V.3. ABSOLUTE MONARCHY WINS

5.3. Absolute Monarchy wins

THE CIVIL WARS END BY TOLERATING PROTESTANTS
TRANSLATION: TOLERATING CAPITALISM
(By the Edict of Nantes, in 1598)

A stronger king has already come to power.
(Henri IV, in 1594)
His dynasty will brake capitalists
until the middle of the 18th century

As Gnapon controls the effects of a divisible currency
and Nambolosse keeps long-distance traders in check.

• French Baroque's sobriety 

• Defeating feudal opponents to growth 

The reinforced monarchy dominates the new forces,
and spectacular dispersals of wealth vanish.   

A unique style of architecture and decor

appears in France. 

*      *      * 

Next,
French baroque's sobriety

FRENCH BAROQUE'S SOBRIETY

BAROQUE:*
THE ART OF THE COUNTER-REFORMATION,**
WHICH CONTESTS PROTESTANT AUSTERITY AND RATIONALITY 

*  The Portuguese term for a pearl of irregular form 

** The Church's reaction to the Protestant challenge 

Translation: 

An art that pushes back on capitalism in Catholic lands,* 

by dispersing investible wealth

and emphasizing the power of the Church -- 

except in France 

* Certain German principalities, central Europe, Spain and Portugal with their colonies

• Compare Saint James of Compostella in Spain  

with Saint-Paul Saint-Louis in Paris:

° Drama and opulence vs. restraint

All Saint James photos / Internet

Saint James: space and stairs separate the church from the street.


Saint Paul: the church is on the street, like any other building.

Voyager comme Ulysse.com

Saint James: the columns are made up of pillars.

Saint Paul: the columns are simple blocs of stone. 

Bombog

Bombog

Saint James altar


Saint Paul altar

° The saints who look down from the summits

announce different political messages  

Saint James: the pilgrim emphasizes traditional Catholicism. 

Internet

Saint Paul: the saint is a canonized king, who wears a crown rather than a halo and stands under a second crown that it is easily seen from the street. He announces the power of monarchy and the architecture and decor suggest that obedience to the rulers is necessary for salvation.

• The simplicity at Saint Paul caracterizes
other Parisian building of the time,
Place des Vosges and Pont Neuf:
Since the monarchy dominates the new economy
riches don't have to be dispersed.  

-- Another explanation, which is not a contradiction: 
The serenity of French art
 corresponds to the taste of a powerful and rational middle class
(Baroque and classicisme by Victor Tapié, 1957, a classic).

*    *     *

Fast forward:
Not destroying wealth after 1635 has a different reason --
entry into the Thirty Years' War and a civil war
absorb resources for a generation.

Little Louis XIV sleeps in torn sheets. 

*     *     *

Next,

Defeating archaic opponents of growth

DEFEATING ARCHAIC OPPONENTS OF GROWTH

THE SPANISH MONARCHY
AND THE FEUDAL FRENCH NOBILITY,
OBSOLETE ADVERSARIES OF GROWTH
Like Tofanga

Spain's outside revenues allow its immobility, 
and French nobles see stronger kingship
limiting their liberties,
not braking the economic transformation
 that is undermining them

• Spain:

The slain commander 

has gone to battle in an armchair (X):

Spanish warfare retains practices 
that maintain the status quo by limiting efficiency

This and other illustrations on this page by Maurice Leloir, in Le Roy-Soleil by T. Cabu, 1931.
Leloir was known for his scholarship, and if he includes the armchair it was there.
If only there were a reference!

People jealous of this French prince's success accuse him of "showing off for having started a fight with violins. They did not know that was the custom in Spain."  

-- Voltaire, The century of Louis XIV. 

Another sign of deliberately inefficient practice?
Voltaire says nothing more.

France begins to swallow up Spain at the end of the Thirty Years' War, a change that the marriage of Louis XIV and Marie-Thérèse cements (in 1660) and that their grandson becoming the ruler of Spain finalizes (in 1700).

• Nobles:
Five revolts (1626-1642)
and a full-fledged civil war (1648-52) 

The count of Chalais on his way to execution (in 1626).  

