for future expeditions across the Adriatic. Indeed, just such an effort was
planned over the course of the next few years, although, in the event,
nothing came of it.^119 In fact, the duke of Athens’chance had come and
gone: he never set foot in Greece again.
With the collapse of his schemes in Italy, it is not surprising that Walter
headed to France. There, we may guess, he hoped to interest both the
French crown and the papacy in his plans. However, he quickly ended up
entangled in the earliest campaigns of the Hundred Years’War, which
had broken out in 1337. Of course, the war is better regarded as a series
of related conflicts, which, in turn, can be broken down into phases. The
veryfirst phase of the war (1337–41) focused primarily on north-eastern
France and the Low Countries. As early as 1338, wefind Walter serving
there under the command of the obvious person, his kinsman Raoul III,
count of Eu and constable of France.^120 A year later, Walter was part of
the host that King Philip VI himself led to Picardy. All seemed set for the
first major encounter of the war, but, not for the last time, the king
decided against risking everything on thefield of battle.^121 Far more
significant was the fact that the Flemish townsfinally entered into an
alliance with England in early 1340, and it was there, at Ghent, that
Edward III formally assumed the title of king of France. This prompted
King Philip’s son and heir, Duke John of Normandy, and Raoul of Eu to
lead a hectic march to Valenciennes, where the constable’s attempts to
persuade the inhabitants to surrender failed miserably. That said, they
did manage to link up with Philip VI and take a number of castles in the
Cambrésis.^122 However, the real challenge for Raoul and his son, the
count of Guînes, was the siege of Tournai: arguably, the great set piece of
this phase of the war. The constable held the city against Edward III,
whilst King Philip assembled a great army, including Walter VI, and
came up to relieve it. Once again, though, there was no decisive battle,
and a truce was agreed at Esplechin.^123 It seems that this provided
Walter, at least, with a way out of the war, and an opportunity to turn
his attention back towards his Greek schemes. He may well have been at
Avignon by the end of 1341, trying to interest Pope Benedict XII in his
plans.^124 At this point, however, there were new and even more exciting
prospects opening up elsewhere.
(^119) See Setton,Catalan Domination of Athens,42–3.
(^120) See Lebailly,‘Le connétable d’Eu et son cercle nobiliare’, 47.
(^121) See the summary in Rogers,War Cruel and Sharp, 166–73. (^122) Ibid., 190.
(^123) SeeThe True Chronicles of Jean le Bel,chs. 37–8.
(^124) Villani,Nuova cronica, iii, book 11, ch. 135.
166 Hubris and Nemesis (c. 1311–1356)