22 January 1793: After being found guilty of high treason by the French National Convention (self-instituted as a tribunal for the occasion) King Louis XVI of France is executed by guillotine as a French citizen under the name of Citizen Louis Capet.
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The name was chosen in reference to Hugh Capet, the founder of the Capetian dynasty – which the revolutionaries interpreted as Louis’s surname.
Louis XVI was the only king of France ever to be executed, and his death brought an end to more than a thousand years of continuous French monarchy.
The monarchy had many opportunities to prevail in France.
It could have done it if Napoleon had won the Napoleonic Wars.
If the Bourbons had stability in the country after the restoration.
If Napoleon’s nephew had won the Franco-Prussian War.
If Louis hadn’t allied himself with the Austrians so he could attack his own country I wonder if the monarchy would have continued to exist in France in a constitutional form, I think the Jacobins would most likely have executed the King and his family for some other reason though (and he deserved it).
Maybe France just had a Republican destiny
*21 January
Respect to the revolutionaries.
You have to break eggs to make omlettes.
Incredible skill of the painter, to make this mere minutes before the king was decapitated.
Not a bad guy but he had it coming
Am currently reading A Tale of Two Cities. The execution of Louis is mentioned but La Guillotine gets more attention:
“It was the popular theme for jests; it was the best cure for headache, it infallibly prevented the hair from turning gray, it imparted a peculiar delicacy to the complexion, it was the National Razor which shaved close: who kissed La Guillotine looked through the little window and sneezed into the sack. It was the sign of the regeneration of the human race. It superseded the Cross. Models of it were worn on breasts from which the Cross was discarded, and it bowed down to and believed in where the Cross was denied.”
They began by beheading a king and ended up with an emperor who launched 20 years of bloodshed all over Europe.
The French, always surprising.
Based and supreme-being pilled
No comments yet about him being de-Capet-ated?
Liberté!
At least he didn’t suffer. Much.
Based, rip bozo. L+ ratio+you fell off+you’re a monarch
Why does his head look so small?
Fun fact: they were still guillotining people in France up until the 1970’s, with the last execution taking place in 1977 by guillotine.
As we say in France: CHEH !
I have loved the French Revolution and Napolean and everything since I was in my early teens. Reading more French lit (Hugo, Dumas, Zola, Balzac, Colette, Voltaire) has just cemented that love.
After all the pro-monarchy posts over at r/norge recently, this felt like a breath of fresh air.
Are people genuinly getting nostalgic for the days of absolute monarchy?
His descendent, “Louis XX”, is active on Twitter
https://twitter.com/louisducdanjou
At least it was fairly quick end for him. I remember reading of the “Loire Barges” the mass drowning events orgranised by the revolutaires to purge the royalists or those suspected of being such. Any that managed to escape from the sinking boats were shot as they swam away.
But I still cannot forgive what the revolutionaries did to his 10 years old child
Jesus Christ – that robe is not just trimmed with ermine, it’s LINED with ermine?!?!?! Each little black dot is the tip of an ermine tail. How many ermine had to die for one cape?