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Louis XIV

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  1. Introduction
  2. Louis XIV (b. 1638–d. 1715) was the longest reigning king in French history. His seventy-two years on the throne were a period of dramatic political, social, and cultural development as well as extraordinary turbulence. Coming to the throne at the age of five, Louis XIV was placed under the Regency of his mother, Anne of Austria, and his first minister, Cardinal Mazarin. As a boy-king, he lived through the last decades of the Thirty Years War and the chaotic civil wars called the Fronde. After deciding to rule personally in 1661, he greatly strengthened the authority of the absolute monarchy, embarked on a quest to increase his personal greatness (gloire, grandeur), made France the dominant power in Europe, and, as the self-proclaimed Sun King (Roi-Soleil), presided over the efflorescence of classical French culture from his glittering court at Versailles. His last three decades were darkened by great wars, religious controversy, famine, state bankruptcy, and economic stagnation. Ever since, historians have grappled with the meaning and significance of his reign. For Voltaire, the age of Louis XIV was an era of cultural achievement equal to Periclean Athens, Augustan Rome, and Renaissance Italy. The partisans of the French Revolution condemned him as the chief architect of royal despotism. French historians of the 19th century, strongly influenced by contemporary currents of liberalism and nationalism, portrayed him as a great state-builder who laid the foundations of the modern state. This interpretation was largely adopted by the English-speaking historians who studied Louis XIV in ever-greater numbers over the course of the 20th century. In the 1980s, a lively debate broke out on the nature of Louis XIV’s absolute monarchy. Challenging the traditional view of the Sun King as a modernizing state builder, revisionist historians have argued that his rule in fact depended on collaboration with existing elites and aimed at the defense of a traditional society. The absolutism debate has transformed the study of Louis XIV, showing no signs of abating. This article is intended as an introductory guide to the scholarship on Louis XIV, a rich and constantly growing body of work full of color, contention, and controversy.
  3. General Overviews
  4. These general overviews place the reign of Louis XIV in the broader context of French history from the 16th century to the end of the 18th century. Briggs 1998 begins with the outbreak of the Wars of Religion and concludes with Louis XIV’s death. Bercé 1996 examines developments from the accession of Henri IV (r. 1589–1610), the first Bourbon king of France, to the beginning of Louis XIV’s personal rule in 1661. Cornette 2012 and Doyle 2001 both place the reign at the center of the history of the French Old Regime; the latter employs a thematic rather than chronological approach.Jones 2002 surveys the history of 18th-century France from the starting point of Louis XIV’s reign. Another excellent survey is Collins 2005, cited under the Debate on Absolutism.
  5. Bercé, Yves-Marie. The Birth of Absolutism: A History of France, 1598–1661. Basingstoke, UK: Macmillan, 1996.
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  7. A translation of La naissance dramatique de l’absolutisme, 1598–1661 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1992), this survey traces the Bourbon kings from Henry IV to Louis XIV’s assumption of personal power in 1661. As its title suggests, it links the rise of the Bourbons to the growth of royal power.
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  9. Briggs, Robin. Early Modern France 1560–1715. 2d ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
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  11. First published in 1977, this survey focuses on political history while also having useful chapters on society, the economy, and beliefs and culture. It hews to the traditional interpretation of the reign of Louis XIV as the culmination of absolute monarchy.
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  13. Cornette, Joël. Absolutisme et lumières, 1652–1783. 5th ed. Paris: Hachette, 2012.
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  15. The best overview in French on the period, this survey places the reign of Louis XIV in a broader perspective. In addition, the author updates this work every two years to reflect the latest historiography in French, English, and other languages. It is thus particularly useful for graduate students.
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  17. Doyle, William, ed. Old Regime France. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.
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  19. The best introduction to the subject for undergraduates. This study is comprised of nine thematic chapters by experts on such subjects as society, the economy, and France overseas. One chapter focuses on Louis XIV. The work’s scope places his reign in the context of the Old Regime’s rise and fall.
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  21. Jones, Colin. The Great Nation: France from Louis XIV to Napoleon, 1715–1799. London: Penguin, 2002.
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  23. This readable survey of the 18th century, aimed as much at a general audience as a scholarly one, begins with a wide-ranging discussion of the legacy that Louis XIV left France in 1715. It argues persuasively that Louis XIV largely set the tone politically for his successors.
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  25. Biographies
  26. The number of biographies of Louis XIV is enormous: no French king, with the possible exception of Henri IV, has been more written about. Lavisse 2010 is a reprint of the classic 1911 work that synthesized 19th-century French liberal historians’ views of the king as a modernizing state builder.Goubert 1972 is a critical take from the perspective of the Annales school. Bluche 1990 is a full-throated defense of Louis XIV’s achievements. Petitfils 1995 is the best biography in French. Wolf 1968 remains the most up-to-date scholarly biography in English. Lossky 1994 is best on Louis XIV’s foreign and religious policies; he argues that the king learned to make more effective use of his power as he grew older and became more experienced. Sturdy 1998 is an excellent short introduction to the king and his reign.
  27. Bluche, François. Louis XIV. Translated by Mark Greengrass. New York: Franklin Watts, 1990.
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  29. Translation of the thousand-page French edition (Paris: Fayard, 1985). Bluche mounts a firm defense of the king, justifying or minimizing many of his most controversial decisions (for example, the devastation of the Palatinate in 1688). While Bluche uses many primary sources and secondary studies in French, he completely ignores non-French works.
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  31. Goubert, Pierre. Louis XIV and Twenty Million Frenchmen. Translated by Anne Carter. New York: Vintage, 1972.
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  33. A translation of Louis XIV et vingt millions de Français (Paris: Fayard, 1966), this work takes an Annales school approach to Louis XIV’s reign. Goubert argues that most of the king’s policies were failures in the face of unfavorable and far-more-powerful social, economic, and demographic forces.
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  35. Lavisse, Ernest. Louis XIV: Histoire d’un grand règne, 1643–1715. Paris: Robert Laffont, 2010.
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  37. New edition of the 1911 three-volume original in which Lavisse magisterially synthesized 19th-century French liberal historians’ interpretations of Louis XIV as a modern state builder. Argues that the Sun King brought the absolute monarchy to the height of its development. However, Louis XIV’s despotism undermined social support for the royal state.
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  39. Lossky, Andrew. Louis XIV and the French Monarchy. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1994.
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  41. Described by the author as a “political biography,” this work is best on Louis XIV’s foreign policy (Lossky’s area of research) and handling of religious affairs. Argues that Louis XIV made serious mistakes in his youth but learned to wield his power more effectively as he grew older.
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  43. Petitfils, Jean-Christian. Louis XIV. Paris: Perrin, 1995.
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  45. The best French biography. Petitfils thoroughly grounds his study in the latest French and foreign-language scholarship on Louis XIV. The result is a comprehensive, very well-balanced account of the king’s life and reign.
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  47. Sturdy, David. Louis XIV. New York: St. Martin’s, 1998.
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  49. A concise survey of the king and his reign. In seven thematic chapters, Sturdy surveys the historiography and provides a clear account of key aspects, such as Louis XIV’s methods of government. An ideal introduction to Louis XIV for undergraduates.
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  51. Wolf, John. Louis XIV. New York: Norton, 1968.
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  53. An ambitious scholarly biography of Louis XIV. Wolf’s coverage is comprehensive, but he is best on the military and foreign policy. Wolf largely agrees with the traditional view of Louis XIV as a great modernizing state builder.
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  55. Primary Sources
  56. A huge number of primary sources on Louis XIV are now readily available to researchers, thanks to the GALLICA digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. These sources include, for example, the king’s memoires, collections of letters from his ministers and other key figures, and histories by contemporaries. The GALLICA site is searchable in either French or English.
  57. GALLICA. Bibliothèque Nationale de France.
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  59. The digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale de France and forty-eight partner institutions, GALLICA has digitized and made available online the full texts of over two million books, manuscripts, and other media. The collection includes numerous sources on Louis XIV. Searchable in French and English.
