Philippe was able to take power away from Louis-Auguste, Duke of Maine (illegitimate son of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan) who had been the favourite son of the late king and possessed much influence. From 1715 to 1718 the Polysynody changed the system of government in France, in which each minister (secretary of state) was replaced by a council. The système de Law was also introduced, which transformed the finances of the bankrupted kingdom and its aristocracy. Both Cardinal Dubois and Cardinal Fleury were highly influential during this time.
1 September 1715: Louis XIV dies, his will entrusts the government of France to a regency council, with Philippe II, Duke of Orléans as an honorary president and the Duke of Maine as the real power, until his great-grandson and successor, the five-year old Louis XV, reaches his majority (13 years old) in 1723.
2 September 1715: the Duke of Orléans allies himself with the Parlement of Paris, who cancelled Louis XIV's will. As a Prince of the Blood, Philippe of Orléans had been a member of the Parlement.
12 September: Philippe of Orléans recognised Regent by order of the Parlement;
15 September: Parlement claims the Droit de remontrance, the right to revoke a law made by a King who had died, further supporting the Regent's claim to power.
1 October 1715: Polysynody was held in Paris; it was composed of the highest nobility of the country.
30 December: Removal of Louis XV from the Château de Vincennes to the Tuileries Palace;
Louis XV put under the care of François de Neufville, Duke of Villeroi; Guillaume Delisle and the Cardinal Fleury are put in charge of Louis' education.
24 September: end of the Polysynody and the reestablishment of ministers;
4 December: Banque générale becomes the Banque Royale;
December Exposure of the Cellamare Conspiracy headed by the Duke of Maine and his wife Anne Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon, which aimed at placing Philip V of Spain as regent of France with the help of the Spanish Ambassador, the "príncipe de Cellamare"; the Duke and Duchess are exiled from court and return in 1720 to their home at the Château de Sceaux;
21 July: Death of Marie Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans; daughter of the Regent who participated in the hectic nightlife of his court, even during several pregnancies with different men. (Jules Michelet, "Histoire de France, vol.XV, La Régence", Equateurs, 2008).
15 June: Louis XV and the court return to Versailles; the Regent takes the old apartments of his dead cousin, the late Louis, Dauphin of France (1661–1711);
22 August: Guillaume Dubois made the Chief Minister of the Regent;
Louis XV orders plans for the future Salon d'Hercule to begin;
2 February: Secret marriage of the Count of Toulouse and Marie Victoire de Noailles (already widowed daughter in law of Mme de Montespan) in Paris; their marriage was only announced after the death of the Regent;
16 February: Louis XV attains his majority upon turning 13 years old
Council of Finances (Conseil des Finances, headed by the Duke of Noailles)
Council of the Affairs the Kingdom (Conseil des Affaires du Dedans du Royaume, headed by the Duke of Antin – half brother of the Duke of Maine and Count of Toulouse) Members included: marquis de Harlay, de Goissard, Marquis of Argenson,
Louis-Auguste, Duke of Maine (31 March 1670 – 14 May 1736) favourite but illegitimate son of Louis XIV and Madame de Maintenon, he was despised by the Princes of the Blood due to his constant honours and great wealth he accumulated from his father. He died at Sceaux aged 66;
John Law (pronounced Jean Lass) (21 April 1671 – 21 March 1729) was a Scottish economist who believed that money was only a means of exchange that did not constitute wealth in itself and that national wealth depended on trade. He was responsible for the Mississippi Bubble and a chaotic economic collapse in France; he died in Venice.
InfantaMariana Victoria of Spain (31 March 1718 – 15 January 1781) was the eldest daughter of Philip V of Spain and his second wife Elisabeth of Parma; born in Madrid, she moved to France in 1721 and lived at the Tuileries Palace in Paris with her proposed husband; the engagement was broken off due to tense relations regarding the marriages of the Regent's daughters to Philip V's sons. The Infanta was sent back to Spain and later married the future Joseph I of Portugal; the present Brazilian Imperial Family descends from Philippe d'Orléans, Louis XV as well as Mariana Victoria;
Anne Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon (8 November 1676 – 23 January 1753) was the wife of the Duke of Maine and thus daughter-in-law of Louis XIV; she was one of the Regent's most ardent enemies and was the aunt of the Duke of Bourbon; she was also the granddaughter of the Le Grand Condé; she held court at Sceaux and was exiled to Dijon after the Cellamare Conspiracy was discovered; she died in Paris having outlived most of her generation;
Palace of Versailles : Birthplace of Louis XV and the home of the French court before and after the Regency; it was at Versailles that the Duke of Orléans died in 1723;
Palais-Royal : Paris home of the House of Orléans; it was from there that the Regent handled state affairs; his last daughter, Louise Diane, was also born at the palace;
Tuileries Palace : the childhood home of Louis XV during the Regency; Louis XV was installed in the Grand Appartements of Louis XIV located on the second floor.
The Régence marked the temporary eclipse of Versailles as centre of policymaking, since the Regent's court was at the Palais Royal in Paris. It marked the rise of Parisian salons as cultural centres, as literary meeting places and nuclei of discreet liberal resistance to some official policies. In the Paris salons aristocrats mingled more easily with the higher Bourgeoisie in a new atmosphere of relaxed decorum, comfort and intimacy.
In the arts, the style of the Régence is marked by early Rococo, characterised by the paintings of Antoine Watteau (1684–1721).
Rococo developed first in the decorative arts and interior design. Louis XIV's succession brought a change in the court artists and general artistic fashion. By the end of the old king's reign, rich Baroque designs were giving way to lighter elements with more curves and natural patterns. These elements are obvious in the architectural designs of Nicolas Pineau. During the Régence, court life moved away from Versailles and this artistic change became well established, first in the royal palace and then throughout French high society. The delicacy and playfulness of Rococo designs is often seen as perfectly in tune with the excesses of Louis XV's regime.
The 1730s represented the height of Rococo development in France. The style had spread beyond architecture and furniture to painting and sculpture, exemplified by the works of Watteau and François Boucher. Rococo still maintained the Baroque taste for complex forms and intricate patterns, but by this point, it had begun to integrate a variety of diverse characteristics, including a taste for Oriental designs and asymmetric compositions.
The Régence is also the customary French word for the pre-independence regimes in the western North African countries, the so-called Barbary Coast. It was applied to:
First the Barbary Coast (Maghrebinian countries in North Africa) was formally Ottoman, but de facto independent (dominated by military governors, soon de facto princes, styled dey, beyorbeylerbey, and by the raïs, Muslim corsairs).
