Page 64 - Northern Spain & Portugal: Pilgrimage into the Past

Unfortunately, this era of accomplishment and peace was followed by the destruction and
bloodshed of the Hundred Years War of 1337-1453. At its core, the war was essentially a
dynastic struggle with England, whose Norman kings held vast feudal estates in France. The
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strength of the French monarchy. Once again, as in the days of Charlemagne, the French
throne exuded a powerful, almost mystic aura, this time with the aid of Joan of Arc, whose
divine voices urged her to lead the French to victory at Orleans in 1429 and to champion
Charles VII as king of France.

During the 16th and 17th centuries, the Valois and Bourbon kings continued to fortify the
royal authority, moving the country toward absolute monarchy. The ironclad rule of Cardinals
Richelieu and Mazarin (1624-61) set the stage for their splendid successor, Louis XIV, whose
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He established the Baroque power base of Versailles and introduced Europe to a gloriously
gilded France—so resplendent that it earned him the title of the Sun King. His was an age of
brilliant achievements in art and literature, making France indisputably the intellectual capital
of Europe. French became the international language for more than a century afterward.

Ironically, the very splendor of the French monarchy helped precipitate its downfall, for it was
expensive to maintain and someone had to pay. The major cause of the French Revolution
was the system of special privileges that exempted nobles and clergy from the taxes paid by
the peasants and the middle class. In 1789, these latter groups rebelled against the monarchy,
guillotined both the king and his queen, (Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette), and established
the short-lived First Republic. The chaos that followed the revolution resulted in the rise
of Napoleon, who proclaimed himself emperor in 1804 and, though a dictator, undertook
to spread the ideal of liberty to the world through his conquests. After his fall in 1814, the
monarchy was restored.

In the 19th century, France alternated between democracy and dictatorship and was
characterized by the steady growth of a new French Empire. A revolution in 1848 established
a Second Republic, which was superseded by the dictatorship of Napoleon III, nephew of the
emperor. Finally, a Third Republic was founded in 1870, during which the Impressionist school
of painting emerged, as well as the Modernist movement of music and poetry, heralded by
composers Ravel and Debussy and poets Mallarme and Verlaine.

From 1914-18, France fought with the Allies in World War I. Afterwards, with the Treaty of
Versailles (1919), France regained the areas of Alsace and Lorraine. Between wars, France
nourished major artistic and philosophical movements: Constructivism, Dadaism, Surrealism,
and Existentialism.

At the beginning of World War II, France sided with the Allies until it was invaded and
defeated by Germany in 1940. The French government, under Marshal Philippe Petain, a World
War I hero, established a puppet government in the Vichy. On D-Day—June 6, 1944—the
Allies landed on the beaches of Normandy and successfully invaded France. Additional Allied

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