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  61. Correspondence, Memoires, and Treatises
  62. Researchers of Louis XIV are fortunate that a number of important primary sources by the king himself and by his contemporaries have been published. Louis XIV’s own thoughts on government are expressed in the Mémoires he produced around 1670 for the instruction of his heir, the Dauphin.Louis XIV 1970 is an excellent edition in English. Two massive collections of ministerial papers, originally published in the 19th century but available online, are indispensible for the study of the practices of government: Clement 1861–1873 is an edited collection of the records of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis XIV’s great Minister of Finances; Boislisle 1874–1897 contains the correspondence of other ministers of finances with the intendants, the principal royal agents in the French provinces. For the royal court, the most celebrated, if not most useful, primary source is the memoires of the Duc de Saint-Simon. The definitive French edition is produced by the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade. Numerous versions are available in English: Saint-Simon 1967 is a reliable translation and widely available. A very different perspective on the court is provided by Elisabeth Charlotte 1984, a collection of letters written by Elisabeth Charlotte, wife of Louis XIV’s brother, Philippe, Duc d’Orléans, to her German relatives. Despite the growing importance of the central state administration and the royal court—the provincial elites and the institutions they controlled, such as courts of law and municipal governments, remained vital throughout the reign. Le Mao 2004 is an extraordinarily rich chronicle from a judge in the Parlement (Sovereign Court) of Bordeaux. A final group of crucial primary sources are learned treatises. The most forceful defense of absolute, divine-right monarchy can be found in Bossuet 1995. De Monsieur de Vauban 2007 is a collection of essays and memoires on diverse subjects by the famous military engineer and polymath, Sébastien le Prestre, Maréchal de Vauban.
  63. Boislisle, Arthur de. Correspondence des controleurs généraux des finances avec les intendants des provinces, 1683–1715. 3 vols. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1874–1897.
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  65. This collection of letters between the controllers-general of finances (effectively the ministers of finances) and the intendants, the chief royal agents in the provinces, is an extremely valuable primary source for the administrative, political, and even social history of the reign. Boislisle excerpts letters primarily from the G7 series of the Archives Nationales. All three volumes are available online.
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  67. Bossuet, Jacques-Benigne. Politics Drawn from the Very Words of Holy Scripture. Translated by Patrick Riley. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
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  69. Appointed tutor to the Dauphin in 1670, Bossuet wrote this treatise for the education of his charge. It consists of a series of prepositions, each of which is then demonstrated by biblical scripture. Bossuet’s work is the most forceful defense of divine-right monarchy during the reign of Louis XIV.
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  71. Clement, Pierre. Lettres, instructions et memoires de Colbert. 7 vols. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1861–1873.
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  73. Collection of letters and other documents is drawn from the records of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis XIV’s celebrated minister of finances. Clement organizes the sources thematically under such headings as private letters, taxes, and the fleet. This source is available on GALLICA.
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  75. de Monsieur de Vauban. Les oisivetés de Monsieur de Vauban: Ou ramas de plusieurs mémoires de sa façon sur differentes sujets. Edited by Michèle Virol. Paris: Champ Vallon, 2007.
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  77. Twenty-nine essays by the famous royal siege engineer and polymath on such diverse topics as agriculture, fortifications, and treatment of the Huguenot minority. Published for the first time in a single critical edition, these essays offer an insightful assessment of the France of Louis XIV.
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  79. Elisabeth Charlotte, Duchesse d’Orleans. A Woman’s Life in the Court of the Sun King: Letters of Liselotte von der Pfalz, 1652–1722. Translated by Elborg Forster. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1984.
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  81. These letters, written by the German-born wife of Philippe, duc d’Orléans—brother to Louis XIV, give an invaluable outsider’s perspective on the French court. Elisabeth Charlotte was scathing about what she perceived to be the hypocrisies of court life.
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  83. le Mao, Caroline, ed. Chronique du Bordelais au crépuscule du Grand Siècle: Le Mémorial de Savignac. Bordeaux: Presses Universitaires de Bordeaux, 2004.
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  85. Extraordinarily rich source based on the 3,000 pages of notes taken by Joseph de Savignac, a judge in the Parlement of Bordeaux. Provides a window into the world of the provincial elite, providing crucial information on such subjects as justice, morality, rural social relationships, and even climate.
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  87. Louis XIV. Mémoires for the Instruction of the Dauphin by Louis XIV. Edited and translated by Paul Sonnino. New York: Macmillan, 1970.
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  89. In 1670, Louis XIV prepared this account of the early years of his rule for the political education of his eldest son and heir, the Dauphin. In his introduction, Sonnino convincingly argues that although this work had several authors, it nevertheless contains the authentic voice and opinions of the king himself.
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  91. Saint-Simon, Louis de Rouvroy duc de. Historical Memoires of the Duc de Saint-Simon: A Shortened Version. 2 vols. Edited and translated by Lucy Norton. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1967.
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  93. The best known source on the court of Louis XIV and perhaps the most famous memoires in French literature. This English edition is a much-abridged version of the massive original. Saint-Simon writes about Versailles from the perspective of an unsuccessful courtier. Nevertheless, his observations are judicious, insightful, and often brilliant. The definitive French edition is the Mémoires suivi de Additions de Journal de Dangeau, 8 volumes (Paris: Gallimard, Bibliothèque de la Pléaide, 1983–1988).
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  95. Sourcebooks
  96. There are a handful of excellent collections of primary sources that focus on the reign of Louis XIV. The newest to date, Beik 2000, contains a good selection of sources on the absolute monarchy and society, including archival sources that have not appeared elsewhere. Mettam 1977 consists mainly of administrative documents. Ranum and Ranum 1972 is the finest collection of primary sources on the reign of Louis XIV.
  97. Beik, William, ed. Louis XIV and Absolutism: A Brief Study with Documents. Boston and New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2000.
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  99. Collection of primary sources covering various political and social aspects of the reign. The sources give a good sense of how the absolute monarchy interacted with important social groups at both the center and in the provinces. The most-suitable collection for undergraduates.
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  101. Mettam, Roger, ed. Government and Society in Louis XIV’s France. London: Macmillan, 1977.
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  103. An excellent collection of administrative documents organized under individual aspects of government, such as government at the center, the intendants, and municipal administration.
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  105. Ranum, Orest, and Patricia Ranum, eds. The Century of Louis XIV. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.
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  107. The most comprehensive selection of sources on the period of Louis XIV. Covers such subjects as the workings of the central government, social conditions, and foreign policy.
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  109. The Minority of Louis XIV and the Fronde
  110. Until 1661, France was ruled first by a Regency and then by Cardinal Mazarin as prime minister. Only after the Cardinal’s death did Louis XIV personally take up the reins of government. This early period of the reign was punctuated by the chaotic series of civil wars called the Fronde. Bonney 1978 is a classic analysis of the development of the royal state up to Louis XIV’s assumption of personal power. Treasure 1995 is a sound biography of Mazarin. The Fronde has a vast bibliography that can only be touched on lightly here. Ranum 1993 is the finest introduction to this confused and confusing event. Moote 1971 examines the revolt of the powerful judges of Paris’s sovereign court, the Parlement. Kettering 1978 is a study of a particularly turbulent provincial Parlement. Golden 1981 looks at the Fronde’s final moment: the uprising of the parish priests of Paris.
  111. Bonney, Richard. Political Change in France under Richelieu and Mazarin, 1624–1661. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978.
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  113. Classic study of changes in governmental practices during the rule of the Cardinal-Ministers. Shows how the central government became more organized and effective, but the book’s greatest strength is its analysis of the origins and development of the intendants, the monarchy’s agents in the provinces.
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  115. Golden, Richard M. The Godly Rebellion: Parisian Curés and the Religious Fronde, 1652–1662. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981.
