Great britain in french

          Great britain in french - France and Britain are only twenty-one miles apart, but their rivalry has repeatedly altered the course of history. For almost 1000 years, England and France have had an ongoing rivalry. It is not as intense now as it used to be – it was so intense during the Middle Ages that England created its own language so that they wouldn't have to speak French! Their rivalry has caused the two countries to change the face of warfare, redraw country boundaries, and even found the United States of America. 

     France and Britain have fought with each other all over the world, and their rivalry has affected us all. 

So, how did  France and Britain rivalry start? 

     During ancient times, France and Britain were close allies. Britain was inhabited by the Celts, and France by the Gauls – both people groups were closely related and saw the English Channel as a connecting river. Even during the Roman occupation, the two countries cooperated. Their rivalry did not begin until 1066, when William the Conqueror arrived in England from Normandy. This was a wealthy French territory – France was not a united country yet – and William believed he had a claim to the English throne. 

     King Edward the Confessor might have promised the throne to him in 1051, but on his deathbed, he gave it to Harold Godwinson, his wife’s brother and a powerful man. William invaded England and met Harold's army at the Battle of Hastings. It was a bloody battle, even for the Middle Ages, but Harold died and left the way open for William to take the throne of England. He was crowned king on Christmas Day in 1066 in Westminster Abbey, and he spent the next five years putting down revolts. The Norman Conquest officially ended the Viking Age in England and brought in French influences. 

     The official language of the court became French, and it soon superseded spoken English, although English was still used vernacularly. Tensions rose between the French and the English as the Dukes of Normandy balanced also being kings of England. They were both equal and subordinate to the French king, and this tension caused many small wars as the two countries disputed over land and power, culminating in the Hundred Years' War. 

What was the reason of the Hundred Years' War? 

     The Hundred Years' War was started by problems with the French throne's succession; they believed that only males could inherit titles and royal positions, and King Charles IV died without brothers or sons. France now had a problem because there were two serious contenders for the throne: Philip of Valois and Edward III of England. Edward III was Edward II's and Isabella of France's son, making him the nephew of King Charles IV. Philip was Charles' first cousin, so Edward believed he had a stronger claim to the French throne. The French did not want an English ruler, so they claimed that because Isabella had had no right to the throne, her son didn't either.

      In 1329, Edward was not strong enough yet to continue the fight, but he paid homage to King Philip VI with the utmost defiance – it was clearly an homage given in word only. War was inevitable, but the two countries stalled until 1337 when Edward stopped paying homage and Philip seized English holdings in France. The two countries officially went to war over who had the right to the throne of France, but all the old tensions from the past three hundred years had bubbled to the surface, fueling the call to war. Neither country intended for the war to last over one hundred years, but it wasn't 116 years of constant fighting. 

     The armies stopped in the winter, and there were gaps in the war that lasted for years. There are three major sections of the Hundred Years' War: the Edwardian War (1337-1360), the Caroline War (1369-1389), and the Lancastrian War (1415-1453). The Edwardian War ended in an English victory, although it wasn't as successful as Edward had envisioned. He wanted the French throne; he had even captured France's King John II, but a freak hailstorm ended his claim by killing one thousand Englishmen. In the end, he signed the Treaty of Brétigny – he was allowed to keep some lands in Gascony and keep King John captive, but he had to give back most of the other French land he and his son – the Black Prince – had captured. 

     King John was eventually released as part of a hostage exchange, with his son Louis being one of the new hostages to arrive in England. He was supposed to be set free once France paid his ransom, but France was so weak that Louis wasn’t able to be set free in six months as previously though. 

     After waiting for three years, Louis escaped prison. King John voluntarily returned to England in his son's place because he thought Louis' escape was dishonorable. King John died soon after in English captivity, and the Hundred Years' War saw its first significant break. The fighting picked back up again in 1369 when Gascony revolted against heavy English taxes – the Black Prince had increased taxes to pay for his part in the Spanish Castilian Civil War. 

     King Pedro of Castile had begged the Black Prince for aid against his half-brother and even promised to repay the prince, but he refused to pay after his victory. In the meantime, King Charles V was also fighting in Castile, and when the English army attacked French troops, it was a stark reminder that the Hundred Years' War – and their rivalry – was still ongoing. When Gascony revolted against England and appealed to France, they unwittingly started the war again. 

    The Caroline War had many French victories, but it ended when both countries faced problems on the home front. Edward, Charles, and the Black Prince all died – and the new kings were still boys. Richard II was crowned king of England in 1377 at ten years old. Charles VI became king of France in 1380 at eleven years old. Of course, the boys were not yet making governmental decisions, which is another reason the war stalled. 

