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96 (died 941 or 942), Fulk the Good (941 or 942-c. 960) and Geoffrey Grisegonelle (c. 960-987) continued to extend their county at the expense of Aquitaine by annexing the district of Mauges, while in Touraine they set up a whole series of landmarks which prepared the way for their successors' annexation of the entire province. And as at the same time the county of Maine and the county of Vendôme to the west, and the county of Gâtinais to the east had each for its part succeeded in regaining its separate existence, the March of Neustria was hardly more than a memory which the accession of Hugh Capet to the throne was finally to obliterate, for, outside the districts of Orleans, Etampes and Poissy, the Duke of the Franks preserved nothing save a suzerainty which the insubordination of his vassals threatened to reduce to an empty name.

Neustria is perhaps of all the ancient "Marches" the one which shews us most plainly and distinctly the process of the splitting up of the great "regional entities" into smaller units. Elsewhere the course of events was more complex; in Burgundy for instance, where the transmission of the ducal power gave rise, as we have seen, to so much friction and dislocation, a break-up which seemed imminent was over and over again delayed and often definitely averted as the result of a concurrence of unforeseen circumstances. It would have been enough, for instance, if Hugh the Black had not died childless, or, still more, if an understanding had not been arrived at by Hugh the Great and Gilbert, the powerful Count of Autun, Dijon, Avallon, and Châlon, to imperil the very existence of the duchy as early as the middle of the tenth century.

The Dukes of Burgundy were, nevertheless, unable to safeguard the integrity of their dominions. From the very beginning of the ninth century the growing power of the Bishop of Langres had been undermining their rule in the north. Through a series of cessions the Bishop of Langres had succeeded in acquiring first Langres itself, then Tonnerre, then gradually the whole of the counties of which these were the chief towns, as well as Bar-sur-Aube, Bar-sur-Seine, and the districts of Bassigny and the Boulenois, whence at the end of the tenth century the authority of the Duke of Burgundy was wholly excluded. On the other hand, the county of Troyes which, from the days of Richard le Justicier, had formed part of the Duchy of Burgundy, before long in its turn had become gradually separated from it. In 936 it had passed into the possession of Herbert II, Count of Vermandois, then into that of his son Robert, from which time the suzerainty of the Duke of Burgundy over the land had appeared tottering and uncertain. On the death of Count Gilbert, Robert openly severed the tie which bound him to the duke, and transferred his homage directly to the king (957), against whom, notwithstanding, he immediately afterwards rebelled. The duke, none the less, continued to regard himself as the suzerain of the Count of Troyes; but his suzerainty remained purely nominal, and the count thenceforward had only one object, that of carving out a principality for himself at the