FRENCH
REVOLUTION
1789 - 1799
FOUR STAGES
1. Moderate (1789-1792)
2. Reign of Terror (1793-1794)
3. Reaction (1794-1798)
4. Napoleonic (1799-1815)
Class
resentments
Financial
crisis
REVOLUTION
Enlightenment
ideas
Bad
harvests
BEFORE THE
REVOLUTION
“LE ANCIEN REGIME”
THE OLD REGIME
FINANCIAL CRISIS
Economic troubles
• Louis XIV & XV
• Wars
• Outdated tax system
• Clergy/nobles
• Exempt from taxes
• Commoners
• Indirect taxes
• taille-produce
• gabelle-salt
• 20% increase
under Louis XVI
• Taxes to lords
FINANCIAL CRISIS
Wars
• Seven Years War, American Revolution
• Lost significant overseas revenue
• Financed with borrowed money
Louis XVI: “Where is the tax money?”
FAILED FINANCIAL
REFORMS
Strength of Aristocracy and Bourgeoisie
• State couldn’t declare bankruptcy
• Attempted reform of tax system in 1787 fails (leads to calling of the
Estates General)
No central bank
• France still used gold as currency
• Couldn’t print money to create inflation
Jacques Necker,
Minister of Finance
THREE ESTATES
Divisions based on class and rank
1.
First Estate
•
Church
Second Estate
•
Nobles
Third Estate
2.
3.
•
•
•
Bourgeoisie
Working poor
Rural peasants
No Taxes
Estate
Clergy
1st
less than 1 % of
population
owned 20% of
land tax free
About 100,000
2nd
Nobility
less than 2 % of
population
Exempt from
corvee’, gabelle
and taille
About 400,000
Role in society Needs
registration
of births,
A decrease in
marriages and deaths
the power of the
collected the tithe
Monarch and
censored books
increase in their
served as moral police
political power.
operated schools and
hospitals
Maintain their
distributed relief to the
property rights
poor
???
To maintain
their current
position
3RD ESTATE
upper
middle
lower
97 %
Wants and needs
Bourgeoisie
merchants
professionals
craftsmen
Political Power to match
their economic power
(exemption from taxes)
Social recognition
Working poor
less taxes and lower rent
Peasants
Rewards for their work and
food on the table
THE MONARCHY
Careless, spendthrift,
foolish
Inherited a country on the
precipice of bankruptcy
• Louis XIV: La etat, ces Moi
• Louis XV: Apres Moi, le deluge
Virtuous, but uninterested
in government
THE MONARCHY
People were starving,
but the royal family
flaunted their wealth,
indulged in excesses,
appeared uncaring
Widespread criticism
of royal excesses
undermined the
monarchy
Marie Antoinette and
her scandals
Dress Scandal
AFFAIR OF THE DIAMOND
NECKLACE
647 diamonds
1.8m francs=$8m today
Refused many times by the
queen
Commissioned by Louis XV
for Madame Dubarry
Trial and scandal
MODEL PEASANT VILLAGE
Gardens of Versailles
Escape from court life
Milking parlor, pigsty,
cowshed, 12 cottages
Dressed in rustic
costume
Supervised peasants at
work
Performed in plays
about country life
Marie Antoinette and her children -
1787
This is one of the last portraits that
Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun painted
of the doomed queen. The picture
shows Marie Therese Charlotte de
France, Madame Royale, and her
brother, Louis-Joseph, Le Dauphin,
standing. Louis-Joseph died of natural
causes early in the year that the
revolution began. The next younger
child, Louis-Charles, Duc de Normandie,
shown on the Queen's lap, then
became the second Dauphin. After his
father had been guillotined he became
known as Louis XVII. This Louis may
have been murdered, or may have died
of other causes while imprisoned in the
temple. In another theory it was
thought he may have survived after
being exchanged for another sickly
child. In April 2000 it was proved by
DNA analysis that the body of a boy
found in a temple was in fact the body
of Louis XVII. He died of malnutrition
and neglect. The empty cradle is a
reference to Princess Sophie, who was
born and died in 1786.This painting still
hangs at Versailles.
FRANCE IN THE LATE 18TH
CENTURY
Population around 28 million
Grew 10 million in 100 years
Over 20 million in the countryside
A few large towns, but dominated by Paris with over 600,000
people.
