nm0079: okay well er today we're er going to be carrying on with the er French Revolution you may have noticed i was sort of getting rather er enthusiastic and carried away at the end of the last one i was sort of almost er like i sort of started at the beginning about someone standing on a coffee table and s-, shouting to arms citizens as if i was going to sort of leap up on the desk and say to arms let's storm the Rootes Social Building [laughter] or er let's go out arm in arm singing the Marseillaise or something er like that well this is obviously er partly at least because the revolution the French Revolution er resonates with something about us about the sort of political life that we lead the er way in the some type of society in which we er live and this is one of the reasons why historians have thought it er important because it does seem to set as i think i mentioned to you in a previous er er lecture set the sort of framework set the framework in existence er through within which we still live much of our political and er social life sets a sort of er agenda if you like of what we expect as participants within the type of society in which we we live so the declaration of the rights of man which er as i said came out on the twenty-sixth of w-, was issued by this new national assembly representing the nation the French nation for the first time er er er an elected body which er er worked according to a new constitution new written constitutional er er er s-, er o-, settlement er this provides a set of rights which are not privileges of er a set of corporate groups not the sort of privileges of the nobility or the privileges of the clergy or the privileges of such and such a a town or cathedral or whatever they are rights which every man er it is held er has and that that declaration is one of the biggest intellectual influences cultural influences on the United Nation Declaration of Human Rights which was issued in nineteen-forty-seven and as as i say is you know the way in which we think about not just our own government not just European governments but world governments the way in which we think er er societies ought to operate in a fair and just and equal way so for example the freedom of speech the freedom to publish er the right to er live in a society without fear of arbitrary er arrest the right to er have a religion er religious views er of your own without any sort of harassment er from the state the right to have pe-, to have political rights if you like to belong to a nation w-, er in such a way that er er er a political entity i should say in such a way that you actually your views are heard you have a a a a a a role in shaping the political system in some ways the French Revolution really sets that out in a sort of model way for the er first time in in a way which is durably extremely influential so that when we think about seventeen-eighty-nine when we think about the French Revolution we think about that movement of elan that movement of tremendous energy and excitement and enthusiasm when new things suddenly seem to be possible when a new epoch in human history seemed to be er starting up it's not for an ac-, it's not by any accident although it was a couple of years after seventeen-eighty-nine in fact that the French Revolutionaries introduced their own calendar a new calendar to get rid of the old er religious er er calendar which existed and to create a a calendar which and it's an amazingly obvious er sort of enlightenment er reference here a calendar which somehow reflected nature so months were named after weather conditions and types of er er the seasons were named after after after er after sort of natural objects the days were not saints' days but er er er plants and flowers and things like that so the idea that a new epoch has been created and the revolutionary calendar starts from year one you know to get rid of seventeen-eighty-nine and we go to a new calendar in human history so this idea of a new opening and ne-, new possibilities and with that the idea and this of course is something which is true of many revolutions the idea that the revolution could create could could er er reorganize society rationally yeah again a very enlightenment sort of project er in a way er that er everyone had a say everyone had a say and this would produce a new type of human individual no longer a subject no longer a sort of person who just follows orders er but a citizen equal in rights equality before the law er er to all other er er citizens this idea of a new man the nation the French nation would be regenerated in this way a new species of humanity would evolve and France would be in the sort of vanguard of a transformation of the whole of the world France was sort of leading the way in pioneering fashion er er towards a new er future and that's exciting and that because it links up with er er you know some of the things which we still feel is one reason why people look back to the revolution and think incredibly positive things about it but on the other hand what do we think about when another part of our mind thinks about the French Revolution it thinks guillotines it thinks reign of terror it thinks er a chilling bureaucracy it thinks a revolutionary tribunal er it thinks the mass execution of peasants men women and children in areas of er France which were not as excited about this new revolutionary beginning er as others it thinks about war it thinks about a war of y-, of France and revolution against just about the whole of the rest er of Europe and it's for this reason that i've sort of put the in the first heading there the term paradox you know that that is one of the great things about the revolutionary legacy if you like to the rest of the nineteenth century that there is this sense of paradox about er about the French Revolution which the whole of the nineteenth century really is intensely engaged with and which still in the twentieth century er we can we can sort of