French Revolution & Napoleon

Question 1

Louis XV

Answer 1

A.K.A. Louis the Beloved. King of France. Great-grandson of Louis XIV

Question 2

Louis XVI

Answer 2

Spouse to Marie Antoinette. Last king of France before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution. Executed by guillotine.

Question 3

Marie Antoinette

Answer 3

Spouse to Louis XVI. Last queen of France before the French Revolution. Born an archduchess of Austria, youngest daughter of Maria Theresa.

Question 4

Abbé Sieyès

Answer 4

French Roman Catholic abbé, clergyman, and political writer. Chief political theorist of the French Revolution. Held offices in the governments of French Consulate and the First French Empire.

Question 5

Maximilien Robespierre

Answer 5

French lawyer and statesman. One of the best-known and most influential figures in the French Revolution.

Question 6

Napoleon Bonaparte

Answer 6

French statesman and military leader who led many successful campaigns during the French Revolution and the French Revolutionary Wars, and was Emperor of the French from 1804 until 1814 and again briefly in 1815 during the Hundred Days.

Question 7

Klemens von Metternich

Answer 7

Prince of Metternich-Winneburg zu Beilstein. Was an Austrian diplomat who was at the center of European affairs for three decades as the Austrian Empire’s foreign minister from 1809 and Chancellor from 1821 until the liberal Revolutions of 1848 forced his resignation.

Question 8

Jean-Paul Marat

Answer 8

French political theorist, physician, and scientist. He was a journalist and politician during the French Revolution. Vigorous defender of the sans-culottes, seen as a radical voice. Published his views in pamphlets, placards, and newspapers.

Question 9

Olympe de Gouges

Answer 9

French playwright and political activist whose writings on women’s rights and abolitionism reached a large audience in various countries. As political tension rose in France, Olympe de Gouges became increasingly politically engaged.

Question 10

Georges Danton

Answer 10

Leading figure in the early stages of the French Revolution. First president of the Committee of Public Safety.

Question 11

Toussaint L’Ouverture

Answer 11

Haitian general and the most prominent leader of the Haitian Revolution. L’Ouverture first fought against the French, then for them, and then finally against France again for the cause of Haitian independence.

Question 12

Jacques Louis David

Answer 12

French painter in the Neoclassical style, considered to be the preeminent painter of the era.

Question 13

Directory

Answer 13

A book of directions for the conduct of Christian worship, especially in Presbyterian and Roman Catholic Churches.

Question 14

Estates-General

Answer 14

The legislative body in France until 1789, representing the three estates of the realm (i.e., the clergy, the nobility, and the commons).

Question 15

Jacobin Club

Answer 15

a revolutionary political movement that was the most famous political club during the French Revolution. The club got its name from meeting at the Dominican rue Saint-Honoré Monastery of the Jacobins.

Question 16

National Assembly

Answer 16

Revolutionary assembly formed by the representatives of the Third Estate of the Estates-General; thereafter it was known as the National Constituent Assembly, though popularly the shorter form persisted.

Question 17

Girondists

Answer 17

members of a loosely knit political faction during the French Revolution. Active in the Legislative Assembly and the National Convention. Together with the Montagnards, they initially were part of the Jacobin movement.

Question 18

Mountain

Answer 18

Political group during the French Revolution. Its members, called the Montagnards, sat on the highest benches in the National Assembly. They were the most radical group and opposed the Girondins.

Question 19

National Convention

Answer 19

Single-chamber assembly in France from September 20, 1792, to October 26, 1795, during the French Revolution. It succeeded the Legislative Assembly and founded the First Republic after the Insurrection of August 10, 1792.

Question 20

Republic of Virtue

Answer 20

A political theory presented on February 5, 1794 by Maximilian Robespierre that advocated for the use of terror if it was defending democracy. It proposed a new state of religion that was meant to become a utopia that would be the ideal republic in France.

