Châteauvillain

The lords of Châteauvillain were a younger branch of the Champenois house of Broyes. Hugh III of Broyes built the castle of Châteauvillain in 1160; his younger son Simon inherited the lordship and took its name.

Jean I, called the Blind, a companion of Saint Louis on the Seventh Crusade, granted the town a charter of liberties in 1286 before abdicating his titles to his son. Simon II of Châteauvillain founded the chartered village of Leffonds around 1285, and was summoned by Philip the Fair to Arras in 1303 for the war against the Flemish revolt.

The lordship was later raised to a county: it was bought in 1620 by Nicolas de L'Hospital and in 1699 by Louis de Bourbon, comte de Toulouse, whose family held it as a duchy-peerage from 1703.