still sort of understand on the one hand the revolution as new opening new beginning er new possibilities the regeneration of the human er species on the other the revolution as an an instrument of terror of repression er a sort of early eighteenth century version er of the kind of totalitarian democracy totalitarian repression the totalitarian regimes i mean er which with which we've become depressingly familiar er in the late er twentie-, by the late er twentieth century so that sort of paradox the posti-, pluses and the minuses is what i want to sort of put absolutely in front of you er today i put it un-, t-, at the start of the lecture i put it under this er heading living paradoxes because it the emphasis i'd like to place is that people just normal individuals had to try and live through the two aspects of the er revolution and try somehow keep them in within the same sort of er box in their in their lives er in in the er in the seventeen- nineties and many groups found it too difficult to keep those things you know together er and what you actually see in the revolution is an increased polarization of er society a pro enthusiastically pro the revolution and an enthusiastically against the revolution a counter-revolutionary er movement as well a revolution which has stressed harmony equality every community everyone being in together i mean the best illustration which historians usually give of that is it's the s-, the first celebration of the fourteenth of July which was obviously a year later in seventeen-ninety the French have what er the in in Paris they create this enormous sort of amphitheatre people come up from every part of France they have an enormous civil er festi-, a civic festival this so- called fête de la fédération the the festival of the federation er symbolizing i think this idea of the new unity the new indivisibility of the new er regime and yet even by seventeen- ninety i think the fissures are opening up let me start let me start at the top sorry i'm not just going er it sounds like i'm doing a striptease [laughter] if i don't take my er pullover which wasn't the intention at all er let's start with the king there's a really good engraving i've i'm sorry i meant to bring it along er it's an engraving of Louis the Sixteenth and it's an engraving originally done under the Ancien Régime so he's looking i don't know if you've ever seen a picture of Louis the Sixteenth but he's trying to look serious which is difficult for Louis the Sixteenth because he's very very he's a simpleton really he's he's well meaning but you know profoundly silly er a twerp in er in er breeches er Louis the Sixteenth and he's there sort of looking in this bovine way and the genre of the engraving is sort of very sort of adulatory you know trying to make him look good he's got a star and he's you know looking good Ancien Régime version of the king okay on the top of this on the top of his head like just painted on the top is a big red bonnet the bonnet which came to symbolize revolutionary patriotism it was actually er the idea of a red bonnet to symbolize freedom and equality came from the red bonnet which in antiquity was given to slaves who had been freed okay so under in er ancient Rome if you were a slave you got freedom you could wear the red bonnet to show that you were emancipated as a slave and the revolutionaries pick up on this idea because they have been slaves allegedly under the Ancien Régime and now they are free men and what thi-, and with this moreover goes a tricolore the tricolore flag a- , but a tricolore coquet the tricolore is the mixture of the colours of Paris the the ceremonial colours of Paris red and blue er with the white colour which is the Bourbon the Bourbon dynasty the the the royal dynasty's er ceremonial colour so putting these together seems to symbolize that new new unity okay so you've got Louis the Sixteenth in this sort of er Ancien Régime type of engraving with on his ho-, sort of painted i-, on in this sort of very crude way a red bonnet a revolutionary coquet and for me what that painting says is can Louis the Sixteenth be er a free man can Louis the Sixteenth adapt to a new type of er er political system in which he is not God's representative on Earth who everyone has to obey because he's allegedly absolute monarch er er the only sort of representative of the of the French nation he has to work within a new political system which is totally new to him er totally foreign and different and difficult for him to accept that he is just one agent of the French nation he's called the King of the French now and the idea is that he is the the executive arm of a of an elected assembly er the national assembly which has come into existence in seventeen-eighty-nine which he hasn't very little control of he can veto legislation a little but not very much frankly the sort of sovereignty er in the er within France has shifted from the body the person of the monarch to this national assembly this new national assembly and within that sit-, situation can Louis the Sixteenth cope can he can he sort of er deal with this new political er arrangement i've got er sort of a few dates for you there to to look at i might mention some of these things as we er go through well can he can he cope no he can't cope er throughout seventeen-eighty-nine and ninety we find him endlessly vacillating wanting to sort of half accept things then sort of falling back on er when he's sort of pressed he's very very lukewarm about the revolution in a way that many people who are enthusiastic revolutionaries find extremely difficult er to to take er and their patience becomes increasingly tested now what are the things that Louis the Sixteenth finds difficult to accept well obviously the reduction in his own power that's a that's the first thing but i think also he finds two other areas of the new revolutionary situation the new political er system of post- seventeen-eighty-nine France very difficult to