Kingdom of France

The Kingdom of France is the historiographical name or <a href="/facts/Umbrella_term/bjxUuoRb">umbrella term</a> given to various political entities of <a href="/facts/France/CxIeIKM3">France</a> in the <a href="/facts/Middle_Ages/RqzEKB9v">medieval</a> and <a href="/facts/Early_modern_France/bGuzvsPu">early modern</a> period. It was one of the most powerful states in Europe from the <a href="/facts/High_Middle_Ages/uPRGYdE6">High Middle Ages</a> to 1848 during its dissolution. It was also an early <a href="/facts/French_colonial_empire/IRauBDs1">colonial power</a>, with colonies in Asia and Africa, and the largest being <a href="/facts/New_France/zDK9hedl">New France</a> in North America geographically centred around the <a href="/facts/Great_Lakes/Fd7pDkPX">Great Lakes</a>.
The Kingdom of France was descended directly from the <a href="/facts/West_Francia/rCGugs8D">western Frankish realm</a> of the <a href="/facts/Carolingian_Empire/kyp74kXx">Carolingian Empire</a>, which was ceded to <a href="/facts/Charles_the_Bald/onDUq4Wg">Charles the Bald</a> with the <a href="/facts/Treaty_of_Verdun/CdLoKatD">Treaty of Verdun</a> (843). A branch of the Carolingian dynasty continued to rule until 987, when <a href="/facts/Hugh_Capet/s4tkP3ky">Hugh Capet</a> was elected king and founded the <a href="/facts/Capetian_dynasty/5dMQyJlU">Capetian dynasty</a>. The territory remained known as Francia and its ruler as rex Francorum ('king of the Franks') well into the <a href="/facts/High_Middle_Ages/uPRGYdE6">High Middle Ages</a>. The first king calling himself rex Francie ('King of France') was <a href="/facts/Philip_II_of_France/c6UKr6bu">Philip II</a>, in 1190, and officially from 1204. From then, France was continuously ruled by the Capetians and their <a href="/facts/Cadet_branch/FwKNzEjI">cadet lines</a> under the <a href="/facts/House_of_Valois/yNsvJ3D9">Valois</a> and <a href="/facts/House_of_Bourbon/U3gm1qqs">Bourbon</a> until the monarchy was abolished in 1792 during the <a href="/facts/French_Revolution/PIkDlrC0">French Revolution</a>. The Kingdom of France was also ruled in <a href="/facts/Personal_union/cBjL324v">personal union</a> with the <a href="/facts/Kingdom_of_Navarre/vL3UGYE3">Kingdom of Navarre</a> over two time periods, 1284–1328 and 1572–1620, after which the institutions of Navarre were abolished and it was fully annexed by France (though the King of France continued to use the title "King of Navarre" through the end of the monarchy).
<a href="/facts/France_in_the_Middle_Ages/3trzjuzL">France in the Middle Ages</a> was a decentralised, <a href="/facts/Feudal/WCK7l9gA">feudal</a> monarchy. In <a href="/facts/Duchy_of_Brittany/f5opp6hA">Brittany</a> and <a href="/facts/Principality_of_Catalonia/wYRywSch">Catalonia</a> (the latter now a part of Spain), as well as <a href="/facts/Duchy_of_Aquitaine/6EdaxWCG">Aquitaine</a>, the authority of the French king was barely felt. <a href="/facts/Duchy_of_Lorraine/5paE5VBE">Lorraine</a>, <a href="/facts/County_of_Provence/TQ3HxVr7">Provence</a> and <a href="/facts/Kingdom_of_Arles/y3AcRFBJ">East Burgundy</a> were states of the <a href="/facts/Holy_Roman_Empire/6mdobnXN">Holy Roman Empire</a> and not yet a part of France. West Frankish kings were initially elected by the secular and ecclesiastical magnates, but the regular coronation of the eldest son of the reigning king during his father's lifetime established the principle of male <a href="/facts/Primogeniture/taMEFK8d">primogeniture</a>, which became codified in the <a href="/facts/Salic_law/x0vVD1Dk">Salic law</a>. During the <a href="/facts/Late_Middle_Ages/XNtcJjrU">Late Middle Ages</a>, rivalry between the Capetian dynasty, rulers of the Kingdom of France and their vassals the <a href="/facts/House_of_Plantagenet/euMP7zW8">House of Plantagenet</a>, who also ruled the <a href="/facts/Kingdom_of_England/1VqdIuFc">Kingdom of England</a> as part of their so-called competing <a href="/facts/Angevin_Empire/D7X4g1cY">Angevin Empire</a>, resulted in many armed struggles. The most notorious of them all are the series of conflicts known as the <a href="/facts/Hundred_Years%2527_War/Q6myk5Hu">Hundred Years' War</a> (1337–1453) in which the <a href="/facts/Kings_of_England/qpow970E">kings of England</a> laid claim to the French throne. Emerging victorious from said conflicts, France subsequently sought to extend its influence into <a href="/facts/Italy/tUf0PDYF">Italy</a>, but after initial gains was defeated by <a href="/facts/Habsburg_Spain/YDSCuG3x">Spain</a> and the Holy Roman Empire in the ensuing <a href="/facts/Italian_Wars/8TUUt503">Italian Wars</a> (1494–1559).
