沈阳师范大学 主讲人：张 辉 欧洲历史与文明 第四章 西欧势力的增长

Chapter 4 The Growing Power of Western Europe ( ) 4.3 France: The Triumph of Absolutism The Treaty of Utrecht

4.3 The France of Louis XIV Louis XIV (5 September 1638 – 1 September 1715), known as Louis the or the Sun King was a monarch of the House of Bourbon who ruled as King of France and Navarre from 1643 until his death. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the longest of any monarch of a major country in European history.

4.3.1 The Triumph of Absolutism Cardinal Jules Mazarin Palace of Versailles Colbert

Louis began his personal rule of France in 1661 after the death of his chief minister, the Italian Cardinal Mazarin. An adherent of the concept of the divine right of kings, which advocates the divine origin of monarchical rule, Louis continued his predecessors' work of creating a centralized state governed from the capital. He sought to eliminate the remnants of feudalism persisting in parts of France and, by compelling many members of the nobility to inhabit his lavish Palace of Versailles, succeeded in pacifying the aristocracy, many members of which had participated in the Fronde rebellion during Louis's minority. By these means he became one of the most powerful French monarchs and consolidated a system of absolute monarchical rule in France that endured until the French Revolution.

The term absolutism may refer to Absolute Monarchy, a form of government where the monarch has absolute power to rule their land freely, with no laws or legally organized direct opposition in force. An absolute monarch wields unrestricted political power over the sovereign state and its people. Absolute monarchies are often hereditary but other means of transmission of power are attested. Absolute monarchy differs from limited monarchy, in which the monarch's authority is legally bound or restricted by a constitution.

During Louis's reign, France was the leading European power and it fought three major wars: the Franco-Dutch War, the War of the League of Augsburg, and the War of the Spanish Succession. There were also two lesser conflicts: the War of Devolution and the War of the Reunions.

4.3.2 The Peace of Utrecht A first edition of the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht between Great Britain and Spain in Spanish (left) and a later edition in Latin and English. Context End of the War of the Spanish Succession Signed11 April 1713 LocationUtrecht, United Provinces Signatories Louis XIV of France Philip V of Spain Anne of Great Britain John V of Portugal Victor Amadeus II of Savoy United Provinces Languages English Spanish Latin

4.3.2 The Peace of Utrecht The Treaty of Utrecht, which established the Peace of Utrecht, is a series of individual peace treaties, rather than a single document, signed by the belligerents in the War of the Spanish Succession, in the Dutch city of Utrecht in March and April The treaties between several European states, including Spain, Great Britain, France, Portugal, Savoy and the Dutch Republic, helped end the war.

The treaties were concluded between the representatives of Louis XIV of France and of his grandson Philip V of Spain on one hand, and representatives of Anne, Queen of Great Britain, the Duke of Savoy, the King of Portugal and the United Provinces of the Netherlands on the other. They marked the end of French ambitions of hegemony in Europe expressed in the wars of Louis XIV and preserved the European system based on the balance of power.. Western Europe's borders after the Treaties of Utrecht and Rastatt