A notable ancestor

Date: 24/10/1996

France launched a new banknote last week, the country's last anticipated paper currency update before the arrival of the euro.

The 200-franc note was unveiled at a lavish launch ceremony in Paris - and the most important man at the event was undoubtedly Xavier Larnaudie-Eiffel, chef de cabinet to Economics Commissioner Yves-Thibault de Silguy.

Larnaudie-Eiffel had to give his personal permission for the design of the new note. If he had refused, the project would have been scrapped.

Such is the power of the Commission in the run-up to the single currency, you might think - but the chef's pivotal role had nothing to do with his job and everything to do with his family tree.

His grandmother's grandfather was Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel, who designed the Eiffel Tower for the Paris exposition in 1889.

This great engineer effectively established metal as an architectural material and, until 1930, the Eiffel Tower remained the tallest structure in the world. Now it is simply one of the EU's most celebrated national monuments.

But before the great engineer's achievement could be honoured on the latest and last French national banknote, La Banque de France required permission from the president of the Association de Défence des Intérêts de Gustave Eiffel.

The president just happens to be Larnaudie-Eiffel. He was happy to agree, no doubt thrilled that the currency he is so actively working to consign to history will at least carry the image of his most distinguished ancestor.