Who brings the Easter eggs where you live? I’ve grown up with the trusty Easter bunny, but when I came to France, I found to my surprise that the bunny is only a recent “import” and that traditionally, the Easter eggs are brought by someone else. Seeing chocolate chicken in stores along with eggs and bunnies, you might be tempted to guess the French have kept it realistic and told their kids the Easter hen brings the eggs. But that’s not what it is at all!
In France, the Easter eggs are brought by the church bells on their return from Rome.
traveling church bells
You see, after Holy Thursday, French church bells go silent until Easter Sunday, to mark the mourning for Jesus Christ, a Catholic tradition that goes back several centuries. Children are told the bells go to Rome, to get blessed by the Pope, and upon their return, they bring the eggs and hide them for the children to find.
The Pope, ready to bless church bells?
Hence the chocolate bells you will find in French (and also Italian) stores alongside eggs, hens, and Easter bunnies.
The Ferme Générale was an outsourced customs, excise and tax collection operation created under King Louis XIV in 1681. It taxed goods coming into the city in the name of the king. Between 1784 and 1791, it built a 5m-high and 25 long wall around the city that was not meant to protect against invaders but to prevent any merchandise to enter the city without paying taxes. However, smugglers used the old quarries running under the wall in what is today the 14tharrondissement.
The Barrière d’Enfer lodges at Place Denfert-Rochereau
Two entry points of this tax wall can still be seen today: the lodges of the barrière d’Enfer at Denfert-Rochereau in the south (14tharrondissement), and the barrière du Trône at Place de la Nation (11th/12tharrondissements) to the east.
The Barrière du Trôme at Place de la Nation
The Barrière du Trôme lodges at Nation
The General Farmers Wall (in purple) and the location of the d’Enfer and Trône lodges
In the 14th century, King Charles V had a new wall built on the right bank but the Philippe Auguste wall was not demolished for all that, since it was considered so solid and wide that a cart could run on top of it.
Charles V was king of France from 1364 to 1380. His reign marks the end of the first part of the Hundred Years War, as he recovered almost all of the lands lost by his predecessors. He was a learned king who founded the first royal library, predecessor to the French National Library (Bibliothèque Nationale de France).
In 1356, Étienne Marcel, Prévôt des Marchands (a position similar to that of a mayor) had a new wall constructed on the right bank, however, he died before the works were completed. Charles V continued the fortification works following his tactics of terre déserte (“better a crushed land than a lost land”) and reinforced the Philippe Auguste wall on the left bank while creating a whole new wall on the right bank that was 5km long and consisted of a combination of ditches and earth-filled ramparts, the last of which was crowned by a small wall. The fortification extended beyond the Louvre Castle to the west, which made the castle lose its protective function. In the east, however, the residence of the king, the Hôtel Saint Pol, was poorly protected and therefore another small bastion was built: the Bastille. It protected against invasions through the Porte Sainte Antoine gate, and in case of an insurrection within Paris, it covered the road leading to the Château de Vincennes, the king’s residence outside of Paris.
The Château de Vincennes
The Charles V wall was destroyed in the 17th century, and there are few remains today. However, it left its imprint on the map of the city, as many boulevards run along the site of the fortification, such as boulevard Saint Denis, boulevard Saint Martin, boulevard du Temple, boulevard des Filles-du-Calvaire, boulevard Beaumarchais and boulevard Bourdon, to name only a few.
The purple line shows the boulevards named above – running along the Charles V wall (see map below).
In 1672, Louis XIV, the Sun King, had a triumphal arch built on the site of one of the former wall’s gates, the Porte Saint Denis. Two years later, he had another triumphal arch built about 250m away, the Porte Saint Martin. The names are misleading since neither of them was ever meant to be a gate, but to glorify Louis XIV and his military victories.
Porte Saint Denis
Porte Saint Martin
Charles V wall (orange) and Philippe Auguste wall (brown)
In Gallo-Roman times, the population of Lutetia lived mostly on Cité Island and the south shore. There are still some remains to be seen today that will be the subject of a later blog post.
