Page 5 - Understanding NCERT Histroy 09th

Activity (Page no. 6)

Q. Fill in the given blank box with appropriate terms from among the following: Food
Goyal Brothers Prakashan
riots, scarcity of grain, increased number of deaths, rising food prices, weaker bodies?
Ans. Bad Harvest----- Scarcity of Grain-----Rising Food prices ----- The Poorest can no longer
buy Bread --- i. weaker bodies , ii Food Riots
Increase Number of deaths --------------- Disease epidemics

1.3 A Growing Middle Class Envisages an End to Privileges
l Peasants used to participate in revolts against increasing taxes and food scarcity.

• The third estate had become prosperous and had access to education and new ideas.
• In the eighteenth century, new social groups emerged, termed the middle class, who earned
their wealth through expanding overseas trade and by manufacturing woollen and silk
textiles that were either exported or bought by the richer members of society.
• The third estate included professionals such as lawyers and administrative officials.
• Middle class was educated and believed that no group in society should be privileged by
birth.
• These ideas envisaging a society based on freedom and equal laws and opportunities for all.
• A new form of government was proposed by J.J. Rousseau based on a social contract between
people and their representatives.
• Similarly, Montesquieu in his book The Spirit of the Laws proposed a division of power
within the government between the legislative, executive and judiciary.
• In his book Two Treaties of Government John Locke refuted the doctrine of divine right
of the monarch.

Source A (Page no. 7)
Accounts of lived experiences in the Old Regime
1. Georges Danton, who later became active in revolutionary politics, wrote to a friend in 1793,
looking back upon the time when he had just completed his studies:
‘I was educated in the residential college of Plessis.
There I was in the company of important men … Once my studies ended, I was left with
nothing. I started looking for a post. It was impossible to find one at the law courts in Paris.
The choice of a career in the army was not open to me as I was not a noble by birth, nor did
I have a patron. The church too could not offer me a refuge. I could not buy an office as I did
not possess a sou. My old friends turned their backs to me … the system had provided us with
an education without however offering a field where our talents could be utilised.’
2. An Englishman, Arthur Young, travelled through France during the years from 1787 to 1789
and wrote detailed descriptions of his journeys. He often commented on what he saw. ‘He who
decides to be served and waited upon by slaves, ill-treated slaves at that, must be fully aware
that by doing so he is placing his property and his life in a situation which is very different
from that he would be in, had he chosen the services of free and well treated men. And he who
chooses to dine to the accompaniment of his victims’ groans, should not complain if during a
riot his daughter gets kidnapped or his son’s throat is slit.’

History Class IX H-3