[6] Phillip the Fair gained possession of Flanders, by force and fraud, in 1299; but in 1802 the French were driven out of the country, after a fatal defeat at Courtrai, here dimly prophesied. [7] Dante here follows the incorrect popular tradition. [8] Who had become a monk. The historical reference is obscure. [9] An ironical reference to the ceremony of consecration at the coronation of the kings. “So long as the great dowry of Provence[1] took not the sense of shame from my race, it was little worth, but still it did not ill. Then it began its rapine with force and with falsehood; and, after, for amends,[2] Ponthieu and Normandy it took, and Gascony; Charles[3] came to Italy, and, for amends, made a victim of Conradin,[4] and then thrust Thomas[5] back to heaven for amends. A time I see, not long after this day, that draws forth another Charles[6] from France to make both himself and his the better known. Without arms he goes forth thence alone, but with the lance with which Judas jousted;[7] and that he thrusts so that he makes the paunch of Florence burst. Therefrom he will gain not land,[8] but sin and shame so much the heavier for himself, as he the lighter reckons such harm. The other,[9] who has already gone out a prisoner from his ship, I see selling his daughter, and bargaining over her, as do the corsairs with other female slaves. O Avarice, what more canst thou do with us, since thou hast so drawn my race unto thyself that it cares not for its own flesh? In order that the ill to come and that already done may seem the less, I see the fleur-de-lis entering Anagna, and in his Vicar Christ made a captive.[10] I see him being mocked a second time; I see the vinegar and the gall renewed, and between living thieves him put to death. I see the new Pilate so cruel that this does not sate him, but, without decretal, he bears his covetous sails into the Temple.[11] O my Lord, when shall I be glad in seeing thy vengeance which, concealed, makes sweet thine anger in thy secrecy? [1] Through the marriage in 1245 of Charles of Anjou, brother of St. Louis (Louis IX.), with Beatrice, the heiress of the Count of Provence. [2] The bitterness of Dante’s irony is explained by the part which France had played in Italian affairs. [3] Of Anjou. [4] The youthful grandson of Frederick II., who, striving to wrest Naples and Sicily, his hereditary possessions, from the hands of Charles of Anjou, was defeated and taken prisoner by him in 1267, and put to deaths by him in 1268. His fate excited great compassion. [5] Charles was believed to have had St. Thomas Aquinas poisoned. [6] Charles of Valois, brother of Philip the Fair, sent by Boniface VIII., in 1301, to Florence as peacemaker. But there he wrought great harm, and siding with the Black party, the Whites, including Dante, were driven into exile. [7] The lance of treachery. [8] A reference to his nickname of Senza terra, or Lackland.