people a sentiment of national grief, mixed with indignation
and scorn at the nobility who had fled before an army so
inferior in number. Those nobles who passed through the cities
and towns on their return from the battle were pursued with
imprecations and outrages. The Parisian bourgeoisie, animated
with enthusiasm and courage, took upon itself at all risks the
charge of its own defense; whilst, the eldest son of the king,
a youth of only nineteen, who had been one of the first to
fly, assumed the government as lieutenant of his father. It
was at the summons of this prince that the states assembled
again at Paris before the time which they had appointed. The
same deputies returned to the number of 800, of whom 400 were
of the bourgeoisie; and the work of reform, rudely sketched in
the preceding session, was resumed under the same influence,
with an enthusiasm which partook of the character of
revolutionary impulse. The assembly commenced by concentrating
its action in a committee of twenty-four members,
deliberating, as far as appears, without distinction of
orders; it then intimated its resolutions under the form of
petitions, which were as follow: The authority of the states
declared supreme in all affairs of administration and finance,
the impeachment of all the counsellors of the king, the
dismissal in a body of the officers of justice, and the
creation of a council of reformers taken from the three
orders; lastly, the prohibition to conclude any truce without
the assent of the three states, and the right on their part to
re-assemble at their own will without a royal summons. The
lieutenant of the king, Charles Duke of Normandy, exerted in
vain the resources of a precocious ability to escape these
imperious demands: he was compelled to yield everything. The
States governed in his name; but dissension, springing from
the mutual jealousy of the different orders, was soon
introduced into their body. The preponderating influence of
the bourgeois appeared intolerable to the nobles, who, in
consequence, deserted the assembly and retired home. The
deputies of the clergy remained longer at their posts, but
they also withdrew at last; and, under the name of the
States-General, none remained but the representatives of the
cities, alone charged with all the responsibilities of the
reform and the affairs of the kingdom. Bowing to a necessity
of central action, they submitted of their own accord to the
deputation of Paris; and soon, by the tendency of
circumstances, and in consequence of the hostile attitude of
the Regent, the question of supremacy of the states became a
Parisian question, subject to the chances of a popular émeute
and the guardianship of the municipal power. At this point
appears a man whose character has grown into historical
importance in our days from our greater facilities of
understanding it, Etienne [Stephen] Marcel, 'prévôt des
marchands'--that is to say, mayor of the municipality of
Paris. This échevin of the 14th century, by a remarkable
anticipation, designed and attempted things which seem to
belong only to recent revolutions. Social unity, and
administrative uniformity; political rights, co-extensive and
equal with civil rights; the principle of public authority
transferred from the crown to the nation; the States-General
changed, under the influence of the third order, into a
national representation; the will of the people admitted as
sovereign in the presence of the depositary of the royal
power; the influence of Paris over the provinces, as the head
of opinion and centre of the general movement; the democratic
dictatorship, and the influence of terror exercised in the
name of the common weal; new colours assumed and carried as a
sign of patriotic union and symbol of reform; the transference
of royalty itself from one branch of the family to the other,
with a view to the cause of reform and the interest of the
people--such were the circumstances and the scenes which have
given to our own as well as the preceding century their
political character. It is strange to find the whole of it
comprised in the three years over which the name of the Prévôt
Marcel predominates. His short and stormy career was, as it
were, a premature attempt at the grand designs of Providence,
and the mirror of the bloody changes of fortune through which
those designs were destined to advance to their accomplishment
under the impulse of human passions. Marcel lived and died for
an idea--that of hastening on, by the force of the masses, the
work of gradual equalisation commenced by the kings
themselves; but it was his misfortune and his crime to be
unrelenting in carrying out his convictions. To the
impetuosity of a tribune who did not shrink even from murder
he added the talent of organization; he left in the grand
city, which he had ruled with a stern and absolute sway,
powerful institutions, noble works, and a name which two
centuries afterwards his descendants bore with pride as a
title of nobility."
_A. Thierry,
Formation and Progress of the Tiers Etat,
volume 1, chapter 2._
See, also,
STATES-GENERAL OF FRANCE IN THE 14th CENTURY.
{1171}
FRANCE: A. D. 1358.
The insurrection of the Jacquerie.
