Café Procope

The Café Procope (), also known as Le Procope (), on the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie, is a café in the 6th arrondissement of Paris. The original café was opened in 1686 by the Sicilian chef Procopio Cutò (also known by his Italian name Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli and his French name François Procope);Bell, David A. "Culture and Religion." Old Regime France: 1648–1788. Ed. William Doyle. Oxford [u.a.: Oxford Univ., 2003. 78–104. Print. it became a hub of the Parisian artistic and literary community in 18th and 19th centuries. It sometimes is erroneously called the oldest café in the world in continuous operation (the Queen's Lane Coffee House in Oxford England has been in continuous operation since 1654); however, the original café closed in 1872 and the space was used in various ways before 1957, when the current incarnation (not a café but a restaurant) was opened, so the claim of "oldest café in continuous operation" is not supported.Bernard Lefort, « Le Procope a trois siècles », Le Monde, 12 juillet 1986 (lire en ligne [archive], consulté le 14 mai 2019)

Background Procopio Cutò first apprenticed under the leadership of an Armenian immigrant named Pascal who had a kiosk (, ) on rue de Tournon selling refreshments, including lemonade and coffee.Fitch, p. 43 Pascal's attempt at such a business in Paris was not successful and he went to London in 1675, leaving the stall to Procopio.The first Paris cafe was probably Le Procope, opened about 1675 (it moved to its present location in 1686) by a Sicilian, who helped turn France into a coffee-drinking society. Literary Cafes of Paris by Noel Riley Fitch, Starrhill Press, Washington & Philadelphia

History Cutò relocated his kiosk in 1686 to rue des Fossés-Saint-Germain-des-Prés.David, pp. 24–25. At the beginning, it was referred to as an "antre" (cavern or cave) because it was so dark inside, even when there was bright sunshine outside.Ukers, William H., All About Coffee – The Project Gutenberg EBook, p. 94. Cutò purchased a bath house and had its unique fixtures removed; he installed in his new café items now standard in modern European cafés (crystal chandeliers, wall mirrors, marble tables).Fitch, p. 43 "An often overlooked feature of the Procope's place in cafe history is Procopio's purchase of a bath-house, whose fittings he had extracted and installed in his coffee-house; large wall mirrors, marble-topped tables, and many other features that have since become standard in cafes throughout Europe."

It was a place where gentlemen of fashion might drink coffee, the exotic beverage that had previously been served in taverns, or eat a sorbet, served up in porcelain cups by waiters in exotic "Armenian" garb. The escorted ladies, who appeared at the Café Procope in its earliest days, soon disappeared.

In 1689, the Comédie-Française opened its doors in a theatre across the street from his caféhence the street's modern name.THE CAFE PROCOPE by Addison May Rothrock; Lippincott's Monthly Magazine (1886–1915); Jun 1906; 77, 462; American Periodicals Series Online, pg. 702 By this stroke of fortune, the café attracted many actors, writers, musicians, poets, philosophers, revolutionaries, statesmen, scientists, dramatists, stage artists, playwrights, and literary critics.Thomazeau, pp. 70–73 It was to the Procope, on 18 December 1752, that Rousseau retired, before the performance of Narcisse, his last play, had even finished, saying publicly how boring it all was on the stage, now that he had seen it mounted.E. P. Shaw, "The Chevalier de Mouhy's Newsletter of 20 December 1752" Modern Language Notes 70.2 (February 1955, pp. 114–116), p. 116.

It was the unexampled mix of habitués that surprised visitors, though no-one remarked on the absence of women. Louis, chevalier de Mailly, in Les Entretiens des caffés, 1702, remarked:

In 1702, Cutò changed his name to the gallicized François Procope, and renamed the business to Café Procope, the name by which it is still known today. Prior to that, it had been known only as the "boutique at the sign of the Holy Shroud of Turin", which was the name of the previous business at the location.David, p. 27.Albala, p. 84 The first cafe in Paris, Le Procopio, was opened by the Sicilian Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli in 1686.

