Hundred Years' War.

The Hundred Years War, which lasted from 1337 to1453, between France and England, was the longest military and political event in the history of the two powers. In fact, it was not a war, but several military campaigns alternating with reconciliation. Disagreements between England and France were born as far back as 1066 in the Norman conquests, when the English king, being at the same time a nobleman in France, seized vast areas of land in this country. Monarchs of France, seeing this as a danger, tried to stop the expansion of British possessions. The continuation of this protracted conflict was the hundred-year war.

Stages of the Hundred Years War

The one-hundred-year war can be divided into four mainstage. The first lasted 23 years - from the declaration of war by the King of England Edward III before the truce, announced in 1360 in Brétigny. During this time, France suffered a lot of military defeats. The first days of the war, in the autumn of 1337, were marked by the onset of England in Picardy. Then there was a series of victories of the British - a sea victory in 1340 at Slayle, in 1346 at Crecy, and in 1356 the eldest son of Edward III, the Prince of Wales, nicknamed "The Black Prince" because of the color of his armor, captivated King John II. During this phase of the war, the Paris uprising took place in France, and in 1360 a truce was concluded in Brétigny, according to which the French lost the southern lands of the Loire, and this is a third of the country's land, and the sea port of Calais.

The second stage lasted 27 years - from 1369 to 1396. In the mid-seventies of the 14th century, the French liberated most of their lands. In France there were insurrections caused bypeople's dissatisfaction with high taxes. In the country at that time it was very restless, the 100-year war was aggravated by the feudal parties between the feudal parties of the country of Burgundians and armagnacs who converted to civil war. The truce, which came in 1396, gave respite to both sides for 18 years.

The third stage was the most fleeting, heContinued from 1415 to 1420 and was marked by new major victories of the British. Henry V, the English king, subdued many areas of France, Normandy and defeated the French army in 1415 under the command of Agincourt. France was without money and without the army, and the feud between Armagnacs and Burgundians split the country's territory. The independent sovereign of the eastern and northern lands of France, the Duke of Burgundy joined the British with the alliance, and in 1420 the peace was signed between them in Troyes, according to which Henry the fifth became the French regent. In addition, the regent entered into a marriage alliance with Catherine, daughter of King Charles VI, realizing the unification of the crowns. The sons of Charles VI were deprived of their patronal rights.

The fourth stage lasted from 1420 to 1453, andbecame the most decisive and most bloody. In 1422, King Charles VI and Regent Henry V died, after which the Duke of Burgundy, together with the English, declared King Regent and Princess Henry VI King of France and England. In turn, deprived of hereditary rights, the Dauphin Karl, son of the previous king, proclaimed himself Charles VII, the French king. France split into three parts: the lands conquered by the British under the rule of Henry V, the area under the political pressure of the Duke of Burgundy and the southern territories recognized by the authority of Charles VII. In 1428, the Burgundians together with the British besieged Orleans, which was a ticket to the lands of the south of France. At that moment, the population joined the war, and the popular movement headed by Jeanne d'Arc, began the liberation of France, and Orléans was liberated in 1429, which marked the turning point in the centennial war, and in July of the same year, solemnly crowned Charles VII.The Duke of Burgundy moved to the side of the new king in 1435, and British troops were banished from the capital and later from other southwestern cities and fortresses in 1436. By the summer of 1451 the centennial war was almost over, but in the autumn of 1452 the English tried to win back south-west of France, capturing Bordeaux and some fortresses in Gieni, Charles VII in the spring of 1453 personally led the army to liberate the south-west of the country.In the summer of that year, the French defeated the British troops at Castillon and Châtillon.In October the French surrendered the garrison of opponents in Bordeaux - October 19, 1453 was the day of the end of the Hundred Years' War.

The victory of France in the hundred-year war meantso much the elimination of the British on the territory of the country and liberation from the conquerors, as much as the centralization of France, the creation of a national strong state. The memory of the war will remain in the hearts of the French as the most large-scale confrontation between the two powers, a complex and bloody event that gradually gave rise to national self-consciousness and fortitude in the French people.