Overview. France in the Sixteenth Century: Monarchy, Renaissance and Reformation 1494-1610
| dc.contributor.author | Tingle, Elizabeth | |
| dc.date.acceptance | 2021-12-15 | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2024-01-04T14:36:36Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2024-01-04T14:36:36Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2023-12-23 | |
| dc.description.abstract | In traditional historiography, the period 1494-1610 in France was one of transition from medieval to early modernity, through the state building of the Renaissance Monarchy of the later Valois kings and the early absolute monarchy of the first Bourbon king Henry IV. The early modern interests of the annaliste historians and their descriptions of long-enduring social structures of demography, family formation, tenure and economic forms of production, with clear regional differences across France, encouraged alternative interpretations of continuity and the importance of impersonal historical agents but also of history from below. The more recent cultural turn in history has shaken up both paradigms: diversity, dissidence and agency has been shown in peasant, urban and courtly societies and such historians have sought to uncover and explain the ties, theoretical, institutional and material, that bound them together. In this overview, three central themes of this current Sixteenth-century historiography will be explored in a broadly chronological outline. The first theme is that of nonarchy, the royal state and the culture of politics in sixteenth-century France. The growth in authority of the Valois kings Louis XII, Francis I and Henry II was visible to contemporaries and later generations, although its causes, nature and scope have been debated. Here, we will examine evolving theories of kingship and changes in state administration at the centre and in the provinces of France - law-making and the judiciary, including the parlements, growth of fiscal apparatus and exactions, administrative growth across the realm - all were vital to the new assertiveness of the crown. The religious wars which broke out in the early 1560s reduced the practical authority of the later Valois kings and limited their freedom of action. The result was a series of creative ‘experiments’ in theoretical bolstering, assertion of royal law and the creation of institutions of peace-making and pacification, held together by the royal person, a vital precursor to the absolutist developments of the following century. Across the whole period, other features of political practice affected the development of the royal state: the creation of a public sphere no matter how small, through print and polemic; the marshalling of visual and material culture in the service of political authority; the role of gender and the place of royal women in the exercise of power. The assassination of Henry IV in 1610 – which was a crisis but did not lead to catastrophe for the monarchy – will end the section. The second theme is that of Renaissance, Reformation and religious conflict. The relationship between Church and Crown was central to the theory and practice of royal authority. Religion also lay at the core of all French subjects’ lives. Evangelical reform, influenced by Humanist scholarship, was prominent in France in the first half of the reign of Francis I, who was sympathetic towards it. But as Lutheranism and then Reformed Protestantism or Calvinism expanded, the monarchy moved to repression. Simultaneously, a resurgent Catholicism, influenced by the Council of Trent and other reforming agents, became more militant and yet also more pastorally-focused. These changes will be traced in the chapter, as will the causes and evolution of the religious wars of the later sixteenth century. The religious cultures of Huguenot and Catholic, text, material culture, new religious institutions and popular responses, have received lively study and the ideas of ‘community of believers’ and ‘confessionalisation’ will be touched on here. The third theme is that of communities and networks in sixteenth-century France, that is, social groups and their interaction. Knowledge of the nobility is fundamental to any understanding of the workings of the monarchical state, whether political process or causes of religious war. Noble cultures, patronage and clientage, including the role of women, will be examined as they have received much recent scholarly attention. Also, the changing nature of urban society has growth of population and economies, urbanism and space, and some of the resultant social issues, such as poverty and new forms of poor relief, criminality and justice, family and gender relations. A brief look at other forms of dissidence – namely popular revolt and witchcraft – will also be given. Overall, the chapter will provide a chronology for sixteenth-century France, along with a discussion of causation and consequence, understood through recent historical writing on the period. | |
| dc.funder | No external funder | |
| dc.identifier.citation | Tingle, E. (2023) Overview. France in the Sixteenth Century: Monarchy, Renaissance and Reformation 1494-1610. In: Routledge Handbook of the History of France, ed. David Andress (London: Routledge, 2023), chapter 13. | |
| dc.identifier.doi | https://doi.org/10.4324/9780367808471-14 | |
| dc.identifier.isbn | 9780367406820 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/2086/23436 | |
| dc.language.iso | en | |
| dc.peerreviewed | Yes | |
| dc.publisher | Routledge | |
| dc.researchinstitute | Institute of History | |
| dc.subject | France | |
| dc.subject | Sixteenth Century | |
| dc.subject | Monarchy Reformation | |
| dc.title | Overview. France in the Sixteenth Century: Monarchy, Renaissance and Reformation 1494-1610 | |
| dc.type | Book chapter |
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