Ancien Régime

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Louis XIV of France, under whose reign the Ancien Régime reached an absolutist form
of government; portrait by Hyacinthe Rigaud, 1701

The Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, later taken to mark the end of the
Ancien Régime; watercolour by Jean-Pierre Houël
Coat of arms of pre-revolutionary Kingdom of France
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The Ancien Régime (/ˌɒ̃sjæ̃ reɪˈʒiːm/; French: [ɑ̃sjɛ̃ ʁeʒim]; literally "old rule"),
[a] also known as the Old Regime, was the political and social system of the
Kingdom of France from the Late Middle Ages (circa 15th century) until the French
Revolution of 1789, which led to the abolition (1792) of hereditary monarchy and of
the feudal system of the French nobility.[1] The Valois and Bourbon dynasties ruled
during the Ancien Régime. The term is occasionally used to refer to the similar
feudal systems of the time elsewhere in Europe such as that of Switzerland.

The administrative and social structures of the Ancien Régime in France resulted
from years of state-building, legislative acts (like the Ordinance of Villers-
Cotterêts), internal conflicts, and civil wars. The Valois dynasty's attempts at
reform and at re-establishing control over the scattered political centres of the
country were hindered by the Huguenot Wars, also called the Wars of Religion, from
1562 to 1598. Much of the reigns of Henry IV (r. 1589–1610) and Louis XIII (r.
1610–1643) and the early years of Louis XIV (r. 1643–1715) focused on
administrative centralisation. Despite the notion of absolute monarchy (typified by
the king's right to issue lettres de cachet) and the efforts by the kings to
develop a centralised state, the Kingdom of France retained administrative
irregularities. Authority regularly overlapped, and nobles resisted change and
tried their best to retain their autonomy.

The drive for centralisation related directly to questions of royal finances and
the ability to wage war. The internal conflicts and dynastic crises of the 16th and
the 17th centuries between Catholics and Protestants and the Habsburgs' internal
family conflict and the territorial expansion of France in the 17th century all
demanded great sums, which needed to be raised by taxes, such as the land tax
(taille) and the tax on salt (gabelle), and by contributions of men and service
from the nobility.
One key to the centralisation was the replacing of personal patronage systems,
which had been organised around the king and other nobles by institutional systems
that were constructed around the state.[2] The appointments of intendants,
representatives of royal power in the provinces, greatly undermined the local
control by regional nobles. The same was true of the greater reliance that was
shown by the royal court on the noblesse de robe as judges and royal counselors.
The creation of regional parlements had the same initial goal of facilitating the
introduction of royal power into the newly-assimilated territories, but as the
parlements gained in self-assurance, they started to become sources of disunity.

Contents
1 Origin of term
2 Foreign policy
2.1 Nine Years' War: 1688–1697
2.2 War of the Spanish Succession: 1702–1714
2.3 Peaceful interlude: 1715–1740
3 Provinces and administrative divisions
3.1 Territorial expansion
3.2 Administration
4 State finances
4.1 Taxation history
4.1.1 Fees for holding state positions
5 Justice
5.1 Lower courts
5.2 Superior courts
6 Administration
6.1 Conseil du Roi
6.1.1 17th-century state positions
7 Religion
7.1 Gallicanism
7.2 Monasteries
7.3 Convents
7.4 Reformation and the Protestant minority
8 Social structure
8.1 Peasants
9 Downfall
10 Nostalgia
11 See also
12 Notes
13 References
14 Further reading
14.1 Religion
14.2 In French
Origin of term
By the end of 1789 the term ancien régime was commonly used in France by
journalists and legislators to refer to the institutions of French life before the
Revolution.[3] It first appeared in print in English in 1794 (two years after the
inauguration of the First French Republic) and was originally pejorative in nature.
Simon Schama has observed that "virtually as soon as the term was coined, 'old
regime' was automatically freighted with associations of both traditionalism and
senescence. It conjured up a society so encrusted with anachronisms that only a
shock of great violence could free the living organism within. Institutionally
torpid, economically immobile, culturally atrophied and socially stratified, this
'old regime' was incapable of self-modernization".[4]

Foreign policy
Main article: International relations, 1648–1814
Nine Years' War: 1688–1697
Main article: Nine Years' War
The Nine Years' War (1688–97) was a major conflict between France and a coalition
of Austria and the Holy Roman Empire, the Dutch Republic, Spain, England and Savoy.
It was fought on Continental Europe and the surrounding seas, and in Ireland, North
America and India. It was the first truly global war.[5]

Louis XIV had emerged from the Franco-Dutch War in 1678 as the most powerful
monarch in Europe and an absolute ruler who had won numerous military victories.
Using a combination of aggression, annexation and quasilegal means, he set about
extending his gains to stabilize and strengthen France's frontiers, culminating in
the brief War of the Reunions (1683–1684). The resulting Truce of Ratisbon
guaranteed France's new borders for 20 years, but Louis XIV's subsequent actions,
notably his revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, led to the deterioration of
his military and political dominance. Louis XIV's decision to cross the Rhine in
September 1688 was designed to extend his influence and to pressure the Holy Roman
Empire into accepting his territorial and dynastic claims, but Leopold I and the
German princes resolved to resist, and the States General and William III brought
the Dutch and the English into the war against France. Louis XIV at last faced a
powerful coalition aimed at curtailing his ambitions.

The main fighting took place around France's borders in the Spanish Netherlands,
the Rhineland, Duchy of Savoy, and Catalonia. The fighting generally favoured Louis
XIV's armies, but by 1696, France was in the grip of an economic crisis. The
maritime powers (England and the Dutch Republic) were also financially exhausted,
and when Savoy defected from the alliance, all of the parties were keen for a
negotiated settlement. By the terms of the Treaty of Ryswick (1697), Louis XIV
retained the whole of Alsace, but he was forced to return Lorraine to its ruler and
to give up any gains on the right bank of the Rhine. Also, Louis XIV accepted
William III as the rightful King of England, and the Dutch acquired their barrier
fortress system in the Spanish Netherlands to help secure their own borders.
However, with the ailing and childless Charles II of Spain approaching his end, a
new conflict over the inheritance of the Spanish Empire would soon embroil Louis
XIV and the Grand Alliance in a final war: the War of the Spanish Succession.

War of the Spanish Succession: 1702–1714

Main articles: War of the Spanish Succession and Bourbon claim to the Spanish
throne
Spain had a number of major assets, apart from its homeland itself. It controlled
important territory in Europe and the New World. Spain's American colonies produced
enormous quantities of silver, which were brought to Spain every few years in
convoys.

Spain had many weaknesses as well. Its domestic economy had little business,
industry or advanced craftsmanship and was poor. Spain had to import practically
all of its weapons and had a large army but one that was poorly trained and poorly
equipped. Spain had a surprisingly-small navy since seamanship was a low priority
for the elites. Local and regional governments and the local nobility, controlled
most of the decisionmaking. The central government was quite weak, with a mediocre
bureaucracy, and few able leaders. King Charles II reigned 1665 to 1700, but he was
in very poor physical and mental health.[6]

As King Charles II had no children, the question of who would succeed to the
Spanish throne unleashed a major war. The Vienna-based Habsburg family, of which
Charles II was a member, proposed its own candidate for the throne.[7] However, the
Bourbons, the ruling family of France, instinctively opposed expansions of Habsburg
power within Europe and had their own candidate: Philip, the grandson of the
powerful Louis XIV. That was a confrontation between two different styles[8] of
Ancien Regime, the French style and the Spanish style, or Habsburg style.
Spain's silver and its inability to protect its assets made it a highly-visible
target for ambitious Europeans. For generations, Englishmen had contemplated
capturing the Spanish treasure fleet, a feat that had been accomplished only once:
in 1628 by the Dutchman Piet Hein. English mariners nevertheless seriously pursued
the opportunities for privateering and trade in Spain's colonies.[9]

As he neared his death, Charles II bequeathed his throne to the Bourbon candidate,
the future Philip V of Spain. Philip's grandfather, Louis XIV, eagerly endorsed the
choice and made unilateral aggressive moves to safeguard the viability of his
family's new possessions, such as moving the French army into the Spanish
Netherlands and securing exclusive trading rights for the French in Spanish
America.[10] However, a coalition of enemies opposed to that rapid expansion of
French power quickly formed, and a major European war broke out from 1701 to 1714.
[11]

From the perspective of France's enemies, the notion of France gaining enormous
strength by taking over Spain and all its European and overseas possessions was
anathema. Furthermore, the prospect of capturing Spanish territories in the New
World proved very attractive. France's enemies formed a Grand Alliance, led by the
Holy Roman Empire's Leopold I, which included Prussia and most of the other German
states, the Dutch Republic, Portugal, Savoy (in Italy) and England. The opposing
alliance was primarily France and Spain but also included a few smaller German
princes and dukes in Italy. Extensive back-and-forth fighting took place in the
Netherlands, but the dimensions of the war once again changed when both Emperor
Leopold and his son and successor, Joseph, died. That left Charles as the Alliance
candidate for both king of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor.[12]

Since such a union between Spain and the Holy Roman Empire would be too powerful in
the eyes of Charles VI's allies, most of the allies quickly concluded a separate
peace with France. After another year of fruitless campaigning, Charles VI would do
the same and abandon his desire to become the king of Spain.

