NEVER in all its many troubled days has France been more in need of a wise head and a steady hand than it was when in 987 the lords gave to Hugh Capet the name of King of France. He was already Count of Paris and Duke of France, that is, of the Île de France, the district around Paris. When he was chosen king the title meant only that a few powerful nobles promised him their fidelity. Back of this insignificant fact, however, loomed the idea of kingship remembered from the Roman days of centralized power. Combined with this idea was the governing principle of the new feudalism which emphasized the duty of every man to be loyal to his superior with obedience and support, to his inferior with protection. Thus the title of king meant much or little in proportion as the holders of great possessions lived up to their oaths of allegiance. The weakness of the royal person was the foundation weakness of the feudal system which
France at Time of Hugh Capet.
(At the dates indicated the provinces came under the French crown)
nominally linked the whole of society in an inter-dependent chain, but really fostered the strength of the individual.
Under such conditions it was only the man of unusual force who could maintain himself at a pitch of power greater than that of subordinates who were his equals in all but name. Hugh Capet proved himself such a man, fighting, cajoling, buying his way through a reign of constant disturbance, but strong enough at its end to leave his crown to his son without opposition from the nobles.
A medieval tradition had it that Hugh was the son of a butcher of Paris. A fourteenth century chanson called “Hugh the Butcher” encouraged the bourgeois to believe in the possibility of a like elevation. Dante refers to the story in the “Divine Comedy.” He hears a shade on the Fifth Ledge of Purgatory say: “I was the root of the evil plant which so overshadows all the Christian land that good fruit is rarely plucked therefrom.... Yonder I was called Hugh Capet: of me are born the Philips and the Lewises by whom of late times France is ruled. I was the son of a butcher of Paris. When the ancient kings had all died out, save one who had assumed the gray garb, I found me with the bridle of the government of the realm fast in my hands.”
Here follows a recital of wicked deeds done by Hugh’s descendants by reason of avarice, in the midst of which is the apostrophe, “O Avarice, what more canst thou do with us since thou hast so drawn thy race unto thyself that it cares not for its own flesh?”
There is no reason to suppose that the tradition concerning Hugh’s birth rested on fact. His descent from Robert the Strong was direct and he himself was the worthy head of a family that had given to the throne of France one titled and two untitled kings.