23 Prairial
An CCXXXIV
Philippe Fabre d'Églantine
Like all artists, Fabre was rather vain, and when one of his poems won the prize of the wild rose, he added this distinction (Églantine) to his name. The artist became a politician - with a slight tendency toward corruption. Fabre took part in shady dealings and forgeries, and was sentenced to death for it. The fact that he had to appear before the court together with Danton and his political allies was due to a clever move by the committees. The rulers wanted to use him to cast the Indulgents in a bad light. Despite his offences, Fabre d'Églantine went down in history as one of the creators of the Republican calendar. He developed the names of the months and days in the new system of time. Thus the day of his execution fell on Sextidi, 16 Germinal, Year II of the Republic.
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1750 - 1794
- July 29, 1750 · Birth in Carcassonne.
- 1770 · Fabre joins a travelling theatre troupe.
- November 9, 1778 · He marries the 18-year-old actress Marie Nicole Godin.
- 1785 · Director of the theatre in Nîmes.
- 1787 · Works as a playwright in Paris.
- 1789 · He leaves his wife and moves in with the actress Caroline Rémy.
- September 1792 · Deputy to the National Convention for the department of the Seine.
- October 24, 1793 · Fabre presents his proposal on the names of the months and days of the Republican Calendar to the Convention. The new designations are established by law.
- January 12, 1794 · Fabre is arrested at the instigation of the Committee of Public Safety because of his involvement in the affair of the East India Company.
- April 2, 1794 · The trial against him and other defendants (including Danton) begins before the Revolutionary Tribunal.
- April 5, 1794 · Execution on the Place de la Révolution in Paris.
Quotes
The priests had assigned every day of the year to the commemoration of a supposed saint; this catalogue of names was neither useful nor logical, it was a register of lies, fraud, and charlatanism.
Fabre in justification of a new calendar system, October 1793.
They have stolen a comedy from me that has nothing to do with my trial—let them keep it!
After his death sentence, Fabre worried about his play The Malta Orange
. He feared that Collot d'Herbois would pass it off as his own.
He kept mistresses, rode in carriages, and mingled with bankers of every nationality.
Albert Mathiez, 1922
Le Moniteur
The months of spring
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