Travelling exhibition
Available for regional organizations
and cultural associations throughout Europe.

'Tween bell and sky

(Catalogue of the exhibition)

As early as the 3rd century, as in the case of the bell chiming at lauds, "the cock chased away the larvae of the night" and became the first country timekeeper.

Sign of St. Peter's denial, it came to symbolize the contrition and remorse
of the parish community and appears, from the 15th century on, as one of the instruments of the Passion.

It came to represent all the attributes, such as vigilance and courage, of village pride and was placed side by side with the royal fleur-de-lys under Henry IV,
thus becoming the symbol of the people of France.

Recognized as such in 1830 in France and in 1913 by the French speaking Walloons in Belgium, it would ultimately
exalt the jingoistic qualities of the nation without managing to avoid the vanities of chauvinism. There is a world between the cock of Rude, the cock of Lurçat and
the cock whose image appears on the sportsman's shirt and indeed from the "Roman de Renard" to Edmond Rostand, Chantecleer does wear different feathers.

While the unicorn and the winged horse gave life to the medieval literary bestiary and lions and leopards roared from the armour of ancient nobility, the cock who reigns from the top of church steeples is the herald of the common folk.

Along the path offered to you between these forms and symbols, that "beautiful shiny cock which blazes in the sunlight" praised by Victor Hugo, remains first and foremost a sign of the proclamation of
its native land and thus one of the fundamental expressions of its identity.