Vol. XXI - University of the Cumberlands

The Upsilonian
Upsilon-Upsilon Chapter
Phi Alpha Theta
Department of History and Political Science
University of the Cumberlands
Williamsburg, Kentucky
Vol. XXI Summer 2010

The front cover contains a picture of the Bennett
Building, home of the Upsilon-Upsilon Chapter
of Phi Alpha Theta and the History and Political
Science Department of University of the
Cumberlands. Built in 1906 as part of Highland
College, University of the Cumberlands assumed
ownership in 1907. The building underwent
extensive renovation in 1986-1987.

Journal of the Upsilon-Upsilon Chapter
of Phi Alpha Theta
THE UPSILONIAN
Student Editor
Matthew Brotherton
Board of Advisors
M.C. Smith, Ph.D., Chairman of the Board of Advisors and
Associate Professor of History
Oline Carmical, Ph.D., Professor of History
Kyla Fitz-Gerald, student member of Upsilon-Upsilon
Christina Gillis, student member of Upsilon-Upsilon
Bruce Hicks, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Political Science
Christopher Leskiw, Ph.D, Associate Professor of Political Science
Al Pilant, Ph.D., Professor of History

COPYRIGHT © 2010 by University of the Cumberlands
Department of History and Political Science
All Rights Reserved
Printed in the United States of America
ii

Table of Contents
iv
v
v
vi
Comments from the Student Editor... Matthew C. Brotherton
Comments from the President.......................... Taylor Bowman
Comments from the Advisor..................................Eric L. Wake
The Authors
Articles
1 “Let Not My Sex Be an Objection:” Olympe De Gouges and
the French Revolution....................................... Kiersten Friend
11 Angel of Assassination: Charlotte Corday and the Death of
Jean-Paul Marat................................................ Taylor Bowman
22 Reflections of the Revolution: A Study of Paintings by
Jacques-Louis David .........................................Megan Hensley
iii

Greetings and Salutations:
Comments From The Editor
Virginia Woolf once wrote that “Nothing has really happened until it has been
recorded.” Indeed, it is those few that dedicate their lives to recording the events of
history that allow us to grasp and understand what has come before. It is because of
those historians of old that we can attempt to avoid the mistakes of our forefathers, but
also to learn from them.
The pursuit of history and the secrets that it holds is one of the hardest goals to
achieve, and as such special thanks and congratulations are due for those who have,
those who are, and those that will try to master this discipline and unlock the secrets
that history still holds.
Most special congratulations go to Kiersten Friend, Megan Hensley, and Taylor
Bowman. They are part of a new generation of historians that will go forth and
continue in the best traditions of those guardians of history. We also thank those
who submitted papers that were not included in this journal. It is my hope that you
continue your pursuit of history in the future.
Thanks also go out to the faculty of University of the Cumberlands’ Department of
History and Political Science. Thank you for your time and effort put into reading and
editing these research papers for their inclusion in The Upsilonian. Special thanks go
to Dr. Eric Wake, chair of the Department and advisor for our Phi Alpha Theta chapter
for his hard work and time working with the students and their papers. Finally, our
sincerest thanks go to Mrs. Fay Partin, secretary of the History Department. Without
her hard work, this publication would not be possible.
We present this 21st edition of The Upsilonian in the hope that the lessons and
facts contained herein may present to a future generation the key to unlocking a future
historical mystery. Happy reading and God bless.
Matthew C. Brotherton
Student Editor, Upsilon-Upsilon
2009-2010
iv

Comments From The President
Another academic year has come and gone and it is time, once again, to publish
The Upsilonian. As one of the authors included in this edition, let me say that it
is an honor to have a paper printed in this volume, and allow me to extend hardy
congratulations to the other two students who have been granted the same privilege.
Their papers are truly exceptional, and I am certain that those who read this journal will
find its contents engaging and enjoyable.
This year has been a good one for the Upsilon-Upsilon Chapter. In addition to (and
as a result of) our group’s fundraising efforts, three of our members were able to attend
the Phi Alpha Theta Biennial National Convention in San Diego, California, where we
had a paper presented. Two of us were also able to present at the Kentucky Regional
Conference, where Kiersten Friend won first place for the very paper published in this
edition. We are very proud of her. Our group has been blessed with a dedicated faculty
sponsor in Dr. Eric Wake as well as with the support of the entire History and Political
Science Department. I would like to offer a word of thanks to Dr. Chuck Smith, who
consistently supplies our chapter’s bake sales and who has been the faculty advisor for
this edition, and to Fay Partin, the department secretary who has, even now, begun to
piece our Best Chapter application together. We are much indebted to you both.
The end of the school year is always a bittersweet affair. On the one hand, many of
us are graduating, moving on to higher levels of education or venturing out into the real
world to encounter the joys and pressures of life beyond academia. On the other, we
are leaving behind many friends and faculty that we have come to respect and cherish,
and the Upsilon-Upsilon Chapter is losing several dedicated members. But such is life.
Changes of this kind are inevitable, and there is nothing left for me to do as President
except to express, one final time, my gratitude for this year’s Phi Alpha Theta members
and the faculty and staff that have seen us through. I appreciate you all and wish each
of you the best in your future endeavors.
Taylor Bowman, President
Upsilon-Upsilon, 2009-2010
Comments From The Advisor
Another year has come and gone. It is hard to believe that I have been the advisor
of this chapter for twenty-five years. The time has been a joyful one for me because
I have had the pleasure of working with some great individuals many of whom I still
hear from every now and then. All of them have contributed to making Upsilon-
Upsilon one of the more outstanding chapters in Phi Alpha Theta.
This year we have had a core of dedicated students who could always be depended
upon to do what needed to be done. We went to the national convention in San Diego
and the group worked hard in helping to raise the money. The Chapter was able to pay
for the airplane fare and the hotel and food expenses. This event demanded much work,
and I am grateful to all who participated. We even presented a paper which received
some good comments. At the regional convention, two of our people presented papers
and one, Kiersten Friend, won the best undergraduate paper. So the conferences were
good to us. As was our lecture series, where attendance was good at each lecture.
The “Health Care Debate” drew around 150 people. Most had around 50 people.
So it was a good year for our attendance.
But the end of the year is always a little sad because many who have worked so
hard will graduate and move on into their adult life. Yet, this is how it should be and
this is what we try to prepare them to do. Remember, however, you are a part of the Phi
Alpha Theta tradition and you will always be a part of us!
Eric L. Wake, Ph.D
Advisor, Upsilon-Upsilon Chapter
v

Authors
Kiersten Friend was a May 2010
graduate with a major in history and
a minor in Communication Arts. The
original draft of her paper was written for
the Departmental capstone course.
Taylor Bowman was a May 2010
graduate with majors in History and
English. The original draft of his paper
was written for the Departmental capstone
course.
Megan Hensley was a May 2010
graduate with a major in history and
minors in Art and French. The original
draft of her paper was written for the
Departmental capstone course.
vi

“LET NOT MY SEX BE AN OBJECTION:”
OLYMPE DE GOUGES AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
By Kiersten Friend
The onset of the French Revolution in 1789 completely changed the
political culture of France. The nation, Paris especially, was steeped in thoughts
of liberty. The future seemed to promise a much freer society, where anyone who
wanted to participate in political activities could do so, including women. They
hosted political club meetings and openly discussed the activities of the National
Assembly. 1 Olympe de Gouges was especially active. She firmly believed in
equal rights, and saw the Revolution as the perfect time to give equal rights to
everyone in France. However, it soon became evident to her that the only ones
who would truly benefit from the Revolution were men. Olympe de Gouges was
a groundbreaking women’s rights pioneer who refused to be bound by the mores
of her time and unabashedly wrote what she believed, even though it eventually
led to her death.
De Gouges was very active in the Revolution from its beginning until
her death in 1793. She served as a commentator on the events occurring in the
government and among the people. 2 From 1784 to 1793 she wrote more than
sixty political pamphlets, a true feat for a woman of that time. 3 She was also a
playwright and was able to get four plays staged during the Revolution. All of
her plays somehow related to political issues of the day. 4 She was obviously
very passionate about what was happening around her.
De Gouges’s desire for women to have the same rights as men came
from her own experiences. Born in southern France, she was given the name
Marie Gouze. She was not born into an aristocratic family, so she did not have
the educational opportunities to read the works of the enlightenment. Her father
was a butcher, but she and many others in the community believed that her real
father was actually a local nobleman. 5 Whether this is true or not, de Gouges
certainly believed it. She felt that she was denied a proper education since the
nobleman never claimed her as one of his children. 6
In 1765, Olympe was married to Louis Aubry, a friend of her father’s
who was much older than she was. This was an arranged marriage that lasted
until Aubry’s death a year later. The marriage did produce one child, a son
named Pierre. 7 In 1767, de Gouges met a wealthy military supplier and left for
Paris with him. However, she never remarried and raised her son alone. Once
in Paris, she changed her name to Olympe de Gouges and began working to
educate herself and her son. She discovered that she was a talented writer and
eventually wrote thirty plays. 8 Her lack of education as a child and her forced
marriage caused her to take an interest in the welfare of all oppressed peoples,
but especially the inequality that was shown towards women.
When the French Revolution began in 1789, Olympe de Gouges greeted
it with enthusiasm. She saw it as the ultimate opportunity for women to achieve
equal rights with men. She used the fame that she had achieved from her theater
career to help promote her ideals and interests. 9 When the National Assembly
adopted the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen” in August 1789, de
Gouges believed that the term ‘man’ meant universal mankind, not just those
of the male gender. The hopes of de Gouges and other feminists were dashed
1

