Revolution and Empire in France, 1789–1815 (AP Euro Unit 5 Notes)

French Revolution (1789–1799)

Political and social upheaval that began in 1789, dismantled the Old Regime, and shifted sovereignty claims from king to “the nation,” spreading ideas like citizenship and rights across Europe.

Old Regime

Pre-1789 French society organized by monarchy, legally defined social orders (estates), and structured privilege (including tax exemptions and exclusive access to offices).

Three Estates

Traditional division of French society: First Estate (clergy), Second Estate (nobility), Third Estate (everyone else).

Privileges

Legally protected special exemptions and advantages—especially tax exemptions and exclusive access to offices/honors—that structured inequality under the Old Regime.

Fiscal crisis

Late-1780s financial breakdown of the monarchy caused by war debt, inefficient taxation, and resistance of privileged groups to new taxes; a key trigger of the Revolution.

Estates-General

Representative assembly summoned by Louis XVI in 1789 (first time since 1614) to address the fiscal crisis, which became a showdown over political representation and authority.

Voting by estate

Estates-General procedure where each estate had one vote; tended to preserve privilege because the First and Second Estates could outvote the Third.

Voting by head

Estates-General procedure where each delegate had one vote; favored the numerically dominant Third Estate and challenged privileged control.

National Assembly

Body formed when the Third Estate declared itself the representative of the nation in 1789, marking an early decisive claim that sovereignty rested with the nation, not the king.

Tennis Court Oath

June 1789 pledge by the National Assembly not to disband until France had a constitution; a major assertion of national sovereignty.

Storming of the Bastille

July 14, 1789 attack on a symbol of royal authority; showed that popular action in Paris could decisively shape political outcomes.

Great Fear

Summer 1789 wave of rural panic and rumor that led peasants to attack seigneurial records and symbols of feudal obligations.

August Decrees

Measures passed August 4, 1789 in response to rural unrest, aiming to end feudal privileges and dismantle aspects of the Old Regime.

Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

August 1789 statement of principles (natural rights, equality before the law) that shifted political identity toward citizenship and provided a universal language for reformers.

Constitutional monarchy (1791)

System created by the 1791 constitution that limited the king’s powers and established a representative legislature, though it retained limits on democracy and kept an executive role for the king.

Civil Constitution of the Clergy

1790 law reorganizing the French Church and requiring clergy to swear loyalty to the revolutionary order, creating a major religious and cultural divide.

Refractory clergy

Clergy who refused to swear loyalty under the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, becoming a focus of resistance and counterrevolutionary sentiment in many areas.

National Convention

Revolutionary assembly that abolished the monarchy and established a republic in 1792; oversaw the execution of Louis XVI (January 1793).

Reign of Terror

1793–1794 period of extraordinary revolutionary rule using surveillance, arrests, tribunals, and executions to defend the republic amid war and internal revolt.

Jacobins

Radical political club/faction influential during the Revolution that generally supported strong centralized measures during crisis, especially during the Terror.

Committee of Public Safety

Central executive body during the Terror that directed war and internal security; associated with figures like Maximilien Robespierre and the expansion of emergency state power.

Law of Suspects

1793 law that broadened who could be arrested as an “enemy of the revolution,” enabling wide-ranging repression during the Terror.

Thermidorian Reaction

Backlash beginning July 1794 with the arrest and execution of Robespierre; dismantled key instruments of the Terror and moved away from radical popular politics.

Directory

Government established by the Constitution of 1795 with a five-man executive; politically unstable and increasingly reliant on the army to maintain order.

Coup of 18 Brumaire

November 1799 seizure of power by Napoleon Bonaparte, ending the Directory and beginning an authoritarian “order bargain” that promised stability while preserving some revolutionary gains.