Thia is interesting news that the King has included France in his first two state visits and even before his own coronation. I think it is highly appropriate and timely in more than one respect - the most current, being the war that is happening on the European continent, and how this visit expresses an underlying solidarity in human 21st century values. But also beyond that, there is that long and very complex and fascinating history of two neighboring nations who have had such a frequently interconnected story - and on the royal level too of course. The Plantangets crossed over into England from what would become present-day France, and ensuing English monarchs still held territory there up until the 16th century. When Calais was lost to the French during the reign of Mary I, she famously said something like "When I die, they will find "Calais" written on my heart". Then of course, long before her reign, Henry VI became the first and only British monarch to be also crowned King of France...although I've never fully understood the basis of the claim to the throne - was it because his father Henry V simply forced the French king to accept his son as heir? It certainly wasn't through blood line, since French women are never dynasts nor do they provide dynastic claims to their sons (referring there to Isabel d'Angouleme). And another question: why the persistence of the British monarch in officially retaining the style of "King of France" right up until the reign of George II? But the lions of England and the lilies of France remain interwined across the history of two countries, for better or worse. Hopefully, better.
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