A new stamp will be offered for sale starting this Monday, March 11. Another female figure replaces Marianne.
At the end of November 2023, a new stamp with Marianne was presented. Nicknamed the “Marianne of the Future”, this version was supposed to echo France’s commitments to ecological transition. That being said, starting this Monday, March 11, Marianne will have competition. A new stamp, bearing the image of another great female figure, has arrived. It will be priced at 1.29 euros in green letter.
On Friday March 8, as part of International Women’s Rights Day, a stamp celebrating the bicentenary of the birth of Julie-Victoire Daubié was unveiled by the Post Office and will go on sale next week. Who is this historical figure who pioneered the emancipation of women? Little known to the general public, she nevertheless had a major role. Julie-Victoire Daubié is, in fact, the first woman to have obtained the baccalaureate in France. This was in 1861 although the diploma had been created 50 years earlier, in 1808.
The youngest of a family of eight children in the Vosges, Julie-Victoire Daubié was very gifted at studies. She obtained her certificate of competency in 1844, which allowed her to become a preceptor and teach in Paris, but also in Docelles and Fribourg. In 1859, she wrote a memoir on “the poor woman by a poor woman”, studying the injustices suffered by women in working-class environments. This writing won him first prize in the competition of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, Belles Lettres and Arts of Lyon.
After several refusals, Julie-Victoire Daubié eventually managed to register, at the age of 37, for the baccalaureate exams. However, she took the exam in a separate room from the men’s room. On August 17, 1861, she became the first woman to obtain this diploma. She did not stop there since ten years later, she continued to lead the way as the first holder of a degree in Literature, even though these courses had long been forbidden to women. The Vosgienne continued her fight for equality between men and women by founding an association for women’s right to vote. A right that was only granted 70 years later, in 1944. She finally died in 1874 at just 50 years old, died of tuberculosis.
