Fronde
the name of a political faction which played a conspicuous part in French history during the minority of Louis XIV., and which gave rise to the celebrated insurrectionary movement known historically as the War of the Fronde. The members of this party obtained the derisive name of Frondeurs (slingers), from the pertinacious lampoon warfare which they waged against both the powerful minister of that day, Cardinal Mazarin, and the Queen Regent, Anne of Austria. Mazarin, as a foreigner and a parvenu, enjoyed the detestation of the French people-both patrician and proletarian-and especially had incurred the opposition of the Parliament of Paris to his measure. In 1648 Mazarin ventured on the bold step FRONTENAC of arresting two of the most popular members of the latter body, and on the next day (la journée des barricades) the Parisians rose in arms, dispersed some of the royal troops sent out against them, and barricaded the approaches to the Louvre, compelling the court party to retire to St. Germain, and thus leaving Paris in the hands of the insurgents. Upon the Prince de Condé advancing to besiege the capital, the parliament called the citizens to arms, when the Prince de Conti, the Duc de Beaufort ("Le Roi des Halles," and son of Henry IV.), and numerous others of the great nobles of the kingdom, came forward to head the insurrection. The famous Cardinal de Retz also joined the movement, nor was beauty wanting, in the persons of the le and de Mont- Duchesses de Longueville and de Montbazon, to inspire the popular cause. The Prince de Condé, too, changed sides and went over to the malcontents, with whom the court party shortly afterward patched up a treaty of peace of but brief duration. Fresh contentions arose, and Mazarin caused the arrest of Condé and Conti, two of the princes of the blood.
This step on the part of the hated Italian excited a revolt in the provinces, and Marshal Turenne hastened to the rescue of the Frondeur princes, but was routed in the battle of Rethel (1650).
The cardinal, however, enjoyed but a mere temporary supremacy; the parliament again agitated against him, and procured his banishment from France, leaving the Prince de Condé master of the situation. Subsequently, the contest degenerated into a war of intrigue.
Some of the Frondeur leaders were influenced by the queen to desert their party, and others were bought over by the cardinal's gold. Ultimately, all parties being weary with these dissensions, the court agreed to remove Mazarin, and a general amnesty was proclaimed. Condé, who refused to be a party to these terms, now finding his cause desperate, entered the Spanish service; while Mazarin, after a time, returned to Paris, and again obtained the reins of government.