Question 21

Émigrés

Answer 21

Any of the Frenchmen, at first mostly aristocrats, who fled France in the years following the French Revolution of 1789. From their places of exile in other countries, many plotted against the Revolutionary government, seeking foreign help in their goal of restoring the old regime.

Question 22

Sans-Culottes

Answer 22

The common people of the lower classes in late 18th-century France, a great many of whom became radical and militant partisans of the French Revolution in response to their poor quality of life under the Ancien Régime.

Question 23

Storming of the Bastille

Answer 23

On 14 July 1789, a state prison on the east side of Paris was attacked by an angry and aggressive mob. The prison had become a symbol of the monarchy’s dictatorial rule, and the event became one of the defining moments in the Revolution that followed.

Question 24

Committee of Public Safety

Answer 24

Formed the provisional government in France, led mainly by Maximilien Robespierre, during the Reign of Terror, a phase of the French Revolution.

Question 25

Constitution of 1791

Answer 25

French constitution created by the National Assembly during the French Revolution. It retained the monarchy, but sovereignty effectively resided in the Legislative Assembly, which was elected by a system of indirect voting. The constitution lasted less than a year.

Question 26

Thermidorian Reaction

Answer 26

Liberal-conservative counter-revolution that followed the overthrow and execution of Maximilien Robespierre in July 1794.

Question 27

Declaration of the Rights of Man

Answer 27

Human civil rights document from the French Revolution. Drafted by the Abbé Sieyès and the Marquis de Lafayette, in consultation with Thomas Jefferson.

Question 28

Congress of Vienna

Answer 28

Held after Napoleon’s banishment to Elba, with Metternich as the dominant figure, aimed at territorial resettlement and restoration to power of the crowned heads of Europe.

Question 29

Women’s March on Versailles

Answer 29

Also known as the October March, the October Days or simply the March on Versailles, was one of the earliest and most significant events of the French Revolution.

Question 30

August Decrees

Answer 30

Abolition of feudalism in France. One of the central events of the French Revolution was to abolish feudalism, and the old rules, taxes and privileges left over from the age of feudalism. The National Constituent Assembly, acting on the night of 4 August 1789.

Question 31

Great Fear

Answer 31

French Grande Peur. In the French Revolution, a period of panic and riot by peasants and others amid rumor’s of an “aristocratic conspiracy” by the king and the privileged to overthrow the Third Estate.

Question 32

Reign of Terror

Answer 32

A period of remorseless repression or bloodshed, in particular the period of the Terror during the French Revolution.

Question 33

Tennis Court Oath

Answer 33

On 20 June 1789, the members of the French Third Estate vowed “not to separate and to reassemble wherever necessary, until the Constitution of the kingdom is established”. It was a pivotal event in the French Revolution.

Question 34

Napoleonic Code

Answer 34

Civil Code of the French. The first modern organized body of law governing France. Assimilated the private law of France, which was the law governing transactions and relationships between individuals.

Question 35

Continental System

Answer 35

A blockade designed by Napoleon to paralyze Great Britain through the destruction of British commerce.

Question 36

Concordat of 1801

Answer 36

Agreement between Napoleon and Pope Pius VII. Defined the status of the Roman Catholic Church in France and ending the breach caused by the church reforms and confiscations enacted during the French Revolution.

Question 37

Cult of Reason

Answer 37

France’s first established state-sponsored atheistic religion, intended as a replacement for Catholicism during the French Revolution.

Question 38

Plebiscite

Answer 38

A vote by the people of an entire country or district to decide on some issue, such as choice of a ruler or government, option for independence or annexation by another power, or a question of national policy.

Question 39

Directory

Answer 39

French Revolutionary government set up by the Constitution of the Year III, which lasted four years. Included a bicameral legislature known as the Corps Législatif.

Question 40

Coup d’etat

Answer 40

Sudden, violent overthrow of an existing government by a small group.

Question 41

Battle of Waterloo

Answer 41

Marked the final defeat of Napoleon.