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Étienne De Silhouette
Étienne de Silhouette (5 July 1709 – 20 January 1767) was a French Ancien Régime Controller-General of Finances under Louis XV. Life Sometimes said to be akin to the next Niccolò Machiavelli, he was born at Limoges where his father Chevalier Arnaud de Silhouette, of Biarritz or ''de Zulueta'' (in Basque), had been posted as a Bourbon administrator. De Silhouette studied finance and economics assiduously and spent a year in London learning about the economy of Britain. He translated into French several works by Alexander Pope, Henry Bolingbroke, William Warburton's ''The Alliance between Church and State'', (1736) as ''Dissertations sur l'Union de la Religion, de la Morale, et de la Politique'' (1742) and Baltasar Gracián's ''El polÃtico''. The Prince of Condé's party later used his translations from English to criticize him, but Madame de Pompadour's support and vision saw him awarded with the position of Controller-General on 4 March 1759; this was one of the most ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Controller-General Of Finances
The Controller-General or Comptroller-General of Finances () was the name of the minister in charge of finances in France from 1661 to 1791. It replaced the former position of Superintendent of Finances (''Surintendant des finances''), which was abolished with the downfall of Nicolas Fouquet. It did not hold any real political power until 1665, when First Minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert, who had acted upon financial matters since Fouquet's embezzlement charge, was appointed to the office. History The term ''"contrôleur général"'' in reference to a position of royal accounting and financial oversight had existed in various forms prior to 1547, but the direct predecessor to the 17th century "Controller-General" was created in 1547, with two position-holders whose job was to verify the accounts of the Royal Treasurer (''Trésorier de l'Échiquier''), then the head of the royal financial system. The name of the charge of the controllers came from their account book, or ''contre-rôle' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