Throughout the 18th century, the brasserie Procope was the meeting place of the intellectual establishment, and of the nouvellistes of the scandal-gossip trade, whose remarks at Procope were repeated in the police reports.A police spy reported in 1749 on one of these scurrilous writers, Mairobert, who later wrote a libellous "biography" of Mme du Barry: "speaking about the reorganization of the army, Mairobert said in the Café Procope that any soldier who had an opportunity should blast the court to hell, since its sole pleasure is in devouring the people and committing injustices" (quoted in Robert Darnton, "An Early Information Society: News and the Media in Eighteenth-Century Paris" The American Historical Review 105.1 (February 2000, pp. 1–35) p. 9 and note. Not all the Encyclopédistes drank forty cups of coffee a day like Voltaire, who mixed his with chocolate, but they all met at Café Procope, as did Benjamin Franklin,On 15 June 1790, after the National Assembly had adjourned to mourn Benjamin Franklin's death, the "True Friends of Liberty" met at the Procope. M. de la Fite, a lawyer, conducted a memorial service in front of Franklin's portrait, which hung there, along with those of Voltaire and other notables (Daniel Jouve, Alice Jourve, and Alvin Grossma, Paris : Birthplace of the U.S.A.); Gilbert Chinard, "The Apotheosis of Benjamin Franklin Paris, 1790–1791" Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 99.6, (December 1955), p 443. John Paul Jones and Thomas Jefferson.

There are words above the door at Cutò's establishment that read: Café à la Voltaire. Voltaire is known to have said, "Ice cream is exquisite. What a pity it isn’t illegal."

The birthplace of the Encyclopédie, conceived by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert, is said to be at Café Procope.Fitch, p. 43 During the French Enlightenment (1715-89) the Encyclopédie was born here in conversations between Diderot and d'Alembert.

Alain-René Lesage described the hubbub at Procope in La Valise Trouvée (1772): "There is an ebb and flow of all conditions of men, nobles and cooks, wits and sots, pell mell, all chattering in full chorus to their heart's content",Arthur Morris, in Notes and Queries 16 August 1890:188. indicating an increasingly democratic mix. Writing a few years after the death of Voltaire, Louis-Sébastien Mercier.Mercier, Tableau de Paris, VI:222, quoted in Georges May, "The Eighteenth Century" Yale French Studies No. 32, Paris in Literature (1964, pp. 29–39), p.31. noted:

During the Revolution, the Phrygian cap, soon to be the symbol of Liberty, was first displayed at the Procope. The Cordeliers, Robespierre, Danton and Marat all used the café as a meeting place. After the Restoration, another famous customer was Alexander von Humboldt who, during the 1820s, lunched there every day from 11am to noon. The Café Procope retained its literary cachet; Alfred de Musset, George Sand, Gustave Planche, the philosopher Pierre Leroux, M. Coquille, editor of Le Monde, Anatole France and Mikael Printz were all regulars. Under the Second Empire, August Jean-Marie Vermorel of Le Reforme or Léon GambettaJ. P. T. Bury, Gambetta and the National Defence: A Republican Dictatorship in France (New York) 1936. would expound their plans for social reform.

In the 1860s, the Conférence Molé held its meetings at the Café Procope. Léon Gambetta, like many other French orators, learned the art of public speaking at the Molé. Other active members during this period included Ernest Picard, Clément Laurier and Léon Renault.

A plaque at the establishment claims that it is the oldest continually-functioning café in the world.Dejean, p. 139 The Café Procope remained on the rue de Tournon until 1686, when it moved a few minutes away to the rue des Fossés Saint-German (today's rue de L'Ancienne Comedie, where the establishment, by now the oldest continually functioning cafe in the world, can still be found at number 13).

However, the claim is not entirely true. The original Café Procope closed its doors in 1872, and the property was acquired by a woman by the name of Baronne Thénard, who leased it to a Théo Bellefonds, under the condition that he preserved the café's atmosphere. Bellefonds opened a private artist's club and established a journal entitled Le Procope, neither of which were very successful.David, p. 33. The premises then became the Restaurant Procope, and in the 1920s, it was changed back to a café called Au Grand Soleil. At some point, a new owner realised the marketing value of the original name and rechristened it Café Procope. In 1988–89, the Café Procope was refurbished in an 18th-century style.

Gallery

Café Procope

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