Hi,

There is a curious history behind the erroneous date for the start of daylight 
saving in France in 1923 as listed in the current issues of the Annuaire du 
Bureau des Longitudes.

In the 1924 issue, the date is given as 27 May (no hour cited).

  https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6571678p/f265.item

This is also confirmed in a short note by T. (= Émile Touchet?) in the Bulletin 
de la Société Astronomique de France of the same year.

  https://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/pdf/1923LAstr..37..277M

Then for several years (1925 - 1934) there is no "heure d'été" table.

In the 1935 issue the "heure d'été" table appears again 

  https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6573371c/f212.item

but with the date changed to 31 March (at 23h) and a reference to a law which 
was only published nearly two months later in the Journal officiel de la 
République française 

  https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6476007v/f4.item

Apparently, when the editors decided to reinstate an "heure d'été" table for 
the issue of 1935, they inadvertently applied this rule to the current year 
while the actual start of daylight saving was not until nearly two months later 
on the day when the law was made public.

I have not checked all issues yet but this error in the Annuaire appears to 
have remained unnoticed up until 1960

  https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k9651481s/f206.item

The 1961 issue

  https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k9656689b/f261.item

finally has the correct date as 26 May (23h).

However, this date was inexplicably changed back again to the wrong date in the 
Annuaire of 2002

  https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k9645974b/f66.item

and this error appears to have been unchallenged ever since.

I will notify the editors of the Annuaire of this error and hopefully they will 
have the correct value reinstated in next year's edition.

Rob van Gent

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