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Francois de Callieres and Diplomatic Theory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Maurice Keens-Soper
Affiliation:
University of Leicester

Extract

Francois de Callieres (1645–1717) was a diplomatic envoy and man of letters who in 1716 published De la Manière de Négocier avec les Souverains. A Normand of literate and noble, but modest ancestry, he lived for many years in various parts of Europe before securing, somewhat late in a long life, a position in the service of Louis XIV. Although he won admission to the Académie Française for a panegyric on the King and published several other books including a noteworthy contribution to the ‘Battle of the Ancients and Moderns’, the high point in his sombre but determined life came during the Nine Years War when as a secret envoy he negotiated the crucial terms with the Dutch which led to the Congress of Ryswick (1697) and peace. Thereafter he held the sensitive position of secrétaire du cabinet at Versailles and supplied the secretary of state for foreign affairs with a flow of memoranda on the conditions of peace.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1973

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References

1 Oakeshott, Michael, Rationalism in Politics (London, 1962).Google Scholar

2 Kertesz, Stephen, Introduction to the grossly defective paperback edition of Callières' On the Manner of Negotiating with Princes (Notre Dame, 1963), p. v.Google Scholar

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6 Ibid. p. 301.

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9 Hatton, Ragnhild, War and Peace 1680–1720, p. 19. Hatton also draws attention to the inadequacies of the Whyte version and quotes from the 1716 English translation.Google Scholar

10 Mattingly, Garrett, Renaissance Diplomacy (London, 1955), ch. viii.Google Scholar

11 Ibid. p. 28.

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13 Ibid. p. 239.

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20 Mattingly, , Renaissance Diplomacy, p. 115.21Google ScholarIbid.

22 In a second volume De Legatorum Jure Tractatuum Catalogus 1625–1700 V. E. Grabar has listed treatises on diplomacy published in the seventeenth century. Cf. Wines, Roger, ‘The Imperial Circles, Princely Diplomacy and Imperial Reform’, The Journal of Modern History, vol. 39 (1967).Google Scholar

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28 In addition to the necessary biographical and administrative studies other relevant materials would include: Instructions, dispatches, memoranda, texts and collections of treaties, the organization of the Foreign Ministry and archives, the memoirs of diplomats, contemporary comment, the law relating to diplomacy, and political theory. In this connexion see the study by Samoyault, Jean-Pierre, Les Bureaux du Secrétariat d'Etat des Affaires Etrangères sous Louis XV (Paris, 1971). Cf. the same author's ‘L'origine sociale des secrétaires d'Etat de Louis XIV’, La Revue d'Histoire Diplomatique (1969). Picavet, already cited, remains the standard work on the French diplomatic mechanism. Published in 1930, his study was designed as a tentative exploration. It has produced no sequel.Google Scholar

29 Mattingly, , Renaissance Diplomacy, p. 115.Google Scholar

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31 He translated works from English, Spanish and German.

32 Lenting, p. xi.

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34 Quoted by Lenting, p. xxi.

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46 I do not wish to suggest that this was of recent occurrence. Perhaps the striking feature is the lag between the emergence of independent states and attempts to formulate their condition after Pope and Emperor had ceased to count. Cf. Figgis, J. N., From Gerson to Grotius (London, 1911), ch. vi.Google Scholar

47 Quoted, in Wolf, John, Louis XIV, p. 618.Google Scholar

48 Grabar, , De Legatorum Jure, pp. 303–4.Google Scholar

50 I have been unable to consult all the treatises, many of which are to be found only in Rome and other European centres. Grabar produces abstracts of many of the documents as well as full references.

51 de Chamoy, Rousseau, L'ldée du Parfait Ambassadeur, ed. Delavand, L. (Paris, 1912).Google Scholar

52 Ibid. p. 28.

53 ibid. p. 11.

54 Antoine Pecquet, Discours Sur L'Art de Négocier. On Pecquet see:Piccioni, Camille, Les premiers commis des affaires étrangères aux XVII et XVIII Siècles (Paris, 1918)Google Scholar, and Samoyault, J. P., Les Bureaux du Secrétariat D'Etat des Affaires Etrangères Sous Louis XV (Paris, 1971).Google Scholar

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56 Ibid. p. 134.

57 In a chapter on the visits owed on the arrival of a new ambassador Wicquefort insists that in each court there is a routine among envoys which binds them together. ‘L'Ambassadeur est obligé de s'accommoder aux règles qui ont été etablies et n'y peut manquer sans déconcerter l'harmonie, sans laquelle il n'y peut point avoir de conversation entre les Ministres Publics’ L'Ambassadeur et ses Fonctions, ch. xxi, p. 296. Callières is familiar with the same facts though more cautious about the sense of community. ‘II lui est utile et souvent necéssaires de Her commerce et amitié jusqua un certain point.’ De la Manière de Négocier, p. 223.Google Scholar

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62 Anderson, M. S., ‘Eighteenth-Century Theories of the Balance of Power’, Studies in Diplomatic History; Essays in memory of Horn, D. B., ed. Hatton, Ragnhild and Anderson, M. S. (London, 1970), pp. 183–98.Google Scholar

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64 The Annual Register, 1787, p. 1.

65 Burke, Edmund, Letters on a Regicide Peace, II, Works viii, p. 243 note.Google Scholar