French Revolution (1789)

Early Modern Era · ~1500 – ~1800

The French Revolution was a period of political and social upheaval in France that began in 1789 and ended, by most reckonings, with Napoleon Bonaparte's seizure of power in 1799. It started when a financial crisis forced Louis XVI to call the Estates General, and it ended the old order of absolute monarchy, noble privilege and a state-backed church. In its place came a series of new regimes, among them a constitutional monarchy and, from 1792, a republic.

The Revolution produced the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, the abolition of feudal dues, the execution of the king, a war against much of Europe, and the Terror of 1793 to 1794. Its ideas of citizenship, equality before the law and national sovereignty spread across Europe and the Atlantic world, and its quarrels over them have shaped politics ever since.

Things happened, and the rest is history

The debt of the French state after the American war
Event
What happened
France supports the American colonists against Britain from 1778 and pays for the war largely by borrowing. By the 1780s, interest on the debt takes up a very large share of royal revenue. Finance ministers such as Jacques Necker and Charles Alexandre de Calonne try to raise money and reform the system, but meet resistance.
The rest is history
The crisis showed that the crown could not fund itself without the consent of privileged groups who would not pay more tax. Historians agree that the debt was a major cause of the Revolution, though they differ on how far deeper social tensions mattered. In 1787 Calonne's reform plan was put to an Assembly of Notables, which rejected it. The failure pushed the monarchy toward calling a wider body, the Estates General, in 1789.
Sources
1. BookDoyle, William. Origins of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980.
2. BookDoyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.
The Assembly of Notables and the Parlement fight, 1787 to 1788
Event
What happened
In 1787 the Assembly of Notables refuses to approve new taxes, and Calonne is dismissed. His successor Loménie de Brienne turns to the Parlement of Paris, which refuses to register new taxes and demands that the Estates General be called. In 1788 the crown tries to curb the parlements, and riots break out in provincial towns such as Grenoble.
The rest is history
The crown lost the support of the nobles and magistrates who had long defended the old order. In August 1788 the government promised to summon the Estates General for May 1789, which had not met since 1614. Necker was recalled to office. The long argument over how the Estates would vote opened the way to the events of 1789.
Sources
1. BookDoyle, William. Origins of the French Revolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980.
2. BookJones, Colin. The Great Nation: France from Louis XV to Napoleon. London: Allen Lane, 2002.
Poor harvests and bread prices, 1788 to 1789
Event
What happened
A hailstorm in July 1788 and a poor harvest that year push up the price of grain in France. The winter of 1788 to 1789 is very cold, and in the spring of 1789 bread costs a large share of a labourer's wages. Food riots break out in towns and the countryside.
The rest is history
Hardship in the cities and villages fed the anger that made the political crisis explosive. Crowds in Paris were already tense when the Estates General met. The hunger helped drive the popular risings of the summer of 1789, including the march on Versailles in October. Historians see the harvest as a trigger working alongside the financial and political crisis rather than as a sole cause.
Sources
1. BookLefebvre, Georges. The Coming of the French Revolution. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947.
2. BookSchama, Simon. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. New York: Knopf, 1989.
The Estates General and the National Assembly, 1789
Event
What happened
The Estates General opens at Versailles on 5 May 1789, with separate bodies for clergy, nobility and the Third Estate. After weeks of deadlock over voting by order or by head, the Third Estate declares itself the National Assembly on 17 June. On 20 June its members swear the Tennis Court Oath not to separate until France has a constitution.
The rest is history
The king gave way, and on 27 June ordered the other orders to join the Assembly. This was a claim that sovereignty belonged to the nation rather than to the crown alone. The Assembly later renamed itself the National Constituent Assembly and began to write a constitution. Troops massing around Paris in early July raised fears of a royal crackdown.
Sources
1. BookDoyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.
2. BookTackett, Timothy. Becoming a Revolutionary: The Deputies of the French National Assembly and the Emergence of a Revolutionary Culture. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996.
The fall of the Bastille, 14 July 1789
Event
What happened
On 12 July 1789 news of Necker's dismissal reaches Paris and crowds gather. On 14 July a crowd seeks arms at the Invalides and then marches on the Bastille, a royal fortress and prison. After some hours of fighting the governor, Bernard-René de Launay, surrenders, and he is killed by the crowd.
The rest is history
The Bastille held only a handful of prisoners, but it stood for royal power. The king withdrew his troops and accepted the new order in Paris. Rural unrest, the Great Fear, spread across the country that summer. 14 July later became the French national day.
Sources
1. BookGodechot, Jacques. The Taking of the Bastille: July 14th, 1789. London: Faber, 1970.
2. BookSchama, Simon. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. New York: Knopf, 1989.
August 1789: feudalism abolished and the Declaration of Rights
Event
What happened
On the night of 4 August 1789 the National Assembly votes to end feudal dues, tithes and many privileges. On 26 August it adopts the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. The Declaration states that men are born free and equal in rights, and that sovereignty rests in the nation.
The rest is history
