In 1911, France quietly aligned with Greenwich time, adjusting clocks by 9 minutes and 21 seconds, a symbolic shift that avoided explicit acknowledgment.
France adopts Greenwich time
On March 9, 1911, Parliament set the legal time "in France and in Algeria" to "the time, mean time of Paris, delayed by nine minutes and twenty-one seconds." This offset corresponds to the time of Greenwich but was not explicitly named in the law.Geographical basis for time change
The difference of 561 seconds, or 9 minutes and 21 seconds, reflects the geographical distance between the meridians of Paris and Greenwich, which is approximately 2.3 degrees of longitude. This adjustment was based on the Earth’s rotation and the longitudinal position of Paris.Avoiding national pride
According to the Revue historique des armées (no. 254, 2009), the reference to Paris time aimed to avoid offending national pride. The law reuses the phrase "the time, mean time of Paris" from a 1891 law, which had established Paris time as the legal time in France and Algeria, and adds the subtraction of 9 minutes and 21 seconds without altering Paris's status as the reference point.France’s initial rejection of Greenwich
France had refused to adopt the Greenwich meridian in 1884, when 22 out of 25 countries at the Washington conference chose it as the prime meridian, according to the archives of Ouest-France. France, along with Brazil, was the only country to reject it at that time.Implementation of the time change
The 1911 law marked France's alignment with Greenwich, though this was not explicitly stated in the text. The change took effect during the night of March 10 to 11, 1911, when clocks were set back by 9 minutes and 21 seconds. L'Ouest-Éclair reported the country had "aged" by 9 minutes and 25 seconds, a figure slightly off from the legal text but highlighting the public's focus on the oddity of the time change rather than the precise seconds.Public reaction and historical note
The archives of Ouest-France summarize the episode as France aligning with Greenwich, a conclusion that the 1911 law had deliberately avoided. The event was marked by a humorous anecdote suggesting a child born at five minutes before midnight under the old time would die at midnight of the old time, "dying before being born." This highlights the public's reaction to the backward movement of the clock hands rather than the technical details.Modern time regulations
The 1911 law remained in force until 1978, when it was replaced by a decree defining legal time as coordinated universal time (UTC) with a whole number of hours added or subtracted. The seasonal time changes introduced in France after the 1973-1974 oil crisis were harmonized within the European Union in 1998, with the last Sunday of October for winter time and the last Sunday of March for summer time.Recent time adjustments
Although the European Parliament voted in March 2019 to abolish the seasonal change, it still occurred in 2026. On the night of October 24 to 25, 2026, clocks will be set back by 60 minutes, a much larger adjustment than the 1911 change.
