Louis xvi biography pdf
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The Life of Louis XVI 9780300221657
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THE LIFE OF LOUIS XVI
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The Life of
LOUIS XVI john hardman
YALE UNIVERSIT Y PRESS NEW HAVEN AND LONDON iii
To Alan Peachment
Copyright © 2016 John Hardman All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form (beyond that copying permitted bygd Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except bygd reviewers for the public press) without written permission from the publishers. For information about this and other Yale University Press publications, please contact: U.S. Office: [email protected] yalebooks.com europe Office: [email protected] yalebooks.co.uk Typeset in Minion Pro bygd IDSUK (DataConnection) Ltd Printed in Great Britain bygd Gomer Press, Llandysul, Ceredigion, Wales Library of församling Cataloging-in-Publication information Names: Hardman, John, 1944– author. Title: The life of Louis XVI / John Hardman. Description: New Haven : Yale University Press, 2016. LCC
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Louis XVI
viii, 264 pages : 25 cm
The reign of Louis XVI, which ended in 1793 with the guillotining of the king and his queen, Marie-Antoinette, is a dramatic and crucial part of French history. Yet there have been no scholarly studies of Louis in any language, a result of the destruction or dispersal of the king's personal papers and documents. John Hardman, who has spent many years tracking down the primary sources, now fills the gap with this engrossing and perceptive account of Louis's reign. Hardman divides his story into three periods. His account of the first twelve years of Louis's reign, from 1774 to 1786, penetrates the secret workings of absolute monarchy in the last stage of its development. During this period, Hardman shows, the King was capable, especially in the fields of foreign affairs and public finance, but also austere, enigmatic and at times callous. The second part of the book, from 1787-9, opens with Louis's great personal reform initiative, presented to t
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The life of Louis XVI (Yale University Press, London and New Haven, 2016)
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Volumes such as this are all too rare in the present age, in which research assessments set the agenda and scholars are encouraged to prioritize their own 'original' research over service to the wider academic community. For this reason alone, we are all greatly indebted to Lynda Rollason and the contributors to this fine book. It contains not only the first scholarly edition and discussion of the Thorney Liber Vitae, but also colour and black-and-white plates of the entire manuscript (the latter annotated to show different hands). The reader is thus not only presented with an accurate text, but also has the ability to follow the arguments made by the commentators, palaeographical or otherwise. This makes the volume an invaluable research tool, one which will find a w