#King charles of france series

The Treaty of Guérande in 1365, however, stated that in the absence of a male heir from the House of Montfort, the heirs of Joanna of Penthièvre would succeed.īy the time Anne was born, her father was the only male from the Breton House of Montfort, and the Blois-Penthièvre heir was a female, Nicole of Blois, who in 1480 sold her rights over Brittany to King Louis XI of France for the amount of 50,000 écus. In this period, the law of succession was unclear, but prior to the Breton War of Succession mainly operated according to semi-Salic Law i.e., women could inherit, but only if the male line had died out. Her father, François II, Duke of Brittany, was the last male of the House of Montfort.

#King charles of france series

January 9, 1514: Death of Anne, Duchess of Brittany, Twice Queen of FranceĪnne, Duchess of Brittany and Queen of FranceĪnne was raised in Nantes during a series of conflicts in which King Charles VIII of France sought to assert his suzerainty over Brittany. Since he had no male heir, he was succeeded by his second cousin once removed and brother-in-law at the time, Louis, Duke of Orléans, the son of Charles, Duke of Orléans, and Maria of Cleves from the Orléans cadet branch of the House of Valois. King Charles VIII died in 1498 after accidentally striking his head on the lintel of a door at the Château d’Amboise, his place of birth. A coalition formed against the French invasion of 1494–98 attempted to stop Charles’ army at Fornovo, but failed and Charles marched his army back to France. To secure his rights to the Neapolitan throne that René of Anjou had left to his father, Charles made a series of concessions to neighbouring monarchs and conquered the Italian peninsula without much opposition. Upon his marriage, Charles became administrator of Brittany and established a personal union that enabled France to avoid total encirclement by Habsburg territories. Preoccupied by the problematic succession in the Kingdom of Hungary, Maximilian failed to press his claim. Anne of Brittany was forced to renounce Maximilian (whom she had only married by proxy) and agreed to be married to Charles VIII instead.

The French army invaded Brittany, taking advantage of the preoccupation of Maximilian and his father, Emperor Friedrich III, with the disputed succession to Mathias Corvinus, King of Hungary. The regent Anne of France and her husband Peter refused to countenance such a marriage, however, since it would place Maximilian and his family, the Habsburgs, on two French borders. Anne, who feared for the independence of her duchy against the ambitions of France, arranged a marriage in 1490 between herself and the widower Maximilian. In 1488, however, François II, Duke of Brittany, died in a riding accident, leaving his 11-year-old daughter Anne as his heir.

Margaret brought the counties of Artois and Burgundy to France as her dowry, and she was raised in the French court as a prospective queen. The marriage was arranged by Louis XI, Maximilian, and the Estates of the Low Countries as part of the 1482 Peace of Arras between France and the Duchy of Burgundy. During Anne’s regency, the great lords rebelled against royal centralisation efforts in a conflict known as the Mad War (1485–1488), which resulted in a victory for the royal government.Ĭharles was betrothed on Jto the 3-year-old Archduchess Margaret of Austria, daughter of the Archduke Maximilian of Austria (later Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I) and Mary, Duchess of Burgundy. His elder sister Anne acted as regent jointly with her husband Pierre II, Duke of Bourbon until 1491 when the young king turned 21 years of age.

He succeeded his father Louis XI at the age of 13. His godparents were Charles II, Duke of Bourbon (the godchild’s namesake), Joan of Valois, Duchess of Bourbon, and the teenage Edward of Westminster, the son of Henry VI of England who had been living in France since the deposition of his father by Edward IV. She was one of 19 children, 14 of whom survived infancy. She was a daughter of Louis, Duke of Savoy and Anne of Cyprus. Charles VIII, called the Affable (J– April 7, 1498), was King of France from 1483 to his death in 1498.Ĭharles was born at the Château d’Amboise in France, the only surviving son of King Louis XI of France by his second wife Charlotte of Savoy.