The Accursed Kings

The Accursed Kings, a series of seven historical novels by French scholar Maurice Druon that describes elite French society and the monarchy from the beginning of the 14th century to the Battle of Poitiers in 1356. The novels, published in French as Les Rois maudits from 1955 to 1977, were cited by American novelist George R.R. Martin as an inspiration for his Song of Ice and Fire series.

Druon was born in 1918 and became a member of the French Academy in 1966. In addition, he served as the Minister for Cultural affairs in 1973–74 and was a member of the National Assembly from 1978 to 1981. He was best known, however, for this historical saga.

Druon’s epic traces the reigns of seven monarchs, a succession cursed by the discordance of murder, famine, rebellion, and religious schism that led to the Hundred Years’ War. Meticulously researched, Druon’s text veils this rigor with an intimate, accessible style relaying not only the activity and dialogue, but the interior world, of the principal characters.

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The first book of the series, Le Roi de fer (1955; The Iron King, 1956) begins with the reign of Philip IV the Fair. In this volume, Philip’s suppression of the Knights Templar leads to the burning at the stake of the order’s grand master, Jacques de Molay, who curses both Philip and Pope Clement V to the 13th generation. La Reine étranglée (1955; The Strangled Queen, 1956) describes the machinations around the new king, Philip’s son Louis X, and covers the murder by strangulation of Louis’s imprisoned and adulterous wife, Margarite, by a member of the faction led by Charles, count of Valois.

Rival factions continue to manipulate members of the royal family and to jockey for power in Les Poisons de la couronne (1956; The Poisoned Crown, 1957), in which the now widowed Louis X marries Clémence of Hungary and, by the book’s conclusion, is fatally poisoned, leaving behind his pregnant wife. In the fourth book of the series, La Loi des mâles (1957; The Royal Succession, 1958), Clémence gives birth to a son, John, and Louis’s brother becomes regent. A few days later an infant presented as being John is killed by poison, and the regent ascends the throne as Philip V. The novel ends with Philip’s death about six years later and the accession of his brother, Charles IV.

La Louve de France (1959; The She-Wolf of France, 1960) begins nine years into Charles’s reign and focuses on his sister, Isabella of France, the wife of King Edward II of England. Isabella’s lover, Roger Mortimer, escapes imprisonment in the Tower of London and flees to France, where Isabella joins him, and the pair plot to overthrow Edward II. Other factions plot against her, seeking to expel her to England and execution. Mortimer and Isabella invade England and overthrow Edward, placing Isabella’s son, Edward III, on the throne. Against Isabella’s wishes, Mortimer has Edward II murdered.

The sixth novel in the series, Le Lis et le lion (1960; The Lily and the Lion, 1961), opens with the death of Charles IV, the last king of the direct Capetian line. He is succeeded by his cousin, Philip of Artois, who reigns as Philip VI. Robert of Artois, who helped place Philip VI on the throne, seeks the countship of Artois, but the relationship between Philip and Robert ruptures, and Robert persuades Edward III of England to try to seize the French throne. Meanwhile, the child raised as the son of Louis X’s son’s wet nurse learns that he is in fact John, the rightful king of France, but he is soon captured and dies in captivity, the last victim of the curse.

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The final novel of the series, Quand un Roi perd la France (1977; The King Without a Kingdom, 2015), is narrated by Cardinal Talleyrand-Périgord, who describes the reign of King John II of France. John creates turmoil and makes an enemy of Charles II, king of Navarre. With the encouragement of Charles, Edward III again attempts to claim the throne of France. Edward’s son, Edward the Black Prince, mounts an attack on France, and, though outnumbered, wins the Battle of Poitiers and captures King John II.