Henri II de Montmorency's mother pleads unsuccessfully for his pardon (in 1632)

Marie-Louise de Montpensier orders the cannon of the Bastille fortress to be fired on the royal troops (in 1652).

Spain and the nobles
 belong to societies of an earlier kind:
That the term "quixotic"
should hark back to a Spanish personnage makes sense,
and nobles look for their models to knights,
who were capable of exploits but not of discipline.

The defeat of both adversairies heralds a century
during which the victorious, powerful monarchy
keeps capitalism under control. 

End of this short chapter.

*     *     *

  Next chapter,
V.4.
 The Sun King, anti-capitalist?

V.4. THE SUN KING, ANTI-CAPITALIST?

: 5.4. The Sun King anti-capitalist?

LOUIS XIV'S ENIGMAS:
BUILDING VERSAILLES AND OUTLAWING PROTESTANTISM 

The need to contain capitalism explains them.

The power that confirms itself then
also explains why France becomes 
Europe's most centralized state --
it still is 

Louis XIV at the seige of Douai, 1672 by Charles le Brun

The monarchy at the height of its power

• The new king taxes and spends   

• Versailles, a madman's palace ? 

• The logic of pharaonic expense  

• Did outlawing Protestantism bring capitalists to heel? 

• Detour: A faith specific to France

• Detour: Memories of persecution and wartime rescue of Jews

• The end of brakes on gain -- almost

*     *     *

Next,

The new king taxes and spends

THE NEW KING TAXES AND SPENDS

 TAXES SKIM OFF PROFITS
AND GIANT FÊTES DISPERSE IT

 Wealthy people revolt,
claiming to protect the poor.
The king suppresses them

Allegory of the revolt against the stamp tax, Brittany, 1675 by Jean-Bernard Chalette, Rennes Museum of Fine Arts, 1676

Statement at the bottom of the painting

"Rich and poor are unjustly oppressed." 

• Celebrations that are over the top accomplish the usual goal:

 Destroy investible income and reinforce authority

° An equestrian ballet
marks the start of Louis's personal reign (without a Prime Minister) 
 and the birth of an heir
(In 1662)  

Festivity in honor of the royal mariages, anonymous, Carnavalet, 1614

The first such event marked the wedding of Louis's parents. 

The  grand carrousel given by Louis XIV at the Tuileries, June 5 and 6 1662 by Henri Gissey, Versailles

This second event is given in front of the Tuileries palace. The bleachers seat 15,000 spectators and one of the prizes is a jewel-filled box with the king's portrait on the cover.

Maurice Leloir 

The theme is mythological as usual, and Louis plays his own role (X). 

 ° Honoring favorites (official royal mistresses),

whose presence reinforces monarchy

(At Versailles, in 1664 and 1668)

As nobles they transmit riches and privileges to their clans, which stimulates their competition around the king and gives them the possibility of power without the risk of revolt. 

As well, the population detests favorites for their extravagance, which diverts fury away from the king. (Louis XVI's faithfulness to Marie-Antoinette will make the queen herself the target of hate).

-- The Sun King's women by Simone Bertière, 1999 (in French)

Bertière is a rare historian to see the past as an anthropologist would.

Louise de la Vallière
1661-67 

Shy and disinterested, she loves Louis for himself. But he makes her serve as a smokescreen for her successor (Madame de Montespan, whose husband can claim the children she has with the king). After years of humiliation, Louise becomes a Carmelite. 

She is the only favorite to leave a king of  France, and  probably the only one to find serenity. 

The fête that is dedicated to her: 
Six days of festivity,
with jewels as lottery prizes  

The pleasures of the encchanted isle, third day

At the chateau given by the king 

Françoise-Athenaïs de Rochechourt, 

Marquise de Mortemart,

1666-about 1682

Gorgeous, cultivated and caustic, of a lineage more venerable than that of the king, she dominates the court at its most brilliant epoch. But visiting a witch for aphrodisiacs implicates her in a scandal of sacrilege and murder. 

As an old lady she takes out the jewels that he gave her and cannot recall the circumstances. She says that her life has made no sense.  

"View and perspective of Clagny chateau, from the garden and swamp of Versailles"

Her fête, with three thousand guests, costs a third of Versailles's annual budget. 

