Explain the French society at the time of French revolution
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Answer:
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Explanation:
In 1774, Louis XVI of the Bourbon family of Kings descended the throne of France. He was only 20 years old and was married to the Austrian Princess Marie Antoinette. Upon his succession the new king found an empty treasury. Long years of war had drained all the financial resources of France. Under Louis XVI France too helped the thirteen American colonies to gain independence from the common enemy, Britain. Addition to this was the cost of maintaining an extravagant court in the palace of Versailles. The war added more than a billion livres to a debt that had already risen to more than 2 billion livres. Lenders who gave the state credit now began to charge 10 per cent interest on the loans. so the French government was obliged to spend an increasing percentage of its budget on interest payments alone. to meet its regular expenses, the French government had to increase taxes. yet this would not have sufficed. in the eighteenth century the French society was divided into three estates-the Clergy, the Nobility and the common people, in which only the third estate had to pay the taxes.
The estates were a part of the feudal system that dated back to the Middle ages. The old regime is used to describe the institutions before 1789.
Peasants comprised more than 90 per cent of the population in which a very few of them owned the land they cultivated. About 60 per cent of the lands were owned by the Church, the Nobles and other richer members of the third estate. The members of the first two estates enjoyed certain privileges by birth. The most important of these was the exemption from paying taxes. the members of the first estate further enjoyed the feudal privileges which included the feudal dues that they extracted from the peasants. The Church two extracted its share of taxes from the peasants.
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