In 1470, the dominant power in the region of Picardy was the Burgundian state, which then seemed to be at its zenith. By the time that Henry II of France made peace with the Habsburgs in 1559, Picardy was a clearly organised province of France, the fidelissima Picardiae natio whose loyalty had been reinforced by generations of war. A loosely defined and undifferentiated region had become one of the great gouvernements of the French kingdom and had taken its place as the French frontier with the Empire and the kingdom's first line of defence. The process by which this was achieved was not straightforward and was accompanied by generations of warfare and political adjustment, which are the themes of this study.

The history of Picardy, though a rich territory for the historian of the earlier middle ages, has been largely neglected in the early modern period. American historians have begun to explore, notably, the religious history of the area and the clientage connections of the nobility during the wars of religion, but the emergence of the province during the decisive period from the mid-fifteenth to the mid-sixteenth centuries is, apart from the pioneering work of Augustin Thierry and Edouard Maugis, an historiographical blank. Some differences of perspective and emphasis from other regional studies may result from the nature of the sources characteristic of the century before 1560. Many of the great pays d' états have been studied through the sources left behind by their estates or their parlements in their battles with the crown.