King of France Louis XIV - King of the world: the life of Louis XIV

Philip Mansel is one of Britains leading historians of France and the Middle East. His previous books include Louis XVIII (1981), The Eagle in Splendour: Napoleon and His Court (1987), The Court of France: 17891830 (1988), Paris Between Empires, 18141852 (2001) and Dressed to Rule: Royal and Court Costume from Louis XIV to Elizabeth II (2005). He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, the Royal Society of Literature, the Institute of Historical Research and the Royal Asiatic Society, and in 1995 he was a co-founder of the Society for Court Studies, whose journal, The Court Historian, he edited for twenty years. He is President of the Conseil Scientifique at the Centre de Recherche du Chteau de Versailles and a Chevalier de lOrdre des Arts et des Lettres. In 2012 he received the London Library Life in Literature Award.

Louis XVIII

Pillars of Monarchy

The Eagle in Splendour: Inside the Court of Napoleon

The Court of France, 17891830

Sultans in Splendour: Monarchs of the Middle East, 18691945

Constantinople: City of the Worlds Desire

The French Emigrs in Europe (co-edited with Kirsty Carpenter)

Paris between Empires

Prince of Europe: The Life of Charles Joseph de Ligne

Dressed to Rule: Royal and Court Costume from Louis XIV to Elizabeth II

Levant: Splendour and Catastrophe on the Mediterranean

Monarchy and Exile: The Politics of Legitimacy (co-edited with Torsten Riotte)

Aleppo: The Rise and Fall of Syrias Great Merchant City

Isral Silvestre, perspective view of Versailles from the south showing, left to right, the garden, the orangery (foreground), the palace and the Grand Commun, from Album Perelle, 1687. Muse du Louvre, Paris. RMN-Grand Palais (musee du Louvre) / Michel Urtado.

Isral Silvestre, perspective view of the town, the palace and the gardens of Versailles from the west, from Album Perelle, 1687. Muse du Louvre, Paris. RMN-Grand Palais (musee du Louvre) / Michel Urtado.

Pierre Mignard (attr.), Louis XIV during his minority, c. 1643. Chteau de Champs-sur-Marne, France. Bridgeman Images.

Philippe de Champaigne, The Virgin Mary offers the Crown and Sceptre to the young Louis XIV, attended by his mother Anne of Austria and brother Philippe, Duc dAnjou, 1643, detail. Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg. Bridgeman Images.

French school (seventeenth century), Gaston, duc dOrlans in Roman dress. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/image RMN-GP.

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Antoine Herisset, Louis XIV holding a lit de justice in the Grand Chambre of the Parlement de Paris, 1651. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/image RMN-GP.

Gobelins manufactory, workshop of Jean-Baptiste Mozin, The Coronation of King Louis XIV, tapestry from the series The History of the King, 166571. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Christian Jean/Jean Schormans.

Workshop of Henry de Gissey, Louis XIV as La Guerre in Les Noces de Ple et de Thtis, 1654. Muse Carnavalet, Paris. Roger-Viollet/TopFoto.

Robert Nanteuil, Nicolas Fouquet, 1661. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Gabriel Perelle, View of the Chteau of Vaux-le-Vicomte, c. 1666. Muse du Louvre, Paris. RMN-Grand Palais (muse du Louvre)/Grard Blot.

Julien-Michel Gu, The Arrival of Anne of Austria and Philip IV of Spain at the Island of Pheasants in 1660, 1837. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Grard Blot.

Jacques Laumosnier, The Meeting between Louis XIV and Philip IV of Spain at the Island of Pheasants in 1660. Painting after a design by Henri Testelin for a tapestry in the series The History of the King, 166571. Musee de Tess, Le Mans. RMN-Grand Palais/Agence Bulloz.

Jean-Baptiste Martin (attr.), Olympe Mancini, Comtesse de Soissons, c. 1668. Rafael Valls Gallery, London. Bridgeman Images.

Anon, Louise de La Vallire, early eighteenth century. Muse de Tess, Le Mans. muses du Mans

Jacob Voet, Hortense and Marie Mancini, c. 1670. Royal Collection Trust Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, 2019. Bridgeman Images.

Franois de Troy, Marie Thrse of Austria, Queen of France, second half of the seventeenth century. Muse des Beaux-Arts, Angers. Selva/Leemage/Bridgeman Images.

Pierre Mignard (attr.), Franoise dAubign, later Madame Maintenon, c. 1674. Muse Bernard dAgesci, Niort. collections muse Bernard dAgesci/NiortAgglo.

Henri Gascard, Madame de Montespan, second half of the seventeenth century, detail. Private Collection. Bridgeman Images.

tienne le Hongre, The Breaking of the Triple Alliance: Louis XIV as Hercules, 1674. Detail of relief sculpture on the south side of the Porte Saint-Martin, Paris. Wikimedia Commons.

Charles Le Brun, The Taking of Ghent, 1678. Ceiling painting in the Galerie des Glaces, Chteau de Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Ren-Gabriel Ojda/Franck Raux/montage Dominique Couto.

Charles Le Brun, Louis XIV, 1668. Muse de la Chartreuse, Douai. Bridgeman Images.

Claude Lefebvre (attr.), Louis II de Bourbon, prince de Cond, and his son Henri-Jules de Bourbon, duc dEnghien, mid-seventeenth century. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Grard Blot.

Charles Herault after Jacob Ferdinand Voet, Franois Michel Le Tellier, marquis de Louvois, 1689. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Grard Blot.

Henri Testelin, Jean-Baptiste Colbert presenting to Louis XIV the members of the Acadmie Royale des Sciences in 1667, c. 1675. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Grard Blot.

Jean Nocret, The Family of Louis XIV, c. 1669, detail. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/image RMN-GP.

Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Louis XIV, 1665. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Grard Blot.

Sbastien Leclerc, The Construction of the East Faade of the Louvre, 1677. Bibliothque Nationale de France, Paris

Pierre Patel, View of the Chteau and Gardens of Versailles, c. 1668. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. Chteau de Versailles, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais/Christophe Fouin.

Jean-Baptiste Martin, View of the stables at Versailles, 1688. Chteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. RMN-Grand Palais (Chteau de Versailles)/Daniel Arnaudet/Herv Lewandowski.