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  117. Examines the so-called “Third Fronde,” the unrest of the parish priests of Paris that followed the noble and judicial revolts. Argues that the curés struggled for recognition as an independent corps in French society, in an effort to protect their autonomy from the Jesuits and their ecclesiastical superiors.
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  119. Kettering, Sharon. Judicial Politics and Urban Revolt: The Parlement of Aix, 1629–1659. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978.
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  121. Study of a provincial sovereign court that revolted against royal authority three times in thirty years. Shows how these uprisings resulted from a combination of political resistance to increasing royal power and factional rivalries among the judges of Aix.
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  123. Moote, A. Lloyd. The Revolt of the Judges: The Parlement of Paris and the Fronde, 1643–1652. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1971.
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  125. Classic study of the revolt of France’s most powerful sovereign court. Sympathetic to the judges, Moot argues that their opposition was rooted in constitutional objections to the growing power of the monarchy, and their revolt was not in vain because it forced reforms on the government of Louis XIV.
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  127. Ranum, Orest. The Fronde: A French Revolution, 1648–1652. New York: Norton, 1993.
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  129. The best, single-volume treatment of the Fronde in any language. Ranum balances narrative and analysis to produce an admirably clear account of this confusing event. He argues that the Fronde was a genuine revolution because in 1648–1649, defiance of the absolute monarchy reached radical heights.
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  131. Treasure, Geoffrey R. Mazarin: The Crisis of Absolutism in France. London: Routledge, 1995.
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  133. The most up-to-date biography in English on the Cardinal-Minister. Treasure presents a sympathetic portrait of Mazarin as a dogged defender of the French monarchy and the political mentor of the young Louis XIV.
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  135. The Debate on Absolutism
  136. Louis XIV is supposed to have declared, “I am the state” (L’état c’est moi). Although the king actually never said these words, he continues to be popularly regarded as the paragon of royal absolutism. Until recently, historians had largely followed suit. In the 1980s, a revisionist approach to the absolute monarchy of Louis XIV emerged among English-speaking historians of France. What made this challenge particularly effective was that it was based on the reassessment of numerous aspects of the practice of absolute monarchy: the key works that established the revisionist model are found in such sections as the Central Government and the King’s Ministers; Finances; the Provinces; andNobles and Peasants. Three key concepts are at the core of the revisionist interpretation. First, the French absolute monarchy was not a forerunner of the modern state, but a premodern form of government closely tied to its society. Second, its power was, in reality, limited rather than absolute. Third, its success and effectiveness depended on collaboration with traditional ruling groups. Revisionism is now the orthodoxy among Anglophone historians of Louis XIV and is being taken up by French-speaking historians. Nevertheless, the debate on absolute monarchy and absolutism continues. Some historians argue that the term absolutism should be abandoned altogether; others contend that the term still continues to have analytical meaning. This section consists of key works that trace the course of the debate. Lossky 1984 is one of the earliest statements of the revisionist position. Mettam 1988 and Henshall 1992 argue that absolutism is an anachronism that does not accurately describe the nature of royal power under Louis XIV—they represent revisionism at its most extreme. Parker 1996 represents a Marxist approach to revisionism. Cosandey and Descimon 2002 shows how French historians are increasingly taking up what was once an exclusively “Anglo-Saxon” view. Beik 2005 is an update of the revisionist interpretation by one of its founders. Collins 2005 argues for a new approach to the study of the state under Louis XIV.
  137. Beik, William. “The Absolutism of Louis XIV as Social Collaboration.” Past and Present 188 (2005): 195–224.
  138. DOI: 10.1093/pastj/gti019Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  139. Author of a study of absolutism in Languedoc that helped to establish revisionism (see Beik 1985cited under Provinces), Beik, after a survey of recent works on Louis XIV, concludes that the absolute monarchy is still best thought of as a social compromise between the king and traditional elites.
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  141. Collins, James. The State in Early Modern France. 2d ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
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  143. In this survey of the French state from Henri IV to the Revolution, Collins forcefully argues that “absolutism” should be abandoned as a subject of study in favor of the “monarchical state.” He contends that Louis XIV developed the “mature monarchical state” after 1690 in response to the pressures of war.
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  145. Cosandey, Fanny, and Robert Descimon. L‘Absolutisme en France: Histoire et historiographie. Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 2002.
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  147. Demonstrates how French historians have adopted the revisionist interpretation of absolutism developed by their Anglophone colleagues. The authors contrast the creation of the theory of an all-powerful absolute monarchy by 17th-century political thinkers with the reality of limited government.
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  149. Henshall, Nicholas. The Myth of Absolutism: Change and Continuity in Early Modern European Monarchy. London: Longman, 1992.
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  151. As the title suggests, this book argues that absolutism never existed in reality. Comparing England with France, Henshall maintains that politics in both depended on the collaborative interplay between the holders of state power and socially powerful elites.
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  153. Lossky, Andrew. “The Absolutism of Louis XIV: Reality or Myth?” Canadian Journal of History 19 (1984): 1–16.
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  155. One of the earliest statements of the revisionist position on absolutism. Lossky points out that while 17th-century French legists and political thinkers elaborated a theory of absolute royal authority, in reality the king’s power was severely constrained by the means at his disposal. He calls this “limited absolutism.”
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  157. Mettam, Roger. Power and Faction in Louis XIV’s France. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1988.
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  159. Contends that absolutism is an anachronism that obscures the reality of government under Louis XIV. The king was a traditionalist who ruled France through his mastery of patronage relationships with the aristocracy. No significant changes in government took place, much less the creation of an embryonic modern state.
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  161. Parker, David. Class and State in Ancien Régime France: The Road to Modernity? London: Routledge, 1996.
  162. DOI: 10.4324/9780203436905Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  163. A Marxist approach to absolute monarchy: the nobility accepted Louis XIV because he regulated their quarrels and protected their economic interests; the king was a conservative who preferred rule through traditional elites. The result was that absolute monarchy became an instrument in the hands of a feudal ruling class.
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  165. Representations of Kingship
  166. The French monarchy displayed its authority and power through ritualistic, visual, and written representations of kingship. No French king paid more attention to how he was represented than Louis XIV. Apostolides 1981 and Burke 1992 discuss how the king and his advisors carefully crafted a magnificent royal image through art and ritual. Klaits 1976 looks at royal propaganda in print.Cornette 1993 is a thought-provoking examination of the links connecting Louis XIV’s participation in warfare, his carefully crafted image as a warrior-king, and the successful exercise of royal sovereignty.
  167. Apostolides, Jean-Marie. Le Roi-Machine: Spectacle et politique au temps de Louis XIV. Paris: Éditions de Minuit, 1981.
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  169. Difficult and challenging work that argues that Louis XIV and his advisors created a magnificent royal image in painting, sculpture, literature, dance, and even fireworks displays in order to establish the king’s predominance over other claimants to power in French society.
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  171. Burke, Peter. The Fabrication of Louis XIV. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992.
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  173. This lavishly illustrated book examines how Louis XIV and his servants strove to create a coherent public image of the king through the visual arts and the written word. Demonstrates how their efforts evolved over the seventy years of the reign, culminating in a “crisis” of representation after 1690.
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  175. Cornette, Joël. Le Roi de guerre: Essai sur la souveraineté dans la France du Grand Siècle. Paris: Payot, 1993.
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  177. Argues that war making was central to Louis XIV’s exercise of royal sovereignty. Part III examines how Louis XIV was depicted as a warrior-king in ceremony, the visual arts, and the written word. This imagery became even more important after 1691, when the king ceased to personally lead his troops.
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  179. Klaits, Joseph. Printed Propaganda under Louis XIV: Absolute Monarchy and Public Opinion. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1976.
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  181. A pioneering survey of Louis XIV’s use of printed polemic. Shows that Colbert mounted a major propaganda effort in the early years of the personal rule. This effort was allowed to lapse for most of the reign, only to be revived after 1697 in order to combat the attacks in print by Louis XIV’s enemies.
