1773 in France

Events from the year 1773 in France

Incumbents

 * Monarch – Louis XV

Events

 * 24 February – Decision of the council reorganizing recovery of the poll tax on the bourgeoisie of Paris. Rents are recorded by Intendant Bertier de Sauvigny and the tax is calculated proportionally; the tax yield increases from 850,000 livres to 1,400,000 livres.
 * 7 April or 24 May – Freemasonry in France: The 200 masonic lodges are reorganized within the Grand Orient de France in a vast relational system hierarchized by affiliation.
 * 9 May – Hunger riots in Bordeaux.
 * 13 October – Astronomer Charles Messier discovers the Whirlpool Galaxy, an interacting, grand design spiral galaxy located at a distance of approximately 31 million light-years, in the constellation Canes Venatici.
 * Lagrange presents his work on the secular equation of the Moon to the Académie française, introducing the idea of the potential of a body. He also publishes on the attraction of ellipsoids and other mathematical matters.
 * Hilaire Rouelle discovers urea.
 * Louis-Bernard Guyton de Morveau proposes the use of "muriatic acid gas" (hydrogen chloride) for fumigation of buildings.
 * Antoine Baumé publishes his textbook Chymie expérimentale et raisonnée in Paris.

Births

 * 6 April – Nicolas Viton de Saint-Allais, genealogist (died 1842)
 * 2 September – Louis-Auguste-Victor, Count de Ghaisnes de Bourmont, Marshal of France (died 1846)
 * 6 September – François Fournier-Sarlovèze, military officer (died 1827)
 * 14 September – Charles Lefebvre-Desnouettes, military officer (died 1822 at sea)
 * 6 October – Louis Philippe I "Citizen King" of the French (died 1850)
 * 12 December – Robert Surcouf, privateer, businessman and slave-trader (died 1827)

Deaths

 * 24 January – Philippe Buache, geographer (died 1700)
 * 14 March – Philibert Commerson, naturalist (born 1727)
 * 30 October – Philippe de La Guêpière, architect (born c.1715)
 * 7 November – Princess Anne Charlotte of Lorraine, Abbess of Mons (born 1714)
 * Full date missing – Maximin de Bompart, naval officer (born 1698)