IV.] EXTENSION TO THE SOUTH. 45 sister, wife, and child, also of his uncle Alfonso, who left no children. By this another great addition of territory took place, as the county of Toulouse lapsed to the crown. Philip, called the Bold (le Hardi), was not a man of mark, but he went on fairly well in the grooves left by his father. He is noted for having granted the first patent of nobility to his silversmith, whereas hitherto a noble had been thought to be born, not made. Nobility meant freedom from taxes, the right to be knighted and to be tried at the royal court, and these rights were inherent in the blood, passing to all the younger sons and their descen- dants so as to perpetuate a distinct and ever-increasing race. 19. Prosecution of Peter of Brosse, 1276. — Philip's eldest son, Lewis, died of a short illness, and suspicion of having poisoned him fell upon Peter de Brosse, the king's chamberlain, who tried to turn the accusation against the prince's stepmother, Mary of Brabant. But, on a trial before a commission named for the purpose, Peter was found guilty and hanged on the great gibbet of Moiit- faiicoH. This was a huge square building with four tiers of arches facing each way, each containing a beam and noose connected with machinery, by which sixty-four executions could take place at one moment. Philip married his next son, Philip the Fair, to foaii of Blois, the heiress of Navarre, and though her subjects resisted, made good his right, so that for two reigns the kingdoms were united. 20. War with Aragon, 1289. — Philip did not, like his father, keep clear of being made a tool of the pope. When Martin the Fourth had declared the crown of Aragon forfeit, because Pedro III. had hearkened to the entreaties of the Sicilians to protect them from Charles of Anjou, he accepted it, and led an army into Catalonia. But the Aragonese fleet cut off his supplies, hunger and sickness drove him back, and he died at Perpigiian on his way home, the third king in succession who had been cut off by fever in an unsuccessful campaign. His son, who was only seventeen, let the war languish, till, through Edward I. of England, it was ended by the peace of Tarascoti. 21. Philip the Fair. War with England and Flan- ders, 1292. — PItilf IV., called the Fair, had as much ability as his forefather, Philip Augustus, but still less principle : he never seems to have been restrained by any scruple of religion, justice, or mercy. A war with
