Bonne de Luxembourg, first wife of King Jean II the Good (le Bon), was born on the 20th of May 1315. She was the second daughter of John the Blind, King of Bohemia, and his first spouse, Elisabeth of Bohemia. When the baby girl first saw the world, she was...
King Jean II of France: family background, personality, and actions
King Jean II of France known as the Good (le Bon) was born on the 16th of April 1319 at Château du Gué-de-Maulny near Le Mans, in France. Given the horrendous troubles his reign brought to France, I think that he should be known not as the Good, but as...
A heroic death of John the Blind, King of Bohemia, at the Battle of Crécy
John (or Jean) the Blind, Count of Luxembourg from 1313 and King of Bohemia from 1310, heroically fell in the Battle of Crécy at the age of 50. He commanded the left wing of the French forces together with Count Jean d’Aumale, Count Guy de Saint-Pol, and Jean de Hainault....
The Battle of Crécy: in the Footsteps of Edward III of England and Philippe VI of France
The Hundred Years’ War… Doesn’t this sound daunting? Frightening for everyone, indeed. It lasted more than 100 years and was one of the most bloodthirsty and longest military conflicts in history. Jean Froissart (a French-speaking medieval author from the Low Countries) became the most famed chronicler of this war, and...
End of the Capets: the beginning of the Valois royal dynasty
On the 29 May 1328, King Philippe VI of France, once simply Count de Valois, was crowned at Reims Cathedral. The nearest male relative to the last Capetian monarch, Charles IV of France known as the Fair (le Bel), Philippe inherited the throne because of the direct male line of...