France’s world recognised cultural heritage

A gaggle of French cheese fanatics referred to as the ‘Confrérie des chevaliers du camembert’ have submitted a request to France’s Ministry of Culture for Camembert, the well-known Norman cheese, to be included on UNESCO’s listing of intangible cultural heritage for 2025.

If profitable, Camembert will turn into the thirty first French factor on the listing.

While UNESCO recognises historic monuments and pure areas through the World Heritage List, the intangible heritage listing seeks to protect cultural practices.

READ MORE: Five UNESCO-recognised websites in France you need to go to

To be eligible, the apply have to be ‘conventional, up to date and residing on the similar time’, which means it isn’t only a factor of the previous. It should even be inclusive (part of tradition that is perhaps handed down by generations, or shared from one village to a different), in addition to consultant of the group. 

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UNESCO has three lists – the longer ‘Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity’, the shorter listing of ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding’, and the ‘Register of Good Safeguarding Practices’,

In complete, France had 30 gadgets listed as of 2025, with 27 on the longer listing. You can see it on the UNESCO web site.

Some is perhaps very recognisable to individuals – like the talents of Parisian zinc roofers or the artisanal know-how to making baguettes and the gastronomic meal of the French, with its mounted construction of apéritif, successive programs, ending off with cheese, dessert and a digestif liqueur.

Others on the listing could also be extra obscure, such because the processional giants and dragon festivals in northern France.

There are additionally the bear festivities within the Pyrenees mountains, which contain a mock hunt with males dressed as bears chasing competition attendees, whereas being pursued by designated ‘hunters’.

At the tip of the competition, the bears are caught and their costumes eliminated – permitting them to turn into human once more.

READ MORE: Bears, lemons and pig-squealing: 9 of France’s strangest festivals

One apply – Cantu in paghjella, a secular and liturgical oral custom of Corsica – was categorised as needing ‘pressing safeguarding’. The paghjella is a conventional Corsican polyphonic music, normally sung by three males.

Meanwhile, three cultural practices have been on the ‘register of excellent safeguarding practices’, which is an inventory of how communities overcame obstacles to transmit their residing heritage to future generations.

Full listing of intangible French heritage

The ‘Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity’, with the yr every factor was added to the listing;

• Skills of Parisian zinc roofers and ornamentalists (2024)
• Art of dry stone building, information and methods (2024)
• Funfair tradition (2024)
• Knowledge, craft and abilities of handmade glass manufacturing (2023)
• Transhumance, the seasonal driving of livestock (2023)
• Bear festivities within the Pyrenees (2022)
• Artisanal know-how and tradition of baguette bread (2022)
• Falconry, a residing human heritage (2021)
• Craftsmanship of mechanical watchmaking and artwork mechanics (2020)
• Musical artwork of horn gamers, an instrumental method linked to singing, breath management, vibrato, resonance of place and conviviality (2020)
• The artwork of glass beads (2020)
• Alpinism (2019)
• The abilities associated to fragrance in Pays de Grasse: the cultivation of fragrance vegetation, the information and processing of pure uncooked supplies, and the artwork of fragrance composition (2018)
• Carnival of Granville (2016)
• Summer solstice hearth festivals within the Pyrenees (2015)
• Gwoka: music, music, dance and cultural apply consultant of Guadeloupean identification (2014)
• Limousin septennial ostensions (2013)
• Fest-Noz, festive gathering primarily based on the collective apply of conventional dances of Brittany (2012)
• Equitation within the French custom (2011)
• Gastronomic meal of the French (2010)
• Craftsmanship of Alençon needle lace-making (2010)
• Compagnonnage, community for on-the-job transmission of information and identities (2010)
• Maloya (2009)
• Aubusson tapestry (2009)
• Scribing custom in French timber framing (2009)
• Processional giants and dragons in Belgium and France (2008)

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Unesco’s register of excellent safeguarding practices

• Tocatì, a shared programme for the safeguarding of conventional video games and sports activities (2022)
• Craft methods and customary practices of cathedral workshops, or Bauhütten, in Europe, know-how, transmission, improvement of information and innovation (2020)
• The Martinique yole boat, from building to crusing practices, a mannequin for heritage safeguarding (2020)

Unesco’s listing of ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding’

• Cantu in paghjella, a secular and liturgical oral custom of Corsica (2009)