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The Medieval Church · c. 1272–1275
The Life of Saint Louis by Geoffrey of Beaulieu
Geoffrey of Beaulieu · d. c. 1274
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What it is
The king's confessor for twenty years describes his penances, his care for lepers and the poor, and his habit of hearing legal petitions himself under an oak.
Why it lasted
The first life of Louis IX, written for the canonisation process, and the foundation of the ideal of the saint-king.
Where to read it
Public domain and free to read in full, though not held here. The archives below have it.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
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