Each son became king in turn, but each died young without surviving male heirs, leaving only daughters who could not inherit the throne.

Because diplomacy and negotiation had failed, Edward III would have to back his claims with force to obtain the French throne.

Though England ultimately failed to win that prolonged conflict, English and British monarchs until 1801 continued to maintain, at least formally, a claim to the French throne.

Edward III's aggression against Scotland, a French ally, prompted Philip VI to confiscate Guyenne.

He was menaced by Charles II of Navarre, of the Évreux branch of the Capetian family, who aspired to the French throne by the right of his mother, the senior descendant of Philip IV of France.

Charles' character eventually alienated both the French and English monarchs, because he readily switched sides whenever it suited his interest.

In the Treaty of Brétigny, the English king gained an enlarged Aquitaine in full sovereignty, gave up the duchy of Touraine, the counties of Anjou and Maine, the suzerainty of Brittany and of Flanders, and his claim to the French throne.

The Black Prince tried to recover his losses by raising taxes in Aquitaine, which prompted them to appeal to the King of France.

The ancient, great families of the feudal nobility had largely been replaced by an equally powerful class – the princes of the royal blood.

Anjou pursued his claim in the Kingdom of Naples; Berry governed his large estates in Languedoc; and Burgundy, having married the heiress of Flanders, found it more convenient to rule his vast dominions from Paris.

His early reign was promising, but the onset of madness, which he may have inherited from the Bourbon dukes through his mother, would prove to be disastrous for France.

In the Treaty of Troyes, Henry V of England became regent of France and heir to that throne; he also married Catherine of Valois, the French king's daughter.

In 1429, Joan of Arc successfully raised the siege of Orléans and had the king crowned at Reims, an important French propaganda victory.

Power struggles between Bedford, his brother Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and their uncle Cardinal Beaufort hampered the English war effort.

He created France's first standing army since Roman times, and limited papal power in the Gallican Church by the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges.

At the beginning of his reign Louis reversed his father's policies, abolishing the Pragmatic Sanction to please the pope and the standing armies, which he distrusted, in favor of Swiss mercenaries.

To obtain peace he conceded all their demands, including the Duchy of Normandy to his brother, which carried with it one-third of the offices of state.

At the death of Charles the Bold in 1477, he seized the duchy of Burgundy, which he claimed as a reverted fief, even though the original grant did not specify the exclusion of female heirs.

But the marriage of Mary of Burgundy, heiress of Charles the Bold, to Maximilian of Austria would prove problematic for later generations.

Louis XII married his predecessor's widow, Anne of Brittany, in order to retain that province for France.

Domestic troubles led to the defection of Charles III, Duke of Bourbon and Constable of France, to the emperor.

Francis obtained his release through the Treaty of Madrid, in which he renounced claims in Naples and Milan, surrendered Burgundy to Spain, abandoned sovereignty over Flanders and Artois, and gave up two of his sons as hostages.

Having often found himself alone in his struggle against the emperor, Francis formed the Franco-Ottoman alliance with the sultan, to the scandal of Christian Europe.

The Spanish king retained Franche-Comté and was confirmed in his possession of Milan, Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, and the State of Presidi, making him the most powerful ruler in Italy.

With the succession of her minor son Charles IX in 1560, Catherine de' Medici maneuvered for a balance of power.

The next year the king's only remaining brother, the Duke of Alençon, fled the court and joined with Condé and Navarre.

Pressured by the Catholic League, the king issued the Treaty of Nemours, which outlawed Protestantism and made Protestants incapable of holding royal office.

[4] The house continued for three centuries as a cadet branch, serving as nobles under the Direct Capetian and Valois kings.

Under the Salic law, the Head of the House of Bourbon, as the senior representative of the senior-surviving branch of the Capetian dynasty, became King of France as Henry IV.

[4] The application of the Salic Law meant that with the extinction of the Valois in the male line, the Bourbons succeeded to the throne as descendants of Louis IX.