when prominent assemblyman Abbé Sieyès declared that there were two types
of citizens: active and passive. He placed women in the passive category, along
with children, beggars, and vagrants. 10
De Gouges did not sit back and accept her status as a passive citizen. She
wrote more pamphlets about the debates taking place in the National Assembly.
One of her favorite topics to discuss was marriage. De Gouges believed that
property should belong to both spouses, not solely the husband. 11 In her
pamphlet entitled “Social Contract,” de Gouges outlined a property agreement
that those who wished to be married would have to sign. The agreement stated:
“we wish to make our wealth communal, meanwhile reserving to ourselves the
right to divide in favor of our children or towards those whom we might have a
particular inclination.” 12 This idea was very controversial in a time when all of
the property belonged to the husband and was left primarily to the eldest son.
De Gouges was also very passionate about helping children and called
for illegitimate children to be recognized by their fathers. This was no doubt
because she believed herself to be illegitimate. In “Social Contract,” she
declared that couples need to recognize that “property belongs directly to our
children, from whatever bed they come.” 13 She also said that it should be a
crime for a parent to renounce one of their children. 14 In addition to helping
children, a law like this would also help single mothers who had been raped or
taken as mistresses. De Gouges was also interested in helping poor children. She
called on wealthy families to adopt poor children so that they might have the
opportunity to get an education and better themselves. 15
De Gouges did not only comment on issues that held particular interest
for women (marriage and children), but also lent her pen to answering the
question of what to do with the monarchy. In 1790, she wrote: “I would sacrifice
neither my king to my country, nor my country to my king, but I would sacrifice
myself to save them as a single entity, fully convinced that one cannot exist
without the other.” 16 De Gouges believed that the monarchy should be kept
in place, but that it should be a constitutional monarchy. 17 She defended the
institution of a constitutional monarchy until the infamous Varennes Flight in
June 1791. 18 However, she did not support the killing of Louis XVI. Her views
on the monarchy would be one of the causes that led to her downfall.
She also argued that women should be allowed to actively participate in
the legislative process, both by voting and by being eligible for elected office. 19
Furthermore, she claimed that “These two powers [executive and legislative],
like man and woman, should be united but equal in force and virtue to make a
good household.” 20 It was very courageous of de Gouges to publish her ideas
about government, an area that was traditionally a man’s venue. This action
alone shows that she truly was a groundbreaking pioneer for women’s rights.
In September 1791, de Gouges wrote the work that would cement her
status as one of the great early women’s rights advocates, “Declaration of the
Rights of Women and Citizen.” This pamphlet was relatively unknown in her
time, but today it is her most famous work. As the title suggests, de Gouges
patterned her pamphlet after the 1789 “Declaration of the Rights of Man.” 21
Basically, the only way that de Gouges changed her work from the original was
in substituting or adding ‘woman’ to man. 22 This document was revolutionary
2

ecause it was one of the first of its kind and it explained why women should be
equal to men in the eyes of the law and society.
Like the original “Declaration of the Rights of Man,” de Gouges based
many of her views on the concept of ‘nature.’ The idea of ‘nature’ was an
Enlightenment ideal that meant absolute truth and goodness. 23 She refers to
nature in the preamble saying that this document is “a solemn declaration of the
natural, inalienable, and sacred rights of woman.” 24 De Gouges was claiming
that since nature was perfect, and that nature had given women the same rights
as men, then women must surely be equal to men. It was a crime to deny anyone
their natural rights. 25 De Gouges drew heavily from the ideology of the time to
support the claims that she put forth in her declaration.
“The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and Citizen” contains
seventeen articles, or rights, that de Gouges rewrote based on the articles in “The
Declaration of the Rights of Man.” De Gouges adjusted them to state what she
felt women were entitled to have. The first article sums up de Gouges’s beliefs
on equality; “Woman is born free and remains equal to man in rights.” 26 In
September 1791, a statement such as this was ground-breaking. Men of various
classes were becoming more equal, but women had been largely left behind by
the 1791 Constitution. De Gouges believed that because women had contributed
to the Revolution, they had earned the same rights as men. 27
Another article dealt with what de Gouges believed about government.
She claimed that its purpose was for “the preservation of the natural and
imprescriptable rights of woman and man. These rights are liberty, property,
security, and especially the resistance to oppression.” 28 Even though this article
is essentially a revision of “The Declaration of the Rights of Man,” de Gouges
clearly did not want a big, powerful government that would oppress its people. 29
She believed that an oppressive government would give rise to inequality, which
was exactly what she was fighting against. According to de Gouges, the new
government should be based on the principles of liberty and equality, and that it
should strive to protect its citizens and their rights. Her eagerness to comment on
government shows how unconcerned she was with the expectations of the time.
Many women discussed government, but few were willing to publically state
their views. Her willingness to publish her views shows how pioneering she
really was.
De Gouges very strongly believed in the absolute equality of men and
women. In article six, she discussed employment; “citizenesses and citizens,
being equal in its [the law’s] eyes, should be equally admissible to all public
dignities, offices and employments, according to their ability, and with no
distinction other than that of their virtues and talents.” 30 In this article, de
Gouges states that she believes people should be given jobs based on their skills
and merits, not because of their gender. The sixth article in de Gouges’s work
was the same as the sixth article in the “Declaration of the Rights of Man.” 31
Not surprisingly, “The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and Citizen”
did not go over well when it was published. The press was especially negative
towards it. Most papers viewed de Gouges, and others like her, as foolish. 32
Newspapers from both sides of the spectrum blasted her for it. The Royalist
paper Tableau de Paris called de Gouges and other feminists a “choir of national
virgins just as extravagant as they are ridiculous.” 33 A pro-Revolution paper
3

called Révolutions de Paris said that de Gouges was “just showing off.” 34 De
Gouges’s willingness to state her views did nothing to bolster her popularity
with the extremists who were wrangling for control of the Revolution.
Interestingly, the part of the “Declaration of the Rights of Woman and
Citizen” that got de Gouges into the most trouble with the extreme leftist
groups of the Revolution did not come from her views on women’s rights.
In the introduction to the document, de Gouges dedicated the work to Marie
Antoinette. 35 This decision caused the far left clubs to view her as a Royalist. 36
De Gouges, however, hoped that if the Queen championed the cause of women,
it would lend more credibility to the movement and possibly make women’s
equal rights a reality.
Marie Antoinette likely never saw de Gouges’s pamphlet. Even though de
Gouges went to great lengths to get her pamphlets into the hands of government
officials, very rarely did they actually see them. They were considered to be
‘junk mail’ and were simply discarded. When some did find their way into the
legislative chambers, they were typically disregarded. 37 The same was true of
the general populace of Paris. De Gouges plastered up posters and distributed
pamphlets all over the city, but most people ignored them. Despite her work
being disregarded, de Gouges’s fame continued to grow. 38 Most people in Paris
knew who she was, even if they did not agree with her actions.
After the publication of “Declaration of the Rights of Woman and
Citizen,” de Gouges continued to write and speak in favor of women’s rights.
Some of her ideas actually became law on September 20, 1792, when the
National Assembly proclaimed equal rights for men and women. The National
Assembly also made it easier for women to obtain divorces and serve as
witnesses in trials. 39 Women did not receive all of the gains that de Gouges had
hoped for, but she viewed it as a step in the right direction. Sadly however, the
strides made by women were completely erased with the establishment of the
Napoleonic Codes in 1804. 40
Aside from women’s rights issues, de Gouges continued to speak her
mind on issues pertaining to the government and its leaders. She was especially
leery of the Jacobins. While the Legislative Assembly was meeting during 1791-
1792, she frequently referred to the Jacobins as a “hideaway for reprobates”
and “a den of thieves.” 41 She criticized the overthrow of the monarchy on June
20, 1792 and in the autumn of 1792 she again criticized the Jacobins. 42 Her
criticism of the Jacobins was what really brought her to the attention of the
government.
De Gouges’s favorite Jacobins to criticize were Maximilien Robespierre
and Jean-Paul Marat. De Gouges considered Marat to be “a destroyer of laws,
mortal enemy of the order, of humanity, and of his country.” 43 She also accused
him of “living large in a society in which he was both a tyrant and a plague.” 44
De Gouges was even more critical of Robespierre and wrote two pamphlets
accusing him of seeking to be a dictator. She addressed him directly in those
pamphlets saying, “You tell yourself that you’re the unique author of the
Revolution, you haven’t been, you are not, you will never be anything other than
disgrace and execration.” 45 She even suggested that Robespierre meet her at the
Seine River, because there they could both do a service to their country: he by
dying and she by giving her life drowning him. 46
4

De Gouges stirred up more trouble for herself in December 1792 when
she offered to defend Louis XVI in his trial. Even though she was no longer an
adamant supporter of the monarchy, she did not believe that Louis should be
killed. She wrote an impassioned letter to the National Convention in December
1792 offering herself to defend Louis in his trial. She even brought feminism
into the issue saying, “let not my sex be an objection: that heroism and liberty
may be possessed by women the Revolution has shown by more than one
example.” 47 De Gouges had no training as a lawyer, but she so strongly believed
that Louis should be spared she offered to defend him. Most historians agree that
this action sealed her fate more than any other because it enabled the Jacobins to
depict her as a traitor to the Revolution, and therefore to France.
De Gouges’s arguments in favor of sparing Louis’s life were sound
and also very perceptive. She claimed that Louis could not be incriminated
because “his ancestors filled to overflowing the cup of the sufferings of France;
unhappily the cup broke in his hands and all its fragments rebounded upon his
head. I may add that, had it not been for his court’s perversity, he might perhaps
have been a virtuous king.” 48 She also said that since they had stripped him of
his power, he was no longer a threat. 49 De Gouges even used an example from
history to prove her point: “In the eyes of posterity the English are dishonored
by the execution of Charles I.” 50 In this statement, she told the National
Convention that they would shame their nation by killing Louis.
Her most insightful comment was “Beheading a king does not kill him.
He lives long after death; he is really only dead when he survives his fall.” 51
This meant that if the Convention killed Louis, then they would turn him into a
martyr and he would be a rallying point for all those opposed to the Revolution.
De Gouges’s arguments, and the fact that it was a woman presenting them,
immensely angered the Jacobins and practically ensured that she would be
arrested and executed. The only question remaining was when it would happen.
Despite her impending demise, Olympe de Gouges refused to stop
writing about women’s rights and criticizing the government. The Committee
of Public Safety finally had her arrested on July 22, 1793. The immediate cause
of her arrest was a pamphlet that she had written entitled “The Three Urns, The
Salvation of the Fatherland.” In this pamphlet, de Gouges said that argument
over which type of government France should have could be decided by letting
the people vote on it. She suggested that three urns be set up, one for each type
of government (monarchy, republic, federation), and the people put their vote in
the urn representing what they chose. 52 Another work that was used against her
was a play she was working on which centered around Marie Antoinette and the
royal family the night before they were overthrown. Jacobins used this play as
further evidence of her supposedly being a royalist. 53
De Gouges’s trial was held on November 1, 1793. She was charged with
publishing “a work contrary to the expressed desire of the entire nation [“The
Three Urns”].” 54 The prosecutors also said that she had “openly provoked civil
war and sought to arm citizens against one another” by publishing “The Three
Urns.” They claimed that “There can be no mistaking the perfidious intentions
of this criminal woman, and her hidden motives, when one observes her in all
the works to which, at the very least, she lends her name.” 55 Because of how
ridiculous the charges against de Gouges were, it is obvious that the real reasons
5

