Le Floréal , Watermael-Boitsfort -    Anne Pierre de Kat , 1936.

Dutch , 1881-1868

Oil on canvas, 60 x 50 cm.

les mis fics always get me because les amis are just so. close. they all love each other so much and it’s so normal and so not a big deal i just want to sob

Oublier Fukushima

S’il y a un nouveau livre de référence sur cette catastrophe qui ne cesse d’avoir lieu, seconde après seconde, c’est bien Oublier Fukushima, paru aux Editions du bout de la ville. Il est signé par Julie Aigoin, Pierre E. Guérinet et Floréal Klein, qui s’effacent derrière le nom d’Arkadi Filine : c’est l’un des 800 000 liquidateurs auquel Svetlana Alexievitch donne la parole dans sa terrible…

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What was the police générale (Police Bureau) ?

Long post! I missed doing these analysis posts! More under the cut. Please feel free to let me know if I need to correct/add any info!

There is a lot of confusion amongst frev hobbyists and historians alike regarding the Police Bureau set up by the Committees in April 1794. Hopefully this analysis will better present it to the frev community here. The Bureau is often wrongly presented as a "Robespierrest power-grab" when in hindsight and more careful analysis has taken place, it appears to be more of an unfortunate coincidence that Robespierre, Saint-Just, and Couthon were signing a majority of the decrees and statements put out from the Bureau. The rest of the CSP, and including Saint-Just- who gave the speech presenting it to the Convention on behalf of both of the leading committees were all largely preoccupied with military matters and missions to the provinces. In fact, Saint-Just, Robespierre, and Couthon did attempt and succeed in passing Bureau document reviews off to other CSP members like Carnot, in some instances. Robespierre's reviews of many documents were vague and often called for further examination- not immediate trial, or let alone condemnation. Robespierre (and likely Couthon's) ill-health left them confined to Paris- someone still had to be there to oversee matters in a committee stretched to its very limits.

The idea that Robespierre, Couthon, and Saint-Just- who was gone away to mission only days after the Bureau came into existence were "terrorizing" the public with this measure is entirely anachronistic reactionary propaganda. Also, it is important to acknowledge the ever-growing rift between the CSP and the CSG- although this bureau in theory was probably intended to be reconciliatory (as many of SJ's proposals were) and alleviate the strain the vast amount of these sorts of cases had on the CGS, it really only divided them further in many ways. Regardless of SJ's and the entire CSP's intent with creating this bureau, in reality it sowed more seeds of envy and distrust amongst the two leading Convention committees.

The two leading Convention committees issued these 18 decrees in alignment with the speech Saint-Just gave on the CSP and CSG's behalf on the creation of the police générale on 26 germinal an II ( 15 April 1794). This is approximately 10 days after the Indulgents/Dantonists' trial and executions, for a timeline reference. However, Saint-Just was never one to willingly make a speech without carefully preparing it. Couthon originally presented amendments 1-7, which passed unanimously. Saint-Just modified Article 7 and introduced Articles 8-15 during his speech. This post is quite long but I recommend checking out Saint-Just's personal script for the articles he introduced (These can be found in the 2004 folio-histoire edition of his Oeuvres complètes, and probably other editions too.)

Articles:

Art. 1- Les prévenus de conspiration seront traduits de tous les points de la République au tribunal révolutionnaire à Paris.

Art. 2- Les Comités de salut public et de sûreté générale rechercheront promptement les complices des conjurés, et les feront traduire au tribunal révolutionnaire.

Art. 3- Les commissions populaires seront établies pour le 15 floréal.

Art. 4- Il est enjoint à toutes les administrations et à tous les tribinaux civils de terminer dans trois mois, à compter de promulgation du présent décret, les affaires pendantes, à piene de destitution ; et, à l'avenir, tous les affaires privées devront être terminéés dans le même délai, sous la même piene.

Art. 5- Le Comité de salut public est expressément chargé de faire inspecter les autorités et les agents publics chargés de coopérer à l'administration.

Art. 6- Aucun ex-noble, aucun étranger des pays avec lesquels la République est en guerre, ne peut habiter Paris, ni les places fortes, ni les villes maritimes, pendant la guerre. Tout noble ou étranger dans le cas ci-dessus, qui y serait trouvé dans dix jours, est mis hors la loi.

Art. 7- Les ouvriers employés à la fabrication des armes, à Paris, les étrangères qui ont épousé des patriotes français ne sont point compris dans l'article précédent.

Art. 8- Le séjour de Paris, des places fortes, des villes maritimes, est interdit aux généreux qui n'y sont point en activité de service.

Art. 9- Le respect envers le magistrats sera religieusement observé; mais tout citoyens pirranse plaindre de leur injustice, et le Comité de salut public les fera punir selon la rigueur des lois.

Art. 10 - La Convention nationale ordonne à toutes les authorités de se refermer rigourousement dans les limites de leurs institutions, sans les étendre ni les restreindre.

Art. 11- Elle ordonne au Comité de salut public d'exiger un compte sévère de tous les agents, de poursuivre ceux qui serviront les complots et auront tourné contre la liberté le pouvoir qui leur aura été confié.

Art. 12- Tous les citoyens sont tenus d'informer les autorités de leur ressort et le Comité de salut public, des vols, des discourses inciviques et des acts d'oppression dont ils auraient été victimes ou témoins.

Art. 13- Les représentants du peuple se serviront des autorités constitutées et ne pourront déléguer de pouvoirs.

Art. 14- Les réquisitions sont interdites à tous autres que la commission des subsistances et les représentants du peuple près les armeés, sous l'autorisation expresse du Comité de salut public.

Art. 15- Si celui qui sera convaincu désormais de s'être plaint de la Révolution vivait sans rien faire et n'était ni sexagénaire, ni infirme, il sera déporté à la Guyane. Ces sortes d'affaires seront jugées par les commissions populaires.