<a href="/facts/Early_modern_France/bGuzvsPu">France in the early modern era</a> was increasingly centralised; the French language began to displace other languages from official use, and the monarch expanded his <a href="/facts/Absolute_monarchy/bw15yYtX">absolute power</a> in an administrative system, known as the <a href="/facts/Ancien_R%25C3%25A9gime/4pCsWuFK">Ancien Régime</a>, complicated by historic and regional irregularities in taxation, legal, judicial, and ecclesiastic divisions, and local prerogatives. Religiously, France became divided between the Catholic majority and a Protestant minority, the <a href="/facts/Huguenots/x2FcqQ8J">Huguenots</a>, which led to a series of civil wars, the <a href="/facts/French_Wars_of_Religion/43pYXFXr">Wars of Religion</a> (1562–1598). Subsequently, France developed its first colonial empire in Asia, Africa, and in the Americas. 
In the 16th to the 17th centuries, the First French colonial empire stretched from a total area at its peak in 1680 to over 10 million square kilometres (3.9 million square miles), the second-largest empire in the world at the time behind the <a href="/facts/Spanish_Empire/RaWWgnQS">Spanish Empire</a>. Colonial conflicts with <a href="/facts/Kingdom_of_Great_Britain/5yBEtQIt">Great Britain</a> led to the loss of much of its <a href="/facts/New_France/zDK9hedl">North American holdings</a> by 1763. <a href="/facts/France_in_the_American_Revolutionary_War/V0V2Pqqw">French intervention</a> in the <a href="/facts/American_Revolutionary_War/8MxJNtcU">American Revolutionary War</a> helped the <a href="/facts/United_States/P0sCdLe5">United States</a> secure independence from <a href="/facts/George_III/1RGERms7">King George III</a> and the <a href="/facts/Kingdom_of_Great_Britain/5yBEtQIt">Kingdom of Great Britain</a>, but was costly and achieved little for France.
France through its <a href="/facts/French_colonial_empire/IRauBDs1">French colonial empire</a>, became a superpower from 1643 until 1815; from the reign of King <a href="/facts/Louis_XIV_of_France/2LseeIlj">Louis XIV</a> until the defeat of <a href="/facts/Napoleon/8TKBIjPM">Napoleon</a> in the <a href="/facts/Napoleonic_Wars/jo0MdaTD">Napoleonic Wars</a>. The Spanish Empire lost its superpower status to France after the signing of the <a href="/facts/Treaty_of_the_Pyrenees/LK9ft4w3">Treaty of the Pyrenees</a> (but maintained the status of <a href="/facts/Great_Power/KBtjXLun">Great Power</a> until the Napoleonic Wars and the <a href="/facts/Spanish_American_wars_of_independence/58o0lPKL">Independence of Spanish America</a>). <a href="/facts/First_French_Empire/b16nSfY7">France</a> lost its superpower status after <a href="/facts/Battle_of_Waterloo/jmATjc2f">Napoleon's defeat</a> against the <a href="/facts/British_Empire/hrsz0j7A">British</a>, <a href="/facts/Prussia/fs1wEGrk">Prussians</a> and <a href="/facts/Russian_Empire/hg1g5SpV">Russians</a> in <a href="/facts/Napoleonic_Wars/jo0MdaTD">1815</a>.
Following the <a href="/facts/French_Revolution/PIkDlrC0">French Revolution</a>, which began in 1789, the Kingdom of France <a href="/facts/Kingdom_of_France_(1791%25E2%2580%259392)/IDAKzXhP">adopted a written constitution</a> in 1791, but the Kingdom was abolished a year later and replaced with the <a href="/facts/First_French_Republic/GpRHNfcm">First French Republic</a>. The <a href="/facts/Bourbon_Restoration_in_France/hKbV35eL">monarchy was restored</a> by the other great powers in 1814 and, with the exception of the <a href="/facts/Hundred_Days/F9GzzHEt">Hundred Days</a> in 1815, lasted until the <a href="/facts/French_Revolution_of_1848/zLUanjgq">French Revolution of 1848</a>.

Kingdom of France open-in-new

Kingdom of France