French Revolution In Gunpowder

Warfare is more than a reflection of a particular society but also a reflection of the era in which it is fought in. By the fourteenth century, European warfare was completely overhauled by a revolution in gunpowder. Gunpowder weapons were cheaper, easier and more efficient to use in an era already laden with costs. Soldiers could effectively learn to aim, fire and load a handgun in under a week. With limited training, the average soldier became militarily equal to his social superiors and quantity further replaced quality. As it became more affordable for European states to sponsor armies of unprecedented sizes, “the century of the soldier” emerged. By the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, it became almost mandatory for states to have large armies to settle their territorial and dynastic claims. For example, Charles the Bold of Burgundy was able to sponsor 15,000 men in 1470 in comparison to his descendant, Philip II, in 1640 who financially sponsored 86,000 soldiers. Even more dramatically, Francis I of France had 32,000 men in 1525 while Louis XIII of France had 144,000 men in 1635. While size created administrative problems, gunpowder weapons did damage similarly if not greater than the expensive aristocratic men of cavalry or the problem of time for training in the case of archers. Gunpowder shaped warfare by creating a large efficient army centred on the average citizen. This revolution in gunpowder also forced changes to …show more content…
The French Revolution of the 1790s argued for societal change after a series of bad harvests, financial crises and resentments toward aristocratic, clerical and royal privileges angered the masses. To set things strait, the masses wrest control for their social superiors, which resulted in army that changed to reflect the new French society. As French General Jacques Antoine Hippolyte, the Comté de Guibert,