Editing Jacquerie (section)

==Background==
After the capture of the French king ([[John II of France|John II]], Froissart's ''bon roi Jean'' "good king John") by the English during the [[Battle of Poitiers]] in September 1356, power in France devolved fruitlessly among the [[Estates General (France)|Estates-General]] and John's son, the Dauphin, later [[Charles V of France|Charles V]].

The Estates-General were too divided to provide effective government and their alliance with [[Charles II of Navarre|King Charles II of Navarre]], another claimant to the French throne, provoked disunity amongst the nobles. Consequently, the prestige of the French nobility sank to a new low. The century had begun poorly for the nobles at Courtrai (the "[[Battle of the Golden Spurs]]"), where they fled the field and left their infantry to be hacked to pieces; they were also accused of having given up their king at the [[Battle of Poitiers]]. The passage of a law that required the peasants to defend the ''[[château]]x'' that were emblems of their oppression was  the immediate cause of the spontaneous uprising.<ref name=Dommanget>{{cite book|last=Dommanget|first=Maurice|author-link=Maurice Dommanget|title=La Jacquerie|year=1971|publisher=F. Maspero|location=Paris}}</ref> The law was particularly resented as many commoners already blamed the nobility for the defeat at Poitiers. The chronicle of [[Jean de Venette]] articulates the perceived problems between the nobility and the peasants, yet some historians, such as Samuel K. Cohn, see the Jacquerie revolts as a reaction to a combination of short- and long-term effects dating from as early as the grain crisis and [[Great Famine of 1315–1317|famine of 1315]].

In addition, as a result of the temporary lull in hostilities of the [[Hundred Years' War]] due to the French defeat at Poitiers, thousands of soldiers and mercenaries on both sides of the conflict found themselves "without commanders or wages". Many of them responded by forming [[Free company|free companies]], attacking both military and civilian targets such as castles and villages (often to ransom for a profit) and engaging in frequent acts of rape, looting and murder. Their ability to do so was exacerbated by the lack of an efficient government authority in many parts of France, which left the French peasantry disillusioned with France's nobility that was perceived as failing to meet its feudal obligations.<ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.openedition.org/ausonius/16398?lang=en | isbn=978-2-35613-574-2 | title=Routiers et mercenaires pendant la guerre de Cent ans : Hommage à Jonathan Sumption | chapter=Soldiers, Villagers and Politics: Military Violence and the Jacquerie of 1358 | series=Scripta Mediævalia | date=9 February 2024 | pages=101–114 | publisher=Ausonius Éditions }}</ref>