The calling of an Estates General to meet in Versailles on 5 May 1789 did not mark a break with the past. On the contrary, it represented the revenge of the past on a decade of spasmodic attempts to promote root-and-branch reform from above. Brienne was hostile to the idea, as we have seen, and Necker was scarcely enthusiastic. Yet this same body gave birth to the National Assembly and a system of government known as constitutional monarchy. Both of these developments would serve to redirect the course of French history. However, it is unlikely that the deputies assembling in Versailles grasped the role that they were about to play: men make history without knowing what history they make. In 1789 men, and women, of very different backgrounds took steps which decisively altered the shape of the polity. On 17 June an impatient Third Estate laid claim to the authority of the nation and with extraordinary audacity declared illegal taxes not sanctioned by the National Assembly. On 14 July the people of Paris diminished the monarchy in a more physical sense. Then on 4 August the deputies voted – in some disarray it is true – to put an end to ‘privilege’, a decision that would entail major institutional reforms. Finally, in the autumn of that momentous year, the balance of power within the kingdom was tilted irrevocably in favour of the legislative body.