Chasse-marée
Encyclopedia
In English, a chasse-marée is a specific, archaic type of decked commercial sailing vessel.
In French, un chasse-marée was 'a wholesale fishmonger', originally on the Channel
coast of France
and later, on the Atlantic
coast as well. He bought in the coastal ports and sold in inland markets. However, this meaning is not normally adopted into English
. The name for such a trader in Britain, from 1500 to 1900 at least, was 'rippier'. The chasse-marée name was carried over to the vehicle he used for carrying the fish, which because of the perishable nature of its load, was worked in the same urgent manner as a mail coach
. Later, fast three-masted lugger
s were used to extend the marketing
process to the purchase of fresh fish in Breton
ports and on the fishing grounds. These vessels too, were known as chasse-marée. Both these meanings, particularly the latter, are used in English where, unlike the French
, the plural normally takes an 's'.
'. Fish
is a highly perishable commodity. Before the days of conservation by salting, canning or freezing, it was brought ashore as near to its market as possible. Therefore, each coastal place had its harbour or its beach on which fish were landed, originally for that community. Berths in small ports and the upper parts of beaches were accessible from the sea only towards high tide. Where estuaries allowed entry further inland, harbours were established some way into them. Consequently, the fishermen landed their catches towards high tide; in other words the landings were half-daily events, though particularly on the morning tide. They occurred in time with la marée so the landing of fish itself came to be known also as la marée; not only the process of landing but the batch of fish too. La marée therefore, now means any of 'the tide', 'the landing of fish' or 'sea fish marketed as a fresh product'. The last is nowadays, usually taken as including shellfish
.
Each of the two French words involved in the name 'chasse-marée' has a range of meanings but in this instance, they are chasser 'to impel' or 'to drive forward' and une marée, 'a landing of fresh sea fish'.
The most prolific fish such as herring
are abundant in given waters only in their season so keeping them for use out of season required salting
or smoking
them. This permitted their sale in inland markets too but fresh fish tasted better so long as it really was fresh. There was therefore a premium on fresh fish in this top end of the market. The medieval chasse-marée merchants catered to this originally by carrying fish in pairs of baskets on pack ponies, as far as possible, overnight. They rushed la marée (the batch from a particular landing) to market but the distance coverable before the fish deteriorated was limited. Another problem was that every lord through whose manor the road led wanted his toll so that if the road was too long, the enterprise became less economic.
Later, where the quality of the road permitted, the range might be extended by the use of charrettes (carts). When designed for this trade, with a minimum of weight put into their construction and provision for harnessing the four horses, these vehicles took the name of chasse-marée. As speed was essential, they were normally hauled by two pairs of horses rather than the single horse which is normal for a cart
. The vehicle took the form of two wheels, of a diameter large enough to minimize the slowing effect of bumps in the road. On their axle was mounted an open rectangular frame within which were slung the baskets holding the fish, packed in seaweed. More baskets were stacked above. The teams of usually fairly small horses were worked hard and changed at posting stations in the same way as those of mail coaches.
The coast supplying Paris by road was originally, that which was nearest to its market, around Le Tréport
and Saint-Valery-sur-Somme
. At its most developed, it extended from Fécamp
to Calais
including such places as Dieppe
, Boulogne-sur-Mer
and Etaples
.
.jpg)
On the coast of Brittany, originally in the southern part, later known as Morbihan
, from the eighteenth century, fast luggers bought fish from the fishermen at sea and carried it to the Loire
and Gironde
for sale in the markets of Nantes
and Bordeaux
.
With the spread of wealth within places like Paris, the market expanded and supplies were sought from more distant coasts. In the nineteenth century, these Breton three-masted luggers began to bring fish from ports further north on the Breton coast and from fishing boats off its coast, into the Seine estuary for sale in Rouen
and for transshipment
up to Paris. In such waters, a vessel without engines relied heavily on the skilful use of tides. Here, the parallel tidal meaning of marée and the catching of the tide became relevant to prosecuting the trade. It may be this which led the compiler of the Oxford English Dictionary
to translate the vessel's name as 'tide-chaser'. This translation is accurate provided less-relevant meanings of the two component words are taken.
According to the Naval Maquette (Ship Model) site, the chasse marées took return cargoes where they were available, so tended to move into the cabotage trade. That is to say; coastal tramping. In particular, having taken fish south to Bordeaux, they would return with salt from Charente Inférieur, as it was then known (Lower Charente) or from Vendée to more northerly coasts of France. Early vessels were replaced progressively by the luggers, then dundees, brigs and schooners. The rig called in French dundee is a little obscure. The Nouveau Petit Larousse Illustrée (1934) describes it only as a 'large sailing ship'. Other available dictionaries ignore it but the Mandragore II site describes it as a gaff ketch and says that the rig was used principally in lobster boats and herring drifters. The article includes an illustration showing a vessel well adapted to the chasse-marée trade, with a large sail area and strikeable bowsprit and bumkin. Apparently, the yawl rig (cotre à tapecul) used by French tunnymen was sometimes but improperly called a dundee.
