The fourteenth century was one of the most traumatic in European history. In its wake came war, death, disease and famine. The arrival of the Black Plague in England during 1348 marked a low point, but the early part of the century featured crop failures, morraines or livestock diseases and in many years famine was widespread. To make matters worse, with the accession of Edward III to the throne of England, the English had a good claim to the throne of France. And with that the two countries descended into a near permenant state of war which lasted for more or less the next one hundred years.