1926 in France

Incumbents

• President: Gaston Doumergue
• President of the Council of Ministers:
• * until 20 July: Aristide Briand
• * 20 July-23 July: Édouard Herriot
• * starting 23 July: Raymond Poincaré

  Events

• 9 May - French navy bombards Damascus because of Druze riots.
• 15 July - Grand Mosque of Paris inaugurated.
• 24 November - The village of Rocquebillier on the Riviera is almost destroyed in a massive hailstorm.

  Arts and literature

• Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts institutes the Prix Puvis de Chavannes, named after co-founder and first president, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes.

  Sport

• 20 June - Tour de France begins.
• 18 July - Tour de France ends, won by Lucien Buysse of Belgium.

  Births

January to June

• 17 January - Robert Filliou, artist
• 2 February - Philippe Chatrier, tennis player
• 7 February - Pierre Villette, composer
• 11 February - Paul Bocuse, chef
• 19 February - Pierre Guénin, French journalist, gay rights activist
• 1 March - Robert Clary, French-American actor, author and lecturer
• 19 March - Henri René Guieu, science fiction writer
• 13 April - André Testut, motor racing driver
• 8 May - Pierre Broué, historian and Trotskyist
• 5 June - Claude Berge, mathematician
• 12 June - Jean-Pierre Munch, cyclist
• 26 June - Jérôme Lejeune, paediatrician and geneticist
• 6 July - Serge Roullet, film director and screenwriter

  July to December

• 10 August - Michel Breitman, writer and translator
• 14 August - René Goscinny, author, editor and humorist
• 16 August - Roger Agache, archaeologist
• 17 August
• *Maurice Lusien, swimmer
• *Jean Poiret, actor, director and screenwriter
• 15 September - Jean-Pierre Serre, mathematician
• 17 September - Jean-Marie Lustiger, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Paris and Cardinal
• 15 October - Michel Foucault, philosopher, historian, critic and sociologist
• 1 November - James Marson, politician
• 3 November - Paul Rebeyrolle, painter
• 9 November - Raymond Hains, artist and photographer
• 21 December - Georges Boudarel, academic and Communist militant

  Deaths

• 14 January - René Boylesve, author
• 28 February - Alphonse Louis Nicolas Borrelly, astronomer
• 26 March - Georges Aaron Bénédite, Egyptologist
• 2 July - Émile Coué, psychologist and pharmacist
• 21 September - Léon Charles Thévenin, telegraph engineer
• 5 December - Claude Monet, painter

  Date unknown

• Jean-Camille Formigé, architect