, Normandy
and Brittany
, the market changed suddenly. The railway saw to the rapid transit aspect of the trade. The chasse-marée vehicle was redundant on the main road routes but was still used more locally. The important thing then was for the fisherman to make his landing in time to catch the early morning train which took the product to the morning markets in inland towns. In order to make a living, he had to see that with or without wind, he was ashore in time. He would therefore choose his fishing ground and the time of leaving it with a view to how the tide would carry him to the fish quay for 4 a.m. or thereabouts. Nonetheless, now that he was working to city time rather than the tide, the railway fish quay had to be accessible at all states of the tide. Over the years, the canneries
took ever more of his catch so that missing the train did not represent a total loss.
The days of the chasse-marée were numbered but still the marée in both senses, ruled the life of the longshore fishermen of the tidal French coasts. The chasse-marée boat seems to have persisted for some years by using its crew's capacity to buy on the fishing grounds and bringing the marée ashore. In that way, the vessel, designed for speed, permitted the fishing fleets to develop into working more distant waters, a process which developed further when it was possible to obtain ice
and ultimately, refrigeration
.
By this stage, the chasse-marée had receded into the romance of history. That process was under way when Monet painted several pictures of the boats on the lower Seine
in 1872.
Some horse lovers are attracted to the idea of driving a version of the chasse-marée carts, as a recreation.
In French, un chasse-marée was 'a wholesale fishmonger', originally on the Channel
English Channel
The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...
coast of France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and later, on the Atlantic
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions. With a total area of about , it covers approximately 20% of the Earth's surface and about 26% of its water surface area...
coast as well. He bought in the coastal ports and sold in inland markets. However, this meaning is not normally adopted into English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
. The name for such a trader in Britain, from 1500 to 1900 at least, was 'rippier'. The chasse-marée name was carried over to the vehicle he used for carrying the fish, which because of the perishable nature of its load, was worked in the same urgent manner as a mail coach
Mail coach
In Great Britain, the mail coach or post coach was a horse-drawn carriage that carried mail deliveries, from 1784. In Ireland, the first mail coach began service from Dublin in 1789. The coach was drawn by four horses and had seating for four passengers inside. Further passengers were later allowed...
. Later, fast three-masted lugger
Lugger
A lugger is a class of boats, widely used as traditional fishing boats, particularly off the coasts of France, Scotland and England. It is a small sailing vessel with lugsails set on two or more masts and perhaps lug topsails.-Defining the rig:...
s were used to extend the marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...
process to the purchase of fresh fish in Breton
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
ports and on the fishing grounds. These vessels too, were known as chasse-marée. Both these meanings, particularly the latter, are used in English where, unlike the French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
, the plural normally takes an 's'.
Derivation of the name
Une marée has the basic meaning of 'a sea tideTide
Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the moon and the sun and the rotation of the Earth....
'. Fish
Fish
Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...
is a highly perishable commodity. Before the days of conservation by salting, canning or freezing, it was brought ashore as near to its market as possible. Therefore, each coastal place had its harbour or its beach on which fish were landed, originally for that community. Berths in small ports and the upper parts of beaches were accessible from the sea only towards high tide. Where estuaries allowed entry further inland, harbours were established some way into them. Consequently, the fishermen landed their catches towards high tide; in other words the landings were half-daily events, though particularly on the morning tide. They occurred in time with la marée so the landing of fish itself came to be known also as la marée; not only the process of landing but the batch of fish too. La marée therefore, now means any of 'the tide', 'the landing of fish' or 'sea fish marketed as a fresh product'. The last is nowadays, usually taken as including shellfish
Shellfish
Shellfish is a culinary and fisheries term for exoskeleton-bearing aquatic invertebrates used as food, including various species of molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms. Although most kinds of shellfish are harvested from saltwater environments, some kinds are found only in freshwater...
.
Each of the two French words involved in the name 'chasse-marée' has a range of meanings but in this instance, they are chasser 'to impel' or 'to drive forward' and une marée, 'a landing of fresh sea fish'.