The grand royal entertainment,, July 18 1668

 ° To mark the reconquest of Franche-Comté,
six fêtes
(At Versailles, summer 1678) 

 

Fireworks literally send revenues up in smoke.
Subjects participate by watching from afar

Versailles web site

Then rebuilding Versailles 
takes the place of the giant celebrations. 

*     *     *

Next,

Versailles, a madman's palace?

VERSAILLES, A MADMAN'S PALACE?

"...THE SADDEST AND MOST GRACELESS OF PLACES...

without a view, without woods, without water, without land,
 because all was quicksand or swamp... 
one cannot come to the end of the monstrous defects of a palace
 that was so immense and so immensely expensive."

 -- The Duke of Saint-Simon, memorialist,  

Louis XIV and his court, underlining added. 

-- Versailles is thought to have absorbed a third of all taxes for 30 years:
 Athenaïs by Lisa Harding, 2002

• Yet the king owns

a series of other palaces,

with woods, land, water, towns.

Saint-Cloud and Saint-Germain
have spectacular views as well

The chateau of Saint-Cloud by Etienne Allegrain

Saint Cloud, which Louis cedes to his brother

Saint-Germain (Internet, artist not named)

At Saint-Germain, terraces spread over four leagues let one admire the river.  

-- Renaissance and Reform by Jules Michelet, 1855

A league: the distance covered in an hour's walk.

• Louis builds his Xanadu on a swamp

that brings malaria, dysentery and in winter, pleurisy:

"It was forbidden to speak of the dead,

that the heavy labor

and, still more, the miasma killed" 

-- Saint-Simon

• As well,

the swamp's water is unusable. 

So he has...

° wells dug and a small river diverted: 
Versailles uses more water than does all Paris.

When there is still too little for fountains and the Grand Canal,
essential for prestige...

-- Description of difficulties:  Machine de Marly, wikepedia

-- Water per Parisian, for all uses: one liter a day
(Pascal Payen Appenzeller, historian of Paris)

Building the palace of Versailles by Adam Frans Van der Meulen, London, Royal collection

The painting shows no water, which is brought in barrels.

° ...he has engineers invent 
the most complex pump ever yet built till then...
(In 1679-1686)

View of the Machine de Marly by Pierre-Denis Martin,1723,  Museum of the chateau of Versailles

It conducts water to the aqueduct at the top of the hill.

Marly chateau by Pierre-Denis Martin, 1724, Versailles

Even if all the water had been used for Versailles' fountains, it would only have supplied a fourth of the needs. But half is diverted to another chateau, Marly, a kind of weekend reesidence that the Sun King erects at the edge of the park. 

Not to mention the fountains of yet another chateau he builds for a favorite (Madame de Montespan).

° ...and starts an aqueduct 
twice as high as the towers of Notre Dame Cathedral,
which is meant to run over 20 kilometers.

War makes its building stop

-- Histoire du canal de l'Eure
by G. Despots and G. Bouquin 

Gérard Métron, https://structurae.info/photos/21303-aqueduc-de-maintenon

Flat-bottomed boats come from Auvergne are specially constructed to carry stones from Champagne and Brien as are canals are built to bring lead pipes from England. None of this has any other use. 

Extras: barracks, carts, horses, tools (many are stolen).
Laborers lack water. Because of that and the death toll, locals refuse to come. So Louis brings in soldiers, concentrating on regiments that have not repressed Protestants with enough energy (please read on). Deserters are sent to the galleys.

Sending the soldiers to war ends construction (in 1688). What has been completed is not kept up (after 1695). 

° "But water was missing 

no matter what one did, 

and the wonders of art

 that were the fountains dried up."

-- Saint-Simon 

• At the same time he...  

° tears down works of art
when he expands the palace... 

Louis XIV in front of the grotto of Thetys, anonymous, Versailles château

The first Trianon palace

When Madame de Montespan says a chateau he has built for her is worthy of an opéra dancer, he demolishes that too and constructs the better one with the fountains.

°...constantly renews the gardens...

