The Age of Louis XIV, Volume 1

Voltaire's first great history follows the warrior king of Sweden from his early victories to his defeat by Peter the Great at Poltava. It reads like an adventure novel and made Voltaire's name as a historian.

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Voltaire's history of the tsar who dragged Russia into the modern age, written with access to Russian court archives. It covers the founding of Saint Petersburg, the war with Sweden and the reforms that remade an empire.

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The second half of The Age of Louis XIV turns to life at court, government, trade, the arts and sciences, and the religious quarrels of the reign. The part where Voltaire invents the history of culture.

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