ARMAGNAC, a district of the south of France, corresponding to a large part of the present department of Gers, with portions of the neighbouring territory, erected in the 10th century into a countship in favour of Bernard the Squint-eyed (le Louche), son of the count of Fezinsac. The family thus founded at various times exercised great influence on the destinies of France, especially in the persons of John I. (d. 1373), Bernard VII. (d. 1418), John IV. (d. 1451), and John V. (d. 1473). Under Bernard VII. the name Armagnacs was given to the party of the house of Orleans, which carried on so ruthless a contest with the house of Burgundy during the imbecile reign of Charles VI. In 1444-5, the Emperor Frederick III. of Germany obtained from Charles VII. a large army of Armagnacs to enforce his claims in Switzerland, and the war which ensued took the name of the Armagnac war {Armagnaken∙ krieg') . In Germany the name of the foreigners, who were completely defeated in the battle of St Jakob on the Birs, not far from Bâle, was mockingly corrupted into Arnie Jacken, Poor Jackets, or Arme Gecken, Poor Fools. On the death of Charles of Armagnac, in 1497, the countship was united to the crown by Charles VII., but was again bestowed on Charles, the nephew of that count, by Francis I., who at the same time gave him his sister Margaret in marriage. After the death of her husband, by whom she had no children, she married Henry of Albret, king of Navarre; and thus the countship of Armagnac came back to the French crown along with the other dominions of Henry IV. In 1645, Louis XIV. erected a countship of Armagnac in favour of Henry of Lorraine, count of Harcourt, in whose family it continued till the Revolution. James of Armagnac, grandson of Bernard VII., was made duke of Nemours in ...