Louis XIV - Hardcover

In the 25 years since a full length biography of Louis XIV has appeared in English, a generation of historians have reassessed the changes in the French society of the ancien regime, the nature of its court and the way in which its administration functioned. In drawing on this new historical perspective, Bluche presents a distinct contrast to the popular image of the king as an enlightened despot, religious zealot and philanderer. Rather he develops an image of Louis as a patron of artists, intellectuals and writers who left his mark on the cultural life of France for nearly a century and as the statesman who added a colonial empire and 12 new provinces to France.