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English claims to the French throne

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Prominent English claimants
Clockwise from upper left: Edward III, Henry V Henry VIII and Henry VI

From 1340 English kings, beginning with Edward III, claimed to be the rightful kings of France and fought the Hundred Years' War, in part, to enforce their claim. Although the war was lost by 1453, and several attempted invasions to claim the crown over the following seventy years failed, English and, later, British monarchs continued to call themselves King or Queen of France until 1802.

Edward's claim was based on being, through his mother, the nearest male relative of the last direct line Capetian king of France who died in 1328. The French magnates, however, chose Philip IV of the House of Valois, a cadet branch of the Capetians, over Edward, preferring a French rather than a foreign monarch. The justification was that he was a descendant of the Capetians through the male line. Although Edward's main concern was protecting his rights to the lands he held in France, he spent most of the rest of his life at war with Philip and his Valois successors, partly to pursue his unsuccessful claim to the throne. After Edward's death in 1377, the war petered out.

In 1415, Henry V's revived the claim and invaded France. Following his crushing defeat of the French at Agincourt, he succeeded in taking control of northern France and being declared heir of the Valois king Charles VI. Both kings died in 1422 and Henry's son Henry VI was crowned king of both countries, creating the so-called dual monarchy of England and France. However, a French revival resulted in the English being expelled from France by 1453, ending the Hundred Years' War and leaving Calais as the last remaining English possession. Although further unsuccessful invasions to claim the crown were attempted by Edward IV, Henry VII and, finally, by Henry VIII, by the time of the loss of Calais in 1558, the claim to the throne had become a wholly unrealistic objective. Monarchs of England and Great Britain nevertheless continued to include France in their titles, even in treaties with French kings, without controversy. however, following the French Revolution, the republican government of France objected to the practice and the title was abandoned finally in 1802.

Background

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French succession

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Main article: Succession to the French throne

From the election of Hugh Capet in 987, the French crown had passed from father to son until 1316, when Louis X died leaving only a daughter, Joan.[1] His wife was pregnant with a posthumous son, John, but he died five days after birth.[2] This created an unprecedented situation as the question of female succession to the crown had never before needed to be considered.[3] However, Louis's brother, Philip, acted quickly to set Joan aside and had himself crowned, becoming Philip V. He then called an assembly of the kingdom to ratify his accession, which met four weeks later and declared "a woman could not succeed to the crown of the kingdom of France."[4] In 1322, Philip V died leaving only daughters and, consistent with the 1316 assembly's declaration, they were set aside and his brother, Charles IV acceded to the throne.[1]

The exclusion of women from the succession was subsequently said to be based on the 5th century Salic law. It is now believed that it was not until much later that the justification of Salic law was deployed: it is thought to have been a theory put forward by the Valois kings' lawyers to fortify their masters' title with an additional aura of authenticity.[5] It appears to be a 1413 work of Jean de Montreuil that first highlighted Salic law as being important to the French succession.[6] Nevertheless, allusions to Salic law by Jacob of Ardizone [it] (1240) and Jean de Vignay (c. 1340) suggest that there may have been an earlier awareness of it.[7][8]

Anglo-French relations

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See also: Capetian–Plantagenet rivalry

Since the Norman Conquest English kings had held territories in France. Although these had once been extensive, particularly those held by the Angevin kings, leading to a lengthy conflict, by the early 14th century they had reduced to the Duchy of Gascony, also known as Aquitaine, as well as some other smaller territories. The lands were held as vassals of the French king for which the English king had to do him homage. The disparity between the feudal concept and the political realities of the relationship between two kings frequently led to tension and conflict.[9] The English kings sought to exercise full sovereignty over their French territories in the same way as they were used to doing in England. At the same time the kings of France were keen to retain their feudal rights in those territories.[10] Disputes over the political status of Gascony and the nature of the feudal relationship had led to a number of confrontations between the English and French kings.[11]

Hundred Years' War

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Main article: Hundred Years' War

Edward III's claim

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Arms of Edward III after 1340, with the French royal arms in the 1st and 4th quarters