Art. 16 - Le CSP encouragera, par des indemnités et des récompenses, les fabriques, l'exploitation des mines, les manufactures, le dessèchement des marais; il protégera l'industrie, la confiance entre ceux qui commercent; il dera des avances aux négociants patriotes qui offriront des approvisionnements au maximum; il donnera des ordres de garantie à ceux qui amèneront des merchandises à Paris, pour les transports ne soient pas inquiétés; il protégera la circulation des rouliers dans l'intérieur, et ne souffrira pas qu'il soit porté atteinte à la bonne foi publique.

Art. 17- La Convention nationale nommera dans son sein deux commissions, chacune de trois membres: l'une chargée de rédiger en un code succinct et complet les lois qui ont été rendues jusqu'à ce jour, en supprimant celles qui sont devenues confuses; l'autre commission sera chargée de rédiger un corps d'institutions civiles propres à conserver les moeurs et l'espirit de la liberté. Ces commissions feront leur rapport dans un mois.

Art. 18- Le présent décret sera proclamé dès demain à Paris, et son insertion au Bulletin tiendra lieu de publication dans les départements.

English translation:

Art. 1- Those accused of conspiracy will be brought before the Revolutionary Tribunal in Paris from all parts of the Republic.

Art. 2- The CSP and CSG will promptly seek out the conspirators' accomplices, and have them brought before the revolutionary tribunal.

Art. 3- The People's Commissions will be established by 15 Floréal.

Art. 4- All administrations and civil tribunals are enjoined to complete all pending cases within three months of the promulgation of the present decree, under penalty of dismissal; and, in the future, all private cases must be completed within the same time-frame, under the same penalty.

Art. 5- The Committee of Public Security/Police Bureau is expressly charged with inspecting the authorities and public officials charged with cooperating with the administration.

Art. 6- No ex-noble or foreigner from countries with which the Republic is at war may live in Paris, or in fortified towns or maritime cities, during the war. Any nobleman or foreigner in the above situation, who is found there within ten days, is outlawed.

Art. 7- Workers employed in the manufacture of weapons in Paris and foreign women who have married French patriots are not included in the preceding article.

Art. 8- Generous citizens who are not on active service are forbidden to stay in Paris, fortified towns and maritime cities.

Art. 9- Respect for magistrates will be religiously observed; but all citizens will complain of their injustice, and the CPS will punish them according to the rigor of the laws.

Art. 10 - The National Convention orders all authorities to remain rigorously within the limits of their institutions, without extending or restricting them.

Art. 11- It orders the Committee of Public Security to demand a strict account from all agents, and to prosecute those who serve plots and turn the power entrusted to them against liberty.

Art. 12- All citizens are required to inform their local authorities and the CSP of thefts, uncivil discourse and acts of oppression of which they have been victims or witnesses.

Art. 13- The people's representatives will use the constituted authorities and will not be able to delegate powers.

Art. 14- Requisitions are forbidden to anyone other than the subsistence commission and the people's representatives to the armed forces, subject to the express authorization of the CSP.

Art. 15- If the person convicted of having complained about the Revolution lives without doing anything, and is not in his sixties or infirm, he will be deported to French Guiana. These kinds of cases will be judged by popular commissions.

Art. 16 - The CSP will encourage, through indemnities and rewards, factories, the exploitation of mines, the draining of marshes; it will protect industry, the confidence between those who trade; it will give advances to patriotic merchants who offer supplies to the maximum; it will give guarantee orders to those who bring merchandise to Paris, so that transporters will not be troubled; it will protect the movement of supply ships in the interior, and will not allow public good faith to be undermined.

Art. 17- The National Convention will appoint two commissions from among its members, each with three members: one will be charged with drafting a succinct and complete code of the laws that have been passed to date, deleting those that have become confused; the other commission will be charged with drafting a body of civil institutions suitable for preserving morals and the spirit of liberty. These commissions will report within one month.

Art. 18- The present decree will be proclaimed tomorrow in Paris, and its insertion in the Bulletin will take the place of publication in the departments.

New 50 euro banknote with the effigy of Emperor Napoléon V of Francesim

The banknotes bearing the effigy of the new Emperor will enter into circulation during the year 231. They were unveiled today by the Europeansim Central Bank. The Emperor joins the "pantheon" of leaders represented on Europeansim banknotes.

20 euro banknote representing the empire of Pierreland (@officalroyalsofpierreland)

10 euro banknote representing the kingdom of Iona (@funkyllama)

The image of Napoléon V will appear alongside the coat of arms Simparte and the Palace of Versailles. It comes in place of the image of the late Emperor Napoléon IV on the front of the bills, according to the visuals unveiled by the monetary institute.

The engraving was made during the month of Floréal, from a photo provided by the imperial family. The old 50 euro banknotes representing the Emperor Napoléon IV will be gradually withdrawn from circulation from next year, just like the coins.

Le nouveau billet de 50 euros à l'effigie de l'Empereur Napoléon V de Francesim

Les billets à l’effigie du nouvel Empereur entreront en circulation dans le courant de l'année 231. Ils ont été dévoilés aujourd'hui par la Europeansim Central Bank. L'Empereur rejoint ainsi le "panthéon" des dirigeants de l'Europesim représentés sur les billets européens.

L’image de Napoléon V apparaîtra aux côtés du blason Simparte et du palais de Versailles. Elle vient à la place de l'image de feu Sa Majesté l'Empereur Napoléon IV sur le recto des billets, selon les visuels dévoilés par l’institut monétaire.

La gravure a été réalisée durant le mois de Floréal, à partir d'une photo fournie par la famille impériale. Les anciens billets de 50 euros représentant l'Empereur Napoléon IV seront retirés petit à petit de la circulation à partir de l'an prochain, tout comme les pièces.

###Avril Update###

Salut les amixes! Dernière de la classe, première de la casse! Je sors d'une mauvaise période et je retourne vers la lumière on espère. *:･ﾟ✧ le blog change de nom pour tout un tas de raisons *:･ﾟ✧ 💥CAMPAGNE d'AVRIL pour moi et cstudioooooos💥 les 18-19 avril, avec les camarades du collectif on va décorer des céramiques avec l'amie atelierdoux_ceramique! Première fois qu'on fait ça, trop trop hâte.

