Miniatures of French history by Hilaire Belloc
"Miniatures of French history" by Hilaire Belloc is a collection of historical sketches written in the early 20th century. It presents vivid, self-contained vignettes of decisive moments that shaped France, from ancient colonization and Roman conquest to medieval faith, monarchy, and nation-building. The opening of the book races through foundational scenes: Greeks led by a priestess and a Ligurian princess found Marseilles; Julius Caesar crushes the seafaring Veneti with improvised naval tactics;
St. Martin dies at Candes in a halo of visions and becomes the enduring saint of Tours. It then shows Clovis’s baptism at Reims under St. Remi as a political-religious pivot for Gaul, and Charles Martel halting the Arab advance near Tours. Charlemagne’s rear guard perishes in the Basque ambush at Roncesvalles, seeding the Roland legend, and Paris endures the vast Norman siege, saved by Count Eudes while imperial aid falters—setting the stage for French autonomy. Next, Archbishop Adalberon engineers the crowning of Hugh Capet at Noyon, marking France’s break from the German sphere. A Pyrenean vignette (“The Torrent”) captures the mood of the early Reconquista along the Aragon, and “The Conqueror” begins William of Normandy’s bid for England as he spars with young King Philip and amasses a Channel fleet. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Read or download for free
For an overview of the different reading options, see our Reading Guide
| Reading Options | Url | Size | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Read now! | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.html.images | 408 kB | |||
| EPUB3 (E-readers incl. Send-to-Kindle) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.epub3.images | 687 kB | |||
| EPUB (older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.epub.images | 686 kB | |||
| EPUB (no images, older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.epub.noimages | 609 kB | |||
| Kindle | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.kf8.images | 1.8 MB | |||
| older Kindles | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.kindle.images | 1.7 MB | |||
| Plain Text UTF-8 | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78114.txt.utf-8 | 367 kB | |||
| Download HTML (zip) | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/78114/pg78114-h.zip | 631 kB | |||
| There may be more files related to this item. | |||||
Similar Books
About this eBook
| Author | Belloc, Hilaire, 1870-1953 |
|---|---|
| Title | Miniatures of French history |
| Original Publication | New York: Harper & Brothers, 1926. |
| Credits | Carol Brown, Tim Lindell and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | DC: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: France, Andorra, Monaco |
| Subject | France -- History |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 78114 |
| Release Date | Mar 4, 2026 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 4923 downloads in the last 30 days. |
| Project Gutenberg eBooks are always free! | |