Brumaire

Brumaire (French pronunciation: ​[bʁymɛʁ]) was the second month in the French Republican Calendar. The month was named after the French word brume (fog) which occurs frequently in France at that time of the year.

Brumaire was the second month of the autumn quarter (mois d'automne). It started between 22 October and 24 October. It ended between 20 November and 22 November. It follows the Vendémiaire and precedes the Frimaire.

In political/historical usage, Brumaire can refer to the coup of 18 Brumaire in the year VIII (9 November 1799), by which General Napoleon Bonaparte overthrew the government of the Directory to replace it with the Consulate, as referenced by Karl Marx in his pamphlet, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, in which Marx parallels Napoleon's original coup with the later 1851 Coup of his nephew, Louis-Napoleon.

Day name table

Like all FRC months Brumaire lasted 30 days and was divided into three 10-day weeks called décades (decades). Every day had the name of an agricultural plant, except the 5th (Quintidi) and 10th day (Decadi) of every decade, which had the name of a domestic animal (Quintidi) or an agricultural tool (Decadi).

Coup of 18 Brumaire

The coup of 18 Brumaire brought General Napoleon Bonaparte to power as First Consul of France, and, in the view of most historians, ended the French Revolution. This bloodless coup d'état overthrew the Directory, replacing it with the French Consulate. This occurred on 9 November 1799, which was 18 Brumaire, Year VIII under the French Republican Calendar.

Context

After Austria declared war on 12 March 1799, France returned to a war footing. Emergency measures were adopted and the pro-war Jacobin faction triumphed in the April election. With Napoleon and the republic's best army in Egypt, France suffered a series of reverses on the battlefield in the spring and summer of 1799. The coup of 30 Prairial (18 June) ousted the Jacobins and left Abbé Sieyès, a member of the five-man ruling Directory, the dominant figure in the government. France's military situation improved following the Second Battle of Zurich, fought on 25–26 September. As the prospect of invasion receded, the Jacobins feared a revival of the pro-peace Royalist faction. When Napoleon returned to France on 9 October, both factions hailed him as the country's savior.