August 16, 1682: Birth of Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Burgundy & Dauphin of France

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Dauphin of France, Duke of Burgundy, House of Bourbon, Louis de Bourbon, Louis the Grand Dauphin, Louis XIV of France and Navarre, Louis XV of France and Navarre, Philippe II Duke of Orleans

Louis, Duke of Burgundy (August 16, 1682 – February 18, 1712), was the eldest son of Louis, Grand Dauphin, and Dauphine Maria Anna and grandson of the reigning King Louis XIV of France. He was known as the “Petit Dauphin” to distinguish him from his father, who died in April 1711, when the former became the official Dauphin of France. He never reigned, as he died in 1712 while his grandfather was still on the throne. Upon the death of Louis XIV in 1715, the Duke of Burgundy’s son became Louis XV.

Louis was born in the Palace of Versailles in 1682, the eldest son of the French Dauphin, Louis, who would later be called le Grand Dauphin, and his wife, Maria Anna Victoria of Bavaria, the eldest daughter of Ferdinand Maria, Elector of Bavaria and his wife Princess Henriette Adelaide of Savoy.

Her maternal grandparents were Victor Amadeus I, Duke of Savoy and Christine Marie de Bourbon of France, the second daughter of Henri IV of France and Marie de’ Medici, thus her husband the dauphin was her second cousin.

His father was the eldest son of the reigning king, Louis XIV and his wife Queen Maria Theresa of Spain born an Infanta of Spain and Portugal at the Royal Monastery of El Escorial, she was the daughter of Felipe IV-III of Spain and Portugal and his wife Elisabeth de Bourbon of France daughter of Henri IV of France and Marie de’ Medici.

Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Burgundy & Dauphin of France

At birth, Prince Louis received the title of Duke of Burgundy (duc de Bourgogne). In addition, as the son of the Dauphin and grandson to the king, he was a fils de France and also second in the line of succession to his grandfather, Louis XIV, after his father.

Louis grew up with his younger brothers: Philippe, Duke of Anjou, who became King Felipe V of Spain; and Charles, Duke of Berry, under the supervision of the royal governess Louise de Prie. He lost his mother when he was eight. His father, viewed as lazy and dull, never played a major role in politics.

Marriage

At the age of 15, he was married to his second cousin, Princess Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy, the daughter of Victor Amadeus II, Duke of Savoy and Anne Marie d’Orléans. She was the daughter of Philippe I, Duke of Orléans, younger brother of Louis XIV, and Henrietta of England, the youngest daughter of Charles I of England, who was the daughter of Henri IV of France and his wife Maria de Medici.

This match had been decided as part of the Treaty of Turin, which ended Franco-Savoyard conflicts during the Nine Years’ War. The wedding took place on December 7, 1697 at the Palace of Versailles.

Military career and politics

In 1702, at the age of 20, Louis was admitted by his grandfather King Louis XIV to the Conseil d’en haut (High Council), which was in charge of state secrets regarding religion, diplomacy and war. His father had been admitted only at the age of 30.

In 1708, during the War of the Spanish Succession, Louis was given command of the army in Flanders, with the experienced soldier Louis Joseph, Duke of Vendôme, serving under him. The uncertainty as to which of the two should truly command the army led to delays and the need to refer decisions to Louis XIV.

Continued indecision led to French inactivity as messages travelled between the front and Versailles; the Allies were then able to take the initiative. The culmination of this was the Battle of Oudenarde, where Louis’s mistaken choices and reluctance to support Vendôme led to a decisive defeat for the French.

In the aftermath of the defeat, his hesitation to relieve the Siege of Lille led to the loss of the city and thereby allowed the Allies to make their first incursions onto French soil.

Louis was influenced by the dévots and was surrounded by a circle of people known as the faction de Bourgogne, notably including his old tutor François Fénelon, his old governor Paul de Beauvilliers, Duke of Saint-Aignan and his brother-in-law Charles Honoré d’Albert, Duke of Chevreuse, as well as the renowned memorialist, Louis de Rouvroy, Duke of Saint-Simon.

These high-ranking aristocrats sought a return to a monarchy less absolute and less centralised, with more powers granted to the individual provinces. Their view was that government should work through councils and intermediary organs between the king and the people.

