FOUQUET, or FOUCQUET, NICOLAS, 1615-80; Viscount of Melun and of Vaux, marquis of Belle-Isle, superintendent of finance under Louis XIV. Carefully educated with a view to official position, lie was appointed master of requests at the age or 26. He was only 35 when lie obtained the post of procureur-general to the parliament of Paris. During the civil war he devoted himself to the interests of the queen-mother, Anne of Austria, and enjoyed her protection. At her instance he was called, in 1652, to the office of superintendent of finance. The finances were then in a state of the utmost disorder from the long wars and the greed of courtiers and officials; and it is stated that he for a time provided the means of meeting the expenses of the state from his own for tune, or by loans obtained upon his own credit. He had long been in the confidence of cardinal 3lazarin, the first minister, and was his zealous instrument. But shortly after the marriage of Louis XIV. a quarrel broke out between them, and from that time each was bent on injuring the other. The increasing deficit in the treasury alarmed the king; inquiries were addressed to Colbert, who, secretly ambitious of succeeding Fouquet as minister of finance, made the worst of the case against Fouquet. F. had bought the port of Belle-Isle, and strengthened its fortifications, with a view of taking refuge there in case of disgrace. Tie had spent large sums in building a palace on his estate of
Vaux, which, in extent, magnificence, and spleedor of decoration, was almost a forecast of Versailles. At this palace he entertained the king, in Aug., 1661, him a Me unrivaled for magnificence, at which Les Facheux of 31oliere was for the first time produced. But the king could not be appeased. By crafty devices, Fouquet had been induced to sell his office of procureur-general, thus losing the protection of its privileges. and he had paid the price into the treasury. The king, however. was only prevented from arresting him at.the Me by the pleading of the queen-mother. The arrest was made about three weeks later at Nantes. Fouquet, after several removals from prison to prison, was at last sent to the Bastile. His trial extended over several years. In 1664. lie was condemned and sentenced to perpetual exile, and to the confiscation of his property. The sentence, however, was commuted into one of imprisonment for life in the fortress of Pignerol. He bore his fate with fortitude, and composed in prison sev eral devotional works. [Condensed from Encyc. Brit., 9th ed.]