Marianne:
a French national symbol, with French definitive stamps

La Liberté guidant le peuple” [Liberty guiding the people]
by Eugene Delacroix [La Louvre, Paris]

france

on first arriving in France - driving

France is not England

Cathedrals in France

Futuroscope

Vulcania

viaduct de Millau

the French umbrella & Aurillac

the forest as seen by francois mauriac, and today

places and playtime

roundabout art of Les Landes

50 years old: Citroën DS

the Citroën 2CV:
a French motoring icon

Grand Palais, Paris

the calendar of the French Revolution

Motorway Aires

le pique-nique

Hermès scarves

bastide towns

mardi gras! carnival in Basque country

what a hair cut! m & french pop/rock

country life in France: the poultry fair

the greatest show on Earth - the Tour de France

short biography of Pierre (Peter) Abelard

Marianne as displayed on official government documents

who is Marianne?

Marianne is a symbol of Republican France. A Marianne is a bust of a proud and determined woman wearing a Phrygian cap. She symbolises the attachment of the common citizens of the revolution to the Republic - Marianne is liberty, egality and fraternity.

Marianne on French stamps

Marianne has been used on most definitive stamps issued since 1944, as well as several commemorative (picture) stamps. When Marianne is not clearly wearing a Phrygian cap, as on the Muller and Cheffer Marianne stamps, she is known as ‘the Republic’.

	Name	Dates	Marianne of ...	Designer
	Dulac	1942 - 1946	London	Edmund Dulac [1] model: Lea, wife of Dulac’s friend Emile Rixens
	Fernez	1944	Algers	Louis Fernez
	Gandon	1945 - 1955	the barricades	Pierre Gandon - portrait of his wife
	Muller	1955 - 1962	the Republic of Hope	Louis-Charles Muller
	la Nef	1959	the ship	André Regagnon
	Cocteau	1961 - 1965 1966 - 1967	second batch with increased prices	Jean Cocteau
	Cheffer	1967 - 1971		Henry Cheffer
	Béquet	1971 - 1974		Pierre Béquet
	Gandon - Sabine	1977 - 1981		Pierre Gandon - from Louvre painting [2]
	Gandon - Liberté	1982 - 1990		Pierre Gandon - from Louvre painting [3]
	Briat	1990 - 1996	the Bicentenary also known as the blind Marianne	Louis Briat
	Luquet	1997	14th July	Eve Luquet - only female designer of Marianne
	Lamouche	2005	the French people	Thierry Lamouche

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Marianne commemoratives

Marianne was used on many French definitive stamps. She also appeared as the symbol of France or as the principle subject of a work of art on commemorative stamps.[4] The following is not an exhaustive list.

	Marianne coming to the help of the unemployed	1935	This stamp price included a tax to benefit “intellectual unemployed”, such as artists and scientists affected by the 1929 crash, there being no unemployment insurance at that time.
	To save the race	1937	Marianne with a protecting arm around a young child. The cryptic “To save the race” apparently described the stamp’s tax goal of the fight against venereal diseases. [Note the tariff is 65c + 25c]
	150th anniversary of the federal constitution of the U.S.A.	1937	Remembering 17 September 1787, this stamp issued to recall Franco-American friendship. Designed by Barlangue.
	Help to the French repatriated from Spain	1938	The Spanish civil war provoked the return to France of many French, whom Marianne welcomed. [Note the tariff is 65c + 60c]
	Liberation	1944	Gandon symbolised the liberation of France with Marianne mounted on a winged horse. Similar to the definitive Marianne by Gandon which appeared a few years later
	Marianne of Dali	1979	Commissioned by La Poste from Spanish painter Salvador Dali. As well as reproducing old masters, La Poste sometimes commissioned contemporary artists to design a stamp.
	Heritage Year	1980	This Marianne, designed by Pierre Foget, has family similarities to the then current Sabine Gandon Marianne, although she faces the opposite direction.
	National census	1982	Marianne travelled all over France looking for a harvest of numbers. This stamp is famous because a hurried retoucher eliminated a mark that was the 7 on Corsica. The stamp was printed entirely on phosphorescent paper.
	Marianne of Jean Effel	1983	Commissioned by La Poste, the stamp became a posthumous homage to the artist who died before it was issued.
	Homage to the dead	1985	Designed and engraved by Albert Decaris, it was issued on the 75th anniversary of the burial of the Unknown Soldier at the foot of the Arc de Triomphe.
	Marianne in love	1988	Designed by Eriki Bilal. Originally part of a booklet - Communication - where each stamp was drawn by a different comic strip artist. This one was later issued as part of a pre-paid envelope.
	Marianne worked by Raymond Gid	1988	Celebrating typography and typesetting.
	Bicentenary of the French Revolution	1990	The woman in the red section wears a Phrygian cap, another symbol of the Revolution, as does the one at the top of the stamp. The stamp is in the French national colours of blue, white and red.
	Constitution of the 5th Republic - 1958/1998	1998	On a background of blue, white and red, echoing the French national flag - Marianne takes a similar colouring.

