Mono Monday 132 :: taste

“Qu'ils mangent de la brioche” was apparently what Louis XVI's Queen, Marie Antoinette, said in 1789 ...

While it is commonly attributed to Queen Marie Antoinette, there is no record of this phrase ever having been said by her.  It appears in Rousseau's 'Confessions', his autobiography (whose first six books were written in 1765, when Marie Antoinette was nine years of age, & published in 1782).  The context of Rousseau's account was his desire to have some bread to accompany some wine he had stolen; however, in feeling he was too elegantly dressed to go into an ordinary bakery, he thus recollected the words of a "great princess".  As he wrote:

"Enfin je me rappelai le pis-aller d’une grande princesse à qui l’on disait que les paysans n’avaient pas de pain, et qui répondit : Qu’ils mangent de la brioche."

"Finally I recalled the stopgap solution of a great princess who was told that the peasants had no bread, and who responded: "Let them eat brioche."


Rousseau does not name the "great princess" & he may have invented the anecdote, as 'Confessions' was, on the whole, not a very reliable autobiography ...

... & many thanks to JDO for taking on the hosting of this month's Mono Monday challenge ...