French Country · Encyclopedia of objects
Copper
Hammered, polished and handed down, copper brought light into the kitchen. Some pieces are kept bright; others are loved for their green patina. (Le cuivre)
Kettle (bouilloire)
Northern France · copper and brass
With a copper body and a brass spout, these kettles still sat in every kitchen of northern France not long ago. Less prestigious than the coquemar, the "grandmother's kettle" is gaining value and moving into other rooms of the house.
Firedog with pot rest (chenet landier)
Hearth iron
Designed to support a pot or the handled kettle called a coquemar beside the fire.
Coquemar (coquemar, marabout)
Originally from Turkey · copper
A handled kettle first imported from Turkey that kept hot water always at hand. Its weighted lid tapped on the rim when the water boiled, warning the household.
Watering cans (arrosoirs)
19th century · copper
Fine old copper watering cans are rare: many hide under oxidation that is hard to remove, or have lost their rose. One bright example is more than a hundred years old. Another, dented and green with verdigris, is better left as it is, since its age is its charm.
Stockpot and braising pan (pot-au-feu, daubière)
Paris · early 19th century
Shaped with the hammer and joined with a dovetailed seam called "wolf's teeth". Paris had a guild of coppersmiths as early as the reign of Charles VI.
Fish kettle (saumonière)
Villedieu-les-Poêles · 17th century
A long kettle for poaching salmon, with a notch for hanging in the hearth. It comes from Villedieu-les-Poêles, the Norman town of coppersmiths.
Galette pan (galettière)
Brittany, Cantal, Corrèze, Limousin, North
The first long-handled plates for cooking buckwheat or wheat galettes on embers were rimless wrought iron. They were called téoulo in the Cantal, téoulé in Corrèze, galetou in the Limousin, galetière in Brittany and tioula in the North. Copper pans came later, closer to a frying pan and sometimes very large.
Church weathercock (coq de clocher)
Copper with verdigris
Why a rooster tops the cross on almost every French bell tower is still debated. Texts from the year 450 already describe "the rooster in its golden finery, resisting every breath of wind." The oldest weathercocks, highly stylized and green with verdigris, recall modern sculpture.
Keep reading
Source: Les Trésors de France: vieux métiers et objets d'autrefois (Éditions Rustica, Détours en France collection, 1995), pp. 138–142. Descriptions summarize the book's reportage and captions; the book was published in 1995, so workshops, people, prices and figures are described as the reporters found them then, and some workshops may since have closed or changed hands.