Great Cat Massacre

Robert Darnton Great Cat Massacre - booknotes on Chapters 2, 3, 4

Chapter 2 Workers Revolt - The Great Cat Massacre of the Rue Saint-Severin
Story of the great cat massacre told by Nicolas Contat, main figures - 2 fictionalized figures Jerome and Leveille, apprentices in the shop of Jacques Vincent.75 killing the cats as a way of getting back at the master, stood out as the most hilarious experience in Jerome’s career.75-7 But how could 18th C. mind find such cruelty hilarious? Certainly somewhat embroidered, but that is not important - what is important is what the story says about deeper mental structures.78
First off, cat massacre was a response to the master and his wife - who treated animals better than their apprentices.80
pages attempt to capture everything about the city. 107-8, how would we organize a “complete” picture of our town? This description of Montpellier, like Dickens, constructed and colored and structured by its author. To get at this 18th century understanding, we need to look more at “the modes of description than the objects described.” I.e. how did he order his world? What categories did he use to sort and describe? 109. Bourgeois. What does it mean? In France, interpretation is Marxist – widened as bourgeois ideology penetrates, is adopted, becomes dominant ideology driving French Revolution. This model assumes 3 tiered model of causality: economic to social to cultural change. 111. In this model, econ. Bourgeois become the most important element. 111. Only problem. Labrousse other annals historians, couldn’t find the bourgeois. At least, in the Marxist sense of manufacturers. 112. So who thought “bourgeois” if no manufacturers? Traditional elite of provincial elite of state officials, doctors and lawyers, who “thought bourgeois” in terms of values. 113. Writer in Montpellier (anon.) seems to come from this strata. He is not noble, nor of the “common people” b his own self-definition. 113. They were bourgeois in another sense, as inhabitants of a city. [Burgermeister Meisterburger!] The writer used the term bourgeois himself, as if it were self-evident.
an admin center and market town in Languedoc, big growth 1710-1789 (20,000 to 31,000). Verdigris production, regional center of wool production.114-5 Economy remained underdeveloped, however, in the sense that scale was universally small no matter what business one was in.115 Commercial oligarchy, some who were ennobled, but no ancient nobles in town. Elites knew each other.116 First part of description reads like a procession or a parade.116 This resembled the older social structure - first came clergy (first estate) bishops first then clergy, followed by nuns and monks, and finally the “Host” carried by the six consuls (top municipal officers)117-8 These counsuls were drawn from specific areas of society according to a set formula (see 118). Cour des Aides, highest court in the area followed next, then lower court officials. Procession ended at this point, but writer used the same hierarchical principles to fill out his description of the city.119 These processions expressed the corporate order of urban society.120 Observer good enough to point out details that indicate change - for example some clerks of the courts not allowed to wear red, which was reserved for those who had studied law.120 Observer thought monks had little dignity, but professors quite a bit - indicating that dignity and quality not necessarily tied to wealth.121 Social order, furthermore, not necessarily tied to polarization, but rather