These intermediary councils were to be made up not by commoners from the bourgeoisie (like the ministers appointed by Louis XIV) but by aristocrats who perceived themselves as the representatives of the people and would assist the king in governance and the exercise of power. Had Louis succeeded to the throne, he might have applied this concept of monarchy.

Death and legacy

Louis became Dauphin of France upon the death of his father in 1711. In February 1712, his wife contracted measles and died on February 12. Louis himself, who dearly loved his wife and who had stayed by her side throughout the fatal illness, caught the disease and died six days after her at the Château de Marly on February 18 aged 29. Both of his sons also became infected.

The elder son of Louis, Duke of Burgundy, Louis, Duke of Brittany, the latest in a series of Dauphins, succumbed on March 8, leaving his brother, the two-year-old Duke of Anjou, who was later to succeed to the throne as Louis XV.

As it was thought that the chances of survival of this frail child, now heir apparent to his seventy-three-year-old great grandfather, were minimal, a potential succession crisis loomed.

Moreover, overnight the broad hopes and squabbling of the aristocrats caused this system to fail, and it was soon abandoned in 1718 in favour of a return to absolute monarchy.

December 20, 1765: Death of Louis de Bourbon, Dauphin of France

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Dauphin of France, Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain, Louis de Bourbon, Louis XV of France and Navarre, Louis XVI of France and Navarre, Louis-Auguste, Maria Josepha of Saxony, Marie Leszczyńska of Poland, War of the Austrian Succession

Louis, Dauphin of France (Louis Ferdinand; September 4, 1729 – December 20, 1765) was the elder and only surviving son of King Louis XV of France and Navarre and his wife, Queen Marie Leszczyńska. Queen Marie Leszczyńska was was the second daughter of King Stanislaus I Leszczyński of Poland and his wife, Catherine Opalińska.

As a son of the king, Louis was a fils de France. As heir apparent, he became Dauphin of France. However, he died before he could ascend the throne. Three of his sons became kings of France: Louis XVI (reign in 1774–1792), Louis XVIII (1814–1815, again in 1815–1824) and Charles X (1824–1830).

Louis, Dauphin of France is also the grandfather of Princess Marie-Thérèse de Bourbon who is another French royal I am featuring on the blog.

Louis’s birth secured the throne and his mother’s position at court, which previously had been precarious due to her giving birth to three daughters in a row before the birth of the Dauphin. He had a younger brother, Philippe, who died as a toddler.

Louis was baptised privately and without a name by Cardinal Armand de Rohan. On April 27, 1737 when he was seven years old the public ceremony of the other baptismal rites took place. It was at this point that he was given the names Louis Ferdinand. His godparents were his cousin Louis, Duke of Orléans and his great-grandaunt the Dowager Duchess of Bourbon.

From an early age Louis took a great interest in the military arts. He was bitterly disappointed when his father would not permit him to join the 1744 campaign in the War of the Austrian Succession. When his father became deathly ill with fever at Metz, Louis disobeyed orders and went to his bedside. This rash action, which could have resulted in the deaths of both Louis and his father, resulted in a permanent change in the relations between father and son. Until then, Louis XV had doted on his son, but now the relationship was more distant. He was very close to his three older sisters.

First marriage

In 1744 Louis XV negotiated a marriage between his fifteen-year-old son and the nineteen-year-old Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain, daughter of King Felipe V and his Italian wife, Elisabeth Farnese, and first cousin of Louis XV. The marriage contract was signed December 13, 1744; the marriage was celebrated by proxy at Madrid December 18, 1744 and in person at Versailles February 23, 1745.

Louis and Maria Teresa Rafaela were well-matched and had a real affection for each other. They had one daughter, Princess Marie Thérèse of France (July 19, 1746 – April 27, 1748). Three days after the birth of their daughter, Louis’s wife, Maria Teresa Rafaela, died on July 22, 1746. Louis was only 16 years old. He grieved intensely at the loss of his wife, but his responsibility to provide for the succession to the French crown required he marry again quickly.

In 1746, Louis received the Order of the Golden Fleece from his father-in-law, King Felipe V of Spain.

