nigrit - Tumblr blog

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

Good spot on that article, which seems well-argued and convincing enough to suggest that indeed, Madame Robert (Mlle Kéralio) was not the author of that scurrilous book/pamphlet.

However, in the interests of completeness, and following up on my promise, I though it worth sharing some of my ‘high-powered’ sources here to show how even the most respected scholars can continue to repeat stuff like this without any awareness, or, at the very least, framing as such, of its questionable origins.

1/ Witness 1.

Chantal Thomas (directeur in the CNRS), The Wicked Queen etc.

Excellent analysis of the degradation of Marie-Antoinette through print and image. Annoyingly, being French, it has no index (the horror, the horror!) so this took some time.

pp.58, 119 & 173 she calls it “a text bristling with stupidity and misogyny”.

This cited extract, however, could conceivably come from the pen of a prude (?):

“But can it be that Antoinette, surpassing all her like, has infected the court of France with a type of debauchery that has never held sway there? [i.e. lesbianism]… My quill fails me. Antoinette! If, in your criminal hands, the state’s gold has served to corrupt and seduce these miserable fools of women, to gangrene their hears, to trample underfoot that modesty which is the foremost virtue of heir sex, to transform them into vile animals, speak. Who… could be so impure as to hear your name without shuddering in horror?”

However, the fact that Thomas goes on to unquestioningly repeat the libel about the princesse de Lamballe having her sexual organs cut out and worn as a moustache puts paid to my faith in her due diligence over sources. I mean, even if you believe it, at least explain its somewhat questionable origins etc.

Moving on then, we have…

2/ Witness 2.

Crimes des reines etc. is not listed under Kéralio in Fortunée Briquet’s near-contemporary biographical compilation, Dictionnaire historique des Francaises connues par leurs écrits (1804).

3/ Witness 3.

However it is listed under Nicole Pellegrin’s article, "Une traductrice historienne. Louise de Kéralio-Robert etc.", in A la Croisée des langues (p.69): “On lui doit sans doute aussi un ouvrage controversé, marqué d’un républicanisme sexiste avéré etc.”

4/ Witness 4.

A biographical dictionary in the BnF (not sure which one) states, correctly, “One lui attribute parfois les Crimes des reines de France (1791, 1793, still being reprinted under her name in 1830!)

5/ Witness 5.

Me. Some random jottings from my notes. She was elected to the Arras Academie when its president was Robespierre. She belonged to the same society (Soc Fraternelle des deux sexes) as the activist ‘feminist’ Etta Palm d’Aelders.

On 18 April 1790, she writes in Le Mercure national et étranger, ou Journal politique de l’Europe that women should renounce their right to play a role in government, while suggesting the best way for them to cultivate public morals is for the Constitution to ban them from politics forever, and persuade them to stay at home and raise their children the right way! [see Anne Geffroy, p.40]. I repeat, she shared a platform in the same society as Etta Palm. The mind boggles!

Moving on now to Francois Robert – a boozy man?

Naturally, I now find no trace in my notes, only a weak palimpsest of memories in my mind, which cannot be cited according to the law of Chicago ref. Moreover, Wiki says he allowed women to be admitted to the Cordeliers after April 1791 putting him in opposition to his wife’s own beliefs (hmmm, curious!). So, m’lud, the case remains unproven.

However, in my defence, I may cite the following:

a/ his portrait! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-Fran%C3%A7ois-Joseph_Robert. If 'twas ever a boozy man this be it (?!)

b/ after 1815, he fled to Belgium and became a liqueur merchant

c/ in Feb 1793, he became an army commissioner but was fired in September, following accusations of corruption (he had also earlier been Danton’s secretary!); he was then sent to Liege in 1795 to reestablish order in the city (he was Belgium) and became a supplier to the French armies (a position notoriously prone to corruption); maybe he supplied them with wine?!

d/ okay, I concede, the evidence is weak! I’m sure there’s some kind of arrest warrant out there, accusing him being corrupt or drunk, or both, but it will have to wait to be found, unless some intrepid tumblr with more time on their hands can track it down or get their hands on a biography of him or them. Interesting couple though and her pre-revolutionary life is spectacular, writing, translating and wheeling and dealing with publishers over producing mega-volume sets on women's history and literature. making and losing fortunes. A truly pioneering, and by today's definitions, feminist, entrepreneur. Inspired in large part by the encouragement of her father, an ex-military type and scholar.

