Origins Guy was the son of
Guy XIII de Laval and
Anne de Laval (1385–1466). Through his mother he was grandson of Guy XII de Laval and of Jeanne de Laval, second wife of constable
Bertrand du Guesclin. In 1420, Guy XIV, only just fourteen years old, was the second person to put his signature to the petition sent to the king of England to demand the release of
Arthur III, Duke of Brittany, the future constable, who had been a prisoner since the
Battle of Agincourt. Arthur was freed in September of that year. In 1424, he accompanied Arthur to the brilliant reception he had prepared for queen
Yolande of Aragon in his
château d'Angers. He thus worked to detach the Breton captain from the English and bring about a rapprochement between Brittany and France.
Companion of Joan of Arc On 8 June 1429, at Selles-en-Berry (
Selles-sur-Cher), he rejoined the royal army which reunited
Joan of Arc and the
duke of Alençon to seek the liberation of the
Loire Valley after the raising of the
siege of Orléans. He has left, in a letter to his mother, a living portrait of Joan of Arc, of whom he was a fervent admirer. They distinguished themselves at
Jargeau,
Beaugency, and above all
Patay, where he fought in the vanguard.
Coronation of Charles VII With his brother André de Lohéac he followed the sovereign to
Reims and assisted at the coronation of
Charles VII of France on 17 July 1429, replacing
Philip the Good,
count of Flanders (who was also the
Duke of Burgundy). Among the favours distributed by the king on this occasion, the territory of Laval was raised to a
county, and Guy de Laval was made governor of
Lagny in 1430.
House of Brittany On 1 October 1430, at
Redon, Guy XIV married
Isabelle of Brittany (died 1444), daughter of
John VI, Duke of Brittany. He was betrothed, in 1420, to
Marguerite of Dreux, Isabelle's sister, who had herself been betrothed to
Louis III d'Anjou.
Duchy of Brittany In 1439, he negotiated the tentative Anglo-French treaty at
Gravelines. Guy XIV assisted at
Tours, on 14 January 1446, in a notable combat before Charles VII, between the Englishman
Jean Chalons and
Louis du Bueil, with the latter being killed. As his ancestors had founded the four canonical-prebendaries of Saint-Jean-de-Langeais, it was up to him to provide the residency privileges which they dispensed, as a result of which divine service was no longer assured.
Marriage with Françoise de Dinan It is known that after he had, for financial reasons, let his son Guy XV's engagement to Françoise of Dinan drop in 1440, in favour of Gilles of Brittany. Guy XIV once again abused the young age of this same son, making him break off another engagement to her, when she became the widow of
Gilles of Brittany, and engaged him at 45 years old in February 1451 at
Vitré,
Françoise of Dinan (died 1500),
baronne of Châteaubriant. Guy XIV had no rights on the barony of Châteaubriant. The Vatican archives contain two solicitations to the
Holy See on this occasion, by Guy XIV and by his son. The inquiry concerning
François-Guy de Laval, fils aîné de Guy, comte de Laval, seigneur du Gavre dates to 23 July 1450 and is addressed to the
bishop of Nantes. He begged, for canonical reasons, for an exemption from parental kinship, and from the ban on marriage between a woman and the father of someone to whom she had previously been engaged. The mandate of dispensation for the marriage of Guy XIV and Françoise of Dinan said to be of Thouars from her mother's name, and for their absolution from certain bans, is dated 17 December 1450 and addressed to the
bishop of Vannes. The Vatican archives mention once more mention the comte of Laval and Françoise of Dinan his wife, in their founding of a psallette (choir school) at the Madeleine at Vitré, on 19 May 1453.
Relationship with Louis XI King
Louis XI established a
cour des comptes at Laval in 1463. The following year the king authorised "his cousin" Guy XIV to add a
first quarter of France, then
those of Evreux - and those of
Vitré.
Brocéliande At the beginning of the 15th century, the
château de Comper became the fiefdom of the
Laval family. In order to assert better his precedence on the viscountcy of Rohan to the
States of Brittany, Guy XIV de Laval, seigneur of
Brocéliande, pretended, via his parent, to be descended from the ancient kings of
Armorica Conan and Ponthus. In 1467, he tried to get inserted into the "Chartre des Usements de Brécilie", with the object of the seigneurial rights over the inhabitants of the forest, mentioning the jousts of Ponthus, making a historical fact of a 14th-century fictional romance in the style of the Arthurian legends called "Le roman de Ponthus et la Belle Sidoine". He was the lieutenant-général of the
duchy of Brittany in 1472.
Count of Laval Louis XI, in 1482, gave full powers to the comté of Laval, separating it from the
Comté of Maine. The comté of Laval was directly responsible to the crown of France. He was buried at the collegial church of Saint-Thugal at Laval. His daughter
Jeanne de Laval (1433–1498) was the wife of king
René I of Anjou. His eldest son, Francis, would be
Grand Master of France and comte of Laval (
Guy XV de Laval), and one of his
cadets Pierre de Laval was
archbishop of Rheims. == See also ==