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I am unable to cite the images, as the descriptions for each event have a limit that does not allow me to input full citations. However, all citations can be found here: file:///media/fuse/drivefs-75d50963f03ee75531046c9f36cef30c/root/Module%20Six%20Lesson%20Two%20Activity%20One%20works%20cited.pdf
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Rumors of an aristocratic conspiracy sparked peasant uprisings across France. Manors were burned, and legal documents detailing feudal obligations were destroyed. This autonomous agrarian revolt compelled the National Assembly to formally abolish the feudal system, which ended the legal privileges of the nobility and clergy. -
To address severe state bankruptcy, King Louis XIV convened the traditional assembly of France's 3 social classes. The immediate deadlock over voting rules led to the representatives of the common people to break away and proclaim themselves in a new, sovereign governing body. -
After being locked out of their meeting hall, the commoner deputies gathered in a tennis court and swore an oath not to disband until they had written a constitution. This act of direct defiance forced a constitutional crisis and convicted many clergy and nobles to join the new assembly, which granted a greater legitimacy. -
Parisian crowds, seeking gunpowder and fearing royal troops, attacked the Bastille, a fortress that held arms and housed political prisoners. The fall of the fortress demonstrated the king's inability to control Paris. It secured the city for the Revolutionaries, ensuring that the National Assembly survived and triggered a nationwide municipal revolution.
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The National Assembly issued this document, defining individual and collective rights as universal and based on nature and reason. It served as the preamble to the new constitution, nullifying the illegal principles of the monarchy and establishing the sovereignty of the nation as the foundation of law.
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This constitution created a government where the king's executive power was checked by an elective Legislative Assembly. The Kings reluctance to rule under these constraints, in addition to the radical opposition of Parisian factions, rendered the government dysfunctional and unable to manage the growing political and military crisis. -
The assembly, influenced by Girondin deputies, declared war on Austria to counter foreign support for counter-revolution and to spread revolutionary principles. The initial military defeats and the advance of enemy armies created a panic in Paris that led to the storming of the Tuileries Palace and the suspension of the monarchy.
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The Committee of Public Safety, under Robespierre, implemented a policy of revolutionary justice through the Revolutionary Tribunal and the Law of Suspects, leading to the thousands of executions. The centralized terror succeeded in mobilizing the nation against foreign and domestic threats but created such fear among the political class that they overthrew Robespierre to end the repression. -
Following a trial for treason, Louis XV was executed by order of the National Convention. The regicide transformed the conflict, provoking a wider war with a European coalition. It also marked the definitive end of the monarchy and justified the radical government's use of extreme measures to secure the Republic. -
A new constitution created a five-member executive Directory and a two house legislature, which was designed to prevent both royalist restoration and Jacobin dictatorship. The Directory's chronic political and financial instability required it to repeatedly violate its own constitution and rely on the army to stay in power, which eroded its legitimacy.
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General Napoleon Bonaparte, with political allies, used military force to dissolve the legislature and overthrow the Directory. The coup replaced the unpopular and weak republican government with a military dictatorship under Napoleon as the First Consul, ending the revolutionary period of parliamentary Rule. -
Napoleon Bonaparte established a hereditary Empire, crowning himself Emperor of the French in a ceremony with Pope Pius VII present. This act consolidated his personal rule, ended the French Republic, and framed his subsequent wars as efforts to build a French imperial system in Europe, rather than to spread revolution. -
Through the Berlin Decree, Napoleon forbade all trade between the European continent and Great Britain, aiming to destroy the British economy. The policy caused severe economic hardship in Europe, formed smuggling and corruption, and led to direct conflict with states like Portugal and Russia, which resisted the blockade.
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To enforce the Continental System, Napoleon launched a massive invasion of Russia. The Russian army refused decisive engagement and retreated, which led to the French occupation and subsequent destruction of Moscow. The catastrophic Retreat from Russia destroyed the core of Napoleon's Grande Armée. This military disaster motivated his enemies and led to the formation of the Sixth Coalition, which would ultimately defeat him. -
After escaping exile, Napoleon's Army was decisively defeated by the combined forces of the Duke of Wellington and Gebhard von Blücher near Waterloo. This defeat ended Napoleon's brief restoration and the Napoleonic Wars. It resulted in his permanent exile to Saint Helena and allowed victorious allies to restore the Bourbon monarchy and redraw the map of Europe at the Congress of Vienna.