The Story of Chartres

by Cecil Headlam

‘Then the King of England beheld the Church of our Lady of Charters, and avowed devoutly to our Lady to agree to the peace, and, as it was said, he was as then confessed, and lodged in a village near to Charters, called Brétigny. And there were made certain compositions of peace, upon certain articles after ordained; and, the more firmly to be concluded by their ambassadors, and by the King of England and his Council, there was ordained, by good deliberation and advice, a letter called the Charter of Peace’ (1360).

By this treaty the English King waived his claims on the crown of France and on the Duchy of Normandy; but, on the other hand, his Duchy of Aquitaine was not only restored to him, but freed from its obligations as a French fief, and granted in full sovereignty with Ponthieu, as well as Guisnes, and the new conquest of Calais.

The captive King, Jean-le-Bon, was ransomed and released, and he, like his captor Edward, and the Black Prince before him, made a pilgrimage to Notre-Dame, and passed piously beneath the Holy Chest, which it was deemed safe at last to bring forth from its hiding-place in the Chapel of S. Lubin.

A period of comparative quiet ensued under the administration of Charles the Wise, who summoned the States-General to meet at Chartres, and entrusted the patriotism of this and other principal towns with the task of raising forces to deal with the roving bands of freebooters which, under the name of grandes compagnies, swarmed over the country. The campaigns conducted by Duguesclin against the English in the south left Chartres undisturbed. She devoted herself to the restoration of order, the enforcement of law, and the strengthening of her wall. One little incident will show the progress which, in spite of war, and impositions of every sort, had been made since the high days of feudalism.

The house of one Guillaume Morhier, knight and seigneur of S. Piat, was forcibly entered by some bailiffs, who were charged to distrain upon him for the benefit of a horse-dealer. Morhier’s daughter, when the chief official was preparing to read his warrant to her, snatched the paper out of his hands, and for this offence was roughly seized and, in spite of her protests, dragged on her knees across the town, as though she had been a common thief or murderess, and committed to prison in the Tour-le-Roi. She was thrown into the cells used for women of loose life. It was with the utmost difficulty that the unfortunate girl regained her liberty, after two friends had appeared to go bail for her. Intense indignation was aroused by this high-handed behaviour on the part of the officials. For the Morhier family was one of the most important in the district. The bailiffs, after a formal investigation of the case, lasting over two years, were condemned to make full apology, and pay a heavy fine. But the mere fact that Morhier did not, without trial, hang then and there the servant of the law who had presumed to raise his hand against his high-born daughter is significant of the advance that had been made in the last two hundred years.

The next thing of importance that happened at Chartres was the curious episode of the Paix Fourrée. A terrible crime plunged France into all the horrors of civil war. The Duke of Burgundy, John the Fearless, jealous of the popularity of the Duke of Orléans, caused him to be assassinated (1407) at Paris. A year of struggle and recrimination passed before Charles VI. could bring the murderer and the son of his victim to make even a pretence of reconciliation. The Duke of Burgundy demanded, without desiring, pardon, which the Duke of Orléans, without forgiving, granted. Each swore aloud to live henceforth in peace with his cousin, and swore beneath his breath to slay him. The ceremony took place in the Cathedral of Notre-Dame. Armed men in battle array stood at the porches of the church, and within, seated on a throne near the crucifix, with the Queen and Dauphin, the Kings of Sicily and Navarre, dukes, cardinals, and other nobles and officials near at hand, Charles waited the arrival of John the Fearless, who had left Gallardon that morning with six hundred men-at-arms.

Amidst profoundest silence the cruel conqueror of the Liégeois advanced down the nave and made his submission to the imbecile King, who had so feebly forgiven the murderer of his brother. Then again advancing towards his ‘dear cousins,’ the children of the murdered duke, he formally besought them to banish from their hearts all hatred and feelings of revenge, and to live in amity with him. At these words, and at the sight of their father’s murderer, the young princes burst into tears. The Queen and Dauphin approached them, and begged them to forgive, and, at the command of the King, the young duke and his brother repeated the prescribed words of the treaty, and they and the Duke of Burgundy, and all the princes of royal blood, swore upon the Cross and the Gospels to obey the behest of the King in this matter. This done, John the Fearless, without taking bite or sup in Chartres, mounted his horse and rode away. Little wonder that John of Montagu, brother of the former Bishop of Chartres, in registering this pact, wrote beneath it these significant words, ‘Pax, Pax; et non est Pax’ (Peace, Peace; and it is not peace). So also thought the excellent Fool of the Duke of Burgundy, who, wrapping an ecclesiastical paten (paix d’église) in his fur mantle (fourrure), remarked that it was but a patched-up peace (Paix Fourrée).

The Fool’s verdict was soon justified. John the Fearless went to Paris, and curried favour with the people of the market-place. His popularity and democratic tendencies provoked the displeasure of the Orleanists, who represented the old feudal party. In the civil war which ensued between the Armagnacs, as the Orleanists were called, and the Burgundians, Chartres, lying very much in the centre of the operations, suffered almost equally from both sides.

The spirit of patriotism and the sense of unity were as yet scarce born in France. The example and exigencies of civil war were not calculated to promote their growth. Maddened by the assassination of the Duke of Burgundy in the very presence of the Dauphin, with whom he had come to confer, the Burgundians threw themselves into the hands of the English. After the Battle of Agincourt, where, against still greater odds, the English archers had inflicted a still more overwhelming defeat upon the French knighthood than at Crécy and Poitiers, Henry V. had been steadily reducing the province of Normandy. Now, by the aid of his new allies, he concluded with the maniac Charles VI. the Treaty of Troyes (1420), which handed over to England the crown of France and the whole kingdom. Chartres had been taken in 1417[85] by John the Fearless, and converted into his capital. Every citizen suspected of favouring the Armagnacs had been expelled from the city. The capital of the Burgundians was therefore not unnaturally one of the first towns to recognise Henry V. in his new rôle of heir to the French crown. The Dauphin, indeed, marched from Blois to take vengeance upon the rebellious city, but he promptly raised the siege when Henry, leaving Paris, advanced to relieve it.

Henry took Dreux, and remained there a month. Then he returned to Chartres as a pilgrim, with bare feet, and a candle in his hand. Rich gifts were bestowed upon Notre-Dame by the English soldiery, amongst which is mentioned a magnificent ostensoir that disappeared during the Revolution. The high bourgeoisie and clergy, captivated by the favours of the English King, were now all addicted to Anglescherie (Anglomania), a fault which they, with the rest of Europe, have since managed to correct. Thus, whereas formerly a Bishop of Chartres had equipped himself as a knight and gone to die at Agincourt in battle with the enemy, the Bishop now could only maintain his See by devoting himself to the English cause. This Jean de Frétigny did with success. As a rival of Orléans and Châteaudun also, Chartres naturally favoured Henry in days when centralisation and patriotism, that higher form of selfishness, were almost unknown, as the tragic history of the Maid of Orléans was shortly to show. Her brother, we may mention, was for a while captain of Chartres.