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Now, in order to understand mediæval love, we must reflect for a moment upon this feudal castle, and upon the kind of life which the love poets of the late twelfth and early thirteenth century whether lords like Bertram de Born, and Guillaume de Poitiers, among the troubadours; the Vidame de Chartres, Meurisses de Craon, and the Duke of Brabant among the trouvères of Northern France; like Ulrich von Liechtenstein among the minnesingers; or retainers and hangers-on like Bernard de Ventadour and Armand de Mareulh, like Chrestiens de Troyes, Gaisses Brulez, or Quienes de Béthune, like Walther, Wolfram, and Tannhäuser great or small, good or bad, saw before them and mixed with in that castle.

His father died about the end of October, 1415, and his mother almost immediately married a Sieur d'Estouville, abandoning her two sons, Gilles and René. They became the wards of their grandfather, Jean de Craon, 'a man old and ancient and of exceeding great age, as the texts say.

The Princes Conti and Dombes had been obliged, on the 13th May, 1592, to raise the siege of Craon, in consequence of the advance of the Duke of Mercoeur, with a force of seven thousand men. They numbered, including lanzknechts and the English contingent, about half as many, and before they could effect their retreat, were attacked by Mercoeur, and utterly routed.