Still more study questions

Louis XIV and Absolutism is a different kind of book from any we've read so far: it's a collection of documents, selected and organized by a contemporary American historian of France, and designed for classes like ours. There's less argument and interpretation than in the other books we've read, and more effort to orient students who are unfamiliar with the period.

In reading, start by getting a handle on the chronology: how does the reign of Louis XIV fit with the events we encountered in Richelieu and Olivares? and how does it fit with the social changes we learned about in The Economy of Europe? The details don't matter, but construct for yourself a rough time-line of the seventeenth century.

Then think about the problems on which Beik focuses. In introducing the various documents, he repeatedly emphasizes the successes of Louis's government in confronting the challenges posed by various groups in French society. What were some of those challenges, and what social groups were especially dangerous? How did these challenges manifest themselves? Give special thought to the place of rebellion in seventeenth-century French life—before Louis's birth (as discussed in Richelieu and Olivares, during his childhood, and after he assumed personal control of the government. (Louis himself described the Fronde as an important influence on his later policies: get a rough idea of what that movement was and why it mattered.)

Third, think more broadly about Louis's efforts to mold French society. He and his minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert viewed themselves as in some ways modernizers, concerned with improving France's economy and society. How did they approach this task? What specific measures did they undertake? What values and assumptions guided their actions?

Fourth, give some thought to court life during Louis's rule. What was it like? What political functions did the court serve? In what ways did it contribute to Louis's political plans?

Finally, think comparatively. We've explored the workings of French and Spanish governments during the first half of the seventeenth century—how different were things during the second half? How similar/different were Louis XIV's objectives to/from Richelieu's? His techniques of government? Was Louis more or less successful than Richelieu?

Scenes from a golden age (cont'd)

Here are two more examples of the cultural action going on in seventeenth-century Spain—and of the radical innovations that this society encouraged, despite its apparent rigidities. They're paintings by El Greco, "The Greek"—his real name was Doménikos Theotokópoulos. El Greco grew up on the island of Crete, worked for a time in Italy, then settled in the small city of Toledo, in central Spain, producing works for the church and nearby aristocrats; he died in 1614. As a favorite of churchmen and aristocrats, he was an artist who enjoyed serious financial support from society's most tradition-minded elements. Those elements are visible in his pictures, which often show religious scenes and aristocratic figures.

(Burial of the Count of Orgaz, ca. 1588; source, Wikimedia Commons)

But the pictures themselves are anything but conservative. Although scholars note continuities with earlier forms, especially with icons of the Greek Orthodox Church, the main impression the pictures convey is of astonishing modernity. El Greco isn't trying for photographic reproduction of reality, but rather to convey his own interpretation of it, in the manner of nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists like van Gogh and Picasso. At the very least, he makes the point that the reality we see is unstable and subject to distortion, both from our own specific perceptions and from larger forces, natural and super-natural alike. He also makes the point that the artist is not bound by past conventions, but rather is free to create new visions of the world.

(View of Toledo, ca. 1600, now at the Metropolitan Museum in New York; source, Wikimedia Commons)

And that's the larger point: in early modern Europe, innovation and conservatism often allied, in ways that repeatedly surprise us.

Scenes from a golden age

Standard ideas about seventeenth-century Spain tend to focus on troubles: military defeats, economic backwardness, social rigidity, religious uniformity. These were part of the reality, but only part. Spanish culture was also one of the most brilliant in seventeenth-century Europe. Spanish painters and writers produced work that was inventive and in many ways astonishingly modern—and their work enjoyed strong support from the crown and the great aristocracy, groups from which cultural conservatism might have been expected.

The picture below is one of the greatest examples of this cultural flowering: Las Meninas (The Maids of Honor), from 1656, by the court painter Diego Velázquez. (Elliott's Richelieu and Olivares reproduces several other examples of his work, since he served as the king's official painter during Olivares's time in power.)

(source: Wikimedia Commons)

The picture shows a scene in the royal palace: Velazques himself appears at the left, holding his brush and palette; at the center, looking right at us, is the king's daughter, with her two companions, richly dressed but subservient to her; a little boy plays with a pet dog, and a dwarf (still a popular entertainment at seventeenth-century courts) is also present; behind them are a nun and a priest, and a courtier (dressed in a standard aristocratic outfit of the era) looks at the scene through an open door.

