1891 in France

Events from the year 1891 in France.

Incumbents

 * President: Marie François Sadi Carnot
 * President of the Council of Ministers: Charles de Freycinet

Events

 * 1 May – Fusillade de Fourmies, nine killed and thirty wounded when troops fire on workers' May Day demonstration in support of eight-hour workday in Fourmies.
 * 27 August – France and Russia conclude defensive alliance.

Arts and literature

 * Gustave Moreau becomes a professor at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris.
 * Henri Matisse begins his studies as an artist at École des Beaux-Arts

January to June

 * 2 January – Didier Daurat, aviation pioneer (died 1969)
 * 14 January – Félix Goethals, cyclist (died 1962)
 * 19 April – Françoise Rosay, actress (died 1974)
 * 17 May – Roger Blaizot, General (died 1981)

July to September

 * 11 July
 * Gabriel Benoist, writer (died 1964)
 * Joseph Sadi-Lecointe, aviator (died 1944)
 * 21 July – Marcel-Frédéric Lubin-Lebrère, rugby union player (died 1972)
 * 1 August – Charles Ritz, hotelier and fly fisherman (died 1976)
 * 6 August – Yvette Andréyor, actress (died 1962)
 * 9 August – Joseph-Marie Martin, cardinal (died 1976)
 * 15 August – Jean De Briac, actor (died 1970)
 * 3 September – Marcel Grandjany, harpist and composer (died 1975)
 * 10 September – Raymond Abescat, oldest man in France and oldest veteran in France at the time of his death (died 2001)
 * 26 September – Charles Münch, conductor and violinist (died 1968)

October to December

 * 10 October – Raymond Bernard, filmmaker (died 1977)
 * 17 November – Jean Del Val, actor (died 1975)
 * 15 December – Martial Guéroult, philosopher and historian of philosophy (died 1976)
 * 23 December – Xavier Vallat, politician and Commissioner-General for Jewish Questions in Vichy France (died 1972)
 * 26 December – Jean Galtier-Boissière, writer, polemist and journalist (died 1966)
 * 30 December – Antoine Pinay, politician and Prime Minister of France (died 1994)

January to June

 * 14 January – Aimé Millet, sculptor (born 1819)
 * 16 January – Léo Delibes, composer (born 1836)
 * 21 January – Jean-Louis-Ernest Meissonier, painter and sculptor (born 1815)
 * 15 March – Théodore de Banville, poet and writer (born 1823)
 * 29 March – Armand-François-Marie de Charbonnel, Bishop of Toronto (born 1802)
 * 29 March – Georges-Pierre Seurat, painter (born 1859)
 * 24 May – Joseph Roumanille, poet (born 1818)
 * 17 June – Théophile Nicolas Noblot, politician (born 1824)

July to December

 * 7 July – Célestin Joseph Félix, Jesuit (born 1810)
 * 20 August – Leopold Chasseriau, planter (born 1825)
 * 29 August – Pierre Lallement, bicycle inventor (b. c. 1843)
 * 5 September – Elie Delaunay, painter (born 1828)
 * 30 September – Georges Ernest Boulanger, general and politician (born 1837)
 * 3 October – Édouard Lucas, mathematician (born 1842)
 * 10 November – Arthur Rimbaud, poet (born 1854)
 * 26 November – Eugène Bouchut, physician (born 1818)
 * 12 December – Charles Émile Freppel, Bishop and politician (born 1827)
 * December – Émile Bayard, illustrator (born 1837)