Philippe Auguste was king from 1180 to 1223 CE. He stands out among medieval kings of France for his long reign, his important military victories and his measures to reinforce the power of the king and put an end to feudalism.
4th arrondissement (Saint Paul)
4th arrondissement (Saint Paul)
5th arrondissement (Panthéon)
He built the city wall that bears his name to defend Paris against attacks from the English Plantagenet dynasty in particular, coming from the north and the east. It was a simple wall 5km long with 77 towers.
4th arrondissement (Marais)
4th arrondissement (Marais)
Later he also built a second portion of the wall on the left bank, after Normandy fell into the hands of the Plantagenet, and an attack from the north-west had to be envisioned.
In order to protect Paris against invaders coming up the Seine river, Philippe Auguste had a fortress built, the Louvre Castle. (It was later demolished to make way for the Louvre Palace, but that’s a subject for another post.)
Since the first settlers built a fence around their settlement, the inhabitants of Paris have constructed walls around their habitat. As early as the 4th century CE, there were walls on Cité Island. As the city grew, new walls were erected, forming concentric circles, from Gallo-Roman times to the 21st century. Let’s have a closer look.
The city wall of Philippe Auguste dates back to the 13th century. Remains can be found near the Pantheon in the 5tharrondissement on the left bank, as well as in the 4tharrondissement on the right bank, in the Marais and near the Village Saint Paul.
The city wall of Charles V dates back to the 14th century. It was destroyed in the 17th century.
TheGeneral Farmers Wall was built between 1784 and 1791 by the corporation of tax farmers. It was no longer a wall to protect Paris from invaders but to collect taxes on incoming goods.
Finally, the Adolphe Thiers Wallfrom 1846 corresponds more or less exactly to the boulevard des Maréchaux of today.
The present-day Paris city limitlies just a little over 100m further out and is marked by the Boulevard Périphérique (“Périph” or BP) expressway, a 35km-long ring road around Paris, but also including the Bois de Boulogne to the west, the Bois de Vincennes to the east, and a heliport in the southwest, near the Seine river.
The evolution of Paris city walls
We will have a closer look at each of these walls in the following posts. Stay tuned!
If you look at a French calendar on February 2nd, instead of Groundhog Day it will say Chandeleur. Your dictionary will translate that to Candlemas. But what’s that to do with crêpes?
The name Chandeleur comes from chandelle, the French term for candles (fancy ones, those you put on a birthday cake would be bougies). The fête des chandelles or Chandeleur has both pagan and Christian origins, like many Christian celebrations. In the Christian religion it corresponds to the presentation of Jesus at the Temple. The date is no accident, February 2nd marks 40 days after Christmas, and it concludes the Christmas-Epiphany season.
After the King Cake on Epiphany, the crêpes on Chandeleur symbolize the sun whose return was awaited impatiently by the farmers at the end of the winter.
A custom said to bring prosperity to the household consisted in turning the first crêpe with the right hand while holding a coin (even better, a gold coin!) in the left. French educational journalist Jamy Gourmaud makes a nice demonstration in his Chandeleur video (at 1’45).
Today, Chandeleur is an important occasion for the French to bake and eat crêpes. Even my local fromager had a crêpe stand a few days before Chandeleur this year!
What’s your favorite crêpe topping? Mine is the Nutella/banana/shredded coconut combo.
As first a settlement and later a city, Paris has existed for over 2,000 years. History has left its marks on the city, and traces of different time periods can be found all around Paris. In non-chronological order, let’s look at some that you might have come past during a visit without knowing.
If you have been driving on the roads of northwestern France, maybe you have noticed stone markers with a flame in addition to regular distance markers. The bornes de la liberté are set along the route of the Allied Forces from D-Day in June 1944. Liberty Road (la Voie de la Liberté) starts in Normandy, travels across northern France to Metz near the German border and then northwards to Bastogne on the border of Luxemburg and Belgium. But other markers can be found outside of this main route.