French definitive stamps in historical context

This section will give some help in understanding why particular French definitive stamps appeared when they did.
Note, French stamps are often colour-coded according to their purpose. Red is used for the standard first-class letter rate, blue for letters to abroad, and green for second-class post, postcards and newspapers.

1848 - 1852	Second Republic - Louis Napoleon Bonaparte
	1849 [5]	Ceres	20 centimes black 1F vermillion	designed and engraved by Jaques-Jean Barre
1852 - 1870	Second Empire - Napoleon III ( Louis Napoleon Bonaparte)
	1862	Napoleon III	First perforated French stamp
1870 - 1940	Third Republic
1871	Franco-Prussian War ended - Germany won
1871	Paris Commune
	1876 - 1900	Peace and commerce allegoric group / Sage type		designed by Jules-August Sage engraved by Louis Eugene Mouchon
	1900 - 1930	Blanc type; Liberty-Egality-Fraternity	used for low values - postcards	designed by Paul-Joseph Blanc engraved by Emile Thomas
	1900	Rights of man / Mouchon type	used for intermediate values	designed and engraved by Eugene Mouchon
	1900 - 1920s	Merson type; Liberty and Peace allegory	first two-colour French stamp; used for high values	Luc-Olivier Merson
	1903 [6]	The sower		designed by Oscar Raty engraved by Eugene Mouchon
1914 - 1918	World War One
	1932 - 1941	(left-handed) Peace of Laurens		designed by Paul-Albert Laurens engraved by Antonin Delzers
	1938	Mercury		designed and engraved by Georges Hourriez
	1939 - 1942	Iris	Occupied France - free zone : green, occupied zone : red	designed and engraved by Georges Hourriez
1940 - 1944	The French State (Vichy Government)
During the occupation of France by Nazi Germany, there were 43 issues of stamps. Many included Petain’s portrait [7], both in uniform and in civilian clothes. (General Philippe Petain was head of the Vichy government, installed by the occupying Nazi Germans.) Below is featured one issue.
	Jan 1942 - Sept 1944	Petain Bersier series		designed by Jean-Eugène Bersier engraved by Jules Pie
Petain stamps were banned after France was liberated, but there were insufficient replacements. Taxed and overprinted Petain stamps were used, in preference obscuring the traitor Petain’s face. There were some two hundred overprints, some official, some not. This page [in French] lists many of the overprint texts used in different towns.		image credit: Max Derouen
	1943	Work, family, country	The slogan of the Vichy government; stamps produced for Petain’s 87th birthday.
1944 - 1947	Provisional Government of the French Republic
	from March 1944 - Corsica Algeria; November 1944 - Paris	Fernez or Algers Marianne	ordered by Charles de Gaulle at the end of the war and issued by the Provisory Government	designed by Louis Fernez engraved by Jamignon printed at l’Atellier Carbonnel, Algeria.
	1944 - 1945 first issue: March 1945	Dulac Marianne	Provisory Government issue, used only until the Paris l'Atelier des Timbres-Poste could restart work	designed by Edmund Dulac engraved by Leonard Phillips, at Thomas de La Rue, London. Printed by de La Rue.
	1945 - 1954	Gandon Marianne		designed by Pierre Gandon engraved by Henri Corot
1947 - 1958	Fourth Republic
	1955 - 1959	Muller Marianne		designed by Louis-Charles Muller engraved by Jules Piel
1958	Fifth Republic
1958	Charles de Gaulle
	1959 - 1960	Marianne à la Nef		designed by André Regagnon engraved by Jules Piel
	1960	Decaris Marianne		designed by Albert Decaris engraved by Jules Piel
	1961 - 1965 1966 - 1967	Cocteau Marianne	second issue with increased prices	designed by Jean Cocteau engraved by Albert Decaris
1962	Algerian Independence
	1962	Decaris Cock [8]	3 colours	designed and engraved by Albert Decaris
	1967 - 1969	Cheffer Marianne		designed by Henri Cheffer (drawn in 1954) engraved by Claude Durrens after Henri Cheffer died in 1957
1969	Georges Pompidou
	1971 - 1974	Béquet Marianne		designed by Pierre Béquet, engraved in relief by J. Miermont, engraved as intaglio dies by Béquet
1974-1981	Valéry Giscard d’Estaing
	1977 - 1981	Sabine Marianne		designed and engraved by Pierre Gandon
1981	President François Mitterand
	1982	Liberté		designed and engraved by Pierre Gandon
1988	President Jacques Chirac
	1990 - 1996	Briat Marianne	first self-adhesive stamps	designed by Louis Briat engraved by Charles Jumelet
1989	200th anniversary of the French Revolution
	1997 - 2004	Luquet Marianne		designed by Eve Luquet engraved by Charles Jumelet
	2005	Lamouche Marianne		Designed by Thierry Lamouche

