Bourbon Restoration

The Bourbon Restoration was the return of the Bourbon dynasty to the French throne from 1814 to 1830, interrupted by Napoleon’s Hundred Days in 1815.

Charter of 1814: The constitution Louis XVIII granted in 1814, establishing a constitutional monarchy while reserving substantial authority to the crown. It defined the political compromise between royal authority and institutions inherited from the Revolution.
Congress of Vienna: The 1814–1815 conference that redrew Europe after Napoleon’s defeat and sought a stable balance of power. Its diplomacy helped secure the Bourbon return and shape France’s postwar position.
Louis Antoine, Duke of Angoulême: A Bourbon prince who served as a royalist military and political figure during the Restoration. His role in the royal family connected dynastic claims with the regime’s military response.
First French Empire: The regime ruled by Napoleon I from 1804 until his abdication in 1814, with a brief return in 1815. Its centralized imperial government differed from the Restoration’s dynastic constitutional monarchy.
French Civil Code: The 1804 French legal code that standardized civil law and protected principles such as property rights and legal equality for men. The Bourbons retained this central Napoleonic-era legal institution rather than restoring the old order wholesale.
Chamber of Deputies: The elected lower house of France’s legislature under the constitutional monarchy. Its shifting royalist and liberal majorities shaped the Restoration’s political conflicts.
Treaty of Paris (1814): The treaty that ended the War of the Sixth Coalition between France and the allied powers in May 1814. It allowed Louis XVIII to return while restoring France largely to its prewar borders.
Armand-Emmanuel de Vignerot du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu: A French statesman who served as prime minister under Louis XVIII from 1815 to 1818 and again from 1820 to 1821. He led governments seeking both royal stability and reconciliation after the Hundred Days.
French Consulate: The French republican government led by Napoleon Bonaparte from 1799 to 1804. It represents the post-revolutionary political order that preceded both empire and Bourbon rule.
French ultraroyalists: Hard-line French royalists who sought a stronger monarchy and a more thorough restoration of pre-revolutionary influence. Their political successes and demands heightened divisions within the restored regime.

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