Abstract
As J.C. Martin noticed, the awkward itinerary of the Comte d'Antraigues may be an outstanding example of the characteristic ambiguity of counterrevolution. After having published a scathing criticism of nobility in 1788, he turned out to be, from 1790, a strong-willed counterrevolutionary activist till the time he died. His puzzling metamorphosis may seem paradoxical to say the least, but it actually highlights the danger of defining counterrevolutionaries as a united category holding a grudge against any sign of advance. Truth be told, many historians have long either disregarded this complex phenomenon or caricatured it as an outdated wish to reverse the order of things. This neglect has led to an overly simplified and incomplete vision of these movements. A British thinker, Edmund Burke, was the first to put the emphasis on the indefectible link between Revolution and Counterrevolution and to view things in a different light. Throughout his ideological analysis of the first events, he blamed revolutionaries for their utopian pretension to believe in the construction of an utterly renewed political and social order.
