Henry the Navigator (Don Henrique el Navegador), was a Portuguese prince. He was born in 1394 and died in 1458. The fourth .son of King John I of Portugal, in his youth he gave brilliant proofs of courage.
When the Portuguese conquered Ceuta in 1415 Henry distinguished himself by his bravery, and was knighted by his father, after whose death he chose for his residence the city of Sagres, in Algarve, near CapeSt Vincent, and vigorously prosecuted the war against the Moors in Africa. He erected at Sagres an observatory and a school of navigation.
From time to time he sent vessels on voyages to the coasts of Barbary and Guinea; resulting in the discovery of the islands of Puerto Santo and Madeira, and some years later of the Azores.
In 1433 Gilianez, one of his navigators, safely doubled Cape Bojador, and other adventurers, pushing still further south, discovered Cape Blanco in 1441 and Cape Verd in 1445. A profitable commerce with the natives of West Africa was soon developed, and the Senegal and Gambia partially explored.
After acting as general against the Moors in 1458 Henry died at Sagres on the 18th of November, 1458. His efforts not only laid the foundations of the commerce and colonial possessions of Portugal, but gave a new direction to navigation and commercial enterprise. Research Henry The Navigator
Anjou was an ancient province of France, now forming the department of Maine-et-Loire, and parts of the departments of Indre-et-Loire, Mayenne, and Sarthe covering an area, about 3000 square miles. In 1060 the province passed into the hands of the house of Gatinais, of which sprang Count Godfrey V, who, in 1127, married Matilda, daughter of Henry I of England, and so became the ancestor of the Plantagenet kings. Anjou remained in the possession of the English kings up to 1204, when John lost it to the French king Philip Augustus. In 1226 Louis VIII bestowed this province on his brother Charles; but in 1328 it was reunited to the French crown. John I raised it to the rank of a ducal peerage, and gave it to his son Louis. Henceforth it remained separate from the French crown until 1480, when it fell to Louis XI. Research Anjou
The interior of France is traversed from south-west to north-east by successive chains of mountains, commencing with the Pyrenees and including the Cevennes, the Cote d'Or, the Vosges, and others, forming the water-shed, on one side of which the rivers flow west and north into the Atlantic and the English Channel, on the other side east and south into the Mediterranean. At its north-eastern extremity this system is met by the Alps and the Jura. A considerable portion of the Western Alps belongs to South-eastern France. Mont Blanc itself (15,781 feet) is mostly within the French boundary-line. Some lofty Pyrenean peaks are also within French territory, the highest being Vignemale (10,792 feet). Near the centre of France, and separate from the great watershed of the country, are several groups of volcanic mountains known by the general name of the mountains of Auvergne, the chief peaks of which are the Plomb du Cantal (5983 feet), the Puy de Sancy (6100 feet), and the Puy de Dome.
The spurs thrown off by the great watershed divide France into seven principal river basins, six of which are on the north-western slope and one on the south-eastern. These are: 1. The basin of the Garonne and its affluents (the Ariege, Tarn, Lot, and Dordogne on the right, and the Gers on the left); with the two secondary basins of the Charente on the north, and the Adour on the south. 2. The basin of the Loire and its tributaries (Nievre and Maine on the right, the Allier, Loiret, Cher, Indre, Vienne, and Sevre Nantaise on the left). 3. The basin of the Seine and its tributaries (the Aude, Marne, and Oise on the right, the Yonne and Eure on the left. To the north is the scondary basin of the Somme. 4. The basin of the Meuse with its affluent the Sambre. 5. The basin of the Escaut or Scheldt with its affluent the Scarpe. Only the southern portion of these two basins is included within the political boundaries of France. 6. The basin which pours a number of tributaries, the principal of which is the Moselle, into the Rhine. Only a comparatively small portion of this basin also is included within the political boundaries of France. 7. The basin of the Rhone, occupying the whole of the territory which lies to the south-east of the great watershed, the tributaries being the Ain, the Saone, Ardeche, and Gard on the right, and the Isere, Drome, and Durance on the left. The secondary basins are those of the Var and the Aude. The four great rivers of France are the Loire, Seine, Rhone, and Garonne. France has in all more than 200 navigable streams, with a total navigation of about 6000 miles. Lakes are few, and individually very limited in extent.