The 1713 Treaty of Utrecht resolved all of the issues. France gave up Newfoundland
and Nova Scotia (now in Canada). Louis XIV's grandson became King Philip V of Spain
and kept all of his overseas colonies but renounced any rights to the French
throne. Spain lost its European holdings outside the homeland itself.[13]

The former members of the alliance also profited from the war. The Dutch had
maintained their independence in the face of French aggression. The Habsburgs had
picked up territory north of Austria and in Italy, including the Spanish
Netherlands and Naples. However, the greatest beneficiary of the war was Great
Britain, since in addition to extensive extra-European territorial gains made at
the expense of Spain and France, it established further checks to French expansion
within the continent by moderately strengthening its European allies.[10]

Peaceful interlude: 1715–1740

The quarter-century after the Treaty of Utrecht was peaceful, with no major wars
and only a few secondary military episodes of minor importance. The main powers had
exhausted themselves in warfare, with many deaths, disabled veterans, ruined
navies, high pension costs, heavy loans and high taxes. In 1683, indirect taxes had
brought in 118,000,000 livres, but by 1714, they had plunged to only 46,000,000
livres.[14]

Louis XIV, with his eagerness for warfare, was gone and replaced by a small sickly
child who was the last Bourbon survivor, and his death had the potential to throw
France into another round of warfare. Louis XV lived until the 1770s. France's main
foreign policy decisionmaker was Cardinal Fleury, who recognised that France needed
to rebuild and so pursued a peaceful policy.
France had a poorly-designed taxation system by which tax farmers kept much of the
money, and the treasury was always short. The banking system in Paris was
undeveloped, and the treasury was forced to borrow at very high interest rates.
London's financial system proved strikingly competent in funding not only the
British Army but also its allies. Queen Anne was dead, and her successor, King
George I, was a Hanoverian who moved his court to London but never became fluent in
English and surrounded himself with German advisors. They spent much of their time
and most of their attention on Hanoverian affairs. He too was threatened by
instability of the throne since the Stuart pretenders, long supported by Louis XIV,
threatened repeatedly to invade through Ireland or Scotland and had significant
internal support from the Tory faction. However, Sir Robert Walpole was the
dominant decision-maker from 1722 to 1740 in a role that would later be called
prime minister. Walpole strongly rejected militaristic options and promoted a peace
program that was agreed to by Fleury, and both powers signed an alliance.

The Dutch Republic was much reduced in power and so agreed with Britain's idea of
peace. In Vienna, the Holy Roman Empire's Habsburg emperors bickered with the new
Bourbon king of Spain, Philip V, over Habsburg control of most of Italy, but
relations with France were undramatic.[15][16]

Provinces and administrative divisions

Territorial expansion

French territorial expansion from 1552 to 1798

In the mid-15th century, France was significantly smaller than it is today,[17][b]
and numerous border provinces (such as Roussillon, Cerdagne, Conflent, Vallespir,
Capcir, Calais, Béarn, Navarre, County of Foix, Flanders, Artois, Lorraine, Alsace,
Trois-Évêchés, Franche-Comté, Savoy, Bresse, Bugey, Gex, Nice, Provence, Dauphiné
and Brittany) were autonomous or belonged to the Holy Roman Empire, the Crown of
Aragon or the Kingdom of Navarra; there were also foreign enclaves like the Comtat
Venaissin.

In addition, certain provinces within France were ostensibly personal fiefs of

noble families (notably Bourbonnais, Forez and Auvergne, which were held by the
House of Bourbon until the provinces were forcibly integrated into the royal domain
in 1527 after the fall of Charles III, Duke of Bourbon).

From the late 15th century to the late 17th century and again in the 1760s, France
underwent a massive territorial expansion and an attempt to better integrate its
provinces into an administrative whole.

French acquisitions from 1461 to 1768:

under Louis XI – Provence (1482), Dauphiné (1461, under French control since 1349)
under Louis XII – Milan (1500, lost in 1521), Naples (1500, lost in 1504)
under Francis I – Brittany (1532)
under Henry II – de facto Trois-Évêchés (Metz, Toul, Verdun) (1552), Calais (1559)
under Henry IV – County of Foix (1607)
under Louis XIII – Béarn and Navarre (1620, under French control since 1589 as part
of Henry IV's possessions)

France in 1477. Red line: Boundary of the Kingdom of France; Light blue: the
directly held royal domain.
under Louis XIV
Treaty of Westphalia (1648) – cities of the Décapole in Alsace and de jure Trois-
Evêchés
Treaty of the Pyrenees (1659) – Artois, Northern Catalonia (Roussillon, Cerdagne)
Treaty of Nijmegen (1678–79) – Franche-Comté, Flanders
Treaty of Ryswick (1697) - Alsace and Strasbourg
under Louis XV – Lorraine (1766), Corsica (1768)
Administration
Main articles: Provinces of France and Généralité
Despite efforts by the kings to create a centralised state out of these provinces,
France still remained a patchwork of local privileges and historical differences.
The arbitrary power of the monarch (as implied by the expression "absolute
monarchy") was much limited by historic and regional particularities.
Administrative (including taxation), legal (parlement), judicial and ecclesiastic
divisions and prerogatives frequently overlapped (for example, French bishoprics
and dioceses rarely coincided with administrative divisions).

Certain provinces and cities had won special privileges (such as lower rates for
gabelle or salt tax). Southern France was governed by written law adapted from the
Roman legal system, but northern France used common law, which was codified in 1453
into a written form.

The representative of the king in his provinces and cities was the gouverneur.
Royal officers chosen from the highest nobility, provincial and city governors
(oversight of provinces and cities was frequently combined) were predominantly
military positions in charge of defense and policing. Provincial governors, also
called lieutenants généraux, also had the ability of convoking provincial
parlements, provincial estates and municipal bodies.

The title gouverneur first appeared under Charles VI. The Ordinance of Blois of
1579 reduced their number to 12, and an ordinance of 1779 increased their number to
39 (18 first-class governors and 21 second-class governors). Although in principle,
they were the king's representatives, and their charges could be revoked at the
king's will, some governors had installed themselves and their heirs as a
provincial dynasty.

The governors were at the height of their power from the mid-16th to the mid-17th
century. Their role in provincial unrest during the civil wars led Cardinal
Richelieu to create the more tractable positions of intendants of finance, policing
and justice, and in the 18th century, the role of provincial governors was greatly
curtailed.

