Volta
Person1748 – 1836

Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès

Also called: Sieyès, Abbé Sieyès

Cleric and political theorist whose pamphlet What Is the Third Estate? opened the Revolution and who plotted the coup of Brumaire with Napoleon in 1799

Born at Fréjus in southern France in 1748, he became a priest and vicar-general of the diocese of Chartres. His pamphlet of January 1789, “What is the Third Estate? Everything. What has it been until now? Nothing. What does it ask? To become something”, caused a sensation. Elected for the Third Estate of Paris, he moved the proclamation of the National Assembly on 17 June and led debates on the constitution. He kept his head down during the Terror, and when asked what he had done is said to have answered “I survived”. Becoming a Director in 1799, he plotted the coup of Brumaire with Napoleon and was made a consul, but soon lost real power. Exiled at the Restoration, he returned in 1830 and died in Paris in 1836.

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3 related events

  1. 1
    1789Estates-General of 1789key figure

    At the first Estates-General in 175 years the orders split over how to vote, and the Third Estate proclaimed itself the National Assembly.

  2. 2
    1789Tennis Court Oathparticipant

    Locked out of their hall, the Third Estate deputies gathered in a nearby real-tennis court and swore not to disperse until they had given France a constitution.

  3. 3
    1799Coup of 18 Brumairekey figure

    Back from Egypt, Napoleon joined Sieyès to overthrow the Directory; the Consulate was set up with Napoleon as First Consul.

People who appear alongside

  • Louis XVI1754 – 1793

    King of France, executed during the Revolution

  • Comte de Mirabeau1749 – 1791

    Nobleman elected for the Third Estate whose oratory led the early National Assembly towards a constitutional monarchy

  • Jacques Necker1732 – 1804

    Genevan banker and finance minister to Louis XVI whose dismissal in July 1789 set off the storming of the Bastille

  • Maximilien Robespierre1758 – 1794

    Jacobin leader who dominated the Committee of Public Safety during the Reign of Terror and was guillotined after the Thermidorian Reaction of 1794

  • Napoleon Bonaparte1769 – 1821

    Revolutionary general, later Emperor of the French

  • Paul Barras1755 – 1829

    Convention deputy who led the Thermidorian Reaction and became the strongman of the Directory until the coup of Brumaire

Themes this person appears in

  • The French Revolution1787 – 1799

    From the Assembly of Notables and the Estates-General to the coup of 18 Brumaire — twelve years that toppled the absolute monarchy, founded a republic, passed through Terror and reaction, and ended with Napoleon