Master and Servant

In the summer of 1661, Nicolas Fouquet the charismatic surintendant des finances appointed by the recently deceased cardinal Mazarin was arrested on the orders of the young Louis XIV. His subsequent trial and imprisonment was a crucial turning point in the history of the monarchy. It marked the end of the era of minister-favourites and the establishment of a new governmental system in which the king acted as the point of focus for a personal monarchy, aided and abetted by the secretaries of state. This chapter examines that transition, and the relationship between the royal master and his ministerial servants, and explores the role of disgrace in the functioning of a political system that would endure in many of its defining features until the eve of the Revolution.