Second marriage

On January 10, 1747, Louis was married by proxy at Dresden to Maria Josepha of Saxony, the 15-year-old younger daughter of Friedrich August II, Prince-Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, and his wife Archduchess Maria Josepha of Austria, the eldest child of Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor and Princess Wilhelmina Amalia of Brunswick-Lüneburg.

A second marriage ceremony took place in person at Versailles on February 9, 1747.

Personality

Louis was well-educated: a studious man, cultivated, and a lover of music, he preferred the pleasures of conversation to those of hunting, balls, or spectacles. With a keen sense of morality, he was very much committed to his wife, Marie-Josèphe, as she was to him.

Very devout, he was a fervent supporter of the Jesuits, like his mother and sisters, and was led by them to have a devotion to the Sacred Heart. He appeared in the eyes of his sisters as the ideal of the Christian prince, in sharp contrast with their father, who was a notorious womanizer.

Later life and death

Kept away from government affairs by his father, Louis was at the center of the Dévots, a group of religiously-minded men who hoped to gain power when he succeeded to the throne.

Louis died of tuberculosis at Fontainebleau in 1765 at the age of 36, while his father was still alive, so he never became king of France. His mother, Queen Marie Leszczyńska, and his maternal grandfather, the former king of Poland, Stanislaus I Leszczyński, Duke of Lorraine, also survived him. His eldest surviving son, Louis-Auguste, duc de Berry, became the new dauphin, ascending the throne as Louis XVI at the death of Louis XV, in May 1774.

Louis was buried in the Cathedral of Saint-Étienne in Sens at the Monument to the Dauphin of France & Marie-Josephe of Saxony, designed and executed by Guillaume Coustou, the Younger. His heart was buried at Saint Denis Basilica.

October 21, 1369: Death of Charles VI, King of France. Part II.

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Charles the Mad, Dauphin of France, Duke of Burgundy, Expulsion of the Jews, House of Valois, Joan of Arc, King Charles VI of France, King Charles VII of France, King Henry V of England, King Henry VI of England, King of France, Philip the Bold

Expulsion of the Jews, 1394

On September 17, 1394, Charles suddenly published an ordinance in which he declared, in substance, that for a long time he had been taking note of the many complaints provoked by the excesses and misdemeanors of the Jews against Christians, and that the prosecutors had made several investigations and discovered that the Jews broke the agreement with the king on many occasions.

Therefore, he decreed, as an irrevocable law and statute, that no Jew should dwell in his domains (Ordonnances, vii. 675). According to the Religieux de St. Denis, the king signed this decree at the insistence of the queen (“Chron. de Charles VI.” ii. 119). The decree was not immediately enforced, a respite being granted to the Jews in order that they have enough time to sell their property and pay their debts.

Those indebted to them were enjoined to redeem their obligations within a set time; otherwise their pledges held in pawn were to be sold by the Jews. The provost was to escort the Jews to the frontier of the kingdom. Subsequently, the king released Christians from their debts.

Struggles for power

With Charles VI mentally ill, from 1393 his wife Isabeau presided over a regency counsel, on which sat the grandees of the kingdom. Philippe II the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, who acted as regent during the king’s minority (from 1380 to 1388), was a great influence on the queen (he had organized the royal marriage during his regency). Influence progressively shifted to Louis I, Duke of Orléans, the king’s brother, another contender for power, and it was suspected, the queen’s lover.

Charles VI’s other uncles were less influential during the regency: Louis II of Naples was still engaged managing the Kingdom of Naples, and John, Duke of Berry, served as a mediator between the Orléans party (what would become the Armagnacs) and the Burgundy party (Bourguignons). The rivalry would increase bit by bit and in the end result in outright civil war.

The new regents dismissed the various advisers and officials Charles had appointed. On the death of Philip the Bold in April 1404, his son John the Fearless took over the political aims of his father, and the feud with Louis escalated. John, who was less linked to Isabeau, again lost influence at court.

