Chronicles

Charles VI went on a tour of southern France, partially to investigate allegations that his uncles, the Dukes of Anjou and Berry, had exploited and oppressed the region. The king resolved several injustices and was greeted extravagantly by the locals with parties. One official working for the Duke of Berry, Betsiac, was arrested and interrogated for impoverishing the people of the area. The council investigating him was unsure if he should be punished for his acts or if he was just following the Duke of Berry’s orders. Betsiac became convinced he would be condemned by the king, so he made the rash decision to confess to heresy so he could be tried by the Pope in Avignon instead. In the end, Betsiac was executed by being hung and burnt.

Charles VI visited the Count of Foix and gave a “guarded answer” (370) over whether the Count would be allowed to have his illegitimate son Yvain as his heir. On the way back to Paris, Charles VI and his brother, the Duke of Tourraine, made a bet on who would make it back to Paris first. The Duke won the wager.

Near Calais, three French knights hosted a tournament. Their challenge was especially directed toward English knights. The Earl of Huntington and other English knights joined the tournament, where they competed by jousting. Joining the competition was a knight from Bohemia who went by Herr Hans. The festivities ended on a “peaceful and friendly note” (380).

The Duke of Tourraine fell in love with a woman from Paris. His wife found out about his infatuation from the Duke’s close friend Pierre de Craon and threatened the woman into breaking things off with the Duke. Finding out from his wife that she learned about the woman from Pierre de Craon, the Duke of Tourraine and the king banished him from the royal court.

Count Gaston-Phoebus of Foix died suddenly of natural causes on a hunting trip. Yvain tried to claim the castle at the city of Orthez before news of his father’s death spread, but he failed. He then addressed the people directly, asking them to let him claim his father’s inheritance despite his illegitimacy. They allowed him to claim the castle. Meanwhile, Count Gaston-Phoebus was widely mourned.

Pierre de Craon blamed Charles VI’s friend, the Constable of France, Oliver de Clisson, for his exile from court. He attempted to assassinate Clisson, but he failed and was forced to flee to the court of his cousin, the Duke of Brittany. Enraged, Charles VI left with a force to march on Brittany to force the Duke to surrender Craon. It was a hot summer day, and the king and his men were stopped by a strange man, who grabbed the reins of Charles VI’s horse and warned him he was going to be betrayed.

When a page dozed off and let his lance hit a helmet, the king was startled and started attacking his own men, even his brother and uncles. Charles VI was eventually overpowered. As he was held down, his eyes started rolling, and he did not talk. The doctors examined the king, and it was determined he had gone mad. Eventually, the king recovered with treatments from the doctor Guillaume de Herselley, although he warned that the king’s mind remained “weak and sensitive” (401).

With the war between England and France over, Froissart decided to return to England. With letters of introduction from the Counts of Hainault and Ostrevant, Froissart met with a previous acquaintance, the Duke of York, who introduced him to Richard II. Despite opposition from his people, Richard II planned to marry a French princess to seal a permanent peace settlement with France. Richard II believed:

the war has gone on too long between him and his ancestors and the French, that too many brave men have been killed in it, too many evil deeds perpetrated, and too many Christian people destroyed or ruined, to the detriment of the Christian faith. (407)

Froissart presented the king with a book he wrote about love.

An English squire, Henry Crystede, told Froissart about Ireland. He described the Irish as an uncivilized people who hid and launched ambushes from forests and swamps when fighting the English. Also, he complained no one in England understood the Irish, “who are very dour people, proud and uncouth, slow-thinking and hard to get to know or make friends with” (410-411). Ireland had many kings, although the English, especially through the efforts of the Anglo-Irish nobleman the Earl of Ormonde, were able to get four powerful Irish kings to recognize English sovereignty.

During a skirmish with the Irish, Crystede was captured with an Irish leader named Brin Costerec. Costerec was made to stay with the Irish for seven years and even married one of Crystede’s daughters. After that time, he was freed and allowed to go to England with his wife as part of a peace deal with the Irish king of Leinster. Richard II put Crystede in charge of a mission to improve the manners of the four Irish kings so they would be ready to be knighted by Richard II.

Negotiations were finished to marry Charles VI’s eldest daughter Isabella to Richard II. The marriage was carried out by proxy. Meanwhile, one of Richard II’s uncles, the Duke of Lancaster, married Catherine de Ruet, the daughter of a Hainault knight. Because Catherine was considered of lower social rank, the marriage was “scandalous” (419). Still, Froissart claims Catherine showed her sincere love for the Duke “in life and in death” (420).