On the whole, the third year of the Crusade had been successful, despite the check at Toulouse. Peter of Aragon had not been there to hinder, having gone off to southern Spain to fight the Moors. The European situation had changed little. Emperor Otto had conquered more Italian territory. Toward the end of the year, southern Germany had definitely declared against him, but the rebels were still the weaker party. John of England was still none the worse for being excommunicated to his face by a papal legate. Whether or not Otto and John aided Raymond, is not clear. One of John’s biographers says that it was their aid which enabled him to hold Toulouse against de Montfort, but no reference to John and Otto’s interference at this time appears in the historians of the Crusade itself.
1212 saw de Montfort growing still stronger. His theatre of operations was now to the north-west of Toulouse, where he took La Penne d’Agen and Moissac. At Moissac appeared the first signs of active disunion in any of Raymond’s cities. The inhabitants attacked the garrison which was composed of mercenaries and of Toulousain militia, and delivered the place to de Montfort. On the Garonne, Castelsarrasin, Verdun, Muret, and St. Gaudens opened their gates, while Raymond, now practically reduced to Toulouse itself and Montauban, attempted no counter-stroke. De Montfort, on his side, made no attack upon Toulouse.
Naturally, after so much success, the morale of the Crusaders rose higher and higher. In their enthusiasm they saw miracles, and they fought, massacred, and burned with a touching joy. De Montfort himself was the first to seek danger or hardship. After entering Muret with his knights, he found his infantry unable to ford the flooded Garonne after the horsemen. Mediæval infantry were accustomed to being despised, being recruited from men of low social class and considered of little military value, as we have seen in the opening paragraphs of this chapter. Furthermore, an attack from Toulouse was feared. Nevertheless de Montfort insisted upon recrossing the river to share the dangers and hardships of the “poor in Christ.” His wife, the Countess Alice, was hardly inferior to him in spirit and energy.
His successes were achieved in spite of many difficulties. He was often short of men, many of the Crusaders having to be brought up with a round turn by the legates for trying to make off before serving even their forty-day tour of duty. Money, too, was lacking. Once the commander could not even buy bread for himself, and had to go for a walk at meal times so that his poverty would not be noticed.
De Montfort was statesman as well as soldier. In December 1212, he called together at Pamiers the “three estates,” nobles, clergy, and townsmen, of his new dominions for a sort of constitutional convention. This convention discussed the whole body of North French law, known as the “custom of Paris,” for Languedoc, and ended by voting for its adoption. To the townsmen, the régime stood for order and the suppression of brigandage, a feat which the Counts of Toulouse had never achieved. To the clergy, the “custom of Paris” meant increased privileges and immunities. Of the nobles, most were by this time already committed to de Montfort. All parties concerned had the chance to “save face” by accepting the opportunity to vote freely in favour of the proposed changes. For de Montfort, the parvenu, the convention was a triumph. Clearly the Crusade was turning into a permanent government of Languedoc by the “French.”
With so much success, de Montfort had received but one check during the year. A temporary coolness had sprung up between him and Arnaut Amalric. The redoubtable Cistercian, having been elected Archbishop of Narbonne, wished to be Duke of that city as well. The title was hereditary in Raymond’s family, but by this time he was no longer worth considering in Languedocian politics; the sole contest for the office was between Arnaut Amalric and de Montfort. Angry at being opposed, Arnaut Amalric went off to join Pedro of Aragon and fought under him through the summer of 1212 against the Moors in Spain. Had the energetic legate remained in Languedoc, de Montfort’s great successes of the year might have been even greater. However, the estrangement between the two leaders of the Albigensian Crusade was only temporary. From de Montfort’s point of view, the serious thing about the Spanish campaign was its complete success and the increased prestige of King Pedro which resulted therefrom. Far to the south, at “Las Navas de Toulosa,” about the time that La Penne d’Agen fell to de Montfort, King Pedro helped to break the last great army of the African Moslems that Spain was ever to see. For the Albigensian Crusade to have its chief opponent known as one of the foremost champions of Christendom in Europe was an ominous thing.
All the time the Pope, the mainspring of the enterprise now rapidly outgrowing his original design, had kept clearly in his mind the religious purpose of the Crusade as opposed to its later political development. During the year he had again protected Durand of Huesca, writing letters in behalf of his following of converted heretics turned Catholic missioners to the bishops of France and Italy. By such action Innocent obstinately refused to go over to the extreme party that was for making an end of mildness and mercy even to the repentant sinner. Furthermore, outside Languedoc, in the previous year in the case of a canon of Bar-sur-Aube who feared for his life because of his heretical reputation in his own neighbourhood, he had insisted that the accused be protected from mob violence. The great Pope was a great lawyer and a great gentleman.
