County of Boulogne

The County of Boulogne was a county of the Kingdom of France centred on the city of Boulogne-sur-Mer, on the English Channel coast of Artois. It originated as a Frankish pagus, the pagus Bononiensis, but few records survive before the eleventh century. In the late ninth and early tenth centuries it came under the counts of Flanders; a count named Erkenger lost his lands in 896 for remaining loyal to Charles the Simple, and Baldwin II of Flanders may have taken control at that point. A separate House of Boulogne emerged in the eleventh century. Eustace II accompanied William the Conqueror's invasion of England in 1066, and the county was a major participant in the First Crusade: Eustace III's brothers Godfrey of Bouillon and Baldwin became kings of Jerusalem, and Eustace himself was offered but declined the crown. Count Renaud fought on the imperial side at Bouvines in 1214 and was defeated by Philip II of France, who had attached the county to the County of Artois in 1212. Boulogne passed under nominal royal control in 1223, and after a complicated succession it was exchanged by Bertrand II de la Tour with Louis XI in 1477 and annexed to the royal domain.