French Country · Encyclopedia · Fire and Light
Peddler's handbell
A heavy bronze bell with a polished walnut handle, nearly thirty centimetres long, rung by peddlers as they arrived in a village to announce ribbons, lace, almanacs and news from afar.
French: grelot de colporteur · Early 19th century · bronze, walnut
At a glance
- Period: early nineteenth century
- Materials: bronze bell, walnut handle
- Length: nearly 30 cm
- A witness of a vanished trade: the colporteur
What it is
A large hand bell, its walnut handle polished by the hand that carried it. The colporteur, the traveling peddler, rang it as he passed through villages to tell women and girls that his pack held ribbons, lace and novelties.
The peddlers of France
Peddlers walked from village to village with a pack or a cart, selling haberdashery, small goods and printed matter such as almanacs, songs and devotional pictures. For isolated communities they were a link with the wider world.
The book describes this bell as a rare witness of a trade that has disappeared.
Collecting and displaying it
Check that the clapper is present and that the handle is firmly fixed. A pleasant, clear ring and old wear on the handle are good signs.
Displayed on a hall table, a peddler's bell makes an evocative object and can still call the household to dinner.
Source: Les Trésors de France: vieux métiers et objets d'autrefois (Éditions Rustica, Détours en France collection, 1995), pp. 116–121, with general background on the object. The book was published in 1995, so workshops, people and figures are described as they were then. Regional names and dates are given as the book records them; a style or a region of origin does not by itself date an individual piece.