Louise de Kéralio-Robert arguing women can’t play a role in politics while being a woman who plays a role in politics compilation

Women! Always women in everything that threatens France! […] Wherever we have seen women in public matters in France, everywhere we have seen them in drunkenness! (dans l’ivresse) Mercure national, 22 August 1790, cited in ”Le corps petit, mais l’âme grande”: Voicing a Woman’s Ambition in Louise de Kéralio (2019) by Vicki Mistacco, page 87.

[I defend] the continuation of the Salic Law among a people too masculine to expose twenty-four million men to ever entrusting this executive power, which emanates from them alone, into the hands of a woman. Journal d’État et du citoyen, 1 October 1789, cited in ”Le corps petit, mais l’âme grande”: Voicing a Woman’s Ambition in Louise de Kéralio (2019) by Vicki Mistacco, page 83.

Mademoiselle de Keralio is very satisfied by what [Monsieur Brissot de Warville] said today about the influence of women. It is very much part of Melle de Keralio’s principles that women should not make a great spectacle of themselves. […] A love of publicity is bad for modesty, from the loss of that comes a distaste for domestic work, and from idleness, principles are forgotten and from lack of morals arise all of public disorders. […] She would like it if one was forced to seek women inside their homes, their presence should be hard to obtain, and rare, offered as a favour. It is one of the regenerations of France and especially of Paris […], men will be busy from now on, and consequently less attentive to the frequent appearance of useless or frivolous objects. Women […] will resort to the peaceful and useful occupations that nature assigns to them; education will change, and in the next generation, we will have fewer of these little amphibious beings whose appearance so cruelly bothered Mademoiselle de Kéralio that she was often called a prude and a bigot (although she was neither one nor the other) […] when she […] sought in vain, the gentleness, the modesty, the pudeur, which she gothicly imagined which must be the share of a weak and timid sex. She is truly delighted that M. Brissot de Warvulle [sic] taught her a little lesson, and it will certainly not be her who makes it a crime. Letter dated October 10 1789 from de Kéralio to Brissot, cited in ”Le corps petit, mais l’âme grande”: Voicing a Woman’s Ambition in Louise de Kéralio (2019), page page 87. Mistacco speculates that the ”little lesson” Brissot gave Kéralio was him reprimanding her for having portrayed the women in the march to Versailles as ”heroines” in her journal a few days earlier.

I do not believe that women can ever have any active part in government, and I believe that the greatest good that the constitution can do to public morals is to keep them out of it forever. Women reign in despotic states, it is enough to say that they must be null in the administration of a free country. The more the austerity of republican mores will make them attentive inside their homes, the more it will render them incapable of knowing enough public men to direct a choice which must be the fruit of constant observation and consummate experience. I know in them the sagacity necessary to judge the best of things, but not the extent of genius which makes known the means of arriving there or the force of temperament which supports the necessary studies. I repeat it again, the more they will be what nature has made them, the less they will want to undertake something beyond their physical and moral strength. Content to teach their children the decrees of the assembly, they will aspire neither to make nor dictate them. Mercure national ou Journal d’État et du Citoyen, April 18 1790, in response to the pamphlet Le franc en vedette, ou, Le porte-voix de la vérité, sur le tocsin (1790) by Armand Joseph Guffroy, which briefly argued women should take part in administrative business. Cited in Louise de Kéralio-Robert, pionnière du républicanisme sexiste (2006) by Annie Geffroy. According to Louise Kéralio Robert, Feminism, Virtue and the Problem of Fanaticism (2021) by Karen Green (tysm! for sharing it with me @nigrit) this article is actually unsigned, and it would therefore be unfair to attribute its authorship to de Kéralio.

Gentlemen of the Social Circle, take care of morals; instead of attracting this crowd of idle and curious women in your footsteps, teach them to shut themselves up in their homes, to make themselves useful and pleasant to their husbands, to their fathers, to their brothers, to provide for and to raise their children there, to take care of their fortune there. Mercure national ou Journal d’État et du Citoyen, April 18 1790, cited in Louise de Kéralio-Robert, pionnière du républicanisme sexiste (2006) by Annie Geffroy.