Le 20 avril, on tiendra la bonne vieille table de zines à Augan (56) pour le festival Formats. Le 23 avril enfin, on sera à Paris eh oui eh oui pour une soirée expo/lectures/vente de zines: ça sera à Floréal Belleville! Toutes les infos dans le ptit visuel que j'ai fait avec mon camarade:

/////// Hello friends grades are bad but I'm worse! I'm out of a down time and back to the light hopefully *:･ﾟ✧ The blog's name's changed for a variety of reasons

April Campaign for me and my good comrades from Cosmic Studios 04/18-19, we're doing a crossover with our good friend and talented ceramist atelierdoux_ceramique! it's a first. 04/20, selling zines in Augan for the festival Formats. 04/23 finally! We'll be in Paris for a small exhibition/readings/zine selling. I'll be here in Floréal Belleville!

~remedios aka fake_deep_girl aka Sticky

Ruthless Representatives, Unjust Executions (2/3): Tribunals and Arrests

In Part 1 of this series, I listed three memoirs that included details on Saint-Just condemning an artillery captain to death and described their inconsistencies. @josefavomjaaga has noted that the overall arc of the story is still true, which raises the question: did the captain actually get executed?

Dr. Lawrence Joseph Fischer, in his paper about Jourdan’s career in the Revolutionary army, says of this affair: "The evidence reveals that much of this was threat only; the artillery captain, for example, was never guillotined.” He adds in a footnote: "Such punishments were announced in each order of the day; no such execution, or even arrest, of any artillery captain was ever announced, either before or after Fleurus." (p. 214) If the artillery captain was executed, there would have to written evidence, because if there was one thing civilians were good at doing, it was paperwork!

Indeed, a look through official documents of the representatives, such as vol. 2 of the Œuvres completes of Saint-Just, turns up no news about the execution of an artillery captain. However, Saint-Just's Œuvres do contain correspondence and proclamations that Saint-Just made during his time as a representative in the Army of the Nord. The text shows that despite threatening executions around every corner, Saint-Just does not act on his word as much as expected.

First off, the decree for forming the extrajudicial military tribunals that Saint-Cyr condemned (cited by @josefavomjaaga in this post) indeed did exist. It was proclaimed on 4 May 1794, the second time Saint-Just and Le Bas went to the Nord. See pages 404, and 406-407, documents number 2. and 7., for more details.

7. The Representatives of the People to the Army of the Nord decree the following: Article 1. — The agents or partisans of the enemy who are found either in the Army of the Nord, or in the surroundings of this army, the prevaricating agents in all posts of the same army, will be shot in the presence of the army. Article 2. — The military tribunal sitting at Réunion-sur-Oise is raised to this effect by the special and revolutionary Commission and will not, for the cases mentioned above, be subject to any particular form of procedure. Article 3. — The tribunal will pronounce in the same manner in the fate of those imprisoned at Réunion-sur-Oise if they know agents or partisans of the enemy. To Réunion-sur-Oise, 15 floréal, year II of the Republic one and indivisible.  LE BAS, SAINT-JUST. (pp. 406-407)

Two further decrees of 21 floréal/10 May adds the military tribunal are authorised to print their verdicts, and affirms that “until further notice the military tribunal of the army will make judgements without being bound by the formality of the jury.” (pp. 413-414) Saint-Just and Le Bas give their reasoning in the following document of 27 floréal/16 May:

Proclamation to the Army of the Nord Soldiers, We call you back to rigourous dicipline, which alone can make you conquer, and which spares our blood; abuses have crept in among you; we have resolved to repress them. Those who provoke the infantry to disband in front of the enemy cavalry, those who leave the line before combat, during the combat, or during the retreat, will be arrested on the hour and punished by death. All cantonments will carry out patrols; they will recognise errant soldiers and arrest them; if they flee, they [the patrols] will fire. Soldiers, we will do you justice; we will punish those who refused it to you; we will share your work; but whoever deviates from his duty will be struck with a prompt death. […] (pp. 414-415)

These proclamations are extreme in its character, but I don’t doubt that indiscipline was occurring in the army. On 25 priarial/13 June, the Representatives specify that anyone convicted of having commandering supplies, implying that such excesses occurred, would be brought to the tribunal and punished with death (p. 430). We can debate whether the representatives’ proclamations were the cause of more privations and desertions, but there was reason for the representatives to watch the armies on the north-eastern frontier so closely. Fischer, in his paper on Jourdan, assesses the army of the Nord pre-Jourdan:

[...] the generals of the 'Nord' worked amid the aftereffects of the Dumouriez conspiracy. The sudden treason of the most powerful general of the Republic had shaken the government greatly. To men such as Robespierre and St Just, who had been weaned on the classics and the tales of military usurpers such as Sulla and Julius Caesar, all generals became objects of suspicion. [...] Because the 'Nord' had been Dumouriez'[s] army, its officers fell under particular scrutiny. The representatives with the 'Nord' were issued specific instructions to root out any who might have been Dumouriez'[s] accomplices. In such an atmosphere honest mistakes could easily be misconstrued as treasonous acts, and treasonous acts could bring execution to those who committed them. (pp. 48-49)

This also explains why so many specific accounts of representatives using disproportionate measures are found in memoirs of soldiers from the Nord, the Sambre-et-Meuse, and the Rhin-et-Moselle. By contrast, when recalling Toulon, Victor also mentions the representatives in his Memoires inédits, calling the representatives acclaimations "frenetic" and critizing revolutionary ideals as "bellicose" (p. 13), but his descriptions of the representatives are markedly less acerbic than Soult’s or Saint-Cyr's. The threats of the representatives of the Nord succeeded in creating an atmosphere of fear among the army cadres in the northeast, but whether they were uniformly as formidable across France is another question.

