Terrorism in the Nineteenth Century

The Gunpowder Plot and Macbeth deal with, in Robert Appelbaum’s phrase, terrorism before the letter. ¹ Meaning, the Gunpowder Plot comprised of the sort of violence, and elicited the sort of reaction, usually associated with contemporary terrorism. But when the term was first coined in France, in 1794 (migrating to England the same year), neither “terrorist” nor “terrorism” denoted a concrete thing. ² Instead, “terrorist” is a derisive term for Jacobins or supporters of Robespierre’s use of terror as state policy. Hence Edmund Burke’s formulation (often taken to be the first use of the term in English): “Thousands of those Hell-hounds called Terrorists … are let loose on the people.” ³