Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1Walton, William
History
Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1
Walton, William
Paris (France) -- Description and travel; Paris (France) -- History
When the question of deciding upon a successor for Louis X arose, the
famous _Loi Salique_, by which at least one modern historian, M. Duruy,
thinks France has profited but little, was revived. Louis le Hutin left
but one child, a daughter; a posthumous son, Jean, lived but a week.
"Should his sister take the crown? A text of Scripture reads: 'The
lilies spin not, and yet Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like
one of these.' This evidently signifies that the kingdom of the lilies
shall not fall under the sway of a distaff. In the fourteenth century
this was a reason. There were others: it was not to be desired that a
foreigner should acquire France by a marriage; and the States-General,
applying to the Crown the rule of succession formerly established for
the Salic domains, excluded the daughter of Louis X from the throne.
Thus the right of inheritance recognized for daughters for the fiefs was
denied for the Crown."
Philippe le Long, also, had only daughters, and their uncle, Charles IV,
accordingly succeeded, only to see the same fate befall his children. On
his death-bed he said to his barons: "If the queen give birth to a son,
he will be your king; if a daughter, the crown will belong to Philippe
de Valois, whom I declare your regent." Another branch of the Capétiens,
the Valois, thus assumed the sceptre. But this interpretation, thus
three times renewed in twelve years, was contested abroad. Philippe VI
of Valois was a cousin of Charles IV, nephew of Philippe le Bel and
grandson of Philippe III. Edward III, King of England, was a grandson of
Philippe IV by his mother Isabella, and he protested against this
decision and asserted his right to the throne of France, mildly in 1328,
on the accession of Philippe VI, and strongly eight years later. Thus
came about the Hundred Years' War, and, incidentally, the residence in
Paris, as if in his capital, of an English king.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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