But the story of the painting plays out elsewhere in the picture, with the two characters—a man and a woman—whom we see straight ahead of us. Since a series of paintings hangs around the room, we may at first think that we're seeing a portrait. In fact it's a mirror, and the figures are the king and queen. The scene, it turns out, is a portrait of portrait painting. The king and queen are posing for their portrait, and they're standing right in the spot that we the viewers occupy; that's why six of the characters in the painting are staring at us, with a variety of expressions—the princess with the look of a beloved, perhaps spoiled daughter, others with looks of respect or concern, Velazquez himself with a look that seems understanding, almost compassionate.

So the picture actually explores ideas about identity, and it does so with a modern sense that who we are is not fixed and simple, but rather an unstable construct. It puts us, ordinary viewers, in the place of the king and queen: for a moment we experience what it's like to be in their shoes, with all eyes turning toward us and with global responsibilities waiting when the portrait session is over. Yet it's also a self-portrait of the artist and a depiction of the process of artistic creation: it forces us to think about how images are constructed, whether by paint or by the mirror itself. All of this takes some time to sort out, and that's yet another message of the painting. In a world of mirrors, painted images, and complex social relations, reality isn't self-evident.

Study questions on J. H. Elliott, Richelieu and Olivares, 1-85, 113-172

Yet again, this is a book aimed at professional historians, rather than at the general public. So an important aspect of your task as a reader is to think about the questions that Elliott poses and the answers that he comes up with. Remember that good history isn't just retelling the details of what happened in the past; it's making sense of the past, understanding how and why things played out as they did, and defining what changed as a result.

Here the starting point is to develop for yourself thumb-nail sketches of the two main characters. Who were Richelieu and Olivares? What were their social and cultural backgrounds? What training did they have for power politics? What was the basis of their power, and how did they hang on to it? After all, neither was a king or elected official; how did they come to play such big roles?

Then think about the outcomes. After a long struggle, Richelieu won and Olivares lost, raising a series of further questions: What exactly was this long struggle? What was being fought over, and what were the methods of the struggle? What events marked the ultimate triumph/defeat?

This leads to one of Elliott's basic claims (spoiler alert...), that Richelieu won by a very narrow margin, and that France rather than Spain might well have failed first. Think about this argument: what steps does it involve, and how does Elliott back it up? One argument that he makes centers on the similar problems and challenges that all seventeenth-century governments faced. What were these?

We've discussed at length the costs of early modern warfare, as a by-product of the military revolution. How important were these costs for France and Spain? What kinds of choices did they require? How difficult was it for these states to sustain their military efforts? What had to be sacrificed in doing so?

Finally, think about these two men as personalities. What was their emotional make-up? What kinds of religious commitments did they display, and what were the limits on their piety? What were their personal lives like? How similar to us do they seem?

Toward a new kind of society

The images here illustrate the social transformations going on in some corners of seventeenth-century Europe—notably in the Dutch Republic and Britain, the primary beneficiaries of the growing importance of the Atlantic to Europe's economy. As the wealthiest, most innovative society in Europe, the Dutch Republic experienced an explosion of artistic production. One result for historians is excellent documentation of daily life there. The painting below (it depicts a middle-class home in the mid-seventeenth century) shows how comfortable that life was. Note the size and number of the glass windows, the tiled floor, and especially the landscape painting on the wall; this economy generated enough discretionary income to sustain a large art market. The four main figures are nicely but not richly dressed, and they suggest some of the other purchasing choices available in this period: one man smokes, another drinks from an elegant wine glass, and the woman is playing cards with one of the men. (Manufacturing playing cards was a big business in the seventeenth century, an offshoot of the printing and paper technologies that had developed over the previous century.)


(From Wikimedia Commons, under a creative commons license.)

The second picture shows a similar scene: a comfortable interior, with a picture above the mantel, a musical instrument hanging on the bed, and even a pet cat (note that the cat has a collar with a bell). The couple is playing chess, a sign of the wife's sophistication, and in fact she seems to be winning.


