Abstract
The way in which the kingdom was ruled in its different provinces had always varied according to the degree that power had been permanently or temporarily devolved to apanage princes and great nobles or that representative assemblies continued to function. It is therefore axiomatic that there was no ‘system of government’ in the France of the Renaissance. The question is: was there a tendency for the kingdom to become more centralised? R. Bonney has wisely cautioned against the over-use in French history of the term ‘centralisation’, a term coined in 1794. The main distinction drawn in the early modern period, as Mousnier made clear, was that between the king’s ‘delegated’ and ‘retained’ justice, the latter covering all the public affairs of the kingdom in which the crown was supreme and the former the private affairs of his subjects.1 No one would pretend, however, that a clear line of division was ever established between the two.
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Notes
The method chosen by the king was a promise of a large subsidy, paid slowly in anticipation of king Rene’s early death, cf. Louis XI to François de Genas, 8 Sept. 1478, Vaesen, Lettres de Louis XI, VII, p.157; same to same, 17 Jan. and 24 June 1480, ibid., VIII, pp.119-21, 221–2; in the event René died on 10 July 1480. On the succession to Provence, cf. A. Lecoy de Marcie, ‘Louis XI et la succession de Provence’, Rev. des quest, hist., 43 (1888), 121–57.
D.L. Potter, ‘The Luxembourg Inheritance’, FH, 6 (1992); SA. Eurich, ‘Anatomy of a Fortune: the house of Foix-Navarre-Albret’ (Emory Univ. Thesis, 1988); Marguerite of Navarre told Norfolk in 1533 that Vendôme ‘hath ben and yet is and ever wolbe fast imperiall, the grettest part of his lyvyng lying in themperours domynions’. (PRO SP1/77 fo.84r). J. Russell Major, ‘Noble income, inflation and the wars of religion in France’, Amer.H.R, 38 (1981), 21–48.
G. Zeller, ‘Gouverneurs de provinces au XVIeme siècle’, RH, 185 (1939), 225–6
On 1548, cf. G.Zeller, ‘L’administration monarchique avant les intendants’, in Aspects de la politique française, pp.204-6; M. Antoine, ‘Institutions françaises en Italie sous le règne de Henri II: gouverneurs et intendants (1547–59)’, Mélanges de l’Ecole française de Rome. Moyen Age, Temps modernes, 94 (1982), 759–818
R. Mousnier, La vénalité des offices sous Henri IV et Louis XIII (Paris, 2nd edn, 1971), pp.35-56; C. Stocker, ‘Public and private enterprise in the administration of a Renaissance monarchy: the first sales of office in the Parlement of Paris (1512–24)’, SCJ, 9, ii (1978), 4–29
D. Hervier, Pierre le Gendre et son inventaire après décès (Paris, 1977), pp.18-87. The main alliance of the Le Gendre was with the secretarial Neufville-Villeroy family. R.J. Kalas, ‘The Selve family of Limousin: members of a new elite in early modern France’, SCJ, 18 (1987), 147–72.
P. Hamon, ‘Culture et vie religieuse dans le monde des offices: les Ruzé dans la première moitié du XVIe siècle’, Bib. Hum. Ren., 53 (1991), 49–64.
Comte de Marsy, ‘vL’exécution d’un arrêt de Parlement au XVe siècle’, MSAP, 26 (1880), 149–64.
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© 1995 David Potter
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Potter, D. (1995). The Crown, Administration and the Provinces. In: A History of France, 1460–1560. New Studies in Medieval History. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-23848-4_5
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