Charles V of France
Charles V ruled France from 1364 to 1380 and recovered nearly everything England had taken, without fighting a major battle. Born at Vincennes in 1338, he was the first heir to hold the title Dauphin, and governed as regent from 1356 when his father John II was captured at Poitiers. Those years were the worst in French history: the kingdom bankrupt, the ransom impossible, Étienne Marcel's revolt in Paris, the Jacquerie peasant rising, mercenary companies plundering at will, and the plague. He was nineteen, physically frail, and survived all of it, which formed him. He acceded in 1364 and set out to reverse the Treaty of Brétigny. His method was to avoid battle. He appointed Bertrand du Guesclin, a Breton of modest birth, as Constable, and pursued a strategy of sieges, ambushes, raids on supply and the systematic refusal of pitched engagements — which denied the English longbow the defensive set-piece it depended on. English chevauchées marched across France repeatedly and achieved nothing while their armies wasted away. By 1375 the English held only Calais, Bordeaux and Bayonne. He rebuilt the finances with permanent taxes on salt and hearths, established a standing military organisation, and built the Bastille and new walls for Paris. He was called Charles the Wise and deserved it. He assembled a library of over a thousand manuscripts in the Louvre, the foundation of the national library, and commissioned French translations of Aristotle, Augustine and works on astronomy and government. He suffered chronic illness and a swollen left arm, possibly from poison. He died in 1380.
- Lived: 1338 CE – 1380 CE
- Nationality: French
- Roles: king, head_of_state
