Unit 4 French Revolution and Napoleon Empire

VOCABULARY
https://quizlet.com/almusociales
revolution (revolución)
Napoleon Bonaparte
new regime (nuevo régimen)
constitutional monarchy
(monarquía constitucional)
republic (república)
abolition (abolición)
Estates General (Estados
Generales)
assembly (asamblea)
riot (disturbios)
feudal rights (privilegios
feudales)
sans- cullotte
coalition (coalición)
guillotine (guillotina)
coup (golpe (de Estado))
civil-right (derecho civil)
Almudena Corrales Marbán

1. INTRODUCTION
The outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789 marked the start of the
Contemporary Age (remember our timeline)

PREVIOUS
UNIT

WHAT IS A REVOLUTION?
Dramatic changes
that often includes:
The fall of a
government
The transformation
of a social and
economic order

At this point it is very important to focus on the following aspects:
• Before the French Revolution, enlightened despots failed to make the
political, economic and social changes the Enlightenment thinkers had
proposed. From 1789 onwards, these changes were violently imposed
by revolutionaries, against the wishes of the monarchs.
• The French Revolution marked the arrival of a new era, which was
symbolized by the famous slogan: “LIBERTY, EQUALITY AND
FRATERNITY´”.
• Revolutionaries often added the words “or death” to the slogan to show
that they were prepared to fight and die for their principles.

The slogan of the revolution (artist and date unknown)

Driven by the example of the American
Revolution and such Enlightenment ideas as
liberty, equality, and democracy, the French ousted
the government of Louis XVI and established a
new political order.
Who do you think some historians cite the
“wind from America” as a cause of the French
Revolution?

2. THE CAUSES OF THE
FRENCH REVOLUTION
The French Revolution was a period of violent political and social
change, which saw the abolition of absolute monarchy and the end of
the estates system of Ancien Régime (closed society).
• The influence of the Enlightenment: Rousseau (Du Contrat Social),
Voltaire (Lettres Philosophiques) and Montesquieu (De l’Espirit des
Loix).
• French intellectuals and bourgeoisie supported Enlightenment ideas
and tried to put them into practice. For example, they demanded that
all French subjects be free and equal under the law.
2.1. IDEAS

2.2. POLITICAL CRISIS
What were The Estates General?
0 A meeting of representatives
of the three estates of the realm in
France.
0 They gave the king some advise
on important issues, such as tax
increases.

0 King Louis XVI (1774-1792)
0 He governed France as an absolute
monarch.
0 He opposed meetings of the Estates
General.
0 The estates of the realm:
0could not present their demands.
0Could not try to limit the king´s power.

2.3. ECONOMIC CRISIS
0 The French state was bankrupt
(without money and unable to pay debts).
0Causes:
0participation in military conflicts, such
as the American War of independence.
0The royal family spent large amounts
of money on palaces, luxury goods and
extravagant parties.

Drawing of the palace of Versailles

Hall of Mirrors. Versailles.
Guess the artistic style!Almudena Corrales Marbán

0 How did Louis XVI´s ministers try to
improve the country finances?
0 Increasing taxes
0Even for the privileged upper classes.
Turgot
Necker

By the late 18th century, all three estates of realm were discontented with
the crown, but for different reasons.
• THE CLERGY (FIRST STATE) AND THE NOBILITY (SECOND ESTATE)
Both estates wanted to protect their traditional economic privileges. They
refuse d to pay taxes that the king’s ministers were demanding.
2.4. SOCIAL CRISIS

• THE MIDDLE CLASS AND THE PEASANTRY
(THIRD STATE)
THE MIDDLE CLASS
The upper middle class, or bourgeoisie,
wanted to abolish the absolute monarchy
because it didn’t allow them to participate in
government.
The lower middle class or petite bourgeoisie,
was suffering from economic difficulties caused
by wars, higher taxes and increased competition
from British products (Great Britain was going
through the Industrial Revolution (1750)=
cheaper prices)

THE PEASANTRY
They also suffered economic problems caused by
wars, taxes and poor harvest.
They also had to pay higher rent to the clergy and
nobility.
As a result:
• The middle class and peasantry were angered by the
luxurious lifestyle of the royal family and court.
• They rejected the privileges enjoyed by the clergy and
the nobility.