(From the The Yorck Project. The compilation copyright is held by Zenodot Verlagsgesellschaft mbH and licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.)

The third picture makes the same point, by showing a young woman engrossed in writing: women were highly literate in this society, and it did not seem threatening to display their command of writing. In this picture as in the previouos one, a Persian rug has been used as a table covering—a sign not only of wealth, but also of awareness of the world beyond Europe.


(The Yorck Project: 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei. DVD-ROM, 2002. ISBN 3936122202. Distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH.)

Finally, a diagram of the Newcomen steam engine, the first commercially viable mineral-based energy source. These were used in the coal mines of northern England from the early eighteenth century; though inefficient, they worked well enough that by 1750 they were being used elsewhere in Europe and in the Americas.


(From Wikimedia Commons.)

And still more study questions: Geoffrey Parker, The Military Revolution, pp. 1-81

As with all historical writing, the first question to ask is about genre: what kind of book is this? What's the intended audience? To what extent does it present specialized research? To what extent is it a broader reflection on existing research?

The second step is to think about argument. Parker develops a central idea through the book, a claim about what changed in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European warfare and about what change meant for other aspects of European life. (That's true of most historical writing beyond the textbook level.) How would you sum up that argument, in two or three sentencs? Think also about Parker's evidence: how does he back up his argument?

Then think about some more specific questions:

1) How important was war in early modern Europe? How many wars were there, and why were they fought? How significant were the issues that they decided? How did contemporaries view war? You don't need to worry about the details of specific wars and treaties, but try to get a sense of the main power struggles; who were the great-power players?

2) The phrase "military revolution" refers to changes over the early modern period in how wars were fought. What were the most important of those changes? Parker argues that the military revolution started with the introduction of gunpowder technology, but that many other changes were involved; what were these? Why should these specific changes constitute a revolution? Think especially about what happened to army sizes, fortifications, and training.

3) Parker argues that the military revolution affected the non-military sides of government, as well as the army. Why and how? How deeply were governments changed by the impact of war? Consider especially such matters as taxation and bureaucratic organization.

4) What was military life like in the early modern period? How large were armies, how well disciplined and trained? What sort of people wound up in them? We saw that cavalry played a big role in medieval warfare—what did the military revolution do to mounted warfare? More generally, what did it mean for the way battles unfolded in the early modern period?

5) Parker wants us to think about contemporary parallels to the changes he describes; we also live in a time of changing military technology. Do contemporary changes in warmaking technology constitute another military revolution? Do these changes have effects similar to what Parker describes?

Homeownership

Like their clothing, nobles' houses became more expensive in the early modern period. Fashion increasingly required comfort and complicated designs, which would display the owner's sophistication. The cost could be enormous, and even wealthy noble families often got themselves into financial trouble with their building projects.

As illustration of this process of change, here are three country houses, all from France. The first is from the mid-sixteenth century, and was the family home of the nobleman-poet Pierre Ronsard. It's a beautiful house, elegantly designed, but solid and sensible rather than fancy-- a glorified farm-house rather than a wannabe palace. (The tower in the middle is strictly practical; it houses the staircase.)


The second example comes from the early seventeenth century, and it counts as a real chateau (the French word literally means castle, but can refer to any fancy country home); it's much bigger than Ronsard's house, with towers at each corner. But the look remains very practical, with limited exterior decoration; note how plain the window frames are. This house could be defended in case of armed conflict, one reason that the windows are so small; glass was also expensive, another reason to limit the number and size of the windows.


Finally, a chateau from the mid-seventeenth century, meant to be a real architectural statement. The owner, so the building would have told seventeenth-century visitors, had both the money and the taste for an elegant design. There are lots of windows, absolute symetry, and allusions to Rome in the arches along the ground floor; this is neither a farmhouse nor a military outpost, rather a site for elegant living. The building also conveys messages about order and control; its elements correspond perfectly to one another—for instance, windows on the ground floor line up exactly with those on the second and third floors.