Clearly Innocent was not the man to approve lightly of the transformation of the Crusade into a general deposition of the southern nobles, and their replacement by “Frenchmen.” Accordingly, the winter of 1212-13 and the following spring saw the diplomatic crisis of the Crusade. For some months past, the legates had been asking from Rome a sentence of deposition against Raymond and, for de Montfort, a confirmation in all the titles of the deposed. When that news reached Paris, Philip Augustus undertook to read the Pope a lesson in law to the effect that only the suzerain of a fief could dispose of it in case of confiscation. Innocent felt obliged to reply defensively, assuring the king that the legates had strict orders to safeguard the “honor and interests of the realm of France.” Meanwhile, Peter of Aragon, back from his Andalusian triumph over the Mohammedan, displayed great activity; went himself to Toulouse; took the place formally under his protection; and sent an embassy to Rome to plead the cause of the southern lord against de Montfort. Towards the end of 1212 the first fruits of the Aragonese diplomacy appeared in the shape of letters from Innocent to Arnaut Amalric and his co-legate the Bishop of Uzes, and other letters to the Bishop of Riez and Theodisius, whom Innocent over two years before had charged with the reconciliation of the Count of Toulouse. The Pope flatly refused to substitute de Montfort for Raymond, blamed the legates for even proposing to disregard the rights of Raymond’s innocent heir, and disavowed altogether the acts of the councils of St. Gilles, Narbonne, and Montpellier. Finally, he gave strict orders to the Bishop of Riez and Theodisius to arrange for Raymond’s reconciliation forthwith; to lay aside their lukewarmness and sloth, and to write the whole truth and nothing but the truth to Rome henceforward!
Still the Pope felt that he had not done enough. Towards the middle of January, therefore, he began to send out a whole series of letters to Languedoc. Already there had been a good deal of correspondence with de Montfort complaining of the scanty returns of the three deniers hearth tax. Now, on January 15th, 1213, Innocent again reproves the chief of the Crusade, this time for non-observance of his duties as vassal to Pedro of Aragon for his Viscounty of Beziers and Carcassonne. On the same day, another papal letter left Rome addressed to Arnaut Amalric directing him bluntly to cease preaching the Crusade and to come to an understanding with Pedro and with the “counts, barons, and other prudent persons whose assistance shall appear to be needed,” for the pacification of Languedoc in the interest of the Christians of Spain and Palestine threatened by the Moslem. Not content even with this, two more papal bulls, dated the 17th and 18th, repeated the orders to the legates and de Montfort to make an end of the Albigensian Crusade altogether. They repeated the imposing list of charges brought by Pedro and the Toulousains to the effect that Comminges and Bearn, vassal lands of Pedro’s, had been attacked by de Montfort at the very moment when their suzerain was fighting the battles of Christianity at Las Navas. The Pope therefore ordered the crusading leader to restore the lands he had taken from the vassals of Aragon. The charges against Arnaut Amalric, to wit that he had practised “usurpation” in directing the Crusade against Raymond’s lands, were also paraded over the papal signature and seal. Pedro had guaranteed, so Innocent wrote, that Raymond would do penance by crusading in Spain or Syria. The heir of Toulouse was to be the ward of Aragon during his minority, and was to be brought up by him as a good Catholic. These propositions were to be debated at a sort of constituent assembly of Languedoc, in which not only the higher clergy and the nobles but also the city “consuls” and the “bailiffs,” that is the mayors of villages, were to sit. This assembly was to report its findings to Rome, where the Pope would render the final decision.
While going so far in support of the Aragonese policy, Innocent nevertheless made two important reservations. In the first place, he did not take the decisive step of recalling Arnaut Amalric. Although the redoubtable Cistercian’s policy was disavowed, he was still given the job of calling the congress and of bringing the new papal policy into force by taking “suitable measures.” Secondly, the ancient and good tradition of caution in papal diplomacy was followed in that care was taken to state repeatedly that Pedro’s accusations against Arnaut Amalric and de Montfort were, after all, only charges not yet proved. Rome knew very well by long and no doubt often bitter experience how impossible it was to get full and accurate knowledge of affairs at a distance. The slow and fitful communications of the time made infinitely difficult the decisions and operations of a centralized system like the Papacy.