The French Monarchy:
1775 - 1793
Marie Antoinette & Louis XVI

Marie Antoinette and the
Royal Children

Marie Antoinette’s
“Peasant Cottage”

Marie Antoinette’s
“Peasant Cottage”

The Necklace Scandal
1,600,000 livres
[$100 million today]

Cardinal Louis René Édouard de Rohan

The Countess de LaMotte

Let Them Eat Cake!

“Madame Deficit”

“The Austrian Whore”

French Budget, 1774

Where is the tax money?

• Urban Commoner’s
Budget:
– Food 80%
– Rent 25%
– Tithe 10%
– Taxes 35%
– Clothing 20%
– TOTAL 170%
• King’s Budget:
– Interest 50%
– Army 25%
– Versailles 25%
– Coronation 10%
– Loans 25%
– Admin. 25%
– TOTAL 160%

The French Urban Poor
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
% of Income Spent on Bread
1787
1788

Socio-Economic Data, 1789

Ancien Regime Map, 1789

Convening the Estates General
May, 1789
Last time it was called into session was 1614!

The Suggested Voting Pattern:
Voting by Estates
1
1
Clergy
1st Estate
Aristocracy
2nd Estate
1
Commoners
3rd Estate

The Number of Representatives in the Estates General: Vote by Head!
300
300
Clergy
1st Estate
Aristocracy
2nd Estate
648
Commoners
3rd Estate

Europe on the Eve of the
French Revolution

“The Third Estate Awakens”

“The Tennis Court Oath” by Jacques Louis David
June 20, 1789


The French king could warrant imprisonment or death in a signed letter under his seal.

A carte-blanche warrant.

Cardinal Fleury issued 80,000 during the reign of Louis XV!

Eliminated in 1790.

Storming the Bastille,
July 14, 1789

Revolutionary Paris, 1789

The Great Fear:
Peasant Revolt
July 20,
1789

March of the Women,
October 5-6, 1789
We want the baker, the baker’s wife and the baker’s boy!

National Constituent Assembly
1789 - 1791
August Decrees
( August 4-11, 1789)

Equality & Meritocracy

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
August 26,
1789

The WHITE of the
Bourbons + the RED &
BLUE of Paris.

83 Revolutionary Departments
February 26, 1790

Planting the Tree of Liberty
1790

The Civil Constitution of the Clergy
July 12,
1790
Jurying vs.
Non-Jurying
Clergy

They were backed by the sale of Church lands.

Louis XVI “Accepts” the Constitution
& the National Assembly. 1791

The French Constitution of 1791:
A Bourgeois Government
 The king got the “suspensive” veto
[which prevented the passage of laws for 3 years].
* he could not pass laws.
* his ministers were responsible for their own actions.

A permanent, elected, single chamber
National Assembly.
* had the power to grant taxation.
 An independent judiciary.
 “Active” Citizen vs. “Passive” Citizen .

Louis XVI Tried to Escape to Varennes, 1791

 The Society of the Friends of the
Rights of Man and of the Citizen.

Organized in 1790.

It provided a political base for Danton and Marat.

It eventually drifted to the extreme left after Marat’s death.

Taken over by Jacques Réne Hébert and the Hébertists , who controlled the
Paris Commune.

Called for the deposition of the king.

The Champs de Mar
Massacre (July 17, 1791)

Led by the Cordeliers.

Put down by the Marquis de
Lafayette and the newly-created
National Guard.
1757 – 1834

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SOURCES o “Hist210—Europe in the Age of Revolutions.” http://www.ucl.ac.uk/history/courses/europe1/ chron/rch5.htm
o “Liberty, Fraternity, Equality: Exploring the
French Revolution.” http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/ o Matthews, Andrew. Revolution and
Reaction: Europe, 1789-1849. Cambridge
University Press, 2001.
o “The Napoleonic Guide.” http://www.napoleonguide.com/index.htm