Major provinces of France, with provincial capitals. Cities in bold had provincial
parlements or conseils souverains during the Ancien Régime. Note: The map reflects
France's modern borders and does not indicate the territorial formation of France
over time. Provinces on the list may encompass several other historic provinces and
counties (for example, at the revolution, Guyenne was made up of eight smaller
historic provinces, including Quercy and Rouergue). For a more complete list, see
Provinces of France.
Île-de-France (Paris)
Berry (Bourges)
Orléanais (Orléans)
Normandy (Rouen)
Languedoc (Toulouse)
Lyonnais (Lyon)
Dauphiné (Grenoble)
Champagne (Troyes)
Aunis (La Rochelle)
Saintonge (Saintes)
Poitou (Poitiers)
Guyenne and Gascony (Bordeaux)
Burgundy (Dijon)
Picardy (Amiens)
Anjou (Angers)
Provence (Aix-en-Provence)
Angoumois (Angoulême)
Bourbonnais (Moulins)
Marche (Guéret)
Brittany (Rennes, parlement briefly at Nantes)
Maine (Le Mans)
Touraine (Tours)
Limousin (Limoges)
Foix (Foix)
Auvergne (Clermont-Ferrand)
Béarn (Pau)
Alsace (Strasbourg, cons. souv. in Colmar)
Artois (cons provinc. in Arras)
Roussillon (cons. souv. in Perpignan)
Flanders and Hainaut (Lille, parliament first in Tournai, then in Douai)
Franche-Comté (Besançon, formerly at Dole)
Lorraine (Nancy)
Corsica (off map, Ajaccio, cons. souv. in Bastia)
Nivernais (Nevers)
Comtat Venaissin (Avignon), a Papal fief
Imperial Free City of Mulhouse
Savoy, a Sardinian fief (parl. in Chambéry 1537–59)
Nice, a Sardinian fief
Montbéliard, a fief of Württemberg
(not indicated) Trois-Évêchés (Metz, Toul and Verdun)
(not indicated) Dombes (Trévoux)
(not indicated) Navarre (Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port)
(not indicated) Soule (Mauléon)
(not indicated) Bigorre (Tarbes)
(not indicated) Beaujolais (Beaujeu)
(not indicated) Bresse (Bourg)
(not indicated) Perche (Mortagne-au-Perche)
Provinces of France
In an attempt to reform the system, new divisions were created. The recettes
générales, commonly known as généralités, were initially only taxation districts
(see "state finances" below). The first 16 were created in 1542 by edict of Henry
II. Their role steadily increased, and by the mid-17th century, the généralités
were under the authority of an intendant and were a vehicle for the expansion of
royal power in matters of justice, taxation and policing. By the revolution, there
were 36 généralités, the last two being created in 1784.

Généralités of France by city (and province). Areas in red are pays d'état (note:
should also include 36, 37 and parts of 35); white pays d'élection; yellow pays
d'imposition (see State finances below).
Généralité of Bordeaux, (Agen, Guyenne)
Généralité of Provence, or Aix-en-Provence (Provence)
Généralité of Amiens (Picardy)
Généralité of Bourges (Berry)
Généralité of Caen (Normandy)
Généralité of Châlons (Champagne)
Généralité of Burgundy, Dijon (Burgundy)
Généralité of Grenoble (Dauphiné)
Généralité of Issoire, later of Riom (Auvergne)
Généralité of Lyon (Lyonnais, Beaujolais and Forez)
Généralité of Montpellier (Languedoc)
Généralité of Paris (Île-de-France)
Généralité of Poitiers (Poitou)
Généralité of Rouen (Normandy)
Généralité of Toulouse (Languedoc)
Généralité of Tours (Touraine, Maine and Anjou)
Généralité of Metz (Trois-Évêchés)
Généralité of Nantes (Brittany)
Généralité of Limoges (divided in two parts: Angoumois & Limousin – Marche)
Généralité of Orléans (Orléanais)
Généralité of Moulins (Bourbonnais)
Généralité of Soissons (Picardy)
Généralité of Montauban (Gascony)
Généralité of Alençon (Perche)
Généralité of Perpignan (Roussillon)
Généralité of Besançon (Franche-Comté)
Généralité of Valenciennes (Hainaut)
Généralité of Strasbourg (Alsace)
(see 18)
Généralité of Lille (Flanders)
Généralité of La Rochelle (Aunis and Saintonge)
Généralité of Nancy (Lorraine)
Généralité of Trévoux (Dombes)
Généralité of Corsica, or Bastia (Corsica)
Généralité of Auch (Gascony)
Généralité of Bayonne (Labourd)
Généralité of Pau (Béarn and Soule)
Généralités in 1789.jpeg
State finances
Further information: Economic history of France
The desire for more efficient tax collection was one of the major causes for French
administrative and royal centralisation during the early modern period. The taille
became a major source of royal income. Exempted from were clergy and nobles (except
for non-noble lands held in pays d'état, see below), officers of the crown,
military personnel, magistrates, university professors and students, and certain
cities (villes franches) such as Paris.

The provinces were of three sorts, the pays d'élection, the pays d'état and the
pays d'imposition. In the pays d'élection (the longest-held possessions of the
French crown; some of the provinces had held the equivalent autonomy of a pays
d'état but had lost it through the effects of royal reforms) the assessment and
collection of taxes were trusted to elected officials (at least originally since
later those positions were bought), and the tax was generally "personal" and so was
attached to non-noble individuals.

In the pays d'état ("provinces with provincial estates"), Brittany, Languedoc,

Burgundy, Auvergne, Béarn, Dauphiné, Provence and portions of Gascony, such as
Bigorre, Comminges and the Quatre-Vallées, recently acquired provinces that had
been able to maintain a certain local autonomy in terms of taxation, the assessment
of the tax was established by local councils and the tax was generally "real" and
so was attached to non-noble lands (nobles with such lands were required to pay
taxes on them). Pays d'imposition were recently conquered lands that had their own
local historical institutions (they were similar to the pays d'état under which
they are sometimes grouped), but taxation was overseen by the royal intendant.

Taxation history
Taxation districts had gone through a variety of mutations since the 14th century.
Before the 14th century, oversight of the collection of royal taxes had fallen
generally to the baillis and sénéchaux in their circumscriptions. Reforms in the
14th and the 15th centuries saw France's royal financial administration run by two
financial boards, which worked in a collegial manner: the four Généraux des
finances (also called général conseiller or receveur général) oversaw the
collection of taxes (taille, aides, etc.) by tax-collecting agents (receveurs) and
the four Trésoriers de France (Treasurers) oversaw revenues from royal lands (the
"domaine royal").

Together, they were the Messieurs des finances. The four members of each board were
divided by geographical districts (although the term généralité appears only in the
late 15th century). The areas were named Languedoïl, Languedoc, Outre-Seine-and-
Yonne, and Nomandy (the last was created in 1449, the other three earlier), with
the directors of the "Languedoïl" region typically having an honorific preeminence.
By 1484, the number of généralités had increased to six.

In the 16th century, the kings of France, in an effort to exert more direct control
over royal finances and to circumvent the double board, which was accused of poor
oversight, made numerous administrative reforms, including the restructuring of the
financial administration and increasing the number of généralités. In 1542, France
was divided into 16 généralités. The number increased to 21 at the end of the 16th
century and to 36 at the time of the French Revolution; the last two were created
in 1784.

The administration of the généralités of the Renaissance went through a variety of

reforms. In 1577, Henry III established 5 treasurers (trésoriers généraux) in each
généralité who formed a bureau of finances. In the 17th century, oversight of the
généralités was subsumed by the intendants of finance, justice and police. The
expression généralité and intendance became roughly synonymous.

Until the late 17th century, tax collectors were called receveurs. In 1680, the
system of the Ferme générale was established, a franchised customs and excise
operation in which individuals bought the right to collect the taille on behalf of
the king, through six-year adjudications (certain taxes like the aides and the
gabelle had been farmed out in this way as early as 1604). The major tax collectors
in that system were known as the fermiers généraux ('farmers-general").

The taille was only one of a number of taxes. There also existed the taillon (a tax
for military purposes), a national salt tax (the gabelle), national tariffs (the
aides) on various products (wine, beer, oil and other goods), local tariffs on
speciality products (the douane) or levied on products entering the city (the
octroi) or sold at fairs and local taxes. Finally, the church benefited from a
mandatory tax or tithe, the dîme.

Louis XIV created several additional tax systems, including the capitation, which
began in 1695 and touched every person, including nobles and the clergy although
exemption could be bought for a large one-time sum and the "dixième" (1710–1717,
restarted in 1733), which enacted to support the military and was a true tax on
income and on property value. In 1749, under Louis XV, a new tax based on the
dixième, the vingtième, was enacted to reduce the royal deficit and continued for
the rest of the Ancien Régime.

