For many years the history of France in the ancien régime has been written from the perspective of the Annales. Particularly important to the conceptualization of this epoch have been the writings of Fernand Braudel and Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, who have emphasized the importance of the notion of la longue durée or of long-term economic and cultural factors in shaping the history of early modern France. The following work represents a critique of this perspective based on a renewed appreciation of the role of the state, on Marx's concept of primitive accumulation, and recent research on early modern proto-industrialization.

I am especially indebted to my colleague Mark Gabbert, who has helped me to think through some of the theoretical problems raised in the course of this investigation. I am grateful to James McConica and Gillian Lewis for permitting me to present some of the ideas in this book in their research seminar on early modern Europe at All Souls College, Oxford University, in 1992. I recall with pleasure the hospitality of Bob Scribner at Clare College, Cambridge, who allowed me to try out my ideas on his graduate students as well. I would also like to thank the librarians of the Bibliothèque Nationale and Bodleian and University of Manitoba libraries, without whose assistance this work would have been impossible. The editorial skill of Margaret Deith of the Cambridge University Press must be acknowledged. My scholarly efforts over the years have been generously supported by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council.