Wars with Burgundy and England

In 1407, Louis of Orléans was murdered in the rue Vieille du Temple in Paris. John did not deny responsibility, claiming that Louis was a tyrant who squandered money. Louis’ son Charles, the new Duke of Orléans, turned to his father-in-law, Bernard VII, Count of Armagnac, for support against Jean the Fearless. This resulted in the Armagnac-Burgundian Civil War, which lasted from 1407 until 1435, beyond Charles’ reign, though the war with the English was still in progress.

With the English taking over much of the country, Jean the Fearless sought to end the feud with the royal family by negotiating with the Dauphin Charles, the king’s heir. They met at the bridge at Montereau on September 10, 1419, but during the meeting, Jean the Fearless killed by Tanneguy du Chastel, a follower of the Dauphin. Jean’s successor, Philippe II the Good, the new Duke of Burgundy, threw in his lot with the English.

English invasion and death

Charles VI’s reign was marked by the continuing conflict with the English, known as the Hundred Years’ War. An early attempt at peace occurred in 1396 when Charles’ daughter, the almost seven-year-old Isabella of Valois, married the 29-year-old Richard II of England. By 1415, however, the feud between the French royal family and the House of Burgundy led to chaos and anarchy throughout France, a situation that Henry V of England was eager to take advantage of. Henry led an invasion that culminated in the defeat of the French army at the Battle of Agincourt in October.

In May 1420, Henry V and Charles VI signed the Treaty of Troyes, which named Henry as Charles’ successor, and stipulated that Henry’s heirs would succeed him on the throne of France. It disinherited the Dauphin Charles, then only 17 years old. (In 1421, it was implied in Burgundian propaganda that the young Charles was illegitimate.) The treaty also betrothed Charles VI’s daughter, Catherine of Valois, to Henry. Disinheriting the Dauphin in favor of Henry was a blatant act against the interests of the French aristocracy, supported by the Duke of Burgundy.

The Dauphin who had declared himself regent for his father when the Duke of Burgundy invaded Paris and captured the king, had established a court at Bourges.

Charles VI died on October 21, 1422 in Paris, at the Hôtel Saint-Pol. He was interred in Saint Denis Basilica, where his wife Isabeau of Bavaria would join him after her death in September 1435.

Henry V of England died just a few weeks before him, in August 1422, leaving an infant son, who became King Henry VI of England. Therefore, according to the Treaty of Troyes, with the death of Charles VI, little Henry became King of France. His coronation as such was in Paris (held by the English since 1418) at the cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris on December 26, 1431.

The son disinherited by Charles VI, the Dauphin Charles, continued to fight to regain his kingdom. In 1429 Joan of Arc arrived on the scene. She led his forces to victory against the English, and took him to be crowned in Reims Cathedral as King Charles VII of France on July 17, 1429. He became known as “Charles the Victorious” and was able to restore the French line to the throne of France by defeating the English in 1450.

May 14, 1643: Death of Louis XIII, King of France and Navarre. Part II.

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Anne of Austria, Dauphin of France, Felipe III of Spain, King Henry IV of France and Navarre, King Louis XIII of France and Navarre, King Louis XIV of France and Navarre, Louis XIV, Louis-Dieudonné, The Man in the Iron Mask, Voltaire

From the Emperor’s Desk: we left off with the marriage of Louis XIII and Archduchess Anne of Austria, Infanta of Spain.

Louis XIII, King of France and Navarre

On November 24, 1615, Louis XIII married Archduchess Anne of Austria, daughter of Felipe III of Spain, his wife Margaret of Austria, the daughter of Archduke Charles II of Austria and Maria-Anna of Bavaria and thus the paternal granddaughter of the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I.

Voltaire claimed in the second edition of Questions sur l’Encyclopédie that Louis XIII had an illegitimate son, before Louis XIV; adding he was jailed and his face hidden beneath an iron mask or velvet mask depending on the source.

Anne of Austria widow, by Charles de Steuben, Versailles. She never lost her love for magnificent jewellery, and she especially loved bracelets, which emphasized her famously beautiful hands

Sexuality

There is no evidence that Louis kept mistresses (a distinction that earned him the title “Louis the Chaste”), but several reports suggest that he may have been homosexual. The prolonged temporal gap between the queen’s pregnancies may have been a result of Louis XIII’s aversion to heterosexuality, a matter of great political consequence, since it took the couple more than 20 years of marriage before Louis XIV’s birth.