that de Gouges was even on trial were because of her attacks on the Jacobin
leaders and her support of the monarchy.
Most of de Gouges’s trial record is filled with accounts of her slandering
Robespierre and the Jacobin party. On her treatment of Robespierre, the
prosecutors accused de Gouges of “spewing forth bile in large doses against the
warmest friends of the people, their most intrepid defender.” 56 It is clear from
this statement that Robespierre had been offended by de Gouges, and that de
Gouges had been writing pamphlets condemning the Jacobins and their goals.
De Gouges’s early support of the monarchy and her defense of Louis’s
life were also used against her. The prosecutors said that “The Three Urns,”
“sees only the provocation to the reestablishment of royalty on the part of a
woman who, in one of her writings, admits that monarchy seems to her to be
the government most suited to the French spirit.” 57 Her warning about sparing
Louis’s life and offer to serve as his lawyer was also used as evidence against
her. 58
De Gouges was not given a lawyer because the court told her she had
“wit enough to defend [herself].” 59 She was found guilty and sentenced to death.
When her sentence was given, de Gouges, in an attempt to buy some extra time
for herself, claimed that she was pregnant and could not be executed. It is not
clear why she said this. She may have hoped that she might see her son, Pierre,
one more time, or at the very least hear some news as to his whereabouts. 60
When de Gouges was examined by a doctor from the Tribunal, she was found
not to be pregnant and was scheduled to be executed. She was able to write one
last letter, and she addressed it to her son. She told Pierre that “I am a victim of
my idolatry for the fatherland and for the people.” 61
De Gouges was guillotined on November 2, 1793. 62 An obituary that
appeared in the Moniteur on November 3 said, “Olympe de Gouges, born
with an exalted imagination, believed her delusions were inspired by nature.
She wanted to be a Statesman; it would seem that the law has punished this
plotter for having forgotten the virtues suitable to her own sex.” 63 De Gouges
had overstepped the boundaries for women at that time by publishing so many
works against the government and for repeatedly calling for women’s rights. It is
also of interest to note that within days of de Gouges’s death, another feminist,
Madame Roland, was also executed. 64
While de Gouges was imprisoned, the National Convention voted to
make women’s clubs illegal. This vote took place on October 29-30. The main
reason given for this decision was that “women are hardly capable of lofty
conceptions and serious cogitations.” 65 On November 17, Pierre-Gaspard
Chaumette, a Jacobin leader, denounced a crowd of women protestors and all
political activism on the part of women. He told them that “It is shocking, it is
contrary to all the laws of nature” for women to want the same rights as men.
He said it was the same as trying to change one’s sex. He used de Gouges as
an example of what would happen to them if they continued; “Remember the
shameless Olympe de Gouges, who was the first to set up women’s clubs, who
abandoned the cares of her household to involve herself in the republic, and
whose head fell under the avenging blade of the laws.” 66 Olympe de Gouges
was executed, not only for her writings, but also because she did not conform to
the behavior acceptable for her gender.
6

Olympe de Gouges believed that women should have the same rights
as men. She had a flair for writing, and she put that gift to use arguing for her
beliefs. Most of her works went unnoticed in her day, but they did garner enough
attention to get her into trouble. She had no reservations about criticizing the
leadership of the day, and fearlessly stood up for what she thought was right.
Because of her defiant and courageous stance on the issues of her time, Olympe
de Gouges really was a ground-breaking women’s rights advocate.
7
ENDNOTES
1
Jeremy D. Popkin, A Short History of the French Revolution, 5th ed. (Upper Saddle River,
NJ: Pearson, 2010), 52.
2
Shirley Elson Roessler, Out of the Shadows: Women and Politics in the French Revolution,
1789-95. Vol. 14 of Studies in Modern European History, ed. Frank J. Coppa (1996; repr., New
York: Peter Lang Publishing, 1998), 63.
3
Janie Vanpée, “Performing Justice: The Trials of Olympe de Gouges,” Theatre Journal 51,
no. 1 (1999): 50, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25068623 (accessed September 14, 2009).
4
Ibid., 51.
5
Joan Wallach Scott, “French Feminists and the Rights of Man: Olympe de Gouges’s
Declarations,” History Workshop, no. 28 (Autumn, 1989): 8, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4288921
(accessed September 11, 2009).
6
Sophie Mousset, Women’s Rights and the French Revolution: A Biography of Olympe de
Gouges, trans. Joy Poirel (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2007), 10-11.
7
Ibid., 16.
8
Ibid., 17-19.
9
Vanpée, “Performing Justice: The Trials of Olympe de Gouges,” 50-51.
10
Lisa Beckstrand, Deviant Women of the French Revolution and the Rise of Feminism
(Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2009), 89.
11
Joan B. Landes, Women and the Public Sphere in the Age of the French Revolution
(Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988), 126.
12
Olympe de Gouges, “Declaration of the Rights of Women and Citizen & Social Contract,”
September 1791, in the Modern History Sourcebook, Fordham, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/
mod/modsbook.html (accessed September 17, 2009).
13
Ibid.
14
Ibid.
15
Landes, Women and the Public Sphere in the Age of the French Revolution, 126.

8
16
Olympe de Gouges, “A Female Writer’s Response to the American Champion or a Well–
Known Colonist,” January 18, 1790, Center for Modern History, George Mason University,
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/344/ (accessed September 17, 2009).
17
Landes, Women and the Public Sphere in the Age of the French Revolution, 124.
18
Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 64.
19
Ibid., 125.
20
Olympe de Gouges (1791), quoted in Landes, Women in the Public Sphere in The French
Revolution, 127.
21
Janie Vanpée, “La Déclaration des Droits de la Femme et de la citoyenne: Olympe de
Gouges’s Re-Writing of La Déclaration des Droits de l’homme,” in Literate Women in the French
Revolution of 1789, ed. Catherine Montfort-Howard (Birmingham, AL: Summa Publications, 1994), 68.
22
Ibid.
23
Beckstrand, Deviant Women of the French Revolution and the Rise of Feminism, 76.
24
Olympe de Gouges, “The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and Citizen,” September
1791, Center for Modern History, George Mason University, http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/477/
(accessed September 17, 2009).
25
Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 66.
26
Olympe de Gouges, “The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and Citizen,” September 1791.
27
Sarah E. Melzer and Leslie W. Rabine, Rebel Daughters: Women and the French
Revolution (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), 236.
28
Olympe de Gouges, “The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and Citizen,” September 1791.
29
Mousset, Women’s Rights and the French Revolution, 67.
30
Olympe de Gouges, “The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and Citizen,” September 1791.
31
“Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen,” August 27, 1789, in P.M. Jones, The
French Revolution 1789-1804, part of Seminar Studies in History (London: Pearson Education, Ltd,
2003), 115.
32
Melzer and Rabine, Rebel Daughters, 235. Other prominent proponents of women’s rights
included Madame Roland, Etta Palm d’Aelders, and the Marquis de Condorcet. All but d’Aelders
would perish during the Reign of Terror.
33
Tableau de Paris, July 1792, quoted in Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 67.
34
Ibid.
35
Olympe de Gouges, “Declaration of the Rights of Women,” quoted in Mousset, Women’s
Rights and the French Revolution, 63-64.

9
36
Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 65.
37
Vanpée, “Performing Justice: The Trials of Olympe de Gouges,” 51.
38
David W. Del Testa, Florence Lemoine, & John Strickland, “Olympe de Gouges,” in
Government Leaders, Military Rulers, and Political Activists: Lives and Legacies (Westport, CT:
Greenwood Publishing, 2001), 52. http://www.netlibrary.com/Reader/. Net Library (accessed
September 19, 2009).
39
Mousset, Women’s Rights and the French Revolution, 85-86.
40
Jane Abray, “Feminism in the French Revolution,” American Historical Review 80, no. 1
(February 1975), 59, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1859051 (accessed November 2, 2009).
41
Olympe de Gouges, 1792, quoted in Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 66.
42
Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 67.
43
Olympe de Gouges, 1792, quoted in Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 67.
44
Ibid.
45
Olympe de Gouges, 1792, quoted in Beckstrand, Deviant Women in the French
Revolution, 127.
46
Roessler, Out of the Shadows, 67.
47
Olympe de Gouges to National Convention, December 1792, quoted in Winifred Stephens
Whale, Women of the French Revolution (London: Chapman & Hill, ltd, 1922), 168,
http://www.archive.org/details/cu3194024300109, American Libraries (accessed September 14, 2009).
48
Ibid., 169.
49
Whale, Women of the French Revolution, 169.
50
Olympe de Gouges to National Convention, December 1792, quoted in Whale, Women of
the French Revolution, 169.
51
Ibid.
52
Vanpée, “Performing Justice: The Trials of Olympe de Gouges,” 47.
53
Ibid., 48.
54
“The Trial of Olympe de Gouges,” November 1, 1793, in Women in Revolutionary Paris,
1789-1795, ed. Darline Gay Levy, trans. Harriet Branson Applewhite, Mary Durham Johnson
(Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1981), 255.
55
Ibid.
56
Ibid., 256.
57
Ibid.
58
Ibid.

59
Olympe de Gouges to Citizen Degouges, November 1793, in Last Letters: Prisons and
Prisoners in the French Revolution, 1st American edition, ed. Oliver Blanc, trans. Alan Sheridan
(New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1987), 131.
60
Mousset, Women’s Rights and the French Revolution, 96.
10
61
Olympe de Gouges to Citizen Degouges, Last Letters, 131.
62
Del Testa, Lemoine, and Strickland, Government Leaders, Military Rulers, and Political
Activists, 52.
63
Moniteur, November 1793, quoted in Mousset, Women’s Rights and the French
Revolution, 97.
64
Mary Seidman Trouille, Sexual Politics in the Enlightenment: Women Writers Read
Rousseau, part of the SUNY Series, The Margins of Literature (Albany, NY: New York State
University of New York, 1997), 278, http://www.netlibrary.com /Reader, Net Library (accessed
September 18, 2009).
65
“Discussion of Women’s Political Clubs and Their Suppression, October 29-30, 1793,”
Center for Modern History, George Mason University, http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/294/
(accessed September 17, 2009).
66
Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette, “Speech at City Hall Denouncing Women’s Political
Activism,” November 17, 1793, Center for Modern History, George Mason University,
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/489/ (accessed September 17, 2009).

