Nicolas Jean Hugon de Bassville

Last updated April 27, 2019

Nicolas Jean Hugon de Bassville or Basseville (February 7, 1743 –January 13, 1793), French journalist and diplomatist, was born at Abbéville.

France, officially the French Republic, is a country whose territory consists of metropolitan France in Western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The metropolitan area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean. It is bordered by Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany to the northeast, Switzerland and Italy to the east, and Andorra and Spain to the south. The overseas territories include French Guiana in South America and several islands in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. The country's 18 integral regions span a combined area of 643,801 square kilometres (248,573 sq mi) and a total population of 67.3 million. France, a sovereign state, is a unitary semi-presidential republic with its capital in Paris, the country's largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Other major urban areas include Lyon, Marseille, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Lille and Nice.

A journalist is a person who collects, writes, or distributes news or other current information to the public. A journalist's work is called journalism. A journalist can work with general issues or specialize in certain issues. However, most journalists tend to specialize, and by cooperating with other journalists, produce journals that span many topics. For example, a sports journalist covers news within the world of sports, but this journalist may be a part of a newspaper that covers many different topics.

A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with one or more other states or international organizations. The main functions of diplomats are: representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state; initiation and facilitation of strategic agreements; treaties and conventions; promotion of information; trade and commerce; technology; and friendly relations. Seasoned diplomats of international repute are used in international organizations as well as multinational companies for their experience in management and negotiating skills. Diplomats are members of foreign services and diplomatic corps of various nations of the world.

Biography

Bassville was trained for the priesthood, taught theology in a provincial seminary and then went to Paris. Here in 1784 he published Éléments de mythologie and some poems, which brought him into notice. On the recommendation of the prince of Condé he became tutor to two young Americans travelling in Europe. With them he visited Berlin, made the acquaintance there of Mirabeau, and became a member of the Berlin Royal Academy.^[1]

Theology is the critical study of the nature of the divine. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the supernatural, but also especially with epistemology, and asks and seeks to answer the question of revelation. Revelation pertains to the acceptance of God, gods, or deities, as not only transcendent or above the natural world, but also willing and able to interact with the natural world and, in particular, to reveal themselves to humankind. While theology has turned into a secular field, religious adherents still consider theology to be a discipline that helps them live and understand concepts such as life and love and that helps them lead lives of obedience to the deities they follow or worship.

Paris is the capital and most populous city of France, with an area of 105 square kilometres and an official estimated population of 2,140,526 residents as of 1 January 2019. Since the 17th century, Paris has been one of Europe's major centres of finance, diplomacy, commerce, fashion, science, and the arts.

The Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences was an academy established in Berlin, Germany on 11 July 1700, four years after the Akademie der Künste, or "Arts Academy," to which "Berlin Academy" may also refer. In the 18th century, it was a French-language institution, and its most active members were Huguenots who had fled religious persecution in France.

At the outbreak of the Revolution Bassville turned to journalism, becoming editor of the Mercure international. Then, through the Girondist minister Lebrun-Tondu, he entered the diplomatic service, went in May, 1792, as secretary of legation to Naples and was shortly afterwards sent, without official status, to Rome.^[1]

The French Revolution was a period of far-reaching social and political upheaval in France and its colonies beginning in 1789. The Revolution overthrew the monarchy, established a republic, catalyzed violent periods of political turmoil, and finally culminated in a dictatorship under Napoleon who brought many of its principles to areas he conquered in Western Europe and beyond. Inspired by liberal and radical ideas, the Revolution profoundly altered the course of modern history, triggering the global decline of absolute monarchies while replacing them with republics and liberal democracies. Through the Revolutionary Wars, it unleashed a wave of global conflicts that extended from the Caribbean to the Middle East. Historians widely regard the Revolution as one of the most important events in human history.

Journalism refers to the production and distribution of reports on recent events. The word journalism applies to the occupation, as well as citizen journalists using methods of gathering information and using literary techniques. Journalistic media include print, television, radio, Internet, and, in the past, newsreels.

