Montfort of Brittany - Ruling As Dukes

Ruling As Dukes

When the peace was sealed in 1365, it was stipulated that the Montfort branch will succeed in Brittany restricted to the Salic Law and in the case of their male line going extinct, the heirs of Joanna of Penthièvre will succeed the last male Montfortist duke. The Blois-Penthièvre family received more estates in Brittany as partial compensation.

Brittany kept autonomous, actually rather independent, although continuously giving lip service to French sovereignty. After the Breton War of Succession, Brittany still had links with the English through the Earldom of Richmond, until the Wars of the Roses.

John V, Duke of Brittany was deserted by his nobles in 1473 and left for exile in England. Louis, duke of Anjou, brother of the French king, and a son-in-law of the deposed Penthièvre Duchess Joanna, was appointed lieutenant-general of Brittany by the king, who in 1378 sought to annex Brittany to France, which provoked the Bretons to recall John V from exile.

The second Treaty of Guérande (1381) established Brittany's neutrality in the Anglo-French conflict, although John continued to make homage to King of France.

In 1420, John VI, Duke of Brittany was kidnapped by Olivier de Blois, count of Penthièvre, son of Joanna of Penthièvre. John's wife, Joan of France besieged the rebels and set free her husband, who confiscated the Penthièvre's goods.

According to the succession order enacted, in 1457 Duke Peter II was succeeded by his elderly uncle Arthur de Richemont instead of his sister Isabelle de Bretagne-Montfort (who married into the Laval family and from whom the future Chabot branch of the Rohan (family) descends).

In 1465, Francis II took the county of Penthièvre from its heiress, Nicole de Bretagne-Blois, thus again undermining the rival family's position in Brittany.

However, the last male Montfort, Francis II, Duke of Brittany (died in 1488) prepared for succession by his daughter Anne of Brittany - thus, the first female Montfort rulership abrogated the rights of genealogically more senior Penthièvre family (Catholics) as well as those of Rohan family (future Huguenots).

In the last years of Francis II, French warred against the Breton and Brittany was defeated in 1488—the last duke of independent Brittany was forced to submit to a treaty giving the King of France the right to determine the marriage of the Duke's daughter, a young girl 12 years old, the heir to the Duchy.

The independence of Brittany waned under the French dominion. Anne was forced to marry Charles VIII of France, but their children did not survive. When Charles died, Anne had to marry his distant cousin and successor, Louis XII of France.