ANGEL OF ASSASSINATION:
CHAROLOTTE CORDAY AND THE DEATH OF JEAN-PAUL MARAT
By Taylor Bowman
On July 13, 1793, Marie-Charlotte de Corday, a young and reportedly
attractive woman from the Norman town of Caen, drove a large knife through
the heart of French Revolutionary leader Jean-Paul Marat, killing him almost
instantly. 1 Corday viewed Marat as evil incarnate. To her, he was a devil who
brought to the originally beneficent Revolution an atmosphere of chaos and
of terror. Unless he were destroyed, she thought, all of France would erupt in
civil war and be consumed in the fires of a revolution that had moved too far
beyond its earliest intents. 2 Corday, however, misjudged her victim’s influence.
She assumed that, were he eliminated, the Revolution would be undone―terror
would cease immediately, and all threat of civil war would abate in a single
moment. This was not the case. The Revolution did not expire with Marat, and
the National Convention began supporting the Reign of Terror with renewed
vigor. Corday failed to restore peace to France, but Marat’s death nonetheless
had severe consequences for the Revolution. Following the assassination, the
Terror’s harshness made enemies of its former allies and strengthened anti-
Revolutionary sentiment until Robespierre and other leaders were ultimately
removed. 3 While her assassination of Marat did not abruptly end the Revolution
as she had hoped, Corday’s actions, nevertheless, ignited a chain of events that
ultimately occasioned the collapse of the Terror.
Charlotte Corday belonged to the petite noblesse. When she reached her
adolescence, her father sent her to a convent in Caen, where she received an
education befitting a young woman of her status. 4 There, she was exposed to
the writings of various theologians, scholars, and philosophers, including those
of Rousseau and Voltaire (the latter of whom was read without the knowledge
and against that mandate of her instructors). 5 As she began to mature, Corday
developed a fascination with the realm of politics. Highly idealistic, she was
an early and enthusiastic supporter of the Revolution. While at the convent, the
young woman met and befriended Gustave Doulcet de Pontécoulant, a young
lawyer and politician who would later become an important member of the
National Convention. Together, they followed the events of the Revolution with
unparalleled interest, beginning with the fall of the Bastille on July 14, 1789.
It was Doulcet that first informed Corday of the events set in motion by the
National Assembly on August 4, and from that time forward, the young lady
dreamed of a government and society in which The Rights of Man would be
made law. 6
Shortly after the completion of her education, Corday took up residence
with her aunt Madame de Bretteville, a wealthy and well-respected citizen of
Caen. Though often praised for her beauty, Corday expressed little desire for the
attentions of men. Her most fervent wish was that she might someday discover
a grandiose means by which to aid both France and humanity. 7 She was an avid
reader of political literature, which, as of September, 1789, included Marat’s
11

L’ami du Peuple. 8 With this journal, Marat earned the title of “Friend of the
People,” and in it, Corday first encountered Marat and his brand of radicalism.
She disliked the often violent rhetoric of Marat and his fellow Jacobins, and her
exposure to his writings marks the beginning of her disillusionment with the
Revolution and its leaders. 9
In July, 1790, the Civil Constitution of the Clergy was enacted. Riots
erupted throughout rural France, and the church was divided. The outrage
with which provincial communities, particularly Caen, reacted to this newlyimplemented
legislation seemed evidence to Corday of Parisian abuse and
perversion of Revolutionary sentiments. The establishment of the Civil
Constitution, to her, revealed the extent to which the Revolution’s most
prominent figures hindered the true spirit of their professed cause. 10 The
deposition of King Louis XVI in 1791 resulted from and contributed to the
chaos that had been brewing in Paris since the early moments of the revolution.
Following the royal family’s failed escape attempt and subsequent arrest,
Marat, by then a prominent figure in the Legislative Assembly, began calling
for the king’s execution. 11 Corday found the notion repugnant. In the past, she
had refused to toast Louis XVI, and she did not nearly possess the same level
of Royalist sympathies that is commonly attributed to her. She considered
herself a Republican. Nevertheless, she felt that execution would be far too
extreme and that such a measure would contradict the humanist values touted by
Revolutionary leaders. 12 The frequent incendiary speeches made by the Jacobins
against the king increased tensions in Paris and bolstered Corday’s increasingly
negative opinion of the Revolution.
The events of 1792 stifled any of Corday’s hopes that the Revolution
might be redeemed. Between September 2 and September 8, Paris prisons
were overrun by ardent Jacobins and Sans-Culottes, who, convinced that those
being held were potentially dangerous enemies of the Republic, tried and
executed everyone found inside. 13 An article printed in Revolutions de Paris
(a newspaper sympathetic to the vigilantes) read, “The people are human, but
without weakness; wherever they detect crime, they throw themselves upon it
without regard for the age, sex, or condition of the guilty.” 14 Many observers,
then and hence, have attributed the brutal actions of the mobs here described
to a panic caused by the fall of Verdun to the advancing forces of the Duke
of Brunswick. The theory often propagated states that, when Parisians heard
of Verdun’s surrender, they were alarmed, knowing that there remained no
additional strongholds between their city and the advancing Prussian forces. In
their supposed fear and rage, they invaded the prisons and killed all captives. 15
While the fear of Brunswick may have motivated some segments of the
population, Corday as well as several members of the Legislative Assembly
held Marat responsible for inciting (through his journal and through speeches)
what came to be known as the Prison Massacres. 16 The belief was so strong in
the minds of some Assembly members that he was brought before that body to
give an account of his actions. Largely due to the backing of several prominent
Montagnards, Marat was acquitted, but Corday continued to lay the blame for
the Prison Massacres squarely on his shoulders. 17 The Revolution had grown
bloody, and she identified Marat as the progenitor of its pitiless violence. 18
12

By the end of September, the National Convention had replaced the
Legislative Assembly as France’s central government. Shortly thereafter, Marat,
a recently elected deputy and member of the Montagnard party, renewed his
call for the execution of Louis XVI. This time, the call did not go unanswered,
and in December of 1792, the former king’s trial began. Regardless of the
enthusiasm with which he was defended and regardless of all attempts made to
have execution eliminated as a form of punishment, the Convention voted to
behead Louis XVI on January 21, 1793. In spite of her previous disillusionment,
Corday could not believe the king had been guillotined. Reports indicate that,
despite her disdain for the Old Regime, the news of Louis XVI’s death moved
the young woman to tears. She saw the execution not only as an affront to
the philanthropic ideology of the early Revolution but as breach of authority
committed by the Convention. 19 This violation she also attributed principally
to Marat. 20 Corday felt that such misuse of power could not go unpunished and
was no longer willing to tolerate the abuses of Marat and the Convention. She
began to contemplate her own ability to end the destructive sequence into which
the Revolution had fallen, and what transpired in April and June of that year set
her on the road to assassination. 21
While Corday sat at home in Caen, reading about the latest atrocities
committed by the Paris Jacobins, Marat was staging a coup. Since the Prison
Massacres, he and his fellow Montagnards had been unable to pass their own
agenda through a Convention dominated by Girondins, members of the largest
party within the government. Between May 31, and June 2, 1793, Marat took
the first steps toward remedying his predicament. In that three-day period, a
mob of Sans-Culottes, organized and incited by Marat, marched on the Tuileries
and forcibly evicted 22 Girondin deputies from their seats in the Convention.
Nearly all of those removed were leading figures within the Gironde, and their
expulsion meant the ascendance of the Montagnards to power. Those ousted
were escorted from the hall and promptly placed under house arrest. Some
managed to escape, but for those who did not, proscription and prison soon
followed. Imprisonment invariably led to execution. Those who escaped house
arrest, therefore, effected a hasty departure from Paris. Many of them made for
Caen. There, Corday, who heard of the overthrow only two days after it occurred
and who had been a long-time Girondin sympathizer, eagerly awaited the arrival
of the refugees. By June 9, several of the escaped Girondins had reached the
Norman town, and almost all of them came prepared with stories of the vile
Marat and of the abominations committed by the Montagnards in the name of
the Revolution. 22
Corday was an eager audience. Among the former deputies then in Caen
were Jerome Pétion, Francois Buzot, and Charles Barbaroux, all of whom
were figures she recognized from her extensive reading. She had sympathized
with them from afar and now had the immense honor of meeting and speaking
with them face to face. Furthermore, she detested Marat and never passed on
an opportunity to hear him vilified. In that regard, she was not disappointed.
The Girondins spoke of endless evil. They told the citizens of Caen about
the policy of Terror that had been enacted following the coup and delivered
tales of horrendous carnage lately sprung up in Paris. They demonized Marat
considerably and reported that the guillotine had already claimed nearly
13

100,000 heads and that the “Friend of the People” had found a cure for his
recently contracted ailments in the spilling of human blood. 23 Such accounts
were doubtless exaggerated, but they fascinated Corday immeasurably. She
had, by this time, already hated Marat and, in fact, had already given thought
to killing him. For her, the expulsion of the elected Girondin leaders from the
National Convention represented a violation of the people’s sovereignty and
an intolerable assault on the noble ideas of undiluted liberalism. She despised
Marat, and the presence and eloquence of the Girondins further cemented
her hatred. 24 In the weeks following their arrival, Corday became convinced
that direct action against the Convention was needed. Marat would have to be
eliminated.
While she liked and appreciated the Girondins’ powerfully delivered
stories, Corday did not admire the impotence with which they opposed the
sitting government. In fact, it disgusted her. On July 7, 1793, General Wimpffen
gathered a small group of Girondin sympathizers and attempted to arrange a
militant gala, complete with speeches, songs, banners, and a parade. The event
was intended to demonstrate solidarity among the Girondins and to rally support
behind them. The sparse attendance generated made the gathering a pitiful
spectacle and a failure. It embarrassed and distressed Corday, who had already
begun to realize that her new friends were incapable of any but a feeble response
to the oppressive Convention. 25 Two days prior to Wimpffen’s attempted rally,
Corday purchased a one-way ticket on a Coach set to leave Caen for Paris on
July 9. She had convinced herself that Marat was the source of all that had gone
awry with the Revolution and that he must be killed to restore order in France. 26
His assassination would be her grandiose gesture for the good of her country and
for the betterment of humanity.
Prior to purchasing her ticket, Corday went to see Barbaroux at the Hotel
de L’Intendance, introducing herself as Marie-Charlotte de Corday. She secured
from the former deputy a letter of introduction to Lauze Duperret, a Girondin
deputy who, not having been expelled, remained in the Convention and served
as an intermediate between Barbaroux and the proscribed Girondins (such as
Madame Rolland) who failed to escape imprisonment. 27 Upon acquiring a seat
on the next coach to Paris, Corday returned home and burned all of her political
literature, arranged for the payment of her debts, bequeathed her valuable
items to friends and loved ones, and returned all the books she had borrowed.
Once her affairs were in order, she made her goodbyes. She told Madame
de Bretteville that she would be going to stay with her father in Argentan.
Meanwhile, she wrote a letter to her father, explaining that she planned on taking
a trip to England. 28 Thus she traveled to Paris on the morning of July 9 without
the knowledge of friends or family.
Corday arrived in Paris on July 12, 1793. She sought out Duperret and
gave him the letter of introduction she had received from Barbaroux. She wanted
to kill Marat publicly, preferably during a meeting of the Convention, and she
asked Duperret how she would go about gaining entrance into a Convention
session. Duperret seemed willing to arrange for her admittance, but Corday soon
learned that Marat no longer attended Convention meetings. He had, prior to
the coup, contracted a debilitating skin condition that had worsened in severity
14

