The royal absolutism that evolved in seventeenth-century Europe represents an important step in governmental development in Europe. In constructing absolutist states—states in which all political power lies with one ruler—monarchs and their ministers both created new organs of administration and built on existing institutions of government to supplant the regional authorities of the earlier society with more centralized state power. In principle, this centralized authority was subject to the absolute authority of the monarch. In practice, royal authority was nowhere near as encompassing as that of a modern dictator. Poor communication systems, the persistence of traditional privileges that exempted whole regions or social groups from full royal authority, and other factors all set limits on royal power. Nevertheless, monarchs of the era strove for the ideal of absolute royal power. And France was the model in their work of state building.
Absolutism in France was the work of Henry IV (reigned 1589–1610), Louis XIII (reigned 1610–1643) and his minister Cardinal Richelieu, and Louis XIV (reigned 1643–1715). With Europe’s largest population and immense wealth, France was potentially the mightiest country on the continent in 1600 and its natural leader, if only these national strengths could be unified and directed by a strong government. Creation of such a government around an absolute monarch was the aim of French rulers, but they confronted formidable problems, common to many early modern states, in achieving their goal.
Nobles everywhere held considerable power, in part a legacy of the system of feudal monarchy. In France they possessed military power, which they used in the religious civil wars of the sixteenth century and in their revolt against growing royal power in the mid-seventeenth century. Nobles also exercised considerable political power through such representative bodies as the Estates‑General (the French national legislative assembly) and provincial assemblies, which gave form to their claims for a voice in government. Moreover, nobles served as the judges of the great law courts, which had to register all royal commands before they could take effect.
A second and major impediment to unifying a country under absolute royal authority was the presence of regional differences. The monarchy of France had been built province by province over several centuries, and the kingdom was not well integrated. Some provinces, like Brittany in the north, retained local assemblies (law-creating bodies) with which the monarch actually had to bargain for taxes. Many provinces had their own cultural heritage that separated them from the king’s government centered in Paris. These differences might be as simple as matters of local custom, but they could also be as complex as unique systems of civil law (trade, family, and other aspects of the law that do not involve violent crime). A particular problem was the persistence of local dialects, which made the French of royal officials a foreign and incomprehensible tongue in large portions of the kingdom.
To achieve greater royal power, Henry IV reestablished peace after the religious warfare of the late sixteenth century, and Cardinal Richelieu curbed the military power of the nobility. Later, with the creation of loyal provincial administrators and a system of political patronage that he directed, the cardinal also established firmer central control during the reign of Louis XIII.