Among geological formations granite holds a chief place as forming the nucleus of the mountains generally, and being the prevailing rock in the Alps, the Pyrenees, the Cevennes, and in the northwest peninsular portion of the country (Brittany). The other crystalline rocks, consisting chiefly of trachytes and basalts, have received a magnificent development in Auveryne, where whole mountains are composed of them, and where the effects of remote volcanic agency are still visible in extinct craters and lava streams. In the Juralimestone occurs in such enormous masses as to have given its name to a peculiar formation (the Jurassic). The granite is overlaid by gneiss, micaceous and argillaceous slates, succeeded, particularly in the Pyrenees, by mountain limestone. The secondary formation, commencing with this limestone, is largely developed in many parts, and furnishes a considerable number of coal and mineral fields. The tertiary formation covers a vast extent of surface, particularly in the south-west and around Paris.
France or Gaul, at the earliest period of which anything is known with regard to it, was inhabited by a number of independent tribes, who appear to have been mainly Celtic in race. In the latter half of the 2nd century BC the Romans conquered a portion of the south-east, and under Julius Caesar the conquest of all Gaul was completed between 58 and 51 BC. Subsequently the country became completely Romanized in language, civilization, and religion, and many flourishing towns sprang up. In the decline of the Roman empire German tribes began to make settlements in Gaul, and it was from a body of these known as Franks, that the name France arose. Towards the end of the fifth century Clovis, chief of the Salian Franks, made himself master not only of almost all France (or Gaul), but also of a considerable territory east of the Rhine. The dynasty which he founded was called the Merovingian from his grandfather Merovseus. Clovis died in 511, leaving his kingdom to be divided amongst his four sons as subsequent rulers often did. The Frankish dominions were thus differently divided at different times; but two divisions, a western and an eastern, or Neustria and Austrasia, became the most important.
A large part of the history of the Franks under the Merovingian kings is the history of the contests between these two states. Latterly Pippin or Pepin d'Heristal, mayor of the palace of the Austrasian king, conquered Neustria and made his sway supreme throughout the kingdom of the Franks. This date may be regarded as that of the real termination of the Merovingian line, for although kings belonging to this family continued to be crowned until 752, they were mere puppets, 'rois faineants' as they are generally called: the real power was in the hands of the mayors of the palace. Pepin died in 714. He was succeeded, after a brief period of anarchy, by his son Charles Martel, or Charles the Hammer - a title he earned by the courage and strength he displayed in battle. During his tenure of power all Europe was threatened by the Saracens, who, after occupying Spain, had penetrated into France, and were met by Charles Martel on a plain between Tours and Poitiers, and totally defeated in 732. Charles Martel died in 741, leaving Austrasia and the countries beyond the Rhine to his son Carloman, and Neustria and Burgundy to his son Pepin the Short. On his brother's deathPepin seized his heritage, and in 752, thinking it time to have done with the system of rois faineants, had himself crowned King of the Franks. In 768 he died, and was succeeded by his sons Charles, afterwards known as Charlemagne (Charles the Great), and Carloman. The latter dying in. 771, Charlemagne then became sole ruler, and conquered and organized an empire which extended from the Atlantic on the west to the Elbe, the Saale, and the Bohemian mountains on the east, and embraced also three-quarters of Italy, and Spain as far as the Ebro. By Pope Leo III on Christmasday in the year 800 he was crowned in the name of the Roman people as Emperor of the West. There was as yet, strictly speaking, no kingdom of France, and Charlemagne was a German, and his empire a German one.
To Charlemagne succeeded in 814 his youngest son Louis the Pious. At the death of the latter the empire, after many disputes, was eventually divided by the Treaty of Verdun in 843 amongst his sons, the portion nearly corresponding to modern France falling to Charles the Bald. From this time the separate history of France properly begins, the history of the French
language being also traced to the same period, while the eastern portion of the old Frankish territory remained German. After Charles the Bald, the first of the Carolingian kings, had been succeeded in 877 by Louis II, and Louis II. by Louis III (879-882) and Carloman (879-884), Charles the Fat, king of the eastern Frankish, territory, became ruler of the western also until 887, when he was deposed. After a brief usurpation by Eudes, Count of Paris, Charles III, the brother of Louis III, was recognized as king. But his kingship was little more than nominal, France being divided into a number of great fiefs, the possessors of which though acknowledging the feudal supremacy of Charles were practically independent. In these circumstances Charles, unable to offer any adequate resistance to the Norman pirates who were devastating the coast and making incursions into French territory, surrendered to them, in 912, the province which took from them the name of Normandy. Towards the end of his reign Hugh of Paris, as he is generally called, duke of France, was really the most powerful person in the kingdom, and throughout the reigns of Louis IV, Lothaire and Louis V, he and his son Hugh Capet held the real power. On the death of Louis V without children in 987 Hugh Capet mounted the throne himself, and thus became the founder of the Capetian dynasty. The great fiefs of Paris and Orleans were thus added to the crown, and Paris became the centre of the new monarchy.
