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If there's an enduring image of the French aristocracy in the English speaking world, it's probably of a woman in a frilly dress and about two feet of hair piled on her head, addressing the question of her subjects being too poor to buy bread with an oblivious, "let them eat cake."
如果在英语世界里有法国贵族的持久形象，那很可能是一个穿着褶边连衣裙的女人，头上堆着大约两英尺长的头发，她要解决的问题是她的臣民太穷了，买不起面包，而她说，“让他们吃蛋糕吧。”
That woman was Marie Antoinette, who was the queen of France during the French Revolution.
这位女士就是玛丽·安托瓦内特，她是法国大革命期间的法国女王。
But while her dress was indeed frilly and her hair was indeed tall, could she really have said something so clueless?
但是，尽管她的裙子确实有褶边，她的头发确实很高，但她真的会说出这样愚蠢的话吗？
The evidence suggests that she didn't.
证据表明她没有。
How do we know?
我们怎么知道呢？
Oh, there are lots of reasons, starting with the fact that, in French, the quote isn't even about cake.
哦，原因有很多，首先，在法语中，这句话甚至与蛋糕无关。
It's about brioche. "Qu'il mangent de la brioche."
是关于奶油蛋糕的。让他们吃奶油蛋糕。
Brioche is delicious.
奶油蛋糕很好吃。
It's a rich buttery bread, and it has strong associations with decadence.
这是一种浓郁的黄油面包，它与颓废有很大的联系。
But if you ever tried to serve a big loaf of brioche to the guests at a child's birthday party, you'll find out real quick that it is not, in fact, cake.
但是，如果你曾经在孩子的生日派对上给客人端上一大块奶油蛋卷，你很快就会发现，它实际上并不是蛋糕。
But either way, the point of the quote is that this out-of-touch aristocrat didn't understand the realities of life as a peasant, so maybe that's a semantic quibble.
但无论如何，这句话的要点是，这位脱离现实的贵族并不理解农民的现实生活，所以这可能是一种语义上的吹毛求疵。
The real evidence against Marie Antoinette having uttered this famous phrase is that, well, it was around long before she was.
对玛丽·安托瓦内特说出这句名言的真正证据是，这句话早在她说出之前就存在了。
Scholars of folklore have found versions of the same quote, with some variations, across Europe.
研究民俗的学者在欧洲各地发现了同一句话的不同版本，但有一些不同。
In 16th century Germany, there was a story of a noble woman wondering why the hungry peasants didn't eat Krosem, a kind of sweet bread.
在16世纪的德国，有一个关于一位贵族妇女的故事，她在想为什么饥饿的农民不吃Krosem，一种甜美的面包。
There's no evidence that Marie Antoinette ever said, "let them eat cake," but we do know people have been attributing the phrase, "Qu'il mangent de la brioche," to her for nearly 200 years, and debunking it for just as long.
没有证据表明玛丽·安托瓦内特曾经说过，“让他们吃蛋糕吧”，但我们知道，近200年来，人们一直将这句话归因于她，并在同样长的时间里揭穿了这个短语。
The first time the quote was connected to Antoinette in print was in 1843.
这句话第一次在书面上与安托瓦内特联系在一起是在1843年。
A French writer named Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr reported finding the quote in a book from 1760, when Marie Antoinette was just five years old.
一位名叫让-巴蒂斯特·阿尔方斯·卡尔的法国作家在1760年的一本书中发现了这句话，当时玛丽·安托瓦内特只有五岁。
He hoped this would end the rumor that she was responsible for the famous phrase once and for all.
他希望这将结束谣言，即她应该永远为这句名言负责。
Sorry about that, Jean-Baptiste. We're trying.
抱歉让-巴蒂斯特。我们正在努力。
