<P> The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 created additional economic problems: of the more than 200,000 Huguenot refugees who fled France for Prussia, Switzerland, England, Ireland, United Provinces, Denmark, South Africa and eventually America, many were highly educated skilled artisans and business - owners who took their skills, businesses, and occasionally even their Catholic workers, with them . Both the expansion of French as a European lingua franca in the 18th century, and the modernization of the Prussian army have been credited to the Huguenots . </P> <P> The wars and the weather at the end of the century brought the economy to the brink: by 1715, the trade deficit had reached 1.1 trillion livres . To increase tax revenues, the taille was augmented, as too were the prices of official posts in the administration and judicial system . With the borders guarded due to war, international trade was severely hindered . The economic plight of the vast majority of the French population--predominantly simple farmers--was extremely precarious, and the Little Ice Age resulted in further crop failures . Unwilling to sell or transport their much - needed grain to the army, many peasants rebelled or attacked grain convoys, but they were repressed by the state . Meanwhile, wealthy families with stocks of grains survived relatively unscathed; in 1689 and again in 1709, in a gesture of solidarity with his suffering people, Louis XIV had his royal dinnerware and other objects of gold and silver melted down . </P> <P> France experienced a slow economic and demographic recovery in the first decades following the death of Louis XIV, although monetary confidence was briefly eroded by the disastrous paper money "System" introduced by John Law from 1716 to 1720 . In 1726, under Louis XV's minister Cardinal Fleury, a system of monetary stability was put in place, leading to a strict conversion rate between gold and silver, and set values for the coins in circulation in France . </P> <P> Starting in the late 1730s and early 1740s, and continuing for the next 30 years, France's population and economy underwent an important expansion . Rising prices, particularly for agricultural products, were extremely profitable for large landholders . Artisans and tenant farmers also saw wage increases but on the whole they benefited less from the growing economy . Pivotal developments in agriculture such as modern techniques of crop rotation and the use of fertilizers, which were modeled on successes in Britain and Italy, began to be introduced in parts of France . It would, however, take generations for these reforms to spread throughout all of France . Farming of recent New World crops, including maize and potatoes, continued to expand and provided an important supplement to the diet . </P>

Who controlled economic and social power before the 18th century in france