-
Imposing Taxes on the Nobility
The Second Estate forced Louis XVI to call a meeting of the Estates-General. An assembly of representatives from all three eststates---to approve this new tax. The meeting, the first in 175 years wes held. -
Period: to
The French Revolution
-
The First Deliberate act of Revolution
Voted to establish the National Assembly, in effect proclaiming the end of absolute monarchy and the beginning of representative government. -
Grand speeches by the Noblemen
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 fuedal privileges of the First and Second Estates, this making commoners equal to the nobles and the clergy. By morning, the Old Regime was dead. -
Bread Price on the Rise
Thousands of Parisian women rioted over the rising price of bread. Then they turned their anger on the king and the queen. They broke into the palace, killing some guards. The women demanded that Louis and Marie Antoinette return to Paris. After some time, Louis agreed. -
A Limited Monarchy
The National Assembly completed the new constitution, which Louis reluctantly approved. The constitutuion created a limited constitutional monarchy. It stripped the king of much of his authority. It also created a new legislative body---the Legislative Assembly. -
France at War
20,000 men and women invaded the Tuileries, the palace where the royal family was staying. The mob massacred the royal guards and imprisioned Louis, Marie Antoinette, and their children. -
Beheading of the King
The National Convention had reduced Louis XVI's role from that of a king to that of a common citizen and prisoner. The convention found and guilty, and, by a very close vote, sentenced him to death. Louis XVI walked with calm dignity up the steps of the scaffold to be beheaded by a machine called the guilloutine. -
End of the Terror
In July 1794, fearing for their own safety, some members of the National Convention turned on Robespierre. They demanded his arrest and execution. The Reign of Terror, the radical phase of the French Revolution ended when Robespierre went to the guillotine.