The first task of the Capetian line was to reconquer the royal prerogatives from the great vassals, but for two centuries without much success. Hugh Capet died in 996, and his first three successors, Robert (died in 1031), Henry I (died in 1060), and Philip I (died in 1106), effected nothing whatever towards the establishment of the royal authority. Louis VI was more successful, being greatly helped by the fact that the nobility had been much weakened by the Crusades. The growth of the towns also, which ultimately became the allies of the kings, was a powerful check on the nobles.
Louis VI died in 1137, and was succeeded by his son Louis VII, who reigned until 1180. During his reign the stability of the French throne was endangered by the influence acquired in France by Henry II of England, who possessed, either by inheritance or by his marriage with Eleanor
of Aquitaine,the whole of the west of France except Brittany. Louis was succeeded by his son PhilipAugustus (Philip II), who did much to strengthen the throne, depriving John, king of England, of Normandy, Maine, and Anjou. His son Louis VIII, who succeeded in 1223, carried on the work by the conquest of Poitou, and a religious war being proclaimed against the counts of Toulouse, who protected the Albigenses, that house was extinguished, and their domains passed to the royal family. Louis VIII died in 1226, and under the wise rule of Louis IX (St Louis) the influence of the crown went on increasing, as it did also under Philip III (Philip the Bold), Philip IV (Philip the Fair), Louis X (died in 1316), John I (died in 1316, after a reign of five days), Philip V (died in 1322), and Charles IV (died in 1328), by the acquisition of fresh domains and other means until the outbreak of the wars with England.
France remained a monarchy until 1792, when it became a republic during the French Revolution. Before the revolution of 1789 France was divided into general governments or provinces, the number of which varied at different epochs. Under Francis I, by whom they were instituted, there were nine, namely, Normandie, Guyenne, Languedoc, Provence, Dauphine, Bourgogne, Champagne-et-Brie, Picardie, Ile de France. Under Henry III there were twelve, formed by the addition of Bretagne, Orleanais, and Lyonnais. Under Louis XIV the number was fixed at thirty-two, to which a thirty-third was added by the acquisition of Corsica under Louis XV. At the revolution the whole of France, including Corsica, was parcelled out into departments, and each department subdivided successively into arrondissements, cantons, and communes. This division, carried out in 1790, has since maintained its ground. The number of departments was originally eighty-three, but it has been at different times. increased and decreased.
In 1814 the Bourbon monarchy was restored, only to be replaced by a second republic in 1848, which then became an empire under Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870 when France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War prompted the establishment of a third republic.
France long had an animosity towards Great Britain, and was instrumental in the success of the colonists during the American War of Independence, supplying a large army commanded by Rochambeau and fleets under D'Estaing and De Grasse, and following the independence of America from Great Britain, the first treaty made by the new independent States if North America was with France. This treaty was signed on February the 6th, 1778, and was both an offensive and defensive alliance made against the common enemy, Great Britain, with the objective of maintaining the sovereignty and independence of the United States. In return for its military aid, France received from the United States all of the American possessions in the West Indies and exclusive mutual privileges granted to ships of war and privateers bringing prizes into port.
During the 19th century military service was obligatory in France upon every Frenchman aged twenty or older, and not pronounced unfit for military service. They had to serve first in the regular army (known as the armee active) for two years, then in the reserve of the regular army for eleven years, next in the territorial army for six years, and finally in the reserve of the territorial army for six years. This gave France on a peace footing an army of more than half a million, which on a war footing could be brought up to two and a half millions or even more. At the same time, the French navy was manned partly by conscription and partly by voluntary enrolment. The effective war navy of France during the 19th century was of considerable strength. Research France
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