THE period of Louis XIV, Le Grand Monarque, from 1643 to 1715, is not only the longest reign of any European monarch, but also by far the most important of any French king. The high tide of this period marks the epoch of absolute monarchy in France, and also of the crystallization of a national form of expression in all fields. This not only greatly influenced the subsequent French styles, but has been the source of inspiration in other national period forms.

Certain clearly defined conditions existed when Louis XIV assumed the reins of government, contributing each in its way to the climax reached during his reign.

First. France had organized and partially developed a political policy whose tendency was the extension of national domain and the promotion of international relationships. This gave an impetus to French thought, while association and contact with other lands and other forms of life affected the general consciousness.

Second. There had been established through the untiring efforts of Richelieu, Mazarin, and their collaborators a respect for arts and letters, science and commerce, which touched the remotest parts of the kingdom, and gradually admiration for the arts became the fashion, developing almost to a mania, particularly among the upper classes and the court.

Third. Conscious effort appears to have been divorced from religious idealism and concentrated on social evolution, which became the dominating impulse of the rapidly developing nation.

Fourth. The early isolation of the court at Versailles and the gradual magnetic influence it exerted over the beauty, talent and money of the realm, hastened the development of forms of social etiquette, ceremonial observance and pageantry which established the social criteria for the world at large.

Fifth. Through the Edict of Nantes, France was flooded by hordes of Flemish and Dutch Huguenots who were artists and craftsmen, working in all materials, ready to do the bidding of any court personage whose whim and resources permitted creation in any field. This variety of craftsmen, the excellence of their work, and the wealth of material at their command aided no little the growth and maturity of this entirely new French period art expression.

Sixth. It must be remembered that Francis I established an entirely different social domestic ideal. It has been said before that the art of France is an art preeminently for women. In no periods is this so clearly felt as in the periods of Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI. While in scale, in colour and design much of the period of Louis XIV is masculine in its feeling, the style itself and the variety of its forms is no doubt very largely influenced by the female favourites of the monarch.

During the ascendancy of Madame de Montespan the period reaches its highest form of development. The qualities of the woman - her indomitable will, her love of show, her vanity and pride, with the refinement and culture which she undoubtedly possessed - are all clearly seen in every object supplied the court during the years of her most absolute sway, not alone over Louis himself, but over all those who through her influence expected and received favours. La Valliere, with less force, therefore less power, made far less impress than did de Montespan; while Madame de Maintenon, whose life was given to service and to the outward regeneration of the court, has left an indelible impression of heaviness, formality, lack of grace and an entire absence of the playful charm which the High period expresses in so notable a degree.

The important fact to be retained is that the art of Louis XIV is dominated by female influence, and that this influence, increasing, finds its climax of perfection in the following reign, when Louis XV expresses it most completely.

There is still another condition which has no little bearing on the remarkable crystallization of the style of Louis XIV. This is the period of absolutism in which the monarch declared himself the church and the state. All impulses bent to the one, the aggrandizement of self and the promulgation in no uncertain terms of the absolute monarchical ideal. This in no little measure is the reason for the gradual disappearance of the influences of the Italian Renaissance, the Saracenic invasion, which came through Spain, and of the Teutonic motif. It resulted in the ultimate crystallization of a united French form of expression.

Perhaps an examination into the effects of these influences will serve to establish a mental connection which will give the period of Louis XIV a place in the decorative idea.

First of all, this new concentrated social ideal developed the most magnificent and ornate display of modern times. The wealth of material, its luxurious combinations and its military effects, have been the admiration of the unthinking from that day to this. Again, the whole palace"aTVersailles, with its walls, its ceilings, its accessory objects, formed a vast stage setting for the most extravagant pageants in court life that history records. The thought of the palaces as a suitable background against which to show furniture or people was furthest from the Louis XIV idea. The palace produced a scenic effect into which the most gorgeous costumes, the most subtle, and still pretentious, manners and customs, the most ornate and unrelated forms, were constantly to be seen moving to and fro. Consequently the result must be overdone, heavy, mixed and whimsical, so far as its applications to real life are concerned.

To be sure, there was good and bad in the materials used, in the designs prepared, in the technique of the work done and in the caprices that inspired it. But the aggregate of these things produced a mixed effect beyond ordinary comprehension, and too involved to be a part of anything except the most luxurious, richest and most presuming of all possible interior expression. Even then it must be readapted, refined and worked out by the most artistic hands in order to make it appear as anything else than a grand ballroom or hotel dining-room when seen as a full blaze of glory.