Censorship in the Ancien Régime

Under the French Ancien Régime, royal censorship was the task of censors appointed by the chancellor to judge the editorial legitimacy of a manuscript and to authorize its publication by an approval they signed.

At the same time, a privilege in the form of letters patent granted in the King's Council, most often to the bookseller, guaranteed not the content, but the property of the publication against the counterfeiters.

[1] After the Fronde, Colbert created a direction of the Bookstore, responsible for ensuring the granting of permissions and privileges now mandatory for all impressions made in France.

In 1701, Abbe Bignon, in charge of the bookstore business, promulgated a regulation of publishing in France which, modified in 1723 for Paris and generalized in 1744, remained in force until the French Revolution.

Voltaire paid the price for his Mohammed (1743), Sedaine for his Deserter (1769); The Barber of Seville and the Marriage of Figaro de Beaumarchais escaped only thanks to the obstinacy of Marie Antoinette.