That despotism, fanaticism, pride, avarice lavishing gold and promises, arm the hands of a multitude of men without confession, without family, without homeland, this we have often had examples of since the [beginning of] the revolution. But that a weak and timid sex, stripping away at the same time the two feelings which are most essential to its being: fear and pity, arms its feeble hands against its fellow citizens, its friends, its brothers, its defenders; that one see women assembled in a public square, calling men to fight, provoking some, inciting others, ordering murder and setting an example! [---] Once again, it is the corruption of morals which today produces the anti-civility of women, formerly noble. Well! how could they not fear to cross, at one point, the limits of their sex, they who have stripped all sense of modesty? How would they blush to add hypocrisy to so many even more shameful vices? Chaste women are timid, lost women are bold, daring, cruel. Adresse aux femmes de Monteauban par Mme Robert, ci-devant Melle de Kéralio (1790)

I thought that we could gain a considerable advantage from the addition of a few women to the inspectors appointed by the section. Their domestic duties, sacred duties, important to public order, prohibit them from all administrative functions, and I do not claim to take them out of their sphere because the best things out of place lose all their value. But the spirit of detail to which they are accustomed in their domestic care makes them suitable for the proposed inspection. What would escape the vast observations of a man, will strike them more quickly either in the visits, or in the examination of the details of the broth, and examining the meats; they will see the bakeries, the cellars, the farmyard, the gardening, the fruits, finally, they will go into those details to which they are accustomed at home, and which constitute the skill of a good housewife. Extrait des délibérations de la société fraternelle des deux sexes: séante aux jacobins du dimanche 4 décembre de l'an III par Louise Robert (1791) page 10.

#louise de Kéralio #frev #french revolution #marie antoinette #les crimes des reines #francois robert

26 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

In the Crimes of Queens etc., didn’t she repeat/make up some pretty vile stuff about Marie-Antoinette’s ‘sex’ life etc.? I mean coming from someone who doesn’t think she’s a prude or a bigot but quite happy to sling mud about

Louise de Kéralio-Robert arguing women can’t play a role in politics while being a woman who plays a role in politics compilation

#still a fascinating woman #journalist #translator #oxymoron #she did eventually close her paper saying her place was in the home #wonder how much her boozy husband Robert was to blame

26 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

In the spirit of Halloween I present a Correspondance des vivants et des morts.

A spooky, if somewhat reactionary, post-Thermidor ghost story from 1794/95… part of a series of imagined encounters in the Underworld where the ghosts of the dead continue to haunt the living

#french revolution #frev #ghost stories #thermidor #robespierre #marat #mirabeau #vendée

9 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

Could apply equally, and very effectively, to understanding the power dynamics of radical journalism during the French Revolution. That phrase about telling truth to power has become such a cliche nowadays.

#french revolution #frev #jean-paul marat #journalism

5 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

But the real question is: who’s shaping contemporary French political discourse on tumblr? Has anyone got a hotline to the Élysée we should know about? ‘Where’s Macron?’ I hear you cry. Who’s Melenchon? Indeed! The Corbyn of yesteryear. How many fifth republicans dwell amongst us?! What would Max do…?

Not quite sure what to make of this study of the frev tumblr community, except that on first glance it seems a bit waffly! And provides few direct egs of what they’re trying to get at. But for those curious to see how their enthusiasm/activities/interventions are perceived, here’s a link. Thoughts?

161 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

Excellent post. Many of the big speeches were still being translated into German and Italian in 1794. Rights of Man into Flemish and Arabic too.

The really juicy ones like Robespierre’s speech on political morality and Saint Just’s Against factions were translated into English and smuggled over on contraband boats although no trace so far found in British libraries/archives. To freak Pitt out and put his pitbulls off the scent they printed them on English type in Paris so it would look like they were being produced in London. The Political morality speech somehow ended up being published in Philadelphia in 1794 with the immortal, and much misunderstood, virtue/terror phrase

I feel that one of the most overlooked aspects of studying the French Revolution is that, in 18th-century France, most people did not speak French. Yes, you read that correctly.

