French nobility
Pre-revolutionary ruling class
The French nobility was the aristocratic class in France, a hereditary social order holding titles, lands, and privileges until the Revolution of 1789 abolished noble status.
The system included ranks from dukes and counts down to minor lords.
The French nobility lost their estates during the Terror.
Noble titles were later restored but without legal privileges.
- Ancien RégimePre-1789 French system
- baronLow-ranking peer
- VersaillesFrench royal palace complex
- Sun KingEpithet for absolute monarch
- Estates-GeneralFrench representative body, three classes
royal court · marquis · count · duke · seigneur · château · landed gentry · heraldry · privilege · royal bloodline · salon · powdered wigs · comte · dauphin · lineage · courtier · estates · hunting
- French Thingsbaguette, beret, Eiffel Tower, croissant, Louvre
- Medieval FranceValois, Philip II, Charles VII, Saint Louis, Joan of Arc
- Pre-Revolutionary FranceLouis XV, Louis XVI, Versailles, Madame de Pompadour, court life
- etiquettemanners, politeness, etiquette, table manners, courtesy
- French cartographyriver maps, city plans, road networks, provinces, Normandy
- French influence on EnglandNorman conquest, Normans, William the Conqueror, Anglo-Norman, Bayeux Tapestry
French nobilitycommoners
Ordinary citizens, untitled
the common people · serfs · the masses · villeins · sans-culottes
French nobilityJacobins
French revolutionary faction
sans-culottes · revolutionaries · the mob · Montagnards · Robespierre
French nobilitybourgeoisie
Capitalist ownership class
merchant class · manufacturers · financiers · entrepreneurs · shopkeepers
noble, nobility, French, ennoble, nobleman, nobles, noblesse, ennobled, noblemen