French Revolution
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Through the Revolutionary Wars, it unleashed a wave of global conflicts that extended from the Caribbean to the Middle East. Historians widely regard the Revolution as one of the most important events in human history, the causes of the French Revolution are complex and are still debated among historians. Following the Seven Years War and the American Revolutionary War, the French government was deeply in debt, Years of bad harvests leading up to the Revolution also inflamed popular resentment of the privileges enjoyed by the clergy and the aristocracy. Demands for change were formulated in terms of Enlightenment ideals and contributed to the convocation of the Estates-General in May 1789, a central event of the first stage, in August 1789, was the abolition of feudalism and the old rules and privileges left over from the Ancien Régime. The next few years featured political struggles between various liberal assemblies and right-wing supporters of the intent on thwarting major reforms.
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The French government faced a fiscal crisis in the 1780s, and King Louis XVI was blamed for mishandling these affairs.
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Caricature of the Third Estate carrying the First Estate (clergy) and the Second Estate (nobility) on its back.
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The meeting of the Estates General on 5 May 1789 at Versailles.
French Revolutionary Wars
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The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of sweeping military conflicts, lasting from 1792 until 1802, resulting from the French Revolution. They pitted the French First Republic against Britain, Austria and several other monarchies and they are divided in two periods, the War of the First Coalition and the War of the Second Coalition. Initially confined to Europe, the fighting gradually assumed a global dimension as the political ambitions of the Revolution expanded, French success in these conflicts ensured the spread of revolutionary principles over much of Europe. The Revolutionary Wars began from increasing political pressure on King Louis XVI of France to prove his loyalty to the new direction France was taking. In the spring of 1792, France declared war on Prussia and Austria, the victory rejuvenated the French nation and emboldened the National Convention to abolish the monarchy. A series of victories by the new French armies abruptly ended with defeat at Neerwinden in the s
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Anonymous caricature depicting the treatment given to the
Brunswick Manifesto by the French population
French livres
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The livre was the currency of France from 781 to 1794. Several different livres existed, some concurrently, the livre was the name of both units of account and coins. The livre was established by Charlemagne as a unit of account equal to one pound of silver and it was subdivided into 20 sous, each of 12 deniers. The word livre came from the Latin word libra, a Roman unit of weight and this system and the denier itself served as the model for many of Europes currencies, including the British pound, Italian lira, Spanish dinero and the Portuguese dinheiro. This first livre is known as the livre carolingienne, only deniers were initially minted, but debasement led to larger denominations being issued. Different mints in different regions used different weights for the denier, livre is a homonym of the French word for book, the distinction being that the two have a different gender. The monetary unit is feminine, la/une livre, while book is masculine, for much of the Middle Ages, different
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French 1793 24-Livre gold coin.
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10 livres Tournois note issued by La Banque Royale (1720)
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Assignat for 125 livres (1793)
National Assembly (French Revolution)
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The Estates-General had been called on Dec 4,1789 to deal with Frances financial crisis, but promptly fell to squabbling over its own structure. Its members had elected to represent the estates of the realm, the 1st Estate, the 2nd Estate. They refused this and proceeded to meet separately, on June 13, this group began to call itself the National Assembly. This newly created assembly immediately attached itself onto the capitalists — the sources of the credit needed to fund the national debt — and to the common people. They consolidated the public debt and declared all existing taxes to have been illegally imposed and this restored the confidence of the capitalists and gave them a strong interest in keeping the Assembly in session. As for the people, the Assembly established a committee of subsistence to deal with food shortages. Jacques Necker, finance minister to Louis XVI, had proposed that the king hold a Séance Royale in an attempt to reconcile the divided Estates. The king agreed
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Tinted etching of
Louis XVI of France, 1792, wearing a
Phrygian cap. This caption refers to Louis's capitulation to the National Assembly, and concludes "The same Louis XVI who bravely waits until his fellow citizens return to their hearths to plan a secret war and exact his revenge."
