 After secret negotiations were undertaken in 1234, it was agreed that Joan would marry King Henry III of England.This marriage would have been politically unacceptable to the French, however, since Joan stood to inherit not only her mother's county of Ponthieu, but also the county of Aumale that was vested in her father's family.Ponthieu bordered on the duchy of Normandy, and Aumale lay within Normandy itself.