STARTING POINT
• Bankrupt in France
• Privileged people refuse to pay taxes.
What did the king have to
do to face this economic crisis?
• The king decided to call together the Estates General
in 1789 in order to increase taxes.
• The last time a French king called together the Estates
General was in 1614 !!!!!
• The minister Necker duplicated the number of
representatives of the Third State in the Estates
General to stop the power of the privileged people.Almudena Corrales Marbán

3.1. The National Assambly
July 1789
The National Assembly The Third Estate
delegates, mostly members of the
bourgeoisie whose views had been shaped
by the Enlightenment, were eager to make
changes in the government.
They insisted that all three estates meet
together and that each delegate have a
vote. This would give the advantage to
the Third Estate, which had as many
delegates as the other two estates
combined.

• Siding with the nobles, the king ordered
the Estates-General to follow the
medieval rules.
• The delegates of the Third Estate,
however, became more and more
determined to wield power. A leading
spokesperson for their viewpoint was a
clergyman sympathetic to their cause,
Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès (syay•YEHS). In
a dramatic speech, Sieyès suggested that
the Third Estate delegates name
themselves the National Assembly and
pass laws and reforms in the name of the
French people.
• After a long night of excited debate, the delegates of the Third Estate agreed to
Sieyès’s idea by an overwhelming majority. On June 17, 1789, they voted to
establish the National Assembly, in effect proclaiming the end of absolute
monarchy and the beginning of representative government. This vote was the
first deliberate act of revolution.

• Three days later, the Third Estate delegates
found themselves locked out of their meeting
room. They broke down a door to an indoor
tennis court, pledging to stay until they had
drawn up a new constitution. This pledge
became known as the Tennis Court Oath
(Juramento del Juego de la Pelota).
• Soon after, nobles and members of the
clergy who favored reform joined the Third
Estate delegates. In response to these events,
Louis stationed his mercenary army of
Swiss guards around Versailles.
• Storming the Bastille.
In Paris, rumors flew. Some people suggested
that Louis was intent on using military force to
dismiss the National Assembly. Others charged
that the foreign troops were coming to Paris to
massacre French citizens.

People began to gather weapons in order
to defend the city against attack. On July
14, a mob searching for gunpowder and
arms stormed the Bastille, a Paris prison.
The mob overwhelmed the guard and
seized control of the building. The angry
attackers hacked the prison commander
and several guards to death, and then
paraded around the streets with the dead
men’s heads on pikes.
The fall of the Bastille became a great symbolic act of revolution
to the French people. Ever since, July 14—Bastille
Day—has been a French national holiday, similar to the
Fourth of July in the United States or Second of May in Madrid.
Día de la Bastilla o Fête Nationale
Fourth of July

• In October 1789, thousands of Parisian
women rioted over the rising price of
bread. Brandishing knives, axes, and
other weapons, the women marched on
Versailles. First, they demanded that the
National Assembly take action to provide
bread. Then they turned their anger on
the king and queen. They broke into the
palace, killing some of the guards. The
women demanded that Louis and Marie
Antoinette return to Paris. After some
time, Louis agreed.
• A few hours later the king, his family, and
servants left Versailles, never again to see
the magnificent palace. Their exit
signaled the change of power and
radical reforms about to overtake
France.
SOURCE
Bread
Bread was a staple of the
diet of the common people
of France. Most families
consumed three or four 4-
pound loaves a day. And the
purchase of bread took
about half of a worker’s
wages—when times were
good. So, when the price of
bread jumped dramatically,
as it did in the fall of 1789,
people faced a real threat of
starvation.
World History, textbook

3.2. The Constituent
Assembly (1789-1791)
Throughout the night of August 4, 1789,
noblemen made grand speeches,
declaring their love of liberty and
equality. Motivated more by fear than by
idealism, they joined other members of the
National Assembly in sweeping away the
feudal privileges of the First and Second
Estates, thus making commoners equal to
the nobles and the clergy. By morning, the
Old Regime was dead.

• The Rights of Man Three weeks later, the
National Assembly adopted a statement of
revolutionary ideals, the Declaration of the
Rights of Man and of the Citizen.
• Reflecting the influence of the Declaration of
Independence, the document stated that
“men are born and remain free and equal
in rights.” These rights included “liberty,
property, security, and resistance to
oppression.” The document also guaranteed
citizens equal justice, freedom of speech,
and freedom of religion.
• In keeping with these principles,
revolutionary leaders adopted the
expression “Liberty,
Equality, Fraternity” as
their slogan.

