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"In the 19th century, romanticism is in novels, not in marriage" A historian reveals the backstage of a marriage agency circa 1842

2021-03-11T11:34:36.295Z


INTERVIEW - Claire-Lise Gaillard unearthed fascinating archives, those of Maison Foy, a 19th century marriage agency. She talks to us about arranged marriages, flattering reputations and social ambition.


Le Figaro.

- Your article dissects the registers of

"

la maison de Foy

"

located between 1842 and 1847, 17 rue Bergère in Paris, in the 9th arrondissement.

Who was this Monsieur Foy?

Claire-Lise Gaillard.

-

Mr. Foy was a former business agent, noble by his father, who was established in Paris because he had connections in all social circles.

He specialized in marriage arrangements and was considered by his contemporaries as the guardian father of the “

marriage profession

”.

Because at that time you needed to look for your partner to find him?

Nostalgic as we are, we tend to believe that the French met more easily before, at the village festival in the country, on the doorstep in town… Is this a mistaken view?

The French tradition of intermediation is very old, we have always had matchmakers.

During the French Revolution, the paradigm changed with the emergence of the democratic ideal of a good marriage for all citizens.

Two small newspapers,

The Marriage Indicator

and

Le Courrier de l'hymen, a ladies' journal

, promoted this revolutionary ideal and published advertisements to allow bourgeois to marry nobles.

I found in the newspaper

L'Hymen

the case of a young girl from a very good family, recluse at the Ursulines, who wrote that she had been forgotten by her mother and that she wanted to marry a man, especially to escape the convent.

She then writes that she has been contacted by a commoner, a good worker who wants to marry her.

In a third letter she announces that she will finally marry a nobleman.

These newspapers did not survive the Directory.

One of the pieces of information recorded in the registers of Maison Foy.

- Claire-Lise Gaillard.

In the 19th century, the Foy house was a novelty in its size.

It has offices, is motivated by profit, not by a revolutionary ideal of inter-class marriages.

It is mainly used to provide information (So-and-so is really noble?

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Source: lefigaro

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