Step by step, though by a process which was spread over many centuries, all the principalities and commonwealths of the Burgundian kingdom, save the lands which have been Swiss and the single valley which is now Italian, have come into the hands of France. The tendency shows itself early. ♦Avignon first seized, 1226. | Annexation of Lyons, 1310.♦ _Avignon_ was seized for a moment during the Albigensian wars; but the permanent process of French annexation began when Philip the Fair took advantage of the disputes between the archbishops and the citizens of _Lyons_, to join that Imperial city to his dominions. The head of all the Gauls, the seat of the Primate of all the Gauls, thus passed into the hands of the new monarchy of Paris, the first-fruits of French aggrandizement at the cost of the Middle Kingdom. ♦Purchase of the Dauphiny of Vienne, 1343.♦ Later in the same century, the Dauphiny of _Vienne_ was acquired by a bargain with its last independent prince. This land also passed, through the intermediate stage of an Imperial fief held by the heir-apparent of the French crown, into a mere province of France. ♦The city of Vienne annexed, 1448.♦ But the acquisition of the Dauphiny did not carry with it that of the city of _Vienne_, which escaped for more than a century. ♦Valence, 1446.♦ Between the acquisition of the Dauphiny and the acquisition of the city, the county of _Valence_ was annexed to the Dauphiny. ♦Provence, 1481.♦ Later in the same century followed the great annexation of _Provence_ itself. The rule of French princes in that county for two centuries had doubtless paved the way for this annexation. And the acquisition of Provence carried with it the acquisition of the cities of _Arles_ and _Marseilles_, which the counts of Provence had deprived of their freedom. By this time the whole of the land between the Rhone and the sea had been swallowed up, save one state at the extreme south-east corner of the kingdom, and a group of small states which were now quite hemmed in by French territory. ♦Nizza passes to Savoy, 1388.♦ The first was the county of _Nizza_ or Nice, which had passed away from Provence to Savoy before the French annexation of Provence. But by this time Savoy had become an Italian power, and Nizza was from henceforth looked on as Italian rather than Burgundian. Between Provence and the Dauphiny lay the city of _Avignon_, the county of _Venaissin_, and the principality of _Orange_. ♦Avignon and Venaissin become Papal, 1348. | Annexed to France, 1791.♦ Avignon and Venaissin became papal possessions by purchase from the sovereign of Provence; and, though they were at last quite surrounded by French territory, they remained papal possessions till they were annexed in the course of the great Revolution. These outlying possessions of the Popes perhaps did somewhat towards preserving the independence of a more interesting fragment of the ancient kingdom. ♦Orange.♦ This was the Principality