The first English claim to the French throne was made by Edward III.[12] In 1328 Charles IV of France died without children.[1] The successions to the French throne in 1316 and 1322 had, by this time, set the clear precedent that a woman could not succeed to the crown.[13] Charles's closest male relative was Edward whose claim to the throne was through his mother, Isabella, Charles's sister. The English representatives in France attempted to press Edward's claim but attracted little support. The French magnates preferred Charles's next closest male relative, his cousin, Philip of Valois, a male line descendant of Charles's grandfather Philip III. The magnates did not want, among other objections, a foreign king, as they saw it, as their monarch, but used as a legal basis for their preference the argument that "the mother had no claim, so neither did the son", in the words of the chronicler of Saint-Denis.[14] Consequently, Philip acceded to the throne as Philip VI, the first of the Valois kings. Edward accepted Philip's accession and did him homage for the Duchy of Aquitaine (Gascony) in 1329.[13]

In 1337, a dispute arose between Philip and Edward regarding Edward's feudal obligations which resulted in Philip ordering the confiscation of Gascony and Edward declaring war on Philip in response.[11] Although fighting continued until peace was agreed in 1360,[15] in retrospect it was seen as the opening conflict of the Hundred Years' War that lasted to 1453.[11][16]

In 1340 Edward first publicly declared that he claimed the French throne.[17] A small number of documents sent by Edward in October 1337 to his allies in France had described him as "king of France and England" but otherwise he had consistently omitted France from his titles prior to 1340.[18] A formal declaration that he was the rightful king of France was made in his "Manifesto", issued in Ghent on 8 February 1340, probably to encourage Flemish support for his struggle against Philip by supposedly giving his supporters some legal protection.[17] (It provided them with the argument that they were not technically rebelling against the French crown.[19]) At the same time he quartered his arms—the arms of England—with the royal arms of France. In his Manifesto, Edward stated that his reign as king of France began in 1340 and that his entitlement was because he was "closer in blood" to Charles IV than Philip who had "intruded himself by force into the kingdom while we were yet of tender years".[20]

Edward continued to use the title during the war until peace was agreed at the Treaty of Brétigny in 1360, when he renounced all claims to the French throne in return for full sovereignty over Gascony.[10][21] He was also granted substantial additional lands in France.[22] Edward revived his claim in 1369 in response to the Valois king, Charles V, attempting to exercise feudal rights in Gascony. In retaliation, Charles sought to confiscate Gascony and the war resumed.[23] During the subsequent truce negotiations at the Conference of Bruges in 1375 and 1376 the English refused to renounce the claim to the French throne.[24] Edward died shortly afterwards in June 1377.[25] By this point, the French were successfully pushing the English back and by 1380 there was little left of Edward's extensive territories. The war petered out and a truce was signed in 1389.[26]

The modern consensus is that the throne of France was not the main objective of Edward's French policy.[27] His primary concern was preserving and extending his lands in Gascony and ensuring that he had full sovereignty over them.[28] The claim to the crown could be used as a negotiating tool to achieve that end, although, at various times, he may well have regarded securing the crown of France as a real possibility.[19]

Henry V and the Lancastrian dual monarchy

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See also: Dual monarchy of England and France
Coat of arms of the kings of England after 1405 with the French quarterings updated with the arms used by the French kings since 1376
Coat of arms of the dual monarchy of Henry VI

It was not until the accession of Henry V, the second Lancastrian king, in 1413 that Edward's claim to the French crown was revived and actively pursued once again.[29] Both of Edward's two immediate successors, his grandsons, Richard II and the first of the Lancastrian kings, Henry IV, followed a policy of pursuing peace with France, although, at the same time, they continued to use the style "king of France".[30][31] Under them, there was mostly a fragile truce between England and France, particularly from 1389, albeit with occasional intermittent fighting. The two kingdoms were more focussed on domestic issues.[26]

This changed with the accession of Henry IV's son, Henry V. Like his immediate predecessors he took the title of "king of France" when he came to the throne.[32] Then, in 1414, he formally demanded from the French the crown of France. He subsequently reduced his demands, first to restoration of what had been the Angevin territories in France and later to the lands ceded to Edward III by the Treaty of Brétigny. When none of these demands were met, he invaded France in 1415[33] to pursue Edward III's claim to the crown.[32][34] By 1420, Henry had inflicted an overwhelming defeat on the French at Agincourt, occupied Normandy and had forced on the French king, Charles VI, the Treaty of Troyes. This not only gave Henry control of Paris and most of northern France[35] but also made him heir to the French crown on Charles's death,[36] disinheriting Charles's son, also called Charles, the Dauphin.[37] Up until this point Henry had always referred to himself as king of France in all his interactions with the French. However, under the treaty, Henry instead took the title "heir (héritier) of France" in place of "king of France".[32]

