[2] A scion of the Capetian House of Valois,[3] he was the eldest of the five children of Count Charles II of Alençon and María de la Cerda.
[5] Charles II was killed on 26 August 1346 in the Battle of Crécy during France's Hundred Years' War against the English.
The armed bands of King Charles II of Navarre, who ruled the neighbouring County of Évreux, also pillaged the young count's lands.
[7] In 1361, Charles renounced his counties[7] and became a Dominican friar, choosing Couvent des Jacobins de la rue Saint-Jacques in Paris.
When the royal official, Archimbaud de Combort, tried to deprive him of his temporal power in 1372, Charles responded furiously with an interdict.