- Guy XIV de Laval
Infobox Military Person
name=Guy XIV de Laval
caption=
born=28 January 1406
died=2 September 1486
placeofbirth=
placeofdeath=Châteaubriant
allegiance=
branch=
serviceyears=
rank=
unit=
commands=
battles=Hundred Years' War
(Battle of La Brossinière Battle of Patay
Battle of Formigny )
awards=
relations=Son ofGuy XIII de Laval
and of Anne de Laval
laterwork=Guy XIV de Laval, François de Montfort-Laval, (
28 January 1406 -2 September 1486 ,Châteaubriant ),comte de Laval , baron de Vitré and ofLa Roche-Bernard , seigneur of Gâvre, ofAcquigny , ofTinténiac , of Montfort and Gaël, ofBécherel , was a French nobleman, known for his account ofJoan of Arc . He and his brotherAndré de Lohéac were simultaneously vassals of theduke of Brittany and of theking of France .Life
Origins
He was the son of Jean de Montfort (1385-1415), called
Guy XIII de Laval , and of Anne de Laval (1385-1466). Through his mother he was grandson of Guy XII de Laval and of Jeanne de Laval, second wife of constableBertrand du Guesclin .Jean de Laval x Isabeau de Tinteniac │ ├──> Jeanne de Laval │ x
Bertrand du Guesclin │ xGuy XII de Laval │ │ │ └──> Anne de Laval (1385-1466) │ xGuy XIII de Laval │ │ │ └──> Guy XIV de Laval │ └──>André de Lohéac │ └──>Louis de Laval In 1420, Guy XIV, only just fourteen years old, was the second person to put his signature to the petition sent to the king of England to demand the release of Arthur, comte de Richemont, the future constable, who had been a prisoner since the
battle of Agincourt . The Count of Richemont was freed in the September of that year.In 1424, he accompanied Arthur to the brilliant reception he had prepared for queen
Yolande of Aragon in hischâteau d'Angers . He thus worked to detach the Breton captain from the English and bring about a rapprochement between Brittany and France.Companion of Joan of Arc
right|300px|thumb|">1429Legend|#ea8b9d|Territories controlled by Henry V of EnglandLegend-line|blue dotted 2px|Joan of Arc's rout to Reims in 1429On
8 June 1429 , at Selles-en-Berry (Selles-sur-Cher ), he rejoined the royal army which reunitedJoan of Arc and the duke of Alençon to seek the liberation of theLoire Valley after the raising of thesiege of Orléans . He has left, in a letter to his mother, a living portrait of Joan of Arc, of whom he was a fervent admirer [See [http://www.lamayenne.fr/uploadfiles/publications/2075/FR-AD53-BN-0014.pdf.V33.aspx] ] . They distinguished themselves atJargeau ,Beaugency , and above all Patay, where he fought in the vanguard.Coronation of Charles VII
With his brother André de Lohéac he followed the sovereign to
Reims and assisted at the coronation ofCharles VII of France on17 July 1429 , replacingPhilip the Good ,count of Flanders (who was also theduke of Burgundy ). Among the favours distributed by the king on this occasion, the territory of Laval was raised to a county and Guy de Laval was made governor ofLagny in 1430.House of Brittany
Joanna of Navarre xJohn V, Duke of Brittany │ │ ├──>Arthur III, Duke of Brittany │ ├──>John VI, Duke of Brittany │ x Joan of France │ │ │ └──> Isabelle de Bretagne │ │ x Guy XIV de Laval │ │ │ └──>Francis I, Duke of Brittany │ │ │ └──>Peter II, Duke of Brittany │ │ │ └──>Gilles of Brittany │ xFrançoise de Dinan │ xHenry IV of England On 1 October 1430, at
Redon , Guy XIV marriedIsabelle of Brittany (d. 1444), daughter ofJohn VI, Duke of Brittany . He was betrothed, in 1420, toMarguerite of Dreux , Isabelle's sister, who had herself been betrothed to Louis III d'Anjou.Duchy of Brittany
In 1439, he negotiated the tentative Anglo-French treaty at
Gravelines . Guy XIV assisted atTours , on14 January 1446 , in a notable combat before Charles VII, between the EnglishmanJean Chalons andLouis du Bueil , with the latter being killed. As his ancestors had founded the four canonical-prebendaries ofSaint-Jean-de-Langeais , it was up to him to provide the residency privileges which they dispensed, as a result of which divine service was no longer assured [Pope Nicholas V had the complaint examined by theArchbishop of Tours , on20 January 1453 .] .Marriage with Françoise de Dinan
It is known that after he had, for financial reasons, let his son Guy XV's engagement to Françoise of Dinan drop in 1440, in favour of Gilles of Brittany. Guy XIV once again abused the young age of this same son, making him break off another engagement to her, when she became the widow of