Internet, Banque d'images

* Thousands of hot-house flowers are planted every day, and two million flower pots are in constant circulation.

* Ten thousand tulips are brought from Holland and planted at night, to surprise courtiers when they wake. 

...and replaces the priceless silks twice a year

When Madame de Montespan's pet bears tear them up, Louis says nothing. 

Versailles's association with the Sun King

has encouraged modern Heads of State

to stud Paris with monuments that recall them

 Web site of the Museum of Primal Arts

The Opéra Garnier is not named after fallen Napoleon III, but his initials and those of the Empress are repeated in gold along the whole facade; the Pompidou Center; the François Mitterand Library; the Jacques Chirac Museum of Primal Arts.

But those edifices did not take up

a third of the national budget.

In a modern context Versailles would be an aberration --

place it in its own. 

*     *     *

Next,

The logic of pharaonic spending

THE LOGIC OF PHARAONIC SPENDING

VERSAILLES RENEWS THE ROYAL FUNCTIONS OF
DESTROYING INVESTIBLE WEALTH
AND MAKING RICHES CIRCULATE

An amplification that growth makes necessary
(whether Louis reasons that way or not) 

• Like ritual destructions generally, it...

° Is public:

Crowds of visitors come each day

° Emphasizes royal might:

The giant complex is built around an axis
 that symbolizes the endless power of monarchy

Versailles in 1668 by Pierre Patel, Chateau of Versailles

The straight line begins at the very edge of town with what is now the long, straight avenue de Paris (the painting show the part nearest the chateau). 

This and the Grand Axis are the first straight lines to lead to European palaces. Origins: the 12th-century space in front the royal tombs, and the short straight street that leads to the first royal place.

• Making riches circulate:

At least 1000 nobles can be welcomed at one time

with their servants and horses --

other estimates are 4000 and even 10,000

° They need the king's help to "hold their rank"

because economic growth is marginalizing them...

It undercuts the value of revenues from land, and they lose their privileges if they enter trade -- for which their education and way of life do not prepare them.

° ...and must come in person --

"paying" court expresses the cost,
which heightens the king's power over them

Only the grandest are lodged at the chateau, so most pay an exorbitant rent in Versailles or western Paris (the 7th district, which is on the way to Versailles and where nobles' descendants still live).

They must acquire the sumptuous court dress with its four changes a day, hire servants and furnish their liveries, maintain a coach and horses, become part of a clan and gain the support of the powerful. 

As well, gambling for high stakes is considered sociable and there alone is does the extremely coded life find spontaneity: a courtier says he loves watching dogs gnaw bones, because they are authentic. 

It is the only time when one can sit down. 

° Louis cannot reward all of courtiers tangibly,

so honors are prizes as well 

The king's levée by Maurice Leloir

The railings, a vestige of kingship that recalls Bornu

A courtier will be rewarded perhaps. With backing, he may be introduced to the king, and even admitted to his ceremonial rising or bedtime. Without it, he is one of hundreds who jostle each other so that Louis will notice them, as he majestically passes through the Hall of Mirrors on his way to mass each morning.  

Then they analyze every remark, gesture, look, to decide whom to flatter or avoid. "Knowing one's court" is essential, but takes time, which means expense. 

Success is uncertain: Saint-Simon is allowed to hold a candlestick -- after three years, and then, once.

Compensation: being part of a superior world that is inaccessible to other mortals.

-- The court society by Norbert Elias, 1974.

That important study stresses the psychological aspect of these rites,

but omits redistribution as a royal function.

Olafur Eliasso

• Meanwhile Protestants' wealth grows,

although they pay double taxes.

-- Blond,  God's enraged, 290

Besides their control of the production already mentioned,

by the Sun King's time they are the...

° Shipowners of the major Atlantic ports

(of Normandy, Bordeaux and La Rochelle).

° Exporters of Bordeaux wine.

° Initiators of production split

 between specialized establishments.

° Employers of 3-4 million Catholics.

-- God's enraged by Louis Blond, 286

Versailles takes containing growth
farther than ever imagined. 
But when capitalism expands regardless,  
Louis turns to violence. 

 *     *     *

Next,

Did outlawing Protestantism bring capitalists to heel?