Charles Martel-class ironclad

The Charles Martel class was a planned class of ironclad barbette ships of the French Navy. The class comprised two ships, Charles Martel and Brennus, and represented an incremental improvement over the preceding Marceau class, being larger, but carrying the same main battery of four 340 mm (13.4 in) guns in single mounts. Details of the ships' construction are unclear and contradictory, with various sources reporting that both ships were laid down, or that only Brennus was begun; neither ship was launched before they were cancelled in 1884 or 1886. Some sources indicate that Brennus was redesigned and completed as France's first pre-dreadnought battleship, Brennus, but most other historians dispute the idea.