Reign of Louis XV of France

Historical Context Note

Litencyc Editors (Independent Scholar - Europe)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.5.2.04: French Writing and Culture: Eighteenth-Century and the Enlightenment, 1700-1800.
Vol. editors: Edward Forman (University of Bristol), Jenny Mander (University of Cambridge), Síofra Pierse (University College Dublin), Tim Unwin (University of Bristol), David Williams (University of Sheffield)

Domains

Changes of government, elections and reigns

Dates

Date of occurrence 1715-09-01-1774-05-10

Places

France (Location)

Louis XV was born in 1710 so inherited the throne from his great- grand-father, Louis XIV, when he was 5. He ruled in all for 59 years and left to his grandson, Louis XVI, a country so maladministered as to make the revolution of 1789 almost a certainty.

Louis ruled under the regency of Philippe d'Orléans until 1723, then through his First Ministers, the Duc de Bourbon and Cardinal de Fleury, until 1743. Thereafter he emulated Louis XIV and ruled directly.

The first years of his reign saw the financial boom and bust promoted by John Law, who in August 1717 emulated the British South Sea Company by floating the Company of the West which was granted by the regent the monopoly of trade with Louisiana. This Company was allied …

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538 words

Citation: Editors, Litencyc. "Reign of Louis XV of France". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 13 February 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=4174, accessed 23 November 2024.]

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Reign of Louis XV of France

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