For those readers who are adventurous and trust their command of French, here is a twenty-question quiz on Marianne stamps.

the origin and history of Marianne

Marianne appears to have come from the name Marie-Anne, which was a common forename during 18th century France. For the aristocracy, Marie-Anne was not a worthy name and was considered as pejorative in their social circles because it represented the people.

The revolutionaries adopted the name Marianne to symbolise the change of regime; but above all it incarnated the symbol of “the mother country”, the mother who nourished and protected the children of the Republic.

Other sources say that the name originates from 1797, when Barras, a member of the Directorate, chose the first name of the wife of one of his friends, Reubelle, to represent the new regime. The name fulfilled the conditions of simplicity and lack of royalist connotation.

At that period, there was also a revolutionary Occitane song, la Garisou de Marianno [la Guérison de Marianne, or the healing of Marianne] that used this forename to refer to the Republic.

Later, during the Restoration and the Second Empire, Marianne became the code name for a clandestine Republican society.

The image of Marianne and her Phrygian cap have their origins in antiquity. The Phrygian cap was worn by slaves emancipated from the Greek and Roman Empires. Thence, they were citizens, not slaves.

The first representations of a woman in a Phrygian cap were made during the period of the French Revolution. Sailors and galley crew from the Mediterranean regions wore caps that were practically the same design. When they joined the Revolution, they brought the cap to Paris.

A Phrygian cap is a soft, red felt cap covering the ears, with a rounded top that is pulled forward. Phrygia was part of Anatolia in Turkey. One of its kings was Midas of whom it was alleged that everything he touched turned to gold.

During the Third Republic, Marianne was represented by statues, often put in town halls [mairies]. She wore the Phrygian cap to emphasise her revolutionary character, but this was sometimes regarded as a call to revolt, and the cap was replaced by a wreath or tiara to give Marianne a character of greater wisdom.

From 1789 (start date of the French Revolution) females appeared in paintings and statuary, where they expressed the values of liberty and revolution with their Phrygian cap and sometimes a decorated lance. When the Marianne wore a long tunic dress, she was formal and conquering.

A decree of 1792 arranged that the “state seal would be changed and would have representing France a woman dressed as in Antiquity, standing, holding in her right hand a lance surmounted by a Phrygian cap, or cap of liberty, her left had resting on a bundle of arms, and at her feet a tiller”. She would also have at her feet tables with the law and the Declaration of the Rights of Man presented to the world.