Bond (finance)
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In finance, a bond is an instrument of indebtedness of the bond issuer to the holders. The most common types of bonds include municipal bonds and corporate bonds, interest is usually payable at fixed intervals. Very often the bond is negotiable, that is, the ownership of the instrument can be transferred in the secondary market and this means that once the transfer agents at the bank medallion stamp the bond, it is highly liquid on the second market. Thus, a bond is a form of loan or IOU, the holder of the bond is the lender, the issuer of the bond is the borrower, and the coupon is the interest. Bonds provide the borrower with funds to finance long-term investments, or, in the case of government bonds. Certificates of deposit or short term commercial paper are considered to be money market instruments and not bonds, the main difference is in the length of the term of the instrument. Bonds and stocks are both securities, but the difference between the two is that stockholders have an e
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Bond certificate for the state of South Carolina issued in 1873 under the state's Consolidation Act.
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Railroad obligation Moscow-Kiev-Voronezh
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Receipt for temporary bonds for the state of Kansas issued in 1922
Biens nationaux
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The biens nationaux were properties confiscated during the French Revolution from the Catholic Church, the monarchy, émigrés, and suspected counter-revolutionaries for the good of the nation. Biens means goods, both in the sense of objects and in the sense of benefits, the phrase is in middle French form, and is in the nominative case, so it literally means both national things and benefits for the nation. This can be summarized as things for the good of the nation, the possessions of the Roman Catholic Church were declared national property by the decree of November 2,1789. These were sold to resolve the crisis that caused the Revolution. Later, the properties of the Crown were given the same treatment, a few months into the Revolution, the public purse was all but empty. To amend this problem, the deputy Talleyrand proposed nationalizing the goods of the clergy. This legacy, evaluated to just about 3 billion livres, constituted an improvement for public finance. The disposition of go
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Assignat of 400 livres, issued 24 Sept, 1792, first year of the Republic
Government debt
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Government debt is the debt owed by a central government. By contrast, the government deficit refers to the difference between government receipts and spending in a single year. A central government with its own currency can pay for its spending by creating money ex novo, Governments create debt by issuing securities, government bonds and bills. Less creditworthy countries sometimes borrow directly from an organization or international financial institutions. As the government draws its income from much of the population, Government debt can be categorized as internal debt and external debt. Another common division of government debt is by duration until repayment is due, short term debt is generally considered to be for one year or less, long term is for more than ten years. Medium term debt falls between two boundaries. A broader definition of government debt may consider all government liabilities, including future pension payments and payments for goods and services the government
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The sealing of the Bank of England Charter (1694)
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Government debt as a percent of GDP by IMF
10 August (French Revolution)
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The Insurrection of 10 August 1792 was one of the defining events in the history of the French Revolution. The storming of the Tuileries Palace by the National Guard of the insurrectional Paris Commune and revolutionary fédérés from Marseilles, King Louis XVI and the royal family took shelter with the Legislative Assembly, which was suspended. The formal end of the monarchy that occurred six weeks later was one of the first acts of the new National Convention, the war declared on 20 April 1792 against the King of Bohemia and Hungary started badly. The initial battles were a disaster for the French, and Prussia joined Austria in active alliance against France, the blame for the disaster was thrown first upon the king and his ministers, and secondly upon the Girondin party. The King vetoed the decrees and dismissed Girondins from the Ministry, events came to a head on 16 June when Lafayette sent a letter to the Assembly, recommending the suppression of the anarchists and political clubs
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Prise du palais des Tuileries Jean Duplessis-Bertaux (fr) (1747-1819) National Museum of the Chateau de Versailles, 1793
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Journée of 20 June 1792
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Louis XVI inspecting loyal troops.