On 26 Prairial, Year II (14 June 1794), Abbé Henri Grégoire (1) stood before the Convention and delivered a report called The Report on the Necessity and Means of Annihilating Dialects and Universalising the Use of the French Language(2). This report, the culmination of a survey initiated four years earlier, sought to assess the state of languages in France. In 1790, Grégoire sent a 43-question survey to 49 informants across the departments, asking questions like: "Is the use of the French language universal in your area?" "Are one or more dialects spoken here?" and "What would be the religious and political impact of completely eradicating this dialect?"

The results were staggering. According to Grégoire's report:

“One can state without exaggeration that at least six million French people, especially in rural areas, do not know the national language; an equal number are more or less incapable of holding a sustained conversation; and, in the final analysis, those who speak it purely do not exceed three million; likely, even fewer write it correctly.” (3)

Considering that France’s population at the time was around 27 million, Grégoire’s assertion that 12 million people could barely hold a conversation in French is astonishing. This effectively meant that about 40% of the population couldn't communicate with the remaining 60%.

Now, it’s worth noting that Grégoire’s survey was heavily biased. His 49 informants (4) were educated men—clergy, lawyers, and doctors—likely sympathetic to his political views. Plus, the survey barely covered regions where dialects were close to standard French (the langue d’oïl areas) and focused heavily on the south and peripheral areas like Brittany, Flanders, and Alsace, where linguistic diversity was high.

Still, even if the numbers were inflated, the takeaway stands: a massive portion of France did not speak Standard French. “But surely,” you might ask, “they could understand each other somewhat, right? How different could those dialects really be?” Well, let’s put it this way: if Barère and Robespierre went to lunch and spoke in their regional dialects—Gascon and Picard, respectively—it wouldn’t be much of a conversation.

The linguistic make-up of France in 1790

The notion that barely anyone spoke French wasn’t new in the 1790s. The Ancien Régime had wrestled with it for centuries. The Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts, issued in 1539, mandated the use of French in legal proceedings, banning Latin and various dialects. In the 17th and 18th centuries, numerous royal edicts enforced French in newly conquered provinces. The founding of the Académie Française in 1634 furthered this control, as the Académie aimed to standardise French, cementing its status as the kingdom's official language.

Despite these efforts, Grégoire tells us that 40% of the population could barely speak a word of French. So, if they didn’t speak French, what did they speak? Let’s take a look.

In 1790, the old provinces of the Ancien Régime were disbanded, and 83 departments named after mountains and rivers took their place. These 83 departments provide a good illustration of the incredibly diverse linguistic make-up of France.

Langue d’oïl dialects dominated the north and centre, spoken in 44 out of the 83 departments (53%). These included Picard, Norman, Champenois, Burgundian, and others—dialects sharing roots in Old French. In the south, however, the Occitan language group took over, with dialects like Languedocien, Provençal, Gascon, Limousin, and Auvergnat, making up 28 departments (34%).

Beyond these main groups, three departments in Brittany spoke Breton, a Celtic language (4%), while Alsatian and German dialects were prevalent along the eastern border (another 4%). Basque was spoken in Basses-Pyrénées, Catalan in Pyrénées-Orientales, and Corsican in the Corse department.

From a government’s perspective, this was a bit of a nightmare.

Why is linguistic diversity a governmental nightmare?

In one word: communication—or the lack of it. Try running a country when half of it doesn’t know what you’re saying.

Now, in more academic terms...

Standardising a language usually serves two main purposes: functional efficiency and national identity. Functional efficiency is self-evident. Just as with the adoption of the metric system, suppressing linguistic variation was supposed to make communication easier, reducing costly misunderstandings.

That being said, the Revolution, at first, tried to embrace linguistic diversity. After all, Standard French was, frankly, “the King’s French” and thus intrinsically elitist—available only to those who had the money to learn it. In January 1790, the deputy François-Joseph Bouchette proposed that the National Assembly publish decrees in every language spoken across France. His reasoning? “Thus, everyone will be free to read and write in the language they prefer.”

A lovely idea, but it didn’t last long. While they made some headway in translating important decrees, they soon realised that translating everything into every dialect was expensive. On top of that, finding translators for obscure dialects was its own nightmare. And so, the Republic’s brief flirtation with multilingualism was shut down rather unceremoniously.

Now, on to the more fascinating reason for linguistic standardisation: national identity.

