On 10 November–the day that a broken-hearted Roland committed suicide on an empty provincial road–the first Festival of Reason was held in Paris. This was the high point of revolutionary dechristianization. The Republic’s secular calendar had been introduced the previous month, with its months and holidays renamed using nature and agriculture as inspiration. According to the new system the festival was held on 20 Brumaire Year II: the second décadi, or twentieth day, of the month of mists, in the second year of the Republic. The day itself was called Herse, or ‘harrow’, after the farm
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