1792: The September Massacres begin in Paris

During the September Massacres of 1792, revolutionary crowds swept through Paris prisons and religious institutions, killing prisoners and others regarded as enemies of the Revolution.

At the Carmelite Convent, Roman Catholic clergy imprisoned for refusing to swear allegiance to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy were brought out and killed, among them several bishops.

The violence formed part of a broader wave of extrajudicial executions that engulfed Paris over several days, as fears of counter-revolution and foreign invasion fed a climate of panic and vengeance.

Those killed at the convent were later recognised by the Catholic Church as the Martyrs of September and were beatified in 1926.

Engraving showing the massacre of Princess de Lamballe
Engraving showing the massacre of Princess de Lamballe

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1546: Scholar and Printer Etienne Dolet Hanged and Burned for Heresy in Paris

Etienne Dolet, born in Orleans in 1509, was a French scholar, translator and printer whose humanist convictions put him on a collision course with the French Inquisition. Educated at Padua and Toulouse, he built a reputation as a gifted orator and a defiant critic of religious orthodoxy. His publications in Lyon drew the close attention of inquisitorial authorities, and after several periods of imprisonment, the combined forces of the parlement of Paris, the Inquisition, and the Sorbonne secured his conviction for heresy, blasphemy and sedition.

On 3 August 1546, his 37th birthday, Dolet was hanged and burned alongside his books on the Place Maubert in Paris. He is remembered today as a martyr for freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

16th century engraving portrait of Etienne Dolet
16th century engraving portrait of Etienne Dolet

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