     Richard's regent was John of Gaunt, whose taxes were so harsh that the peasants revolted in 1381. They hated the poll tax most – many peasants couldn't pay it without starving their families and were imprisoned if they did not pay. John saw it as a solution to England's money troubles, but the peasants were angry; they marched on his Savoy Palace, which had enough gold and silver to pay for thousands of poll taxes, and tore it to the ground. Richard II managed to put down the rebellion, but he was still too busy to focus on a rivalry with France.

      Charles VI of France was also too busy putting down peasant revolts. His uncles were serving as regents and were plundering the royal money coffers, which were already depleted from the war. Charles raised taxes to compensate and then had to deal with two rebellions. By 1389, the Hundred Years' War had reached a stalemate brought about by discontent at home. The war did not start again until 1415, even though advisors in both countries were anxious to continue the rivalry. 

     No king was interested until King Henry V took the English throne, and he dearly wanted the French throne for himself. He began goading the French, demanding land, money, and finally, the hand of Catherine of Valois – the daughter of King Charles VI. When France refused to allow him to marry Catherine, so Henry V invaded. He is remembered in history as a great fighter, winning several English victories, including the Battle of Agincourt. Still, just when it seemed England would finally win the Hundred Years' War, King Henry V died and left his nine-month-old son, Henry VI, whom he had with his wife Catherine of Valois, as heir. 

     A few years after this, France found help from an unexpected source: Joan of Arc. She was a peasant girl who believed that she received visions from God that told her to restore the rightful king of France. Her visions helped her encourage the French troops and turn the Siege of Orléans into a French victory. The Hundred Years' War ended with a decisive French victory at the Battle of Castillon – England fully relented their claim to the French throne as the Middle Ages finally ended. 

Did the rivalry outlive the Middle Ages? 

     The Hundred Years War did not finish their rivalry – it lived on into the modern era. It intensified during the English Reformation, which started under King Henry VIII when the Catholic Church would not allow him to divorce his wife. He broke away from the Catholics and formed the Church of England; it was similar to Catholicism, except it was technically Protestant. 

     The French remained loyally Catholic, and the two countries now saw each other as a foreign and heretically evil. This did not stop trade, and the economic relationship between the two countries remained strong and relatively friendly. 

     The political relationship was constantly fluctuating. Their governmental systems began to shift; England became more parliamentarian after the English Civil War, and France became an absolute monarchy. The two countries became involved in the complex web of European alliances in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and they fought over colonies. Although they occasionally fought on the same side, Britain and France were more often on opposite sides of the wars throughout this time. 

     One of the most striking wars was the Seven Years' War – also known as the French and Indian War in North America – and it began in North America in 1754. Both countries wanted control of the Ohio area, and the clash of forces there reverberated around the world. Britain and France were soon back to the same fight they had been having for the past century: who would be the supreme European power in the world. 

     The fighting spanned across the globe, and Britain defeated France in North America, Europe, and elsewhere, weakening France's hold on its colonies and setting the stage for the British Empire. Even though Britain had finally proven itself to be the more powerful of the two countries in the modern era, France was not done fighting. They watched gleefully as the American Revolution began and sent supplies to the Americans, primarily because of their rivalry with the British. They did not officially join the war until they were certain of an American victory. After the Battle of Saratoga, France recognized the United States as an independent country and sent them military support. 

     The Battle of Saratoga had been a British defeat, and American and French troops joined together for the Battle of Yorktown. This was the final major battle of the American Revolution, and the French and American soldiers worked together to trap the British on a peninsula in Virginia at Yorktown. The French navy was essential – it held back the British rescue ships, preventing them from supplying aid. The British finally surrendered on October 19, 1781, and the French celebrated beating their rivals.

      Britain returned the favor after the French Revolution by joining Prussia and the Kingdom of the Netherlands to defeat Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo, which officially ended his control of continental Europe. The Battle of Waterloo was the last battle where the French and the British fought each other. Britain and France fought on the same side in the modern wars, although they continued their rivalry with criticism and jokes instead of war. Since 1815, tensions between the two countries have been settled diplomatically, yet the two countries still weren't allies before World War I.

     Britain only entered the war because they had an alliance with Belgium, which Germany invaded on the way to France. Once they were in the war, the two countries worked closely together, and by World War II, the bond between the countries was so strong that the French Resistance had a headquarters in London led by Charles de Gaulle. He named it Free France, and although it started with only a handful of volunteers, the resistance soon blossomed into a French national movement. 

     The two countries have continued to work closely together in the present day, but their rivalry is not over. Conflicts, tensions, and crises continue to arise; however, they have never led to war between the two countries, showing that a fierce rivalry that reshapes history and revolutionizes warfare, culture, and language can settle into more friendly terms when given about a thousand years to work itself out.