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A second légende noire is that the French Revolution was similarly destructive of the family.38 By instituting liberal divorce provisions, undermining the testamentary power of parents, and making marriage a purely civil act, it was soon argued that the Revolution had undermined parental authority and debased the institution of marriage. Again, the reality is far more complex. Revolutionaries themselves argued that the intent of the reforms was in fact to “regenerate” the family, seen to have been corrupted by the inequality of the Ancien Régime. Certainly, this was the explicit rationale of the 1792 divorce law. Between 70,000 and 100,000 people were divorced  in 1792-1803, mainly in cities such as Paris and Rouen and in country towns like Vire, Bayeux and Honfleur. It was overwhelmingly women who initiated the divorce to escape marriages that had ended in desertion, violence or misery...

 The legal status of women changed significantly in specific areas. In 1791 the law on inheritance guaranteed daughters equal inheritance rights to their brothers; only the addition in 1801 of a share of property set aside for parental discretion altered a law essentially in force to this day. The Constitution of September 1791 defined civil majority in identical terms for men and women. In 1792 women were also acknowledged to possess sufficient reason and independence to serve as witnesses to public documents and to enter into contracts. They were also allowed to share in the division of communal property in 1793. The laws of September 1792, concerning civil status and divorce, treated husband and wife in symmetrical terms.