Browse Items (67 total)

http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/files/original/2720d3de4a0bba4d7589a2b171eb0e88.jpg

1805

The second image, a color drawing by the popular English caricaturist James Gillray in 1805 during the Empire, takes a different view of the Directory, suggesting that it is a time of moral decadence and self–aggrandizement. It depicts Paul Barras,…

November 21, 1789

This 1789 article from the Révolutions de Paris, a leading radical newspaper, argues that the Revolution has not been achieved, because all of the changes to date could still be reversed. Moreover, it warns that "anti–patriots"—"nobles" in the…

March 6, 1789

The petitions from rural communities focused in part on the abuse of seigneurial dues owed by peasants to lords for which, in principle, they received protection and supervision. But by 1789, these excerpts demonstrate that peasants considered their…

1784

Like his predecessors of earlier generations, playwright Pierre–Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais—who became an important figure of the late Enlightenment because of the controversy surrounding his work The Marriage of Figaro [1784]—believed that a…

1789

The petitions from rural communities decried the abuse of seigneurial dues that peasants owed to lords in exchange for which they were supposed to receive protection and supervision. But by 1789, as these excerpts demonstrate, peasants had come to…

1789

The cahiers de doléances ["lists of grievances"] drawn up by each assembly in choosing deputies to the Estates–General are the best available source of the thoughts of the French population on the eve of the Revolution. This excerpt from a parish…

February 22, 1787

In 1783 Charles Alexandre de Calonne, a provincial noble, became royal finance minister. At first, he, like Vergennes, saw no need to rationalize the royal treasury or to appease the Parlements. By 1786, however, the deficit had become so…

December 23, 1789

On 21 December 1789, a deputy raised the question of the status of non–Catholics under the new regime; his intervention started a long debate that quickly expanded to cover Jews, actors, and executioners, all of them excluded from various rights…

August 11, 1789

The abolition of the feudal system, which took place during the famous night session of 4–5 August 1789, was precipitated by the reading of a report about the misery and disturbances in the provinces. The report was adopted in a fervor of enthusiasm…

August 11, 1789

The abolition of the feudal system, which took place during the famous night session of 4–5 August 1789, was precipitated by the reading of a report on the misery and disturbances in the provinces. The voting was carried in a fervor of enthusiasm and…
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