The Exciting 18th Century: Revolutionaries, Adventurers, Debauchers, and Puritans. An Era That Changed the World Forever

The era of revolutions, wars, the wealth of Versailles, and the cunning of adventurers — all this is the 18th century. Historian Francis Waines immerses us in the whirlpool of an era that changed the world. The American War of Independence defined the future history of democracy, while the French Revolution gifted the world the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. Masonic lodges gained popularity across Europe, and numerous religious sects found refuge from persecution in the American states. The philosophy of the Enlightenment questioned the unlimited power of monarchs and the powerlessness of the people. The marriage of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette united the great dynasties of the Bourbons and Habsburgs, yet their reign became the embodiment of all the vices of absolute monarchy. High court fashion coexisted with the hunger of peasants, while revolutionaries and philosophers tirelessly wrote denunciatory pamphlets. Waines reveals to us a true panorama of the mad era of smugglers, debauchers, intrigants, as well as Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. 'The Bastille was the embodiment of all that was vile, according to the demonstrators, in a regime guilty of the hunger of the French people. There was no way back. The Bastille had to fall' (Francis Waines).