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Louis XVI calls the Estates General
general assembly representing the French estates of the realm summoned by Louis XVI to propose solutions to France's financial problems. It ended when the Third Estate formed into a National Assembly, signaling the outbreak of the French Revolution. -
Tennis Court Oath
In the Tennis Court Oath, representatives of the non-clergy and non-nobles of France swore they would not disperse until a constitution was established for France. While the oath-makers were successful, the French Revolution soon tumbled out of control. -
Writing of the Declaration of the Rights of Men
Who wrote the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen? The Marquis de Lafayette, with the help of Thomas Jefferson, composed a draft of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and presented it to the National Assembly on July 11, 1789 -
Parisians storming the Bastille
storming of the Bastille, iconic conflict of the French Revolution. On July 14, 1789, fears that King Louis XVI was about to arrest France's newly constituted National Assembly led a crowd of Parisians to successfully besiege the Bastille, an old fortress that had been used since 1659 as a state prison -
March on Versailles
Louis XVI promised to give them bread and to come to Paris. At 1.25 pm the Royal cortege left Versailles. Along the way the crowd proclaimed they were bringing back “the baker with his wife and boy -
Execution of the King and Queen
King Louis XVI of France and his wife Queen Marie Antoinette were both beheaded by the guillotine at the Place de la Révolution (now the Place de la Concorde) in Paris, France. Louis XVI was executed on January 21, 1793, and Marie Antoinette was executed on October 16, 1793 -
Reign of Terror
The Reign of Terror was a period of the French Revolution when, following the creation of the First Republic, a series of massacres and numerous public executions took place in response to revolutionary fervour, anticlerical sentiment, and accusations of treason by the Committee of Public Safet -
Napoleon Overthrows the Directory
The coup d'état of 18 Brumaire brought Napoleon Bonaparte to power as First Consul of France. In the view of most historians, it ended the French Revolution and led to the coronation of Napoleon as emperor. This bloodless coup d'état overthrew the Directory, replacing it with the French Consulate -
Establishment of the New French Constitution
the National Assembly began the process of drafting a constitution as its primary objective. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, adopted on 26 August 1789 eventually became the preamble of the constitution adopted on 3 September 1791