1780s are marked by a series of crop failures and rising food
prices
Marked with periodic rebellions
% OF INCOME SPENT ON BREAD
FOR THE AVERAGE LABORER
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Aug 1788
Feb 1789
Aug 1788
Feb 1789
ENLIGHTENMENT
IDEAS SPREAD
Liberty-Natural rights
Sovereignty of the people
Equality
• Under the law
• Bourgeois ambitions and discontent
• Abbe Sieyes “What is the Third Estate” 1788
Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite!
Abbe Sieyes
WHAT IS THE THIRD
ESTATE?
• Everything.
What has it been until Now?
• Nothing.
What does it demand?
• To become something.
Abbé Sieyès
"What is the third Estate?“
"Qu'est-ce que le Tiers-Etat?"
January 1789
MODERATE
STAGE
1789-1792
Estates General at the palace of Versailles
CALLING OF THE
ESTATES GENERAL
Called in July 1788 to meet in 1789
• First time since 1614
• End of Absolutism
Parlements decides EG will be conducted in the same way as
before
• One voter per Estate
This disgusts the Third Estate
Cahiers de
doleances
CAHIERS DES
DOLEANCES
Objections to the current system
Main Demands
• Eliminate Lettres de Cachet
(i.e. demands due process)
• Nation decides its own taxes
• Estates General every 4 years
• Equal taxes on all classes
• Third Estate representation in Parlements
AT THE ESTATES GENERAL
May 5th 1789
Background of rising bread prices
Third Estate urges reform, relief, equal voice (vote by head, not
estate)
Third Estate declares the “National Assembly” on June 17th 1789
after weeks of arguing and stalemate
Locked out of meeting place, convenes on the King’s tennis
courts
Tennis Court Oath
THE TENNIS COURT
OATH
June 20th 1789
Will not disband until a constitution is drafted
Conservatives on right, Liberals on left
Starts making laws in the name of the French people
RISING TENSIONS
June 27th Louis orders nobles and clergy to join the Third Estatethey refuse
Louis orders army near Paris & Versailles
Soaring bread prices
Fear of aristocratic plot against Assembly
Storming of the Bastille, July 14th
• Aristocrats flee
• Louis withdraws troops
Storming of the Bastille
July 14th 1789
CHAIN REACTION
Peasants in the countryside hear of the success of the Paris riots
Triggers riots throughout France
The Great Fear
• Looting (food)
• Burning (houses of Lords, records of obligations)
Louis acts indecisively
• People begin to demand his removal
The Great Fear
The Path
of the
Great
Fear
The
awakening
of the Third
Estate—
the nobility
and clergy
recoil in
fear
AUGUST 4TH 1789
Emergency night session called in response to “Le Grande Peur”
National Assembly ends serfdom, feudalism, all class privilege
(August Decrees)
“Liberty, equality, fraternity”
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
Calls for a constitutional monarchy like that of Britain
Declaration of the Rights
of Man and of the Citizen
Adopted August 26, 1789
Women’s march to Versailles, October 5, 1789
We want the baker, the baker’s wife and the baker’s boy!
OCTOBER DAYS
Louis had not accepted the August 4 decrees or the
Declaration
Women (and men) march on Versailles to demand bread
• Joined by 20,000 Paris Guards
• Louis promises bread
• Royal family forced to Paris
• Remove Louis from the influence of his corrupt ministers
THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY &
REFORMS
Subordination of Church to
State
Confiscates Church property (Nov. 1789)
• Sells land to pay public debt
Civil Constitution of the Clergy (1790)
• Reduces power of bishops
• Clergy selected and paid by the State
• Oath of Allegiance
Confiscation of Church Lands
Caricature showing the jubilation of the clergy after the reforms
Print Assignats
Issued by the National Constituent Assembly.
Interest-bearing notes with church lands as security.
THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY &
REFORMS
Administrative reforms
83 new administrative units replace the uncoordinated
provinces
Standardized system of courts
Abolition of torture and sale of judicial offices
Citizen juries created
Re-Division of
France, 1790
83 administrative
units of roughly equal
size
THE NATIONAL
ASSEMBLY &
REFORMS
Economic reforms
Uniform system of weights and measures
Abolition of guild restrictions
Elimination of taxes on goods transported within the country
THE NATIONAL
ASSEMBLY &
REFORMS
Constitution of 1791 (Sept.)
