Blood and Violence in Early Modern France

Abstract

Blood and Violence is a sustained analysis of violence in France, especially among the nobility, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It is based on extensive research in French archives, both in Paris and in the provinces; and, as such, is the first systematic analysis of the social realities and lived experiences of noble violence in early modern France. The results of this research succeed in exploding a number of myths and ambiguous impressions about the French nobility and absolute monarchy. It has long been assumed, for example, that the transition from a medieval to a modern society involved the decline of personal and collective violence as both church and state helped Europeans understand how better to control their emotions. These myths, constructed largely upon prescriptive sources that described how the state's actions were supposed to work, are undermined by Carroll's extensive research in the archives that illuminates the lived experiences of these nobles. First, Carroll's work significantly complicates the whole idea of ‘a civilising process’, by which the state managed to secure a monopoly on violence by transforming the blood feud so common among noble families into the duel, thereby reducing bloodshed and violence, and making for a more civilised nobility. This idea, first staked out by Norbert Elias more than half a century ago, has survived in many more recent guises. Above all, Carroll's research shows very convincingly that the ‘idea’ of the duel was always more powerful as a civilising factor than the experience itself. Indeed, Carroll makes it very clear that duels were often as bloody and even more violent than many blood feuds, as seconds and other clients of the principals often turned duels into bloodbaths. Indeed, his argument that the duel did not displace the blood feud but continued it in an even bloodier format is wholly convincing. Thus, seeking vengeance and restoring honour remained a significant and inherent component of noble behaviour long after the introduction of the duel. Above all, Carroll insists that the French nobility remained acculturated to violence, because violence was so much a part of courtliness.