As an open region east of Paris bounded by the rivers Aisne, Marne, and Yonne,
Champagne lacked a natural center. In the late Roman Empire, northern Champagne was
part of a frontier province facing Germanic tribes on the Rhine, while southern
Champagne belonged to an interior province centered at Lyon. The church observed that
division in creating two archiepiscopal sees, at Reims and Sens. Under the Franks,
southern Champagne entered the Burgundian orbit; the northern area, with its chief city
of Reims, fell under the sway of royal Francia. Remi baptized Clovis (ca. 496) at Reims,
and later Archbishop Hincmar (845–882) made his city the preferred site of royal
coronations and its most prestigious monastery, Saint-Remi, the royal necropolis. The
cathedral school of Reims enjoyed wide repute from the 9th century, producing such
influential personages as Gerbert (later Pope Sylvester II) and Fulbert (later bishop of
Chartres).
The collapse of Carolingian government brought political fragmentation to
Champagne: numerous counties and lesser lordships, monasteries with immunities, and
episcopal cities all resisted integration into larger territorial units. The prelates of Reims
and Châlons-sur-Marne, the major urban centers of Champagne, assumed control of their
cities and surrounding counties, in effect displacing secular authority from most of
northern Champagne. In the 10th century, the house of Vermandois acquired the counties
of Meaux and Troyes by marriage, but on the death of Étienne, count of Meaux-Troyes
(r. 995–1019/ 21), those counties passed to his closest heir, Eudes II, count of Blois (r.
996–1037). Eudes’s son, Thibaut III of Blois (I of Champagne; r. 1037–89), acquired the
adjacent counties of Bar-sur-Aube and Vitry through marriage to Alix de Valois and thus
held the four old counties of southern Champagne that would later become the core of the
new county of Champagne.
At Thibaut’s death, however, the counties of Champagne were temporarily divided
between his sons: Meaux remained with the eldest, Étienne-Henri, count of Blois (r.
1089–1102), while Troyes, Bar-sur-Aube, and Vitry passed to the youngest, Hugues (r.
1093–1125). Since Count Hugues’s most important urban center and principal residence
was the city of Troyes, it became the de facto capital of southern Champagne. Count
Hugues’s young nephew, Thibaut IV of Blois (II of Champagne; r. 1102–52), spent much
time in Champagne in his capacity as count of Meaux, and thus it was natural that when
Hugues disowned his own son on suspicion of illegitimacy, he transferred his three
counties to Thibaut (1125).
Thibaut le Grand continued his uncle’s support of the Cistercians, who were rapidly
expanding in eastern France under Bernard of Clairvaux’s leadership. The count offered
secure routes to merchants traveling through the county and supervised trade fairs for the
exchange of merchandise. Those Champagne fairs, later organized into a cycle of six
terms that rotated between Troyes, Bar-sur-Aube, Provins, and Lagny, became in the
course of the 12th century the center of international trade between northern Europe and
the Mediterranean. The fairs also served as a financial clearinghouse for princes,
aristocrats, and merchants through the 14th century, long after the Atlantic shipping route
had displaced the overland trade routes converging in Champagne.
Thibaut’s rapprochement with King Louis VI had longterm consequences for
Champagne. The count served as guardian to young Louis VII, whom he escorted to
Bordeaux for marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine (1137); and despite a falling out that
resulted in the destruction of Vitry by a royal army (1142/43), Thibaut restored good
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