If the representatives did threaten officers with death, the fact remains to see if they carried it out, especially if there is printed evidence. Curiously, in Saint-Just’s oeuvres, I could only find two instances of dismissals and two instances of arrests, and none of them exhibit the bloodlust contemporary memoirists associate with Saint-Just. The first, dated 19 floréal/8 May, is this:

The Representatives of the People to the Army of the North decide that citizen Plaideux, general of brigade of the Army of the North, will retire to the Ministry of War, the Army of the Nord not having for the moment any need of his services. (p. 410)

So what happened to Plaideux? According to Georges Six’s Dictionnaire biographique des généraux et amiraux français de la Révolution et de l'Empire : 1792-1814, vol. 2, he was additionally issued an arrest warrant on 21 April of the same year. However, on 14 August, he assumed detachable command at Béthune, and on 6 November, he took up the post of general of brigade in the Laclaire devision (p. 318). In other words, he was back to work in three months. No executions here.

Saint-Just issued the other dismissal on 1 messidor/19 June:

Considering the citizen Capella, chef de brigade, commanding the 132nd demi-brigade, had neither the knowledge nor the energy necessary to fill a post so important; That this demi-brigade, composed of bataillons who have acquired in the war the highest reputation, has been exposed to see its glory eclipsed by an unable leader and his character, notably on the day of the 28th of the previous month, under the very eyes of the Reperesentants of the people; We decree that the citizen Capella will cease to be employed. He will present himself to the War Ministry his service records to obtain his retirement. (p. 433)

Next, the representatives promote Pouchin, captain of the 4th battalion of la Manche, in place of Capella, and orders that “all officers, non-commissioned officers, and soldiers acknowledge him and obey him according to military laws. Just like in Plaideux’s case, nowhere does Saint-Just order the execution of Capella, and despite Capella's incompetencies, Saint-Just does not sentence him to the extrajudicial military tribunal where he would have met certain death.

As for the arrest warrants, such as the one on 29 priarial/18 June, Saint-Just justifies them thus:

The Representatives of the People to the Armies of the Nord, the Moselle, and Ardennes, On the account given to them by the general of division Kléber that, yesterday, the second battalion of the Vienne fled shamefully before the enemy, during which the flags of the other battalions from two divisions of the Army of the Nord flew on the road to victory, and that it ignored ther voice of the general who called him back to his post; Considering that the crime cannot be of the entire battalion, because the bravery and the hatred of tyrants exist in the hearts of all the French and that, when a troop leaves their battle post, the cause is in the cowardice of officers or in the negligence of those tasked to maintain the discipline and to shape the soldiers they command to have a love of glory, which consists of braving the dangers of war and to conquer or to die at the post that the fatherland has conferred them; Decree that the chef de bataillon and all the captains of the second battalion of the Vienne will be dismissed and put under arrest; They will be replaced on spot according to the law. The chief of staff will execute the present decree. (pp. 432-433)

While this may seem extreme, knowing Saint-Just’s fanatic reputation, we might have expected him to force the representatives and generals to put the whole battalion to death. Moreover, this decree shows that generals in high command "tip off" the representatives on military indiscipline for them to correct, which I am sure deserting during a victory would count as. That said, the civilian respresentatives' attempts to rectify this military indiscipline may have caused irritation among the officers.

Notice that the proclamation also does not condemn the rightfully arrested to the military tribunals, as the Representatives have promised earlier, and that for the second time, these dissmisals and arrests decree all procedures to be done in accordance to the law. It is far cry from the disregard the representatives seem to have for the law and for the words of the generals, as they say their declaration of the military tribunal. And when prisoners are to be tried, it is also according to "the law", as in this proclamation on 1 messidor/19 June.

The Representatives of the People to the Armies of the Nord, the Moselle, and Ardennes, Approve the nomination made on the battlefield by the general of division Marceau of citizen Verger, captain of the carabiniers, to the rank of chef of the 1st battalion of the 9th demi-brigade of light infantry, and decree that the officer who commanded that battalion at that time and who refused to rally it despite the orders of the general, will be dismissed, put under arrest, and brought before the military commission established at the headquarters of the combined armies, to be judged in accordance to the law. The chief of staff is charged with executing this present decree. (pp. 434-435)

This proclamation raises a few questions. Is the military commission the same as the military tribunal, and if it is, is it following the laws of decree that the Representatives proclaimed on 15 floréal/4 May? If all the above are true, and Verger was found to be an agent of the enemy, then this is the only instance that the military tribunal had their hand in an execution.

Even so, Verger was not arrested for not being patriotic enough, but due to direct insubordination on the battlefield, as Marceau's actions indicate. Of course, Marceau may not have wanted to condemn his captain to arrest even with his insubordination, or one could argue that the representatives forced Marceau to denounce Verger. We would be here all day if we were to debate how much the representatives' paperwork differed from their historical actions. The bottom line is that despite all the threats the representatives have made about giving disobedient soldiers a prompt death, very few of the arrested individuals were made to appear before the military tribunals or were sentenced to death on paper. Furthermore, all the arrestations appear to be for actual offenses, even if said arrests are disproportionate to the offences.

Because of the comparatively lenient nature of the arrest warrants in Saint-Just's Œuvres, I am inclined to think tales of Saint-Just's ruthlessness, while not unfounded, are greatly exaggerated. Feel free to add any additional information.

Napoleon wrote blunt letters long before he was famous

CG1-172. AU CHEF DE BATAILLON BERLIER, SOUS-DIRECTEUR DE L’ARTILLERIE À L’ARMÉE D’ITALIE

Nice, 18 Floréal Year II [May 7, 1794]

Je suis étonné que tu mettes tant de retard dans l’exécution des ordres, il faut toujours t’ordonner trois fois la même chose.

Fais passer aux gares de siège, sur-le-champ, les cinq canonniers comme je t’ai ordonné.

Buonaparte

---

I am surprised that you are so late in carrying out orders, you always have to be ordered the same thing three times.

Get the five gunners through the siege stations immediately, as I ordered you.

napoleonica.org

Les Misérables 1.2.6 - Jean Valjean

A few things stood out to me that I hadn’t noticed on previous reads.

