by James Hickman
Schiff Sovereign
The corpse of King Louis XV was still warm when his son and successor, 19-year old Louis XVI, started cleaning the royal house.
French finances were an absolute mess. The country was almost hopelessly bankrupt after decades and decades of costly warfare… and even more costly royal luxury. The young king’s predecessors, Lous XIV and Louis XV, spared no expense when it came to their comfort and grandeur, and the end result was the largest national debt in the history of the world up to that point.
Louis XVI knew something had to be done urgently. So, his first order of business was to appoint a brand new finance minister– the famed economist and philosopher Jacques Turgot.