Montfaucon

The House of Montfaucon was a Franche-Comte noble family named after its castle east of Besancon; its lords are recorded from the mid-eleventh century as vassals of the counts of Burgundy. In 1123—1124 they founded Cistercian Lucelle abbey, and Richard II's marriage to Sophie of Montbeliard let their son Amadeus II inherit the county in 1163.

Amadeus (died 1195) carried the house into the Vaud country, buying half of Orbe from Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in 1168. After 1227 the Montbeliard and Montfaucon inheritances were split between brothers, and when the Montbeliard line failed, Henry I of the younger branch recovered the county in 1339 by marrying Agnes, its heiress.

Henry's son Stephen, count from 1367, was the last male: his son Henry II fell at Nicopolis in 1396, and when Stephen died in 1397 the lands passed to three granddaughters. Henriette, who took Montbeliard, married Count Eberhard IV of Wurttemberg in 1407, carrying it into the Wurttemberg-Montbeliard line.