Fees for holding state positions

Another key source of state financing was through charging fees for state positions
(such as most members of parlements, magistrates, maître des requêtes and financial
officers). Many of the fees were quite high, but some of the offices conferred
nobility and could be financially advantageous. The use of offices to seek profit
had become standard practice as early as the 12th and the 13th centuries. A law in
1467 made these offices irrevocable except through the death, resignation or
forfeiture of the title holder, and the offices, once bought, tended to become
hereditary charges that were passed on within families with a fee for transfer of
title.[18]

In an effort to increase revenue, the state often turned to the creation of new
offices. Before it was made illegal in 1521, it had been possible to leave the date
that the transfer of title was to take effect open-ended. In 1534, a rule adapted
from church practice made the successor's right void if the preceding office holder
died within forty days of the transfer, and the office returned to the state.
However, a new fee, the survivance jouissante protected against that rule.[18] In
1604, Sully created a new tax, the paulette or "annual tax" of a sixtieth of the
official charge, which permitted the titleholder to be free of the forty-day rule.
The paulette and the venality of offices became key concerns in the parliamentarian
revolts of the 1640s called the Fronde.

The state also demanded a "free gift", which the church collected from holders of
ecclesiastic offices through taxes called the décime (roughly a twentieth of the
official charge, created under Francis I).

State finances also relied heavily on borrowing, both private (from the great
banking families in Europe) and public. The most important public source for
borrowing was through the system of rentes sur l'Hôtel de Ville of Paris, a kind of
government bond system offering investors annual interest. The system first came to
use in 1522 under Francis I.

Until 1661, the head of the financial system in France was generally the
surintendant des finances. That year, the surintendant Nicolas Fouquet fell from
power, and the position was replaced by the less powerful contrôleur général des
finances.

Justice

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Lower courts
Justice in seigneurial lands (including those held by the church or within cities)
was generally overseen by the seigneur or his delegated officers. Since the 15th
century, much of the seigneur's legal purview had been given to the bailliages or
sénéchaussées and the présidiaux (see below), leaving only affairs concerning
seigneurial dues and duties, and small affairs of local justice. Only certain
seigneurs, those with the power of haute justice (seigneurial justice was divided
into "high" "middle" and "low" justice), could enact the death penalty and only
with the consent of the présidiaux.

Crimes of desertion, highway robbery and mendicants (so-called cas prévôtaux) were
under the supervision of the prévôt des maréchaux, who exacted quick and impartial
justice. In 1670, their purview was overseen by the présidiaux (see below).

The national judicial system was made-up of tribunals divided into bailliages (in
northern France) and sénéchaussées (in southern France). The tribunals numbered
around 90 in the 16th century and far more at the end of the 18th century, were
supervised by a lieutenant général and were subdivided into:

prévôtés supervised by a prévôt;

or (as was the case in Normandy) into vicomtés supervised by a vicomte (the
position could be held by non-nobles);
or (in parts of northern France) into châtellenies supervised by a châtelain (the
position could be held by non-nobles);
or, in the south, into vigueries or baylies supervised by a viguier or a bayle.
In an effort to reduce the case load in the parlements, certain bailliages were
given extended powers by Henry II of France, which were called présidiaux.

The prévôts or their equivalent were the first-level judges for non-nobles and
ecclesiastics. In the exercise of their legal functions, they sat alone but had to
consult with certain lawyers (avocats or procureurs) chosen by themselves, whom, to
use the technical phrase, they "summoned to their council". The appeals from their
sentences went to the bailliages, who also had jurisdiction in the first instance
over actions brought against nobles. Bailliages and présidiaux were also the first
court for certain crimes (so-called cas royaux; such cases had formerly been under
the supervision of the local seigneurs): sacrilege, lèse-majesté, kidnapping, rape,
heresy, alteration of money, sedition, insurrections and the illegal carrying of
arms. To appeal a bailliage's decisions, one turned to the regional parlements.

The most important of the royal tribunals was the prévôté[c] and présidial of
Paris, the Châtelet, which was overseen by the prévôt of Paris, civil and criminal
lieutenants, and a royal officer in charge of maintaining public order in the
capital, the Lieutenant General of Police of Paris.

Superior courts
The following were cours souveraines, or superior courts, whose decisions could be
revoked only by "the king in his conseil" (see administration section below).

Parlements – eventually 14 in number: Paris, Languedoc (Toulouse), Provence (Aix),

Franche-Comté (Besançon), Guyenne (Bordeaux), Burgundy (Dijon), Flanders (Douai),
Dauphiné (Grenoble), Trois-Évêchés (Metz), Lorraine (Nancy), Navarre (Pau),
Brittany (Rennes, briefly in Nantes), Normandy (Rouen) and (from 1523–1771) Dombes
(Trévoux). There was also parlement in Savoy (Chambéry) from 1537–59. The
parlements were originally only judicial in nature (appellate courts for lower
civil and ecclesiastical courts) but began to subsume limited legislative functions
(see administration section below). The most important parlement, both in
administrative area (covering the major part of northern and central France) and
prestige, was the parliament of Paris, which also was the court of first instance
for peers of the realm and for regalian affairs.
Conseils souverains – Alsace (Colmar), Roussillon (Perpignan), Artois (a conseil
provincial, Arras) and (from 1553–59) Corsica (Bastia); formerly Flanders, Navarre
and Lorraine (converted into parlements). The conseils souverains were regional
parliaments in recently conquered lands.
Chambre des comptes – Paris, Dijon, Blois, Grenoble, Nantes. The chambre des
comptes supervised the spending of public funds, the protection of royal lands
(domaine royal) and legal issues involving those areas.
Cours des aides – Paris, Clermont, Bordeaux, Montauban. The cours des aides
supervised affairs in the pays d'élections, often concerning taxes on wine, beer,
soap, oil, metals etc.
Chambre des comptes combined with Cours des aides – Aix, Bar-le-Duc, Dole, Nancy,
Montpellier, Pau, Rouen
Cours des monnaies – Paris; additionally Lyon (1704–71), and (after 1766), the
chambre des comptes of Bar-le-Duc and Nancy. The cours des monnaies oversaw money,
coins and precious metals.
Grand Conseil – created in 1497 to oversee affairs concerning ecclesiastical
benefices; occasionally the king sought the Grand Conseil's intervention in affairs
considered to be too contentious for the parliament.
The head of the judicial system in France was the chancellor.

Administration
Main article: Conseil du Roi
One of the established principles of the French monarchy was that the king could
not act without the advice of his counsel, and the formula "le roi en son conseil"
expressed that deliberative aspect. The administration of the French state in the
early modern period went through a long evolution, as a truly-administrative
apparatus, relying on old nobility, newer chancellor nobility ("noblesse de robe")
and administrative professionals, was substituted to the feudal clientelist system.
Conseil du Roi
Under Charles VIII and Louis XII, the Conseil du Roi (King's Counsel) was dominated
by members of twenty or so noble or rich families. Under Francis I the number of
counsellors increased to roughly 70 individuals (although the old nobility was then
proportionally more important than had been in the previous century). The most
important positions in the court were those of the Great Officers of the Crown of
France, headed by the connétable (chief military officer of the realm) until it was
eliminated in 1627) and the chancellor.

The royal administration during the Renaissance was divided between a small counsel
(the "secret" and later "high" counsel) of 6 or fewer members (3 members in 1535, 4
in 1554) for important matters of state and a larger counsel for judicial or
financial affairs. Francis I was sometimes criticised for relying too heavily on a
small number of advisors, and Henry II, Catherine de Medici and their sons found
themselves frequently unable to negotiate between the opposing Guise and
Montmorency families in their counsel.