to such an extent that he was forced to remain at home. 29 This discovery
momentarily disappointed Corday, but shortly thereafter, she discovered that,
while he was not the leader he had been formerly, he remained active and
continued to conduct Convention business despite his lack of mobility. 30 Corday
remained convinced that the key to peace lay in the death of Marat, so she
resolved to pay him a visit on the following morning and to accomplish her task
at that time.
Corday arose at 6:00 on the morning of July 13. Her first destination
was the Palais Royal, where she intended to purchase the tools necessary for
the task that lay ahead of her. In her zeal, she arrived before any of the shops
were yet open for business, so she was obliged to wait, which she did with little
patience. When the vendors had arrived, Corday began her search. Ultimately,
she purchased her knife from a Monsieur Badin for two francs. Its blade was
six inches in length, and its handle was ebony. The young woman concealed
her purchase in the bosom of her dress and went to secure a coach. 31 When
she arrived at Marat’s home in the Rue des Cordeliers, she was greeted by his
common law wife Simmone Evrard, who turned her away. Corday explained
that she had come to give Marat information about an underground Girondist
movement, but Evrard insisted that the Revolutionary leader was in no condition
to receive guests. 32 Nonplussed, Corday retreated, but she returned around 7:30
in the evening, after having sent a letter to Marat explaining the purpose of her
visit. This time, Marat ensured that she received an audience with him. 33
Corday was shocked by what she encountered. She was escorted to
Marat’s quarters, where she found the villainous Montagnard sitting in a
shoe-shaped tub with a vinegar-soaked towel wrapped around his head. Warm
baths were the only proven method of soothing his painful skin condition,
and the towel had been contrived as a method of counteracting his frequent
headaches. 34 Corday wasted little time. As soon as she and her unsuspecting
victim were alone, she began telling him of a fabricated Girondin conspiracy,
naming several of the Girondins she had come to know in the past month. Upon
Marat’s response that those named would soon be guillotined, Corday pulled
the knife from her dress and, with a single thrust, drove it into his heart up to
the handle. 35 Her blow was astonishingly accurate. The blade pierced Marat’s
heart and left lung, rendering him lifeless in a matter of seconds. 36 Corday was
hindered when attempting to leave Marat’s apartment by a man (one of Marat’s
close friends) who purportedly struck her with a chair. News of her deed spread
almost instantly, and the scene on the street quickly grew tumultuous. Charles
Henri Sanson, Public Executioner for the Convention, recorded the following
conversation among Parisians just a few minutes after the assassination:
‘Who [killed Marat]’
‘A woman.’
‘Has she been arrested’
Some said, ‘no’ with an air of delight. Others said, ‘yes’ and fell
silent again. One inquired discreetly if the wound was mortal.
‘Where was he struck’
‘Below the collar bone, between two ribs.’
‘Was it a bullet’
‘No. A knife driven into his lungs to the full length of the blade.’
‘Plague on it! She must have struck hard.’ 37
15

Within seconds of Marat’s death, the police were called for. In just a few
minutes’ time, they arrived amid a growing mass of men and women that had
begun to congregate outside the home of the dead Marat. 38
Corday was taken into custody immediately. The police did not even
wait to remove her from Marat’s apartment before subjecting her to a rigorous
questioning process. Jaques-Philibert Guellard, police superintendant of the
district, set up a desk in one of the rooms adjacent to the crime scene and, less
than an hour after the assassination, had Corday brought in for interrogation. 39
She admitted her crime from the outset of his inquiry. 40 He asked her where
she had purchased her knife and if she had received the aid of any accomplices,
to which she replied that she had been to the Palais Royal the day before.
She denied ever having accomplices. All present for the interrogation were
impressed by the young woman’s calm and dignified comportment. To many it
did not seem possible that she had so recently committed an act of homicide. In
his report, Guellard wrote, “Guellard: Asked her if, after having accomplished
the crime, she had not tried to escape by the window. Corday: Replied no,
she had no intention of escaping by the window, but she would have gone out
by the door if she had not been stopped.” 41 When all police reports had been
assembled, Corday was asked if she would like to alter any of her testimony. She
replied that she would not and signed her confession. 42
Her trial was set for July 7, 1793. It would be a mere formality; she
had no hope of acquittal. The people of Paris considered Marat a martyr.
Songs and hymns comparing him to Christ were sung in mourning throughout
the streets of Paris. 43 The famous French painter Jacques-Louis David was
commissioned to paint a portrait of the dead Marat and was given charge of
funeral arrangements. David’s desire (as well as that of the Convention) was
to further perpetuate the image of Marat as a saint who had given his life for
the Revolution. To this end, David decided to display Marat’s body on a large
bed with a damp sheet concealing everything below the waist (this hid Marat’s
decaying flesh and combated putrefaction) and a crown of oak leaves on the
dead man’s head. Flowers were strewn across the bed, and Marat’s chest was
left bare to fully display the knife-wound. 44 Devoted to this image of the slain
Marat, the citizens of Paris developed vehement hatred for Corday. An article
in the Gazette Nationale, published just one week after her assassination of
Marat, characterized Corday as “a remarkable example of the seal of reprobation
with which nature stamps those women who renounce the temperament, the
character, the tastes and the inclination of their sex.” 45 Most of Paris seems
to have held this opinion, but Corday’s trial and execution would win her the
admiration of many, including her accusors.
In her last days, Corday expressed little fear of her fate. On July 15,
she wrote to the Convention, saying, “Since I have only a few minutes to live,
might I hope, citizens, that you would allow me to have my portrait painted.” 46
Citizen Haüer, an artist she had observed in the courtroom, was sent to her the
following day. 47 Anticipating the trial ahead of her and recognizing the reality of
its predetermined outcome, she wrote a letter to her father in Argentan. It read as
follows:
16

17
Forgive me, my dear papa, for disposing of my life without
your permission. I have avenged many innocent victims. I
have prevented many another disaster. The people will one
day be disabused and rejoice at being delivered from such
a tyrant…I beg you to forget me, or rather to rejoice at my
fate, its cause is a fine one. 48
In a letter to Barbaroux written that same day, she said, “Goodbye, citizen, I ask
all true friends of peace to remember me.” 49 Corday’s courageous acceptance
of her fate so evident in these letters was also clearly visible in her demeanor
at trial. She endured the testimony of Simmone Evrard and others present on
that evening as well as the questioning of her prosecutors without showing even
the least sign of becoming unnerved. When offered the services of a priest,
she gently replied that she had no sins to confess and then politely thanked the
Tribunal for its courtesy. Her apparent tranquility was nearly impossible for her
judges to comprehend. On two separate occasions, they had a doctor examine
her for signs of sexual immorality—the thinking was that only a truly depraved
woman could commit such a violent act with so little remorse. Examination
confirmed her virginity. 50 When she was marched to execution on July 17, her
resolve remained immutable. A German historian at the scene, identified in his
writings only as Klause, was mesmerized by the sight of Corday approaching
the guillotine. In a description of her execution, he recorded, “Already half
transfigured, [Corday] seemed like an angel of light…she approached the death
machine and, of her own accord, placed her head on the appointed spot…solemn
silence reigned. The fatal blade fell…thus ended Charlotte Corday, the sublime
maiden of Caen.” 51
Marat was dead and Corday executed for his assassination. Despite
the optimism of her letters, however, the young woman had not succeeded
in ending the Revolution or the Convention’s policy of Terror. She had, in
fact, inspired the Convention to impose harsher restrictions on the people of
France. Nevertheless, her shadow and that of her actions loomed over France
for the next year as an era began in which the Revolution began to consume its
founders. 52 In the wake of Marat’s assassination, Jacque Roux and Theophile
Leclerc continued publication of L’ami du Peuple and, in it, caustically criticized
the Convention for its inability to adequately address counter-revolutionary
efforts. Along with other Sans-Culotte leaders, the pair of enragés called for a
more stringent enforcement of the Terror. Jacques Hébert, another prominent
Sans-Culotte radicalized his publication Pére Duchesne, and the Convention
began conceding to many Sans-Culotte demands. 53 The fact that a woman from
Caen could ride into Paris and assassinate one of the foremost leaders of the
Revolution was alarming, and many Convention leaders feared that they would
be targeted next. 54 Measures must be taken to counteract potential resistance.
Corday’s was the first truly sensational public trial conducted by the
Tribunal, but more soon followed. 55 Between July 14 and 28, eight previously
unsuspected deputies faced accusation for having aided Corday, and a series
of repressive acts were passed in the following months. Between July 30 and
August 6, several other deputies were exiled or brought before the tribunal,

18
and the number of those proscribed rose to fifty-five. 56 On September 17,
the Law of Suspects was passed, encouraging all French citizens to spy on
their neighbors for the sake of the Convention. This led the number of those
guillotined to escalate dramatically. 57 Women were also beginning to trouble
many Convention deputies who began to view the female sex as inherently
problematic. Within the next few months, Marie Antoinette, Olympe de Gouges,
and Madame Roland were all executed. Their trials, like Corday’s, were highly
public and theatrical. On November 5, 1793, women’s political associations and
public gatherings were banned as well as their admittance into men’s clubs. 58
Violence and repression continued to grow in spite of a growing popular
distaste for it. On October 31, 1793, twenty-one Girondins were convicted of
crimes against the Republic and sentenced to death by guillotine. One official
present for the event wrote, “Sillery was executed first. Those that followed him
displayed a villainous courage…The execution proceeded at such a vigorous
pace that several heads rolled down the scaffold at once…I noticed when it came
to the sixth to be executed, many of the onlookers began to walk away with
sad expressions and in the greatest consternation.” 59 This journal entry clearly
betrays a growing dislike among Parisians for the guillotine and for public
executions, but despite mounting popular disdain for these events, brutality
continued well into 1794. As the Terror became even more stringent, anyone
associated with former governments or around whom stories circulated was put
to death. 60 Distrust was omnipresent, even within the Montagnard party, and the
Terror, with its remorseless cruelty, could not ultimately sustain itself.
The aggressively chaotic nature of the Terror ignited by Corday’s
assassination of Marat persisted until July 27, 1794. On that day, Maximillian
Robespierre, who had (in the wake of Marat’s murder) brought his Committee
of Public Safety to the leading position within the National Convention, accused
his fellow Committee members of plotting against him. In response, several
members of the Committee turned against Robespierre, put him on trial, and
executed him via guillotine. Those who participated in the overthrow received
the favor of the people, who saw their actions as an important step away from
Terror and toward a return of normal and stable government. 61 Corday’s desire,
it seemed, had finally come to fruition. The assassination failed to destroy the
Terror, but the chaos that sprang from it ultimately accomplished her goal. The
Revolution would continue for several years after the fall of Robespierre, but the
Terror had reached its end.
ENDNOTES
1
Hugh Gough, The Terror in the French Revolution (London: Macmillian Press, Ltd., 1998), 82.
2
Marie Scherr, Charlotte Corday and Certain Men of the Revolutionary Torment (New
York: D. Appleton and Company, 1929), 121-122.
3
Gough, Terror in the French Revolution, 36; Louis R. Gottschalk, Jean Paul Marat: A
Study in Radicalism (New York: Benjamin Blom, 1966), 190-191.