His interests as a teenager were focused on male courtiers and he developed an intense emotional attachment to his favourite, Charles d’Albert, although some say there is no clear evidence of a physical sexual relationship. Gédéon Tallemant des Réaux, drawing from rumours told to him by a critic of the King (the Marquise de Rambouillet), explicitly speculated in his Historiettes about what happened in the king’s bed.

Louis XIII as a Warrior King

A further liaison with an equerry, François de Baradas, ended when the latter lost favour fighting a duel after duelling had been forbidden by royal decree.

Louis was also captivated by Henri Coiffier de Ruzé, Marquis of Cinq-Mars, who was later executed for conspiring with the Spanish enemy in time of war. Tallemant described how on a royal journey, the King “sent M. le Grand [de Cinq-Mars] to undress, who returned, adorned like a bride. ‘To bed, to bed’ he said to him impatiently… and the mignon was not in before the king was already kissing his hands.”

Death

Louis XIII died in Paris on May 14, 1643, the 33rd anniversary of his father’s death, Henri IV. According to his biographer A. Lloyd Moote,

“his intestines were inflamed and ulcerated, making digestion virtually impossible; tuberculosis had spread to his lungs, accompanied by habitual cough. Either of these major ailments, or the accumulation of minor problems, may have killed him, not to mention physiological weaknesses that made him prone to disease or his doctors’ remedies of enemas and bleedings, which continued right to his death.”

With Louis XIII dead, the five year old HRH Prince Louis-Dieudonné de Bourbon, Dauphin of France becomes King Louis XIV of France and Navarre. Queen Anne had her husband’s will annulled by the Parlement de Paris (a judicial body comprising mostly nobles and high clergymen).

Young HRH Prince Louis-Dieudonné de Bourbon, Dauphin of France

This action abolished the regency council and made Anne sole Regent of France. Anne exiled some of her husband’s ministers (Chavigny, Bouthilier), and she nominated Brienne as her minister of foreign affairs.

Known as Louis the Great (Louis le Grand) or the Sun King (le Roi Soleil), Louis XIV was King of France and Navarre from May 14 1643 until his death in September 1, 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the longest recorded of any monarch of a sovereign country in European history. In the age of absolutism in Europe, Louis XIV’s France was a leader in the growing centralisation of power.

April 19, 1770: By Proxy marriage of Louis-Auguste, Dauphin of France and Archduchess Marie Antoinette of Austria.

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Affair of the Diamond Necklace, Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria, Dauphin of France, Dauphine of France, French Revolution, King Louis XV of France, King Louis XVI of France, King of the French, Louise-Auguste, Marie Antoinette, Queen of the French

Marie Antoinette of Austria was born Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna of Austria (November 2, 1755 – October 16, 1793) she was the last Queen of France before the French Revolution. She was born an Archduchess of Austria and was the penultimate child and youngest daughter of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa, Queen of Hungry, Bohemia and Archduchess of Austria and her husband Franz I, Holy Roman Emperor and Duke of Lorraine. Prior to her marriage she was known as Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria.

Maria Antonia was raised together with her sister, Maria Carolina, who was three years older, and with whom she had a lifelong close relationship. Maria Antonia had a difficult but ultimately loving relationship with her mother, who referred to her as “the little Madame Antoine”.

Under the teaching of Christoph Willibald Gluck, Maria Antonia developed into a good musician. She learned to play the harp, the harpsichord and the flute. She sang during the family’s evening gatherings, as she had a beautiful voice. She also excelled at dancing, had “exquisite” poise, and loved dolls.

Despite the private tutoring she received, the results of her schooling were less than satisfactory. At the age of 10 she could not write correctly in German or in any language commonly used at court, such as French or Italian, and conversations with her were stilted.

Following the Seven Years’ War and the Diplomatic Revolution of 1756, Empress Maria Theresa decided to end hostilities with her longtime enemy, King Louis XV of France. Their common desire to destroy the ambitions of Prussia and Great Britain and to secure a definitive peace between their respective countries led them to seal their alliance with a marriage. On February 7, 1770, Louis XV formally requested the hand of Maria Antonia for his eldest surviving grandson and heir, Louis-Auguste, duc de Berry and Dauphin of France.

