Tears of the Kingdomis a return to a saved Hyrule, a rarity for theZeldaseries, as it lets us see the impact we’ve had, watching as civilisation begins to rebuild. There are plenty of nods toBreath of the Wildand little lore tidbits that expand on the world we know, but nestled among these details is a reference to France.
France… the very real European country that was founded in 1792, is referenced in the horse customisation options thanks to the “French-Braided Mane”. Somehow, it exists in the fictional world of Zelda among Hyrule, which begs the question of whether other real countries do, or if Hyrule replaces one of our countries. Maybe it’s a post-apocalyptic version of the USA, a laDeath Stranding, or maybe France is just a constant no matter the universe you’re in. Maybe there’s a France across from Middle-earth.
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Whatever the case, “French-Braided Mane” implies the existence of French people, which in turn implies the existence of France.The Zelda timeline and world is confusing as is, let alone when mixing in real life. More likely, this name isn’t an in-universe title, but a real-world description, but logic is no fun - France is canon.
Instead of trying to explain away the name, let’s look at what could be France across the Zelda series. Maybe we’ve already been there and didn’t realise. Kakariko Village is speculated to come from ‘cocorica’, a Portuguese and French “onomatopoeia for the sound of a crowing rooster.” A French-named city, a French-named mane, we can loosely connect the two to sayKakiriko VillageisFrance, right? It’s much smaller than the real country, but then again, Hyrule is tiny compared to most anyway. It is a video game, after all.
Alternatively, Kakariko Village could be a French settlement, implying that somewhere out there, the real deal exists. Maybe Zelda herself has been there on behalf of the Hyrule royal family. Whether that means England, Spain, the USA, Japan, or any other real-world countries exist is unclear. They probably don’t, and we’re definitely reading way too much into this.
Others in the comments joke that it’s actually the other way around and that real-world France is named after a horse’s hairstyle, so this doesn’t canonically prove that France exists in the Zelda universe. Others claim that it’s not proof of France tangibly existing as a real place, but as a fictional setting like Hyrule is to us. They might have books about the fantastical lives led on our Earth, where we file taxes and sometimes nip out for aStarbucks. What an adventure.
Forget that, though. France is out there somewhere, and we gotta find it.
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