Dictionary

lettre de cachet en · NOUN

Etymology

From French lettre de cachet.

Meanings

1. (historical) A warrant issued by the monarch in ancien régime France, especially one which imprisons someone without trial.
   • “Bon Dieu!” thought the old negotiator, “the boy has actually talked the woman round, and she’d get him a wife as she would a toy if Master cried for it. Why are there no such things as lettres-de-cachet—and a Bastille for young fellows of family?” 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 7, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:
   • I lost my temper, and spoke so irreverently of the Grand Monarque, that the next morning I was sent to the Bastile, by virtue of a Lettre de Cachet. 1751, [Tobias] Smollett, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), London: Harrison and Co., […], →OCLC:
   • This year the King sent it to Troyes, each member ordered there by an individual lettre de cachet. 1992, Hilary Mantel, A Place of Greater Safety, Harper Perennial, published 2007, page 113:
   • Louis stepped up persecution of prominent Jansenists, using lettres de cachet to imprison the most subversive [...]. 2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin, published 2003, page 22:

Forms