Associate Professor of Modern History

New College

01865 (2)79498

david.parrott@new.ox.ac.uk

I have been a Fellow and Tutor in Early Modern History at New College since 1992, having previously taught at the University of York. My research and publications have been largely concerned with the relationship between war, government and society in early modern Europe. My first book, Richelieu's Army, examined the administration of the French army in the first half of the seventeenth century, and the relationship of the military with French politics and society. More recently I have developed an interest in early modern mercenaries and military contracting, and my most recent book, The Business of War, explores these themes. I am happy to supervise graduate students across a range of early modern European topics in political, military, social and cultural history, though focusing above all on France and the Italian states.

It is assumed widely that 'war made the state' in seventeenth-century France. Yet this study of the French army during the ministry of Cardinal Richelieu (1624-42) shows how the expansion of the war effort was not matched by army reform but by a reliance on traditional mechanisms of control. The army imposed a huge burden upon the French population, but far from being an instrument of the emerging absolutist state its demands contributed to weakening Richelieu's hold upon France and heightened levels of political and social tension. This is the first detailed account of the size, organization, recruitment, financing and control of the troops during this formative period of French history. The book also includes a detailed study of foreign policy during Richelieu's ministry, and places the training, deployment and fighting methods of the French army into the context of arguments for military change in early modern Europe. The title was runner up in the History Today Awards 2002.