The Royal Stag : Governing Red Deer on the Estate of Rambouillet, 1706-1870
Résumé
As a royal, imperial, and finally presidential hunting estate, Rambouillet has served as a habitat for princes and animals. This chapter focuses on the governement of the red deer (Cervus elaphus) population in the estate from the early eighteenth to the nineteenth century. Under the ancien régime, the stag represented royalty, which made red deer the most preferred and most documented game in France. Based on the rich archival sources of the estate, the chapter analyses the notion of population as a tool in the government of nature between the reigns of Louis XV and Napoleon III. Inspired by the concepts of biopolitics and population ecology, this study proposes a new view on princely hunts and their influence on the fauna in the past. More than a simple pleasure, hunting was a political art that implied the governance of both game and the estate.