When did the Duchy of Burgundy exist?

The Duchy of Burgundy existed 1032–1477. On this map it is drawn 1003–1017, 1385–1481.

How large was the Duchy of Burgundy?

At its greatest extent drawn on this map, the Duchy of Burgundy covered about 121,000 km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.

Europe · High and late Middle Ages

Duchy of Burgundy

1032–1477

Duché de Bourgogne; Latin Ducatus Burgundiae. Capital: Dijon. A fief of the French crown, distinct from the Free County across the Saône (an imperial fief).

See it on the map → Wikipedia ↗

Existed: 1032–1477
Shown on the map: 1003–1017, 1385–1481 (2 periods)
Peak area: 121k km²
Region: Europe

Names

Duché de Bourgogne; Latin Ducatus Burgundiae. Capital: Dijon. A fief of the French crown, distinct from the Free County across the Saône (an imperial fief).

Capetian dukes

The duchy passed to a Capetian cadet branch in 1032 (Robert I), which ruled until the line failed in 1361 and it briefly reverted to the crown under John II.

Valois dukes and the Burgundian State

In 1363 John II granted the duchy to his youngest son Philip the Bold (1363–1404), founding the House of Valois-Burgundy. Philip's marriage to Margaret of Flanders brought him, on the death of her father Louis of Male (30 January 1384), the counties of Flanders, Artois, Nevers, Rethel and the Free County — the nucleus of a composite state. His successors John the Fearless (1404–1419; assassinated at Montereau in 1419 after ordering the 1407 murder of Louis of Orléans, igniting the Armagnac–Burgundian civil war), Philip the Good (1419–1467; acquired Brabant, Limburg, Hainaut, Holland, Zeeland, Namur and Luxembourg, founded the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1430, presided over the apogee of Burgundian art and Early Netherlandish painting), and Charles the Bold (1467–1477) assembled a vast, wealthy realm straddling France and the Empire.

Fall

Charles sought to weld his lands into an independent kingdom and bridge his northern and southern territories through Lorraine. His aggression provoked the Burgundian Wars (1474–1477) against the Swiss Confederacy, Lorraine and France. Defeated at Grandson and Morat (1476), he was killed at the Battle of Nancy (5 January 1477). The duchy proper was seized by Louis XI; the Low Countries passed via Charles's daughter Mary of Burgundy (d. 1482) and her marriage to Maximilian of Habsburg to the House of Habsburg.

Historiographical debate — a nascent "middle kingdom"? The term "Burgundian State" is a modern coinage: the Belgian historian Henri Pirenne treated the Valois dukes as creators of a Burgundian/Belgian nation (a nationalist reading); Johan Huizinga reused it; Bertrand Schnerb popularized L'État bourguignon (1999). The polity was in contemporary reality a personal union of separate duchies and counties, and many historians regard "state" as anachronistic, preferring "composite monarchy." Charles the Bold clearly aimed at a revived Lotharingian kingdom, and his death at Nancy is often said to have ended a real chance of a durable middle kingdom.

Common questions

What was the Duchy of Burgundy?: Duché de Bourgogne; Latin Ducatus Burgundiae. Capital: Dijon. A fief of the French crown, distinct from the Free County across the Saône (an imperial fief).
When did the Duchy of Burgundy exist?: The Duchy of Burgundy existed 1032–1477. On this map it is drawn 1003–1017, 1385–1481.
How large was the Duchy of Burgundy?: At its greatest extent drawn on this map, the Duchy of Burgundy covered about 121,000 km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.
How did the Duchy of Burgundy end?: Charles sought to weld his lands into an independent kingdom and bridge his northern and southern territories through Lorraine. His aggression provoked the Burgundian Wars (1474–1477) against the Swiss Confederacy, Lorraine and France.

Sources

This compendium cites its sources once for the whole document rather than per territory. Its bibliography names the English Wikipedia articles for each territory as the primary basis, cross-checked against Encyclopædia Britannica and specialist snippets, and flags entries built on unreliable foundations — the 911 treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte known only from Dudo of Saint-Quentin, and Arnaud Amalric's alleged order at Béziers attested only decades after the fact. The article this entry is anchored on:

Wikipedia — Duchy of Burgundy en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duchy_of_Burgundy

This entry was last updated 27 September 2026.

This entry was researched and drafted with AI from the sources above, and has not been reviewed by a historian. How entries are made

Text available under CC BY-SA 4.0: reuse it with a credit to The World Through Time and a link to this page. Passages drawing on the Wikipedia articles listed above are also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by their contributors.

Border geometry for the map itself comes from Cliopatria v0.12 (Seshat Global History Databank, CC-BY-4.0).

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