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  183. The Court
  184. Louis XIV will be forever associated with his splendid court. Permanently established at the newly built palace of Versailles after 1682, the court was long regarded as a “gilded cage” in which the king confined the French aristocrats in order to isolate them from their provincial powerbases and thus render them impotent. More recent analyses have shown the court to be a central institution of government as well as an arena where power and position were negotiated between the king and his leading subjects. Elias 1983 is a highly influential sociological analysis of the court that argues that Louis XIV used court rituals and etiquette as important instruments of power. Duindam 2003 is a comparative analysis of Europe’s two leading courts that challenges some of Elias’s conclusions. Le Roy Ladurie 2001 is an innovative analysis of the court at Versailles based on the memoirs of Saint-Simon.
  185. Duindam, Jeroen. Vienna and Versailles: The Courts of Europe’s Dynastic Rivals, 1550–1780. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003.
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  187. Comparative study of the Bourbon and Habsburg courts. Demonstrates that the court was at once the royal household and the home of the upper-reaches of the state bureaucracy. Argues that the courts were also sites where nobles were integrated into the state, not dominated by its power.
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  189. Elias, Norbert. The Court Society. Translated by Edmund Jephcott. Oxford: Blackwell, 1983.
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  191. Originally published in German as Die höfische Gesellschaft (Berlin: Luchterhand, 1969). A tremendously influential sociological analysis of the court that argues that mastery of court rituals and etiquette allowed Louis XIV to control his courtiers. These very rituals, however, also trapped Louis XIV in a “system of dependence.”
  192. Find this resource:
  193. le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. Saint-Simon and the Court of Louis XIV. Translated by Arthur Goldhammer. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001.
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  195. Translation of Saint-Simon, ou le système de la cour (Paris: Fayard, 1997), with the collaboration of Jean-Francois Fitou. This study uses Saint-Simon’s famous journals to recreate the structure, personal relationships, and political dynamics of the Versailles court. It is particularly good at explaining the nature and composition of court factions and how they exerted political influence.
  196. Find this resource:
  197. The Central Government and the King’s Ministers
  198. When Louis XIV decided to abolish the position of prime minister and rule personally in 1661, he effected changes in the organization and personnel of the central state institutions great enough that some historians have described them as a revolution in government. The most significant change was the reform of the Council of State (Conseil d’En haut) so that it consisted only of the king and his most trusted ministers. This reformed council considered and decided the most important issues facing the kingdom. The opening chapters of Antoine 1970 provide the best introduction to the structure, organization, and composition of the council under Louis XIV. How the council operated has been a difficult subject to research because its deliberations were secret. Rule 1997 provides an invaluable reconstruction of its day-to-day procedures and conduct during the latter part of the reign based on the journals of Colbert de Torcy, foreign minister from 1700–1715. The ministers who made up the council have been studied quite unevenly. Corvisier 1983 is an authoritative scholarly biography of François-Michel le Tellier, Marquis de Louvois, Louis XIV’s greatest minister of war. No comparable biography exists of the king’s most famous minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, controller-general of finances from 1665–1683; the best available study is Meyer 1981. Colbert’s signature policy, mercantilism (the state promotion and financing of manufacture and trade), has also not received much recent attention. Although now a dated classic, Cole 1939 is still helpful on this subject. Soll 2009 is a provocative examination of another initiative by Colbert: the gathering of information for use by the state. By comparison to Louvois and Colbert, none of the ministers of the late reign have received adequate scholarly attention. On the other royal councils, Smith 2002 is an important article on the Council of Commerce as a communications channel connecting French merchants with the royal ministry.
  199. Antoine, Michel. Le Conseil du Roi sous le règne de Louis XV. Geneva, Switzerland: Droz, 1970.
  200. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  201. Although on the royal council during the reign of Louis XV, the opening chapters remain the best introduction to the structure and organization of this key governmental institution under Louis XIV.
  202. Find this resource:
  203. Cole, Charles W. Colbert and a Century of French Mercantilism. 2 vols. New York: Columbia University Press, 1939.
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  205. Although dated, this classic examination of mercantilism remains a useful introduction to the subject.
  206. Find this resource:
  207. Corvisier, André. Louvois. Paris: Fayard, 1983.
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  209. Scholarly biography of Louis XIV’s great minister of war by the leading authority on the French army. Louvois emerges from these pages as a hard, ruthless statesman, the great rival of Colbert, who made Louis XIV’s army the most powerful in Europe.
  210. Find this resource:
  211. Meyer, Jean. Colbert. Paris: Hachette, 1981.
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  213. The best biography to date. Meyer successfully disposes of the traditional interpretation of Colbert as a visionary proto-capitalist advanced by Lavisse (see Lavisse 2010, cited under Biographies) and others by demonstrating that the great minister was a man of his time and social context.
  214. Find this resource:
  215. Rule, John C. “The King in His Council: Louis XIV and the Conseil d’en haut.” In Royal and Republican Sovereignty in Early Modern Europe: Essays in Memory of Ragnhild Hatton. Edited by Robert Oresko, G. C. Gibbs, and Hamish M. Scott, 216–241. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
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  217. Based on the journal of Colbert de Torcy, foreign minister from 1700–1715, this chapter is a rare and invaluable study of the day-to-day procedures and practices of the Council of State, the most important body in the government of Louis XIV.
  218. Find this resource:
  219. Smith, David Kammerling. “Structuring Politics in Eighteenth-Century France: The Political Innovations of the French Council of Commerce.” Journal of Modern History 74 (2002): 490–537.
  220. DOI: 10.1086/345110Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  221. Contends that the French royal government’s attempts to regulate trade through its Council of Commerce inadvertently led to the participation of merchants, manufacturers, and artisans in economic policy making. This participation in turn led to growing political awareness among these social groups that were formally excluded from affairs of state.
  222. Find this resource:
  223. Soll, Jacob. The Information Master: Jean-Baptiste Colbert’s Secret State Information System. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2009.
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  225. Provocative study that argues that Colbert set out to capture and control all of the information needed by the state. Its strength is in describing how Colbert improved recordkeeping and practices of information control and retrieval. Overstates the degree of bureaucratization and coherence of the French royal government.
  226. Find this resource:
  227. Finances
  228. Raising and spending money, principally for war, was a fundamental attribute of the French royal state. Louis XIV’s financial system produced revenues that dwarfed those of any of France’s rivals. However, save for a brief period in the 1660s and early 1670s, they were never enough to meet the monarchy’s enormous expenses. A key characteristic of the French financial system during the 17th and 18th centuries was its domination by financiers: private individuals who placed their financial resources at the king’s disposal in return for making enormous profits from handling his money.Dessert 1984 and Bayard 1989 are exhaustive studies of this important group. One significant reason for the French state’s chronic deficits was its inadequate system of direct taxation. Collins 1988 offers a detailed examination of this problem. Beik 1985, Collins 1994, and Swann 2003 (cited under the Provinces) show how taxation worked in various parts of the kingdom. With its ordinary revenues falling short of its needs, the French royal government turned to loans to make up the difference. Bonney 1981 analyzes government borrowing up to the personal reign of Louis XIV. An important source of loans was venality of office, the practice of selling government posts. Bien 1987describes how venal offices became the basis for a uniquely French system of state credit. During the Nine Years’ War and the War of the Spanish Succession, Louis XIV pushed venality to its limits, selling thousands of new offices and subjecting officers to a wide range of exploitative financial expedients. Doyle 1996 looks at this development and its long-term effects. The great wars finally forced Louis XIV and his ministers to create new taxes, the capitation and the dixième, that targeted previously tax-exempt social groups, particularly the nobility. Guéry 1986 examines how the government developed the capitation tax, which levied money on people according to a system of twenty-two social classes. Kwass 2000 is an in-depth study of the long-term political and social effects of these new taxes.