Over time, the decisionmaking apparatus of the council was divided into several
royal counsels. Its subcouncils can be generally grouped as "governmental
councils", "financial councils" and "judicial and administrative councils". With
the names and subdivisions of the 17th and 18th centuries, the subcouncils were the
following:

Governmental councils:

Conseil d'en haut ("High Council", concerning the most important matters of state)
– composed of the king, the crown prince (the "dauphin"), the chancellor, the
contrôleur général des finances, and the secretary of state in charge of foreign
affairs.
Conseil des dépêches ("Council of Messages", concerning notices and administrative
reports from the provinces) – composed of the king, the chancellor, the secretaries
of state, the contrôleur général des finances, and other councillors according to
the issues discussed.
Conseil de Conscience
Financial councils:

Conseil royal des finances ("Royal Council of Finances") – composed of the king,
the "chef du conseil des finances" (an honorary post), the chancellor, the
contrôleur général des finances and two of his consellors, and the intendants of
finance.
Conseil royal de commerce
Judicial and administrative councils:

Conseil d'État et des Finances or Conseil ordinaire des Finances – by the late 17th
century, its functions were largely taken over by the three following sections.
Conseil privé or Conseil des parties or Conseil d'État ("Privy Council" or "Council
of State", concerning the judicial system, officially instituted in 1557) – the
largest of the royal councils, composed of the chancellor, the dukes with peerage,
the ministers and secretaries of state, the contrôleur général des finances, the 30
councillors of state, the 80 maître des requêtes and the intendants of finance.
Grande Direction des Finances
Petite Direction des Finances
In addition to the above administrative institutions, the king was also surrounded
by an extensive personal and court retinue (royal family, valet de chambres,
guards, honorific officers), regrouped under the name "Maison du Roi".

At the death of Louis XIV, the Regent Philippe II, Duke of Orléans abandoned
several of the above administrative structures, most notably the Secretaries of
State, which were replaced by councils. That system of government, called the
Polysynody, lasted from 1715 to 1718.

17th-century state positions

Under Henry IV and Louis XIII, the administrative apparatus of the court and its
councils was expanded and the proportion of the "noblesse de robe" increased and
culminated in the following positions during the 17th century:

First Minister: ministers and secretaries of state – such as Sully, Concini (who
was also governor of several provinces), Richelieu, Mazarin, Jean-Baptiste Colbert,
Cardinal de Fleury, Turgot, etc. – exerted a powerful control over state
administration in the 17th and 18th century. The title "principal ministre de
l'état" was, however, given only six times in this period and Louis XIV himself
refused to choose a "prime minister" after the death of Mazarin.
Chancellor of France (also called the "garde des sceaux", or "Keeper of the Seals";
in the case of incapacity or disfavour, the Chancellor was generally permitted to
retain his title, but the royal seals were passed to a deputy, called the "garde
des sceaux"[20])
Controller-General of Finances (contrôleur général des finances, formerly called
the surintendant des finances).
Secretaries of State: created in 1547 by Henry II, of greater importance after
1588, generally 4 in number but occasionally 5:
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
Secretary of State for War, also oversaw France's border provinces.
Secretary of State of the Navy
Secretary of State of the Maison du Roi (the king's royal entourage and personal
military guard), who also oversaw the clergy, the affairs of Paris and the non-
border provinces.
Secretary of State for Protestant Affairs (combined with the secretary of the
Maison du Roi in 1749).
Councillors of state (generally 30)
Maître des requêtes (generally 80)
Intendants of finance (6)
Intendants of commerce (4 or 5)
Ministers of State (variable)
Treasurers
Farmers-General
Superintendent of the postal system
Directeur général of buildings
Directeur général of fortifications
Lieutenant General of Police of Paris (in charge of public order in the capital)
Archbishop of Paris
Royal confessor
Royal administration in the provinces had been the role of the bailliages and
sénéchaussées in the Middle Ages, but that declined in the early modern period, and
by the late 18th century, the bailliages served only a judicial function. The main
source of royal administrative power in the provinces in the 16th and the early
17th centuries fell to the gouverneurs (who represented "the presence of the king
in his province"), positions which had long been held by only the highest ranked
families in the realm. With the civil wars of the early modern period, the king
increasing turned to more tractable and subservient emissaries, which caused the
growth of the provincial intendants under Louis XIII and Louis XIV. Indendants were
chosen from among the maître des requêtes. Those attached to a province had
jurisdiction over finances, justice and policing.

By the 18th century, royal administrative power had been firmly established in the
provinces, despite protestations by local parlements. In addition to their role as
appellate courts, regional parlements had gained the privilege to register the
edicts of the king and to present the king with official complaints concerning the
edicts. They thus had acquired a limited role as the representative voice of
(predominantly) the magistrate class. A refusal by the parlement to register the
edicts (frequently concerning fiscal matters) allowed the king could to impose it's
registration through a royal assize ("lit de justice").

The other traditional representatives bodies in the realm were the États généraux
(created in 1302), which reunited the three estates of the realm (clergy, nobility
and the third estate) and the États provinciaux (Provincial Estates). The États
généraux (convoked in this period in 1484, 1560–61, 1576–1577, 1588–1589, 1593,
1614 and 1789) had been reunited during fiscal crises or convoked by parties
malcontent with royal prerogatives (the Ligue, the Huguenots), but they had no true
power since dissensions between the three orders rendered them weak and they were
dissolved before having completed their work. As a sign of French absolutism, they
ceased to be convoked from 1614 to 1789. The provincial estates proved to be more
effective and were convoked by the king to respond to fiscal and tax policies.

Religion

Dioceses of France in 1789.

The French monarchy was irrevocably linked to the Catholic Church (the formula was
la France est la fille aînée de l'église, or "France is the eldest daughter of the
church"), and French theorists of the divine right of kings and sacerdotal power in
the Renaissance had made those links explicit. Henry IV was able to ascend to the
throne only after abjuring Protestantism. The symbolic power of the Catholic
monarch was apparent in his crowning (the king was anointed by blessed oil in
Rheims) and he was popularly believed to be able to cure scrofula by the laying on
of his hands (accompanied by the formula "the king touches you, but God heals
you").

In 1500, France had 14 archbishoprics (Lyon, Rouen, Tours, Sens, Bourges, Bordeaux,
Auch, Toulouse, Narbonne, Aix-en-Provence, Embrun, Vienne, Arles and Rheims) and
100 bishoprics. By the 18th century, archbishoprics and bishoprics had expanded to
a total of 139 (see List of Ancien Régime dioceses of France). The upper levels of
the French church were made up predominantly of old nobility, both from provincial
families and from royal court families, and many of the offices had become de facto
hereditary possessions, with some members possessing multiple offices. In addition
to fiefs that church members possessed as seigneurs, the church also possessed
seigneurial lands in its own right and enacted justice upon them.

In the early the 16th century, the secular clergy (curates, vicars, canons etc.)
accounted for around 100,000 individuals in France.[17]

Other temporal powers of the church included playing a political role as the first
estate in the "États Généraux" and the "États Provinciaux" (Provincial Assemblies)
and in Provincial Conciles or Synods convoked by the king to discuss religious
issues. The church also claimed a prerogative to judge certain crimes, most notably
heresy, although the Wars of Religion did much to place that crime in the purview
of the royal courts and parliament. Finally, abbots, cardinals and other prelates
were frequently employed by the kings as ambassadors, members of his councils (such
as Richelieu and Mazarin) and in other administrative positions.

The faculty of theology of Paris (often called the Sorbonne), maintained a

censorship board, which reviewed publications for their religious orthodoxy. The
Wars of Religion saw thar control over censorship however pass to the parliament
and, in the 17th century to the royal censors, although the church maintained a
right to petition.

The church was the primary provider of schools (primary schools and "colleges") and
hospitals ("hôtel-Dieu", the Sisters of Charity) and distributor of relief to the
poor in pre-revolutionary France.
The Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges (1438, suppressed by Louis XI but brought back by
the États Généraux of Tours in 1484) gave the election of bishops and abbots to the
cathedral chapter houses and abbeys of France, thus stripping the pope of effective
control of the French church and permitting the beginning of a Gallican church.
However, in 1515, Francis I signed a new agreement with Pope Leo X, the Concordat
of Bologna, which gave the king the right to nominate candidates and the pope the
right of investiture. The agreement infuriated Gallicans but gave the king control
over important ecclesiastical offices with which to benefit nobles.

