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| 1715, Sept. 1 |
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| Louis XIV died. | 1 |
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| 1715–74 |
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| He was succeeded by his five-year-old great-grandson, LOUIS XV. Philip, duke of Orléans, became regent during the minority of Louis XV (1715–23), thus setting aside the will of Louis XIV. | 2 |
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| 1716 |
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| John Law founded Banque Générale, which became the Banque Royale. He gained the right to coin money from the government and financed government debts through his Mississippi scheme. | 3 |
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| 1718–20 |
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| War with Spain. By the Treaty of the Hague (Feb. 17, 1720), the emperor received Sicily, and Savoy received Sardinia in exchange. | 4 |
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| 1718, Aug. 2 |
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| Quadruple Alliance with Britain, the emperor, and Holland to maintain the Treaty of Utrecht (See 1718, Aug. 2). | 5 |
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| 1718–20 |
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| Law's Mississippi scheme. John Law encouraged investment in Louisiana through his Company of the West. Supported by the government, the company's stock rose rapidly, but when gold was not found in Louisiana, the stock plummeted and proved disastrous for speculators. Despite its failure, the plan did increase shipping and colonization in Louisiana. | 6 |
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| 1720 |
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| The last major outbreak of the plague in Europe struck Marseilles. More than 50,000 died. | 7 |
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| 1725 |
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| Louis XV married the daughter of the deposed king of Poland, Stanislas Leszczynski, having broken off a projected marriage with the Infanta of Spain. | 8 |
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| 1725 |
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| Food riots in Paris in the wake of famine. | 9 |
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| 1726–43 |
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| Administration of André-Hercule de Fleury, the king's tutor, marked by economic and population growth. Fleury fixed the value of currency and reestablished tax farming which Law had abandoned. | 10 |
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| 1730 |
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| Abbé de St. Pierre introduced his Projet pour perfectionner l'ed-ucation des filles, which advocated education for both boys and girls, although it assumed that girls would not need to be trained for public office. | 11 |
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| 1730 |
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| Law allowed a convicted seducer of an unwed, pregnant woman to choose to marry her rather than suffer the death penalty. In reality, conviction and punishment of the seducer were rare. | 12 |
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