Looking aristocratic

The images that follow are meant to illustrate our discussion of what happened to Europe's nobles during the seventeenth century. The basic pattern is simple: battlefield prowess became less central to nobles' self-definition, while culture, wealth, and a refined mode of living became more important. As we've discussed, that could be a difficult transition for many nobles, especially those without deep financial resources, and not all of them succeeded in it. A lot of spending power is on display in the portraits here.

First a characteristic scene from the late Middle Ages, portraying a mid-fifteenth-century Italian battle. Note that this is an all-cavalry scene; the horsemen carry enormous lances, and wear heavy-duty armor.

(The reproduction is part of a collection of reproductions compiled by The Yorck Project. The compilation copyright is held by Zenodot Verlagsgesellschaft mbH and licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.)

Nobles continued to fight in later centuries, but there was growing emphasis on looking educated and graceful. The young man portrayed here (from mid-sixteenth-century Italy) holds a book, and the portrait emphasizes his gracefulness—in the overall pose, and in such details as his hands, with a ring on one finger. Despite the dark color, the clothing is very fancy: bows on his hat, and on his coat buttons, complicated stitching, and a series of cuts designed to show off the lining.

(Image from Wikimedia, under a Creative Commons licence.)

This sketch of an early seventeenth-century French nobleman makes the same point; every item in this look required careful and expensive tending—the hair, the beard, the ruff around the neck. The look seems deliberately to blur gender boundaries, but this young man in fact was one of the most violent in seventeenth-century Paris; he fought in the royal army, and in about a dozen private duels, before the king finally had him decapitated.

(Image from Wikimedia, under a Creative Commons licence.)

Women's dress of course was even more expensive. These two examples come from the mid-seventeenth century. The one (a portrait by the Flemish artist Anthony van Dyck) shows the richness of the fabrics that might be used; the other (a portrait of the French writer Madame de Sévigné) shows a more casual look, but one that cost plenty of money— note the lace and gauze, the pearl buttons on the arms and the jewels buttoning the front. As in the portrait of the young man above, a lot is made of the young woman's hand. Here and in the two following portraits, the message is, it's not just about clothing; these people have been trained to carry themselves well.

(The reproduction is part of a collection of reproductions compiled by The Yorck Project. The compilation copyright is held by Zenodot Verlagsgesellschaft mbH and licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.)

(Image from Wikimedia, under a Creative Commons licence.)

The new civil servants who became so prominent after 1500 had a very different look. The portrait shows the French finance minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert, wearing the black robes that marked him as an official. The look is dignified, restrained, non-flashy; but his shirt underneath is abundantly trimmed with lace, making the point that he too has money to spend on his clothing.

(Image from Wikimedia, under a Creative Commons licence.)

More study questions

These are some questions to think about as you read the second assignment (pp. 147-254) in Jan de Vries's The Economy of Europe in an Age of Crisis. The main question to keep in mind is simple: by 1750, Europe was close to industrialization and broader economic modernity—what had changed to produce that result? What are de Vries's answers to that question? What answers does he reject or downplay?

Some more specific questions:

1) What happened to European cities during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries? How big did the biggest become? What were the primary engines of economic growth? Note especially p. 154, where de Vries points out that "urban Europeans did not become relatively more numerous;" if city population remained a constant percentage of the total, what's the big deal about urbanization? What did change?

2) How did the texture of city life change? What new pleasures and experiences did it offer? What new attitudes did it encourage or require?

3) De Vries describes the development of European colonies and international trade after 1600: how many countries got into these acts? What sort of colonies did they set up, and what were the main commodities being traded?

4) How important were these commercial empires, according to de Vries? He presents reasons for viewing these empires as less important than we might imagine: how does this argument work? (More or less—don't worry too much about the details.) He suggests that the key questions concern the home societies, rather than the overseas empires that they controlled—why?

5) In Chapter 6, de Vries traces the changing demand for goods during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. What changed? Consider especially the changing demands of ordinary people of ordinary people for consumer items. How much did this form of demand change between 1600 and 1750, and why? How is it that peasants and other relatively poor people could afford more goods in 1750 than a century earlier?

6) What impact did government action have on economic development during these years? Was the impact good or bad, big or small? "Mercantilism" is a standard term for early modern governmental economic regulation; try to get a sense for what the term meant and how well its policies worked.