Examples Of Absolutism

Paper 3 During the early modern era there emerged all over Europe absolute monarchy. Monarchs were no longer completely tied down by the nobility and exercised much more power. Two examples of such absolute monarchs are the Czar of Russia, Peter the Great and the King of France, Louis XIV. These two are the epitome of absolutism, and someone with absolute power will usually not have a very benevolent relationship with their inferiors. They had domineering control of their subjects and paranoid suspicions of their subjects. The absolute monarchs had complete control over their subjects. Because of this reality they would usually have yes men all around them. Louis XIV could do no wrong according to his courtiers. He seemed to have always gotten his way and this severely inflated his ego. He thought that he knew more than people who were experts in
Louis XIV had spies everywhere to collect information on his court “maintained a great number of spies and tale bearers” (Louis XIV). Of course when one monarch has so much power people are of course going to envy the monarch, and the kings knew this. Apparently Louis would ruin the lives of some of the people in his court based on the tales of spies without the affected person even knowing what they did wrong. The arbitrary punishments of monarchs must have been a constant worry. Louis moved out of Paris, his capital, because he was afraid of cabals. The extreme suspicion they had of their own subjects was astonishing. Peter the Great was also a paranoid absolute monarch. After a revolt by the Streltsi Peter led a reign of terror in order to root out any possible collaborators “No day, holy or profane were the inquisitors idle; everyday was deemed fit and lawful for torturing. There were as many scourges as there were accusers” (Peter). The spy networks and inquisitors are reminiscent of Stalin’s purges, but much more