Sale: Triton XIII, Lot: 1770. Estimate $150.  Closing Date: Monday, 4 January 2010.  Sold For $300. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

FRANCE, Royal. Charles V le Sage (the Wise). 1364-1380. AR Gros tournois (2.48 g, 5h). 2nd emission, 3 August 1369. + BnDICTV · SIT · nOmЄ · DnI · nRI · DЄI · IhV · XPI/+ kΛROLVS (trefoil) REX (triple pellet stops), Cross pattée / (crown) TVROИVS (trefoil) CIVIS, châtel tournois; border of twelve lis. Duplessy 362a; Ciani -; Roberts 2476. VF, darkly toned.

From the Leonard O. Greenfield Collection.

The Treaty of Brétigny, signed four years before Charles’s accession in 1360, ceded a third of western France to England and only reduced the ransom for the captured king Jean II from 4 million écus to 3 million. The territories lost and ransom paid, a weakened Jean returned to France, ineffectively ruling until his death.

Upon becoming king, Charles V sought to restore France to its status before the ravages of the Hundred Years’ War---namely, to reverse the losses incurred from the Treaty of Brétigny. Together with his generals, Bertrand du Guesclin and Olivier de Clisson, he reconquered the ceeded territories. Hoping to maintain French influence within the papacy, Charles urged Pope Gregory XI to remain in Avignon rather than return the papal seat to Rome. When the French cardinals retuned from Rome refusing to accept Gregory’s successor, Urban VI, they elected their own, Clement VII, whom Charles recognized as the true pope---an act which helped create the Papal Schism which divided Europe for nearly 40 years.