  229. Bayard, Françoise. Le monde des financiers au XVIIe siècle. Paris: Flammarion, 1989.
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  231. Exhaustive examination of the financiers who ran the financial system of the French state and also provided it with much of its credit. Shows how their success depended on their ability to raise sums from the real holders of money in French society, particularly the court nobility.
  232. Find this resource:
  233. Bien, David. “Officers, Corps, and a System of State Credit: The Uses of Privilege under the Ancien Régime.” In The Political Culture of the Old Regime. Edited by Keith Michael Baker, 89–110. Vol. 1 of The French Revolution and the Creation of Modern Political Culture. Oxford: Pergamon, 1987.
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  235. Classic article that shows how venal office holding became the basis for a system of state credit. Explains how the royal government manipulated the privileges of officers to raise loans from them.
  236. Find this resource:
  237. Bonney, Richard. The King’s Debts: Finance and Politics in France, 1589–1661. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981.
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  239. In-depth study of how the royal government borrowed money during the 17th century up to the beginning of the personal rule of Louis XIV. Shows how the government’s ability to rally and sustain credit was crucial to French victory during the Thirty Years War.
  240. Find this resource:
  241. Collins, James B. The Fiscal Limits of Absolutism: Direct Taxation in Early Modern France. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988.
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  243. Analysis of the direct tax system during the 17th century. Demonstrates how massive resistance from peasants and local officials reduced the intake of the royal government’s most important source of revenues.
  244. Find this resource:
  245. Dessert, Daniel. Argent, pouvoir et société au Grand Siècle. Paris: Fayard, 1984.
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  247. A thoroughly researched study of the financers during the reign of Louis XIV. Explains who the financers were, how they were connected both to ministerial clans and wealthy aristocratic backers, and why they were indispensible to royal finances. Includes biographical details on 534 financers. By no means an easy read.
  248. Find this resource:
  249. Doyle, William. Venality: The Sale of Offices in Eighteenth-Century France. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
  250. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198205364.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  251. An analysis of the political, financial, social and cultural dimensions of venality of office during the 18th century. The first three chapters examine venality under Louis XIV and explain how the king pushed the system to its limits after 1688 by selling new offices as well as exploiting existing ones.
  252. Find this resource:
  253. Guéry, Alain. “État, classification sociale et compromis sous Louis XIV: La Capitation de 1695.” Annales ESC 5 (1986): 1041–1060.
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  255. Key article that examines how the government of Louis XIV created the capitation tax, which was levied on all French lay people, based on twenty-two social classes.
  256. Find this resource:
  257. Kwass, Michael. Privilege and the Politics of Taxation in Early Modern France. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
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  259. Important book on Louis XIV’s introduction of new direct taxes, the capitation and the dixième, that levied money not only from commoners, but also from the formerly tax-exempt nobility. Argues that the long-term effect of this development was to provoke increasingly vocal criticism from elites of the state’s “arbitrary taxation.”
  260. Find this resource:
  261. War and the Military
  262. Waging war was another traditional attribute of French kingship, and Louis XIV was perhaps the most bellicose French king of all: out of the fifty-four years of his personal rule, France was at war for thirty-three and engaged in minor military operations for a further five. Cornette 1993 (cited underRepresentations of Kingship) establishes that making war was a key aspect of Louis XIV’s exercise of royal sovereignty. Lynn 1999 provides a concise narrative history of the wars. Given the frequency of armed conflict, it is unsurprising that the instruments of war at Louis XIV’s disposal developed rapidly and expanded hugely. His army became by far the largest in Europe: 420,000 men at its maximum strength during the height of the Nine Years’ War. Lynn 1997 provides an in-depth institutional study of the Sun King’s army. Corvisier 1964 focuses on the ordinary soldier. The massive growth of the army had significant consequences for the noble officers who led it. Rowlands 2002 and Drévillon 2005 are two recent studies of the officer corps. Smith 1996 (cited under Nobles and Peasants) examines noble military service from a cultural history perspective. As Minister of the Marine, Jean-Baptiste Colbert was determined to build a French fleet that could rival those of the English and the Dutch. Dessert 1996 analyzes the build-up of the fleet under Colbert and its mixed fortunes afterward. After 1688, the enormous costs of war made a large battle fleet unaffordable for Louis XIV and his ministers. Symcox 1974 explains why they decided to switch naval strategies from a fleet war (guerre d’escadre) to a war of commerce raiding and privateering (guerre de course).
  263. Corvisier, André. L’armée francaise de la fin du XVIIe siècle au ministère du Choiseul: Le soldat. 2 vols. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1964.
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  265. A social history of the ordinary French soldier during the 18th century by the leading French military historian of the period. Covers such diverse topics as geographical origin, length of service, age and height, and desertion. Argues that the War of the Spanish Succession tied the army closer to society.
  266. Find this resource:
  267. Dessert, Daniel. La Royale: Vaissaux et marins du Roi-Soleil. Paris: Fayard, 1996.
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  269. Study of the development of the French navy under Louis XIV. Includes chapters on naval administration and finance, the building of ships, and the conditions of naval service. Dessert emphasizes the importance of Jean-Baptiste Colbert and his network of clients in the astonishing growth of the fleet.
  270. Find this resource:
  271. Drévillon, Hervé. L’impôt du sang: Le métier des armes sous Louis XIV. Paris: Éditions Tallandier, 2005.
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  273. An examination of the noble officers of the army. Maintains that nobles were drawn to military service because Louis XIV supported and encouraged their traditional notions of honor.
  274. Find this resource:
  275. Lynn, John A. Giant of the Grand Siècle: The French Army, 1610–1715. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
  276. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511572548Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  277. Comprehensive study of the French army during the 17th century. Covers such topics as administration, recruitment, logistics, strategy, and weapons. Argues that the army was a successful example of absolutist state building; in fact, it grew faster than the state that sustained it.
  278. Find this resource:
  279. Lynn, John A. The Wars of Louis XIV: 1664–1714. London: Longman, 1999.
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  281. The only modern narrative history in any language of Louis XIV’s wars. Concise and readable, it is highly suitable for undergraduates.
  282. Find this resource:
  283. Rowlands, Guy. The Dynastic State and the Army under Louis XIV: Royal Service and Private Interest, 1661–1701. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
  284. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511496882Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  285. A study of the noble officer corps that seeks to answer how Louis XIV’s army was larger and more effective than those of his predecessors. Argues that Louis XIV accommodated the interests of his noble officers, who found themselves better supported materially and socially than ever before.
  286. Find this resource:
  287. Symcox, Geoffrey. The Crisis of French Sea Power 1688–1697: From the guerre d’escadre to the guerre de course. The Hague: Martinus Niehoff, 1974.
  288. DOI: 10.1007/978-94-010-2072-5Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  289. Examines the switch in French naval strategy from a fleet war (guerre d’escadre) to commerce raiding (guerre de course). Demonstrates that this switch came not as the result of naval defeat in 1692, but because of the collapse of French finances following the famine of 1693–1694.
  290. Find this resource:
  291. Foreign Policy and Diplomacy
  292. Traditional interpretations of Louis XIV’s foreign policy have been neither kind nor balanced. European historians writing from nationalist perspectives have tended to cast him as a warmonger driven by territorial ambition and vainglory. Many French historians reacted by excessively apologizing for the king’s actions, explaining away every war as defensive. Beginning in the 1960s, a wave of new scholarship overturned these traditional interpretations by placing Louis XIV’s foreign policy within the cultural, intellectual, political, and governmental contexts of his time. The essays collected in Hatton and Bromley 1968 and Hatton 1976 exemplify this approach, as do Wolf 1968and Lossky 1994 (cited under Biographies). All of these works characterize Louis XIV as a more complicated, measured figure, driven by a desire for glory (gloire) and reputation in his youth, but becoming more cautious and defensive-minded in later life. They also show that control over foreign policy was contested by great ministerial clans and court factions. Black 1988 is a useful summary of the reassessment of Louis XIV’s foreign policy. Sonnino 1988 is a meticulously researched analysis of how the king and his ministers decided to wage war against the Dutch Republic in 1672. Sahlins 1990 includes a reconsideration of how Louis XIV viewed and treated the frontiers of his kingdom. For most of the second half of the 20th century, historians in France neglected foreign policy and international relations. Lucien Bély has done much to reinvigorate the study of these subjects. Bély 1990 is a massive work on the diplomacy and espionage surrounding the Treaty of Utrecht of 1714 that ended the War of the Spanish Succession.
