same year, however, Thibaut acquired his mother’s inheritance, the kingdom of Navarre,
where he and his successors spent many years.
The county achieved its ultimate shape under Thibaut IV. His sons, Thibaut V (r.
1253–70) and Henry III (r. 1270–74), brought Champagne under increasing royal
influence. Thibaut V, having married Louis IX’s daughter, maintained a residence in
Paris, while Henri affianced his daughter Jeanne (b. 1273), heiress of Champagne, to a
son of Philip III. With Jeanne’s marriage to the future Philip IV (1284), Champagne lost
its independence. Philip III already had issued directives to the baillis of Champagne, and
soon the Jours of Troyes were staffed by royal officials and the county administered as a
royal province. Title to both Champagne and Navarre passed through Jeanne to her son
Louis X, then to his daughter Jeanne, who was dispossessed of Champagne by Philip V
(1316). Charles IV assigned most of the county in dower to his wife (1325) and had the
comital archives transferred to Paris.
As a royal province, Champagne suffered misfortune. Heavy taxation spawned an
antiroyal league of nobles (1314). The decline of the fairs as trading centers weakened
the county’s economic vitality. Plague and the Jacquerie, which flared along the Marne
and particularly in Meaux, destabilized the social order. And by the 1370s, the Hundred
Years’ War brought its ravages to Champagne. A demographic decline of 50 percent and
more, especially in the towns, forced the abandonment of many villages. Only in the late
15th century did some semblance of order return to this once prosperous province.
Theodore Evergates
[See also: BLOIS; THIBAUT; THIBAUT DE CHAMPAGNE]
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——. “Philip the Fair and the Jours of Troyes.” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History
6(1969):281–344.
——. “Recueil des actes des comtes de Champagne, 1152–1197” [A “preedition” of 732 acts of
Count Henry I, Countess Marie, and Count Henry II. On deposit at the Library of Congress and
selected university libraries.]
Berlow, Rosalind K. “The Development of Business Techniques Used at the Fairs of Champagne.”
Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History 8(1971):3–32.
Bur, Michel. La formation du comté de Champagne, v. 950-v. 1150. Nancy: Université de Nancy,
1977.
Chapin, Elisabeth. Les villes de foires de Champagne. Paris: Champion, 1937.
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Crubellier, Maurice, ed. Histoire de Champagne. Toulouse: Privat, 1975.
Desportes, Pierre. Reims et les Rémois aux XIIIe et XIVe siècles. Paris: Picard, 1979.
Evergates, Theodore. Feudal Society in the Bailliage of Troyes Under the Counts of Champagne,
1152–1284. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975.
——ed. and trans. Feudal Society in Medieval France: Documents from the County of Champagne.
Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993.
——. “The Chancery Archives of the Counts of Champagne.” Viator 16(1985):161–79.
Longnon, Auguste, ed. Documents relatifs au comté de Champagne et de Brie, 1172–1361. 3 vols.
Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1901–14.
——. Rôles des fiefs du comté de Champagne sous le règne de Thibaut le Chansonnier, 1249–
- Paris: Menu, 1877.
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