Cult of the SUN KING
In the early hours of 6 January 1649, the ten-year-old Louis XIV and his younger brother Philippe were woken from their sleep and hustled into a carriage that was waiting outside their apartments in the Palais Royal in Paris. Accompanied by their mother and Louis’s regent, Queen Anne, the two boys were whisked away to the safety of Louis’ birthplace, the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, just outside Paris, only to discover that it was completely unprepared for their arrival, and in a state of disarray. The reason for the young king’s hasty flight from his capital was the Fronde uprising, a civil war that broke out in the spring of 1648 as the result of a bitter stand-off between the crown and the parliament of Paris, inflamed by Queen Anne’s chief minister Cardinal Mazarin’s efforts to raise money for the Thirty Years War, which involved raising taxes, that impinged on various fiscal privileges enjoyed by the nobility for centuries. The Italian-born Mazarin was already universally loathed throughout France by the nobility, bourgeoisie and peasantry alike, but it was this latest tussle with the parliament that proved to be the final straw, leading to violent demonstrations on the streets of Paris and simmering discontent among the aristocracy. Matters worsened when the regent, Queen Anne, who completely relied on Mazarin, doubled down and had a number of the chief leaders of Parliament, including the extremely popular Pierre Broussel, arrested, which brought the royal family into direct opposition with the rebels and made them a focus for their wrath. Broussel was released two days later, but the damage was already done, and relations between the crown and the mutinous Parisians continued to deteriorate until finally the decision was made to flee the capital.
“This feeling that he alone was divinely appointed to rule over France would crystallise throughout Louis’ childhood and adolescence”
For ten-year-old Louis, who had been King of France since the age of four, this seemingly precipitous flight from Paris was both an exciting adventure and
