Paris in the 18th century were both used for high-ranking political prisoners, and had relatively luxurious conditions. The last three prisoners at the Chateau de Vincennes, the Marquis de Sade and two elderly and insane noblemen, were transferred to the Bastillle in 1784. The Bastille, begun in 1370, never held more than forty inmates; At the time of the Revolution, the Bastille had just seven prisoners; four counterfeiters, the two elderly noblemen, and a man named Tavernier, half-mad, accused of participation in an attempt to kill Louis XV thirty years earlier. Priests and other religious figures who committed crimes or other offenses were tried by
Paris in the 18th century the façades of government buildings. New forms of address were required: "Monsieur" and "Madame" were replaced by "Citoyen" and "Citoyenne", and the formal "vous" was replaced by the more proletarian "tu". Stores were forbidden to close on Sunday, and the heads of the statues of Saints on the façade of Notre-Dame cathedral were decapitated. Streets named for saints had the word "saint" effaced with a hammer. On 10 November, the first festival of Reason and Liberty was celebrated at the Cathedral. On December 4, 1793, the relative independence of the city government of Paris that it had enjoyed since 1789