Under Louis XVI, a French livre contained 0.29 grammes of pure gold [1]; this puts Marseillois' worth at 145 kilograms (320 lb) of gold. For a 110-gun ship like Bretagne, the raw wood was already worth 490,000 livres, and the total construction cost amounted to 1,150,000 livres (see Les Européens et les espaces océaniques au XVIIIe siècle, p.17)
In later editions of The French Revolution: A History, Carlyle added a paragraph that dismisses his own previous account. See for instance the Centenary Edition, p.242
Under Louis XVI, a French livre contained 0.29 grammes of pure gold [1]; this puts Marseillois' worth at 145 kilograms (320 lb) of gold. For a 110-gun ship like Bretagne, the raw wood was already worth 490,000 livres, and the total construction cost amounted to 1,150,000 livres (see Les Européens et les espaces océaniques au XVIIIe siècle, p.17)