French First Republic
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In the history of France, the First Republic, officially the French Republic, was founded on 21 September 1792 during the French Revolution. The First Republic lasted until the declaration of the First Empire in 1804 under Napoleon, under the Legislative Assembly, which was in power before the proclamation of the First Republic, France was engaged in war with Prussia and Austria. The foreign threat exacerbated Frances political turmoil amid the French Revolution and deepened the passion, in the violence of 10 August 1792, citizens stormed the Tuileries Palace, killing six hundred of the Kings Swiss guards and insisting on the removal of the king. A renewed fear of action prompted further violence, and in the first week of September 1792, mobs of Parisians broke into the citys prisons. This included nobles, clergymen, and political prisoners, but also numerous common criminals, such as prostitutes and petty thieves, many murdered in their cells—raped, stabbed and this became known as th
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Napoleon Bonaparte seizes power during the Coup of 18 Brumaire
National Convention
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The National Convention was the third government of the French Revolution, following the two-year National Constituent Assembly and the one-year Legislative Assembly. Created after the insurrection of 10 August 1792, it was the first French government organized as a republic. The Convention sat as an assembly from 20 September 1792 to 26 October 1795. The National Convention was therefore the first French assembly elected by a suffrage without distinctions of class, although the Convention lasted until 1795, power was effectively stripped from the elected deputies and concentrated in the small Committee of Public Safety from April 1793. After the fall of Robespierre, the Convention lasted for year until a new constitution was written. The election took place from 2 to 6 September 1792 after the election of the colleges by primary assemblies on 26 August. Therefore, the increased suffrage had very little impact, the electorate returned the same sort of men that the active citizens had c
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Autel de la Convention nationale or Autel républicain
François-Léon Sicard Panthéon de Paris, France, 1913
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The trial of Louis XVI
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Journées des 31 Mai 1er et 2 Juin 1793
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Constitution du Peuple Française du 6 Messidor l'an I (24 June 1793)
Thermidorian Convention
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The Thermidorian Reaction was a coup détat within the French Revolution against the leaders of the Jacobin Club who had dominated the Committee of Public Safety. It was triggered by a vote of the National Convention to execute Maximilien Robespierre, Louis Antoine de Saint-Just and this ended the most radical phase of the French Revolution. Thermidorian Reaction also refers to the period until the National Convention was superseded by the Directory. Prominent figures of Thermidor include Paul Barras, Jean-Lambert Tallien, Thermidor represents the final throes of the Reign of Terror. His only real power at this time lay in the Jacobin Club. Many others who conspired against Robespierre did so for practical and personal reasons. The surviving Dantonists, such as Merlin de Thionville, wanted revenge for the death of Georges Danton and, more importantly, among the latter were Joseph Fouché and Pierre-Louis Bentabole, who engineered Robespierres downfall. In the end, it was Robespierre hims
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The execution of Robespierre on July 28, 1794 marked the end of the first Reign of Terror.
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The Closing of the Jacobin Club, during the night of 27–28 July 1794.
French Directory
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It gave its name to the final four years of the French Revolution. The Directory was continually at war with foreign coalitions which at different times included Britain, Austria, Prussia, the Kingdom of Naples, Russia and it annexed Belgium and the left bank of the Rhine, while Bonaparte conquered a large part of Italy. The Directory established six short-lived sister republics modelled after France, in Italy, Switzerland, the conquered cities and states were required to send to France huge amounts of money, as well as art treasures, which were used to fill the new Louvre museum in Paris. An army led by Bonaparte conquered Egypt and marched as far as Saint-Jean-dAcre in Syria, the French economy was in continual crisis during the Directory. At the beginning, the treasury was empty, the money, the Assignat, had fallen to a fraction of its value. The Directory stopped printing assignats and restored the value of the money, but this caused a new crisis, prices and wages fell, and economi
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Paul Barras, the only Director to serve during the entire term of the Directory
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The
War in the Vendée was a royalist uprising that was suppressed by the republican forces in 1796.
