Western Franks
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West Francia ← 843 – 987 → The threefold division of the Frankish empire by the Treaty of Verdun in 843, showing West Francia on the left. Capital Paris Religion Roman Catholicism Government Monarchy King  - 843-877 Charles the Bald History  - Treaty of Verdun 843  - Capetian dynasty 987

West Francia or West Frankish Realm (Western realm) or the West Frankish Kingdom was a short lived kingdom encompassing the lands of the western part of the Carolingian Empire that was placed under the undisputed control of Charlemange's grandson, Charles the Bald after the Treaty of Verdun of 843.

France during the High Middle Ages was not geographically much different than the Kingdom of the West Franks under Charles the Bald.

The great realm and Frankish Empire, once united by Charlemange, was partitioned after a three year long civil war between his grandsons (840-843), during which Charles the Bald allied with his half-brother Louis the German in disputing the inheritance with his brother Lothair I, the nominal Carolingian Emperor of the Franks and Emperor of the Romans (Charlemangne's title also used by the Holy Roman Emperors from Otto I much later).

The Carolingian Empire of the Franks that had been founded by their grandfather lasted only through their father Louis the pious's reign was after some skirmishing to little effect, split into East Francia, the Western Realm, and Middle Francia from the great demesne which had covered most of Northern Italy (Lombardy), France (excepting Brittany), the Low Countries, and most of modern Austria and Germany. The West Frankish Kingdom is however, the precursor of both Medieval France and modern France, though West Francia would have to pass to the less quarrelsome House of Capet before it achieved steady growth and stability.

The western realm was divided into the following great fiefs: Aquitaine, Brittany, Burgundy, Catalonia, Flanders, Gascony, Gothia (Septimania), the Île-de-France, and Toulouse.

The Carolingians were subsequently to share the fate of their predecessors: after an intermittent power struggle between the two families, the accession (987) of Hugh Capet, Duke of France and Count of Paris, established on the throne the Capetian dynasty which with its Valois and Bourbon offshoots was to rule France for more than 800 years. After 987, the kingdom came to be known as France, because the new ruling dynasty (the Capetians) were originally dukes of the Île-de-France.

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