The King's Gambit: The Price of Gaming at the French Court

When France was a kingdom, people in high places played games—not only for fun, but also by royal decree. Louis XIV made games a meticulous ritual, having learned that to govern one must first provide amusements. In his Mémoires pour l'instruction du dauphin ( Memoirs for the Instruction of the Dauphin ), he explained the need to establish "this society of pleasures, which gives the people of the court an honest familiarity with the [sovereign], and touches and charms them ineffably"... The weekly rhythm permanently established in the 1690s dictated "apartment" evenings—featuring concerts, games and dancing—alternating with events devoted to the theater: a smooth-running set-up, with the Sun King as puppet-master, that subsequently continued to the end of the Ancien Régime. By then it was no longer a question of obeying, but of drowning one's sorrows.   Antoine Trouvain (1650-1710), Le Roi jouant au billard avec monsieur de Chamillard ( The King Playing Billiards with Monsieur de Chamillard ), from a set of six folio prints entitled Les appartements du roi Louis XIV , 1694. Paris, Drouot, June 26, 2020. Ferri & Associés auction house. Mr. Lecomte Sold for €22,330 Louis XIV period, two royal engraved ivory cup-and-ball games, h. 19 and 15.5 cm (7.5 and 6.1 in. respectively). Paris, Drouot, October 6, 2020. Daguerre auction house. Mr. Derouineau Sold for €33,800 and €13,000 Late 18 th -century French work, made for Louis XVI, King of France, Polychrome beaded purse…