by Graham Robb
Now and then, a secret comes to light like an old convict emerging from prison long after the demise of the regime that locked him away. On the night of 17 October 1961, thousands of French Algerians, protesting peacefully against the curfew that had been imposed on them, were rounded up by the Paris police. Though records have disappeared and though official figures still disagree with scholarly estimates, it is certain that many Algerians were tortured, maimed and stuffed into dustbins, and that about two hundred were beaten up by policemen and thrown into the Seine, where they drowned, in the tourist heart of Paris. In 2001, despite the furious opposition of right-wing parties and the Paris police, a discreet commemorative plaque was attached, at knee level, to a corner of the Pont Saint-Michel. Four-fifths of the French population are still completely ignorant of the events of 17 October 1961.
As these pages are being written, towns and cities on the meridian are being discovered by the rest of the country. Cars are burning in the ugly, overpopulated Parisian suburbs of Aubervilliers, Saint-Ouen and Saint-Denis. Amiens and Orléans have been placed under a curfew. A law passed during the colonial war in Algeria in 1955 has been invoked to impose a state of emergency. Newspapers report online conversations from the terrae incognitae at the end of the Métro line, with explanatory footnotes to render their form of French comprehensible. A Minister of the Interior calls the rioters racaille (‘scum’). More insulting names are used in private conversations.
The ‘scum’ are the children and grandchildren of immigrants. The immediate cause of what the authorities call ‘riots’ is the death of two boys, who accidentally electrocuted themselves while running away from a group of policemen. Everyone in the suburbs knows that non-whites are routinely harassed and humiliated by the police. The French Republic makes no official distinction between ethnic groups, but many of its citizens do, and most employers prefer white faces. Like earlier immigrants from Brittany, Burgundy, the Auvergne, Savoy, Italy and Spain, Africans and Arabs were encouraged to come and help feed and clean the cities. Once, they lived in shanty towns; now, they live in neighbourhoods dehumanized by cars. They have failed to ‘integrate’ themselves into the French Republic.
Thirty years ago, the French Arabs I knew carried photocopies of their identity cards because the police would ask to see them and then tear them up. At least they had jobs. Now, the unemployed are blamed for the failures of the state. Two hundred and seventy-four towns have been affected by the troubles and the tourist trade is suffering. In the twenty-first century, many parts of France remain to be discovered.
Chronology
1532
Union of Brittany to France.
1539
Decree of Villers-Cottereˆts makes French the official language of all legal documents.
1589–1610
Reign of Henri IV; Basse-Navarre, Foix and Auvergne (Comte´) joined to France.
1610
Accession of Louis XIII: ruled 1624–43; Cardinal de Richelieu (d. 1642) chief minister.
1620
Be´arn joined to France.
1643
Accession of Louis XIV; ministry of Cardinal Mazarin (1643–61).
1648
Peace of Westphalia: France acquires parts of Alsace and Lorraine.
1659
Treaty of the Pyrenees: France acquires Roussillon and neighbouring regions, most of Artois and parts of Flanders.
1661–1715
Reign of Louis XIV. Conquests in Flanders, Franche-Comte´ and Alsace. Incorporation of Nivernais and the Dauphine´ d’Auvergne.
1667–82
Construction of the Canal du Midi.
1685
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
1702–10
War of the Camisards (persecution of Protestants in the Ce´vennes).
1715–23
Regency of Philippe d’Orle´ans.
1726–43
Ministry of Cardinal de Fleury.
1741
June – Windham expedition to Chamonix.
1743–74
Reign of Louis XV.
1756–1815
Publication of the Cassini map of France.
1766
Incorporation of Lorraine.
1768
Genoa cedes Corsica to France.
1774
Accession of Louis XVI.
1775
Public coaches permitted to use staging posts.
1786
8 August – First recorded ascent of Mont Blanc.
1789
14 July – Fall of the Bastille. August – abolition of feudal rights and privileges. November – national sale of Church property.
