ABSTRACT
‘Here and now a new epoch in world history is beginning, and you will be able to say you were present at it’, declared Goethe to his companions on the eve of the bombardment of Valmy, in Champagne, on September 20, 1792. We cannot be certain that these famous words were actually uttered in their present form; Goethe’s account of the French campaign was written late in life, as the last part of his memoirs, under the title Campagne in Frankreich, and in compiling it he refreshed his memory from old diaries, letters, memoirs, and by listening to the talk of his old servant Paul Gôtze . But his saying is true. Miserably planned and even more miserably conducted the campaign marked a turning point in world history: it decided the fate of the French Revolution. As the first great war of intervention undertaken for ideological reasons it also pointed to the future.
