In July 1794, during the final days of the Reign of Terror, a period of intense political and religious persecution during the French Revolution, sixteen Carmelite nuns from Compiègne were executed in Paris. The nuns, known as the Martyrs of Compiègne, were guillotined on July 17, 1794, at the Place du Trône Renversé (now Place de la Nation) in Paris, just 10 days before the overthrow and execution of Maximilien Robespierre, the climate of fear and suspicion was so pervasive that it could easily be compared to a city under siege by unseen evil, as anyone could be denounced and dragged to the scaffold as the supernatural or demonic evil was used as a metaphor for the real, human atrocities taking place before and after nightfall.
