1886 in France
Events from the year 1886 in France.Incumbents
January to June
- 28 January – Georges Painvin, cryptanalyst
- 5 March – Léon Mathot, actor and film director
- 7 March – Jacques Majorelle, painter
- 7 March – René Thomas, motor racing driver
- 28 March – Gustave Mesny, army general
- 29 March – Paul Amiot, actor
- 15 April – Amédée Ozenfant, cubist painter
- 19 April – Hermine David, painter
- 25 April – Marie Brémont, supercentenarian, the oldest recognized person in the world from November 2000 until her death
- 29 April – Count Renaud de la Frégeolière, author and first president of the Fédération Internationale de Bobsleigh et de Tobogganing
- 3 May – Marcel Dupré, organist, pianist and composer
- 24 May – Paul Paray, conductor, organist and composer
July to December
- 16 July – Pierre Benoit, novelist
- 3 August – Henri Debain, actor
- 8 September – Marguerite Jeanne Carpentier, painter and sculptor
- 15 September – Paul Lévy, mathematician
- 16 September – Jean Arp, sculptor, painter, poet and abstract artist
- 30 September – Gaston Ramon, veterinarian and biologist
- 3 October – Alain-Fournier, author and soldier
- 4 October – Laurent Eynac, politician and Minister
- 6 November – André Marty, leading figure in the French Communist Party
- 15 November – René Guénon, orientalist and philosopher
- 30 December – Henri Chapron, automobile coachbuilder
Full date unknown
- Marie-Gabriel Tissot, Abbot of Quarr
Deaths
- 23 January – Jean Baptiste Prosper Bressant, actor
- 27 April – Eugène Isabey, painter, draftsman, and printmaker
- 17 March – Pierre-Jules Hetzel, editor and publisher
- 23 May – Pierre Édouard Frère, painter
- 12 July – Ferdinand Berthier, deaf educator, intellectual and political organiser
- 14 August – Edmond Laguerre, mathematician
- 8 September – Maurice Jean Auguste Girard, entomologist
- 16 September – Louis, duc de Decazes, statesman
- 26 September – Hippolyte Castille, writer
- 14 November – Alexandre-Emile Béguyer de Chancourtois, geologist and mineralogist