Louis forced to accept the Constitution
Constitution of 1791
FLIGHT TO VARENNES
Louis tries to escape Paris (June 20, 1791)
Planned to mobilize troops with help from Leopold II of
Austria
The royal family is captured just a few miles from the border
and returned to Paris. Now the King is viewed with
deepening suspicion.
DECLARATION OF PILLNITZ
Austria and Prussia issue the Declaration of Pillnitz
• States intention to intervene in France under certain situations
Response of the Assembly
• “we will incite a war of people against kings”
Olympe de Gouges
(1745-1793)
Declaration of the Rights
of Woman and of the
Citizen (1791)
Against the execution of the
King
Guillotined in 1793 as a
reactionary royalist
END OF THE
REVOLUTION?
By the end of September 1791, the National Assembly
announces that its work is done
All goals seem to have been achieved
Only a radical minority clamor for more
Things seem to be settling down
HOWEVER…
LA MARSEILLES
Let us go, children of the father land
Out day of Glory has arrived
Against us stands tyranny,
The bloody flag is raised
The bloody flag is raised.
Do you hear in the countryside
The roar of these savage soldiers
They come right into our arms
To cut the throat of your sons,
Your country. To arms, citizens!
Form up your battalions
Let us march, Let us march!
That their impure blood
Should water our fields
The Tricolor (1789)
The WHITE of the
Bourbons + the RED &
BLUE of Paris.
Citizen!
The “Liberty Cap”: Bonne Rouge
The “Second” French Revolution
 The National Convention:
 Girondin Rule: 1792-1793
 Jacobin Rule: 1793-1794
[“Reign of Terror”]
 Thermidorian Reaction:
 The Directory  1795-1799
1794-1795
Attitudes
& actions
of
monarchy
& court
Fear of
CounterRevolution
Religious
divisions
The Causes of
Instability in France
1792 - 1795
Economi
c
Crises
War
Political
divisions
The Jacobins
Jacobin Meeting House
 They held their meetings in the
library of a former Jacobin
monastery in Paris.
 Started as a debating society.
 Membership mostly middle class.
 Created a vast network of clubs.
The Sans-Culottes:
The Parisian Working Class
 Small shopkeepers.
 Tradesmen.
 Artisans.
They shared many of the
ideals of their middle
class representatives in
government!
The Sans-Culottes
Depicted as Savages by a British Cartoonist.
The National Convention
(September, 1792)
 Its first act was the formal
abolition of the monarchy on
September 22, 1792.
 The Year I of the French Republic.
 The Decree of Fraternity
 it offered French assistance to any
subject peoples who wished to
overthrow their governments.
When France sneezes,
all of Europe catches cold!
The Political Spectrum
TODAY:
1790s:
Montagnards
The Plain
(swing votes)
Girondists
(“The Mountain”)
Monarchíen
(Royalists)
Jacobins
The Politics of the
National Convention (1792-1795)
Jacobins
 Power base in Paris.
 Main support from the
sans-culottes.
 Would adopt extreme
measures to achieve their
goals.
 Saw Paris as the center of the
Revolution.
 More centralized [in Paris]
approach to government.
Girondists
 Power base in the
provinces.
 Feared the influence
of the sans-culottes.
 Feared the dominance
of Paris in national
politics.
 Supported more
national government
centralization
[federalism].
The “Purifying” Pot of the Jacobin
Louis XVI as a Pig
c
c
For the Montagnards, the king was a traitor.
The Girondins felt that the Revolution had
gone far enough and didn’t want to execute
the king [maybe exile him].
Louis XVI’s Head (January 21, 1793)
c
c
c
The trial of the king
was hastened by the
discovery in a secret
cupboard in the
Tuilieres of a cache of
documents.
They proved
conclusively Louis’
knowledge and
encouragement of
foreign intervention.
The National
Convention voted
387 to 334 to
execute the monarchs.
The Death of “Citizen” Louis Capet
Matter for reflection
for the crowned
jugglers.
So impure blood
doesn’t soil our land!
Marie Antoinette as a Serpent
The “Widow Capet”
Marie Antoinette
on the Way to the Guillotine
Marie Antoinette Died in October, 1793
Attempts to Control
the Growing Crisis
1. Revolutionary Tribunal in Paris  try
suspected counter-revolutionaries.
A. Representatives-on-Mission
sent to the provinces & to the army.
had wide powers to oversee
conscription.
B. Watch Committees [comité de
surveillance]
keep an eye on foreigners & suspects.