cope with first of all the reduction of the nobility's status the idea that the nobility who were you know the most powerful group of individuals within er France er they were s-, allegedly the second estate you know the ones who above the third estate above everyone else these too have to accept that they are normal citizens as well indeed in seventeen-ninety all titles are abolished er throughout France so you're not allowed to call yourself the Duke of this the Marquis of that or or whatever you have to take normal li-, normal names like everyone else and many of the privileges and rights which they have er had for literally more than a millennia in many er er cases are removed them removed from them one of the er things which k-, happens in seventeen-eighty-nine which makes this such an important powerful national movement is the peasants er rising in seventeen-eighty-nine following the er overthrow of the Bastille er which leads to the abolition of feudalism the abolition of many of the senorial and feudal rights which the nobility in particular although other social groups as well have maintained so the nobility is losing its rights losing its power losing its its sort of status within French society and putting a lot of pressure on the king er to stand by their f- , you know the king is a noble he's the first of all nobles the first of ar-, most aristocratic of all aristocrats if you like er he the nobility are putting pressure on him not to fall in with this new revolutionary system but to stick by their rights one way in one thing which this which many of these nobles were starting to do in sevente-, well even in seventeen-eighty-nine but particularly in seventeen-ninety and ninety-one is to emigrate to get out of France they just say this is hopeless we're getting out you know er this is a sort of political system we don't like they emigrate and they s-, try and put pressure on the political leaders of other countries particularly in Germany er er to s-, to build up an army on the French frontiers which will frighten the French out of their sort of revolutionary ways so the émigrés the emigrated nobles other groups as well but the nobles are the most important start talking conspiracy they start conspiring in some of the provinces but outside France they're trying to make er the overthrow of the new revolutionary government on the top of the agenda of most of the European rulers okay so already you've got a sort of sense of polarization there er coming up er very strongly so the king is worried about his own position he's worried about that of the nobility he's worried too and i think this cannot be underestimated or overestimated whichever word is right er the n-, clergy okay religion now i didn't when i was talking about the Enlightenment i didn't say that much about er religion i emphasized the changes in er in ideas which the Enlightenment had brought about i emphasized how the ideas of the Enlightenment circular circulate among social groups and in settings and urban setting er in which they obviously are doing er doing very well but if one looked at the total picture of France er in seventeen-eighty-nine one would probably say that most of the population are still Catholics and many of them are intensely er Catholic okay when the revolution fixt-, it first comes out er first occurs many people don't see a problem with that they don't see that er a revolution need necessarily be anticlerical in fact the fête de la fédération which i mentioned to you which is this sort of celebration of harmony and unity in er seventeen-ninety is in fact celebrated by a Te Deum there is actually a an altar at the centre of this enormous sort of amphitheatre where someone er you know celebrates er a Mass and er so in other words religion is part of the new sort of revolutionary er er sort of culture but it doesn't last like that for very long if you remember the reason why the state is having a revolution at all in seventeen-eighty-nine is because of its financial problems it's facing bankruptcy and one of the first things that the revolutionary assembly does in seventeen-eighty-nine is try and seek a way out of that by nationalizing church property church owns probably between six and ten per cent of the total cultivable land er within France between six and ten per cent so straightaway as soon as you've nationalized that you're basically you're going to be all right financially that's a lot of money coming in in return for that nationalization of land the church says we will er reorganize the church now w-, it reorganizes the church along lines which you'd expect because as i say the influence of the Enlightenment is very clear which are rational er straightforward administratively very clear-cut okay many people within the church accept that they accept that the revolution the revolutionary has the right to impose a new structure on the French church many however do not what happens in seventeen- ninety seventeen-ninety-one the so-called Civil Constitution of the Clergy which is voted through a new constitution for the clergy as well which will be written into the in the er er political constitution as well er so there'll be salaries for priests there'll only be one bishop in every department er most monastic orders lose their property and the monks and nuns are grouped together there won't be any sort of perpetual vows 'cause this is it's alleged to be against individual freedom and all the rest of it a lot of the clergy say yes this is a good system this will allow us to work within it but many people are extremely unhappy about that of course many people lose within the clergy the a-, the old bishops the people who have been monks and nuns the cathedral chapters all of these people earned a lot of wealth within the within the Ancien Régime are going to lose that they're going to be opposed to it many of the high kind of one should also say most in fact i would say go so far to say make a generalization