Gilles of Brittany [Cadet ofJohn VI, Duke of Brittany .] , and engaged him at 45 years old in February 1451 at Vitré,Françoise of Dinan (d. 1500), baronne of Châteaubriant [She had been, in a short time, engaged to Francis, eldest son of Guy XIV, then aged 15 years old...] . Guy XIV had no rights on the barony of Châteaubriant.The Vatican archives contain two solicitations to the
Holy See on this occasion, by Guy XIV and by his son. The inquiry concerning "François-Guy de Laval, fils aîné de Guy, comte de Laval, seigneur du Gavre" dates to23 July 1450 and is addressed to thebishop of Nantes . He begged, for canonical reasons, for an exemption from parental kinship, and from the ban on marriage between a woman and the father of someone to whom she had previously been engaged. The mandate of dispensation for the marriage of Guy XIV and Françoise of Dinan, said to be of Thouars from her mother's name, and for their absolution from certain bans, is dated17 December 1450 and addressed to thebishop of Vannes .The Vatican archives mention once more mention the comte of Laval and Françoise of Dinan his wife, in their founding of a
psalette at the Madeleine at Vitré, on19 May 1453 [Abbé Vaucelle, "Lettres de Nicholas V", p. 12, 126, 158, 167, 181? 183, 204, 248, 263.] .Relationship with Louis XI
Charles VI │ ├──> Charles VII │ │ │ └──> Louis XI │ ├──> Jeanne de France │ x
John VI, Duke of Brittany │ │ │ └──> Isabelle of Brittany │ x Guy XIV de LavalKing
Louis XI established a cour des comptes at Laval in 1463. The following year the king authorised "his cousin" Guy XIV to add a "first quarter of France" [To remember Joan, his grandmother, wife ofJohn VI, Duke of Brittany , was the daughter of king Charles VI] , then "those of Evreux" [In remembrance of Jeanne d'Évreux, grandmother of Isabelle of Brittany, wife of Guy XIV] - and those of "Vitré".At the beginning of the 15th century, the
château de Comper became the fiefdom of theLaval family. In order to assert better his precedence on the viscountcy of Rohan to theStates of Brittany , Guy XIV de Laval, seigneur ofBrocéliande , pretended, via his parent, to be descended from the ancient kings ofArmorica Conan and Ponthus. In 1467, he tried to get inserted into the "Chartre des Usements de Brécilie", with the object of the seigneurial rights over the inhabitants of the forest, mentioning the jousts of Ponthus, making a historical fact of a 14th century fictional romance in the style of the Arthurian legends called "Le roman de Ponthus et la Belle Sidoine".He was the lieutenant-général of the
duchy of Brittany in 1472.Comte of Laval
Guy XIV de Laval x Isabelle of Brittany │ ├──>
Guy XV de Laval │ ├──> Pierre de Laval │ ├──> Jeanne de Laval │ x René I of Anjou │ xFrançoise of Dinan Louis XI, in 1482, gave full powers to the comté of Laval, separating it from the Maine. The comté of Laval was directly responsible to the crown of France.
He was buried at the collegial church of
Saint-Thugal at Laval. His daughter Jeanne de Laval was the wife of king René I of Anjou. His eldest son, Francis, would beGrand Master of France and comte of Laval (Guy XV de Laval ), and one of his cadets Pierre de Laval wasarchbishop of Rheims .Bibliography
* Émile Cesbron, "Jeanne d’Arc et le Bas-Maine", extrait de la Semaine religieuse du diocèse de Laval, Laval, Goupil, 1909, 30 p. [http://www.lamayenne.fr/uploadfiles/publications/2075/FR-AD53-BN-0014.pdf.V33.aspx]
* Malcolm Walsby, The Counts of Laval: Culture, Patronage and Religion in Fifteenth and Sixteenth-Century France (Ashgate, Aldershot, 2007)Notes
External links
*http://perso.orange.fr/jean-claude.colrat/2laval.htm
ee also
*
Château de Comper ource
*Jürgen Klötgen, "Une charte retrouvée de Guy XV de Laval (1491) - Notice historique sur les armoiries de Laval", in Revue Historique et Archéologique du Maine, t.CXLVIII, Le Mans, 1997 p.209-232. See also : Full text from DVD-RHAM Revue Historique et Archéologique du Maine/1875-2000, Copyright by Société Historique et Archéologique du Maine, Le Mans, 2006.
*fr icon "Guy XIV de Laval", in Alphonse-Victor Angot, Ferdinand Gaugain, Dictionnaire historique, topographique et biographique de la Mayenne, Goupil, 1900-1910 ( [détail édition] ), t. IV, p. 528.
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