Louis-Auguste de France, (August 23, 1754 – January 21, 1793) who was given the title Duc de Berry at birth, was born in the Palace of Versailles. One of seven children, he was the second surviving son of Louis, the Dauphin of France, (1729-1765) and the grandson of Louis XV of France (1710-1774) and of his consort, Maria Leszczyńska. His mother was Marie-Josèphe of Saxony, the daughter of Friedrich-August II, Prince-Elector of Saxony and King of Poland.

Louis-Auguste was overlooked by his parents who favored his older brother, Louis, duc de Bourgogne, who was regarded as bright and handsome but who died at the age of nine in 1761. Louis-Auguste, a strong and healthy boy but very shy, excelled in his studies and had a strong taste for Latin, history, geography, and astronomy and became fluent in Italian and English.

He enjoyed physical activities such as hunting with his grandfather and rough play with his younger brothers, Louis-Stanislas, comte de Provence, and Charles-Philippe, comte d’Artois. From an early age, Louis-Auguste was encouraged in another of his interests, locksmithing, which was seen as a useful pursuit for a child.

Maria Antonia formally renounced her rights to Habsburg domains, and on April 19, 1770 she was married by proxy to the Dauphin of France at the Augustinian Church in Vienna, with her brother Archduke Ferdinand standing in for the Dauphin.

On May 14, Maria Antonia at the age of 14 met her husband at the edge of the forest of Compiègne. Louis-August’s was aged 16. Upon her arrival in France, she adopted the French version of her name: Marie Antoinette. A further ceremonial wedding took place on May 16, 1770 in the Palace of Versailles and, after the festivities, the day ended with the ritual bedding. The couple’s longtime failure to consummate the marriage plagued the reputations of both Louis-Auguste and Marie Antoinette for the next seven years.

The initial reaction to the marriage between Marie Antoinette and Louis-Auguste was mixed. On the one hand, the Dauphine was beautiful, personable and well-liked by the common people. Her first official appearance in Paris on June 8, 1773 was a resounding success. On the other hand, those opposed to the alliance with Austria had a difficult relationship with Marie Antoinette, as did others who disliked her for more personal or petty reasons.

After eight years of marriage, Marie Antoinette gave birth to Marie Thérèse, the first of her four children. A growing percentage of the population came to dislike her, with the French libelles accusing her of being profligate, promiscuous, harboring sympathies for France’s perceived enemies—particularly her native Austria—and her children of being illegitimate. The false accusations of the Affair of the Diamond Necklace damaged her reputation further. During the Revolution, she became known as Madame Déficit because the country’s financial crisis was blamed on her lavish spending and her opposition to the social and financial reforms of Turgot and Necker.

On May 10, 1774, her husband ascended the throne as King Louis XVI of France and Navarre and Marie Antoinette assumed the title Queen of France and Navarre, which she held until September 1791, when she became Queen of the French, as the French Revolution proceeded, a title that she held until 21 September 21, 1792 when the monarchy was abolished.

Several events were linked to Marie Antoinette during the Revolution after the government had placed the royal family under house arrest in the Tuileries Palace in October 1789. The June 1791 attempted flight to Varennes and her role in the War of the First Coalition had disastrous effects on French popular opinion.

On August 10, 1792, the attack on the Tuileries forced the royal family to take refuge at the Assembly, and they were imprisoned in the Temple Prison on 13 August. On September 21, 1792, the monarchy was abolished. Louis XVI was executed on January 21, 1793. Marie Antoinette’s trial began on October 14, 1793, and two days later she was convicted by the Revolutionary Tribunal of high treason and executed by guillotine on the Place de la Révolution.

February 22, 1403: Birth of King Charles VII of France

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Agnès Sorel, Dauphin of France, Isabeau of Bavaria-Ingolstadt, Joan of Arc, King Charles VI of France, King Charles VIII of France, King Henry VI of England, Kings of france, Maid of Orléans, Marie of Anjou

Charles VII (February 22, 1403 – July 22, 1461), called the Victorious or the Well-Served was King of France from October 21, 1422 to his death on July 22, 1461.

