Because
of the Gauls - first tribe with Ligures and Iberians to
occupy the French territory- was called Gaul the territory
that includes the actual France. The Gaul was conquered
in the 1st century BC by the Romans, who spread their
civilization and culture during four centuries. The Barbarians
invasion, in the beginnings of the 5th century knocked
down the country, until the end of the same century, the
frank king Clovis managed to restore the unit of the Gaul.
The distribution of the country among his sons debilitated
the Merovingian dynasty that was demolished by Pipin the
Brief, father of Charlemagne, founder of the dynasty of
the Charolingians. With Charlemagne, who reigned from
768 to 814, the Gaul got to be the centre of a vast empire
that extended until the Elbe, the Theiss, the Adriatic,
the Garellano and the Ebro. In 987 the Charolingian dynasty
was overthrown by the Capetians, that governed the destinies
of France until the French Revolution.
The first Capetian tried to recover the royal authority
and extend their dominions, in spite of the opposition
from England and Germany, but Philip Augustus II defeated
them in the first years of the 13th century. Louis IX
(San Luis) directed the two last Crusades (1248-1270).
Philip IV the Beautiful, who reigned from 1285 to 1314,
defend the crown against the pretensions of Pope Boniface
VIII and Louis X, in his ephemeral reign (1314-1316),
carried out the emancipation of the servants.
In the 14th and 15th centuries (1336-1453), France was
immersed in the Hundred years war until the intrepidity
and heroism of Joan of Arc lifted the French fighting
spirit and freed of the invasion to their mother country
(1429-1431). Louis XI (1461-1483) established with Charles
the Reckless a duel that finished with the death of the
Duke of Bourgogne in the battle of Nancy (1477). Charles
VIII (1483-1498), Louis XII (1498-1515) and Francis I
(1547-1559) invaded the Italian territory and there they
maintained unfruitful wars for France.
Francis I and his son Henry (1547-1559) fought very indefatigably
against Spain in the reigns of the children of Henry II:
Francis II (1559-1560), Charles IX (1560-1574) and Henry
III (1574-1589) Therefore, the royal authority was debilitated
and with Charles IX the religion wars began. Henry IV
(1589-1610) definitively recovered the royal authority
and with Louis XIII (1610-1643) and his minister Richelieu
acquires absolutism character. This absolutism, increased
soon in the reigns of Louis XIV (1643-1715) and Louis
XV (1715-1774), the wars of the Sun King and the exaggerated
expenses of this sovereign, the vices and the diplomatic
stupidities of Louis XV, the bad administration of the
inept and unpopular ministers of Louis XVI (1774-1792
king), the writings of the philosophers and the inequality
between nobility, clergy and level state, lead to the
Revolution (1789).
This one, after establishing beneficial laws, fell in
excesses. After the violence’s Terror (1793-1794)
appeared the Directory (1795-1799), the Consulate (1799-1804)
and the Empire (1804-1815) with Napoleon I who with his
memorable campaigns against the whole Europe extended
the limits of France vertiginously until he lost the Waterloo
battle.
The Restoration that gave the throne to Louis XVIII (1814-1824)
reduced the frontiers. While Charles X (1824-1830) was
reigning, exploded the 1830 liberal revolution that put
in the throne to Louis Philip of Orleans, which was demolished
as well in 1848 by another revolution that restored the
Republic. Soon came (1852) the coup d'etat of Louis Napoleon,
who was elevated emperor with the name of Napoleon III
and whose government was so beneficial in the interior
as unfortunate in the foreign, because he finished causing
the disastrous French-German war of 1870-1871. As a result
of it, the emperor was dismissed and the third Republic
was restored.
From 1871 France tried to reconstruct its internal forces
and to conserve peace in Europe arranging capable alliances
but if in its first intention it prevailed, was not thus
in the second, because when exploding in 1914 World War
I, those same alliances pushed it to take part immediately
in it, taking with England all the weight of the fight,
which they ended up winning. It followed a period of peace,
darkened by distrusts until in September of 1939, the
balance between the States of Europe was truncated because
of the proclaim that incorporated Dantzig to Germany and
of to have attacked this one Poland, France forced by
his alliance with England declared the war to the Germans,
to be defeated by these in 1940.
It had to request a peace treaty separately for which
the government presided over by Reynaud resigned and passed
the power to the hands of Pétaín, who was
in charge to ask for the armistice. President Lebrún
also resigned his position and the Cameras voted the abolition
of the Third Republic and the restoration of a totalitarian
State; they granted to the Government faculties to establish
a new Constitution and conferred the power to Pétain
as Chief of State with plenary sessions powers.
When the nation was released by the English and the Americans
in 1944, after the disembarkation in Normandy the 6 June
of that year, a provisional government was created, with
general De Gaulle in front, a man that had encouraged
the resistance from England and that was conserved in
it until 1946.
In January of 1947 the IV Republic was restored, with
Vincent Auriol as President. In this period began the
collapse of the French colonial empire. France retired
from Indochina, granted the independence of Tunisia and
Morocco and faced the Algerian rebellion. De Gaulle returned
to the power in 1958. The same year a new Constitution
was elaborated and was proclaimed the V Republic. A consequence
of that was the independence of Guinea. In 1962, after
a bloody war, also Algeria obtained its independence.
In spite of all these incidences, France is at the present
among the great world-wide powers, the same in the technical
aspect as in economic and the politician.
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