Although exempted from the taille, the church was required to pay the crown a tax
called the "free gift" ("don gratuit"), which it collected from its office holders,
at roughly a twentieth the price of the office (that was the "décime",
reapportioned every five years). In its turn, the church exacted a mandatory tithe
from its parishioners, called the "dîme".

For church history in the 16th century, see Protestant Reformation and French Wars
of Religion.
The Counter-Reformation saw the French church create numerous religious orders
(such as the Jesuits) and make great improvements on the quality of its parish
priests; the first decades of the 17th century were characterized by a massive
outpouring of devotional texts and religious fervor (exemplified in Saint Francis
of Sales, Saint Vincent de Paul, etc.). Although the Edict of Nantes (1598)
permitted the existence of Protestant churches in the realm (characterized as "a
state within a state"), the next eighty years saw the rights of the Huguenots
slowly stripped away, until Louis XIV finally revoked the edict in 1685, which
caused a massive emigration of Huguenots to other countries. Religious practices
that veered too close to Protestantism (like Jansenism) or to the mystical (like
Quietism) were also severely suppressed, as were libertinage or overt atheism.

Regular clergy (those in Catholic religious orders) in France numbered into the
tens of thousands in the 16th century. Some orders, like the Benedictines, were
largely rural; others, like the Dominicans (also called "Jacobins") and the
Franciscans (also called "cordeliers") operated in cities.[17]

Although the church came under attack in the 18th century by the philosophers of
the Enlightenment and recruitment of clergy and monastic orders dropped after 1750,
figures show that on the whole, the population remained a profoundly Catholic
country (absenteeism from services did not exceed 1% in the middle of the
century[21]). At the eve of the revolution, the church possessed upwards of 7% of
the country's land (figures vary) and generated yearly revenues of 150 million
livres.

Gallicanism
Louis XIV supported the Gallican Church to give the government a greater role than
the pope in choosing bishops and the government the revenues when a bishopric was
vacant. There would be no inquisition in France, and papal decrees could operate
only after the government approved them. Louis avoided schism and wanted more royal
power over the French Church, but he did not want to break free of Rome. The pope
likewise recognized the "most Christian king" was a powerful ally, who could not be
alienated.[22]

Monasteries
Until the French Revolution, the monastic community constituted a central element
of the economic, social, and religious life of many localities under the Old
Regime. From the end of the Wars of Religion to the French Revolution, Menat, a
Cluniac abbey dating back to 1107, ruled over the Sioule Valley in the northwest
region of the Clermont diocese. The monks were large landholders and developed a
diversified and complex set of links with their neighbors. They received
seigniorial rights; provided work to the rural poor and were in daily contact with
notaries public, merchants, and surgeons. While they did not directly manage the
religious life of the faithful, which was done by parish priests, monks were a
motivating force in it by setting up of a parish clergy, providing alms and social
services and playing the role of intercessors.

Convents
Communities of nuns in France on the eve of Revolution had on average 25 members
and a median age of 48 years. Nuns were both entering the profession later and
living longer than ever. In general, they had little wealth. Recruitment varied
from region to region and by convent lifestyle (active or contemplative, austere or
opulent, lower class or middle class). The nature of male and female monasticism
differed greatly in France both before and during the revolution. Convents tended
to be more isolated and less centrally controlled, which made for greater diversity
among them than among male monasteries.[23]

Reformation and the Protestant minority

French Protestantism, which was largely Calvinist, derived its support from the
lesser nobles and trading classes. Its two main strongholds were southwestern
France and Normandy, but even there, Catholics were a majority. Protestantism in
France was considered to be a grave threat to national unity, as the Huguenot
minority felt a closer affinity with German and Dutch Calvinists than with its
fellow Frenchmen. In an effort to cement their position, Huguenots often allied
with France's enemies. The animosity between the two sides led to the French Wars
of Religion and the tragic St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre. The religious wars ended
in 1593, when the Huguenot Henry of Navarre (1553–1610), who was already
effectively king of France, became a Catholic and was recognized by both Catholics
and Protestants as King Henry IV (reigned 1589–1610).

The main provisions of the Edict of Nantes (1598), which Henry IV had issued as a
charter of religious freedoms for the Huguenots, allowed Huguenots to hold
religious services in certain towns in each province, allowed them to control and
fortify eight cities, had special courts established to try Huguenot offenders and
gave Huguenots equal civil rights to Catholics.

The military privileges were incorporated in the edict to allay the fears of the
minority. Over time, those privileges were clearly open to abuse. In 1620, the
Huguenots proclaimed a constitution for the "Republic of the Reformed Churches of
France", and Prime Minister Cardinal Richelieu (1585–1642) invoked the full powers
of the state and captured La Rochelle after a long siege in 1628. The next year,
the Treaty of Alais left the Huguenots their religious freedom but revoked their
military freedoms.

Montpellier was among the most important of the 66 villes de sûreté that the 1598
edict had granted to the Huguenots. The city's political institutions and
university were handed over to the Huguenots. Tension with Paris led to a siege by
the royal army in 1622. Peace terms called for the dismantling of the city's
fortifications. A royal citadel was built, and the university and consulate were
taken over by the Catholics. Even before the Edict of Alès, Protestant rule was
dead and the ville de sûreté was no more.

By 1620 the Huguenots were on the defensive, and the government increasingly
applied pressure. A series of small civil wars that broke out in southern France
between 1610 and 1635 were long considered by historians to be regional squabbles
between rival noble families. New analysis shows that the civil wars were in fact
religious in nature and remnants of the French Wars of Religion, which had largely
ended by the Edict of Nantes. Small wars in the provinces of Languedoc and Guyenne
had Catholics and Calvinists use destruction of churches, iconoclasm, forced
conversions and the execution of heretics as weapons of choice.
Louis XIV acted more and more aggressively to force the Huguenots to convert. At
first, he sent missionaries, which were backed by a fund to reward converts to
Catholicism financially. Then, he imposed penalties, closed Huguenots' schools and
excluded them from favorite professions. Escalating the attack, he tried to convert
the Huguenots by force by sending armed dragonnades (soldiers) to occupy and loot
their houses. Finally, the 1685 Edict of Fontainebleau revoked the Edict of Nantes.
[24][25]

The revocation forbade Protestant services, required children to be educated as

Catholics and prohibited most Huguenot emigration. That proved disastrous to the
Huguenots and costly for France by precipitating civil bloodshed, ruining commerce
and resulting in the illegal flight from the country of about 180,000 Protestants,
many of whom became intellectuals, doctors and business leaders in England,
Scotland, the Netherlands Prussia and South Africa; also, 4000 went to the American
colonies.[24][25]

The English welcomed the French refugees by providing money from both government
and private agencies to aid their relocation. The Huguenots who stayed in France
became Catholics and were called "new converts". Only a few Protestant villages
remained in isolated areas.[24][25]

By the 1780s, Protestants comprised about 700,000 people, or 2% of the population.

It was no longer a favorite religion of the elite since most Protestants were
peasants. Protestantim was still illegal. The law was seldom enforced but could be
a threat or a nuisance to Protestants.

Calvinists lived primarily in the southern France, and about 200,000 Lutherans
lived in Alsace, where the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia still protected them.[26]

In addition, there were about 40,000 to 50,000 Jews in France, chiefly centred in
Bordeaux, Metz and a few other cities. They had very limited rights and
opportunities, apart from the moneylending business, but their status was legal.
[27]

Social structure

A prerevolutionary cartoon showing the Third Estate carrying on her back the Second
Estate (the nobility) and the First Estate (the clergy)

A prerevolutionary cartoon showing the Third Estate carrying on his back the Second
Estate (the nobility) and the First Estate (the clergy)
Political power was widely dispersed among certain elites. The law courts
("Parlements") were powerful, especially that of France. However, the king had only
about 10,000 officials in royal service: very few indeed for such a large country
and with very slow internal communications over an inadequate road system. Travel
was usually faster by ocean ship or river boat.[28] The different estates of the
realm (the clergy, the nobility, and commoners) occasionally met together in the
Estates General, but in practice, the Estates General had no power since it could
petition the king but not pass laws itself.

