FLEURY, ANDRÉ-HERCULE de. - Cardinal and statesman, b. at Lodève on 26 June 1653, d. at Paris on 29 Jan. 1743. Appointed almoner to Queen Maria Theresa (1679), and then to Louis XIV (1683), he was bishop of Fréjus from 1698. Having become tutor to Louis XV in 1715, he knew how to win his complete confidence. On the death of the Duke of Orléans (1723), he had the Duke of Bourbon appointed prime minister, but, having had him exiled in 1726, he became de facto prime minister, and obtained the cardinal's hat.

Domestically he favored the development of commerce and of the navy, achieved monetary stability and financial equilibrium, reduced the taille, while restoring the royal corvées and favoring the ferme and the fiscal exemptions of the clergy. He was hostile to Jansenists and Protestants, also for absolutist ends. In foreign policy he was a pacifist, the architect of the Congress of Soissons (1728) and of the Peace of Seville (1729), in which Spain renounced Gibraltar and England recognized the rights of Charles of Bourbon to the duchy of Parma and Piacenza and to Tuscany. Favorable to a pacification between Austria and the Bourbon courts, he was opposed to the War of the Polish Succession and tried to localize the conflict. Having exiled Chauvelin, a supporter of the anti-Austrian policy, he was in 1739 the arbiter of the Peace of Belgrade between Austria and Turkey. Opposed to the War of the Austrian Succession, he attempted secret direct agreements with Maria Theresa. But, when these relations came to light, he was disavowed and exiled.

FLEURY, ANDRÉ-HERCULE de - Portrait.(from Cardinalium S. R. E. Imatista 12 catoographia der. Cuorac Apostolice, col. II, ter. II)

Bibliography5 works

BIBL.: L. Ranke, Französische Geschichte, IV. Die Regentschaft und card. F., Leipzig 1869; V. Verlaque, Histoire du card. F. et de son administration, Paris 1879; P. Vaucher, R. Walpole et la politique de F., ibid. 1924; G. Hardy, Le card. de F. et le mouvement, Janalaire, ibid. 1925; M. De Sars, Le card. de F. apôtre de la paix, ibid. 1942 and the bibliography cited there.

Sergio Cotta

@incollection{ec5_fleury_andre_hercule_de, author = {Cotta, Sergio}, title = {Fleury, andré-hercule de}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {V}, pages = {1449--1450}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1950}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/fleury-andre-hercule-de} }

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Fleury, André-Hercule de

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