County of Nevers

The County of Nevers was the Nivernais land between Loire and Morvan from 900 to 1539, the county that married its way into Burgundy. Born about 900 on the upper Loire, its counts held the fords and the Clamecy timber floats, vassals of the duke and bishops in turn. In 1384 the heiress married Philip the Bold of Burgundy, and Nevers rode with the greatest principality in the West for a century: its men fought at Agincourt, its dukes' cousins ruled Flanders. The Burgundian inheritance split and resplit; the Cleves line took Nevers and held it through the mad wars of Armagnacs and Burgundians. Charles, last count of the old economizing line, died owing everyone; in 1539 François I, who liked tidy maps and loyal cousins, raised Nevers into a duchy for his Gonzaga kin by marriage, ending six centuries of county and beginning the duchy that Mazarin would buy for cash in 1659. The hills kept their charcoal burners and the Loire its barges; only the title on the gate changed.