Firstly, the way the narration shifts when it describes the theft of the bread. Before and after that, the perspective is focused on Valjean. For that moment, though, it switches to:

One Sunday night, Maubert Isabeau, the baker on Place de l’Eglise, in Faverolles, was just going to bed when he heard a violent blow against the barred window of his shop. He got down in time to see an arm thrust through the aperture made by the blow of a fist on the glass. The arm seized a loaf of bread and took it out. Isabeau rushed out; the thief used his legs valiantly; Isabeau pursued him and caught him. The thief had thrown away the bread, but his arm was still bleeding. It was Jean Valjean.

There’s an unusual level of detail - not that detail is unusual for Hugo, but we get the full name and address of the baker, which we don’t get for any of Valjean’s nieces or nephews. There’s also a kind of depersonalization of Valjean: first with the description as a disembodied body part, “the arm”, then as “the thief”. Only after that identity is established is his name given. It feels, in the detailed narration of events from the baker’s perspective, like the testimony given at a trial - the gist of the testimony, perhaps, that Isabeau did give to the tribunal. It conveys how everything about Valjean as a person, and his reasons, and his family, is dismissed, with these isolated facts being what the trial considers relevant and important.

Secondly, Napoleon come up again.

On the 22nd of April, 1796, there was announced in Paris the victory of Montenotte, achieved by the commanding-general of the army of Italy, whom the message of the Directory, to the Five Hundred, of the 2nd Floréal, year IV, called Buonaparte; that same day a great chain was riveted at the Bicêtre. Jean Valjean was part of this chain.

The combination of this with the mentions in the first section of this chapter makes me more convinced that Hugo’s focus is a contrast in what society values (as with the ‘good man’ and the ‘great man’ in Myriel’s comment). The question Hugo is evoking is: what makes a nation great? What speaks to its identity? What should it take pride in? What should it aspire to? The achievements of a ‘great man’ like Napoleon, or the way it treats the least and lowest in its society? Combeferre responding to Marius’ Bonapartist rant - What could be greater than this? - with “To be free” is the answer to this central thematic question.

Thirdly, Valjean only hears of his sister’s family once, when he learns that she is in Paris, in severe poverty, with only one child, the youngest, a boy of six who is left outside in the cold on winter mornings before his school opens. He learns this, the narrator says, “I think, at the end of his fourth year of confinement” (purposefully vague, since the author/narrator could know whatever precision he chose to). Right after this, we move to Valjean’s first escape attempt, “near the end of this fourth year”. This suggests strongly to me that Valjean’s first attempt to escape was due to this news, out of a desire to go to his sister and help her, which makes everything even more tragic.

There's a thought about umw that I've had for a long long time and since I didnt exactly have anywhere else to out it I thought I'd share it here.

It's about Montparnasse, or rather, the apparent lack of him and where oh where is he.

Now, obviously, there are many les mis characters who aren't in the story, it makes perfect sense, eg. javert who is implied once or twice but isn't actually mentioned.

But anyway, while thinking about umw my thoughts often turn to R's life before the story. I mean, it has been many centuries and while I can imagine it Nit Being Much, there had to be Events to fill the time, right? Some people he met, some historical events he's witnessed, etc etc.

I've always imagined imagined Grantaire to have met Floréal some time in the 1600s or 1700s and them being very loose sort of friends. Acquaintances is a better word maybe.

But the one concept that cannot for the love of everything leave my mind is Montparnasse sort of being there, throughout the ages. At first I thought, a fallen angel maybe? But that doesn't seem to fit him at all, and the idea that I arrived at was that Montparnasse was a Reaper. I'm going to be serious, I haven't been keeping up with spn for several seasons now and my memory of the lore is very fragmented so I'm not sure how it holds up canon-wise, but it seemed neat to me. He accompanied R during the worst of times, when he witnessed the most deaths, wars, revolutions, massacres, the sort of atrocities that made Grantaire so cynical and distrustful and That Way in general. Maybe they became sort of friends. Maybe Montparnasse was the Reaper intended to bring the kids from Smoleńsk across. Who knows. Maybe the whole theory is bullshit and he's either some rando doing Crime around Lyon or he doesn't exist in the universe at all, but it's still fun to think about.

Anyway that's all I hope it's at least a bit entertaining 🙌🙌 + tysm for all the hard work on the fic it's taken up at least 85% of my brain at all times for thr last 2.5 (maybe more?) years<33

Ooh that's a cool idea! It would have been fun to have a Reaper character in UMW, especially since humans can't see them (unless they're dying or, y'know, dead) so it would be someone only Grantaire could interact with. Or maybe Jehan can perceive Reapers too, which would add a tasty Romantic quality to his abilities – he sees dead people and also the embodiments of death itself 💕 also I imagine a Reaper, a keeper of the Natural Order, would have a thing or two to say about resurrected-ghost-Feuilly 😂

I actually do have my own UMW version of Montparnasse, since he was originally meant to feature but got cut due to the story already spiralling madly out of my control without me adding even more characters and plot threads. I think I wrote about him in a post once but it was like a bajillion years ago so for funs let me tell you about him here:

He IS some rando doing crime around Lyon!! (Or possibly Paris, I never 100% decided.) He's sort of like a dark mirror of Jehan; he's human and also a psychic, but much less naturally powerful, and has started dabbling in witchcraft and other unsavoury things to enhance his abilities. He's wildly jealous of Jehan's powers and also considers Jehan to be an idiotic waste of those powers because he won't use them for his own gain. He comes from a much bleaker background than Jehan and had to fend for himself from a young age, and so has become very adept at using his abilities to manipulate people and is now a very successful and wealthy con artist. He's not 'evil', which is a pretty strong term in a world with demons etc, but circumstances have molded him into a person who does not trust others and is very out for himself, and his psychic abilities make him somewhat arrogant and he considers ordinary people to be inferior and fair game for him to mess with.

As you can see my personal take on Montparnasse is a bit darker than the pure neutrality of a Reaper-type character 😂 In this AU I envisioned him as kind of the same type of character as Spike from Buffy, in that he starts out as a legitimate threat and thorn in the protagonists' sides but reluctantly develops into an ally as time goes on.

