by Bernard Richard, Historian
Camembert is one of France’s gastronomic emblems along with the baguette, champagne, coq au vin, wine and many other products that make up the French identity.
According to a well established, but undocumented, legend the cheese called camembert was created in about 1791 by a certain Marie Harel, a milkmaid whose statue was inaugurated by the French president in 1928 in the town of Vimoutiers, which is the administrative center down the road from the village of Camembert. Vimoutiers is in the Orme department in Normandy. The story goes that Marie, during the chaos of the Revolution, gave refuge to a priest who came from Brie, east of Paris, and that to show his gratitude the priest gave Marie the famous cheese recipe. But in fact much earlier, around 1705, Thomas Corneille, brother of the playwright Pierre, already wrote of the good cheese from Camembert.
The round boxes made of wood slivers (poplar, pine and spruce) with their illustrated labels appear around 1890, nearly a century after the supposed invention of the cheese, when the need to transport the cheese to Paris by train required stacking the cheeses without crushing them. Very early on the labels, with white background and decorated with bright attractive colors, were saved, stuck on walls and even collected.
Up until the 1970-80s, cheese labels often depicted history or even the politics of the moment, showing historic figures, kings, queens, famous men, presidents of the French Republic, generals and more. This wonderful diversity however disappeared when cheese production was industrialized and concentrated in the hands of large companies, the “three Bs”: Besnier (now Lactalis), Bongrain and Bel.
Republican camemberts and the Sower
Let’s begin with the Republican camembert with its familiar label.
This label from 1903 reproduces the Sower created by the medal maker Oscar Roty as the new symbol of the Republic of the late 19th century. The Sower appeared on coins, postage stamps etc. The camembert label from the beginning of the 20th century is a declaration of support for the Republic, a cheese for the Parisians that fits with their political ideas. Amongst the hundreds or thousands of different camembert labels, this one is surely one of the prettiest and most majestic.
The Sower rapidly became a republican emblem comparable to the painting Liberty guiding the people by Delacroix or the sculpture la Marseillaise by François Rude which decorates the Arch of Triomph. The model of the Sower medal, made of wax on slate, and a bronze casting, are in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.
Similar labels from a bit later include the Sower in a red tunic with a red sunset on a livarot label (another Norman cheese) and the “La Marianne” with her white dress for a “real camembert made in Picardy”. Both of these labels show the female allegorical figure wearing a right red phrygian cap.
Other “republican” cheeses had labels honoring Pasteur, the “benefactor of humanity” celebrated by the French Republic.
Amongst earlier historical figures on cheese labels we find Vercingetorix, the Gaulic chief who was defeated in the battle of Alésia by Caesar; William the Conqueror is on a pont l’Eveque label. Since camembert is a Norman product they were proud to glorify William, duke of Normandy who conquered England in 1066 as well as the Vikings who were the ancestors of the Normans.
Moving forward in time we find a coulommiers and a camembert label featuring Joan of Arc, a camembert with Charles VII and another with Agnès Sorel his mistress; one with Diane de Poitiers mistress of Henri II in the 16th century. Other great men to make cheese labels include the Grand Condé, a prestigious general of the 17th century and the philosopher Descartes on a camembert produced in his native village. The respectability of the the person chosen for the label was a sort of a guarantee of the quality of the cheese and the cheesemaker.
To these we can add a Saint George (patron saint of England since the middle ages) label for cheese sent to England or for the French market there is the galant Henry IV, the most beloved of French kings.
Napoleon, the great emperor, has yet more importance than all the other great men and is thus featured on many labels. One cheese called carré de l’est from the Champagne region is nicknamed the “Briennois” after Brienne-le-Château, the town in the Aube where young Bonaparte did his studies; a camembert shows the Arch of Triumph built by Napoleon with text in English and mentioning Cambridge, Massachusetts was clearly destined to the American market. We can also find a camembert called “Notre Dame” where Napoleon was crowned emperor in 1804, an “Invalides” cheese commemorating his burial. Napoleon’s entire life is featured on cheese labels from youth to glory to the grave !
Cheese labels also reflect important events in French history.
Cheese becomes patriotic and extols the Allies of 1914-18. There are several labels depicting the French soldier or poilu in the trenches. A play on words and the subtle trick-of-the-mind addition of an apostrophe on Field Marshal Joffre’s surname gives an ambiguous label both celebrating Joffre as the best general Joffre le meilleur (he was the victor at the battle of the Marne in September 1914) and serving the best cheese J’offre le meilleur.
Other labels that collectors have preserved include a victory camembert produced – prematurely – in 1915! Also a “camembert of the victorious” depicting Council President Clemenceau with General Pétain, also prematurely printed in 1917 or early 1918. After the war was finally over in 1919 a camembert “Clemenceau” and in 1920 “Les victorieux” camembert were produced.
After the first World War, camembert, despite its Norman roots was being made all over France and becomes thus a national cheese, and the cheese of the nation.
