Louis I, Duke of Bourbon

Louis I of Bourbon, "le Boiteux", the Lame (Clermont-en-Beauvaisis, 1279 – January 29 1342) was Count of Clermont-en-Beauvaisis and La Marche, and the first Duke of Bourbon.

Life

Louis was son of Robert, Count of Clermont and thus grandson of King Louis IX of France, who never saw him, the son of his youngest son. Louis' mother was Beatrix of Burgundy, heiress of Bourbon and a granddaughter of Hugh IV, Duke of Burgundy.

He fought on the losing side in both the Battle of the Golden Spurs (1302) and the Battle of Mons-en-Pévèle (1304), but escaped unharmed. In 1310, he was made Grand Chambrier of France. In 1327, Charles IV of France persuaded him to exchange the County of Clermont for that of La Marche, and elevated Bourbon to a duchy-peerage. However, Clermont was restored to him by Philip VI of France in 1331.

Duke Louis is reported to have been mentally somewhat instable, a trait of nervous breakdowns presumably hereditary that showed clearly for example in his granddaughter Joanna of Bourbon, the queen, and in her son, king Charles VI of France, as well as down in the line in Charles' grandson king Henry VI of England.

Family and children

In 1310, Louis married Mary of Avesnes, daughter of John II of Avesnes, Count of Hainaut and Holland by Philippa of Luxembourg. They had eight children:
# Peter I, Duke of Bourbon (1311–1356), killed at the Battle of Poitiers
# Jeanne (1312–1402), married in 1324 Guigues VII, Count of Forez
# Marguerite (1313–1362), married on July 6, 1320 Jean II de Sully, married in 1346 Hutin de Vermeilles
# Marie of Bourbon (1315–1387, Naples), married first in Nicosia in January 1330 Guy of Lusignan (d. 1343), titular Prince of Galilee, married second on September 9, 1347 Robert of Taranto, the titular Latin Emperor. Only her first marriage produced surviving children.
# Philip (1316 – aft. 1327)
# James (1318)
# James I, Count of La Marche (1319 – 1362), killed at the Battle of Brignais, from whom the later royal Bourbons descend.
# Beatrice of Bourbon (1320 – December 23, 1383, Danvillers), married first at Vincennes in 1334 John of Luxembourg, King of Bohemia as his second wife, married herself second c. 1347 Eudes II of Grancey (d. 1389)