However I know that fandom interpretations of Montparnasse vary wildly and all are valid, and since he's almost definitely never going to actually show up in UMW, please have fun imagining whatever version of him you enjoy most!! I just also have a lot of thoughts with nowhere to go and will take any opportunity to share 😂

Judgments pronounced month by month by the Paris Revolutionary Tribunal, from its installation to its abolition

Source: Le Tribunal révolutionnaire de Paris: d’après les documents originaux conservés aux archives de l’Empire, suivi de la liste complète des personnes qui ont comparu devant ce tribunal (1866) by Émile Campardon, volume 2, page 217-225

Tribunal from March 10 1793

April 1793 (6 to 30)  Death sentences……………………..9  Acquittals or releases[1]……………16  Sent to a different tribunal………….1  Total number of accused……………26

May 1793 (1 to 31)  Death sentences………………….….9  Acquittals or releases…………….….23  Sent to a different tribunal……….….2  Total number of accused………...….34

June 1793 (1 to 30)  Death sentences…………………….15  Acquittals or releases……………….33  Deportations…………………………..3  Sent to a different tribunal…..……….2  Total number of accused………..…..53

July 1793 (1 to 31)  Death sentences……………….…….14  Acquittals or releases……….……….47  Deportations…………………………..1  Confinement…………………………..2  Prison……………………………….….1  Sent to a different tribunal………..…..1  Total number of accused……………..66

August 1793 (1 to 31)  Death sentences………………...…….5  Acquittals or releases……………..….36  Deportations…………………….……..1  Confinement……………………………1  Sent to a different tribunal………..…..2  Total number of accused……..………45

September 1793 (1 to 30)  Death sentences…………………….17  Acquittals or releases……………….37  Deportations………………………….6  Confinement…………………….……1 Sent to a different tribunal…..……...1  Total number of accused……………62

October 1793 (1 to 8)  Death sentences…………………….13  Acquittals or releases……………….11  Confinement…………………………..1  Prison………………………………….5  Total number of accused…………....30 

Vendémiare year II (September 22 to October 21 1793)  Death sentences…………………….10  Acquittals or releases……………….11  Deportations…………………………..1  Confinement…………………………..2  Prison…………………………………..9  Total number of accused………..…..33

Brumaire year II (October 22 to November 20 1792)  Death sentences………………..…….65  Acquittals or releases…………..…….45  Deportations…………………….……..1  Banishment…………………….……….2  Confinement………………………..…..5  Prison………………………………….…2  Seclusion………………………….……..1  Total number of accused……….……..33

Frimaire year II (November 21 to December 20 1792)  Death sentences……………….……….67  Acquittals or releases…………………..91  Deportations……………………………..2  Confinement……………………..………3  Prison………………………………….….3  Total number of accused……………….166 

Nivôse year II (December 21 1793 to January 19 1794)  Death sentences…………………..…….61  Acquittals or releases…………….…….101 Confinement……………………….……..2  Prison………………………………..….…3 Total number of accused………………..167 

Pluviôse year II (January 20 to February 18 1794)  Death sentences………………………….68  Acquittals or releases…………………….106  Deportations………………………..……..12  Confinement………………………………..5  Prison…………………………………….…3  Sent to a different tribunal…………….….4  Total number of accused…………………198

Ventôse year II (February 19 to March 30 1794)  Death sentences………………………….116  Acquittals or releases…………………….79  Deportations…………………………..…..5  Confinement……………………..………..1  Sent to a different tribunal……………….5  Total number of accused…………………206

Germinal year II (March 21 to April 19 1794)  Death sentences……………………  ..….155  Acquittals or releases……………….…….59  Prison…………………………..……..….…3  Sent to a different tribunal…………….….1  Total number of accused…………………218

Floréal year II (April 20 to May 19 1794)  Death sentences…………………….…….354  Acquittals or releases…………………….155 Confinement……………………………….4 Prison…………………………………….…6 Seclusion……………………………..…….4  Total number of accused……………..…..525

Prairial 1 to 22 year II (May 20 to June 10 1794)  Death sentences…………………….…….281  Acquittals or releases…………………….120  Confinement……………………..………..6  Sent to a different tribunal……………….1  Total number of accused…………………408

After the law of 22 Prairial is passed

Prairial 22 to 30 year II (June 10 to June 18 1794)  Death sentences………………………….228  Acquittals or releases…………………….44  Total number of accused…………………272

Messidor year II (June 19 to July 18 1794)  Death sentences………………………….796  Acquittals or releases…………………….208  Confinement……………………..………..1  Total number of accused…………………1005

Thermidor 1 to 9 year II (July 19 to July 27 1794)  Death sentences………………………….796  Acquittals or releases…………………….208  Confinement………………………..……..1  Total number of accused…………………1005

Thermidor 10, 11 and 12 year II (July 28, 29, 30 1794) Death sentences after outlaw declaration…….103

Thermidor 27 to 1 Sans-Culottides (August 14 to September 17 1794)  Death sentences…………………….…….14  Acquittals or releases…………………….273  Sent to a different tribunal……………….3  Total number of accused…………………290

1 Sans-Culottides to Brumaire 1 year III (September 17 to October 22 1794)  Death sentences………………………….24  Acquittals or releases………………..…..242  Deportations………………………..……..2  Prison………………………….…………..1  Confinement………………….…………..38  Sent to a different tribunal………..…….4  Total number of accused………….……311

Brumaire year III (October 22 to November 20 1794)  Death sentences………………….…….5  Acquittals or releases…………………..223  Confinement……………………………..8  Total number of accused……….………236

Frimaire 1 to 28 year III (November 21 to December 18 1794)  Death sentences…………………..…….3 Acquittals or releases…………………..99  Confinement……………………………..2  Sent to a different tribunal………..……1  Total number of accused………………105

Tribunal of 8 Nivôse, installed Pluviôse 8 year III (January 27 1795) 

Pluviôse year III (January 20 to February 18 1795)  Acquittals or releases……………..…..17  No accusation………………….………3  Sent to a different tribunal……………10  Total number of accused………..……30

Ventôse year III (February 19 to March 20 1795)  Death sentences……………………….1  Acquittals or releases………..………..16  Confinement…………………. ………..2  Sent to a different tribunal………….…2  Total number of accused………………21

