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Formal opening of the Estates General
In France under the Ancienor Regime, the Estates General was a legislative and consultative assembly of the different estates. It had a separate assembly for each of the three estates (clergy, nobility and commoners). It served as an advisory body to the king, primarily by presenting petitions from the various estates and consulting on fiscal policy.The Estates General first met in 1302 and 1303 in relation to King Philip IV's conflict with the papacy. -
Tennis Court Oath
It was a key moment that set off the French Revolution. it set off the French Revolution. It also was based upon the premise that political authority came from the will of the nation, not from the king. -
Storming of the Bastille
The Storming Bastille, was a royal fortress and prison that had come to symbolize the tyranny. Was attacked by a crowd mainly consisting of lower classes. This dramatic action signaled the beginning of the French Revolution, a decade of political turmoil and terror in which the Bourbon monarchs, King Louis XVI and his wife Marie Antoinette, were executed. The anniversary is still celebrated in France as the country’s national holiday. -
The August Decrees
Were a set of 19 articles passed by the National Constituent Assembly during the French Revolution which abolished feudalism in France and ended the tax privileges of the upper classes. Although not without flaws, the passage of the decrees was a significant achievement of the Revolution. This decision took place in the context of the Great Fear, rural peasant revolt fueled by rumors of an aristocrats to starve or burn out the population. -
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
Marked the beginning of a new political era. Since then, it has never ceased to be a reference text. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen came into existence in the summer of 1789, born of an idea of the Constituent Assembly, which was formed by the assembly of the Estates General to draft a new Constitution, and precede it with a declaration of principles. Its 17 articles, adopted between August 20 and August 26, by France’s National Assembly. -
The Flight to Varennes
is the name given to the royal family’s failed escape from Paris in June 1791. Dissatisfied with the course of the revolution, particularly its attacks on the Catholic church, King Louis XVI acceded to suggestions that it was time to flee the capital. Though well hatched, the plan failed and the royal family were arrested at Varennes, some 240 kilometres from Paris. His actions had destroyed his last vestiges of support and Parisians began to talk seriously about a republic.