The war of 1914-1918 was in fact the beginning of the boom of sales for the cheese during which it became a staple for most of the population. The cheese was frequently part of soldier’s rations in the trenches and thus was introduced to men from all corners of France. Normandy, however, couldn’t produce enough cheese for the whole army and so it was during the war that the cheese started to be made in many different milk-producing areas of France and was no longer an exclusively Norman product. A small name and quality protection zone was created in 1909 around the village of camembert in which the true camembert was made. However camembert-style cheese was and is made all over France and today in Switzerland, Spain, the United States and now production of “kamanber” has been started in Russia as a response to trade limitations imposed on Russia after the annexation of Crimea. The Russian kamanber, with its label written in Cyrillic characters, is however quite a different product made of cow and goat milk with sometimes vegetable oil added for creaminess…
After the war and the victory, cheese labels turn to the colonial world and exoticism which was in vogue. The “Caïd” cheese is an example.
When Ethopia was invaded by Mussolini’s army in 1935, the Ethiopian emperor, or Négus, was greatly admired by the French for his resistance, and cheese makers honored him with a label. A similar admiration was shown on a cheese box when the ocean liner Ile-de-France saved hundreds of shipwrecked people during its trans Atlantic crossing in 1954 and was nicknamed the “Saint Bernard of the Atlantic” in the press. The tricolor flag in the background attaches the ship’s heroics to France itself.
In 1994 the 50th anniversary of D-Day is commemorated on several camembert labels. A particular anecdote comes to mind regarding the second world war. During Allied bombings of the 14 of June 1944 the village of Vimoutiers (Camembert) was all but razed by error, more than 200 civilians were killed and the statue of camembert creator Marie Harel from 1928 was destroyed. 1956 – in a bid for forgiveness – an Ohio cheese maker, which also produced camembert, replaced the statue.
Two who are absent from the camembert pantheon
Surprisingly enough, given all the patriotic labels, there are no labels glorifying Field Marshal Pétain or General de Gaulle.
There is a savoyard cheese called “Le Maréchal”, but seems to be more honoring the profession of farriers (maréchal-ferrant) rather than the field marshal given his country cap. Interestingly there are no labels honoring Pétain. He does have a wine label in his name, but only because the Mayor of Beaune, who was also the prefect of the Cote-d’Or department, transferred some Hospices de Beaune property to Pétain. There is no cheese to accompany the wine however…
As for General de Gaulle, although honored by huge quantities of trinkets by the souvenir industry – in his hometown of Colomby-les-Deux-Eglises you can find mundane souvenirs similar to the chocolate caves and sugar virgins of Loudres – the only cheese label you’ll find is a camembert with a Lorraine cross. On the label the cross is paired with a thistle thus is more about the Lorraine region than de Gaulle but there it is in the epicenter of the gaullian cult as a souvenir for the “pilgrims” to his village.
Even though he is not linked to his own cheese label, journalists and admirers have attributed many cheese quotes to the General, such as « la République n’est pas un fromage ! » (The Republic is not cheese). One famous quote, which was also attributed to Churchill at some point, is « Un pays qui produit plus de 365 sortes de fromages ne peut pas perdre la guerre » (A country that produces more than 365 different kinds of cheese can’t lose the war). And of course the General’s famous exclamation « Comment voulez-vous gouverner un pays où il existe 246 variétés de fromages ? » (It’s impossible to govern a country that has 246 types of cheese!).
Camembert Conclusion
Think back to the Republican Camembert from 1904. The association of republican emblems and French gastronomy, at least beginning with World War I, is worth reviewing. However these labels are today slowly disappearing and are just leftovers from the early 20th century. Today we don’t see them but in collections, antique and bric à brac fairs or at the Camembert Museum in Vimoutiers.
Article by Bernard Richard, historian and specialist of political symbols from the French Revolution to today. Mr. Richard been a teacher-researcher and a French culture attaché to foreign countries. He has published several books at the editor CNRS: Les Emblèmes de la République (2012, paperback 2015), Petite histoire du drapeau français (2017) and is working on a third titled Les Échos de la Marseillaise dans le monde.
Editor’s notes:
Read more about camembert label collections or as they say in France tyrosemiophile on http://www.letyrosemiophile.com/
Tyrosémiophilie is the general term for cheese label collection. The labels can be from round camemberts or other types and shapes right down to the little triangle of La Vache qui rit. And don’t laugh, this is serious collecting in France, some individual collectors have amassed more than 100,000 labels and the collector’s collective has millions ! To see some in person visit the Musée du Camembert in Vimoutiers and the Maison du Camembert right nearby in the village of Camembert in Normandy.
The name Camembert, by the way, is said to come from a land-owner’s name. There was a Franc named Mambert who owned the area. In the early middle ages it was referred to as Champs de Mambert and in the renaissance Campo Mauberti – deformed over the years to Camembert.
Read more about French cheese.
All the images are from the author’s collection except : Charles VII, D-day, Pasteur, the Napoleons and Briennois.