Henrietta Maria of France

Louis XIV, known as the Sun King, reigned as King of France and Navarre from 1643 to 1715, a span of seventy-two years that remains the longest documented reign of any European sovereign. The son of Louis XIII and Anne of Austria, he succeeded at the age of four, took personal control of government on Mazarin's death in 1661, and ruled thereafter without a first minister. He made the court at Versailles the centre of French political and cultural life, backed the arts and the sciences through royal academies, revoked the Edict of Nantes in 1685, and fought a long series of wars that left France dominant but exhausted. His marriage to Maria Theresa of Spain produced the Grand Dauphin, and his grandson Philip took the Spanish throne in 1700.

Philippe I, Duke of Orléans, was the younger son of Louis XIII and Anne of Austria, the only brother of Louis XIV, and the founder of the Orléans branch of the Bourbons that eventually gave France its last king. Born in 1640, he was known at court simply as Monsieur. He was a capable soldier who commanded the French army to victory at the Battle of Cassel in 1677, after which Louis XIV gave him no further independent command. At his residences of Saint-Cloud and the Palais-Royal he was a lavish patron of art, theatre and gardens. His first wife was Henrietta of England; his second, Elizabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate, was the mother of his successor Philippe II. He died at Saint-Cloud in 1701.

Louis, known as the Grand Dauphin and addressed at court simply as Monseigneur, was the eldest son of Louis XIV and Maria Theresa of Spain and heir to the French throne for almost fifty years without ever reigning. Born at Fontainebleau in 1661, he was educated under the historian Bossuet, commanded French forces in the Rhineland campaign of 1688, and otherwise lived apart from government at his château of Meudon, where he assembled a notable art collection. His marriage to Maria Anna Victoria of Bavaria produced three sons: Louis, Duke of Burgundy, Philip, who became Philip V of Spain, and Charles, Duke of Berry. He died at Meudon in 1711, four years before his father.

Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, governed France as regent from 1715 to 1723 during the minority of Louis XV, a period known ever since as the Régence. Born at Saint-Cloud in 1674, the son of Philippe I and Elizabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate, he was a nephew of Louis XIV and distinguished himself as a commander in Italy and Spain during the War of the Spanish Succession. As regent he set aside the late king's will, restored a measure of influence to the parlement and the nobility, reversed the alliance with Spain in favour of Britain, and supported the financial experiments of the Scottish banker John Law, whose paper money scheme collapsed spectacularly in 1720. He was a cultivated patron of painting and opera and died at Versailles in 1723.

Louis, Duke of Burgundy, was the eldest son of the Grand Dauphin and the grandson of Louis XIV, and was heir to the French throne for the last year of his life. Born at Versailles in 1682, he was educated by the archbishop and writer Fénelon, who turned a hot-tempered boy into a serious and devout prince with reforming ideas about kingship and the burden of war on the French people. He commanded in Flanders during the War of the Spanish Succession and became Dauphin on his father's death in 1711. His marriage to Marie Adélaïde of Savoy produced the future Louis XV. He died at Marly in February 1712, only days after his wife, leaving his young son as heir to his great-grandfather.

Philip V was the first Bourbon king of Spain and the founder of the dynasty that reigns there today. Born at Versailles in 1683 as Philip, Duke of Anjou, he was the second son of Louis, the Grand Dauphin, and a grandson of Louis XIV. The childless Charles II of Spain named him heir, and he took the throne in 1700, triggering the War of the Spanish Succession, which ended in 1714 with his crown confirmed and his claim to France renounced. He centralised the Spanish state on the French model through the Nueva Planta decrees, rebuilt the navy and pursued Italian ambitions driven by his second wife, Elisabeth Farnese. He abdicated in January 1724 in favour of his son Louis I and resumed the throne on Louis's death that year, reigning until 1746.

Louis I was King of Spain for seven months in 1724 and remains the shortest reigning monarch in Spanish history. Born in Madrid in 1707, he was the eldest son of Philip V and Maria Luisa of Savoy and the first Spanish born member of the Bourbon dynasty. He was created Prince of Asturias as heir to the throne and married Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans, a daughter of the Regent of France, in 1722. His father abdicated in his favour in January 1724, apparently intending to retire from public life, and the young king took over a government still largely run by his father's ministers. He died in Madrid in August 1724, and Philip V resumed the crown.

Louis XV was King of France and Navarre from 1715 to 1774, succeeding his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five after the deaths of his father, mother and elder brother left him the only direct heir. The kingdom was governed during his minority by Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, as regent. His long personal reign saw France gain Lorraine and Corsica but lose most of its North American and Indian possessions in the Seven Years' War, and saw a prolonged constitutional quarrel with the parlements. His wife, Marie Leszczyńska, bore him ten children, including Louis, Dauphin of France, father of three future kings. His court patronised the art and architecture that gave the age its name. He died at Versailles in 1774.

Louis, Dauphin of France, was the only surviving son of Louis XV and Marie Leszczyńska and the father of three kings, yet he never reigned himself. Born at Versailles in 1729, his birth secured the direct succession and was greeted with public rejoicing. He was pious, studious and associated with the devout party at court, and he was largely kept away from government by his father. His first wife, Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain, died young; his second marriage, to Maria Josepha of Saxony, produced Louis XVI, Louis XVIII and Charles X, who between them occupied the French throne for all but three of the years from 1774 to 1830. He died at Fontainebleau in 1765, nine years before his father.

Louis Philippe Joseph, Duke of Orléans, known from 1792 as Philippe Égalité, was the head of the Orléans branch of the Bourbons and the father of King Louis Philippe I. Born at Saint-Cloud in 1747, he served in the navy at the Battle of Ushant in 1778 and opened the gardens and arcades of his Palais-Royal to the Paris public, making them a centre of political discussion in the 1780s. A cousin of Louis XVI and a prominent freemason, he joined the third estate in 1789, was elected to the National Convention as a deputy for Paris, and adopted the surname Égalité when titles were abolished. His popularity with the revolutionary left did not survive the defection of General Dumouriez, and he died in Paris in November 1793.

Louis XVI was the last king of France of the old regime, reigning from 1774 until the monarchy was abolished in 1792. Born at Versailles in 1754, a grandson of Louis XV, he came to the throne at nineteen and married the Austrian archduchess Marie Antoinette. He supported the American colonies against Britain, backed attempts at fiscal and administrative reform, and abolished serfdom on the royal domain, but the crown's debts forced him to summon the Estates General in 1789, opening the French Revolution. He accepted the constitutional monarchy of 1791, was suspended after the storming of the Tuileries in August 1792, and was tried by the National Convention. He died in Paris in January 1793.