5.1.1 Louis XIV’s Galley Fleet

Previously, the English experiment with galleys has already been noted. However, in the North Sea, galleys always remained very much peripheral, given that they were not very useful in those waters.

Galleys were useful as coastal patrols and could serve as an expression of Louis’ power, but they also offered symbolic value. Whilst the French King was not disinclined against making peace treaties with the Barbary States when necessary, conducting just wars against Muslims also helped to convey the impression of Louis as “the most Christian King”. And there most certainly was an almost continuous state of war between the Barbary States and the European Mediterranean powers, as many ships were subject to this guerre de course (commercial raiding). Between the sixteenth and the nineteenth century, almost one million Christians were enslaved by the Barbary pirates, some of them to be kept in Barbary and some of them to be ransomed. But capturing “the other” also went the other way round, and we are primarily interested in the state of those Muslims captured by the French.³

We want to consider the condition of the persons who were rowing in these galleys, the chiourme des galères. In fact, three categories of rowers have to be distinguished: benevoglies, forçats and Turcs.⁴

The benevoglies were considered to be voluntary rowers.

Things become more difficult with the second category, the forçats. Generally, this term was used for those persons who were condemned to the galleys because of a crime they had committed. Being sentenced to the galleys as a punishment was already known in fifteenth century France, but the condemnations soared during the time of Louis XIV. It was Colbert, Louis XIV’s long-time chief minister, who sent letters to the French courts to encourage them to condemn people to the galleys to fill Louis’ ships with unpaid labour.⁶ In the period 1680–1748, approximately 60.000 persons were sentenced to the galleys for a temporary or permanent time for crimes such as murder, theft or desertion (and in some cases even because of Protestant beliefs).⁷ Classifying these persons becomes more difficult. If slavery is to be defined by factual conditions, then one could easily claim that they were slaves, as they were chained, received no wages and could be whipped in the galleys. If slavery is defined by legal status, things become more difficult. Although it is clear that by current standards, forçats would be classified as slaves, I would dare say that most seventeenth century Frenchmen did not perceive them as such. There are various reasons for this: condemnations to the galleys were usually only for a certain duration of time, and the progeny of the convicts did not become slaves. But the most important reason to vie in favour of the proposition that forçats were no slaves, is just because there was a third category of oarsmen who could be safely classified as genuine slaves, namely the “Turks”.

There were about 12.000 Muslims in the galleys of France. Generally, this category was simply called “Turk”, which was used as a quasi-synonym for esclave in France by the mid-sixteenth century.⁸ There are various reasons to classify the Turks as a separate category, and to see them as “real slaves”. First, the means of procurement of the Turks. This was done in three ways. First, many were purchased on slave markets across the Mediterranean (chiefly Livorno and Malta, but also French port-cities such as Marseille). Modern estimates even hold that during the second half of the seventeenth century, the expenditures for buying slaves represented more than two percent of the overall budget for the galleys.⁹ Second, they could be captured at sea (and on land) during the various raids that were held by the warring parties.¹⁰ Third, forçats trying to escape their condemnation to the galleys had the possibility to exchange their own labour for that of a Turk (except if they were Protestants), bought by themselves or their family and friends.¹¹ Next to this, royal ordonnances made a distinction between forçats and Turks. For example the ordonnance of 11 February 1687 set administrative rules on the galleys and decided that Turks had to comprise one-quarter of the oarsmen of a galley, whereas forçats had to count for the remaining three-quarters.¹² Finally, the religion of this category also bears testimony to the fact that we are dealing with slaves. Although “Turk” was used as a lump category and many captives were not actually ethnic Turks, nearly all of them were Muslims. The occasional orthodox Greek or Russian could be found amongst them, but administrative correspondence shows that attention was paid to ensure that Christians were usually not to be found amongst this category.¹³

As Louis XIV made several peace agreements with the Barbary States at the end of the seventeenth century, this resulted in a decline of the number of Turks in the galleys. Louis XIV then experimented with putting black and Iroquois slaves in these ships. Those experiments failed, and the number of Turks would slowly dwindle, until there were fewer than 200 left right before the abolition of the Corps des Galères.¹⁴ In all of these elements, one can see a clear application of what the Classics of International Law said. The exception not to enslave the opponent only counted in just wars between Christian nations, but the infidels were fair game.