Henry M. Baird · 4 of 379

CHAPTER I · Territorial development.

But, although its area was somewhat smaller than that of the modern republic, France in the sixteenth century had nearly attained the general dimensions marked out for it by great natural boundaries. Four hundred years had been engrossed in the pursuit of territorial enlargement. At the close of the tenth century the Carlovingian dynasty, essentially foreign in tastes and language, was supplanted by a dynasty of native character and capable of gathering to its support all those elements of strength which had been misunderstood or neglected by the feeble descendants of Charlemagne. But it found the royal authority reduced to insignificance and treated with open contempt. By permitting those dignities which had once been conferred as a reward for pre-eminent personal merit to become hereditary in certain families, the crown had laid the foundation of the feudal system; while, by neglecting to enforce its sovereign claims, it had enabled the great feudatories to make themselves princes independent in reality, if not in name. So low had the consideration of the throne fallen, that when Hugh Capet, Count of Paris, in 987 assumed the title of king of France, basing his act partly on an election by nobles, partly on force of arms, the transaction elicited little opposition from the rival lords who might have been expected to resent his usurpation.