The French Revolution can be viewed as a culmination of several hundred years of European History.  Many factors led to this event, including: famine and poverty, new attitudes about social class, ideas inherent in the American Revolution, and individual greed.

     Historians argue about the divisions and even the length of Le Grande Revolution.  This site divides the Great Revolution into four distinct phases for the purposes of understanding.  These include: the Constitutional Phase, the Reign of Terror, the Directory, and the Napoleonic Phase. 

     Ultimately, the revolution ended and France was seemingly restored to its former position.  However, as much as the leaders of Europe would have liked to believe that the old system was again in tact, they were fooling themselves.  The revolution sounded a warning to the system of monarchy and within a century of Napoleon's demise, the kings and queens of Europe had also lost their grip on power.