all of the high er clergy is noble in fact it's usually very noble indeed very aristocratic the highest positions within the church are almost monopolized by a small set of very aristocratic families they're the people who because they're nobles are against the revolution these al-, co-, al-, people also have a reason 'cause they're religious to be against the er revolution what happens in seventeen-ninety-one and ninety-two is that the the national assembly realizing that France is divided on this imposes an oath of loyalty to the new civil constitution if you vote for it fine you know you can stay within the church you can become a priest er you can become a bishop you you know you everything will work well for you you are like a state civil servant for religion if you don't however if you don't vote for it er then basically you're out you wha-, you haven't got the right to any position within the church you lose your salary you lose any any sort of rights to a pension late seventeen-ninety there is an oath the clergy splits down the middle roughly half er vote for the constitution civil constitution half against interestingly you know is that just the clergy which it takes it's the clergy who are half for half against very interesting work been done in recent years by an American historian called Timothy Tackett T-A-C-K-E-double-T and what he argues i think it's a convincing argument if you read the book is that that that oath which you know obviously it's the clergy that take fact that's like a sort of popularity poll on the revolution by the whole of the French nation because the people who are voting you know for it for the oath the clergy are under pressure from their parishioners or from the people in their er neighbourhood to vote one way or another in other words the complexion of er the the sort of religious the the geography if you like of voting for and voting against is is mapped over a sort of s-, a regional geography of pro-church and anti-church feeling and this in France at least and i think this is not just France but you know France is very very clear this vote of seventeen-ninety-one divides France for the rest of the seventeen-nineties and indeed to a very considerable extent for the next two centuries if you look for example at who votes right and who votes left in it's not so clear actually it must be said in the nineteen-eighties and nineteen-nineties but if you look in nineteen- seventies look at you know the voting pattern who's you know like in England north of England normally votes er er Labour the south well you know i know it's been different since er Blair but you know that's usually the sort of what we expect in France you look at the map and you see that the righ-, the places which vote right and are therefore tend to be pro- supporting er supportive of the church er places like the Brittany in particular in the west the Massif Central these are very precisely the areas which voted against the civil constitution in seventeen-ninety so in other words religion has broken apart has has crea-, created a massive fissure within the rev-, new revolutionary nation which had been established in er seventeen- ninety the clergy therefore had to live this paradox er seventeen-eighty-nine had seemed to open up er a new a new era to them they had to accept that er half of them at least are not finding this something they want to go along with fro-, the the the the the unity of seventeen-eighty-nine is breaking apart in seventeen-ninety-one as you'll see the situation sort of looks as if it's coming to a head when Louis the Sixteenth the king leaves Paris secretly clandestinely where he feels he's being held prisoner and makes a run for the border makes a run for the frontier where all these émigré er armies are he's fortunately caught er before he gets there he's brought back to Paris many people would say at that stage let's get rid for him for heaven's sake you know the man's obviously against the revolution he's actually creating more trouble than he's worth let's get rid of him this is the exact opposite of what in fact happened okay because this gives er the revolutionary national assembly a chance if you like to blackmail Louis the Sixteenth into accepting the new constitution er which they are going to pass in seventeen-ninety-one creating a constitutional er monarchy why don't they get rid of him well because i think very largely you've got the pressure from the émigrés the pressure from er the the clergy as well the other grouping i think in this period we would say isn't which is living the paradox of the revolution is the lower classes and in particular the most politically conscious of those the people in the towns the urban consumers er who are they're often called in fact and you'll get used to this term the sans-culottes this does not mean that they didn't wear trousers by the way those who er have er er sort of O-level er G-C-S-E er French sans- culottes this means without knee breeches the knee breeches is the sign of er gentility it shows you're sort of a gent er if you don't if you wear the straight trousers of the workman that means you're a worker okay so it's er it's not always the case but er you know that's that's the idea okay so the sans-culottes are the politically active group of the urban er working and labouring classes a lot of artisans a lot of shopkeepers as well generally speaking not those who are have benefited most from the revolution 'cause this is the paradox for for many of these the revolution has seemed to open up this era of equality equality before the law but that equality does not make many people's lives better in fact the economy is going through very considerable problems from seventeen-ninety seventeen-ninety-one the e-, economy which has done well over the an-, the the Ancien Régime over the eighteenth century as i have argued but the disruption caused by the revolution is causing very severe problems prices are going up price of