ABSTRACT
Greater Anjou was the geographical centre of the collection of territories that constituted the Angevin 'empire'. Once Henry had cemented his hold on Greater Anjou by 1152, he reimposed a measure of authority approaching that of his ancestors. J. Boussard's view owes to longstanding assumptions about 'feudalism' than to documentary evidence, and new scholarship now requires look at the view of the growth of Greater Anjou. Loss of comital control over numbers of castles in Greater Anjou alarmed Henry II, and he moved to assert control; in 1156. Another indicator of the Plantagenet rulers' authority within Greater Anjou is their control over the Church. In the absence of any records of comital resources, an estimate of Richard's income from Greater Anjou appears impossible. John W. Baldwin estimates that the bulk of Philip Augustus's increased revenues after his occupation of the duchy of Normandy and the Loire valley came from Normandy, not from Greater Anjou.
