La Mouffe! - Rue Mouffetard
Paris Kiosque - December 1996 - Volume 3, Number 12
Copyright (c) December 1996 Norman Barth - used with permission
There is a chance that you'll discover this street during your first
visit to Paris - then again it may take several years. I fall into
the latter category. I was on a walk with two friends,
one of whom was showing us some of his old
haunts from student days. We turned the corner from
R.E. Quénu, walked past the church St. Médard, and
started to walk up a narrow street - La Mouffe! After only a few
steps I knew this street was something special, and over the years
I have discovered just how true that is.
Number 122 - La Bonne Source, a shop sign from 1592.
Rue Moufftard is one of the city's oldest streets - a remnant of
an old Roman road to Rome via Lyon. Its 605 meters
long, 6 meters wide (ifs thats confusing, then just substitute yards
for meters and you'll still get the general idea).
According to Jacques Hillairet in his Dictionnaire Historique des
Rues de Paris, its current name was decided in the 18th century
but first after passing through various stages of defformation.
The exact origins are obscure, but at the time, the River Bievre
(long since diverted underground through pipes now) flowed nearby
and was the home of tanners, wood pulp works, etc whose activities
didn't lend themselves to a very pleasant smelling neighborhood.
So apparently the word Moffettes was applied to the locale
(if you look this word up in the dictionary, you won't find
it, at least not in mine. Instead you find Mofette - emanation
of carbonic gas, most often in volcanic regions and
mines. My guess is that a slang version of the word might
have been used to describe other sorts of gaseous emenations of
a biological origin. Whatever the exact origins or meanings,
this word underwent several distortions:
Montfétard, Mauffetard,
Mofetard, Mouffard, Moftard, and Mostard,
before finally becoming Mouffetard.
La Chope Café on Place de la Contrescarpe.
At the northern end of the street is Place de la Contrescarpe.
Ernest Hemingway lived around the corner from there on rue du
Cardinal-Lemoine on the third floor of number 74, and described
the square in The Snows of Killimanjaro.
Balzac also described it in Père Goriot.
The fountain was put in in 1990. The word Contrescarpe
itself is from the creation in 1852 of a military emplacement
there. Before then, it was at limits of the walls of the
city - the Enceinte de Philippe Auguste. Remenants
of the wall are also just around the corner on rue Clovis
at number 3.
The square now is dominated by two cafes, one of them La Chope,
the other La Contrescarpe.
These two cafés trade customers with the seasons.
La Chope - on the northern side of
the square - gets the sun just about all day throughout the year.
In the summer this usually makes it unbearably hot, and
I always sit in the shade of La Contrescarpe on
those sorts of days.
But in winter, the tables are turned - to warm up,
I walk across the square to the sun of La Chope.
The corner of rue Mouffetard and rue Arbalète.
Now start walking down rue Mouffetard. There is a story
behind just about every number on the street. Some are
small: number 6 has a small
bucher's ensignia dating from the 18th century; number 9 has
an inscription - difficult to read - recalling the demolition
in 1685 of the Porte Saint-Marcel.
Some stories are a bit bigger. For example number 53's story.
On 24 May 1938,
while demolishing the house there, a hidden treasure of
Louis Nivelle, councellor to the King was discovered.
3,351 pieces of gold, most of them bearing the likness of Louis XV
were eventually distributed among 84 decendents, but first
after paying the costs of the geneologists, the construction
crew, and the City of Paris.
At number 60 there is the Fountaine du Pot-de-Fer,
a small fountain dating back to Roman times, and later
connected to an aquaduct
used by Marie de Médicis to bring water for the nearby
Palais du Luxembourg and gardens.
Number 134 has a painted façade of obscure origins - but its
been there a while.
The church - Saint Médard, has also been there a while. Pope
Alexandre III mentioned the church in a document from when he came
to Paris to lay the first stone of Notre Dame in 1163. Over the centuries
various pieces were added to the place: part of the choir and chapels
were added during the period 1560-1586, but their construction wasn't
completed until 1632. The sacriste was done in 1718; from 1773 to 1784
there was more work, and in 1901 the chapelle des catéchismes
was added.
Saint Médard also was the scene of some bizarre events in the
early 18th century. The incidents involved people who became known as the Covulsionnaires de
Saint Médard; the collective hysteria which took place during
a five year period is complicated.
Saint Médard at the southern end of La Mouffe.
The result was that the church found itself at the center
of a religious storm, with political overtones. All of this
started with the teachings of Jansénius - Bishop of Ypres - who had
published a theological tombe in 1640 about the doctrines of St Augustin
regarding the health of the soul. Internal conflicts with Church ensued,
and then there were crack-downs by the Pope. Saint Médard became
a place of pilgrimage for followers of Jansénius when
François de Pâris was buried there in 1727.
Claims of miracles, and visions, by pilgrims to his tomb gave rise
to crowds visiting the church. People became entranced; some rolled
on the ground, some ate earth from near the tomb. Others in their
hysteria had themselves crucified, or pierced their tongues. The
scene lasted half a decade before a local police lieutenant - Hérault -
closed the cemetary in 1732 by the order of Louis XV and placed guards.
There is more to this hysteria story, but lets stop there. Nowadays, the
church is a quiet, unassuming place. Surrounded by trees, and with a small
little park next to it, it marks the southern end of the Mouffe.
The daily open market - St. Médard is in the background.
During the mornings the lower half of the Mouffe is a lively open market
with people from the neighborhood shopping for lunch and dinner. The
market is there every day, and without too much imagination, it is
easy to see the scene as if it was being played out in the Middle Ages.
Entrepreneurs shouting out their prices; hogs heads smile from
the butcher's stand, the vegetable carts, the beggers, neighbors
meeting for a coffee, or drink.
Thats the Mouffe in the morning.
At night the market is gone, and a multitude of little restaurants
open - Greek, Argentinian.... everything but French it seems.
These are for consumption by tourists. Not too many Parisians eat
at these places, but it is still a charm to walk down the street at night just
the same. Stop in one of the cafés up at the
Place de la Contrescarpe, get an ice cream on a hot summer night
at the little Italian place, or a crêpe at the Crêperie
across from the Greek Giros sandwich place.
Of course all of the above is not even the half of it. The Mouffe is
yet richer than this. Take a stroll down it your next visit to Paris.
You won't be disappointed.
If you go, rue Moufftard is in the 5th arrondissement, a short walk
from the Panthéon.
The nearest
Métro Stops are
Place Monge, and Censier-Daubenton.
Norman Barth is the Editor of the Paris Kiosque, and webmaster/creator of
Les Pages de Paris. He can be contacted at
nbarth@paris.org