1790
15 January – France divided into eighty-three d e´partements.
1790
August – Abbe´ Gre´goire, ‘Report on the Necessity and Means of Exterminating Patois and Universalizing the Use of the French Language’.
1791
June – Arrest of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette. August – Jews granted full citizenship; September – annexation of Avignon and Comtat Venaissin (later part of Vaucluse).
1792–8
Meridian expedition of Delambre and Me´chain.
1793
21 January – Execution of Louis XVI. 16 October – Execution of Marie-Antoinette.
1794
28 July – Execution of Robespierre. September – Rhoˆne expedition of Boissel de Monville.
1795–99
Directoire.
1799
9 November (18 Brumaire) – Coup d’e´tat: Napoleon Bonaparte First Consul.
1801
First census of the population of France.
1804
Coronation of Napoleon I.
1814
First abdication of Napoleon; first Restoration.
1815
18 June – Battle of Waterloo.
1815–24
Reign of Louis XVIII.
1824
Accession of Charles X.
1828
1 October – Opening of first railway in France, from Saint-E´ tienne to Andre´zieux (opened to passengers 1832; horses replaced by steam, 1844).
1830
June – Capture of Algiers. July Revolution. Abdication of Charles X. Coronation of Louis-Philippe.
1832
April to May – Rebellion in the Vende´e led by the Duchesse de Berry.
1833
June – Guizot’s education law: each commune of five hundred inhabitants or more to maintain an elementary school for boys (girls from 1836).
1834–52
Prosper Me´rime´e tours France as Inspector General of Historic Monuments.
1836
The state assumes responsibility for upkeep of minor roads (chemins vicinaux).
1841
First complete geological map of France. June to September – tax riots.
1848
February Revolution. Universal male suffrage. June – repression of popular revolt.
1851
2 December – Coup d’e´tat of Louis-Napole´on Bonaparte (Emperor Napoleon III, 1852–70).
1852
Start of pe´brine epidemic (disease of silkworms).
1856
Mediterranean joined to Atlantic by the Canal Late´ral a` la Garonne.
1857–
Forestation of 2.5 million acres of the Landes.
1858
February to July – Virgin Mary appears to Bernadette Soubirous at Lourdes.
1860
Savoy and Nice become part of France.
1863
Start of phylloxera epidemic (disease of vines).
1870
September – Defeat of France by Prussia at Sedan; Siege of Paris; France loses Alsace and Lorraine. Ligue du Midi founded in Marseille. Proclamation of the Third Republic.
1871
Paris Commune elected (March) and defeated by government troops (May).
1
873
Franco-Provenc¸al language identified by G.-I. Ascoli.
1874
Club Alpin Franc¸ais founded.
1879
Government funding of local railways and canals (Freycinet Plan): 696 stations or halts in 1854; 4,801 in 1885 (6,516 in 2006).
1882
Ethnographic Museum opens at the Palais du Trocade´ro in Paris.
1882
April – Law for the Restoration of Mountain Terrains.
1881–82
Free, compulsory, secular education for boys and girls from six to thirteen (Jules Ferry laws).
1888–1913
Underground explorations of E´ douard-Alfred Martel.
1889
Universal Exhibition and inauguration of Eiffel Tower.
1893
August – Massacre of Italian immigrant workers at Aigues-Mortes.
1898
13 January – ‘J’Accuse!’: Zola’s letter on the Dreyfus Affair.
1900
19 July – Opening of first Me´tro line in Paris.
1901–4
Anticlerical measures (governments of Rene´ Waldeck-Rousseau and E´ mile Combes).
1903
1–19 July – First Tour de France bicycle race (six stages, 1,518 miles).
1904
8 April – ‘Entente Cordiale’ agreements between France and Britain.
1905
August – Exploration of Gorges du Verdon.
1909
April – Beatification of Jeanne d’Arc.
1911
French protectorate in Morocco.