4
Halina Sokolnikova, Nine Women Drawn From the Epoch of the French Revolution,
translated by H.C. Stevens (New York: Jonathan Cape and Harrison Smith, 1932), 36; J. Mills
Whitham, Men and Women of the French Revolution (Freeport, New York: Books for Libraries, Inc.,
1968), 155.
5
Sokolnikova, Nine Women, 37-38.
19
6
Whitham, Men and Women, 155-156.
7
Ibid., 157-158.
8
Stanley Loomis, Paris in the Terror, June 1793-July1794 (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott
Company, 1964), 99; Cynthia Burlingham and James Cuno, “Catalogue of the Exhibition: VII.
Marat,” French Caricature and the French Revolution, 1789-1799 ed. James Cuno (Los Angeles:
UCLA, 1988), 220.
9
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 99.
10
Whitham, Men and Women, 159.
11
Burlingham and Cuno, “Catalogue of the Exhibition,” 220.
12
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 103.
13
Ibid.,73; Laura Mason and Tracey Rizzo, The French Revolution: A Document Collection
(New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1999), 174.
14
“Article on the events of September 1-8, 1792,” Revolutions de Paris no. 165 (September
1792), trans. Laura Mason, quoted in Laura Mason and Tracey Rizzo, The French Revolution: A
Document Collection (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1999), 174.
15
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 73; Mason and Rizzo, The French Revolution, 174.
16
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 98.
17
Ibid.; Burlingham and Cuno, “Catalogue of the Exhibition,” 220.
18
Witham, Men and Women, 160.
19
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 103.
20
Witham, Men and Women, 160.
21
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 103.
22
Ibid, 12-13; Burlingham and Cuno, “Catalogue of the Exhibition,” 225.
23
Sokolnikova, Nine Women, 35-36.
24
Ibid., 40.
25
Ibid.; Whitham, Men and Women, 168; Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under
Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Pennsylvania: Penn State
University Press, 2003), 197.

20
26
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 111.
27
Ibid., 109.
28
Ibid., 110-111; Whitham, Men and Women, 169.
29
Sokolnikova, Nine Women, 48.
30
Ernest Belfort Bax, Jean-Paul Marat: The People’s Friend (London: Grant Richards, 1901), 300.
31
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 121; Whitham, Men and Women, 173.
32
Sokolnikova, Nine Women, 49.
33
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 126-127.
34
Bax, Jean-Paul Marat, 300.
35
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 130.
36
Whitham. Men and Women, 176.
37
Charles Henri Sanson, “Recollection of a Conversation Concerning the Murder of Marat,”
Personal Diary (13 July 1793), quoted in Reay Tanahill, ed., Paris in the Revolution: A Collection of
Eye Witness Accounts (London: The Folio Society, 1966), 82.
38
Scherr, Charlotte Corday, 125.
39
Tanahill, Paris in the Revolution: A Collection of Eye Witness Accounts, 82.
40
Scherr, Charlotte Corday, 125.
41
Jacques-Philibert Guilard, Report Filed on the Events of Marat’s Murder (13 July 1793)
quoted in Tanahill, ed., Paris in the Revolution: A Collection of Eye Witness Accounts, 84.
42
Scherr, Charlotte Corday, 127.
43
Gottschalk, Jean Paul Marat, 187.
44
Antoine de Baecque, Glory and Terror: Seven Deaths Under the French Revolution trans.
Charlotte Mandell (New York: Routelage, 2003), 6.
45
Fabre d’Eglantine, “Article on Charlotte Corday,” Gazette Nationale (20 July 1793),
quoted in Nina Corazzo and Catherine R. Montfort, “Charlotte Corday: femme-homme,” Literate
Women of the French Revolution of 1789 (Birmingham: Summa Publications, 1994), 33-54, 35-36.
46
Marie-Charlotte de Corday, “Letter to the Committee of General Safety” (15 July 1793),
quoted in Olivier Blanc, Last Letters: Prisons and Prisoners of the French Revolution, 1793-1794,
trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: The Noonday Press, 1987), 11.
47
Blanc, Last Letters: Prisons and Prisoners of the French Revolution, 1793-1794, 12.
48
Marie-Charlotte de Corday, “Final Letter to her Father” (16 July 1793), quoted in Blanc,
Last Letters: Prisons and Prisoners of the French Revolution, 1793-1794, 12.

49
Marie-Charlotte de Corday, “Final Letter to Citizen Barbaroux” (16 July 1793), quoted in
Scherr, Charlotte Corday and Certain Men of the Revolutionary Torment, 130.
50
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 140-141; Witham, Men and Women, 183.
21
51
Klause, “Reflections on the Execution of Charlotte Corday,” Personal Diary (17 July
1793), quoted in Tanahill, Paris in the Revolution: A Collection of Eye Witness Accounts, 86.
52
Tanahill, Paris in the Revolution, 85.
53
Gough, Terror in the French Revolution, 36.
54
Gottschalk, Jean Paul Marat, 188.
55
Loomis, Paris in the Terror, 245.
56
Gottschalk, Jean Paul Marat, 189-190.
57
Gough, Terror in the French Revolution, 82.
58
Caroline Webber, Terror and its Discontents: Suspect Words in Revolutionary France
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003), 105.
59
“Account of the October 31 Execution,” (October 1793), Quoted in Blanc, Last Letters:
Prisons and Prisoners of the French Revolution, 1793-1794, 65.
60
Blanc, Last Letters, 65.
61
Gottschalk, Jean Paul Marat, 190-191.

REFLECTIONS OF THE REVOLUTION: A STUDY OF PAINTINGS BY
JACQUES-LOUIS DAVID
By Megan Hensley
The period of the 1790s was very eventful and turbulent in French
history. During these years, the country suffered from the French Revolution,
which brought rapid and dramatic change to the country. Many suffered through
the chaos, but a few, such as Jacques-Louis David, were able to harness the
emotion and focus the energy into art. David, a neoclassical painter, played a
very significant role in the Revolution. He was not only an artist, but he also
worked as pageant-master, giving him a degree of power. In his work, which
was some of the best from this period, he attempted to capture history in his
paintings and create a chronicle of the time. As the Revolution developed,
David’s paintings changed dramatically, reflecting the changing spirit of the
Revolution.
David was born in Paris in 1748, a time when the French monarchy
seemed unshakable. Yet, in his life time, he saw not only the fall of the
monarchy, but the beheading of the king. France in the late eighteenth century
was struggling financially. The country had undergone the luxurious reign of
Louis XIV, had fought in wars, and had suffered through years of financial
advisors possessing lofty ideas that always failed. While the country was
struggling, David was flourishing. In 1774, he won the Prix de Rome, a prize
allowing him to go to Rome, which he had fought to win for four years. 1 This
sent the young painter to Italy, where he thrived, immersed in classical art.
He developed his skills as a neoclassical painter, and his work for years to
come reflected the Roman images. He returned to France, after a five year
stay in Rome, and found the country still struggling financially. Even so, the
Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture (the Royal Academy of Painting
and Sculpture), which was the institution that had sent David to Rome, was
still commissioning art. Because of his achievements in the Salons, which
were art shows commissioned by the Academy, he was propelled into being
acknowledged as one of the most talented artists in France. David’s reputation
led him to being accepted into some of the most elite circles in Parisian society,
and it allowed him to make contacts with foreign visitors. 2 By the time of the
Salon of 1789, France had politically and economically reached its breaking
point, and David was one of the most revered painters in Paris. 3
David, on a commission, crafted a large painting for the Salon of 1789.
Entitled, The Lictors Bring to Brutus the Bodies of his Sons (fig. 1), the painting
was David’s second to be entered into that year’s Salon and was much more
controversial than the first. 4 His other exhibitions were commissioned privately,
unlike Brutus, which was commissioned by the Royal Academy. 5 Brutus was
not the subject that the King’s government or the Academy expected. In 1787,
David proposed to submit a painting to the Salon of 1789 and it was determined
that he would paint “Coriolanus being restrained by his family from seeking
revenge.” However, there is no evidence that David ever began work on this
painting. Instead, he began the sketches for Brutus and spent the next two years
very involved in completing it. In doing this, he was committing a blatant act
22

