Pierre Flotte
Pierre Flote († July 11, 1302 in the Battle of the Spurs in Kortrijk ) was one of the most famous jurists from the reign of King Philip IV Born in the Dauphiné in the middle of the 13th century, he was from 1283 to 1291 the confidant of the Dauphin Umberto I.
In 1294, during the Anglo-French conflict, he was the chief negotiator for Philip IV in Gascony. 1296 he was admitted to the royal council, from which he organized the French fight against the Pope. Boniface VIII had reminded his decretal Clericis laicos the king to the papal consent to the investiture of bishops. At the instigation Flotes and other jurists Philip IV forbade then the export of gold and silver from the kingdom, which the Pope a large part of his income was robbed. Boniface VIII pulled thereupon with the Bull Romana mater ecclesia back the decisions of Clericis laicos.
The confrontation with Rome flared up again in 1301, when the King Bishop of Pamiers, Bernard Saisset arrest, indict for treason and was condemned. A new bull Ausculta filii, once again declared the primacy of the spiritual against the secular and spoke to the king on the right, pass judgment, a member of the French clergy. Again, it was Pierre Flote, who organized the royal reply. He called for April 1302, the barons, prelates and citizens in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, which is considered by some historians as the first meeting of the Estates General in history. There he took the papal bull by its kind in six sets together, including: "We want you to know that you are subject to us in the spiritual as in the mundane ", and was then allowed to confirm the king's anti-papal policy, even by the ecclesiastical dignitaries, whose consent however much more cautious failed.
Three months later, Pierre Flote was killed in the Battle of the Spurs in Kortrijk. His job as a political strategist against Rome was taken over by Guillaume de Nogaret.
Boniface VIII expressed shortly after the meeting at Notre Dame to Pierre Flote as follows: "This is the devil or a man possessed by the devil. God has already punished him by blinding his body ( flute was one-eyed ) as his mind is blind. Pierre Flote, a person full of venom is to chastise and condemn as heretics. He is the downfall of his own brother. He is an advisor to the king, and since that time the King and the Kingdom of have done nothing other than to damage its relations with the Church. "