Diplomatic History of Europe 1500 - 2000 | French Superpower (Lecture 7)

Lecture 7: Displacing earlier Spanish primacy, the kingdom of France now took on the role of the strongest European power, in turn worrying neighboring kingdoms, who seized on coalition diplomacy to contain French power. This lecture covers the period from 1648 to the death of the preeminent figure of the age, “the Sun King,” Louis XIV, in 1715. We examine the vast claims of absolutism as an ideology of royal power in the Baroque age. We consider the skilled diplomatic maneuverings of the successor to Cardinal Richelieu, Cardinal Mazarin and survey the endless wars of Louis XIV in search of glory for himself and his realms. Finally, we study how coalitions of powers, led by Britain, sought to hem in France in order to assert a European balance of power, ratified in the important 1713 Treaty of Utrecht, the second of the great peace conferences of the age.
Essential Reading:
Ludwig Dehio, The Precarious Balance: Four Centuries of the European Power Struggle, pp. 65–90.

Supplementary Reading:
M. S. Anderson, The Rise of Modern Diplomacy 1450–1919, pp. 154–63.