"The miseries of France weighed more and more heavily on the
peasantry; and none regarded them. They stood apart from the
cities, knowing little of them; the nobles despised them and
robbed them of their substance or their labour. ... At last
the peasantry (May, 1358), weary of their woes, rose up to
work their own revenge and ruin. They began in the Beauvais
country and there fell on the nobles, attacking and destroying
castles, and slaying their inmates: it was the old unvarying
story. They made themselves a kind of king, a man of Clermont
in the Beauvoisin, named William Callet. Froissart imagines
that the name 'Jacques Bonhomme' meant a particular person, a
leader in these risings. Froissart however had no accurate
knowledge of the peasant and his ways. Jacques Bonhomme was
the common nickname, the 'Giles' or 'Hodge' of France, the
name of the peasant generally; and from it such risings as
this of 1358 came to be called the 'Jacquerie,' or the
disturbances of the 'Jacques.' The nobles were soon out
against them, and the whole land was full of anarchy. Princes
and nobles, angry peasants with their 'iron shod sticks and
knives,' free-lances, English bands of pillagers, all made up
a scene of utter confusion: 'cultivation ceased, commerce
ceased, security was at an end.' The burghers of Paris and
Meaux sent a force to help the peasants, who were besieging
the fortress at Meaux, held by the nobles; these were suddenly
attacked and routed by the Captal de Buch and the Count de Foix,
'then on their return from Prussia.' The King of Navarre also
fell on them, took by stratagem their leader Callet, tortured
and hanged him. In six weeks the fire was quenched in blood."
_G. W. Kitchin,
History of France,
chapter 2, section 3._
"Froissard relates the horrible details of the Jacquerie with
the same placid interest which characterises his descriptions
of battles, tournaments, and the pageantry of chivalry. The
charm and brilliancy of his narrative have long popularised
his injustice and his errors, which are self-apparent when
compared with the authors and chroniclers of his time. ... The
chronicles contemporary of the Jacquerie confine themselves to
a few words on the subject, although, with the exception of
the Continuator of Nangis, they were all hostile to the cause
of the peasants. The private and local documents on the
subject say very little more. The Continuator of Nangis has
drawn his information from various sources. He takes care to
state that he has witnessed almost all he relates. After
describing the sufferings of the peasants, he adds that the
laws of justice authorised them to rise in revolt against the
nobles of France. His respected testimony reduces the
insurrection to comparatively small proportions. The hundred
thousand Jacques of Froissard are reduced to something like
five or six thousand men, a number much more probable when it
is considered that the insurrection remained a purely local
one, and that, in consequence of the ravages we have
mentioned, the whole open country had lost about two-thirds of
its inhabitants. He states very clearly that the peasants
killed indiscriminately, and without pity, men and children,
but he does not say anything of those details of atrocity
related by Froissard. He only alludes once to a report of some
outrages offered to some noble ladies; he speaks of it as a
vague rumour. He describes the insurgents, after the first
explosion of their vindictive fury, as pausing--amazed at
their own boldness, and terrified at their own crimes, and the
nobles, recovering from their terror, taking immediate
advantage of this sudden torpor and paralysis--assembling and
slaughtering all, innocent and guilty, burning houses and
villages. If we turn to other writers contemporary with the
Jacquerie, we find that Louvet, author of the 'History of the
District of Beauvais,' does not say much on the subject, and
evinces also a sympathy for the peasants: the paucity of his
remarks on a subject represented by Froissard as a gigantic,
bloody tragedy, raises legitimate doubts as to the veracity of
the latter. There is another authority on the events of that
period, which may be considered as more weighty, in
consequence of its ecclesiastical character; it is the
'cartulaire,' or journal of the Abbot of Beauvais. ... There
is no trace in it of the horror and indescribable terror ...
[the rising] must have inspired if the peasants had committed
the atrocities attributed to them by the feudal historian,
Froissard. On the contrary, the vengeance of the peasants
falls into the shade, as it were, in contrast with the
merciless reaction of the nobles, along with the sanguinary
oppression of the English. The writer of the 'Abbey of
Beauvais,' and the anonymous monk, 'Continuator of Nangis,'
concur with each other in their account of the Jacquerie.
