Photo Gallery | Causes of the French Revolution

The First Estate

Second Estate

Third Estate

Here is the famous King Louis

There were terrible harvests

The Estates General

The Hierarchy 

A Short Video | Causes of the French Revolution

Hello! This is a short video so that if you don't understand what is going on my posts, you will now understand. BEWARE! John Green (whoop hee!) speaks really fast, so keep your ears open.

      Enjoy!

The Calling of the Estates General | Causes of the French Revolution

The Estates General

May 5th, 1789, Louis calls the Estate General for the first time since 1614. 

This event was a major cause for the eruption of the French Revolution in 1789.

People had high hopes. They believed it would solve all their problems. They wanted new taxes, concessions. The fact that the Estates-General hadn’t been summoned in nearly 200 years probably says a thing or two about its effectiveness.  

June 17th, the Third Estate breaks away from it. They were insulted - they were told to wear black robes and had to enter through a side door. 

In the end, Louis did not propose any major reforms. This is probably why people were so angry, and thus the start of the revolution.

Law & Order In France | Causes of the French Revolution

Law & Order

So in France there was a problem - the punishments were way too harsh. Thieves who stole gold could have the same punishment as those who stole hay. Criminals would be branded with hot iron and would be hanged; during the revolution people would be executed with the guillotine (FunFact: the guillotine was still being used in France when the first Star Wars movie came out!), but only aristocrats could afford this. People were being sentenced and executed on the very same day. Lesser crimes,  usually meant a few hours in the stocks, branding, whipping, and a sentence of several years in the galleys. 

The Hierarchy | Causes of the French Revolution

The Hierarchy

So  in France during the build up to the revolution, there was not very much equality to go around. The population was divided up into 3 estates, each with different power and wealth. At the top of the hierarchy was the first estate, then second, and lastly third. 

THE FIRST ESTATE was the clergy. They were people, including priests, who ran both the Catholic Church and some aspects of the country, as well as keeping register of births, deaths and marriages. The clergy also had the power to levy a 10% tax known as the thithe. They owned 10% of land, and were in rival with priests. They had the most power.

THE SECOND ESTATE was the nobility of France, including the members of the royal family (not including the king). They did not have to pay many taxes (and many refused to) , and had privileges such as wearing a sword and hunting. Like the clergy, they collected taxes from the third estate. They earned 500-20,000 livres per year (that's approx. £540-21,580) 

THE THIRD ESTATE was everybody else. From peasant farmers to the wealthy business class, the third estate made up 96% of France's population, while the second estate only made up 1%! They had none of the rights or privileges. This was made up of 3 groups:
THE MIDDLE CLASS had lots of money, but had to no power or political say. They had some of the best jobs and wanted equality.
THE URBAN POOR lived in hard conditions on dirty streets. They had insecure jobs and often went hungry.
THE PEASANTS had no land, no money, or food and couldn't work.

Historians  believe that one of the reasons for the French Revolution was because the third estate wanted more distribution of power and wealth. 

Industry | Causes of the French Revolution

How did Industry add to the Start of the French Revolution?

Hello again! This post is about the problems in the French industry.

Partly because people couldn't afford to buy things, there was a huge financial crisis. The government were taxing common people regularly and paying half their money to cover debts that Louis had inherited (sigh) . The Seven Years's war had drained the treasury, as well as the participation in the American Revolution. Louis puts Charles de Calonne in charge of finance, who generally made a mess of his job. France were spending more than they were receiving from taxes. France had clearly seen the problem, but were far too deep in it to fix it. 46,000 were unemployed in Amiens. 

Harvests | Causes of the French Revolution

Hello Everyone!

This blog is about causes of the French revolution... Why did this happen? On this blog, I will be exploring the reasons why.

Bad Harvest

On this post we are going to be looking at the first reason- at this time there were a number of bad harvest which affected the whole economy and left people feeling not as good as they used to!

Because of the harvests, the costs of living rose by a whopping 45%! This got so bad that people were spending 75% of their wages on bread. Imagine earning £100 per week, and spending £75 of that on bread so you could keep your belly full. Here are the dates of how it all happened:

1787 - poor harvest, silk harvest failed

1788 - terrible harvest!

1789 - poor harvest, including wine (sorry Mum and Dad!) 

This was all because of bad weather :(

Hungry people are more likely to rebel (everyone gets a little hangry), and the peasants did not have enough money to support their family!