Raoul II of Brienne

Raoul II of Brienne (death on November 19th 1350, with Paris) wire of Raoul Ier de Brienne, count of Have and Guînes, lord of Jarnac and Jeanne of Mello. In 1344, it succeeds his/her father in his counties and keeps the load of Connétable of France that the king Philippe VI had entrusted to his father.

In 1340, it marries Catherine of Savoy, girl of Louis II of Vaud and Isabelle de Châlon. Of this union it does not have a descent, but it recognizes in 1345 an illegitimate son, Jean of Wood, lord of Strong House.

At the time of the head office of Caen in 1346, Raoul de Brienne is made prisoner by the English forces carried out by the Duc of Kent, Thomas Holland. In autumn 1350, it is authorized to return to France so that it can join together the sum of 60 000 ecus of gold to pay its ransom. The causes of its execution remained secret but it seems that he was convinced of high treason. Indeed, it is about a cosmopolitan gentleman whose field is shared between several kingdoms ((in France, England and Ireland). As all the lords whose possessions have a maritime frontage in the west (except those whose fields are in the basin of the Seine and who can easily trade with Paris) it may find it beneficial to support England for economic reasons (the maritime transport being at the time more powerful than the surface transport the sleeve constitutes an intense zone of exchange). At once its arrival in Paris, of malicious gossip claim that the constable would have been released because it would have paid homage to the king Edouard II of England by yielding its fortress of Guines to him, fortified town on the strait of the Pas-de-Calais. It seems that he negotiated his release against the commitment to recognize Edouard III as king de France and that the king was informed of it by the interception of mails bound for the English sovereign. The king does not wish that spread because that would give ahead the problem of Edouard rights to the crown.

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