Their judgments are similar, and they manifest the same
moderation. Their opinions, moreover, are confirmed by a
higher authority, a testimony that must be considered as
indisputable, namely, the letters of amnesty of the Regent of
France, which are all preserved; they bear the date of 10th
August 1358, and refer to all the acts committed on the
occasion of the Jacquerie. In these he proves himself more
severe upon the reaction of the nobles than on the revolt of
the peasants. ... There is not the slightest allusion to the
monstrosities related by Froissard, which the Regent could not
have failed to stigmatise, as he is well known for having
entertained an unscrupulous hatred to any popular movement, or
any claims of the people. The manner, on the contrary, in
which the Jacquerie are represented in this official document,
is full of signification; it represents the men of the open
country assembling spontaneously in various localities, in
order to deliberate on the means of resisting the English, and
suddenly, as with a mutual agreement, turning fiercely on the
nobles, who were the real cause of their misery, and of the
disgrace of France, on the days of Crecy and Poitiers. ... It
has also been forgotten that many citizens took an active part
in the Jacquerie. The great chronicles of France state that
the majority were peasants, labouring people, but that there
were also among them citizens, and even gentlemen, who, no
doubt, were impelled by personal hatred and vengeance. Many
rich men joined the peasants, and became their leaders. The
bourgeoisie, in its struggles with royalty, could not refuse
to take advantage of such a diversion; and Beauvais, Senlis,
Amiens, Paris, and Meaux accepted the Jacquerie. Moreover,
almost all the poorer classes of the cities sympathised with
the revolted peasants.
{1172}
The Jacquerie broke out on the 21st of May 1358, and not in
November 1357, as erroneously stated by Froissard, in the
districts around Beauvais and Clermont-sur-Oise. The peasants,
merely armed with pikes, sticks, fragments of their ploughs,
rushed on their masters, murdered their families, and burned
down their castles. The country comprised between Beauvais and
Melun was the principal scene of this war of extermination.
... The Jacquerie had commenced on the 21st of May. On the 9th
of June ... it was already terminated. It was, therefore, in
reality, an insurrection of less than three weeks' duration.
The reprisals of the nobles had already commenced on the 9th
of June, and continued through the whole of July, and the
greater part of August. Froissard states that the Jacquerie
lasted over six weeks, thus comprising in his reckoning three
weeks of the ferocious vengeance of the nobles, and casting on
Jacques Bonhomme the responsibility of the massacres of which
he had been the victim, as well as those he had committed in
his furious despair."
_Prof. De Vericour,
The Jacquerie
(Royal Historical Society, Transactions, volume 1)._
ALSO IN:
_Sir J. Froissart,
Chronicles
(Johnes' translation),
book 1, chapter 181._
FRANCE: A. D. 1360-1380.
English conquests recovered.
The Peace of Bretigny brought little peace to France or little
diminution of the troubles of the kingdom. In some respects
there was a change for the worse introduced. The armies which
had ravaged the country dissolved into plundering bands which
afflicted it even more. Great numbers of mercenaries from both
sides were set free, who gathered into Free Companies, as they
were called, under leaders of fit recklessness and valor, and
swarmed over the land, warring on all prosperity and all the
peaceful industries of the time, seeking booty wherever it
might be found.
See ITALY: A. D. 1343-1393.
Civil war, too, was kept alive by the intrigues and
conspiracies of the Navarrese king, Charles the Bad; and war
in Brittany, over a disputed succession to the dukedom, was
actually stipulated for, by French and English, in their
treaty of general peace. But when the chivalric but hapless
King John died, in 1364, the new king, Charles V., who had
been regent during his captivity, developed an unexpected
capacity for government. He brought to the front the famous
Breton warrior Du Guesclin-rough, ignorant, unchivalric--but a
fighter of the first order in his hard-fighting day. He
contrived with adroitness to rid France, mostly, of the Free
Companies, by sending them, with Du Guesclin at their head,
into Spain, where they drove Peter the Cruel from the throne
of Castile, and fought the English, who undertook, wickedly
and foolishly, to sustain him. The Black Prince won a great
battle, at Najara or Navarette (A. D. 1367), took Du Guesclin
prisoner and restored the cruel Pedro to his throne. But it
was a victory fatal to English interests in France. Half the
army of the English prince perished of a pestilent fever
before he led it back to Aquitaine, and he himself was marked
for early death by the same malady. He had been made duke of
Aquitaine, or Guienne, and held the government of the country.
