Lord of the Pyrenees: Gaston Fébus, Count of Foix (1331-1391)Boydell & Brewer Ltd, 2008 - 222 páginas The reign of Gaston III, Count of Foix and self-proclaimed sovereign Lord of Béarn, stands out as one of the rare success stories of the `calamitous' fourteenth century. By playing a skilful game of shifting allegiances and timely defiance, he avoided being drawn into the conflicts between his more powerful neighbours - France and English Aquitaine, Aragon and Castile -- thus sparing his domains the devastations of warfare. Best known as a patron of the arts, and the author of a celebrated Book of the Hunt, Fébus - as he styled himself - also prefigures the eighteenth-century `enlightened despots' with his effort to centralize government, protect natural resources and promote enterprise. But a sequence of mysterious tragedies -- the abrupt dismissal of his wife, the slaying of his only legitimate son - reveal the dark side of the brilliant and enigmatic `Sun Prince of the Pyrenees'. |
Índice
Inheritance | 2 |
Apprenticeship | 15 |
Trials and Tribulations | 29 |
Fébus Revealed | 44 |
Challenges and Designs | 62 |
Governing Wisely | 83 |
Fébus at Home | 107 |
Fébus the Author | 127 |
The Orthez Mystery | 144 |
Endgame | 163 |
Death and the Spoils | 184 |
Appendix Bernard de Béarn Count of Medinaceli | 204 |