Chapter 1.2.II: Petition in Hieroglyphs
Background
In the spring of 1775, a poor harvest combined with the new policies of Turgot led to a sharp increase in the price of grain. This precipitated the so-called Flour War, or Grain War, a series of up to 300 riots which broke out across France from April to May.
Turgot, who belonged to the new physiocratic school of economics — a forerunner of economic liberalism — had removed the price controls and otherwise liberalized a grain trade which had previously been run in accordance with the demands of the “moral economy”, in which the king was seen as ultimately responsible for making sure the peasants could afford to eat.
An average annual salary for a peasant at this time was 200 francs. When bread cost the “fair price” of 12 sous per loaf, he could be expected to spend 108 francs per year on bread. When bread reached the “fixed price for misery” of 14 sous per loaf, he had to spend 192 of his 200 francs on bread alone. In 1775, prices reached into the 20s. This meant starvation.
The peasants blamed Turgot’s liberalization of the market for enabling hoarding. They raided bakeries, typically leaving behind the fair price. One series of riots broke out in Versailles, causing alarm and repression which Louis XVI pushed through quickly with a lit de justice.
Though price controls were reintroduced and the Turgot school took a reputational hit, the riots were ultimately quelled by repression. Two men were hanged, one of them 16 years old, for relatively mundane offenses. The young man continued to plead his case as the hangman tied the noose.
Notes
real, or were it even “factitious;” An allusion to the hoarding of grain intended to drive up the prices. The peasants were constantly on high alert for shenanigans from those who held the grain, often accusing sellers of diluting it with crushed bones.
Mirabeau, the crabbed old friend of Men, looked on, in these same years, from his lodging, at the Baths of Mont d’Or Mirabeau had been confined to house arrest at the behest of his father after getting into trouble involving women
surplice the loose white linen vestment worn by clergy
stole the strip of fabric worn by clergy around the shoulders and hanging to the knee or below
peruke archaic term for periwig, the wig worn by both men and women that was fashionable at this time
Marechausee sabre The Maréchaussée was the pre-revolutionary French police force, their sabre, known as a klewang, was a bladed weapon somewhere between a sword and a machete
jupes Jupes were loose-fitting wool jackets or tunics for men
taille The taille was a land tax on peasants and non-nobles, directly proportional to land holdings. As de Tocqueville points out in The Ancien Régime and the Revolution, contrary to popular belief, the Revolution is largely attributable to the fact that France had more individual land holders than other European countries at the time. This meant that the peasants were exposed to various taxes and headaches that peasants in other countries with no land holdings did not experience.
And you want further to take their salt from them! For the wildly unpopular tax known as the gabelle, see Chapter 1.1.II supra.