1770 in France

← 1769 1768 1767 1766 1765 1770 in France → 1771 1772 1773 1774 1775
Decades:	1750s 1760s 1770s 1780s 1790s
See also:	Other events of 1770 History of France  • Timeline  • Years

Events from the year 1770 in France

Incumbents

• Monarch – Louis XV ^[1]

Events

• 16 May – 14-year-old Marie Antoinette of Austria marries Louis-Auguste (who in 1774 becomes King Louis XVI of France) at the Palace of Versailles
• 20 May – A stampede at a celebration of the newly wedded Marie Antoinette and Louis-Auguste in Paris kills more than a hundred people ^[2]
• 3 June – The 7.5 M_w Port-au-Prince earthquake affects the French colony of Saint-Domingue with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme), killing 250 or more
• 14 June–3 October – Charles Messier observes Lexell's Comet as it passes closer to Earth than any other in recorded history ^[3]
• 7 December – Louis XV issues the Edict of December, dismissing rebellious magistrates of the Parlements of Paris and the other 13 provinces ^{[4] [5]}
• 24 December – César Gabriel de Choiseul is dismissed from his position as Secretary of the Navy by the king ^[6]
• Cemetery of Saint-Louis, Versailles established
• Joseph-Louis Lagrange proves Bachet's conjecture
• The Baron d'Holbach's (anonymous) materialist work Le Système de la Nature ou Des Loix du Monde Physique et du Monde Moral is published

Culture

• 20 January – The new Théâtre du Palais-Royal (rue Saint-Honoré), the first purpose-built opera house in Paris, designed by Pierre-Louis Moreau-Desproux, is inaugurated with a performance of Rameau's Zoroastre ^{[7] [8]}
• 16 May – The new Opéra royal de Versailles, designed by Ange-Jacques Gabriel, is inaugurated with a performance of Lully's Persée ^[9]
• 27 October – First performance of the opera Les deux avares , written by André Grétry
• December – The Library of the Sorbonne in Paris is opened to the public ^[10]
• The Théâtre Déjazet is established in Paris by the Comte d'Artois
• Anne Vallayer-Coster is admitted to the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture at the age of 26 ^[11]

Births

• 5 February – Alexandre Brongniart, chemist, mineralogist and zoologist (died 1847)
• 21 February – Georges Mouton, Marshal of France (died 1838)
• 2 March – Louis-Gabriel Suchet, Marshal of France (died 1826)
• 25 March – Antoine Richepanse, revolutionary general (died 1802)
• 10 May – Louis-Nicolas Davout, Marshal of France (died 1823)
• 18 December – Nicolas Joseph Maison, Marshal of France, Minister of War (died 1840)

Deaths

Esprit Antoine Blanchard

• 14 March – Nicolas-Charles-Joseph Trublet, clergyman and moralist (born 1697)
• 19 April – Esprit Antoine Blanchard, musician (born 1696) ^[12]
• 25 April – Jean-Antoine Nollet clergyman and physicist (born 1700)
• 30 May – François Boucher, painter (born 1703)
• 3 August – Guillaume-François Rouelle, chemist and apothecary (born 1703)
• 28 November – Charles-Jean-François Hénault, historian (born 1685)
• 15 December – Pierre-Joseph Alary, ecclesiastic and writer (born 1689)

References

1. "Louis XV (1710-1774)". History. BBC. Retrieved 2025-05-21.
2. Delalex, Hélène; Maral, Alexandre; Milovanovic, Nicolas (2016). Marie-Antoinette. Los Angeles: Getty Publications. p. 25. ISBN   9781606064832.
3. "D/1770 L1 (Lexell)". Gary W. Kronk's Cometography. Retrieved 2025-05-21.
4. Loft, Leonore (2002). Passion, Politics and Philosophie: rediscovering J.-P. Brissot. Westport, Ct: Greenwood. p. 55.
5. Van Kley, Dale K. (1996). The Religious Origins of the French Revolution: from Calvin to the Civil Constitution, 1560-1791. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 249.
6. Strugnell, Antony (2012). Diderot’s Politics: a study of the Evolution of Diderot’s Political Thought after the Encyclopedie. Nijhof. p. 123.
7. Pitou, Spire (1983). The Paris Opéra: An Encyclopedia of Operas, Ballets, Composers and Performers: Genesis and Glory, 1671–1715. Westport, Ct: Greenwood Press. p. 26. ISBN   9780313214202.
8. Mead, Christopher Curtis (1991). Charles Garnier's Paris Opera. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. p. 45. ISBN   978-0-262-13275-6.
9. Praefcke, Andreas. "Versailles: Théâtre Gabriel / Opéra Royal". Carthalia. Retrieved 2025-05-21.
10. Stam, David H. (2001). International Dictionary of Library Histories. Routledge. p. 881. ISBN   978-1-136-77785-1.
11. McKinven, Mary Jane (June 2002). Stunning Still Lifes by Anne Vallayer-Coster, Foremost 18th-Century Painter in Court of Marie-Antoinette. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art.
12. Blangstrup, Chr., ed. (1915). "Blanchard, Esprit Joseph Antoine". Salmonsens Konversationsleksikon (in Danish). Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Copenhagen: J.H. Schultz Forlagsboghandel. p. 385. Retrieved 28 August 2015.