Germinal year III (March 21 to April 19 1795)

Acquittals or releases……………..…..4  Confinement………………..…………..1  Sent to a different tribunal……….……7  Total number of accused………..……12

Floréal year III (April 20 to May 19 1795) Death sentences…………………….16  Acquittals or releases……………….17  Confinement…………………………..3 Sent to a different tribunal……….….10  Total number of accused……………46

— 

From April 6 1793 to 22 prairial year II (June 10 1794) 2358 accused appeared before the revolutionary tribunal and were judged the following way:

Death sentences…………………….1258  Acquittals or releases………………..969  Deportations…………………………..34.  Prison…………………………………..28  Confinement…………………………..40  Sent to a different tribunal……….….23  Banishment……………………………2   Seclusion……………………………….3  Total number of accused…………2358

From 22 prairial to 9 thermidor year to (June 10 to July 28 1794) 1703 accused, judged as followed:

Death sentences…………………….1366  Acquittals or releases……………….336  Confinement……………………………..1  Total number of accused………..…1703

On 10, 11 and 12 thermidor, 103 people declared outlaws were executed.

From 24 thermidor year II to 28 frimaire year III (August 11 - December 18 1794)

Death sentences…………………….46  Acquittals or releases……………….837  Confinement…………………………48  Sent to a different tribunal……….….8  Deportations…………………………..2  Prison…………………………………...1  Total number of accused……….……942

Finally, from 8 pluviôse to 28 floréal year III (January 27 to May 17 1795) 109 were judged as follows:

Death sentences…………………….17  Acquittals or releases……………..54  Confinement…………………………..6  Sent to a different tribunal……….29  Non-indictment.……………………….3  Total number of accused…………109

[1] The aquittal was pronounced by the tribunal sitting in open court, and release by the tribunal assembled in the Council Chamber.

woah that french in the tags 😳 didn't know you were a poet

Yeah that is the beginning of a poem I wrote in my French class last year 😅 Let's see I think I have it saved.

Les racines des arbres serpentent une toile

Vaste et étouffant sous la vielle neige

Pour garder la pourriture des étoiles.

Les vers dans leur prison superficiel

Savent pourquoi, quand ils voient les nuages,

Les racines des arbres serpentent une toile.

De la terre une chanson discordiale

Tends ses vrilles en haut avertir les anges

Pour garder la pourriture des étoiles

Que mange le feu, son peau et sa moelle.

Et, pour piéger ce mal nécrophage,

Les racines des arbres serpentent une toile.

Meprisant la croissance des spores floréals,

Les cieux luttent retenir les nuages

Pour garder la pourriture des étoiles.

Avec la pulse des étoiles cardiales

Le champignon embrasse, léche, aime, et mange

Les racines des arbres serpentent une toile

Pour garder la pourriture des étoiles.

And the translation:

The roots of the trees weave a web

Vast and suffocating under the old snow

To keep the rot from the stars.

The worms in their superficial prison

Know why, when they see the clouds,

The roots of the trees weave a web.

From the earth a discordant song

Stretches out its tendrils to warn the angels

To keep the rot from the stars

That eats the fire, its skin and its marrow.

And to trap the evil scavenger

The roots of the trees weave a web.

Despising the spread of the floral spores,

The skies fight to clutch the clouds

To keep the rot from the stars.

With the pulse of the cardial stars

The fungus kisses, licks, likes/loves, and eats

The roots of the trees weaving a web

To keep the rot from the stars.

hey love your blog!

i’ve got a really random specific question.

so I read les mis over 10 years ago and there was a passage in it i’ve been trying to find since but i just can’t… it was a description of a garden and i remember it being soooo lyrical and beautiful but for the life of me i can’t find it again …. any chance it rings a bell????

Gardens are a big motif in Les Mis, and there are lots of lyrical descriptions of gardens in the book! So it is hard to say, but- I'll put other possibilities in the tags, but I think the most likely candidate is probably the longest and most lyrical garden description we get in the book-- the description of the garden in the Rue Plumet, where Jean Valjean lives with Cosette. This is Volume IV, Book 3, Chapter 3, "Foliis Ac Frondibus":

There was a stone bench in one corner, one or two mouldy statues, several lattices which had lost their nails with time, were rotting on the wall, and there were no walks nor turf; but there was enough grass everywhere. Gardening had taken its departure, and nature had returned. Weeds abounded, which was a great piece of luck for a poor corner of land. The festival of gilliflowers was something splendid. Nothing in this garden obstructed the sacred effort of things towards life; venerable growth reigned there among them. The trees had bent over towards the nettles, the plant had sprung upward, the branch had inclined, that which crawls on the earth had gone in search of that which expands in the air, that which floats on the wind had bent over towards that which trails in the moss; trunks, boughs, leaves, fibres, clusters, tendrils, shoots, spines, thorns, had mingled, crossed, married, confounded themselves in each other; vegetation in a deep and close embrace, had celebrated and accomplished there, under the well-pleased eye of the Creator, in that enclosure three hundred feet square, the holy mystery of fraternity, symbol of the human fraternity. This garden was no longer a garden, it was a colossal thicket, that is to say, something as impenetrable as a forest, as peopled as a city, quivering like a nest, sombre like a cathedral, fragrant like a bouquet, solitary as a tomb, living as a throng.

In Floréal this enormous thicket, free behind its gate and within its four walls, entered upon the secret labor of germination, quivered in the rising sun, almost like an animal which drinks in the breaths of cosmic love, and which feels the sap of April rising and boiling in its veins, and shakes to the wind its enormous wonderful green locks, sprinkled on the damp earth, on the defaced statues, on the crumbling steps of the pavilion, and even on the pavement of the deserted street, flowers like stars, dew like pearls, fecundity, beauty, life, joy, perfumes. At midday, a thousand white butterflies took refuge there, and it was a divine spectacle to see that living summer snow whirling about there in flakes amid the shade. There, in those gay shadows of verdure, a throng of innocent voices spoke sweetly to the soul, and what the twittering forgot to say the humming completed. In the evening, a dreamy vapor exhaled from the garden and enveloped it; a shroud of mist, a calm and celestial sadness covered it; the intoxicating perfume of the honeysuckles and convolvulus poured out from every part of it, like an exquisite and subtle poison; the last appeals of the woodpeckers and the wagtails were audible as they dozed among the branches; one felt the sacred intimacy of the birds and the trees; by day the wings rejoice the leaves, by night the leaves protect the wings.