C. Sanctioned the trial & execution of
rebels and émigrés, should they ever
return to France.
Attempts to Control
the Growing Crisis
2. The printing of more assignats to
pay for the war.
3. Committee of Public Safety [CPS]
 to oversee and speed up the work of the
government during this crisis.
4. Committee of General Security [CGS]
 responsible for the pursuit of
counter-revolutionaries, the
treatment of suspects, & other
internal security matters.
Committee for Public Safety
 Revolutionary Tribunals.
 300,000 arrested.
 16,000 – 50,000 executed.
Maximillian Robespierre
(1758 – 1794)
Georges Jacques Danton
(1759 – 1794)
Jean-Paul Marat
(1744 – 1793)
“The Death of Marat”
by Jacques Louis David, 1793
The Assassination of Marat
by Charlotte Corday, 1793
The Assassination of Marat
by Charlotte
Corday
Paul Jacques
Aimee
Baudry, 19c
[A Romantic
View]
The Levee en Masse:
An Entire Nation at Arms! – 500,000 Soldiers
An army based on merit, not birth!
Legislation Passed by the
National Convention
1. Law of General Maximum
 September 5, 1793.
 Limited prices of grain & other essentials to 1/3
above the 1790 prices & wages to ½ of 1790
figures.
 Prices would be strictly enforced.
 Hoarders rooted out and punished.
 Food supplies would be secured by the army!
2. Law of Suspects
September 17, 1793.
This law was so widely drawn that almost anyone
not expressing enthusiastic support for the
republic could be placed under arrest!
The Reign of Terror
Terror is nothing other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible. -Robespierre
Let terror be the order of
the day!
c
c
The Revolutionary
Tribunal of Paris alone
executed 2,639 victims
in 15 months.
The total number of
victims nationwide was
over 20,000!
The Guillotine:
An “Enlightenment Tool”?
Oh, thou charming guillotine,
You shorten kings and queens;
By your influence divine,
We have re-conquered our rights.
Come to aid of the Country
And let your superb instrument
Become forever permanent
To destroy the impious sect.
Sharpen your razor for Pitt and his agents
Fill your divine sack with heads of tyrants.
Different Social Classes Executed
8%
7%
28%
25%
31%
The “Monster” Guillotine
The last guillotine execution in France was in 1939!
War of Resistance to the Revolution:
The Vendee Revolt, 1793
Vendee Revolt, 1793
Vendee
Symbol:
Drowning the Traitors!
For God &
the King!
Why was there a Revolt
in the Vendee?
1. The need for 300,000 French troops
for the war effort.
2. Rural peasantry still highly taxed.
3. Resentment of the Civil Constitution
the Clergy.
4. Peasants had failed to benefit from
the sale of church lands.
TARGETS:
Local government officials
National Guardsmen
Jurying priests
Religious Terror:
De-Christianization (1793-1794)
 The Catholic Church was linked with
real or potential counter-revolution.
 Religion was associated with the
Ancien Régime and superstitious
practices.
 Very popular among the sans-culottes.
 Therefore, religion had no place in a
rational, secular republic!
The De-Christianization Program
1. The adoption of a new Republican
Calendar:
abolished Sundays & religious holidays.
months named after seasonal features.
7-day weeks replaced by 10-day
decades.
the yearly calendar was dated from
the creation of the Republic
[Sept. 22, 1792]
The Convention symbolically divorced the
state from the Church!!
A Republican Calendar
The New Republican Calendar
New Name
Meaning
Time Period
Vendemaire
Vintage
September 22 – October 21
Brumaire
Fog
October 22 – November 20
Frimaire
Frost
November 21 – December 20
Nivose
Snow
December 21 – January 19
Pluviose
Rain
January 20 – February 18
Ventose
Wind
February 19 – March 20
Germinal
Budding
March 21 – April 19
Floreal
Flowers
April 20 – May 19
Prairial
Meadow
May 20 – June 18
Messidor
Harvest
June 19 – July 18
Thermidor
Heat
July 19 – August 17
Fructidor
Fruit
August 18 – September 21
A New Republican Calendar Year
I
1792 – 1793
II
1793 – 1794
III
1794 – 1795
IV
1795 – 1796
V
1796 – 1797
VI
1797 – 1798
VII
1798 – 1799
VIII
1799 – 1800
IX
1800 – 1801
X
1801 – 1802
XI
1802 – 1803
XII
1803 – 1804
XIII
1804 – 1805
XIV
1805
The Gregorian System returned in 1806.