After 1799, the end of the Republic and the start of the First Empire weakened the representation of Marianne, even if the theme of liberty endured. Her name reappeared for a time during the Second Republic, but generally took a negative sense.

Napoleon III, the new emperor, replaced Marianne on coins and stamps with his own portrait. The 1870 Commune of Paris developed a cult of a female revolutionary fighter with bare breasts wearing a Phrygian cap of the sans-culottes [9], but she was not called Marianne.

Under the Third Republic, two models competed - the statue with a wreath of wheat and the statue with the Phrygian cap. The first represented a moderate Republic, while the second a revolutionary Republic, the people’s republican called Marianne.

As the Third Republic settled in, busts multiplied in the mairies and schools. A uniform model generally was used, being a bust of a woman with a young and calm face, sometimes wearing a wreath of wheat, but more often wearing a Phrygian cap.

The assimilation of the Marianne into the French Republic has now been achieved. Marianne has survived through five Republics and through the upsets of history. The most recent designs of Marianne are popular in town halls, with the features of celebrities like Brigitte Bardot, Catherine Deneuve and Laetitia Castra.

some related websites

[All sites in French unless otherwise indicated]

Cercle des Amis de Marianne
La Poste
L’Assemblie nationale
comprehensive online search for French stamps - at the bottom of the linked web-page
complete list of French stamps
French history - dates (in English)

end notes

1. After the fall of France, the remnants of the French Army retreated to England, regrouping around General de Gaulle in London under the name Free France. The French stamp printers (l’Atelier des Timbres-poste) were now in German-occupied Paris. De Gaulle commissioned a Frenchman in London, Edmond Dulac, to design a stamp (to be printed in London) to rally the French colonies to Free France. However, because de Gaulle would not accept the design, only about 5,000 copies were produced. One of the stamps de Gaulle preferred was the Algers Cockerel. This stamp included a cross of Lorraine, symbol of Joan of Arc and adopted by the Free French forces.
   
   Later, in 1943, Dulac entered a stamp design competition for French artists in England and his design was accepted, becoming known as the Marianne of London. The stamps were first sent to Paris at the end of August 1944.
   
   

2. [La Louvre Museum, Paris]

   From Sabines arrëtant le combat entre les Romains et les Sabins - Sabines stopping the fight between the Romans and the Sabins. Hersilie is standing with arms open to stop her Roman husband from throwing a javelin at her father-in-law, Tatius, king of the Sabins.(Hersilie had been kidnapped some years before by the Romans, a common way for Romans to obtain new young brides.)
   
   Pierre Gandon used as his model, the face of the Sabine in a painting at the Louvre - L’enlèvement des Sabine [the kidnapping of the Sabines] by Jacques-Louis David, 1799
   
   The legend “France”, which conformed to the Universal Postal Union rules, was replaced by “Republique Française” in 1981 after the election of President François Mitterand.
   
   
   
3. After the principal person in the painting La Liberté guidant le peuple [Liberty guiding the people] by Eugene Delacroix, painted soon after deposition of King Charles X by the July 1830 Revolution. This Liberty image used to figure on 100 franc notes.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
4. Definitive stamps are the standard stamps that are sold year after year. Commemoratives were originally made to commemorate a special event. More recently, commemoratives have been issued in order to raise revenue rather than celebrate an event, with some minor event being used as a fig leaf.
   
   
5. The first stamp paid for by the sender, rather than the receiver, was the Penny Black, issued on 6 May 1840. The stamp showed a side portrait of Queen Victoria at age 15. The idea of pre-paid postage had been developed by Rowland Hill.
   
   The first French postage stamp was issued on 1 January 1849. Its value was 20 centimes. Its colour was black, and had a portrait of Ceres (as illustrated), goddess of harvest and agriculture. In 1849, France was a rural and agricultural society so the choice of Ceres to represent the Republic was appropriate.
   
