THE FRENCH CHURCH AND THE REVOLUTION Jansénismes et Lumières: pour un autre XVIIIe siècle. By Monique Cottret. Paris: A. Michel, 1998. Pp. 418. ISBN 2-226-10475-5. 160 Fr. Frs. Catholic Revival in the age of the Baroque: religious identity in Southwest Germany, 1550–1750. By Marc R. Forster. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Pp. xiv+268. ISBN 0-521-78044-6. £40.00. Church and society in eighteenth-century France,I: The clerical establishment and its social ramifications;II: The religion of the people and the politics of religion. By John McManners. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999. Pp. xviii+817, xiv+866. ISBN 0-19-827003-8 and 0-19-827004-6. £59.90. Christianity under the ancien régime, 1648–1789. By W. R. Ward. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Pp. xii+269. ISBN 0-521-55361-X. £13.95.

2003 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 211-218
Author(s):  
DEREK BEALES
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Ancien Regime ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
The People ◽  
Politics Of Religion ◽  
Church And Society ◽  
Recent Edition ◽  
Ancien Régime

If few historians of the French ancien régime and Revolution entirely ignore the role of the Church, most treat it perfunctorily and many make crass errors in writing about it. To start with examples of error, J. F. Bosher declared in his generally admirable The French Revolution: ‘at least nine abbots wrote for the Encyclopédie’. Actually, at least twenty-three abbés did so, but no abbots. J. C. D. Clark, in his recent edition of Burke's Reflections, attempts to explain Burke's discussion of French commendatory abbots by defining commendam as it was used in England, which makes Burke's argument incomprehensible. Until now it has not been easy to find a work, at any rate in English, which would settle such matters authoritatively. McManners's Church and society in eighteenth-century France will certainly do that. A delightful chapter deals with the vast majority of abbés who were not abbots, that is, those who had taken the very first steps towards an ecclesiastical career, probably to enhance their educational prospects, but never taken vows or significant orders. To this group belonged such notorious philosophes as the abbé Diderot and the abbé Raynal.

Hesitant Steps: Acceptance of the Gregorian Calendar in Eighteenth-Century Geneva

2006 ◽  
Vol 75 (3) ◽  
pp. 544-564 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Powell McNutt
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Julius Caesar ◽  
Ancien Regime ◽  
Gregorian Calendar ◽  
Julian Calendar ◽  
Ancien Régime ◽  
At Will ◽  
The Catholic Church

History demonstrates that the calendar is a tool of far more significance than simply a means to organize units of time. For Roman high priests prior to the reign of Julius Caesar, the calendar was a tool of power, symbolizing political supremacy over society through the manipulation of time at will. Under Pope Gregory XIII, the calendar was a symbol of papal responsibility to ensure the proper worship of the Catholic Church. In the case of European Protestants, the Julian calendar was a symbol of religious identity and protest against Catholic domination. Likewise, within revolutionary France, the Calendrier Républicain symbolized the rejection of the Ancien Régime and Catholicism. These few examples are an indication that throughout history in various times and places calendars have proven to represent more to humanity than mere time reckoning methods. Consequently, one may approach the study of the calendar as a means to grasp cultural and religious identity within specific regional contexts.

scholarly journals European history and war: The case-study of the eighteenth century

2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-35
Author(s):  
Jeremy Black
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Military History ◽  
European History ◽  
Ancien Regime ◽  
Ancien Régime ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Relevant Consideration ◽  
The French Revolution

A widely-relevant consideration of conceptual and methodological points in military history drawing on the case-study of ancien régime European warfare and the impact of the French Revolution.

Gibbon's unfinished History: the French Revolution and English political vocabularies

1992 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Womersley
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Ancien Regime ◽  
Royal Family ◽  
Textual History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Ancien Régime ◽  
The French Revolution

AbstractOn Gibbon's death his papers contained an incomplete and unpublished essay on the genealogy of the European dynasty of which the British royal family was a branch, entitled The antiquities of the house of Brunswick. This article explains why Gibbon began this work, and why he laid it aside. Beginning by describing the nature and purpose of literature on Hanoverian genealogy in the earlier eighteenth century, and proceeding to relate the content of the Antiquities to the politics of Blackstone and Hume, the article identifies the Antiquities as a distinctively ancien régime defence of British political life and institutions which was elicited from Gibbon by the early months of the French revolution. The abandonment of the Antiquities is then explained as part of Gibbon's shocked response to the deepening gravity of events in France after the September massacres. In the polarized political atmosphere which ensued, the literary finesse of the Antiquities ran the risk of being confused with disaffection. That risk was increased when Gibbon and The decline and fall began to be used by radicals as auxiliaries in their attack on England's ancien régime. The textual history of the Antiquities allows us to perceive the rapidity with which the connotations and ownership of certain political vocabularies in England changed during the early 1790s.

FRENCH CROSSINGS IV: VAGARIES OF PASSION AND POWER IN ENLIGHTENMENT PARIS

2013 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 3-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Jones
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Ancien Regime ◽  
Hybrid Identity ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Paris Opera ◽  
Ancien Régime ◽  
Olympe De Gouges ◽  
The French Revolution ◽  
French Feminism

ABSTRACTThis paper examines female libertinism in eighteenth-century France, highlighting the hybrid identity of actress, courtesan and prostitute of female performers at the Paris Opéra. The main focus is on the celebrated singer, Sophie Arnould. She and others like her achieved celebrity by moving seamlessly between these three facets of their identity. Their celebrity also allowed them to circulate within the highest social circles. Feminists of the 1790s such as Olympe de Gouges and Théroigne de Méricourt had pre-Revolutionary careers that were very similar to those of Arnould. It is suggested that understanding this kind of individual in Ancien Régime France can help us to identify a neglected libertine strand within Enlightenment culture, that merged into proto-feminism in the French Revolution. The paper offers a new approach to some of the origins of modern French feminism.

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