of defiance and created a symbol of liberty and republican ideas. As David
was finishing his painting, the Estates-General was meeting, allowing the three
Estates (the Clergy, the Nobility, and the common men) to discuss problems and
come up with possible solutions for the failing economy. This showed a decline
in the power in the monarchy, as the king had to come up with solutions with the
people. Because of this tension, his subject choice became controversial. 6
The painting depicts Lucius Junius
Brutus. He had helped rid Rome of
the tyranny of the king, Tarquin the
Proud. The empire was in need of
new leadership after the king’s son,
raped Lucretia, who then committed
suicide. Her death was witnessed by
both Collatinus and Brutus, who vowed
to avenge her death by destroying the
corrupt monarchy. After expelling
Figure 1: The Lictors Bring to Brutus the Bodies of his Sons
Tarquin, they created the first Roman
Republic in 508 BC. Not long after
the creation of the Republic, Brutus’
sons, Titus and Tiberius were pulled into a plot to restore the monarchy. The
conspiracy was soon discovered by their father, who was forced to sentence
them to death. 7
Using changes in light and lines, David breaks the painting into three
sections. First, on the left and in the background, the lictors are carrying the
bodies of the dead. Though they are mostly illuminated and had harsh lines,
both of which draw in the viewer’s eye, the scene is fading into the darkness. 8
Original sketches of the painting show severed heads on spikes. This image was
taken out of the final piece, as David felt it took from the subtle nature of the
representation of bodies being carried. 9
The middle-ground of the painting, which is shown on the right side,
depicts the image of the women mourning the deaths of Titus and Tiberius.
Unlike most of the painting, the women are fully catching the light, becoming
a focal point. 10 The blatant emotion of the women is shown in their expression
and body language. The women cling to one another in a manifestation of
grief and anguish. Brutus’ wife calls the attention of the painting’s audience
with her outstretched hand, which creates an implied line directly to the bodies
of her dead sons. Along with using light to create distinction between the
sections, David also uses lines. The women are drawn more undulated than the
background or foreground. Here, the images are flowing and have a rise and
fall to the lines, unlike the harsh, defined lines of the dead. This technique is
common in David’s work: he created contrast in men and women by making
the men appear strong, while the women appeared soft. An empty chair in this
section separates the dead sons and Brutus from the women, who represent the
domestic, family life of which the men will never be able to return. 11
The last section of the painting is Brutus himself. Seated in the
foreground and to the left, he is almost completely in shadows except for a sliver
of light shining on his feet. His face, barely visible in the darkness, is somber
and tense. His toes are gnarled and stiff, showing the tension in his body as the
23

epercussion of his actions are shown. His body is turned away from the lictors
carrying his sons. Again, David uses line to create contrast: Brutus’ section is
marked by nervous, quick lines, unlike the flowing lines of the women or the
harsh lines of the dead. This depicts a nervous energy in Brutus. He chose the
Republic over his family, and his suppressing the emotion that comes with it. 12
This painting, like most of David’s early work, was a symbol of Roman
patriotism. It showed the conflict between love of state and love of family.
Brutus put his loyalty in the state, sacrificing his sons. This type of extreme
patriotism was mirrored to the events of the start of the French Revolution.
Brutus had an unwavering, dedicated devotion to the state, to the point of
doing anything to remain loyal. The attitude of the Third-Estate was reaching
this level. Instead of being faithful to the monarchy, as was common years
before, loyalties were shifting toward the state and national pride. The image
of Brutus shows the tension that can be created in reforming government.
Because of the symbolism in the painting, and the fact that it was exhibited
during a radical time of French history, it was quickly adapted as a symbol that
strongly advocates the ideas of republic and revolution in the troubled world. 13
Because of this, when the news of the subject of the painting came out, it was
met with resistance. The Academy saw the image as bad propaganda against
the monarchy at a time when the King needed as much support as he could get,
especially from an influential man such as David. Because of the negative sparks
the painting produced, the newspapers were soon reporting that the government
was not allowing the painting to be shown. Because the tensions were so high
in France, the public outcry was phenomenal, and soon the officials were forced
to give in. In the end, not only was the painting shown, but it was protected by
David’s art students. 14
The year of 1789 proved to be an eventful one. After the Third Estate
realized they were not going to be treated fairly in the Estates-General, they
decided to call themselves, along with some members of the clergy, the
National Assembly. The group was forced to meet in a tennis court in order to
discuss their position. On June 20, 1789, they decreed “that all members of this
assembly immediately take a solemn oath never to separate, and to reassemble
wherever circumstances require, until the constitution of the realm is established
and fixed upon solid foundations; and that said oath having been sworn, all
members and each one individually confirm this unwavering resolution with his
24
Figure 2: Tennis Court Oath

signature. 15 This event was known as the Tennis Court Oath. The men did craft
a constitution for France, and when it was clear that the Oath was a momentous
event, they commissioned David to paint it. David, who was very intrigued by
the idea of capturing history into his paintings as it happened, readily accepted. 16
He began, as always, by creating a sketch of what he wanted the final
image to look like. The sketch, an ink and pen drawing, of the Tennis Court Oath
(fig. 2) is enormous. 17 The sketch shows 629 citizens, though David wanted
there to be at least a thousand in the final product. Because David captured the
image from the width of the tennis court as opposed to the length, he created
tension that would not be there otherwise. In the middle of the drawing, Jean-
Sylvain Bailly, the president of the Assembly stands reading the proclamation
that they had created. Men and a few women peer in through the windows above
the scene. A lightning bolt strikes in one of the windows, aimed toward the
raised hand of Bailly, as if he were a lightning rod. This is to show the charged
energy of the men as they give their oath to the President. 18
The image shows the men positioned in poses that were almost
theatrically dramatic. Many were reaching toward the middle, pledging
their allegiance to the Assembly. Others were lifting their hats toward the
ceiling. Robespierre, who later becomes very influential to both David and
the Revolution, was included in the painting. Placed slightly to the right, he
clutches his hands to his chest. Even this early in the Revolution, David saw
Robespierre as a passionate revolutionary. These reactions show the passion
that was involved in the creation of the constitution. The men were fervent
about the revolutionary ideas and were dedicated to forming a better, reformed
government. Brutus showed the French the importance of a republic. The Tennis
Court Oath showed the joyful reaction of the men as the idea of a republic
becomes closer to reality and truly captured the spirit of the moment. 19
It was intended for the painting to be completely for the Salon of 1791,
the first Revolutionary Salon. However, by 1791, only the sketch and a very
small portion of the painting were finished. These years had proved to be very
turbulent and situations were changing rapidly. Because of the turmoil of the
time, by 1791, David was unsure if he would ever finish the painting. As the
Revolution had developed, men had changed. The Tennis Court Oath was meant
to show the lofty idea of fraternity of the National Assembly, but by 1791, the
group had broken into sects and the men were no longer bonded as they once
were. Now, some of the men that were deemed heroes at the time of the Oath
were now seen in a much more negative light. Some men, even men within the
same political groups, no longer saw the Tennis Court Oath as the best course
of action, though it was unclear in what they would have done alternatively. 20
Many of the men that David included in the preliminary sketches were part
of the elite middle class. By 1792, the Revolution was attempting to embrace
the lower class citizens and give them the rights they deserved after years of
oppression. By completing the work, David’s loyalties would be questioned,
and it would put him in a dangerous position. David was determined to capture
history as it happened, and vowed to finish the work in the course of the
next few years, hoping the country would become more stable. However, the
enormous work, the final canvas measuring nineteen by thirty feet, was never
completed. 21
25

The tension in France continued to build. By 1792, the country had
gone from a monarchy, to the National Assembly, to the Legislative Assembly,
and the National Convention had just been formed. An influential journalist,
Jean Paul Marat, nominated David to the National Convention on September
6, 1792. The two men, both of whom were part of the Jacobin club of thought,
were against the tyranny of the monarchy and supported the republican ideas.
They were for the will of the people being honored above all else, especially
supporting the poor and oppressed. 22 Another man, Maximilen Robespierre,
was becoming more and more powerful by controlling the Committee of Public
Safety. David found himself aligning with the radical ideas of Robespierre.
By 1792, David was a willing and active member of the Jacobin dictatorship.
David became further involved and caught up in the Revolution, and further
attached to Robespierre, who he idealized greatly. 23 Also in this year, David
decided to resign from the Academy. He felt as though he, and other artists, were
being suppressed by the institution that obviously veered toward Royalist ideas.
Without the powerful persona of David backing it, the Academy lost a great
deal of support. Not long after his resignation, the institution was suspended
because its loyalties were clearly to the monarch. Getting rid of an institution
that had existed for many years showed not only the influence of David under
Robespierre, but also the changing spirit of the country. 24
The members of the Committee of Public Safety, which was created in
April, 1793, had been elected by the National Convention. When the Committee
was restructured in July of that year, Robespierre was elected as one of the
twelve members. Because France was in a state of war, the Committee became
a very powerful de facto government, meaning that it had executive rights,
including the power to execute. Robespierre quickly became the dominate
force of the Committee. David, though not a direct member of the Committee,
was very good friends with Robespierre and was a member of the National
Convention and later a member of the Committee of Public Security, thus had
quite a bit of power. So much in fact, that he voted for the death of the King.
Because of David’s artistic skills and creativity, he became pageant-master, and
was in charge of planning events, ranging from parties to funerals. He was also
in charge of most of the propaganda of the Committee, including the painting
that captured the death of Marat. 25
Marat was viewed as one of the most influential men involved in the
Revolution. He was a deputy of the Convention and was often violent. He had
developed a skin disease and the only relief he had was from soaking in the
bathtub. This is where he was on the evening of July 13, 1793, working on the
desk top that had been erected. Charlotte Corday, a closet royalist from Caen,
entered the house under the pretense of speaking to Marat about criminals, secret
royalists in her home town. She stood beside the tub and read a list of names of
those who had been deemed enemies of France. As he thanked her and told her
they would be executed within the week, she pulled a kitchen knife out from her
skirts. She then reached forward and stabbed him in the chest, fatally. Corday
was arrested soon after and executed on July 17. 26
David, a good friend of Marat, saw him as a model of “virtue.” 27 On July
14, David was invited into the Convention to discuss the funeral arrangements
26

and was asked to paint Marat’s portrait. David accepted this task readily. The
men thought that by painting a close likeness of the dead, they were bringing
the spirit closer to them, one last time.
The image, however, came out idealized
as Marat’s body had already begun to
decompose. Also, David had a limited
time to complete the piece, and his
emotions were running high. These
factors created the painting Death of
Marat (fig. 3). 28
The painting depicts a dying Marat.
He is bent over, right arm slid to the
ground. His head is resting heavily
Figure 3: Death of Marat
on his shoulder, and his eye lids are
drooping. Though Marat was an older
man, David showed his body as still
being youthful and healthy. A deep, red wound is on his chest, directly below his
clavicle and a bloody knife is lying on the floor beneath him. His left hand holds
the list of criminals that Corday had brought him, stained in his blood. Because
of the muted colors and the lack of decoration of the room, the blood stands out
vividly. The rest of the painting is simple. The light cuts in, falling very softly
on Marat’s face and shoulders, and more harshly on Corday’s petition. A crate
stands beside the bathtub, with the words “À Marat, David” on the side. 29 The
angle at which David presents Marat’s body allows the viewer to somehow look
down on and straight at the image at the same time. Symbolically, this gives
Marat both sympathy and respect. 30
Death of Marat was used the next year, when Robespierre’s regime
executed hundreds, as propaganda for the republic. The painting symbolized a
martyr, a fallen man that had been dedicated to only helping the people. David’s
painting was copied and distributed, as the Committee knew that the haunting
image cast a horrible glow on the royalists. 31
Though Robespierre and his Committee of Public Safety attempted to
control France for the so called good of the people, movements began to form
against them, most focusing on Robespierre. The Committee, along with the
Committee of General Security that David had been elected to, was policing the
nation in a very harsh, uncontrollable manner. Many men were being executed
on a daily basis. Finally, events hit a breaking point. After Robespierre’s speech
on Thermidor (August) 8 in which he announced that there was a plot against
public liberty, it was clear his time was running short. The members of the
Convention were unsure as to who the conspirators were, some claiming it was
Robespierre himself. A meeting of the Jacobins that night led to Robespierre
announcing that if they could not deliver the Convention from those trying to
take it, he would drink hemlock. David, rushing forward with emotion, declared
“If you drink the hemlock I will drink it with you.” 32 The next day, David, who
was not feeling well, missed the meeting of the Convention. This most likely
saved his life from ending immediately by guillotine. On Thermidor 10, the day
following the meeting, Robespierre was executed. Over eighty of his followers
27