The war in Spain proved expensive; he taxed his Gascon and
Aquitanian subjects heavily. He was ill, irritable, and
treated them harshly. Discontent became widely spread, and the
king of France subtly stirred it up until he felt prepared to
make use of it in actual war. At last, in 1368, he challenged
a rupture of the Peace of Bretigny by summoning King Edward,
as his vassal, to answer complaints from Aquitaine. In April
of the next year he formally declared war and opened
hostilities the same day. His cunning policy was not to fight,
but to waste and wear the enemy out. Its wisdom was well-proved
by the result. Day by day the English lost ground; the footing
they had gained in France was found to be everywhere insecure.
The dying Black Prince achieved one hideous triumph at
Limoges, where he fouled his brilliant fame by a monstrous
massacre; and thence he was carried home to end his days in
England. In 1376 he died, and one year later his father, King
Edward, followed him to the grave, and a child of eleven
(Richard II.) came to the English throne. But the same
calamity befell France in 1380, when Charles the Wise died,
leaving an heir to the throne only twelve years of age. In
both kingdoms the minority of the sovereign gave rise to
factious intrigues and distracting feuds. The war went on at
intervals, with frequent truces and armistices, and with
little result beyond the animosities which it kept alive. But
the English possessions, by this time, had been reduced to
Calais and Guines, with some small parts of Aquitaine
adjoining the cities of Bordeaux and Bayonne. And thus, it may
be said, the situation was prolonged through a generation,
until Henry V. of England resumed afresh the undertaking of
Edward III.
_F. P. Guizot,
Popular History of France,
chapter 22._
ALSO IN:
_J. Michelet,
History of France,
book 6, chapter 4._
_T. Wright,
History of France,
book 2, chapter 6._
_E. A. Freeman,
Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 9._
_D. F. Jamison,
Life and Times of Du Guesclin._
_Froissart, Chronicles
(Johnes' translation),
book 1._
See SPAIN: A. D. 1366-1369.
FRANCE: A. D. 1364.
Accession of King Charles V.
FRANCE: A. D. 1378.
Acquisitions in the Rhone valley legal conferred by the
Emperor.
See BURGUNDY: A. D. 1127-1378.
FRANCE: A. D. 1380.
Accession of King Charles VI.
FRANCE: A. D. 1380-1415.
The reign of the Dukes.
The civil war of Armagnacs and Burgundians.
"Charles VI. had arrived at the age of eleven years and some
months when his father died [A. D. 1380]. His three paternal
uncles, the Dukes of Anjou, Berry, and Burgundy, and his
maternal uncle, the Duke of Bourbon, disputed among themselves
concerning his guardianship and the regency. They agreed to
emancipate the young King immediately after his coronation,
which was to take place during the year, and the regency was
to remain until that period in the hands of the eldest, the
Duke of Anjou." But the Duke of Anjou was soon afterwards
lured into Italy by the fatal gift of a claim to the crown of
Naples [see ITALY: A. D. 1343-1389.], and perished in striving
to realize it. The surviving uncles misgoverned the country
between them until 1389, when the young king was persuaded to
throw off their yoke. The nation rejoiced for three years in
the experience and the prospect of administrative reforms; but
suddenly, in July, 1392, the young king became demented, and
"then commenced the third and fatal epoch of that disastrous
reign. The faction of the dukes again seized power," but only
to waste and afflict the kingdom by dissensions among
themselves.
