AIGUILLON, EMMANUEL ARMAND DE WIG NEROD DU PLESSIS DE RICHELIEU, Duc (172°— 1782), French statesman, nephew of the marechal de Richelieu, was born on July 31, 1720. He was a member of the so-called parti devot, the faction opposed to Madame de Pompadour, to the Jansenists, and to the parlement. In 1753 he was appointed commandant (governor) of Brittany and was engaged in constant disputes with the Breton parlement, in 1768 returning to court, where he resumed his intrigue with the parti devot and finally obtained the dismissal of the minister Choiseul (Dec. 24, 177o). When Louis XV., acting on the advice of Madame Dubarry, reorganized the government with a view to suppressing the resist ance of the parlements, d'Aiguillon was made minister of foreign affairs, Maupeou and the Abbe Terray 0715-1778) also obtaining places in the ministry. D'Aiguillon was blamed f or having pro voked the coup d'etat of Gustavus III., king of Sweden, in 1772, although the instructions of the comte de Vergennes, the French ambassador in Sweden, had been written by the minister, the duc de la Vrilliere. D'Aiguillon, however, could do nothing to rehabili tate French diplomacy; he acquiesced in the first division of Poland, renewed the Family Compact, and, although a supporter of the Jesuits, sanctioned the suppression of the society. After the death of Louis XV. he quarrelled with Maupeou and with the young queen, Marie Antoinette, who demanded his dismissal from the ministry (I774)• He died, forgotten, in '782.
See Memoires du Ministere du duc d'Aiguillon (3rd ed., 1792), probably written by J. L. Soulavie. On d'Aiguillon's governorship of Brittany see Carre, La Chalotais et le duc d'Aiguillon (1893) Marion, La Bretagne et le duc d'Aiguillon (1898) ; and Barthelemy Pocquet, Le Duc d'Aiguillon et La Chalotais (19oi—o21. The three last have full bibliographies. See also Flammermont, Le Chancelier MauPeou et les parlements (1883) ; Frederic Masson, Le Cardinal de Bernis (1884) •