by the loss of Tours and the subsequent acquisition by marriage of two additional
counties in Champagne, Bar-sur-Aube and Vitry, under Thibaut III (I of Champagne, r.
1037–89).
Thibaut’s elder son, Étienne, became count of Blois-Chartres-Meaux (r. 1089–1102),
while the younger, Hugues, was granted Troyes, Bar-sur-Aube, and Vitry (r. 1093–1125).
Étienne is best known for his marriage to William the Conqueror’s daughter, Adèle, and
his ignominious departure from the First Crusade on the eve of Antioch’s capitulation.
Although his motives are now better understood, contemporary derision forced his return
to the Levant to complete his crusade vow. Despite courageous service on the Crusade of
1101, and his execution in captivity, chroniclers relished retelling his earlier misdeeds.
Count Hugues likewise perished overseas, on his third expedition.
Étienne’s eldest son, Thibaut IV le Grand (II of Champagne, r. 1102–52), inherited the
patrimony of Blois-Chartres-Meaux, then in 1125 acquired the counties of his uncle
Hugues, who had disowned his own son. Thibaut was a major personage of the time:
among the most powerful French princes and a firm supporter of Bernard of Clairvaux,
he was, according to Gerald of Wales, an ideal prince. His decision to shift his energies
from the confines of the Loire Valley to the more promising counties of Champagne,
where he established the international fairs, dramatically transformed the house of Blois:
Champagne passed to his eldest son, Henri I, and became a major principality, while the
counties of Blois-Chartres, shorn of their accretions, receded to second-tier standing.
Thibaut’s younger brother, Étienne, who had been sent to England to make his fortune at
the court of their uncle Henry I, became King Stephen of England (r. 1135–54) but failed
to install a dynasty there.
From 1152, the counts of Blois-Chartres were steadily drawn into the royal orbit.
Thibaut V le Bon (r. 1152–91), who was appointed royal seneschal (1154) and who
married Louis VII’s daughter, Alis, by Eleanor of Aquitaine (1164), regularly attended
the king. He accompanied Philip Augustus on the Third Crusade and died at Acre. His
son, Count Louis (r. 1191–1205), deprived of a role at court (the office of seneschal was
left vacant), encouraged the development of his towns by franchising, among others,
Blois, Châteaudun, and Clermont-en-Beauvaisis (which he acquired through his wife) in
1196/97. Blois, however, with a population under 10,000, remained small compared with
its neighboring rivals Tours, Orléans, and Chartres. The count’s resources, concentrated
in the county of Blois, were inadequate to raise the town of Blois to any significant level
of administrative, commercial, or cultural importance. That Louis became one of the
organizers and leaders of the Fourth Crusade was due entirely to his close familial tie
with the count of Champagne. Louis supported the diversion of that expedition to
Constantinople and led an assault against the city walls. Awarded the duchy of Nicaea in
October 1204, he died in combat the next spring at Adrianople.
Thibaut VI (r. 1205–18) maintained the family crusading tradition by serving in the
Albigensian Crusade and at Las Navas de Tolosa, but he died without issue after
contracting leprosy and the counties reverted to his father’s sisters: Marguerite took Blois
(r. 1218–25) while Isabelle took Chartres (r. 1218–56). Both counties became direct royal
fiefs in 1234, when Louis IX purchased their homages from the count of Champagne.
Although Chartres was sold to Philip IV in 1286, Blois passed by marriage to the
Châtillon family and was inherited by its eldest sons through the next century. Count
Louis IV of Blois died at Crécy, and his sons led royal forces against the English. Gui II
Medieval france: an encyclopedia 250