The Catholic Church controlled about 40% of the wealth, which was tied up in long-
term endowments that could be added to but not reduced. The king, not the pope),
nominated bishops, but typically had to negotiate with noble families that had
close ties to local monasteries and church establishments.

The nobility came second in terms of wealth, but there was no unity. Each noble had
his own lands, his own network of regional connections and his own military force.
[28]
The cities had a quasi-independent status and were largely controlled by the
leading merchants and guilds. Paris was by far the largest city, with 220,000
people in 1547 and a history of steady growth. Lyon and Rouen each had about 40,000
population, but Lyon had a powerful banking community and a vibrant culture.
Bordeaux was next, with only 20,000 population in 1500.[28]

Peasants
Peasants made up the vast majority of population, who in many cases had well-
established rights, which the authorities had to respect. In 1484, about 97% of
France's 13 million people lived in rural villages. In 1700, at least 80% of the 20
million people population were peasants.

In the 17th century, peasants had ties to the market economy, provided much of the
capital investment necessary for agricultural growth and frequently changed
villages or towns. Geographic mobility, directly tied to the market and the need
for investment capital, was the main path to social mobility. The "stable" core of
French society, town guildspeople and village labourers, included cases of
staggering social and geographic continuity, but even that core required regular
renewal.[29]

Accepting the existence of both of those societies, the constant tension between
them and extensive geographic and social mobility tied to a market economy are the
key to a clearer understanding of the evolution of the social structure, the
economy and even the political system of early modern France. The Annales School
paradigm underestimated the role of the market economy and failed to explain the
nature of capital investment in the rural economy and grossly exaggerated social
stability.[29] The demands by peasants played a major role in fashioning the early
stages of the French Revolution in 1789.[30] The role of women has recently
received attention, especially regarding their religiosity.[31][32]

Historians have explored numerous aspects of peasant life in France, such as:[33]

The struggle against nature and society

Life and death in the peasant village
Scarcity and insecurity in agrarian life
A source of peasant strength; the village community
Peasant protests and popular uprisings
The peasant revolution of 1789.
Downfall
Main article: Causes of the French Revolution

One of the assistants of Charles Henri Sanson shows the head of Louis XVI.
In 1789, the Ancien Régime was violently overthrown by the French Revolution.
Although France in 1785 faced economic difficulties that concerned mostly the
equitability of taxation, it was one of the richest and most powerful nations of
Europe.[34] The French people also enjoyed more political freedom and a lower
incidence of arbitrary punishment than many of their fellow Europeans.

However, Louis XVI, his ministers, and the widespread French nobility had become
immensely unpopular because the peasants and, to a lesser extent, the bourgeoisie
were burdened with ruinously-high taxes, which were levied to support wealthy
aristocrats and their sumptuous lifestyles.

Historians explain the sudden collapse of the Ancien Régime as stemming in part
from its rigidity. Aristocrats were confronted by the rising ambitions of
merchants, tradesmen and prosperous farmers that were allied with aggrieved
peasants, wage-earners and intellectuals influenced by the ideas of Enlightenment
philosophers. As the revolution proceeded, power devolved from the monarchy and
privileged-by-birth to more-representative political bodies, like legislative
assemblies, but conflicts among the formerly-allied republican groups became the
source of considerable discord and bloodshed.

A growing number of French people had absorbed the ideas of "equality" and "freedom
of the individual" as presented by Voltaire, Diderot, Turgot, and other
philosophers and social theorists of the Enlightenment. The American Revolution had
demonstrated that Enlightenment ideas about the organisation of governance could
actually be put into practice. Some American diplomats, like Benjamin Franklin and
Thomas Jefferson, had lived in Paris and consorted freely with members of the
French intellectual class there. Furthermore, contact between American
revolutionaries and the French soldiers, who had provided aid to the Continental
Army in North America during the American Revolutionary War, helped to spread
revolutionary ideals in France.

After a time, many people in France began to attack the democratic deficit of their
own government, push for freedom of speech, challenge the Roman Catholic Church and
decry the prerogatives of the nobles.[35]

The revolution was caused by not a single event but a series of events that
together irreversibly changed the organisation of political power, the nature of
society and the exercise of individual freedoms.

Nostalgia
For some observers, the term came to denote a certain nostalgia. For example,
Talleyrand famously quipped:

Celui qui n'a pas vécu au dix-huitième siècle avant la Révolution ne connaît pas la
douceur de vivre:[d] ("Those who have not lived in the eighteenth century before
the Revolution do not know the sweetness of living.")

That affection was caused by the perceived decline in culture and values after the
revolution during which the aristocracy lost much of its economic and political
power to what was seen as a rich, coarse and materialistic bourgeoisie. The theme
recurs throughout 19th-century French literature, with Balzac and Flaubert alike
attacking the mores of the new upper classes. To that mindset, the Ancien Régime
had expressed a bygone era of refinement and grace before the revolution and its
associated changes disrupted the aristocratic tradition and ushered in a crude
uncertain modernity.

The historian Alexis de Tocqueville argued against that defining narrative in his
classic study L'Ancien Régime et la Révolution, which highlighted the continuities
in French institutions before and after the revolution.

