Status, Power, and Identity in Early Modern France - The Rohan Family, 1550 1715

In Status, Power, and Identity in Early Modern France, Jonathan Dewald explores European aristocratic society by looking closely at one of its most prominent families. The Rohan were rich, powerful, and respected, but Dewald shows that there were also weaknesses in their apparently secure position near the top of French society. Family finances were unstable, and competing interests among family members generated conflicts and scandals; political ambitions led to other troubles, partly because aristocrats like the Rohan intensely valued individual achievement, even if it came at the expense of the family's needs. Dewald argues that aristocratic power in the Old Regime reflected ongoing processes of negotiation and refashioning, in which both men and women played important roles. So did figures from outside the family-government officials, middle-class intellectuals and businesspeople, and many others. Dewald describes both how the Old Regime's ruling class maintained its power and the obstacles it encountered in doing so.

About the author

Jonathan Dewald is UB Distinguished Professor of History at the University at Buffalo. He is the author of Lost Worlds: The Emergence of French Social History, 1815–1970 (Penn State, 2006).

Summary

Examines the aristocratic experience in early modern France through a close examination of the history of the Rohan, a noble family in the Parisian court who were involved in notable political and religious events from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries.

Product details

• Authors: Jonathan Dewald, Jonathan (State University of New York Dewald, Jonathan (SUNY-Buffalo) Dewald, Dewald Jonathan
• Publisher: Penn State University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 30.04.2015
• EAN: 9780271066165
• ISBN: 978-0-271-06616-5
• No. of pages: 264
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History; France, European History, HISTORY / Social History, HISTORY / Europe / France, Social & cultural history, HISTORY / Modern / 16th Century, HISTORY / Modern / 17th Century, HISTORY / Europe / Western, French Revolution