ABSTRACT
To take the date of the sudden and unexpected death of a minister as marking the opening of the ‘third reign’ of Louis XIV is to make a choice that is heavy with implications, for it suggests how dependent our perception of the Sun King is upon our view of the personality of his ministers. If his Secretary of State for War, the marquis de Louvois, who died aged 50 in 1691, had lived for ten more years, would the beginning of the third reign be put back accordingly to 1701? The answer is not simple and depends on the respective roles we assign to men and to structures. This last period of the reign, from the perspective of ministers and ministries, is in fact marked by a series of closely interrelated factors that suggest an evolution in the exercise of power; an evolution that, while lacking sharp outlines, nevertheless cuts through an apparent sense of permanence engendered by a very long reign. Of these factors, some are biological: the age of the king (who celebrated his 53rd birthday in 1691), the influence of this unusual longevity on people’s mentalities and the gradual disappearance of the strong personalities who had marked the first phase of the personal rule. Other factors are contingent: the succession of two bloody and costly wars between 1688 and 1714 that brought the state to the brink of bankruptcy imposed new forms on the practice of royal and ministerial power.
