Timeline of the French Revolution
1791
• January 30: Mirabeau elected President of the Assembly
• February 28: Day of Daggers; Lafayette orders the arrest of 400 armed aristocrats
at the Tuileries Palace
• March 2: Abolition of trade guilds
• April 2: Death of Mirabeau - first person to be buried in Pantheon, formerly the
church of Sainte-Geneviève
• June 14: Le Chapelier law banning trade unions is passed by National Assembly
• June 20–25: Royal family's flight to Varennes
• June 25: Louis XVI forced to return to Paris
• July 10: Leopold II issues the Padua Circular calling on the royal houses of
Europe to come to his brother-in-law, Louis XVI's aid.
• July 15: National Assembly declares the king to be inviolable and he is reinstated.
• August 27: Declaration of Pillnitz (Frederick William II and Leopold II)
• September 13–14: Louis XVI accepts the Constitution formally
• September 30: Dissolution of the National Constituent Assembly
1792
• April 20: France declares war against Austria
• April 25: Battle Hymn of the Army of the Rhine composed by Rouget de Lisle.
First execution using the guillotine.
• April 28: France invades Austrian Netherlands (Belgium).
• July 5: Legislative Assembly declares that the fatherland is in danger (La Patrie
en Danger).
• July 30: Austria and Prussia begin invasion of France.
• August 9: Revolutionary commune took possession of the hôtel de ville.
• August 10–13: Storming of the Tuileries Palace. Swiss Guard massacred. Louis
XVI of France is arrested and taken into custody, along with his family. Georges
Danton becomes Minister of Justice.
• September 3–7: The September Massacres of prisoners in the Paris prisons.
• September 19: Dissolution of Legislative Assembly.
• September 20: First session of National Convention. French Army stops advance
of Coalition troops at Valmy.
• September 21: Abolition of royalty and proclamation of the First French
Republic.
• December 3: Louis XVI brought to trial, appears before the National Convention
(11 & 23 December). Robespierre argues that "Louis must die, so that the country
may live".
1793
• January 21: Citizen Louis Capet guillotined, formerly known as Louis XVI.
• March 7: Outbreak of rebellion against the Revolution: War in the Vendée.
• June 24: Ratification of new Constitution by National Convention, but not yet
proclaimed. Slavery is abolished in France until 1802 (Rise of Napoleon
Bonaparte).
• August 23: Levée en masse (conscription) order.
• September 5: Start of Reign of Terror.
• September 9: Establishment of sans-culottes paramilitary forces - revolutionary
armies.
• September 29: Convention passes the General Maximum, fixing the prices of
many goods and services.
• October 10: 1793 Constitution put on hold; decree that the government must be
"revolutionary until the peace".
• October 16: Marie Antoinette guillotined.
• December 4: Law of 14 Frimaire (Law of Revolutionary Government) passed;
power becomes centralised on the Committee of Public Safety.
• December 23: Anti-Republican forces in the Vendée finally defeated and 6000
prisoners executed.
1794
• May 7: National Convention, led by Robespierre, passes decree to establish the
Cult of the Supreme Being.
• June 10: Law of 22 Prairial - the Revolutionary Tribunal became a court of
condemnation without the need for witnesses.
• July 27-28: Night of 9-10 Thermidor - Robespierre arrested, guillotined without
trial, along with other members of the Committee of Public Safety. End of the
Reign of Terror. Also called The Thermidorian Reaction.
1795
• July 14: Marseillaise accepted as the French National Anthem.
• August 22: 1795 Constitution ratified - bicameral system, executive Directory of
five.
• October 26: National Convention dissolved.
• November 2: Executive Directory takes on executive power.
1797
• September 4: Coup d'état of 18 Fructidor revives Republican measures
• October 17: Treaty of Campo Formio
1798
• May 11: Law of 22 Floréal Year VI - Council elections annulled, left wing
deputies excluded from Council.
1799
• June 18: Coup of 30 Prairial Year VII - removed Directors, left Sieyès as
dominant figure in government.
• December 24: Constitution of the Year VIII - leadership of Napoleon established
under the Consulate. French Revolution may be considered ended
