Born during the reign of his grandfather, Louis IX, he was not yet three years old when his mother died. As his father had just succeeded to the crown, Philippe and his three brothers saw very little of him as he, grief stricken, threw himself into campaigning and administrative affairs. This neglect in Philippe's early years manifested itself in his adult personality. 

In 1274 his father married Marie of Brabant, a beautiful and cultivated woman. In the same year there also arrived at court the two-year-old Jeanne, Queen of Navarre. Jeanne was reared with the royal children and, when she was twelve, became the bride of Philippe. As Philippe's elder brother, Louis, had died in 1276, rumoured to have been poisoned by their step-mother, Philippe became heir to the throne 
of France. Philippe made his grandfather, St. Louis IX, a model for his own behaviour.

In 1285 he accompanied his father to the south, campaigning to instal Philippe's brother, Charles, on the throne of Aragon. This enterprise was supported by his step-mother and aimed against the King of Aragon, his late mother's brother. When his father died in October 1285, Philippe IV immediately abandoned the venture. 

In 1294 war with England began a period of conflict which strained Philippe IV's resources. During this period of war he came  into conflict with Pope Boniface VIII. In 1296 the Pope prohibited lay taxation of clergy without papal approval. Both Edward I and Philippe IV retaliated, forcing Boniface VIII to retreat and accept the legitimacy of clerical taxation without the pope's permission. To 
mollify Philippe IV, the pope supported him against the Flemish and, in 1297, canonized Philippe's grandfather, Louis IX. 

However, in 1301 new disputes developed and, in 1303, Philippe IV pledged to see Boniface VIII judged for heretical words and criminal and immoral deeds with which the pope had been charged. The pope 
intended to excommunicate Philippe IV but, on 7 September 1303 in Anagni, he was seized by Guillaume de Nogaret, one of Philippe IV's ministers. Two days later the townsmen freed the pope who died in the next month. The charges against Boniface VIII assisted Philippe IV in negotiations with the next pope, Benedict XI, and even more with his successor, the Gascon-born Pope Clement V, who transferred the papal curia from Rome to Avignon. 

In 1303 peace was made with England and, as a result, Philippe IV's daughter, Isabelle, was engaged to the future Edward II, King of England. However, before the peace treaty was signed, Philippe IV 
intended to crush the Flemish as their Count had allied himself with the English king. But then, in 1302 at Kortrijk, he saw a host of his nobles fall in battle. In 1305 he forced a harsh peace treaty on the 
Flemish that exacted heavy reparations and humiliating penalties. In April 1304 his wife died and he considered to abdicate and assume the kingship of the Holy Land as head of a crusading order. 
However, to vent his grief and prove his dedication to God while at the same time advancing the material interests of his kingdom that was impoverished by long years of warfare, in 1306 he expelled all Jews from France, seizing their property and confiscating the monies owed to them. 

In the early hours of 13 September 1307, his officers swooped on the houses of the Knights Templars all over France, carrying off their occupants to the royal dungeons. He justified his actions by 
proclaiming that they had committed heinous crimes, but he was not believed by the Kings of England and Aragon who did not follow his example. Consequently, he then obtained confessions by psychological pressure and horrific torture. 

In 1312 Pope Clement V dissolved the Templar order and transferred their great estates to the rival crusading order of Knights Hospitaller, who became the legal owners only after paying massive and fictitious Templar 'debts' to Philippe IV. As he stood at the stake, Templar Grand Master Jacques de Molay summoned king and pope to appear with him before God's tribunal; within a year both were 
dead, and within a generation Philippe IV's three sons, 'the cursed kings', were all to die without heirs, bringing the royal line of Capet to an end. 
 

Source: Leo van de Pas