Cardinal-Duc de Richelieu et de Fronsac was born on 9 September 1585 and died on 4 December 1642. He was a French clergyman, nobleman and statesman.
He was ordained bishop in 1608 and later entered politics, when he became Secretary of State in 1616. Richelieu quickly rose in importance, in both the Catholic Church and in the French government, as he became a Cardinal in 1622, and the Prime Minister of Louis XIII in 1624. He was succeeded by Cardinal Jules Mazarin.
Cardinal De Richelieu is considered the world's first prime minister, in the modern sense of the word. He wanted to strengthen royal power, and by restricting the power of the nobility, he transformed France into a strong, centralized state.
His main foreign policy goals were to curb the power of the Austrian House of Habsburg and to defend France’s interests in the Thirty Years' War. Although he was a cardinal, he did not hesitate to enter into alliances with Protestant rulers in order to achieve his goals.
Richelieu is one of the main characters in Alexandre Dumas’ novel The Three Musketeers, in which he is portrayed as the antagonist even more powerful than the king, but history recognizes that the Cardinal’s power was in fact very dependent on the trust that the king placed in him.
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