Chasse-marée - road vehicle
Herring
Herring is an oily fish of the genus Clupea, found in the shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and the North Atlantic oceans, including the Baltic Sea. Three species of Clupea are recognized. The main taxa, the Atlantic herring and the Pacific herring may each be divided into subspecies...
are abundant in given waters only in their season so keeping them for use out of season required salting
Salting (food)
Salting is the preservation of food with dry edible salt. It is related to pickling . It is one of the oldest methods of preserving food, and two historically significant salt-cured foods are dried and salted cod and salt-cured meat.Salting is used because most bacteria, fungi and other potentially...
or smoking
Smoking (cooking technique)
Smoking is the process of flavoring, cooking, or preserving food by exposing it to the smoke from burning or smoldering plant materials, most often wood...
them. This permitted their sale in inland markets too but fresh fish tasted better so long as it really was fresh. There was therefore a premium on fresh fish in this top end of the market. The medieval chasse-marée merchants catered to this originally by carrying fish in pairs of baskets on pack ponies, as far as possible, overnight. They rushed la marée (the batch from a particular landing) to market but the distance coverable before the fish deteriorated was limited. Another problem was that every lord through whose manor the road led wanted his toll so that if the road was too long, the enterprise became less economic.
Later, where the quality of the road permitted, the range might be extended by the use of charrettes (carts). When designed for this trade, with a minimum of weight put into their construction and provision for harnessing the four horses, these vehicles took the name of chasse-marée. As speed was essential, they were normally hauled by two pairs of horses rather than the single horse which is normal for a cart
Cart
A cart is a vehicle designed for transport, using two wheels and normally pulled by one or a pair of draught animals. A handcart is pulled or pushed by one or more people...
. The vehicle took the form of two wheels, of a diameter large enough to minimize the slowing effect of bumps in the road. On their axle was mounted an open rectangular frame within which were slung the baskets holding the fish, packed in seaweed. More baskets were stacked above. The teams of usually fairly small horses were worked hard and changed at posting stations in the same way as those of mail coaches.
The coast supplying Paris by road was originally, that which was nearest to its market, around Le Tréport
Le Tréport
Le Tréport is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-Geography:A small fishing port and light industrial town situated in the Pays de Caux, some northeast of Dieppe at the junction of the D940, the D78 and the D1015 roads...
and Saint-Valery-sur-Somme
Canton of Saint-Valery-sur-Somme
The Canton of Saint-Valery-sur-Somme is a canton situated in the Somme department of northern France.- Geography :The canton is organised around Saint-Valery-sur-Somme in the arrondissement of Abbeville...
. At its most developed, it extended from Fécamp
Fécamp
Fécamp is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France.-Geography:Fécamp is situated in the valley of the river Valmont, at the heart of the Pays de Caux, on the Albaster Coast...
to Calais
Calais
Calais is a town in Northern France in the department of Pas-de-Calais, of which it is a sub-prefecture. Although Calais is by far the largest city in Pas-de-Calais, the department's capital is its third-largest city of Arras....
including such places as Dieppe
Dieppe, Seine-Maritime
Dieppe is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in France. In 1999, the population of the whole Dieppe urban area was 81,419.A port on the English Channel, famous for its scallops, and with a regular ferry service from the Gare Maritime to Newhaven in England, Dieppe also has a popular pebbled...
, Boulogne-sur-Mer
Boulogne-sur-Mer
-Road:* Metropolitan bus services are operated by the TCRB* Coach services to Calais and Dunkerque* A16 motorway-Rail:* The main railway station is Gare de Boulogne-Ville and located in the south of the city....
and Etaples
Étaples
Étaples or Étaples-sur-Mer is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France. It is a fishing and leisure port on the Canche river.There is a separate commune named Staple, Nord.-History:...
.
Chasse-marée - boat
Morbihan
Morbihan is a department in Brittany, situated in the northwest of France. It is named after the Morbihan , the enclosed sea that is the principal feature of the coastline.-History:...
, from the eighteenth century, fast luggers bought fish from the fishermen at sea and carried it to the Loire
Loire
Loire is an administrative department in the east-central part of France occupying the River Loire's upper reaches.-History:Loire was created in 1793 when after just 3½ years the young Rhône-et-Loire department was split into two. This was a response to counter-Revolutionary activities in Lyon...
and Gironde
Gironde
For the Revolutionary party, see Girondists.Gironde is a common name for the Gironde estuary, where the mouths of the Garonne and Dordogne rivers merge, and for a department in the Aquitaine region situated in southwest France.-History:...
for sale in the markets of Nantes
Nantes
Nantes is a city in western France, located on the Loire River, from the Atlantic coast. The city is the 6th largest in France, while its metropolitan area ranks 8th with over 800,000 inhabitants....
and Bordeaux
Bordeaux
Bordeaux is a port city on the Garonne River in the Gironde department in southwestern France.The Bordeaux-Arcachon-Libourne metropolitan area, has a population of 1,010,000 and constitutes the sixth-largest urban area in France. It is the capital of the Aquitaine region, as well as the prefecture...
.