  293. Bély, Lucien. Espions et ambassadeurs au temps de Louis XIV. Paris: Fayard, 1990.
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  295. A monumental 900-page examination of diplomacy and espionage during the late reign of Louis XIV. It is divided into three Parts: “The World of Spies and Espionage,” “The Ambassadors: Honorable Spies,” and “The Congress of Utrecht at Work.”
  296. Find this resource:
  297. Black, Jeremy. “Louis XIV’s Foreign Policy Reconsidered.” Seventeenth-Century French Studies 10 (1988): 199–212.
  298. DOI: 10.1179/c17.1988.10.1.199Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  299. Summarizes and synthesizes two decades of reappraisal of Louis XIV’s foreign policy. Emphasizes that Louis XIV pursued rational goals based on what he and his ministers perceived to be France’s vulnerability in a Europe of hostile powers.
  300. Find this resource:
  301. Hatton, Ragnhild, ed. Louis XIV and Europe. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1976.
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  303. An important collection of essays by European and English-speaking historians that helped to establish a new view of Louis XIV’s foreign policy as rational and subject to evolution over the course of his long reign. Four essays are on “general problems” and seven on specific diplomatic periods and events.
  304. Find this resource:
  305. Hatton, Ragnhild, and John S. Bromley, eds. William III and Louis XIV: Essays 1680–1720 by and for Mark A. Thomson. Liverpool, UK: Liverpool University Press, 1968.
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  307. This collection of essays places Louis XIV’s foreign policy in the context of European international relations after 1680. Louis XIV emerges as a ruler who balanced pragmatism with principles like divine-right monarchy in his foreign policy.
  308. Find this resource:
  309. Sahlins, Peter. “Natural Frontiers Revisited: France’s Boundaries since the Seventeenth Century.” American Historical Review 95.5 (1990): 1423–1451.
  310. DOI: 10.2307/2162692Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  311. Explores how the idea of “natural frontiers” informed French foreign policy up to the 19th century. During his reign, Louis XIV regarded France’s natural frontiers as both the limits of his kingdom and passages leading to further conquests.
  312. Find this resource:
  313. Sonnino, Paul. Louis XIV and the Origins of the Dutch War. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
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  315. Examines the events that led to the French attack on the Dutch Republic in 1672. Explains in exhaustive detail the process by which Louis XIV and his ministers reached the decision to make war on the Dutch. A challenging read for those new to the subject.
  316. Find this resource:
  317. The Provinces
  318. How Louis XIV ruled France’s provinces has drawn considerable attention from historians. They have focused on the relationship between the king and provincial elites, investigating the possibilities as well as the limits of royal power. Provincial studies have made key contributions to the debate on Louis XIV’s absolute monarchy, particularly the rise of a revisionist interpretation that challenges traditional views of absolutism. Beik 1985 is a classic study of Languedoc that demonstrates how the king and local elites collaborated to rule the province. Collins 1994 argues that the need to maintain order brought the royal state and provincial nobles together in Brittany. Dee 2009 provides a contrary view from the province of Franche-Comté, where the royal government disregarded the interests of local elites in key areas of finance, justice, and defense. Under Louis XIV, a handful of provinces managed to retain Estates or assemblies that represented the provincial elites. The Estates have been extensively studied. Major 1994 argues that these institutions served as sites of consultation for the king and the nobility during the 16th and early 17th centuries; Louis XIV abandoned this relationship for a more assertive royal posture. Two more recent studies argue in favor of a more collaborative relationship. Legay 2001 contends that the Estates of the small northern provinces of Artois, Cambrésis, and Walloon Flanders became key administrative agents of the absolute monarchy. Swann 2003 contends that the Estates of Burgundy remained important and powerful governmental institutions through Louis XIV’s reign and down to the Revolution because of their administrative competence and financial resources. The king’s chief agents in the provinces were the intendants and the governors. The intendants have been thoroughly investigated in a number of works. Bonney 1978 (cited under the Minority of Louis XIV and the Fronde) describes how the intendants were first sent out into the provinces. Beik 1985, Collins 1994, and Dee 2009 contain extensive information on what they did in Languedoc, Brittany, and Franche-Comté, respectively.Smedley-Weill 1995 provides a general overview of these agents during the reign of Louis XIV. By comparison, the provincial governors have received far less attention. Nachison 1998 is an invaluable article on the powerful governors of Burgundy, the Princes of Condé.
  319. Beik, William. Absolutism and Society in Seventeenth-Century France: State Power and Provincial Aristocracy in Languedoc. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1985.
  320. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511583797Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  321. A classic study that uses a Marxist approach to demonstrate that Louis XIV successfully ruled Languedoc by supporting the interests of the province’s elites and sharing resources with them: this collaborative relationship amounted to a “recharged feudalism.” A foundational text of the revisionist approach to the absolutism of Louis XIV.
  322. Find this resource:
  323. Collins, James. Classes, Estates and Order in Early Modern Brittany. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
  324. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511562587Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  325. Contends that a shared concern for social order brought together the absolute monarchy and the elites of Brittany. The two sides collaborated in many areas, including, most importantly, taxation.
  326. Find this resource:
  327. Dee, Darryl. Expansion and Crisis in Louis XIV’s France: Franche-Comté and Absolute Monarchy, 1674–1715. Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2009.
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  329. Argues that in the newly conquered province of Franche-Comté, the absolute monarchy asserted itself in crucial areas of government, such as taxation, justice, and defense. Furthermore, it collaborated with provincial elites only when it was in its interests to do so.
  330. Find this resource:
  331. Legay, Marie-Laure. Les états provinciaux dans la construction de l’état moderne. Geneva, Switzerland: Droz, 2001.
  332. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  333. A study of the Estates of three small northern provinces, arguing that these institutions survived until the Revolution because they agreed to surrender their traditional roles of defending local autonomy, in favor of becoming indispensable administrative agents of the absolute monarchy.
  334. Find this resource:
  335. Major, J. Russell. From Renaissance Monarchy to Absolute Monarchy: French Kings, Nobles and Estates. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994.
  336. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  337. An analysis of the relationship between the monarchy and provincial Estates during the 16th and 17th centuries. Traces the development of this relationship from a consultative Renaissance Monarchy to the more authoritarian regime of Louis XIV’s absolute monarchy.
  338. Find this resource:
  339. Nachison, Beth. “Absentee Government and Provincial Governors in Early Modern France: The Princes of Condé and Burgundy, 1660–1720.” French Historical Studies 21 (1998): 265–298.
  340. DOI: 10.2307/286630Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  341. An important article on a neglected topic, the provincial governors under Louis XIV. It shows that the Condé remained powerful and influential figures in Burgundy throughout the reign.
  342. Find this resource:
  343. Smedley-Weill, Anette. Les intendants de Louis XIV. Paris: Fayard, 1995.
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  345. An overview of the intendants under Louis XIV based entirely on the correspondence between these agents and the royal ministers. As a result, the intendants are rather optimistically portrayed as tireless, selfless bureaucrats. Includes a very useful list of all the intendants that served during Louis XIV’s personal rule.
  346. Find this resource:
  347. Swann, Julian. Provincial Power and Absolute Monarchy: The Estates General of Burgundy, 1661–1790. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003.