were executed in the next few days. David was arrested on the 15th of the
month. 33
While in prison, David flourished artistically. Here, his work was not
being interrupted by the political demands he had before. This time, from his
arrest in August to his release at the end of 1795, is known as one of the most
fruitful of his career. In prison he
learned the story of the Sabine
Women, and had begun sketches
for a painting by the end of 1795.
His urge to start the painting
was so strong that in 1796, he
deserted another project in favor
of the Intervention of the Sabine
Women (fig. 4). 34
In the early days of
Roman history, the Romans
Figure 4: Intervention of the Sabine Women
abducted the daughters of their
neighbors, the Sabines. The
Sabines, in return, attacked
Rome. However, Hersilia, the daughter of the Sabine leader Tatius had married
the Roman leader, Romulus. Because of this, the attack was delayed. David’s
painting Intervention of the Sabine Women depicts Hersilia standing between
her father and her husband, arms outstretched, and it is clear that battle had
been going on behind them. This painting marks David’s return to the classical
iconology he captured prior to the Revolution. In this, he was turned to go
back to the “source.” He was determined to capture the artistic principles of the
Greeks. Though his subject was Roman, as before, his style was Greek. 35
Just as the Greeks painted their heroes and gods, David decided to make
his warriors nude. This was his attempt to strip away the unnecessary and leave
only what was simply needed. In the painting, Hersilia and the other Sabine
Women appear to be practically bursting from in between the warriors. They,
along with several small children, dominate the middle of the painting. Hersilia
captures the attention of the audience as she stands, arms outstretched, in a
white garment. Unlike his Tennis Court Oath, this painting only suggests the
presence of hundreds of men by showing only the tops of their spears. Unlike
earlier paintings, such as Brutus, David mutes his colors, allowing the vivid
red he frequently utilized before to only be used sparingly. The majority of the
painting is done in bronze tones, under a cloudy sky with just a hint of bright
blue. Also unlike Brutus, he limits the effects of shadowing and chiaroscuro, a
term meaning contrast of light and dark. The majority of the painting is washed
in light, and it highlights the Sabine Women. 36
David completed the image, one of his largest paintings, in 1799. Though
the painting is stylistically different from his other work, the major difference
is that this painting represents reconciliation over destruction and love over
war. The painting depicts a battle, but the two sides are not fighting. The
Sabine Women are blocking the two sides from one another, forcing the battle
to stop. The women represent love, and are trying to pull the Romans and the
28

Sabines together. Unlike other paintings, such as Brutus, the painting shows
no death. Also, David is no longer stressing the importance of a republic as he
did in previous paintings. Instead, he is simply making the statement that love
conquers all. 37
The painting, like most of David’s work, represents the state of France
at the time. By the end of the 1790s, the French were growing tired of fighting
with one another. They had seen many governments come and go, and most
were grieving the loss of at least one loved one. The French were at war with
themselves, forcing some in the position of Hersilia in the painting: stuck
between two people they cared about, fighting one another. People were willing
to go to extremes in order to stop the fighting. The painting represents the
change in the French spirit. Unlike the enthusiastic Tennis Court Oath which
pushed for a Republic above all else, this painting sought for reconciliation
and a stop to the violence. Unlike the Death of Marat and others, this painting
was not commissioned as propaganda. This was David’s interpretation of the
physiological state of the country. He felt the urgent need to complete the
Intervention of the Sabine Women in hopes of resolution. This painting also
depicts women in a much stronger manner than the majority of David’s work.
Typically, as in Brutus, women are shown in a weak manner. Now, women are
the ones stepping forward in order to end the chaos of war. 38
David attempted to capture the spirit of the French Revolution through
his paintings. The Lictors Bring to Brutus the Bodies of his Sons, one of his
early works, depicts the feelings of France just before the Revolution began.
This painting idealizes the Roman Republic, and shows that man should be
willing to put the republic above all else. It shows a desperate attempt to create
a republic, even at the death of loved ones. The Tennis Court Oath gives the
audience an inside view of the forming of the National Assembly. The images
of men are enthusiastic and emotional, excited over what is to come. This
sketch is a very realistic portrayal of the feelings of the event. Death of Marat is
unlike the others, in that it is a symbol of propaganda for Robespierre’s regime.
Instead of directly capturing the state of France in the manner of those before it,
this painting was used to spark emotion in its audience. It depicts the pain and
suffering that comes in the Revolution, and gives the Royalists a very negative
image. Finally, the Intervention of the Sabine Women shows the feelings of
France towards the end of the Revolution. The people had grown tired during
the constantly changing government and most were mourning the loss of loved
ones. This painting inspires a calm ending to the war, with love prevailing over
the fury. Each piece depicts the feeling of France at the time it was created.
David’s work, as these paintings exhibit, mirrors the changing spirit of the
Revolution.
29
ENDNOTES
1
Hubertus Kohle, “The Road from Rome to Paris: The Birth of a Modern Neoclassicism,”
Dorothy Johnson, ed. Jacques-Louis David: New Perspectives (Newark: University of Delaware
Press, 2006), 71-72.

30
2
Philippe Bordes, “Jacques-Louis David’s Anglophilia on the Eve of the French
Revolution,” The Burlington Magazine 134, no. 1073 (August, 1992): 482-483,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/885156 (accessed October 21, 2009).
3
David Lloyd Dowd, Pageant-Master of the Republic: Jacques-Louis David and the French
Revolution (Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1969), 6-19.
4
Jacques-Louis David, The Lictors Bring Brutus the Bodies of his Son, 1789, The Louvre
Museum, Paris. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:David_Brutus.jpg (Accessed May 1, 2010) The
full title of this work is J Brutus, First Consul, returned to his house after having condemned his two
sons who had allied themselves with the Tarquin and conspired against Roman liberty; the lictors
return their bodies so that they may be given burial, but it is rarely seen in full.
5
Simon Lee, David (London: Phaidon Press Limited, 1999), 116-119.
6
Warren Roberts, Jacques-Louis David, Revolutionary Artist: Art, Politics, and the French
Revolution (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989), 33.
7
Lee, David, 116-121.
8
Luc de Nanteuil, Jacques-Louis David, The Library of Great Painters (New York: Harry N.
Abrams, Inc., Publishers, 1985), 100.
9
Thomas Crow, Emulation: David, Drouais, and Girodet in the Art of Revolutionary
France, rev. ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006), 107.
10
Nanteuil, Jacques-Louis David, 100.
11
Crow, Emulation, 108.
12
Nanteuil, Jacques-Louis David, 100.
13
Lee, David, 116-119.
14
Anita Brookner, Jacques-Louis David (New York: Harper and Row, Publishers, 1980), 91-92.
15
Internet Modern History Source Book: French Revolution, “The Tennis Court Oath: June,
20, 1789,” Fordham University Internet History Sourcebooks Project,
http://www.fordham.eduhalsall/mod/modsbook13.html (accessed November 3, 2009).
16
Roberts, Jacques-Louis David, Revolutionary Artist, 50-51.
17
Jacques-Louis David, The Tennis Court Oath, 1791, Chateau de Versailles,
http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/File:Se ment_du _jeu_de_paume.jpg (accessed May 1, 2010).
18
Dorothy Johnson, Jacques-Louis David: the Farewell of Telemachus and Eucharis (Los
Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum, 1997), 20; Warren Roberts, Jacques-Louis David and Jean-
Louis Prieur, Revolutionary Artists: The Public, the Populace, and Images of the French Revolution
(Albany: State University of New York, 2000), 227-228.
19
Antoine Schnapper, David (New York: Publishers of Fine Art Books, 1980), 102-106.
20
Brookner, Jacques-Louis David, 95-100, 155.
21
Lee, David, 141.

31
22
Helen Rosenau, The Painter Jacques-Louis David (London: Nicholson and Watson,
1948), 53-55, 58-60.
23
Ewa Lajer-Burcharth, Necklines: The Art of Jacques-Louis David after the Terror (New
Haven, CT: Yale University Press), 50-51.
24
Jacques-Louis David, “Resignation from the Académie” (November 11, 1792), quoted in
Anita Brookner, Jacques-Louis David (New York: Harper and Row, Publishers, 1980), 100-101.
25
Roberts, Jacques-Louis David, Revolutionary Artist, 72-73.
26
William Vaughan and Helen Weston, ed. Jacques-Louis David’s Marat (Cambridge, NY:
Cambridge University Press, 2000), 9-14.
27
Nanteuil, Jacques-Louis David, 112.
28
Jacques-Louis David, Death of Marat, 1793, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium,
Brussels, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Death_of_Marat_by_David.jpg (accessed May 1, 2010).
29
Nanteuil, Jacques-Louis David, 112.
30
Vaughan, Jacques-Louis David’s Marat, 15-16.
31
Ibid., 17.
32
Roberts, Jacques-Louis David, Revolutionary Artist, 95.
33
Ibid., 99-101.
34
Ibid.; Jacques-Louis David, The Intervention of the Sabine Women, 1799, The Louvre
Museum, Paris, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sabine_women.jpg (accessed May 1, 2010).
35
Bordes, Philippe. Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2005), 195-198.
36
Karen Domenici, “James Gillray: An English Source for David’s Les Sabines” The
Art Bulletin 65, no. 3 (September, 1983): 493-495, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3050351 (accessed
October, 20, 2009); Robert Rosenblum, “A New Source for David’s ‘Sabines’,” The Burlington
Magazine 104, no. 709 (April, 1962): 158-159, http://www.jstor.org/stable/873618 (accessed
October 21, 2006).
37
Brookner, Jacques-Louis David, 143-145.
38
Roberts, Jacques-Louis David, Revolutionary Artist, 115.