1. 1789-1815

2. July 14 th, 1789: A Parisian mob storms the Bastille.

3. France was comprised of three groups, shown above, called Estates. Who paid taxes? The 3 rd Estate, most of whom were poor, shouldered that burden for the nobles and the clergy. The Third Estate included the merchant class and professionals; they were the bourgeoisie. Out of this group came the leadership for the revolution against the monarchy of Louis XVI.

4. King Louis XVI and his wife Marie lived at the Palace of Versailles outside of Paris. The lifestyle at the palace was extravagant. Louis was a conscientious ruler but his nation was facing deep financial problems in 1789. France had loaned great sums of money to the American Revolution and was in deep debt. Louis called a meeting of the Estates-General in May of 1789 to get advice on how to handle the fiscal crisis. The poor in Paris were beginning to starve. Palace of Versailles

5. <<< A modern “Real Tennis” Court Note: wood floor & small racquet>>> The Estates-General met but the Third Estate wanted to change the voting system but Louis refused to let them in the meeting. Thus the group met in a nearby indoor tennis court (the sport was called Jeu de Paume, “Real Tennis” in English) and swore to create a new constitution for France. Meanwhile the peasants had begun to revolt. By August of 1789 all legal privileges for the 1 st & 2 nd Estates were abolished, and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen was adopted. France had a new constitution. Soon Louis & Marie were forced to leave Versailles for Paris. “The Tennis Court Oath,” by Jacques-Louis David

6. Louis and his Family remained in Paris as prisoners while revolution raged across France. Lands of the Catholic Church were seized, Bishops would now be elected by the people, and chaos reigned. Louis and his family tried to escape but they failed. Since wife Marie was Austrian that country threatened war. France declared war 1 st but fared poorly. In Paris radicals looked to the sans-culottes (French for “without breeches”), common artisans and merchants who were not aristocrats, for leadership. They would bring the revolution into a violent abyss.

7. “A Marat,” by Jacques-Louis David. The revolution swallowed its children. The guillotine was considered a safe and humane way to execute people.

8. Georges DantonJean-Paul MaratMaximilien Robespierre Here are some of the radical leaders of the Reign of Terror. A large man, Georges Danton was the Minister of Justice and called for Louis’ execution. Jean-Paul Marat was a radical Jacobin leader who spent a good deal of time condemning political enemies to death. Maximilien Robespierre, leader of the Committee of Public Safety, is best known for his role in the Terror. All three leaders died violently. Danton and Robespierre were guillotined, and Marat was stabbed in his bathtub.

9. Radical factions in Paris had King Louis executed by guillotine in early 1793, and his wife Marie Antoinette was guillotined later that year. Although this solved one problem, the monarchy could never be restored, it angered all the other monarchs in Europe. More war loomed and France was in danger.

10. The murderous excess of the Jacobins came to an end with the rise of a more conservative ruling body known as the Directory. The committee of five moderated the revolution but were also very corrupt. France was suffering under economic problems created by its wars against foreign powers. In 1799 a young artillery officer walked into this group and seized power in a coup d’etat. His name, of course, was Napoleon Bonaparte.

11. Napoleon was a superb field General; he often defeated larger forces.

12. Napoleon is an amazing character from this time period. As Emperor of he believed he could bring Enlightenment ideals of good government and restore order to France. Napoleon made amends with the Catholic Church, created the Napoleonic Code, and created a capable administration for the country. He did not allow freedom of the Press. As a general Napoleon had some failures but on the whole he was very successful in the field. That is why the French Empire was enlarged to encompass almost all of Europe by 1812. The only holdouts then were Great Britain and Russia.

13. <<< Napoleon lost 400,000 men against Russia in 1812

14. Josephine Beauharnais Marie Louise & son Napoleon had a personal life too. He was married to Josephine Beauharnais but divorced her after she failed to produce him a male heir. He then married Marie Louise of Austria (great-niece of Marie Antoinette!). She was 18 and Napoleon was 41. She gave birth to a son, also named Napoleon, but Napoleon lost power soon afterward.

15. After a disastrous Russian campaign in 1812 Napoleon lost power and was exiled to the tiny island of Elba in the Mediterranean in 1814. He soon escaped and returned to Paris in 1815. But Napoleon’s enemies were closing in so Napoleon had to take field command at Waterloo, in Belgium. He was opposed by a combined force of British and Prussian troops. He lost the battle, was captured, and was then exiled to the nearly inaccessible island of Helena in the South Atlantic. He died there in six years later in 1821. Battle of Waterloo

16. <<<< What Kind of Chart is this? The chart on the left shows a number of causes and effects from the French Revolution. Your group is assigned to create 8 Multi-Flow Maps using the Effect part of the chart for the event. You should be able to answer what the outcome of each event was. Any questions? Let’s get to work!

17. Congress of Vienna