{1173}
The number of the rival dukes was now increased by the
addition of the Duke of Orleans, brother of the king, who
showed himself as ruthless and rapacious as any. "Charles was
still considered to be reigning; each one sought in turn to
get possession of him, and each one watched his lucid moments
in order to stand well in power. His flashes of reason were
still more melancholy than his fits of delirium. Incapable of
attending to his affairs, or of having a will of his own,
always subservient to the dominant party, he appeared to
employ his few glimmerings of reason only in sanctioning the
most tyrannical acts and the most odious abuses. It was in
this manner that the kingdom of France was governed during
twenty-eight years." In 1404, the Duke of Burgundy, Philip
the Bold, having died, the Duke of Orleans acquired supreme
authority and exercised it most oppressively. But the new Duke
of Burgundy, John the Fearless, made his appearance on the
scene ere long, arriving from his county of Flanders with an
army and threatening civil war. Terms of peace, however, were
arranged between the two dukes and an apparent reconciliation
took place. On the very next day the Duke of Orleans was
assassinated (A. D. 1407), and the Duke of Burgundy openly
proclaimed his instigation of the deed. Out of that
treacherous murder sprang a war of factions so deadly that
France was delivered by it to foreign conquest, and destroyed,
we may say, for the time being, as a nation. The elder of the
young princes of Orleans, sons of the murdered duke, had
married a daughter of Count Bernard of Armagnac, and Count
Bernard became the leader of the party which supported them
and sought to avenge them, as against the Duke of Burgundy and
his party. Hence the former acquired the name of Armagnacs;
the latter were called Burgundians. Armagnac led an army of
Gascons [A. D. 1410] and threatened Paris, "where John the
Fearless caressed the vilest populace. Burgundy relied on the
name of the king, whom he held in his power, and armed in the
capital a corps of one hundred young butchers or
horse-knackers, who, from John Caboche, their chief, took the
name of Cabochiens. A frightful war, interrupted by truces
violated on both sides, commenced between the party of
Armagnac and that of Burgundy. Both sides appealed to the
English, and sold France to them. The Armagnacs pillaged and
ravaged the environs of Paris with unheard of cruelties, while
the Cabochiens caused the capital they defended to tremble.
The States-General, convoked for the first time for thirty
years, were dumb--without courage and without strength. The
Parliament was silent, the university made itself the organ of
the populace, and the butchers made the laws. They pillaged,
imprisoned and slaughtered with impunity, according to their
savage fury, and found judges to condemn their victims. ...
The reaction broke out at last. Tired of so many atrocities,
the bourgeoisie took up arms, and shook off the yoke of the
horse-knackers. The Dauphin was delivered by them. He mounted
on horseback, and, at the head of the militia, went to the
Hôtel de Ville, from which place he drove out Caboche and his
brigands. The counter revolution was established. Burgundy
departed, and the power passed to the Armagnacs. The princes
re-entered Paris, and King Charles took up the oriflamme (the
royal standard of France), to make war against John the
Fearless, whose instrument he had been a short time before.
His army was victorious. Burgundy submitted, and the treaty of
Arras [A. D. 1415] suspended the war, but not the executions and
the ravages. Henry V., King of England, judged this a
propitious moment to descend upon France, which had not a
vessel to oppose the invaders."
_E. de Bonnechose,
History of France,
volume 1, pages 266-279._
ALSO IN:
_E. de Monstrelet,
Chronicles (Johnes' translation),
volume 1, book 1, chapters 1-140._
_T. Wright,
History of France,
book 2, chapters 8-9._
FRANCE: A. D. 1383.
Pope Urban's Crusade against the Schismatics.
See FLANDERS: A. D. 1383.
FRANCE: A. D. 1396.
The sovereignty of Genoa surrendered to the king.
See GENOA: A. D. 1381-1422.
FRANCE: A. D. 1415.
The Hundred Years War renewed by Henry V. of England.
"When Henry V. resolved to recover what he claimed as the
inheritance of his predecessors, he had to begin, it may be
said, the work of conquest over again. Allies, however, he
had, whose assistance he was to find very useful. The dynasty
of De Montfort had been established in possession of the
dukedom of Britanny in a great measure by English help, and
though the relations between the two countries had not been
invariably friendly since that time, the sense of this
obligation, and, still more powerfully, a jealous fear of the
French king, inclined Britanny to the English alliance. The
Dukes of Burgundy, though they had no such motives of
gratitude towards England, felt a far stronger hostility
towards France. The feud between the rival factions which went
by the names of Burgundians and Armagnacs had now been raging
for several years; and though the attitude of the Burgundians
varied--at the great struggle of Agincourt they were allies,
though lukewarm and even doubtful allies, of the French--they
ultimately ranked themselves decidedly on Henry's side. In
1414, then, Henry formally demanded, as the heir of Isabella,
mother of his great-grandfather Edward, the crown of France.
