Divorcing in Revolutionary France

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Liberté de mariage (Divorce), 1793-1794, via Bibliothèque nationale de France.

During France's long revolutionary period, a lot of things changed,  including how you could end your marriage. In this episode, Christine takes a look at the introduction of divorce in France, including some of the ways you could (and couldn't) legally split from your spouse from the dawn of the French Revolution through the Napoleonic years and beyond.
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​Podcaster: Christine

Further Reading 

Code Napoleon, or the French Civil Code. (George Spence, Trans.), London, England: William Benning, 1827. See also Napoleon Series.

The French Revolution and Napoleon: A Sourcebook. Philip G Dwyer and Peter McPhee, Eds., Routledge (2002).

Suzanne Desan, The Family on Trial in Revolutionary France, University of California Press (2004).

Jennifer Ngaire Heuer, The Family and the Nation: Gender and Citizenship in Revolutionary France, 1789-1830, Cornell University Press, (2007). 

Theresa McBride, “Public Authority and Private Lives: Divorce after the French Revolution”, French Historical Studies, 17:3 (Spring 1992), pp. 747-768.

Roderick Phillips, “Demographic Aspects of Divorce in Rouen, 1792-1816”, Annales de démographie historique, (1976), pp. 429-441.

--, “Women and Family Breakdown in Eighteenth-Century France: Rouen 1780-1800”, Social History, 1:2 (May 1976), pp. 197-218.

Images

Liberté de mariage (Divorce), 1793-1794, via Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Le Divorce, 1793, via Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Related Content

This episode is part of our Revolutionary France Series.

Music: "Evening Melodrama" by Kevin Macleod (www.incompetech.com)

Le Divorce, 1793, via Bibliothèque nationale de France.