The Important Components Of The French Absolute Monarchy

Social relationships were important components of the French absolute monarchy. Historians agree that to achieve supreme control and national unity, Kings relied heavily on military strength. There is little question that absolutist France came to posses the largest standing army Europe had ever seen. Armies made France a powerful state, and the King a powerful ruler. However kings also controlled through non military means, establishing bureaucratic and legal systems and developing an absolutist culture with the King at the centre. These manifestations of absolutism, at varying degrees of significance, helped shape social relationships, and in turn, enforced the absolutist regime. Contrastingly, other historians maintain that the absolute system worked within pre-existing social codes, which were more influential in shaping social relationships. Historians herald the significance of these different factors because they take a variety of historiographical approaches.

Absolutism redefined the socio-political structures and language of court society. Court cabals and courtesies became important factors that influenced social relationships. Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie uses the court memoirs of Duc de Saint Simone, to explain the system of court cabals. Ladurie explains how the King placed himself at the top of the court hierarchy, and held a number of favourites.1 Lower courtiers
d group around these powerful individuals, such as King Louis XIV’s wife Madame de Maintenon, to gain power, wealth, status and other privileges through association.2 Saint Simon’s court memoirs are a more traditional historiographical source, detailing friendships, marriages and patronage relationships that formed and separated court cabals.3 However Laudrie himself admits the limitations of the source, stating that it has a tendency to be subjective with some