La Blanche Hermine
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| "La Blanche Hermine" | |
|---|---|
| Song by Gilles Servat | |
| from the album La Blanche Hermine | |
| Released | 1971 |
| Genre | Folk |
| Length | 3:47 |
| Label | Kelenn, Phonogram |
| Songwriter(s) | Gilles Servat |
| Music video | |
| "La Blanche Hermine" (2014 video) on YouTube | |
La Blanche Hermine (French for "The White Ermine") is a 1970 song by French singer Gilles Servat with lyrics affirming the Breton identity. It was first published on the eponymous album from 1971, which was certified gold. Calling for an armed uprising against the French, the song quickly became an anthem in Brittany and popular in all of France.
The song is a rhymed seven-syllable laisse. The ermine from the title was the heraldic animal of the Duchy of Brittany, a sovereign feudal state.
The lyrics are about a villager who meets "a band of sailors, workers and peasants" who are going to ambush the "Franks" and win their freedom. He joins them and sings about the plight of his wife, visiting her and children in secret during the war, and possibly dying for his homeland.
The chorus mentions the fortresses of Fougères and Clisson, which seems to point to the feudal wars of the Bretons against the French at the border of the duchy. However, the rebels' "charged guns" indicate a more recent past; therefore, the only plausible period is believed to be the Chouannerie war of the French Revolution, popularized by La Villemarqué in Barzaz Breiz.[1][2] The song is often found in collections dedicated to the Chouans, the War in the Vendée, and the Legitimists, but also in general collections of military songs.