Law and Citizenship in Early Modern France
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Description
Scholars of French history have long maintained that the modern French notion of citizenship--including the concept that citizenship endows one with certain civil rights--is a product of the Enlightenment. But in Law and Citizenship in Early Modern France, historian Charlotte Wells argues that many of the ideas that found their way into Enlightenment tracts in fact had their roots in the French Renaissance. Wells shows how an understanding of the droit d'aubaine--the legal disabilities of foreign-born residents of the French kingdom--helps to identify the implied rights of native citizens. She then describes how such sixteenth-century jurists as Jean Bacquet, René Choppin, and Jean Bodin combined Roman law and feudal principles into an organized concept of citizenship. Through an examination of key 17th-century trials, Wells demonstrates how French "citizens" were gradually transformed into "subjects" during the absolutist reign of Louis XIV. A century later, however, jurists and such writers as Diderot and Montaigne rehabilitated earlier notions of citizenship, thus providing the foundation for further developments in political and legal theory.
Keywords
Citizenship -- France -- History -- 16th century; Citizenship -- France -- History -- 17th century; Citizenship -- France -- History -- 18th century
Document Type
Book
ISBN
9780801849183
Publication Date
1995
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press
Department
Department of History
Object Description
xviii, 198 pages ; 24 cm
Language
en
Recommended Citation
Wells, Charlotte Catherine, "Law and Citizenship in Early Modern France" (1995). Faculty Book Gallery. 701.
https://scholarworks.uni.edu/facbook/701
