The French Revolution

Metternich was an Austrian alive during the French Revolution and Napoleonic Era. He would have been around to witness the revolution in France and its wide-reaching consequences, like involving...

The French Revolution affected other countries because there was immediately a perceived threat that the French would attempt to spread the Revolution to other countries. The movement to overthrow,...

It is unclear for certain if and how many children were subjected to the guillotine during the French Revolution, but some sources imply that they did in fact guillotine children. In many cases,...

The Reign of Terror was a period of violence during the French Revolution emanating from conflicts between the Girondins and the Jacobins. During this period people perceived to be against the...

The storming of the Bastille on 14th July, 1789, is usually taken to be the day on which the French Revolution began. The significance of the event, however, is more symbolic than anything...

Although Napoleon was in practice very much a despot, he was still a product of the Enlightenment. Growing up in Corsica, Napoleon was exposed to the enlightened ideals of the Corsican nationalist...

The French Revolution of 1789-1799 followed on the American Revolution and was inspired by similar ideals, albeit in different circumstances. A key element in the Revolution was revulsion against...

The Directory ruled France from 1795-1799. There were five Directors that led France. The Directory dealt with competing forces that wanted a constitutional monarchy or a radical democracy. The...

The major conflicts between classes in the decades leading up to the French Revolution were between the lower classes (proletariat) and the upper class (bourgeoisie), which consisted mainly of the...

Danton and Robespierre were around the same age, were both provincial lawyers before they started out in politics, and were both fanatical revolutionaries who believed in meting out extreme...

The French Revolution was a deeply transformative (as well as destabilizing) period in history, and its repercussions continued to be felt across the nineteenth century. It's also deeply difficult...

The directory was the government set up by the Constitution of the Year III as a result of the French Revolution. It was a very short-lived government, lasting only 4 years. The Directory included...

The French Revolution was caused by a number of factors, some of which served to exacerbate others. Some of these factors, like a dying class system, were common to most of the European...

Actually, the First and Second Estates paid no taxes whatsoever. This meant that one hundred per cent of the tax burden fell on the Third Estate. To make matters worse, as a means of raising money...

There were a number of turbulent events of the French Revolution. Some of the key ones between 1789 to 1794 are described below. The Tennis Court Oath - June 20, 1789 - This pivotal event occurred...

The French Revolution is often referred to as a watershed event because it had a profound effect on France, as well as other European countries. Because of the financial excesses of King Louis XV,...

Though the French Revolution was largely the handiwork of the bourgeoisie, the working-class people of France also played their part. For the most part, their political role was outside the formal...

The French Revolution, which begin in 1789, and the Haitian Revolution, which first began in 1794, were products of the Enlightenment. In the eighteenth century, philosophers like John Locke began...

One major significance of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen was that it was one of the first European governing documents to apply the concepts of the Enlightenment to the...

I would argue that the end should never justify the means. If the French Revolutionaries genuinely wanted to build a society based on liberty, equality, and fraternity, then they should have used...

Robespierre and the Jacobins massively overreached during the Terror. The Terror was getting rapidly out of hand, destroying the lives of many who, by no stretch of the imagination, could...

A major cause of the French Revolution was the severe economic stress the country faced near the end of the eighteenth century. France was heavily in debt due to foreign wars, including its support...

While the Napoleonic Regime did function essentially as an authoritarian monarchy, it differed greatly from the Ancien Régime, or Old Regime, as it existed before the French Revolution. Where the...

This is one of the great questions on the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Era and a subject of considerable debate (and you can probably make a case for either side of it). Of course, it...

The circumstances that led to the outbreak of the French Revolution were intricate and complex. In analyzing these conditions, it becomes clear how seismic the French Revolution actually was. One...

France’s conflicts with its neighbors can be evaluated in the context of its internal strife. Domestically, the French Revolution produced myriad violence and death. In June of 1793, the radical...

One similarity between both revolutions is in how the will of the majority of the body politic was expressed extremely loud and extremely clear. There was an undeniable will of the people heard in...

I think that much of this answer is going to be dependent on the idea of what defines "radical." If we are examining the idea of "radical" as one that fundamentally changes the way revolution is...

Let's try for four. 1) All three represented a transition from a less democratic to a more democratic government. The Glorious Revolution replaced a king who had come to the throne by monarchic...

The Bourbon Monarchy was undoubtedly both the main cause and the main victim of the French Revolution. Enlightenment ideas encouraged the people of France to question their government and demand...

The ideals of the French Revolution were a direct outgrowth of Enlightenment philosophy. A major focus of the Enlightenment was the worth of the individual and his or her right to take a role in...

The French Revolution began the establishment of social and economic rights for all citizens, affording them voice and some control over their political destinies. The Napoleonic Era established...

Napoleon underestimated several crucial factors that would arise during his invasion of Russia. First, the distance his armies had to cross in order to reach Moscow was enormous in an age long...

The French and English Revolutions were alike in terms of how they dethroned monarchs and involved religion, and they were different due to the level of violence. In the French and English...

The French Revolution had significant impacts on English society and literature. To get you started on this assignment, we will go over a few points you will want to include in your answer. You...

The French Revolution led to the fall of absolutism in France through very extreme means. The Revolution was not something that came about unprovoked—a number of factors contributed to this event....

I think the negative outcomes were mainly short-term and the positive ones long term. There is no question that the French Revolution was needed. The Ancien Régime was brutal, denying basic human...

The French Revolution occurred in several stages, beginning in 1789 with the overthrow of the Ancien Régime and culminating in 1799 with a military coup led by Napoleon Bonaparte. There were...

I think that the contribution of print, or the printed word, had a huge impact on the French Revolution. The "rise of Enlightenment" ideals played a massive role in the initiation of thought that...

Many of the philosophes cited as inspirations by the liberal revolutionaries (though not, admittedly, the radicals) were strongly impressed by the English constitution, which they believed to be...

To me, the major effect of the French Revolution was that it created the idea of nationalism in Europe. This idea came to be hugely influential -- it led, for example, to the creation of the...

Looking back through the lens of history, there are several points where the revolution could have been avoided, or at the very least, delayed. The food shortages and economic decline that began in...

In the early phase of the French Revolution, members of the Third Estate, the commoners who made up most of France's population, which was divided into a series of "estates" denoting one's place in...

The French Revolution produced many reforms and changes for French citizens. Obviously, the main reform that happened was the removal of the monarchy and the nobility, who were oppressive to the...

The people expressed their resentment towards the oppressive absolute monarchs by supporting the revolution in their countries. America stood against King George while France rejected King Louis...

I am not sure there is going to be much in the way of good about the Jacobins in the French Revolution. I think that one positive element could be how the group started. Its origins were rooted...