county, along with the Duchy, was seized by King Louis XI of France, in 1492 his son Charles VIII ceded it to Philip of Austria, the grandson and heir of Charles the Bold. When Philip's son, Emperor Charles V, inherited the Spanish throne in 1516, the Franche-Comté, along with the rest of the Burgundian lands, passed to the Spanish. Province of the Kingdom of France Franche-Comté was captured by France in 1668, but returned to Spain under the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. It was conquered a second time in 1674, and finally was ceded to France in the Treaty of Nijmegen (1678). Enclaves such as Montbéliard remained outside French control. The Franche-Comté was one of the last parts of France to have serfdom. In 1784, half of the population consisted of serfs, accounting for 400,000 out of the 1 million French serfs. Landowners took one-twelfth of the sale's price if a serf (mainmortable) wanted to sell up. Serfs were not forced to stay on the land, but the lord could claim droit de suite, whereby a peasant who died away from his holding left it to the lord, even if he had heirs. A runaway serf's land was forfeit after ten years. Louis XVI issued a decree banning these practices on 8 August 1779, but the Parlement of Besançon blocked this until 1787. After 1790 The population of the region fell by a fifth from 1851 to 1946, reflecting low French natural growth and migration to more urbanized parts of the country. Most of the decline occurred in Haute-Saône and Jura, which remain among the country's more agriculture-dependent areas. Environment This region borders Switzerland and shares much of its architecture, cuisine, and culture with its neighbour. Between the Vosges range of mountains to the north and the Jura range to the south, the landscape consists of rolling cultivated fields, dense pine forest, and rampart-like mountains. Not so majestic as the Alps, the Jura mountains are more accessible and are France's first cross-country skiing area. It is also a superb place to hike, and there are some fine nature trails on the more gentle slopes. The Doubs and Loue valleys, with their timbered houses perched on stilts in the river, and the high valley of Ain, are popular visitor areas. The is a land of gorges and waterfalls dotted with tiny villages, each with a domed belfry decorated with mosaic of tiles