For Henry V, successfully pursuing the claim to the French throne and establishing a Lancastrian "dual monarchy" of England and France became a key objective for securing the prestige and position of the new Lancastrian dynasty.[38] However, Henry's claim, prior to the Treaty of Troyes, had suffered from the disadvantage that the Lancastrians were arguably usurpers to the English throne. Applying the same genealogical principles that had given Edward III his claim would mean that, in fact, Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, rather than Henry, was the rightful English claimant to the French crown.[39] It was left deliberately ambiguous in the Treaty of Troyes whether the Lancastrian right to the French throne was by virtue of inheriting Edward III's claim or it was a new right specifically ceded by Charles VI as the incumbent king of France.[32]

In any event, when Henry and Charles VI both died in 1422, Henry's infant son Henry VI succeeded to both crowns in accordance with the treaty,[40] initiating the so-called "dual monarchy".[41] However, the Dauphin disputed his exclusion from the succession and, as Charles VII, was recognised as king in the areas outside of English control south of the Loire.[42] In practice, France was partitioned between the northern half under the dual monarchy and Charles VII's "kingdom of Bourges" in central and southern France.[37] The war continued and the English initially pushed the border further south, but the relief of Orléans in 1429 was a turning point. From the 1430s, Charles slowly drove the English northward, recovering Paris in 1436 and Normandy in 1450. By 1453, Gascony had been taken as well, leaving Calais and the Channel Islands as the last remaining English possessions,[43] but bringing the Hundred Years' War to an end.[16]

After the Hundred Years' War

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James I of England and VI of Scotland's coat of arms, France and England are quartered together which, in turn, are quartered by Scotland and Ireland
Removal of the French fleurs-de-lys from the coat of arms in 1801
George III coat of arms used from 1760 to 1801 as King of Great Britain, with the French fleurs-de-lys
George III coat of arms used from 1801 to 1816 as King of the United Kingdom

Henry VI continued to be styled King of France but, from 1453, it was a title without substance. All subsequent monarchs of England, and then Great Britain, continued to use the empty title (including in treaties with France[44]) until the reign of George III.[45]

In 1475, Henry VI's Yorkist successor, Edward IV, reasserted the claim to the French crown and launched an invasion of France to further it. He had made an alliance with the Duke of Burgundy, Charles the Bold, in which it was agreed that the country would be partitioned. Charles would be given full sovereignty over his domains, expanded to include Champagne, leaving the rest of the kingdom to Edward. However, Louis XI of France bought off Edward at the Treaty of Picquigny, with a large cash payment and the promise not to support his domestic enemies, and Edward withdrew.[46]

Henry VII, the first Tudor king, followed a similar path to Edward IV.[47] In 1489 Henry declared that he was claiming the French throne and invaded France from Calais in 1492 in alliance with the Breton opponents of Charles VIII of France. Henry withdrew when Charles agreed to pay him a large subsidy at the Treaty of Étaples.[48] By this time the claim was very much theoretical and primarily used for tactical purposes in negotiations with the French kings.[47]

Henry VII's son, Henry VIII, was the last English monarch to take the claim literally and to actively pursue it.[47] In the early part of his reign he repeatedly invaded France with the aim of claiming the crown and becoming the rightful king of France. In 1513, he even anticipated being crowned in Paris.[49] In all, he invaded France three times in the decade from 1513, even occupying Tournai for six years as king of France.[47] Henry treated Tournai not as an English conquest but part of his kingdom of France.[49] His last attempt to take the crown was an attack on Paris in 1523, which Stephen Gunn calls "in effect, the last campaign of the Hundred Years' War".[50] Once it became apparent that the hoped for support of the French people to his claim did not exist, Henry's interest in it diminished.[51] As early as 1520, Henry declared during the Field of the Cloth of Gold that it was "a title given to me which is good for nothing".[44] In 1544 he attempted a final invasion, but the objective was limited to the conquest and colonisation of the Boulonnais, as Henry had given up on any aspiration to claim the throne. During the campaign he seized Boulogne, the occupation of which was very different to the occupation of Tournai. Henry attached it, as a colony, to the kingdom of England rather than ruling it as a king of France.[52] Boulogne was evacuated in 1550[53] and in 1558, Calais, the last remaining English possession in mainland France, was lost as well.[44]

