Once dubbed the “National Razor” of France, Madame La Guillotine was the nickname Parisians gave to the device that beheaded their aristocratic French Revolution enemies, and which they held in great regard. In 1789, Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin proposed to the French government that decapitation by this lightning-quick machine would be more humane than the much-botched …
Let Them Eat Cake
While this phrase might have been wrongly attributed to Queen Marie Antoinette during the French Revolution, she certainly was not high on the popularity stakes! The first important event I wanted to mark was the death of Marie Antoinette on 16th October, 1793. At 12h15, several weeks before her 38th birthday, she was guillotined on …