With the spread of wealth within places like Paris, the market expanded and supplies were sought from more distant coasts. In the nineteenth century, these Breton three-masted luggers began to bring fish from ports further north on the Breton coast and from fishing boats off its coast, into the Seine estuary for sale in Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
and for transshipment
Transshipment
Transshipment or Transhipment is the shipment of goods or containers to an intermediate destination, and then from there to yet another destination....
up to Paris. In such waters, a vessel without engines relied heavily on the skilful use of tides. Here, the parallel tidal meaning of marée and the catching of the tide became relevant to prosecuting the trade. It may be this which led the compiler of the Oxford English Dictionary
Oxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press, is the self-styled premier dictionary of the English language. Two fully bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989. The first edition was published in twelve volumes , and...
to translate the vessel's name as 'tide-chaser'. This translation is accurate provided less-relevant meanings of the two component words are taken.
According to the Naval Maquette (Ship Model) site, the chasse marées took return cargoes where they were available, so tended to move into the cabotage trade. That is to say; coastal tramping. In particular, having taken fish south to Bordeaux, they would return with salt from Charente Inférieur, as it was then known (Lower Charente) or from Vendée to more northerly coasts of France. Early vessels were replaced progressively by the luggers, then dundees, brigs and schooners. The rig called in French dundee is a little obscure. The Nouveau Petit Larousse Illustrée (1934) describes it only as a 'large sailing ship'. Other available dictionaries ignore it but the Mandragore II site describes it as a gaff ketch and says that the rig was used principally in lobster boats and herring drifters. The article includes an illustration showing a vessel well adapted to the chasse-marée trade, with a large sail area and strikeable bowsprit and bumkin. Apparently, the yawl rig (cotre à tapecul) used by French tunnymen was sometimes but improperly called a dundee.
End of the trade
In the 1840s, when the railways reached the coasts of PicardyPicardy
This article is about the historical French province. For other uses, see Picardy .Picardy is a historical province of France, in the north of France...
, Normandy
Normandy
Normandy is a geographical region corresponding to the former Duchy of Normandy. It is in France.The continental territory covers 30,627 km² and forms the preponderant part of Normandy and roughly 5% of the territory of France. It is divided for administrative purposes into two régions:...
and Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
, the market changed suddenly. The railway saw to the rapid transit aspect of the trade. The chasse-marée vehicle was redundant on the main road routes but was still used more locally. The important thing then was for the fisherman to make his landing in time to catch the early morning train which took the product to the morning markets in inland towns. In order to make a living, he had to see that with or without wind, he was ashore in time. He would therefore choose his fishing ground and the time of leaving it with a view to how the tide would carry him to the fish quay for 4 a.m. or thereabouts. Nonetheless, now that he was working to city time rather than the tide, the railway fish quay had to be accessible at all states of the tide. Over the years, the canneries
Canning
Canning is a method of preserving food in which the food contents are processed and sealed in an airtight container. Canning provides a typical shelf life ranging from one to five years, although under specific circumstances a freeze-dried canned product, such as canned, dried lentils, can last as...
took ever more of his catch so that missing the train did not represent a total loss.
The days of the chasse-marée were numbered but still the marée in both senses, ruled the life of the longshore fishermen of the tidal French coasts. The chasse-marée boat seems to have persisted for some years by using its crew's capacity to buy on the fishing grounds and bringing the marée ashore. In that way, the vessel, designed for speed, permitted the fishing fleets to develop into working more distant waters, a process which developed further when it was possible to obtain ice
Ice
Ice is water frozen into the solid state. Usually ice is the phase known as ice Ih, which is the most abundant of the varying solid phases on the Earth's surface. It can appear transparent or opaque bluish-white color, depending on the presence of impurities or air inclusions...
and ultimately, refrigeration
Refrigeration
Refrigeration is a process in which work is done to move heat from one location to another. This work is traditionally done by mechanical work, but can also be done by magnetism, laser or other means...
.
By this stage, the chasse-marée had receded into the romance of history. That process was under way when Monet painted several pictures of the boats on the lower Seine
Seine
The Seine is a -long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Saint-Seine near Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and into the English Channel at Le Havre . It is navigable by ocean-going vessels...
in 1872.
Some horse lovers are attracted to the idea of driving a version of the chasse-marée carts, as a recreation.
External links
By the nature of the subject, these links are in French but several include pictures.- Government edicts - 1500 to 1805 Make a search for 'chasse'.
- A survey of the herring fishery form the eleventh century on
- Site with pictures of a model of a Breton chasse-marée lugger.
- These chasse-marées were clearly carrying general cargo in 1810 but these were the special circumstances of war. (en)
- The road system developed in and around Picardy for the mail and chasse-marées Scroll down to the last two sections.
- http://www.crpmemhn.fr/historiq.htm http://www.scienceaction.asso.fr/estran/pagesasso/chassemaree/chassemaree.htm These deal with the road transport chasse-marées