The title nevertheless continued to be used by English and British monarchs for the next 250 years with little impact on relations between the two countries. In the immediate aftermath of the Hundred Years' War it had been a cause of diplomatic strain with France. Louis XI, in particular, was fixated with it, and commissioned a book rebutting the claim which was reprinted several times up to the mid-16th century. Once it became apparent it was an unrealistic irrelevance, the English lost interest and the French ignored the title, even though it was used by the English in diplomatic interactions.[44]

This continued to be the position until the French Revolution and the subsequent revolutionary wars. In peace negotiations between Britain and France in 1797, the French strongly objected to the use of the title on the grounds that France had become a republic.[44] The title was finally abandoned as a result of the Treaty of Amiens of 1802,[54] although the French quartering in the royal coat of arms had already been removed in 1801 and "king of France" did not appear as a title in the Act of Union, 1801.[55]

References

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  1. ^ a b c Arnold-Baker 2015, p. 1107.
  2. ^ Hallam 2014, p. 323.
  3. ^ Bartlett 2020, p. 146.
  4. ^ Bartlett 2020, p. 147.
  5. ^ Taylor 2001a, pp. 358–77.
  6. ^ Bartlett 2020, p. 148.
  7. ^ Nassiet & Giesey 2011, pp. 163–65.
  8. ^ Ghislain 2023, p. 6.
  9. ^ Green 2023, pp. 20-21.
  10. ^ a b Saul 2008, p. 210.
  11. ^ a b c Green 2023, pp. 24-26.
  12. ^ Delogu 2008, p. 234.
  13. ^ a b Keen 2004, p. 88.
  14. ^ Sumption 1999, pp. 106–107.
  15. ^ Wagner 2001, p. 126.
  16. ^ a b Wagner 2001, pp. 126–127.
  17. ^ a b Green 2023, p. 28.
  18. ^ Ormrod 2012, Appendix I, p.1.
  19. ^ a b Morillo 2017, p. 723.
  20. ^ Green 2023, pp. 28-29.
  21. ^ Prestwich 2005, p. 326.
  22. ^ Sumption 2011, p. 447.
  23. ^ Thomson 2014, p. 1.
  24. ^ Ormrod 2012, pp. 160-162.
  25. ^ Ormrod 2012, ch. 21, p.1.
  26. ^ a b Neillands 2001, p. 173.
  27. ^ Green 2023, p. 22.
  28. ^ Taylor 2001b, p. 168.
  29. ^ Gillespie 2017, p. 347.
  30. ^ Given-Wilson 2016, p. 528.
  31. ^ Saul 2008, p. 212.
  32. ^ a b c d Curry 2017, pp. 32-33.
  33. ^ Allmand 1988, pp. 27–28.
  34. ^ Allmand 2014, p. 115.
  35. ^ Green 2013, p. 238.
  36. ^ Wagner 2001, p. 127.
  37. ^ a b Green 2014, p. 18.
  38. ^ Harris 1994, p. 3.
  39. ^ Mortimer 2014, pp. 27-28.
  40. ^ Curry 2017, pp. 32, 35.
  41. ^ Griffiths 1981, p. 2.
  42. ^ Wolffe 2001, pp. 26–27.
  43. ^ Hay 2016, pp. 160–161.
  44. ^ a b c d e Sumption 2023, p. 592.
  45. ^ Panton 2023, p. 203.
  46. ^ Sumption 2023, pp. 588-589.
  47. ^ a b c d Sumption 2023, p. 590.
  48. ^ Bucholz & Key 2019, p. 46.
  49. ^ a b Murphy 2019, p. 9.
  50. ^ Gunn 1986, p. 629.
  51. ^ Murphy 2019, pp. 9–10.
  52. ^ Murphy 2019, p. 10.
  53. ^ Murphy 2019, p. 15.
  54. ^ Hay 2016, p. 157.
  55. ^ Morieux 2016, p. 111 footnote 9.

Bibliography

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