Hard Facts About the Tour d’Argent
Since the Tour d’Argent reopened in 2023, a number of articles have appeared on the restaurant, most more or less reproducing the same article which repeats old undocumented tales about the restaurant. The one exception so far is Vivian Song’s article for the BBC , which cites two prominent food historians as challenging the restaurant’s claims (notably of having been founded in 1582 and frequented by Henry IV): Patrick Rambourg: "The notion of a restaurant as an establishment in the 16th Century doesn’t work… From the sources I’ve seen, I don’t see any mention of the Tour d’Argent until the 18th Century”. Rebecca Spang… “author of The Invention of the Restaurant: Paris and Modern Gastronomic Culture , points out that inns and taverns were patronised by travellers like religious pilgrims or merchants who had no other food options – not the elite and much less French royalty. ‘It wasn't a luxurious experience,’ she said.” As it happens, even these historians are wrong,...
