BOOK REVIEW

Book Review: Venality

Book Review: Venality

Offices for sale have always been one of the key elements in every student's interest in the history of France, but in this case William Doyle offers some wonderful new ideas for their attractiveness and durability. William Doyle, a professor of history at the University of Bristol and author of Venality: the sale of offices in the eighteenth century in France, published by Oxford University Press. During the three centuries of the modern era, the venality is a fundamental institution of French life. Launched by the monarchy as a means to borrow from his subjects, the purchase and inheritance of public office have a profound impact on the evolution of the state and social behavior. This book examines the entire history of the system of its medieval origins until its abolition during the Revolution. He points at the same time contemporary traces of venality through the recent debates on the notary and the abolition of the monopoly of auctioneers. This book is considered the matter very differently compared to other sources. He was dedicated and has a detailed discussion of this group.

The reason to choose this book for review is the question that what made offices sell. Royal Service prestige is of course, a stimulus. Even some of the most humble offices of their respective owner's right to free the king's advisers. And as more and better jobs monopolies have become corrupt, trying to make a living in these areas had no choice but to buy her in addition, meant monopoly profits. Offices were licensed to make money and while for most, it simply means a decent life, in a few, but large crown could mean profits in the hundreds of thousands of people. What really brought the buyers, however, were privileges. Many companies have been reducing the total load, such as salt monopoly (for a minimum of salt a year to buy, he managed to corrupt officials) or quartering of soldiers. The most prestigious offices conferred tax exemptions in different forms. It was particularly important in France, where in 1483 it was licensed for sale in 1522 of charges of financial and judicial ones, with the right to trade them and pass them. In 1604 was imposed on all the tax office said Paulette (1 / 60 of annual purchase value and 1 / 8 in case of transmission), which sanctioned their hereditary capital.

The creation of venal offices was the usual trick of French royal treasury: between 1515 and 1665, they went from more than 4,000 to more than 46,000, resulting in the administrative framework of the kingdom but also the independence of officials, not could be deposed except with the repayment, to exercise sovereign control was therefore established the system of commissioners and stewards . The value of offices grew continuously between the sixteenth and seventeenth century, not so much for the income-related, highly uncertain, but because they represented the way to go to the minor nobility , fell in the ...