Paris in the 18th century Picpus. Among those executed in the last great surge of the reign of terror were the eminent chemist Lavoisier (8 May 1794) and the poet Andre Chenier, executed 25 July 1794, just two days before the end of the Terror. On June 8, 1793, at the debut of the new wave of terror, Robespierre presided over the Festival of the Supreme Being in the huge amphitheater on the Champs de Mars which had been constructed in 1790 for the first anniversary of the Revolution; the ceremony was designed by the painter David, and featured a ten-hour parade, bonfires a statue
History of the Jews in France up the Jews of Rouen in a church and to have murdered them without distinction of age or sex, sparing only those who accepted baptism. According to a Hebrew document, the Jews throughout France were at that time in great fear, and wrote to their brothers in the Rhine countries making known to them their terror and asking them to fast and pray. In the Rhineland thousands of Jews were killed by the Crusaders (see German Crusade, 1096). The First Crusade led to nearly a century of accusations (blood libel) against the Jews, many of whom were burned or attacked