Philip IV of France

About Philip IV of France

Philip IV of France, known as Philip the Fair (1268–1314), was a highly consequential medieval monarch who ranks #626 in historical importance according to the Pantheon project. His reign was defined by his efforts to consolidate royal power against the Church and local lords, most famously culminating in his conflict with Pope Boniface VIII, which led to the Pope's humiliation and the eventual relocation of the papacy to Avignon. Philip also oversaw the dramatic suppression and dissolution of the Knights Templar in 1307, seizing their vast wealth to fund his ongoing wars and administrative centralization.

In terms of modern internet attention, Philip IV presents a near-perfect balance to his historical ranking, achieving an Attention Gap of approximately 1x, with 382K annualized Wikipedia views in 2025. This level of traffic is broadly consistent with a figure of his historical magnitude, especially when compared to contemporaries like Emperor Meiji (#822 importance, 826K views), showing a relatively stable level of interest. However, his attention is notably lower than that garnered by figures like William the Conqueror (#934 importance, 3.0M views), suggesting a slight underrepresentation compared to other medieval power brokers.

Despite this overall balance, the recent data indicates a slight cooling of interest; his Year-over-Year change is a modest +11.4%, but his 2025 Momentum (Q1 vs Q3) shows a -1% decline, suggesting his peak online curiosity might have recently passed.