Mandats territoriaux
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Mandats territoriaux were paper bank notes issued as currency by the French Directory in 1796 to replace the assignats which had become virtually worthless. They were land-warrants supposedly redeemable in the lands confiscated from royalty, the clergy, in February 1796,800,000,000 francs of mandats were issued as legal tender to replace the 24,000,000,000 francs of assignats then outstanding. In all about 2,500,000,000 francs of mandats were issued and they were heavily counterfeited and their value depreciated rapidly within six months. In February 1797, they lost their legal tender quality and by May were worth virtually nothing, throughout most of the French Revolution economic instability fueled by inflation, speculation, and disruption of resources and supplies created incredible hardship for average French citizens. The Revolutionary government depended on printing new paper money to fund its operation, the mandats territoriaux was the second paper currency put into circulation
French sol
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The sol, later called a sou, is the name of a number of different coins, for accounting or payment, dating from Antiquity to today. The name is derived from the solidus and its longevity of use anchored it in many expressions of the French language. The solidus is a made of 4.5 g of gold. The sou itself is divided into 12 denarii and one denarius is worth 10 asses, but for rare exceptions, the denarius will in practice be the only ones in circulation. The name evolves as does the rest of the language, from Latin to French, solidus becomes soldus, then solt in the 11th century, then sol in the 12th century. In the 18th century the spelling of sol is adapted to sou so as to be closer to the pronunciation that had become the norm for several centuries. A thousand years after the Carolingian monetary reform, when the pound from Tours is replaced by the franc in 1795, sols/sous, still, all the French people keep calling sou the twentieth of a franc. Thus the large bronze 5 centimes coin was
Roman Republic (18th century)
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The Roman Republic was proclaimed on 15 February 1798 after Louis Alexandre Berthier, a general of Napoleon, had invaded the city of Rome on 10 February. The Roman Republic was a client republic under the French Directory composed of territory conquered from the Papal States, Pope Pius VI was exiled to France and died there in 1799. It immediately took the control of the other two former-papal revolutionary administrations, the Tiberina Republic and the Anconine Republic, the Roman Republic was short-lived, as the Papal States were restored in October 1799. Napoleons campaign on the Italian peninsula from 1796 to 1797 was one of the reasons for his elevation to supreme commander of the French Army during the Wars of the Republic. At the same time he intended to reinforce the French Army of Italy, which was outnumbered by Austria and this invasion of the Italian Peninsula was also a diversion since, according to the First Coalition, the main offensive was expected in the Rhine River. Ro
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Flag of the Roman Republic, with the black stripe instead of the blue one of the
flag of France.
Fructidor
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Fructidor is the twelfth month in the French Republican Calendar. The month was named after the Latin word fructus, which means fruit, Fructidor is the third month of the summer quarter. By the Gregorian calendar, Fructidor starts on either August 18 or August 19 and ends exactly thirty days later, Fructidor follows the month of Thermidor and precedes the Sansculottides. The month is used as a shorthand term for the Coup of 18 Fructidor. Like all French Republican months, Fructidor lasted thirty days and was divided into three weeks called decades which each lasted ten days
Papal States scudo
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The Roman scudo was the currency of the Papal States until 1866. It was subdivided into 100 baiocchi, each of 5 quattrini, other denominations included the grosso of 5 baiocchi, the carlino of 7½ baiocchi, the giulio and paoli both of 10 baiocchi, the testone of 30 baiocchi and the doppia of 3 scudi. In addition to issues for the Papal States as a whole, uniquely in Bologna the baiocco, also known as the bolognino, was subdivided into 6 quattrini. Between 1798 and 1799, the revolutionary French forces established the Roman Republic, in addition, the municipalities of Ancona, Civitavecchia, Clitunno, Foligno, Gubbio, Pergola and Perugia issued coins in the name of the Roman Republic. In 1808, the Papal States were annexed by France, when the Popes authority was restored in 1814, the scudo was restored as the currency. However, outside Rome solely the coinage of Bologna was resumed, in 1849, another Roman Republic was established which issued coins centrally and in Ancona. In 1866, the s
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Various denominations, largest is 40 mm
Assignation ruble
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Assignation ruble was the first paper currency of Russia. It was used from 1769 until 1849, Assignation ruble had a parallel circulation with the silver ruble, there was an ongoing market exchange rate for these two currencies. In later period, the value of the Assignation ruble was considerably below that of the silver ruble, in 1768, during the reign of Catherine the Great, the Assignation Bank was instituted to issue the government paper-money. It opened in St. Petersburg and in Moscow in 1769, several bank branches were afterwards established in others of the towns, called government towns. Notes of 100,75,50, and 25 roubles, were issued upon payment of sums in copper money. The emergence of Assignation rubles was due to government spending on military needs. The lack of silver, and huge masses of copper coins in the Russian domestic market led to the fact that payments were extremely difficult to implement. So this has necessitated the introduction of some kind of bills for large
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Russian State Assignat-50 Rubles (1807)
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25 Assignation rubles of 1769
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10 Assignation rubles of 1819
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Assignation Bank building in St. Petersburg today;
Bank Bridge in the foreground
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Media related to Assignat at Wikimedia Commons
