The French Revolution officially started on July 14th, 1789 with the storming of the Bastille. Though, revolutionary ideas were already among the French for a long time. Louis XIV had built Versailles and when Louis XV succeeded him on the throne, he inherited a state debt of nearly 400 million Francs. Louis XV did not do a lot to overcome this debt and by the time Louis XVI acceded the throne, the bourgeois French were truly sick of their monarchs living in such verwhelming luxury while they were struggling to pay the taxes (while members of the Church and all of the Nobility did not have to pay anything). This caused uproars and eventually led to the Revolution as we know it today.
