Episode Details

Louis XIV took the throne at four and ruled France for over 72 years, but his reign was shaped by childhood terror during the Fronde, when an armed mob broke into his bedchamber. This episode examines the psychology of absolute power and how a traumatized boy built a system designed so no one could ever make him vulnerable again.

We cover his decision to rule without a chief minister after Mazarin's death, the downfall of Nicolas Fouquet, Colbert's tax overhaul, Versailles as a tool for controlling the nobility, ballet as political exhaustion, costly wars, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes and the dragonnades, Madame de Maintenon's influence, and his painful health battles and final years.

• Why Louis was called Dieudonné, the God-given miracle child
• How Versailles made physical proximity to the king the currency of power
• The dragonnades and the Huguenot exodus that strengthened France's rivals
• The 1686 fistula surgery rehearsed on peasants without anesthesia
• How the throne passed to a five-year-old great-grandson, Louis XV