King Louis Philippe Coin Pendant

Louis Philippe, called the Citizen King (1773-1850), King of France (1830-48). He was the son of Louis Philippe Joseph, Duc D’Orleans and was born in Paris. By the late 1820’s under the autocratic rule of Louis XVIII’s brother and successor, Charles X, the last of the Bourbon Monarchs, the French middle and lower classes were growing restive.

Louis Philippe was by this time the favorite of those republican leaders who feared to arouse the opposition of all Europe by establishing a republic, and hoped that Louis Philippe would govern according to popular will. In 1830, by the July revolution that overthrew Charles Xand the Bourbon Dynasty in France, Louis Philippe was proclaimed King by the Chamber of Deputies.

At first Louis Philippe was content to rule as a “citizen king” and to conciliate the republicans who had helped bring him to power; he also dispensed with many royal privileges. Gradually, however, while remaining a constitutional monarch, he became more authoritarian, seeking not only to establish the Bourbon-Orleans Dynasty in France but also to consolidate his position among the sovereigns of Europe. He arranged for the marriage of his daughter Louise to Leopold I, King of the Belgians. This is a coin of this time.