Louis XVI 1754-93
King of France

He was born at Versailles, the third son of the Dauphin Louis and Maria Josepha of Saxony. He became Dauphin by the death of his father and his elder brothers, and succeeded his grandfather Louis XV in 1774. He was married in 1770 to Marie Antoinette, youngest daughter of the Habsburg Empress Maria Theresa, to strengthen the Franco-Austrian alliance. When he ascended the throne the treasury was empty, the state was in debt to 4,000 million livres, and taxation levels were excessive. Reforms proposed by Chr�tien Malesherbes and Anne Robert Turgot were accepted by the king, but rejected by the court, aristocracy, parliaments and Church. Louis managed to make some reforms and to relieve some of the fiscal problems and was for a time extremely popular. In 1777 Jacques Necker was made director-general, and succeeded in bringing the finances to a more tolerable condition, but through France's outlay in the American Revolution he was obliged to propose the taxation of the privileged classes, which led to his resignation. He was replaced by Charles Calonne (1783) who renewed for a while the splendour of the court, and advised the calling together of an Assembly of Notables. His successor, Brienne, obtained some new taxes, but the parliament of Paris refused to register the edict. The convening of the Estates General was universally demanded. Louis registered the edicts and banished the councillors of parliament, but had to recall them. In May 1788 he dissolved all the parliaments and established a Cour pl�ni�re. In August he ordered that the Treasury should cease all cash payments except to the army. The Estates General, in abeyance since 1614, met in May 1789 at Versailles. The tiers-�tat (third estate) formed themselves into a National Assembly, thereby commencing the Revolution, and called themselves the Constituent Assembly. The resistance of Louis to the demands of the deputies for political independence and equal rights led to their declaration of inviolability. Louis deployed troops, dissolved the Ministry and banished Necker. With revolutionary outbreaks in Paris on 12 July 1789, the National Guard of Paris was called out. On 14 July the people stormed the Bastille and the unrest spread to the provinces. On 4 August feudal and manorial rights, which declared the equality of human rights, were abrogated by the Assembly. The royal princes and all the nobles who could escape sought safety in flight. The royal family remained at Versailles and tried to conciliate the people by the feigned assumption of republican sentiments, but on 5 October the palace was attacked, compelling them to return to Paris, where the Assembly also moved. For two years Louis alternately made concessions to the republicans, and devised schemes for escape. The Constituent Assembly was succeeded in 1791 by the Legislative Assembly and in April 1792 Louis was compelled by the Girondins to a war (ultimately unsuccessful) with Austria. After the advance of the Prussians under the Duke of Brunswick into Champagne the Assembly dissolved itself, the National Convention took its place, and the Republic was proclaimed. In December the king was brought to trial, and called upon to answer for repeated acts of treason against the Republic. On 20 January 1793 sentence of death was passed, and next day he was guillotined in the Place de la R�volution, ending 1,025 years of monarchy.

Bibliography: S K Padover, Life and Death of Louis XVI (1939)