Pierre-Henri-Hélène-Marie Lebrun-Tondu was a journalist and a French minister, during the French Revolution.

In Rome Bassville acted as the outspoken revolutionary he was, rather than a conventional diplomat. He ordered the fleur-de-lys on the escutcheon of the French embassy to be replaced by a picture of Liberty painted by a French art student, proclaimed himself protector of the radical Jacobins in Rome, and demanded the expulsion of the French émigrés who had taken refuge there, including the "demoiselles Capet"^[1] (i.e. members of the French Royal Family).

Broadly speaking, liberty is the ability to do as one pleases. In politics, liberty consists of the social, political, and economic freedoms to which all community members are entitled. In philosophy, liberty involves free will as contrasted with determinism. In theology, liberty is freedom from the effects of "sin, spiritual servitude, [or] worldly ties."

A Jacobin was a member of the Jacobin Club, a revolutionary political movement that was the most famous political club during the French Revolution (1789–99). The club was so called because of the Dominican convent in Paris in the Rue Saint-Jacques where they originally met.

Bassville talked at large of the "purple geese of the Capitol"^[1] - i.e., the Sacred geese of Juno who were told in Roman Mythology to have saved the ancient City of Rome, a story taken up and given a Republican interpretation by French Revolutionaries. He met the remonstrances of Cardinal Zelada, the Papal Secretary of State, with insults.^[1]

Francesco Saverio [de] Zelada was a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, born of a Spanish family, who served in the Papal Curia and in the diplomatic service of the Holy See.

His conduct enraged the more conservative elements of the Roman populace, who considered him to have "insulted the Pope". On the January 13, 1793 Bassville, who was driving with his family to the Via del Corso, was dragged from his carriage and lynched, so roughly handled that he died. The affair was magnified in the Convention, being considered "a deliberate murder of the representative of the Republic" by the pope's orders. In 1797 an article of the treaty of Tolentino compelled the Papal government to pay compensation to Bassville's family.^[1]

The Via del Corso, is a main street in the historical centre of Rome. It is straight in an area characterized by narrow meandering alleys and small piazzas. Considered a wide street in ancient times, today the Corso is approximately 10 metres wide, and it only has room for two lanes of traffic and two narrow sidewalks. The northern portion of the street is a pedestrian area. The length of the street is roughly 1.5 kilometres.

Lynching is a premeditated extrajudicial killing by a group. It is most often used to characterize informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged transgressor, or to intimidate a group. It is an extreme form of informal group social control such as charivari, riding the rail, and tarring and feathering, and often conducted with the display of a public spectacle for maximum intimidation. It is to be considered an act of terrorism and punishable by law. Instances of lynchings and similar mob violence can be found in every society.

Pope Pius VI, born Count Giovanni Angelo Braschi, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 15 February 1775 to his death in 1799.

Among his writings is included Mémoires historiques, critiques et politiques sur la Révolution de France (Paris 1790; English trans. London, 1790).^[1]

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References

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain : Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Bassville, Nicolas Jean Hugon de". Encyclopædia Britannica . 3 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 498. Endnotes:
- F Masson, Les Diplomates de la Révolution (Paris, 1882)
- David Silvagni, La Corte e la Società romana nei secoli XVIII. e XIX. (Florence, 1881)

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[EB1911-1] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain : Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Bassville, Nicolas Jean Hugon de". Encyclopædia Britannica . 3 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 498. Endnotes:
F Masson, Les Diplomates de la Révolution (Paris, 1882)
David Silvagni, La Corte e la Società romana nei secoli XVIII. e XIX. (Florence, 1881)

[mwQQ] F Masson, Les Diplomates de la Révolution (Paris, 1882)

[mwRA] David Silvagni, La Corte e la Società romana nei secoli XVIII. e XIX. (Florence, 1881)