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Written about two decades before starting his epic five-volume history of the Hundred Years War, Sumption’s history of the fall of southern France follows along the same general lines.

In this case, the second chapter goes into a general long-term history of dualist theology. Like so many religious theories, it has a start in the Middle East, echoes elsewhere, and raised questions for Christianity. There’s no one definitive theory, but it does tend to resolve around the idea of the material and the spiritual being two separate spheres, with only the latter being the creation of God. These ideas slowly spread west (especially after having been encountered in the Crusades), with communities growing up in northern Europe. Suppression and persecution followed, with many people fleeing to more hospitable lands, largely southern France.

The third chapter goes on talk about the Cathar Church as it existed there (from what little can be pieced together). From there, the book pretty much entirely drops down to the affairs of men, and the Languedoc of the first chapter. This is presented as a rich area, yet without real central authority. The Viking raids and other troubles of the past few centuries had largely bypassed the area. While northern Europe had, for the day, fairly centralized states forged in military necessity, southern France invested little real power in the higher rungs of what was really just the trappings of a feudal system.

Raymond V of Toulouse spent nearly half a century fighting the centrifugal actions of his domain, but to little avail. His son Raymond VI takes over in 1194 with ongoing crises in a slow boil. The Catholic Church, and especially Pope Innocent III who was concerned with matters there. Legates were sent to deal with the problem, but were of course viewed with suspicion by most of the inhabitants of the region, and one was killed at the start of 1208.

Just who decided to kill Pierre de Castlenau, how much official sanction, and from who, is impossible to say. But, the death set in motion a crusade aimed at stamping out heresy in the region. Since there was little help to be had on hand, an army was assembled at Lyon and swept, well, much before them. The immediate aftermath of the first campaign’s success was to appoint someone to administer the lands seized from heretics, and Simon de Montfort (father of the—in English history—more famous leader in the Second Barons’ War) steps in. As might be expected of the Montfort family, his concerns are military, secular, and involve maintaining and extending his power.

Since Raymond VI is not the technical target of the crusade, but much of his lands and rights are, there are endless petitions to the Pope about what is going on, and a slow but steady stream of legates are sent to oversee the situation, and try to balance the competing claims, which often fall afoul of Arnaud Amalric, who is bitterly opposed to Raymond VI. Meanwhile, more heretical areas fall to the crusade, until a series of revolts puts everything into doubt in 1216. Part of this is from changes in the cast of characters, with Innocent III dying in 1216, Simon in 1218, and Philip II of France in 1223. His son, Louis VIII steps in to finally bring the power of the northern monarchy to bear, with a final treaty protecting Raymond VII’s position, but with his titles passing into the French royal family.

While technically a religious matter, and Innocent III had meant for a more scholarly approach to the matter, the threat of force rapidly turned into the use of force, and the religious problems became little more than a backdrop as messages take their time on the roads. This makes it well suited to Sumption’s general style, which is not so well developed here as two decades later. Still, I found it good and informative, and it certainly one of the best volumes you’re going to find in English. (I was surprised to see my new book was a 1999 edition before I realized it was the 30th printing.)