Charles VII was born at the Hôtel Saint-Pol, the royal residence in Paris, the eleventh child and fifth son of Charles VI of France and Isabeau of Bavaria-Ingolstadt, the eldest daughter of Duke Stephen III of Bavaria-Ingolstadt and Taddea Visconti of Milan. Charles was given the title of comte de Ponthieu at his birth in 1403. His four elder brothers, Charles (1386), Charles (1392–1401), Louis (1397–1415) and Jean (1398–1417) had each held the title of Dauphin of France (heir to the French Throne) in turn. All died childless, leaving Charles with a rich inheritance of titles.

Charles VII inherited the throne of France in the midst of the Hundred Years’ War, under desperate circumstances. Forces of the Kingdom of England and the Duke of Burgundy occupied Guyenne and northern France, including Paris, the most populous city, and Reims, the city in which the French kings were traditionally crowned. In addition, his father Charles VI had disinherited him in 1420 and recognized Henry V of England and his heirs as the legitimate successors to the French crown instead. At the same time, a civil war raged in France between the Armagnacs (supporters of the House of Valois) and the Burgundian party (supporters of the House of Valois-Burgundy allied to the English).

Marie of Anjou

On December 18, 1422, Charles married his second cousin Marie of Anjou the eldest daughter of Duke Louis II of Anjou, claimant to the throne of Naples, and Yolande of Aragon, claimant to the throne of Aragon. They were both great-grandchildren of King Jean II of France and his first wife Bonne of Bohemia through the male line. They had fourteen children. But whatever affection he may have had for his wife, or whatever gratitude he may have felt for the support of her family, the great love of Charles VII’s life was his mistress, Agnès Sorel.

Political conditions in France took a decisive turn in the year 1429 just as the prospects for the Dauphin began to look hopeless. The town of Orléans had been under siege since October 1428. The English regent, the Duke of Bedford (the uncle of Henry VI), was advancing into the Duchy of Bar, ruled by Charles’s brother-in-law, René. The French lords and soldiers loyal to Charles were becoming increasingly desperate. Then in the little village of Domrémy, on the border of Lorraine and Champagne, a teenage girl named Joan of Arc (French: Jeanne d’Arc), demanded that the garrison commander at Vaucouleurs, Robert de Baudricourt, collect the soldiers and resources necessary to bring her to the Dauphin at Chinon, stating that visions of angels and saints had given her a divine mission. Granted an escort of five veteran soldiers and a letter of referral to Charles by Lord Baudricourt, Joan rode to see Charles at Chinon. She arrived on February 23, 1429.

Joan of Arc

What followed would become famous. When Joan appeared at Chinon, Charles wanted to test her claim to be able to recognise him despite never having seen him, and so he disguised himself as one of his courtiers. He stood in their midst when Joan entered the chamber in which the court was assembled. Joan identified Charles immediately. She bowed low to him and embraced his knees, declaring “God give you a happy life, sweet King!” Despite attempts to claim that another man was in fact the king, Charles was eventually forced to admit that he was indeed such. Thereafter Joan referred to him as “Dauphin” or “Noble Dauphin” until he was crowned in Reims four months later. After a private conversation between the two (Charles later stated that Joan knew secrets about him that he had voiced only in silent prayer to God), Charles became inspired and filled with confidence.

Joan of Arc at the coronation of Charles VII with her white flag

After her encounter with Charles in March 1429, Joan of Arc set out to lead the French forces at Orléans. She was aided by skilled commanders such as Étienne de Vignolles, known as La Hire, and Jean Poton de Xaintrailles. They compelled the English to lift the siege on May 8, 1429, thus turning the tide of the war. The French won the Battle of Patay on June 18, at which the English field army lost about half its troops. After pushing further into English and Burgundian-controlled territory, Charles was crowned King Charles VII of France in Reims Cathedral on July 17, 1429.

Joan was later captured by Burgundian troops under John of Luxembourg at the siege of Compiègne on May 24, 1430. The Burgundians handed her over to their English allies. Tried for heresy by a court composed of pro-English clergy such as Pierre Cauchon, who had long served the English occupation government, she was burned at the stake on May 30, 1431.