“To tame their ferocious character”: The noble cadet corps, École royale militaire, and the circulation of educational models in eighteenth-century Europe

The article explores what is probably the earliest known episode when French eighteenth-century actors held up an educational model borrowed from Russia as an example, rather than the other way around. It focuses on a memorandum presented to Louis XV by Joseph Pâris-Duverney, the founder of École royale militaire in Paris, in which the author sets up the Noble Land Cadet Corps established in St. Petersburg in 1731 as the model for the new French school. Both institutions were among the most significant educational innovations in the two countries in the eighteenth century. Additionally, the École is also central for Michel Foucault’s story of disciplinary power. A study of possible Russian influence on this French institution introduces a new perspective on the history of Franco-Russian cultural exchanges in the eighteenth century. This article also introduces the text of Duverney’s memorandum and offers an overview of the ways in which the Corps was perceived by Western Europeans of that day and the channels through which information about the Corps could have reached Pâris-Duverney.