Mahaut, Countess of Artois, was a powerful French noblewoman of the early fourteenth century. Her disputed inheritance, political authority and connections to the Capetian court made her a major figure in aristocratic conflict around the Hundred Years’ War’s origins.
Mahaut, Countess of Artois also held the offices or ranks of count of Artois. Mahaut, Countess of Artois belonged to the House of Artois and operated within Kingdom of France. Mahaut, Countess of Artois was born in France and died in Paris.
Maurice Druon’s The Iron King introduces Mahaut through her bitter legal and dynastic struggle with her nephew Robert of Artois, a dispute that becomes entangled with the collapse of Philip IV’s family. The Strangled Queen keeps Mahaut among the competing factions around Louis X while the Tour de Nesle scandal and the succession crisis deepen. In The Poisoned Crown, her feud with Robert continues as the court struggles with famine, Flanders and the king’s need for an heir. The Royal Succession places Mahaut’s interests within Philip of Poitiers’ manoeuvres after the deaths of Louis X and the infant John I. By The Lily and the Lion, Robert’s attempt to overturn Mahaut’s possession of Artois through forged evidence has become one of the political conflicts helping drive him into exile and towards Edward III.
