Silk Industry of Tours

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This luxury business developed by Louis XI towards the end of the 16th century provided a living for a third of the population of Tours. For a long time they rivalled Lyon in volume and quality of their product, gradually Tourangelle silk has been forgotten.	Silk made in Tours had been so beautiful, that it was exported to Spain, Italy and other foreign countries.
Louis XI decided, in 1470, to create a new industry in Tours near to his Chateau at Montils-les-Tours. (He had bought this Chateau from the Maillé family in 1464 since he had spent some happy stays; it gradually became his principal residence and hence the centre of the kingdom of France).	He brought in workers from Lyons and they organised their profession and its corporation according to rigorous statute. Tours was then the royal capital, the King contributing because of his taste for the precious material to the success of the industry.
Silkworms were cultivated on specially grown ‘muriers blancs’ which favoured the larvae of Bombyx mori which produced the threads of silk.	The silkworm lives no more than six weeks; to make its cocoon, it produces a thread of 1500m. The cocoons are harvested and chrysalids stuffed in the heat (only the nymphs are destined for reproduction and allowed to turn into butterflies).
Silk provided work for 40,000 people, weavers, dyers, finishers, merchants, in a town which in 1550 housed 85,000 people. They made taffeta, velvet, damask and luxurious brocades. But competition from the Protestant manufacturers from Nantes, installed in England and Holland meant that by 1689 only 120 jobs remained.	Early in the 18th century, thanks to a stop by the Council of State in 1787, their methods were protected for 15 years, at the Exhibitions of 1867 and 1878 the material from Tours were highly paid.
Today you will find only 40 people in Tours occupied with the silk industry, only the houses Roze and Le Manach continue to assure the name of Tours silk.
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