  348. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511496646Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  349. An important and meticulously researched study of the Burgundian Estates from the personal reign of Louis XIV to the Revolution. Demonstrates that the Estates were very capable administrators. Furthermore, beginning in 1688, they were a vital source of loans and other financial resources for the royal government.
  350. Find this resource:
  351. Nobles and Peasants
  352. Louis XIV ruled over the largest and most populous kingdom in Western Europe. His twenty-two million subjects exhibited a staggering economic, cultural, and even linguistic diversity. The king therefore had unparalleled human resources at his disposal. Moreover, deeply mindful of the social turbulence that had bedeviled his predecessors and his own youth, he committed considerable attention and energy to managing relations with his people. Constituting at most 2 percent of the French population, the nobility was nevertheless the dominant group in society. The king considered himself first among the nobles of his realm, and he managed his relations with them carefully. Key here were the relationships created by patron-client ties. Kettering 1986 is an indispensable study of the system of patronage and clientage. Smith 1996 examines how the massive expansion of noble service in the royal army led to changes in ideas of merit. Louis XIV’s relationship with the noble judges of the Parlements, France’s sovereign appellate courts, illustrates his treatment of one important group within the nobility. Hamscher 1987 argues that Louis XIV managed to forge a collaborative relationship with the parlementaires. Hurt 2002 disputes this conclusion, contending that Louis XIV severely reduced the judges’ powers and then relentlessly exploited them during the period of prolonged warfare after 1688. On the other end of the social scale from the nobles, peasants made up four out of every five of Louis XIV’s subjects. The king himself frequently expressed genuine concern about improving the condition and situation of his people; more pragmatically, he and his ministers understood that peasants provided much of their revenues. Root 1993 argues that the state strengthened village communities and supported them against their lords in order to protect an important source of taxes. Yet the royal government’s powers to affect the French peasantry were attenuated by the social, cultural, demographic, and climatic facts of the age. After 1688, two great famines produced death and misery on a scale that the state could do little to alleviate. Lachiver 1991 is an indispensible account and analysis of these subsistence crises.
  353. Hamscher, Albert. The Conseil Privé and the Parlements in the Age of Louis XIV: A Study in French Absolutism. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 77.2. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1987.
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  355. Argues that after the Fronde, Louis XIV managed to reach an accommodation with this most important sovereign court in which the king protected the legal authority of the noble judges in exchange for their loyalty. This book is also one of the founding studies of the revisionist interpretation of absolutism.
  356. Find this resource:
  357. Hurt, John. Louis XIV and the Parlements: The Assertion of Royal Authority. Manchester, NH: Manchester University Press, 2002.
  358. DOI: 10.7228/manchester/9780719062353.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  359. Contends that Louis XIV did not forge an alliance with the judges of the Parlements, but instead chose to dominate them. After stripping the judges of their power to block royal legislation, the king ruthlessly exploited them financially during the great wars after 1688.
  360. Find this resource:
  361. Kettering, Sharon. Patrons, Brokers, and Clients in Seventeenth-Century France. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.
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  363. A thorough analysis of the system of patronage-clientage and its fundamental importance for the nobility and other French elites. Kettering demonstrates that Louis XIV’s success lay in his ability to control and manipulate networks of clientage.
  364. Find this resource:
  365. Lachiver, Marcel. Les années de misère: La famine au temps du Grand Roi; 1680–1720. Paris: Fayard, 1991.
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  367. A meticulously researched study of the subsistence crises that caused such widespread misery during the late reign of Louis XIV. Shows that weather—the period from 1687 to 1700 was particularly cold and wet—caused the great famines of 1693–1694 and 1700–1710.
  368. Find this resource:
  369. Root, Hilton. Peasants and King in Burgundy: Agrarian Foundations of French Absolutism. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.
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  371. Study of the relationship between the absolute monarchy and village communities in Burgundy. Argues that Louis XIV transformed rural power relations by establishing the intendants as monitors and protectors of the villages against their lords. The royal government intervened in order to protect villages as a source of tax revenue.
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  373. Smith, Jay M. The Culture of Merit: Nobility, Royal Service, and the Making of Absolute Monarchy in France, 1600–1789. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996.
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  375. A cultural history of noble service and state formation. Argues that noble service was predicated on a royal gaze that recognized and rewarded merit. Louis XIV made his gaze omnipresent, which encouraged zealous royal service. But that omnipotence rendered the gaze impersonal, opening a gap between king and state.
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  377. The Towns and Urban Society
  378. As economic, political, cultural, and military centers, France’s towns and cities had an importance disproportionate to their size and their minor share of the total population. Louis XIV strove to assert greater royal control over towns by placing loyal elites in charge of municipal governments. Beik 1994 discusses his overall approach to ruling urban France. Breen 2007 examines how the royal government excluded one important group of urban notables, lawyers, from municipal government in Dijon in favor of more compliant elites. The largest and most important city by far was, of course, Paris. Having been driven out of it as a boy-king by the rebels of the Fronde, Louis XIV had no great love for his capital and preferred to reside in the surrounding royal palaces. Nevertheless, he paid the city careful attention and beautified it with an ambitious building program. The standard French history of Paris in this period is Dethan 1990, part of the lavishly illustrated Nouvelle histoire de Parisseries. Ranum 2004 is a classic essay on the city under the first three Bourbon kings. Lyon was the kingdom’s third-largest city, a regional capital, and an important financial center. Monahan 1993examines how it survived one of the greatest crises of Louis XIV’s reign, the famine of 1709. Historians have also produced studies that focus on the lower orders of urban society. Lottin 1979 is a study of the social conditions and mentality of the urban poor, based on the extraordinary chronicle of an artisan of Lille. Towns were also frequently sites of popular unrest and rioting. Beik 1997argues that a distinctive urban style of protest existed based on a “culture of retribution.”
  379. Beik, William. “Louis XIV and the Cities.” In Edo and Paris: The State, Political Power, and Urban Life in Two Early-Modern Societies. Edited by James L. McClain, John M. Merriman, and Ugawa Kaoru, 68–85. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1994.
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  381. An overview of Louis XIV’s approach to the cities of his kingdom. Argues that Louis XIV demanded the loyalty of urban elites. In exchange, he helped them to enforce social hierarchy in their towns and enhanced their prestige through ambitious building projects as well as access to pensions and royal offices.
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  383. Beik, William. Urban Protest in Seventeenth-Century France: The Culture of Retribution. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
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  385. Examines popular protest and rioting in French towns and cities during the 17th century. Argues that these uprisings were rooted in a distinctive “culture of retribution” (pp. 50–51). Louis XIV expected urban elites to deal with urban protests, and he supported them with his authority as well as military might.
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  387. Breen, Michael. Law, City, and King: Legal Culture, Municipal Politics, and State Formation in Early Modern Dijon. Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2007.
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  389. Examines lawyers and their involvement in urban government in Dijon, capital of Burgundy. In 1668, Louis XIV reorganized the municipality and threw out the lawyers who previously controlled it. The lawyers developed an oppositional stance to the absolute monarchy. A fine case study of Louis XIV’s approach to towns.
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  391. Dethan, Georges. Paris au temps de Louis XIV (1660–1715). Paris: Hachette, 1990.
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  393. A lavishly illustrated history of Paris and its people during the king’s personal reign. Divided into three Parts, each of three chapters: Part I is a narrative of events; Part II is a social history of Paris’s people; and Part III looks at religious and cultural life.
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  395. Lottin, Alain. Chavatte, ouvrier lillois: Un contemporain de Louis XIV. Paris: Flammarion, 1979.
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  397. A study of the social, cultural, and mental world of the urban poor based on the invaluable chronicle of a weaver of Lille. Valuable for those interested in urban popular culture during the 17th century.
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  399. Monahan, Gregory. Year of Sorrows: The Great Famine of 1709 in Lyon. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1993.
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  401. A closely focused analysis of how Lyon suffered and survived the famine that followed the Great Winter of 1709. This work reveals how municipal government and the absolute monarchy functioned at a time of enormous pressure.
