Sinclair de la Behottiere, Normandy <labehotierre@wanadoo.fr>

Map of Normandie

Henry I 1100-1135,
Stephen 1135-1154
Henry II 1154-1189
Richard I the Lionhearted 1189-1199

Louis the VI (the Grosse) b1078 1108-1137
and his son Louis VII Le Jeune b1120 ruled 1137-1180

Attempted to seek Royal Power on their own territory. They vanquished the Brigans cajoled the nobilty of France to enter service. Louis was disrupted by his divorce from Eleonore (French Spelling) of Acquataine. Her remarriage to Henry II of Plantagenet placed over half of France under direct control under the English Crown aggrivating political imbalance in intercontinental Europe. At the extreme edge of Norman control in the east Philippe Augustus built the town of St Paul en Vence. On the edge of this town which is in fact a Royal Hilltop Fortress in the south east of France stands the town St. Clair, guarding the approaches to and from Philippe Augustus's Fotress. The fortress was developed under Louis VIIII b1215 King 1226-1270 cannonised by the Roman Catholic Church as St Louis. The town of St. Clair was taken by the French King Henrie II who moved his entire court to St Paul en Vence.

In William's Conquest of England the territorial expansion of duchy of Normandie severly imbalanced power in Europe.

I found in a publication by Thierry de Lauriston Boubers The Kings of France Ten centuries of art and history in Europe (Paris 1988 Editions Les Reperes de Temps) the following comment which I found extremely disturbing:

"France's history is now part of the history of a Europe that ever since the end Second World War has tried to impose its unity in the face of the United States and the URSS who had developed into superpowers. This desire for unity first found an economic, then a political, expression (Creation of the European Parliament), and this desire was reaffirmed by the Maastricht agreement in December 1991. Following the reunification of Germany and the collapse of the Eastern bloc, the european community faces the need to expand. This will make it possible for it to assert itself, at the dawn of the 3rd millenium, in its dealings with Japan - now becoming a world's economic power - and with the United States, which, since the Gulf War, has reaffirmed its political supremacy on the international scene."

Regards,
Sinclair