Anjou (än-zhōō'), an ancient province in the northwest of France, area about 3,000 square miles. In the 12th and 13th centuries it was a possession of the English kings, and from it came Godfrey, Count of Anjou, who, in 1127, married Matilda, daughter of Henry I of England, and so became the ancestor of the Plantagenet kings. In 1480 it reverted finally to France, in the reign of Louis XI.