Charles de la Cerda

Charles de la Cerda (1327–1354), known as Charles of Spain, was a Franco-Castilian nobleman, a distant cousin and boyhood favourite of John II of France. In 1350 he commanded the Castilian galleys at L'Espagnols-sur-Mer off Winchelsea, where Edward III of England defeated him. Once John was king, Charles succeeded the executed Raoul II of Eu as Constable of France and was made Count of Angoulême.

Charles the Bad, king of Navarre, also claimed Angoulême and bitterly resented the favourite's rise. In 1351 Charles married Marguerite, daughter of the Duke of Brittany.

After a quarrel with Philippe, the Navarrese king's brother, he was killed in an inn at L'Aigle in Normandy on 8 January 1354 by a henchman of the king of Navarre. The murder left France unsettled until Charles V came to the throne in 1364.