Did Marie-Antoinette Say âLet Them Eat Cakeâ?
âQu'ils mangent de la brioche.â
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Transcript
If thereâs an enduring image of the French aristocracy in the English-speaking world, itâs probably of a woman in a frilly dress and about two feet of hair piled on her head addressing the question of her subjects being too poor to buy bread with an oblivious, âLet them eat cake.â
That woman was Marie-Antoinette, who was the queen of France during the French Revolution. But while her dress was indeed frilly and her hair was indeed tall, could she really have said something so clueless?
The evidence suggests that she didnât. How do we know? Oh, there are lots of reasons, starting with the fact that in French the quote isnât even about cake â itâs about brioche. âQuâils mangent de la brioche.â
Brioche is delicious. Itâs a rich, buttery bread and it has strong associations with decadence. But if you ever try to serve a big loaf of brioche to the guests at a childâs birthday party, youâll find out real quick that it is not, in fact, cake.
But either way, the point of the quote is that this out-of-touch aristocrat didnât understand the realities of life as a peasant, so maybe thatâs a semantic quibble. The real evidence against Marie-Antoinette having uttered this famous phrase is that, well, it was around long before she was.
Scholars of folklore have found versions of the same quote, with some variations, across Europe. In sixteenth-century Germany there was a story of a noblewoman wondering why the hungry peasants didnât eat Krosem, a kind of sweet bread.
Thereâs no evidence that Marie-Antoinette ever said âlet them eat cake.â But we do know people have been attributing the phrase âQuâils mangent de la briocheâ to her for nearly two hundred years â and debunking it for just as long.
The first time the quote was connected to Antoinette in print was in 1843. A French writer named Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr reported finding the quote in a book from 1760âwhen Marie-Antoinette was just five years old.
He hoped this would end the rumor that she was responsible for the famous phrase once and for all.
Sorry about that Jean-Baptiste. Weâre trying.
That woman was Marie-Antoinette, who was the queen of France during the French Revolution. But while her dress was indeed frilly and her hair was indeed tall, could she really have said something so clueless?
The evidence suggests that she didnât. How do we know? Oh, there are lots of reasons, starting with the fact that in French the quote isnât even about cake â itâs about brioche. âQuâils mangent de la brioche.â
Brioche is delicious. Itâs a rich, buttery bread and it has strong associations with decadence. But if you ever try to serve a big loaf of brioche to the guests at a childâs birthday party, youâll find out real quick that it is not, in fact, cake.
But either way, the point of the quote is that this out-of-touch aristocrat didnât understand the realities of life as a peasant, so maybe thatâs a semantic quibble. The real evidence against Marie-Antoinette having uttered this famous phrase is that, well, it was around long before she was.
Scholars of folklore have found versions of the same quote, with some variations, across Europe. In sixteenth-century Germany there was a story of a noblewoman wondering why the hungry peasants didnât eat Krosem, a kind of sweet bread.
Thereâs no evidence that Marie-Antoinette ever said âlet them eat cake.â But we do know people have been attributing the phrase âQuâils mangent de la briocheâ to her for nearly two hundred years â and debunking it for just as long.
The first time the quote was connected to Antoinette in print was in 1843. A French writer named Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr reported finding the quote in a book from 1760âwhen Marie-Antoinette was just five years old.
He hoped this would end the rumor that she was responsible for the famous phrase once and for all.
Sorry about that Jean-Baptiste. Weâre trying.