Читать книгу Virtue and Terror - Robespierre Maximilien - Страница 9

Accapareurs: term used to refer to figures hated by the populace who could either be the administrators responsible for food supplies, or those who supported free trade in grain, and especially those who preferred to hoard their produce rather than to bring it to market (the latter could be sentenced to the death penalty from July 1793 onwards).

Committee of General Security: created under the Convention on 2 October 1792. Responsible for general and interior police matters, it entered into conflict with the Committee of Public Safety dominated by Robespierre.

Committee of Public Safety: created under the Convention on 6 April 1793, it was charged with taking measures of general internal and external defence. Robespierre began to sit on it from 27 July 1793 and continued to do so until his arrest. The powers of the Committee became more and more extensive, a process which created conflict with the Committee of General Security.

Constituent Assembly: founded at the Estates-General on 9 July 1789 and lasted until 30 September 1791. Robespierre was a member of this Assembly.

Convention: assembly elected by quasi-universal male suffrage, it succeeded the Legislative officially on 21 September 1792 with the beginning of the First Republic; first influenced by the Girondins (until 2 June 1793), then by the Montagnards with Robespierre playing a preponderant role (until 9 Thermidor Year II—27 July 1794), and finally by the Thermidorians (until 26 October 1795).

East India Company Affair: the decree of 24 August 1793 dissolved all joint stock companies. The liquidation of the East India Company was supposed to have been carried out by the state; when the decree was announced it emerged that the minutes had been been falsified with the complicity of Fabre d’Eglantine, who was then accused of corruption.

Federalism: designation for the delegates from the Girondin départe-ments who were hostile to the authority of the Convention at the end of 1792—beginning of 1793.

Fédérés: the armies of the Revolution included battalions of fédérés who comprised a volunteer revolutionary force often mobilized to intervene against internal subversion. They played a decisive role in the fall of the monarchy on 10 August 1792.

Feuillants – Feuillantisme: the Feuillants Club was a split from the Jacobins at the time of the Champ-de-Mars affair (17 July 1791); it grouped together supporters of the constitutional monarchy, including La Fayette.

Girondins (‘Brissotins’): ‘Girondins’ was the name given by the historiography of the nineteenth century to the supporters of Brissot and Vergniaud. During the Revolution they were known as ‘Brissotins’ or ‘Rolandins’ and they constituted the right wing of the Convention, favourable to economic liberalism and hostile to interventions by the popular movement.

Jacobin Club: first representing a moderate tendency, this society included a range of political figures in 1789: Mirabeau, La Fayette and Robespierre, among others. After a split away by the more moderate elements in 1791, the Club increasingly moved towards republican positions. The Girondins left it after the September Massacres of 1792 and thereafter it became a powerful centre for the Montagnards (see below). Closed after 9 Thermidor, it was reconstituted several times until its definitive dissolution in 1799.

Journées: The great journées of the Revolution were often synonymous with popular insurrections. The main ones were: 14 July 1789 (storming of the Bastille); 5–6 October 1789 (march of women on Versailles); 17 July 1791 (Champ-de-Mars Massacre); 10 August 1792 (fall of the monarchy); 31 May–2 June 1793 (fall of the Girondins), 9 Thermidor Year II (27 July 1794, fall of Robespierre).

Law of Suspects: the law of 17 September 1793 defined those suspected of being agents of the counter-revolution, principally priests, nobles and foreigners.

Maximum: the sans-culottes demanded a maximum price limit (to fight against speculators).

Montagnards: name given to the deputies sitting on the higher benches (the ‘Mountain’) of the Legislative Assembly and then of the Convention. They differed from the Girondins in drawing their support from the popular movement, by showing their support for regulation of the economy and finally by an equalizing vision of social relations. Robespierre was one of their most eminent representatives.

