mémoire

In French culture, the word mémoire, as in un mémoire ("a master's dissertation") or des mémoires ("memoirs" or "a memoir"), reflects the writer's own experiences and memories.

==Up to the 18th century== The word appeared in the course of the 12th century. In this era, it simply meant an explanatory text written to show an idea. Little by little, and above all in the modern era, the term became synonymous with an argumentative piece of writing, serving and asserting an idea. Vauban also wrote mémoires to Louis XIV on fortifications, such as ''Mémoire pour servir d'instruction dans la conduite des sièges et dans la défense des places, par M. le maréchal de Vauban, présenté au Roi en 1704, and the religious quarrels of the time also produced several mémoires.