This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) open access license. This is the first scholarly study of the political and economic relationship between Louis XIV and the parlements of France, the Parlement of Paris and all the provincial tribunals. The author explains how the king managed to impose strict political discipline for which this reign, and only this reign, is known. Hurt shows that the king built upon that discipline to extract large sums of money from the judges in the parlements, thus damaging their economic interests. When the king died in 1715, the regent, Philippe d’Orléans, after a brief attempt to befriend the parlements through compromise, resorted to the authoritarian methods of Louis XIV and perpetuated the Sun King’s political and economic legacy. This study calls into question current revisionist understanding of Louis XIV and insists that absolute government had a harsh reality at its core. Based upon extensive archival research, this remarkable book will be of interest to all students of the history of early modern France and the monarchies of Europe.

This vol., while encompassing the entire reign of Louis XIV & all the parlements of the realm, has the narrow focus of investigating the impact of royal policy on the judicial authority of the parlements as revealed in their relations with the king's councils, notably the one that specialized in judicial affairs, the Conseil Prive. This is above all a study of the evolution of conciliar jurisprudence & judicial procedure, as much an exercise in what the French call "l'histoire du droit" as an opportunity to observe in a novel way the resolution of some of the most pressing political problems in the Age of Louis XIV. But the overall aim is to understand the practical consequences of royal absolutism for the kingdom's highest judicial institutions.

"This study calls into question the current revisionist understanding of the reign of Louis XIV and insists that, after all, absolute government had a harsh reality at its core. Based upon extensive archival research, Louis XIV and the parlements will be of interest to all students of the history of early modern France and the monarchies of Europe." "John J. Hurt is Associate Professor of History at the University of Delaware."--BOOK JACKET.

Originally published in 1968, this authoritative study analyses the Parlement as a law court and examines its political role and significance. From its beginning in the mid-13th Century until its fall during the 1789 Revolution, the Paris Parlement stood at the heart of government in France. Its primary function as the crown’s judicial authority grew out of the need for a royal court to dispense justice when the king could no longer do so personally. The book describes how the Parlement evolved sophisticated procedures and a complex organization of chambers, officers and personnel and examines the Parlement’s judicial and political growth, against the social backdrop of the Court and the Palais de Justice.

Discarding the traditional view of the Fronde as an abortive revolution against "absolute monarchy" during the minority of Louis XIV, A. Lloyd Moote analyzes it by studying the ambivalent role of its leading institutional element, the Parlement of Paris. France's highest tribunal, dedicated to law and the principles of royal absolutism, the Parlement was paradoxically, at the center of the opposition from the beginning of the movement for state reform in 1643. Originally published in 1972. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Beginning with a discussion of familiar images of the French Revolution, this work looks at how the ancien régime became ancien as well as examining cases in which achievement failed to match ambition.