The French Revolution Class 9 History NCERT Solutions & Detailed Notes

Ans: 1. Financial Crisis: Long years of war had drained the financial resources of France. Under Louis XVI, France helped the thirteen American colonies to gain their independence from Britain.
2. Social Division: French society was divided into three estates. The first two estates enjoyed privileges by birth and were exempted from paying taxes.
3. Subsistence Crisis: The population rose from 23 million in 1715 to 28 million in 1789. Production of grains could not keep pace with the demand, leading to a rapid rise in bread prices.
4. The Great Fear: Rumours spread that lords of the manor had hired bands of brigands to destroy ripe crops, leading peasants to attack chateaux.

Ans:
• Benefited: The Third Estate, especially the richer members (middle class) like merchants, manufacturers, and lawyers.
• Relinquished Power: The Clergy and the Nobility lost their feudal privileges and were forced to pay taxes.
• Disappointed: Women and the poorer sections (small peasants, landless labourers) were disappointed as they were categorized as 'passive citizens' and did not get the right to vote initially.

Ans: 1. The ideas of liberty and democratic rights were the most important legacy.
2. These spread from France to the rest of Europe during the 19th century, where feudal systems were abolished.
3. Colonised peoples reworked the idea of freedom from bondage into their movements to create a sovereign nation-state.
4. Tipu Sultan and Rammohan Roy are two examples of individuals who responded to the ideas coming from revolutionary France.

Ans: Freedom of speech, Freedom of expression, Right to equality, Right to liberty, Right to property, and the Right to form associations.

Ans: Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He proposed a form of government based on a social contract between people and their representatives.

Ans: On 20 June 1789, the Third Estate gathered in an indoor tennis court at Versailles and swore not to disperse until they had drafted a constitution for France that would limit the powers of the monarch.

Ans: 1. Women were active participants from the beginning. They hoped their involvement would pressure the revolutionary government to improve their lives.
2. Most women of the Third Estate had to work for a living (laundry, selling flowers/fruits).
3. They started their own political clubs and newspapers. The Society of Revolutionary and Republican Women was the most famous.
4. They demanded the same political rights as men, including the right to vote.

Ans: In 1804. He saw his role as a moderniser of Europe.

Ans: A tax levied by the Church, comprising one-tenth of the agricultural produce from the peasants.

Ans: Maximilian Robespierre.

Ans: It was a patriotic song composed by Roget de L’Isle, first sung by volunteers from Marseilles as they marched into Paris. It is now the national anthem of France.

Ans: The unit of currency in France, discontinued in 1794.

Ans: A political body to which the three estates sent their representatives. Only the King could decide when to call a meeting of this body.

Ans: John Locke. In it, he sought to refute the doctrine of the divine and absolute right of the monarch.

Ans: In 1848.

Ans: One of the most important politically active women in revolutionary France who protested against the Declaration of Rights of Man for excluding women.

Ans: The Bastille.

Ans: At the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.

Ans: Castle or stately residence belonging to a king or a nobleman.