Compagnons du Tour de France
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The Compagnons du Tour de France are a French organization of craftsmen and artisans dating from the Middle Ages, but still active today. Their traditional technical education techniques includes taking a tour (Tour de France) around France and being the apprentice of several competent masters.
The compagnons focus on the building industry:
- carpenter
- roofer
- mason
- tiler
- stone carver
- joiner, cabinet maker
- ebenist
- plumber
- heating specialist
- plasterer
- locksmith
The compagnons are all male.
[edit] Note
Tour de France refers to the fact that they are taking a tour around France. It is unrelated to the Tour de France cycliste, a cycling competition.
[edit] External link
Aspiring compagnons must first complete a two year course, which gives them the Certificat d'Aptitude Professionelle, the basic French trade qualification. They then go on a tour of France, staying in several towns/cities over the next three to five years, working under compagnons, to learn the trade. A typical day, for a charpentier (roof carpenter/framer) would involve a day on site, followed by technical drawing classes in the evening from about 6pm until 8pm. Dinner is eaten together in the siége (lodge) during which a tie must be worn. After dinner, the aspirants are expected to work on their maquette - a wooden model that they have conceived and created, first through drawings, and then using these drawings as a template, cut and assembled the wood. They will make a few of these throughout their time as itinerants, and each piece is expected to show that they have understood and mastered the most difficult aspects of the trade so far. Ultimately, it will be their masterpiece maquette that will be presented to the board of Compagnons at around the third or fourth year of the aspirant's tour, hoping that he will be admitted to the Compagnons.
On admission, each new Compagnon is given his Compagnon name, which is made up from the region or town that he comes from in France and a personal attribute. For example, somebody from Burgundy who shows determination, might be called 'Bourgogne le Courageux'. They are also presented with a ceremonial walking staff (representing the itinerant nature of the organisation) and also a sash. Here we see similarities with the Freemasons, who may well have had much the same origins. Compagnons are also given secret words - the secrecy and the Compagnon name comes from the later medieval times, when the strengthening group of Compagnons (Compagnonnage), who were building the churches and chateaux of France was persecuted by the king and the Catholic Church, as they refused to live under the rules of either - a dangerous thing to do in France at that time. The secrecy came in useful during the Nazi Occupation of France in World War II too, when the Compagnons split into different factions; those supporting the collaborationist Vichy regime and those in resistance. Many siéges burnt all their records in order that their details never be uncovered by the Nazis or the Vichy. The splits within the Compagnonnage remain bitterly held to this day.