Louis Tries to Escape
• As the National Assembly restructured
the relationship between church and
state, Louis XVI pondered his fate as a
monarch. Some of his advisers warned
him that he and his family were in danger.
Many supporters of the monarchy
thought France unsafe and left the
country.
• Then, in June 1791, the royal family
tried to escape from France to the
Austrian Netherlands. As they neared
the border, however, they were
apprehended and returned to Paris under
guard. Louis’s attempted escape
increased the influence of his radical
enemies in the government and sealed
his fate.
One of the people
who stopped Louis
from escaping said
that he recognized
the king from his
portrait on a French
bank note.

• For two years, the National
Assembly argued over a new
constitution for France. By
1791, the delegates had made
significant changes in France’s
government and society.
• A Limited Monarchy In
September 1791, the National
Assembly completed the new
constitution, which Louis
reluctantly approved.
French
Constitution
1791
A
constitutional
monarchy
Separation
of powers
Limited
male
suffrage
Popular
sovereignty

3.3. The Legislative
Assembly (1791-1792)
0 After the Constitution had been adopted, a new Legislative
Assembly was elected to implement the legal changes.
Political
groups
Girondins Jacobins

Believed in the revolution but
represented the interests of the
bourgeoisie.
Moderate political ideas.
Liberal economic policies that
helped the middle class.
Limited suffrage.
GIRONDINS

JACOBINS
Believed in the revolution, but their
ideas were more radical.
Abolition of the monarchy and put the
king on trial.
Expand the suffrage.
Control price rises to help workers.
They gained support of the Parisinian
labourers known as «san´s-cullotes»

A «sans-culottes»:
workers and craftsmen.
In contrast, some Parisian workers and
small shopkeepers wanted the Revolution
to bring even greater changes to France.
They were called sans-culottes (SANZ
kyoo•LAHTS), or “those without knee
breeches.” Unlike the upper classes,
who wore fancy knee-length pants, sans-
culottes wore regular trousers. Although
they did not have a role in the assembly,
they soon discovered ways to exert their
power on the streets of Paris.

Despite the new government, old
problems, such as food shortages and
government debt, remained. The
question of how to handle these
problems caused the Legislative
Assembly to split into three general
groups, each of which sat in a different
part of the meeting hall.
Radicals, who sat on the left side of
the hall, opposed the idea of a
monarchy and wanted sweeping
changes in the way the government
was run. Moderates sat in the center
of the hall and wanted some changes
in government, but not as
many as the radicals. Conservatives
sat on the right side of
the hall. They upheld the idea of a
limited monarchy and
wanted few changes in government

3.4. The Convention
(1792-1793)
The beginning of the Republic starts the
radical and popular phase of the
Revolution.
There were elections for a new
Assembly called:
The Convention:
Louis XVI was accused of
treason and then executed.
Execution of Louis XVI. 21 January 1793
«The end, not of a man, but of an institution»

A number of European
countries formed a coalition
and declared war on France to
prevent the revolution from
spreading.

• Most of the people involved in the governmental changes
in September 1792 were members of a radical political
organization, the Jacobin (JAK•uh•bihn) Club. One of the
most prominent Jacobins, as club members were called,
was Jean-Paul Marat (mah•RAH).
• The «sans-culottes» gave a «coup-d´Etat»
against the Girondins in June 1793.
• The leader of the Jacobins was
Robespierre.
• The Jacobins took control of the
government and imposed a dictatorship,
known as the Terror.

The jacobins persecuted people they
believed to be counter-revolutionaries.
More than 42.000 people were executed by
guillotine during the Terror.
The Terror claimed not only the
famous, such as Danton
and Marie Antoinette, the
widowed queen. Thousands of
unknown people also were sent
to their deaths, often on the
flimsiest of charges. For example,
an 18-year-old youth was
sentenced to die for cutting
down a tree that had been
planted as a symbol of liberty.
Perhaps as many as 40,000
were executed during the Terror.
About 85 percent were
peasants or members of the
urban poor or middle class—
for whose benefit the Revolution
had been launched
The Committee of Public
Safety’s (Comité de Salud Pública) chief
task was to protect the Revolution from its
enemies. Under Robespierre’s leadership,
the committee often had these “enemies”
tried in the morning and guillotined in
the afternoon. Robespierre justified his use
of terror by suggesting that it enabled
French citizens to remain true to the ideals
of the Revolution. He also saw a connection
between virtue and terror:

0 27 July 1794 there was a Coup-
d´Etat.
0 When Robespierre was removed
from power, he was also executed
by guillotine in the Place de la
Révolution.