In winter the thicket was black, dripping, bristling, shivering, and allowed some glimpse of the house. Instead of flowers on the branches and dew in the flowers, the long silvery tracks of the snails were visible on the cold, thick carpet of yellow leaves; but in any fashion, under any aspect, at all seasons, spring, winter, summer, autumn, this tiny enclosure breathed forth melancholy, contemplation, solitude, liberty, the absence of man, the presence of God; and the rusty old gate had the air of saying: “This garden belongs to me.”

It was of no avail that the pavements of Paris were there on every side, the classic and splendid hotels of the Rue de Varennes a couple of paces away, the dome of the Invalides close at hand, the Chamber of Deputies not far off; the carriages of the Rue de Bourgogne and of the Rue Saint-Dominique rumbled luxuriously, in vain, in the vicinity, in vain did the yellow, brown, white, and red omnibuses cross each other’s course at the neighboring crossroads; the Rue Plumet was the desert; and the death of the former proprietors, the revolution which had passed over it, the crumbling away of ancient fortunes, absence, forgetfulness, forty years of abandonment and widowhood, had sufficed to restore to this privileged spot ferns, mulleins, hemlock, yarrow, tall weeds, great crimped plants, with large leaves of pale green cloth, lizards, beetles, uneasy and rapid insects; to cause to spring forth from the depths of the earth and to reappear between those four walls a certain indescribable and savage grandeur; and for nature, which disconcerts the petty arrangements of man, and which sheds herself always thoroughly where she diffuses herself at all, in the ant as well as in the eagle, to blossom out in a petty little Parisian garden with as much rude force and majesty as in a virgin forest of the New World.

Nothing is small, in fact; any one who is subject to the profound and penetrating influence of nature knows this. Although no absolute satisfaction is given to philosophy, either to circumscribe the cause or to limit the effect, the contemplator falls into those unfathomable ecstasies caused by these decompositions of force terminating in unity. Everything toils at everything.Algebra is applied to the clouds; the radiation of the star profits the rose; no thinker would venture to affirm that the perfume of the hawthorn is useless to the constellations. Who, then, can calculate the course of a molecule? How do we know that the creation of worlds is not determined by the fall of grains of sand? Who knows the reciprocal ebb and flow of the infinitely great and the infinitely little, the reverberations of causes in the precipices of being, and the avalanches of creation? The tiniest worm is of importance; the great is little, the little is great; everything is balanced in necessity; alarming vision for the mind. There are marvellous relations between beings and things; in that inexhaustible whole, from the sun to the grub, nothing despises the other; all have need of each other. The light does not bear away terrestrial perfumes into the azure depths, without knowing what it is doing; the night distributes stellar essences to the sleeping flowers. All birds that fly have round their leg the thread of the infinite. Germination is complicated with the bursting forth of a meteor and with the peck of a swallow cracking its egg, and it places on one level the birth of an earthworm and the advent of Socrates. Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two possesses the larger field of vision? Choose. A bit of mould is a pleiad of flowers; a nebula is an ant-hill of stars. The same promiscuousness, and yet more unprecedented, exists between the things of the intelligence and the facts of substance. Elements and principles mingle, combine, wed, multiply with each other, to such a point that the material and the moral world are brought eventually to the same clearness. The phenomenon is perpetually returning upon itself. In the vast cosmic exchanges the universal life goes and comes in unknown quantities, rolling entirely in the invisible mystery of effluvia, employing everything, not losing a single dream, not a single slumber, sowing an animalcule here, crumbling to bits a planet there, oscillating and winding, making of light a force and of thought an element, disseminated and invisible, dissolving all, except that geometrical point, the I; bringing everything back to the soul-atom; expanding everything in God, entangling all activity, from summit to base, in the obscurity of a dizzy mechanism, attaching the flight of an insect to the movement of the earth, subordinating, who knows? Were it only by the identity of the law, the evolution of the comet in the firmament to the whirling of the infusoria in the drop of water. A machine made of mind. Enormous gearing, the prime motor of which is the gnat, and whose final wheel is the zodiac.

Aujourd'hui, nous sommes le septidi 17 floréal, de l'année CCXXX du calendrier républicain, jour de la pimprenelle.

Hortense: Tiens? What are you doing here?

Hortense: Did you get lost?

Oliver: It's my present, love

Hortense: Really? Oh thank you Oliver!

Oliver: I will miss you. I thought you might like a little companion

Hortense: That's lovely, you are so thoughtful. I'll take care of him Oliver: What's his name? Hortense: Hmmm

Hortense: "Mignon" Oliver: Perfect

⚜ Le Cabinet Noir | Palais des Tuileries, 3 Floréal An 230

Beginning ▬ Previous ▬ Next

The Duke of Rothsay returns to his kingdom after completing his military training in Francesim. For his departure, he gives Hortense a little puppy, which she names Mignon.

Collaboration with @officalroyalsofpierreland

⚜ Traduction française

Le duc de Rothsay regagne son royaume, après la fin de sa formation militaire en Francesim. Pour son départ, il offre à Hortense un petit chiot, qu'elle nomme Mignon.

*aboiements*

Hortense : Tiens? Que fais-tu là toi?

Hortense : Tu t'es perdu ?

Oliver : C'est mon cadeau, mon amour Hortense : Vraiment ? Oh merci Oliver !

Oliver : Tu vas me manquer. J'ai pensé qu'un petit compagnon te plairait

Hortense : C'est adorable, tu es si attentionné. Je prendrai soin de lui Oliver : Comment s'appelle-t-il ? Hortense : Hmmm

Hortense : "Mignon" Oliver : Parfait