These acts ended legal privilege by birth in principle, though many feudal payments were in practice made redeemable and the details took years to settle. The Declaration became a model for later statements of rights. It did not address slavery in the colonies or political rights for women, issues later argued over by figures such as Olympe de Gouges. The king hesitated to approve the decrees until pressed in October.
Sources
1. PrimaryDéclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen. Adopted by the National Constituent Assembly, 26 August 1789. (opens in a new tab)
2. BookHunt, Lynn. Inventing Human Rights: A History. New York: W. W. Norton, 2007.
The flight to Varennes, 1791
Event
What happened
On the night of 20 June 1791 Louis XVI and his family slip out of the Tuileries in disguise, heading for the eastern frontier. They are recognised and stopped at Varennes on 21 June and brought back to Paris. The king had left behind a declaration condemning the Revolution.
The rest is history
The flight destroyed much trust in the king as a constitutional monarch. Many came to see him as an enemy who would side with foreign powers. Even so, the Assembly kept him on the throne and completed the Constitution of 1791. Support for a republic grew, and tension with Austria and Prussia rose toward war.
Sources
1. BookOzouf, Mona. Varennes: The Death of Kings. Paris: Gallimard, 2005.
2. BookDoyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.
War, the republic and the execution of the king, 1792 to 1793
Event
What happened
France declares war on Austria in April 1792. In August a Paris crowd storms the Tuileries and the king is suspended, and in September the National Convention abolishes the monarchy and proclaims a republic. Louis XVI is tried for treason and guillotined on 21 January 1793.
The rest is history
Britain, Spain and the Dutch Republic joined the war against France in 1793. The war and fear of internal enemies led to the Committee of Public Safety and the Terror, in which many thousands were executed and far more died in prison or in the civil war in the Vendée. The Terror ended with Robespierre's fall on 9 Thermidor, 27 July 1794. A coup by Napoleon Bonaparte on 18 Brumaire, 9 November 1799, closed the revolutionary decade.
Sources
1. BookDoyle, William. The Oxford History of the French Revolution. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.
2. BookBlanning, T. C. W. The French Revolutionary Wars, 1787-1802. London: Arnold, 1996.
Let them eat cake
Popular belief
The legend
Told when the poor of Paris have no bread, Marie Antoinette is said to have replied, "Let them eat cake." The line is used to show how out of touch the royal court was.
The rest is history
There is no evidence she said it. Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Confessions, written in the 1760s, tells of a great princess who suggested brioche for peasants with no bread. Marie Antoinette was then a child in Austria, and Rousseau did not name the princess. The line was pinned on her later in the Revolution as hostile propaganda.
Sources
1. PrimaryRousseau, Jean-Jacques. Les Confessions, Book 6. Written 1765 to 1770, published 1782.
2. BookFraser, Antonia. Marie Antoinette: The Journey. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2001.
The Bastille was full of prisoners freed by the crowd
Popular belief
The legend
The Bastille is often imagined as a dungeon packed with victims of royal tyranny, whom the crowd of 14 July 1789 set free.
The rest is history
When the fortress fell it held only seven prisoners: four forgers, two men held as insane, and one noble held at his family's request. The crowd was mainly after gunpowder and arms. The fortress mattered as a symbol of arbitrary royal justice, especially the lettres de cachet, and revolutionary writers made it a legend. It was demolished within months.
Sources
1. BookGodechot, Jacques. The Taking of the Bastille: July 14th, 1789. London: Faber, 1970.
2. BookSchama, Simon. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. New York: Knopf, 1989.
Dr Guillotin invented the guillotine and died by it
Popular belief
The legend
Joseph-Ignace Guillotin is said to have invented the guillotine and then been executed on it himself.
The rest is history
Guillotin was a physician and deputy who in 1789 urged that executions be made equal and painless for all ranks. The machine was designed by others, notably the surgeon Antoine Louis and the German maker Tobias Schmidt, and first used in April 1792. Guillotin did not die on it. He was jailed during the Terror, was freed, and died in 1814 of natural causes. His family later sought to change the name of the device, without success.
Sources
1. BookArasse, Daniel. The Guillotine and the Terror. London: Allen Lane, 1989.
2. BookGerould, Daniel. Guillotine: Its Legend and Lore. New York: Blast Books, 1992.
Marie Antoinette's hair turned white overnight
Popular belief
The legend
After the arrest at Varennes, or before her execution, Marie Antoinette is said to have gone grey or white in a single night from grief and fear.
The rest is history
Accounts say her hair was white at the time of her trial, and memoirs tell of it turning grey after the return from Varennes in 1791. Sudden whitening in a night is not supported by medical evidence, though stress may be linked to hair loss in some conditions. She was 37 when executed on 16 October 1793, after months of hardship in prison. Her hair may well have been much greyer than before, and the story grew from this.
Sources
1. BookFraser, Antonia. Marie Antoinette: The Journey. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2001.
2. BookSchama, Simon. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. New York: Knopf, 1989.

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Things happened, and the rest is history

The debt of the French state after the American war

The Assembly of Notables and the Parlement fight, 1787 to 1788

Poor harvests and bread prices, 1788 to 1789

The Estates General and the National Assembly, 1789

The fall of the Bastille, 14 July 1789

August 1789: feudalism abolished and the Declaration of Rights

The flight to Varennes, 1791

War, the republic and the execution of the king, 1792 to 1793

Let them eat cake

The Bastille was full of prisoners freed by the crowd

Dr Guillotin invented the guillotine and died by it

Marie Antoinette's hair turned white overnight