Charles the Bold, Last Duke of Burgundy

Charles the Bold was the last of the great medieval warlords who dreamed of building a kingdom from nothing. In the mid-fifteenth century, this charismatic and ruthless Duke of Burgundy assembled a territory that stretched from the Low Countries to the Swiss Alps, a realm so wealthy and powerful that it threatened to shatter the fragile balance of power across western Europe. Ruth Putnam's masterful biography traces Charles's relentless campaign of conquest and diplomacy, his battles against Rene II of Lorraine, and his fatal overreach into Lorraine in 1477 where he died in the mud outside Nancy, his dream of a royal crown forever unfulfilled. The book captures both the dazzling spectacle of the Burgundian court and the political earthquake that Charles's ambitions triggered throughout the continent. This is a portrait of ambition unchecked: a man who had everything except the one title that would have legitimized everything he built.