Early Modern
Women's March on Versailles (1789): Bringing the King to Paris
The royal family and soon the National Assembly were forced to leave Versailles for Paris, placing them under the eyes of the capital.
Region
Europe
Early Modern
Lavoisier and the Chemical Revolution (1789): Modern Chemistry
Lavoisier's oxygen theory, new nomenclature and quantitative method replaced the phlogiston theory and established modern chemistry.
Early Modern
Tennis Court Oath (1789): The Third Estate Defies the King
The deputies of the new National Assembly swore not to disband until France had a constitution, openly challenging royal authority.
Early Modern
Estates-General of 1789: The Assembly That Sparked a Revolution
The Third Estate broke away to form the National Assembly, ending the Estates-General as a body and opening the French Revolution.
Early Modern
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)
The Assembly adopted 17 articles proclaiming natural rights and national sovereignty; the text became the preamble of the 1791 Constitution and remains part of French constitutional law.
Early Modern
French Revolution (1789–1799): Causes, Events and Legacy
The absolute monarchy and the privileged society of the old regime were abolished; after a decade of upheaval and war, Napoleon Bonaparte seized power in 1799.
Early Modern
William Wilberforce's 1789 Speech Against the Slave Trade
The speech won wide praise, but the Commons postponed any decision to hear more evidence; the trade was abolished only in 1807.
Early Modern
Olaudah Equiano and The Interesting Narrative (1789)
A bestselling first-person account of enslavement that strengthened the British campaign against the slave trade.
Early Modern
Haitian Revolution (1791): The Slave Uprising in Saint-Domingue
The uprising led to the abolition of slavery in Saint-Domingue in 1793–1794 and ultimately to Haitian independence in 1804.
Early Modern
Champ de Mars Massacre (1791): National Guard Fires on Crowd
Between about a dozen and fifty people were killed, radicals were driven underground for a time and the reputations of Lafayette and Bailly were ruined.
Early Modern
Flight to Varennes (1791): Louis XVI's Failed Escape from Paris
The royal family was arrested at Varennes and brought back to Paris, and public trust in Louis XVI as a constitutional monarch collapsed.
Early Modern
Constitution of 3 May 1791: Poland's Landmark Reform Charter
The Sejm adopted a modern written constitution, but it was overturned after the Russian invasion of 1792 and the Second Partition of Poland.