The De-Christianization Program
2. The public exercise of religion was
banned.
3. The Paris Commune supported the:
destruction of religious & royal statues.
ban on clerical dress.
encouragement of the clergy to give up
their vocations.
4. The Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris
was turned into the “Temple of Reason.”
5. The deportation of priests denounced by
six citizens.
The “Temple of Reason”
Come, holy Liberty, inhabit this temple,
Become the goddess of the French people.
The Festival of Supreme Being
A new secular holiday
Backlash to the
De-Christianization Program
 It alienated most of the population
(especially in the rural areas).
 Robespierre never supported it.
 he persuaded the Convention to
reaffirm the principle of religious
toleration.
 Decree on the “Liberty of Cults”
was passed
 December 6, 1793.
 BUT, it had little practical effect!
The Radical’s
Arms:
No God!
No Religion!
No King!
No Constitution!
The Terror Intensified:
March to July, 1794
Jacques
Hébert & the
Hérbetists
Danton & the
“Indulgents”
Executed in March, 1794
Executed in April, 1794
 Law of 22 Prairial [June 10, 1794].
 Trials were now limited to deciding only on liberty
OR death, with defendants having no rights.
 Were you an “enemy of the people?” (the law was
so broadly written that almost anyone could fall
within its definition!)
 1,500 executed between June & July.
French Victory at Fleurus
 June 26, 1794.
 France defeated Austria.
 This opened the way to the
reoccupation of Belgium!
The End of the Terror, 1794
P July 26  Robespierre gives a
speech illustrating new
plots & conspiracies.
 he alienated members of the CPS
& CGS.
 many felt threatened by his
implications.
P July 27  the Convention arrests
Robespierre.
P July 28  Robespierre is tried &
guillotined!
The Arrest of Robespierre
The Revolution Consumes
Its Own Children!
Danton Awaits
Execution, 1793
Robespierre Lies Wounded
Before the Revolutionary
Tribunal that will order him
to be guillotined, 1794.
The “Cultural Revolution”Brought About by the
Convention
 It was premised upon Enlightenment
principles of rationality.
 The metric system of weights and measures
 Was defined by the French Academy of
Sciences in 1791 and enforced in 1793.
 It replaced weights and measures that had
their origins in the Middle Ages.
 The abolition of slavery within France in 1791
and throughout the French colonies in 1794.
 The Convention legalized divorce and enacted
shared inheritance laws [even for illegitimate
offspring] in an attempt to eradicate
inequalities.
The “Thermidorian Reaction”
V Curtailed the power of the Committee
for Public Safety.
V Closed the Jacobin Clubs.
V Churches were reopened.

1795  freedom of worship for all cults was
granted.
V Economic restrictions were lifted in
favor of laissez-faire policies.
V August, 1795  a new Constitution is
written

more conservative republicanism.
Characteristics of the Directory
V The Paris Commune was outlawed.
V People involved in the original Terror
were now attacked  “White” Terror
V Inflation continues.
V Rule by rich bourgeois liberals.
V Self-indulgence  frivolous culture;
salons return; wild fashions.
V Political corruption.
V Revival of Catholicism.
The Government Structure of the
New Directory
V 5-man executive committee or oligarchy [to avoid
a dictatorship].
V Tried to avoid the dangers of a one-house
legislature.
 Council of 500  initiates legislation.
 Council of Elders [250 members]  married or
widowed males over 40 years of age.
o They accepted or rejected the legislation.

Both houses elected by electors who owned or
rented property worth 100-200 days’ labor [limited
to 30,000 voters].

The electors were elected by all males over 21 who
were taxpayers.
Political Instability: 1795-1796
 April, 1795  Inflation; bread riots.
 May 20, 1795  Revolt of Prairial [Year III]
 October, 1795 :
 Vendée and Brittany
revolted.
 Military suppressed
them.
 May, 1796  First
“communist” revolt
 Gracchus Babeuf and
the Conspiracy of Equals”
18 Brumaire (Nov. 9, 1799)
 Coup d’état by
Napoleon.
 Approved by a
plebiscite in
December.
 Abbe Sieyès:
Confidence
from below;
authority from
above.
A British Cartoon about Napoleon’s Coup
in 1799