bread is going up er there's a lot of layoff with er of employment there's a lot of trade disruption a lot of industrial disruption as well and so a lot of the as i say politically conscious er work-, labouring classes are saying well look this is a revolution that's supposed to be equali-, about equality where where is the equality for us and these people blame the elite they blame the old elite they they blame the King they blame the nobility they blame the clergy for not producing not delivering the goods if you like on the equality and the liberty er which they've been er er promised and when the King comes back from Varennes very precisely there are massive a massive growth within Paris er of popular antiroyalism anti-, there's real antimonarchism coming out lot of people in other words are saying which they never said in seventeen-eighty-nine they're saying let's have a republic you know the King is hopeless you know deputies in the national assembly are therefore caught in this very sort of odd position whereby they want the King because they need the King's support for the revolution so that they can fight against the émigrés the e-, and the nobles and the clergy who are wanting a return to the Ancien Régime they want the King so that they can prevent the lower classes getting too powerful getting above their station perhaps wanting a republic a more democratic system than the one that which they have introduced in seventeen- eighty-nine so in the summer of seventeen-eighty-nine so sorry of er seventeen- ninety-one you in fact find the King despite the flight from Varennes actually comes back into the national assembly and there's sort of agreement between the national assembly and the King let us have a er a new constitution a new constitutional monarchy a new constitution is elected a new assembly is elected seventeen-ninety-one seems to be again the possibility of a new beginning all those paradoxes after that will not go away nm0079: war and revolution some you know sort of question that comes up on er on the er exam papers occasionally war and revolution and re-, revolutionized the revolution is this true well i think it is true and why well that's what i'm going to explain er we've got a situation there when you've got a increased polarization of er f-, the French political system by by the time you're going into seventeen-ninety-one er you've got a counter-revolution quite clearly developing er you've got a a r-, a strong revolutionary group but not the sort of harm-, harmonious community that you seem to be introducing in seventeen-er -er -eighty-nine and you've got a king er a pivotal figure who is the symbol to the counter-revolutionaries let's give the King back all his power from seventeen-eighty-nine but it's also a symbol a contested symbol as well for the revolutionaries 'cause they say well you know he's the man who's accepted the revolution the King continues to vacillate on the one hand supporting seeming to give support to the counter-revolution then finally under pressure agreeing to er to er er er support the revolution in the new er assembly a group who were called very often called er by historians the Girondins 'cause they come from the department of the Gironde from many of them round Bordeaux start arguing start arguing that maybe given the situation what France really needs to create a new unity or to refine that unity of seventeen-eighty-nine is warfare to attack the Europe which seems to be so counter-revolutionary to wipe out those émigrés on the frontiers who seem to be so er er so contentious and so opposed to the revolution and to reunite the nation er behind er the war a war for revolution and moreover it will make the position of the King utterly clear there will be no longer the chance of sitting on the fence when you're at war er you basically have to be for the war or against it okay they drift to war they go to war in er from April seventeen-ninety-two er they're at war a-, against most of Germany ger-, most of Germany er most of the rest of Europe comes in down to early er seventeen-er -ninety-three what happens well the King has to choose but he doesn't he doesn't choose he again continues to vacillate at a time when it frankly is impossible to vacillate and what happens on the tenth of August er seventeen-ninety-two er is that there is a popular insurrection on these politically sort of active er groups with er the sans-culottes within Paris reinforced by many people who were pouring through Paris so they can go and fight on the er front attack the Tuileries Palace er pull him out of there s-, send him to prison and er the national assembly has to accept the fact that you know you need a new constitution which is a republican constitution which is more democratic than the er constitution so far er er which gives those sans- culottes some sort of stake in the nation er and which can re-, re-, er reunite in a patriotic manner behind the revolutionary assembly which will then go on and er win the er win the war so in other words what you had is a second revolution in some ways er at the time they looked back to say seventeen-eighty-nine saying yeah seventeen-eighty-nine was the revolution of liberty that's when we got our freedom if you like seventeen-ninety-two is the revolution of equality where we s-, we took s-, liberty but we also decided that equality was essential and we got rid of the King and we tried to establish a republic er er without er er a sort of som-, someone standing over er er us and sort of telling us what to do or thinking they ought to return to the old regime er or whatever just as war has er just as the revolution has become so polarized in other words so the war will make that polarization much deeper and moreover make that polarization separated with groups one from another by a line a line of blood a line of dead bodies a line of corpses er because war counterac-, war produces a er increasing level of violence within revolution