The French nobleman Charles the Bold (1433-1477) was Duke of Burgundy from 1467 to 1477. During his life the Burgundian state reached the height of its political, economic, and cultural power.

The last of the four Valois dukes of Burgundy, Charles the Bold ruled a heterogeneous collection of territories running from the North Sea and the Netherlands around the eastern edge of the kingdom of France and terminating near the Mediterranean coast in Provence. The "Great Duchy of the West," as Burgundy was called, possessed the greatest strategic and diplomatic importance, wealth, and culture of any 15th-century principality. The independent policy of Charles's predecessors, Philip the Bold, John the Fearless, and Philip the Good, had made Burgundy the key power in resolving the Hundred Years war between England and France, as well as the most important influence on the political stability of the French kingdom. The life and career of...