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  403. Ranum, Orest. Paris in the Age of Absolutism: An Essay. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2004.
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  405. An updated edition of a book first published in 1969. The original consisted of four Parts covering Paris during the Wars of Religion, Henry IV’s expansion of the city, the religious revival under the Cardinal Ministers, and Paris under Louis XIV. The new edition includes a chapter on women writers. For undergraduates, the best introduction to the city in this period.
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  407. Religion
  408. The Catholic Church was the only national institution in France other than the monarchy itself. Over 90 percent of French people belonged to it, and its clergy formed an important group in society. Since the 15th century, French kings had possessed important powers over the Church, such as the appointment of bishops. Louis XIV was determined to exercise these so-called Gallican rights fully.Bergin 2004 shows how the king appointed bishops and those whom he appointed. The French Church was also an important source of revenues for the royal government. Michaud 1991 is a detailed study of the Church’s role in the French fiscal system. During his reign, Louis XIV dealt increasingly harshly with two religious minorities. The first were the French Calvinists or Huguenots. Making up perhaps 3 percent of the population, the Huguenots had been guaranteed religious tolerance and certain political rights by Louis XIV’s grandfather, Henri IV, in the Edict of Nantes of 1598. Under Louis XIV, they suffered increasing popular and official persecution, which culminated in the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. Garrisson 1985 examines this event and the growing intolerance that led to it. Scoville 1960 is a classic account of the economic consequences of the persecution of the Huguenots, many of whom fled France for refuges all over Protestant Europe. The second religious minority that bedeviled Louis XIV was the Jansenists, followers of a particularly austere and rigorous brand of Catholicism. Doyle 2000 is a concise and wonderfully clear explanation of what Jansenism was as well as why Louis XIV regarded it as such a threat. Kostroun 2011 studies one of the most famous moments in the king’s conflict with its adherents, the closure of the Abbey of Port-Royal and the eviction of its Jansenist nuns in 1679.
  409. Bergin, Joseph. Crown, Church and Episcopate under Louis XIV. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004.
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  411. A dense and detailed study of the formation of the French episcopate during the personal reign of Louis XIV. Bergin investigates who the bishops were, culminating in a 125-page biographical dictionary. In section two, he describes and analyzes the process by which Louis XIV appointed these prelates.
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  413. Doyle, William. Jansenism. Houndmills, UK: Macmillan, 2000.
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  415. Concise and clear survey of this controversial religious movement. In ninety pages of text, Doyle explains the theology of Jansenism and also provides a narrative account of the conflicts between Jansenists and Louis XIV. Also includes a useful glossary and bibliography. The best introduction to the topic for students.
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  417. Garrisson, Janine. L‘Édit de Nantes et sa revocation: Histoire d‘une intolérance. Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1985.
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  419. A study of Louis XIV’s Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, which ended tolerance for the Huguenots. As her title indicates, Garrisson regards the Revocation as the culmination of a long process of popular and official persecution of the Huguenot minority.
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  421. Kostroun, Daniella. Feminism, Absolutism, and Jansenism: Louis XIV and the Port-Royal Nuns. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
  422. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511976452Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  423. A study of the long struggle between the French royal government and the Jansenist nuns of Port-Royal that ended in the closing of the abbey and the dispersal of its occupants in 1679. Takes a feminist perspective in analyzing how the nuns were able to resist the absolute monarchy.
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  425. Michaud, Claude. L’Eglise et l’argent sous l’Ancien Régime. Paris: Fayard, 1991.
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  427. A dense and highly detailed analysis of the contributions of the Catholic Church to the royal finances. Of particular importance is Michaud’s examination of the Assembly of the Clergy, the organization that granted and channeled funds to the monarchy.
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  429. Scoville, Warren C. The Persecution of the Huguenots and French Economic Development. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960.
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  431. A classic account of the economic effects of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which drove many Huguenots into exile. However, most scholars now conclude that Scoville overestimated the damage done to the French economy by the Revocation.
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  433. Arts and Intellectual Life
  434. Voltaire famously compared the cultural achievements of Louis XIV’s France to those of Periclean Athens, Augustan Rome, and Renaissance Italy. Ever since, the Sun King has maintained a reputation among scholars and the public alike as a patron of intellectual life and the arts. Much of this activity was centered on the royal palace at Versailles. Walton 1986 is a copiously illustrated look at the palace and court. Mukerji 1997 is an account of how the Gardens of Versailles expressed the expansionist ambitions and absolutism of the king. Berger 1994 examines royal patronage of architecture, while Isherwood 1973 does the same for music. Louis XIV also patronized and attempted to control history and the sciences. Ranum 1980 examines the place of historians in the official culture constructed by Louis XIV and his ministers. Stroup 1990 looks at the Royal Academy of Sciences, placing particular importance on the patronage of Jean-Baptiste Colbert. Dew 2009 is a fascinating study of how Parisian scholars and scientists under Colbert’s patronage laid the foundations for Orientalist studies. But the movement of ideas in 17th- and 18th-century France was far too complex for even the king to channel into official culture. Rothkrug 1965 is a dense analysis of how long-standing ideological critiques of mercantilism developed into political doctrines that opposed Louis XIV and absolute monarchy.
  435. Berger, Robert W. A Royal Passion: Louis XIV as Patron of Architecture. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
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  437. A comprehensive account of Louis XIV as royal builder and sponsor of architecture. Includes excellent chapters on the royal building program in Paris and the military architecture of Vauban.
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  439. Dew, Nicholas. Orientalism in Louis XIV’s France. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
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  441. Account of how scholars and scientists, largely under Colbert’s sponsorship, created knowledge about the East. Focusing on the works on three scholars (Barthélemy d’Herbelot, Melchisédech Thévenot, and François Bernier), it shows how they created a distinctive “baroque Orientalism”: a view of the Orient developed before European colonialism and imperialism reached its height.
  442. Find this resource:
  443. Isherwood, Robert. Music in the Service of the King. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1973.
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  445. A well-researched study of the production of music under Louis XIV that pays particular attention to the composer Lully, who is depicted as a musician of humble origins who faithfully served the king in exchange for social advancement.
  446. Find this resource:
  447. Mukerji, Chandra. Territorial Ambitions and the Gardens of Versailles. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
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  449. A copiously illustrated book that argues that the design, creation, and maintenance of Versailles’ gardens mirrored Louis XIV’s territorial policy that aimed to make France better protected, more orderly, and more productive.
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  451. Ranum, Orest. Artisans of Glory: Writers and Historical Thought in Seventeenth-Century France. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1980.
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  453. A comprehensively researched examination of official historiography under the Sun King. Using six scholars as case studies (Bernard, Sorel, de Mézerai, Chapelain, Pellison-Fontanier, and Racine), it analyzes the interaction between state sponsorship and the writing of history.
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  455. Rothkrug, Lionel. Opposition to Louis XIV: The Political and Social Origins of the French Enlightenment. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965.
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  457. Account of the development of ideological opposition to Louis XIV, based on currents of antimercantilist thought. Argues that intellectual opposition to mercantilism escalated over the course of the king’s reign and concludes that antimercantilism was one of the most important sources of the Enlightenment.
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  459. Stroup, Alice. A Company of Scientists: Botany, Patronage, and Community at the Seventeenth-Century Parisian Royal Academy of Sciences. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990.
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  461. Study of the Royal Academy of Sciences founded by Louis XIV. Examines ministerial patronage, noting that Colbert was lavish with funds, his successors less so. Explores the careers and accomplishments of the academicians, particularly scholars of natural history, and concludes that the Academy’s main achievement was the increase of royal prestige.
  462. Find this resource:
  463. Walton, Guy. Louis XIV’s Versailles. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986.
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  465. A copiously illustrated history of the palace of Versailles during the reign of Louis XIV. Covers in great detail the palace’s architecture, landscape, interior decoration, construction, and maintenance up to the king’s death in 1715.
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