and counter-revolution which makes it very difficult to to to go back to tho-, o-, those old days of er harmony so for example in er following the er overthrow over the King in er er er August lots of the people are going off to the front war's going terribly badly the er German troops Prussian troops Austrian troops are not very far away from Paris it looks like they're kind of come and slaughter everyone er many of the sans-culottes many of the people come up through Paris going out to the front er decide that if they're going to go out they don't want the perison-, the prisoners within the Paris prison breaking out of prison where they're allegedly various prison plots and slaughtering all their wives and children so in fact the so-called September massacres horrible horrible moment er groups of sans-culottes go from prison to prison basically massacring prisoners in vast numbers innocent people whole pile of prostitutes who were there they just you know they need they need blood the revolution becomes er a revolution of blood-drinkers buveurs de sang this is the way it looks from the revolution this is the way it looks to English people at the at this time as well er they go out these people they attack er the the German troops they drive the German troops back but from this moment on the revolution has got that that sort of polarized that sort of paradoxical thing on the one one hand it has been a revolution about liberty and s-, allegedly equality but it's a revolution too about killing people killing people in prison who are not who are not ba-, basically guilty of anything apart from the fact that they're not enthusiastic supporters of the er revolution and that that line of blood if you like which is created from seventeen-ninety-two onwards actually causes this sort of polarization to to continue and be durable er throughout the revolution and er and beyond many of the Girondins felt that war would be successful war would be successful er but for a single country to take on the united forces of er Europe is frankly too much and the war goes actually by seventeen-ninety-three extremely badly it's not just at the front you're also getting internal counter- revolution er within er France in western France in particular in the department of the Vendée er there is a sort of full scale popular royalist uprising a peasant revolt if you like and what caused that well it was precisely the war because the revolutionaries go in there and they try and recruit they try and conscript local people to go off to the front er they revolt that is the trigger if you like of a whole sort of area becoming massively er a-, counter-revolutionary in the name of church and king and there are other areas like that in the middle of seventeen-ninety-three it looks literally as if France is going to fall apart the whole of France is going to fall apart er the armies are sort of pouring in over every er front er the British navy is blockading all the ports it is probably one of the most serious occasions in er French er history for just er survival survive they do they survive through war they survive through terror let's take war first Ancien Régime armies okay now sort of very very er er you've got a incredibly simplistic sort of Ladybird guidebook guide to er conduct of war coming up okay under the in the eighteenth century armies fight against each other in lines they're all in er lines like this and they march across through lines are always very long 'cause if you don't then obviously it's rather er vulnerable to er sort of flanking attack so you have to lengthen the lines as much as possible so you can't be sort of like er surrounded er they're all incredibly well trained so one line sort of shoots you know then they sort of go to the back to reload second line comes through volley fire all the rest of it like that okay i don't know if you've ever seen a film like this all those red coats marching along you know firing that's it okay revolution most of the officer corps emigrates in France they just can't do it you can't train a load of peasants who are enthusiastic er to er to to fight like that you need years of training so that you can fight under that sort of discipline don't know if you've ever been in the Boy Scouts or the C-C-F or whatever you know you where you sort of like walk in a line across broken country the girls here have been have you er it's very difficult to do it's very difficult to do you need training okay most of that training has gone France is facing the armies of Ancien Régime Europe who have this training how do they actually manage to sort of just hold up against those armies well the way they do that is that they use the single thing that they've got well the two things they've got going for them one is numbers people are enthusiastic about the revolution they actually want to win they want to beat the army and they want to go home okay and secondly besides er er numbers they have obviously enthusiasm so numbers and enthusiasm is the way in which the revolutionary er armies er conquer instead of coming in this sort of linear way they basically form if you like again okay it's incredibly simplistic and in fact any military historian er in in here please put something over your ears but as i say it's just a simplified very s-, very much running at the enemy firing as they go basically frightening the shit out of the er [laughter] the enemy by these wild men who come come who come enthusiastically towards you shooting off as they go and punching a hole through these er these lines by just sort of sheer force of numbers okay that's the way that the revolution is witne-, er Marshal er sorry not Marshal er General er er Hoche says H-O-C-H-E he says what have we got we've got fire steel and patriotism okay enthusiasm fire steel okay close in close in the puncture that hole destroy wipe out the er the sort of linear perfection of the of the Ancien Régime armies and and conquer and that's what they