Famine Plot Persuasion in Eighteenth-Century France: Transactions, American Philosophical Society (Vol. 72, Part 3)

This is a print on demand publication. The French Revolution seethed with rumors of plots instigated by various groups from aristocrats to brigands. Many of the rumors had to do with the food supply, especially with grain, from which the vast majority of Frenchmen derived most of their nourishment. These were called "famine plots," by which was meant a secret machination to starve the people in order to achieve certain ends. Like many attitudes & practices associated with the Revolution, the famine plot persuasion was a way of making sense of the world that was deeply rooted in the collective consciousness & the material, moral & political environment of the old regime. When there was a serious & protracted disruption of the normal grain & bread supply, consumers found reasons to question the authenticity of the dearth. The conviction grew that the crisis had been contrived, that there was a criminal conspiracy afoot against the people, that popular suffering was needless, & that the plotters somehow had to be resisted. This study examines the dearths of 1725-1726, 1738-1741, 1747 & 1751-1752, & the crises of 1765-1770 & 1771-1775.