château de Blois, Touraine. His father was Charles, Duke of Orléans, and his mother was Marie of Cleves. Charles died in 1465, and Louis became Duke of Orléans. A 14-year-old Louis had orders from the King of France at the time, Louis XI, to marry his disabled daughter Joan. After the king died, Louis had the marriage annulled.

Louis made himself an enemy of Louis IX's successor, Charles VIII, even attempting to have the new king captured. Charles's sister Anne was regent because Charles was too young to rule in his own right, and so Anne commanded the troops that assembled to defend against another attack by Louis in 1488. On July 28 of that year, the royal troops defeated Louis and the rebels at the Battle of Saint-Aubin-du-Cormier. Captured, Louis begged forgiveness. He served time as a hostage and, in 1491, found himself pardoned and installed as a commander in the king's army.

He marched with Charles and a strong host down the length of the west coast of Italy, seizing Milan and Naples. Louis fought at the Battle of Fornovo, on the side of the Italians.

Charles died on April 7, 1498. He had no heir. Louis took the throne and continued the campaign against Milan. Elsewhere, however, he looked to keep the peace. The new monarch made peace with Spain and with the Holy Roman Empire. In 1499, he renewed the Auld Alliance, a mutual defense agreement with Scotland against England. In the same year, he concluded a deal with the Swiss Confederation. Thus fortified, Louis could concentrate on Italy, which he did, taking control of Milan (after much back and worth fighting Ludovico Sforza during the first few years of the 16th Century) and then Naples, which he won in 1501, with the help of the Spanish king, Ferdinand II.

Internally, Louis carried out many of the reforms recommended by the Estates General, which had met in 1484 under the reign of Charles VIII. Louis brought back the Pragmatic Sanction, which specified that the king or other French nobles–not Church officials–had the power to make appointments of religious office within the borders of France. The king also instituted reforms in the areas of judicial power and tax collection.

Louis had married Anne, the widow of Charles VIII, in 1499. They had six children, two of whom survived infancy. The surviving daughters were Renée and Claude.

King Louis XII of France

The Italian intrigues continued, as Louis went to Genoa in 1507 to put down a revolt and in the following year joined the League of Cambrai in a fight against Venice. Despite Louis' help against the Venice, the League, at the instigation of Pope Julius II, became the Holy League and turned on Louis, driving him out of Milan, in 1513.

England's King Henry VIII had joined the Holy League. invaded France, in June 1513. The English army, with Henry at its head, enjoyed success at the Battle of the Spurs. While king and army were in France, however, the Scottish king, James IV, invaded England. English forces defeated Scotland as well, at the Battle of Flodden Field in September 1513. Henry, out of money for another French invasion, settled for a peace agreement with Louis, which was cemented by the French monarch's third marriage, to the king's sister, Mary, which took place in 1514. Louis' daughter Claude married Francis of Angoulême that same year.

Louis XII died on Jan. 1, 1515, after battling a severe case of gout. His son-in-law succeeded him, becoming King Francis I.

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