Language and Nation

One of the major shifts during the French Revolution was in the concept of nationhood. Today, there are many ideas about what a nation is (personally, I lean towards Benedict Anderson’s definition of a nation as an “imagined community”), but definitions aside, what’s clear is that the Revolution brought a seismic change in the notion of French identity. Under the Ancien Régime, the French nation was defined as a collective that owed allegiance to the king: “One faith, one law, one king.” But after 1789, a nation became something you were meant to want to belong to. That was problematic.

Now, imagine being a peasant in the newly-created department of Vendée. (Hello, Jacques!) Between tending crops and trying to avoid trouble, Jacques hasn’t spent much time pondering his national identity. Vendéen? Well, that’s just a random name some guy in Paris gave his region. French? Unlikely—he has as much in common with Gascons as he does with the English. A subject of the King? He probably couldn’t name which king.

So, what’s left? Jacques is probably thinking about what is around him: family ties and language. It's no coincidence that the ‘brigands’ in the Vendée organised around their parishes— that’s where their identity lay.

The Revolutionary Government knew this. The monarchy had understood it too and managed to use Catholicism to legitimise their rule. The Republic didn't have such a luxury. As such, the revolutionary government found itself with the impossible task of convincing Jacques he was, in fact, French.

How to do that? Step one: ensure Jacques can actually understand them. How to accomplish that? Naturally, by teaching him.

Language Education during the Revolution

Under the Ancien Régime, education varied wildly by class, and literacy rates were abysmal. Most commoners received basic literacy from parish and Jesuit schools, while the wealthy enjoyed private tutors. In 1791, Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand (5) presented a report on education to the Constituent Assembly (6), remarking:

“A striking peculiarity of the state from which we have freed ourselves is undoubtedly that the national language, which daily extends its conquests beyond France’s borders, remains inaccessible to so many of its inhabitants." (7)

He then proposed a solution:

“Primary schools will end this inequality: the language of the Constitution and laws will be taught to all; this multitude of corrupt dialects, the last vestige of feudalism, will be compelled to disappear: circumstances demand it." (8)

A sensible plan in theory, and it garnered support from various Assembly members, Condorcet chief among them (which is always a good sign).

But, France went to war with most of Europe in 1792, making linguistic diversity both inconvenient and dangerous. Paranoia grew daily, and ensuring the government’s communications were understood by every citizen became essential. The reverse, ensuring they could understand every citizen, was equally pressing. Since education required time and money—two things the First Republic didn’t have—repression quickly became Plan B.

The War on Patois

This repression of regional languages was driven by more than abstract notions of nation-building; it was a matter of survival. After all, if Jacques the peasant didn’t see himself as French and wasn’t loyal to those shadowy figures in Paris, who would he turn to? The local lord, who spoke his dialect and whose land his family had worked for generations.

Faced with internal and external threats, the revolutionary government viewed linguistic unity as essential to the Republic’s survival. From 1793 onwards, language policy became increasingly repressive, targeting regional dialects as symbols of counter-revolution and federalist resistance. Bertrand Barère spearheaded this campaign, famously saying:

“Federalism and superstition speak Breton; emigration and hatred of the Republic speak German; counter-revolution speaks Italian, and fanaticism speaks Basque. Let us break these instruments of harm and error... Among a free people, the language must be one and the same for all.”

This, combined with Grégoire’s report, led to the Décret du 8 Pluviôse 1794, which mandated French-speaking teachers in every rural commune of departments where Breton, Italian, Basque, and German were the main languages.

Did it work? Hardly. The idea of linguistic standardisation through education was sound in principle, but France was broke, and schools cost money. Spoiler alert: France wouldn’t have a free, secular, and compulsory education system until the 1880s.

What it did accomplish, however, was two centuries of stigmatising patois and their speakers...

Notes

(1) Abbe Henri Grégoire was a French Catholic priest, revolutionary, and politician who championed linguistic and social reforms, notably advocating for the eradication of regional dialects to establish French as the national language during the French Revolution.

(2) "Sur la nécessité et les moyens d’anéantir les patois et d’universaliser l’usage de la langue francaise”

(3)On peut assurer sans exagération qu’au moins six millions de Français, sur-tout dans les campagnes, ignorent la langue nationale ; qu’un nombre égal est à-peu-près incapable de soutenir une conversation suivie ; qu’en dernier résultat, le nombre de ceux qui la parlent purement n’excède pas trois millions ; & probablement le nombre de ceux qui l’écrivent correctement est encore moindre.

