Dechristianization of France during the French Revolution itself. There has been much scholarly debate over whether the movement was popularly motivated. The French Revolution initially began with attacks on church corruption and the wealth of the higher clergy, an action with which even many Christians could identify, since the Roman Catholic church held a dominant role in pre-revolutionary France. During a two-year period known as the Reign of Terror, the episodes of anti-clericalism grew more violent than any in modern European history. The new revolutionary authorities suppressed the church; abolished the Catholic monarchy; nationalized church property; exiled 30,000 priests and killed hundreds more. In October 1793 the
Red Terror men engaged in it. The term 'Red Terror' came to refer to other campaigns of violence carried out by communist or communist-affiliated groups. Examples of the usage of the term "Red Terrors" include the following: Red Terror The Red Terror was a period of political repression and mass killings carried out by Bolsheviks after the beginning of the Russian Civil War in 1918. The term is usually applied to Bolshevik political repression during the whole period of the Civil War (1917–1922), as distinguished from the White Terror carried out by the White Army (Russian monarchists) against their political enemies (including