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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2015
Copyright © Maurice Druon 1977
This translation copyright © Andrew Simpkin 2014
First published in French as Quand un Roi perd la France
Cover Layout Design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2015
Jacket digital illustration © Patrick Knowles
Jacket photograph © Antiquarian Images (map)
Maurice Druon asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780007491377
Ebook Edition © January 2015 ISBN: 9780008159443
Version: 2016-03-01
‘Our longest war, the Hundred Years War, was merely a legal debate, interspersed with occasional bouts of armed warfare’
PAUL CLAUDEL
Contents
Part One: Misfortunes Come From Long Ago
1. The Cardinal of Périgord thinks …
2. The Cardinal of Périgord speaks
5. The Beginnings of the King they call The Good
6. The Beginnings of the King they call The Bad
Part Two: The Banquet of Rouen
Part Four: The Summer of Disaster