Question

Describe the circumstances leading to the outbreak of revolutionary protests in France.

Answer 1

Circumstances leading to the outbreak of revolutionary protests in France were:
1. Long years of war and the cost of maintaining the palace of Versailles had emptied the financial resources of France.
2. The state was forced to increase its taxes to meet its regular expenses such as the cost of maintaining the court, an army, and running government offices or universities.
3. French society was divided into three estates in the eighteenth century. The first estate was the clergy. The second estate was the nobility and the third estate included the remaining sections of society such as merchants, lawyers, peasants, labourers and servants.
4 The members of the first two estates, that is, the clergy and aristocracy, enjoyed certain privileges.
5. The nobles also enjoyed other feudal privileges. These included feudal dues that peasants had to pay to them.
6. The Church also extracted taxes called ‘tithes’ from the peasants. All the members of the Third Estate also had to pay taxes to the state. These included a direct tax, called ‘taille’ and a number of indirect taxes which were levied on articles of everyday consumption like salt or tobacco.