3.5. The Directory
(1795-1799)
By 1795, France´s moderate middle class had gained control of the country.
To avoid a new dictatorship, a moderated government was created.
The executive power was controlled by a Directory
• A more conservative government which was composed of five
members.
• Created to stop the violence and executions.
New Constitution (1795)

3.6. The Consulate (1799)
The Directory was weak.
• Supporters of the monarchy wanted
to restore the Borbons.
• Radical revolutionaries wanted to
regain control.
In response, General Napoleon Bonaparte
organised a military coup and established a
new form of government called the
Consulate.
2 different
possitions
Napoleon’s Coup-d´Etat. 18 Brumario (9 de noviembre de 1799Almudena Corrales Marbán

The Consulate was a group of three leaders
known as consuls.
It included Napoleon himself as head of
state and First Consul.
Napoleon (centre) and other two leaders
of the Consulate.

4. From the Revolution to the
Empire
Napoleon Bonaparte was born in 1769 on the Mediterranean
island of Corsica. When he was nine years old, his parents sent
him to a military school. In 1785, at the age of 16, he finished
school and became a lieutenant in the artillery. When the
Revolution broke out, Napoleon joined the army of the new
government.
Hero of the Hour In October 1795, fate handed the young officer a
chance for glory. When royalist rebels marched on the
National Convention, a government official told Napoleon to
defend the delegates. Napoleon and his gunners greeted the
thousands of royalists with a cannonade. Within minutes, the
attackers fled
in panic and confusion. Napoleon Bonaparte became the hero
of the hour and was hailed throughout Paris as the savior of
the French republic.

Napoleon gradually
increased its power:
He was named First
Consul for Life in
1802. (cónsul vitalicio)
In 1804 Napoleon
declared himself
Emperor of
France.
The Constitution of
1804 says that the
government of the
Republic is given to
an emperor.
More info:
Blog: library
World History
Pages 783-
790

La consagración de Napoleón(Le Sacre de Napoleón), Jacques-Louis David, 1807

In 1796, the Directory appointed
Napoleon to lead a French army against
the forces of Austria and the Kingdom
of Sardinia. Crossing the Alps, the young
general swept into Italy and won a series
of remarkable victories.
In an attempt to protect French
trade interests and to disrupt
British trade with India, Napoleon
led an expedition to Egypt. But he
was unable to repeat the successes
he had achieved in Europe.

THE DECLINE OF THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE
• From 1812 onwards, his
power began to decline
because he had to divide his
forces between two very
distant fronts:
• Spain (West)
• The Russian Empire
(East)
• Napoleon abdicated in
1814 and went into exile on
the island of Elba.

Francisco
Goya’s painting
The Third of May,
1808 shows a
French firing squad
executing Spanish
peasants suspected
of being
guerrillas. Almudena Corrales Marbán

• Napoleon went back to
power during a period of
one hundred days, but he
was definetly defeated in
Waterloo (1815).

• As a punishment, he was deported on the small
island of Saint Helena, where he died.

• What happened after
Napoleon´s defeat?
• The victorious powers re-
established the Ancien
Régime, although this only
lasted for a short period of
time.

5. THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
AND THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE
• The most important consequence is the crisis
and disintegration of the Ancien Régime.

POLITICAL CHANGES
New forms of
government
Constitutional
monarchies
Republics
New constitutions
based on:
Popular
sovereignty
Separation of
powers
New constitutions
established:
Limited male
suffrage
Civil rights
Emergence of
political groups
Because of
elections

ECONOMIC CHANGES
End of the economic
privileges
All the citizens now had
to pay tax and
contritute to the state´s
expenses.
Included the
nobility and
clergy.
Property rights
Guaranteed by
new laws.
Free trade
Guaranteed by
new laws.
It benefited
middle-class
merchants.

Society in
the Ancien Régime
Society after
the French Revolution

SOURCES
Modernworldhistorytextbooks. Mc Dougal Little
Oxford student’s book, year 4.
http://es.slideshare.net/Aggelma/the-french-revolution-
27838775?related=1
E.H., Gombrich, A little history of the world.

Unit 4 French Revolution and Napoleon Empire

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