The Giraffe that Launched France into the Future
In 1826, the Pasha of Egypt sent an African giraffe as a gift to Charles X, the king of France. The last time anyone in Europe had seen a giraffe was in Italy in the 15th century. Nothing could have appeared more completely alien to the people of cosmopolitan Paris. The Pasha hoped that his unique gift would convince Charles X to do him a favor in a matter of foreign policy. Instead, the Pasha’s giraffe became a weapon in an internal political struggle. The Restoration was a period of unease. France was poised as if at the threshold between two rooms, undecided which way to go. In one room was the past, the monarchy and the Catholic church offering the comfort and certainty of centuries-old institutions. In the other room was the uncharted future, offering both opportunity and menace. Critics of the government used the giraffe to alienate the monarchy from the people and launch France into the future.
Charles X was the second, the more conservative, and as it would turn out the last of the Restoration monarchs. The youngest of four brothers, it was never expected that Charles might one day have to govern. He was raised in the royal compound at Versailles and lived there as a member of the court until the age of 32. Charles spent lavishly, play-acted with Marie-Antoinette at living as a rural peasant, and nurtured ultra-conservative political views. In the events leading up to the French Revolution, when it became clear that the balance of political power was shifting, Charles strongly opposed effort by his brother, the ill-fated king Louis XVI, to diffuse the situation but that would have also eroded the privileges of the monarchy. Now as king, following the death of his third brother Louis XVIII in 1824, Charles X desired nothing more than to re-establish the supreme authority of the monarchy over France.
However, many people were not entirely willing to turn back the clock and return to the status quo of two generations earlier, when the monarchy last governed France. The Revolutionary ideals of liberty, equality, and fraternity were widely held. The terms negotiated by Louis VIII for restoration of the monarchy acknowledged this new political reality. The Charter of 1814 provided for an elected legislature and other provisions that shared political power, including freedom of the press. Growing demand, fed by an increasingly wealthy middle class, combined with falling costs, which were the result of technological innovation, to create the new a mass market for popular literature, news, and gossip. This was a new phenomenon. For the first time writers and artists could express themselves and earn a living without relying on the patronage from the monarchy and wealthy aristocrats. If nothing else, the French Revolution had succeeded in engaging a larger portion of the population in politics, and technological innovation gave them a voice.
Charles X regarded the concessions contained in the Charter of 1814 as a thorn in his side. The press especially was vocal in its criticism of his conservative agenda, which included paying financial compensation to aristocratic families for properties confiscated during the Revolution and increasing the influence of the Catholic Church. In response to growing public opposition, the embattled monarch moved to reign in the press. On June 24, 1827, a new law established censorship over what newspapers could publish on topics of morals, religion, and the monarchy. However, the move to censorship broadened the conflict. The publishing industry was a growing source of skilled jobs for the working class. Therefore, restrictions on the press were seen as a double assault on supporters of the Revolution and its political ideals.
Just days after the new censorship law was enacted, Zarafa the giraffe arrived in Paris at the end of a well-publicized cross-country trek from the Mediterranean port of Marseilles. The Museum of Natural History, where she would live, had taken great care to protect the giraffe’s health and help her adjust to the climate of France, sending one of its leading scientists, Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire to supervise her journey. Zarafa was outfitted with a protective, rain-proof coat, custom-made and embroidered with the crest of the monarchy. And, she was accompanied by an entourage that included two handlers from her African homeland, dressed in colorful costumes, three cows to provide milk, because the giraffe was still young, and a cart carrying several other exotic animals, luggage and supplies.
The public was immediately smitten by Zarafa, and Zarafa-mania spread through Paris. Over half a million people, about two thirds of the population of the city, filed through the zoo at the Jardin des Plantes to see the giraffe in her new home. Observers remarked on her regal bearing and grace, which was unexpected of such an ungainly creature. Zarafa inspired a wave of new fashions, including giraffe-themed hair styles and clothing designs for both men and women. Pictures of the giraffe being led through the French countryside by one of her handlers were reproduced in countless prints and on various items of household pottery and other kitsch.
All of this was dutifully reported by newspapers and lampooned on the stage in theater that commented on current events for entertainment. However, Zarafa was not always the intended topic. Critics exploited the spectacle surrounding the giraffe, using metaphor, allegory and double-entendre, to sidestep government censors and continue their attacks on Charles X, government ministers, and the church. Several employed the device of conducting an imagined interview with the giraffe to have Zarafa herself deliver the attacks. In a memorable political cartoon, distinctive physical characteristics of Charles X, his lanky build and a protuberant lower lip, are used to show a docile king-as-giraffe led on a leash by a Catholic priest.
The onslaught of sly political attacks that followed the giraffe’s arrival in Paris did not signal the end for the monarchy, but they had a role in resolving the dilemma that plagued the Restoration - would people follow the monarchy’s retreat into the past, or would they instead act to launch France into the future? Those inclined to follow Charles X back to the days of the ancien regime could not have been encouraged by the easy comparison drawn between the monarch and his new pet. In 1827, at the beginning of a revolution in science and technology that promised to transform the world, the king and the aristocracy resembled, more and more, members of an exotic species better suited to being on display in a zoo than to leading France.
