The third estate included approximately ninety-eight percent of the french population under the old regime. which group was exclusively part of this estate?
Answers
Answer :
The impoverished nobility, farmers, peasants labourers were exclusively part of the third estate.
According to Wikipedia, 'France under the Ancien Régime (before the French Revolution) divided society into three estates: the First Estate (clergy); the Second Estate (nobility); and the Third Estate (commoners). The king was considered part of no estate.
The Third Estate comprised all of those who were not members of the above and can be divided into two groups, urban and rural, together making up 98% of France's population. The urban included wage-labourers. The rural included free peasants (who owned their own land) who could be prosperous and villeins (serfs, or peasants working on a noble's land). The free peasants paid disproportionately high taxes compared to the other Estates and were unhappy because they wanted more rights. In addition, the First and Second Estates relied on the labour of the Third, which made the latter's unequal status all the more glaring.'