Royalists and patriots: Nîmes and its hinterland in the late eighteenth century

Royalists and patriots: Nîmes and its hinterland in the late eighteenth century

Nîmes, history, Ardèche, eighteenth century, 18th century, royalists, France, social mobility

This is a study of an event: an abortive royalist insurrection in the city of Nîmes in June 1790 and its aftermath - a series of royalist revolts centred upon the commune of Berrias in the department of the Ardèche in 1790, 1791 and 1792. The thesis is divided into four parts, each designed to contribute to an explanation of what made these events possible. Part I is a discussion of the composition and ideological assumptions of royalism in the South-East of France. Part II consists of an examination of the social and economic structure of Nimes in the eighteenth century. Part III is a study of the relationship between Nimes and its hinterland as it was organised through the production of silk. Part IV deals with the manner in which the form of this town-country relationship intersected with tensions and conflicts within the city itself in the later eighteenth century. It is argued from this analysis that it is impossible to explain royalism in unilateral terms. Royalism was the product of a developing social process; it cannot therefore be deduced from the divisions which it contributed to produce after 1790. Royalists became royalists because of the particular form of their relationship to those who became "patriots" in the decades preceeding 1790. Secondly, royalism cannot be explained exclusively in terms of local and regional tensions. Royalists occupied a particular place within the hierarchy of functions which articulated the relationship between Nimes and its hinterland. Rather, therefore, than deducing royalism from tensions at one particular level - whether of the village, small town, region or city - this study has sought to explain royalism in terms of the relationship between these different levels, and of the manner in which contemporaries sought to understand this relationship. The argument pursued throughout this study is that royalism in the South-East can be seen as one possible "solution" to the "problem" of social mobility in eighteenth century France.

Sonenscher, Michael

University of Warwick

1977

en

Thesis

http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/37055/

http://lallier.msh-vdl.fr/theses/items/show/1155

http://lallier.msh-vdl.fr/theses/archive/files/83fd4616f6938ad2e1e9db67080d61f0.jpg