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Wicquefort, Abraham de (1598-1682) |
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An intelligencer, gazetteer and, like Machiavelli, a diplomat of the second order who is remembered more for what he wrote than for his other accomplishments. Born in Holland, Wicquefort nevertheless spent most of his diplomatic career in Paris. Here he served as resident of the Elector of Brandenburg-Prussia from 1626 until 1658, when, having fallen foul of Mazarin, he was first briefly imprisoned in the Bastille and then expelled. Invited to The Hague by John de Witt, the Grand Pensionary of Holland, Wicquefort was employed as a translator for the States General but chiefly as the Grand Pensionary\'s special secretary for French correspondence. In 1675 Wicquefort, who had in the previous year also secured the appointment of resident in Holland of the Duke of Brunswick-Luneburg-Celle, was accused by his enemies of selling state secrets. He was tried by the Court of Holland and, despite his plea of diplomatic immunity, imprisoned for life on the grounds that he remained a Dutch national in the paid service of its government to which he had taken an oath of secrecy. Sent, like Grotius before him, to the prison of Loevestein (though he escaped to Celle in 1679), he devoted his time to furious writing. Without the aid of his large library, which had been confiscated, he wrote first the Mémoires touchant les ambassadeurs et les ministres publics, which he signed simply ‘L.M.P.’ (Le Ministre Prisonnier), and then his massive L\'Ambassadeur et ses fonctions. First published in the year before he died, translated into English as The Embassador and His Functions in 1716, and subsequently reissued many times, this became the most highly regarded manual of diplomacy of the eighteenth century. As has been remarked, Wicquefort was the Satow of the ancien régime. See also locally engaged staff. |
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