See also
Censorship in the Ancien Régime
Notes
According to the Oxford English Dictionary (second edition, 1989) and the New
Oxford American Dictionary (third edition, 2010), the original French is translated
"old rule". The term no longer needs to be italicised since it has become part of
the English language. According to the New Oxford American Dictionary (2010), when
it is capitalised, it refers specifically to the political and social system in
France before the French Revolution. When it is not capitalised, it can refer to
any political or social system that has been displaced.
In 1492, roughly 450,000 km2 compared to 550,000 km2 today.
Despite being called a prévôté, the prévôté of Paris was effectively a bailliage.
See [19]
"Celui qui n'a pas vécu au dix-huitième siècle avant la Révolution ne connaît pas
la douceur de vivre et ne peut imaginer ce qu'il peut y avoir de bonheur dans la
vie. C'est le siècle qui a forgé toutes les armes victorieuses contre cet
insaisissable adversaire qu'on appelle l'ennui. L'Amour, la Poésie, la Musique, le
Théâtre, la Peinture, l'Architecture, la Cour, les Salons, les Parcs et les
Jardins, la Gastronomie, les Lettres, les Arts, les Sciences, tout concourait à la
satisfaction des appétits physiques, intellectuels et même moraux, au raffinement
de toutes les voluptés, de toutes les élégances et de tous les plaisirs.
L'existence était si bien remplie qui si le dix-septième siècle a été le Grand
Siècle des gloires, le dix-huitième a été celui des indigestions." Charles-Maurice
de Talleyrand-Périgord: Mémoires du Prince de Talleyrand: La Confession de
Talleyrand, V. 1-5 Chapter: La jeunesse – Le cercle de Madame du Barry.
References
"Ancien Regime", Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World, The
Gale Group Inc., 2004, retrieved 26 February 2017 – via Encyclopedia.com
Major 1994, pp. xx–xxi
Doyle 2012, p. 1.
Schama, Simon (1989). Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. New York:
Alfred A. Knopf. p. 184.
Wolf, John B. (1951). The Emergence of the Great Powers: 1685–1715. p. 15-53. ISBN
9789070084745.
Nolan, Cathal J. (2008). Wars of the Age of Louis XIV, 1650-1715. p. 71, 444-445.
Wolf (1951), p. 59-91.
López, Ignacio Vicent (1 January 1994). "Una cuestión de estilo". Madrid.
Satsuma, Shinsuke (2013). Britain and Colonial Maritime War in the Early
Eighteenth Century: Silver, Seapower and the Atlantic. pp. 1–2. ISBN 9781843838623.
Kennedy, Paul (1987). The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers. ISBN 0-394-54674-1.
Kamen, Henry (1969). The War of Succession in Spain, 1700-1715.
Falkner, James (2015). The War of the Spanish Succession 1701–1714.
Lynch, John (1989). Bourbon Spain 1700–1808.
Davis, William Stearns (1919). A History of France from the Earliest Times to the
Treaty of Versailles. Houghton Mifflin. p. 193.
Roberts, Penfield (1947). The Quest for Security: 1715 – 1740. p. 1-20.
Ogg, David (1965). Europe of the Ancien Régime: 1715-1783. p. 128-150.
Bély (1994), p. 50.
Salmon (1975), p. 77.
Salmon (1975), p. 73.
Salmon (1975), p. 67.
Viguerie (1995), p. 280.
Wolf (1968), p. 388–392.
Rapley, Elizabeth; Rapley, Robert (1997). "An Image of Religious Women in the
'Ancien Regime': the 'Etats Des Religieuses' of 1790–1791". French History. 11 (4):
387–410. doi:10.1093/fh/11.4.387.
Wolf (1968), ch. 24.
Van Ruymbeke, Bertrand (2001). "Escape from Babylon". Christian History. 20 (3):
38–42.
Aston (2000), p. 61-72.
Aston (2000), p. 72–89.
Baumgartner, Frederick J. (1995). France in the Sixteenth Century. p. 4–7. ISBN
9780312099640.
Collins, James B. (1991). "Geographic and Social Mobility in Early-modern France".
Journal of Social History. 24 (3): 563–577. doi:10.1353/jsh/24.3.563. For the
Annales School interpretation, see Goubert, Pierre (1986). The French Peasantry in
the Seventeenth Century.
McPhee, Peter (1989). "The French Revolution, peasants, and capitalism". American
Historical Review. 94 (5): 1265–1280. doi:10.2307/1906350. JSTOR 1906350.
Gibson, Wendy (1989). Women in seventeenth-century France. ISBN 9780333463956.
Rapley, Elizabeth (1990). The dévotes: women and church in seventeenth-century
France. ISBN 9780773507272.
Woloch, Isser, ed. (1970). The peasantry in the old regime : conditions and
protests. ISBN 9780030798306.
 Gash, Norman. "Reflections on the revolution – French Revolution". National
Review. Yet in 1789 France was the largest, wealthiest, and most powerful state in
Western Europe[verification needed]
"The Origins of the French Revolution". Historyguide.org. 30 October 2006.
Retrieved 18 November 2011.
Further reading
Baker, Keith Michael (1987). The French Revolution and the creation of modern
political culture. Volume 1, The Political Culture of Old Regime. Oxford: Pergamon
Press.
Behrens, C.B.A. Ancien Regime (1989)
Black, Jeremy. From Louis XIV to Napoleon: The Fate of a Great Power (1999)
Brockliss, Laurence and Colin Jones. The Medical World of Early Modern France
(1997) 984pp; highly detailed survey, 1600–1790s excerpt and text search
Doyle, William, ed. Old Regime France: 1648–1788 (2001) excerpt and text search
Doyle, William, ed. The Oxford Handbook of the Ancien Régime (2012) 656pp excerpt
and text search; 32 topical chapters by experts
Goubert, Pierre (1972). Louis XIV and Twenty Million Frenchmen. ISBN
9780394717517., social history from Annales School
Goubert, Pierre (1986). The French Peasantry in the Seventeenth Century. ISBN
9780521312691.
Hauser, H. “The Characteristic Features of French Economic History from the Middle
of the Sixteenth to the Middle of the Eighteenth Century.” Economic History Review
4#3 1933, pp. 257–272. online
Holt, Mack P. Renaissance and Reformation France: 1500–1648 (2002) excerpt and text
search
Jones, Colin. The Great Nation: France from Louis XV to Napoleon, 1715-99 (2002).
excerpt and text search
Scholarly bibliography by Colin Jones (2002)
Kendall, Paul Murray. Louis XI: The Universal Spider. (1971). ISBN 0-393-30260-1
Kors, Alan Charles. Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment (4 vol. 1990; 2nd ed. 2003),
1984pp excerpt and text search
Knecht, R.J. The Rise and Fall of Renaissance France. (1996). ISBN 0-00-686167-9
Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel. The Ancien Regime: A History of France 1610–1774 (1999),
political survey excerpt and text search
Lindsay, J.O. ed. The New Cambridge Modern History, Vol. 7: The Old Regime, 1713-
1763 (1957) online
Lynn, John A. The Wars of Louis XIV, 1667–1714 (1999) excerpt and text search
Major, J. Russell (1994). From Renaissance Monarchy to Absolute Monarchy: French
Kings, Nobles & Estates. ISBN 0-8018-5631-0.
Mayer, Arno (2010) [1981]. The Persistence of the Old Regime: Europe to the Great
War. London & Brooklyn, NY: Verso. ISBN 978-1-844-67636-1.
O'Gorman, Frank. "Eighteenth-Century England as an Ancien Regime," in Stephen
Taylor, ed. Hanoverian Britain and Empire (1998) argues that a close comparison
with England shows that France did have an Ancien Régime and England did not (an
attack on Jonathan Clark. English Society, 1688–1832 (1985))
Perkins, James Breck. France under Louis XV (2 vol 1897) online vol 1; online vol 2
Potter, David. A History of France, 1460–1560: The Emergence of a Nation-State
(1995)
Riley, James C. "French Finances, 1727-1768," Journal of Modern History (1987) 59#2
pp. 209–243 in JSTOR
Roche, Daniel. France in the Enlightenment (1998), wide-ranging history 1700–1789
excerpt and text search
Salmon, J.H.M. (1975). Society in Crisis: France in the Sixteenth Century.
University paperbacks, v. 681. London: Methuen. ISBN 0-416-73050-7.
Schaeper, T.J. The Economy of France in the Second Half of the Reign of Louis XIV
(Montreal, 1980).
Spencer, Samia I., ed. French Women and the Age of Enlightenment. 1984.
Sutherland, D. M. G. "Peasants, Lords, and Leviathan: Winners and Losers from the
Abolition of French Feudalism, 1780-1820," Journal of Economic History (2002) 62#1
pp. 1–24 in JSTOR
Tocqueville, Alexis de. Ancien Regime and the French Revolution (1856; 2008
edition) excerpt and text search
Treasure, G.R.R. Seventeenth Century France (2nd ed. 1981), a leading scholarly
survey
Treasure, G.R.R. Louis XIV (2001) short scholarly biography; excerpt
Wolf, John B. (1968). Louis XIV. ISBN 9780575000889.
Religion
Aston, Nigel (2000). Religion and Revolution in France, 1780-1804. Washington D.C.:
Catholic University of America Press. ISBN 978-0-8132-0977-7. OCLC 59522675.,
comprehensive overview
McManners, John (1999). Church and Society in Eighteenth-Century France. 1: The
Clerical Establishment and Its Social Ramifications, Vol. 2: The Religion of the
People and the Politics of Religion.
Palmer, R.R. (1939). Catholics and Unbelievers in Eighteenth-Century France.
Princeton University Press.
Van Kley, Dale (1996). The Religious Origins of the French Revolution: From Calvin
to the Civil Constitution, 1560–1791.
Ward, W. R. (1999). Christianity under the Ancien Régime, 1648–1789.
In French
Bély, Lucien (1994). La France moderne: 1498–1789. Collection: Premier Cycle (in
French). Paris: PUF. ISBN 2-13-047406-3.
(in French) Bluche, François. L'Ancien Régime: Institutions et société. Collection:
Livre de poche. Paris: Fallois, 1993. ISBN 2-253-06423-8
(in French) Jouanna, Arlette and Philippe Hamon, Dominique Biloghi, Guy Thiec. La
France de la Renaissance; Histoire et dictionnaire. Collection: Bouquins. Paris:
Laffont, 2001. ISBN 2-221-07426-2
(in French) Jouanna, Arlette and Jacqueline Boucher, Dominique Biloghi, Guy Thiec.
Histoire et dictionnaire des Guerres de religion. Collection: Bouquins. Paris:
Laffont, 1998. ISBN 2-221-07425-4
(in French) Pillorget, René and Suzanne Pillorget. France Baroque, France Classique
1589–1715. Collection: Bouquins. Paris: Laffont, 1995. ISBN 2-221-08110-2
Viguerie, Jean de (1995). Histoire et dictionnaire du temps des Lumières 1715–1789.
Collection: Bouquins (in French). Paris: Laffont. ISBN 2-221-04810-5.
Preceded by
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