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The power to tax is the power to destroy.

-John Marshall

Croissant of Islam

Ah, the joys of discovery. Allow me to take you through a web-surfing journey:

I read an article today at Little Green Footballs called Belgian Churches Becoming Mosques. A commenter named "Pettifog" responded to a call for Charles Martel:

And to think, it was the Charles the Hammer (born in Belgium) and his Franken armies so long ago that stopped the Moorish armies, thereby saving Western Civilization from the world wide Caliphate. Now the Belgians, with the French and Dutch beside them, are surrendering their culture, religion, society, politics to those who have no concept of "civilization" and without any fight. Charles the Hammer must be turning over in his grave.

I'm not sure how I got from there to here, but Robert W. Martin had this to say about Charles Martel and his famous battle of Tours:

How do you connect a roll with medieval warfare? What does the battle of Tours (732 AD) and a tasty breakfast food have in common? Well, unless you eat your morning meal with a battle axe or you consume your sausage and eggs while clad in Saracen armor, most would say not much. However, there is an edible connection to the Battle of Tours which should make for some very interesting table conversation. When news of the great victory spread throughout the Frankish countryside, bakers began to fashion bread in the form of the Islamic crescent. The croissant was served up as a testament to Charles and a symbol how he devoured the invader on the battlefield. Today, the French croissant still holds a place of respect at most breakfast tables. And yet, many people are unaware that their favorite roll has a direct relationship to an engagement fought over 1200 years ago.

Pretty neat, eh? I was so excited by this Clavenistic Factoid, that I quickly put together the above graphic for an Atlas Blogged article.

Only, it's not true.

According to the editor of the Oxford Companion to Food, "[...] the earliest French reference to a croissant he found was among the fantasy or luxury breads in Payen's Des substances alimentaires, 1853." The croissant, as they say, is a relative newcomer in the pastry world. The myth of it being created as a tribute to Charles Martel is apocryphal, and off by about a millennium.

But I already had the graphic made up...so, I thought I'd share.

The OChef wraps things up nicely:

The sad thing is, the truth in this case is not nearly as interesting as the myth. No one knows when or where the first croissant was baked, but it was definitely in France and certainly not before 1850. The word was first used in a dictionary in 1863. The first croissant recipe was published in 1891, but it wasn't the same kind of croissant we are familiar with today. The first recipe that would produce what we consider to be a croissant wasn't published until 1905, and, again, it was in France.

So there you have it, everything you'd ever want to know about croissants. I take comfort in the fact that - in a thousand years from now - historians will be speculating on how the croissant evolved into the croissan'wich.

Posted by Rammage on May 9, 2006 at 11:31 PM

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The power to tax is the power to destroy.

-John Marshall

Croissant of Islam

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