Paris Commune (also known as the Insurrectionary Commune): on 10 August 1792 an insurrectionary commune composed of members of the far left (Chaumette, Hébert) was formed. It took part in the great journées of the revolution but at the end of 1793 its power was supplanted by that of the Committee of Public Safety under the influence of Robespierre. Purged by the elimination of the Hébertists, it tried unsuccessfully to mobilize Paris to save Robespierre on 9 Thermidor.

Représentants en mission: members of the Convention who, from spring 1793 onwards, were sent alongside the armies and to the départements; they often played an important role in the local application of the Terror, although in a manner that varied greatly from individual to individual.

Revolutionary Government: on 10 October 1793 a report by Billaud-Varenne proclaimed the government as ‘revolutionary until peacetime’ (a decree specified the modalities on 18 November), meaning that the 1793 Constitution should only be applied in times of peace. This latter constitution was not put into practice and another – less democratic – one, that of Year III, succeeded it fourteen months after the fall of Robespierre.

Revolutionary Tribunal: set up in Paris in March 1793 by the Convention to judge the enemies of the Revolution, its power was extended thereafter notably with the law of the ‘great Terror’ (22 Prairial Year II—10 June 1794). It was suppressed several months after the fall of Robespierre on 31 May 1795.

Sans-culottes: originally a pejorative term, replacing that of canaille, for the lower classes. Literally the term refers to the absence of (aristocratic) knee breeches, thus indicating poverty and ignorance. With time, the term increasingly came to identify the ‘people’ as against the ‘aristocrats’. For Robespierre, more than anything, it designated ardent patriots of modest origins.

Sections: originally, the sections in Paris simply had a role as electoral districts. As activists from the popular movement threw themselves increasingly into the sections, the latter tried to widen their scope of activity. With these organs thus gaining in autonomy, the Revolutionary Government progressively curtailed them.

Terror: term used to cover different measures taken by the state during the period from the summer 1792 to July 1794. Originally taken in a disordered manner, these measures became more systematic with the Convention’s placing of the Terror on the ‘order of the day’ from 5 September 1793 onwards. The law of the ‘Great Terror’ of 22 Prairial Year II (10 June 1794) marked its climax. The repressive measures were indissociable from the context of internal and external warfare or from the economic measures aiming at greater equality.

Vendée: department in Western France which was the scene of an insurrection hostile to the Revolution – originally sparked off by the mobilization of 300,000 men for the armies – from March 1793 onwards. The insurrection was harshly repressed.

KEY FIGURES CITED IN THE TEXTS

Abbé Maury (Jean Siffrein) 1746–1817: elected to the Constituent Assembly, he was one of the principal defenders of the Ancien Régime against the Revolution. He emigrated to Rome in 1792.

Barère de Vieuzac (Bertrand) 1755–1841: deputy of the Constituent Assembly and then Montagnard deputy in the Convention. Member of the Committee of Public Safety, one of the organizers of the Terror; for a long time he was close to Robespierre but turned against him on 9 Thermidor.

Billaud-Varenne (Jean-Nicolas) 1756–1819: member of the Jacobin Club, he wrote texts in which he claimed to be a republican. Member of the Paris Commune after 10 August 1792, he then became a Montagnard deputy in the Convention and entered the Committee of Public Safety alongside Robespierre in September 1793, before becoming one of the instigators of 9 Thermidor.

Brissot (Jacques-Pierre) 1754–1793: member of the Jacobin Club, he contributed to the drafting of the petition calling for a republic which was carried to the Champ-de-Mars in July 1791. A deputy in the Legislative Assembly, he was one of the leaders of the Girondins and in favour of the war. Elected to the Convention, he opposed Robespierre and the Montagnards. He was tried and guillotined by the Revolutionary Tribunal.

Chaumette (Pierre Gaspard) 1763–1794: member of the Cordelier Club, he was the procureur-syndic of the Paris Commune in 1792. Robespierre opposed him on account of his de-Christianizing convictions. He was arrested and guillotined with the Hébertists.