(4) And, as someone who has done A LOT of statistics in my lifetime, 49 is not an appropriate sample size for a population of 27 million. At a confidence level of 95% and with a margin of error of 5%, he would need a sample size of 384 people. If he wanted to lower the margin of error at 3%, he would need 1,067. In this case, his margin of error is 14%.

That being said, this is a moot point anyway because the sampled population was not reflective of France, so the confidence level of the sample is much lower than 95%, which means the margin of error is much lower because we implicitly accept that his sample does not reflect the actual population.

(5) Yes. That Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand. It’s always him. He’s everywhere. If he hadn’t died in 1838, he’d probably still be part of Macron’s cabinet. Honestly, he’s probably haunting the Élysée as we speak — clearly the man cannot stay away from politics.

(6) For those new to the French Revolution and the First Republic, we usually refer to two legislative bodies, each with unique roles. The National Assembly (1789): formed by the Third Estate to tackle immediate social and economic issues. It later became the Constituent Assembly, drafting the 1791 Constitution and establishing a constitutional monarchy.

(7) Une singularité frappante de l'état dont nous sommes affranchis est sans doute que la langue nationale, qui chaque jour étendait ses conquêtes au-delà des limites de la France, soit restée au milieu de nous inaccessible à un si grand nombre de ses habitants.

(8) Les écoles primaires mettront fin à cette étrange inégalité : la langue de la Constitution et des lois y sera enseignée à tous ; et cette foule de dialectes corrompus, dernier reste de la féodalité, sera contraint de disparaître : la force des choses le commande

(9) Le fédéralisme et la superstition parlent bas-breton; l’émigration et la haine de la République parlent allemand; la contre révolution parle italien et le fanatisme parle basque. Brisons ces instruments de dommage et d’erreur. .. . La monarchie avait des raisons de ressembler a la tour de Babel; dans la démocratie, laisser les citoyens ignorants de la langue nationale, incapables de contréler le pouvoir, cest trahir la patrie, c'est méconnaitre les bienfaits de l'imprimerie, chaque imprimeur étant un instituteur de langue et de législation. . . . Chez un peuple libre la langue doit étre une et la méme pour tous.

(10) Patois means regional dialect in French.

814 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

#frev #tumblr #social anthropology

161 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

If I remember correctly, the two portraits flanking Rousseau, later scrubbed out, were Lepeletier and Marat!

The squeak I let out (when I realized that this image of Antoine Léaument was similiar to Janelle's art of Robespierre) at the jeepney was audible that's for sure.

#frev #french revolution #rousseau #marat #lepeletier #rights of man

44 notes · View notes

nigrit · 7 months ago

Text

are you saying Camille is the court jester who went too far? What was his brother’ role during the Revolution?

His fate always reminds me, for some reason, of the children being hunted down by Robert Mitchum’s terrifying (false) preacher man with the words ‘love’ and ‘hate’ tattooed on his knuckles, in Night of the Hunter

Therefore, if you have the oppurtunity to meet him, and the conversation starts revolving around me, I leave you my reputation. What induces me warn you in this way is that my brother last year told me that cousin Henriet was far from eulogizing me, and I believe that on his next journey he will go even further than what he said previous years, as he now believes he has the right to revenge. Regardless, if I allowed myself a few jokes on his expense, it was always in secret and within earshot; but in public, and whenever the words I uttered might have had any consequence, I have always exalted my cousin, and I dare to speak against my conscience at times, at least in some respects. Camille Desmoulins in the first conserved letter written by him that we know of, dated May 10 1782

I had dreamed about a republic that everyone would have loved. Never had I imagiened that men could be so cruel and so injust. How can it be so that a few jokes in my writings, against colleagues that had provoked me, could delete the memory of my services! I do not hide the fact that I die as a victim of these jokes and of my friendship for Danton. Desmoulins in the last conserved letter have from him, written in the Luxembourg prison on April 1 1794

#jokerman #camille desmoulins #desmoulins

45 notes · View notes

nigrit · 8 months ago

Text

h/t Shusaku Takaoka

It was the ducky!