do they're very successful as we see when er we're talking about Napoleon that's his type of fighting er er as well so as well as and arguing as well as revolutionizing er as er as long as as well as the war revolutionizing the revolution we would also say that the revolution revolutionized warfare er that the the way in which warfare was fought war was fought is changed like this it's sort of like a mass army in other words and is precisely and this is something we'll talk about later in the term the up-, in August of er er of seventeen-ninety-three the levée en masse is declared by the national assembly that is every person in the whole of the er er republic has the duty to support the er the war effort in some ways old men should sort of collect er saltpetre to be made into gunpowder women should sort of knit socks for the people at the front and men have the right and the duty if they're called on to go and fight for the front so this is sort of first inkling of this idea of mass warfare which is obviously such an important thing in the nineteenth and particularly er the twentieth er er century so around that patriotism how do you get people to how do you mobilize that enthusiasm obviously the revolution has brought much in seventeen-ninety-three er how in seven-, in seventeen- eighty-nine how in seventeen-ninety-three do you make people want to go out and you know even kill themselves on the battlefield for er an entity France which probably didn't mean very much to them er before seventeen-eighty-nine well there are two arms to the strategy er of within France of mobilizing the nation in this way i've sort of given some of the er things here er very si-, very simplistically i would say radical social policies and terror okay let's start with radical social policies 'cause they are often forgotten er because people have a view of the terror which is almost entirely er negative but if you were writing the history of the welfare state you would make a big detour er into this period because it's precisely in this period that the French legislative asse-, the French er national convention and particularly this guy particularly Robespierre argued that in order to give people something to fight for you've got to give them something you've got to introduce the maximum in other words a ceiling on prices so grain and bread is at an affordable price you've got to introduce a whole welfare package for er families of er er of soldiers for the aged for the infirm whole sort of set of new hospitals and all the rest of it a whole sort of set of welfare provision er within this er period er so that people have something to fight for and if they're not if they're not enthusiastic if they're not keen then you have to frighten them into being keen as well that's the other side you a-, the terror side is that you use violence the violence of the revolutionary state er against the enemies of the republic er both without and within so you've got the e-, the the idea of of this su-, sort of new national er this new nation fighting against the er er the the the the forces of counter-revolutionary Europe but within you've got also a set of terroristic policies meant to keep the enemies of the revolution quiet and even er in its more horrible e-, er exemplifications to liquidate them so you have a revolutionary tribunal a special court where anyone accused of a a counter-revolutionary offence will go and this becomes tighter and tighter and more defined basically anyone can go er and have their head chopped off by the by the summer of seventeen-ninety-four you have a committee of public safety a war cabinet but also a sort of terror cabinet in which the Robespierre faction the person Robespierre as i say who gets this sort of this strategy of er war on the frontiers but er so-, radical social policy give the people something to fight for let them rally around the flag of the republic er er Robespierre dominates the committee of public safety you've got er the maximum the law of suspects er sort of very m-, very vague definition of counter-revolution and you've got these représentants en mission deputies elected to the national assembly going into the provinces and using violence against anyone who seems to be counter-revolutionary i mean some of the famous ones people like Carrier in Nantes where he sort of puts whole piles of priests and counter-revolutionaries on boats floats them out into the middle of the River Loire and then pulls the plugs and so thousands of people die or Lyon or indeed in in the Vendée where people where basically in certain you've got a sort of free fire zone essentially in many parts of of er er Brittany and in some of the other areas of counter-revolution where if you see anyone with a rifle in your hand in their hands you shoot them if you're a a revolutionary soldier and you go through a policy of s-, of burning houses down killing er civil populations and all the rest of it that horrible side of the revolution horrible side of the revolution which is however effective the Marseillaise is created the the French er national anthem is created precisely at this time in in August i think by seventeen- ninety-two er don't know if you've ever listened to the words of the Marseillaise or or translated them it's all about blood flowing through er er through furrows and things like that it is a v-, it's a marching song a militaristic song er the idea's that French republic is an army a nation with rights the citizen is a rights bearing individual but he's also an arms bearing cit-, er cit-, citizen he bears arms to defend er the r-, the er republic and this policy is successful because by seventeen-ninety-four er er what's happening is that i should have put the third heading er as well what's happening by seventeen er ni-, ninety-four is that the counter- revolutionary armies are being driven back France there aren't any more sort of troops or anything on French soil in fact the French are pushing them