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The Breton Nationalist Party (Parti
nationaliste breton, or PNB) was a French political party that advocated
independence for Brittany.
It existed from 1911 to 1914.
Origins
It was founded in October 1911 under the patronage of a
committee of seven members, including Camille Le Mercier d'Erm, Louis
Napoleon Le Roux, Georges Le Rumeur, Edouard Guéguen and Emile
Masson. The immediate cause of the party's foundation was the
proposal to erect a monument to celebrate the unity of Brittany
with France, a process which had been finalised by the 1532 treaty
of union.[1] The
goal of the party was to "always and repeatedly protest against
French oppression, and prepare for the resurrection of Brittany in
condemnation of this movement regarding the French people depriving
this country of the national independence which is its right."[2] It
advocated severing all ties between Brittany and France.[3]
The PNB sought to unite the burgeoning Breton political
movement, even though other groups already existed, most notably Bleun
Brug (Heather Flower) created in 1905 by the Abbe Jean-Marie
Perrot with its journal Feiz ha Breiz (Faith and Brittany).
In contrast to the purely Catholic Bleun Brug, the PNB included
political radicals, libertarians and leftists, along with
conservatives.
At its inception, it published a manifesto and proposed a Breton
national holiday on September 29, the anniversary of the coronation
of Nominoë, first Duke of Brittany,
and of the victory won in 1364 at the Battle of Auray by John V, Duke of Brittany
against the French army of Charles de
Blois.
Manifesto
- Article 4. We have had stolen in succession our national
independence, then our local freedoms and provincial franchises, in
constant violation of the Treaty of 1532 which provided these
freedoms and these franchises for our country, including the
privilege of a parliament and the right to bear arms: all this in
lieu of lost sovereignty — the ermine bonnet encircled in gold
(derisory compensation it is true, for this glory that we lost).
Since the French Revolution, the situation has worsened. Today, the
insidious persecution from our masters, all the more dangerous as
it is hidden and burrows under our hallowed soil, sought to wrest
from us our language and our customs, our civil and religious
traditions: whatever remains of the former national heritage,
everything that makes our pride and our joy. We oppose with all our
strength, and we reclaim the legacy of our ancestors.
- Article 5. One believes us crushed, annihilated, assimilated,
Frenchified? Not so! There still exists in the soul of Brittany,
something that resists and that survives, something that will not
be suppressed, destroyed, and which remains alive and robust today
as in the time of our independence and that, conscious or
unconscious, is the National sentiment.[4]
Activities
The party's first public action took place on October 29, 1912.
This was a protest at the official unveiling of the monument to
Breton-French unity the Place de l'Hotel de Ville in
Rennes. The monument, created by the artist Jean Boucher, depicted Duchess Anne of
Brittany kneeling before the King of France.[5] During
this event Camille Le Mercier d'Erm and André Guillemot were
arrested and taken into custody by the local municipal police.
Breiz Dishual ("Free Brittany") was the party's monthly
journal, founded in July 1912.
The party ceased to exist in 1914 on the outbreak of World War I. Its
journal ceased publication at the same time.[6]
A new nationalist party was founded in 1931 under the slightly
different name Breton National Party (Parti
national breton). Party activists destroyed Boucher's monument
with a bomb in 1932. In 1941, on the thirtieth anniversary of the
foundation of the original PNB, the leaders of the new party
organised a celebration of it and a tribute to Camille Le Mercier
d'Erm.
References
- ^
Jack Eugene Reece, Anti-France: The Search for the Breton
Nation (1898-1948), 1971, p.99
- ^
Alain Deniel, Le mouvement breton, , Maspéro, 1976, ISBN 270716826X
- ^
Camille O'Reilly, Language, Ethnicity and the State,
Palgrave, 2001, p.119
- ^
René Barbin, L'autonomisme Breton, 1930. Original French:
Article 4. On nous a successivement volé notre indépendance
nationale, puis nos libertés et franchises provinciales, on a violé
sans cesse le traité de 1532 qui assurait à notre pays ces libertés
et ces franchises avec le privilège d'un Parlement et le droit de
porter sur ses armes, à défaut de la couronne fermée, le bonnet
d'hermine cerclé d'or (dérisoire compensation il est vrai, cet
regard de ce que nous avions perdu). Depuis la révolution
française, la situation a empiré. Aujourd'hui, la sournoise
persécution de nos maîtres, d'autant plus dangereuse qu'elle se
dissimule et creuse des galeries souterraines dans notre vieux sol,
cherche à nous arracher notre langue et nos coutumes, nos
traditions civiles et religieuses, tout ce qui reste de l'ancien
patrimoine national, tout ce qui fait notre orgueil et notre joie.
Nous nous y opposons de toute notre force, et nous revendiquerons
l'héritage de nos ancêtres. Article 5. On nous croit écrasés,
annihilés, assimilés, francisés. C'est faux! Il v a encore, dans
l'âme bretonne, quelque chose qui résiste et qui survit, quelque
chose que l'on a voulue étouffer, anéantir et qui demeure
aujourd'hui aussi vivace et robuste qu'au temps de notre
indépendance et cela, conscient ou inconscient, c'est le sentiment
National.
- ^
Le Musée Virtuel de Jean
Boucher: L'Union de la Bretagne à La France
- ^
Theodore Zeldin, A History of French Passions 1848-1945,
Oxford University Press, 1993, p.62
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