#tallien

I was able to find descriptions of Manon Roland, Claire Lacombe, Elisabeth Le Bas, and Lucile Desmoulins. The description of Simone Evrard is thanks to @anotherhumaninthisworld.

Here are some women reputed either for being charming or very beautiful during the French Revolution (I will make another one about men of the french revolution next time). Which of these women would you prefer based on physical appearance?

Among the Enragés: Claire Lacombe

While imprisoned at Sainte-Pélagie, her physical appearance is described as: “height of 5 feet 2 inches (168 cm). Brown hair, eyebrows, and eyes, medium nose, large mouth, round face and chin, plain forehead.” She is described as “pretty” by Pierre Joseph Roussel in Histoire secrète du tribunal révolutionnaire. Even Marc-Antoine Baudot and Choudieu, who often describe her pejoratively (and sometimes in a sexist manner), admit she is beautiful.

Among the Hébertists: Sophie Momoro

Sophie Momoro played the role of the Goddess of Reason, according to her contemporaries such as Herlaut, Avenel, and Jean-Clément Martin, suggesting she had a graceful appearance. A report cited in Lenôtre’s works says that “she was noted for the beauty of her figure, as well as for the freshness and radiance of her complexion”, while another source describes her as “graceful” and “Raphaelesque”. According to the Maitron website, Sophie Momoro was considered very beautiful.

Jean-Baptiste Laboureau, while she was imprisoned at Port-Libre, stated that she “is very mundane; passable features, terrible teeth, the voice of a fishwife, an awkward appearance, that’s what constitutes Madame Momoro.” However, Laboureau was a spy who testified against Momoro and may have been deliberately cruel, so his description is likely unreliable—especially since playing the Goddess of Reason required at least a minimally graceful physique.

Among the Montagnards after Thermidor: Anne-Angélique Doye (wife of Billaud-Varenne)

Conte describes her as: “Blonde, with a porcelain complexion, she radiates beauty and charm.” Bernard, an aide-de-camp of Victor Hugues, describes her as “a lady of moving beauty.”

Among the Babouvists: Sophie Lapierre

Robert Legrand, in his book Babeuf et ses compagnons de route, describes her as a "pretty woman with Venetian blond hair".

Among the “Maratists”: Simone Evrard

Simone Evrard, widow of Jean-Paul Marat, is described in a 1792 police report as: “Height: 1.62 m, brown hair and eyebrows, ordinary forehead, aquiline nose, brown eyes, large mouth, oval face.” In Marat et ses calomniateurs ou Réfutation de l’Histoire des Girondins de Lamartine (1847) by Constant Hilbe, her neighbor describes her as “very distinguished,” “very fine,” and “of angelic sweetness,” although Souberbielle claims she “was extremely plain and could never have had any good looks.”

Among the Robespierrists: Elisabeth Le Bas

According to Alphonse Esquiros, she had dark eyes. Even if it is uncertain that Hamel met her personally, he describes her as “one of the most charming blondes one could see.”

Among the Dantonist : Lucile Desmoulins

According to Hervé Leuwers’ book devoted to her and her husband, Camille et Lucile Desmoulins: un rêve de république, she is described as “height of five feet one and a half inches (166 cm). Brown hair, eyebrows, and eyes. Medium-sized nose and mouth. Round face and chin. Ordinary forehead. A mark above the chin on the right.” Le Journal Générale de la Cour et de la Ville in 1791 describes her as pretty, and the deputy of the Convention Pierre Paganel calls her beautiful. Amandine Rolland, Louis Marie Prudhomme, and Théodore de Lameth also describe her as beautiful. Maximilien Robespierre, in a letter he wrote to Camille Desmoulins on February 14, 1791, says that Lucile has “beautiful eyes” and is “charming,” as you can see here:Une lettre de Robespierre à Camille Desmoulins (14 février 1791) on JSTOR

Among the Girondins: Manon Roland

Although she describes herself in her memoirs as “of little beauty,” she notes that she had “a firm and graceful posture.” She describes her physical appearance when she was 14 in these terms:

”At fourteen, like today, I was about five pieds (162 cm) tall; my size had acquired all its growth; the leg well shaped, the foot well placed, the hips very raised, the chest broad, the shoulders effaced, the attitude firm and graceful, the walk rapid and light; this is what first hit the eye. There was nothing striking about my face, only great freshness, a lot of softness and expression. By detailing each of the features, one can ask oneself: Where is the beauty? Nothing is regular, everything pleases. The mouth is a little big; there are a thousand prettier ones; not one has a more tender and seductive smile. The eyes, on the contrary, are not very large, their iris is a grey-chestnut; but placed not very deep in the sockets, with an open, frank, lively and gentle gaze, crowned with brown eyebrows the same colour as the hair, and well defined, they vary in their expression, like the affectionate soul whose movements they paint; serious and proud, they sometimes surprise; but they caress much more, and always wakes you up. My nose was causing me some pain, I found it a little big at the tip; however, I considered that overall, and especially in profile, it did not spoil anything else. The broad, bare forehead, little covered at that age, supported by the very high orbit of the eye, and in the middle of which veins in Greek vanished at the slightest emotion, was far from the the insignificance that one finds on so many faces. As for the fairly upturned chin, it has precisely the characteristics that the physiognomies indicate for those of voluptuousness; when I bring them together with everything that is particular to me, I doubt that anyone was ever more made for it, and enjoyed it less. Bright rather than very white complexion, dazzling colors, frequently enhanced by the sudden redness of boiling blood, excited by the most sensitive nerves; the soft skin, the rounded arm, the pleasant hand, without being small, because its elongated and slender fingers announce skill and retain grace; fresh, tidy teeth; the plumpness of perfect health: such are the treasures that nature had given me.I have lost many, especially those who are plump and fresh; those who remain with me still hide, without me using any art, five to six of my years; and the very people who see me every day need me to tell them my age, to believe that I am over thirty-two or thirty-three. […]My portrait has been drawn several times, painted and engraved: none of these imitations gives the idea of ​​my person; it is difficult to grasp because I have more soul than face, more expression than features. […]Camille Desmoulins was right to be surprised that at my age, and with so little beauty, I had what he calls admirers ».

Helena Maria Williams describes her as “still handsome”, and Honoré Riouffe, who saw her at the Conciergerie prison, describes her as “a pretty woman” with “an elegant figure.”

Among the Thermidorians: Théresia Tallien

Described by her jailers during her incarceration in 1794: “Thérèse Cabarrus, femme Fontenay, (…) native of Madrid, Spain, without occupation, residing in Versailles, height 5 feet 15 inches, brown hair and eyebrows, ordinary forehead, brown eyes, medium nose, small mouth, round chin.” The Queen of the Directory was also known for her exceptional beauty.

Marat (originally Barras), I guess the afterlife turned him into a moderate. They do call him “François” at the begging of the film, so I suppose it’s meant to be a different Marat? I like to think it’s his evil twin. And Talleyrand (originally Tallien), slightly less egregious than the last one since instead of another metaphysical plane, Talleyrand was just in another continent during Thermidor. (He also gets described as an “honest man”, which was the comedic highlight of film.)

The writer’s room:

Henri Admirat: wanted to shoot Robespierre at the Committee of Public Safety, tried to shoot Collot d’Herbois in his stairwell.

Cécile Renault: wanted to stab Robespierre with an ivory dagger that she didn’t know was in her pocket. 

Legendre: was encouraged by an anonymous letter to take two pistols and shoot Saint-Just and Robespierre in the middle of the Convention

Lecointre, Fréron, Barras, Rovère, Thirion, Courtois, Garnier de l'Aube, Guffroy and Tallien: planned to team up and stab Robespierre to death in the middle of the Convention.

Bourdon d’Oise: planned to on his own stab Robespierre to death with a cutlass according to Pierre Nicolas Berryer.

Fouché: wanted to kidnap Robespierre from the jacobins and drown him in the Seine according to Paul Ségur.

Collot d’Herbois: attempted to throw Robespierre through the window of the Committee of Public Safety according to Barras.

Unknown assassin 1: tried to kill Robespierre on the eve of the Insurrection of August 10 according to Lucile Desmoulins.

Unknown assassin 2: tried to choke Robespierre to death when alone with him at the Duplays according to Charlotte Robespierre.

Charlotte Robespierre: attempted to poison Robespierre with jam according to Françoise Duplay.

If reddit had existed in the 18th century I bet these guys would be active in threads like this:

OK but seriously, which one of these assassination attemps actually come off as least unserious/most probable to actually working?