   
6. Several issues of the sower appeared, in various series. Firstly, the lined sower, named after the lines on the background, had two major series, firstly from 1903 to 1907, then from 1924 to 1929, with the colours and the values changing. The lined sower had a further outing from 1960 to 1965, this time engraved by Jules Piel. The lines were to give an impression of copperplate printing, a more prestigious printing form than the letterpress printing actually employed. Note that the sower is sowing against the wind.
   
   The cameo sower, also known as the plain background sower, is sometimes called La Semeuse grasse, the fat sower. The word ‘fat’ refers to the heavy letters used for the stamp’s value.
   
   
   
   
   
7. Only two French heads of state, Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte and Philippe Pétain, have wished their portrait to appear on stamps contrary to the Republican tradition, with the principle that a personality is not put on a stamp while they are still living. However, these two heads of state did have the excuse that they were not Republicans.
   
   However, La Poste (the French Post Office) has sometimes slipped up, for instance producing stamps showing portraits of Ginette Leclerc and Jean-Pierre Cargol, while still living, in the French Cinema series of 1986. Another still living French personality on a French stamp is Jean-Claude Killy, 6 times world champion and 3 times Olympic champion, twice world cup winner amongst many other sporting successes.
   
   The two first Napoleon III stamps, produced before he was proclaimed emperor still included the words “Repub. Franc.”, following stamps had instead “Empire Franc.”
   
   
8. The Gallic cock decorated the French flag during the 1789 revolution. In 1830, he replaced the fleur-de-lys, the royal emblem. In 1852, he was chased away by the Empirial eagle, but returned in 1962 on a tricolour [blue, white, red] stamp.
   
   The cockerel, gallus gallus, has been a French symbol since Roman times. The French appreciate the play on words: the Roman word for cock, gallus, was also used by the Romans to name the French people of that period - the Gaulois.
   
   
   
9. Sans-culottes means without breeches. This label was applied by the richer classes in 18th century France, who could afford smart, fitted knee-breeches, to the poorer, working classes, in particular around Paris, who wore ill-fitting pantaloons. Specifically, the term referred to “the ill-clad and ill-equipped volunteers of the French Revolutionary army”.
   
   
   
10. The tricolour of the French national flag - blue, white, red - combines the colours of Paris (red and blue) with the colour of the king (white).
    
    These colours appeared during the first days of the French Revolution. In July 1789, a little before the taking of the Bastille prison (14th July), there was a great general unrest in Paris. A militia was raised, which wore a cockade composed of the ancient colours of Paris - red and blue. On the 17th July, Louis XI went to Paris to review the new National Guard. The Guard was wearing the cockade of red and blue, to which (apparently) the Lafayette, the Guard commander added the royal white.
    
    The law of 27 pluviôse year II (15 February 1794) made the tricolour the national flag of France and, following the recommendation of the artist David, stipulated that the blue should be attached to the mast.
    
    

French governments from 1792 to present

• First Republic: 1792 - 1804
• First Empire: 1804 - 1814
• Restoration of the Bourbons: 1814 - 1848
• Second Republic: 1848 - 1852
• Second Empire: 1852 - 1870
• Third Republic: 1870 - 1940
• The French State (Vichy Government): 1940 - 1944
• Provisional government of the French Republic: 1944 - 1947
• Fourth Republic: 1947 - 1958
• Fifth Republic: 1958 - present




11. The group represents an allegory of the Republican trilogy, Liberty-Egality-Fraternity, symbolised by a winged woman holding the scales of justice and the cherubs who embrace each other.
    
    
12. These stamps show an allegoric representation of Liberty and Peace.
    
    
13. While in the unoccupied zone of France under the Vichy government, with new stamps were issued from November 1940, in the occupied zone things were different.

    image credit: statusinternational.com

    
    
    Existing stamps were overprinted by the Germans with a franking-type stamp. The stamp read Besetztes / Gebiet / Nordfrankreich - Occupied Zone Northern France.
    
    

• the greatest show on Earth - the Tour de France 1
• Le Tour 2: preparing for the Great Day
• Le Tour 3: the Great Day arrives
• le Tour de France 4: in the Pyrenées
• Le Tour: Photo album 1
• Le Tour: photo album 2

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