1914
1 August – France orders general mobilization.
1918
11 November – Armistice.
Notes
1. THE UNDISCOVERED CONTINENT
link ‘out of range of a rifle’: Lanoye, 302.
link ‘scarcely any accommodation’: Murray, 392.
link hacked to death: Mazon (1878), 271; Reclus (1886), 60; Sand (1860), 228.
link deliverance from Satan: Devlin, 39–41.
link considered themselves ‘French’: ‘France’ commonly referred to the province of Île-de-France: e.g. Duchesne (1775), 114; Wright, 14.
link ‘the locals are no more familiar’: Sand (1860), 242 n. 20.
link ‘joined and united’: Varennes, 2.
link ‘complete isolation’: Stendhal, 190. Rousselan is now Rousseland, between Francheville and Saint-Igny on the N151.
link La Charité-sur-Loire: Stendhal, 11–12.
link Paris–Toulouse road: Balzac, IV, 361.
link internal exile: Cobb (1970), 167.
link the din of tiny places: e.g. Barker (1893), 27 and 122.
link Brande region: Sand (1872), 143.
link ‘a desolate country’: Grandsire (1863), 3.
link hawthorn bushes: Égron (1831), 305.
link ‘Never leave me alone’: ‘La Maison du berger’, v. 279.
link ‘dominated by the forces of nature’: J. Duval, 198.
link phantom districts: Assemblée Nationale, IX, 745.
link wine-merchants: Cavaillès, 16.
link Julius Caesar: Gallic War, VII, 1–4.
link Rabaut from Nîmes: Peyrat, II, 427; also Rouquette, 4.
link fleeing the White Terror: Cobb (1970), 337.
link ‘capitaines de Bauzon’: Riou, in Tilloy, 221.
link Victor de l’Aveyron: Itard.
link ‘wild girl’ of Issaux: Buffault, 343.
link wild man of Iraty: Folin, 73; Russell, 58. Another Pyrenean ‘wild girl’ was found near Andorra in 1839.
link Louis Mandrin: Duclos.
link ‘enlarged Paris Basin’: Barral.
link Ancien Régime: on this old term: C. Jones, xx.
link censuses are unavailable: Cavaillès, 277; Foville (1890), 297–98.
link Young was amazed: Young, 106, 30, 17 and 16.
link A ‘commune’ is not a village: Tombs, 233.
link recruits from the Dordogne: Weber, 43.
link towns were half-dissolved: e.g. Merriman, 199 (Perpignan).
link ‘no interior towns in France’: Pinkney, 142.
link ‘those Breton forests’: Quatrevingt-treize, III, I, 2–3 (Molac misnamed ‘Meulac’).
link ‘no one . . . has ever gone to Brittany’: Cambry (1798), I, 53.
link On a sunny day: Peuchet and Chanlaire, ‘Vendée’, 16.
link Openings in the hedgerow: Dumas (1863–84), VII, 97–98. On military consequences: Lasserre, 24.
link ‘wild animals’: La Bruyère, Les Caractères, ‘De l’Homme’, no. 128.
2. THE TRIBES OF FRANCE, I
link Goust: Dix, 169–77; also Anon. (1828) and (1840), 206–07; MP, 1878, pp. 377–8; Perret (1882), 390–91; and information supplied by Nathalie Barou.
link high Alpine villages: Fontaine, 17.
link ‘Each valley’: Chevalier (1837), 627.
link Chalosse region: MP, 1864, 273; on a ‘demarcation line’ (soil, wine, dress and language) between Poitiers and Châtellerault: Creuzé-Latouche, 24–5.
link Nitry and Sacy: Restif, 50–51.
link ‘no one took her side’: Restif, 108.
link Polletais or Poltese: Conty (1889), 127; Marlin, I, 300; MP, 1844, p. 223–4; Turner, I, 9.
link Le Portel: Lagneau (1866), 634–5; Smollett, letter 4.
link ‘floating islands’: Gazier, 1879, 54; Hirzel, 325; Lagneau (1861), 377; Lavallée, ‘Pas-de-Calais’, IV, 22.
