La liberté des mers Récits de voyages et enjeux coloniaux dans la France du premier xvii^e siècle

This article studies the very favourable reception of Hugo Grotius’ treatise, De Mare Liberum, in France in the early seventeenth century. The demand for the free movement of people and goods over the entirety of the world’s seas curtailed the division of the world between Iberian powers. It provided the legal framework for a new form of expansion orientated less towards territorial conquest and more towards an aggressive form of trade exemplified by the Dutch East India Company.