France stands as the global capital of fashion, food, and culture. While millions of tourists flock to Paris to see the Mona Lisa, the country hides a history full of bizarre revolutions and strange inventions. For instance, the French army invented a technology now used by every military in the world. Furthermore, the last use of the guillotine happened much more recently than you might think. Prepare to travel through the vineyards and villages of the Republic.
France
King Louis XIX ruled for only 20 minutes. After his father Charles X abdicated the throne in 1830, Louis ascended as the rightful king. However, he immediately signed his own abdication papers just twenty minutes later, giving him the shortest reign in history.
The guillotine was last used the same year “Star Wars” came out. Hamida Djandoubi was executed by the blade in September 1977. This means the medieval-style punishment was still legal while audiences were watching spaceships and lightsabers in theaters.
France covers more time zones than any other country. Due to its overseas territories in the Caribbean, Indian Ocean, and Pacific, the nation spans twelve distinct time zones. This beats both the United States and Russia.
The French Army invented camouflage during World War I. They created a dedicated unit called “camoufleurs,” which consisted of artists who painted vehicles and guns to blend into the landscape. The word itself comes from a French slang term meaning “to make up for the stage.”
It is illegal for supermarkets to throw away unsold food. In 2016, France became the first country in the world to ban grocery stores from destroying edible food. Instead, they must donate it to charities or food banks to help people in need.
The Eiffel Tower grows during the summer. The iron structure expands when temperatures rise, causing the tower to grow by up to six inches (15 centimeters). Conversely, it shrinks back down when the cold winter weather returns.
The hearts of French kings were used to make paint. Artists in the 18th and 19th centuries prized a pigment called “Mummy Brown,” made from ground-up remains. Legend says the hearts of Louis XIII and Louis XIV ended up on an artist’s palette after revolutionaries raided the royal tombs.
The croissant actually originated in Austria. This famous French pastry began as the “Kipferl” in Vienna. Austrian artillery officer August Zang introduced it to Paris when he opened a Viennese bakery in the city in the late 1830s.
Potatoes were once illegal in France. In the 1700s, the government banned them because they believed they caused leprosy. The agronomist Antoine-Augustin Parmentier had to guard his potato fields with soldiers to trick peasants into thinking the tubers were valuable, which eventually made them popular.
The Louvre was originally a fortress, not a museum. King Philip II built it in the late 12th century to protect Paris from English soldiers. If you look comfortably in the basement of the museum today, you can still see the remains of the original medieval walls.
France produced the oldest person who ever lived. Jeanne Calment lived to be 122 years and 164 days old. She famously met Vincent van Gogh as a teenager and described him as “dirty, badly dressed, and disagreeable.”
You can marry a dead person with the President’s permission. Under French law, posthumous marriage is legal if you can prove the deceased intended to marry you before they died. This law dates back to 1959 when a dam burst killed a woman’s fiancé.
The Lumière brothers invented the cinema in 1895. They held the first public screening of a motion picture in Paris. The film of a train arriving at a station was so realistic that the audience allegedly ran to the back of the room in fear.
Sparkling wine is only “Champagne” if it comes from Champagne. International law protects the name of the region. If you produce the exact same drink using the exact same method anywhere else in France, you must call it “Crémant” or simply sparkling wine.
Finally, the French eat around 30,000 tons of snails a year. While tourists often view escargot as a cliché, locals genuinely love the delicacy. However, most of the snails consumed in France today are actually imported from Eastern Europe.