Cloots (Anacharsis) 1755–1794: of Prussian origin, Cloots was in Paris and rallied to the Revolution in 1789. He named himself ‘the orator of humanity’ and he was a member of the Jacobins and a deputy in the Convention. A de-Christianizer, he was close to the Hébertists and was guillotined alongside them.

Danton (Georges Jacques) 1759–1794: a founder of the Cordelier Club in 1790, he became the Minister of Justice on 11 August 1792 after the fall of the monarchy. Elected to the Convention, he sat amongst the Montagnards. He was one of the instigators of the Terror but criticized virulently the Hébertist ultra-revolutionaries and, alongside other ‘Indulgents’, demanded an end to the Terror at the beginning of 1794. Implicated in a scandal, he was condemned to death and executed in April 1794 together with his supporters (including Camille Desmoulins).

Desmoulins (Camille) 1760–1794: member of the Cordelier Club and Montagnard deputy, he was close to Danton. At the end of 1793–beginning of 1794, he called for a softening of the Terror in his newspaper Le Vieux Cordelier. Condemned and executed in April 1794.

Dumouriez (Charles François du Périer) 1739–1823: member of the Jacobin Club, he became Minister for Foreign Affairs in March 1792 and then Commander in Chief of the armies of the North, winning the Battle of Valmy on 20 September 1792. During an offensive in March 1793, he was accused of treason and then handed over to the Austrians the agents sent by the Convention to keep an eye on him, before surrendering himself to the enemy.

Fouché (Joseph) 1759–1820: deputy in the Convention, he sat with the Montagnards. Charged alongside Collot d’Herbois with the repression of the federalists of Lyons, he distinguished himself by his ferocious application of the Terror. He was one of the instigators of the 9 Thermidor plot against Robespierre; thereafter, he became a loyal supporter of Bonaparte.

Hébert (Jacques René) 1757–1794: famous for his newspaper the Père Duchesne, he was Chaumette’s substitute in the Paris Commune and a key figure in the Cordelier Club. He came into conflict with Robespierre, whom he accused of moderation on social questions, and was arrested and then condemned to death in March 1794.

La Fayette (Marquis de) 1757–1834: left for America in 1777 to help the insurgents and pushed the French government to support the anti-colonialists in the American War of Independence. Elected as a noble deputy in the Estates-General, he led the National Guard in July 1789. La Fayette wanted to reconcile the king and the Revolution, and was responsible for the shooting of demonstrators at the Champ-de-Mars. He then set up the Feuillants Club which supported a liberal monarchy and opposed the dethronement in 1792.

Marat (Jean-Paul) 1743–1793: member of the Cordelier Club, he became a deputy for Paris in the Convention and was famous for his newspaper l’Ami du peuple [Friend of the People] founded in September 1789. Sitting with the Montagnards, he became a hate figure for the Girondins who tried unsuccessfully to get him condemned by the Revolutionary Tribunal. He had a role in the sparking off of the September Massacres and especially in the overthrow of the Girondins. Assassinated on 13 July 1793 by Charlotte Corday, he became a cult figure amongst layers of the popular classes.

Priestley (Joseph) 1733–1804: important English chemist who supported the French Revolution; was accorded French citizenship and membership of the Convention.

Ronsin (Charles Philippe) 1752–1794: the author of a number of patriotic plays, he was a member of the Cordeliers and became General in Chief of the Parisian revolutionary army in September 1793. Fovourable to Hébert, he was executed alongside him and his supporters in March 1794.

Saint-Just (Louis Antoine) 1767–1794: deputy in the Convention, he sat alongside Robespierre and the Montagnards. Along with Couthon, Robespierre and Saint-Just formed a ‘triumvirate’ in the Committee of Public Safety. Very active in the factional struggle at the beginning of 1794, he tried to give the Terror a social edge with the ‘Ventôse decrees’. Arrested and guillotined with Robespierre.