This claim the French princes wholly refused to consider.
Henry then moderated his demands so far, at least, as to allow
Charles to remain in nominal possession of his kingdom; but
... France was to cede to England, no longer as a feudal
superior making a grant to a vassal, but in full sovereignty,
the provinces of Normandy, Maine, and Anjou, together with all
that was comprised in the ancient duchy of Aquitaine. Half,
too, of Provence was claimed, and the arrears of the ransom of
King John, amounting to 1,200,000 crowns, were also to be
paid. Finally, the French king was to give his youngest
daughter, Katharine, in marriage to Henry, with a portion of
2,000,000 crowns. The French ministers offered, in answer, to
yield the duchy of Aquitaine, comprising the provinces of
Anjou, Gascony, Guienne, Poitou, and to give the hand of the
princess Katharine with a dowry of 600,000 crowns.
"Negotiations went on through several months, with small
chance of success, while Henry prepared for war. His
preparations were completed in the summer of 1415, and on the
11th of August in that year he set sail from Southampton, with
an army of 6,000 men-at-arms and 24,000 archers, very
completely equipped, and accompanied with cannon and other
engines of war.
{1174}
Landing in the estuary of the Seine, the invaders first
captured the important Norman seaport of Harfleur, after a
siege of a month, and expelled the inhabitants from the town.
It was an important acquisition; but it had cost the English
heavily. They were ill-supplied with food; they had suffered
from much rain; 2,000 had died of an epidemic of dysentery.
The army was in no condition for a forward movement. "The
safest course would now have been to return at once; and this
seems to have been pressed upon the king by the majority of
his counsellors. But this prudent advice did not approve
itself to Henry's adventurous temper. ... He determined ... to
make what may be called a military parade to Calais. This
involved a march of not less than 150 miles through a hostile
country, a dangerous, and, but that one who cherishes such
designs as Henry's must make a reputation for daring, a
useless operation; but the king's determined will overcame all
opposition." Leaving a strong garrison at Harfleur, Henry set
out upon his march. Arrived at the Somme, his further progress
was disputed, and he was forced to make a long detour before
he could effect a crossing of the river. On the 24th of
October, he encountered the French army, strongly posted at
the village of Azincour or Agincourt, barring the road to
Calais; and there, on the morning of the 25th, after a night
of drenching rain, the great battle, which shines with so
dazzling a glory in English history, was fought. There seems
to be no doubt that the English were greatly outnumbered by
the French--according to Monstrelet they were but one to six;
but the masses on the French side were unskilfully handled and
no advantage was got from them. The deadly shafts of the
terrible English archers built such a rampart of corpses in
their front that it actually sheltered them from the charge of
the French cavalry. "Everywhere the French were routed, slain,
or taken. The victory of the English was complete. ... The
French loss was enormous. Monstrelet gives a long list of the
chief princes and nobles who fell on that fatal field. ... We
are disposed to trust his estimate, which, including princes,
knights and men-at-arms of every degree, he puts at 10,000.
... Only 1,600 are said to have been 'of low degree.' ... The
number of knights and gentlemen taken prisoners was 1,500.
Among them were Charles, Duke of Orleans, and the Duke of
Bourbon, both princes of the blood-royal. ... Brilliant as was
the victory which Henry had won at Agincourt, it had, it may
be said, no immediate results. ... The army resumed its
interrupted march to Calais, which was about forty miles
distant. At Calais a council of war was held, and the
resolution to return to England unanimously taken. A few days
were allowed for refreshment, and about the middle of November
the army embarked."
_A. J. Church,
Henry the Fifth,
chapters 6-10._
ALSO IN:
_E. de Monstrelet,
Chronicles (Johnes' translation),
volume 1, book 1, chapters 140-149._
_J. E. Tyler,
Henry of Monmouth,
chapters 19-23._
_G M. Towle,
History of Henry V.,
chapters 7-8._
_Lord Brougham,
History of England and France
under the House of Lancaster._
_C. M. Yonge,
Cameos from English History:
second series, chapters 24-26._
FRANCE: A. D. 1415-1419.
Massacre of Armagnacs.
The murder of the Duke of Burgundy.