A baguette has a diameter of about 5 or 6 cm (2-2⅓ in) and a usual length of about 65 cm (26 in), although a baguette can be up to 1 m (39 in) long.
No academic study has been written on the history of the baguette itself, as a type of bread. Thus, much of its history is speculative; however, some facts can be established. Among these are the increased popularity of long, stick- like breads in France starting in the 18th century, the shift among French bakers to using "gruau", a highly refined Hungarian high-milled flour in the early 19th century, the introduction of Viennese steam oven baking to Paris in 1839 by August Zang, and the subsequent introduction of the Austrian Adolf Ignaz Mautner von Markhof's compact yeast to Paris in 1867 at the Universal Exposition. Finally, there is the first use of the word "baguette" in print, to define a particular type of bread, in a set of laws enacted by the Prefecture of the Seine Department in August 1920: "The baguette, having a minimum weight of 80 g and a maximum length of 40 cm, may not be sold for a price higher than 0.65 francs apiece" While no one of these events is in itself definable as "the invention of the baguette", each of them, the shape, the flour, the fermentation, and the steam baking, contribute to what is today recognized as a "baguette".
To summarize this history, the historian and author Jim Chevallier states that "it seems most accurate to say that the bread which became known as the baguette first appeared in its most primitive form in the eighteenth century, then experienced a number of refinements and variations before being (officially) given that name in 1920."Although the word "baguette" was not used to refer to a type of bread until 1920, the word itself simply means " wand ", "baton" or "stick", as in baguette magique (magic wand ), baguettes chinoises ( chopsticks ), or baguette de direction (conductor's baton).
Though the baguette today is often considered one of the symbols of French culture viewed from abroad, the association of France with long loaves predates any mention of it. Long, wide, loaves had been made since the time of King Louis XIV, long thin ones since the mid-18th century, and by the 19th century, some were far longer than what is today sold as a baguette: "...