into their own er into Europe as we'll see when talking about this er er next week er so to a certain extent the terror has its justification you know this is a horrible way a a horrible logic if you like the terror has its justification and that it's successful it defends France against it it allows the it allows France to stay geographically united even though socially and politically it's very er divided and by the middle of seventeen-ninety-four you've got a a choice it's open to you really if you're within er er France if you're as long as you're keeping your head down if you're a counter-revolutionary obviously but if you're a revolutionary you have two choices one of them is to say well terror you know we don't like what's gone on in the terror but it has been successful at least so let's go back to you know what it was before let's go back and to sort of seventeen-ninety-two or seventeen-ninety or something let's dismantle all this er sort of stuff all this sort of apparatus of terror this apparatus of er er strong centralized government which has been set up by the war emergency and yet there is that group and yet there is another group er Robespierre is perhaps the most prominent and certainly the most articulate of them who say no no turning back this is the time to create a new republic that new man which we talked about in seventeen-eighty-na nine may have been a new man of the age of liberty what we need is a new man of the age of equality even though in other words the war is being won and the the the sort of rationalization for terror is no longer there let's take things er further what is very interesting and i i think it's also one of the reasons why this paradox about the revolutionary le-, legacy is so powerful and yet so difficult for us in the ni-, in the twentieth and nineteenth and twentieth century er is that where Robespierre gets his ideas from where this idea of a purification of the nation er of more radical social legislation more equality within the er within the system is very precisely from the Enlightenment the Enlightenment i've argued has created the sort of conditions the social conditions and the ideology that the discourses which make seventeen-eighty-nine er possible what historians get very agitated about very divided about er very upset about sometimes is that the the the ideology and the discourses of Enlightenment have also seemed to prove the pr-, provide the justification er behind the reign of terror the idea that a new republic of virtue that's what Robespierre is always talking about virtue er that one can get a new civ-, er a new civic system of equality where everyone basically has a sort of direct and equal relationship to each other and in which the state sits over er er er above them and so er we have a situation where Robespierre is sticking up and his supporters on the Committee of Public Safety you know the these the storm centre the the the sort of brain centre of the terror and much of the rest of the the political nation are thinking well surely this is the time to draw back this is not the time to to to go on but such is the terror that there is not by late by the spring of seventeen-ninety-four the sort of freedom of opinion freedom of speech which you've had in seventeen-eighty-nine people are frightened that's this is why you know there are a lot of those ideas about the terror being a sort of protototalitarian system you know that that sort of fear in which people never know whether there's going to be a knock on the door they're frightened of the meaning of words where you know you can use the word er s-, er er er subject instead of citizen and you'll be seen to be a counter-revolutionary in which you can say i quite liked the Louis the Sixteenth and you'll end up before the revolutionary tribunal so opinion opinion is no longer free so how do you get rid how do you change it you have to get rid of Robespierre this is what many of the people who got rid of him later say they say we couldn't do anything you had to kill him there was no way out Robespierre has to go the symbol of this new idea of of of revolutionary virtue has to be executed there is a coup d'état er on the n-, ninth of Thermidor under the new calendar the twenty-seventh of July seventeen-ninety-four where he he h-, he is captured he and they are all executed a gang of them are executed er the next day the the people who've been the driving force the van if you like of the movement for social regeneration and political regeneration social welfare policies but also terror but also terror so you know very much the two sides are removed and one can if you like the revolutionaries who get get the sense of going back so that they can get go forward they've got over the political crisis they've got over er the social divisions if you like of seventeen er ninety-three to four they've fought back the the armies seventeen-ninety-five they can sort of move forward without Robespierre without the option of a terroristic policy hopefully at least and create er er a new political system in which those virtues of seventeen-eighty-nine and seventeen-ninety-one those liberal er equalities those lib-, liberal and free er free virtues of of seventeen-eight eighty-nine to ninety-one er will be dominant and not the virtue er not the liberty not the equality er as it's been interpreted er under Robespierre so the very vocabulary in which we think in which revolutionaries in seventeen- ninety f-, nineties think about these things but in which we into the late s-, er late twentieth century are still thinking er about the er about er politics what does freedom mean what does equality mean how do these two things actually mesh in any political er system er these things have become in that sort of short laboratory like period er of of just four or five years er up into the open up into discussion they've become the thing fa-, the framework within which er we all try and live okay have a nice weekend