The first act of the new Assembly was to declare the abolition of royalty, and to proclaim France a Republic. At the same time it began the attempt to inaugurate a new era, the first day of the first year of which was to be September 22nd, 1792.
In the new Revolutionary calendar the Christian order of months and weeks was set aside for an arbitrary arrangement whose awkward and frivolous character was evident, even independently of its sacrilegious intent. Instead of weeks of seven days, periods of ten days, or decades, were substituted. As there was to be no Sunday, the tenth or last day of the decade, called "Decadi," was to be observed as the day of rest, and have all the importance of the Lord's Day, the place of which it had taken. The months were twelve and consisted each of thirty days; to make up the necessary 365 days of the year, five intercalary days, called _sans culottes_, were added.
The months were adorned with festive names taken from Nature; thus Vendemaire, the vintage month; Brumaire, the foggy; Frimaire, the frosty; Nivose, the snowy; Pluvoise, the rainy; Ventose, the windy; Germinal, the month of sprouting; Floréal, the month of flowers; Prairial, the haymaking; Messidor, the time of harvest; Thermidor, the month of heat; and Fructidor, the month of fruit. To obliterate, as far as possible, every Christian idea associated with the days of the year, the new calendar abolished the Christian festivals and substituted strange and uncouth denominations for each successive day. It was a bold stroke, and though the Convention succeeded a few months later in causing its execution throughout the country, nevertheless it was never heartily accepted even by the most radical, and only a favorable opportunity was wanting for its final abolition with the Revolution itself.
On the twenty-seventh of September, the Convention reduced ecclesiastical pensions to 1000 livres, and on October 23rd, it decreed that all who had flown the country were to be considered as banished in perpetuity, and should they return they were to be punished with death. On November 27th, a decree was passed, declaring that if a priest should marry, and be therefore inquieted by the residents of the commune in which he resided, he might retire to any place he liked, and his salary should be paid by the commune which had persecuted him. It was an effort to render the marriage of priests popular, an attempt, however, which always met with failure.