In March 1941, following the battle of Kufra in Libya, Leclerc (then a colonel) and his men swear an oath to “not put down the arm until our colours fly over the cathedral of Strasburg”. They fulfilled their oath in November of the same year. But before they could liberate Strasburg, they had to liberate Paris.
In August 1944, the Second Armored Division, in French 2e Division Blindée shortened to 2e DB, marched into Paris from the south. Commanded by the now General Leclerc, it was also called the Division Leclerc.
This monument commemorates not only the Oath of Kufra and the Liberation itself but also the events in this town the 2e DB crossed.
Traces of the combat in Paris in August 1944 can be found–among other places–on the wall of the Paris School of Mines on the boulevard Saint Michel (6tharrondissement, near the Luxemburg Gardens).
The avenue d’Orléans, in the 14tharrondissement leading from the Porte d’Orléans to the Place Denfert-Rochereau is today called Avenue du Général Leclerc.
Map of Paris showing the Avenue du Général Leclerc (the lower point) and the wall of the Paris School of Mines (the upper point).
The Galette des Rois, the King Cake, has a long tradition in France. It is eaten on or around Epiphany, Kings’ Day, January 06, celebrating the visit of the Wise Men, or Three Kings.
The tradition associated with the galette, however, is much older and goes back to Ancient Rome, where during the Saturnalia, a festival around the end of December and the beginning of January, among others, a “King of the Saturnalia” was elected, according to certain sources, with a bean hidden in a cake.
Throne of the French King, château royal d’Amboise
The tradition lived on through the Middle Ages and to the Renaissance where it so happened that one Kings’ Day, the real king, François Ier, after much feasting and celebrating and drinking, wasn’t happy about the “elected” king and with his friends started a snowball fight against him. During that fight, he was hit in the face by a snowball containing a hard object, leaving a permanent scar that he hid by growing a beard, setting a new trend among the male members of the nobility.
François Ier without and with a beard (by Jean Clouet and Titian respectively)
For King Cake celebrations at (by then bearded) François Ier’s court, I recommend this excellent blog post by fellow writer Julianne Douglas.
Even the Sun King Louis XIV kept up the tradition, but the French Revolution tried to do away with it, for obvious reasons. The feast of Epiphany was changed to the Sans-Culottes Day (during the Revolution, sans-culottes, literally “without breeches”, were the common people of the lower classes); however the sans-culottes changed the day to the “Day of Good Neighbors” and the cake became the galette de l’Égalité (Equality Cake) and returned to the table.
Today, it can be found in bakeries and supermarkets as early as Christmas, filled with frangipane or in variants including apples or chocolate. The bean (fève in French) has long since been replaced by a porcelain figurine, the collectors of which are called fabophiles.
In this video, Jamy Gourmaud explains the reason: The king of the day had to pay the drinks for everyone, and people would rather swallow the bean than incur the cost. To stop that practice, the real beans were replaced with porcelain ones. Each cake sold comes with a paper crown for the person who finds the fève in their part.
The cake is cut in as many parts as there are people, and the youngest person in the room hides under the table and announces who gets the next part to be served. The person who finds the fève in their part gets to wear the crown and to choose their queen or king consort.
King Louis XV’s crown (Louvre, Paris)
The only King Cake in France that does not contain a fève is the one served at the Élysée Palace for the President because, in holding with the principles of the French Revolution, one cannot be at the same time president and king.
In France, and even more so in Paris, a place royale, literally a royal square, was meant to surround a royal statue, mostly an equestrian statue in the Roman tradition, but later also pedestrian statues. People could walk in the square and admire the statue of their king. There are five places royales in Paris that have undergone changes over the course of history.
1 – Place des Vosges
Initial name: Place Royale Inauguration: 1612 Statue: Louis XIII Origin of the name: The French Département Vosges (in eastern France), was the first to pay its taxes under the French Revolution. Location: Marais, 4tharrondissement Story: Ordered by Henri IV, it was inauguration at the occasion of the engagement of Louis XIII with Anne of Austria.
