third estate
Non-noble French populace
The third estate was the common people in pre-revolutionary France—everyone who wasn't clergy (first estate) or nobility (second estate).
This vast majority included peasants, merchants, and the bourgeoisie, yet held minimal political power.
The term now refers broadly to ordinary citizens as distinct from privileged classes: The revolution claimed to speak for the third estate.
Rural working class
- artisansSkilled manual workers
- serfsFeudal bound laborers
- plebeiansRoman lower classes
- proletariatLaborers lacking capital ownership
laborers · craftsmen · tradespeople · yeomen · commonalty · guildsmen · cottagers · villagers
Bulk or populace
- populaceInhabitants of a place
- multitudeVery large number
- rank and fileOrdinary members collectively
- common peopleNon-elite members of society
general public · majority · society · lower orders · ordinary people · subjects · citizens · have-nots
Felt wrongs or injustices
- National AssemblyA nation's legislative body
- uprisingOrganized resistance to power
- JacobinsFrench revolutionary faction
- sans-culottesRevolutionary French working-class radicals
guillotine · liberty · equality · fraternity · ancien régime · reform · pamphlet · 1789
Depiction or likeness
- suffrageRight to cast ballots
- parliamentNational legislative assembly
- assemblyConstructing from components
- votingFormally registering a choice
electorate · legislature · civic · enfranchisement · citizenship · republic · democracy · rights
Tenth for clergy
- manorialismMedieval estate labor system
- serfdomFeudal bound labor
- vassalageSubordination to a lord
- fiefsGranted hereditary estates
feudalism · lords · nobility · clergy · privileges · obligations · landless · taxation
peasantry
Rural working class
proletariat · laborers · craftsmen · tradespeople · yeomen · commonalty · guildsmen · cottagers · villagers · tenant farmers
masses
Bulk or populace
- populaceInhabitants of a place
- multitudeVery large number
- rank and fileOrdinary members collectively
common people · general public · majority · society · lower orders · ordinary people · subjects · citizens · have-nots · disenfranchised
grievances
Felt wrongs or injustices
- National AssemblyA nation's legislative body
- uprisingOrganized resistance to power
- JacobinsFrench revolutionary faction
sans-culottes · guillotine · liberty · equality · fraternity · ancien régime · reform · pamphlet · 1789 · delegates
representation
Depiction or likeness
- suffrageRight to cast ballots
- parliamentNational legislative assembly
- assemblyConstructing from components
voting · electorate · legislature · civic · enfranchisement · citizenship · republic · democracy · rights · voice
tithe
Tenth for clergy
- manorialismMedieval estate labor system
- serfdomFeudal bound labor
- vassalageSubordination to a lord
fiefs · feudalism · lords · nobility · clergy · privileges · obligations · landless · taxation · exemptions
- Ancien Regimeintendant, Versailles, Bastille, corvee, capitation
- social classesupper class, middle class, lower class, working class, nobles
third estateclergy
Ordained religious officials collectively
nobility · aristocracy · peerage · noblesse · the church
third estatecounter-revolutionaries
Opponents of political overthrow
royalists · émigrés · reactionaries · monarchists · White Terror