#french revolution #frev #jean-paul marat #death of Marat #parody

46 notes · View notes

nigrit · 8 months ago

Text

Thanks for this. Don’t know how I missed the Robes self refs, and I read it twice! Pretty quickly admittedly. I’ll blame the 😷. Still it fits in with the idea of him slowly detaching from himself and becoming a kind of revolutionary archetype. Comes across very strongly in his later speeches but I need to figure this out more.

Will try to identify the ?s on your list and reblog later. Wiki says Granet seen as a man of the left and was appointed to CPS in Sept with Collot and BV but turned it down. Judging by his portrait he was also a terrible dresser!

I've got a little list…

Here’s something to get your teeth into over the weekend.

I recently found this “Liste des hommes sûrs aiant de la tête et du cuer” in Albert Mathiez’s collection of articles and speeches, Autour de Robespierre (1957, reissued in deluxe edition 1976, Eds Famot), between pp.64-65.

Now the funny thing is that apart from Max’s lousy spelling, few people seem to have seen this list, which is currently missing from the Archives (although it is credited here as from the B & AN), and is not published in the Courtois collection of the Robespierre papers that fell into his hands after 9 Thermidor. Almost certainly he wished to spare a few blushes to some of the freshly blooded Thermidorians!

So a couple of mysteries to solve here.

1/ When was the document written?

I’m guessing not before December 1793, as there’s no Marat, Danton or Desmoulins but Fouché & Carrier are on it.

However, assuming there was no need to list “sound men” if they were already in positions of power, why list Moyse Bayle and PFJ Le Bas who were appointed to the Committee of General Security (Aug & Sept? 1793)?

I’m also assuming that reports of the crimes in Lyon and Nantes, which led to the recall of Fouché and Carrier (sent “en mission” in the summer of 1793), would not have reached Paris/the CPS until Jan/Feb 1794?

I think all the names listed are Convention deputies from the Mountain but happy to be corrected

2/ What does L.R. no.23 mean? “Liste (de) Robespierre”?

Was it written by Max or added later by a clerk? Does this mean there are at least 22 other lists waiting to be discovered?! Has anyone seen the originals of the ones in Courtois? Do they also have L.R. (x)?

3/Why does he refer to his own brother as Robespierre jeune?! Perhaps because the list was intended to be passed on to someone, but then why would it be found in Robespierre’s papers?

Thoughts?

54 notes · View notes

nigrit · 8 months ago

Text

I just noticed you missed one out, 22 - Granet de Marseille. Do we know as anything about him?

Thank you for explaining the nuances over Max’s known attitude towards Fouché & Carrier. As you say, it is extraordinary when (otherwise good) historians just repeat each other and ignore or choose to minimise the known facts.

I wonder if this is because of 9 Thermidor and the need to explain it in terms of a fundamentally decent (but ruthless) man vs the fanatical, opportunist rest? Sometimes I look at him and see a brave, honest, principled defender of human rights. Other times I see a pompous, bigoted, ruthless, jealous chauvinist who barely left Arras/Paris, wrote bad poetry, hated England, despised uppity women (who resisted their obvious domestic role for cooking and cleaning), condoned violence when it suited him and didn’t have a cosmopolitan bone in his body!

From what you suggest here, it seems he only objected to the excessive punishments once they started to lose the hearts and minds of local ‘patriots’. Although even here, he seems to have ignored the plea of one of his oldest friends from Arras.

BTW, I checked both refs here and couldn’t find 3rd person egs. This is something that really intrigues me so could you indicate more precisely. Many thanks

“Robespierre is recorded to have referred to himself in third person in other notes he’s written himself (1, 2), so I guess referring to his brother as ”Robespierre the younger” wouldn’t be that out of character for him…”

I've got a little list…

Here’s something to get your teeth into over the weekend.

So a couple of mysteries to solve here.

1/ When was the document written?

I’m guessing not before December 1793, as there’s no Marat, Danton or Desmoulins but Fouché & Carrier are on it.

I think all the names listed are Convention deputies from the Mountain but happy to be corrected

2/ What does L.R. no.23 mean? “Liste (de) Robespierre”?

3/Why does he refer to his own brother as Robespierre jeune?! Perhaps because the list was intended to be passed on to someone, but then why would it be found in Robespierre’s papers?

Thoughts?

54 notes · View notes