2 – Place Dauphine
Inauguration: 1614 Statue: no statue in the square, but a statue of Henri IV stands in the middle of the Pont Neuf Origin of the name: Named for the Dauphin, the heir apparent, the future Louis XIII. Location: Île de la Cité, 1starrondissement Story: Created by Henri IV following the construction of the Pont Neuf. (It’s actually a triangle, by the way.)
3 – Place des Victoires
Inauguration: 1686 Statue: Louis XIV as Roman Emperor Origin of the name: in celebration of the military victories of Louis XIV Location: 1st and 2ndarrondissements Story: Financed by the Duke de la Feuillade, Marshal of France, it is the first square created by a private individual to celebrate his sovereign. (Also it is actually a circle, not a square.)
4 – Place Vendôme
Initial name: Place Louis Le Grand (Louis XIV) Other names: Place des Conquêtes (Conquests Square), and during the Revolution, Place des Piques (Pike Square, from the pikes on which were displayed the heads of the beheaded by the guillotine) Inauguration: 1699 Statue: initially Louis XIV (destroyed in 1792), presently Napoléon Ier at the top of the column Origin of the current name: The square was built in the place of the Hôtel de Vendôme, a hôtel particulier or townhouse. Location: 1starrondissement between rue de la Paix and the Tuileries Gardens Story: Initiated by Louis XIV, his grand project never saw the light of day. In the end, the square was built by the City of Paris. One of its prestigious addresses houses the Ritz.
5 – Place de la Concorde
Initial name: Place Louis XV Other name: Place de la Révolution Inauguration: 1772 Statue: Louis XV, destroyed and replaced by the Egyptian obelisk Origin of the name: Reconciliation of the French people at the end of the Terror (bloody period during the French Revolution) Location: 8tharrondissement, between the Tuileries Gardens and the Champs-Élysées, on the “royal axis” Story: During the Terror, it was the location of the guillotine where among many others, King Louis XVI and Queen Marie-Antoinette were beheaded.
Chestnuts (châtaignes or marrons) are the fruit of the chestnut tree, le châtaignier, which is native to the Mediterranean region but also grows in more northern parts of Europe, including all of France and Germany. Notably in the regions of the Cévennes and the Limousin in south-central France, chestnuts used to be an important food source, hence the tree’s nickname of arbre à pain, bread tree.
Dried and ground, the chestnuts make for a kind of flour that needs to be mixed with some wheat flour in order to make bread, pancakes, or pastries, which you find mainly in Corsica.
The département of Ardèche (in south-eastern France) is famous for its chestnut specialty crème de marrons, chestnut cream, which you can purchase at any French supermarket in the jam section.
If you are looking for roasted chestnuts from a street vendor, follow their cries of “Chauds les marrons!” Another French specialty are marrons glacés, candied chestnuts, a popular Christmas sweet.
The sweet chestnut is not to be confused with the horse chestnuts, utterly inedible. The horse chestnut tree is the one producing white pyramids of flowers that are called candles in German.
During a recent walk in the woods—I write this as of mid-November—I came across a group of chestnut trees that had the ground littered with chestnuts. Some were still in their burrs, but most lay among the leaves. Picking them up proved more fun than expected, for as soon as I had spotted one chestnut, I suddenly saw them everywhere. Within a few short minutes, I had collected 650g of them.
I’d never made roasted chestnuts myself, I usually buy them from a street vendor. But I found a very simple recipe I’d like to share here.
Roasted Chestnuts
Rinse your chestnuts and let them dry. Then make an X-shaped incision into each.
Preheat the oven to 220°C (about 430°F).
Put the chestnuts into the oven on a baking sheet or into a flat oven dish for about 20-25 minutes, until they begin to blacken.
Let them cool down before removing the skin which is not edible (or at least, not very digestible). Enjoy.