link tribes on the borders of Brittany: Roujou (1874), 252–55.
link Cannes and Saint-Tropez: Beylet.
link ‘some out-of-the-way villages’: Topinard (1880), 33.
link ‘We had not the slightest notion’: Guillaumin, 59.
link ‘The people of Périgord’: Marlin, II, 137.
link ‘The Lyonnais acts high and mighty’: Marlin, II, 62. Other moral maps: Égron (1830), 11–12; Stendhal, 50–51.
link Semitic tribes . . . Tibet: Biélawski, 96; Charencey; Girard de Rialle, 185; A. Joanne, Morbihan (1888), 28; Mahé de La Bourdonnais.
link ‘Franchiman’ and ‘Franciot’: Aufauvre, 153; Boissier de Sauvages, v.
link games of pelota: Lunemann, 54–5.
link ‘France ought not to exist’: Le Bras and Todd, 23; Perrot, 127 .
link zones of ugliness and beauty: Marlin, II, 81 and 97; I, 66; IV, 117; II, 157; IV, 37.
link ‘how many pretty women’: Marlin, II, 280.
link priest of Montclar: Barker (1893), 214.
link ‘a very fat file’ (Lot): Weber, 57.
link champions were appointed: e.g. Lachamp-Raphaël: Du Boys, 241.
link Lavignac, Flavignac: Corbin (1994), 58.
link pays: e.g. Planhol, 159–60; Reclus (1886), 454–70.
link ‘246 different kinds’: Newsweek, 1 October 1962.
link Secret army reports: Weber, 105.
link heirlooms to the metal: Corbin (1994), 86.
link recruiting sergeants: Salaberry, 17.
link dispelled storms: Feuille villageoise, 1792–93, 247–8.
link electrocuted at the end of a bell-rope: Arago (1851); also MP, 1888, p. 195.
link summoned angels: Corbin (1994), 102.
link countless complaints: Corbin (1994), 99 and 300.
link communes in . . . Morbihan: Augustins.
link As late as 1886: Levasseur, I, 342.
link cagot exogamy, 1700–59: Marie Kita Tambourin, in Paronnaud; also Planhol, 207.
link sophisticated village institutions: Baker; P. Jones (2003), 50–54.
link Salency: Marlin, II, 346–50.
link Hoedic and Houat: Bonnemère, II, 445; Laville; Letourneau.
link La Bresse: N. Richard, 224.
link Pignou clan: Bonnemère, II, 341–6; Hirzel, 326–7 and 370–84; A. Legoyt, in Les Français, Province, II, 209–11.
link declared independence: P. Jones (1988),
171.
link measures varied: e.g. Burguburu; Fodéré, I, xxiii; Peuchet and Chanlaire, passim; Weber, 30–32.
link ‘using Roman numerals’: Peuchet, ‘Isere’, 43.
link ‘Chizerot’ tribe: Dumont (1894), 444.
link three meetings: Soulet, in Tilloy, 239.
link Mandeure thieves: Capt. G. . . .
link absence of crime . . .: e.g. Pérégrin, 65.
link illegitimate children: Sussman, 21.
link ‘insulting vegetable bombardments’: M. Segalen, 49–51.
link a ‘witch’ was burned to death: Devlin, 363. Another witch was burned at Tarbes in 1862 (Dix, 326), and a witch’s possessions at Rodez, c. 1830 (Maurin).
link French imperial justice: e.g. Corbin (1990).
3. THE TRIBES OF FRANCE, II
link villages’ nicknames: Collet; Labourasse, 198–224.
link ‘Faubourg de Rome’: Balzac, IV, 359.
link Foratin people: F. Pyat, in Les Français, Province, II, 330; Lagneau (1861), 394–5; Lucay, 70–71; Reclus (1886), 403; Rolland de Denus, 72; Wailly, 330–31.
link Gavaches or Marotins: Lagarenne, 135; Lagneau (1861), 404; Lagneau (1876); Larousse (‘Gavache’).