| It was in the year 1248, under
St. Louis, King of France, that the Royal Guild of Oyers Rotisseurs was established.
Limited at first to the "masters" in the art of roasting geese, the object of
the Guild was to perpetuate the standards of quality befitting the royal table. Soon the
craft of "Rotisseurs" encompassed the preparation of all the various meats and
fowls designed for the spit or rack, and the activities of the Guild, always under royal
patronage, enlarged to include the development of an apprentice program, wage and work
standards, and the conferment of appropriate honors.  In
1509, the official Coat of Arms was awarded to the Guild by King Louis XII by royal
proclamation. As recorded by Hozier in L'Amorial, the components of the coat of arms are
two crossed turning spits in juxtaposition with four larding needles. Flames indicate the
hearth fire surrounded by the fleur-de-lis. The inner chain represents the bond which
brings together the members of this ancient order.
The increasingly wealthy monopoly continued until 1776,
when Louis XVI declared freedom of work laws in an effort to forestall the French
Revolution. As his efforts were in vain, in 1791 the Chaine was disbanded.
Gastronomically speaking, 160 years passed until three
amateurs and two professionals met in Paris in 1950 with a common goal - to restore the
pride in culinary excellence lost during a period of wartime shortages. La Chaine des
Rotisseurs was reincorporated and the Coat of Arms of the ancient guild was restored by
the French Government to which the year of incorporation of the modern Chaine, 1950, was
added. Among the founders were Jean Valby, Grand Chancelier, and Curnonsky, the justly
renowned "Prince of Gastronomes". |
