Charles Martel failed to capture the Umayyad city of Narbonne but devastated most of the other principal settlements of Septimania, including Nîmes, Agde, Béziers and Maguelonne, which he viewed as potential strongholds of the Saracens.
According to Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat, the commercial production of pain d'épices was a specialty of Reims, made to a recipe of a pastry-cook from Bourges, and given éclat by the taste for it of Charles VII, "King of Bourges" and his mistress Agnes Sorel.